In order to know whether it's viable, I have to know what you want to do with it.
I get really good results from frankenslotting Blasters- 70-95% recharge in five slots, typically, with sufficient Acc and softcapped Dam and usually some End as well. Two Acc/Dam/Rech, two Dam/End/Rech and a Dam/Rech should get you sufficient performance for most purposes. (I tend to get a couple global Acc bonuses from sets and call it good.)
But you can't get, for instance, super ranged defense or huge global recharge that way. I find that if anything's still standing after Fireball/Fire Breath/Fire Sword Circle you're going to want to single-shot it anyway and everything'll be back in time for the next spawn.
Mini-guides: Force Field Defenders, Blasters, Market Self-Defense, Frankenslotting.
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Oh yeah, I would!
Targetted AoE's are one of the best candidates for Frankenslotting, since there's only one set with good bonuses (Positron's Blast), and it doesn't have fantastic enhancement values for the power its slotted in.
There is not Targetted AoE equivlent to Thunderstrike or Crushing Impact, which give great bonuses and good frankenslotting value for the set.
Frankenslotting is inexpensive, easy, quick, and in my opinion very powerful. Definitely something I like to do as I level up a character and work on finalizing an IO build for bonuses (if I bother to do so at all). Essentially you're adding extra slots for SO's to your powers by mixing and matching inventions! Alright in my books!
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I do it all the time with all of my characters, especially if I don't have the means to make their *final* build.
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Personally, I don't agree with the "with little or no regard for set bonuses" part. If this is the case, then what would you call slotting in such a way that aims to maximize basic enhancement bonuses AND maximizes set bonuses as well?| ...purely to maximize the basic enhancement bonuses to that power with little or no regard for set bonuses.? |
In my opinion, Franken-slotting is just slotting a mixture of different SO's, Hami's and IO's to maximize...well...pretty much every aspects of your powers.
Edit: And yes I do recommend slotting in such a manner since it's usually better than just going for an entire set of IO's in every single powers, since that last couple bonuses are usually worthless...unless you're wanting that +defense which is usually the last bonus in a set.
The big benefit of frankenslotting is that it's extremely cheap. In fact, if you do it in the late 20s or early 30s it's often cheaper than buying SOs at 35-50. I normally frankenslot all my characters in that level range and then switch to a "real" set build if I like the character enough to take it to 50 (and more importantly, if I think I'll ever play it again after 50 
). Add in a few cheap set bonuses and you can be very effective while leveling up without needing to play the market or import funds from an alt.
I certainly wouldn't use a frankenslotted build for poat-50 play though. Blasters desperately need defense if they plan to solo late game and need recharge whether they solo or not, so at the least I slot midrange sets like Thunderstrike, usually looking for decent ranged defense and enough global recharge for a good attack chain. But frankenslotting is great until you start looking for that endgame build (though recharge and defense are important if you want to solo well in the 40s).
Cascade, level 50 Blaster (NRG/NRG since before it was cool)
Mechmeister, level 50 Bots / Traps MM
FAR too many non-50 alts to name
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No. It can be COMPARATIVELY cheap. But some of the best candidates IOs for frankenslotting can be highly desireable and (thus) expensive.
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Originally Posted by StrykerX
The big benefit of frankenslotting is that it's extremely cheap.
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You really need to ask what can you do with the particular powerset not what can be done with the at.
Take a set like devices, the rate you lay down trip mines is going to be a major factor in your performance, frankenslotting just wont get you the high rates of recharge you need to pop out large minefields quickly. The same goes for a set like mental manipulation where having enough recharge will let you have permanent drain psyche and possibly bypass the fitness pool
On the other hand, with sets like energy manipulation or fire manipulation you can achieve much with just frankenslotting Boost range, power boost, fire sword circle, burn are all highly effective with just the limits from ED,
Depends on what I'm goin' for. I generally don't due to the want o' the defense bonuses from the sixth slot. However, I did frankenslot by DP/Nrg for damage procs where I might've otherwise sixth slotted Thunderstrikes for the ranged defense.
Also for PvP, you might choose to frankenslot some damage procs in all your powers as they aren't resisted.
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I Frankenslot ALL of my alts... No exceptions. I find it Very Viable.|
Originally Posted by Flints
Do you? Would you?
I'm thinking of rolling more alts, one of them being a fire/fire blaster, and while in mids I was considering instead of using global rech through slots, that I would take a look at Frankenslotting for Acc/Dmg/Rech in most of the powers, as well as hitting early set bonuses to get Regen/Recover up. While frankenslotting a blaster seems a little unconventional, as opposed to slotting global rech to achieve perma-hasten and slotting for acc/dmg regen/recover, is it a "viable alternative" technique for slotting blasters, instead of meta-gaming them? |
I don't do it with a "little or no regard for set bonuses", but there are very
few of my alts that have a complete set of anything in them... 2 IO's per set
is common, 3 is occasional, and 4 or 5 is pretty rare except on builds
where I specifically want Global Acc or Rch.
YMMV.
Regards,
4
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I typically start slotting IOs at level 22 (previous levels go by quickly and I typically don't worry about slotting too much before then).
Frankenslotting is very effective--especially for Ranged and Melee attacks. You can get Ruin or Maelstom's Fury very cheaply (5-20K inf or less for the recipe hero-side with pretty reasonable salvage requirements most of the time). Any 2 Acc/Dam and then some Dam/Rech or Dam/End or some triples. Then you can forget about that slot until you can replace it with the set you're going for. This is really good for when you're leveling quickly and can't spend the time to constanly update SOs.
And then there are the powers like Mind Link that beg for Frankenslotting. Or slot-starved builds like Kheldians where you're going to be more effective with Frankenslotting then you may be with going after sets. And then there are things like the slow sets and some of the mez ones that are really poorly designed and you have to Frankenslot if you want all the right enhancements.
Frankenslot
1. Slotting a power with a diverse mix of multi-aspect Set Invention Origin Enhancements, as well as possibly Common IOs and/or Hamidon Origin Enhancements, purely to maximize the basic enhancement bonuses to that power with little or no regard for set bonuses.
I'm thinking of rolling more alts, one of them being a fire/fire blaster, and while in mids I was considering instead of using global rech through slots, that I would take a look at Frankenslotting for Acc/Dmg/Rech in most of the powers, as well as hitting early set bonuses to get Regen/Recover up.
While frankenslotting a blaster seems a little unconventional, as opposed to slotting global rech to achieve perma-hasten and slotting for acc/dmg regen/recover, is it a "viable alternative" technique for slotting blasters, instead of meta-gaming them?