Stone/WP

So I just rolled a Stone/WP toon and out of the box he feels pretty solid, a little end heavy, but still pretty solid and quite powerful. I've never been able to get into brutes before, but this guy seems like he might be fun.

Now I gotta know, is this combination a valid one that will provide me with hours of bashing fun?

Also what powers should I avoid on this combo?

Thanks for your time.

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As I was going up the stair
I met a man who wasn't there.
He wasn't there again today.
I wish, I wish, he'd stay away.


-- Hughes Mearns (1875-1965) The Psychoed
Saint Fourth the Patron Saint of Dark Poetry

You should skip Resurgence and Hurl Boulder. Strength of Will is also a skippable to most. I like to skip Stone Fist, personally - to me it's a choice between that and Stone Mallet. Other than that, I'd take them all.

Been quite a while since I played a Stone/*, but in my experience the knockdown from Fault and Tremor are amazing combined with Rise to the Challenge. The only real downside to knockdown comes when there's multiple on a team, and the magnitude can become a group knockback every now and then.

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Stone and WP go together like bread and honey. Stone provides you an almost excessive amount of KB, which is fantastic when you consider that one of WP's main strengths is regenerating a ton of damage, something that's much easier to capitalize on when everything around you is knocked flat. You also have the advantage of Stamina + Quick Recovery to cover the otherwise end-heavy nature of Stone.

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Stone Fist + Mallet + H Mallet + S. Smash + Fault
Everything in WP except the last two powers

Extremely fun set to play, very high single target dps, lots of knockdown to mitigate incoming damage and allow you to regen, can be IOd up to solid performance for dirt cheap.

SM/WP is a very safe, solid, inexpensive build with fast attacks and high damage. The end issue that high damage brings is easily taken care of by QR+Stamina, without having to go into expensive unique's.

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I love my SM/WP.

Stone fist, stone mallet, brawl and boxing allows rapid low level fury building. QR and stamina gives me enough end to SMASH without expensive IOs, although if you're prepared to splash out on miracle, numinas and performance shifter specials, you can probably get by on QR.

Fault and later tremor are great mitigation. Mine is a really cheap build with frankenslotted attacks and is very effective, but I would imagine if you throw cash at it, it could be obscenely good.

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It's true. This game is NOT rocket surgery. - BillZBubba

SM/WP is alot of fun. A few advices :

- Get QR and Stamina 3 slotted aspa, SM is end heavy.
- Put a FF +rech proc in both Fault and Tremor, this thing has a chance to proc for every critter hit by your AoEs... it's totally awesome.
- Frankenslot a bit your attacks for more end red, if you like to attack non stop like I do, even QR and Sta might not be enough.
- In WP I would only skip Resurgence, and in SM taunt and hurl are optionnal.
- You also pretty need Tough. Air Sup is a good filler attack for your single target chain also until you get alot of recharge. For massive single target dps at 50, Gloom is the best (chain = SS->HM->SM->SF->Gloom repeat). All in all it's a pretty tight build.

Good luck and have fun

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For damage, tremor isn't very good, but it allows you a second aoe knockdown for regeneration purposes.

High Pain Tolerance: I went 3 resist, 3 health.

I recommend getting tough and weave from the fighting pool.

I was torn between stone fist, kick, and boulder as an attack filler. I went with the boulder. Not the best choice, but it doesn't keep me up at night. I slotted it with the hold proc, so it could combo decently with Seismic SMASH! It gives me a second or two of mitigation with bosses or EB's. (Also good as a finisher. A dying mob flying out of the crowd herded around you is aesthetically pleasing.)

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My SM/WP isn't built "optimally" since I haven't respecced after the hammer animation changes, but the idea was maximizing recharge and using Fault for an "oh " power, since the regen that happens while the mobs are standing back up amounts to roughly the same hit points recovered as using Aid Self.

I skipped Tremor and use Dark Obliteration (with a Ragnarok KD) for AoE damage and an extra -tohit; the DPA on it is nearly double Tremor's and it doesn't tie up a lot of time in your attack chain; I skipped Hurl Boulder because Gloom is the second best DPA attack you have available. If I respecced today I'd drop Stone Mallet (when I took it, the DPA was higher than Stone Fist, now it's not) and use Stone Fist for attack chain filling; Fault has the FF +rech proc in it along with 5 Absolute Amazements - I'd probably end up replacing the +rech proc with a damage proc also given that I have over 210% recharge in all of the attacks with global+slotting without it firing.

The Fighting Pool stacks well with your secondary, and with little to no work at all you can survive some rather insane things - it's typically recommended to aim for +hp and +regen set bonuses but I've found that with Fault you really don't need them at all, even Cimerorans don't present that much of a problem because you can use it before they trigger their mez/-KB power (if you wait until afterwards you'll want to hit SoW to boost your S/L resistance, though - Hapless Schoolgirl hits 82% with it up) and you really only need to worry about critical hits coming from a boss or EB.

Long and short of it, my SM/WP is as survivable as my FM/SA was (I deleted her at 50) while maintaining better single-target damage output and similar AoE output (due to the -rech in Granite).

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For Stone, I don't like Fault too much. But that's probably just personal opinion. Other than that, pick Stone Fist OR the Mallet, I wouldn't suggest both.

For Willpower, take everything but Resurgence and Strength of Will. Resurgence and SoW are pretty good, they're just not necessary. Everything else is.

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I'm working on a SM/WP Brute myself. Someone mentioned the IO set bonuses for +regen, +HP, you'd be suprised how much they boost your regen in higher levels, particularly when you stack em. Stacking IO/s until I have 5 of each +hp +regen bonus is why my brute is going to end up costing me billions, but I'm just curious to see how the final hp/sec works out to be. It should be fairly obnoxious to anyone actually trying to kill me as well.

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