Claws/elec vs claws/fa - not just for farming

Hi guys, I'm trying to decide whether to choose between elec or fire for my new claws brute. I know the dmg power of fire from my experience with my fire/SS tank but I'm not familiar with electric. Although i will farm at times, that is not my main goal. I like to run alot of TF/SFs especially at lower levels and can't help but wonder if electric might be better suited for that. Any thoughts or even some pro/cons comparing the 2 armors?

If farming means getting tickets, Claws/elec is more than capable of doing so, see Lowbie Map thread. For lower level stuff, I'm not sure it really matters. Each will have pros and cons and you'll have teammates to help cover the cons.

Well i think elec is probably a lot touger and has much better end management. You can have capped energy res and really high s/l res with tough. The extra recharge will help also.

And as you said /fa has way WAY more damage, capped fire res and high s/l res with tough. You still have some end management with consume and a good self-heal. They are pretty similar sets. Just different focuses. High protection from elec with amazing endurance or high fire protection with amazing damage.

Since you've already played fire on a tank I'd suggest going for /elec.

Thank you both for your input! After doing a couple of quick build comparisons in Mids I think I might try out electric. Although I might not be able to kill stuff as fast with electric as opposed to fire, I noticed the following benefits:

Not having to worry about fitting in KB IOs
Having some Psionic resistance would be nice
Energize looks good for lots of regen and will be easy to perma that with spiritual alpha
End sapping with power sink should be very helpful
Lightning reflexes for extra recharge will have my attacks up quicker

I also plan on taking soul for dark oblit and darknest night.

Although nothing might never compare to burn from /FA, elec seems to be well rounded and has plenty to offer as well. Also, I'm wondering if elec might also stack up better when trying to AV solo although I guess like any armor its situational depending on what you are fighting.

Is my thinking on the right track?


Oh, and on a side note - do people usually slot follow-up with damage or go for Gaussians for the set bonuses?

I would probably recommend claw/fire. My friend has one that he is retardedly fast at pl'ing on and I have run regular missions set to +2/8 with him and he absolutely steam rolls whatever the enemy may be.

That said he is IO'd out the wazoo and fully t4 incarnated. A /fire on SO's by itself isn't even close to what he can do.

I have a 50 ss/ela and 50 dm/fire among others and I feel that /fire has more to offer when fully io'd with incarnates included.

For solo against AV's I would take a pimped out claws/fire because you can get it at or close to s/l soft capped defense and you will have the dps to whittle them down. That and healing flames with spiritual alpha is really nice and heals fast.

I think claws/ela would be a strong offensive build with less weaknesses than /fire especially if you build for s/l defense on the /ela and take the cardiac to boost your already solid all around defenses. I just feel you get more return on investment with /fire because if you're going uber sturdy than you're better off rolling an /Inv, /Wp or even /Da rather than /ela when io's are in the mix.

After going back and forth on whether to go with claws/elec or claws/fire, I've decided to give claws/elec a shot since I have several /fire toons and want to try something new. Here is the build I was looking to go with, can you please take a look and let me know what you think?

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If you post the full build, I can comment. Don't have mids at work