New Dawn

Bridger might move this to general discussion or somewhere which is why people may as well have no problems replying to it whilst in the tanker section.

I have never had probs with my super reflex against carnie. I just dont worry about them. Dark ring mistresses are probably the biggest worry..for my tank.

On my SR the shadow servants are the one thing i look at and think i better click elude before i start. The stacked DoT and my aid self simply doesnt work.

I dont know if in fairness they could widen 20 degree cones a bit or if in reality you are meant to have a realistic likelihood of maximum of 2 hit when in teams although you can have a possible few more when multihitting solo (with all the time in the world and when there is nothing like someone elses kbs beyond your control). The range of the 20 degree attacks are 10 ft i think and the range of the 90 degree attacks are 5ft and so the area coverage isnt that much different.

I think the Carnies holds were psionic.

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I dont see the need for recharge on confront, its 4 seconds and its good for holding attention providing no one else taunts obviously and overlaps well.

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That was directed at how you slotted confront.

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(Not as useless as on other scrappers, you're one of the better choices to tank Psi mobs)

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The "not as useless as on other scrappers" is not necessarily implying that its useless on scrappers but someone could read it that way. Dark Armour is damn good I quite happily chose it over stone for my brute.

The rest is FAI especially newcomers as for alot of people its old news and works. In some cases i maybe being overly cautious in a set up. Thats because situations vary. Keeping damage of a team is superior to anything else imo. Tanks do it at Hamidon raids.

I do put team survival above my own as a brute and kited that winterlord fella with no res slots so just base figures for resistance. It was a case of get close for own means of survival, then get back (because team may of taken a hit) and by being back i take damage of the team so they get a chance to recover from the hit. Hardwork and so i missed a few tells but was not unsupported, it was a great team effort.

A whole team can survive a Psionic AV with no dark armour in the team cos of good dynamics but yes dark is great for psionics and a great one to take confront on just for that which is another part of the reason i chose dark brute as my main brute to do them the easy way for once .

I dont see the need for recharge on confront, its 4 seconds and its good for holding attention providing no one else taunts obviously and overlaps well. My experience with it comes all the way back from turning level 12 on my SR in feb 2005 and when it comes to AVs i think i have taunted and outlived most of them upto lvl 52. I lack resists and i lack hitpoints but a right build/method in combination with a defender its always been doable. I did Infernal and Dreck couple of weeks ago without any worries.

My suggestion would be a range slot, then certain attacks of certain range may not get used by an AV and may limit whatever your kiting to using weaker single target attacks.
Many attacks of AVs do exceed 80 feet but usually the meatier ones dont and so with the right support "any" scrapper can be made useful and be good for kiting. I know Regens, SRs and DA's who are but i certainly dont doubt Invuln.

Kiting is a method used to bring damage down on one person and not the whole team and so i like it, it sounds sensible. Brains over Braun. Blappers are safer to be in close which is good as they do higher melee damage than ranged (whilst defeated ones from sharing the taunters aoe do jack) but they will perhaps may need to get back from the AV when the AV is at certain hp levels.

But theoretically an attack from an immobd or kited AV could be 80 feet and there you are at 85 feet and "out of range".

It should work well with just a stormie in the team at base slotting for range. The storm defenders 02 boost reaches 80ft and the confront is atleast 70ft base range. The scrapper is 70ft away from an immobd AV, cone attacks usually cant reach and so damage even if a cone attack cant be directed at the team because an AV cant hit you with what cant reach you and so it cant be used. As long as the scrapper stands, the stormie with its only single target heal only has to heal one person. The Stormie can be right behind, next to or in front of the AV and has hurricane on, of which is -37.5% range with a flooring tohit debuff.

A dark defender can stand near to the scrapper offering energy, neg energy and psionic resists and do all the debuffing from 70 ft, even fearsome stare and petrifying gaze are 70 ft. The pbaoe for shadowfall is 40 ft which is plenty of space from the scrapper when needed so as the scrapper is not be the only one needing to heal from an AoE. Again flooring tohit.

An empath only has to fort the scrapper and heal only the one scrapper, so no trying use a small aura on a team that needs healing all at once against undebuffed damage but instead using single target heals that can more likely keep up with incoming damage. Ranged attacks are sometimes seriously weaker than melee so often even empaths can be used especially Battle Maiden as her crossbow is laughable. If your a regen or invuln with haste then it only takes AB to make dull pain perma and suddenly your a bag of decent hitpoints. Empaths can stand with the team around an AV providing regen and recovery aura when needed and throw out heals. If you dont have enough resistance or hitpoints left before another attack that hits then unlucky.

Kinetics you just need to be in close or have one foe standing next to you as an anchor but also taunted but everyone being upclose is usually okay cos the level of damage could be dropped enough and the heal aura is big for a meet in the middle and the kin can give you shields. Of course if the AV uses a pbaoe hold then the kin could be stuffed without a BF.

Rads are the most superior defender to go up against an AV with and you can be close or far but far is more of to be sureness and again the debuffs can be applied from 70ft and a defender can fly by heal you or just cusp you with an aura.

I like the use of range and i like defenders. Never tried AVs as a tanker or scrapper with just a Trick archer, Sonic or Forcefield Bubbler but thats why i made them for myself - to get to know them. The starting off phase may require insps as a debuffer needs to debuff after the AV has been taunted. When you also add controllers etc into the mix things get better.

Dont expect to go into RV and succeed with these tacts for multiple reasons and there the best place to taunt from is within the pillboxes whilst the shields are up, the shields buff and your taunts can keep the turrets working and someone from ideally above 70ft away can support you without getting caught up.

Mileages will vary with different scrappers in combination with different defense sets against different AVs of differing levels. Timing and position do play a part. Id love to see more scrappers with taunt just dont try to out taunt a tank or taunt whilst next to people. I think its the best one to have in PVP as well. Id love to get 3 range slots in my scrappers confront. With her aid self, SR toggles and a sonics shields maybe all i need, id probably have good luck with a trick archer too.

If anyone thinks its unfair to not allow others to get hit and get defeated then add me to ignore.

I use tp self and bfs or strength of wills. Get in trouble just bugger off in any direction at speed, if someone else is in need support then get to them at speed. I basically TP buff and TP or flyby buff with super speed and stealth. When it comes to attacking and defeating anyone well i just wouldnt bother, making the team better and being wherever needed is more of a priority especially as i get more fun from supporting people than fighting people. If ya get immobd, -jumped or -flied or -spd then ya still can tp.

You dont need to replace ranged slot, if its good for you then its good for you. The powers you pick are what you decide on whats good for you and the teams you have been in.

Carnie have stacked them on me, you can be more about defense so they have more of a chance of missing. Usually the moment they are stacked its a very fast lights out even with passives. Never if offered clearmind or one of the others say "save it for the other people thanks" they may be dead soon after ya. Everyone needs support sometimes. Its better to just accept it.

Blazing aura when it does hit is better than spamming taunt. Only under -tohit circumstances has it been poo, thats tsoo sorcerors, storm shamans, spectral daemons. Mainly i had to acc it high anyway removing chance for other slots and participate in attacks more so as to spend less time in each mob.

Some secondaries are better AoE than others so whether ya can just get rid of blazing aura and still have time to attack and not need to spam taunt and keep aggro is based around that. With 10 around you, you can do more damage over time with blazing aura than autoing say combustion and for much less endurance so i'd definately have BA in lower levels when ya got few attacks or at any level on a low aoe secondary. On a fire/ss itll be second to footstomp in terms of multihit damage over time and for good damage per endurance as long as you regularly effect more than a certain amount. I think 10 is a nice figure . With gauntlet having so many different durations (some sweet nothing) and chances to hit, i still think blazing aura is good enough to not lose - for aggro purposes.

Maneuvers does pseudo stack with flash arrow however with the slots you can afford not by much, thats not to say it wouldnt be useful to someone by stacking with someone of good defense.

Maneuvers would give 3.5 def to all for people unslotted from a defender and flash arrow would -tohit by 6.25%.
In the tohit calculation you would get 50% tohit -6.25% - 3.5% def before critter accuracy is applied. So critter chance to hit before accuracy would be 50 - 9.75% = 40.25% with a 5% minimum. With both powers 3 slotted for what they do around 15% giving critters chance to hit from 5% - 35%.
Maneuvers and Flash Arrow can work well together. People at 21% def have a chance of being hit against slotted flash arrow and slotted maneuvers by 14%.

Assault is an 18.75% damage buff from a defender to the base level of damage of peoples attacks which will stack with acid arrow and disruption arrows -20% resistance.

Tactics unslotted is a 12.5% buff to peoples base accuracy which will stack acid arrows -def and oil slicks -def.

Vengeance i like and have on my Trick Archer, its been barely used since i have got it but the bleep can hit the fan for anyone.

I took leaderships cos of base raids and went assault, tacts and vengeance, but ya cant lose with any of them but i wouldnt trade certain attacks for them. Fistful of arrows hits 10 so the damage to a group adds up for low endurance in comparison. Rain of Arrows hits 16 so again same thing. Id use Aim, the fact that i lower defence for accuracy and that mine also has Assault as well. The snipe is the only one id drop, id never need it and I look at things in terms of damage per endurance over time. The problem with the AoE attacks is the same with the debuffs, if no one is keeping aggro control or has beat ya in bein hated ya start tanking but when having aoe debuffs ya may aswell go for the aoes anyway.

I would of added a second end slot to assault or tactics before temp invuln if i was gonna have them on just as or more often.

Rage on superstrength dont come to level 28 and the first superstrength pbaoe comes at 38 so being a long haul dps toon is a reward imo. Just like granite makes up for its bad points. Granite/SS or EM tankers that are hastened and took air sup have it easy.

It is hard to find the slots but on stunning shot you have a duration of 30 secs roughly. I base durations on what a fight duration maybe, in teams it could be around 20 secs. On average for me it is maximum ideally. I have seen them go from next to nothing to far too long though so an average figure is fine. You will probably be busy using other stuff before you even use stunning shot as well so basically 1 duration ought to do it giving you your 2 rechgs for haste . Your current recharge of stunning shot is good. So you can perma stun but 3 rechg haste will be so so worth it in terms of debuffs over time.

My Genin are called: Nachi, Amagi, Hyuga

My Jounin are called: Nagara, Ukiha

My Oni will be called: Jiji

Ands its a homage to the film Azumi, i watch alot of world cinema and i particularly liked this one. My friend took the Seven Samurai names which were too long for me.

On my Thugs i went:

Colt, Browning and Leon. First 2 are gun brands and last the guy from the film Leon.

Smith and Wesson again gun names (was gonna be Starsky and Hutch)

Cassius for my brute after Mohammed Ali

Then on my Bots i have:

Huey, Dewey and Louie for lil ones,

Donald and Daisy protector bots

Mickey the Assault bot

Then on my Zombies/Dark so far i have got Shaun of the Dead.

They need to do Pirate MMs imo as it would mix with Leviathon nicely especially Zombie Pirates so then i can go all Pirates of the Carribean.

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dark dark is good

but everyone loves a kin

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I love dark but alot of other people love kins, rads are probably the most superior defense set but hey its each to their own opinion on whats hot and whats not. My kin is higher than my dark which is a shame lol cos id personally rather it the other way around. My rad is higher than my kin too all this when i am trying to level/play them up equally. It shows to me that some toons are more likely to get teams than others. Personally i like a defender and thats it, and just adopt the right play to get the best out of the defender.

If ya go Kin then you could be elec for things like short circuit and be end draining or be fire for your personal extra damage or sonic to psuedo buff everyone elses damage.

If ya go Dark then i think going dark is a good way to go as they synergise really well.

Flash arrow slotting and snapshot are the wrong way around. Acid arrow i dont think needs accs in it for PVE. Flash arrow is "weave for everyone" but mainly to -per nearby groups that people seem to think wont notice them.

Leaderships when stacked start to weigh on the end bar along with everything else. Usually i would see 2 end slots in each but mileage will vary depending on how you play and who you play with. I took leaderships to in a round about way stack with the trick archery, save on slots and also i did base raid pvp and i know my attacks wouldnt of made as big difference (especially even now in need of slots) as the res to confuse and taunts etc do.

Poison Gas arrow looks underslotted but maybe isnt, I actually put in sleeps.

Oilslick arrow 3 rechg and 3 dam does affect 16 foes and has alot of ticks that add up to kill fight duration against a large group so thats nice to me. The total damage seemed to be about 5 times defenders blazing arrow and then you times that by 16 to get OMG total damage to mob iirc and that was without debuffs or aim etc. Id have to verify it now anyway.

When i got to use EMP pulse id use Aim so that i could 3 hold and 3 rechg same with Rain of Arrows except thats how ya have it. Fight duration with a trick archer can be short and so Rain of Arrows maybe the only thing ya get off sometimes after Debuffs.

A hastened build would of brought everything about alot sooner so you can use them more often. You went combat jump and superjump but no acrobatics. If travel power isnt part of your concept then haste ss would do more for you. I find sometimes the fights over before i get to attack and blame stacking lots of debuffs in an area at once alot of the time.

To get to know the powers better then go here but if ya dont like knowing figures dont peek!

Blazing aura isnt a autohit taunt aura. Blazing Aura can be -acc'd by hurricanes but look at perma rage for +tohit and i'd look at consume to counter balance the end loss. Blazing aura isnt a autohit taunt aura.

Damage stacks with taunt so you couuld have 3 damage slotted to keep fight duration down and still have taunt duration. I suggest possibly 1 - 2 acc 1 - 2 end (although id just have 1) and 2-3 dam (firetanks need to keep fight duration down and damage stacks with taunt) so not much need for taunt slots.

Subjected to a lot of -tohit Blazing aura on its own may not hit and but taunt is autohit. If anything is knocked outside of the aura consider it untaunted as in some cases (level dependent) it could be.

On a firetank you have no defense and so get hit by alot of secondary effects and -rechg is one of them. Id suggest atleast 2 rechgs and 1 taunt but preferably 2 taunts after 40 (although just 1 is normally just about fine). I have done experiments with mixed results on AVs with different tankers. On runners that run after taunt atleast they should run back looking for one person and one person only.

I hope she has alot of luck with it. On a fire/ss being a more of a longer stayer (less aoe and sec effect than other sets) in a group id consider tough as a useful power to take and acrobatics or flight route. With flight route she can be easily -flied and burn only works on ground anyway so i went leap pool as my patience is short.

A few weeks ago I had a long post on it with experienced players helping me out abit. The horrible thing about stormies is the endurance consumption so that was a bit important to me. As well as getting usefulness out of the powers i wanted them a bit often. Read it all and do what ya will with anyone elses additional advice. The Link has an extra Link to Chi's build but that looks very end heavy in comparison to mine from a numbers perspective. I did go into the numbers of what each power does before choosing my slotting, taking into acount a large part of a stormies time can be spent positioning some end recovery is made but i wanted that to be good.

Here for some peoples advice already given. Save them repeating.

For an in depth look at the numbers for yourself go here

I have aid other and aid self on my bots traps and the aid other acts like a faster rechg repair and the aid self is always handy. Id not be without them two as it keeps downtime down, setting up to a minimum and aids other people when needed. Plus the tricorders are basically another gadget .

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All ATs have their strength and weaknesses, one must allow the others to do what theyre good at, not put together a team with the powers that makes the TANK look good...

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I agree with that, i cant stand for example, someone saying "we need a kin" just cos they are granite or something along them lines or "get a rad" cos its an AV although both do offer advantages that can outweigh the others in certaon terms. Although the true magic does come from the defence sets in my opinion as they buff the whole team or debuff all of the enemy and thus make the whole team look good.

A tanker helps the defender alot either by being the only one getting hit allowing more time for blasts with buddy targetting for extra measure or keeping groups together in the debuff zones and then still by being the only one getting hit in the process leaving in terms of survivability the defender only helping the tanker and the tanker taking it for the team. In case of sonic and FF its still good even though the team have that much more survivability working to the idea that insps like lucks or sturdies effectively go alot further on a tanker than anyone else. But then some blasters etc like to get hit and so they only have to say or join me in some attacks cone area.

I think the term herding is what it is in the dictionary and not necessarily getting foes to chase you, its also keeping them together. If you like mobs spread about hitting all different people and attacks hitting 1 or 2 when they could of hit 16 at once then thats not efficient in terms of damage per endurance or keeping the fight duration down to a few action times.

We should all play to fit everyones power sets. Herding to me, can be merely tending to a group you have run into.

Getting the most out of everyone makes the team stronger and you can then go lets up the levels.

My firetanker hasnt dropped in 6 levels and no one else has, i shall make that more hopefully.

When i joined a team as a lvl 17 firetanker they were all scrappers +3 to me facing enemies that were +3 to me all with single target attacks and they asked why i didnt herd.

Why bother?

On a team that had a -5 lvl player to me we did someones old mission that had -1s to me and someone asked why i was treating the enemy like +4s.

Because they were +4 to someone. Nevermind the fact that the aoes stacked dropping mobs even quicker than all the single target attacks would of in that team.

When it comes to tanking i dont say "cant do it till the 20's" i start doing it between lvls 4 and 6 (not with an invuln tho) and alot of it is teamwork as opposed to playing like random people moving randomly.

Yesterday i had fun proving certain points to a mate about PuGs. I was on my kheld, he was tank maging using a debuff to pull mobs onto quicksand only to have everyone wait except for this one regen who'd run past the quicksand not letting the mobs get to sand and then instantly dropping who then rinsed and repeated. Some people just dont get it. I liked the time when i cryo freezed ray an enemy and dropped a trip mine at his feet and someone telekinesed the enemy (on his own, he was held why TK?) away from my tripmine saving them from it. Or the kheld who using nova KB'd a group out of range from my time bomb when he could of saved the nova for the next mob and not waste the timebomb (i get there early as team finish up previous mob) and get more out of timebomb and then get what he got out of nova in the next group.

Other peoples powers are just as important as your own.

Herding:
1. To gather, keep, "or" drive (animals) in a herd.
2. To tend (sheep or cattle).
3. To gather and place into a group or mass: herded the children into the auditorium.

It doesnt have to be go and get 17 mobs or gather 2 groups. It could be whatever is needed to simply try to "keep" aggro solely on the tanker and to aid the debuffer in debuffing as many of the enemy as is sufficient within one group without them getting KO'd. It could be just to simply get 10 foes squeezed into an area small enough for a rad to stack 3 debuffs on all 10 then making the team able to drop the group faster with better chance of survivability. Foes could in theory only move a mere 3 feet.

Sometimes i am happy to do split groups 10 around me and 5 away from me (to get tighter maybe a waste of time). I can only footstomp 10 and taunt 5 thats why i am happy with it even though aoe debuffs and aoe blasts can get upto 16 the taunt control is there. A couple of strays for someone who likes living on the edge is fine too. If the scrapper wants a boss for himself or to take out something thats more dangerous to others thats actually what scrappers are designed to do just as long as when he runs in he dont get aggro cap and when someone else runs in they dont get their own aggro cap for an ambush situation of 34 foes.

As long as i have assumed taunt control before anyone starts i am usually happy, following anyone else in is usually just an absolute no no. Flyby tank mage and taunt intercept is about my limit on following anyone else into battle.

Herding as most people may see it could be the taunting out of the death room not needed in all situations, blind corners, groups too close to eachother is about it but in none of those situations its about tending to a flock to me even if the sheep dont like ya.

People powerlevel everytime the xp weekend comes along.

I dont mind scrappers becoming good later on simply because of the amount of time spent playing them during the different level ranges. More time is spent on later content or even at 50 with me.

My Broadsword/Regen was me avoiding Broadsword/Invuln but i am most certainly happy with her because although she is squishie inside a herded group she is more easily given power pools. Fitness pool is not so much of a must have for a start, opening up other options more. Resilience and tough make things a bit better. I took stealth to stack with ss to position better before using an opening pbaoe or pbaoe from a good point as a tank moves in.

They will hit you eventually due to streakbreakers and you will either have the resistance or hitpoints. As an SR with aid self id love a sonic personally in such a situation. Adding bubbles to an eluded person adds nothing except for the situations MaXimillian stated.