Tonality

I don't think it's unusual. Since our patrons don't always match up with themes as well as the hero element-driven APP's, you sometimes pick a combo that really doesn't make sense.

For example, my mace/stone brute doesn't have the patron powers for several reasons, such as not wanting to see the redraw, and thematically, it doesn't make sense to shoot lightning or dark magic when I'm just a rock carrying a pipe wrench.

Come to think of it, I really don't know why a rock carrying a wrench makes any sense either.

From a performance standpoint, sometimes the patrons help your character perform better - but not always. For example, maybe a /fire brute wants to use the patron AoE immob to immobilize enemies so they are stuck in a fire patch, so they go with web grenade or elec fences. Or perhaps you rolled dark melee and wanted a bit more AoE so you picked up dark obliteration. Also, gloom in dark melee is a *very* good attack, so I certainly took advantage of both of those powers for my DM/SD brute to add AoE and have a powerful single-target attack chain.

If the patron doesn't make sense to skip it, I wouldn't let anyone ruin your fun just because you didn't pick some power. My mace/stone brute doesn't miss the patron powers, and it was actually nice to be able to skip the patron arcs for once!

There are a few scrappers that might enjoy energy aura, but I don't see it being met with joy if it was brought to tanks. As energy is basically a 'gimp' version of ice, the only reason to actually choose energy over ice is probably going to be aesthetic.

I want my ice broot.
I've already heard the arguments, and I still want one

One of the newer combos you might enjoy solo is claws/wp for brutes. If you like scrappers, you'll probably enjoy this combination a lot. Once you add IO's it really gets sick.

For stalkers, I'd even perhaps recommend elec/nin for a little fun. Lightning Rod is a fun little power, and the thought of a nuke from nowhere sounds deliciously evil.
*rolls a elec/SR stalker*

edit: Nope, nevermind. No elec/sr in the works. I think it might be an elec/nrg stalker for fun.

No need to run. It's cold outside, and I'm not going out there to chase you down, which probably would involve a very, very long swim.

Actually, if you're going to 5-slot red fortune, you might as well use 6 slots for the 2.5% range defense.

Here are my recommended slotting choices I would use for a Shield:

4 slot options:
Luck of the Gambler: Def, Def/End, Def/7.5 rech, Def/End/Rech
-Good HP/regen bonuses
-Accuracy bonus
-The LOTG 7.5 rech global.

Gift of the Ancients: Def, Def/End, Def/7.5 rech, Def/Rech
-Recovery and +End to significantly improve your endurance
-The GOTA 7.5 runspeed global

LOTG/GOTA Combo: def/7.5, def/end
-Global rech bonus
-Gobal runspeed bonus
-10% regen bonus
-recovery bonus

6 slot options:
Red Fortune:
-Cheap set.
-5% recharge
-2.5% range defense bonus for the 6th slot

Red Fortune @ 5/LOTG 7.5
-Total rech of 12.5% for 6 slots
-I suppose you could, but why?

If you have the income, go with the 4 slots. You'll use Blessing of the Zephyr to get your range defense instead of red fortune. Then the big decision is whether you want the HP/accuracy or the extra recovery with the combo.

If you're looking to save money, go with either Gift of the Ancients at 4 or Red Fortune at 6.

All y'all're wrong.
(How's that for a contracted contraction?)
I would have spelled it 'yaller'

Now, go ahead and figure out this conversation:

M R Dux.
M R Not Dux!
C D EDBD Wings?
L I B! M R Dux.

Granite armor is not customizable, though I'm eager to see what BaBs comes up with. Coloring rooted as lava and pairing it up in granite looks rather silly.

Agreed.

Some days I wish it was a PBAoE like accelerate metabolism.
Gather for SB! Oh oops, I cast it. Gotta wait till next one. *snicker*

---

I've only deleted two characters because I didn't like the powersets:

WP/Dual Blades Tank - If they ever let me skip the first attack, I might consider it again. I really liked the name I picked for that tank too. I just wasn't terribly impressed with the combo, and rather preferred all my brutes.

Dark/Dark Corr - This was the very first character I rolled in the game. I deleted it about two weeks into playing the game, for several reasons:
1) Moonbeam did not live up to my expectations of a snipe (as a newcomer, I expected it to actually drop enemies)
2) I felt underpowered while those around me were mowing down enemies right and left. I rerolled it as a fire/dark.

However, that was a long time ago, when I was first learning about the game and just understanding why that natural SO wasn't working was about as advanced as I got.

That seems reasonable to me. It would be a nice addition to AE. I haven't done any messing in notepad with AE files, but it might be possible to attach music right now to AE files that way.

Let's compare the taunt aspect of RTTC with Evasion then:
Evasion:
-8 Foot Radius
-2 second pulse
-Mag 4 taunt
-13.5 sec duration

RTTC:
-8 Foot Radius
-1 second pulse
-Mag 3 taunt
-1 second duration

The significantly lower magnitude of RTTC coupled with the short duration means that it is very easy to strip aggro off of a WP brute with another brute, unless they taunt. Strictly considering the AoE taunt capability of those two powers, Evasion is superior.

Considering the entire set, I'd put RTTC on a SR any day.

I agree with BBQ_Pork on this. I already find the pop-ups annoying, and wouldn't want to support any additional pop-ups unless I had the ability to disable them.

Take it up with Customer Support, not the forums. I can't fix your name, and I'm fairly certain nobody here can either. I don't think this topic has helped any of your problems, has it?

What?

Well, you'd just make sure you don't ever go AFK in the arena with an auto power on. There are a few other creative options, but I'll leave that to your brain since you seem creative enough to ask for an exploit by not asking.

Which I really don't see any of that as an exploit. It is frowned upon by the devs, which is why we have the stupid rules on the drops right now, but I'd be shocked if anyone actually asserted that to be an exploit.

Well, claws is the new set, and it's fun.

What I don't think you quite have realized is that the inherent of a brute is not fury. It is fun. It's automatically included in every brute.

The only potential reason you might farm the Snake map is for Pool C drops as the back room is filled with bosses.

I keep this map on several of my brutes as a benchmark, rather than a farm. If I can solo this at x/8 difficulty, my build is doing pretty well. What makes this particular enemy so difficult is the tremendous amount of AoE toxic damage the snakes do, coupled with the hard-hitting lethal sword attacks.

I rolled and designed a DM/SD brute specifically to handle this map (this map presented a challenge for me to solve). While I am pleased with its performance, I have come to the conclusion that a SS/SD or SS/SR would be superior in this situation due to the reliable mitigation of knockdown for the snakes, which I now think is more valuable than siphon life.

If you think your brute is pretty tough, I recommend giving this map a try at even 2/8, and actually stand in the middle of the map. Bonus points if you tank the AV throwing psi damage at you at the same time.

Now, I found this completely unrelated thread that might be where some other people are talking about some sort of MMO that's supposed to release shortly: 1,965 posts and counting for this particular MMO in our thread

fix't

Have you tried the dark-elec custom? My guess is all black might work for your tastes.

I treat resist sets a lot differently than defense sets. I'll scream at the RNG if I die on a defense toon, but on a resist toon, if I faceplant, I blame myself. It doesn't make too much sense, but if I die on a resist toon it's because I misjudged how much damage I would be taking before my heal was back up.

On a dark, you have a great heal. If I was to take one of those on an ITF, I probably wouldn't stack defense, because it only takes a couple hits for a billion inf in defense IOs to be rendered worthless. I'd go HP/regen/recov on a dark if you're planning on facing a lot of debuffs. If you won't be facing debuffs, defense is awesome.

Random stupid thought: Wouldn't it be fun if we would have had rep when the Official Farming Thread was raging? That would have destroyed the rep system, and perhaps, indicates a very strong reason why rep is a bad idea.

The rep system has worked for me. However, if I was to get involved in a hot topic, I probably would have disabled mine a long time ago. As it stands, I usually only get +rep for a helpful post.

Actually, it can be helpful. For example, every once in a while you get a player with around 3 posts that goes on a tirade on some random issue in the game. Enough negative rep from a troll post, and it lets players quickly identify a troll. For the most part, I usually don't see those with red dots that haven't earned them.

Couldn't have said it better.
So, in the spirit of this topic, +Rep to you, sir.

I've been rather fond of the tag system. The influx of elec/sd posts has left me tagging any post I come across, to which the poster can quickly find similar posts where many of the questions have already been addressed.

Plus, I have to admit I like reading the tags and errm tagging some of the really bad suggestions.

Well...

1) Search user: yourself.
2) Click the rep button on every single post of yours.
3) Find the offending post.
4) Report if needed.

It's a pain.

edit: I just saw "snarky or nonsensical tag"
Wasn't me.