Two_Dollar_Bill

Running all those defense toggles with no end reduction is really going to cramp your style. Use the Luck of the Gambler Def/End and Def/End/Recharge IOs instead of the generic Defense IOs. Slot Cloaking Device the same way. Even when it suppresses in combat, it gives your nearly the same bonus as Maneuvers (Pool) for less endurance, so it should not be neglected.
If you still need a bit more defense, the best power to slot into ED territory is TT:Maneuvers since it has the largest base value.

From a thematic standpoint, if you really want your character's focus to be on the dakka, and not on vomiting superhuman amounts of stomach acid, I would fully slot all of your SMG attacks and drop the patron powers. I think the extra toxic damage from Bile Spray can be more than replaced by taking both versions of Assault and slotting your SMG attacks to their true potential.
- Single Shot and Burst can both accept procs, like the -Resist proc from Achiles' Heel or the Negative Energy proc form Touch of Lady Grey.
- Heavy Burst is a cone and it benefits greatly from range enhancements, so leave out the Damage/End and keep the Damage/Range IO from Positron's Blast. For Slot #6 I recommend the Damage/End/Range IO from Detonation.
- If you feel like you need another attack, Frag Grenade is AoE, comes with some crowd control, and it doesn't require the redrawn of the patron attacks.

Tactical Training: Assault gives yourself, your pets and your team +15% damage, and it doesn't even require any extra enhancement slots. Both of my Soldiers take both versions of Assault, but I urge everyone to take the superior SoA version at the very least.

As I mentioned in the Arachnos ATOs thread, my Crab Spider operates in melee and does a lot of damage with Frenzy. He doesn't want his victims terrorized and cowering. He wants them to bunch up where he can hit multiple targets with Arm Lash, Frenzy and point-blank Venom Grenades. At the moment he has the rest of the set in Suppression but I have unslotted the proc and have no specific plans for using it.

My Bane Spider has ranged attacks but typically uses them at the end of a fight for cleanup purposes, or when he needs crowd control. He can slot the whole set in Mace Beam Blast or some other ranged AoE without messing things up, but it also decreases the usefulness of the proc.

I'm going to make a wild guess here and say that Pummel is just a mule power that you added to squeeze in one more purple set. If you actually wanted a useful melee attack you would have taken Bayonet and slotted it like a real attack. I would get rid of Pummel entirely.

Heavy Burst: Replace one of the generic Range IOs with the Damage/Range IO from the Positron's Blast set. This will give you the set's 6.25% Recharge bonus and more damage, at a minimal cost in range.

Single Shot: I recommend six-slotting this power with five slots of Decimation and the Achilles' Heel -Resist proc. You will lose that 3% damage bonus but your damage will be much higher when the proc fires. More importantly, you will gain another 6.25% recharge bonus, leaving you better off than you were with the purple set in Pummel.

Tactical Training: Leadership: Six-slot with Gaussian's Synchronized Fire Control. It will give you a bigger damage buff than Adjusted Targeting provides, and you'll get the extremely desirable 2.5% global defense buff.

Stamina: People who like crunching numbers much more than I do have determined that the optimal slotting for Stamina is: The End Mod IO and the Proc from Performance Shifter, and a generic End Mod IO. I really do not think that the two extra enhancement slots are worth the 2.5% damage bonus, at least not while you have attacks that are less than fully slotted.

Venom Grenade and Frag Grenade are pretty-well maxed out for damage in ED terms, but they will accept the Energy Damage proc from Positron's Blast. Burst can accept the Negative Energy proc from Touch of Lady Grey or the -Resist proc from Achilles' Heel.

Well, I would like to offer a heavily Crab-biased review of your build, but your data link is not working and there is no code block, and I'm too busy playing my Crab Spider to want to enter all your IOs in to Mids' by hand. If I can load up your build, I'll comment on it!

I will echo the sentiment that the importance of the "healer" role has been in decline for a long time, well before there were incarnate powers. I admit that I do miss the days when task forces took all night and the was a real and serious need for support skills, instead of just all DPS all the time. However, I also remember the bad old days of "Defender = Healer" culture, when my Dark/Dark Defender would get multiple tells demanding to know if he was an Empath and then telling him he wasn't needed on the team because he wasn't a "healer". So, healers are getting less important all the time, but that's not 100% bad.

Necrotech Master's build is a Huntsman (favors SMG attacks over mace) with a ton of recharge. Many Huntsmen are anti-mace and cannot use Executioner's Strike but I'm glad to see that Necrotech Master's Bane has retained that critical skill.

My build doesn't care so much about recharge, and focuses instead on survivability and team support. Since Banes do not have a self-heal, I really like having fully soft-capped positional defenses and Tough. Bear in mind that Cloaking Device suppresses somewhat in combat, so my defenses are not as overbuilt as they might appear at first glance.

I feel that one of the big strengths of all Soldiers of Arachnos is their superior Leadership. Both my Bane and my Crab Spider run five Leadership toggles, which gives your team and pets a big boost.

At the moment, this build has Mace Beam Blast and the patron Mace Blast for ranged attacks. Most people would probably take Venom Grenade instead of Mace Beam Blast in a second, and things could easily be reshuffled to do so. With Shatter Armor and Surveillance already providing resistance debuffs, I just find that I don't get much use out of Venom Grenade. Using Venom Grenade at the beginning of combat where it would be most useful ruins your executioner's strike. By the time I'm done with the big melee attacks, including two Executioner's Strikes, Shatter Armor and Crowd Control, the need for an AoE resistance debuff has largely passed. But if I get in over my head, the AoE knockback of Mace Beam Blast can be useful.

Villain Plan by Mids' Villain Designer 1.954
http://www.cohplanner.com/

Click this DataLink to open the build!

Bane 50 B: Level 50 Natural Arachnos Soldier
Primary Power Set: Bane Spider Soldier
Secondary Power Set: Bane Spider Training
Power Pool: Leaping
Power Pool: Teleportation
Power Pool: Fighting
Power Pool: Leadership
Ancillary Pool: Mace Mastery

Villain Profile:
Level 1: Bash -- T'Death-Acc/Dmg(A), T'Death-Dmg/EndRdx(3), T'Death-Dmg/Rchg(3), T'Death-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(27), T'Death-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(29), T'Death-Dam%(31)
Level 1: Bane Spider Armor Upgrade -- S'fstPrt-ResDam/Def+(A), S'fstPrt-ResKB(5)
Level 2: Mace Beam Blast -- Posi-Acc/Dmg(A), Posi-Dmg/EndRdx(7), Posi-Dmg/Rchg(7), Posi-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(11), Posi-Dam%(31)
Level 4: Super Jump -- Zephyr-Travel(A), Zephyr-Travel/EndRdx(9), Zephyr-ResKB(9), EndRdx-I(34)
Level 6: Recall Friend -- Winter-ResSlow(A)
Level 8: Boxing -- Acc-I(A)
Level 10: Tactical Training: Maneuvers -- LkGmblr-Def/EndRdx(A), LkGmblr-Def(11), LkGmblr-Def/EndRdx/Rchg(13), LkGmblr-Rchg+(13)
Level 12: Maneuvers -- LkGmblr-Def/EndRdx(A), LkGmblr-Def/EndRdx/Rchg(15), LkGmblr-Rchg+(15), EndRdx-I(17)
Level 14: Build Up -- RechRdx-I(A), RechRdx-I(17)
Level 16: Tactical Training: Assault -- RechRdx-I(A)
Level 18: Shatter -- T'Death-Acc/Dmg(A), T'Death-Dmg/EndRdx(19), T'Death-Dmg/Rchg(19), T'Death-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(37), T'Death-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(40), T'Death-Dam%(40)
Level 20: Tactical Training: Leadership -- GSFC-ToHit(A), GSFC-ToHit/Rchg(23), GSFC-ToHit/Rchg/EndRdx(23), GSFC-Rchg/EndRdx(40), GSFC-ToHit/EndRdx(43), GSFC-Build%(43)
Level 22: Mental Training -- Run-I(A)
Level 24: Cloaking Device -- LkGmblr-Def/EndRdx(A), LkGmblr-Def/EndRdx/Rchg(25), LkGmblr-Rchg+(25)
Level 26: Placate -- RechRdx-I(A), RechRdx-I(27)
Level 28: Surveillance -- ShldBrk-Acc/DefDeb(A), ShldBrk-Acc/Rchg(29), ShldBrk-DefDeb/EndRdx/Rchg(31), ShldBrk-Acc/EndRdx/Rchg(50)
Level 30: Tough -- Aegis-ResDam/EndRdx(A), Aegis-ResDam/Rchg(34), Aegis-ResDam(34), Aegis-EndRdx/Rchg(37), Aegis-ResDam/EndRdx/Rchg(37)
Level 32: Crowd Control -- SDoArach-Acc/Dmg(A), SDoArach-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(33), SDoArach-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(33), SDoArach-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(33), SDoArach-Rchg/DmgFear%(43)
Level 35: Mace Blast -- Thundr-Acc/Dmg(A), Thundr-Dmg/EndRdx(36), Thundr-Dmg/Rchg(36), Thundr-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(36), Thundr-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(45), Thundr-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(45)
Level 38: Call Reinforcements -- ExRmnt-Acc/Rchg(A), ExRmnt-Acc/Dmg(39), ExRmnt-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(39), ExRmnt-EndRdx/Dmg/Rchg(39)
Level 41: Shatter Armor -- Mako-Acc/Dmg(A), Mako-Dmg/EndRdx(42), Mako-Dmg/Rchg(42), Mako-Acc/EndRdx/Rchg(42), Mako-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(46), Mako-Dam%(46)
Level 44: Summon Blaster -- ExRmnt-Acc/Rchg(A), ExRmnt-Acc/Dmg(45), ExRmnt-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(46), ExRmnt-EndRdx/Dmg/Rchg(50)
Level 47: Weave -- LkGmblr-Def/EndRdx(A), LkGmblr-Def/EndRdx/Rchg(48), LkGmblr-Rchg+(48), EndRdx-I(48)
Level 49: Assault -- EndRdx-I(A), EndRdx-I(50)
------------
Level 1: Brawl -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Conditioning
Level 1: Sprint -- QckFt-EndRdx/RunSpd(A)
Level 2: Rest -- Empty(A)
Level 4: Ninja Run
Level 2: Swift -- Run-I(A)
Level 2: Health -- Mrcl-Rcvry+(A), Numna-Regen/Rcvry+(5)
Level 2: Hurdle -- Jump-I(A)
Level 2: Stamina -- P'Shift-EndMod(A), P'Shift-End%(21), EndMod-I(21)
------------

Well, I didn't want to hijack your thread by making it about my Bane, but I will post what I am working on late tonight when I get home.

I like my Bane to fight in melee where he can annihilate select targets with Executioner's Strike, and then use soft-capped defense and Crowd Control to avoid being overwhelmed battling the remainer of the spawn. When soloing, he plays pretty-much exclusively melee, occaisionally shooting a runner in the back with Poisonous Ray. When on a team, I can't always take advantage of the best targets or wait long enough between fights for Cloaking Device to come back on, so I make more ranged attacks. That balance between melee and ranged attacks is what I keep tinkering with.

Seeing your current bad build would still be helpful since it could offer some insights into how you are playing your Bane. Trilby will also make you a build if you fill in the blanks!

Each of the ATO enhancements is a unique and catalyzing it does not make it a different enhancement. So, you cannot have more than one set in the same build.

The idea behind frankenslotting is that double, triple and quad enhancements have more total bonus than singles. The more things an enhancement does, the better its total value is. So, there's no reason to use a plain End Cost Reduction IO in Bile Spray when there are Acc/Damage/End triples available. Detonation even has an Acc/Damage/Range triple that would allow you to sneak some range bonus in... always helpful on cone attacks.

However, there is another (or maybe complimentary) way to push your enhancement values into the red. Enhancement Boosters will give you even more bonus from each slot, allowing you to move some slots elsewhere (like maybe some procs in your filler attacks). Anyway, you may find that some of the powers that you have pushed into the red with frankenslotting could still be maxed out with one less enhancement slot.

You could use an extra slot for end cost reduction in Assault (pool) and I think Super Jump is a lot more fun and user-friendly if you slot it for serious use.

I also think that you have enough ranged attacks that you could get rid of Longfang and never miss it. You could replace it with Arm Lash to deal with opponents that get too frisky and want to melee, or you could get the old standby... Hasten.

I have an Assault Rifle / Sonic Resonance Corruptor, with a build more similar to your "recharge" build. Unfortunately, even with very good resists, he can still be extremely squishy and has to choose carefully when to use his big AoE attacks. So, I keep trying to introduce more ranged defense.

I think the "defense" build needs work. It's missing the Steadfast Protection +3% Defense unique, and the Performance Shifter proc. It will have brutal endurance issues with Sonic Disruption. Although Aegis is a great set for AoE defense, I think that five-slotting Sonic Barrier and Sonic Haven is a waste of slots that could give you more important bonuses elsewhere, even if your AoE defense ends up below soft-cap.

I'm not really a fan of frankenslotting, and my Corruptor is an alt that I don't consider high enough priority to buy purples or Hami-O's for. A low-budget alternative would be to 3-slot the shields with Aegis for the 1.56% AoE bonus, and then five-slot Cutting Beam and Piercing Beam with the unloved-but-cheap Detonation set for 1.88% AoE defense. You'd still lose some AoE defense, but you'd gain two enhancement slots and a lot of Inf.

On the "recharge" build I would drop the Aegis Status Resistance unique. Sonic Dispersion makes you immune to most crowd control, and reducing the duration of a sleep effect will not save you from needing to restart Disruption Field.
I would also add another slot of endurance cost reduction to Assault.
You could argue that three-slotting Hasten for recharge is worth the largely-wasted third slot... though you can achieve the same effect with two slots and some boosters. In any case, I do not think that Aim and Power Build Up are worthy of three slots, at least not while you have attacks that could use more slots. You could add procs to Charged Shot and Single Shot, or just frankenslot in a triple or a quad IO for better enhancement values.

One of my projects for double XP weekend is getting my 45 Bane Spider to 50. I have been alternating back and forth between a melee build and a ranged build but I plan to combine them together into a hybrid when I hit 50. I am pretty happy with the melee build. The ability to instantly annihilate a lieutenant with a single executioner's strike never seems to get old. I hope to have a build of my own to share soon(tm).

It sounds like your Mastermind is running around with generic (non-set) IOs. If that's the case, I think your resources would be better spent on more modest set IOs. You can get a whole lot of useful set bonuses and non-purple procs for the cost of one purple.

Even without the set bonuses, the dual/triple/quad IOs carry a greater total enhancement bonus than you can get with generic IOs.

If you don't already have it, I suspect that taking Assault from the Leadership pool will give you more damage than any proc, and it doesn't require you to change the slotting of your pets.

At least for the purposes of my characters' bios, which is all most people know about them, I try to avoid making references to NPCs. Descriptions that rely heavily on alts/SG-mates/NPCs that nobody's ever heard of create a barrier to entry and prevent readers from understanding the full story. Far better to use established characters that the audience can instantly relate to.

I started a Plant/Poison Controller back in November, posted the build and got exactly zero responses. I designed my character to have an entire attack chain of Holds (five of them). Plant/Poison is very clicky and has a bewildering array of powers for any situation, which might be good or bad depending on what you like to play.

There was another build thread in December that generated a few responses and some build ideas.

I don't hate Omega Maneuver, but when people ask me my opinion about it, I explain why I don't take it. (See multiple other threads for details.) In general, I think of it as being rather like Trip Mines; a great power for soloing, but difficult to use to good effect on a fast-moving team.

My own build has Boxing/Tough/Weave and Vengeance, but no pets or psuedo-pets. I would love to have pets, but being nigh-invulnerable is a higher priority.

Someone is being mean to multi-billionaires? That's horrible!
Just think of how these hapless victims managed to accumulate billions of Inf without any real comprehension of how the market works. And of course they managed to get to the point where they needed the most expensive and exclusive of all PvP IOs, doubtless after buying dozens of other purples, all without a basic grasp of the economy. It must have been pure accident that they sought out an off-market sale, since they certainly don't have the savvy to understand them. And finally they probably located their off-market sale contact here in the Market & Invention forum where they managed to avoid all the threads that discuss I22 and converters.
Given this scenario, I agree with the OP. It's mean.
/sarcasm

I don't play this game to pretend I'm rich. I play it to pretend I'm super-powered and violent. I've been to the test server. I've read all the threads about how to make (or lose) billions in the post-I22 economy... and I have not stocked up on anything or delayed any purchase I would normally make. To me, having 100 billion Inf stashed on 50 alts would not make the game more fun. But being able to try out my new build ASAP... that's fun, and worth paying extra for.

I didn't take any special Omega Maneuver replacement power. I just hit every spawn with Venom Grenade and Suppression, then finish them off in melee. I'm fine taking alpha strikes since 95% of them miss, and I can weather a few lucky shots. If I'm concerned the alpha strike might actually be dangerous, I will hit Serum first.

Since my Crab is melee-oriented, I don't especially want my foes stunned and wandering around drunkenly. I want them to gather around me where I can savage them with Frenzy.

Melee Attacks
If you plan to be controlling aggro and fighting in melee (standard Tanker things) then you will want Frenzy. Slice and Arm Lash are good attacks, but they are not enough to keep you busy in melee, and they certainly won't deliver the minion-slaughtering blast of AoE damage that Frenzy will. Frenzy will never miss if you simply wait until you're surrounded by a pack of foes before hitting it. Ideally, I recommend using Venom Grenade first. The combination is devastating and finishes melee combats much more quickly than you ever could with just Slice and Arm Lash.

Defense
Maneuvers (Pool) will give you a 5% global defense bonus with minimal slotting. I can't think of any good reason to ever skip it.

AoE Defense
You have a lot of sets that grant very small bonuses to AoE Defense... Ruin, Detonation, Harmonized Healing. All sets with junk bonuses like mez resist and debt protection. The Aegis set (five slots) is worth 4.69% AoE defense and you can slot it twice (Fortification, Tough).

Speaking of Tough
Tough is important to any Crab that plans to stand there and take a lot of aggro. It really needs to be slotted like you mean it. Right now it will cost you 0.33 end/second for a sub-par bonus.

Omega Maneuver
My experience has been that when I am using Omega Maneuver on a team, my teammates have little desire to roast marshmallows and exchange campfire stories while waiting for the thing to go off. They run in and pull aggro away from the bomb, hurl the mobs around with knockback and just generally ruin the intended "group hug the bomb" effect. I find it very skippable.

Unique Set IOs
Things like the Miracle and Numina's Convalescence uniques are generally easiest to get with Villain Merits. Run tip missions during idle bits of downtime, and do a Signature Story Arc once a week, and soon they will be yours. If your Crab is a Rogue/Vigilante, then you will need an alt to get the recipes.

Pets
Right now you have all of your pets six-slotted and none of them are giving you the very desirable 6.25% recharge bonus that recharge intensive pets can grant. If you fit Maneuvers (Pool) into your build (5% to all positional defenses) you won't need those pet damage sets for their defense bonuses. You could four-slot all three sets with Expedient Reinforcement, gain 18.75% global recharge, significantly increase the recharge of your pet powers, squeeze in a few defense/resistance uniques (slot 5) and still free up some extra slots (the now-unused slot #6) for other projects.

Enhancement Converters and PvP IOs
I would test that first before making any plans for PvP IOs. The PvP versions have always been in a category of their own for a reason... they are supposed to be earned in PvP. I suspect the best deal you will get is to buy other Gladiator's Armor IOs and do in-set conversions. Of course lots of other people have this idea too and have stocked up on them.

Dual, triple and quad IOs have more total enhancement bonus than singles do. It's the foundation of the unholy craft of frankenslotting. For example, a normal (Schedule A) IO gives you a 42.4% bonus, while a dual gives you 26.5% in each category, or 53% worth of bonuses. Unless you are getting a lot of genuinely useless bonuses mixed in with the good ones, there usually is an advantage to slotting set IOs.

Gaussian's is the only proc available for your toggles, but many people slot the Numina's and Miracle procs in Health and Performance Shifter in Stamina, since all three of them give you endurance.

I only recommend Tough and Weave if you really want to be in the tanking business. You can certainly be an effective AoE-and-pet Crab with soft-capped defenses and Fortification. If you do want the Fighting pool you can drop Combat Jumping since Weave will more than replace it. I would never advise anyone to drop their travel powers. ALL my characters have Recall Friend and at least one travel power.

I don't care for Omega Maneuver. It can be fun and effective while soloing, but I find it largely useless on teams. The few seconds of time between when you summon the bomb and when it goes off is more than enough for your team to completely steal its aggro, or scatter its victims with knockback attacks, or simply annihilate the whole spawn with an incarnate judgement attack. Considering how slow it recharges, the payoff just isn't worth it for me. Still, if you solo a lot it can be devastating. Slot it to include some extra range (Positron's Blast has some) so that you and your pets don't steal the bomb's aggro by being too close, drop the bomb, then hit the gathered-up mobs with Venom Grenade before it explodes... and the damage can be impressive.

Due to the fast and chaotic nature of fights in City of Heroes, limits on individual aggro, and the large teams that often contain multiple melee characters, a lot of people end up sharing the aggro. You might say we off-tank all the time. My Crab Spider often collects stray mobs with his AoE attacks and then stands and fights them in melee, but I wouldn't call that off-tanking in the strictest sense. I'm not really in control of the aggro, I'm just dealing with it. If you really want to be in the business of aggro management, you must have a taunt. Crabs just don't have the DPS to pull aggro off of an over-taxed Tanker or an overly-enthusiastic Blaster before they are beaten down.

If standing your ground and holding aggro is a priority, and if you want to use Frenzy to good effect, I would get Tough and Weave and try to build your Crab up to tank-like standards of survivability. Soft-capped positional defenses is a must, and high Smashing/Lethal resistance is highly desirable. Crabs are quite vulnerable to defense debuffs, and you can suffer a cascading failure that gets you killed in seconds. Healthy damage resistance is your best insurance against random lucky shots and debuffs.


If money is no object and you are willing to coat yourself in purple sets and that 3% defense PvP IO, then why not use set IOs for ALL your powers? Even if you don't want or need their set or unique bonuses, the enhancement values on the doubles, triples, etc. are higher than regular IOs. Example:

Defensive power three-slotted with 1 End Cost Reduction and 2 Defense Buff IOs:
+49.7% Defense, +42.4% End Cost Reduction

Same power three-slotted with LotG Def/End, Def/End/Recharge and Defense:
+51.93% Defense, +47.7% End Cost Reduction, +21.2% Recharge

Even if you never use the recharge bonus, the power is stronger using set IOs. Likewise, TT: Leadership and Fortification could be stronger with set IOs, even if a few extra bonuses creep in.


I assure you that you do not need the added accuracy IOs. With ordinary slotting in your attacks, TT: Leadership, and a bunch of accuracy set bonuses, you should have a 95% chance to hit pretty-much everything. If you do find your to-hit chance so heavily debuffed that it counters your plentiful built-in buffs, there are always those yellow things in your inspiration tray for those rare emergencies.


What is the purpose of all the Blessing of Zephyr sets? If you are using them for AoE defense, I recommend five-slotting Fortification with Aegis instead. It's worth 4.69% AoE defense... one of the biggest bargains you'll find. If you need the ranged defense, you can put one slot of actual defense in Combat Training: Defensive and gain about 3%.


I like a full set of Gaussian's Synchronized Fire Control in TT: Leadership. It gives you a global defense bonus that's almost as high as that expensive PvP IO, and the buildup proc checks for activation every 10 seconds as well.

I would refer to this character as a "Huntsman" in the title so people know what they are looking at up front. And I have to ask... what made you choose the Bane Spider path when you are ignoring pretty-much everything that makes Bane Spiders useful? You have Cloaking Device but you can't deliver an Assassin's Strike. You have low damage output but you skipped taking Build Up. And I promise you, Crowd Control is just plain awesome even if you prefer to fight at long range.

The problem with your painfully low damage, besides the lack of Assassin's Strike and Build Up, is how your attacks are slotted. You could be doing amazing damage with Heavy Burst if you slotted it like a real attack. Venom Grenade is also a significant damage dealing power and it's only got two enhancement slots. Frag Grenade is frankly the weakest and least useful of the three. Disruptor Blast could also deal amazing damage if it were slotted with a damage-dealing IO set. On the other hand, if you want to use the assault rifle for attacks, I would strip all the enhancement slots out of Disruptor Blast and remove it from your hot bar, then max out Venom Grenade. You're going to be shooting Venom Grenade to debuff things anyway, why not make it a useful attack?

In terms of defenses, it looks to me like you are relying way too much on IO sets for defense bonuses, when you could take Maneuvers (Pool) for far better effect. You could also slot your defensive powers for more defense. Cloaking Device and Combat Jumping aren't even being affected by ED yet. Combat Training: Defensive and Tactical Training: Maneuvers are taking a small hit from ED but if you can squeeze one more percentage point out of Maneuvers, that's equivalent to the bonus you get from a whole IO set. (1% to all positionals as opposed to 3% to a single defense.)

You can ignore S/L Defense completely and concentrate on positional defenses. There's no advantage to being "close but not quite" in both categories. Ditch Kinetic Combat and slot Pummel with Mako's Bite or Touch of Death... something that adds a useful defense bonus.

Damage Resistance is nice, but Wolf Spider Armor provides a really small base value to be slotting it so heavily. You've pushed its resistance well into the red for ED purposes, which is better than you have slotted the much superior Bane Spider Armor Upgrade.

Hmmm... I would get rid of Combat Training: Offensive, take the previously-touted Maneuvers (Pool), and slot it with a few LotG (which will give you five). Get the extra slots from Wolf Spider Armor.

I would six-slot Tactical Training: Leadership with Gaussian's Synchronized Fire Control. It does cost you a small recharge bonus, but if you're willing to spend billions on a PVP 3% defense IO, surely you can see the benefits Gaussian's 2.5% global defense bonus.

The Performance Shifter End Mod/Recharge IO in Stamina is gaining you about 0.06 end/second. If you got rid of it and instead applied that slot to endurance cost reduction in Maneuvers (Pool) you could save yourself 0.12 end/second.

Although Hover does convert knockback into a flipping animation, you are still being crowd controlled and delayed. Even my characters that fly or hover all the time invest in a minimal level of knockback resistance.

To get the extra slots for Gaussian's and the Knockback protection IO, I would slot Fortification the same as Tough, with Hami-O's.

I don't know how much you exemplar, but... for your pets, I would use full-strength level-50 Expedient Reinforcement instead of level-30 Call to Arms. Your enhancement values will be better and you can get 3% damage bonuses and 3.13% ranged defense bonuses, which I think are more useful for your ranged DPS build.

And this is more of a question than a recommendation... does the Kismet +6% Accuracy unique really add anything useful to your build? Due to the large number of 9% and greater accuracy bonuses in IO sets, you can easily have a capped 95% chance to hit even level 54 Rikti drones without taking this unique.

This is a topic that comes up quite frequently. The Turning an SoA into a tank. thread has a discussion of tank Crabs, some builds, and links to even more of our previous tank Crab threads.

If you are using IO sets, you will likely be coated in 9% accuracy bonuses from Luck of the Gambler, Positron's Blast, Obliteration, etc. so you won't really have any pressing need for accuracy powers.
I agree with Muon_Neutrino that Tactical Training: Leadership is the best. It gives your whole team and all your pets the same accuracy bonus as Combat Training: Offensive.

With Crab Spider Armor Upgrade and Fortification you have so much status protection that you can bask in Romulus' Stygian Return (self-resurrect) without feeling groggy. The only things that can affect you are in incarnate trials. Wolf Spider Armor is completely redundant and skippable.

You lose set bonuses if you exemplar more than three levels below the level of the IOs.
Using lower-level IO sets is fine. The only problem with them is that their enhancement values are somewhat lower than 50's. My own Crab uses level 40 set IOs for everything so that he can exemplar better. He loses a few percentage points of bonus but some of that bonus was being eaten by enhancement diversification anyway.


Leaping - My own Crab has Super Jump and nothing else from this pool, and he still soft-caps with level-40 IOs. Many people only take Combat Jumping and/or Hover.

Fighting - If you just want to blast people with AoE attacks at long range, you could soft-cap your positional defenses without Weave and you would not really require Tough. If you see yourself using Frenzy a lot, you want Tough and Weave.

Leadership - I advise everyone to use the Leadership powers and love them. They are one of the great strengths of Soldiers of Arachnos, and especially good for Crabs, which can have the most pets. My Crab has Maneuvers x2, Assault x2, TT: Leadership and Vengeance... turning dead Blasters into useful bonuses.

Area Attacks - True AoE junkies often take things like Bile Spray and Heavy Burst, picking and choosing the best AoEs from all sources. Since Frag Grenade does not debuff resistance, deal toxic damage or cover a big cone, it often loses out. If you like the Crab theme and don't spit poison or summon sharks, then Frag Grenade is a worthwhile power. If your Crab likes Melee combat, you can skip it for that other AoE... Frenzy.

Filler Attacks - Channelgun is more popular than Longfang, and you really don't require both.

Melee Attacks - If you just wanted one melee attack, I'd recommend Arm Lash. It looks cool and it hits hard. It is an AoE attack, if you pay attention to the positioning of your victims. You can certainly go all the way and make a "Tank Crab" that specializes in melee. I would only caution that it takes set bonuses to soft-cap (45%) your melee defense and you will not really be ready for the big time as a melee Crab until this is done.

Defenses - Don't even think about skipping Fortification, it's awesome. Mental Training gives you +20% global recharge (only slightly weaker than 3 LotG uniques combined) and it requires no extra slots. I'm trying to think of a reason to skip it, but I can't. Combat Training: Defensive depends on your other defensive abilities, and how much you like purple sets (which don't improve your defenses). It is possible to skip it if you have lots of strong defense toggles, but it does give you a big chunk of ranged defense with very minimal slotting.

Serum - One of the advantages of Crab Spiders over other Soldiers is their self heal. Even badly slotted, it can be a life saver.