City of Heroes: Live Forum Archive

Elec/Shield Build help....

DSorrow

By DSorrow,
Posted on: 2010-05-28 08:59 in Scrappers

 

Posted

Im on my way to lv 50 and I've been researching on builds for elec scrappers. There are some that pick different powers and enh then others. I'm aiming for defence, accuracy, and damage. I tend to loose alot of endurance. Anyone can give me some pointers on which powers I should of gotten, including pools.

 

Posted

I'll give you a short list on what I find particularly useful:

Elec Melee:
Build Up - for more damage. That's what you do as a Scrapper.
Lightning Rod - your "mini" nuke. It's great, and coupled with Shield Charge you can cycle a mini nuke for each spawn.
Thunder Strike - a good AoE, also nice to throw in a +Rech proc which are quite cheap.
Charged Brawl - your best ST attack. It has the second best DPA in the set with only a three second recharge.
Jacob's Ladder/Havoc Punch/Chain Induction - pick at least two of those to spice up your ST damage.

Shield Defense:
The first 6 powers - for self defense and added damage.
Shield Charge - see Lightning Rod.
Grant Cover - nice for added Def Debuff Res, but not very useful outside of that. If you aren't planning on tanking or soloing something insane, I'd probably skip it.

Fitness:
Hurdle/Swift - your pick.
Health - I think this is very useful for a set with Defense and +HP.
Stamina - I don't think this needs an explanation.

Fighting:
Kick/Boxing - both suck, take your pick.
Tough - useful, but not as good as Weave for a Shielder. Take it and slot it, but don't run it if you end up not having the recovery for it.
Weave - very nice thing to add some length into your average lifespan. Pick it, slot it, run it.

Speed:
Hasten - to give you more nuke. It is by no means mandatory, though. It can make your blue bar cry.

Travel power of your choice.

As for ancillary pools there are two choices: Body Mastery to sacrifice extra damage potential for easy Endurance or Blaze Mastery to sacrifice potential easy Endurance for more damage.

First, Body Mastery:
Conserve Power - to get rid of any Endurance woes for 90 seconds whenever it's recharged.
Physical Perfection - to make Endurance management easier.

Second, Blaze Mastery:
Char/RoF - your pick, but I'd take Char.
Fire Blast/Melt Armour - your pick, but I'd take Fire Blast because it's a solid attack (as good as Charged Brawl damage-wise) and it has a range of 80ft. Melt Armour's values are so low for Scrappers I wouldn't bother.
Fire Ball - for more AoE obviously.

- @DSorrow - alts on Union and Freedom mostly -
Currently playing as Castigation on Freedom

My Katana/Inv Guide

Anyone who doesn't take truth seriously in small matters cannot be trusted in large ones either. -Einstein

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by DSorrow View Post
I'll give you a short list on what I find particularly useful
Mostly agree with the recommendations. I list my exceptions / caveats below.

Quote:
Elec Melee:
Build Up - for more damage. That's what you do as a Scrapper.
Lightning Rod - your "mini" nuke. It's great, and coupled with Shield Charge you can cycle a mini nuke for each spawn.
Thunder Strike - a good AoE, also nice to throw in a +Rech proc which are quite cheap.
Charged Brawl - your best ST attack. It has the second best DPA in the set with only a three second recharge.
Jacob's Ladder/Havoc Punch/Chain Induction - pick at least two of those to spice up your ST damage.
If you're building for AoE, you can get by with just taking one out of the three: Jacob's Ladder, Havoc Punch / Chain Induction.

Quote:
Shield Defense:
The first 6 powers - for self defense and added damage.
Shield Charge - see Lightning Rod.
Grant Cover - nice for added Def Debuff Res, but not very useful outside of that. If you aren't planning on tanking or soloing something insane, I'd probably skip it.
One with the Shield, your level 38 choice, is not a bad power. However, most players feel that with soft capped defenses and with the additions of tough/weave, that it's a power they don't need. Considering that it's on a long timer, judicious use of inspirations can simulate this power quite easily.

Quote:
Fitness:
Hurdle/Swift - your pick.
Health - I think this is very useful for a set with Defense and +HP.
Stamina - I don't think this needs an explanation.
If you have Ninja Running from the MA pack, your travel time is significantly bettered by picking hurdle rather than swift. Hurdle also stacks well with combat jumping if you have it.

Quote:
Fighting:
Kick/Boxing - both suck, take your pick.
Tough - useful, but not as good as Weave for a Shielder. Take it and slot it, but don't run it if you end up not having the recovery for it.
Weave - very nice thing to add some length into your average lifespan. Pick it, slot it, run it.
Boxing is better than kick largely because it can take the stun sets. The stun sets can provide recovery and recharge bonuses. Razzle Dazzle can also provide positional defense bonuses. Kick can take knockback sets but the bonuses for the stun sets are better. Even with 2 slots, you can slot for a meaningful recovery bonus.

Quote:
Speed:
Hasten - to give you more nuke. It is by no means mandatory, though. It can make your blue bar cry.
Agree. However just about every top end build has it for good reason.

Quote:
Travel power of your choice.
Most take either super jump or super speed largely because their prerequisites, hasten and combat jumping are in almost every top end shield build. Combat jumping is a great IO set place holder and adds valuable incremental defense.

Quote:
As for ancillary pools there are two choices: Body Mastery to sacrifice extra damage potential for easy Endurance or Blaze Mastery to sacrifice potential easy Endurance for more damage.
Disagree a bit. Blaze also has a number of utility powers and Body has damage powers as well too.

Quote:
First, Body Mastery:
Conserve Power - to get rid of any Endurance woes for 90 seconds whenever it's recharged.
Physical Perfection - to make Endurance management easier.
Energy Torrent is a very underrated choice from this APP. It's a wide cone that does almost guaranteed knockdown and is a good choice in builds where you want even more mitigation.

I would skip Focused Accuracy largely because tactics from the leadership pool is better in every way, but I've seen some builds use it as a set mule for 6 slotting Gaussians. FA also provides +perception which is valuable.

Laser Beam Eyes is a quick charging, low damage attack, but can take a number of useful IO sets.

Quote:
Second, Blaze Mastery:
Char/RoF - your pick, but I'd take Char.
Fire Blast/Melt Armour - your pick, but I'd take Fire Blast because it's a solid attack (as good as Charged Brawl damage-wise) and it has a range of 80ft. Melt Armour's values are so low for Scrappers I wouldn't bother.
Fire Ball - for more AoE obviously.
I'd take char in most cases because 4 slotted char provides some ranged defense, some recovery and a ranged positional defense component. RoF is useful because it can also be slotted for a melee defense component (using Enfeebled Operation) or Ranged Defense (Trap of the Hunter). However most builds don't have the slots to 6 slot RoF.

Fire Blast/Melt Armor - it's rather closer than you think. Melt Armor is a lousy power for a scrapper but it can take valuable IO sets which makes it a solid choice for some builds. Fire Blast can also take great IO sets but none with a melee defense component.

Fire Ball - agreed. It's a no brainer pick and the whole reason to go Blaze Mastery.

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by DSorrow View Post
Fitness:
Hurdle/Swift - your pick.
Health - I think this is very useful for a set with Defense and +HP.
Stamina - I don't think this needs an explanation.
I was told that Electric/ doesn't need Stamina because of all the Endurance Drain. Is this not true? If not, I may have to destroy my current build to find a place for it... :-\

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by SpACatta View Post
I was told that Electric/ doesn't need Stamina because of all the Endurance Drain. Is this not true? If not, I may have to destroy my current build to find a place for it... :-\
Completely untrue. You'll want stamina.