Judging by what you say about defenders and blasters I think you might not like a dominator that much. They have a weakish assault secondary where the best attacks are melee attacks. And you should really use the secondary a lot to achieve the 90 seconds of uberness that is Domination.
That said I have two dominators and the AT appeals to me a lot. They're like rabid controllers and very unforgiving of any errors by the player or the team. Squishy aggro magnets in a game where it sometimes seems that nobody wants to take aggro. Support toons in a game where everyone else has a damage primary. And VERY binary in that a fight that is trivial with Domination up can be impossible when it's down. But they will be getting a mystery buff in I7 and when Domination is up they feel like gods. If you want to go for a dom, I think Plant, Mind and Ice are the best team sets. My Plant seems a bit stronger than my Ice, but it has also had the benefit of better teams at low levels, and I suppose I'm a better dominator myself after taking one to 40 with no prior control experience.
I think you might like a corruptor with a good debuff secondary. /Cold or /Dark or something.
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I think you might like a corruptor with a good debuff secondary. /Cold or /Dark or something.
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Really, as I was thinking something like an Ice/Energy/Fire Corr with Kin.
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I think you might like a corruptor with a good debuff secondary. /Cold or /Dark or something.
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Really, as I was thinking something like an Ice/Energy/Fire Corr with Kin.
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For team support on CoV? I wouldn't. I love Kinetics, it's a great set and awesome support for brutes in particular. And of course it's an awesome combo with a blast set (but energy? Ew with the knockback and kinetics. And Fire/Kin is extremely squishy and basically needs at least as much support as it gives.)
But is it really what teams on CoV need the most in general? Kinetics makes you do more damage and storm through missions like nothing else, but it has very little in form of defense. The way I see it, everyone on CoV has damage. What they lack is mitigation so I would say that defensive buffs and debuffs are really the way to go if you want to build a support toon.
If you find Brutes inadequate in comparison to Tanks then you might find the same true of Dominators if you are used to playing Controllers.
The only thing abouts Brutes is that they are clearly not Tanks (I think they are more similar to Scrappers) but you should look at them without your Tank hat on. Tanking (i.e. taking one for the team) is a very non-villianous way of looking at it.
Maybe Dark/Dark was the wrong power choice for you. How about Fire/invul for higher resistance and Fury-fuelled AoE madness. I'm playing a Fire/Fire Brute at the mo and he plays in a very similar fashion to my old Fire/Fire Tank (pre-Burn nerf of course).
I think that you should have a look at a Corruptor and focus on control (ice/dark?) but then again everyone is either a Corruptor or a MM.
Seeing as you are already a PvP of renown will you be looking for a PvP toon ultimately?
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I think you might like a corruptor with a good debuff secondary. /Cold or /Dark or something.
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Really, as I was thinking something like an Ice/Energy/Fire Corr with Kin.
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For team support on CoV? I wouldn't. I love Kinetics, it's a great set and awesome support for brutes in particular. And of course it's an awesome combo with a blast set (but energy? Ew with the knockback and kinetics. And Fire/Kin is extremely squishy and basically needs at least as much support as it gives.)
But is it really what teams on CoV need the most in general? Kinetics makes you do more damage and storm through missions like nothing else, but it has very little in form of defense. The way I see it, everyone on CoV has damage. What they lack is mitigation so I would say that defensive buffs and debuffs are really the way to go if you want to build a support toon.
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Ah, after re-reading the OP, I would suggest maybe a */Thermal Corr? It has heals, buffs and debuffs in there, that is of course if you like being some kind of heal/buff bot, probably not as bad as an empathy defender though.
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So. Should I bother trying out a new villain? Or will I just get annoyed at the lack of content and boring stories, and should just wait for I7?
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Surely you jest there Tech? The zone arcs and background, the way they all fit in and lead up to particular SF's or AV encounter are a LOT more thought out than on CoH and it's the arcs that give give CoV a reason to play!
Anyway, back to the main point. I've played CoH from day one and started out as a blaster before throwing in the towel at 31. I then went with a katana/regen before getting bored with him at lvl 42 and switched to a fire/ice tank who was my first lvl 50.
On CoV, I have played every AT up to 20. My favourite AT across all 12 available is the Corruptor. This is pretty surprising as I love playing my scrapper for his pure offence and my tank for the fact he refuses to die. Even more so when Blasters and Defenders, the closest AT's to Corruptors on CoH, are not very high on my favourite list.
I've got a lvl 40 Fire/Thermal and every step of the way with him has been fun. He's a pure PvE team build and is completely useless in PvP. His offence is quite low as he only has 2 'standard' attacks with his others being a snipe and Nova. Despite this, I can solo with him in a way I could never manage on a blaster and 'Scourge' is one of the best inherents about. That said, it's teaming where he comes into his own.
I've also started work on an Ice/Ice Corruptor for PvP and while his build is specialised for that, I also think he's great. Nothing is more fun in PvE than seeing a +3 Freak tank lumber towards me like he's running through treacle while I dance just out of range throwing snowballs at him 
Depsite the strnght of brutes, damage of AS and sheer number of pets for MM's, seeing a team of Corruptors tear through missions with the enemies debuffed to hell while we're buffed to the max is pretty impressive.
If you are a team player, nothing relies on teaming more than a Dom. I would avoid Stalkers and MM's though as they are probably the two most 'solo' builds in CoV
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So. Should I bother trying out a new villain? Or will I just get annoyed at the lack of content and boring stories, and should just wait for I7?
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Surely you jest there Tech? The zone arcs and background, the way they all fit in and lead up to particular SF's or AV encounter are a LOT more thought out than on CoH and it's the arcs that give give CoV a reason to play!
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Ok maybe I said that wrong... I don't know most of the stories, obviously, having played it so little in truth, but those I did I wasn't impressed with. I had an En/En brute up to 26 or so before he was blatted, btw, that was exceedingly no fun, especially since noone seemed to play corrupters back then and so teaming = lying around most of the time. Really unimpressed with /en up to then.
Whenever I try villains, I quickly get depressed with the enemies and zones, they're what I really wasn't impressed with, and was probably what I was thinking. Does anyone know if more zones that just the lvl 40-50 one are coming in I7? Mercy is annoying, and Port Oakes is dull. If I got past there with my first brute I don't remember anything.
As for the suggestions. I dunno kinslayer, about Dominators, the way you put them as 'relies on teaming' makes it sound like 'you need a team to keep you going' rather than 'is a good team player'... And that wouldn't suit me. I like teaming to be part of a team, rather than relying on one, if that makes sense 
If a dom falls into the former, I probably wouldn't be keen on it 
Corrupters do sound like a bit of me then. I must admit the scourge inherent is very appealing too, after playing a few levels with defiance...
Kinetics is fun, as you can see above I have a pair of 'em, and they're great! It's definitely under consideration there. What do cold and dark secondaries do? My brutes duo partner is a /thermal, and tbh I'm not that impressed with it. Like I said we're only at 14 tho... maybe it comes into it's own later. Is there a /rad? I'm enjoying my Fire/Rad controller, he tears through mobs at the moment, and can see me getting him high. Primaries though, hmm. I like the sound of an Ice corrupter, do they do good slow AoEs and the like? How are they damagewise? I've always been a bit of an ice fan. I've been teaming a lot with a fireblaster in CoH, and am very impressed with her AoEs too, but that sounds painful in CoV... Energy is right out 
grr to the knockback kings!
Animal: I'm definitely not a PvP renown person, that was an accident 
. I'd like someone that could be half decent in PvP though, especially in Pentads/teams, which I enjoy the most. I don't see myself going brute again, really, especially with the number of elec/* brutes soon to be invading the isles, *sigh*. Hey, they'll all need a good 'rupter at their back won't they 
Ok, corrupter it is, I'll have a look when I get home from work, but if someone can tell me the benefits of ice/ fire/ and /dark /cold /is kin different?, that would be superb!
Ta for the thoughts all.
When it comes to dominators, you're really looking at both sides of what you said. A good Dominator is GREAT in a team situation. IMO, dominators are much better at aggro management than MM's or Brutes in teams where there are lots of enemies as the holds make a huge difference... As long as the Dom doesn't take the alpha.
Bigger teams also allow Dom's to fire up Domination quicker and that really does make a difference. Unfortunately, they are notoriously hard to solo with from 10-30.
A Dom relies on a team but is also very beneficial to one.
Cold secondary has a couple of shields in it, a grant dull pain move and some very good debuffs. Snow Storm is a toggle/anchor AoE and dropped on a mob, slows them down like caltrops. The main difference being they can't actually escape it like caltrops as it follows the anchor, rather than being area specific, also drops fly. Infrigidate is one of the best powers in the set and is available at the beginning as it drops recharge on all powers and can bring AV's to a standstill in terms of attacks. Benumb is available quite late on but is probably one of the best debuffs around.
Thermal is a bit of a slow starter, the three key powers in it are all available at the end of the set. However, the two heals are probably the most user friendly as they're one of the few that do not rely on enemies in CoV. The two shields are OK as well. Thaw is probably the best anti mez buff on CoV as well. The three key powers at the end are the jewels in the crown though. Forge is pretty much identical to Fortitude and slapping one of these on a brute in full flow will see him cut through mobs like they aren't there, especially if his rage is up. Heat Exhaustion is a single target debuff and very powerful. Melt Armour is the final power and is an AoE DEF debuff. Any brute loves having a thermal along for forge, shields and heals.
In terms of primaries, Ice and Fire also happen to be the two most damaging ones. Ice is a bit of an end chewer and reasonably slow on recharge while Fire has a lot of AoE or cone ones and some quite short range attacks. The other thing Ice has in it's favour as a primary are a couple of single target holds and the -slow on it's attacks. stcked up with the secondary of ice it is devastating in stopping enemies attacking.
Hey Kin, IMO that's just not true about Doms. They're not that hard to solo even on low levels, just very slow and end heavy so it feels painful. But definitely safe. I think the main frustration about doms is the huge aggro they draw and the low survivability they have on sub-par teams. The fact is that if control is insufficient or fails they tend to be pretty much out of luck because the damage is insufficient to wipe out the threats fast enough. In a team wipe the dom tends to faceplant first. When CoV first came out I was in lots of PUGs with my ice dom, everybody was unfamiliar with the ATs and the new enemies, teams were large and fighting +2/+3 at low levels and I had generally a pretty miserable time. On the other hand, I always felt my presence made a huge difference to the survivability of others, so in a way it was satisfying.
Also, in my experience Domination is much harder to build in a large team. When soloing I can get Domination bar up loads of times in a single mission, in fact I generally fill the bar before the ability recharges.
The larger the team, the harder it gets as I have less time to blast, the rest of the team takes targets out fast and there are often bigger gaps between fights.
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Ok, corrupter it is, I'll have a look when I get home from work, but if someone can tell me the benefits of ice/ fire/ and /dark /cold /is kin different?, that would be superb!
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/Dark is a great debuff set. Highlights are:-
Twilight Grasp: the heal, starts off rubbish but when you get SOs starts to shine. You need to hit an enemy to heal, but unlike the kinetic heal it doesn't matter if they die before the power runs out and the heal is centred on you. It has a good Area of effect and the heal is reasonably strong. It also does a 10% damage buff and about a 10% to hit debuff for a good 10 seconds after hitting. So helps debuff AVs, bosses and lts.
Tar Patch: The positional debuff, another power that needs SOs to get good. This is a -30% res debuff so you do more damage ( x1.3 ). It also is a slow. With 3 recharge SOs it has a 1-2 second downtime. It's duration is 45 seconds. Note that the -res makes damage debuffs more effective ( by x1.3 for evens ). The slow might make rain powers very effective.
Darkest Night: The alpha strike absorber toggle debuff. 30% damage debuff and 30% to hit debuff. This has a slow animation but it doesn't aggro enemies or suppress stealth for about 2-3 seconds so you have 2-3 seconds to go hide round a corner if you want to. Good out of the box, but best slotted with 3 to hit debuffs and end to taste ( I have 1 end red ).
Howling Twilight: Group res + AoE disrionet I think, I never picked this.
Shadow Fall: Stealth any allies within 40ft, give them 20% resist to energy, negative energy and psi damage in the process ( + puny defence to all ). With this you can get within 10ft of an enemy and put darkest night on his firend at the back of the spawn and leg it and not be noticed.
Fearsome Stare: Wide Cone Fear power. Also provides a to hit debuff of around -10%. Very fun power.
Petrifying Gaze: Single target hold.
Black Hole: Enemy Phase shift.
Dark Servant: A pet that uses hold heal and various other powers ( as well as having a -acc debuff aura ).
I use Darkest Night on a member of a spawn, run to a corner, put down a Tar Patch and then when they come round the corner jump out and Fear them. Then start blasting away, with Twilight Grasps on the most dangerous foe! With Tar Patch and Darkest night you can take an alpha for ther team, something that is very rare in CoV.
I would go for a set with synergy, either Fire ( for AoE damage ), Ice ( more control ), Sonic ( -res to stack with Tar Patch and make the -dam more effective ) or Dark ( more -acc ). I have a Sonic/Dark and am very impressed, especially as I'm not a fan of CoV. It scares me how good the defender version would be.
@Unthing ... Mostly on Union.
To be honest if you want a rundown on the corruptor powers just look at the CoH equivalents. they're all near direct ports as far as I can see. As far as it goes most of the differences in the powersets are purely in the costumes of the people using them.
As for being a team player that's more difficult in CoV in that many archetypes are mainly out for themselves. Masterminds are the new tanks but a large amount of people dislike teaming with them and their powers are more "tempramental", Brutes are the new scrappers and wind up normally being the last one alive who didn't run and never seem to have a spare awaken, stalkers seem to go off on their own a lot, corruptors are blasters by any other name, dominators are probably the best team players but a problem to level up without a team.
In a good team these aren't problems but I've found many more bad teams in CoV than CoH.
Friends are just enemies that haven't betrayed you yet.
If your making a Corr, and you thinking of Fire/* Ice/* and */Kin */Dark or */Rad, I'd say Fire/Kin, Ice/Rad or Ice/Dark.
I have to agree with Lady DarkForce. Ice/Rad or Ice/Dark might work well for you. Ice/Cold might be worth looking at, too. You say you like the Ice Blast set, and it seems you like control, ranged damage, and being able to support a team. Any of those builds will let you do all of that, and they'll also be workable in PvP.
Ice/Dark is best on the control, with the secondary having a hold, a cone fear, and slow from Tar Patch. (Ice Blast itself has two holds, although the second one has a rather annoying long animation - Ice/Dark is great because you can drop that second Ice hold, take the Dark hold, and still stack holds on bosses.) It's ridiculously fun, and I absolutely love my Ice/Dark. She's quite possibly my favourite character, and I have 24. 
However, Ice/Dark is the worst build I have ever played when it comes to endurance usage. My level 40 Ice/Dark can eat through Stamina, and even a Corruptor's Speed Boost on top of that. I'm sure that, in part, it's build-dependent - if I went with a one accuracy PvE slotting on my blasts, it would open up slots that could have endurance reductions in. Taking Scirocco as a patron might help, since Corruptors can get Power Sink from his pool.
Ice/Rad probably has endurance problems too, I've heard people with Ice/Rads complaining about it. However, with Accelerate Metabolism, you might be able to alleviate your problems to some extent. Dark Miasma has nothing to help you on that front. Ice/Cold I've heard is pretty heavy on the end, too - it has just has many toggles, and I know my Fire/Cold isn't exactly endurance-light. If you enjoy slows though, it's probably the way to go, and you can make a really nice support build with it. All three builds I think can both be quite offensive, but at the same time great team support - I love that about Corruptors.
If you do go for Ice/Dark, I'll gladly hand along a few tips from my experiences.
EDIT: Oh, and yeah... agreeing with what's been said above... do not try to compare Brutes to Tanks. They're damage-dealers, not damage-takers, and are all about flying through missions as quickly as possible smashing everything in sight. In fact, it's best to just forget the CoH ATs when playing CoV. Sure, there are a lot of shared powersets, but just don't try to shoehorn them into the same roles, because those roles don't exist. Yes, CoV ATs tend to be fairly self-sufficient, but good teams on CoV are far more than the sum of their parts, and can race through missions. I've found CoV teaming really good fun.
Also, I greatly prefer the story arcs and contacts system in CoV to CoH. Some people just don't, and you might never change your mind. However, I found the later part of CoV much more interesting than the early part - I like the later zones more, and I prefer the arcs and contacts. It doesn't take long to get past Mercy and Port Oakes, so no point in writing the game off based on them. I'm glad you're giving it another go, you might find it gets better for you further in.
Wow, /Dark definitely sounds like a great set!
Thanks for all the comments again. I'm sorely tempted to go down the /Kin route, just because they are familiar powers from my controllers, but think I'll ignore that urge and try something new.
I will take a look at the /Dark and /Cold tonight powersets tonight, and see if I can find any powers that I like at low levels, so pre-10 I'd guess.
Reading the corrupter board, I see a group of /Rads starting out, whoa mama, that would be a disgustingly powerful SG! Unfortunately it's on Defiant, and the meetup times are... odd
Might start something here Would a Darkrupter SG go as well as a Radrupter one? Hmm, might need a couple of toons...
Ta all!
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Wow, /Dark definitely sounds like a great set!
Thanks for all the comments again. I'm sorely tempted to go down the /Kin route, just because they are familiar powers from my controllers, but think I'll ignore that urge and try something new.
I will take a look at the /Dark and /Cold tonight powersets tonight, and see if I can find any powers that I like at low levels, so pre-10 I'd guess.
Reading the corrupter board, I see a group of /Rads starting out, whoa mama, that would be a disgustingly powerful SG! Unfortunately it's on Defiant, and the meetup times are... odd
Might start something here Would a Darkrupter SG go as well as a Radrupter one? Hmm, might need a couple of toons...
Ta all!
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Dark Miasma rocks completely. It has one of my favourite animations : the "I'm gonna give them the Glowering of their lives" of Fearsome Stare. So many toys in it.
Dark Blast is a little light on damage though and there's a lull in the 20s with its relatively useless high-tier powers (Torrent and Life Drain. yuck)
Who cares about Torrent and Life Drain? TT and Night Fall for the win ! Although all 4 of these powers come from the Dark primary for corruptors, not the secondary.
My personal experience in CoV, Tech, includes Doms (Ice/Fire) and Corruptors (Dark/Dark). I've found both ATs to be immense fun for quite different reasons. Both ATs solo and team very well, imo. Doms *are* aggro magnets, to be sure, but an experienced player like yourself should find this of little bother. Personally, I find it makes the AT more interesting. My corr deals out more dmg consistently than my dom, and the scourge inherent is sweet, but the domination inherent is just sick, and more intoxicating than fury on Brutes - for me, at least. I always manage to get the power up at least once per mission. Twice on small teams or solo. Having teamed with SB back in the day, and Tech more recently, I can see you enjoying either AT. Try them both if you're unsure.
As for power selections: The only Dom powers I'm familiar with are Ice and Plants (only because there are soo many of them). I personally don't like plants much, but it *is* effective, and capitalises on the Dom AT's strengths. Ice is fun and quick. Your end runs out quite fast, less because of the power costs, I think, than the rate at which you can use them. My primary helps out there, since it's fairly cheap on end.
Corruptors: I've only played my Dark/Dark (much like a D3, only more offensive - the way I've always felt a D3 should play - almost Blastery), but I've been in many teams with /Thermals and /Colds, and the buffs/ debuffs from both sets are awesome. The heals are solid in Therm, but have long recharges: the buffs are where the money is. Cold has some effective buffs as well, but I feel the set is bigger on the debuffs.
For the actual power selections, and well they work, you can check out the Troller powers for Doms. I like to reference the guides on the US servers as well. There's a really solid guide to all the Dom sets, and how well the various primaries work the secondaries here
Whoa, hold the phones.....
When did you get back, Noir?
Plant/Thorns dominator. The powerset is excellent for teaming yet, later on, can also be used for soloing (damage is a bit weak at low levels). The main powers (Seeds of Confusion/Carrion Creepers) are superb, both in effect and useability. I _do_ still faceplant now and again but, in general, my dominator is a great addition to a team and eminently playable. Good fun, and noticeably different in feel to playing a controller...!!
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Whoa, hold the phones.....
When did you get back, Noir?
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I'm not. I like to touch base every now and then. Keep as much in the loop as possible. I don't want to be a stranger in a strange land when I can start playing again.
I did manage to log in a couple of days ago for the new badges, and to just say hi to everyone - well, whoever was online, at least.
Phew. Ok, so I've tried out a few things.
I have an Ice/Dark corrupter (8), a Fire/Dark corrupter (8), and a Plant/Ice dominator (5).
So far I'm quite enjoying the corrupters, the dominator keeps getting passed over, but it looks like some interesting powers too.
From my limited levels, I've found I like the Ice for soloing, feels like more single-target damage, and the Fire for grouping (bigger spawns, more orange numbers ). I convinced a bunch of my SG to join me with other /dark corrupters, all with different primaries, which currently blasts through missions . Unfortunately we've had to create this on Defiant, since we all seem to have few, if any, slots left on union... but that's ok. At least Max Powerz can't spam me with SG invites there .
Will see how it goes. If anyone is on Defiant Villains, if you see a group of near-identical 'Hunter' toons, that's me and my group . When one of us hit's 10, we'll start a SG and might start recruiting.
Cheers all!
Hmmm may have to create a supergroup on defiant then
Heros
Max Powerz: Lv 50 Tanker
Villains
Max Khaos: Lv 50
Overlord of E.V.I.L.
My Brute - http://maxy-khaos.mybrute.com/
LF SG! Arc ID# 193083
make a /stone brute, can tank better than your Inv any day of the week, with a kinetic you can even kill them all remarkably quickly.
**Acceptable "support" responses**
Its your fault
Its your computers fault
Its your ISPs fault
Ok so some of my mates have been trying to push me into the gloom of CoV *thwacks Max*.
. I don't really think I like them as much as it seems (though they are fun, in the right situations), and have almost no idea how I got one to 50, I honestly just wanted him to be a Cavern of Transcendance runner, which is the main reason he comes out now, really.
This is what I play on heroes:
Inv/Axe Tanker 50 (Main)
Ill/Emp Controller 50 (Old Main)
Dark/Dark Scrapper 29 (Semi-main)
FF/En Defender 26
Ice/Kin Controller 25 & 20
Elec/Elec Blaster 21
Ice/En Blaster 18 (Reason for S4 Champ forum title)
Fire/Rad Controller 14 (Hopefully for PvP)
Ice/Stone Tanker 12
And I do have a villain:
Dark/Dark Brute 14, who is only there to duo with a corrupter mate, not because I'm overly fond of it
So. Should I bother trying out a new villain? Or will I just get annoyed at the lack of content and boring stories, and should just wait for I7?
If so. What kind of toon might I like? My favourite toon is my tank, but a brute appears to be a pale shadow of one, so I haven't been able to get into them (tried a few different powersets).
Strangely I mostly have controllers. I don't know how that happened, honestly, I think it was because friends were making new toons so I'd join them and the main thing that would help us team would be a controller
Blasters are ok, I wish they were more blastery rather than almost forcing you to take melee to do decent dmg though.
Defenders are not really fun for me. I have no idea why they were given blasts as secondaries, shrug, and can see myself taking very few of them in my current one.
Am mostly enjoying my scrapper, probably because he's now high enough to have a good swath of powers. I don't like the AT in general though.
Ok so my thoughts on villains:
Brute: Can't see how this fits well in a team
Corrupter: Could be fun, if I can find powersets I like. Blasts are good, and could be a damn good team member with a good secondary.
Mastermind: I does like me pets. But defo not Robo/FF, what's up with you ppl? Sheesh...
Dominator: Hrm, I do like that it appears so underused/unliked, but what powersets?
Stalker: No.
I'm big on teamplayerness, from my controller list that's obvious I guess, hmm. Villains don't seem to be teamplayer oriented. Maybe that's why I haven't gotten into it. If I wanted a single player game I'd go play Oblivion...
So can anyone help me out? I don't just want something with 'uber-leet' high powers, since if I have to grind there I at least want to enjoy the ride. Mediocre all the way would be fine over [censored]-on-toast then OMG(optional: !) type sets...
Oh yeah, I hate knockback btw. Yes I know I have /En on my bubbler, but he's not taking blasts anyway, shrug. Wish I'd taken Ice(is there an ice?), Rad, Dark, or Psi now.
Shrug.