Muon_Neutrino

If ice/ice has issues, they come from the primary. /ice is fine - doesn't really do anything especially outstanding, but it's more than serviceable. Ice/, on the other hand, has definite problems. However, they aren't the problems a lot of people think.

Being melee oriented is not a problem - heck, most doms want to be there anyway to make use of their high damage melee attacks! Frostbite negating ice slick isn't a big problem, because you don't need to use them both at the same time (in the vast majority of situations, all your slows are going to keep them on the slick anyway). Not benefiting very much from dom is somewhat of an issue, but given that ice's soft controls already a) have very long durations or are toggles, and b) affect bosses the same as minions, it doesn't *need* it as much anyway. The mez protection and end refill are nice, for sure, but honestly I find the break from the 'must perma at all costs' type of set refreshing. Jack is nothing special, for sure, but he's no deal-breaker either.

The actual problems with ice/ are the lack of any decent alpha absorbing power and the lack of good *hard* control. Ice has oodles of soft control, but outside of glacier it doesn't have any way to completely negate damage from a spawn. That by itself isn't necessarily the end of the world as long as your mitigation can keep up with whatever damage does get through, but then you factor in the lack of alpha control and it gets worrying. Overall, while it does have strengths in unconventional control that isn't as easily negated as some, ice just lets through way more damage than a control set ought to. While this is most noticeable solo, it can be a problem on teams too if you're running into anything more challenging than usual. You may be able to paper over the set's mitigation woes with softcapped S/L def and permadom (especially since high defense is perfect for allowing regen to keep up with occasional hits), that doesn't mean that those problems don't exist.

To fix ice, I'd look at flash freeze. An easy change would simply be to remove the useless tick of damage, lower the recharge, and increase the range to give ice a reliable alpha absorber (at least solo). You could even do something a bit more drastic and give the power some sort of ongoing effect after the sleep is broken to make it more attractive for teams.

Dark armor also makes a fairly good 'sea mist' type set if you color it with pale blues/greens. The default is pretty boring, I agree, but it definitely seems to have a lot of potential when you start fiddling with the colors.

Yup.... really sad too. I have been waiting to make /nin scrappers, fire/etc defenders, and illusion doms for quite a long time, but it seems like we'll be waiting a while longer.

Well, if he's got the DPS and abilities to take down so many *other* AVs, why does this one get to be so much tougher? I'd think it's not so much that 'I ought to be able to kill everything, wah', but more like 'why does this (relatively) unimportant AV have so much more powerful defensive abilities than practically every other?'

You can definitely take on trapdoor solo. I did it on my FF/nrg whose build is the base of the one I posted, and he had very little trouble. Hover over his head and your softcapped ranged defense should keep you alive (just keep a few greens for any lucky hits), and then all you need to do is to chase after and kill his clones ASAP when the message appears on your screen. Keep a few greens and as many blues as you need to keep going, but the rest of your tray should be reds which you pop 2 or 3 at a time until he dies. Between the reasonable damage (for a defender), the high survivability and mobility, and the reds, he shouldn't be an insurmountable obstacle.

Hell, I'd do that arc over again if it was available in ouro. It was fun!

Internally in the game engine, damage buffs and resistance are the same thing - it's just that one applies a positive boost to damage, and the other applies a negative one. They're both 'damage' effects. So, unless prevented from doing so, every damage buff would also boost the effectiveness of resistance buffs on the character.

This would lead to silly things like brutes running around perpetually at the resist cap to everything. So, the devs flag resistance granting powers or effects so that they're not affected by such buffs. These two facts mean that in order for power boost to affect resistance shields, power boost would also have to have a *damage* boost, and the devs would have to make resistance powers/effects affectable by buffs - which would allow them to be boosted by any damage buff, hence the fulcrum comment.

No, power boost does not affect resistance boosts of any kind.

Yup. Prize had nothing to do with it, especially since I don't need any of what he was offering anyway (well, I suppose I could take the +internets ). He laid out his request very clearly, and since I have a character with those powersets whose build was already somewhat focused on the OP's goals, why not tweak it a bit and post it?

Water spout is sorta like a toned down version of tornado. It's still a mobile pseudopet, it behaves the same, but it doesn't have all of tornado's abilities. It has a chance for knockup, but no knockback (whether that's good or bad is up to you). It has a chance to stun rather than a guaranteed stun, and does about 2/3rds the damage. However, it does seem to have had the fear component removed, and it has a 10 foot radius instead of a 7 foot radius.

Procs in tornado/waterspout will check every 10 seconds, and yes you definitely should stick the achilles proc in there.

Ignite is a bit hard to use effectively. The fire patch it spawns is only 8 foot in diameter (*not* radius!), so with the flee effect enemies tend to run out of it quickly. I find it's best used either right at your feet to convince enemies to run out of melee with you, or if you can get the baddie immobilized/held. It's definitely a limited use tool - although if you *can* keep an enemy in the patch, it does do a good amount of damage and can help make up for AR's otherwise lackluster ST output.

Flamethrower, on the other hand, is a great bread-and-butter attack for the set; I'm not sure why you'd be having so much trouble with it. The cone is the same length as buckshot and 50% wider (45 degrees instead of 30), so if you're able to get decent coverage with buckshot you should be more than able to do the same with flamethrower. It does more than twice as much damage as either buckshot or m30, and has a 30% accuracy bonus on top of all that. It does cost a lot of end and take a while to recharge, but it's definitely worth it. About the only reason I can think for it to seem lackluster is that it does do that damage spread out in 8 small chunks over 7 seconds, so you might just not be seeing how *much* damage it actually does, especially if you're laying in with other AoEs at the same time. But it's definitely a staple attack, and one that I'd never skip.

Here's my entry.

Features:

71.2% damage bonus solo (*NOT COUNTING* the effects of the Musculature Alpha).
40% recharge while hasten is down.
Ranged defense 6% *over* the softcap for debuff cushion.
Both hover and force bubble, either of which, combined with the above and all your knockback, makes you extremely hard to kill in most situations.
Super speed+stealth for full PvE invisibility.
Endurance usage that, while high, should be manageable without Cardiac (just don't run tactics or SS when you don't need to), allowing you to go Musculature and further boost your damage - note that in i20 this will also boost the damage of your Judgement and Lore incarnate powers.
Conserve power for any times when you do run low on endurance
Aim, PBU, and the damage bonuses allow your nuke to actually do noticable damage - it will oneshot all even level minions, 87.5% of +1 or +2 minions, and 37.5% of +3 minions and even level LTs, and will do significant damage to any non-boss survivors (assuming no resistances, also it takes into account the level shift, hence the lack of a +4 entry).

Notes:
For some reason mids' text export says the build has a Musculature radial; ignore that, it should be a Musculature core paragon.
Where I didn't need the higher enhancement percentages, IOs are at level 30 as is my preference for exemplaring purposes. If exemplaring isn't important to you, you can use level 50s instead.
The explosive strike sets in energy torrent and explosive blast may seem odd at first glance, but the set has several advantages. It gives both ranged defense *and* a damage bonus, includes a proc to partially make up for its poor enhancement values, and is only 3 pieces, leaving room to get reasonable enhancement values in the remaining 3 slots.
No Medicine pool or detention field; if you want those, you'll have to figure out something to drop. Personally, I don't think either is needed.
My FF/nrg defender has a cheaper version of this build which lacks most of the recharge, hasten/SS, and a bit of the damage bonuses - he still can solo quite well.

Special note: I don't play on justice, and I have plenty of cash already, so no need to worry about prizes if you decide to use my build.

Hero Plan by Mids' Hero Designer 1.93
http://www.cohplanner.com/

Click this DataLink to open the build!

Tourettes: Level 50 Technology Defender
Primary Power Set: Force Field
Secondary Power Set: Energy Blast
Power Pool: Flight
Power Pool: Leadership
Power Pool: Speed
Ancillary Pool: Power Mastery

Hero Profile:
Level 1: Deflection Shield -- LkGmblr-Def:50(A), LkGmblr-Rchg+:50(3), LkGmblr-Def/EndRdx:50(15)
Level 1: Power Bolt -- Thundr-Acc/Dmg:30(A), Thundr-Dmg/EndRdx:30(3), Thundr-Dmg/Rchg:30(7), Thundr-Acc/Dmg/Rchg:30(33), Thundr-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx:30(37), Thundr-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg:30(42)
Level 2: Power Blast -- Thundr-Acc/Dmg:30(A), Thundr-Dmg/EndRdx:30(5), Thundr-Dmg/Rchg:30(9), Thundr-Acc/Dmg/Rchg:30(25), Thundr-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx:30(34), Thundr-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg:30(42)
Level 4: Energy Torrent -- Posi-Acc/Dmg:50(A), Posi-Dmg/Rchg:50(5), Posi-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx:50(17), ExStrk-Dmg/KB:20(29), ExStrk-Acc/KB:20(34), ExStrk-Dam%:20(43)
Level 6: Insulation Shield -- LkGmblr-Def:50(A), LkGmblr-Rchg+:50(7), LkGmblr-Def/EndRdx:50(17)
Level 8: Force Bolt -- ExStrk-Dmg/KB:20(A), ExStrk-Acc/KB:20(9), ExStrk-Dam%:20(19), Ruin-Acc/EndRdx/Rchg:30(33), KinCrsh-Rechg/EndRdx:30(46)
Level 10: Power Burst -- Thundr-Acc/Dmg:30(A), Thundr-Dmg/EndRdx:30(11), Thundr-Dmg/Rchg:30(11), Thundr-Acc/Dmg/Rchg:30(19), Thundr-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx:30(34), Thundr-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg:30(43)
Level 12: Dispersion Bubble -- RedFtn-Def/EndRdx:30(A), RedFtn-Def/Rchg:30(13), RedFtn-EndRdx/Rchg:30(13), RedFtn-Def/EndRdx/Rchg:30(15), RedFtn-Def:30(37), RedFtn-EndRdx:30(40)
Level 14: Personal Force Field -- LkGmblr-Rchg+:50(A)
Level 16: Hover -- Zephyr-Travel:25(A), Zephyr-Travel/EndRdx:25(29), LkGmblr-Rchg+:50(50)
Level 18: Fly -- Zephyr-ResKB:25(A), Zephyr-Travel/EndRdx:25(25)
Level 20: Maneuvers -- RedFtn-Def/EndRdx:30(A), RedFtn-Def/Rchg:30(23), RedFtn-EndRdx/Rchg:30(23), RedFtn-Def/EndRdx/Rchg:30(31), RedFtn-Def:30(40), RedFtn-EndRdx:30(40)
Level 22: Assault -- EndRdx-I:50(A)
Level 24: Tactics -- AdjTgt-EndRdx/Rchg:30(A), AdjTgt-ToHit/EndRdx:30(50)
Level 26: Repulsion Bomb -- JavVoll-Acc/Dmg:30(A), JavVoll-Dam/Rech:30(27), JavVoll-Dam/End/Rech:30(27), JavVoll-Acc/End/Rech:30(31), Posi-Dmg/Rchg:30(33), Posi-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx:30(43)
Level 28: Hasten -- RechRdx-I:50(A), RechRdx-I:50(50)
Level 30: Aim -- AdjTgt-ToHit/Rchg:30(A), AdjTgt-Rchg:30(31)
Level 32: Force Bubble -- EndRdx-I:50(A)
Level 35: Explosive Blast -- Posi-Acc/Dmg:50(A), Posi-Dmg/Rchg:50(36), Posi-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx:50(36), ExStrk-Dmg/KB:20(36), ExStrk-Acc/KB:20(37), ExStrk-Dam%:20(46)
Level 38: Nova -- Oblit-Dmg:30(A), Oblit-Dmg/Rchg:30(39), Oblit-Acc/Dmg/Rchg:30(39), M'Strk-Dmg/Rchg:50(39)
Level 41: Power Build Up -- AdjTgt-ToHit/Rchg:30(A), AdjTgt-Rchg:30(42)
Level 44: Temp Invulnerability -- S'fstPrt-ResDam/EndRdx:30(A), S'fstPrt-ResDam/Def+:30(45), ImpArm-ResDam/EndRdx:40(45), ImpArm-ResDam/EndRdx/Rchg:40(45)
Level 47: Conserve Power -- RechRdx-I:50(A)
Level 49: Super Speed -- Clrty-Stlth:30(A)
Level 0: Freedom Phalanx Reserve
Level 0: Portal Jockey
Level 0: Task Force Commander
Level 0: The Atlas Medallion
Level 50: Musculature Radial Boost
------------
Level 1: Brawl -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Sprint -- EndRdx-I:30(A)
Level 2: Rest -- RechRdx-I:30(A)
Level 1: Vigilance
Level 4: Ninja Run
Level 2: Swift -- Run-I:30(A)
Level 2: Hurdle -- Jump-I:30(A)
Level 2: Health -- Mrcl-Rcvry+:30(A), Numna-Regen/Rcvry+:30(48)
Level 2: Stamina -- P'Shift-EndMod:30(A), P'Shift-EndMod/Rchg:30(21), P'Shift-EndMod/Acc/Rchg:30(21), P'Shift-Acc/Rchg:30(46), P'Shift-EndMod/Acc:30(48), P'Shift-End%:30(48)
------------
Set Bonus Totals:

• 22.5% DamageBuff(Smashing)
• 22.5% DamageBuff(Lethal)
• 22.5% DamageBuff(Fire)
• 22.5% DamageBuff(Cold)
• 22.5% DamageBuff(Energy)
• 22.5% DamageBuff(Negative)
• 22.5% DamageBuff(Toxic)
• 22.5% DamageBuff(Psionic)
• 3% Defense(Melee)
• 3% Defense(Smashing)
• 3% Defense(Lethal)
• 4.563% Defense(Fire)
• 4.563% Defense(Cold)
• 20.81% Defense(Energy)
• 20.81% Defense(Negative)
• 3% Defense(Psionic)
• 27.38% Defense(Ranged)
• 6.125% Defense(AoE)
• 21% Enhancement(Accuracy)
• 40% Enhancement(RechargeTime)
• 17% FlySpeed
• 41.97 HP (4.126%) HitPoints
• 17% JumpHeight
• 17% JumpSpeed
• Knockback (Mag -4)
• Knockup (Mag -4)
• MezResist(Immobilize) 4.4%
• MezResist(Stun) 2.2%
• 22% (0.367 End/sec) Recovery
• 30% (1.274 HP/sec) Regeneration
• 5.67% Resistance(Fire)
• 5.67% Resistance(Cold)
• 17% RunSpeed

To expand on what CBeet said, just because the DoT for full auto extends over several seconds, that doesn't mean the proc gets multiple chances to fire.

The way this stuff works is that procs are based off of power *activation*, not the actual effects of the power. This is why, for example, a proc from a KB set in a power that only has a chance for knock can still go off even if the target mob is not knockbacked, or the achilles' heel proc can activate in a dual pistols attack even if you're using an alternate ammo which turns off the defense debuff effect.

So, when you use full auto, the game basically says 'oh, he's activated this power. It hit... this many targets. It will apply... these effects to those targets. Ooh, it has a proc, make a roll for each target... it hit this many. etc, etc'. It doesn't actually care that full auto does a DoT, so having a DoT doesn't give it more chances to activate.

This is slightly more complicated for toggle or auto powers, since those essentially 'activate' several times a second while they're on. *Here* is where a DoT effect would have given a proc a chance to activate on each tic - i.e. rain of fire actually summons a psuedopet that uses a fast-ticking auto power to apply the damage, so if procs worked the same way in these powers it would proc tons. *However*, since this would be pretty absurdly powerful, the devs instituted the ten second rule for procs in these sorts of powers - a proc in a toggle/auto will only check once every 10 seconds at maximum, so either way a DoT will never give a proc chance on each tick.

I have always tended to be a hoarder of *everything* in video games. In CoH, for example, I almost *never* use any runtime/charge limited temp powers since they can't easily be replaced - on my 50s I tend to have a couple dozen temp powers I've picked up along the way gathering dust, they're not even usually on my trays.

For a long time this extended to insps. Especially if I had higher tier insps, they were 'too valuable' to use, *especially* once I had obtained the 'perfect' set and had them all neatly arranged in my tray. Unless I *knew* I was going to *have* to use them (i.e. purples for a dom/blaster against an EB), they were being perpetually saved for a rainy day that almost never came. However, both through reading on the forums and occasionally seeing someone who played with the 'insp spamming' style in game, I gradually realized just how much power I was passing up by having my insp tray almost always full and not recieving or burning any drops. Once I had tried this for myself a few times, I knew I had to rearrange things to make it the default.

Nowadays I still have my stash of 'rainy day' insps, but I force myself to only allow those to take up 4 columns - one each of greens, blues, purples, and 'whatever this character needs' (like reds, breakfrees, etc), plus usually a wakie at the top of a column. This way, I have my entire f1 stack empty - anything that drops there is either immediately burned, or transferred to one of the other columns if there's a vacancy that needs filling or it's a higher tier version of an insp I already have. Now on my higher killspeed characters I can frequently go entire missions with at least one insp up most of the time. As well, between getting into the habit of using insps and the continual subconscious reminder of just how often they drop, I've become much less reticent in using my 'rainy day' insps as well.

It's still not a perfect system - for example, it doesn't work below level 25 as I don't have enough slots to have both a free column and an adequate stash - but it's far better than hardly ever using them at all.

Annnnnnnnnnnnd I go to sign up for an account so I can ask a question and they want full first *and* last name and location. Um, seriously? I'm really not a big fan of giving that out to any website that asks. It's already easy enough to find me on the internet if you know what you're looking for, I'd rather not make it any easier. Any particular reason the devs *had* to use such a site?

Guess I'm not asking a question after all. Anyone want to bug them about proliferation (especially /nin for scrappers, ill/ for doms, and fire sets for defenders) for me?

/storm



Seriously, though, grav is really kinda bad for doms. Its big schtick (extra ST attacks) is quite redundant with an assault secondary (especially with how terrible propel's DPA is). In return for those abilities it provides quite sub-par AoE mitigation, which can be papered over somewhat by a buff/debuff set but becomes pretty glaringly obvious on a dom. If what you're truly interested in is a grav character rather than just a grav dom specifically, you're likely to get a more satisfactory overall experience out of a grav controller.

That isn't to say you couldn't make a grav/ dom *work* - it's a bad set, but it's hard to make a truly useless character. It's just that it's a set that works a lot better on a controller than on a dom. I've found storm to have good synergy with freezing rain and hurricane, I've also heard /rad and /TA mentioned.

I've been looking forward to the guardian TT, however I find that I'm not likely to be back home until 9:30 ET or maybe even closer to 10. Do you think you all will still be going then, and if so would I still be able to jump in?

For that matter, how would I contact you if I do get in late?

Grav/traps will be hilarious (and pretty damaging), but only when controllers actually get traps proliferated...

Hmm. You have found one of my niches. I don't remember what exactly I was *doing* in that niche 3 weeks ago, but I bet we've been competing at least a bit.

I use it on my warshade for occasionally TPing voids/quants. If I've got a full head of steam (active eclipse, 2 fluffies out, etc) I'll just jump in and gank him first, but if I've been stealthing or it's the first mob or something, he's getting TP'd out of the mob and fed a faceful of gravity well.

Heh, always torn between cringing and laughing when I see one of these. Worst 'extra 0' error I ever made was only on the order of 10mil, but I'm sure I'll make one of the 100mil variety eventually. Someone extra 0'd one of my niches recently, saw the 360mil price among a few '30's and '35's and sorely regretted not putting up enough items to still have some for sale by the time that bid rolled around.

Electric blast.... kinda sucks. There are the occasional builds that can leverage it, but for the most part it's a pretty lackluster set. The reasons are several:

First, the secondary effect is extremely hard to get any use out of, because endurance drain doesn't have any effect until the enemy is *fully* drained - and that's not usually very easy to achieve. On its own, about the only good drain electric blast can leverage is that two hits of a fully endmod slotted short circuit will drain up to +2s and, if fully slotted for recharge so you can use it again as soon as the -recovery effect expires, it will keep them drained (toss in a couple uses of ball lightning and you can drain up to +3s). However, that requires you to jump into melee range, use a 3s animation PBAoE, survive for at least 10 seconds, and then use it again. If you could survive that long in melee range in the first place, it's unlikely you actually *need* the endurance drain effect anyway.

Add in contributions from a secondary set and you can get a bit more use out of end drain (i.e. fully slotted transference draining a boss and then tesla cage's -recovery keeping him there, endmod slotted heat loss and short circuit draining a mob in 2 shots, combining short circuit with endmod slotted power sink from mu for the same effect), but in general such combos are limited in their usefulness, plagued by long recharges, difficult to leverage well, or all of the above.

So without the secondary effect, you're left with a fairly ho-hum set that is severely hampered by the loss of a 3rd blast. AR can somewhat get away with that since it's such an AoE beast, and dark actually brings some mitigation and utility to the table to compensate, but elec offers only average, at best, AoE and just a (fairly decent, but still) ST hold for utility. Voltaic sentinel does not compensate, as like most pets he is quite dumb and will frequently spread his fire around, shoot at unimportant targets, and generally faff around a lot. He also costs a ton of endurance, and combines the need for frequent recasting with a lengthy cast time. He will add notably to your DPS against a single tough target when there's nobody to distract him, but otherwise doesn't really compensate for the loss of a 3rd ST attack.

It's not like a character with electric blast is *useless*, or unable to contribute to a team, but it does seem to me that it really doesn't bring anything to the table that another blast set can't do better. If you want mitigation, dark, ice, and even sonic and energy are probably better. If you want damage, most corr sets will best it. Outside a few gimmick cases, it's just not all that effective. It's still perfectly usable, but if performance is your criteria there are better choices.

I love knockback. Absolutely *nothing* in this game feels as 'super' to me as opening up with a huge attack and seeing bodies go flying. Energy blast's Nova and the kheld equivalents are some of my favorite powers in the game.

Thankfully, I play on a server that doesn't seem to house nearly the proportion of KB haters as some people seem to run into. Never gotten any serious grief over it, not that I'd care anyway (especially as I *do* try to be sensible and not knock everything away from the melees, etc).