Levels 1 through 19: Getting Past Being Squishy
Regen scrappers are, initially, rather squishy. The 75% base healing rate on Fast Healing is almost purely a downtime reducer; you won't really notice the benefit during fights. Consequently, you want to end fights as quickly as possible.
You have a choice of two initial attacks: Sting of the Wasp (SotW) and Gambler's Cut (GC). Which you prefer will likely depend on your playstyle. SotW does decent damage and recharges quickly. GC has a very fast activation time and recharge, but doesn't do much damage; since it is spammable, though, it's useful for bringing down a target's defense. If you are impatient, GC will give you a button to hit more often; you can spam it between every other attack, and it does good damage for its activation time. (This build assumes SotW, but for slotting purposes, GC can be treated as interchangeable, though likely eventually with four slots rather than six, as GC does not really need the benefit of recharge reduction.)
At level 2, take Flashing Steel (FS), which is a wide, shallow cone attack that does somewhat less damage than SotW, and recharges at a similar rate. You will use it throughout your career. Learn, early on, how to position yourself so your enemies line up within the arc of the cone; you can easily hit three, and can sometimes hit more, at the same time.
The default slot in both SotW and FS should be accuracy; although both attacks have a +5% chance to hit, you will still want an accuracy enhancement.
You will use Brawl as a filler attack in these early levels, although you won't slot it, of course. For katana, Brawl is a stylish pummel smash; it doesn't require redrawing your weapon.
At level 3, put a damage slot in SotW and FS. Don't bother to slot Fast Healing in these early levels; it's not worthwhile.
At level 4, take Reconstruction. This effectively gives you the equivalent of a free Respite inspiration every 60 seconds, and it will get more and more useful as it gets slotted out. This is a cornerstone power of the set. You're going to use it throughout your career to recover from heavy hits from a boss, and from alpha strikes, and from situations where pure regen just isn't cutting it.
At level 5, put a damage slot into SotW and FS. Do your Safeguard mission so you can get the Raptor Pack to fly.
At level 6, take Hasten, and put two slots into it at level 7. Hasten will let you spam attacks more quickly. The less time it takes for you to do a lot of damage, the less damage you'll take from your enemies, and the less downtime you will incur. Slotting Hasten over slotting your attacks is preferable at this point because the Training enhancements aren't boosting your damage as much as faster attacking does, plus faster recharge on Reconstruction is always good.
At level 8, take Divine Avalanche. This is a quick-recharging attack that does modest damage, but its real value is that it gives you a 20% melee defense buff. With Hasten, you can use Divine Avalanche in between each attack, if you want; this will allow you to stack two DAs, making the defense buff 40%. Don't think of DA as an attack. Think of it as a click defense power that happens to do a little bit of damage. It's incredibly useful against bosses, and, indeed, in any situation where you really want more defense. Its default slot should be accuracy.
At level 9, you have a choice. I would recommend putting two more slots into Hasten and then doing a respec trial when you hit level 24, allowing you to enjoy having Hasten up more often before you get SOs and hit the ED caps. If you choose not to do this, slot your attacks for damage.
At level 10, take Build Up, and make its default slot a recharge. Build Up has a base recharge time of 90 seconds, and lasts for about 10 seconds -- long enough for an attack chain. You'll want to use it to start fights whenever possible.
Also at level 10, do your Safeguard mission so you can get the Zero-G Pack to superjump. Since your travel power is going to be SuperSpeed, you'll want to conserve the Raptor Pack and Zero-G Pack (or hope you can later purchase equivalents in the PvP zone Siren's Call), for those times you need vertical movement.
At level 11, put two slots into Reconstruction. If you're teaming, you'll probably want those slots to be heals; you're likely to take bigger bursts of damage and you can't count on low-level defenders or controllers for timely sizeable heals, so you'll want to be able to take care of your own health. If you're soloing, you may find that recharges are more useful, as this will be more downtime reduction and save-my-bacon usage.
At level 12, take Quick Recovery. This is in preparation for the toggles you'll pick up in the next several levels, and the fact that, now that you can have Dual Origin enhancements, you can have Hasten up for a good bit of the time, which will allow you to whittle through your endurance bar somewhat more quickly, especially if you're spamming DA between regular attacks.
At level 13, put damage slots into SotW and FS. You now have a very respectable damage output -- you won't need to slot these attacks again until convenient, much later in your bulid. (You don't have to slot QR the level after you get it; you need the damage now, more than you need the endurance.) Note that even if you chose to slot damage into these attacks rather than slotting Hasten at level 9, you'll still want to do this; with DOs, you'll still get the benefit of four slots of damage, and once you get SOs, you can turn one of those slots into a recharge.
At level 14, you get your travel power -- SuperSpeed. (If you don't want SuperSpeed, see the "Taking an Alternative Travel Power" for the build variant that allows you to take your choice of travel power.) If you plan to use SuperSpeed in combat, you may want to consider making the default slot an endurance reduction instead of a run speed increase. (Even though the speed is nerfed in combat, it can be convenient to just leave the toggle on.)
At level 15, put two slots into Quick Recovery.
At level 16, you pick up Integration, and life is suddenly good. You're getting a base healing rate of 150% from it, and while you're not uber, you should be able to survive soloing quite nicely, and be on par with other scrappers for team survival. Integration is also fantastic status protection -- it will prevent you from being knocked back, and has a very high-magnitude protection from mez effects (multiple high-magnitude effects have to be stacked on you before they'll go through Integration). Turn it on when you log on, and never turn it off.
Your initial slot in Integration can be an endurance reduction or a heal. The toggle cost is relatively inexpensive (it's cheaper than SuperSpeed), but it never hurts to conserve endurance.
At level 17, put two heal slots into Integration.
At level 18, pick up Dull Pain. It boosts your hit points by 40%, which has the side effect of boosting the number of HP you regen each second, too. Slot it with one recharge for now. You are not counting on it for healing; it's there to reduce the likelihood that you'll get one-shot. (By the way, while it might look like your hit points drop momentarily and then are healed when you activate Dull Pain, this isn't actually the case. What happens is that the game first increases your max HP, which makes the percentage of your HP bar that is full look lower. Then, it boosts your HP, which fills the bar back up. Thus, you see a "bounce" effect on your HP bar, but your HP is only going up, never down.)
At level 19, put a recharge slot in Dull Pain. If you don't already have three heals in Integration (i.e., you have an endurance reduction slotted), put another heal slot in it; otherwise, add one more recharge slot to Dull Pain. At the moment, recharges are more valuable than heals in Dull Pain, because there's nothing at this level really hits you that hard, and having it up more often is preferable to really big hit point boosts.
Your build now looks something like like this:
Level 1: Sting of the Wasp -- Acc(A), Dmg(3), Dmg(5), Dmg(13)
Level 1: Fast Healing -- Heal(A)
Level 2: Flashing Steel -- Acc(A), Dmg(3), Dmg(5), Dmg(13)
Level 4: Reconstruction -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(11), RechRdx(11)
Level 6: Hasten -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(7), RechRdx(7), RechRdx(9), RechRdx(9)
Level 8: Divine Avalanche -- Acc(A)
Level 10: Build Up -- RechRdx(A)
Level 12: Quick Recovery -- EndMod(A), EndMod(15), EndMod(15)
Level 14: Super Speed -- Run(A)
Level 16: Integration -- EndRdx(A), Heal(17), Heal(17), Heal(19)
Level 18: Dull Pain -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(19)
Taking an Alternative Travel Power
If you don't want SuperSpeed as your travel power, you'll need to alter this early build somewhat.
At level 8, take Divine Avalanche.
At level 10, take your travel power prerequisite (Combat Jumping, Hover, or Recall Friend).
At level 14, take your travel power rather than SuperSpeed.
You'll take Build Up at level 30 instead. This is the power most easily sacrificed, because its recharge rate is slow enough, without recharge SOs and frequently-up Hasten, that its contribution to your damage output is modest during these earlier levels. (This will leave you with spare slots at level 23, which I would suggest should go into recharge slots on your two primary attacks.)
Alternatively, you can take Build Up at 20, but this means pushing off Stamina until level 30. This is doable if you manage your endurance when Hasten is up. (When Hasten isn't running, you shouldn't have endurance problems.)
Levels 20 through 24: Getting to the Respec
If you put an extra 2 slots into Hasten at level 9, you will want to respec out of them once you can get SOs; the earliest you can run the respec trial is level 24.
Adding to the argument for a respec at 24 is the fact that this will let you pick up Stamina at that point, without sitting around with the two prerequisite Fitness pool powers doing nothing for you for four levels.
Therefore, if you're going this respec route, you should take powers that help you level. I suggest taking The Lotus Drops (slot accuracy), Stealth (slot endurance reduction), and Resilience (slot resist). If you feel like you want more damage output, take TLD first; if you want to complete missions quickly by stealthing to the objective, take Stealth first.
At level 21, slot Dull Pain (recharge) and Reconstruction (heal), in the anticipation of greater amounts of burst damage in your 20s.
At level 23, put two recharges into Build Up. With SOs, the three slots of recharge will give you 10 seconds of it being up, and 35 seconds of it being down; with Hasten, it will be up even more frequently. Unless there's a particular tactical reason not to, you should simply hit Build Up every time it recharges, maximizing your damage output.
Levels 20 through 24: The Real Build
When you respec at 24, the two slots you've taken out of Hasten are freed up to go to something else. I'd suggest SotW and Flashing Steel -- a recharge in each. This will speed up the base recharge of each attack when Hasten isn't up.
Now, you're free to take the Fitness pool all at once: Swift at 20, Health at 22, and Stamina at 24. (This does mean sacrificing the three powers you picked up pre-respec, but you got a couple of levels of utility out of them that you wouldn't have gotten otherwise.)
This is what the post-respec build looks like at 24:
Level 1: Sting of the Wasp -- Acc(A), Dmg(3), Dmg(5), Dmg(9), RechRdx(13)
Level 1: Fast Healing -- Heal(A)
Level 2: Flashing Steel -- Acc(A), Dmg(3), Dmg(5), Dmg(9), RechRdx(13)
Level 4: Reconstruction -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(11), RechRdx(11), Heal(21)
Level 6: Hasten -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(7), RechRdx(7)
Level 8: Divine Avalanche -- Acc(A)
Level 10: Build Up -- RechRdx(A)
Level 12: Quick Recovery -- EndMod(A), EndMod(15), EndMod(15)
Level 14: Super Speed -- Run(A)
Level 16: Integration -- EndRdx(A), Heal(17), Heal(17), Heal(19)
Level 18: Dull Pain -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(19), RechRdx(21)
Level 20: Swift -- Run(A)
Level 22: Health -- Heal(A)
Level 24: Stamina -- EndMod(A)
Levels 25 through 34: Finishing the Basic Build
Your build should be shaping up pretty solidly at this point, and your 20s should be smooth cruising. You can probably crank up your mission difficulty level when soloing, and Integration's regeneration will still cover you nicely, with the occasional judicious use of Reconstruction.
At level 25, you should put two slots into Stamina. In the next couple of levels you are going to be picking up some expensive attacks, and you'll need the endurance to support them.
At level 26, take Soaring Dragon (SD). It is a high-damage, single-target attack that has a very high likelihood of doing knock-up. A target that is flat on its back is not hitting you, so once you get SD, it becomes much easier to fight bosses. Make the default slot an endurance reduction. Why endurance reduction? Because SD is an expensive attack that you will use very frequently in your attack chain. When you are low on endurance because something's drained you, you don't want to be denied the ability to use this power because you don't have enough endurance; one endurance reduction makes it only marginally more expensive than SotW or FS.
At level 27, put two slots into SD. You'll probably want them to be accuracy and damage. (If you have Influence to spare, this is a good time to frankenslot with level 30 dual or triple-set IOs; damage, recharge, endurance, and accuracy are all useful to have in the combination, in that order of priority.)
At level 28, you receive a new panic button in the form of Instant Healing. Instant Healing gets you 800% regeneration for 90 seconds, but it has a pathetic recharge (slotted with a single recharge SO, you'll have about six and a half minutes between uptimes). This is your boss fight button and your "crud, pulled two groups" button.
At level 29, put two damage slots into SD.
Level 30 is a filler power. Stealth is one possibility, if that's your style of play. If you took a travel power other than SuperSpeed, this is the level to take Build Up. Otherwise, another attack is always handy; take The Lotus Drops, a PBAoE attack that does solid damage, but it has a slow recharge, high endurance cost, and cast time that's twice that of your other attacks. TLD is most efficient when you're surrounded by mobs, which is handy in big teams, but less useful when solo. It needs slots to be effective, and you can't give it slots at this point in time in your build, but it's okay filler for the moment.
At level 31, put a recharge slot into SD (which finishes slotting it out). Put the other two slots into recharges for Instant Healing. (Your need to have this frequently up is less than your need to kill things more quickly, thus slotting SD takes priority, which is why it got the slots at 29 rather than IH.)
At level 32, get Golden Dragonfly (GD). This attack does terrific damage right from the start, and although its recharge time is the longest of your attacks, it will still be a regular part of your attack chain. It is essentially a straight-line, very narrow cone attack, that will hit one target and has the possibility of hitting any targets that are directly behind it. It has a higher critical hit chance than the other attacks, and it sometimes does knockdown. It eats a significant amount of endurance -- basically double that of your basic attacks. The first slot in it should be endurance reduction.
At level 33, put three slots into GD (one accuracy and two damages). Much like SD, this is a good power to frankenslot with IOs if you can afford it.
at level 34, put two slots into GD (one damage and one recharge). The remaining slot could go to any number of things. Dull Pain (heal) is a good choice since it's up for two minutes and down for one, thus allowing you to maintain higher hit points and therefore regen, a significant percentage of the time. However, slotting Reconstruction (heal) instead may be attractive if you prefer to just smack it to heal rather than trying to figure out when you want Dull Pain up.
Your build now looks like this:
Level 1: Sting of the Wasp -- Acc(A), Dmg(3), Dmg(5), Dmg(9), RechRdx(13)
Level 1: Fast Healing -- Heal(A)
Level 2: Flashing Steel -- Acc(A), Dmg(3), Dmg(5), Dmg(9), RechRdx(13)
Level 4: Reconstruction -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(11), RechRdx(11), Heal(21)
Level 6: Hasten -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(7), RechRdx(7)
Level 8: Divine Avalanche -- Acc(A)
Level 10: Build Up -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(23), RechRdx(23)
Level 12: Quick Recovery -- EndMod(A), EndMod(15), EndMod(15)
Level 14: Super Speed -- Run(A)
Level 16: Integration -- EndRdx(A), Heal(17), Heal(17), Heal(19)
Level 18: Dull Pain -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(19), RechRdx(21), Heal(34)
Level 20: Swift -- Run(A)
Level 22: Health -- Heal(A)
Level 24: Stamina -- EndMod(A), EndMod(25), EndMod(25)
Level 26: Soaring Dragon -- EndRdx(A), Acc(27), Dmg(27), Dmg(29), Dmg(29), RechRdx(31)
Level 28: Instant Healing -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(31), RechRdx(31)
Level 30: The Lotus Drops -- Acc(A)
Level 32: Golden Dragonfly -- EndRdx(A), Acc(33), Dmg(33), Dmg(33), Dmg(34), RechRdx(34)
Levels 35 through 40: Decisions, Decisions
At this point, you're pretty much set -- you've got decent regeneration and heals and should be dealing good damage.
Your key decision at this point is Fighting pool or no Fighting pool. You do not need it to survive, but having it will make it easier to do missions on higher levels of difficulty. The question is going to be whether or not you actually kill higher-con things quickly enough to make the XP rate greater than if you had your difficulty set lower.
Fighting Pool, for SuperSpeeders
Respec at 35 to drop whatever power you took at 30, and pick up Boxing or Kick instead; both of those powers are completely useless to you, unfortunately.
Then, at 35, pick up Tough, and put an endurance reduction into it. Put three slots of resist into it at level 36.
At level 37, finish slotting out Dull Pain with heals, and put an additional heal into Reconstruction.
At level 38, take Weave, put an endurance reduction into it, and put three slots of defense into it at level 39.
At level 40, finish slotting out Reconstruction with a heal. Put a recharge into SotW and FS, which finishes slotting those out.
This build looks like this:
Level 1: Sting of the Wasp -- Acc(A), Dmg(3), Dmg(5), Dmg(9), RechRdx(13), RechRdx(40)
Level 1: Fast Healing -- Heal(A)
Level 2: Flashing Steel -- Acc(A), Dmg(3), Dmg(5), Dmg(9), RechRdx(13), RechRdx(40)
Level 4: Reconstruction -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(11), RechRdx(11), Heal(21), Heal(37), Heal(40)
Level 6: Hasten -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(7), RechRdx(7)
Level 8: Divine Avalanche -- Acc(A)
Level 10: Build Up -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(23), RechRdx(23)
Level 12: Quick Recovery -- EndMod(A), EndMod(15), EndMod(15)
Level 14: Super Speed -- Run(A)
Level 16: Integration -- EndRdx(A), Heal(17), Heal(17), Heal(19)
Level 18: Dull Pain -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(19), RechRdx(21), Heal(34), Heal(37), Heal(37)
Level 20: Swift -- Run(A)
Level 22: Health -- Heal(A)
Level 24: Stamina -- EndMod(A), EndMod(25), EndMod(25)
Level 26: Soaring Dragon -- EndRdx(A), Acc(27), Dmg(27), Dmg(29), Dmg(29), RechRdx(31)
Level 28: Instant Healing -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(31), RechRdx(31)
Level 30: Boxing -- Dsrnt(A)
Level 32: Golden Dragonfly -- EndRdx(A), Acc(33), Dmg(33), Dmg(33), Dmg(34), RechRdx(34)
Level 35: Tough -- EndRdx(A), ResDam(36), ResDam(36), ResDam(36)
Level 38: Weave -- EndRdx(A), DefBuff(39), DefBuff(39), DefBuff(39)
Fighting Pool, for non-SuperSpeeders
At level 35, take Resilience.
At level 36, put two recharges into Build Up, and a heal into Dull Pain.
At level 37, finish slotting out Dull Pain and Reconstruction with heals.
At level 38, take some temporarily useful power (like Stealth, or Moment of Glory), and run a respec. For your respec, you'll:
- Take Boxing or Kick at level 35.
- Slot two recharges into Build Up at level 36, and a heal into Dull Pain.
- Finish slotting out Dull Pain and Reconstruction with heals at level 37.
- Take Tough at 38.
At level 39, put three resists into Tough.
At level 40, either three-slot Instant Healing with heals, or three-slot Divine Avalanche with defense, depending on your playstyle and needs. (Whichever one you don't take, you'll slot out at level 43).
At level 41, take Weave, put an endurance reduction into it, and put three slots of defense into it at level 42.
No Fighting Pool
If you decide not to go with the Fighting pool, you can opt to maximize your damage output first, or maximize your defenses, or a mixture of both, as suits your tastes.
You'll probably want a bit of extra toughness, so you should pick up Resilience at 35. You could consider a useful alternative like Stealth, as well, or any other power that catches your fancy.
For levels 36 and 37, a good choice is slotting out SotW and FS with recharges (or putting two recharges into Build Up, if you took a non-SuperSpeed travel power). putting a defense into Divine Avalanche, slotting out Dull Pain with two heals, and putting one more heal slot into Reconstruction.
At level 38, take Moment of Glory (MoG), and make its default slot a recharge. This is your out-of-endurance panic button, for those times when Malta Sappers or Carnie mistresses (mask of vitiation) kill your endurance bar, thus causing your toggles to drop; it will hopefully buy you enough time to deal with the problem. It's also a reasonable power for surviving something you expect to hurt, like an alpha strike. It's also handy for letting your regen catch up with massive damage, such as in a situation where Reconstruction hasn't recharged, you're out of greens, and you're continuing to take damage. While it's not necessary, and you can skip it if there's something else you want, it's one more click in your anti-dying arsenal.
At level 39, put three slots into The Lotus Drops.
At level 40, put two slots into The Lotus Drops, and finish slotting out Reconstruction with a heal.
This build looks like this:
Level 1: Sting of the Wasp -- Acc(A), Dmg(3), Dmg(5), Dmg(9), RechRdx(13), RechRdx(36)
Level 1: Fast Healing -- Heal(A)
Level 2: Flashing Steel -- Acc(A), Dmg(3), Dmg(5), Dmg(9), RechRdx(13), RechRdx(36)
Level 4: Reconstruction -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(11), RechRdx(11), Heal(21), Heal(37), Heal(40)
Level 6: Hasten -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(7), RechRdx(7)
Level 8: Divine Avalanche -- Acc(A), DefBuff(36)
Level 10: Build Up -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(23), RechRdx(23)
Level 12: Quick Recovery -- EndMod(A), EndMod(15), EndMod(15)
Level 14: Super Speed -- Run(A)
Level 16: Integration -- EndRdx(A), Heal(17), Heal(17), Heal(19)
Level 18: Dull Pain -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(19), RechRdx(21), Heal(34), Heal(37), Heal(37)
Level 20: Swift -- Run(A)
Level 22: Health -- Heal(A)
Level 24: Stamina -- EndMod(A), EndMod(25), EndMod(25)
Level 26: Soaring Dragon -- EndRdx(A), Acc(27), Dmg(27), Dmg(29), Dmg(29), RechRdx(31)
Level 28: Instant Healing -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(31), RechRdx(31)
Level 30: The Lotus Drops -- EndRdx(A), Acc(39), Dmg(39), Dmg(39), Dmg(40), RechRdx(40)
Level 32: Golden Dragonfly -- EndRdx(A), Acc(33), Dmg(33), Dmg(33), Dmg(34), RechRdx(34)
Level 35: Resilience -- ResDam(A)
Level 38: Moment of Glory -- RechRdx(A)
Playing the Build in Your 30s
The 30s will cruise by pretty quickly. Your tactics are mostly comprised of where to stand and what to hit (situational awareness is important, by the way, since you want to keep track of who's in trouble and go to assist if necessary). While some people favor setting up a smooth attack chain that maximizes DPS, I believe that you will find that it is actually much safer to decide what attack to use based on the situation at the moment. For instance, there are foes that you will want to keep knocked down as much as possible, and have a Divine Avalanche defense buff in effect when they're about to hit you. Enjoy the straightforward gameplay, because this is about as relaxed as the game gets.
You are unlikely to really feel like you need the Fighting pool in your 30s. Consequently, you might want to consider taking the non-Fighting option, then doing a respec at 39 or later into a Fighting build, giving you the greater resiliency for your 40s while giving you more damage output in your 30s.
Levels 41 through 50: A World of Options and Pain
The 40+ game is dramatically different from the 30-39 game. There are a number of new and nasty villain groups, and there are a lot of archvillains (AVs). Increasingly, you will find yourself teaming up to take on AV missions. You'll be fighting things that take forever to kill and can dish out incredible amounts of damage. You will find that you end up dying far more often than you ever did in the earlier levels of the game.
However, a lot of missions are still going to be pretty straightforward for you, when you're solo, even with the difficulty level cranked up. If you've gone with a Fighting build, you should have no problem surviving most things that are thrown at you; just don't go into "scrapperlock" and forget to watch your health bar.
Your choice of epic power pool is up to you, but I highly recommend Body Mastery. Pick up Focused Accuracy at level 41, and make its default slot endurance reduction, because it drinks endurance. Unless you've slotted some endurance reduction in your attacks, you probably won't be able to run FA all the time until you get some more endurance reduction into it, which you should do promptly at 42 (two more endurance reductions plus a to-hit buff will round this out nicely).
You'll also find that Conserve Power is useful, slotted with a total of three recharges. You will be doing some very long beat-downs of ArchVillains, and if nobody on your team can buff endurance recovery, you may find that you're going to gradually eat through your bar, especially if you're running a lot of toggles.
From 45 onwards, ArchVillains are going to be a staple of your life. If you are taking the Fighting pool, have it slotted up by 45; Tough will help reduce the likelihood that you get one-shotted, and Weave will help increase your survivability overall.
This is also a good time to slot some defense buffs into Divine Avalanche. This will solidly protect you from melee attacks, especially when stacked, but it is useless against ranged and AoE attacks. That means that the boss probably won't hit you, but the miscellaneous minion and LT AoEs being flung at the tank, whom you're likely next to, are likely to still hurt. Ditto the alpha strikes from Nemesis soldiers in formation, and the like. DA is the most economical way to get defense in terms of slots, at the cost of limiting what situations it's useful in. It will be more effective solo than teamed, in most instances, due to the percentage of melee-vs-other damage.
The last couple of power choices are really going to be whatever you feel rounds out your build.
Resilience is a good choice, even if you have Tough, if you want to be as sturdy as possible.
Stealth can be handy, even in its nerfed form; in combination with SuperSpeed, it renders you fairly close to invisible. This allows you to scout missions, click glowies with a low probability of being noticed, and avoid drawing a villain's attention when it's choosing which team member to attack. (Just remember that if you're teamed with squishies and don't have a tank, you should make sure to turn the toggle off so that the mobs go after you rather than the squishies.)
Calling the Wolf, which is a single-target auto-hit taunt, is sometimes useful for pulling aggro off squishy teammates. You'll probably find this most useful if you tend to duo or trio with squishies.
Teleport Foe can be sometimes useful for administering a beatdown when there are simply too many things in a room to deal with (you'll find this more useful in your 40s).
Enhancement Diversification pretty much guarantees that you'll spread your slots out in an increasingly useless manner. You will probably eventually want to slot out Instant Healing with three heals, finish slotting out Divine Avalanche (one accuracy, three defenses, two damage), get three resists into Resilience (if you took it), and possibly get three to-hit buffs into Focused Accuracy (enabling you to hit +6 mobs with reasonable ease). But you probably won't feel like these last couple of slots make a noticeable difference.
All in all, your 40s, while significantly harder than the 30s and definitely no cakewalk, are still going to go by pretty smoothly. Leveling speed in the 40s is considerably slower than at any other point in the game, and many people resort to bridging for power-levelers during the mid-40s. However, with this build, you won't have any trouble breezing through just about all of your own missions; most of the game's best storylines arguably come at this point.
General Combat Tips
Katana does lethal damage, and a significant number of things, notably robots, are resistant to lethal damage. Armored villains, such as Crey tanks and Rikti Chiefs of various sorts, also have some resistance to lethal damage. However, for the most part, villain resistance to lethal merely means that it takes you longer to kill something. If you want to eliminate sources of incoming damage as quickly as possible, though, it may be worthwhile to go after the non-resistant foes in front of you first.
You will do the most damage if you move around slightly during combat, positioning yourself so that Flashing Steel catches multiple villains in its arc, and, if possible, that Golden Dragonfly has at least two targets in its line-up. Since the game auto-corrects your position when you attack, though, you may find that what you thought was a perfect set-up turns out not to be so, especially if you're experiencing any lag.
Moving around also helps mitigate incoming damage. Your foes will tend to want to move when you do, which means that it takes them a moment to adjust and then attack. That's a little extra regen time for you, and the chance to get in a killing blow before they can hit you.
If you don't have SuperSpeed (SS), Sprint plus Swift will get you around a fight with sufficient rapidity (and you may not even need Sprint on). If you do have SS, it's not necessary to keep it running during combat. Indeed, you will find that you can make small position changes more accurately without it. Furthermore, even if you have it on, your run speed is suppressed for a few seconds after you attack. You're usually better off turning it off when you get up to the villain and launch an attack, and then turning it back on when you've dispatched that foe and need to move to more foes that are further away.
Keep at least one inspiration slot free -- just suck whatever drops when it drops, or swap it with another inspiration and suck that one. Being constantly inspired, whether or not you need it, gives you a slight edge in kill rate over the longer term. (If your tray is full of useless junk, give it away to whoever on your team can probably use it. If you need inspirations before a mission, try Wentworth's, rather than your contacts; you can frequently pick up small inspirations for 10 Influence each.)
Purple and orange inspirations are going to be useful throughout your career. Reds are handy, as well, and are the secret to doing missions at higher difficulty; pop them to sustain higher damage output and thus kill more quickly, which has the useful side effect of also giving you greater survivability.
It is, as a scrapper, easy to go into the suicidal killing frenzy of "scrapperlock", where you are focused only on the target in front of you, unaware of your own health and endurance and unaware of what's going on around you. If you team, you need to pay attention to the rest of your teammates. You'll especially want to watch the team's defenders and controllers. Support ATs whose health is rapidly dropping have probably attracted melee attention from something, and you will definitely get plenty of gratitude if you zip back to them and kill or at least draw the attention of whatever's beating on them. (Just don't train a pile of aggro back to them when you run back. Calling the Wolf may help, too, but it might be faster to just run over.)
Consideration for your teammates means that, even if you're at full health and endurance, you shouldn't go charging ahead of the team while everyone else recovers. First off, it is likely to mean that you draw more aggro than you can handle. Second, most teams will see you getting into trouble and dive ahead after you. If you insist on running ahead, and get into trouble, have the courtesy to not drag a pile of villains with you when you run away; make a valiant stand or die trying. Scout if you're invisible and so impatient that you can't stand still for a few moments, but don't start fights without the rest of your team. The only exception might be very small teams, where even separated you are completely dominating your foes. In this case, you should announce and get agreement that you are going to continue onwards without your compatriots.
Managing Your Health
If you're soloing a handful of whites and yellows, you probably don't need to watch your health. But in all other situations, you're going to want to keep an eye on your health bar. You may be in more danger of dying from failing to notice death-from-a-thousand-cuts than from taking some hard whacks from a boss -- you probably won't fail to notice the boss pounding on you, but the little drops in health from attacks that you can't quite out-regen can put you at a point where one hard hit drops you.
If you're about to fight a boss, and there's no tank to keep the hits from falling on you, fire up Dull Pain. This will allow you to withstand more big hits and prevent a one-shot.
If you're at half-health or below, hit Reconstruction. Do this even if you're in a team with a defender or controller with single-target heals; let them save their endurance and time to heal the squishies and use their other abilities. Regen scrappers with half health can get one-shot or two-shot pretty trivially by bosses, so try not to let your health drop below half.
If you hit Reconstruction, and you get a chunk of your health carved away nearly immediately (as can happen when you're fighting, say, a Rikti Chief Soldier and Chief Mentalist together), fire Dull Pain if it's not up already, and then use Instant Healing. (Dull Pain will boost your HP total and therefore the amount regenerated by IH per tick, so for maximum effect, you want both up.)
If you're at half-health, you've used your Reconstruction, and you can't pop a green inspiration, this is a good time for Moment of Glory. The high defense and resist should hopefully mitigate enough incoming damage for the next several seconds that your regen will have time to catch up.
How to Level Up
As a scrapper, you will experience the joy of being able to immediately solo your own missions, although this is not without its dangers, and you should still be careful what villain groups you take at low levels -- a bunch of Clockwork can really wreck your day, for instance.
However, prior to Integration, you are extremely squishy. If you team up, you may be better off in smaller teams rather than larger ones. In the early levels, a controller probably makes the best duo partner, and there are usually far more of them looking for teams than there are teams to accomodate them, so make a new buddy. Their holds will reduce incoming damage sufficiently for you to deal with it, given your fast kill speed.
The time between getting Integration and Instant Healing can be spent either solo or on teams. Small teams will probably get you the best XP with the least risk of death. Soloing is very viable. If you're going to avoid any villains, avoid the Vahzilok (their damage output is still excessive compared to your regen rate).
Once you get Instant Healing, you'll have a nice panic button that makes large teams more survivable. You are not godlike in your 30s, but if you judge your click heal usage timing properly, you should have good survivability. If you're going to avoid anything at this level, avoid things that have both a slow and ranged attacks; you have no way to hit anything from afar, and your defense is melee, so anything that prevents you from running into melee range while hitting you from afar is going to be unpleasant. The Devouring Earth are also a real pain (for you and for everyone); they've got effects that slow down recharge times and the like, and quite a few of them have resistance to lethal damage.
The 40s, as mentioned earlier, are much harder. You'll still be able to solo without an issue, but the villains become much more of a problem. The build offered here is not designed to solo AVs, so you will need to team for those (and you'll need to be careful not to fill all of your mission slots with AV missions). There wlil be AVs that do enough damage to one-shot you, and other situations where your regen rate can easily not be equal to the situation (a takedown of Infernal's altar can be problematic, for instance).
This is also one of the few times in the game where you'll run into things that can overcome Integration. Most notable are the Carnival of Shadows' Master Illusionists whose effect magnitude can overcome Integration, if there are two of them attacking you.
Bosses in the 40s can be quite nasty as well -- there are some that can two-shot you, so stay alert. And minions are sometimes nothing to laugh at -- the Knives of Artemis, for instance, can really be quite annoying, as they'll stack caltrops around you, making it very difficult to move. (SuperSpeed helps, but not enough.)
There is not enough solo content in the 45-50 tier to get you through those levels, so you will probably end up cycling a lot of repeatable missions (police radio, Cimerora, Shadow Shard, etc.), or teaming up a lot. Thus, you may want to be careful about the missions you take at 40-44. As long as you start arcs from that contact tier by 45, you will be able to receive missions in that arc, and given that the arcs are usually a dozen missions or more, that'll keep you occupied for a while. 40-44 has more solo content, relative to the length of time it takes to level up, than 45-50 does, so take advantage of that by doing non-arcs for as long as possible in the earlier levels. (Once a contact has offered you the first mission in an arc, the arc slot is taken, and you will be able to get it from them even if you've outleveled the contact.)
During your 40s, consider making a lower-level defender's day by duoing with them. You can generally safely pick a defender 5 to 9 levels below you, as long as their powers don't draw aggro. If they're not around your level, you can offer them the choice of just buffing you and leeching, or getting sidekicked and contributing -- they'll vary in which they prefer. Either way, a decent defender can boost your kill rate and level of safety significantly, sufficient that you can get a hefty XP per minute boost duoing rather than soloing. An extra person only slightly boosts the spawns you'll see, so you do not really need them to contribute damage. Indeed, you can probably handle missions spawned for three just fine, especially if what your teammates are contributing are healing and buffs. An empath can turn you and an offensively-oriented kinetics into absolute killing machines.
Good Luck
I think a katana/regen scrapper is one of the most entertaining ways that one can play the game solo, while still being able to team when desired (or, in the late game, necessary). Because you can go through missions quickly, you will be able to see a great number of the game's storylines. Because missions, especially at the higher difficulty levels, are a pretty efficient way of leveling, you will be able to see content without sacrificing too much leveling speed -- this is a "go enjoy the missions" build, not a "grind in hazard zones" build. Good teams will still return much higher rates of XP than you can achieve solo, so if you like to team, you should probably team, but it's not a necessity unless you're fighting an archvlilain.
This is, obviously, only one constellation of possible ways to build a katana/regen, but I think it's a reasonably sensible cookie cutter which you can customize to your tastes. I hope you enjoy leveling up with it; constructive feedback and debate is of course appreciated.
When you reach 50, you may want to pursue an entirely different type of build, if you're planning on frankenslotting IO sets. In some cases, you may want more slots in some powers simply so you can put in IOs that will get you some bonus that you find desirable.
What's Changed from the Previous Guide?
Compared to I4, katana's animations and cast times are now faster, regeneration was nerfed heavily, Stealth's defense boost was basically obliterated, and Enhancement Diversification dramatically altered the potential damage output and regeneration capacity of this combination.
The old build depended upon perma-Hasten. For better or for worse, ED results in trading out slots in damage for slots in recharge. Hasten is a 70% boost to recharge rate, so two slots of recharge will make up for its lack. The new build still has Hasten, and it will be useful as you level up, but it's not as important. (If you do a respec at 50 and plan to flashback a lot, you might consider taking some other useful power earlier in the build and save Hasten until later, since you will be gaining the full benefit of your slots of recharge, and will probably not miss it much.)
The change in the DPS output of katana is significant. Previously, five slots of +0 SO'd damage would get you 166% to your base damage; now three slots using the best IOs you can get your hands on gets you about 100% enhancement to your base damage. In other words, if your base attack is 100 damage, you're now doing at most 200 damage rather than 266 damage, or 75% of what you used to. Add to that the loss of perma-Hasten, and therefore the ability to cycle your most damaging attacks more frequently, and the effects get more pronounced. Simply put, it takes you a lot longer to kill things, which makes the changes to your regen rate even more pronounced. This is slightly offset by the cast time change, but certainly the lengthier kill time is noticeable.
Because of the loss of perma-Hasten, lower overall damage output, and more free slots, The Lotus Drops is now something to take and slot, whereas it was much more a matter of taste in the old build. You'll have the slots to put endurance reduction in your attacks, so it's much more possible to make this part of your regular attack cycle.
On the positive side, the new Gambler's Cut is a massive improvement, thanks to its new fast animation time. In short, it no longer sucks. In fact, its damage-to-activation time (DPA) is excellent. This makes the initial choice of attack much more of a playstyle choice.
With the drop in base rate of Integration from 200% to 150%, it's now more important to slot out Integration in the levels immediately following picking it up. (People who feel that they're getting enough healing from unslotted Integration during the teens may want to slot Build-Up in preference to it, and wait until their 20s to put slots in Integration.)
Because you can no longer 6-slot Quick Recovery, this build now pushes Stamina relatively early on. You can do without it, especially since you're not attacking at Hasten rates all the time, and ED means having slots that you can now devote to endurance reduction in your attacks, and you don't have to finish fights full on endurance (just full enough that you can recover back to full by the time you start the next fight). However, if you're going to run a lot of toggles, Stamina is still vital. (The one good thing about Instant Healing as a click power is that you no longer have a constant gigantic endurance drain, which frees you to go run other toggles for survival.)
Reconstruction, already favored by the previous build, comes to prominence now; it's a key tool for survival, now that Instant Healing has been nerfed into an occasional click power.
Moment of Glory has changed entirely. In the previous build, it was the panic button for incoming rates of damage too high to be overcome with regen. Now, its brief duration means that it's what you hit to cope with alpha strikes or to give your regen a chance to catch up. I still think it's a useful power, since you're getting 15 seconds of heavy damage mitigation, at no penalty.
Calling the Wolf no longer has a range that sucks, making it more useful if you play in no-tank small teams where you want to be able to grab aggro off a squishy.
The previous build really pushed Stealth, because it had a defense buff nearly as good as Weave's, required no prerequisites, and allowed near invisibility in combination with SuperSpeed. With the nerf to Stealth's defense, it's no longer a reasonable substitute for going with the Fighting pool, and is now really purely a utility power.
All in all, a katana/regen scrapper is no longer EZ mode. It's still a very strong set, but ironically, I think that with the various nerfs, the build options were actually narrowed rather than expanded. Much of the interesting option bits are actually now in choosing IO sets, whether during the leveling-up process (for those flush with Influence) or at level 50.
People who liked the fire-and-forget, high survivability of the old regen might prefer to play the Willpower set now. Willpower seems to have been the dev response to figuring out how they really wanted a regeneration set to play, and provides a well-thought-out, well-rounded, potent alternative to the "purity" of the Regeneration set.
Mids' Hero Designer Builds
For convenience, here are the builds in Mids' import format.
Initial build through level 19
<font class="small">Code:[/color]<hr /><pre>| Copy & Paste this data into Mids' Hero Designer to view the build |
|-------------------------------------------------------------------|
|MxDz;918;410;548;|
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|?P`<1'R[.F9D&K`L7#N3[)__\9^8,TWYN6H2\'!.E?.J[<=SO#B,W#"$R>C"<T,`/QM|
|/:E9NXU&W<P!AH(PD:NWLZ(61Y'NVWP0=P1&HC&l t;YOP"#0&AY=!Y"9>0.U+.H$(:.+,)|
|T8G"'RG&P*,+#X]\Q(*<6R*']\;3Q*;SR_IDQ=[`\_WDJG="KVA<Q*,IOVV&R<035=9|
|1SOLFV%K?*0J%TTE.56H)M62VL2LPK.$&,)[U:7%ZI4_ZELL*PY)<ZHM/&-!MU@F+S)|
|:7GJ%!5U:T#=6(ZZ1$EUZ[\PH\LY2IL([8YXI^L^9!>&5%W2;94IRKU)=>!?,JX@ZM:|
|(+KVK\U)K4<[9NBWK%EKW4I*;_'>M:]EB$[T:N?SD=+7L0HG!G4\N>[5_CTYJ?5;S!V|
|_80'<0MX@YQCWA`N(@!8HA(O[+JRCXV=(`X1!PA9AC2308382%*B#*B@J@BZH@5Q!KB|
|`Y%^`S-0\>D`|
|-------------------------------------------------------------------|</pre><hr />
Respec into this build at level 24
<font class="small">Code:[/color]<hr /><pre>| Copy & Paste this data into Mids' Hero Designer to view the build |
|-------------------------------------------------------------------|
|MxDz;997;443;592;|
|>-JED<U.VT`4A2>Q@XGM_)@0J!"H45FQ\1KH`JD-?Z*1H@2Q`B+'7)*1K'%D6XCL^@`|
|1[0OT0:H^G#MWYL92PZ
D?R=R?&YUW<RO>>NR]CW$U:J?XV"-!T-PR28S2"QKR&<BC|
|B*)_/-JR`+1-`9P`1$YQP$)#RT&&/M97C4@PC`U[F]PNW"(X@4?%4(29#Q6'B78@H)B|
|,Q?;NQ^'$?^<`;PX*KM&<\$I*FC?T1\,LT\M;\4 3SSE8Q[Q;.Z=SGCH?XD?YJ->D&:0|
|S#_(B0[DL\#1U,I-):;!RH96DW2=U/6T=K&FI&H8L[7W8I$E^Y3^L\^IK#%TC6&09Z_|
|H)O7_)+,5G2U7Z-W:BOZ0&8LR%GE;*_I3!JIJTERJ]LZDY^CSE)TU[=57=%]F:KHWJ[|
|6T=R&]AJXS&I;VFO:_ND%Z+M][-)M'LVPLSTA
9D6_:\M^H8EO39Y;>JU+KUM\K9IO|
|OS-:]<L;IZI<O;ME=,WBUME)>5\-(N[?]?Z[2Z_51W@L:X1?<0-XA9QA[A'!(@Q(D3D|
|?XKJQB$.=(0X1GQ&+#!D.1(.PD74$'5$`]%$M!!;B!W$+T3^%PEKZ-X`|
|-------------------------------------------------------------------|</pre><hr />
The basic build through level 34
<font class="small">Code:[/color]<hr /><pre>| Copy & Paste this data into Mids' Hero Designer to view the build |
|-------------------------------------------------------------------|
|MxDz;1179;509;680;|
|>-JE4LMNTT`4G<1.W3A.4C=-'VE#4EAUXW6!!1*D+04B16W%"HA<]S:Q9(TCVT)DQP=|
|4@(`M'X+X.'.OY]I2C(20&,GGC,^<^YC'^,/($N+C$U%I/0O<.)Y>>I&[6$!D7H$WEV|
|$0SI9;+]W$E>[P`F8@AV<@(?(]0PC1S<W3,00`CO+U"W4$MR!C<+)`B-S$#Z5]+N<0@|
|4R<?&
.PC!P+A<`-U8V/?43"7'<Y)_9//'ES,[^SN5[/_:O_<!/EOPO><I^'-<CIV|
|XP2BY2[V=(3?'367C53/2-=$55.L,Z\S6[;B$<54LA@A3*5],EC"/)5_S'.",9J*T33|
|6S!)O<?[[Z*TI;[7&:VLE_H(>(^LB%0;W\!DG=8ZKLV^[Q*?H::C]5!MK2FN5^`%ZFB|
|J/:':4]ARUMHK3VH;2-LQ5WF0^PW6;]VISW<U\C\R'[*VAM\/GV^%:!FI=UKKL6T=MA|
|_O>X3YW2_P-/7NJ;FV/>^SQV?3X/@Y*?(_[>8'^?3Z[?7MU+>>OZ.GSN?0Y[W?4!EQS|
|P#6'O#;45ODP9\Z7_G4<Z,5K%9E5O/I#F>C%2Q253!GHQ7O]K_'3RFO5+^@*K@@F!*\|
|)WA"\)7A'X!)<$W@$Z:\BNGU,#3TD>$3PF.".3$8#H4 %@$30)6@1M@@V"#L$V08_@!T|
|'Z&R1>WYD`|
|-------------------------------------------------------------------|</pre><hr />
Level 40, with fighting pool
<font class="small">Code:[/color]<hr /><pre>| Copy & Paste this data into Mids' Hero Designer to view the build |
|-------------------------------------------------------------------|
|MxDz;1306;539;720;|
|>-JE4TUOTT`07<=.W3A.4B<D;=.&I.F7N/C,QP$)TD"!2%%;]01$;KHDEJQU9%N(W/@|
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|H7ON?/ELW73N0(IW?!9USTANYL'KEBIC/&FJE[,N(>Y[8T=C)UP#]P$7([B>2!$[F^L|
|,[%G`=<1'8Z,<:^[]F7"\YOS60Z="/!P[!"+S*?E;R=BX]NZ-ZXGALMK;.%.[6?^;?+|
|R<@)(QXL=Z"F!_#<87')B(L):2HKJ)(UXDUBTY)\2CS `6"6)9<R0VA>=)-A/^<?]SB!|
|6I5B5-"/']RC/$?$I<1]B90-QH4C>C1Q_`X^>5!<SG6K["I,2Q97(U\KQ$#QEV6>AO"|
|&U:HX/P5.1^[!*0VHO0:O).+6F2VW+6.4Z\0M8MZAWB_+6TYZ)#W*]IUR$V`;=0X-RZ|
|Z`U26N2;Q.T;>ICF^K>R?%W\.Q2';M4<YO.JDWWM I_C^U3?*_#OT5GN6:MK*2O@Z=`Y|
|=5I2^P%:EW)V*6>/<O;453Y(F?93P=^G,^Y3[&%]/6NP?DS>8_*>:.LY7C/VM>Q?88F|
|!O?E+&6O9]\^41.EJV5_R7^.7F>8J7>"%7B&,$:X1WB*\0WB/X"#<($P1XM]9=.TA%O|
|0(X3'"$X0[-.EE@#*"B5!!J"+4$+80&@@MA#;"3X3X#U%CVP,`|
|-------------------------------------------------------------------|</pre><hr />
Level 40, without fighting pool
<font class="small">Code:[/color]<hr /><pre>| Copy & Paste this data into Mids' Hero Designer to view the build |
|-------------------------------------------------------------------|
|MxDz;1303;546;728;|
|>-JE4\MNTT`4'<=.W=A.4B=-'VE#TH2V8N,UCP42I"V!1HK:JBL@<MTAL639D6TALN,|
|#*D#`E@]!?)RYUW-M*88-8J2<,SD^Y\Z=&7O\86@P]O$IDVK//3N*II=.:"\6/-2NN#|
|/W`R^8+3=?V;'MV[T+/N-^[XS[/'0=E3'6RLS3,?<XMX2ODZM#_H[[$;?2(`_MV`U\<|
|^3/><C]V,HFVB0(/.MRP?FMD4Y/W=CG4:2+/YX[F\=F.A_Y[]W(O7$]-UZ
PO7L9X%|
|M\OIV(YB'BYWH*,'\+O#UM*1E%-29%:2!2O$Z\2&*7A`/,2LE&89TX3V224)ZDG_6.\|
|$LC)E9=*T`F_2.O>CXG[D!4;2$IE\JX5^`MXU+2[1%*IMX$B^#,(%<I7R+]5X%/PZ&|
|*_)7U-:+4"#\!3%758M2FT%Z#514ZNJT+;T%:Y07P&STTZ`Y/6;61[)SXHG$'&9<@VZ|
|3Z:M+8*6HNT%OG60=NF?6Q3WSL%_@:>7>ICEWINTYFU Z?[V"WR/^GL)_CTZRSUS]5G&|
|7\'3H?H=JG]$]8_D53[.F++?P=^E>R/<KVY%4^R)BR(_#WZ3SZ#:&=@W9(=W9(ON0|
|O8U_)OQ66&MCY'\I$R=]_)J5*5\F_DO\:/XULK<H%7N05P@3A&N$UPAN$MP@VP@V"@Y|
|#\RM/UA]C0(X3'"$\0[M"DZ@`Z@H%01:@AU!$V$)H(6PAMA!\(R6^$`=J[|
|-------------------------------------------------------------------|</pre><hr />
Unfortunately, I don't have the attention span to read this whole thing, but I read bits and pieces, and I have to say that this is one of the most in-depth guides I've read. The best part about guides like this is that it is excellent for new players who don't know what things do or why they are being told to do certain things in guides.
5/5 =)
I have a level 43 kat/regen scrapper and overall I really think you've done a great job. I especially like how you give careful attention to how heros can respec/plan their build for different levels. I think that all folks could benefit from reading through and studying the thought you put into power picks at different levels even if they were not planning on playing a Katana/Regen scrapper.
Some minor things you might want to think about if you are going to revise the guide further.
Hasten is a must for your build, and I agree it is great for katana/regen. It boosts damage, defense, and healing. I think your build would be stronger as a teaching tool if you went in depth a bit more about why hasten (for example) is more critical than build-up especially in the section on taking a travel power other than superspeed. I think it would help newer players better understand the theory behind your build.
You do a good job mentioning frankenslotting and alluding to IO sets. In the interests of making a comprehensive guide, perhaps an example or two of some frankenslotted attack powers (ie pointing out that using 2 dam/end/rech at level 25 or higher gives 3 SOs worth of power in 2 slots). Perhaps a link to another guide that discussed frankenslotting more in-depth. That may be more than you care to do, but at a minimum I ask that you mention which powers take melee and which take pbaoe IOs so that folks don't buy the wrong ones (been there, done that).
A general section on IO set bonuses that katana/regen scrappers may find helpful would also be good (for example, is it better to emphasize recharge over HP? Is positional defense more desirable than damage? What about +regen, how important is that to a regen scrapper?). Discussing some specific IOs which can be used to get around katana/regen's limitations (for example, there are a couple of neg energy procs or damage resist debuffs procs that could be slotted to overcome resistance to lethal damage, Resiliance is a great place for the steadfast protection +3% defence IO, etc). There are all sorts of neat QOL tricks that aren't all bank-busters. Touch of lady grey, for example, gives bonus health for 2 slots . . . neg energy proc and a rech/end for example.
Again, this may not be your area of interest but your guide is *so* comprehensive that if you have time, that would be nice. Having an agenda when going into IOs is a real money saver.
Thanks for the great guide!
I am actually an incredibly opportunistic IO shopper, and therefore do not so much "plan" as "take what I can get cheap and make the best out of it". Thus, I haven't really done the play with IO sets necessary to really give good advice here. In general, I've gone the route of looking for bargain deals, lowball bidding them, and being patient -- usually there's a chance at a lowball deal within a day or three. It means that I'm not slotted optimally, but I have overall attractive combinations plus some modest set bonuses. In general, I bargain-shop for cheap ways to get extra enhancement into a power, rather than for ideal set bonuses. About the only thing I could write would be "IOs for the Cheapskate".
QR-
This is an excellent Guide. I disagree with several of the points you have made (I personally think of DA as more of a single-target damage aura with defense to the two biggest regen killers out there, melee and lethal...I set it on autofire accordingly) including the reliance on hasten with katana's recharge times, but your ideas will definitely help keep a newbie going until they have enough experience with the set to decide what they are going to do with it, and you have some good advice for vets as well.
At earlier levels, Hasten is a big help in damage output and (for me, the impatient) in the feel of the set, although it might feel less necessary with GC rather than SotW as the first attack.
At later levels, I tend to like having Hasten available because it speeds the recharge of SD and GD, making it easier to keep targets off their feet, and also helps in getting Build Up more often. But at that point it falls into the category of nice-to-have; I often don't bother with firing up Hasten on my 50 unless I'm fighting a boss.
I recently re-re-rebuilt my kat/regen scrapper. I've had Hasten and I've taken it out. I've usually used it only versus bosses or to get Instant Healing and Dull Pain back more quickly.
At present, I don't have it, and I don't really miss it.
The guide's quite good.
I have a few additional suggestions.
1) Knockdown is good. Soaring Dragon and Golden Dragonfly are great attacks. You can make SotW and GC into similar attacks via the Kinetic Combat chance for KD proc. It's not super-cheap, but it's not terribly expensive either.
2) Virtually every attack does -def. The -def sets have some nice IO bonuses, but also, offer some nice doubles, like recharge/end reduction.
The Achilles Heel -res proc and Touch of Lady Grey damage proc are also handy. Personally, I put Achilles Heel in GC and the Lady Grey proc in Lotus Drops.
Other than that, while you made some choices I didn't, the guide's nicely done!
Currently: 50s (5), 40s (3), 30s (5)
Red and blue side, mostly Infinity, Virtue, and Freedom.
Just wanted to say that this is a great guide.
It is nice to see a guide discuss getting up in levels and focus on the powers and play style as opposed to time spent in the market to get what ever IO sets.
[ QUOTE ]
...but its real value is that it gives you a 20% melee defense buff
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Divine Avalanche base is 15%. Slotted, it is about 23%.
Rising to the Challenge: Spines/Willpower
So, why is this listed as [I12] without a single IO listed? Got my Scrapper to 50 and thought this would give me some ideas on what to spend my Influence on and what to improve. What Young Tutor said. It is an excellent guide on how to play and level pre [I9], but not past that without ANY IOs
Overall, I think this is a great guide. If I had seen this prior to starting my katana/regen I probably would have levelled up much faster. As it stands, he was still my first toon and first 50. And in the 2.5 years that I've had him, I've only felt the need to respec once.
The differences in my build:
I don't use Divine Avalanche, Build Up, or Hasten
I have considered putting DA back in, since my lvl 49 slot is just a bonus for me (Heal Other, which is fun to run around low level zones and heal squishy lowbies when you're 50).
If you solo a lot, I feel that Stealth is must. For soloers, no matter how much dps you put out, glowie missions and defeat boss mob missions will net you more xp in the long run, as you can speed to the end and pick up your mission bonus, and eventually story arc bonus. Add to that the recent developments such as merits and day jobs (the ones with end of mish bonuses) and you'll find that playing a bit like a twitchy stalker can be both profitable and fun.
Your choice of Body Mastery is commendable--FA and CP are excellent additions to the build, and, honestly, make more thematic sense.
I'm not a big fan of super speed, especially as a scrapper. With swift (two- or even one-slotted for speed), and having sprint on (between stamina and QR the end drain shouldn't be an issue), in-mission you will move as fast as you need to. I even leave Stealth on most of the time, and hardly notice the slowdown. This leaves you open to take a more 3-dimensial travel. I'm partial to Super Jump, as it gives me the best mix of speed and control. Fly is good, but slower for commuting and rarely worth turning on in-mish. TP I find too "digital", forcing my destinations, but then again, you can't beat it for speed (except in Steel Canyon and DA) and if you team a lot, Recall Friend will make you popular. This all does assume that you choose the fitness set, which I personally feel is a good addition to ANY AT build.
I DO think Tough would be a great addition to the build. Although more res to smash/lethal is not totally necessary.
Sorry for the long post, but I wanted to explain the things I differ on instead of making it sound like "my build is better than yours". Perhaps in some ways, but not overall.
What I'd like to add for someone who hasn't played a katana/regen and is trying to figure out if it's worth it, my advice is this: consider your play style.
My description of the KR build is "Boss Killer". If I'm on a team, it's my job to damage the biggest, baddest mofos first. The tank has enough on his plate trying to keep the aggro from 30 mins/lts off of people. You can help out immensely by downing the more dangerous targets.
Solo, I tear through missions, and if it's not a defeat all, I may stealth it or just kill lt's/bosses along the way because it's more economical and efficient.
And for the record, I've soloed almost every Elite Boss on invincible and won (There are 3 that elude me: Ghost Widow, Nosferatu, and the Madame of Mystery--and if you've ever fought them you know why), and can stand against an AV by myself, though I need a buffer/debuffer with me in order to overcome their regen and high hp.
Also, I should point out, this build has impenetrable resistance to knockdown, and requires stacked mezzes to hold/stun you etc. And not having to carry around rez insp is nice.
If you like blowing things up and having a lot of AOE's, this build is not for you. Obviously if you like to assist others directly then it's not for you.
But if you like going toe-to-toe with bosses and watching the awe among your teammates as you land a critical hit and down a lieutenant in one hit, then this build is for you.
One final note: After lots of play with this build, I can point out two holes in it--basically, just things to watch out for.
1. The obvious. Psychic powers. However, I'm hoping to overcome this with the IO system, as there are unique enh that can offer a little def/res to psy powers.
2. Slow. And perhaps this is why Amberyl chooses SS. Of course, slow powers usually affect recharge rate as well, which can be frustrating since you're used to firing off your attacks in combo.
3. I know I didn't say 3, but you should also watch out for Sappers and Carnival Mistresses. They are really the 2 enemies in the game that steal so much endurance that you will panic.
Best Wishes,
Xason
"Begin with the End in mind" - Covey
Arc #1270 The Death of Xason Mushu
Arc #15364 Frostfire's Plea
Nice job. This guide showed me what powers i should drop to take what i need thanks
" I don't let me kids play on the Freedom Server" -Oya
Amberyl's Guide to Building and Playing the Post-ED Katana/Regen Scrapper
This is a level-by-level guide to building and playing a katana/regeneration scrapper. It offers several variant builds that are intended to be easily soloable and have good team utility, without necessarily being "uber".
The build advice here is intended for Issue 12 and later. I actually leveled my scrapper during I3, but I've done enough testing with flashbacks and empty enhancement slots to feel like I've got a decent idea of how this build will play while leveling up in the current game environment.
This is a "revision" to my I4 guide, which while now outdated, probably remains an interesting historical reference.
Why Katana/Regen?
Katana is an excellent scrapper primary for the impatient. The powers recharge quickly, animate quickly, use modest amounts of endurance, and do excellent damage. Plus, the animations have lots of style. Katana is primarily a single-target set, with damage per second (DPS), over time, that is roughly equivalent to Broadsword's, but with Katana, you'll always have a button that you can push. (If you are looking for a fast and stylish AoE set, Dual Blades is probably more up your alley.)
Regen probably takes the honors for the most-nerfed powerset in the history of the game. It remains an extremely strong scrapper secondary, but it is "clicky"; it requires you to pay attention to your health and manage your push-button heals. (If you want to just turn on some toggles and tough it out, Willpower might be more your style.) Because it has effectively no downtime, it's great for relatively safe, fast, fun, soloing.
Regen is a decent secondary in team situations, as well. You'll need to pay closer attention to your health bar when you're teamed, because you'll need to decide how much regeneration you need for a given situation, and pace yourself through a mission accordingly. In a given situation, incoming damage comes in two flavors -- an incoming damage rate that is less than your HP regen per second, and an incoming damage rate that is more than your HP regen per second. The latter is highly dangerous, because having less than a full bar of health greatly increases the chances that something will one-shot you.
Philosophies
All the builds are based on the following ideas:
- The best solo defense is a good offense.
- If it's dead, it's not hurting you.
- If it's been knocked down, it's not hurting you.
My personal build philosophy also includes:
- If it didn't notice you, it's not hurting you.
- If you dodge its attacks, it's not hurting you.
Also, I believe that powers and slots should be chosen to facilitate fast leveling at that instant in time, without sacrificing utility over the long term. If you need a significantly different build later, you can respec.
The builds presented here don't use any IO sets. If you have the Influence to get IOs, you will undoubtedly see there are many opportunities to shift slots around in order to take advantage of the "extra slots" that are effectively created by slotting multiple dual and triple-set IOs.