dave_p

Since this is your guide, Local, I'd really like to do a thorough read through and provide any commentary, but it won't be any time soon (maybe later tonight?). I can already see from just skimming it that you did a hell of a job, but that's hardly surprising.

Edit: Okay, I printed out the first 10 pages (of 43!!!) to read over during a boring meeting. Some comments on those, and these are largely nitpiks since you really cover everything:

-In the Intro section (page 2 for me), you state, "Radiation is the only secondary that has a Recharge buff and foe debuffs to make PA better." When first reading that, I thought you might want to say "both recharge & debuffs..." since it sounds like no other sets as either. Your wording is technically correct, but could lead to some confusion. In fact, you expand on this later around page 6-ish starting with, "As explained below, Phantom Army ("PA") cannot be buffed," and is a bit redundant. Since your guide is so long to begin with, you may consider trimming one of the two places you talk about this.

-Page 5-ish, talking about the various control effects (hold, stun, etc), you leave out Fear as a mez effect. Sorta big considering Spectral Terror is in the set.

-Starting w/your Ill control powers, you list a variety of stats. If you like, I can provide you w/their DPAs w/Arcanatime factored in:

<font class="small">Code:[/color]<hr /><pre>
Ill Dam Act DPA
SW 30.6 1.07 23.18
Blind 30.6 1.67 16.56

Fire Dam Act DPA
RoF 33.6 1.17 25.45
Char 33.6 1.07 25.45

Grav Dam Act DPA
Crush 30.6 1.33 19.32
Lift 24.5 1.03 20.62
Propel 59.9 3.5 16.21

Fire Blast Dam Act DPA
Flares 63.19 1 53.19
Fire Blast 92.576 1.67 50.10
</pre><hr />

I put in Fire &amp; Grav as comparisons since they're both considered high damage primaries (only really true for one of those). Spec Wounds only includes permanent damage, so is misleading, but it's a good guideline if you care to use them. I also put in Fire Blast's tier 1 &amp; 2 blasts as a comparison to show why ppl might really want to consider slotting for damage in their control primaries (remember, consider containment).

-Under IO sets for holds, you sorta put in Lockdown as an afterthought, almost. I'd put that up there with the very best of the hold sets, and in fact, I place it in favor of even the purp Unbreakable set on some builds, depending on what I'm going for. Obviously, w/Ill, you want max recharge, but Lockdown has some phenomenal 2, 3 bonuses for extra holding &amp; damage (not for PA, obv), and then 5 &amp; 6 bonuses for defenses.

-Finally, under your first description for Deceive (you reference that you will talk more about it under tactics), you talk about DFs taking away from XP, but don't mention that they also increase your kill speeds, so in balance, you actually end up ahead likelier than not. I'm sure you go into this in the tactics section, but a blurb up here might not be a bad idea.

Will print out the rest and read under guise of work later today. Again, great job overall--you've pretty much written a textbook, not just a guide.

QR

Nothing really useful to add, esp after Local's already taken up all the good points, but...

Anyone else notice that some of the sleeps in this game also have some of the best graphics? Frozen Aura for Ice Melee always had really nice graphics, but no one took it because it was a sleep (now, it's a flat out awesome power too). Similarly, Thunderstrike for Storm has a great graphic, but it's rarely taken for its low mag stun. It's almost like the devs presciently gave the crappy powers some great looks to make up for their meh factors.

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I dunno about anyone else but I can tell you this: A good Cold is playing actively and using some sense.

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This statment is also true for FF. FF is practically a master at preventing DMG period. Anyone that is just doing the fields every 4 min isnt playing a FF defender.

Both of these sets have + and -
But regardless of what they are, the sets are going to shine in the hands of someone who knows how to use them.

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Yeah, that sounds nice in theory, but really, FF is about 3 powers (4 w/Maneuvers), and they're very, very easy to use. Sure, you can do neat things w/KB &amp; stuff if you really want to get tricky that might actually require skill, but 95% of your job is done as long as you bubble every 4 min and keep most of your team in the big bubble. That means FF will shine in the hands of anyone willing to do the bare minimum, i.e. bubble, bubble, turn on 2 toggles.

Cold isn't exactly rocket science either, but it takes more active gameplay than FF. Every other set takes more active gameplay than FF to play well. Here, check out Fulmens' FF satanic bible. I especially liked this bit:

If you do NOTHING besides keep the team bubbled and stay close to the guy on point, you are a good Force Field Defender. If you do everything else in your power and do not bubble the team, you are a bad Force Fielder.



Edit: I just reread Fulmens' thread (cuz it's a funny guide) and noticed you'd already responded in it, and by its manner and your name, I'm assuming you're a FF devotee. So I apologize for arguing with you--please disregard this post in its entirety. For everyone else, it still stands.

QR

FF for PuGs and generally crappy teams.

Cold for even remotely competent teams.

If you need to keep a group of idiots alive against their will, FF will do the job far, far better than Cold ever could.

If you want to help cruise through missions, TFs, etc faster &amp; smoother (faster damage, faster killing speeds, mucho end recovery) while keeping a decent-to-good team very safe, Cold has few peers.

Ill/Kin is very powerful, but sorta annoying in that Phant sometimes knocks away targets of your Kin powers. I'd imagine it'd be equally annoying if they KB'ed your Rad anchors as well, but w/Kin, that annoyance can turn fatal rather more easily than w/Rad.

I think the consensus on the controller boards has always been Ill/Rad having better synergy than Ill/Kin, but you really can't go wrong w/either. I will say if I rerolled my Ill controller, it'd be as Ill/Rad, not /Kin. Mostly, just consider your playstyle--if you like to stay super busy and always have a button to press, play Kin. If you like a bit more laid pack playing style, go Rad.

Why would a cyborg plant mines or throw grenades? Targetting drone sorta fits, but I'd go w/AR/Energy Melee (cyborgs punch hard, right?), or AR/Elec.

GI Joe = AR/Dev for sure. *shrugs*

Biggest cons to AR/Dev is no Build Up, no Aim. I'll let others describe the pros--they're there, but they're not enough to overcome the no BU+Aim bit for me.

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just hoping its not the ONLY thing in issue 16..the last 3 issues are meh and very small

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Agreed, tho I look forward to getting rid of the pink pom poms of doom.

I was never under the impression that TA had a poor reputation in the first place. It's not popular, to be sure, but those of us who know, know.

If the OP's is merely trying to spread the word, more power to you, sir.

Hmm... not quite thread necro, but close.

So, what was the purpose of the original test, just to determine ST DPS? Because that's easy enough to analyze on paper (Fire wins, by a lot). Your latest tests seem to focus on confuse damage, which is far harder to quantify, so kudos on those results. Then again, I never imagined a ST confuse would do much for your DPS (AoEs are a different story, obviously).

QR

In that you can pick what map &amp; mobs to farm, Fire/Fire/Pyre all the way.

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I think farming is a boring waste of time. Play the game instead.

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I wonder how many times this poster's been told, "MMOs are a waste of time, get a life instead."

Solid build, but no Blizzard? Def rain powers are blaster level--there's no way I'd skip Ice Storm or Blizzard on my */Ice defender (I take Aim &amp; PBU to leverage those 2 powers too). Frost Breath is really iffy tho--love it on my blaster, skip it on my defender.

Pet Gaze is really nice to stack on top of Freeze Ray, though it's a bit of a tossup bet. it and Bitter Freeze Ray, since PG animates faster, but has a shorter duration and does no damage. Either way, I'd definitely take a 2nd hold in addition to Freeze Ray.

I 6-slot Blood Mandate for the fantastic +def bonuses. I wouldn't change it even after they fix the Soulbound set, but if you're not actively seeking +def, frankenslotting is prolly the way to go (3 Nucleouses and call it a day).

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ok 2 respecs later and about 50 million more I think I have finally set on a build. This build finally feels SUPER!!!!

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Have you done some runs in Cim w/this build? I'd be afraid of cascading failures w/o Grant Cover, esp when you don't have AD double stacked.

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Not sure if I'd ever try it on a melee toon.

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I don't think I'd ever try that on a Defender. :P I can't help but wonder if that scatter is actually hurting your survivability more than it's helping. It's spreading things out so that DN, Fluffy, and DN are all less effective, while at the same time reducing your ability to stack tohit debuffs from TT and NF. Couple that with the fact you can knock things out of your own Tar Patch... Ungh. Just doesn't seem worth it to me.

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Actually, I'm Cold/Dark w/that build, but same general problems (Sleet instead of Tar Patch, etc) apply. And yeah, like I said, I'm really not fond of the effect. Then again, I only really even took OG as a Stupefy mule, and don't run it all the time. When I do, it's to stack w/Dark Pit--I never try to stun just minions w/OG by itself. I *would* run it all the time w/o the KB proc tho since there's no other reason not to (the HP drain is more than covered by Health and +regen).

To add, the damage crash does not affect procs or vet/temp powers. I usually save Sands of Mu, my Nemesis Staff, etc, for those 10 secs, but I also load Jab up w/procs to throw in there. Sometimes, you get good damage, others... not, but it's like 1 attack wasted and you still get aggro.

And as Sarrate points out, if you're constantly stacking Rage as is easily possible w/just SOs, you never have to worry about the def crash.

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Just for kicks I slotted the Stupefy chance for KB into OG and it was one of the funniest things to watch. It was on my Spines/Dark so it looked like sometimes the quills would shoot out and knock things around.

Not practical but funny

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It's very practical for the defender version of OG which is why I have the proc there.

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Ugh, I hate it myself. I have both OG &amp; Dark Pit 6-slotted w/Stupefy for the def bonus, and I hate having have to slot the stupid KB proc. Hurts more that TT is a soft immob and doesn't shut down the KB that invariably follows. The only source of humor is when a teammate starts looking around for the invisible energy blaster.

Oh, and I'm not exactly a fan of OG to begin with, tho it's handy being able to stack a mag 4 stun on bosses w/Dark Pit. Not sure if I'd ever try it on a melee toon.

Karma in CJ used to be the default slotting, but I've switched all mine over to BotZs. Of course Karma's are going for like 1M on Went's.

I use Hurricane as a -to hit debuff tool first, positioning second. Definitely bind it to a handy key to toggle on/off as needed.

QR

If Ice/Ice feels slow, you're likely doing it "wrong".

And by wrong I mean a combination of:

1) Too many controls

2) Not enough AoEs

Of course, there are times when you want a lot of controls or high ST damage, and Ice/Ice certainly gives you that, but if you're aren't mowing through crowds at a fast pace, it's your own damn fault.

Oh, you want safe w/a minimum of fuss? Try casting Ice Storm & Blizzard (not necessarily in that order) around a corner/over a wall. Drop down an Ice Patch first if you're really worried about things coming around that corner/wall, but you shouldn't have to.

I see a lot of ppl slotting FR w/the Achilles proc. Does that actually work out? I mean, that's really only *really* useful for hard targets--sure, it's nice if it procs on a bunch of minions or lts, but those are going down fast enough anyway w/FR up, so really, you're using it for bosses and higher. It's gonna have a chance to fire once every 10 sec, right? And its duration is 10.3 sec, so basically, it's a 20% chance of being on at any time, which works out to a 4% total debuff. FR itself is a 30% -res debuff, so you're using a slot to get a 13.3% return, which doesn't seem like the best use of a slot, esp in a tight build.

As a counterexample, on my Kat/Regen, I have the Achilles slotted in Gambler's Cut, which cycles a around 3~4x per every 10 seconds in my attack chain, which means the odds of it being active during a given 10 sec period is around to 50~60%, so basically a 10~12% debuff on average which is very much worth a slot.

Very often, actually. Of course, I throw Oil Slick Arrow on top instead.

Seriously though, I do find EQ a very good "oh sh**" power when QS &amp; OSA &amp; whatever have already been deployed. Just by itself, it does a pretty good job of keeping a crowd occupied. If I were using it as an opener, say around a corner, of course I throw QS on top.

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Edit : To put it another way the slow is a necessary component to Ice Slick to make it as effective as it is.

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Earthquake is quite effective w/o QS on top of it. Better still with, of course, but Ice Slick doesn't *need* the slow component. It's just, er, icing.

Right, thus the "combination". BotZ for speed &amp; set bonuses, LotG for def &amp; even more set bonuses.

Slotting Hover for def is sometimes overlooked, but if you just need that tiny bit to hit def cap (and let's face it, LotG has some fantastic bonuses)...

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Dave: You clearly, as a retired guy, need a hobby.

I'm trying to burn 10 billion inf- not just spend 10 billion, remove it from the game. I'm at like 700 M after about a week. Wanna help me out?

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I saw your post and it really awed me that you were willing/able to do that. I'm a complete pack rat and hate "losing" anything, i.e. deleting stuff (you should see my RL closets). I don't even like deleting DOs that I pick up on my teens who all like have 100s of M's (I mean I do it, I just don't like to do it...).

Currently, my hobby is getting FC on all my toons on my main (and really only) server. I have like 2 left that are almost done w/their memorization badges, another 1 or 2 that just need Master Crafter, and I'll be done. Not sure what I'll do after that... prolly take a break for a while. Maybe try to break 4 min on pylon soloing with some super build (though I'm not too far from that already). The latest challenge on the scrapper forums is soloing stuff w/ SOs only which takes no cash, so is sorta pointless for me.

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Ahh, the + should have given that away to me, and I don't think I've seen anyone take both. Since you've tried it, you don't have any issue with the snail pace of Hover. =T

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Hover actually moves at a decent clip now, especially once slotted.

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Yes, but do you slot for movement or defense or set bonuses or some combination? Seems wasteful to 6-slot hover of all things, but it could be reasonable (3 BotZs, 3 LotGs).