Inexpensive PvP toon?

No, not really. Not that they'd necessarily be expensive; they're just not well suited for PvP, regardless of your budget.

Dark/Storm Corr could gimp along in zones and 1v1s, maybe. Grav/Nrg Dom has decent Mez/Dmg, but the damage is slow and not sustained.

Generally speaking most nice builds, unless they are straight damage (read: psi/em) wont have/need a boat load (and maybe none at all) of PvP IOs in them. Even then ppl usually only put them in for HP buffs because they are so pricey and stick with that.

So going off your list here are a few suggestions you could consider making:

Son/Therm Corr - Has some good buffs and an ok team mate heal as well as an aoe self heal. It also has Heat Exhaust which is a great debuff as well as melt armor (-res debuff). Sonic is a great synergy with this since its 2 t1/2 attacks are some decent damage as well as added -res. Shout is a great heavy hitter finisher (very nice with scourge kicking in). Also has a nice little stun. Alternativly you could do a rad/ instead and it would play very similar, just -def instead.

Mind/Therm Troller - Same idea as above for therm stuff. Mind is a great troller primary. It has psi damage as well. Psi damage is still a very good choice of damage type to have. It also has a great hold and knockup power (slotted correctly can do a mag 41 knock before DR - ends up being able to knock ppl with less then 30ish KB protection if I remember right). This also has a non-repeling TK (telekinesis), unlike the defender version which repels.

Son/Cold Corr (Cold/Son Def) - There are some great -recharge powers in cold as well as -def/-dam and a monster debuff that does -regen/-end/-dam/-special. The special debuffs your status protection/resist by a lot. Also has a +recovery power which is always nice to have. There are some buffs as well, but sadly not many ppl spec it for team buffing (in all reality not many ppl plan for playing it with a team). Has 2 +def buffs (S/L/melee and range/aoe/NE/E) that also give a small res to c/f. There is also a +HP teammate buff (If i remember right the only one in the game) that can easily HP cap your teammates. Pair this with a son for the added -res and its a done deal. At this point I would say it would be better to do a corr rather then a def just because corrs get slightly better damage and scourge.

Psi/Em Blaster - Bread and butter damage here. This will be FoTM for a while until damage gets changed just for the simple fact that 1 psi blaster can setup a mini spike by themselves because of how the delayed damage shows up when you attack. As a blaster you can spend anywhere from 1 to prolly 20 bill. I think I have that cheap build (might have to dig to page 2 or 3) that rikti asked for that psyrene posted up. I think it only cost about 1.5 bill at the buyitnoa price even. Its a solid build for what you pay for and unless I start playing mine a lot more I highly doubt I will upgrade to more expensive one. Really the only thing you get is a little more damage cause of procs, better end recov, and recharge. Don't get me wrong, it does make a difference, but for your avg joe it won't matter to much. Played well on a team, 2 of these, or even 1 and some support/added damage, are pretty lethal

Mind,Earth,Grav/Fire Dom - Pick your primary. Whatever floats your boat. They all play slightly different but in the end is just how fast you can spam flares/blaze/flares/fire blast. Great damage output if left unchecked. This would by far be the most expensive toon to even play at a manageable level (for a build worth your time playing easily over 4 bill). A lot of what the blaster has going for it, so does this. Biggest difference is that a dom can somewhat disrupt and control the pace of a fight with its mez's. Refer to Mind/ portion of the Mind/Therm Troller.

SS/Invuln Brute - Classic taunt bot that can smack someone upside the head pretty nasty in pinch. Remember kids, Taunt is your friend. Overall its still kinda a 1 hit wonder with KO Blow, but the stacked rage, rock throwing, and the fairly recent option of tanker epics you can still spit out some decent range damage if your built for it. This plays great in teams if you use all your tools (taunt more pls), though solo its not so mean but still a bit of a pain.

KM/Regen Scrapper - Currently the damage is broken on KM for scrappers so they can hit someone and take 700 HP. If you like FoTMs, roll em while its hot and run around and try to 3 shot ppl. Expect to see a fix for this in i35. Overall Regen or SR is your pretty standard FiteKlub toon. I highly suggest NOT ever rolling one of these. It ends up making ppl so closed minded about PvP in general and I dont want you to join the rest of the noob scrapper fite klubbing mass(s) (Im not really sure how many are left of these but it cant be the majority of PvPers that are left just yet...)

Sharks/Sharks Stalker - As much as noob stalkers are hated for spamming sharks and that is all, there is no denying the fact that a smart player on a stalker that can pull off an AS can be a very real threat. If they can actually function in a team, thats like 100x better then the average stalker youll find in RV at any given time. Oh did and there is sharks.


Overall thats kinda the basics as far as toons go. I didnt cover healing much (emps/pains), though they re very viable with a team. They wont spit out much damage (unless you spec them for damage but if you do you would be greatly hurting their healing/buffing ability so you might as well just roll a therm or rad). I didnt cover some of the less played combos, but it doesnt make them any less viable (Im talking about different sorts of disruption and debuffs, not whether or not your energy blaster will be better then a psi blaster. It wont, get over it). Some ppl like to play disruption and that is all they have fun on. It is a totally separate play stlye. Anyway I think this book is done. Any other questions, feel free to ask.

Wow, that is a lot of great info! Thank you very much. I like the idea of a sonic/therm or rad/therm. That is the direction I will most likely go. If I do go that way, I suppose encouraging my buddy to make a brute would be a good choice? Perhaps the SS/Invuln you mentioned...What about willpower instead of invuln. I only aske because he alrady has a SS/WP in his 30s.

I would say therms are on the same leg as a psi/em. You can spend a lot of money on them and it will make a pretty big difference, but you dont have to and they are still very enjoyable.

Actually you might have him roll a therm as well. They can be great to play in duo. Either that or I suggest some damage.

As far as brutes go, WP does work very similar. Biggest thing you would be missing is the oh sh** heal/+hp buff that invuln has. WP does get some +HP in other ways though which is still nice. My only thing really against suggesting that your friend do a melee is that for beginning PvPers they go get on a regen/brute/tank and they just end up stopping with that. They dont expand on toons they try and PvP with. They just end up falling into fite klubing and never getting past how hard their regen is to kill in a zone. I dont mean to bash fite klubing so bad. Let the Tru Warriors have their fun, but with someone who has some clue on how to play though, a taunt bot/range speced melee toon can be very effective and not just some nuisance that is running around and punching you in the face when 5 other ppl are travel suppressing you.

Awesome! Thanks for the build. Unfortunately, I am at work and can not open Mids, but I will definitely take a look at it. Thanks!

Ya Cold/Darks are pretty powerful in 1v1s. If you dont care about 1v1s, just do either toon you like better. There really isnt any major burst damage from either, its kinda all just doting ppl to death (moreso with dark).

Not sure why youd advise a brute over a tanker for a classic taunt bot. Especially now that tanks can pick up webnade. Theres no reason at all to play a brute in PvP. Playing a taunt bot with a thermal MM in zones is kinda nice, or a poison MM for debuffs. MMs are pretty cheap builds also (this duo might have a real hard time gettin kilss but youd be annoying as hell). Since you are going tank you have inherent taunt. Plus more HPs so choosing fire/ss or elec/ss is very viable.

A couple of reasons. Both have their own advantages and disadvantages.

Tanks get higher base HP and then overall higher max HP. They get inherent taunt with their attacks. They also get lower base damage as well as a lower damage cap (which doesnt really matter in pvp, but w/e). Also, unless this changed since it was last tested, Tank resists get hit harder by DR then Brutes.

Brutes get a higher base and damage cap. Rage inherent (which doesnt mean much in pvp unless your into fite klubing). Higher overall resists because, as backwards as it sounds, Brutes resists dont get hit as hard by DR. Lower Base HP and in turn lower max HP.

So really then you have to decide which is a better trade off. Do you want higher HP and lower damage/resist or do you want lower HP and higher damage/resist.

Fossilize is also funny.

Tankers get higher base damage than brutes last time I checked (.80 tanks, .75 brutes iirc) (although its been awhile). And last I heard even with DRd resistances they end up very close (and lol resists versus a psi blaster?)???

So meaning in the end you get resists to close to count, substantially higher HPs, slightly higher base damage. Inherent taunt (guantlet so all attacks taunt). They loose some damage compared to brutes because of LOL Fury (but doesnt build nearly fast enough to make a difference unless 1v1 vs a melee : ) ).

Id go one further, if it wasnt for SS and rage... Scrappers would make better taunt bots (its still debateable, not sure if scrap challenge gives - range). And again they have web... Plus much better damage... Can you imagine a SS/Regen...

So again Id ask why would someone make a brute? In fact Id highly recommend you not. Ive been waiting for devs to make the brute AT worthwhile in PvP for along time. Or am I completely wrong...

Tbh does it really matter what you play tauntbot on once you get over 2000 hp and have a self heal?