I'll answer your questions first.
If you go the S/L/Melee def route, aiming for about 30% defense in either category will significantly increase your survivability. Anything above that usually gimps a build.
If you go the recharge route, yes you will burn endurance faster. But you can do things to control that. You'll avoid slotting rage with rechage to decrease the frequency of rage crashes. You'll rely more on energize's endurance reduction, and at higher recharge, will have it up 80% or more of the time.
Now about build cost. 80 Million is a drop in the bucket when it comes to build investment. You can make an effective build on that budget, but I certainly would never consider a defensive build on that budget, simply because of how expensive S/L/Melee defense is to get. For 80 million, I'd lean toward a mid-range recharge build, using crushing impacts in your single target attacks, and doctored wounds in energize.
It looks like your power selection is solid. I am a fan of the patron pool, but to fit that in your build would require dropping taunt and combat jumping. I gain a little more AoE damage from it. I would strongly suggest soul mastery if you were going to consider a defensive build as the -to-hit from Dark Obliteration would stack onto your approximate 30% defense to make for a pretty sturdy build.
But as I said, if you're looking at a budget under 300 mil+, don't consider a defensive build because buying either Kinetic Combats or Touch of Death for your single target attacks will get VERY expensive VERY quickly.
Yeah, I know 80 mill isn't much. But like I said, I'm patient. I don't need it perfect at this moment, just want to get some ideas for what to work towards so I'm not burning my limited respecs left and right trying for different things. I'll probably go the recharge route. I'd hate to rely too much on some defense just to see it melt away because I don't have def debuff resists. Rather get some good recharge and regen going, if that seems feasible.
~WP
Just my opinion, feel free to disregard...
Seconding what Tonality said about going for a mid-range recharge build. It'll be cheaper and getting good uptime on Energize will go some way to keeping you on your feet. A lot of your mitigation will also come from knocking everything down with Footstomp, so more recharge helps there too. For the time being I would go with a recharge/+hp build (to maximise your hp/sec from Energize) and eat purple insp as you need to, they drop like candy anyway.
Recharge is pretty important for SS/Elec and its hard to get good recharge with a defense build on the cheap so I'd make that a future goal.
To that end, in the way of sets I'd recommend Doctored Wounds for Energize since they're not too expensive and give good bonuses and a Force Feedback proc in Footstomp. They're dead cheap nowadays and give a nice bonus to your recharge when it goes off (which in Footstomp is pretty often in big spawns).
Support Guides for all Corruptor secondaries and Fortunatas
The Melee Teaming Guide for Melee Mans
The Melee Teaming Guide for Melee Mans
So, taking the great advice you guys gave me, I decided to focus on Recharge, and Recovery to help with the increased endurance costs that comes with Higher Recharge. Don't get me wrong, I know that Power Sink will more than take care of my endurance issues, but every time I activate that, I'm not dishing out damage. Cut Weave and CJ from the build, figuring that if I'm not trying to get massive amounts of defense, the 10% or so won't make that huge of a difference. Replacing them with Elec Fences and Ball Lightning means more AoE damage, and dead enemies do 0 damage, so yeah... Here's the new build:
Villain Plan by Mids' Villain Designer 1.601
http://www.cohplanner.com/
Click this DataLink to open the build!
Level 50 Magic Brute
Primary Power Set: Super Strength
Secondary Power Set: Electric Armor
Power Pool: Fitness
Power Pool: Speed
Power Pool: Fighting
Ancillary Pool: Mu Mastery
Villain Profile:
Level 1: Punch
- (A) Crushing Impact - Damage/Endurance/Recharge
- (7) Crushing Impact - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance
- (7) Crushing Impact - Accuracy/Damage/Recharge
- (23) Crushing Impact - Damage/Endurance
- (23) Crushing Impact - Accuracy/Damage
- (A) Impervium Armor - Resistance
- (39) Impervium Armor - Resistance/Endurance
- (39) Aegis - Resistance/Endurance
- (40) Aegis - Resistance/Endurance/Recharge
- (A) Crushing Impact - Damage/Endurance/Recharge
- (3) Crushing Impact - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance
- (3) Crushing Impact - Accuracy/Damage/Recharge
- (5) Crushing Impact - Damage/Endurance
- (5) Crushing Impact - Accuracy/Damage
- (A) Impervium Armor - Resistance
- (40) Impervium Armor - Resistance/Endurance
- (40) Aegis - Resistance/Endurance
- (42) Aegis - Resistance/Endurance/Recharge
- (A) Jumping IO
- (A) Crushing Impact - Damage/Endurance/Recharge
- (9) Crushing Impact - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance
- (9) Crushing Impact - Accuracy/Damage/Recharge
- (15) Crushing Impact - Damage/Recharge
- (17) Crushing Impact - Accuracy/Damage
- (A) Impervium Armor - Resistance
- (11) Impervium Armor - Resistance/Endurance
- (11) Aegis - Resistance/Endurance/Recharge
- (15) Aegis - Resistance/Endurance
- (A) Recharge Reduction IO
- (13) Recharge Reduction IO
- (13) Recharge Reduction IO
- (A) Miracle - +Recovery
- (A) Aegis - Resistance
- (17) Aegis - Resistance/Endurance
- (A) Adjusted Targeting - To Hit Buff/Endurance/Recharge
- (19) Adjusted Targeting - To Hit Buff/Endurance
- (19) Adjusted Targeting - Endurance/Recharge
- (21) Adjusted Targeting - To Hit Buff/Recharge
- (21) Adjusted Targeting - To Hit Buff
- (A) Performance Shifter - Chance for +End
- (42) Performance Shifter - EndMod
- (42) Performance Shifter - EndMod/Recharge
- (50) Endurance Modification IO
- (A) Run Speed IO
- (A) Scirocco's Dervish - Chance of Damage(Lethal)
- (25) Scirocco's Dervish - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance
- (25) Scirocco's Dervish - Damage/Endurance
- (27) Scirocco's Dervish - Accuracy/Damage
- (27) Cleaving Blow - Damage/Endurance
- (34) Cleaving Blow - Accuracy/Damage
- (A) Accuracy IO
- (A) Doctored Wounds - Endurance/Recharge
- (29) Doctored Wounds - Heal
- (29) Doctored Wounds - Heal/Endurance
- (31) Doctored Wounds - Heal/Recharge
- (31) Doctored Wounds - Heal/Endurance/Recharge
- (31) Recharge Reduction IO
- (A) Aegis - Resistance
- (34) Aegis - Resistance/Endurance
- (37) Steadfast Protection - Resistance/Endurance
- (39) Steadfast Protection - Resistance/+Def 3%
- (A) Cleaving Blow - Accuracy/Damage
- (33) Cleaving Blow - Damage/Recharge
- (33) Scirocco's Dervish - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance
- (33) Scirocco's Dervish - Damage/Recharge
- (34) Force Feedback - Chance for +Recharge
- (48) Kinetic Crash - Recharge/Endurance
- (A) Performance Shifter - EndMod
- (36) Performance Shifter - EndMod/Recharge
- (36) Performance Shifter - EndMod/Accuracy/Recharge
- (36) Adrenal Adjustment - EndMod/Recharge
- (37) Energy Manipulator - EndMod/Recharge
- (37) Energy Manipulator - EndMod
- (A) Aegis - Resistance/Recharge
- (46) Titanium Coating - Resistance/Recharge
- (50) Impervium Armor - Resistance/Recharge
- (A) Positron's Blast - Chance of Damage(Energy)
- (43) Positron's Blast - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance
- (43) Positron's Blast - Damage/Range
- (43) Positron's Blast - Damage/Endurance
- (45) Positron's Blast - Accuracy/Damage
- (48) Performance Shifter - Accuracy/Recharge
- (A) Positron's Blast - Chance of Damage(Energy)
- (45) Positron's Blast - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance
- (45) Positron's Blast - Damage/Recharge
- (46) Positron's Blast - Damage/Endurance
- (46) Positron's Blast - Accuracy/Damage
- (48) Performance Shifter - Accuracy/Recharge
- (A) Celerity - +Stealth
- (A) Trimuphant Insult - Taunt/Recharge
- (50) Trimuphant Insult - Taunt
Level 1: Brawl
- (A) Empty
- (A) Empty
- (A) Empty
------------
Set Bonus Totals:
- 2% DamageBuff(Smashing)
- 2% DamageBuff(Lethal)
- 2% DamageBuff(Fire)
- 2% DamageBuff(Cold)
- 2% DamageBuff(Energy)
- 2% DamageBuff(Negative)
- 2% DamageBuff(Toxic)
- 2% DamageBuff(Psionic)
- 3% Defense(Smashing)
- 3% Defense(Lethal)
- 3% Defense(Fire)
- 3% Defense(Cold)
- 3% Defense(Energy)
- 3% Defense(Negative)
- 3% Defense(Psionic)
- 3% Defense(Melee)
- 3% Defense(Ranged)
- 3% Defense(AoE)
- 4% Enhancement(Heal)
- 37.5% Enhancement(RechargeTime)
- 57% Enhancement(Accuracy)
- 10% FlySpeed
- 106.8 HP (7.13%) HitPoints
- 10% JumpHeight
- 10% JumpSpeed
- MezResist(Immobilize) 6.6%
- MezResist(Terrorized) 2.2%
- 18.5% (0.31 End/sec) Recovery
- 20% (1.25 HP/sec) Regeneration
- 4.41% Resistance(Fire)
- 4.41% Resistance(Cold)
- 1.26% Resistance(Energy)
- 4.39% Resistance(Negative)
- 35% RunSpeed
Code:
Let me know what y'all think!| Copy & Paste this data into Mids' Hero Designer to view the build | |-------------------------------------------------------------------| |MxDz;1398;692;1384;HEX;| |78DAA593D94F135114C6EFB4534A374AAD6C85CA524A5B4B071A7D7079302A90A05| |4318DD1A8B1947229939481CC0C081A135F8CD1F8E4129FDC175C1E5DA37F5C3DCB| |A509F1D149FBFDE69EDEF39D33677A4B5B536121EE9C105AE874A3EA389553F6862| |B7DA56ADDAC09BF102241814A4936A434CA1BEBD2AE945D5B5A757765807F9A92CB| |D272A431DD9035D7366B9593F6EA9A1D9BB55624EC738DDD9BF0FCDA5AC398315D4| |B3A4E9016E5752997222A5E5F714DAB1EA3D5ACB5693AE6A2D930DDEDAEE975B366| |A836362AA5AAE34A7BBB177ACBC1774413EA6AEA42028AA26D8951237457190B84B| |7B893529A5E91859B8C181B654C6AB821738890D2D436B0D5D8D6C3B61EB6D5D956| |67DBF7A05E65EB65DB0CDB66D836C7B66D30521FEF13BE2CA5A661E95795FC5CA99| |D2BB573A58E45422757FA001A5095025C29C895825CA2830B8E8067886D3DA13CA5| |86F7C00F1B22AA95C81972D8814594435AF430D974AAA980C668204D3DF6CA83A17| |D6F18AF09FB5F325E10DAC13BAE9A8C3FA350EE11E331A138443D7C04ED523D7415| |28F40EB48743BE9E5B14EABDC9B841486C325609C30D820605FBF869455F82429F4| |0FB39E4EB9FA3A71838CF384B3850629C63F054BC6094549D277904C33C82D16E40| |528CF51072A083CA7D907B18B218DCEDD016F777979E77E236E133FE61798CBE111| |E488A07927AC2B807888BD1078CFB842FB03FAD5E65BA48CD14F284629ADEDB8257| |88AC6A26FB8BEA1EFCC9F8C1F84618FF4A98784AB5AA9095575979CE1AE7ACF1EF8| |4026715F664A56040867A6546804263B09C64236D72995A2E4AC280DE3A9CF0814B| |CCFD1399D75B274D681499D15B67F4BFAEDFE1DD5A810B41D032CA45944B289751A| |EA05C45B986721DA582D2FCD3CA8E1EC1868EA21C43398EF21037F9F1848550C228| |11940E94284A274A1CA51B2581F21CA5F91763CFF8FA| |-------------------------------------------------------------------|
~WP
Just my opinion, feel free to disregard...
Couple things:
As for endurance issues, energize really does help take care of that if you use it regularly. What you will find more useful is not +recovery, but +end, because the more endurance you have, the larger pool of endurance you have to work with, as well as it actually increasing your recovery. Simply getting the four auto accolades will drastically improve your build - without having to spend anything (other than time)
Now onto the build:
1) Take out the imperviums for Titanium so you get more HP. The bigger your HP pool, the greater cushion you have to get energize back up before you face plant.
2) Don't forget about multi-strike. The set bonuses may be awful, but having a triple-aspect IO in some of your AoE's will really help make your slotting more efficient.
3) I believe Efficacy's Acc/Rech does not require rare salvage, so buy that one over performance shifter. I don't know the recipe costs off-hand, but I don't expect them to be expensive.
4) Grounded doesn't need more than one slot. You'll get maybe 3% more negative nrg res from that. If anything, just throw in a steadfast KB protection.
5) I prefer having the steath IO in sprint so I have more control over when I use it. I'd rather have an end redux so I can use SS mid-fight if I need it, and even forget I have it up.
6) If you're using doctored wounds in energize you want these IOs from the set:
--Recharge
--Heal/Rech
--Heal/Rech/End
--End/Rech
--Heal
...skipping Heal End. With that slotting you will hit the ED cap on recharge and have the heal nearly touching the ED cap. There is no real reason to 6 slot it when 5 will suffice
Other than that, it seems like you've done a good job on slotting. If you find you have freed up some slots, put them in health!
So I've had this brute at 50 for a while, and I'm looking to try to up his overall performance a bit. He's got good damage ability, good survivability, but I'd like to take him to the "next level" so to speak. Thing is, I don't really know in what direction to take him. If I work hard to softcap s/l, will I be losing too much on recharge/endurance? If I focus on Recharge, will I have the endurance to manage it without having to have at least 2-3 mobs in range of Power Sink? I don't really want to go to one extreme to the point where I lose perfomance in other areas.
Here's what I've got so far, without Enhancements because other than the steadfast res/def, I don't have any set IOs. I'm fully generic at the moment.
Villain Plan by Mids' Villain Designer 1.601
http://www.cohplanner.com/
Click this DataLink to open the build!
Level 48 Technology Brute
Primary Power Set: Super Strength
Secondary Power Set: Electric Armor
Power Pool: Fitness
Power Pool: Speed
Power Pool: Fighting
Power Pool: Leaping
Villain Profile:
Level 1: Punch -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Charged Armor -- Empty(A)
Level 2: Haymaker -- Empty(A)
Level 4: Conductive Shield -- Empty(A)
Level 6: Hurdle -- Empty(A)
Level 8: Knockout Blow -- Empty(A)
Level 10: Static Shield -- Empty(A)
Level 12: Hasten -- Empty(A)
Level 14: Super Speed -- Empty(A)
Level 16: Health -- Empty(A)
Level 18: Rage -- Empty(A)
Level 20: Stamina -- Empty(A)
Level 22: Lightning Reflexes -- Empty(A)
Level 24: Grounded -- Empty(A)
Level 26: Boxing -- Empty(A)
Level 28: Energize -- Empty(A)
Level 30: Tough -- Empty(A)
Level 32: Foot Stomp -- Empty(A)
Level 35: Power Sink -- Empty(A)
Level 38: Power Surge -- Empty(A)
Level 41: Weave -- Empty(A)
Level 44: Lightning Field -- Empty(A)
Level 47: Taunt -- Empty(A)
Level 49: Combat Jumping -- Empty(A)
------------
Level 1: Brawl -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Sprint -- Empty(A)
Level 2: Rest -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Fury
Thanks in advance for all your help!
~WP