Sarrate

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Yeah,just like I loathe freshly cooked macadamian nut pancakes. If your going to be confrontational, don't be passive agressive, it shows a weakness you think your hiding, but thats just text book, and your not text book right?....your orginal and unique.

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Lacrymosa: My statement is genuine. I don't like fights or pointless bickering. I am human, and things can get under my skin and get the better of me.

Sadly, there's no way I can prove this. You have only my word to take for it. If you can't or don't want to, I understand.

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Additionally, I wouldn't go crowing on about how many tests you (or the various board junkies) did when said board junkies didn't even know that Gauntlet required a toHit check per mob or that its accuracy was not enhanceable.

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Kruunch: Gauntlet is a mechanic that utilizes Taunt. I've tested tested how Taunt works; Gauntlet I have not, nor do I have any reason to pretend I did. Ignorance of Gauntlet is not indicative of ignorance of Taunt.

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/in Probably something useful

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TA doesn't count!

Mids:
Thanks for all your hard work on this application. It has been an exceptional tool, one of the best this game has ever seen. It pretty much single handedly made IO builds easy and fun to make. I've spent countless hours lost in it trying to eek out the last bit of performance out of many characters (some of whom I never even IOed!). I salute you for your contribution to this community.

Godspeed!


Steiner:
I extend my thanks to you for picking up the ball where Mids left it. He has left quite the legacy for you to live up to, but I'm eager to see you succeed and continue the quality he started. I wish you the best of luck, and can't wait to see what you have in store for us.

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(And then maybe a Difficulty level 6 so that it REALLY pays off, but thats more wishful thinking)

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I think they should give us another five difficulty levels with “super” tacked on the front. I want to be SUPER INVINCIBLE. Yeah, probably not going to happen.

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Difficulty 6 should be called "Unstoppable." What? They already have Unyielding and Invincible, might as well top it off with Invuln's t9. :P

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Lot of tanks read these boards. Only a couple disagreeing with me. Probably because most of them don't care ... they play the game to play the game.

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Either that or maybe they don't understand the mechanics well enough to make an informed decision either way. At any rate, only having a few people disagree with you doesn't make you right.
[edit: Btw, that isn't meant as an insult to anyone, just raising another possibility.]


Also, could you please drop the condescending "you're wrong" / "you don't play the game" / "take a hint" nonsense. It doesn't support your cause, and it's quite obnoxious to see people present evidence and all you respond with are unsupported anecdotes and insults. I think most here are more than willing to civilly discuss mechanics and their methodology / results, of which you're doing none of.

(Yes, I realize that comment is directly confrontational and borderline "civil." I loathe coming across that way.)

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If simply increasing damage is the goal then Pyre Mastery is a good choice. The OP seemed interested in finding a way to increase the effectiveness of Burn. Earth Mastery is a better choice for that and adds some damage mitigation to boot.

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The only mitigation Earth has over Pyre is an AoE sleep and a 10% for a MAG3 stun one a 64s (base) recharge. That mitigation doesn't seem worth it, to me.

Quicksand + Burn is the only possible (performance) reason I'd take Earth over Pyre. It's something I've never tested, though, so I can't say how good or bad it works. [edit: I concede it could be amazing - I've never personally utilized it.]

If you're looking for damage, Pyre. It's AoE Fire Ball is superior in every way compared to Stalagmites; recharge (32s vs 64s), target cap (16 vs 10), accuracy (1 vs 0.8), range (80ft vs 70ft), damage (scale 0.9 and 80% chance for 0.3 more vs 0.9), and it's fire damage, which benefits more from FE (larger, longer lasting dmg buff). The only thing that Stalagmites has in its favor is a 10% chance for a MAG3 stun. The chance of it going off is incredibly weak.

Pyre and Earth both gets st holds (Char and Fossilizeand immobs (Ring of Fire and Stone Prison) - note Earth's hold requires lvl44 and 1 other pick while Pyre can get it at lvl41.
Pyre gets a ranged blast (Fire Blast) and Earth gets an AoE sleep (Salt Crystals)
Pyre gets an AoE res/def debuff (Melt Armor) and Earth gets Quick Sand).

The only unique thing Earth offers that Pyre can't do (and better) is Quicksand - of whose benefits I'm dubious.

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+heal set bonuses do not work in powers with slottable resistance. Since you can slot Healing Flames for its toxic res, it ignores the +heal set bonuses.

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Well aint that a... Now that you mention it. It didn't work on recon but it worked on DP. Learn something new every day. Guess ill use that freespec to put a common IO heal to replace one of the heal/* numinas. I could save a few mil and use it on another alt. One more thing. That's just res slotting right? Will the heal bonus will still work on powers like EAs energy drain? That would be good to know. Just in case...

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To the best of my knowledge, it should, but I haven't tested it to know for sure. If you want to play it safe, copy the character to Test before placing the enhancers and test it there.

+heal set bonuses do not work in powers with slottable resistance. Since you can slot Healing Flames for its toxic res, it ignores the +heal set bonuses.

I told you I'd take a look a this several days ago, Sonic Bang. Sorry it took me so long to get around to giving it the once over. That said, let's get right to it.

That said, the biggest problem I see with your build is end consumption. Your longevity in a fight is very compromised in this build. You only have 1.15 eps recovery after toggles (swapping SS for Quills). That gives you less recovery than a detoggled lvl1 to attack with (1.67 eps). (Since several of your AoEs have low end reduc, that only exasperates the problem.)

The simplest way to get more endurance would be to drop two powers (Resurgence and either CJ or Maneuvers) and pick up Stamina - even if it's only 1 slotted. That'd push your recovery to ~4 eps. (It'd net you 57% regen from Health to boot.)

If you did take Stamina, another option would be to drop two slots from SS and 3 slotting Stam with Perf Shifters. That'd be a net gain in maxhp and boost your recovery to ~4.18 eps. (I'd slot SS with either a lvl50 runspeed or a Micro, then move the +Stealth IO to Sprint.)

That would help curb your end consumption, but I expect you'd still have problems in the long run. (You'll have to keep SS shut off in combat.)


Also, you're giving up some significant heal enhancement in both HPT and FH, but I don't see anywhere to pull it from without sacrificing your two main build goals of +def and +rech. Try plugging that in and see how that looks to you.


[edit: Oh, I should note that I added the Accolades when I was mentioning eps recovery after Stamina.]

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Once again, I point back to my RL example of my old RPG group. We had one bad player who was trying as best he could to reap all the rewards while not putting his character in harms way. From time to time, our GM would make adjustments to the enemy or the gameworld in general. He felt that this would be an easy way to deal with things and handle the player in question.

Instead, that one player whould just shrug his shoulders and find other ways to keep doing what he was doing. At the same time, the rest of the players will have to deal with the changes, including one player who would vehimately voice these concerns to my GM friend.

It took me years before I finally got it through my GM friend's head as to how much damage he was doing to his game. Unfortuately, it didn't get through until after his game imploded.

*SIGH*

I wonder if the devs realize that the very players they are trying to deal with will just do what the one player in my group did, just go find another way to get what they want. And in the end, it will be us the regular players who will suffer.

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Note Mod 8's adjustment to the posts title. The entire OP was made up just to stir the pot; it's not real.

The build should work, but there are some things that have room for improvement:

*) Do you plan to never exemplar? I ask because all your IOs are lvl50.
*) HPT should be your level 1 pick. It provides better survivability out of the box than MoB and to more damage types. (I personally pushed back Taunt until 22/24, but I solo/duoed most of those levels.)
*) I think HPT's +maxhp is more useful than its +res, but I understand you're slotting that way for the defense.
*) If you don't mind giving up ~0.5% s/l/p res, you could swap the res/rech for end/rech and get some extra end reduc in MoB.
*) Take the Numina/Regen Tissue uniques out of health. Their +regen component is actually enhanceable, so you want to place them in a power that is enhanced. For example, if you slot RttC 3 Numina (Heal, Heal/End, Unique), Regen Tissue, Golgi, you'd pick up extra set bonuses to boot. (Catch - they'd only activate when something is fueling it. I've also heard that the uniques would scale down fighting higher enemies because of an oddity of the system. I'm not 100% positive, though.)
*) Keep in mind Obliteration has pathetic end reduc.
*) Any reason you changed your GFS slotting from what you used in other powers? The Incin slotting is superior in every way.
*) Speaking of GFS, I personally wouldn't drop it. It helps quite a bit against hard targets. I think it would make a bigger different than BU would.
*) I'd try to get some end reduc into Tough. A Ribo or a single lvl50 End/Res IO would do. Actually, move your slotting from SoW to Tough (including moving the extra slot). Now in SoW slot 3 Aegis for the +3.13% f/c def. You don't need to fully enhance SoW's res to hit the s/l cap, and losing a few percent from the exotics won't be noticeable.


Hmm, those are the things that struck me right off the bat. Try those out and see what you think.

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If you slot Invincibility or Against all Odds with three taunt duration SOs, then at level 50, the taunt duration will actually be longer than that of the unenhanced Taunt in Dark Melee and Dual Blades

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*blink*
That has to be a bug.

Other oddities:
DB/Taunt's PvP duration is shorter than usual.
DM/Taunt's attack flag is Range instead of AoE.


I also agree with you about the strength of taunt auras. They're pretty much impossible to override with straight damage.

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Scrappers have every level of taunt except from /SR
/WP
/Inv
/Shield
All have taunt auras

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Dark Armor: Death Shroud / Cloak of Fear / Oppressive Gloom don't taunt for Scrapper
Fiery Aura: Blazing Aura does not taunt for a Scrapper

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Scrapper melee attacks have a single target taunt as well

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No they don't; Scrappes have an above average threat mod (3 vs 4 for Brutes/Tanks), but their attacks don't have any taunt component at all.

JupiterMoon: Now I won't argue that, I was just being overly technical there. Sorry, habit.

Grae_Knight: WP benefits greatly from mitigation from your secondary, no doubt, especially before IOs/Tough/Weave. After IOs (as it seems JM would go for) their benefit becomes less useful. A couple inspirations can pretty much cover you during tough fights (if you're not against using them) and in [edit: certain] tough fights (like AVs or tight packs of romans) the mitigation does nothing since they resist it so heavily.

I personally think /Fire pairs with WP very well (especially once IOs are added to the mix), but I won't say that it's absolutely the best build. It really depends on what you're going for. (For survivability vs AVs, DM wins because of SL. For survival against most mobs, Stone Melee wins due to Fault.)


[edit: Btw, I'd highly recommend taking SoW. It's invaluable for the ITF and can easily tip the balance between incoming damage and your regen in your favor. I like saving it for when I'm lower on life (~30%?) and regenerating back to full. 90% s/l res is no joke.]

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i worry about what can tank the ITF and STF more than anything else.

i dont give two craps about peoples concepts, only what actually works. having not done the itf on either side nor the stf, i want a toon i can not only do them on but lead them on and i've decided that's to be a tanker. so the tanker needs to be able to tank them both.

can a willpower with tough and weave tank them both

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JupiterMoon: Yes, yes it can.

I will say that an important aspect of being able to tank something is experience and being able to react to a changing situation. This may mean preparing and knowing when to use inspirations - even if you usually don't need them.

For example, even with softcapped defense, Recluse will cream WP. If you know that his damage/tohit at the start of the fight is insane and take the requisite precautions (ex: using SoW, eating purples up to 75% def) then you'll be fine.

The biggest thing to remember about WP is that the taunt aura is weak, so you need to be very proactive about holding aggro.

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then be glad heroes dont fight longbow.

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JupiterMoon: They do in Gaussian's arc in the RWZ.

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it's a test of how much recharge your pocket healer has.

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Heraclea: That can help, but I think it's more a matter of the strength available buffs/debuffs. With the right group, I've done it without a healer at all. :P Last STF I was on, the Emp attacked the tower 90% of the time rather than heal me because I simply didn't need to be babysat. (Last run consisted of Cold/Sonic shields, a tray full of t2 purples, and a heavy IO build.)

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I agree with you on everything except the diminishing returns. I suspect it may have more to do with proximity.

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Well, I said people theorized diminishing returns (this was back in the I4-5ish days). It was long before the threat multiplier explanation was given. People just knew it wasn't working as an easy on/off switch, but couldn't figure anything out beyond that.

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Sarrate: regarding your earlier posts about Scrappers pulling agro off of their Tankers and maintaining that agro ... I've run with some of the most damaging built Scrappers and Blasters in the game (both in AT combos and specifically built toons) and I have *never once* had agro pulled off of me where I was actively looking to keep agro.

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Which is why I specified Invuln, Shield, and possibly WP Scrapper - all of them have taunt auras. Damage alone (unless there is some weird AI preference going on) isn't enough to override Taunt. Taunting off a taunt aura Scrapper or Brute is a completely different story.

I've seen a Spines/Invuln have aggro that took 1-2 taunts and AoEs to out threat. That is a very well slotted (5 Perfect Zinger) Taunt (~80s duration, ~5s recharge), I might add - strong enough to keep the attention of all four Patron AVs stuck to me like glue though a 30s Black Hole when combined with my AOEs. I've seen the exact same thing when duoing with a DM/Fire Brute in Cimerora. (I'd let him share part of the aggro to get his Fury up, then work to steal it back when he got into trouble. He wasn't Taunting, just using Blazing Aura.)

Taunt is not a 100% override; it's a threat multiplier Tankers have to weave in with attacks to maximize their threat generation.

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I'd be willing to bet that this is when Taunt and taunt like effects got changed in CoH from a control-like effect to a high threat meter type of effect as explained by Castle

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My guess is that it was always a threat multiplier, just that the internal docs were wrong from the beginning. Heck, old school Hamidon raids used to be griefed by the non-designated Tank Taunting with the hold team. Taunt + close range + dmg yields higher threat than Taunt alone from range - despite the fact the Tank had been Taunting him for the entire raid. (This was actually generating theories that Taunt had diminishing returns or something - it just wasn't working as it should have.)

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I must be thinking about tanks. I know one of them get more out of it.

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Yep, that would be Tanks.

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Sarrate,

Your basically saying that a /Elec Stalker also sucks then?

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vallatabanan: Never played one, but I think they'd be far less than ideal, yes... probably more so than even Scrappers (less hp, lower hp cap, loss of Elec Field which kills their mitigation from end drain, and it's resist based instead of defense so it's harder to slip back into Hide). I'm no genius Stalker player or anything (~38 Elec/EA), but those are my thoughts.

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Keep in mind that tough and weave aren't as strong on a scrapper as they are on brutes.

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Rieze: Tough/Weave are just as strong on Scrappers as they are for Brutes. Both ATs have the same res/def mods.

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I don't have experience with a DA brute, but I have a DA scrapper at 50.

Neither Cloak of Fear or Oppressive Gloom affect LTs or bosses. What they DO do is take minions out of the fight so you can beat on the LTs and bosses without having to worry about them. If you take Dark Armor on a brute I would say pair it with a primary that builds fury quickly, as minions will not be attacking you to build it for you.

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Brute cloak of fear DOES work on LTs, bit odd really

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Iirc, Castle has stated that is a bug.

Electric Armor on a Scrapper (if ported as is) would be terrible. The biggest problem is the lower resistance cap compared to Brutes (75% vs 90%) for two reasons:

1) One of the hallmarks of the set is the sets capped energy resistance. This benefit would be completely diluted at 75%, forcing the Scrapper to take 2.5 times as much damage. Instead of being able to take ~13,380 pure energy damage (not counting regen) before dying (90% res), it would only take 5,352 pure energy damage to kill a Scrapper.

2) Power Surge would suck. For the same reason as above, a Scrapper would be taking 2.5 times as much damage as a Brute. Considering this is a power that Elec Brutes would lean on heavily (due to low mitigation outside of the set) it wouldn't be half as powerful on a Scrapper. Unlike Unstoppable, Elec Armor doesn't have DP (heal +maxhp) or defense (TH, Invin) to stack on top of it.

That's not even mentioning the fact Brutes have higher hp.

Yuck.

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some reason all I get from copying your mids code is an error on my mids...thanks for the time though to looking into my build.

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Do you have the latest patch for MIDs?

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People also tend to overlook that the changes to Buckshot make it an attractive choice for single-target damage now.

At level 50:
Buckshot
37.95 lethal damage
0.9 second cast time (1.056s cast post ArcanaTime)
(42.17 DPA pre-Arcanatime) (35.9375 DPA post ArcanaTime)
8 second recharge time
10.192 end cost

Slug
68.4 lethal damage
1.67 second cast time (1.848s cast post ArcanaTime)
(40.96 DPA pre-Arcanatime) (37.01 DPA post ArcanaTime)
8 second recharge
8.528 endurance cost

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Just for completeness sake. They're still very close together, performance wise.

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Yup, but it's dang good.

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I love AOE Fears (strong mechanic in this game) but single target for a Tanker? Meh.

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It's also got a hefty -Acc attached to it, from what I recall. Great for helping with Bosses and up.

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That and it double stacks out of the box to fear bosses. My Scrapper (when I play him) uses it all the time for trouble mobs (psi users, Dark Ring Mistresses, Rularuu Eyeballs, Cimeroran bosses, AE mobs, etc).

I originally planned a respec for him to amp up his defenses/recharge/etc but it would have cost me ToF. I never ended respeccing into that build because I kept running into critters that it was invaluable for.