Two_Dollar_Bill

By far the most popular Crab Spider spec seems to be "ranged AoE fire platform with soft-capped ranged defense". However, I'm glad to say there is no "right" spec for Crabs, and many different tactics are viable. Mine started out with lots of pets, ranged attacks and Leadership pool but has slowly evolved into a rather tank-like character that engages most foes in melee after softening them up with ranged attacks/debuffs.

All of a Crab's attacks are AoE except for the first few rapid filler attacks, so you can choose which ones you like. I agree that Venom Grenade (Resistance Debuff) and Suppression (Defense Debuff) are critical powers that should not be skipped. Other than that, pick whatever suits your tactics.

I do like Arm Lash, even as a single-target attack. It has unusually long range for a melee attack and I always left it on auto-attack as a sort of point-defense system for my ranged spec to finish off things that got too close. And, really, what's the point of having giant mechanical spiked arms without the ability to impale people with them?

Some powers that work great solo are not as desirable on teams. Omega Manuever is fun when solo, but it's too slow to be effective on a big team. By the time it goes off, your team has rolled through the group of mobs and/or completely scattered them with knockback and competing sources of aggro. Likewise, Frenzy is great when solo since you control the aggro and can get a large group of targets to pile in around you. Not as ideal on a team, though my current spec does have Frenzy but not Omega.

Threads in the Player Guides section DO tend to linger....

CoH/CoV isn't a big PvP destination... I'd consider an 8-on-8 fight in Siren's Call or Warburg to be a pretty big melee on a typical night (on Justice anyway). As a long-time DAoC player, I can safely say that the "farming + grinding = PvP power" model is really not present in CoH/CoV. CoH used to have uber-loot in the form of Hami-O's that were literally godlike, but that problem has been largely corrected and now the power difference between the casual gamer and the hard-core are not that great anymore. My level 50 Controller and my 40-something Warshade are pretty evenly matched against Villains in PvP who have far fewer enhancement slots and wimpier enhancements.

Some of the best PvP in the game can be found in Siren's Call, where nobody operates at higher than Level 30. Many of the most powerful abilities in the game are simply not present there, and villains who can barely afford SO's can still be very effective against 50 heroes there. After Issue 7 comes out, there will still be just one PvP zone where epic pools or patron powers even work.

When Issue 3 was on the test server I was in a group determined to make the Paladin spawn. Three of us, more dedicated or stupid than the rest, held out until we got one. The theory we were working on was that beating up the Clockworks in King's Row would make them band together to build a Paladin to defend them. We harrassed and kicked around all the clockworks EXCEPT the ones at the build/junk sites for a long time before they started building him. I'm still not sure what actually triggers the spawn.

Watching the Clockworks build their new leader. You can see from the map the location of the NorthEast build site. We didn't attempt to stop them... we wanted to see the Paladin!
Monster Construction

A new Paladin sets out for a night on the town in King's Row. He started with a huge troop of followers, possibly because we never attacked any of them while he was being built.
Paladin and friends