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No one expects Electric Melee/Dark Aura.
No one!
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That combo happens to be one of my favorites. Not to mention the def/res numbers are pretty high with creative slotting.
Proud member of [url=http://www.repeat-offenders.net/]Repeat Offenders[/url]
Global @Pyre Flasher
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Best farm or AOE brute for boss spawns would be SS/SA. IO'd out, they are unstoppable!
Best farm or AOE brute for LT's is either SS/SD or SS/FA. I've never seen a good SS/FA but I have a fully IO'd out SS/SD and he absolutely murders LT's!
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You could take your Fire Armor Brute against Fire Blast bosses. Then you'd be equally unstoppable, have more damage tools and not have the penalties of Granite.
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True, however AE centric it may be. For a more diverse and unstopable boss killer, I vote stone armor. Granites penalties are easily nullified with some nice IO's.
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And just think of how awesome any other Brute would be with those IOs and no penalty. I've repeatedly shown that many Brutes can handle the same circumstances that Stone do without billion IO builds.
If you want to afk, not use inspirations and don't care about killing things then use Stone. If you aren't actually good at using your primary powers or other things and die all the time use Stone. If you have the ability to learn from your mistakes and utilize the tools available to you... make anything else.
One advantage FA has over SD is it has its own End-replenishment power in Consume. Lacking external buffs most high recharge SD builds will be sucking wind if they attack nonstop. At least, mine does. 
Freedom: Blazing Larb, Fiery Fulcrum, Sardan Reborn, Arctic-Frenzy, Wasabi Sam, Mr Smashtastic.
I've had great fun playing my Elec/Shield and SS/Shield Brutes. I've pumped a lot of resources into both builds and find the differences in overall performance to be pretty negligible. I think the SS has the upper-hand on single-target damage, but not by a landslide.
However, the reason I'm responding is because of this: I love my Battle Axe/Shield Brute for AoE goodness. This seems like a bit of an unconventional choice, but with a bunch of enemies packed in tightly (which I typically have), The AoE's keep going and going. Now, I realize that Footstomp has the superior radius and a short recharge, but Pendulum, Whirling Axe and Cleave recharging in ~5s with AAO and BU (not to mention Shield Charge) supplementing the damage, you make short work of large groups, and there is something really satisfying about slicing and dicing with a big axe.
It may not be the min/max choice, but these quick charging AoEs leave a quick path of destruction behind you...
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Best farm or AOE brute for boss spawns would be SS/SA. IO'd out, they are unstoppable!
Best farm or AOE brute for LT's is either SS/SD or SS/FA. I've never seen a good SS/FA but I have a fully IO'd out SS/SD and he absolutely murders LT's!
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You could take your Fire Armor Brute against Fire Blast bosses. Then you'd be equally unstoppable, have more damage tools and not have the penalties of Granite.
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True, however AE centric it may be. For a more diverse and unstopable boss killer, I vote stone armor. Granites penalties are easily nullified with some nice IO's.
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And just think of how awesome any other Brute would be with those IOs and no penalty. I've repeatedly shown that many Brutes can handle the same circumstances that Stone do without billion IO builds.
If you want to afk, not use inspirations and don't care about killing things then use Stone. If you aren't actually good at using your primary powers or other things and die all the time use Stone. If you have the ability to learn from your mistakes and utilize the tools available to you... make anything else.
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This is way over the top, on a brute, the -damage is laughable. On a tank, a 100 base damage attack slotted for another 100% for ease of maths does 170 in granite, a 15% reduction. On a brute with say 70% fury, they do 310 instead of 340, a 9% reduction.
If you happen to choose a set where one long recharge attack has all the DPS, then yes stone armor will be bad news, but on other sets where the DPS is better distributed then stone armor is fine.
If you happen to have a kin with you, then the effect of granite really is negligible, FS will minimise the dam % you lose, and the recharge in SB mitigates a lot of the recharge problems meaning you don't need to use lower DPS attacks, so don't lose out much there. Yes you will have 65% more recharge in fire armor, but it may not help you that much, animation times govern your DPS much more than recharge in high end builds particularly on sets like axe where apart from the first attack, the DPA is pretty consistent through the set.
It's true. This game is NOT rocket surgery. - BillZBubba
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Best farm or AOE brute for boss spawns would be SS/SA. IO'd out, they are unstoppable!
Best farm or AOE brute for LT's is either SS/SD or SS/FA. I've never seen a good SS/FA but I have a fully IO'd out SS/SD and he absolutely murders LT's!
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You could take your Fire Armor Brute against Fire Blast bosses. Then you'd be equally unstoppable, have more damage tools and not have the penalties of Granite.
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True, however AE centric it may be. For a more diverse and unstopable boss killer, I vote stone armor. Granites penalties are easily nullified with some nice IO's.
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And those same IOs will help the baseline of any other set even more than Granite. Granite is only popular farming build on freedom where the dumb masses don't know any better.
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If you happen to choose a set where one long recharge attack has all the DPS, then yes stone armor will be bad news, but on other sets where the DPS is better distributed then stone armor is fine.
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Like most aoe attacks? Footstomp on a 20 second timer. Patron aoe attacks on 20 and 32 second timers.
I can get them under 7 seconds on my /WP but good luck getting that in granite.
Coming from a brute who has a 3 billion elec / sd and a 3 billion ss /sd. I have to say without a doubt, I love my SS/SD by leaps and bounds over my elec/sd.
Elec/Shield PERIOD.
No more discussion. I've seen a few of those in AE.. man, oh man do they kill quick with two Lightning Rod-like powers.
I am not a fan of Brute but Elec/Shield can really deal impressive aoe damage. You may need herding a bit but I don't think there is anything close to this combo unless it's a nuke from Blaster but Lightning Rod and Shield Charge don't have endurance crash and they are only on 90s recharge.
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.
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If you happen to choose a set where one long recharge attack has all the DPS, then yes stone armor will be bad news, but on other sets where the DPS is better distributed then stone armor is fine.
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Like most aoe attacks? Footstomp on a 20 second timer. Patron aoe attacks on 20 and 32 second timers.
I can get them under 7 seconds on my /WP but good luck getting that in granite.
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So you have say +200 recharge and a 6.67s recharge, in granite with the same bonuses you'd have +135 so it would recharge in 8.5, not hideously different, now get both of you speed boosted, yours drops to 5.7, the stoner's drops to 7. Yes it's an issue, but it's not stupidly borked, and this is with the worst type of set for stone in that it has only one AoE and it's a very large proportion of the DPS for the set and a big ST attack on a 25s recharge.
Compare axe with 3 AoEs on 14 or 15 second timers and DPA much more even through the set and granite stacks up much better.
It's true. This game is NOT rocket surgery. - BillZBubba
The 3 attacks in my attack chain are footstomp, elec fences, and ball lightning. My single target attacks are there for the sake of holding purples. This attack chain would not be possible with a reduction in my recharge. I need 0 outside help to attack fast and am not stuck with TP as a means to get to where I want to go quickly and I can jump into a middle of a spawn to make sure my AOEs are hitting everything. Can you do that in granite?
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Elec/Shield PERIOD.
No more discussion. I've seen a few of those in AE.. man, oh man do they kill quick with two Lightning Rod-like powers.
I am not a fan of Brute but Elec/Shield can really deal impressive aoe damage. You may need herding a bit but I don't think there is anything close to this combo unless it's a nuke from Blaster but Lightning Rod and Shield Charge don't have endurance crash and they are only on 90s recharge.
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I love my Elec/Shield. And it's true that since Lightning Rod and Shield Charge are both superior damage powers, when I'm damage capped by Fulcrum Shift I can do an incredible amount of burst damage with the two TP attacks. The TP attacks are fun, flashy, and cause knockdown. That's all good.
What's not so good is that they both are on 90 second timers. Foot Stomp has a smaller radius and does less damage but it's on a 20 second timer. That's key. That's what lets SS pull ahead in damage. The time it takes for two Lightning Rods = 9 Footstomps.
Ultimately it comes down to personal preference. Many folks hate Rage's cooldown period and -End penalty. There are circumstances playing Elec where it's very nice doing Energy damage since it's resisted less than Smashing. And having 2 TP attacks plus Thunder Strike which does AoE knockdown is just pretty damn fun. 
Elec/Shield is fun and very effective but it's not accurate to say it's the ultimate AoE brute.
Freedom: Blazing Larb, Fiery Fulcrum, Sardan Reborn, Arctic-Frenzy, Wasabi Sam, Mr Smashtastic.
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The 3 attacks in my attack chain are footstomp, elec fences, and ball lightning. My single target attacks are there for the sake of holding purples. This attack chain would not be possible with a reduction in my recharge. I need 0 outside help to attack fast and am not stuck with TP as a means to get to where I want to go quickly and I can jump into a middle of a spawn to make sure my AOEs are hitting everything. Can you do that in granite?
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No, but I can TP into the middle of the spawn and might need to KoB the boss in the middle as the AoE chain doesn't kill them. Oh yeah I forgot boss in a normal spawn is a phrase you don't recognise, you will either farm minions and lieutenants only or all bosses by the sound of it. It's actually useful that granite doesn't allow you to hover as you drop straight in at the end of the TP without the wait period.
It's true. This game is NOT rocket surgery. - BillZBubba
Currently farm lvl 52 bosses at the aggro cap. So no I am not used to just 1 or 2 bosses with the rest minions and LTs. With my aoe most everything drops about the same time and additional attacks would just be a waste of endurance. That chain with rage crahses and hasten crashes is a killer on the end bar.
You don't need granite to survive. There are plenty of other options that can be made just as difficult to kill wihtout having to have 5 purple sets and 2 LotG just to be at 0 recharge. Not saying it is useless. Just not very flexable. Go figure a big rock not being flexable.
This is in reply to a couple of post. Sure you can use fire enemies for your fire armor brute... Sure you can spend billions on your willpower, reflexes, electric, shield, etc.. NOTHING can take all of it and eat a sandwich except stone armor when it comes to boss spawns, period! If you can build ANYTHING with unlimited influence that can stand multiple boss spawns of different varieties spawned for 8 at lvl 54, than I dare you to try! Stone armor can negate ALL penalties and run an all elite boss map if he so chooses. Possibly even an all AV map. Therefore I stand by my claim, stone armor for BOSS spawns. Run whatever you wish for LT's, I'm sure SS/FA owns them.. I'm positive my ss/shield does.
Just for the record my stone armor brute is 7 seconds away from perma hasten... While in granite form.. Runs faster than damn near everyone while in granite. (of course ss is faster) ... I have a simple macro that combines everything into reds and that plus my double rage, in almost always at damage cap... Not to mention the near perma hasten again... So I can damage as good as the rest of them... I'm done with the argument... Apparently none of you have an IO'd out SA. Go do some research in mids. Ciao.
no doubting the survivability of /stone, that is its redeeming quality.
but beyond special cases (ie. an all AV map) i would say that ss/sd is the best AoE brute.
One point in your favor... Stone armor looks like $hit.. You win!
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no doubting the survivability of /stone, that is its redeeming quality.
but beyond special cases (ie. an all AV map) i would say that ss/sd is the best AoE brute.
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I completly agree!
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Just for the record my stone armor brute is 7 seconds away from perma hasten... While in granite form.. Runs faster than damn near everyone while in granite. (of course ss is faster) ... I have a simple macro that combines everything into reds and that plus my double rage, in almost always at damage cap... Not to mention the near perma hasten again... So I can damage as good as the rest of them... I'm done with the argument... Apparently none of you have an IO'd out SA. Go do some research in mids. Ciao.
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Double Rage is generally a bad idea on Brutes. Why don't you eat all those reds and not crash every 60 seconds?
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Please run us some Herostats on you soloing you Stone Armor Brute. I would love to see some actual data to compare to.
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Just for the record my stone armor brute is 7 seconds away from perma hasten... While in granite form.. Runs faster than damn near everyone while in granite. (of course ss is faster) ... I have a simple macro that combines everything into reds and that plus my double rage, in almost always at damage cap... Not to mention the near perma hasten again... So I can damage as good as the rest of them... I'm done with the argument... Apparently none of you have an IO'd out SA. Go do some research in mids. Ciao.
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Might I see your build? So far I have yet to come up with a build in Mids for SA that I liked. I'm intrigued.
I too would love to see that build.
Active 50's
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Wardman (Fire/sd Scrapper)
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Peroxisome (mind/psi Dominator)
Evil Thing (Fire/Kin Corruptor)
Proud Member of Repeat-Offenders
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Just for the record my stone armor brute is 7 seconds away from perma hasten... While in granite form.. Runs faster than damn near everyone while in granite. (of course ss is faster) ... I have a simple macro that combines everything into reds and that plus my double rage, in almost always at damage cap... Not to mention the near perma hasten again... So I can damage as good as the rest of them... I'm done with the argument... Apparently none of you have an IO'd out SA. Go do some research in mids. Ciao.
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Double Rage is generally a bad idea on Brutes. Why don't you eat all those reds and not crash every 60 seconds?
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Please run us some Herostats on you soloing you Stone Armor Brute. I would love to see some actual data to compare to.
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I skip rage all together when fighting the average mob because I get a steady supply of inspirations. Obviously I don't receive as many inspirations when fighting all bosses + because they don't die as quickly. So in certain situations I use all inspirations, rage plus inspirations, and sometimes double rage. Depends.
I won't be running hero stats because I'm not trying to prove anything other than survivability against tougher opponents that aren't Made specifically for my character. I have no doubt that your ss/fa brute is faster and better suited to fight premade fire enemies.
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Just for the record my stone armor brute is 7 seconds away from perma hasten... While in granite form.. Runs faster than damn near everyone while in granite. (of course ss is faster) ... I have a simple macro that combines everything into reds and that plus my double rage, in almost always at damage cap... Not to mention the near perma hasten again... So I can damage as good as the rest of them... I'm done with the argument... Apparently none of you have an IO'd out SA. Go do some research in mids. Ciao.
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Might I see your build? So far I have yet to come up with a build in Mids for SA that I liked. I'm intrigued.
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I'll be happy to post my build a little later. I'm on my trusty iPhone. To get a general idea however, just go to the brute guides section. He is almost a complete copy of one of the builds.
No one expects Electric Melee/Dark Aura.
No one!