Jibikao

From what I understand, the bug with the proc has more to do with stacking procs which rehides you during your normal attack chain. Last week I used my Elec/Will Stalker in DA and during the last elite boss fight without using Placate, I did 3 Interruptable Assassin Strike during the fight! It happened because of overlapping proc duration. One is supposed to cancel out the other.

There were some talks about how CE interferes with critical. I couldn't tell because you are only supposed to get one critical state within 10-15s (depending when you start the attack chain).

At this point, I say just do whatever attack chain you like. The critical state will happen on its own. I find it hard to keep track of it. I just have the habit of using Assassin Strike (where the proc is) and then follow up with a heavy hitter.

SJ/Ice is one very fine combo. CE does not interfere with your Placate + Uppercut. You just need to que the attack and you have plenty of time to do. The Stun aura in Dark Armor is different because it actually "hurts" you. I have an Incarnate Kin/Dark who I haven't played in a while. I don't normally run the stun toggle, but I do run the fear toggle.

To give you an example, you can setup Assassin Strike with CE running. You just won't get back to Hidden and score a critical. You cannot setup Assassin Strike with the stun aura because it's auto damage to you which will interrupt.

Having played SJ/Ice to 50, I would say CE is one toggle that you should run all the time. It provides aoe slow and damage debuff. Yes, it may interfere with setting up AS but I think CE is better than setting up AS. With the new AS change, you no longer have to do Placate + AS. You just score 3 stacks of Focus and unleash critical AS. The new patch is supposed to reduce the Stalker proc problem. I haven't played my SJ/Ice since the new patch though. Not sure how much it's reduced/fixed.

I will not skip CE if I were you. CE is arguably my favorite power in the set and Icy Bastion.

I saw several critical between my friend and I last night. We were level 4-5.

That's what I thought at first when Beast was on beta. However, after the first update, I've noticed my 2 wolves and 1 lion were scoring Critical damage. When I leveled my Beast/FF from 1 to 13, I did not notice any critical at all but after the first update to Beast (with increased resistance and other stuff), I started seeing critical damage.

The nicest aoe sets are Elec and Spines. Street Justice doesn't lose any pbaoe either but its aoe radius is somewhat limited. Dual blade has decent cone attack but the reach is not as good as Elec and Spines.

Claw has shockwave but I have love/hate relationship with it because I love when I solo and hate it when I am on a large team who complains about kb. Other than that, Claw's aoe is not too bad.

Kinetic's Burst is a very high damage pbaoe but the radius is small.

I really don't think this game should have a melee or range set that has ZERO aoe. It's a design flaw and it makes no sense to me. Yes, there are some ways to get aoe but other sets can get even better aoe potential with epic/patron.


I enjoy Martial Arts and while each kick hits pretty hard, it is still on the slow side. The DPA is still not high enough except for Storm Kick. I really hope they can improve DPA on Axe, Crane, Cobra and Eagle. Or they can add something similar to Gravity Control's Impact to allow MA truly shine in ST department. I feel Street Justice has very similar ST damage while having two pbaoe. That is just not fair and I can't understand why the dev would take out the only pbaoe.

Are you serious? With the old model, we only got like 1-2 new sets or proliferated sets once in 4-5 months. With the F2P model, they have pushed out a lot more new stuff than before.

As much as I wanted to level Staff during double exp (mainly because my playing time is very limited now), I still think they are pushing new stuff out much quicker than before.

I can see the reason why they don't want to push Beast Mastery and Staff out at the same time. I mean we already have Titan Weapon that came out a few months ago. If they push one more melee set out, the non-melee players will feel like they are not getting new stuff soon enough.

And besides, it may have something to do with cash points. If they push two new sets out at the same time, the VIP players (who don't purchase extra cash points) may not have enough for both sets. That will be seen as they are not getting enough cash points.

I've only saved up about 900 points, so it's only good for purchasing one new set. I am bitter but not mad. I just wanted to level Staff stalker faster due to time restraint.

I constantly get into argument with people who claim this game is ONLY about AoE. Some people that I play with regularly hate Stalker because they think Stalker has no "role" on a team.

They think Scrapper/Brute can easily replace Stalker.

Well, even if mathematically Stalker is still a bit under-performed, the new change certainly makes Stalker very interesting and fun! I think that alone means something. And in honesty, not all Brute and Scrapper combos have great aoe. There are DM/SR builds that don't have much aoe either and some Stalker combos do have decent aoe (Elec/Spine).

I can't wait to team with other Stalkers to see the true potential of the stalker change. I never felt Stalker is useless. I just think Stalker wasn't doing enough damage (especially in ST department) and suffers a lot of penalties.

And if you are on a large team, there's probably too much aoe thrown around. Those trash minions don't hold much threat any way. But I do believe every primary should have at least one pbaoe. Having none is a design problem IMO. For a set to have zero aoe, each ST attack needs to come out so hard and fast to make up for it.

They did increase beast's S/L resistance but they still lack fire, energy and psionic.

I never like /sonic on its own. I think /sonic is ok if you have other team members with a complimentary secondary (like /FF).

I do see how it is easier with beast/sonic because all pets are melee. You don't need to worry about the anchor not going in.

Well, I mostly only play Ninja and /trap doesn't work that well because Ninjas run extremely fast and with them "fear" mobs away with their Rain of Fire and Caltrops, it is such a hassle to keep the ninjas within FFG. And FFG is always behind you. The best defense for Ninja is /FF because the shields stay on them and I can follow them with Dispersion.

However, Robot is different. Robots themselves already have good defense and resistance and all range. You probably get a better mix of offense with /Trap than with one-dimensional set like Force Field.

On my current Elec/Will, I have all the primary attacks but I mostly only use Thunderstrike for battle opening BU + LR + Thunder and only use Thunder right after Assassin Strike because I have the proc. I also use Thunderstrike for full set bonuses. I hate that long animation! A lot of time I am just hitting a dead corpse. lol

But if you have to drop either Charged or Havoc, I say Charged only because with enough recharge, you should have no problem cycling Havoc, Jacobs and Chained and use AS whenever it's 3 stacked.