Verification: Scrappers don't need ranged attacks?

There are only two archetypes I like playing in City of Heroes and City of Villains currently. That is the Scrapper and the Brute. I only have three characters that are level 50 and was refusing to make more Characters.
I have an Illusion/Empathy Controller that was awesome, and is still playable and players like having me take it on Task Forces. But I really don't like playing that character much. I don't want to delete it because its my oldest character so I just play it now and then to keep the dust off.
I also have an Electric Melee and Electric Armor Brute and a Claws and Willpower Scrapper. Both are awesome and fun to play. So much fun in fact, that when Issue 16 comes out, I want a Claws/Willpower Brute and an Electric Melee and Electric Armor Scrapper.
I have also decided to break down and add a Shield Defense scrapper because of the cool shields. The Damage Resistance is weak and offers no Psionic Damage Resistance which is of concern when Fighting the Carnival of Shadows and Rularuu especially. But I noticed the Defense is pretty high and though it doesn't specifically say it offers protection against Psionic Attacks, It does offer Melee, Ranged and Area of Effect defense, which should be enough.

Anyways,I want Broadsword for the Primary powerset for my shield toon. But I am really worried about not having a ranged attack since I want all 9 Broadsword Powers, all 9 Shield Defense Powers, the Entire Fitness Pool, and Combat Jumping and Superjump. But that leaves me no room to dip into epic powers to get a ranged attack.
I know on my Electric Melee and Electric Armor Brute I had alot of problems on the Mayhem Missions since the Longbow Ambushes would send like 6-8 Longbow Eagles after me and those mobs would fly high above me where I couldn't hit them and they would shoot me like crazy. I had to run inside the nearest building and have them follow me inside where I can take em out. I did Scirocco's Story Arc and got his Patron Power and took Mu lightning and Ball Lightning instead of taking Jacob's Ladder and Thunderclap so I could take out those Eagles in outdoor missions. I also made sure I got Air Superiority to help knock out those flying foes since I wanted Fly as a Travel Power anyways.
Claws and Willpower offer Focus and Shockwave and I use those to take out flying foes. Shockwave is also fun to use during the winter event if you have caltrops, I used to drop the Caltrops on the Winter Lord Elite Boss and hit him while he is running out of the Caltrop Field and when he left the field,I would nail him with Shockwave and make him fly backwords, back inside the field and pound him again while he is leaving. Focus helped keep him in the Caltrops Field longer since I would knock him down inside the Caltrops field.
But I can't recall if City Of Heroes has Flying Foes that fly out of range of melee attacks and pound on you with ranged attacks besides the Freakshow Stunners and Rularuu Wisps. I know my Scrapper shouldn't encounter Longbow unless I do an AE mission with them in it right now.

But do you guys encounter Flying foes like this or other situations we need to worry about having no ranged attacks? I think my Broadsword/Shield Scrapper will be fine, I just want to verify it.

You can easily give up Slash for a ranged attack from an Epic Pool. Slash is a very mediocre attack, costs too much end for the damage it does, and for the animation time required.

I have only 1 Sword character that has Slash and I have it slotted with Shield Breaker. I don't use it often (it's more of a set mule). When I do use it, it is as an opener against targets that have moderate-high defense.

If you are going to soft cap the build with IO set bonuses (recommended) you can also give up Parry and could potentially discard One With the Shield.

This would allow you to pick up a ranged attack from an Epic and Aid Self from the Medicine Pool (which will be useful more often than OWtS).

My DM/Regen doesn't miss the lack of a ranged attack at all when he exemps down, and only barely notices that LBE exists at all when not (I use it more for a set mule than as a real attack).

My Kat/WP doesn't miss the complete lack of ranged attacks (outside of vet powers) at all.

In general, if there's a runner/flier, I've got no problem either running them down (or jumping them down, in the case of fliers) or simply moving on to another group and waiting for them to run back to me (it's not always necessary to spend the time to run your target down when there are plenty of other guys 10' away from you, ready for a good beat down). It probably helps that the APP ranged attacks that Scrappers get are simply bad attacks. Their numbers can't compare with the awesomeness of the attacks in your primary.

Headsplitter is almost a ranged attack on its own, and does lots of damage and knockdown.

Do you really need Confront? NOBODY takes Confront. Except PVPers, but that's... PVP.

I'm a superspeed guy so I always keep my jet pack and use it to track down fliers.

GvE pack has a jet pack that could be used as well.

Ditto on the jet pack. I do have Laser Beam Eyes on both of my mains, but it's mostly a set mule, and I only use it infrequently. I could do without. I wouldn't give it much thought.

I think the single target ranged attacks from scrapper APPs are pretty much useless. None of them do awesome damage and they all cause redraw to all primaries except DM and MA.

The only APP powers I use on scrappers anyway are caltrops and conserve power. Most of my scrappers dont use any APPs.

You don't need Confront, and there's really no reason to take Swift if you're going to have Hurdle, Combat Jumping and Super Jump. You ought to be able to fit in a couple "just for fun" or "extra utility" powers if you drop Swift and Confront.

Don't take Slash or Taunt. Hack is so much better it's not EVEN funny. And Confront (I think it's called) just isn't worth it. Your Against All Odds will be more effective "taunting" enemies. Hack, Headspliiter, Disembowel and Parry will make for a lovely attack chain (maybe in a different order, repeating hack) with a low amount of Global Recharge.

With combat jumping and hurdle, you should have no problem getting to your enemies.

That is true, I have no need for confront. I should look for something else to take, I'll need time to sleep on it. My guess would be Conserve power since I got no Recovery or Endurance stealing powers and I got like 3-4 Expensive Toggles I need to keep running. My assumption is that groups like the defense that Grant Cover gives.

I am also tempted to make a second build and instead of taking Confront, Grant Cover, Shield Charge and Against all odds, I just take all four leadership powers for group play instead.

I should sleep on that as well. The thinking on this decision is to be more team friendly by not using as many powers that compete with Tankers for aggro. To hit buffs for all the team members that really help Dark Miasma, Radiation, and Kinetics Defenders and controllers Heal and debuff better. A Group Defense buff that gives myself AND my team a defense buff at a cost of a much lower defense bonus. I frequently have a hard time getting to mobs on teams and getting in kills to convince team leaders that I am not leeching XP, so I am now giving extra damage and other buffs to team members in my way as well as to myself. Most teams I go on, insist on cranking up difficulty to the max and I frequently get myself killed since the healers get overhwelmed, so I will now have vengeance to help out the team some until I get a Rez.

This scrapper is gonna be fine. Thanks for the Advice.

The only time I've had an issue with flying foe in coh are the annoying DE swarms, ghost, them cabal witches. They are faced at levels most scrappers can't get ranged attacks anyway. Diobolique can be a pain in her area map timed mission. That's the only other flying pain I can think of. If you need something for runners in late game, go with web grenade and slot it with the hold proc for kicks.

I just use geometry... break line of sight and they come right to you. Or just ignore them if they can't kill you... which is often the case on a scrapper.

If you're at all worried about flying foes hovering out of range, grab a Web Grenade temp power from Siren's Call. If you end up making use of it (I can't see it happening that often myself) then you might be able to justify picking up the Weapon Mastery Epic Pool Version. Ranged Immobilise that inflicts -fly on foes.

The only Scrapper I currently have with ranged attacks is my Spines/DA. I'll use Impale occasionally, but more often than not I stick to just Throw Spines and Energy Torrent - as an opener on a tightly-clustered mob before I jump in and start using PBAoEs. There's very few things that you'll need ranged attacks to hit - Hamidon Mitos, Outdoor Rularru Wisps/Eyeballs and Outdoor Sky Skiffs are the only things that spring to mind. And the Nemesis Staff or Blackwand Veteran Powers do a good enough job on their own versus those...

@ Werner & Lucky666

I'm not talking about adding Assault to increase your DPS for faster AV soloing and/or Maneuvers to reach the defensive softcap. The OP thinks that he needs the entire Leadership pool to make his teams effective and himself a contributing team member. That is absolutely wrong, at least from my point of view.

Why? To answer that question I should explain my understanding of the Scrapper AT. The biggest advantage of the AT is neither its damage (a good Blaster does more) nor its survival capability (a good Tanker can take alot more than a good [=! godlike 4 billion inf] Scrapper). It's the ability to be self-reliant what makes Scrappers helpful team members. A good Scrapper doesn't fear damage or needs buffs and heals to be effective. It's fair to say he removes himself from the tankers/controllers/defenders protection-list.

Too achieve this goal, it is the best to enhance your own defensive capabilites and your damage. This is usually done by adding most of your primary and secondary powers as well as some selected pools like Fitness, Fighting or Speed. You can also add some Leadership powers like the abovementioned Assault or Maneuvers. But adding an entire pool with the vague hope of becoming more "helpful" would hurt your self-reliance, especially during the leveling process, and you'd become an obstruction for the team that you tried to support with your power choices.


For clarification:

1. My favorite Scrapper (Claws/WP) uses Assault and my current Scrapper project (BS/SD) will add Maneuvers in his early 40s.
2. And I'm not the kind of person that kicks people from his teams without consinderation. And I'm not doing this because of power selections, unless it's a defender with only 1 primary power.
3. I'm no native speaker and I don't post here to insult other forum readers. So anything that can be understood as an insult is not meant that way.

OK, I think we agree, then, SteelKing. I see a Scrapper's primary job as damage (like a Blaster), and secondary job as protecting squishies (such as a Blaster). I also agree that Scrappers should be largely self-reliant, one less squishy for others to worry about.

If Leadership helps you achieve that, great. If Leadership doesn't help you achieve that, but you can fit it in without much compromise, great. If Leadership doesn't help you achieve that, and you're compromising your damage and survivability to fit it in, then you're weakening your primary team role for something that is only slightly helpful.