It might be the worst scrapper secondary. But unless we're grading on a curve, that probably means a B+ instead of an A, because all scrapper primaries are good. Martial Arts is fine, and at least on the forum, it seems like a lot of people play them.
I don't have one myself, but I can give the pros and cons a shot. For pro, it has style. Who wouldn't want to kick bad guys in the face? And it can do decent single target damage. For cons, the secondary effects don't really work well together, and AoE damage is a bit lacking. If neither the pros nor cons sounded very significant, that's because I don't think they are. It's just a basic scrapper primary.
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"Four hours in, and I was no longer making mistakes, no longer detoggling. I was a machine." - Werner
Videos of Other Stupid Scrapper Tricks
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It might be the worst scrapper secondary.
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MA is a Primary Powerset, not a secondary
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I don't have one myself, but I can give the pros and cons a shot. For pro, it has style. Who wouldn't want to kick bad guys in the face? And it can do decent single target damage. For cons, the secondary effects don't really work well together, and AoE damage is a bit lacking. If neither the pros nor cons sounded very significant, that's because I don't think they are. It's just a basic scrapper primary.
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agree
I don't think it's useless...as Werner pointed out, it has a lot of style and the ST damage is really pretty decent.
My MA is a MA/Regen, and it used to be my main scrapper. I still play the toon from time to time, as I love her concept. However, she's not my scrapper focus anymore. That went to my DB/SR, not due to a lack of anything on MA/ or /Regen's part; it was simply because I liked the concept behind my /SR's background better.
I still see a lot of MA, both in AP as newly rolled toons and in the late game. I see it paired quite frequently with /WP, /SD and /SR.
As for pros and cons - for me personally, the pros are the flashy style (Eagle's Claw still makes me giddy every time I use it), and the secondary stun. And it's still fun to Crane Kick an enemy over the face of a cliff. 
Cons - it's endurance heavy, and a couple of powers have some long animation times.
That's my 2 inf, for what it's worth. 
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It might be the worst scrapper secondary.
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MA is a Primary Powerset, not a secondary
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Doh! 
"That's because Werner can't do maths." - BunnyAnomaly
"Four hours in, and I was no longer making mistakes, no longer detoggling. I was a machine." - Werner
Videos of Other Stupid Scrapper Tricks
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I haven't seen anyone playing a MA Scrapper?
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I have to wonder if you play on a low-population server, or at low-access times of day, or just haven't been looking for very long. It seems a little odd to me that you've never seen an MA Scrapper.
It's actually never been a wildly popular set. It doesn't offer very strong damage mitigation or any fancy tricks, and it doesn't have very much AoE. It's single-target damage is pretty competitive.
There's nothing wrong with it, it's perfectly functional, and you'll be able to flip out and kill things about as well as any other scrapper you're likely to meet. It just doesn't do anything special.
Blue
American Steele: 50 BS/Inv
Nightfall: 50 DDD
Sable Slayer: 50 DM/Rgn
Fortune's Shadow: 50 Dark/Psi
WinterStrike: 47 Ice/Dev
Quantum Well: 43 Inv/EM
Twilit Destiny: 43 MA/DA
Red
Shadowslip: 50 DDC
Final Rest: 50 MA/Rgn
Abyssal Frost: 50 Ice/Dark
Golden Ember: 50 SM/FA
Pros:
[*] Looks Sexy (slick animations)[*] Sounds Cool ("wham" and "kapow" sound effects)[*] Feels Unique'ish (not as many MA scraps out there)[*] No Weapon Redraw[*] And teh catgurlz dig flexible guys.
Winteriel Ice/Fire/Soul Tanker | @TBoxer Global | City of Heroes R.I.P. (2004-2012)
I've got a 17 MA/SR scrapper that I'm thinking of well...scrapping. He just feels empty to me for some reason, and I'm thinking it's a lack of an AoE attack which you don't get in the set until like 26, but even then it's your only AoE in the entire set whereas most other scrapper sets get at least a PBAoE and a cone.
I was also planning to play him as mostly a solo character, but with the high endurance costs of MA's attacks as well as the cost of running SR's toggles it's a complete pain to run solo missions in the early levels. You either have to completely fill up on blue inspirations, or take a 2-3 minute break after every other spawn or so because you're going to run out of endurance faster than rest can recharge.
Personally I feel that MA should have been the Ice Blast of the scrapper sets, offering superior single target damage while foregoing more area damage, yet MA is merely competitive in ST damage while retaining a lack of area damage. That's probably the main reason it's feeling empty to me.
About the only thing that MA has going for it, and the only thing that would actually put it ahead of other scrapper sets in terms of ST damage is having access to your 2nd highest damaging attack (Crane Kick) at lvl 8, but that only puts you ahead in the lower levels. After 26 you pretty much fall to "on par".
Sorry to sound really negative. Maybe my views will change if/when I get MA up into the 20s and 30s when you get access to the rest of your attacks. I might try powering through to lvl 20 and see how much stamina helps my endurance management, since the endurance costs of my power set is what's really discouraging me atm.
Edit: I'd hate to scrap him though, since I really like my MA's costume and backstory and he was the first guy I made when I came back from my break and I was so sure he'd be my new main that I changed my handle to his name, so if I did scrap him it'd be weird to have his name by my handle all the time xD
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Martial Arts....Dead power?
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Oh, hell no.
I was playing my Martial Arts/Invulnerability Scrapper all day yesterday.
The only problem I know about Martial Arts is that the attacks actually use more Endurance than they should for their damage. Maybe one of the number crunchers can tell me if that is still true?
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Well I just got my MA/SD scrapper up to 50 this week and it was a really fun combo to play. I never did like MA tell I paired it with /SD.
"All right, they're on our left, they're on our right, they're in front of us, they're behind us...they can't get away this time"- Chesty Puller US Marine Corps
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I haven't seen anyone playing a MA Scrapper?
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I have to wonder if you play on a low-population server, or at low-access times of day, or just haven't been looking for very long. It seems a little odd to me that you've never seen an MA Scrapper.
It's actually never been a wildly popular set. It doesn't offer very strong damage mitigation or any fancy tricks, and it doesn't have very much AoE. It's single-target damage is pretty competitive.
There's nothing wrong with it, it's perfectly functional, and you'll be able to flip out and kill things about as well as any other scrapper you're likely to meet. It just doesn't do anything special.
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I play on Victory, so yeah...Low population. Or should I say an almost strictly farming server of noone lower than 40. lol
I still may try MA. I was thinking of MA/WP.
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I was playing my Martial Arts/Invulnerability Scrapper all day yesterday.
The only problem I know about Martial Arts is that the attacks actually use more Endurance than they should for their damage. Maybe one of the number crunchers can tell me if that is still true?
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MA/Invuln.......I need to try that.
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Working up my MA/WP with casual play these days. She's hit lvl 30. And I have to say, I really love MA on female characters, just seems to fit so very well. Thinner, nimble male characters work, too. It just looks odd for some of the heavier looking characters.
My eventual build is going to use relatively cheap (Smashing Haymaker and Multi-Strike) IO sets to aim at def in the mid-20s. Toss on the solid resists and excellent regen and she'll be good to go. Cobra Strike and Eagle's Claw, both 100% chance stuns, can combine to stun everything up to a PtoD EB, and it shouldn't be too hard to get the recharge down enough, especially on Dragon's Tail, to keep many enemies on their butts.
MA is a very mixed bag, and like Claws, I think it takes a bit of time to truly master it. However, it gets 3 solid ST attacks spread across the levels, is now quite fast activating, which combined with no redraw issues at all, makes for some very fluid combat. Great set, just not the best set.
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Well I just got my MA/SD scrapper up to 50 this week and it was a really fun combo to play. I never did like MA tell I paired it with /SD.
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Just got mine to level 36. Active+Buildup+Dragon's Tail+Shield Charge=me squeeling like a school girl who just got her first Jonas Brothers DvD.
Pros
- Dead sexy
- Fits "natural" (ie - no powers) concepts well
- Sound Effects are great
- As a previous poster mentioned, uniqueness (less common)
Cons
- Higher end cost than warranted
- All damage attacks are kicks... no punches
- No ranged attacks
- No cones and only 1 PBAoE
Martial arts have the same dam/end numbers as other scrapper sets (except for Claws) and since it's not that highly damaging the end costs shouldn't be that bad.
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I haven't seen anyone playing a MA Scrapper?
Is this power useless now? Can anyone give me pros/cons?
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I rarely see MA Stalker as well. Here is what I think is wrong with MA.
1. MA is not a master of anything. For Stalker, both Energy Melee and Dark Melee have higher dps than MA. There is no aoe attack in all 3 sets (well, Dark Melee has a small cone). This means MA needs to offer something more to attract...
2. MA's damage isn't superior to other ST-oriented set so it needs to offer better secondary effect. For Dark Melee, you can stack tohit debuff to stack with your defensive second. For Energy, you can stack a lot of stuns for extra safety.
MA has some stun and some knockback. It is hard to maximize anything with MA and this is my #1 complaint.
3. All Smashing damage. This one isn't that important to me but Dark and Energy have an advantage for having dual.
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MA really only has style. The first two kicks are very fast but that's about it. Some people really hate Crane Kick because the knockback is strong. Eagle Claw also takes a long time too.
One buff I've been thinking is giving Eagle Claw a 15' range. I got this idea from Bane's Shatter which has 10' reach but only single target. Eagle Claw will be a real flying kick. I can see this being somewhat useful in PvP.
I am speaking specifically from Stalker's point of view. If I only want to excel in single-target damage, why would I pick MA when I have Dark Melee and Energy Melee to choose from? Hell, even Claw's dps has gone up too.
What's left is to normalize all Assassin Strikes and improve Stalker's old sets (Claw, MA and EM)! You don't need to bring back the missing PbAoE attack. You just need to make the existing ones better! For example, make Slice a WIDER and LONGER cone.
Yeah, I made a BS/WP scrapper today and I think I'm actually liking him a bit more than my MA/SR, mainly due to not having any toggles yet that suck the life force out of me, and I'm finding BS's attacks to be a bit more interesting than MA's. Plus the secondary effects of BS (-def) I think are more beneficial/dependable than MA's (stuns).
The only thing I'll give to MA is I do like how fast Storm/Thunder kick activate. BS does feel a bit slower than MA, but at the same time it feels heavier, like each blow actually hurts instead of just chipping away at the mob.
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I play on Victory, so yeah...Low population. Or should I say an almost strictly farming server of noone lower than 40. lol
I still may try MA. I was thinking of MA/WP.
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*buzzer sounds* Try again, please. Anecdotal evidence is so weak because, yeah, it's anecdotal. I have an MA/Regen that I recently got to 50 on Victory, and I have played with plenty of MA heroes on Victory, too. Oh, and I have plenty of heroes (and two villains) that are under level 40 on Victory, nor do I farm. At all.
So who's right? No one, really. Unless you have the actual numbers of who plays MA on Victory server (and compare it to what they used to be), you can't say. I just have seen way too many of these "does anyone play X powerset anymore? I haven't seen many" threads, so sorry about getting angsty about it.
Amyway, MA is a great, fun set. I'd say it's solid from the get-to and stays there all the way to 50... other sets may outperform it in some areas, but it's a Scrapper set, which means it's solid.
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I see a lot of people still use MA.
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I've got 3 MA scrappers on Victory, two at 50, the other at 45. I like to think of the stylish animations as the secondary effect, not the soft controls. Eagles Claw is probably the best animation in the game. It's pretty fun tripping surrounding enemies with Dragons Tail too. Also, Storm Kick -> Practiced Brawler looks badass if you're MA/SR.
I dunno if you pvp but imo, MA is also the best primary in scrappers for pvp, assuming you take Web Grenade. The stuns are very useful. It suppresses any toggles your targets may have on, leaving them susceptible to full damage for a short while. Although you probably won't be able take advantage of this against other melee ATs with mez protection, it works great on those pesky squishy ATs that get resistance/defense toggles in their ancillary/patron pools. Most say Spines is the best pvp scrapper primary but from my experience, MA performs just as well if not better when it has web grenade for the immob/slow.
It'd be nice if MA got a little attention, but there's nothing really wrong with it.
MA is only a King next to the aces of other sets. Nothing wrong with wanting it to be an Ace as well, but there's less room to complain when there's still twelve others it's better than.
Know what would be great? If Cobra Strike got the same treatment Clobber from War mace did. Damage doesn't have to be Extreme like Clobber but hey, at least give us something.
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Know what would be great? If Cobra Strike got the same treatment Clobber from War mace did. Damage doesn't have to be Extreme like Clobber but hey, at least give us something.
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I'd rather see the damage of an actual attack power increased.. or something done with CAK. I'm not a huge fan of how CAK is currently.
Or better yet, turn Cobra Strike into the attack and CAK into the stun power. :P That'd be pretty awesome, and finally give Martial Arts a 'punch' that does damage.
What they *need* to fix:
~ Fix the End cost of Storm Kick. It's still almost 1 end too high and since it's our best DPA attack builds that use it a lot might throw it 12-15 times a minutes. I would love to have somewhere between 10-15 endurance per minute thrown back into my build.
What I'd like to see:
~ Since we lack AoE and do smashing damage I'd like a little to see some more beef in our single target damage. We need a 70-75 DPA attack to pair with Storm Kick.
~ Make Crippling Axe Kick do -Recharge like the description says. It would be a nice mitigation tool against foes that can't be stunned like AVs and EBs.
~ Make Cobra Strike useful. Since it's one of our few hand strikes it would be nice if it pumped out around 70-75 DPA to give us some single target beef. You could also bump the stun duration.
Moonlighter
50s include MA/SD, MA/SR, DP/Elec, Claw/Inv, Kat/Dark, Kat/Fire, Spine/Regen, Dark/SD
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I haven't seen anyone playing a MA Scrapper?
Is this power useless now? Can anyone give me pros/cons?
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