Stalker primary questions

Having never really played stalkers seriously I figured I would try on out finally.

What are the different primaries like?

Secondaries I figure I am pretty well sold on ninjitsu so that's covered.
Any good synergy with any primary? Any advice?

Thanks in advance....oh and no am I not using this for pvp.

I actually never played a Claws Stalker, but I hear it's pretty scrappy.
Claws Pros:
-Looks sexy.
-Scrappy.
-Build Up naturally recharges faster (72 sec vs normally 90sec).

Claws Cons:
-Not very Bursty.
-Eviscerate is single target.
-Damage isn't compensated for the lack of Follow up.

I also have no 'Ninja Blade' Stalker and I don't like Broadsword period.
'Ninja Blade' Pros:
-Very survivable with resist sets.
-Also Scrappy and Bursty.

'Ninja Blade' Cons:
-It's called 'Ninja Blade' instead of Katana or even Ninja-to.
-It loses an AoE and its tier 9 only has a 50% crit chance since it's a kinda-cone.

Dark Melee is fun on a Stalker. While Katana makes resist sets really survivable, DM makes defense sets really survivable. With the heal, the fear/-ToHit/Placate, you're hard to kill. You've got lots of negative energy damage which you can crit on command and you've got a huge shadow skull in your Assassin's Eclipse! It's scrappy, it's bursty, it's got utility and it feels sneaky. IMO, it's the best basic function stalker primary.

Martial Arts...my MA Stalker is still young (only 21) but she's surprisingly strong. You don't have any native AoE, but your ST is very strong. Eagle's Claw hits harder than its Scrapper counterpart and can crit on command but you lose the extremely cool looking Dragon's Tail...but hey, you get the most bad *** Assassin's Blow animation in Fist of Annihilation.

Energy Melee...I have one in the 30s and I like it...but it's an acquired taste. I tend to focus on smacking stuff with AS from hide and then aiming at hard targets with TF and ET. They don't benefit much from criticals, but they are consistent (if they ever land). The control is rather meh unless you enhance it...all in all, I wouldn't suggest it unless you just like Energy Melee.

Dual Blades...I do like this set. Having played my new DB/FA brute a lot, I noticed I don't like using the combos all the time. It frustrates me when I miss a combo (due to a miss or foe out of range or needing to use a heal or something) and it frustrates me more when I don't *need* a combo because, by the time Attack Vitals starts ticking, the foes are dead or would have been just as dead had I just used Blinding Feint + Burn + Sweeping Strike. Anyway, what I'm trying to say is, combos are overrated. If you like pulling them off every now and again, you should have no problem playing them on a Stalker. If you *must* use combos all the time then I pray for your soul, no matter which AT you choose to play them on. No, you don't get Blinding Feint or Typhoon Edge, but you gain things in return. Ablating Strike is a pseudo-PBAoE in that, if you put procs in it, they will check all foes within 10ft of you every time you click the power. Your Sweep combo is auto-hit 10ft PBAoE if you connect with your main target so use that wisely. Your 1kcuts is a few feet longer and you can combine it with an 80% +dmg buff and 50% crit chance for some great burst AoE dmg.

Kinetic Melee...mine is young. I don't have Concentrated Strike slotted yet, but I hear its quite nice. It hits pretty hard and it will automatically recharge Build up if you critical with it. That said, you automatically crit with CS when using it from hide or after placate so use that to your advantage. Also, Burst, the PBAoE, will crit 100% from hide rather than the standard 50% that AoEs get. Use *that* to your advantage too. All in all, you lose Power Siphon (but lots of KM users express a dislike for the power...it seems quite nice to me) but gain Build up. The only other power you lose is Repulsing Torrent which is pretty cruddy for an attack and even cruddier for a utility/mitigation power. And your Assassin's Strike looks like a Kamehameha blast...use that to your advantage.

Spines...I love Stalker Spines. It's slow, yes, but it's heavy. It's one of the few minion mower powersets Stalkers get (Dual Blades being one and Electric Melee being another). It's weak on ST attacks, meaning you'll have to lean on Assassin's Impaler more than other Stalkers would if you want to kill bosses. But the crits you get +BU plus the slows just makes for a cool feeling Stalker. I like to play mine from range until he kills mostly everything, then whip out Ripper to finish off stragglers and then placate/AS for the persistent ones.

Electric Melee....this is the only powerset across the melee ATs where it's actually stronger for the Stalker. What you lose (Thunderclap) in the set is made up for by giving you more damage (Assassin's Shock). That's it. Not only that, but Lightning Rod doesn't break hide when you use it so you can follow up with another critical hit. However, LR also doesn't ever crit (not even for Scrappers). It's also weak on ST attacks, like Spines, but not as bad. Thunder Strike will 100% crit from hidden on the choosen target and 50% crit on the targets around it. Chain Induction will crit the target 100% from hidden and then jump to other nearby targets. And for those persistent targets, the other melees have to look for other powers while Stalkers get AS. Oh, and Assassin's Shock looks pretty cool with all the lightning arcing from your hands as you charge it.

I've tried and abandoned Ninja and dual blades. Took them into the 20s then said, "meh".

Claws was very fun through the 30s but it was on a friend's account and he stopped playing hehe. As stated quite scrappy, you hardly feel like a stalker. Just gogogo killkillkill. You need to get used to chewing through targets fast with single-target attacks, but once you have it down, it was fun.

Dark has been awesome to me. It is wonderful damage, very reliable, exemplar's beautifully, and at the high end keeps up with anyone around me. On incarnate trials I regularly out damage scrappers and brutes. And as I mention over and over, my dark/dark stalker rocks and is fine at +2/x6 with honestly the worst build I have ever seen. So bad if I posted it as is people would assume I was trolling and not serious. I just love how placate, buildup and midnight grasp can down a lieut reliably. Even the ones it doesn't kill a fast smite is enough to finish off. And that's anotehr thing, except for shadow maul, dark feels fast. It's actually only slightly above average (slower than nin, DB and claws for instance), but it feels fast.

Spines has been very bad to me. I still have my spines/nin stalker but I think he's sitting at 179 days since I logged into him. And that's with me knowing he has two purples uncrafted in his inventory. The damage is crap, and the attacks are slow and it has nothing to help you stay alive. I pretty often get killed by enemies who die after me just because the attack was so slow they got their attack in before mine dropped them. That, to me, spoils the whole experience of being a stalker. the combo of slow attacks and a dot-based damage system is where I lose interest in spines. I wish it was just claws with toxic damage.

I'm with Leo on Broadsword but for different reasons. Except for PvP, it is 100% inferior to Katana/Ninja blade in every category. Less damage, more endurance, slower attacks, even the parry is weaker because it rotates up slower so you can't stack it as easily. I have a BS scrapper who I love, but I tell everyone to avoid the set like the plague and I'll never make another unless it is massively buffed.

Haven't tried Kin past 14, but it was fun. Haven't tried MA because I think it looks pathetic. Haven't tried EM. I have an Electric Brute and knowing that it's even better on Stalkers I can say I really need to try one out, because Electric is very nice.

What are they like...

Well for me....I felt the swords all felt about equal....they where ok...they did what i expected...and that was about it....actualy they kind of made me get board a bit.

Martial arts was also ok....it was a little more lively but just doesnt do the damage on a stalker that it does for a scrapper...

Kinetic Melee was alot of fun for me....it does smash and some energy...though i am not sure if it was fun due to its knock down effects...or the fact i slotted it for more knock down via kinetic combat enhancements.

Claws...are fun for me right now...i am currently leveling up a claws stalker....its mostly single target damage though and all lethal mostly...which is not that great...but its fast rate of attack and combined with kinetic combat's chance for knock down...makes me knock things down alot.....my next goal is to get some stuff that causes differing damage types.
I did have one weird thing though with claws....after i do a placate and if i get hit afterwards...i find i dont do the extra damage i am supposed to..yes placate does list this information....i dont have this problem with kinetic melee or ninja sword...so i assume its a claws thing only.

Electric...well i played this set for a while....and found some of its attacks just plain miss or dont go off much...like the jacobs ladder for example....i seamed to only hit one target namely my primary one only alot....
The interesting thing is that the sounds its makes...makes it perfect for the concept i was trying...which was to make a snake/reptile character...the sound effects are very much like that of a rattle from a rattle snake in my opinion.

Well thank you for all the info I've decided to go KM/Nin and thinking very heavily on making a DM/?.

That being said thanks to all you helped make up my mind.

My twin bro had a 50 Claw/Will Stalker and it was his most favorite toon.

I used to play his characters when he wasn't on and I have to say that Claw is a fast-pace set and it requires you to run back and forth a lot to get the most out of the knockbacks and aoe cone. It is a very "engaging" set. Let's put it that way. You run backward to use Shockwave and forward to use Eviscerate and you use Focus while jumping back to give you breathing room, etc. The knockback/down gives you a lot of protection.


I know people say Ninja/Broadsword have Parry defense but it won't surprise me if Shockwave/Focus give you more "protection" than Parry in most cases. I say most because there are times your knockback won't work so in that case the added defense is better.

PS: Broadsword should have been a Two-Handed Sword. One hand sword looks very weak.

I'll back Leo. The end cost on a stalker /da is not very significant outside of the heal. Mine is missing murky (I warned you it's a crap build) but I have assault and I don't have end trouble unless I need to heal twice fast.

The theft of essence proc is a godsend. So is mixing pieces from both theft and touch sets to get maximum acc/end/rech/heal values in the remaining 5 slots.

With the heal under control, endurance is not an issue. I don't have miracle or numina's unique or the performance shifter proc. End is not an issue for me. Although I think I have a spare numina in my base so I might add it soon if I can get a heal cheap. Right now I have two from Triage in non-inherent fitness. Sigh.

I don't mean to highjack but this seems like a good primary general discussion thread: which primary is best for exemplaring? Keeping in mind that this means Ouro exemplaring and TF/SF exemplaring. Is there any stalker than can solo everything at +0x1/yes/yes?

edit: It's been a long, long time since I played a stalker, so am I even right in my assumption that they're kings of soloing?

Major nailed it. To put some numbers, if you have 100% damage at level 50 using high-level IOs at level 21 you'll only have 58%. But if you followed Major's instructions, you'd still have 100% at level 21.

Down lower than 20 you can't have a single bonus on each portion of the IO higher than 15%, which gets hard to bring a large total at the end even with 6 slots. (if you only get 12% per slot, 6 of them is only 72%).

And yes both purple and pvp sets are subject to this. You can get more details on the Wiki.

Now, this effect happens before ED comes into play, so the other option, is to overslot. Dropping 5 level 50 damage enhancers into a power will only give you about 118% at level 50, but down at level 10, instead of the 28% it would be if the reduction kicked in after ED, it will be 51%. Of course, you'll only have 1 slot left for acc, dam, recharge, and endurance and whatever you slot will be cut down by three-quarters. Low-level optimization is a pretty tricky process.