A Letter to Nyte Inferno

Okay, I know you were looking at my 81 months of Vet rewards and thinking I knew a lot about the game mechanics, so I'm hoping you took the only really good advice I gave and came here to the forums to investigate. I'm putting your name in the subject so hopefully you find this.

I play for fun. I have a Psi/Psi Dom because I wanted a psychic character and never have looked at the number crunch on it's DPS vs the DPS of a Fortunata VEAT. I have two Nrg/Will Brutes because I'm doing a scenario in my head about how it's one character with an actual Secret Identity as a under cover villain to infiltrate the Rogue Isles. Almost all my characters AT and Power Set choices are made due to whatever backstory I'm writing for them, not for any attempt at being the best at anything, PvE or PvP.

It seemed like most of your questions came down to the word 'Best' and that's why I think I gave unsatisfying answers to you. Best is a hard decision to make. Best is variable. It depends on what you want to do. At one point you asked which is better, Leadership Defense (Maneuvers) or Tough. Hard numbers-wise, I'd guess Tough because it's only for you and requires one other power to get and you can't even get it until level 14. Maneuvers is available at 06 and has no initial investment required. But that's just a guess.

To me the real question is, what other effects do you care about? Do you care about the AoE defense buff that Maneuvers gives? What power are you giving up in order to take the lead in power so you can pick up Tough? On top of that, Maneuvers grants a Defense Buff, meaning you get hit less often, while Tough grants Damage Resistance, which means you take less damage when you get hit. So does your AT allow you more of one than the other and you're trying to fill a gap? Or are you asking if Defense Buff is better than Damage Resistance?

I know there are people that will argue this point, but I think one of the best things about CoX is that there really is no 'Best Build Evah' in the game. There are enough variables in available powers and enough different ways to approach the game that it doesn't matter. For every AT Powerset out there that 'everyone' says is bad, there's one person who has found the right build and right Pool Powers to make it kick tushie and then posted a You Tube link to prove how fast it melts face in a fight. There are lots of players who have fun doing the math. So if you want advice on any particular build, check the forum threads. Hopefully they can provide you more detailed advice than I did in group.

Good Luck.

And, btw, you got a cool name.

It would definitely be cool if he or she gets to read this. Unfortunately, I've heard estimates that less than 10% of the players visit the forums. Hopefully Nyte will say "Hi" if they read it.