Jade_Dragon

In fact, I would reorganize your tray so that Sprint, Rest and those temporary powers are all in your second tray. You can put Hover there as well if you want to get it out of the way. (you might bind it to a key like "H" with /bind h "powexec_name Hover")

I find it easiest to put all the most common powers in the tray where just the number keys will activate them.

Another tip is that if you keep clicking on the icon, after three trays it will close back to one. If you press Alt, that second tray will pop up, and pressing a number key (Alt-number) will activate that power in the second tray.

(Honestly, I find that popup action annoying and always disable it, but you may find it useful )

What's interesting is according to the manual, it should be based on the "base type" of your Archetype. That is, if you get a Scrapper, Blaster, Tanker, Defender or Controller to 20, you should unlock the HEATs, the other five ATs for the VEATs. This should not depend on whether you started them in Paragon City, the Rogue Isles, or Praetoria, or whether you change sides. (Only ONE side should be available when you hit 20 in Paragon City or the Rogue Isles. You cannot switch sides until after the unlock has already happened)

Since so many of us already have EATs unlocked, because we came into this with characters above 20, I'm not sure we can be 100% sure about this until it has been thoroughly tested. Even what a red name says "should" be the case may not be the way it is currently working.

I originally posted all the way back on page 2, but only named Arachnophelia. So since I've been playing my SoA a lot more lately, I thought I'd go ahead and post them all.

Arachnophelia

Picture Maud Adams from Octopussy. In that white bathrobe. With Crab Spider arms. Now picture her on a recruitment poster for Arachnos. That's basically where the concept came from.

Basically, she has a fetish for spiders, and wants to become one. So the Crab Spider legs are a way for her to do that. (She would probably go full Tarantula if she could, but doesn't have the psi scores to get into the program)

Huntsman Raynard

"Steve Raynard" is actually the alias my vigilante, Bloodwolf, uses when he goes undercover. The name comes from Raynard the Fox. So this is actually an undercover hero. I plan to give him the Bane powers, so he is stealthy like his Scrapper/Stalker persona.

He's going Hero and then Vigilante, so he will have a Longbow costume as well.

Operative Rachel

Another of my characters, Alan Midnight, is from the 26th century, and has a robotic AI he brought to this time with him named Rachel. I have a villainous version of Alan who is a Robots Mastermind, however since Rachel herself looks human, except for having retractable claws, I realized I could make an evil version of her as a Widow. (Normally she is Alan's Assault Bot)

The backstory I came up with is that this Blood Widow, who coincidentally really was named Rachel, stumbled across Alan while he was trying to get his AI to work in the body he built with 20th century parts. The Widow tried to fight him but was killed. Seeing an opportunity, Alan decided to use the parts to put implants in the Widow's brain, figuring that would be easier than trying to build a whole body.

So this AI is now infiltrating Arachnos. And to make it funny, she's trying to act human, but has no idea how to, and so everything she says and does just comes out creepy. Like, "I'm a real Arachnos Widow, honest, I have not been killed and taken over by an Artificial Intelligence or anything..." It's so macabre and yet hilarious that I really enjoy playing her.

I believe the term I've heard is "Guncrab".

My second build for my Crab is this. (And right now it's the strongest of her two builds, because she doesn't have Fortification to a point where it's strong enough yet, or even Serum at all. I tried to run a team with her last night, and she was getting creamed from all the large spawns we were going up against )

To me the Huntsman is not as much the AoE damage, as the bonus he brings to the team. Double stacked Leadership skills, Surveillance, and the Venom Grenade all increase the effectiveness of the team, and while a Crab could get to two of those, the Leadership is unlikely without sacrificing a lot of the very AoE that gives him the advantage.

When you add to that Cloaking Device, to give you Critical damage, and the ability to throw off aggro with Placate, you've just got a very different capability from a Crab. And the Bane wouldn't have Venom Grenade. (Unless he went with the redraw of the gun)

It is a reasonable strategy up until about level 26. Below that level, you are doing considerable damage with your own attacks, and can easily compensate for a missing tier. In fact, in the 18-22 range, having both available tiers AND your own attacks can help you get through a low point in MM damage.

Having said that, once you get to level 32, your attacks no longer remain competitive. You are doing less than 1/5 your overall damage, with the pets each doing 25-30% of the damage. More importantly, the effect of Bodyguard on your survivability, and the support aspects of their powers, make them too important to skip. You may be cutting into your offense by only about 5-10%, but you are cutting into your defense by a huge amount.

Now, this may be different for Demon Summoning. Since the attacks reduce the Res of your foes, that means ALL attacks used against them, yours, your henchmen's, and your team's, all do more damage. This could easily turn the balance against not using attacks at all and using only your pets.

Then again, a viable balance of attacks with pets, with perhaps only two of the attacks taken out of the three, would probably still be better than skipping a tier. You might be able to get away with only moderately slotting one of your tiers, though. (I did this with my Punks on my pseudo-petless build, until I got into my 40s. In fact, if I could have slotted my Arsonist and NOT the other two morons, I would have )

Technically speaking there are six SoA ATs:

Wolf Spider
Bane Spider
Crab Spider

Blood Widow
Fortunata
Night Widow

Wolf Spider and Blood Widow are the "base" for the other two, though, so very few people continue with the base powers without "branching out". Those who do this with the Wolf Spider + some Bane Spider powers call themselves "Huntsmen", after the high level officers in Arachnos.

Probably the only reason there isn't a similar differentiation between Blood Widow and Night Widow is that there aren't as many overlapping powers. A Night Widow pretty much already has all the Blood Widow powers.

Also, by definition the Huntsman is supposed to not have the backpack, and so all Crab Spider powers are off limits. In essense, it's an alternate build that uses the gun instead of the mace, although there are some (like me) who plan to use the Mace with the team-centric/support Huntsman strategy.

I think the question is would you be willing to remove the damage from Foot Stomp to put it in Hand Clap.

Personally, if I were to try to fix the power, I would make it a short range cone in front of the caster. Then it could do damage about the likes of Jacob's Ladder or Shadow Maul. And the knockback would be more controlled, you could direct it if you wanted to throw foes into a corner, or into another Tanker or Brute.

Then again, if we're going to "fix" Hand Clap, I'd like to hear what you plan to do about Fault, Lightning Clap, and Ice Patch, not to mention Stun or even Touch of Fear. (especially since Cobra Strike no longer lacks damage)

I've often thought that it would be somewhat cool if, while flying, your Crab legs fired rocket trails out of their ends. If you've ever used Flying with the backpack, the legs kind of stick down underneath you and "wriggle".

They don't appear to have any purpose but as mount points for either lasers or machine guns, though. And they are apparently sharp enough to use as slashing weapons. But I would guess they can't be used to pick up anything.

Recluse is different though, as his arms are "real". It's not a backpack, he has real spider arms growing out of his back. He might be able to pick up things and grasp with them.

Also, it's likely that the Tarantulas are an extension of the technology, with the person "inside" lying prone, and using the legs (with his arms as the front two legs) to walk around. Of course, some are robots, but the Mistresses obviously aren't.

I have Jump Kick slotted for Knock Up on one of my characters. When it was changed to Knockup and not Knockback, I went onto test and loaded it up with three Enhancements. It took so long for the foe to come down it was kind of funny.

Don't confuse it with Knockdown, that's a totally different effect. I believe Jump Kick, KO Blow and Lift/Levitate are the three big powers that have that effect.

You should not be losing Alignment Points for entering a co-op zone. However, I believe Tips you have not yet run (and those currently selected but not completed) might be lost.

The hardest part is realizing that the Public Fame does not mean your Alignment Points are degrading. Rather, you ability to earn Alignment is recovering. The bars next to your two possible Alignments (three if you are Vigilante/Rogue) show your progress and they should never go down.

It feels almost like cheating, but if you have a real problem with altitis, you might do what I'm doing. Pick a day, and log on to each of your characters. Street sweep until you get a tip (if you're 30 or above, you can just pick a 20-30 zone and beat up greys) and when you do, select it. Then Complete the mission.

If you're quick, or even take the time to save up a bunch of tips ahead of time, you can do a half dozen characters in one sitting. Then 3 days later, repeat the same again. After a month, you should be ready to switch.

Save the concentrated work for the characters that you want to switch by more than one Alignment, say Hero to Villain. You can probably get a half dozen more characters done in that same month.

The Combat Auras category in the costume editor made sense at the time it was added, as the only Combat Auras available were those in the Cyborg Pack. However, now that all auras have a Combat only mode, it seems redundant to have a separate category for that. In fact, I thought for a moment the new auras might be in that category, before I checked the category for my currently selected aura that I wanted to change.

The Cyborg Pack auras are unique, though, and don't fit into any other category, even though they don't have a non-Combat mode. My suggestion is to change the category to "Cyborg Auras", or my personal pick for a category name, "Targetting Auras."

I don't think it's a tech issue, I think it's just the devs don't want to create 60 more missions when only 1/4 of the players in the game can take them.

Vigilante Tips are in Paragon City where the Heroes can also take them, and Rogue Tips are in the Rogue Isles where Villains can take them. If you added Vigilante Tips to the Rogue Isles, they would ONLY be visible to the Vigilantes. No one else.

A better solution would be for the Vigilantes to get a Vigilante point for the Rogue mission, with just a change to the accept text to explain why, other than money, he's out to do good. But there, I think, is where the technology doesn't exist. The same mission can't reward two different points based on your Alignment.

(Then again, maybe it can. If the Rouge Missions awarded a Rogue Point AND a Vigilante Point, the Rogues and Villains wouldn't get the Vigilante point, just as the Vigilante won't get the Rogue point. We know this works just fine for a team including a Vigilante. He just gets nothing for running the mission)

Well, Tips don't show up in the Active tab, even though they are (by definition) always active. So there is at least a consistency there.

I agree it is more convenient to have the newpaper/radio available in the Active tab, though. It would also be convenient to have the Tips available there. Or maybe one of them? (Whichever is the oldest)

I hate to disagree with all posts in a thread, but honestly, if you can fit Mutation into a Rad build somewhere, I personally would go for it. Mutation is not just a rez, it is a powerful boost for the rezzed character as well. It does come with a crash, but although I think Howling Twilight is considered the best of the rezzes, I still prefer Mutation myself.

I would consider whether it fits your concept, though. You might also consider whether you expect to team with players who tend to be careless and don't mind dying all the time, or the really cautious types for whom you will never use it. (And if you often find them jumping the gun on you by Awakening themselves, or you have another teammate who is fast with the rezzes you might skip it)

In my case, the character that has it not only heals people, but she has the power to reshape their bodies and give a boost to their systems as well. So it makes sense that if an ally ended up falling in battle, she would "reshape" them temporarily into an unstoppable killing machine. She's also really light on offense, so she's got the slots to spare.