Building a character to host lowbies/exemplar with

I'm leveling up a Shield/Elec tanker specifically for hosting fun teams with lower level pubbies. I want to play some of the older story arcs, run tips mishes and TFs and just enjoy some content I've never played much (Midnighters Club/Cimerora, Croatoa, Ouro, custom AE mishes, etc).

My plan is to level him to 50 as soon as I can (he's 39) and then do as many trials as I can to unlock some incarnate slots. I realize I can start now without having incarnate slots, but I'd rather have them first. In that time I'll try to pick up some IO sets and make as much money as I can so I can pass out some cash and just generally be a fun host for lowbies/newbies.

I've read about how enhancements work with exemplaring but I'm not sure I completely understand. Also, I don't have much experience with Flashback missions. Is it easier to enhance with however high level enhancements I want and play flashbacks, or enhance somewhat lower so I can exemplar back?

Any other ideas about things I can do to make it easier to exemplar down, and/or enjoy the content I mentioned above?

The first trick with exemplaring is if you ever respec, don't forget to take your travel power as early as possible and any anti-mez power your power set may have as early as possible. It's no fun if you find out you have to run everywhere at Lvl 30 or are stunned every other encounter because you chose your powers during a respec poorly.

So I assume you read this over at ParagonWiki. Yes it gets to be rather confusing when you are dealing with IO set bonuses. The key thing to understand here is if you are now more than 3 Lvls below the level of an IO enhancement, that enhancement no longer counts toward the "with X of this set you get bonus Y". Very rare and PVP IO sets "purples" are immune to this effect.

Here's some general tips that I keep in mind:

1) Take advantage of slots- Slots from higher levels don't go away when you exemp down. So 6 slot those lower level powers so even though your enhancers scale down, you still get good enhancement values.

2) Get your Accolade powers, love your Accolade powers- They work at all levels now. The hit point and End bonuses, and a power like Demonic/Eye of the Magus can be invaluable to easy exemping.

3) Take advantage of the +5 rule- You get powers from 5 levels above whatever level you exemp to. Keep that in mind when planning the build.

4) Make sure you have an attack chain- It doesn't have to be the best chain, but it really does make a difference if you have 3 of your own attacks and don't have to rely on Veteran powers because you only have 1 regular attack.

5) Purple Sets are your friend- Their IO Set bonuses don't follow the normal rules. They stay active at all levels. They're expensive of course, but in an exemping build well worth the investment.

6) Plan your IO Levels- I have a Tanker designed to tank the Abandoned Sewer Trial. When I slotted him for this, I kept a close eye on the level of my IOs, so that I wouldn't lose IO bonuses when exemped down to that level. I assure you, he's not gimped at 50 either. I can do all my normal tanking duties up to and including incarnate trials. However having as many bonuses as you can get at lower levels really helps.

This is all helpful and great advice, thanks a lot.

Is there a way to identify purple IOs by looking at them, or should I consult a list?

Ouro has a level 25 requirement so no one under 25 can do flashbacks, right? Can I still get older mishes as a level 50?

Hi,

I think you will find that Oro access is dropping to lvl 14 when issue 21 hits live.

Cheers

I usually start getting IO sets for characters starting at level 27 to 30, and try to keep the level of IOs at 35 or below for powers obtained at those levels. The bonuses are generally "good enough" for me (better than even-con SOs), which means I can often exemp down to level 25-30 without any loss of set bonuses on the powers that are still available at those levels.

Since the content below that is generally aimed at SOed characters, you usually have no problems running at those levels by virtue of the inherent "enhancement diversity" that IO sets enforce. That is, most IO sets give a good balance of accuracy, damage, end reduction and +recharge.

If you're not trying to to get some special kind of build (soft-capping to S/L, for example), your job is a lot easier.

However, if you're trying to keep the softcap at lower levels (say, 25, which would let you run level 20 content and keep your bonuses), you will find that the values of the enhancement bonuses will be significantly lower than the bonuses you'd get at higher levels. That is, if you slot multiple sets of Kinetic Combat 25 for the S/L bonuses, they will give a noticeably small accuracy, damage, end red and recharge bonuses for your attacks. Ditto for Reactive Armor and similar sets.

You might therefore want to "frankenslot" one or two other level 50 IOs in those powers that use lower-level IOs to keep the overall enhancement bonus high.

One point nobody made yet that I can see is that Recall Friend comes in very handy at the early levels, especially if you took your travel power early too. Exemped characters get access to powers 5 levels higher than their exemplared level, which means they could be in a great position to help travel-powerless lowbies get around. (At least until I21 when lowbies get travel powers at level 4.)