I was the only one not to quit Sister Psyche's taskforce & only had my Empath controller. After dying too many times I quit & grabbed a scrapper buddy to go with me & showed him how to get the shivan temp power. Now I have that which has been used once & a warwolf whiste I have never used. Are they worse/better? But you are right. That shivan saved my but & might have helped me fight the EB. Least I would have something to use my empathy on.
I'll probably forget I have them again until I die a few times.
Oh and I found a spleen as salvage. Sold it on the black market for more than wings since their price drop. Dr. Vazisomething said he'd pay top influence for any more hero parts.
Besides, what could you do with one with only arrows? Roast it like a marshmallow? This guy had scalples & sutchers.
Your guide is just ducky! Best out there. Makes me want to make an archer.
*hands Luminara a grayish, spongy blob*
Here. Hro'Dhotz had this stuck under his foot. Comet pried it off after she dropped him last night. I was wondering what it was...
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With Snap, Aimed, Blazing and Fistful all slotted with 3 Damage SOs, and running Assault, it takes 10 seconds to defeat a +0 minion using Snap/Aimed/Snap/Blazing/Snap/Aimed/Snap, whereas it only takes 8 seconds to defeat the same minion using Aimed/Blazing/Aimed/Fistful.
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Where I usually find Snap Shot handy is to drop a foe who just has a sliver of life left. I'm usually on teams, and tend to tab around to different targets as my attacks are animating to see who is low on hit points and can be finished easily, returning to my original if I don't see any likely candidates. This avoids overkill by an unnecessarily slow/end intensive/high damage attack, and if I'm half way through A's hit points but can finish B with one shot and return to A it mitigates more damage faster.
But I tend to use "attack chains" less than many people, many CoX team fights are too dynamic for them to make sense to me. Against foes that will be standing awhile, resistant bosses, AVs, EBs, they start getting more important IMHO.
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Time.
With Snap, Aimed, Blazing and Fistful all slotted with 3 Damage SOs, and running Assault, it takes 10 seconds to defeat a +0 minion using Snap/Aimed/Snap/Blazing/Snap/Aimed/Snap, whereas it only takes 8 seconds to defeat the same minion using Aimed/Blazing/Aimed/Fistful.
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According to your numbers, Snap Shot is better DPS. That means that it does more damage over LESS time. So I don't agree.
I wouldn't use either of those attack chains. I start with the highest DPS attacks I have and only fit in the lower DPS attacks later to fill time between getting to fire off the high DPS ones again.
Edit: I'm not saying that you should use Snap Shot and Aimed Shot together. I'm saying you should use Snap Shot *instead* of Aimed Shot. And only IF you are going to use either of them at all.
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What it comes down to is the difference between sustained DPS and burst damage and how the two function in actual combat. Using Snap Shot forcibly changes all of your fights into sustained DPS fights, and sustained DPS is really wasted on minions and most lieutenants, those are "burst kills".
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Yeah, with respect to this I'd just say what I said above: I wouldn't use either of the chains you mention. If you want the highest burst damage you want to start with your highest DPS attacks first and only go to lower DPS attacks when nothing else is available.
Defender Stats from City of Data at Level 50
Snap Shot: 24.5dps
Aimed Shot: 21.64dps
Fistful of Arrows: 16.4dps [per target hit]
Blazing Arrow: 26.53dps [initial], 35.33dps [after DoT]
Exploding Arrow: 12.1dps [per target hit]
Ranged Shot: 59.73dps
Neglecting Rain of Arrows, for single-target max burst damage you want to prioritize attacks in this order: Ranged Shot, Blazing Arrow, Snap Shot, Aimed Shot, Fistful, Exploding Arrows. Your optimal attack chain for dropping the target the quickest will be to start at the top and keep going down until something higher up the list recharges.
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Time.
With Snap, Aimed, Blazing and Fistful all slotted with 3 Damage SOs, and running Assault, it takes 10 seconds to defeat a +0 minion using Snap/Aimed/Snap/Blazing/Snap/Aimed/Snap, whereas it only takes 8 seconds to defeat the same minion using Aimed/Blazing/Aimed/Fistful.
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According to your numbers, Snap Shot is better DPS. That means that it does more damage over LESS time.
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I've covered the issues with Snap Shot more than enough already. The DPS looks better on paper, it doesn't deliver in practice.
You've written a really great guide in general. It's just this one point that stood out for me. It's just still not at all clear why Aimed is any better Snap Shot. Did you deal with this in another thread somewhere that I missed? If it doesn't deliver in practice, well, I'm interested in knowing why.
Adding better DPS to the fact that you HAVE to take Snapped (as a defender) seems to make it a much better choice than Aimed. The biggest problem with using aimed to fill holes in your attack chain is that you're burning another power slot for that. If Aimed isn't better significantly better then why take it?
Again, I'm not saying use both at the same time. I'm saying use Snap instead of Aimed. Neither is that great for DPS and in practice Snapped seems to win just because I'm ready to shoot my big guns more often. The difference between firing off a Blazing Arrow or Ranged Shot .67s quicker can be a big difference when those are doing 2-3x the damage of Aimed Shot in the same amount of time.
I have been duo'ing an Archry\nrgy and a TA\A. Put the chance of disorient IO in Ranged on both and follow that up with ranged boosted Stun Arrows.
We take down bosses and they never even get to fire back. :-) Sometimes I will tp next to the stun'd boss and Bonesmasher & total focus to add a bit more disorient fun to the mix.
For an Archery/Energy blaster build, is there any real reason to take Power Boost? Your only ranged mez attack is Stunning Shot, and it seems overkill to take Power Boost just for that...
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A small update to the thread in general.
I got my first Shivan with Dancing Hawk last night.
At any rate, I'm pleased with the results of having finally gone to get a Shivan and used it to do some missions that would've been otherwise impossible for me. Other TA/As might have better luck due to different builds (Hover would probably make fighting EBs a lot easier, but i'm still adamant about not deviating from my concept, so no Hover for me), but in my experience, EBs were just that wall that TA/As hit and couldn't get over, under, around or go through. Shivans aren't nearly as difficult to acquire as some people think they are, not even for a silly TA/A with no travel power, and they make those impossible walls crumble.
Go make a green blobby friend. You won't regret it. Don't use it as a crutch, that's not going to help you be a "better" player or TA/A, but do use it to get through the rough parts of the games, like Elite Boss encounters, or when that nasty Council lieutenant turns into a boss warwolf (might as well be an AV as far as TA is concerned... rotten, nasty mutts).
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I ran with a team of all TA/* defenders a while ago on Freedom (most were TA/A's, but a few had other secondaries). Shivans really did come in handy in tough spots, taking aggro and helping the DPS.
Before that, I had run on a team of mostly warshades and Peacebringers (with a few trollers thrown in here and there), and we had to use shivans a lot more in the end game to help with AVs.
Those shivans are nice temp power to have, but don't get too used to them.
My Guide to the Hero-side Venomous badge
(622 Badges on my badge-guy)
number of lvl 50's: 24
number in the 40's: 3
[u]Galleryview[u]
I started one of these just recently after issue 10. I have tried before in the past but would always give up because of the anemic damage at the early levels. I have just come to the realization that I will just have to team to get anywhere with this defender TA/Arch. Now my other issue with this is the lack of damage mitigation I bring to the team. I just dont know what I will be doing to keep a team alive if Oil slick or EMP arrow are down. Every other defender set has something they can use 24/7 but in this set your best powers have hellish recharge times. I just dont see why it has to be so much harder. That poison gas arrow is teh suck because sleeps are worthless on teams and it only works on minions. I hear it has a -30% on damage but after level scaling it is more like -20%. And lastly why does acid arrow even have to have an accuracy check in pve. I think that is just flat out wrong considering all other defender resistance debuffs are either already auto hit or they hit multiple times when the power is cast in the case of storm summoning. Overall I just think this set should have went to blasters because I feel like I cant defend a team with this.
Bump and Grind Bane/SoA
Kenja No Ishi Earth/Empathy Controller
Legendary Sannin Ninja/Pain Mastermind
Entoxicated Ninja/PSN Mastermind
Ninja Ryukenden Kat/WP Scrapper
Hellish Thoughts Fire/PSI Dominator
Thank You Devs for Merits!!!!
I must say that playing a Gravity/Trick Arrow controller to 50 has been an absolute blast. I used this guide to decide which TA powers would be best suited for my character and in the end I took all but Flash Arrow. It's such an amazing set that pretty much all the powers have a relatively high value. Great guide!
<QR>
Silly question, but I want to be sure I'm understanding right before I spend 35 levels on a controller getting there (Although I *love* /TA. I've never zipped through the first ten levels on a controller so fast)
Does a lit OSA have a fear/terror component ala Burn? I'm playing around with a couple of concept characters (Ill/TA and Grav/TA), leaning toward Ill, but curious if Grav would tactically be more sound with the AoE immobilize and Wormhole both at their disposal ... Plus there's that pet fear bug to contend with with Phantom Army too.
It's just downright crazy how much control /TA brings. I used to think my Mind controller was the queen of ST control because of my 'busy' playstyle/approach to her, but these two leave her in the dust. I'm even considering Earth/TA at some point just to see if there's a point of redundancy on control options. 
Anyway, excellent guide Luminara!
Thanks for the guide, its helping lots with my defender Pin Needle on freedom.
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Does a lit OSA have a fear/terror component ala Burn?
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Pretty sure it does.
Tossing an oil slick out and mobs will either start closing (trying) with you..or stand (try) and fire their ranged attacks.
Light it up and the groups movement will start becoming pretty disjointed...they definitely are trying to get out of it.
I say trying..because with the slow component and the knockdown...most mobs arent going much of anywhere.
Mobs that resist slow or knockdowns can escape, but little else.
Least thats been my experience with it.
A small update to the thread in general.
), I decided to continue on and start the Gaussian story arc tonight.
I got my first Shivan with Dancing Hawk last night. It's something I've never even attempted with Dancing Hawk before, simply because of a lack of interest. I'm one of "those people" who rarely use inspirations and almost never use temp powers. I always think there's going to be a time when I'll "need" them, so I try to save them for those times, and those times never seem to come. I always look for a way to accomplish things strictly through the "regular" powers.
But I hit a wall on the Serpent Drummer arc. The last mission has an Elite Boss, and I've never been able to defeat an Elite Boss as a TA/A. Except Alexander, or whatever that Warriors EB is named. Even he killed me once before I finished that fight. Every other EB in the game has absolutely murdered my TA/A, I had no chance against them.
After three attempts at this particular Elite Boss, I gave up in frustration. He destroyed Fusionette in seconds, and the Rikti fellow that was helping me didn't last much longer. Faultline was the only one to survive any of the attempts, and I think he lived mostly because he kept turning himself into a giant rock and pretending to be part of the cavern. Coward. *shakes fist*
I was about to give up on doing the RWZ story arcs as a TA/A (my original goal was to do them with my Archery/Energy blaster, Sand Wasp, but the grind from 38 to 40 was getting sooooooooooooo tedious that i just had to stop before i went mad. so i decided to run the story arcs with Dancing Hawk instead), but then I remembered the Shivans. I've read about how powerful they are, but I was really just hoping it could divert attention and tank for a bit while I and the three mission pets did the work of defeating the EB. So off to Bloody Bay I went!
I have to say, getting a Shivan as a travel power-less TA/A was shockingly easy. The turrets are resistant to Lethal damage, but they're not actually any different from fighting Crey Riot Cops, except that they don't chase you and bonk you on the head with nightsticks, or drop your toggles. I'm not a big fan of bonking and toggle-dropping, so I didn't mind these turrets at all. I attacked each of the outside turrets, brought them down to one attack's worth of health, then did the same to the inner turrets. Then another circuit to finish them all off, into the bunker to use the computer, and I was done.
Getting the meteor fragments was even easier, despite not having a travel power. Two Shivans hit me, the rest never even tried or didn't have time to attack before I was out of range (though, i did have a Stealth IO active, so that lovely thing might've just been doing what it was designed to do and keeping my pretty Cherokee bottom from being leered at by giant green glob monsters). Hurdling around the zone was, admittedly, slower than I liked, but since I was leveled down to 25, not actually slower than I expected and, in truth, still about as fast as flying.
I also acquired my 292nd badge for Dancing Hawk, Gunner. I've only ever farmed one badge, Illusionist, so I consider 292 to be another significant accomplishment for me. Rush_Bolt or Trickshooter probably have more, but I'm still pleased by this and hoping to hit 300 soon(ish).
I've seen some complaints about how hard it is to get Shivans. Let this be your assurance that you can ignore those complaints. Laugh at those complaints. A travel power-less TA/A did it, easily, there's no reason any other build in the game can't do it. And there's no reason why you can't.
Once I had the much vaunted Shivan, I made my way back to the mission in the RWZ. I summoned the Shivan right at the Elite Boss' feet, then moved forward far enough for the three mission pets to aggro, and the fight was on! Everything went pretty smoothly this time. The Shivan kept aggro off of me, but the Elite Boss called for reinforcements and I had to start hopping and getting out of sight to heal myself (i used the I9 freespec to get the Medicine pool back. not because i needed it, but because i want to work on my healing badges (already had Medic, halfway to the second one, might as well keep going!)). Instead of changing focus and trying to defeat the waves, I just worked on keeping myself alive and defeating the Elite Boss.
And down he went. My first solo Elite Boss defeat as a TA/A. Even if I had to use a Shivan to do it, it was still a great feeling.
Of course, with great victory comes great owieness. The last wave spawned a Rikti Heavy, Elite Boss rank. My Shivan was stuck in the terrain, Fusionette had gotten herself killed (again...) and Faultline was still pretending to be part of the cavern. The nice Rikti person who I'd saved earlier leaped to my defense, but the eleventy billion Rikti from the waves swarmed him while the Heavy blasted my spleen across the room.
By the way, if anyone finds a spleen, it's mine. And I do want it back.
Flush with the feeling of success, even though I died after the mission was complete (and that was a disappointment... i wanted to beat that Heavy so i could start progress on another badge.
First, those Vanguard can be brutal if you're not careful. I went into the first mission in full "EYE AAR ARCHERY/TRIK ARO BALSTAR LOL" mode and promptly got a swift kick to the hospital for my temerity.
Yes, I asked, my spleen isn't at the hospital.
When I got back, I wised up and started using my primary instead of trying to blast my way through. From that point on, it was business as usual for any average spirit of the Cherokee people who happens to be trained in the ways of the shaman and the hunter. Glue, PGA, Acid, lots of sharp, pointy sticks, next spawn.
Be warned, the Vanguard and Longbow are acting a little... odd with TA. Sometimes they're aggroing at the beginning of the Glue Arrow animation, which they shouldn't be doing. They're also not displaying the choking animation caused by PGA's sleep, so if you're relying on that, give yourself a few seconds to see which ones are just standing still, those are the ones that are supposed to be choking. Using any power after PGA seems to trigger the choking animation, so if you follow it up with, say, Flash or Entangling, you'll see it. I've already sent a bug report with the details to _Castle_.
It was in the fourth mission that I almost stopped and logged out. Another Elite Boss, and this one has been causing a lot of roaring and wailing on the forums for the last few weeks. The instant I saw him, the only thing I could think of was to give up, because he's reported to be almost impossible to defeat. It's said to be a bug in the downscaling from AV to EB that causes the EB to be, literally, an AV that's just labeled as an EB. At least, that's what I've been able to gather from the posts.
Being a TA/A, I was very seriously considering just stopping there and not trying to finish the story arc. As I've said, my history with Elite Bosses has been very bad, and I really wasn't feeling terribly excited about making several futile attempts to beat him. As much as I want to prove that TA/A can "cut the mustard", there's a limit to how far I'm willing to go, and fighting Elite Bosses is one of those things that reaches that limit. It's frustrating and, until recently, very unrewarding.
Then I noticed that little Shivan sitting in my power tray. I'd already forgotten that it was there, despite having gotten it just 24 hours earlier. Tells you how often I use my temp powers. >.<
I figured it was worth a shot. If the Elite Boss turned out to be impossible to beat, I could show off my 3-slotted Hurdle and 5-slotted Sprint while he was eating my Shivan. If my Shivan didn't lose half his HP bar in the first few seconds, then I'd stay and give this fight my best shot.
It seems I got lucky, though, and my Elite Boss wasn't buggy. His first hit on my Shivan barely scratched the big green boy, so out came the bow and away went the arrows. Despite my Shivan being knocked back frequently and sometimes far enough to take several seconds to get back to the EB, I never pulled aggro. The fight ended so flawlessly that I barely even got to heal my Shivan twice with Aid Other. That was actually the biggest letdown, I was counting on him taking more damage so I could make more progress on my second healing badge. -_-
At any rate, I'm pleased with the results of having finally gone to get a Shivan and used it to do some missions that would've been otherwise impossible for me. Other TA/As might have better luck due to different builds (Hover would probably make fighting EBs a lot easier, but i'm still adamant about not deviating from my concept, so no Hover for me), but in my experience, EBs were just that wall that TA/As hit and couldn't get over, under, around or go through. Shivans aren't nearly as difficult to acquire as some people think they are, not even for a silly TA/A with no travel power, and they make those impossible walls crumble.
Go make a green blobby friend. You won't regret it. Don't use it as a crutch, that's not going to help you be a "better" player or TA/A, but do use it to get through the rough parts of the games, like Elite Boss encounters, or when that nasty Council lieutenant turns into a boss warwolf (might as well be an AV as far as TA is concerned... rotten, nasty mutts).
Oh, and there's a 500 influence reward for my spleen. Payment will be made upon delivery.