Blood Widow Sniper Guide to Level 50

Blood Widow Sniper Guide to Level 50

Perhaps this sounds a little ludicrous. Blood Widow is the powerset available to Widows only until level 24. After that, you evolve into a Night Widow or Fortunata. The Widow itself is generally considered a stalker/melee archetype - it has crits when invisible and higher defense in melee, and only a few largely unpopular ranged attacks. On the other hand, Wolf and Crab Spiders overachieve at ranged combat. In any case, sniper attacks just don't work.

But no, you're stubborn or dyslexic, and you want a 'widow sniper'. So let's see how that works out for you:

Motivations

1. You want a solo sniper that doesn't get wiped by the mob's return fire. You could go with holds, but how heroic is that? Your assaults may be pre-meditated, but shooting that cute, helpless, twitching Freakshow feels wrong. Widows on the other hand are built to enjoy a little payback - pain is defense! It's like Excelsior shots all around.
   
2. You still want to be useful. Sure, you're a sniper, but once you've taken your shot it's up to the team to finish the mob off around the guy you wounded a little bit. Widows have loads of team buffs!
   
3. Maybe you want to roleplay a hero. Okay, so you start out in Arachnos, but that shouldn't stop you from slaughtering in the name of the blue team. That puts you in Paragon City around level 20. Where would you ever find an Arachnos trainer for those 'Fortunata' and 'Night Widow' skills? Well, aside from PvP zones, missions and fellow players. Um. Sticking with our initiate Blood Widow makes perfect sense!
   
4. You probably imagine having a superhero who fires lots of darts. Not Bullseye™, single shot kill, but a whole murder of darts. No doubt your character concept has him firing those darts from a dual-purpose set of custom bagpipes, to the tune of Amazing Grace, but while the developers complete your costume and music options you still want to practice. Widows have more dart attacks than anyone else!
   
5. You're an individual. We all are. All those Widow guides out there dismiss the ranged attacks out of hand. You just know there's got to be a reason for them, developers aren't idiots. And it's your job to prove it.

I trust we're now sufficiently inspired to give this a try.

Build Philosophy

The ranged attacks of a Blood Widow are just Dart and Dart Burst. Night Widow (or Fortunata) adds Mental Attack. The first two are obvious picks. Mental Attack can be useful from time to time against opponents with unreasonable levels of defence, but it animates and travels very slowly. If we focus on just Darts we will need a LOT of recharge. We can aim for 'perma-hasten'. Apologies for the fiery-hands-of-doom animations that turn your screenshots into screenshat. Maybe someday they will fix that.

Now, of course we do not ignore the extra powers available after the level 24 respec. We could even consider adding Fortunata attacks in a ranged chain at higher levels, reducing the emphasis on recharge. This would lock out the 20% recharge from Night Widow 'Mental Training', but we don't need that to complete the attack chain. That leads to a classic Fortunata build, not where we’re going. We decide instead to maximise recharge to make the most of the ranged damage boost (Build Up for Widows, Aim for Fortunatas) - the classic sniper method. Pushing recharge as far as possible we get a darts-only attack chain with a fair bit of near-double-damage. It provides a mix of a single target attack and a cone effect, probably with some gaps in the chain at lower levels that allow some time to better position for the cone. Further tactics are described below.

We can still pile on lots of defence. Then more damage. Loosely, the philosophy prioritises for Darts/Recharge/Defence/Damage. Team buffs become a side effect of this. We will run with all the buffs we can, so endurance reduction becomes critical.

Build Example

From level 6 we have both Dart and Dart Burst. From level 8 it's quicker with Hasten, and from level 24 (or level 18 exemplared after respec) we do more damage with Build Up. At level 25 we start accumulating LotG global speed, and Mask Presence makes positioning to snipe much easier at level 28. Throughout our growth we're accumulating self- and team-buffs.

Hero Plan by Mids' Hero Designer 1.952 http://www.cohplanner.com/

Click this DataLink to open the build!

The core powers

This example character grabs all the powers he can to make his dart sniping work, plus some defense. Mental Blast is in there early on as the only other choices were melee. The Leadership Pool power Leadership has not been added, and I take Combat Training: Offensive later on. Either of these could replace another Leadership Pool power or add to these, if you find you aren’t hitting enough. I’ve only found that to be critical with Malta Sappers.

The omitted melee powers are: Swipe, Strike, Spin, Lunge. I’ve also omitted the taunt, Confront. Without melee plans (no critical hits) I omitted Placate. Also Tactical Training: Vengeance and Elude. Clearly I’m specializing, and some of these powers might be considered, perhaps during the later optional powers discussion. To keep it simple I specialized before taking supplemental stuff.

Itchy Bitchy Sniper: Level 50 Natural Arachnos Widow
Primary: Night Widow Training; Secondary: Widow Teamwork; Power Pools: Speed, Leadership, Teleportation; Ancillary Pool: Mu Mastery

Hero Profile:
Level 1: Poison Dart -- Entrpc-Acc/Dmg(A), Entrpc-Dmg/EndRdx(3), Entrpc-Dmg/Rchg(3), Entrpc-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(5), Entrpc-Heal%(5), EndRdx-I(7)
Level 1: Combat Training: Defensive -- LkGmblr-Rchg+(A)
Level 2: Mental Blast -- Entrpc-Acc/Dmg(A), Entrpc-Dmg/EndRdx(42), Entrpc-Dmg/Rchg(42), Entrpc-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(43), Entrpc-Heal%(43)
Level 4: Tactical Training: Maneuvers -- LkGmblr-Rchg+(A), RedFtn-Def/EndRdx(25), RedFtn-EndRdx(31), RedFtn-EndRdx/Rchg(31), RedFtn-Def/EndRdx/Rchg(33), RedFtn-Def(34)
Level 6: Dart Burst -- Posi-Acc/Dmg(A), Posi-Dmg/EndRdx(13), Posi-Dmg/Rchg(13), EndRdx-I(15), Posi-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(15), Posi-Dam%(17)
Level 8: Hasten -- RechRdx-I(A), RechRdx-I(9), RechRdx-I(9)
Level 10: Indomitable Will -- S'fstPrt-ResDam/Def+(A), EndRdx-I(29), EndRdx-I(29)
Level 12: Maneuvers -- LkGmblr-Rchg+(A), RedFtn-Def/Rchg(19), RedFtn-EndRdx(19), RedFtn-Def/EndRdx/Rchg(21), RedFtn-Def(21), RedFtn-Def/EndRdx(23)
Level 14: Build Up -- AdjTgt-Rchg(A), AdjTgt-ToHit/Rchg(17), AdjTgt-ToHit/EndRdx/Rchg(34), AdjTgt-EndRdx/Rchg(34), AdjTgt-ToHit/EndRdx(33)
Level 16: Tactical Training: Assault -- EndRdx-I(A), EndRdx-I(25), EndRdx-I(37)
Level 18: Assault -- EndRdx-I(A), EndRdx-I(27), EndRdx-I(27)
Level 20: Tactical Training: Leadership -- Rec'dRet-Pcptn(A), EndRdx-I(40)
Level 22: Mental Training -- Run-I(A)
Level 24: Foresight -- LkGmblr-Rchg+(A)
Level 26: Mind Link -- AdjTgt-ToHit(A), AdjTgt-ToHit/Rchg(31), AdjTgt-ToHit/EndRdx/Rchg(33), AdjTgt-EndRdx/Rchg(36), AdjTgt-ToHit/EndRdx(36)
Level 28: Mask Presence -- LkGmblr-Rchg+(A), RedFtn-Def/EndRdx(36), RedFtn-EndRdx(37), RedFtn-EndRdx/Rchg(37), RedFtn-Def/EndRdx/Rchg(39), RedFtn-Def(39)

That completes the primary combat functions.

It includes 171.25% recharge when fully slotted:
70%: Hasten
20%: Mental Training
5 x 7.5%: 5 Luck of the Gambler global recharge
3 x 6.25%: 2 Entropic Chaos 5-sets, Positron’s Blast 5-set
5 x 5%: 3 Red Fortune 5-sets, 2 Adjusted Targeting 5-sets
Luck of the Gambler is ridiculously expensive in the market. However for two Hero or Villain merits you can buy one at the level of your choice (level 25 exemplars the most, with very minor loss of defence). That is a cost of just four days’ tip missions each – less any alignment merits you gather from the Who Will Die arcs. Be careful to select the level before buying the recipe. And you can only shop with alignment merits once per day, so buy as you go. If there is a negative to this route, it is that your missions will eventually get repetitive and you might rapidly out-level other content that you wanted to try. You can switch off xp under Options if this is a real worry.

The other powers

Next I chose some travel powers to add some more Ranged Defense through Blessing of the Zephyr IO pairs. For regular travel I use Ninja Run and Sprint, so any travel powers that slot would suffice.

Lastly I added some powers that could hold purple sets. It depends how much you play at level 50 whether these will be accumulated –you start out slotting Positron’s Blast, Entropic Chaos and Basilisk’s Gaze instead. If you do get purple sets they could be placed in, say, the Dart powers, and the IOs there moved over here. Electrifying Fences requires a Patron but it is a convenient place to put a Gravitational Anchor set, the “cheapest” purple set (defined as “selling a costly purple buys you three cheap purples”).

Alternative to either of these additional ‘bunches’ of powers, you could consider:

• Accumulate Fighting Pool powers, for additional defence and resistance. This build is not capped in the mid-levels.
• Accumulate Medicine Pool powers, for the security of Heal Self. I miss this sometimes in my build, but I enjoy the extra stress.
• Accumulate Presence Pool powers, as a place to slot a Fear IO Set on Intimidate. I’d imagine this being purely for the global set bonuses, fear and taunting are done so much better by other archetypes.

Level 30: Recall Friend -- Zephyr-Travel/EndRdx(A), Zephyr-ResKB(40)
Level 32: Combat Training: Offensive -- Acc-I(A)
Level 35: Teleport -- Zephyr-Travel/EndRdx(A), Zephyr-Travel(42)

My purple set holders are below, of course populated with lesser sets until you get there. You could instead chase other options such as mentioned previously to fill out your powers.

Level 38: Psychic Scream -- Ragnrk-Dmg(A), Ragnrk-Dmg/Rchg(43)
Level 41: Spin -- Armgdn-Dmg(A), Armgdn-Dmg/Rchg(45), Armgdn-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(45), Armgdn-Acc/Rchg(46), Armgdn-Dmg/EndRdx(50)
Level 44: Lunge -- Hectmb-Dmg(A), Hectmb-Dmg/Rchg(45), Hectmb-Acc/Rchg(46), Hectmb-Dmg/EndRdx(46), Hectmb-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(50)
Level 47: Electrifying Fences -- GravAnch-Immob(A), GravAnch-Immob/Rchg(48), GravAnch-Acc/Immob/Rchg(48), GravAnch-Acc/Rchg(48), GravAnch-Immob/EndRdx(50)
Level 49: Long Range Teleport -- RechRdx-I(A)
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Level 2: Swift -- Run-I(A)
Level 2: Health -- Numna-Regen/Rcvry+(A), Mrcl-Rcvry+(39), Numna-Heal(40)
Level 2: Hurdle -- Jump-I(A)
Level 2: Stamina -- P'Shift-EndMod(A), P'Shift-EndMod/Rchg(7), P'Shift-End%(11), P'Shift-EndMod/Acc(11)
Level 1: Brawl -- RechRdx-I(A)
Level 1: Sprint -- QckFt-EndRdx/RunSpd(A), EndRdx-I(23)
Level 1: Conditioning
Level 2: Rest -- EndMod-I(A)
Level 4: Ninja Run
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Tactics

First things first, we have all our buffs running. Indomitable Will first, so we don't get mezzed before we fire up the other ones. Include Mask Presence, unless we're already leading a hostage or we want to live dangerously (hoarding aggro on a team of blasters). We then target something better than a minion in the mob.

The attack chain is simple: MindLink-BuildUp- then DartBurst-PoisonDart-DartBurst-PoisonDart-, inserting a BuildUp whenever it's up again (I usually use it just before DartBurst). Keep any other boosters handy, such as Heroic Justice and Mind Link, and apply between mobs.

Unlike a Soldier of Arachnos, your first attack does not lock everyone down, so unless you have a a teammate holding the enemy together you will tend to retreat a little before DartBurst to pull everyone into your cone. Any gap in your attack chain at lower levels is a convenient time to jostle for a better position. It is harder work than being an Arachnos Soldier, but perhaps less boring.

The requirement to alternate single target and cone attacks means you can take down the boss/lieutenants at the same time as the rest of the mob. Or you can focus on that sapper while not ignoring the rest. Given these strategies, that work for me, I do wonder if there are any useful approaches to comparing things like “DPS” with other archteypes.

I have not had much experience yet with AVs. The Widow does not have high hit points, and a big hit can really hurt. As part of a team, your “Light” attacks and ranged position do not draw all of the aggro if you have a tanker or brute. The ultimate test will be solo-ing. Stay tuned.

Smelling the Incarnations

Only at level 40 so far, but it’s been fun. My toon is happily soloing at +1/+3, and seems to be welcome on teams, even pushing up the difficulty settings if the team is able to stick together. My Huntsman slaughters with greater efficiency, but my Widow Sniper satisfies all of my motivations. I look forward to the military bagpipes slated to release on Scotland Independence Day! And I’ll keep this guide updated as I learn more.

Cheers, airhead.

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Intriguing...perhaps I've found a use for one of those character slots I bought at 50% off after all...

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@Mistress Rue
Yes, I RP and play Redside on Virtue - No, Rumors of its demise have been greatly exaggerated

Do you suck at COH/COV? not yet...

Thanks Ms. Rue, that would be awesome! Do let me know how it goes. I've only played so many toons, any comparisons would be really helpful. From my limited experience this appears to be an effective toon with a fair bit of flexibility / optional powers.

I'm soloing missions at level 44, +2/x3, and taking Fighting Pool powers instead of the build above but I still need to test solo against AVs and EBs more and do more TFs.

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