Okay. First people will have to forgive my english. It is not the best and I tend to make mistakes everynow and then. I play from korea. ^-^
Secondly I have played COH from beta and I have 4 level 50 characters. I use Herostats to get my test results and I run various different builds on test server to test most of my comparative suggestion / opinions on build advice using two separate accounts.
Thirdly... despite using all these data sources... My Guide is basically still the opinion of one person and also based on my play style. Though I have tried many different tactics in the past using various different builds on test server before posting what I think might be the best combination, you have to understand that primarys and secondary power groups all intereact differently. So... though it is possible to use this guide to seek advice for playing a Ninja Primary or a Force Field Secondary... the guide itself is used to point out efficiencies of playing these sets together and not apart.
Finally, I write my guide chronologically through the development of a build from level 1 to 12 (early), from 12 to 24 (mid), from 24 to 36, and 36 to 50. (high end)
Thus my advice for builds tends to be different depending on what powers are availble at the time to the characters during their growth and not necessarily what is good for the character at the very end. That is what Respec is for.
This guide is based on providing information on the Ninja / FF set only. Many other players of either the primary or the secondary will find that they have different results if either their primary or secondary differs from this exact set.
First let me say.. I have tried Ninja Traps, and Ninja DM... I prefer Ninja FF due to the fact that Ninjas are a bit squishy.
Secondly I invite others to make suggestions to add to this guide as I am not the total expert on this build. My Ninja/ FF is only level 40.
1) When you begin your Ninja / FF MM You will pretty much start off with Force bolt. This is a very good power and will often time be used even in the late game. I certainly stil use it and would never even think about respecting out of it. I'm not sure one could respec out of it as I have never tried too because it is the one power that you start off with.
2) You will want to pick up Call Genin and Deflection shield and slot them right away. Though everyone may differ in their opinion. At this point you can only slot TOs so.. I slot my ninja for accuracy and slot my Deflection shield for defense. This is where I noticed a HUGE difference between my Ninja / FF and the other ninja build I tried early on like ninja traps and ninja DM. The difference is that my Ninja simply live longer. Trust me when I say this... this is true in the begin game as it is in the end game. You want to avoid haveing to recast your summon in the middle of a battle because :
a) this takes time
b) this takes even more time if you have to reshield and rebuff them
c) your teammates and you are getting beat up on during this time
d) often you waste your endurance because your ninja tend to die one at a time and your resummon is used to resummon only the one that died.
e) if you resummon and they die again often your resummon has not refreshed which leaves you SOL for the battle.
Thus the conclusion is that if and when possible you want your ninja's to survive. FF is awesome for this. For deflection shield will help. Later on in the game when you have it fullly slotted with SOs, and your running Dispersion shield, and Force bubble on top your ninja's will seem invincle even against boss mobs. This is particularly true if you have the endurance to run Replusion shield and are effeciently using replusion shield at the same time. (they made changes to this power recently to make it even more useful. But I'm getting ahead of myself now and I promised that I would try to avoid that...hehe
3) At this point you can pick up either aimed shot or snap shot as other powers are not really availble and neither are your powerpools which you have to wait till level 6 to get. I suggest you get aimed shot. In the early game it is very useful for dealing a good amount of damage to help your ninjas. This will not be the case for long as you level... you may find that this power become less and less useful. There are however several reasons that may convince you to continue using this power even at later levels. It has a moderately fast animation, takes very little endurance, refreshes moderately fast and does a pretty signifigant amount of damage. Upto you. but everytime I bother to use forcebolt... I throw in this stacked right on top of it. It really only takes a few seconds to stack this attack on top while the mob is flat on it's back. And forcebolt I use frequently even in the later part of this game at higher levels.
4) At level 6 you will have a dilemma... I can't really solve it for you either since all the available choices at the level have draw backs and pluses. You can choose to pick up your train ninja power... which of course you will have to pickup anyway... now or later. Or you can invest in a pool power. Either way the lower levels breeze by pretty quickly so there is no real wrong choice. However, I think that everyone should at least consider that the longer you wait to make your way to a travel power the longer it will take you to move from location to location in the game which means lots of wasted time on travel which you could be using to gain experience.
Anyway... I choose hasten because I love superspeed. and Hasten is also a good power to have when fully slotted. Upto you how you want to choose your powerpool though. And upto you when you want to pick up those pool powers. I have my own set of suggestions for this build however again my choices reflect my playstyle and battle tactics.
I could see choosing Aid other at this point because it is really invaluable for the FF secondary as we have only damage mitigation powers and no direct healing capabilities. Heck many of the other people that have healing powers in their secondaries actually prefer the medicine pool set because of the refresh times etc..
Aid other is awesome or other reasons as well. I will tell you why.
a) If you slot it with SOs for interrupt distruption reduction it is nearly impossible to interrupt even if your standing in a freaking burn patch! So... it goes from a interruptable power to a non interruptable power.
b) With just on recharge reduction and Haste fully slotted with SOs... this power is up almost all the time and you can spam it on your ninjas and on your team mates when needed.
c) 3 slotted with Health SOs this power gives a respectable heal punch!
d) the last slot I would suggest either recharge again or end reduction... upto you. But after the healing SOs you will not gain much with the fourth.
Between this pool power and your Force fields for damage mitigation your gonna feel awesome and the power of your ninjas will seem to double and triple. Anyway... I picked up haste at level 6 and then train ninjas at level 8 and then Aid other at level 10.
5) Ahhh... finally the time has come!! Call Jounin is available and I would seriously question the villian that did not take this power at level 12. It gives you your first really kick a** pet. HE is a kewl black color and the guy has swords! Not to mention he is really the king of melee damage one on one in your ninja group as your Oni will tend to do more AOE stuff. It's not that the Oni can't deal more single damage..they can.. but you may prefer your ONI doing his AOE stuff instead. Anyway it is very hard to conrol what your ONI does..you can use goto commands and be selective about what upgrade you give him but ultimately the AI chooses what he does so you can only influence... not guarantee his actions. One of the reasons why some of my Ninja MM brethren do not use Kuji on them. I think however it is all situational... at times you will want your ONI doing the rain of fire thing. Depending on the situation and the mobs your fighting. Anyway again... I'm getting ahead of myself... sorry about that. the point is you at level 12 the recommended choice is getting your call jounin power which I ofcourse slotted for ACC. ACC is king. You want your ninjas to hit...worry about posting big numbers later. Remember you get status effects too when they hit .... if they miss you don't get that benefit regardless of posting larger numbers "WHEN" they hit. At this point you still don't have that many slots availble and my suggestion is that you use what you have for ACC when it comes to pets.
6) level 14... hmmm... Detention field, and Insulation field will be awful tempting... Among your powerpools so will getting Aid self (this can often save your butt until you get PFF) However... I personally was sick and tired of sprinting around the map so at level 14 I picked up superspeed. Gotta love this power. It provides a degree of stealth and with Speed on demand bind from Citybinder you can have it availble only when moving so their is almost zero end drain when using it all the time. (if you don't know about speed on demand you need to find out about it right away) It is about the only power that can be used in combat situation both indoors and outdoors. (Flying is okay but limited effectiveness indoors.) The only draw back is the limitation in vertical ability. Most people think that being in the air help in PVP helps a lot but I find this to be not true. Experience PVPers will knock you out of the air. Many have said it is harder for others to target air targets which is also not true when your playing against experience PVP teams. I find that Superspeed is much better for PVP. I will tell you why... If you are zipping in, out, and around and out of range and back into range again all the time, this is far more confusing that hovering from above. FLY cannot match Superspeed for moving in and out of ranged attack ranges. Not even close. you can slot Fly for speed but the same number of running speed slots in superspeed will make you so fast you will literally be afriad to hit the SS button for fear of breaking the time barrier and accidentally ending up in next tuesday. With practive you can teach your self to zip in and out of most ranged attacks in a fraction of a second when your SS is fully slotted. This aggrivates the heck our of blasters and the like who simply give up after a while trying to even aim at you because your are constantly out of range. (anyway... this may be a subject of much argument...so I will stop here) I will simply suggest people to practice with using superspeed. I have seen people that are better than I at using it in pvp zones who simply are untouchable with it on. 3 slotted for speed. Again... you don't have to worry about end reduction if you have the speed on demand bind.
7) Level 16... oh my... well... You may want to take Insulation Shield. It does wonders again mobs with cold, hot, and energy attacks. Infact this might be a little on the late side to take this power but for me it was okay Detention Field is also a great power for taking the boss mob right out of the fight and finishing off his minions first (good for solo!) but I find that one can wait a little later to take this power. It does however play havoc in PVP and extremely accurate from the get go to boot. I was sorely attempted to take Aid self at this point as well. Even thought about Assault to add damage. However I decided to go when with insulation shield.... even though PFF was really really lookin good to me....
8) Okay... here is a suggestion... and a comment. Smoke flash in most cases for me... really really suc*** I took it on test server to try it out and just did not think it was worth the HUGE endurance cost! At level 18 there as soo many other great choices. I took PFF. Along with SS this was a sure "get away" or "[censored] my butt" button. I really just stopped dieing in PVE engagements at this point. I experienced about one death per level after getting PFF. This thing really rulez. It also plays havoc in PVP as well. People will say stuff about it cutting of supremacy for your pets but I say the situation in which I need to use PFF are the situations where I'm pretty much trying to save my own as* and the pets are just meat shields at that point anyway. So if I'm in trouble... I hit PFF and Superspeed the heck out, recover, ask my minions to follow me get out of range of everything... heal up the pets that did not die on the way and re-summon the ones that did and then superspeed right back into battle.
9) At level 20 your a fool if you wait on taking dispersion bubble. It rulez. It provides defense against all nearly all types of status effects and damage as well except Psionic. It provides this protection to your entire group and your pets as well. Nuff said here.
10) People are gonna question my next choice. and again this is just from my experience but I have to tell you... If you gonna run replusion field your gonna need stamina. So here is where I take Hurdle, and Health just to get to Stamina. I know it seems like an aweful waste of power slots but I actually use hurdle because without a vertical power I need the extra jumping ability in the game to negotiated the terrain in certain zones. Along with SS it's a pretty good way to get from A to B.
10) After stamina I picked up Replusion Field. So many FFs go without this and their are many camps that don't like this power but I'm here to tell you that I know a lot of level 50 FF defenders and they all use it religiously. Slot it for endurance reduction 3 times and along with Stamina you can run the sucker all the time (or as much as you will ever need to). It knocks down foes and once you have haste slotted as well as a few recharge reductions on top of that slotted in the power you can use it at will to knock down everyone in the area. Then you can flash it back off to save on end and flash it back on when you need it. It plays havoc in PVE and PVP as well. I would suggest not slotting knock down... the given knock down is good enough. I really think why most FF build don't like this power is because they don't like to waste slots on stamina which is nearly a necessity if you want to use this power religiously. They also probably did not take hasten / Superspeed which is key to maximizing the usefulness of this power.
Here is my personal play style. This is a Repulsion field is an AOE self Toggle. So it eminates from your own person. If you took nearly any other travel power than superspeed... positioning yourself to use it correctly is just that much more difficult. Let me lay out the stragtegy for you. With fly or superjump you just cannot avoid being nailed on occasion using this power. But with SS slotted 3 times for speed with the added stelath component that SS comes with I almost never get smacked using repulsion. Basically I
a) locate a extremely impossibly dangerous group of mobs that could one shot me in a instant.
b) I flash in with superspeed (3 slotted) right into the center
c) I hit Replusion field and zoom the heck out. Everyone is on his [censored] and I'm totally safe and out of range before than can do anything.
I can keep zipping everywhere at lighting speed knocking down everyone while haveing my ninjas hack away at everything that is on it's butt and can't fight back. Add to that replusion bomb on your ninja pets, The occasional force bolt for those that don't get knocked down, insulation shield and deflection shield on your pets and Detention Field on that particularly hard to hit Boss / AV mob to take him out of the fight and your Ninja pets pretty much have their way with the enemy without much damage being taking. Problem is that to make this effective you need... Hasten, Superspeed, Stamina, Replusion Field and the liberal use of Replusion bomb as well as Force bubble. Any one of the powers missing takes a bit away from the over all effect of using them all together. They have synergy. The Idea in PVE is to create a situation where the enemy is not able to attack and when he does he misses due to your Force Fields. The Idea in PVP is to create general havoc and confusion and lots of detoggling of powers and knockdowns. While you Ninjas and team mates hack away at everyone. If you really want to piss people off you can slot your powers for additional knock down and it increases the level of your enemies frustration in PVP combat.
11) at level 26 ONI is your obvious power pick the at 28 and 30 I picked up Assualt and Tactics because I had a full horde of Ninja pets that could take advantage of it by then. Not to mention Assault and Tactics help your teammates as well. Leadership powers also stack with other people who have them.
However... you have to ponder... Assault, Tactics, Replusion field, Dispersion Bubble and of course later Force Bubble.. Your gonna resemble a Endurance Sink. That is why Stamina is necessary in this build.
12) At level 32 I decided to take KUJI and I think you will want not to really wait on this power because it give your jounin "Golden Dragon fly" A marvel to behold in action! Jounin also get Hide and blinding powder. The necessity of using Kuji on your oni will be situational. Char and Rain of Fire should be reserved for use again Large mob populations so you may want to not upgrade your Oni because you would prefer them to use Fire breath and Ring of fire and the Fire sword for more direct damage.
12) Level 35 and 38 were Replusion bomb and Force bubble for me. However depending on when you picked up your powerpools you may be forced to wait till later. Personally... Aid Self I think can wait.. but that is personal. Assualt and Tactics can wait for me... but you may feel differently. Either way with all the powers I mentioned you will be maxed out. I currenly do not have assault, tactics, or aid self since the respec cause I wanted all my secondary and primary powers earlier. I used to have them in a different order before respec. At 41 I have all the powers I want except those 3.
I have begun to ponder the need for Aid Self again... in favor of that really horrible power from before... Smoke flash. The reason for this is that I have enough endurance to use it now... and it make a good alpha strike power when you have ALL your pets. So... my level 28 it may be a possibility to reconsider it's effectivness. I need to test it on test server first before reporting on it's possible effectiveness at later levels.
I will follow up with a tactics guide a little later... Here is my current projected build.
Okay. First people will have to forgive my english. It is not the best and I tend to make mistakes everynow and then. I play from korea. ^-^
Secondly I have played COH from beta and I have 4 level 50 characters. I use Herostats to get my test results and I run various different builds on test server to test most of my comparative suggestion / opinions on build advice using two separate accounts.
Thirdly... despite using all these data sources... My Guide is basically still the opinion of one person and also based on my play style. Though I have tried many different tactics in the past using various different builds on test server before posting what I think might be the best combination, you have to understand that primarys and secondary power groups all intereact differently. So... though it is possible to use this guide to seek advice for playing a Ninja Primary or a Force Field Secondary... the guide itself is used to point out efficiencies of playing these sets together and not apart.
Finally, I write my guide chronologically through the development of a build from level 1 to 12 (early), from 12 to 24 (mid), from 24 to 36, and 36 to 50. (high end)
Thus my advice for builds tends to be different depending on what powers are availble at the time to the characters during their growth and not necessarily what is good for the character at the very end. That is what Respec is for.
This guide is based on providing information on the Ninja / FF set only. Many other players of either the primary or the secondary will find that they have different results if either their primary or secondary differs from this exact set.
First let me say.. I have tried Ninja Traps, and Ninja DM... I prefer Ninja FF due to the fact that Ninjas are a bit squishy.
Secondly I invite others to make suggestions to add to this guide as I am not the total expert on this build. My Ninja/ FF is only level 40.
1) When you begin your Ninja / FF MM You will pretty much start off with Force bolt. This is a very good power and will often time be used even in the late game. I certainly stil use it and would never even think about respecting out of it. I'm not sure one could respec out of it as I have never tried too because it is the one power that you start off with.
2) You will want to pick up Call Genin and Deflection shield and slot them right away. Though everyone may differ in their opinion. At this point you can only slot TOs so.. I slot my ninja for accuracy and slot my Deflection shield for defense. This is where I noticed a HUGE difference between my Ninja / FF and the other ninja build I tried early on like ninja traps and ninja DM. The difference is that my Ninja simply live longer. Trust me when I say this... this is true in the begin game as it is in the end game. You want to avoid haveing to recast your summon in the middle of a battle because :
a) this takes time
b) this takes even more time if you have to reshield and rebuff them
c) your teammates and you are getting beat up on during this time
d) often you waste your endurance because your ninja tend to die one at a time and your resummon is used to resummon only the one that died.
e) if you resummon and they die again often your resummon has not refreshed which leaves you SOL for the battle.
Thus the conclusion is that if and when possible you want your ninja's to survive. FF is awesome for this. For deflection shield will help. Later on in the game when you have it fullly slotted with SOs, and your running Dispersion shield, and Force bubble on top your ninja's will seem invincle even against boss mobs. This is particularly true if you have the endurance to run Replusion shield and are effeciently using replusion shield at the same time. (they made changes to this power recently to make it even more useful. But I'm getting ahead of myself now and I promised that I would try to avoid that...hehe
3) At this point you can pick up either aimed shot or snap shot as other powers are not really availble and neither are your powerpools which you have to wait till level 6 to get. I suggest you get aimed shot. In the early game it is very useful for dealing a good amount of damage to help your ninjas. This will not be the case for long as you level... you may find that this power become less and less useful. There are however several reasons that may convince you to continue using this power even at later levels. It has a moderately fast animation, takes very little endurance, refreshes moderately fast and does a pretty signifigant amount of damage. Upto you. but everytime I bother to use forcebolt... I throw in this stacked right on top of it. It really only takes a few seconds to stack this attack on top while the mob is flat on it's back. And forcebolt I use frequently even in the later part of this game at higher levels.
4) At level 6 you will have a dilemma... I can't really solve it for you either since all the available choices at the level have draw backs and pluses. You can choose to pick up your train ninja power... which of course you will have to pickup anyway... now or later. Or you can invest in a pool power. Either way the lower levels breeze by pretty quickly so there is no real wrong choice. However, I think that everyone should at least consider that the longer you wait to make your way to a travel power the longer it will take you to move from location to location in the game which means lots of wasted time on travel which you could be using to gain experience.
Anyway... I choose hasten because I love superspeed. and Hasten is also a good power to have when fully slotted. Upto you how you want to choose your powerpool though. And upto you when you want to pick up those pool powers. I have my own set of suggestions for this build however again my choices reflect my playstyle and battle tactics.
I could see choosing Aid other at this point because it is really invaluable for the FF secondary as we have only damage mitigation powers and no direct healing capabilities. Heck many of the other people that have healing powers in their secondaries actually prefer the medicine pool set because of the refresh times etc..
Aid other is awesome or other reasons as well. I will tell you why.
a) If you slot it with SOs for interrupt distruption reduction it is nearly impossible to interrupt even if your standing in a freaking burn patch! So... it goes from a interruptable power to a non interruptable power.
b) With just on recharge reduction and Haste fully slotted with SOs... this power is up almost all the time and you can spam it on your ninjas and on your team mates when needed.
c) 3 slotted with Health SOs this power gives a respectable heal punch!
d) the last slot I would suggest either recharge again or end reduction... upto you. But after the healing SOs you will not gain much with the fourth.
Between this pool power and your Force fields for damage mitigation your gonna feel awesome and the power of your ninjas will seem to double and triple. Anyway... I picked up haste at level 6 and then train ninjas at level 8 and then Aid other at level 10.
5) Ahhh... finally the time has come!! Call Jounin is available and I would seriously question the villian that did not take this power at level 12. It gives you your first really kick a** pet. HE is a kewl black color and the guy has swords! Not to mention he is really the king of melee damage one on one in your ninja group as your Oni will tend to do more AOE stuff. It's not that the Oni can't deal more single damage..they can.. but you may prefer your ONI doing his AOE stuff instead. Anyway it is very hard to conrol what your ONI does..you can use goto commands and be selective about what upgrade you give him but ultimately the AI chooses what he does so you can only influence... not guarantee his actions. One of the reasons why some of my Ninja MM brethren do not use Kuji on them. I think however it is all situational... at times you will want your ONI doing the rain of fire thing. Depending on the situation and the mobs your fighting. Anyway again... I'm getting ahead of myself... sorry about that. the point is you at level 12 the recommended choice is getting your call jounin power which I ofcourse slotted for ACC. ACC is king. You want your ninjas to hit...worry about posting big numbers later. Remember you get status effects too when they hit .... if they miss you don't get that benefit regardless of posting larger numbers "WHEN" they hit. At this point you still don't have that many slots availble and my suggestion is that you use what you have for ACC when it comes to pets.
6) level 14... hmmm... Detention field, and Insulation field will be awful tempting... Among your powerpools so will getting Aid self (this can often save your butt until you get PFF) However... I personally was sick and tired of sprinting around the map so at level 14 I picked up superspeed. Gotta love this power. It provides a degree of stealth and with Speed on demand bind from Citybinder you can have it availble only when moving so their is almost zero end drain when using it all the time. (if you don't know about speed on demand you need to find out about it right away) It is about the only power that can be used in combat situation both indoors and outdoors. (Flying is okay but limited effectiveness indoors.) The only draw back is the limitation in vertical ability. Most people think that being in the air help in PVP helps a lot but I find this to be not true. Experience PVPers will knock you out of the air. Many have said it is harder for others to target air targets which is also not true when your playing against experience PVP teams. I find that Superspeed is much better for PVP. I will tell you why... If you are zipping in, out, and around and out of range and back into range again all the time, this is far more confusing that hovering from above. FLY cannot match Superspeed for moving in and out of ranged attack ranges. Not even close. you can slot Fly for speed but the same number of running speed slots in superspeed will make you so fast you will literally be afriad to hit the SS button for fear of breaking the time barrier and accidentally ending up in next tuesday. With practive you can teach your self to zip in and out of most ranged attacks in a fraction of a second when your SS is fully slotted. This aggrivates the heck our of blasters and the like who simply give up after a while trying to even aim at you because your are constantly out of range. (anyway... this may be a subject of much argument...so I will stop here) I will simply suggest people to practice with using superspeed. I have seen people that are better than I at using it in pvp zones who simply are untouchable with it on. 3 slotted for speed. Again... you don't have to worry about end reduction if you have the speed on demand bind.
7) Level 16... oh my... well... You may want to take Insulation Shield. It does wonders again mobs with cold, hot, and energy attacks. Infact this might be a little on the late side to take this power but for me it was okay Detention Field is also a great power for taking the boss mob right out of the fight and finishing off his minions first (good for solo!) but I find that one can wait a little later to take this power. It does however play havoc in PVP and extremely accurate from the get go to boot. I was sorely attempted to take Aid self at this point as well. Even thought about Assault to add damage. However I decided to go when with insulation shield.... even though PFF was really really lookin good to me....
8) Okay... here is a suggestion... and a comment. Smoke flash in most cases for me... really really suc*** I took it on test server to try it out and just did not think it was worth the HUGE endurance cost! At level 18 there as soo many other great choices. I took PFF. Along with SS this was a sure "get away" or "[censored] my butt" button. I really just stopped dieing in PVE engagements at this point. I experienced about one death per level after getting PFF. This thing really rulez. It also plays havoc in PVP as well. People will say stuff about it cutting of supremacy for your pets but I say the situation in which I need to use PFF are the situations where I'm pretty much trying to save my own as* and the pets are just meat shields at that point anyway. So if I'm in trouble... I hit PFF and Superspeed the heck out, recover, ask my minions to follow me get out of range of everything... heal up the pets that did not die on the way and re-summon the ones that did and then superspeed right back into battle.
9) At level 20 your a fool if you wait on taking dispersion bubble. It rulez. It provides defense against all nearly all types of status effects and damage as well except Psionic. It provides this protection to your entire group and your pets as well. Nuff said here.
10) People are gonna question my next choice. and again this is just from my experience but I have to tell you... If you gonna run replusion field your gonna need stamina. So here is where I take Hurdle, and Health just to get to Stamina. I know it seems like an aweful waste of power slots but I actually use hurdle because without a vertical power I need the extra jumping ability in the game to negotiated the terrain in certain zones. Along with SS it's a pretty good way to get from A to B.
10) After stamina I picked up Replusion Field. So many FFs go without this and their are many camps that don't like this power but I'm here to tell you that I know a lot of level 50 FF defenders and they all use it religiously. Slot it for endurance reduction 3 times and along with Stamina you can run the sucker all the time (or as much as you will ever need to). It knocks down foes and once you have haste slotted as well as a few recharge reductions on top of that slotted in the power you can use it at will to knock down everyone in the area. Then you can flash it back off to save on end and flash it back on when you need it. It plays havoc in PVE and PVP as well. I would suggest not slotting knock down... the given knock down is good enough. I really think why most FF build don't like this power is because they don't like to waste slots on stamina which is nearly a necessity if you want to use this power religiously. They also probably did not take hasten / Superspeed which is key to maximizing the usefulness of this power.
Here is my personal play style. This is a Repulsion field is an AOE self Toggle. So it eminates from your own person. If you took nearly any other travel power than superspeed... positioning yourself to use it correctly is just that much more difficult. Let me lay out the stragtegy for you. With fly or superjump you just cannot avoid being nailed on occasion using this power. But with SS slotted 3 times for speed with the added stelath component that SS comes with I almost never get smacked using repulsion. Basically I
a) locate a extremely impossibly dangerous group of mobs that could one shot me in a instant.
b) I flash in with superspeed (3 slotted) right into the center
c) I hit Replusion field and zoom the heck out. Everyone is on his [censored] and I'm totally safe and out of range before than can do anything.
I can keep zipping everywhere at lighting speed knocking down everyone while haveing my ninjas hack away at everything that is on it's butt and can't fight back. Add to that replusion bomb on your ninja pets, The occasional force bolt for those that don't get knocked down, insulation shield and deflection shield on your pets and Detention Field on that particularly hard to hit Boss / AV mob to take him out of the fight and your Ninja pets pretty much have their way with the enemy without much damage being taking. Problem is that to make this effective you need... Hasten, Superspeed, Stamina, Replusion Field and the liberal use of Replusion bomb as well as Force bubble. Any one of the powers missing takes a bit away from the over all effect of using them all together. They have synergy. The Idea in PVE is to create a situation where the enemy is not able to attack and when he does he misses due to your Force Fields. The Idea in PVP is to create general havoc and confusion and lots of detoggling of powers and knockdowns. While you Ninjas and team mates hack away at everyone. If you really want to piss people off you can slot your powers for additional knock down and it increases the level of your enemies frustration in PVP combat.
11) at level 26 ONI is your obvious power pick the at 28 and 30 I picked up Assualt and Tactics because I had a full horde of Ninja pets that could take advantage of it by then. Not to mention Assault and Tactics help your teammates as well. Leadership powers also stack with other people who have them.
However... you have to ponder... Assault, Tactics, Replusion field, Dispersion Bubble and of course later Force Bubble.. Your gonna resemble a Endurance Sink. That is why Stamina is necessary in this build.
12) At level 32 I decided to take KUJI and I think you will want not to really wait on this power because it give your jounin "Golden Dragon fly" A marvel to behold in action! Jounin also get Hide and blinding powder. The necessity of using Kuji on your oni will be situational. Char and Rain of Fire should be reserved for use again Large mob populations so you may want to not upgrade your Oni because you would prefer them to use Fire breath and Ring of fire and the Fire sword for more direct damage.
12) Level 35 and 38 were Replusion bomb and Force bubble for me. However depending on when you picked up your powerpools you may be forced to wait till later. Personally... Aid Self I think can wait.. but that is personal. Assualt and Tactics can wait for me... but you may feel differently. Either way with all the powers I mentioned you will be maxed out. I currenly do not have assault, tactics, or aid self since the respec cause I wanted all my secondary and primary powers earlier. I used to have them in a different order before respec. At 41 I have all the powers I want except those 3.
I have begun to ponder the need for Aid Self again... in favor of that really horrible power from before... Smoke flash. The reason for this is that I have enough endurance to use it now... and it make a good alpha strike power when you have ALL your pets. So... my level 28 it may be a possibility to reconsider it's effectivness. I need to test it on test server first before reporting on it's possible effectiveness at later levels.
I will follow up with a tactics guide a little later... Here is my current projected build.
Ninjas : Force Field : Mastermind
Lv Power Enh Enh Enh Enh Enh Enh
1 Call Genin Acc(1) Acc(3) Acc(3) Dmg(5) Dmg(5) Dmg(40)
1 Force Bolt Acc(1) Acc(13) Acc(45)
2 Deflection Shield DefBuf(2) DefBuf(7) DefBuf(7) EndRdx(46)
4 Insulation Shield DefBuf(4) DefBuf(9) DefBuf(11) EndRdx(46)
6 Hasten Rechg(6) Rechg(9) Rechg(11)
8 Train Ninjas Rechg(8)
10 Aid Other Heal(10) Heal(13) Heal(15) IntRdx(15) IntRdx(17)
12 Call Jounin Acc(12) Acc(17) Acc(19) Dmg(19) Dmg(21) Dmg(40)
14 Super Speed Run(14) Run(21) Run(23)
16 Hurdle Jump(16)
18 Health Heal(18)
20 Stamina EndMod (20) EndMod (23) EndMod (25)
22 Dispersion Bubble DefBuf(22) DefBuf(25) DefBuf(27) EndRdx(27) EndRdx(43)
24 Personal Force Field DefBuf(24) DefBuf(29) DefBuf(29) EndRdx(31) EndRdx(46)
26 Oni Acc(26) Acc(31) Acc(31) Dmg(33) Dmg(33) Dmg(43)
28 Repulsion Field EndRdx(28) EndRdx(33) EndRdx(34) Rechg(34) Rechg(37) KB_Dist(40)
30 Detention Field Acc(30) Acc(34) Acc(36)
32 Kuji In Zen Rechg(32)
35 Repulsion Bomb Acc(35) Acc(36) Acc(36) Rechg(37) DisDur(37)
38 Force Bubble EndRdx(38) EndRdx(39) EndRdx(39) Rechg(39)
41 Aid Self Heal(41) Heal(42) Heal(42) IntRdx(42) Rechg(43)
44 Assault EndRdx(44) EndRdx(45) EndRdx(45)
47 Tactics TH_Buf(47) TH_Buf(48) TH_Buf(48) EndRdx(48) EndRdx(50)
49 Resuscitate Rechg(49) Rechg(50) Rechg(50)
1 Sprint Empty(1)
1 Brawl Empty(1)
1 Supremacy Empty(1)
2 Rest Empty(2)
Note... I thought about add more slots to recharge in KUJI as well. Just have not figured out where to take stuff out.