I made a DB/EA brute a while back too, she's parked at level 24 at the moment (Claws/Willpower is taking up much of my bruting time :P). I had asked around here if it was worth continuing with her or trying a different secondary and some folks offered some helpful comments here:
http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=215164
Hope that helps!
Edit: A few more thoughts
-Keep respites and purples around... email them to yourself if you end up with a surplus
-Don't expect /willpower levels of survivability early on
-Plan on building for some smash/lethal defense
-Use your knockdowns to keep the bosses on their backs
Grab Weave and Combat Jumping, use that -acc debuff combo and knockdown combos a lot.
My own EA Brute is Dark Melee so I can't offer much more unbiased advice.
You can check out the EA guides in the sticky thread. Feel free to take a look at my EA guide as well.
Since you just made your EA brute, I believe its level should be quite low. People like to brag here about the difficulties that they can handle. I would set the reputation such that it can present a challenge while you can still handle it well. For defense-based power sets, there will be huge improvement in their performance after soft-capping defense with power pools and IO set bonus. So, you might want to bump up your difficulty after soft-capping.
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I usually run solo -1/xY on a low level brute, Y=a number that won't kill me the majority of the time. Fighting blues/whites means more attacks that drive your fury yet won't eliminate you most of the time, better hitting with crappy accuracy (and thus less end wasted), and more inspirations dropping faster, to keep the fury rolling non-stop. I typically bump mine when I hit 25 (a new row of inspirations + decent IOs) and when I get about 30-35% in the central defense (S/L in this case), crank it to x6/x8, since one small purple puts you at or near the softcap.
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Originally Posted by Twilight_Snow
So, you might want to bump up your difficulty after soft-capping.
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Ok. Thanks guys
@Zopharshinta
@Zophar2
I wish you the best of luck. Every time I think about making an /EA Broot, I look the powerset and various guides over, and decide against it. The Weaknesses Twilight lists in her guide are usually why...
One of these days, though, I'm gonna take a chance and make one... Maybe. Probably not?
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Biggest Troll on the forums? I'll give you a hint:
I played a stone/ea brute up to the mid 30s once, he was a concept character.
I don't play him anymore.
it's not that EA is terrible, it just worse than anything else you can choose.
The Nethergoat Archive: all my memories, all my characters, all my thoughts on CoH...eventually.
My City Was Gone
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I wouldn't really say that. EA's problem is that it has the rough protection of a fart cloud early on because you're a resist set with no heals and no HP buffs. Then you get Energize, and it's a little better... except it's on a 120 (technically 100 with Lightning Reflexes) second cooldown. You have to pray to God that every mob drops a Respite or you tend to drop like a rock.|
Originally Posted by Nethergoat
it's not that EA is terrible, it just worse than anything else you can choose.
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The big change comes when you can get Power Sink and have Lightning Field running at the same time. Fully slotted with endurance mod enhancements, EA will zap 80% of everything's endurance bar, and Lightning Field can help to clean up the rest of it. This is some amazingly good soft control, and it only gets better once you can grab the Mu AoE immobilize. It might not have the pure "oomph" of Dark Regeneration or a softcapped Invulnerability, but it's still able to stand toe-to-toe in most situations. There's obviously some better sets, but I'd still place post-buff EA on reasonable standings with things like Dark Armor. It could stand a bit more of a buff (like, say, slashing Energize's cooldown and moving it to some time below level 26).
oh that's right, I forgot they buffed it.....nevermind, all my playtime was racked up in the good ol' days.
maybe I should dust him off, give him a respec and check out the changes.
The Nethergoat Archive: all my memories, all my characters, all my thoughts on CoH...eventually.
My City Was Gone
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EA = Energy Armor .... not Electric Armor (that's ElA)
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Originally Posted by Vermain
I wouldn't really say that. EA's problem is that it has the rough protection of a fart cloud early on because you're a resist set with no heals and no HP buffs. Then you get Energize, and it's a little better... except it's on a 120 (technically 100 with Lightning Reflexes) second cooldown. You have to pray to God that every mob drops a Respite or you tend to drop like a rock.
The big change comes when you can get Power Sink and have Lightning Field running at the same time. Fully slotted with endurance mod enhancements, EA will zap 80% of everything's endurance bar, and Lightning Field can help to clean up the rest of it. This is some amazingly good soft control, and it only gets better once you can grab the Mu AoE immobilize. It might not have the pure "oomph" of Dark Regeneration or a softcapped Invulnerability, but it's still able to stand toe-to-toe in most situations. There's obviously some better sets, but I'd still place post-buff EA on reasonable standings with things like Dark Armor. It could stand a bit more of a buff (like, say, slashing Energize's cooldown and moving it to some time below level 26). |
The Porcelain God - DarkKinetics Corruptor
Meat Juice - DarkDarkSoul Brute
Pretty and Strong - Do you really have to ask?
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Methinks you're talking about Electric Armor (ElA?) vs. Energy Aura (EA). ElA, in my experience is actually pretty good. EA at the moment is a bit more painful.
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Originally Posted by Vermain
I wouldn't really say that. EA's problem is that it has the rough protection of a fart cloud early on because you're a resist set with no heals and no HP buffs. Then you get Energize, and it's a little better... except it's on a 120 (technically 100 with Lightning Reflexes) second cooldown. You have to pray to God that every mob drops a Respite or you tend to drop like a rock.
The big change comes when you can get Power Sink and have Lightning Field running at the same time. Fully slotted with endurance mod enhancements, EA will zap 80% of everything's endurance bar, and Lightning Field can help to clean up the rest of it. This is some amazingly good soft control, and it only gets better once you can grab the Mu AoE immobilize. It might not have the pure "oomph" of Dark Regeneration or a softcapped Invulnerability, but it's still able to stand toe-to-toe in most situations. There's obviously some better sets, but I'd still place post-buff EA on reasonable standings with things like Dark Armor. It could stand a bit more of a buff (like, say, slashing Energize's cooldown and moving it to some time below level 26). |
As mentioned, CJ and Weave will help. One nice thing about EA is that it's very possible to get capped defense to all but Psi with IOs. I did so with a DM/EA, and it didn't have to gimp the build to achieve it.
If you don't want IOs, then at least consider spending some inf on the Steadfast +3 defense IO. That would help as well.
@Rylas
Kill 'em all. Let XP sort 'em out.
I leveled a FM/EA to 50, and that's widely regarded as the squishiest brute in existence.
Long term, concentrate on getting your defense to the soft-cap. CJ, Weave, slotting Energy Cloak all help, and eventually you'll want to slot some IO sets for defense bonuses so you can soft-cap S/L/E/F/C. (NE is tougher since you start with a smaller base.)
Short term, look for damage mitigation wherever you can. I took Air Sup and Aid Self early on and that helped considerably. DB's KD attacks don't come until late in the build, so something like Air Sup will be helpful in the early levels. However, you may want to replace it later with CJ depending on your travel pool preferences. Likewise, you may want to drop Aid Self when Energy Drain becomes available, but IME ED is pretty lacklaster as a heal, so I kept Aid Self on my EA brute.
Hope that helps!
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I should probably actually read the thread instead of repeatedly punching myself in the face.|
Originally Posted by _Krom_
EA = Energy Armor .... not Electric Armor (that's ElA)
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EA's still pretty buggered. Pairing it with Dark Melee does help considerably, though, since the Life Drain heal shores up a lot of your otherwise unimpressive defense. I never really used it much, though. It always felt like Super Reflexes' wimpier brother.
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As the proud owner of Pretty and Strong (WM\EA)...one of my favorite brutes now...I can say that I see why some might not like EA as I've leveled him up...especially looking at the numbers. But it goes exceptionally well with sets that offer up some good mitigation (and decent investment in IO's), in particular in levels 30+, before that it's a long road.
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Originally Posted by Vermain
I should probably actually read the thread instead of repeatedly punching myself in the face.
EA's still pretty buggered. Pairing it with Dark Melee does help considerably, though, since the Life Drain heal shores up a lot of your otherwise unimpressive defense. I never really used it much, though. It always felt like Super Reflexes' wimpier brother. |
The Porcelain God - DarkKinetics Corruptor
Meat Juice - DarkDarkSoul Brute
Pretty and Strong - Do you really have to ask?
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hm...that's how you use my guide: to convince people not to try it. |
Originally Posted by Kheldarn
Every time I think about making an /EA Broot, I look the powerset and various guides over, and decide against it. The Weaknesses Twilight lists in her guide are usually why...
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I don't think EA's weaknesses are particularly bad. Other power sets have their weaknesses too. To remove the problems of EA is basically making EA into SR. In my opinion, the strength or the special features of EA are not strong enough to be appealing to players. For example, I still have a hard time trying to make stealth useful for a brute. And we have to find ways to use the huge amount of endurance provided by energy drain and conserve power. If the special features of a power set are not appealing, then what remains in the set is just a collection of standard toggles and passives.
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I must be the only weird one who uses: */Elec and */En to refer to those sets. It completely takes the ambiguity out of the system. *shrug*
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Originally Posted by Valorin
Methinks you're talking about Electric Armor (ElA?) vs. Energy Aura (EA). ElA, in my experience is actually pretty good. EA at the moment is a bit more painful.
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I guess my big thing about it is that it's got essentially Shield levels of defense and resists, but instead of having absurd damage and a super-powered charge ability, it has a cloak and essentially unlimited endurance. Shields is undoubtedly easier to softcap, though, since you don't have to worry about dancing around with a whole handful of different sets to hit softcap on each Defense type. The cloak's got interesting tactical possibilities, but... I dunno. It seems like you give up far too much for what you get.
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Originally Posted by _Krom_
As the proud owner of Pretty and Strong (WM\EA)...one of my favorite brutes now...I can say that I see why some might not like EA as I've leveled him up...especially looking at the numbers. But it goes exceptionally well with sets that offer up some good mitigation (and decent investment in IO's), in particular in levels 30+, before that it's a long road.
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The new Kinetic Dampener temporary power should help a lot against a number of bosses, since its adds to S/L Defence (and also adds some energy resistance).
If you can afford that, it'll make your early career a lot smoother.
My main experience with EA is on a stalker, but I have a stone/EA in the 30s. I found it was very easy to softcap in that many of the sets that you want stop at low level, so you can slot them early and the typed defence set bonuses come in for 4 IOs so you don't have to 6 slot everything. I think my stalker was soft capped to many things by 36.
Is it as tough as /SR ? no, is it as good as shield ? probably not, is it perfectly serviceable and fun ? Yes, although some opponents (particularly psi damage) will frustrate you intensely.
It's true. This game is NOT rocket surgery. - BillZBubba
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For a brute, unlimited endurance (with a nice little heal to boot) is a BIG plus. The cloak's stealth function really doesn't affect my EA brutes as I pick up taunt and slot it and set it to auto. Now naturally an EA brute would be a bit squishy doing this if there wasn't some decent level of mitigation you can get from your primary. This, to me, is where WM shines. WM is a VERY endurance heavy set...and it's also a very AOE intense set (with some really nice single target attacks as well)..so pairing it with something that has unlimited endurance works really well. I've actually tried a few times to soft cap my wm\ea brute w/o the cloak, but it was too much of a pain in the ****.|
Originally Posted by Vermain
I guess my big thing about it is that it's got essentially Shield levels of defense and resists, but instead of having absurd damage and a super-powered charge ability, it has a cloak and essentially unlimited endurance. Shields is undoubtedly easier to softcap, though, since you don't have to worry about dancing around with a whole handful of different sets to hit softcap on each Defense type. The cloak's got interesting tactical possibilities, but... I dunno. It seems like you give up far too much for what you get.
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I'm not saying it's better then a shield brute. I look at a shield brute as being more offensive minded and sets like SR and EA being more defensive. There's also the fun factor...even when my WM\EA brute was just SO's...he was really effective due to the synergy...and the unlimited endurance had a lot to do with that. Shield brutes don't have the luxury of unlimited endurance (or a heal for that matter unless you go DM/SD) and so have to play things a bit differently (and are more reliant on IO's to address those issues).
The Porcelain God - DarkKinetics Corruptor
Meat Juice - DarkDarkSoul Brute
Pretty and Strong - Do you really have to ask?
Not sure if this has been mentioned or not, but one helpful thing I plan to do on my Claws/EA brute is take maneuvers and tactics. Tactic's +To Hit and +Perception will help with it's lack of To Hit & Perception debuff resistance. Also Tactic gives you Confusion & Fear resist which, although not completely because it's only status resistance, not defense, will help with EA's hole in that as well. And EA's energy absorption will make running these extra toggles no problem.
Hey guys,
I just made a DB/EA and I'm loving it so far. But I've recently found out that the floor is my friend.
Paper mission set for 1, +0, with full boss seem to take 1 to 2 tries. So I ask, are there any tricks to EA?
Keep lucks and resprites on hand? Auto +res powers needed?
I don't really have a build I just made this guy on a whim since I haven't played either sets.
Any help is good, other then don't play EA.
Thanks,
@Zopharshinta
@Zophar2