First 50?

So, I've been playing about 4 months, and I keep thinking I want to see some of the higher-level content, but I have serious altitis.

I seek advice: What's a good first character to try to get to 50? Either something that will really bloom post-30, or something that'll be easy to level, or... I dunno. What should I try to finish levelling, and why? (I'd list my characters, but really, would adding one more change things? No.)

What do you most enjoy playing? That one.

My first one was an elec/elec blaster, back in I3/I4. Somewhat different then, though.

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What Bill said. It doesn't matter if the character can mow down so many foes per second or whatever if you don't like playing it.

Find a combo you like, stick with it, get on some good teams and you'll be 50 before you know it.

And for the record, my first 50 was a TA/A Defender back in Issue 6 or 7.

Still waiting for his Official BackAlleyBrawler No-Prize

I most like playing whatever I'm on, until I've played a couple of hours, then it feels sorta old...

I'm with Bill.

But that being said, as a fellow altitus sufferer, I used this strategy -

I chose a character that I really enjoyed - in my case, my very first character, modelled on a PnP Champions character I really loved from a now defunct campaign. I made it a point to play that character at least every other time I logged on and set myself an interim goal. In the 30s, the goal was to make a level every other time I played her, then in the 40s, it was "x" bubbles of XP per session. I also found a static group (a Saturday afternoon TF group) where I would always play her - great XP there.

Now - not to discourage you - even so, I didn't get her to 50 until I had been playing almost 3 years. Of course, I didn't start my strategy from the beginning - I only played her like this for the last 4-5 months when I decided I wanted to finally get a character up to 50. Another thing that delayed her ascent was that she dated back to before *all* the XP smoothing and reduction of debt. And as a Blaster, she had most of the debt badges by the time she reached 50, since she dated back to the time when XP debt started at level 4 and you could have more than 1 level's worth of debt accumulated.

Basically my advice is to set a few interim goals, find something you find fun (I'm partial to Blasters, but I also have a Scrapper almost there), and then make a personal commitment to have that character on "heavy rotation" so that you play it just a bit more often than the rest of your alts.

I'd recommend a Mastermind. Each tier of pets or pet upgrade really changes things up, so you keep having new things to look forward to. Add in a secondary with a great level 38 power (like /Dark) and you at least have good incentive to play until then. 38-50 isn't that long a trip, and you have some interesting content in those levels and more that opens up at 45 to keep you going.

I'd also suggest going Hero. They have cooler zones, like Striga and Croatoa, plus it's easy to find a group or a task force. Also, Masterminds solo very well so you can run through the (very well done) arcs in Striga and Croatoa and then hit the various task forces if you have the time.

Hmm. I have a ds/dark MM at 32, blue side. I could work on that. I forget why she's been 32 so long. Might be stamina-related, or coulda just been full inventory of recipes that I had to sell off.

I'll add my voice to those saying play whatever is fun. On top of that I think the character should also be fun when solo, teams aren't always available. I don't know your playing schedule or if you have to take short breaks often, so you might not want to disrupt teams if that's the situation.

Come up with a concept for your character that you like, that helped a lot on my first 50, then team with a steady group of friends, that also help a lot with my first 50.

I went through a lot of different characters, untill my Claws/Regen hit 50.

My first 50 was a ninja/dark MM, and as fun as he was at the time, I hate him now and never want to play him. Ever.

But yeah, as others have said, play what you like and what you can have fun with and getting to 50 will be much easier.

Not my first, but my two fastest 50s were a DB/WP Brute and a Thugs/Pain MM.

My first 50 was on Triumph a Storm/Rad defender, not the ideal solo toon, but I had 3 or 4 key friends that made a 50 or bust pact including a Invul/SS tank, an Illusion/kinetic controller and other folks just joined in off the server interested in getting 40s to 50. It was a lot of fun together. We just got in broadcast and announced 50 or bust and worked on whoever had good missions at the time. (This was before supersidekick.) No AV or big outdoor map was safe from us!

My first fifty was my namesake, a Energy/Energy/Munitions Blaster. He wasn't my first character ever, but held the title for my favorite for a good couple o' years. I ran with the same people daily for a few months and we all hit the big 5-0 around the same time.

I also never play'im anymore.

Edit: Add my voice to the chorus o' others. Play whatever you think is fun.

I have a really hard time with "most enjoy". It seems to vary pretty quickly over time. Problem is, this game is too well balanced; each character tends to be good at something, so I end up enjoying playing them more... then I play someone else and that's fun...

Last night I pulled out an alt for a Numina Task Force. Even though that's a "lower" level TF than the alt was (she was 40), she motored up from 40 to 42.3 during the TF without even trying. A few hours of fun and I've closed a substantial amount of the distance to 50.

All you gotta do is play...especially teamed...even the supposedly "long" levels fly by.

My first 50 was an elec/elec/elec blaster (/shame!) that occurred about 22 months into the playing the game. My second, which I'm much happier with and actually enjoy playing, is my DP/TA corruptor.

By far the best advice any of us can give is whichever character you most enjoy playing; we could give you a dozen different combinations that we've liked but this is all about what YOU enjoy playing.

When I first started playing I, like many players, created lots of widely different characters. My first, and my first to 22 was a Fire/EM blaster. About the time I got to 22 on that character I'd become highly frustrated at constantly faceplanting... that blaster wasn't forgiving of my inexperience at the time. I'd seen what tankers were capable of surviving at the time (this was issue 3, the Golden Age of Tankers) so I created an Invulnerability/Stone Melee tanker and named him after all the purse snatching victim's... they always SAID I was Awesome after all

Well, the tanking playstyle clicked with me and as I got more experience I actually started getting good at it... and I wasn't faceplanting 5 times a mission anymore. That tanker, my namesake, became my first level 50 character 250 hours later right at the start of issue 4.

After several years and a number of 50's under my belt I decided to revisit my original, long since deleted, fire/em blaster. This time around I knew what I was doing and enjoyed the character immensely.

I guess what I'm getting at is that it took me several tries to find my first 50. Since that time I've found that many of the early characters that I found lacking originally became a lot of fun later on when I understood things better.

Right now I have all blueside AT's at 50, most multiple times. The only exception is Keldians; I have a 50 Peacebringer but my Warshade's only in the mid-40's. Most of those characters I enjoyed playing the whole way although I do have some favorites.

My BS/Shield is my favorite Scrapper and my usual go-to character when I'm feeling antisocial. My favorite Tankers are a tossup between CMA and my Shield/Fire. My favorite Controller is my perma-PA Ill/Rad and my favorite Blaster is my Fire/EM. For Defenders my Dark/Dark is the most effective; I bring him out when something calls for extreme tohit debuffing.

Anyway, pick your favorite 2 or 3 characters and play them. Don't feel like playing character A tonight? Play character B instead. You'll get to 50 in good time and as you play you'll find yourself tending to one character over the others... guess what, you've figured out your favorite

I can definitely relate to your malady: I didn't have my first level 50 until I had 2 level 49's, and that was after several years of play, and at least a dozen sub-20 alts deleted.

The best advice I can find is get some friends to play with regularly.

For me, a HUGE boon to my leveling on one of my characters was the fact that I got to be really good friends with a Fire/Fire blaster player, and they REALLY wanted Sonic Resonance buffs and debuffs. Result was, every time they came online, I was "pestered" into logging that alt in and rocking out for a good couple hours, so the pink bars filled up rather swiftly. Good times, good company, and good progress were a formula for what was literally my fastest 50 out of the ones I have.

My Earth/Storm controller really started to bloom post-32. It was the 31 levels before that that were a soul-eroding grind.

On the plus side, you get Hurricane and I've heard you do enjoy Hurricane