A note on enemy combat styles here, with regard to AOEs and combat mobility. There are several kinds of enemies as far as general attack pattern goes. Bear in mind, these are screaming generalities, if you want specifics on what every enemy in the game does you'll have to do it yourself. 
One, like the Longbow Eagles, Carnie Harlequins, Council Galaxies, and Fortunatae, are what I call "Range-Preferred". What this means is that they will almost always prefer to fight from range, running away if you close to melee, and will not normally come directly into melee range themselves. In other words, they fight like your average Controller or Blaster. They are usually comparatively squishy.
Another is "melee-preferred". Legacy Chain of Steel, Trolls, Family, Knives of Artemis, for examples. They will have one or two ranged attacks, but will use them and then attempt to close to melee. And they will stay there, because their best attacks are melee attacks and they have the HP and defenses to support being in melee with you.
The third kind is mixed-range. COT Thorn Casters, Paragon Protectors, Crey Tanks, Bone Daddies, Hellion Damned, to name a few. They have good defenses, and good damage from both range and melee. Often, they'll have some fairly vicious attacks from both melee and range.
Melee-preferred enemies make Brutes with AOEs happy. They don't generally run from you unless they're really hurt, and they like to cluster up in mobs. Thus, you don't have to move nearly as much to get to your next target. This is also when you'll get the best use of your AOEs, damage aura, and cone attacks.
Now, if you're using cones like Shadow Maul and Jacob's Ladder, you'll need to maneuver around these guys. They'll like to circle you, which is not conducive to a melee cone, so you'll need to hop out of the circle onto one side. Use your cone quickly when you do this, because they'll want to circle around you again.
Range-preferred enemies are a bit trickier to handle. Most of them won't clump up nicely for you unless you're pulling them into a corner. (More on that later.) So you'll have to go and get them. How you do this will generally depend on your secondary, your team, and your travel pool of choice.
If you have ranged attacks on your team, let them handle the ranged enemies first. You concentrate on the melee attackers, and don't waste time and fury chasing down one or two range-preferred enemies until you're done with the main group of bad guys. If you're feeling particularly tankish that day, you can toss out a taunt or two to keep the ranged attackers focused on building your fury rather than damaging your teammates, but that's entirely up to you. Well, and up to whether you took your Taunt. I recommend that Stone Armor Brutes specifically take their Taunt for this reason - Once you've got Rooted or Granite running, you're going to find it tricky to chase down one or two Eagles, and you'll suck your end bar dry if you teleport to them.
Most other travel pool types can either jump, run, or fly over to these little scaredy-cats. Keep in mind that they like to run through other spawns that haven't yet aggroed, so be sure you're keeping an eye on what's around them. Don't Brutelock and collect more aggro than your team can handle when chasing down a ranged enemy. Where we Brutes encounter problems is with the fliers in high-clearance areas. If you don't fly or have a charged flight temp power, you have three options. First: Let your ranged teammates handle it. Good option. Not so good if you're solo. Second: Get out of their line of sight and wait. They will return to attempt to kill you again. The bad part is that this will not do good things for your Fury bar. Third: Move on to the next spawn and let them come back to you. I find that this third choice works well for most cases. This is NOT a recommended tactic for Tsoo Sorcerers, since they'll heal anything you're fighting regardless of whether it spawned in their group or not. Kill the Sorcerers before you move on.
I think that'll do it for today's update. As always, feel free to ask questions, throw insults, or add your own opinions on the matter.
@SithRose and @Sith Rose
Permanent resident of Virtue
"Mommy, I need Cthulhu. He keeps the bad dreams away."
The Hulk. Grundy. Mr. Hyde. Brutes. The redheaded stepchild of the Scrapper and the Tanker. The whirling, speedy, dervish of destruction of COV. This is a brief guide to the playstyle of the Brute, and the care and feeding of your Fury bar.
Fury. One cannot mention Brutes without mentioning Fury, as it is the power which turns you into a behemoth of brutality. First and foremost, the Brute is designed best for sustained combat. The longer you're in a fight, the higher your Fury bar is, which means the higher your damage is. This will often lead to what is known as the Brute Suicide, a reckless charge from one mob of enemies to the next with little to no concern for your Endurance or Health bars. One should take care when attempting this, as it can lead to a stunning faceplant if you don't have the appropriate tools to survive. And once you die, your Fury bar empties.
Be prepared. Ensure that your team knows what Fury does, and how it works. Remind them that you enjoy a high Fury bar, and so do they. Inform them that you will not want to stop unless you have to, so they may wish to be prepared to keep up with your pace. Regrettably, not all teams can do this. If they can't keep up, you may have to bite the bullet and slow yourself down. A Brute is a machine of destruction, but a Brute who refuses to work with his team is often called a dead Brute. A Brute who refuses to consider tactics, strategy, and common sense is also often called a dead Brute.
Obviously, one should consider the level of the enemies, your own weaknesses, and the team composition and competence while moving at the Brute pace. It is unwise for the Invulnerability Brute to charge recklessly into the spawn full of Tarantula Mistresses, and for the Electric Brute to rush headlong into the mob of Vazhilok. OK, so it's unwise for *anyone* to rush headlong into a mob of Vazhilok, but that's beside the point. On the other hand, if the Invulerability Brute happens to have brought along a Dark Miasma Corruptor, he'll have a much better time of charging into those Tarantula Mistresses, as will the Electric Brute who acquired a friendly Poison Mastermind. Know what your team can do for you, and remember that the team is there for reasons other than simply supporting your climbing Fury bar.
Why yes. I am telling you to adjust your playstyle depending on what you've brought with you on the team. If you have a Stalker, they usually like to get into position before you charge. AOEs do nasty things to Hide, and Stalkers get very sad when their Assassin Strike is spoilt. Masterminds fall into two camps, those that cherish their pets and hate to see them die, and those who use and abuse their pets, resummoning mid-combat with ease. Know which type you have, and whether you should expect to charge with, before, or after the pets. Corruptors come in many fun-filled flavors, but none of them are healbots or shieldbots. Recognize the strengths and weaknesses of their particular flavor - The Dark Miasma will make things miss, the Kinetics will boost your speed, damage, and end recovery, the Thermal, Sonic, and Cold will buff you quite merrily, and throw debuffs at the enemies, and the Traps will...do whatever it is that they do. Treat your Corruptors well, and never spam "Heal plz, SB plz, shield plz". Dominators will grab the enemy, hold them, and tear them up, so let them focus on their targets while you focus on everything else. And ignore those worries about a Dominator hurting your Fury bar, just remind them that you don't always want *everything* locked down. Don't discount the team-saving abilities of a Dominator - A Seeds of Confusion or Total Domination tossed out at the right time can turn the tide of battle. Brutes can be your partners, splitting the aggro neatly and slicing it into manageable chunks, or your enemy who tries to take the entire aggro, leaving nothing for you. Play nice with your fellow Brutes, and remember that they like to have high Fury too. You can generate a good Fury with part of a spawn perfectly well, there's no need to hog the entire thing. Discuss this with your fellow Brutes, and work out some strategies - For example, if you have a /Dark and an /Invulnerability Brute, let the /Dark take the alpha on things he is more resistant to, while the /Invul takes the alpha on his strengths.
Speaking of taking the alpha strike, I've seen the question of Tanking as a Brute many a time. I shall say this. You are NOT a Tanker. You do not have the hit points or defenses to handle the amount of incoming hatred that a Tanker can. And that is, frankly, not your job. Both Brutes and Tankers want a certain amount of incoming attacks, aggro directed towards them. Both wish to hold on to the aggro as much as they can, but for entirely different reasons. A Tanker wants that aggro because he can survive it, and because attacks that hit him aren't hurting his squishier companions, who in turn are busy killing everything in sight while the Tanker takes the brunt of the attack. A Brute wants that aggro because everything that attacks him builds his Fury bar, and makes him able to kill things better and faster. Things which attack the Brute's companions are not building the Brute's Fury, and should thus be redirected. In short, a Tanker wants to grab and hold aggro so his team can kill things, while a Brute wants to grab aggro and kill things, not necessarily hold the aggro.
This leads me into some of my list of Frequently Asked Questions.
Should a Brute take Taunt? My answer is yes, absolutely. It is an extremely useful tool for building Fury, and for redirecting attackers who are at some distance from you. It is NOT necessary for a good Brute build. I will be the first to say that you do not *need* Taunt to do your job and do it well. In comparison, a Brute with Taunt and a damage/taunt aura will hold aggro roughly as well as a tauntless Tanker who uses Gauntlet well. A Brute with Taunt and no damage aura or just a damage aura will hold aggro about as well as a taunting Scrapper. A Brute with no taunt and no damage aura will hold aggro about as well as a tauntless Scrapper. I am informed that Taunt is very nice to have in the Recluse Strike Force, and in PVP situations, so keep that in mind if you plan to do either a great deal. It's also very useful for Energy Aura Brutes, since they have no damage/taunt aura.
But Brute Taunt is only single-target, isn't it? No. Not at all. Brute Taunt is identical to Tanker Taunt. It is an auto-hit 5 target AOE in PVE, and requires a to-hit check in PVP. I have been told that Brute Taunt has a slightly shorter duration, but I haven't directly tested that myself. Taunt can be slotted for accuracy, but this is strictly for PVP purposes. If you do not plan to PVP, you do not ever need to slot accuracy into Taunt, since it's auto-hit vs NPCs.
Why can I slot my attacks with Taunt Duration? Brutes have a Punchvoke effect inherent in their attacks. Each enemy that you hit will briefly be Taunted into attacking you when you hit them. This lasts about 5 seconds. Note: This is NOT the Tanker inherent power, Gauntlet. Gauntlet affects up to 4 targets in addition to the target the Tanker hits, and is basically a melee-range Taunt that takes effect with every attack the Tanker lands. The Brute Punchvoke is single-target. It only affects the enemy that you just hit.
I did mention Brutes in comparison with Scrappers earlier. Well, Brutes play very much like Scrappers in some aspects. However, where a Scrapper will go directly for a Lt. or Boss threat, the Brute will let that threat slide a bit until they've generated some Fury. They'll pick off a few minions, and then let loose on the Boss or Lt. when their Fury is high and their damage is good. You see, unlike Scrappers, who are able to bring high damage to the table right out of the box, Brutes take a bit of time to bring their damage up. But when they do, they'll blow a Scrapper right out of the water.
Slotting your Brute - getting over the pre-Stamina endurance crunch.
Caveat: These slotting recommendations are my personal preference, and presume that you do not waste money on slotting anything other than found trainings before level 12. This section discusses slotting pre-Stamina and pre-SOs.
Brutes are, as I've mentioned before, best designed for sustained damage. They shine in situations where they can get into a fight, keep pounding, and never, ever need to stop. This makes things awfully tricky for pre-Stamina Brutes, who will rapidly find their endurance to be at a premium when their Fury bar is high and they want to keep going. Damage Auras are expensive, and hard to maintain with DO slotting and no Stamina. I usually recommend avoiding them until level 22, when you already have Stamina and can support the endurance cost of the aura.
Now, I'm of the mind that if I'm dead, I'm not generating Fury. Or anything else, for that matter. So I will normally drop at least three slots into each shield, preferably four, as soon as I can manage it. One of those slots get an End Reduction right off the bat, and the others are Damage Resist/Defense. This slotting is predicated on the theory that you run only the appropriate shields to a given situation - I.E. don't run your Mez resist if your enemies have no mezzes, don't run your Energy/Element shield if they only do smashing/lethal, etc. Micromanaging your shields is very important to keeping your baby Brute going as long as possible. And remember, a single Luck or two Sturdies are as good as your shields at this level. If you absolutely must, you can pop a Luck or a Sturdy and drop your shields for a minute to continue a fight when you're out of blues and endurance both. Once you reach level 22 and can get SOs, 1 end reduction is sufficient for most shields and damage auras.
If your attack misses, it's a waste of endurance. Slot at least one Accuracy DO in every attack. Some people prefer two, and if you're fighting +2s or better, you'll probably want to squeeze two in. If you're only fighting even-cons or +1s, you can manage tolerably well with only one DO Accuracy. Every attack uses endurance. Your attacks will use more endurance than your shields by far. Every attack, without exception, should have at least one Endurance Reduction DO in it. Recharge Reductions are nice, but it does you no good to have a charged attack if you don't have the endurance to fire it off. Forget about slotting damage at these levels, let your Fury carry your damage. That's part of what it does. While a Scrapper will want to slot damage and accuracy at lower levels so they can kill things as fast as possible, a Brute wants to be able to stay in the fight as long as possible. You don't have the burst damage a Scrapper does until your Fury is high, and it takes endurance to get your Fury that high. Stone Melee probably wants two end reductions in many attacks, it's an endurance hog.
My attack slotting when I reach level 22 is usually 1 acc, 1 end reduction, and 1 recharge, with additional slots being devoted to damage as they're available. My shield slotting is 1 end reduction, 3 damage/defense. Those extra slots in the attacks get placed only after my shields are slotted and I have some slots in support powers such as Dark Consumption, Hover, Combat Jumping, etc.
You will have endurance problems pre-Stamina. This is not open for disagreement. Everyone has endurance problems pre-Stamina, except for clever Defenders and Regen Scrappers. Do the best you can, and know that once you hit 20, your problems will ease. Once you hit 22, your problems will be largely gone. My Brutes don't run out of endurance unless they're fighting Ring Mistresses or Sappers, and I run through missions at high speed, without stopping. You just have to get past that hump.
And now for Frequently Asked Questions, round two.
I'm a Dark Melee/Energy Aura, Electric Armor, or Fiery Aura Brute. Can I skip Stamina? This is something that *can* be done. I do not recommend it, personally. With your inherent power being focused around sustained damage, you want to have as much endurance to keep fighting with as possible. You want to be able to slot your attacks and your shields and your utility powers well. Skipping Stamina will require considerably more slots devoted to endurance reduction in your attacks, as well as additional slots devoted to endurance modifications in your end recovery powers. As I recall, when I attempted this experiment on my own DM/Fire Brute, I wound up with 13 slots devoted to endurance recovery of one kind or another that I was able to move into better use when I added Stamina into the build. Bear in mind that with all of these, you must have clumped enemies in order to get the best recovery possible. Anyone using scatter-control or heavy knockback, like your friendly Energy Dominators and Corruptors, or your Robots and Force Field Masterminds, will cause the enemies to scatter. And you will detoggle and die because you can't effectively recover your endurance. I respecced my DM/Fire Brute into Stamina at level 27, and haven't looked back. Now, you certainly can respec OUT of Stamina on Energy or Electric once you pick up Conserve Power and Power Sink, but you'll find yourself having problems exemplaring.
Can Fiery Aura,and Dark Armor live without the Jumping pool? Absolutely yes. However - If you want knock-back protection for either of these two armors, you must take either 3 powers from the Jumping Pool (Combat Jumping, Superjump, and Acrobatics), or you must take Hover and 3-slot it for Flight Speed. Hover is a bit slow, even when 3-slotted with SOs, and you'll want to create a bind or macro to toggle between Sprint and Hover for moving between combats and moving in combat. If you want immobilization protection, you must take Jumping, or you must take Burn, or Cloak of Darkness. Yes, Cloak of Darkness has immobilization protection in it. And Burn is highly underrated for Brutes. It's a very valuable and useful tool, especially in enclosed areas and mayhem missions, but does require thought to use well.
Pros of Hover: Three-dimensional maneuverability. One power selection, 2 additional slots. Ability to go over Mastermind pets with ease. No falling to your doom in Oranbega or Arachnos maps. Available at level 6, combat-useable at level 12 with 3 DOs. Endurance-cheap. Flip over instead of falling down, and you can activate powers while flipping.
Cons of Hover: Slow. Can result in being pushed away from a target when knocked back. Vulnerable to -fly, and you lose the KB protection of Hover while grounded with a -fly effect.
Pros of Jumping Pool: -jump is much less prevalent than -fly. Offers some additional mez protection above your normal mez resist. Faster. Better for PVP overall.
Cons of Jumping Pool: 3 power selections, at least 5 additional slots. Endurance-expensive. Harder to control in laggy situations. Harder to maneuver around Oranbega, especially if you're already bad at aiming jumps. Locks you into a single travel power.
Can I PVP with my Brute? Yes. Brutes can shine in PVP. It will take work, it will take persistance, and it will take patience to get there. However, Brutes have some problems. The first problem is a current bug with Fury generation. Your fury does not generate as fast as it should in PVP. PVP is more about burst damage than sustained fights, by and large, and this cripples the Brute with their speciality in sustained, long-term fights. I'll let someone with more love for PVP than I've got speak in detail about Brutes in PVP, since I'm by no means an expert.
Well. I think this covers our session of Brute discussion for the day. Feel free to add in anything I might have forgotten. For that matter, feel free to disagree with me if you want to. Just remember: Scrappers move fast. When pressed, the Brute pace is described as "Psychotic". We go to Ludicrous Speed and beyond, and our teams can only hope to keep pace.
@SithRose and @Sith Rose
Permanent resident of Virtue
"Mommy, I need Cthulhu. He keeps the bad dreams away."