Why SS over Claws for Farming?

Sorry guys, I know this topic has been beat to death and the information is probably out there somewhere but a lot of bias and false tests have really skewed the results (The genius idea of putting KO blow in the attack chain for SS to lower their DPS for example).

Looking at the sets and their aoe chains, I just don't really see why SS is better though...

Comparing the ideal chains of:
SS: Footstomp, Ball Lightning, Burn and Electrifying Fences Vs
Claws: Shockwave, Spin, Burn and Fireball.

When it comes to straight damage per animation, it is easy to see the advantage falls to claws: Spin > Footstomp, Shockwave > Electrifying Fences, Fireball > Ball Lightning and Burn = Burn.
All of those compared attacks have the same target caps.

There are however a few differences:
1: Footstomp has a much bigger radius than Spin and can more easily hit it's target cap.
Rebuttal: I'm not sure this matters, I don't have a claws farmer but the mobs pack so tightly on my SS I couldn't imagine not hitting 10 of them with an 8' radius.

2: Rage.
Rebuttal: Unless you have more than two passengers on your team, you have more than enough inspirations dropping to stay at the damage cap, in those situation using Rage is only handicapping yourself due to it's crash. I only ever use Rage towards the end of a farm when I have a full team and I am running short on reds, so as far as I am concerned this is only a small win to SS.

3: Shockwave sucks
Rebuttal: Shockwave doesn't suck, the knockback sucks and it being a cone is a minor annoyance. However, there is no reason the mobs can't have KB protection and the cone isn't bad - 90 degrees plus a decent range, I'm fairly confident it will hit it's target cap consistently.

Am I missing anything else?
If I am not missing anything, the only thing I see that SS has over Claws is ease of use and for that ease, it is giving up 3 superior attacks...


Edit: Figured out another advantage of SS

4: Survivability: Footstomp keeps the enemies off their feet fairly well, due to Shockwave needing mobs with KD protection, claws doesn't have that layer of protection.
Rebuttal: Generally survivability isn't really an issue... It does have it's advantages though for example: right now while browsing these forums I am sitting in the fire troll farms with footstomp on auto. I can be sure I'll survive but I am fairly confident I couldn't do that and expect a happy ending if I were Claws/. Still don't know if this is enough to tip things in favor of SS though, it is obviously situational and I am sure many people aren't as lazy as me.

I don't own any L50 Brute but from what I know, the key is the Force Feedback +Rech proc in Footstomp.

Granted, you can put the very same proc into Shockwave and Eviscerate (and Focus, but that's a ST attack - you're better off using the slot for something else), but the Footstomp radius is much larger, meaning you'll have an easier time hitting the maximum targets - therefore the chance of proc'ing is bigger.

Other than that, the redraw also seems to be a minor issue.

EDIT: If you want a Claws brute, roll a Claws brute. It shouldn't fall THAT far behind in terms of speed of farming. Me, I'm rolling Fire/Fire because I want to and it fits my concept better. I know it won't farm as well as SS/FA, but it's my choice and I'm cool with that.

Spin, Shockwave and Eviscerate should be very decent for AE farming.

Ahh redraw.
Forgot about redraw...
Is that enough to lower Claws's DPS beneath the SS attack chain?

Bill Z Bubba ran a test of Claws/FA against SS/FA not too long ago, convinced Claws would win for many of the same reasons. It didn't, partly due to redraw, and the example data didn't use a pure AOE attack chain for the SS/FA.

Claws is much better than SS for minimum-level farming, though.

I don't have any numbers - I'm at work. I'm sure someone else will be kind enough to do the math for you But since there are dozens of threads debating this and if 90% of the players say SS/FA is faster - there's a good chance it actually performs a bit better.

I, for one, wouldn't roll a SS/FA simply because I don't like SS that much. I very much prefer Claws, Stone or Fire. And I'm sure I would have a lot more fun with one of those primaries than with SS.

EDIT: I actually got a planned Axe/FA and it should work very well - plus it would be a LOT less common.

BillZ even came on here to try and prove once and for all that Claws was indeed the best and found out he couldn't back up his claim. The only set that has a chance is if/when Spines comes to brutes.

I have both and I like the claws better for farming. It comes down to personal choice really. You can lvl a claws brute up in 6 hours on a lvl 1 map btw... I did that.

Redraw, Recharge, and Radius.

In the spreadsheets I've done for regular content, SS/FA AoE is a 10 to 11, while Claws/FA AoE is 8.5 to 9.5. I've not done any calculations specific to AE Farms.

It's my EWAG, that in an AE Farm they will be very close. In a regular farm or any content that can leverage Rage, SS will start pulling ahead. The more you leverage recharge, the more SS will pull head. At some point, at lower recharge, Claws may well be better than SS - at low recharge levels. At the extreme high recharge levels, nothing is going to compete with SS/FA.

Yes Radius Counts, less so in ambush farms, but it still counts.
I give FS and Mu ball an x10, while I give Spin, Burn, E Fences an x8
E-Fences may, or may not, hurt your output, depending on the build and recharge level. In one build I had, it litterally was a neutral, neither gain nor loss; which implies there are builds where what you sacrifice may outweight what you gain.
I assume Redraw as 0.60, but really have no idea how long or short it is. Once upon a time I reverse calculated it, but have since completely forgotten. I would love for someone more knowledgeable to give us a definitive value for redraw that I could note somewhere so I don't forget it.

If, like me, you simply don't like SS ... then Good Alternatives are (in order, maybe): Fire Melee, War Mace, Claws, Battle Axe, Katana(i21), Dual Blades. Chances are I'm gonna give a Katana/Fire a spin in i21. One half to two thirds of your AoE potential is coming from /Fire and /Mu anyway, so it's not such a huge loss if you don't like SS, but it is a loss.

If anyone is capable and able, I'd love to see some spreadsheets of the following attack chains including redraw and reactive procs at the target cap for each attack (which without having actually played a Claws farmer, I am still confident they would hit with ease):

Super Strength: FS, Burn, Ball Lighting and Elec Fences.
Claws: Shockwave, Spin, Burn and Fireball.
Claws: Shockwave, Spin, Ball Lightning and Elec Fences.

Why would you use shockwave for farming? To me that limits you because of the KB effect. Unless you create a farm where the minions have KB protection. Which I am not sure you can. Eviscerate does just as good damage wise and it is what I use on bosses in my chain.

Creating a farm where the minions have KB protection isn't a difficult task you just give them Indomitable Will. I'll agree the damage of Shockwave is only marginally better than Evis but the big difference is the target cap. Shockwave hits twice as many targets and consequently does double the damage. It also has a massive range boost on it, I'd consider it far more likely for Shockwave to hit 10 targets than I would Evis to hit 5.

Google Docs is apparently broken today, so dropbox:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/15076020/Cha...%20FARM%29.xls

• It's dead even - on this low recharge build.
• This is for AE Ambush Farms of short duration only.
  • This assumes solo farming.
  • Solo Farming for AE Ambush Farms of short duration, you should remain damage capped from beginning to end. Rage, FE, FU, BU, and other powers only ease your ability to remain capped in every mission regardless of the luck of the drops.
  • If not solo farming you have to time weight your various damage levels, and approximate your +damage levels including red inspirations. This is essentially impossible to do on paper. In-game tests have always given this edge to SS.
• Standard Procs Included, but not purple procs.
• Redraw .66 (.46 +.20). I add .20 to all activation times to estimate arcana time, so I give redraw an activation of .46, so that it consumes .46 +.20 = .66 seconds.
• I used x8 for the small radius and x10 for the larger radius. This is what my experience has shown me to be pretty reliable. Other players or playstyles may have better, or worse, use of radius, cones, and ranges. I personally am not extremely proficient with cones, even after playing them for years. Ambush farms make the use of radius and cones much better than average.
• If you insist on different x multipliers, despite experienced players telling you otherwise, help yourself.
• If you want a different chain, or other variations, help yourself.

• In all non-ambush-farm content, the SS will pull ahead.
• As recharge increases, SS will pull ahead, and this build is farily low recharge.
• If you use rage, SS will pull ahead. However, I wouldn't use double rage in AE Farms, and even single rage can be questionable depending on the length of the levels vs the rage crash. If you can max tickets in 120s or less, or time your use of rage such that the crash happens while you're between missions. This will vary depending on build, farm, and playstyle.
• Radius IS an advantage, even in ambush farms, more-so in all other farms or content.
• The SS is in my experience easier to build, has more slots available, but costs considerably more since recharge is the primary leverage point.
• Counter Point: Claws can get good performance cheaply.
• Further Counter Point: See CEBR (link) for ludicrously cheap but still good performance.

180% recharge, they are still dead even, but claws has hit it's plateau while SS still has room to grow.

What I mean by easier to build is, less sacrifices, simpler overall build. By cheaper, I mean you can plateau your performance for much lower costs, or reach a 90% or 95% mark magnitudes more cheaply and quickly. Sometimes that last 5% or 10% just isn’t worth it, at least for me. I'm not going to get into builds 10s of billions in cost when I can get 90 to 95% of that performance for 2 billion and some A-Merits/E-Merits. I honestly don't see an upper price point when I start looking at SS/FA builds, while I see very nice Claws builds for less than 10. It's just an opinion of course, you seem to be much more willing to spend influence than I am.

Theoretically, cones will always hit maximum targets without need to maneuver. In practice, even a tiny adjustment to line up a group takes its toll on DPS and tiny adjustments are often required - occasionally you have to jump out of a group to get them all in the cone. Tab to change a target and you lose more time. Ignore these things, use a level of damage buff that negates Rage, and Claws looks pretty good. It is pretty good. In play, though, it does fall a little short.

Can you sustain a 300% damage bonus without reds or incarnates with claws? I think not and that's why SS pulls ahead of claws. I can go through 3 mobs in the Battle for TV at +3/x8 with bosses before my end crash. Its not too bad considering I'm using my AE farming build and I don't have an incarnate slotted. The three warhulk combos or 2 warhulks and 1 fake nemesis truly pack a punch.

I tried both SS/FA and claws/FA. The claws/FA seemed faster on the lowbie maps due to Spin. The claws/FA was the 2nd toon, so I may have used the experience of SS/FA to pick better powers. Or I just enjoy watching my toon Spin and seeing all those orange numbers.

Both toons are just used for AE tickets. Right now, the claws/FA is 32 and is my goto for tickets. The SS/FA is stuck at 24 and is looking like delete bait (maybe for a new tank, troller or mastermind).

Playing either toon is more of a job to get tickets for rare salvage than something I really want to level.

Reading this thread it sounds like SS/FA can be better outside the farm, but you need some serious inf to get there.

Honestly, they seem kind of a wash, go for the concept or the powerset you like to play.

Does anyone have a good claws/fa build i can look at?
im really bad when it comes to makeing a build on mids.

thanks guys