Torrynt

You are going to run into some of the same problems that I did with a Kin/Rad. Little to no mitigation...

It will be chaotic and fun to some degree, but likely frustrating unless you have some really good team mates. Also matching Kin with a cone based set can be pretty rough.

Yes, 8 Emps are slow. Compared to some of the other primaries that have much better synergy and improve what Defenders lack... damage. 8 Emps are safe, but Adrenal boost is still only up 50-75% of the time and it only helps damage in that you get a +Rech, which is nice, but not nearly as helpful as -Res or +Dmg.

At some point +Rech gets redundant in regards to your attack chain as the animation/cast times begin to dictate what you are going to be casting. That limit can also be reached with IOs.

I'll stick by that and when I see a superteam of all emps roaming around that can be even mentioned in the same breath as 8 Rads, then I'll concede the point.

Primaries that Stack Well:
Rad, Dark, Cold

Primaries that Stack Somewhat Well:
Storm, Kinetics (Pre FS), TA

Primaries that don't stack Well:
FF, Sonic, Kinetics (post FS), Empathy

I haven't played with traps but would imagine it would stack pretty well. Keep in mind that primaries that don't stack are still wonderful. However, you only get benefit for 1 or perhaps 2 of those primaries on the same team before you are running into cap limits.

Also, most defender primaries get pretty useless when the team can wipe a spawn before the buffs can even be cast. At that point what should your defender be doing?

How many times has your defender been on a team with a Tank + 3 really good DPSers. The tank runs in, the DPSers wipe most of the spawn as you are trying to debuff. The mob is now scattered and decimated and you need to do cleanup. What is your role on that team?

For me, I would say that you have a secondary offense. You nail the stragglers! Of course if it takes you longer to kill the odd minion/lt as it did for them to wipe the spawn, then something is very wrong with defender damage.

I don't think you need anything that complicated. Raise the defender damage scale to .8 and you likely solve the soloing problem. At that point, come up with a new inherent or not, Defenders are then capable and welcome beyond their buffs.

Think about it... a fully capped Defender (after a large FS) barely does more than a self buffed tanker (build up).

The argument is that if you buff defender damage people won't play blasters. However, when they buffed tanker damage, people still played scrappers. I think the same would still be true.

To the folks who disagreed with my decision to drop QS and SS. I see little to no benefit to -DEF in any portion of the game past the high 20s. By that point most toons that you encounter have already slotted their characters for both ACC and if they are IOing, global ACC.

Play any other toon in your late 20s/early 30s. Monitor your to hit. If you dip below 95% on many attacks I'd be surprised. Maybe I slot more for ACC on the rest of my toons, but I can't think I'm that far off. Try playing your Earthie without tossing QS for a while.

Do people still hit consistently? I run without it and mowing through +3/+4 is rarely a problem once teams get into Founders or late Talos. That's with everyday PUGs and not some kind of team that is specialized to layer buffs/debuffs.

Of course all of this is anecdotal and I can only claim experience of myself and a few friends. It's a great tool prior to your slotting your powers and as a slow patch it's useful. However, once I've gotten slotted I don't need -DEF for +3 or +4... and a slow patch is of marginal use to me.

Others might find more use out of it and who knows, you may love either or both. I like them, but not enough to sacrifice things like Tough/Weave which let me live longer and hence use controls that have, IMHO, a far more tangible effect on the battle.

On my Earth/Storm I have neither. I don't want a slow toggle, and I don't need the -DEF in quicksand. If you are going to make even the cheapest attempt at IOing your character, you'll be at 95% for just about everything anyway.

If you want a slow patch, which Earth only really needs at lower levels, then take it. However, I'd rather go for pool powers that give my character some added versatility.

I have to imagine that the developers realized that GR would make Defenders less attractive to a large portion of the player base. Yes, Defenders are better on teams, but not so much so that far too many people would rather roll a toon that can actually be self sufficient.

Kudo's to them for realizing this.

Added a new guide:

Kin/Rad - Reroll Now!

New Guide:

Kin/Rad - Reroll Now!

<Reserved for Sample Builds. I don't have them formatted and will get to it as time permits.>

IV. Power Pools:
There are few builds that are solid without power pool picks, Kin/Rad needs them as much or more than others. While I will not go into the detail I did with the primary and secondary, I will touch on each pool and their powers as well as how they will help you.

Concealment:
A pool dedicated to hiding yourself from mobs. Not a great choice given the number of methods of getting stealth with the IO system or other power pool picks.

Stealth 2/10
Useful if you don’t want to spend money on +stealth IOs. The defense isn’t enough to warrant using in a defensive build.

Grant Invisibility 1/10
I can’t think of any times, short of the days of Katie Hannon runs that anyone really thought getting turned Invisible was a great thing. It’s a mostly wasted power pick.

Invisibility 3/10
Some possible benefit from stealthing missions, but too many power picks to get what you can essentially do for free.

Phase Shift 5/10
If you are already taking concealment powers for stealth or concept purposes, this is not a bad power to take. The ability to hit a panic button is nice.

Fighting:
Since you have no defense available to you in either your primary or secondary, this is one of the pools that you should really consider. Tough and Weave can help your survivability for the cost of slots and power picks. Alone, they are not really enough to make you want to hang out near mobs without a tank, but when added into other defensive power pools, and set IO bonuses, they truly help.

If you don’t go this route, realize that your options for playing your character become limited as well as what teams you can play with.

Boxing 4/10
A tolerable single target melee attack that can disorient. You can use it with Cosmic Burst to stack mag on a single target.

Kick 2/10
Another mediocre attack that has a lesser secondary benefit in knockback.

Tough 8/10
Decent smashing and lethal protection. Since that’s some of the most common damage, it can really help you live through encounters.

Weave 9/10
Decent defense to all damage. With IO slotting in other powers and additional pool picks you can get your defense up to the soft cap, significantly improving your characters survivability.

Fitness:
On nearly every character made in City of Heroes, you can argue that they will be better with Stamina, which is really the main power that anyone takes this pool for. With Transference, you are one of the few characters that this pool becomes more of a quality of life choice as opposed to an absolute necessity. Realize that you will miss with Transference, you will have times where you have to stop attacking since your end bar is drained. However, with that power and IOs, you can get along just fine without Stamina which gives you a lot of freedom in how to make your build and cover its many deficiencies.

Swift 2/10
Of the two entry powers into this pool this is probably the lesser choice for you since you have access to a massive run speed buff.

Hurdle 3/10
Adding a bit more vertical component is likely of more use to you than the speed, however, neither of the entry powers is particularly useful.

Health 4/10
Since you have a great heal that you will be forced to use on multiple occasions this power is more of a quality of life thing. However, there are some nice unique heal IOs that can be placed here.

Stamina 7/10
There are few cases to make to say that less endurance is better.

Flight:
Since you already have travel powers in your primary, any of the travel pools are skip able. However, flight does have some nice benefits if you do decide to go with this pool. The advent of temp jetpacks really took some of the luster off this pool.

Hover 6/10
Adds some much needed defense, and with Siphon Speed, is nearly as fast as Fly.

Air Superiority 5/10
While Defender melee damage is pitiful, the knockdown effect makes this attack worth considering, especially as you are leveling up.

Fly 3/10
Probably not needed as Siphoned Hover is better and saves a power choice. Only needed for quality of life reasons or concept.

Group Fly 1/10
Buggy and hard to use. Plus everyone else will already have their own travel power.

Leadership:
Defenders get the most out of this pool and can add significant benefits to themselves and their team with the powers in this pool.

Maneuvers 7/10
Adds a small amount of defense, but with enhancements can add to a defense oriented build. Also a great place to put some unique IOs.

Assault 4/10
While you have a lot of +dmg abilities, if you solo much, this is a nice power to take. 18% damage is useful until you can stack enough Siphons or Fulcrums to start really boosting your damage.

Tactics 9/10
For kinetics, where hitting is paramount, this is nearly a must take power. The fact that it has some terrific set options only adds to its usefulness.

Vengeance 1/10
A rez power that grants you nice bonuses for a short while. It can turn the tide of the battle, but I’d rather have powers that kept the battle from going bad in the first place.

Leaping:
While you already have access to travel powers in your primary, there are some nice defensive options in this pool.

Jump Kick 2/10
A poor attack made worse by the lousy damage defenders do in melee.

Combat Jumping 6/10
Protection from immobilization and defense make this a very nice power to consider.

Super Jump 2/10
While it’s a little better than Inertial Reduction, it’s only really worth taking if you need it for Acrobatics.

Acrobatics 7/10
The only Mez protection that you can get short of IOs. If it had a little better protection, it would be a must have power. As it stands, it’s a very nice power to get.

Medicine:
You have a nice heal already and even with this pool, will never be a great healer. If you are going to stand back a lot, and not get into melee range, you might consider this to help team mates, but I wouldn’t.

Aid Other 4/10
One of the frustrating issues with your main heal is that you need a mob near the person getting hit. If you want to heal more, this wouldn’t be a bad option as you can target who you need to heal without worrying about the battlefield positions.

Stimulant 1/10
A shorter and worse version of Increase Density, don’t take it.

Aid Self 1/10
Your main heal is so much faster, better, and since you can stand next to something before casting, reliable.

Resuscitate 2/10
A rez, which is not worth getting two other powers in this set to cast.

Presence:
You have enough trouble handling agro in all but the best IOed out builds. Shy away from this pool.

Challenge 1/10
A single target taunt… which you can’t really survive for all that long.

Provoke 1/10
Even worse, and AOE taunt that will put you in trouble.

Intimidate 3/10
Single target fear, low mag and not useful enough to keep you alive

Invoke Panic 5/10
A PBAoE fear that could help you stay alive, but having to take two other powers from this pool limits its use.

Speed:
Like other travel pools, this pool has only one really necessary power, hasten. Everything else is skip able or quality of life.

Flurry 1/10
A long animating attack that does poor damage for a defender

Hasten 9/10
Your value to the team short of being a buff bot is to put out AOE damage. Having those AOEs up more, along with Fulcrum, Transfusion and Transference is huge. You want this power and you likely want to three slot it for recharge.

Super Speed 6/10
While you have access to a run power, this one doesn’t need a hit check and grants stealth as well. It’s a quality of life pick, but a good one.

Whirlwind 1/10
Short of a costume change macro, there is little to like about this power for a Kinetics Defender

Teleport:
Another travel pool that you don’t really need.

Recall Friend 4/10
While I love this power to speed teams up, it’s not necessary and doesn’t really help you much. A complete quality of life pick.

Teleport Foe 2/10
Somewhat useful for pulling enemies out of a group that you can’t handle. Otherwise, not really useful.

Teleport 2/10
A travel power that uses a lot of endurance and is really fast. Not really needed for anything other than concept reasons.

Team Teleport 4/10
While not great, you can use it to make sure those blasters come in with you to get their dose of Fulcrum Shift.

VI. Epic Power Pools:
As I did not respec this character endlessly, I can not comment on the epic pools too much other than to say, get one with the armor. Between tough and any of the defender armors, you can actually take a shot or two before going down. It's a novel concept for you. If you IO out and softcap defenses, then you probably have a pretty decent toon. Although, most every other character can offer the same contributions without having to go to such lengths.

When I originally rolled this character I took Psych for the AOE confuse. It did not help as much as I hoped and ended up taking Dark for the armor and some of the PBAoEs which are quite nice.

If I ever revisit the character, I may flesh this section out more. Especially if I can handle extensively playing the toon to test various combinations.

VII. Some Leveling Considerations:
While we’ve talked a lot about powers, we haven’t really talked much about what you can expect your role to be on a team. With this character more than any, I found my role changing a lot for different level bands.

Level 1-11 – Get some powers
Everyone loves the sewers, right? It’s certainly the fastest way to get from 1-8. You will act primarily as a blaster and healer. Hit what you can, but you have one of the better heals so use it a lot. If you have irradiate, you will find your teams do much better as they hit more often. When you are done with the sewers head over to Kings Row to get your travel packs in the bank missions offered there. From that point it’s either off to the hollows or the zone of your choice.

Level 12-22 – The fun part
You gained Speed Boost. This is the start of your role as a buff bot. At this point, no one has Stamina, so you are nearly always welcomed on teams. You’ll get on teams much higher than you, and no one will care if you SK up or not. That’s how in demand SB is at these levels. Additionally, since slots are so tight in this level range, the –Def on your blasts is also a huge help to teams. I probably had the most fun on my character in this band. Steel Canyon and Talos Island is you stomping grounds. If you can, form teams and run your story arcs, you'll get some much needed merits for later build requirements. Hollows arcs are good as is The Vahzilok Pollutant Plot.

Level 23-32 – Grind grind away
As people get Stamina and solve their endurance issues, you will find you are not in as much demand as you were. Still teaming is not too bad, and you can add some damage and work at being an all around character. A little buffing, a little healing, a little damage. This is a really long crawl though. Talos and Brickstown are your hang outs. If you can get on Katie’s runs, they’ll net you some fast levels. Since Katie's are mostly gone now, I like to stick with more story arcs and if you can get on Task Forces, you will be setting yourself for the later levels. As much as you'd like too, streetsweeping is not your thing, nor is hazard zone clearing... unless you can duo with a tank or troller.

Level 33-46 – Mini blaster, rock friend.
With Fulcrum Shift slotted, you will find you add a lot to a team. Also, your tanks are starting to become more and more stone tanks. Stone tanks are your friends. They love SB and will take you sight unseen as long as you keep it on them. These levels aren’t over run with Fire/Kins (I guess they are all getting PLed…) so your damage and buffs are most appreciated. I would have had more fun here if I didn’t spend most of these levels watching the fights being held, slept, or dead. You start to really notice how little defense you have. If you can use those merits to get a -KB or some status resistance, this will be one of the more fun bands for your character. Open up the ITF as soon as you can since there seems to always be one running.

Level 47+ - Afterthought
The upper levels are dominated by Kinetics controllers who seem to be on every team. They get into the mob before you since they have alpha mitigation and most tanks/scrappers will already be at the cap when you get in there. Your damage is average at best and while you contribute to teams, most of the time you get the feeling that another blaster or scrapper would do the team better. You also spend a lot of time here held and knocked down unless you’ve addressed those problems with IOs. Continue on the TFs until you have the merits to address some of your major shortcomings. If you can, then congratulations, you likely have a pretty effective toon.

VIII. Conclusions:
That's all folks. If you've stuck with me this far, you likely have the patience to play this build... although why? I am not really sure. To me, it boils down to this:

(1) Kinetics is a great set if you have other powers to match with it. Sonic, Dark, TA, and others have decided advantages that can make Kin really work. However, with little to no natural mitigation, you want a secondary that will help you in every way possible. Rad is really not that powerset.

(2) Based on the mechanics, fully capped and buffed, you could still do as much or more as a blaster/scrapper with minimal support.

(3) Despite all of this, the character is fun when it works. You have insane speed and if you use the Neutrino Bolt with procs, you have a machine gun that does pretty good ST damage. Add that to a wealth of AOEs and people will notice you. Hopefully they won't notice how often you face plant or the relatively small numbers you put out.

I am not kidding when I said this was the character that weaned me off CoH for a few months. It was very discouraging to put all that effort into a character only to find out that it took tons of IOs and inf to make it as competitive as a run of the mill scrapper or blaster.

(4) Defenders rule as support toons and force multipliers. If you want to play a defender, either take a more buff/debuff geared primary or get a secondary with strong effects like cold or dark. In the end, you'll likely be much happier.

If you play this combination, I wish you well and hope you find strategies that I didn't! Good luck and have fun.

III. The Radiation Set:
The Radiation Blast set was unique to Defenders on the hero side. It has a decent amount of AOE attacks and one very good short range single target attack. There are no real defensive powers in the set (short of a ST Mez and the Nuke), one of the reasons that pairing it with Kinetics can be problematic. It also doesn’t have a particularly great secondary effect, -DEF. While that’s fine in your teens when hitting can be an issue, most of the time people overslot for accuracy anyway and the –DEF goes to waste as characters are already capped at their 95% to hit chance.

While it is not perhaps the best of the defender blast sets, it has a few things going for it. First is a fair amount of AOE attacks, most of which are up fairly often. The second is the huge amount of procs that you can slot. Finally is the fact that it’s a unique and very classy looking power set.
Sadly, the procs only help a bit for you. Procs can be enhanced with –RES not +DMG. So having a proc heavy build is much more suited to a set where you can floor resistance, like Cold, Storm, Rad, or TA. Having large amounts of Procs can be counter productive in a build with so much +DMG available to itself. Still, if you can balance the damage needs, you should be able to have a nice balance and get your damage up close to the blaster realms.

Neutrino Bolt:
Type: Single target ranged attack
Value: 8/10*

This is a bit of a controversial power. You have to take it and it does ridiculously poor damage out of the box (21.69 at level 50). Even enhanced, it still barely will tickle a mob. To its credit, it has a very low recharge time and the animation is pretty quick as well. More important, is that it can take three damage procs among others. With the speed that you can spam the attack, and the number of procs you can add to it, I think it becomes a must slot power. That is assuming you can pay the going rates for all of the procs that you are going to need.
The inherent def debuff of the power is ok, but it’s not something I have ever really noticed all that much. Again, people slot for accuracy quite a bit and –DEF is just not as useful once characters start hitting their 20’s

Tips:

• You can leave this power on auto fire and it will blast while you are doing other things, like healing, or buffing. It works especially well while buffing speed boost as you get an attack off when you select each player in turn. The recharge is about right for casting Speed Buff, then Neutrino Bolt.
• Create a Maco to toggle on and off the blast, it’s up far too much to manually click. /macro NB powexec_auto Neutrino Bolt.
• If you do turn the blast on auto, make sure to turn it off after each fight. I have aggroed new mobs while speed boosting people. When they select a target, and I have the attack on auto, I attack that target. So make sure to turn it off.
• You likely also do not want the power on auto if you are trying to heal. There is nothing worse than trying to heal someone and killing the target next to them with your auto attack.

Slotting:
Much of this depends on whether or not you want to pay to trick this power out. If you don’t, then I wouldn’t devote more than 1-2 slots too it. It just doesn’t do enough on its own to justify slots without trying to get procs into it.

Basic: Acc/Dmg

As for set options there are a ton depending on what you are aiming for. If you are like me, and use this for a main attack, you are going to want to get the three damage procs into it: Shield Breaker Lethal, Touch of Lady Grey Negative, and Apocalypse Negative. Since the third proc is only available at level 50, you have options as you level. One is to put the Achilles Heel –Res proc in that slot, another is the Devestation Chance to Hold. Both of them give nice benefits to this quick firing power. Entropic Chaos has a chance to heal proc which I’d avoid. You’ll rarely see the benefits when you need them.

I typically use the remaining three slots to get some set bonuses and the thunderstrike set works well for some ranged defense and recovery. You can use the rest of the shield breaker set to get some melee defense as well as a bit of welcome status resistance. Again, enhancing damage on this power is a bit of a waste, so using non damage sets is just fine. However, since you are likely using three or more slots for procs, you have very limited options.

If you run tactics like I recommend, then slotting all five procs and an Accuracy IO would likely be the best slotting you can get.

X-Ray Beam:
Type: Single target ranged attack
Value: 3/10

This is your second single target attack and shares much with its smaller cousin, Neutrino Bolt. Much like Neutrino Bolt its damage is not all that great, and it takes much longer to cast 1.67 seconds. While it has a higher defense debuff, you likely don’t need that anyway, especially as it gets an accuracy bonus to start. While it does a bit better damage when you are at capped damage, it’s still not all that great. This is why I typically skip this attack, it doesn’t offer more than Neutrino Bolt as a conveyance of procs, and it doesn’t offer enough extra damage to make me want it in a build that’s going to be power tight anyway.

As a defender attack, it’s not too bad, but it’s still a defender single target attack with few tangible benefits. The two caveats on this is that it can help you leveling early on and you can add the hold and –res proc in it as well. With enough recharge, you can string this and Neutrino Bolt together spamming a 20% chance to hold with each attack. It’s not a real hold, but you’ll see the effects often enough. I have only taken this power to test it and don’t have it on either of my builds on live.

Of course all this pales to the fact that you shoot ‘Fricken Laser Beams from your eyes!’.

Tips:

• Since this has a much stronger –def debuff you could use this and irradiate to tackle much harder to hit enemies Slotting:

Your slotting will depend on how you are using the power. If it’s one of your main attack powers than you need to devote a lot of slots to it. If you are using it as a poor man’s hold and –res debuff along with Neutrino bolt, you can skimp on the slots.

Basic Slotting: Acc/Acc/Dam/Dam/Dam/Rech
Light Slotting: Acc/Dam/Dam/Dam

If you are using this power, there are two sets you would want to consider, Thunderstrike and Decimation. Thunderstrike would be the better of the two as it adds to Global Accuracy and gives some really nice defensive boosts. Decimation is decent for Global Recharge and some max endurance. You can also add in the Hold or Resist procs as well as the Unique proc if you are not placing it in Neutrino Bolt.

Irradiate:
Type: PBAoE attack
Value: 9/10

This is one of my favorite powers in the set; a quick firing PBAoE attack that has lots of options. Many times I run into combat, hit FS and immediately trigger this attack. It’s quick, and you don’t have to worry about who you are targeting. The defense debuff is huge and lasts for longer than most debuffs in the set. Damage is on par with X-Ray Beam and can hit 16 targets. For an AOE it has an accuracy boost as well!

As far as I know, it’s one of the only powers that can take six damage procs! Although as a Kin, this is kind of counterproductive as procs don’t benefit from +dmg. Still, the attack is good enough that when I have enough global recharge going, it’s usually cast every time it comes up. It also makes a nice power to mix with your costume change to get that flashy costume change effect!

Tips:

• As with all of your AOEs, you need to make sure that someone is getting agro other than you. Frankly you won’t stand up to many mobs and an AOE is certain to tick a bunch of them off. Make sure your tank has them amply taunted or you’ll face plant a lot.
• Since this power is a sphere radiating on you, you need to be right in the middle of a mob to have the best effect
• While the defense debuff is huge, I rarely use it before casting Fulcrum
• It usually takes about 3 applications of this and Neutron Bomb at capped damage to beat a hazard spawn

Slotting:
I’d be hard pressed to not six slot this power. To me it’s the crown jewel in the set since you can get it off so quickly. You really want to concentrate on recharge to get the power to come up as much as you can. Damage is of course also critical.

Basic: Acc/Dmg/Dmg/Dmg/Rech/Rech
Minimal: Acc/Dmg/Dmg/Rech

While you can slot six procs into the power, that’s kind of a waste, so the goal is to cap damage and acc with as few slots as possible and then add procs for more damage. The ideal slotting would be 2 acc/dmg hami-o’s and your choice of four of the damage procs. If you have enough global accuracy and can hit things without slotting accuracy in the power, then 2 damage IO’s, three basic procs and the unique proc will cause the most damage possible with the power.

If you are slotting for set bonuses, then nearly all of the PBAoE sets have very nice defensive options. SCirocco’s Dervish grants 9% global accuracy with four slots which can be nice. Obliteration gives nice Melee defense bonuses as well as Acuuracy and Recharge! Multi Strike has moderate defensive bonuses and likely isn’t worth the loss in damage unless you are looking for much cheaper options. Finally Eradication is ok, but not nearly as good as the others.

Placing a –res proc from Achillies Heel in this power can be very useful as you tend to spam it a lot and it usually hits a fair number of people. The defense debuff sets are nice, but avoid them on this power as you are going to have to eke out all the damage you can to be a solid team contributor.

Electron Haze:
Type: Cone based attack
Value: 6/10

Electron haze is a decent attack which I find doesn’t quite fit into my normal play style. Since it’s a cone, you want to be out of the action for it to have the greatest effect. If you are away from the mobs you lose your survival mechanism in Transfusion. You also don’t gain from your better buffs. On the other hand, it does much better damage and can cause knockback. The knockback is too unreliable to use it as a survival mechanism unfortunately. I like to have it, especially for teams where I don’t have a tank to follow into the mob and need to stay back.
The endurance cost is a little steep and it doesn’t recharge all that fast, but it’s a decent solid overall attack. If you can make the cone work for you, it’s an excellent way to increase your damage output.

Tips:

• Since this is a cone, you want to be slightly back from the action to get more targets. Dive in after the tank, Fulcrum Shift, Irradiate, then jump out of the combat and line up someone in the middle of the pack. Toss your haze and neutron bomb (if you have it) dive back in just as Irradiate has recharged. It’s not a bad attack chain and you can fill the gaps with the quick firing Neutrino Bolt.
• Cones work wonders in tunnels
• While you usually don’t want to use powers with knockback around the melee folks, the knockback on this is so spotty that you can usually do it without ticking too many people off.

Slotting:
If you are going to take this power, and use it, then you want to at least 5 slot it. That enhances the power sufficiently and gives you a very nice option for set bonuses as you get inf. Since it’s a high endurance attack I wouldn’t go with fewer slots since it needs to be good to make up for its cost.

Basic Slotting: Acc/Dmg/Dmg/Dmg/End
Post Transference: Acc/Dmg/Dmg/Dmg/Rech

The Positron’s Blast set is the best thing you can do for five slots. Take the damage proc with it and you get a nice 6.25% recharge bonus. That also leaves a potential slot to place another Achilles heel proc, or even a second damage proc. This power should slot for damage before procs, but if you already have capped damage, then the procs will stack very nicely. For silly money, you can slot the purple Ragnarock set . Like all of the purple sets, it has excellent global accuracy and recharge. However, I can’t really recommend you look at this until you have filled other more pressing needs.

Proton Volley:
Type: Single target sniper attack
Value: 2/10

The age of the sniper attacks has long since passed in the world of City of Heroes. Back in the day, some blaster or defender would snipe pull and everyone would stay put for the rush of mobs. It was kind of standard practice on a lot of PUG teams. That day has passed, and while the attack does massive damage, it’s a sniper attack. That means that it’s interruptible and has a 4.33 second cast time. So your DPS actually can go down by casting this… especially if you get interrupted. Unless you have a regular team that wants to pull, or have some odd set needs, this is a very skip able power.

Tips:

• If you can manage to get enough defense, or sleep the mobs and slow the boss, you can trigger this off to lead an attack chain that does some very sick damage.
• If you are pulling, don’t target a boss, your best bet is a minion since you don’t do enough damage to actually one shot them.
• Don’t use the power unless your team is ready.
• As a solo kin, this is really not a power you want to lead with as some of the mobs will come forward and try to agro you. You want mobs in a nice little clump for all the /RAD AOEs and the KIN/ buffs.

Slotting:
If you are just going to use it to pull, then one slot is fine. For team usage, 4+ slots would be recommended. Since it’s not going to be a base attack, four slots is likely fine.

Basic Pulling: Acc
Typical Sniper: Acc/Dmg/Dmg/Dmg

Some of the sniper sets are very good for bonuses. Extreme Measures can help with Melee defense and recovery, but will need 6 slots. Sting of the Manticore has some modest defense but a very nice 7.5% recharge with 5 slots. Calibrated accuracy has an accuracy bonus at 4 slots that can help. Much of the time, if you are slotting this power, it’s not really for the power as much as the bonuses.

Aim:
Type: Self ACC and DMG buff
Value: 6/10

Nearly every toon short of controllers has access to Aim or Build up. It’s a power that boosts the accuracy and damage of your powers for a short time (10s). I have mixed feelings about the power depending on whether I am solo or in a team. In a team, I rarely use it. With tactics running, I don’t find my attacks are hitting at less than the 95% cap most of the time and with Fulcrum Shift on large groups, damage is capped at 300% as well. However, when solo, you are hovering between 150% and 220% damage bonus depending on your settings. It’s nice for those occasions to boost your damage against a tough foe.

There are two great IO sets for the power and it’s sometimes worth it to six slot the power for those alone. However, in the end, I find I end up using it far less than I like too. So it fits that space of a nice, but not necessary power.

Tips:

• While you are still leveling up, trigger this before hitting a key power, such as Cosmic Burst to stun a mob, or Fulcrum/Transference/Transfusion.
• If you find you are hitting 95% of the time anyway, then look to use the power as a damage boost on small teams or solo missions.
• Try to time it so that you are not wasting your Aim on buffs, as long as they are likely going to hit, instead use it to cap damage in cases where FS will not do it on its own.

Slots:
Much of the slotting decisions will be determined if you are going to use Tactics or not. If you are not, then a minimum of three slots for recharge IO/SOs would be in order. If you run tactics then one slot is sufficient for the times you just want that extra bit of Acc.

Basic Slotting: Rech/Rech/Rech
Lite Slotting: Rech

The two sets that come close to must have for this power are Gaussian’s Synchronized Fire Control which gives 2.5% defense to AOE/Ranged/Melee and 1.25% to the typed defenses as well as recovery for a six slot investment. Adjusted targeting has three very desired traits, Accuracy at four slots, Recharge at five, and status resistance at 6. While the slot investment is high, it’s a high payoff for the bonuses.

Cosmic Burst:
Type: Short range single target attack and Stun
Value: 10/10

This is one of the crown jewels in the Rad blast set. I really couldn’t imagine not taking it as soon as it becomes available. It does over double the damage of X-Ray Beam, has a short timer, and causes a mag 2 stun. The cast time is pretty quick although the range is short. Still, it will allow you to take down bosses in less than an agonizing amount of time and offers some protection in the form of disorient. Using this and the machine gun Neutrino Bolt will spit out a steady stream of damage, especially when under the effects of Fulcrum Shift.

If you are not Fulcrum shifted, the damage will be decent, but nothing to write home about. However, for a defender attack, it’s quite good.

Tips:

• Mag 2 won’t stun a boss, so if you are soloing, target a Lt. with this to mitigate some damage. It does save you a lot of pain to take a foe out of the fight.
• Even capped damage won’t let you one shot anything but minions with this attack.
• If you take the dark pool and the stun aura, you can use that to stack mag and stun bosses.

Slotting:
I would consider five slots a minimum and likely would put six in here. The attack is by far and away your best single target attack and should be enhanced as far as you can. Like all of the ranged attacks there are some nice options to slot in this power.

Basic Slotting: Acc/Dmg/Dmg/Dmg/Rech/Rech
Minimal Slotting: Acc/Dmg/Dmg/Dmg/Rech

For sets you have two leading options, Thunderstike or Decimation. Thunderstrike really wants six slots in a defensive oriented build. Decimation can live with five slots for the global recharge, and add in another slot for a proc or further bonuses. While you toss this power out a lot, it’s still on a longer recharge than Neutrino bolt so procs aren’t quite as valuable in it. Even with good recharge you are looking at using the power every 4 seconds or so.

Neutron Bomb:
Type: Targeted AOE attack
Value: 7/10

Your third AOE power in the set brings you another base damage attack that has the advantage of being used at range. Its radius isn’t that impressive and it’s nowhere near as fast as Irradiate. However, in the end game of City of Heroes, AOE damage is king and having more AOEs to toss around is golden. With tolerable recharge you can have this attack up every 4-5 seconds and alternate it with Irradiate to put out some decent AOE damage. If the damage scales were balanced, you’d be doing impressive AOE damage. However, you have to be content with the tools you have.

While the cast time is 1.67 seconds, I tend to find that it seems a lot slower than that. Many times foes run out of the radius before it casts. I also notice that there is a certain point where even if they run out of the radius, they get caught either way.

Tips:

• If your tank can’t hold agro, or the foes are using lots of AOE based attacks, then darting into the combat for FS and out to use Haze and Neutron Bomb will allow you to do some respectable damage while mitigating risk.
• I tend to use this attack first, followed by Irradiate since the debuff and dot in Irradiate tend to make foes run briefly. If you reverse the order and Irradiate first, you hit a lot less enemies with Neutron Bomb.
• While I am not 100% certain, I find that if my initial target dies before the attack finishes, no one in the area is hit. Until I can confirm, I make sure to target Lt’s and above who are at half health or better. It’s also another reason to use this as your opener attack.

Slotting:
As long as you are going to use this as one of your main attacks then five slots is nearly a minimum. It’s damage out of the box, is mediocre, so enhancing it heavily is a good thing. If you are running tactics, and have enough global acc, then you can shift more to damage and recharge and skimp on accuracy.

Basic Slotting: Acc/Acc/Dmg/Dmg/Dmg/Rech
High Global Acc: Acc/Dmg/Dmg/Dmg/Rech/Rech

There are a lot less set options for targeted AOE damage. Positron’s blast is really the best of the full sets, granting you more global recharge for five slots. With a sixth slot you can add in the Achilles heel proc which does nice -res for an AOE attack. If you are not going for the set bonus, this power will benefit more from procs than it will for damage in most cases. Your best damage would be to have the three damage procs and then slot for damage/recharge/accuracy in that order. For a max bonus/damage setup you could take four from Positron’s blast (including the damage proc), and then the Lady Grey damage proc and the shield breaker proc. That gives you near max damage as well as some global acc and recovery.

Atomic Blast:
Type: PBAoE nuke
Value: 6/10

I have a hard time rating this power since I personally love it. However, like many nukes, it comes with a high price. For the excellent damage and power you gain, you have to deal with both a long recharge timer as well as the loss of all your endurance when you cast it. The gain of course is massive damage if you manage to get a decent Fulcrum Shift in right before hand. As a Kinetics Defender, you have the best tool for recovering from the end crash in transference. It still means you need a blue inspiration to use before getting enough end to cast transference, but it does mean that typically you can nuke and go… as long as you didn’t defeat the whole spawn in the process.

Keep in mind that all of your toggles will drop and your recovery is 0 for a short while. If you make use of the +end proc in performance shifter, it will grant you end in this period if the proc fires off. A side benefit of the power is that mobs that are not defeated typically are held while you are in your endurance recovery period.

Tips:

• This attack, without Fulcrum Shift, is not powerful enough to defeat foes on its own. Make sure to get a decent damage bonus (say 200% going before using the power)
• Be careful when using this power against Freaks. Since they resurrect, you will often find yourself facing half a spawn after wiping them all out.
• Never use the power unless you have a blue inspiration or a team that can cover for you. Missing an opponent is a bad thing when you can’t use any of your powers and everything detoggles.
• With some fast timing, you can use the blue immediately after the power triggers and before any of your toggles check for end. It is possible to keep toggles off if your timing/lag allows it.

Slotting:
Depending on how much you use the power, you can argue that anything from 2-6 slots would be fine. For an emergency one off power 2 slots would be fine. For a maximum use, 5-6 slots would be recommended.

High Availability: Acc/Dmg/Dmg/Rech/Rech/Rech
Emergency Use: Acc/Dmg

This is one of the powers that you should never sacrifice damage IOs for procs, even if you can place them here. The power does enough damage that you’ll always be better off slotting for it than the unenhanced damage from a proc. The PBAoE sets are very nice and have great bonuses. If you have the money, Obliteration is a terrific set to six slot. It gives acc, rech, and def bonuses and has enough recharge % to get Atomic blast up as much as possible. Scirroco’s is a good set as well if you are going to four slot the power.

II. The Kinetics Set:
We’ll start with the primary. Kinetics is a melee centric defender set. Its powers almost universally require you to be at close proximity to the mobs you are affecting (if you want to see any benefit from them. You can play a Kin standing far away from the fight, but you limit your damage, and to some degree survivability, even more). Its primary effects are buffing your damage, recharge, and endurance along with that of your allies. It has a very powerful heal which trades power for versatility.

Originally I had laid out all of the power details, trying to be incredibly comprehensive in my guide. However, I came to the realization that I don’t read it when other people give all the power numbers. So instead, I’ll summarize the power and give thoughts, tactics and other tips on slotting and using the power.

Transfusion:
Type: Mob centered AOE heal
Value: 10/10

This is a very powerful mob centered AOE heal, which is sadly your only real means of survival for a long time. While it is an incredible heal, it has some huge downsides. It has to hit first and foremost which isn’t a problem until you are trying to save a teammate and the RNG decides that you are going to miss. The second problem is that at the end of the cast time, the mob has to be alive. If it is not, the heal graphic shows, but no targets are healed. While this doesn’t seem like much of a problem, with all the AOE’s that occur it can be more problematic than you think. Finally, you have to have a mob next to someone who needs healing, which for non melee folks can be tricky.

Now for the positives, the heal is very powerful, healing close to 50% of a targets health when fully slotted. It recharges relatively quickly and the cast time is average. That means that in the lower levels, it usually will be enough to keep you alive should you want to solo missions and hunt smaller spawns. Don’t try to use this for hazard sweeping as you will quickly be overwhelmed and in later levels you definitely don’t want to be getting much agro until you have some of the Epic defenses.
Making sure you are healed is not usually too much of a problem (short of the 5% miss rate and the mob dying on you.) Getting it to heal any non melee class can be tricky. There is no reliable method of healing a blaster, controller, or fellow defender unless they stay right in the thick of it.

A not commonly known aspect of this power is the fact that it also drains some end from the target as well as debuffs their regen.

Tips:

• Target the tank. Much of the time, the tank will be targeting something big and threatening that is likely standing right in front of him. If you are having trouble keeping people buffed and getting an enemy targeted who’s near someone you need to heal, targeting through your tank, or scrapper is a good idea.
• If someone is dying, target them and cast. One of the most frustrating things about this heal is that you can’t heal a person, you need to find a mob that’s near them to heal. With the exception of blasters, you can sometimes catch them by targeting them instead of a mob and toss a heal. I only recommend this if they are dropping fast and you don’t have time to turn in their direction and pick a mob.
• Target bosses if you can or something with half health or more. It’s amazing how often whatever you are trying to target dies before the heal goes off. Target a boss, which will likely drop a lot slower or at least something that has most of its life left.
• Spam this power in an AV fight even if you don’t need the healing. Knocking down their regen is nearly as good as doing damage.

Slotting:
I normally 6 slot this power. It’s really your main, and for many levels, only survival tool. While you could go less, you are shooting yourself in the foot by not doing so.

Basic: Acc,Acc,Heal,Heal,Heal,Rech

I wouldn’t do anything less than that. However, you do have a few nice bonuses you can pick up from the Healing IO Sets.

There are several set options you can play with, but only two of the sets make a whole lot of sense. Doctored Wounds will grant you a 5% global recharge with 5 slots, add an accuracy IO to that and you have my favorite slotting. The Touch of the Nictus is a nice alternative, using 3 slots for a 9% global accuracy or bumping to five slots for both the accuracy and a decent Max End bonus. As an added bonus, the Touch set gives you enough bonus that you can 5 slot the power and still get good effect out of it. Of course your sixth slot here could always be used for one of the super shineys.

Siphon Power:
Type: Single target damage debuff, AOE damage buff
Value: 6/10

Siphon Power is an ok power that targets a mob and debuffs its damage by a little bit. Additionally, everyone around you gets a small damage bonus. This power can stack the buff with itself, so if you have enough recharge, you can get a pretty decent bonus. It’s not Fulcrum Shift, but it’s also the only way you are going to buff the damage of the blasters, controllers, and other defenders who don’t want to come into Melee combat.

It’s not a bad power, but it doesn’t really shine either. Without the debuff stacking it doesn’t really help you survive as much as you would like. I take it so that even if I’m on a team of blasters I can help them out with their damage. I don’t really like it for solo all that much, although it can help with capping your damage and neutering a single target. Still consider that for 10 end and 2 seconds you could attack instead and it would take 5 blasts before you recouped the damage you lost by casting this. So its solo use is kind of limited unless you are solo casting a lot of AOEs which multiply the effects.

Tips:

• The power has a decent radius, so get in a crowd of blasters and trigger this off, even if you’ve Fulcrum Shifted. Odds are, the support and ranged toons didn’t get much of that bonus.
• While it’s not going to save you, having a 25% damage debuff on a boss goes a long way on increasing your limited survivability.

Slotting:
More often than not, I leave this power with one slot. It’s mildly effective with it and there are no sets to get bonuses out of anyway.

Basic: Acc
Mini Fulcrum: Acc/Rech/Rech/Rech

With the Mini Fulcrum option, you are recharging the power every 7 seconds, with a 2 second cast time. If you are lucky, you can keep 2-3 of them on the blasters for an entire mission. 50-75% bonus damage for a blaster is enough to speed things up significantly.

Repel:
Type: PBAoE repel/lnockback
Value: 1/10

Here is perhaps the most useless power in the game. Kinetics is a set that thrives on being in melee range with a power that knocks people out of that range. To add insult to injury, it sucks endurance from you for each mob that it affects. It pulls one end per mob you bounce, so be careful when you are using it so you don’t run out of end for the powers you need to cast.

While the power is pretty useless, those of you on a budget can get some nice set bonuses out of the kinetic crash set. For those knockback experts, the power can be ok, but as mentioned, it really goes against the spirit of the powerset by knocking people out of the range you want them at.

Tips:

• You can bounce people into a corner and keep them there. Realize it’s one end per bump and you’ll drain pretty quick, but you can keep a boss bouncing pretty well with some practice.
• There’s a place to play Hellion Soccer in Atlas with this power.

Slotting:
While I wouldn’t use the power for any serious use myself, there are some who want it.

Basic: End

The set options for this power are quite good… kind of like they realized how bad knockback powers are in general and are trying to be nice about it. The kinetic crash set is pure gold with a huge recharge bonus, an Knockback prevention, and some regen to boot. Four slots will get you the knockback protection and six gets you the recharge.

Siphon Speed:
Type: Mob targeted speed debuff, self speed buff
Value: 9/10

Siphon speed is one of the signature buffs of the set. When you cast it, you debuff your target by lowering their recharge and travel speed. In addition, you game both recharge and travel speed for 60 seconds. It stacks with itself on the buff side of things and I do not think it does on the debuff side. Still, with enough recharge, you can stack three of these on yourself and get the equivalent of another hasten running on you. The down side is that it’s nearly a 2 second cast time, making it kind of slow and interrupting your attack chain, especially if you’re spamming it to keep your recharge up. Ironically, if you use this and Siphon Power a significant amount, you will likely lower your DPS as you end up spending tons of time doing no damage to cast the buffs.

Still, as this is an AOE centric power combination, we want those AOE’s up as much as possible so I’m hitting this nearly every time it’s available.

Tips:

• You will find that your Irradiate power tends to make people want to run away. This is a nice power to use on the boss that you don’t want to chase all over the place.
• Get enough recharge to have it stacked on you 2x, it makes a big difference.
• Combine this power with hover and you have the equivalent of flight
• You can use this for a travel power assuming that you are not going through zones that are significantly higher than you.

Slotting:

As long as you are not soloing smaller spawns (2-3 mobs). I found I used the power enough to justify five slotting it. If you have lots of Global acc and rech, you can reduce the slots to 3-4.

Basic: Acc, Acc, Rech, Rech, Rech
High Glob Acc: Acc, Rech, Rech, Rech
High Glob Rech: Acc, Acc, Rech, Rech
High Glob Acc & Rech: Acc, Rech, rech

You can see that as you acquire more set bonuses, you can drop some of the slots from the power. I still like to 5 slot it with lots of accuracy and recharge, however, if you are purpling, or have several global +9% bonuses and run tactics, you might find that to be overkill.

As for set bonuses, there aren’t any great low hanging fruits. Partially because the slow sets don’t have enough recharge in them to make the power really shine. However, if you are trying to cap some defenses, six slotting the power and picking up Pacing of the Turtle isn’t a bad idea, just make sure you have enough global recharge to compensate.

Increase Density:
Type: Ally only buff, +resist Mez effects, +resist Immob, +resist(Smash/Energy)
Value: 3/10

On paper, this is a great power. You can buff an ally to give them good resistance to mezz powers and immobs as well as smashing and energy damage. They do lose some speed, but I think that most people would make that trade off. The problem, and I’ll say crime, is that it’s a 60 second buff. Yes, I could take this power and keep it active on everyone along with Speed Boost. However, that’s all that I would ever be doing. Eight people is 16 seconds of cast time for ID, and Speed Boost would add another 16 seconds. Figure another 5-10 for targeting people and you are looking at between 50%-75% of your time being spend casting single target buffs.

If you want to go insane quickly, take this power and try to keep it up on your team.

It does work ok keeping it on one-two players, and then using it reactively when people get held or slept. However, for a power choice, this one is skip able.

Tips:

• If you do use this power, keep it on the folks drawing the most agro. Don’t try to keep it on everyone all the time. Also, make sure you have them speed boosted so they don’t lag behind people.
• For the people who are not getting all the agro, make sure to throw this on them as they get mezzed.

Slotting:
One slot is all the power really needs, unless you are looking to get some set bonuses/unique slotted here.

Basic: Res

Perhaps the best reason to take the power earlier is to get some of the Resist IOs slotted into the power. The four that I would consider are: Aegis Status Resistance, Impervious Skin Status Resistance, Steadfast Protection Knockback Prot and Steadfast Protection Resistance/3% def. Since status protection is near impossible to get on this character, having those IOs will go a long way towards adding to your survivability.

Speed Boost:
Type: Ally only buff, +speed, +recharge, +end
Value: 10/10

I think that I would refer to this power as your meal ticket. While I was underwhelmed with this power combination, I did level to 50 faster than just about any other that I have had. This power is the primary reason for that. The buff has a few powerful things that nearly everyone wants; recharge and endurance. Additionally, it gives a run speed boost which makes Stone Tanks very, very happy. I kept several stone tanks on my friends list and they were always happy to see my character join their teams.

While the buff is amazing, you will also find that it can be a source of annoyance as well. First of all, people like it enough that they will spam you with messages to ‘SB Now!’ or ‘SB Plz!’. This will occur as you are buffing the team, after they have run off to another part of the map, while they have it on, and many other times. It doesn’t start to slack until the late 40s where everyone has their powers slotted. This means that you will be spending from 16-30 seconds every two minutes (or 12-25% of your time) casting single target buffs; over and over and over and over again.
The second annoyance is when you are migrating through cave missions, with SB on can be a navigational nightmare. Enough so that many people will ask not to have this amazing buff.

Finally, there will be people who just don’t want the power. That means that in addition to spending 16-30 seconds every 2 minutes buffing, you have to try and remember which people want it and those that don’t. It’s not all that uncommon to have people shouting at you to get it on them and others shouting at you because you put it on them.

Still, it is an amazing power; one that you should take, and use as much as you can. It’s your meal ticket to level 50.

Tips:

• Bind this power to a third mouse button if you have one. It makes casting it on the fly so much easier.
• If you have Neutrino Bolt on auto fire, you can buff while attacking. You will buff someone, attack who they are targeting, select another player to buff, buff them, auto attack who they are targeting and so on. It’s a nice way to keep this power up and still be contributing to the teams effectiveness.
• You can use this bind for targeting and speedboosting players on your team: /bind numpad1 "+ $$powexecname Speed boost$$teamselect 1"
• If you cast it just before you enter the mission, and right after you enter, it stacks with itself giving +100% recharge and some insane endurance recovery.
• If you have a stone tank, keep this on him/her all the time, they will love you to death for it. It’s a great way to always be on teams.
• A tip from the forums: When confronted with SB Plz request over and over, especially if you’ve been good at keeping the power up, just start chain casting it on them over and over until they get the point.

Slotting:
Out of the box, the power is plenty good. I have never enhanced it further than placing a single end mod in there. However, some people really like to solve their team mates end problems, so adding a few more wouldn’t be the worst thing. If you buff in combat a little recharge isn’t bad either, although usually global recharge is enough to cover this; especially if you are spamming Siphon Speed

Basic Slotting: End Mod
Enhanced Slotting: End Mod/End Mod

As for sets, there are a couple that you might want to take advantage of. This is a nice place to slot Blessing of the Zephyr for the Knockback protection. If you are heading down the defensive route, two more slots gives you 3% defense in several categories. Combine that with an end mod and you have a very nice buff on a power that’s typically team only. Two slots using Energy Manipulator will get you a small recovery bonus as well.

Inertial Reduction:
Type: PBAoE travel power
Value: 4/10

This power made a whole lot more sense before people had access to the various jetpacks. You have Siphon Speed already, and many take Super Speed anyway for the stealth and the ability to move through zones that are a higher level than you. Before the free jetpacks, this was a great way to get some vertical movement without having to delve into another power pool. Now, it’s nice, but more of a luxury than a requirement. The downside is that it is not a toggle and can run out before you land. This can be a real problem if you fall into near a mob which aggros as you are recasting the power.

Tips:

• Make sure to let people know they have it, most people won’t notice until they actually jump.
• Be aware when the power is wearing off, you don’t really want to have to cast this while standing in the middle of a large mob you just landed in.
• A stealth IO is a nice proc to have here so you don’t get creamed on the way down.

Slotting:
Another power that’s good with minimal slotting. If you are using basic IO’s, adding a recharge to it is nice to make sure you can recast when you want too. A jump enhancement makes it as good as Super Jump.

Basic Slotting: Rech
Alt Slotting: Rech/Jump

There are few set items that you can choose from, but Blessing of Zephyr is one of them. That allows you to place a –KB proc here, or add more slots to go the defensive route. Another good option is to place a stealth IO in this power. It alleviates some of the danger from landing right in the middle of a mob.

Transference:
Type: Mob targeted AOE endurance replenish
Value: 10/10

This is where things start to get more fun for you. Transference operates much like Transfusion, in that it’s a mob centered AOE power. However instead of healing your HPs, you regain lost endurance as the mob looses endurance. It’s quite powerful unenhanced, and with some slotting can let go from nothing to nearly full in one casting. With this power you can skip taking stamina, and/or use your powers much more liberally than you otherwise would.

Transference suffers the same problems as it’s cousin Transfusion. It needs to hit, the mob needs to be alive, and people have to be in range of the target to get the benefits. While this tends to break Transfusion for team healing, it’s not as bad in this power since toons usually don’t die if they run out end (short of the tank who has agro). Between Speed Boost and this power, no one on your team should ever have any end problems.

Tips:

• This power was made to help people recover from their tier 9 nukes. Many nukes, yours included, drain all of your end when you cast them. If it’s your nuke, pop a blue, hit transference and you are back in the fight at full end.
• See all of the tips for Transfusion.

Slotting:
This power is important enough that you really want to slot for it. I recommend six slots, but you can manage with anywhere from 3-6 depending on your set bonuses and if you took Stamina or not.

Basic Slotting: Acc/Acc/End Mod/End Mod/Rech/Rech
Lite Slotting: Acc/End/Rech/Rech

Six slotting with the Efficacy adaptor gives some really nice bonuses, including a global recharge. It’s a lot of slots, but this is one of your signature powers and well worth the investment. If you are going the defense route, performance shifter isn’t a bad set, but you won’t get much out of the proc to get the defense bonus from the sixth slot.

Fulcrum Shift:
Type: AOE team damage buff
Value: 10/10

This is THE power that all Kinetics players fall in love with. You target a mob, any mobs in range (20) are attacked by the power as well. For EACH mob you hit, you and your team get a 25% damage buff. Each mob hit is also debuffed on their damage by 25% as well. The cap is 10 mobs which gives you a 250% damage buff if you manage to hit that many targets.

This power changes the dynamics of the game allowing your AOE’s to hit for double or more what they might normally do. As a defender, it gets you nearly up to Blaster damage and for your lucky team mates, it makes them into walking paragons of destruction. With enough recharge, the power is up nearly every spawn and sometimes can be doubled on a spawn.
Like most of your buffs/debuffs, if your target dies before the cast finishes, the power fizzles. There is nothing sadder than having your Fulcrum fail because a scrapper one shotted your target.

Tips:

• Target something that is going to live.
• Wait until someone has agro, you can not take an alpha nor sustained agro.
• If you have access to an AOE sleep, Fulcrum Shift does not wake the mobs up. You can sleep them, walk in, Shift, then bast away.
• If there is another Kin on the team, keep track if they are using FS as well. You can’t get more than 300% damage boost.
• Monitor your damage boost with the power attributes window to see if you are capped or not

Slotting:
While Fulcrum Shift is one of the best powers in the game, it does not accept any Set IOs. So you are limited to basic slotting. I recommend 3-5 slots for this power depending on your global bonuses.

Basic Slotting: Acc/Acc/Rech/Rech/Rech
Lite Slotting: Acc/Rech/Rech

There are no set IO options for this power.

I. Introduction:

Let me start by saying, roll another combination. That’s right, you heard me. If you want to do damage, for Pete’s sake roll a blaster or join all of the other walking demigods with their scrappers. If you want to help your team, make some other defender or perhaps a controller. You are going to be disappointed and unless you are making the toon for some kind of theme, do something else. Trust me, you’ll be much happier.

Why are you still reading?

Seriously, I am not kidding and this isn’t some literary ploy. Odds are you will be much happier with some other combination. I’ve taken this road, and it’s long… and painful… and mostly futile. In fact, this is the toon that caused me to quit playing CoX for six months or so. Yes, it is that bad.

You’re still here…

Fine there’s one in every crowd. I know that I suffered through 50 levels of this combination to find the truth of the matter. You have little to no place on any real team where another person couldn’t come in and offer more. I know you’re excited and your fledgling hero has that new character smell. You have visions of being a rolling ball of boosted AOE destruction. I know that I did. However, don’t take the short version, before I talk about any powers, I’m going to continue to try and get you to make another character.

Here are the problems:
(1) You have no natural method of surviving.
Read that again; carefully. It’s very, very important. Your only power that will keep you alive is a targeted heal, that while powerful, needs to hit and won’t fire if the mob dies. It is amazing on how often both of those occurrences happen. Even so, you are playing a reactive game and if you manage to get agro away using your AOEs, the incoming damage will likely be more than you can handle.

Of course, all of this goes without talking about your complete lack of Mez and knockdown protection. Even if you manage to keep up with damage with your targeted heal, you can’t really be using it when you are held, slept, stunned, or flopping on the ground. All of those occasions occur with alarming frequency in the later levels.

To make yourself at all survivable, you will need to dip heavily into the power pools which means you’ll give up on several quality of life items. You’ll have to skimp on some of the blast set to fit in what you need and the slots will get very tight as you six slot powers to get those elusive defensive bonuses

If you do go through the effort to get some defense, you will likely spend a whole lot of time, and more than a billion inf in making it work.

Note: See light at the end of the tunnel to talk more about this

(2) You do defender damage.
That’s right, there is no hero AT that does worse damage than you. Here are the damage scales for Melee and Ranged damage at Level 50: