A Thugs/Dark guide?

Any suggestions on where to find a Thugs/Dark build in the simple format of "here's what I picked and why"?

Here's one that's easy to follow for this Ninjas/Dark.


For a newcomer like me, simple powers lists

like this
and
this,

are better than nothing, but I'm still lost about order.

Builds without discussion, like this
Leadership Early
or
Leadership Late
or
no travel power until 22,

are also tough. I'm happy to make my own choices, but it's nice to learn from vets, and it sure helps to have a sense of the tradeoffs.

Are my travel powers just a matter of personal preference, or are some a better match for this build? Is Leadership essential, and if so, how early? Will I go nuts trying to make it without any pistol powers? In the nebulous levels between 10 and 18, how do vets recommend planning for power pools?


Inquiring newbies want to know!

If you like you can forget travelpowers. Just buy a fresh Raptor in Grandville for 10000. Saves you two powerslots. You can also get the raptor at the atlas mayhem, plus one mission in Sharkhead. At Cap au diablo you can get a goldbrickers Rocketpack.

But if you want to have a travel power, I would recommend flight. Villain maps are not friendly towards superspeed and Superjump can be challenging now and then.

About Leadership, as thugs/dark MM, I found that one useful. I kept using my pistols, because I like to blast at things.

I wrote this Thugs/Dark guide a while ago. It's a little out of date (for example, no mention of Recharge Intensive Pets sets), but I think it's fairly good, if I do say so myself

Fleeting's guide is very helpful! Recommended.

For those who haven't seen it, after discussing powers, it gives sample builds oriented toward damage, control, and support, highlighting the options.


Three following questions:

- Is the Raptor/Rocketpack a viable alternative to travel powers?
I've never used one, and as a new player, I've found Fly hugely helpful on my Hero.
A vet can make more use of Superspeed than I can. For someone feeling his way around, flight is a big relief, as GrinningSpade noted above.

- Do most MM's take Leadership?
It clearly helps. But all powers help, and Fleeting's offers it one build, while in another, he replaces it with more control options. How useful have other players found Tactics and Maneuvers?

- Can I make an effective Thugs/ build without Dual Wield or Empty Clips?
GrinningSpade suggests it for damage, and Fleeting for control (through Knockback). Both are good things, but once again, so are other powers, and as a newcomer, I figured my pets would do more damage than I do. Is that not so?
__________________

I've done every sort of MM possible, and I can give some input toward a few things.

Attacks: The attacks can be useful. My Thug/Traps has them, while my Necro/Dark does not. I find that Dark has enough stuff to do that you don't need to supplement in any attacks. Mostly I use the attacks to pick on bosses while everything else is getting killed.

Leadership: Leadership is good, but I find that it's never really necessary. I only take it when there's nothing else I need/want to take. For instance, on my Thug/Trap, I skipped a good number of powers, and didn't have anything else to take, so I picked up Assault and Tactics. On my Necro/Dark, I had too many other useful powers to take so I didn't bother with it.

Quote:

Originally Posted by PRAF68_EU Dispari has more than enough credability, and certainly doesn't need to borrow any from you.

Haven't played my thugs/dark in ages, but a few thoughts I can offer:

1. I took the flight travel power.

2. I took the leadership pool, and found it extremely useful.

3. I only took one pistol attack (not sure which one off the top of my head). I recall having more at one point, but respecced all but one out. Between managing the actions of your henchmen, and all the useful /dark tools at your disposal, the pistols attacks were simply superfluous for the most part, although keeping one was helpful for "filler" purposes.

Based on the helpful responses above and Fleeting's excellent guide, here's what I'm working on:

1: Call Thugs Acc Dmg Acc Dmg Acc (laterDmg
1: Twilight Grasp Acc Heal (laterHeal Heal Rech
2: Tar Patch Rech Rech Rech
4: Darkest Night EndRdx, tHDebuff, tHD, tHD[/COLOR]
6: Equip Thugs EndRdx
8: Hasten Rech, Rech, Rech
10: Howling Twilight Rech Rech Rech (later EndRdx EndRdx
12: Call Enforcer Acc Dmg Dmg Dmg Acc
14: Super Speed Run
16: Shadow Fall EndRdx ResDam (later) ResDam ResDam
18: Gang War EndRdx ResDam (later) ResDam ResDam
20: Fearsome Stare Acc Fear Rech tHD, Rech, Rech
22: Hurdle Jump
24: Health Heal
26: Call Bruiser Acc Dmg Dmg Dmg
28: Stamina EndMod, EndMod, EndMod
30: Petrifying Gaze? or Assault?
32: Upgrade Equipment EndRdx EndRdx? Rech?
35: Black Hole? or Tactics? Rech
38: Dark Servant Acc Rech Rech Hold Hold tHD? Immob?
41: Night Fall(Soul Mastery?) Acc Dmg tHD Dmg Rech
44: Soul Tentactles Acc Dmg Dmg Dmg Rec EndRdx
47: Soul Storm? or Assault/Tactics?
49: Tactics (or if already taken, Vengeance?


I don't mind the lack of pistol powers, but I'm scared not to have Fly. I somehow missed the early Raptor Pack, despite running the mission (a teammate thought I may have outleveled it during Double XP weekend?), so I may try getting one from Marshall Brass or even taking my lumps as a lowbie in Granville.

But unless I drop Hasten, it's hard to fit Fly here. Fleeting shows a way to do it without Darkest Night, but that post may have pre-dated the Rocket Packs?

Am I going to get slapped silly as a SuperSpeeder who doesn't know the maps?

Any villain can purchase a 2hr jetpack in Grandville from the jetpack vendor for 10K. No missions required.

For an occasional cost of 10K (peanuts for high level villains) you have fly. The Pocket D jump pack caps it for 30 seconds at a time.

The other jetpacks can be scooped by completing the appropriate Ouroboros mission, or teaming up with a lowbie with the appropriate mayhem mission.

Having taken Thug/Dark to 50 (first villain to 50, at that) I can tell you that Dark Miasma is a rather endurance friendly set, at least when Darkest Night is not running. Other than the heal (which should be used as often as possible, whether you/your pets need the heal or not, simply for its massive debuffs) every other power in the set is rather set-and-forget. You lay down your debuffs and controls and refresh them every so often. You aren't constantly spamming abilities (other than the heal) so you aren't using a lot of endurance. I worked up a pretty basic leveling build, slotted with IOs, but similar DO/SO slotting will suffice.

As for not having flight, as others have said, the Raptor pack bought in Grandville will serve you fine. You'll have Super Speed for most travel needs, and toggling on the Pack will get you whatever vertical movement you may need to get from A to B. Another good reason to take SS, other than having Hasten already, is that it gives a stealth aspect and -1 to threat status. Combined with Shadow Fall, you'll have pseudo invisibility (anything with perception buffs will manage to see you if you get too close) and a total of -2 to your threat status, making it much easier for your pets to draw aggro off of you while you are debuffing the enemies. Once they have the aggro and you have debuffed the mob, toggle off SS and do what's needed to take the mob down, be it healing your pets, dishing out some damage of your own, or reapplying your debuffs.

Here's the build:
Villain Plan by Mids' Villain Designer 1.601
http://www.cohplanner.com/

Click this DataLink to open the build!

Level 50 Technology Mastermind
Primary Power Set: Thugs
Secondary Power Set: Dark Miasma
Power Pool: Speed
Power Pool: Fitness
Power Pool: Leadership
Ancillary Pool: Soul Mastery

Villain Profile:
Level 1: Call Thugs -- Acc-I(A), Dmg-I(3), Dmg-I(3), Acc-I(5), Dmg-I(9)
Level 1: Twilight Grasp -- Acc-I(A), Heal-I(5), Heal-I(7), Heal-I(9), RechRdx-I(43), ToHitDeb-I(43)
Level 2: Tar Patch -- RechRdx-I(A), RechRdx-I(7), RechRdx-I(34)
Level 4: Dual Wield -- Acc-I(A), Dmg-I(43), Dmg-I(46), EndRdx-I(46)
Level 6: Equip Thugs -- EndRdx-I(A)
Level 8: Hasten -- RechRdx-I(A), RechRdx-I(23), RechRdx-I(34)
Level 10: Howling Twilight -- RechRdx-I(A), RechRdx-I(11), RechRdx-I(11)
Level 12: Call Enforcer -- Acc-I(A), Dmg-I(13), Dmg-I(13), Dmg-I(15), ToHit-I(15), DefBuff-I(23)
Level 14: Super Speed -- Run-I(A)
Level 16: Shadow Fall -- EndRdx-I(A), ResDam-I(17), ResDam-I(17), EndRdx-I(21), ResDam-I(50), DefBuff-I(50)
Level 18: Gang War -- RechRdx-I(A), RechRdx-I(19), Acc-I(19), Dmg-I(21), Dmg-I(34), Dmg-I(40)
Level 20: Hurdle -- Jump-I(A)
Level 22: Health -- Heal-I(A)
Level 24: Stamina -- EndMod-I(A), EndMod-I(25), EndMod-I(25)
Level 26: Call Bruiser -- Acc-I(A), Dmg-I(27), Dmg-I(27), Dmg-I(29), EndRdx-I(33)
Level 28: Darkest Night -- EndRdx-I(A), EndRdx-I(29), ToHitDeb-I(33), ToHitDeb-I(33), EndRdx-I(37), ToHitDeb-I(37)
Level 30: Fearsome Stare -- Acc-I(A), RechRdx-I(31), RechRdx-I(31), ToHitDeb-I(31), Fear-I(37)
Level 32: Upgrade Equipment -- EndRdx-I(A)
Level 35: Petrifying Gaze -- Acc-I(A), RechRdx-I(36), Hold-I(36), RechRdx-I(36)
Level 38: Dark Servant -- Acc-I(A), Heal-I(39), ToHitDeb-I(39), RechRdx-I(39), Heal-I(40), RechRdx-I(40)
Level 41: Dark Embrace -- EndRdx-I(A), ResDam-I(42), ResDam-I(42), ResDam-I(42)
Level 44: Soul Tentacles -- Acc-I(A), EndRdx-I(45), Dmg-I(45), Dmg-I(45), Dmg-I(46)
Level 47: Soul Storm -- Acc-I(A), RechRdx-I(48), Hold-I(48), RechRdx-I(48)
Level 49: Assault -- EndRdx-I(A), EndRdx-I(50)
------------
Level 1: Brawl -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Sprint -- Empty(A)
Level 2: Rest -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Supremacy

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