Going for Very Rare Alpha?

How many people are not going for the very rare alpha? Personally, the 2/3 ignore ED and the other bonuses don't interest me enough to waste components on building another rare. If Rare gets 1/2 ignore ED and the level shift, then it is sufficient for my needs. The investment for a very rare alpha slot compared to a rare alpha slot is not worth it IMO since I am not a minmaxer that requires to get the maximum benefit out of everything. Of course, I am using a Cardiac in a Mastermind so my endurance requirements are being met with just the rare. I am definite that there will be other incarnate slots that would warrant getting a very rare, but not the alpha.

I'm quite tempted, but mostly because I had a Spiritual Radial, but would prefer a Partial Core Revamp - so I'm going to build two rares anyway, and when I've got 32 spare shards, I'll turn it into a Core Paragon. Yeah, it's a lot, but I'll get there someday.

I think I worked out a plan, and it needs me to do one more STF, two ITFs, a ship raid, two Khans and gather 24 more shards and 3 Notices. I think that should be very doable. Running tips for a couple of days would probably let me skip one of the TFs, too.

EDIT: removed brainfart.

I'll end up getting it on all my 50s eventually, but I'm gonna try to get it ASAP on my two Shield Scrappers. Spiritual Core Paragon looks tasty.

It really depends on the character - what they want, and how close to the ED limit they already are in the relevant powers. The difference between 45% and 33% isn't too important to me unless it's the last few percent to something important like a res/def cap - in which case, the ED ignoring is likely to be the more important part of the alpha anyway.

For example, the only things my shield/mace tanker has pushed into ED levels is def and res on the defensive powers, and damage on the offensive ones. I'm not really interested in the defensive bonuses since she's already over softcap, her endurance management is fine after she dumped her merits into the uniques, and AAO already gives me enough damage buffing that more would be significantly diluted. So I'm just going spiritual to tighten up my attack chain, but I don't need the very rare since not a single one of my attacks has more than 56% recharge in it anyway, so I'll just stop at partial core revamp for the level shift.

On the other hand, my FF defender would go all the way to very rare on any of the three alphas I'm considering giving him. Nerve core paragon for the ED ignore on defense buffing and accuracy for those nasty level 54 TFs, cardiac core paragon for the ED ignore on toggle endredux for solo, or musculature core (or radial) paragon for ED ignore on the damage (and potentially endmod).

My warshade will also be going to spiritual core paragon, because she *is* pushed into ED cap on recharge on the important stuff, and wants MOAR! Not to mention tightening up the nova and dwarf attack chains will be nice.

I might go Very Rare on my Brute, but I doubt I'll be getting it on my other 5 toons (who will just stay at Rare). It's not like they aren't delightfully overpowered already.

Why not? My brute was in a good place before the alpha slot, but piling on more recharge certainly doesn't hurt.

I've decided not to bother with Incarnate stuff at all on all but two characters for the time being, and for those two, I do intend to take them all the way to the Very Rare, just for the sake of squeezing every last ounce of oomph from their respective slots. Cardiac on an /Invuln scrapper to cap his Smashing/Lethal resistance, and Musculature on my Bane, just to see exactly how high I can crank the damage.

I've got one character I'm pretty much gonna max out in everything that comes along... so yeah. She's my Superman...er, woman.

My fire/shield just needs the Notice of the Wells to get his very rare. For my other incarnate toons I'll get them eventually, but my Scrapper is my main guy for the incarnate system.

Bring on Judgement slot nao!

I find muscular radial paragon will work great for a few of my radiation characters. It will boost AM's endurance and run speed, RI's def and tohit debuffs, and obviously damage, on a few lower damage toons that need it, but for some it's just extra awesomeness.

I agree with your reasoning that there isn't much difference between the Very Rare and the Rare, compared to the (relatively) greater effort. I'll personally get them because I play a lot and run endgame TFs as part of my normal playstyle, but if one feels that to be a grind it sure doesn't seem worth it to go beyond a Rare.

You are correct in that the rare is a big boost for relatively little work. (on all my active 50s I already had way more shards then needed, so all it took was running 1 TF). And the very rare is not much of a boost, especially considering that all it gives is something that's very far into the realm of diminishing returns to begin with.

But, that's the funny thing about gaming and rewards. If you build it, people will jump through every hoop you put in front of them to get it... heck, look at badges... most of them add nothing, and a lot of people go through way more effort then it takes to pick up a very rare slot to get them.

I'll say this, though. My favorite thing by far about incarnates isn't the added power... it's the increase in level 50+ teaming it's brought to the game. I'm the kind of player that likes to play his maxed out toons and I don't mind pick-up groups.

I've been around this game pretty much since day 1 and I remember most fondly a time when getting a synapse TF was as easy as walking up to Synapse and say in local "looking for Synapse." That hasn't been true for probably 6 years. But as of this week, you can do that in IP for one of the most difficult challenges in the game.

Sure, the final incarnate boost may be small... but it doesn't matter. In my opinion, this past week is one of the best weeks this game has seen in a very long time.

Do we know if the VR applies a +2 level shift, or is it the same +1 shift as the Rare?

I haven't decided. I like the idea of 4 Rares to swap in and out first, then maybe pick one very rare to work on, but I might skip it.

All of my characters will go for Very Rare Alpha, it's pretty weird to pass it up just because you don't want to, if the option is there. It's almost like IOs - I put them off for ages because I didn't understand them, nor did I want to - but when I decided to try, I felt stupid for not using them earlier, haha. In fact, my namesake inv/ss Tanker only recently IO'd out properly at the start of i19 with Inherent Fitness, and now he's softcapped to s/l/f/c/e/n with one enemy in range with no endurance problems in a fight (unless he's fighting Recluse in STF for more than 5 minutes without help, haha).

However - it's not a race. Each character will get there in their own time.

Of course, some are more keen to get there faster than others, like my main trio of level 50s, hehe.

I'll probably get it on my Broadsword/Dark Armor scrapper, but I'm in no particular hurry to get it.

The rest of them will probably stop at the Rare unless I run across a compelling reason to go for it with them.

I haven't even gotten the Rare yet on anyone... I've been using the WST to get the Common/Uncommon on characters I ignored in the incarnate system previously. I still dunno if I'll go for the Very Rare just yet, 'cause I'm waiting to find a character that I really, really click with first. So... my Plant/Kin will probably be my first contender once he gets to 50. After that, we'll see how I feel about the rest of my characters.

I do think I should go ahead and grab my characters the Rare though... 'cause it's not that much more work after the Uncommon and the level shift seems pretty significant.

Wild Streak - Lv. 50(+3) Beast Mastery/Sonic Resonance Mastermind, Amnesty - Lv. 50 Staff Fighting/Dark Armor Stalker

I had one laggard 50 who did not have the Alpha Slot unlocked until yesterday, mostly because I wanted to solo Ramiel's arc with him, but I had unslotted most of his enhancers for an I19 respec, and had not yet replaced them.

Now that all my 50s are unlocked, I plan to have all nine of them with the very rare slotted once we've had enough WSTs to acquire four Notices of the Well.

This is relatively easy for me to plan on, because I have access to regular TF teams who can complete the existing TFs without much in the way team formation gyrations.