Well before I slotted sets I aimed to get as much defense out of powers as I could. I used Boxing as part of my attack chain to help get Weave sooner, I did spend Inf on a Steadfast unique. Don't put off True Grit too long, it helped me survive in the lower levels. Touch of Fear would help your survivability but I didn't plan on having it at 50 so I never took it.
For me when I was using SOs I had plenty of slots but a hard time fitting in powers. I typically go for offense and then defense on scrappers but in this case I got Weave in the mid 20s.
Shadow Maul is a big part of your AoE damage. To make the most out of Soul Drain you will want more enemies to fuel it, but without sets your defense might not allow that. With the 2 SD sheilds, PF, Weave, CJ, and the Steadfast unique you'll be about 33% defense, and 1 small purple should get you to the soft cap. That's about the time I really started enjoying the combo, and also when I started adding sets.
Poisonous Ice 50 Ice/Rad
Icy Jax 50 Ice/SS
Jaxon Penn 50 Shield/Mace
Cpt Clax 50 Thugs/Dark
Lady BlackIce 50 Dark/Cold
Lady Black Ice 50 Dark/Ice
Bella Jax 50 Storm/Sonic
Operative Jax 50 SoA
Level 50 Trick Arrow Alts
TA/A-Plant/TA-Bots/TA
Level 50 Claws Scrappers
SR-Regen-DA-Invul-WP-FA
Leveling up you should really focus on getting your defense up and managing your endurance. I'd advise avoiding AAO until your mid to late 30s until you have the defense to manage the extra aggro
Virtue: @Santorican
Dark/Shield Build Thread
I need some advice on a lvling build for my DM/SD. I have no clue what I'm doing with this build so far. I've looked around but all I see are high level builds.
I was hoping for some do's and dont's from you guys so I can throw a build together and post it on here.
This toon is most likely going to be a long term project that won't see lvl 50 for quite some time so I'm really just looking at regular IO slotting. I usually start putting IO's in after lvl 25...I think I'm at lvl 17 now and he's completely unenhanced.
Like my other toons, this guy will mainly team with some solo action here and there. No AV madness.
Thanks.