Best possible build for a Solo Defender?
By
Animal_Mutha_EU,
Posted on: 2007-02-20 10:04 in Defenders
Can't see why KD wouldn't be useful soloing, it's a great soft control, and works well even on bosses.
Anyways, my personal preference at the moment is TA/Psi, huge -rech, two powers with -res, good damage blasts, lots of nice debuffs, only issue is lack of self heal which can be countered with aid self.
I'd say the best possible primary for a soloist would be Rad or Kin.
Each one has a self-heal, an endurance buff and the capacity to raise your own damage output considerably... Rad would be safer with -tohit and -regen, but Kin would never have any endurance issues and has the potential for much higher damage with Fulcrum Shift.
Sonic would be the most damaging secondary due to the -res, but Psi and Archery look to have very decent numbers on their higher-damage attacks. I'd guess that Fulcrum Shift + Rain of Arrows would be fun... but a soloist would be unlikely to ever see that many mobs clustered together, so I'd suggest the Single Target attacks of either Sonic or Psi. 
Never found any real problems soloing my Kin/El on invincible except for Malta Gunslingers the main thing to remember is you need to be in melee range for transference and transfusion to buff you so a good control secondary helps. Personally I find short circuit very helpful for this as mobs without end can't hurt you.
I also have a sonic/Kin corrupter and that is a lot of fun - solo or on a team so may be worth looking at as a def if its possible - you do need to keep some range most of the time with it though.
Dark and Rad will also solo safely although possibly a bit slower than a kin.
A team build empath however is probably not the best although solo builds have certainly been done.
Mind of Gaia lvl 50 Defiant's first Mind/Storm 'troller.
Deadly Doc 50 Dark/Dark Corr
and lots more on Pinnacle,Union and Defiant
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Can't see why KD wouldn't be useful soloing, it's a great soft control, and works well even on bosses.
Anyways, my personal preference at the moment is TA/Psi, huge -rech, two powers with -res, good damage blasts, lots of nice debuffs, only issue is lack of self heal which can be countered with aid self.
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He's build for team-play. I like to see him as multi-purpose character. FF/Psi + TP and Stealth. He can be very handy scout. But it also can be because of sloting or power choices. He's my first character and i love him so i guess he will be the one to hit 50 first. As always i say he can hold himself pretty well versus one any color enemy or white and yellow two. But more can be very deadly.
From experience of playing Radiation and Kinetics, I would say that while I prefer my Kinetic overall to just about everything, Rad is better for soloing on a Defender.
Kinetics is great, I absolutely love the set, but I always feel the bigger the team the better the character gets. Dark is great too, but I tend to feel Rad is a better mix with Psionic Blast due to the lack of aim in secondary, and lack of tohit boosting powers in dark primary (you could run tactics, but there's also no endurance recovery/boosting powers).
Bow redraw would irritate the hell out of me mixing one Archery set and one non-archery set.
Rad/Sonic is great. I played with one quite a bit a while back and liked it to team with a lot. I finally made one fairly recently. It's the best soloing Defender I've ever had at low level (although it's also the most offensively built Defender I've had at low level).
Yeah Radiation kinda seems work good for me. As i won't get mutation and fallout it will give me more powers to pick from secondary. I think i will pick Invisibility and Stamina from power pool. Maybe flight for travel power. But Swift + AM + invisibility can gave me safe travel opportunity as i never intended to rush somewhere.
Rad/Psi ftw! Great for solo.
Actually my Rad/sonic was better than my rad/psi in leveling from the word go. Early levels go insanely fast, and now im at 31, soloing warburg missions on invincible if I solo at all.
For solo defenders I seriously recommend sonic secondary. (-def and -res btw work great with sands of mu 
)
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Actually my Rad/sonic was better than my rad/psi in leveling from the word go. Early levels go insanely fast, and now im at 31, soloing warburg missions on invincible if I solo at all.
For solo defenders I seriously recommend sonic secondary. (-def and -res btw work great with sands of mu )
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Rad/Sonic is an awesome solo defender combo
thePhilosopher Martial Arts/Regen/Fire Scrapper
theRegulator Empathy/Energy/Soul Defender
Total Inertia Ice Blast/Kinetics/Psy Corruptor
Total Inferno Ice Blast/Thermal/Leviathan Corruptor
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Actually my Rad/sonic was better than my rad/psi in leveling from the word go. Early levels go insanely fast, and now im at 31, soloing warburg missions on invincible if I solo at all.
For solo defenders I seriously recommend sonic secondary. (-def and -res btw work great with sands of mu )
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If a recommendation comes from you probably it is wise to listen it but i don't like FX's of that set. And Psi attack animations are hot. Personal Favorites (keep in mind i don't see high level animations yet) Mental Blast/Psionic Lance and Psychic Scream. God i love that sound and flying orange numbers.
And i also thank friend who led me to Rad/Psi. It's great combo. But i have a little trouble. Could someone point out must have rad powers. I intended to take 4 Power Pool. Fighting, Stealth, Fitness and Fly. Maybe you think fighting is useless for a defender. But it's a concept thing. I won't planing to take any Ancilary Powers.
Thanks in advance. 
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Could someone point out must have rad powers. I intended to take 4 Power Pool. Fighting, Stealth, Fitness and Fly. Maybe you think fighting is useless for a defender. But it's a concept thing. I won't planing to take any Ancilary Powers.
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The 3 debuffs (RI, EF, LR), AM, Radiant Aura (not a great heal, but better than nothing) and EM Pulse (best AoE hold). Mutation is nice if you team, but not essential. I don't like Choking Cloud that much given its accuracy and endurance cost. Skip Fallout. The Fighting Pool is OK for getting Tough (I assume that's why you want it? if it's for the attacks, stick to your secondary, "concept" permitting of course), but I would take Speed for Hasten instead of Concealment. Are you sure you want to skip the Epics though??? Power or Psychic Mastery would be much more useful than anything left to take after 40 from your primary/secondary/pools.
CoX 50s: <ill/rad> <ice/ice> <fire/kin> <grav/sonic> <ice/storm> <earth/kin> <kin/elec> <cold/psy> <thugs/dark> <fire/dark> <dark/elec> <night widow> <EM/ninj> <mind/icy>
Hmm actually Psychic Mastery seem appealing. But as i said it is matter of concept. I usually don't think about which power is more useful when it comes the power pools.
Freeek is a latent mutant whose genes altered by heavy radiation. So his p.pool choices must be related to the his psionic or radiation abilities. This is why i take concealments invisibility and grant invisibility powers. He can make himself and his allies invisibile to the living creatures. Fly maybe because of telekinetic abilities. And as his best friend is an ex-soldier that will show the hand to hand combat training he received for that friend. Actually i don't wanna get any travel power but this can be annoying for other team mates. 
And thanks for the tips. I didn't get RI, i think i should get it asap.
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And i also thank friend who led me to Rad/Psi. It's great combo. But i have a little trouble. Could someone point out must have rad powers.
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Radiation infection is your first pick.(slot 3 toHit debuff, 2 def debuff and maybe 1 endred) Radiant aura, Accelerated metabolism (slotted for recharge and end recovery) and lingering radiation are a must. Enervating field is also a must but can leave it after stamina and slotted heavily for endred. Thats it.
I prefer anything Kin based although I would go Sonic, PSI, Elec in that order.
On a team though, with no End worries multiple stacked Speed Boost + Haste are great fun and serious DPS.
I was going to start a new thread but this seems to be an appropriate place to ask.
I love Defenders but I am put off by the lack of soloability (is that a word?) of some of the ones I've tried. I'm currently testing a Dark/Sonic which seems to solo ok but I'm only at level 8 at the moment. Does this combination perform well at higher levels? I remember thinking that my Dark/Elec did well at the beginning only to see the damage output diminishing rapidly by the late teens.
The resist debuffs are great but are they still effective later?
Thanks. 
@Dante EU - Union Roleplayer and Altisis Victim
The Militia: Union RP Supergroup - www.themilitia.org.uk
Well I prefer Kin to Dark because you only get the -Res from Tar Pit but with Kin you can stack Transfer Power several times which is a nice buff and a nice debuff on enemy damage.
With Speed Boost and Haste you'll have no problems stacking the -res of sonics and the +dam of Transfer power although you will have to watch your end usage if your solo.
The reason I prefer Dark to Kin solo is that (a) Your Fulcrum Shift isn't as uber solo. (b) -resistance is better that +dmg when you are facing enemies who are strongly resistant to your damage types. (c) Dark is a much stronger defensive set than Kin which relys on healing up the damage as you take it. Dark you don't get hit at all (wonderful against strong mezzing/debuffing toons like those wretched Tsoo Ink Men)
They're my two favourite Defender primaries though. Kinetics I don't like solo mainly because I know how amazing it is in teams! It's sort of like a crime not being in a team!
Overall though if I was making an absolute soloing toon I'd go Rad/Sonics I think, Rads AM & general jack-of-all-trades debuffs makes it a decent soloer. (Dark suffers from poor accuracy, Kin from poor defenses).
I never really liked soloing my kinetic defender. I always felt to get the most out of the buffs she needed a full team around her...
Favourite to solo defenders so far are:
Storm/Electric. Wasn't so great early on but once I got past Stamina she was a joy to solo And not everyone likes Storm so I did find myself solo a bit with her... She only actually had 4 attacks from electric as well so was quite surprised that she soloed so well
Rad/Sonic. I only respecced her in the late 20s to a more offensive build but once I did she has been amazing fun teamed and solo. The damage output is great, and I think she can almost out damage my sonic blaster I think sonic is probably one of the more effective blasts for the solo defender tho'
I have 3 level 50 defenders (kin/psi, dark/dark and rad/sonic) and all are more than capable of soloing on the hardest difficulty levels although I much prefer teaming with them. Just make sure to have a ready supply of break frees
IMO they become noticeably easier to solo in the 30s once you start getting all the extra slots and then again once you get the epic pools (power and psychic mastery in particular).
Octavian Vanguard
@ohmsEU and @ohms 2
Badging character: Bimble on the Union server, Badgehunter.com and City Info Tracker.
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(b) -resistance is better that +dmg when you are facing enemies who are strongly resistant to your damage types.
[/ QUOTE ]Quite the contrary. Resistance resists resistance debuffs. So someone with 90% resistance will only have his resistance resisted by (10 * (1 - 0.9)) = 1% when hit with a 10% RES debuff. However, for a target with no/low resistances, resistance debuffs will be superior to damage buffs if the character is slotted for damage.
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As tried other AT's i think defender is the only one i feel comfortable. KD is kinda useless in soloing, so i am wondering what's the best build for solo defender. But there's a point, i can't use every secondary. I think archery or psychic blast will be my secondary.
Thanks for the help by the way.
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If you want a soloing beast of a Defender, try Kin/Elec. I was quite surprised that by late 20s (or was it early 30s? can't remember) I was able to solo Invincible missions as easily as with my scrapper (maybe a tad longer, but pretty safe and quite excitingly blastery action). Basically you can buff your damage, heal, end drain and hold. The end drain is awesome for turning the really dangerous lts and bosses into absolute kittens. Really great combination.
The other great soloing Defender in my book is Dark/Dark - a very versatile toolkit, and with TT and Nightfall as 2 AoE attacks, you can put out pretty respectable damage and melt large groups of mobs away.
I'd say that the Leadership pool and Hasten/Stamina are a must for both these builds btw, if you want to solo on Invinc (Stamina is essential for the Dark/Dark, but not so much for the Kin/Elec obviously - it just makes life a bit easier). It's important not to waste shots, and Tactics plus 1 acc in important powers (or even 2 acc in things like Transfusion) means you can be pretty effective against +2s and even +3s solo. (The Assault damage buff is also quite nice for the Dark/Dark, while Maneouvers helps the Kin/Elec a tiny bit.)
Thanks for advices Yin. Rad/Psi was quite good but i deleted that character, because everyone was saying it was same with the KD. I made Storm/Archery defender and love it. The one with TA/Archery also fine in groups. I re-made Freek as Mind/Rad troller.
I was thinking about trying other sets too so Kin/Elec will be a freshing character. Anything including Sonic and Dark isn't my type. I don't like Sonics sound FX and darks visual FXs. I think only one left is an Empath. I will make it as Emp/NRG i guess.
So by this way Blue team of the GW will be complete. As i love my SG, i have my own storyline in mind for my own characters. All have the same costumes, so anyone can understand they are mine.
Thanks for all replies and suggestions. They are a great help to me.
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I made Storm/Archery defender and love it.
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eep I tried that once; think I got all the way to level 3 before deletion as the constant putting-the-bow-away-getting-it-out-again *really* got on my nerves, shame really I liked the concept.
I've been playing a Dark/Dark Defender for a while now, and once I got a respec and fixed his gimped build it was like the whoopass can had just been blown open.
Darkest Night (massive -Acc), Tar Patch (-Acc, -Res), and possibly Shadow Fall (minor +res and +stealth) will be the cornerstones of any solo D3 build. Gloom and Dark Blast will form your main single-target attacks, while Nightfall and Tentacles are good for groups of 3 or more.
Stamina and (imho) Health are a must for this set, 3 slotted.
When things go right you'll be able to throw DN on a boss and wade into a group of mobs without getting hit. A word of warning, though, when things go south with this build they go south FAST, and you can end up at the hospital before you know what happened. That's because DN is the keystone of your build, and if you lose it (by being mezzed, say) you're just another squishy trying to act tough. The heal is good, but requires an Acc roll, and we all know those only fail when you need them most: so take Aid Self as a backup - just in case.
My D3 just hit lvl 30 and I'm really enjoying it. If you want a thinking-man's soloer, I can highly recommend the D3.
...Just make sure you get your build right or you'll want to delete him.
It's not for everyone, though, and you might be more comfortable with the Rad/Psi or Rad/Sonic builds that have been mentioned as they are most likely easier and faster than the D3.
As tried other AT's i think defender is the only one i feel comfortable. KD is kinda useless in soloing, so i am wondering what's the best build for solo defender. But there's a point, i can't use every secondary. I think archery or psychic blast will be my secondary.
Thanks for the help by the way.