Rerolled SJ/WP Scrapper to SJ/NIN Stalker...

So I rerolled my SJ/WP Scrapper to SJ/NIN Stalker. Why? Fits his concept a bit better and I envision much gadgety-goodness from Ninjitsu paired with the Weapons Ancillary Pool (and guess what? Stalkers get Physical Perfection along with their Weapons!)

Question is, am I going to regret the change? Part of my misgivings come from my earlier, less-than-satisfying experiences with Ninjitsu. It's a forum favorite, and I can see what the set is trying to do and appreciate it on a design level, but when I last experienced it (all toys taken and fully slotted) in the 40+ game it just left me cold.

Specifically, my experiences with +0x4 spawns of Knives of Artemis and Awakened PPD. My Claws/SR Stalker had little issue with these, but my then MA/NIN Stalker was getting PWND.

The problem? Knives strip Ninjitsu's Defense completely and then burst it to death very quickly. Awakened strip its defense and wittle it down. The Heal is of little use in these situations.

Up to that point, Ninjitsu was looking like the champ everyone said it was. That 40+ game made me take my ball and go home.

Of course, this is a very different game these days. Fresh new game means a fresh new chance for all the powersets and Archetypes, and Ninjitsu was high on my list, even if I'm coming out of the closet as a non-fan of Ninjitsu. I feel like I'm the only one who doesn't care for it so much.

The promise of Ninjitsu/Weapons is giving me hope that this will be good. I just don't want to have to delete another 40+ character.

SJ/EA Scrapper was another possibility, but the removal of combat stealth from EA's play style gives me sad face.

Here's hoping...

WARNING: I bold names.

Your problem is like comparing /wp to /regen. /SR is a toggle and forget set. You just wade in and kill things. /Nin is like regen, player skill is vastly more important than the build. If you don't use your toys and if you don't use them intelligently, you will die. Horribly. Again and again and again. Even against wimpy enemies. It can be much more survivable than /sr but only if you put in the effort while you're playing it. By build alone it will always be vastly inferior.

This means, like /regen it is not the right choice for everyone.

/Nin does get some DDR, but not nearly as much as /SR. So it will always be more vulnerable to def debuffs than /sr.

That is why you have kujinretsu and caltrops and smoke grenade, etc. Used properly they give you the leeway to let your defense recover.

Drop caltrops and stand inside them. no one will melee you at all. They will run up, then run away with no attacks. Or drop them and run around a corner. Only a few enemies will come to you through them. Splits the spawn and lets you tear it up piecemeal.

Use smoke grenade and placate to keep part of a spawn from shooting you. Combined with caltrops this means you should be fighting only a few enemies at a time.

If you do get your defense crippled, pop your tier 9 and you have a huge buffer. People say don't slot it for defense becasue it takes you over the cap. You want to go over the cap because you have only limited debuff resistance and you need that extra. PPD have pushed me to -30 def. unslotted retsu would get me to 20, which is much better than -30 but not enough to survive the fight unless those debuffs stopped coming in. And Cims are much worse than PPD.

'Course Cims are helpless in the face of caltrops, muhahaha.

Use some powers proactively, some reactively, and know who to kill first. It is the most tactical set, which is what makes it such a great fit for stalkers.

/Nin is more forgiving than a /Regen stalker, but I agree that timing is everything.

I have to be honest...i dont know why but playing ninjustsu i do feel like it doesnt give as much defense as its power description says it does.....it isnt the greatest defense set either....but it works ok....seams a bit endurence heavy at times...not sure why that is....but i guess thats just the way it is designed...it does give you an extra placate power though and a confusion power.

I find if you want more forgiving sets you might try Energy Aura or Dark Armor.....only thing is with those sets is that they tend to not have any way to supress their FX....thus you will always stay as a dark cloud or bright shiney bulb....And Dark Armor is mostly resistance...with energy armor mostly defense....I meantion this last bit becasue that may determine your individual play style with each.

I am surprised you didnt enjoy willpower very much....but seeing that you dont like willpower....i dont think you are going to really like Ninja armor any better...to me they kind of play very much the same way...though in willpower you dont have to have a power constanty on auto-click to make it give you resistance to stuns and things...

I too suggest you avoid regeneration on your stalker....i have said in other places why...and it looks like others have tried it and noticed the same things.

As for the other defenses....well they work....i have personaly been too worried about trying ICE becasue it seams like every power in that set seams to give mostly protection from Cold with some fire and barely anything else....though that might be just a Knee Jerk Reaction becasue it is new and different.

Oh one other thing....since you are trying ninja armor....get your self some knock-back resistance invention origins if you can use them.....if you can't use those invention items....then you might consider getting acrobatics.....as knockback is a pain....and its useful to not be effected by it much.

You should know every set has its weakness. An /EA would get shredded even harder than a /Nin from those mobs for having little DDR and a heal on a long timer. I bet even a /shields scrapper would have difficulty unless it's a top IO build with HOs to stack Active defense to cap DDR. An Ice Armor Stalker would also have problems, the only advantage I can think of is that you'd be able to run past the caltrop hell from the Knives of Artemis. So for those kinda mobs at 0/x4 for a Stalker... Maybe only /SR can do well at least from the defensive sets. I don't think a regen or wp would fare much better unless paired with ninja blade (if you check the scrapper forums the /wps, /DAs and /regens doing crazy stuff are mostly katana at level 50 with top IO builds because of divine avalanche).

It's the same thing as an Invul tanker facing psi mobs. I remember a really long arc full of psi mobs blueside that we had an Ice and an Invul Tanker, they were getting shredded all the time even with some buffing defender on the team I don't remember (it wasn't an emp, maybe a rad or kin, was a long time ago, all I remember was that the def had 'green heals' and wasn't dark miasma), and things only started to go well when I decided to take the alphas on my DM/DA scrapper (psi res plus fast recharging heal, she had no defenses at all) and they were only wiping minions (they were both fire melee so plenty of AoE to do it fast even for Tankers) while I took down bosses and lts.

My permahasten incarnatey tricked out ss/fire Brute can tank LGTFs and ITFs, but Arachnos shred him even at 0/x8 solo, I don't even know exactly why but he got owned by them everytime I tried - I was doing tip missions solo at +2/x8 with carnies, council, whatever, but when it was arachnos I had to tone down to 0/x3, 0/x8 was too hard for him even using tons of insps.

Have to admit, the only Ninjitsu Stalker I have 40+ that I've played a great deal is Ninja Blade. So I've got all the melee defense buffer I need for melee defense debuffing mobs like Knives, Cimerorans, etc. Enemies that debuff with ranged or AoE attacks though are a problem. For those I use line-of-sight and caltrops to control them so they can't string together too many attacks in a row and stack their debuffs. Same should work in melee for MA and I've done that with my MA/Nin... just haven't played that one much past getting to 50 and really didn't solo very much along the way.

In any case, my NB/Nin has zero difficulties with Knives. I LOVE being able to give them a taste of their own medicine with caltrops. Still, a lot of that ease is due to NB's knock-up, knock-down, and +def powers. So even the heavy hitters among them spend some time on the floor instead of being able to two-shot me and they sure can't get past 50-70% melee defense, lack of DDR or no.

I think I will eventually prefer /Ice over /Ninjitsu but I have too many projects going on now that a Stalker/icy will need to wait. :P

I find it weird that the main 'complaint' about Ninjitsu here is the exact same weakness every other defense-based set except /SR and crazy IO/HO SD builds (not available to Stalkers as you all know) has.

Well Nin never had the fame of being 'the perfect set', it is loved by many for being well balanced, unlike shields (if you look at the scrapper forums there are scrapper addicts there complaining they have a hard time playing anything not shield these days, but that's considering softcapped builds, leveling shields is not that great because besides the extra damage you get very low def numbers without IOs and no heal).

What I'm trying to say is that you shouldn't get discouraged by a set because of some particular mob, even if you ignore the toys ninjitsu's heal and psi resistance are valuable. Ice Armor has lower def values than Nin until 35 (energy drain, but at the same time you get blinding powder which does -tohit) , a psionic hole, no significant heal and if you're talking non softcapped builds and no crazy reacharge ones the nice tier 9 from IA isn't up very often.

So, the same way an Ice *tanker* can get completely owned by psi using mobs, ninjitsu will have its weakness too. I can be wrong, but unless you are ninja blade/BS you won't have an easy time with nin against def debuffing mobs at x4 without heavy insp usage, the other set with besides SR with high base def values (EA) also has a psi hole so you'll be weak against mobs that nin will beat easily since most psi attacks are labeled as ranged and nin even has resistance to psi in the mez protection.

I don't think /nin will ever have an easier time than SR against knives or ranged def debuffers (for melee def debuffers a sword/nin can do better especially having Reconstruction/Kuji In Sha). They're not exactly very prevalent mobs either.

My Elec/EA felt basically without a secondary in a First Ward mission (only psi mobs) and I had to resort to insps and the stupid 'hit and run' playstyle, it was so bothersome, I was about to give up when a friend joined me on his stj/wp brute and we did well.

And when I posted the same thing as above (that my 50 SS/Fire Brute trounces everything at +2/x8/bosses but Arachnos shred him so I have to lower to 0/x4 AND remain softcapped with purples) on the Brute forums, another poster said that he had the same problem, that he was also used to +2 or +3/x8 but with arachnos he had to resort to fighting white minions/yellow lts/orange bosses at x2/x4 just like me.

Doesn't surprise me you're liking Stj better than MA, I consider MA the powerset Stalkers got hosed the most.