Dark Questions & Do I need Stamina?

Just rolled a Thug/Dark yesterday and am toying around with the build at the moment.

I loathe having to get stamina with any of my toons I would rather have 3 addtional powers however somtimes its unavoidable.

Now im planning on getting all the Thug powers bar the 1st attack. I intend to use my attacks (Duel Weild and Empty Clip) just as a mean of self defense if things go belly up.

So basically is dark a end hevey set and do you rekon I could get by slotting with end reducers instead of getting stamina.

Based on my very limited knowledge of Dark Im not getting black hole which according to my sources is very end heavy and I dont think im getting howling twilight or shadow fall either.

Please tell me if Im mad for missing these powers and can I surrvive stamina less.

Thanks in advance

Black hole is definitely skippable, and howling twilight, whilst the best rez in the game (and a handy combat power with a sizable disorient) is also not necessary.

Shadow Fall I would take if you can - increased damage resistance and some stealth for you, your pets and your team, plus resistance to psionic damage? A beautiful power, that I tend not to leave the house without on my /dark corr and mm.

AS far as stamina goes, not sure - not really tried it - might be worth a go, but with spamming twilight grasp, fearsome stare, and darkest night toggled on, you might find it tough. Give it a go, see how you get on!

Playing thugs/dark too (23 atm). I went for Stamina since I was a bit worried about some of the endurance-heavy powers in Dark, but I'm starting to think that unless you go for the primary attacks (I only took 1), you might be OK with just some enreds. But if you do want them, then definitely go for Stamina. I took Shadow Fall since it works nicely with Super Speed. Still undecided about whether taking Howling Twilight later.

Just read up on Shadow Fall again and am taking it now i thought it was just a stealth power, how wrong can I be.

I don't have Stamina on my Necro/Dark, currently level 25 and quite happy. I only took one attack and rarely use it at all.

Shadow Fall is a great power. Howling Twilight is too. I'd skip one of your blasts for it if you aren't going to be using them much anyway.

Ive now fitted shadow fall in.

The main reason for not get howling twiglight is that usualy duo 90% of the time with Mr Marvellous. I remember seeing Howling in action now and I dont think it will be of a great benifit due to the amount of mobs that a duo spwans.

Having said that I still have 2 spare powers to pick at Lvls 30 & 35 so may end up with it.

I was going to go for assualt but this would impact on my end with it being a toggle and ive also heard that the enforcer in thugs gives a leadership buff. Is that right??

Any suggestion what are other good pool powers for a MM?

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I was going to go for assualt but this would impact on my end with it being a toggle and ive also heard that the enforcer in thugs gives a leadership buff. Is that right??

Any suggestion what are other good pool powers for a MM?

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Well still couldn't hurt to get the leadership pool as the buffs stack (at least they do since I7, and boy was I surprised!).

Endurance wise I tend to fight alongside my pets so can't really advise about whether to take Stamina or not.

Only the Vengence power in Leadership doesn't stack, Assult, Tactics and d'other one do.

As for what to get at 30 & 35 I'm debating this one too. I've already taken Assult since I'd nothing else I wanted from the main sets and I reckon I'll get Tactics at 30.

I have a Necro/Dark without Stamina, and I can run Shadowfall, Tactics, Assault and spam heals/holds/fears and not run into any end problems. Things can get a bit dicey with Darkest Night as well, mind, but popping a blue or two or turning off Assault normally sorts it. All my toggles have a single end red slotted in them.

I have Bots/dark..i currently run the following toggles

Manouvers, Assault, Tacticts, Combat Jumping, Shadowfall, Acrobaticts and darkest night.

Now you will be running some toggles, maybee not as many as i do, however with spamming of heals and holds and taking a couple of the attacks i would recomend stamina. The attacks are end heavy, however again it depends if your teaming or soloing a lot.

Soloing i find stuff doesn't live long enough to warrent stamina.

Teaming your more likely to lose some henchmen and summoning them mid fight, or between, without worrying about an end crash is a bonus......enough to lose 3 other powers i'm still not 100% but before stamina i did have end crashes now i never do.

I remember one six man mission that went a bit pear shaped (at the time i had recall friend and teleport) i was able to keep all my toggles up had TG on auto was resummoning fallen bots, tp'ing the fallen people next to me then hit howling twlight and ress'ed everyone.......couldn't have done it without stam.....like i say rare instances but worth it......you're choice

I don't find /dark End-heavy at all. I only took Assault from the Leadership pool and I have one EndRdx in all 3 of my toggles (Assault, Shadow Fall, Darkest Night), but I use the /dark powers constantly in combat. I only took one attack from my primary (the second one) for myself, though - I really only use it to finish off runners or to add extra damage on EB/Hero/AV fights (although I picked up another attack from my Patron Pool at L41, and it seems to use tons of End). Running Assault & Shadow Fall constantly the only times I came close to running low on End in combat up until around L35 were when using Darkest Night on boss fights - even then it wasn’t that bad, and I never had End crashes.

But at the start of every mission I had big Endurance problems when summoning all 6 pets and buffing them with both upgrades (from L32 onwards) - it's going to be even more noticeable now that pet buffs recharge faster. And like boomtime says there will be occasional situations where you need to re-summon and re-upgrade those pets in combat (some EB/Hero/AV fights spring to mind, both solo and teamed) - although solo or duo’d you shouldn’t really lose (m)any pets under normal conditions, perhaps a first tier pet here or there as you get higher in level and face stuff that can one-shot them.

So I took Stamina at 35 mainly for that, and it helped noticeably with pet summoning/buffing. Even with 3-slotted Stamina, an EndRdx in my second pet buff (2 recharges in it too), and my toggles off, I still have to Rest after summoning all 6 bots and fully upgrading them all - but at least I don’t have to Rest in the middle of upgrading them anymore, and then wish Rest was available again when I finished! Really it depends how impatient you are to get started on missions - I don’t like standing around for my End bar to refill when I could be earning xp You may not mind so much.

So combat-wise I think I could have lived without Health/Stamina if there were other things I really wanted instead, but there weren't. And there are crunch moments when I’m glad I took it. YMMV. Imho Stamina is certainly skippable until the mid to late levels (unless you want to run more toggles than I do). I just found L35 a good time to take it because with 2nd pet upgrade at L32 and Dark Servant at L38 that was the latest I could pick it up before 40. And with all the long EB/AV/Hero fights past 40 I have a feeling you'd rather have Stamina than not for the 40-50 stretch. Also at L40+ Malta Sappers and Longbow Spec-Ops can drain all of your Endurance in one shot, so having Stamina helps to recover from that if you happen to not have any blue insps.

I almost forgot to talk about the /dark powers, hehe.

Apart from Black Hole (which I didn’t take, so can’t comment on) EVERYTHING in Dark Miasma is fantastic. All the powers have varied uses. Even at later levels when you may stop using Tar Patch & Darkest Night every spawn (because things die so fast), they’re invaluable for debuffing on boss/EB/Hero/AV fights. ShadowFall is lovely for the stealth, but it's even better for the resists, and you seem to have already realised that Fearsome Stare and Petrifying Gaze are good (godlike might be a better description - take them as soon as you can and fully slot them - I use them every single fight).

Dark Servant is just godlike too - he heals, he debuffs, he holds & immobilises things, he can take alphas for you on boss spawns, and he can even tank Elite Bosses because with his auto-hit aura (like DN I think) and spammed powers he can hold aggro very well and his heal keeps him alive. When I took on Numina solo my Dark Servant tanked the 3-4 ambushes that spawned while I killed her - that’s around a dozen red/orange-con Longbow - he's just that good! I can't praise him enough. With 3 Recharges you can have him up all the time, but I tend to just summon him as needed.

I think Howling Twilight is very underrated - it’s the unsung hero of the set - sure it's a mass resurrect (and a great one too), but 99% of the time I use it as an area disorient. It's a fantastic "panic button", especially if Fearsome Stare isn't up, when you really need to lock down a spawn (such as an incoming ambush) - it's auto-hit so is 100% reliable, and there are not many powers you can say that about. It has saved my life more times than I can count, and with just one Recharge SO in the base slot it's always been there when I needed it. Consider it as an extra control power rather than a rez.

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But at the start of every mission I had big Endurance problems when summoning all 6 pets and buffing them with both upgrades (from L32 onwards) - it's going to be even more noticeable now that pet buffs recharge faster.

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Theve speeded them up great didnt notice much diff in the 1st upgrade.

Whats the recharge now on the Lvl 32 upgrade running at now as that may help my build greatly.

i think with 2 recharges in the second upgrade is up just slightly slower than unslotted or 1 slotted first upgrade.

whatever it is, its damn site better than the 60 secs that it was.

sorry cant be more accurate but i cant at the mo remember how i have them slotted now since respec

If thats right Boom thats fantastic I had factored in hasten due to the ridiculas rechage of the 2nd enhancment.

I can now free that slot up

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I have a Necro/Dark without Stamina, and I can run Shadowfall, Tactics, Assault and spam heals/holds/fears and not run into any end problems. Things can get a bit dicey with Darkest Night as well, mind, but popping a blue or two or turning off Assault normally sorts it. All my toggles have a single end red slotted in them.

[/ QUOTE ]I find that interesting, seeing as I tend to run out of endurance in harder fights with my necro/dark, who has stamina...

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Whats the recharge now on the Lvl 32 upgrade running at now as that may help my build greatly.

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Pre-I7 I had 3 Recharge SOs in the Tier2 and a single Recharge SO in the Tier1.

To save using up my freespec just to move slots after I7 I tried out several different combinations of enhancements and I find the fastest buffing comes about with an EndRdx in the Tier1 then 2 Recharge SOs and 1 EndRdx SO in the Tier2 - that way I can upgrade a bot with the T2, followed by the T1, then I only have a couple of seconds to wait for the T2 to be back up again, so I use it on the next bot and, just as I finish clicking the T2, the T1 upgrade comes back up ready to be clicked (hence why I swapped out the Recharge for an EndRdx in the basic slot).

Now I can get all 6 bots summoned and upgraded on one bar of endurance (I usually have to wait a few seconds for some End to regen to upgrade the final bot) in just over one minute, then while I'm Resting I flick both of my toggles back on, then click off Rest.

So in about 90seconds I'm ready to go with full End and 6 fully upgraded bots - compared to pre-I7 when it took me around 4 minutes to summon all 6 bots, upgrade them all with the T1 buff, and just upgrade the Prot/Assault bots with the T2 (I'd upgrade the drones during the next few fights).

It's much much better now. And when you lose bots in combat its less annoying to get them back up to full strength again.

But personally I think both of the upgrade powers should be PBAEs, so you could upgrade all 6 bots at once - I really don't see how the extra minute of "timesink" upgrading bots individually balances the archetype in any way.

I'd guess that unslotted the recharge time on the T2 is now around 12-15seconds (never had mine unslotted or bothered to time it) and the T1 is still around 5-6 seconds like it always was.

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But personally I think both of the upgrade powers should be PBAEs, so you could upgrade all 6 bots at once - I really don't see how the extra minute of "timesink" upgrading bots individually balances the archetype in any way.


[/ QUOTE ]It makes the henches harder to get to full strenght mid-fight, and makes it much harder to ghost to boss in certain situations. PBAoE would be too powerful.

Yeah I agree with Max on that point It would be too easy to get the pets back up mid fight.

So far so good with my thug/Dark though neraly at lvl 14, endurance is not an issue so far.

Ive decided to only go for duel pistols as a personel attack and have 3 dark powers so far. Ive got the lucy of 3 spare power slots in my build so if stamina does become an issue I can always factor it in.

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I find that interesting, seeing as I tend to run out of endurance in harder fights with my necro/dark, who has stamina...

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Do you have attacks? I don't.

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I find that interesting, seeing as I tend to run out of endurance in harder fights with my necro/dark, who has stamina...

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Do you have attacks? I don't.

[/ QUOTE ]One, but I rarely have time to use it, as I'm spamming my other powers, or out of end.

Im about to pick up shadow fall tomorrow, any suggestions on the slotting or should i just pop the one end red in there.

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Im about to pick up shadow fall tomorrow, any suggestions on the slotting or should i just pop the one end red in there.

[/ QUOTE ]1/2 EndRdx, 3 DamRes, it gives nice resistances (20% unslotted, 31% with 3 SO's) to E/N/P, which are generally not too well resisted.

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Im about to pick up shadow fall tomorrow, any suggestions on the slotting or should i just pop the one end red in there.

[/ QUOTE ]1/2 EndRdx, 3 DamRes, it gives nice resistances (20% unslotted, 31% with 3 SO's) to E/N/P, which are generally not too well resisted.

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Wow thats quite a bit of resitance didnt think it would be as powerful as that.

I have it on my Necro/Dark MM...
I constantly are running around with 5 toggles(6 with darkest night)smam heals, holds etc. I have slotted all my leadership toggles with 2 end red, 2 in shadow fall and none in combat jumping..
I very rarely use my blues, and almost dont think about my endurance.. I like that