Best Solo SoA

ok so i have several 50s on both red/blue sides...now i often just log on to solo a mish or two but now im so familiar with all my toons after hundreds of hours that i would like a bit of 'new hotness'

i want to know what you guys think the best solo SoA would be based on what i like. if you believe a build to suit me in SoA doesnt exist please leave your thoughts as well. thanks...

1) i want to solo... teaming is a distant second because i have a ton of toons that will help a team. i have options in that area and this toon isnt about that

2) while its a distant second i would like to have a couple things to offer a team so i dont get complaints when i team once in a while

3)i prefer a strong offense with a middling defense ( assuming strong O and D is a bit too much to ask). i hope to make them dead before i see my HP start to drop. what i mean is that sometimes you can sacrifice your O for D (/stone brute) or your D for O (/fire brute)...i dont want either extreme but a little more on the O would be good if possible

4)i dont want to wait until 30s to be at least effective. if im in my teens i would like to sign on and wreck shop. i dont want to slog thru too many levels before im a force. if i have to choose between a build that peaks early and suffers later or a build that peaks way late but is a lvl50 'I Win' button, i will take the former

5) as i said im a experienced player so i dont care about how intricate a build is to make it work. i have a tri-form kheldian that can solo fine. ( although slower than i hope this SoA will be)

6)im not big on IO heavy builds. i normally dont play my toons enough to amass billions and so the extent of my spending is in the 10-20 million range which is likely just plain IOs and only a few set bonuses

Lastly i dont mind doing some research on builds. if i get some good suggestions i dont mind doing even more reading in the builds sections if required. im asking first so i can at least get a little direction

so what do you think? is there a SoA for me?

Bane. Like a stalker on PCP.

Night Widows are pretty crazy. Great offense and the ability to couple it with softcapped Defense. Plus you get to do cool spins and wear a giant piece of lipstick on your head.

Night Widows satisfy 1, 2, 3, and 5 handily. For number 4, widows are squishy in their teens and have some difficulty on anything besides challenge setting 1. By the twenties they start getting reasonable defense and by the thirties you will become nigh unkillable. And for number 6, Night Widows need softcapped defenses to be AMAZING in the defense department which requires some set bonuses, although I would estimate that it would cost no more than 20 million inf. Otherwise, they will be just "pretty okay" in defense but still have ridiculous offense no matter what.

Can't comment on the other SoAs since I only have experience with Widows.

Night Widow. All you need for softcap is 4 Def/Rech IOs and Hasten to get Mind Link up. Strong Early, high damage. Also, it isn't as slow as a Bane.

Night Widow should meet or exceed most of your qualifications

Being the SoA board you'll find there a majority bias towards night widows and a minority bias towards banes. Bottom line is -both- lay things to waste pretty easily, both have team buffs and both have massive hard hitting attacks available to them.

My advice is try both out, both solo rather easily (most stealth classes do). Folks tend to say banes are squishy, but since they can have soft capped defenses just like a widow (gonna take some IOing to make happen of course but isn't that tough to pull off), higher hit points through armor passives and decent resists (mine has 41% lethal/smashing and 20-25% all else) in the end they are IMO more durable than widows in the high end game. Not only that but they have a ton of mitigation through knockdowns in crowd control and shatter and access to pets to help with hard targets.

Am I biased against widows? Not really, it's just everyone plays one and I find them a bit boring myself. I go in with my widow and a few slashes later things are dead. Then I click mind link again and repeat. I go in with my bane and a few swings later bodies are flying all over and things are dead (if you've ever played war mace this is basically it, but with crits from stealth and toxic damage added in). Just my preference.

Widows are a bit more straight forward: no glamor, no announcing to the room that they've arrived and everyone should make out a quick will. They just kill. What makes them so alluring is that it's stupid easy to cap defenses on them. Both ATs get mental training so your attacks are quicker, both get access to veat-specific leadership pools. And both can be a lot of fun to play.

My advice again: make one of each .

Bane is far superior to night widow any day of the week.

After playing both all the way to level 50, I can say that the Night Widow has been my most enjoyable experience. (All this is Pre-AE/No-AE mind you) Bane was fun as the kill a target, placate, kill, stalker play. Night Widow has been my tank/stalker with the softcapped defense.

My test is the "Ms. Liberty" test. You kill Ms. Liberty without popping purples, and see which can survive better and kill her faster. My Night Widow has the most surivability and almost the same damage output as my Bane.

Depending on your type of play, it's really your choice.

For solo I rank them as


Bane/NW-Tied,both do very good ST damage, personal choice.
Fortunata-Close Second.
Crab/Huntsmen-Lowish ST damage, more AoE, killer on teams.


All can solo, but Bane/NW are the best.

From my experience, I'm gonna have to go with Bane (My Night Widow is level 28, though she can shred stuff pretty good). It's true that Banes do lack in the durability/defense department, but most of my opponents rarely last long enough to do any sufficient damage

just an update...

so much for #4 and "slog thru"...

my widow isnt 24hrs old and is already lvl25 after a global friend invited me for some teaming

damn....a lot has changed since 2006

still plan to try a Bane though

I solo my huntsman with little problems. I would however go bane from lvl 24-32 and then respec into a huntsman.

I just got my Bane respec the other day and I'm having a blast with him solo.

One bonus of the dual build feature is that I'm planning on making my Huntsman and Bane builds on the same toon.

My crab solos without breaking a sweat, but I DID spend 500m on her IO's...

Banes and Night Widows are the go-to soloers. Both are fast and efficient getting through missions.

Banes have lots of toys and options.
Night Widows have durability.

Their damage output is comparable, their play styles are very different (Bane is best played Blapper-style, Night Widows are very Scrappery).

My personal favorite is the Bane. For me, the animations, tools and toys, and feeling of being well-balanced game-mechanics-wise makes them far and away my fave VEAT.

WARNING: I bold names.

I say hybrid Fortunata is your best choice.

While Night Widow / Bane deal more damage, Fortunata's damage is nothing to be laughed about.

I say "hybrid" because you can reduce a lot of damage taken by just holding one, attacking another (the same ole' Dominator strategy).

Believe me, I have very well invested 50 Fortunata, Blood Widow (NW but with follow-up and no Hide) and Night Widow (hide, build up type), lvl 50 Crab (semi Melee) and lvl 44 Bane.

Go with Dominate, Follow Up, Lunge, Swipe, Spine and the usual leadership + mind link. You'll solo just about anything.

I've soloed with Bane/NW and one bad thing about NW is that when your luck runs out, you are in a much deep trouble than Fortunata. Bane's base defense is not as high without additional help from sets and since you said you don't want to invest much, I say Fortunata melee hybrid is your best choice.

The body-slamming, bone-crunching sound of an Executioner's Strike is so satisfying that it is reason enough by itself to go with a Bane. Take a stroll around the Fab some time if you'd like to experience it first-hand. The slicing sounds of Night Widow claws seem almost mundane by comparison.

If you're not so lucky to be plvled to post-24 greatness, I found it somewhat of a grind--most especially because I was working on a Fortunata and really wanted to be doing ranged, psionic damage lol. That's a weird design choice--start out as a claws scrapper to make a psionic blaster!

Anyway, the grind wasn't much worse than any other class--or really any better, except that Conditioning was actually noticeable and helpful. I even noticed that my regen/recovery were better than I'm used to before I even noticed I had Conditioning. You get some decent attacks that chain well, and since some of them are ranged (the Dart ones), you don't have to spend any time chasing the runners, which is cool.

I'm totally loving my Fortunate post-24, so I wouldn't write them off just because these boards are melee-obsessed. It's like having the perfect psionic blaster--at least perfect for my playstyle. Whatever you sacrifice in raw damage (and I'm guessing you do, but I honestly don't know), you easily make up for with passive defenses (near enough to softcap without IOs and well beyond with Mindlink), complete status protection (Ah, Heaven!!!), excellent debuffs (-regen on Dart attacks, -recharge on some of the Psy attacks), decent controls, a crashless nuke (woot!), nice AE/ST balance, etc. Not to mention cool psionic attacks! What's not to love??

My Fortunata--who's been 100% solo so far--is cruising in his 30's. I can't comment on the 40's, but considering that the primary bane of ranged attackers at that range is status effects and debuffs (which have to hit you to be a problem), I'm hoping he will continue cruising all the way to 50.

Pick based on how you enjoy to play. Each one solos fine. Anything in the game solos fine, but SoAs specifically solo VERY well.

Here's my ranking on four attributes based on feel, not numbers.
They are ranked against themselves only.
I've also given three attributes that I think of when I play them.

1 is best, 4 is least

Typically, there's a small margin between 1-3, and 4 is a bigger step down from 3.

Damage: How much damage it feels like you are doing. Most impacted by bigger spikes.
Speed: How fast you feel. Most impacted by activation times.
Tactics: Do you feel like you're plotting the next fight, or just going in blind and mashing buttons.
Sensual Impact: If you saw this happen in the street IRL, how horrified/impressed would you be. Note that fear powers don't count because you're not affected, just watching. This is obviously the most subjective category.

NW: Speed, grace, shadowy
Damage: 1
Speed: 2
Tactics: 4
Sensual Impact: 4

Bane: Tactical, STRENGTH, gadgetry
Damage: 2
Speed: 3
Tactics: 2
Sensual Impact: 1

Crab: Tactical, minion masher, evil
Damage: 3
Speed: 2
Tactics: 3
Sensual Impact: 2

Fortunata: Control, vampiric, grace
Damage: 4
Speed: 4
Tactics: 1
Sensual Impact: 3