Which power combos shine on a Scrapper, and not on Brute/Stalker?

Scrappers are the most consistent Melee class between the three, but the numbers seem to make all three ATs somewhat comparable to each other aside from playstyle preference.

What individual sets or set combos do you feel truly stand out on Scrappers compared to how they perform on other ATs?

Anything with a +Dam Buff will tend to see more value from that buff on a Scrapper vs a Brute - Shield and Dark Melee, notably.

Some powersets lose more than others in the port to Stalker - though given the other advantages of the Stalker core chassis, I dont know if any are strictly worse on a Stalker, barring Titan Weapons.

Adding stalker AND brute into this comparison is a bit wonky, as brute and scrapper are closer to each other in terms of their melee kits versus stalker. Instead, I'm going to offer a few thoughts on which kits I think have a good niche on scrapper vs. stalker:

1) Claws: this set has decent ST DPS and excellent AOE DPS in the scrapper/brute kit. For stalkers, it loses an enormous amount of that AOE kit and does not excel in ST DPS (compared to the other stalker kits).

2) Dual Blades: this is a special case. This set is excellent on stalker for ST DPS and has passable AOE. For scrapper, it also has very strong (not quite stalker level) ST DPS and stronger AOE capacity due to a much better Attack Vitals combo chain.

3) Martial Arts: in the stalker kit, this becomes purely a ST DPS set-up with zero AOE capacity and there are other sets that do its ST DPS job better. In scrapper, and especially brute, it retains a decent PBAOE in Dragon's Tail while still doing reasonably strong ST DPS. Noteworthy for brute (+ tanker), it provides a +defense buff for 10s when you use its best move, Storm Kick.

Notable mentions for War Mace and Titan Weapon, which are not accessible on stalker and are superb (TW obviously being a pretty big outlier in terms of damage) sets.

I think people tend to agree that electric/shield works best on a scrapper, although I do like shield stalkers because any additional AoE on a stalker is nice.

Kinetic Melee is a set that really works best on a stalker, because of the addition of a quick-strike AS attack.

 

I think people tend to agree that electric/shield works best on a scrapper, although I do like shield stalkers because any additional AoE on a stalker is nice.

 

Kinetic Melee is a set that really works best on a stalker, because of the addition of a quick-strike AS attack.

With shield charge and lighting rod now being able to go to the brute caps, is that still the case?

From what I have read, broad sword works great on a stalker and sucks for everyone else.

From what I have read, broad sword works great on a stalker and sucks for everyone else.

What happened to BS? After recreating my BS/DS scrapper it didn't feel worse, but I've been seeing this a lot here. Why is it not the hardest hitting Scrapper Primary any more? Is it a victim of the late game power creep? Did IO sets and incarnates level the playing field or erase its strengths too much? Is it simply the fact that the animations were so slow?

BS has been directly outclassed by Katana for quite a long time. It used to be able to at least say that it had especially large hits even if its sustained DPS wasn't the highest, but with Clobber, War Mace beats it at that, and many of the other post-launch melee sets get KO Blow-esque powers that hit harder than Headsplitter. Its AoE damage leaves something to be desired, and its only other unique thing is Parry, which is dramatically less valuable in a world where every scrapper can be plenty durable from IOs without compromising their attack chain to do it.

It's no worse than it ever was, so it's certainly not unplayably bad, it just doesn't really have anything that makes it stand out anymore, and has generally been a victim of power creep.

I'm not sure it's better on a stalker in an objective sense, but at least stalkers play well to the Broadsword fantasy of "I want to do big single hits" thanks to AS and autocrits. Using Headsplitter from hide and killing two lieutenants in one shot feels pretty good.

If my understanding is correct, Stalkers have much better single target damage with Savage Melee.  But they lose Rending Flurry, which is an excellent AoE attack with very wide range at five stacks and recharges really quickly, making it good for mowing stuff down.  Although that's really a trend in Stalker versus Scrapper in general.  Stalkers tend to trade an AoE attack for Assassin's Strike.  Although some Stalker sets benefit more from that trade than other.

I wanna say Savage might be better on a Brute than Scrapper due to the fast recharge nature would be good for Fury building, I imagine, but I've seen Brutes complaining about the set pretty hard so...  shrug.

BS is pretty outclassed, but I think Scrappers run it better than Brutes do, if memory from Live serves me right, such because of the cooldowns.

3) Martial Arts: in the stalker kit, this becomes purely a ST DPS set-up with zero AOE capacity and there are other sets that do its ST DPS job better. In scrapper, and especially brute, it retains a decent PBAOE in Dragon's Tail while still doing reasonably strong ST DPS. Noteworthy for brute (+ tanker), it provides a +defense buff for 10s when you use its best move, Storm Kick.

 

Something I'm not sure everyone is aware of on only the scrapper version of MA attatched to eagles claw is this :

Self:

UnresistibleNo BuffsStacking+33% to chance of all effects tagged ECCritModPlayer for 2s (after 1.2 second delay)

UnresistibleNo BuffsStacking+33% to chance of all effects tagged ECCritModSmall for 2s (after 1.2 second delay)

UnresistibleNo BuffsStacking+33% to chance of all effects tagged ECCritModLarge for 2s (after 1.2 second delay)

Target:

PvE142.64 Smashing damage

PvE4.768s Stunned (mag 3)

PvPSuppression2.384s Stunned (mag 3)

PvP210.3 Smashing damage

tagPvPFloating Text210.3 Smashing damage (15% chance)

tagPvEFloating Text142.64 Smashing damage (15% chance)

tag64.19 Fire damage (0% chance)

Specifically the first part makes MA a bit of a crit machine now on scrappers. 

Something I'm not sure everyone is aware of on only the scrapper version of MA attatched to eagles claw is this :

 

Self:

UnresistibleNo BuffsStacking+33% to chance of all effects tagged ECCritModPlayer for 2s (after 1.2 second delay)

UnresistibleNo BuffsStacking+33% to chance of all effects tagged ECCritModSmall for 2s (after 1.2 second delay)

UnresistibleNo BuffsStacking+33% to chance of all effects tagged ECCritModLarge for 2s (after 1.2 second delay)

Target:

PvE142.64 Smashing damage

PvE4.768s Stunned (mag 3)

PvPSuppression2.384s Stunned (mag 3)

PvP210.3 Smashing damage

tagPvPFloating Text210.3 Smashing damage (15% chance)

tagPvEFloating Text142.64 Smashing damage (15% chance)

tag64.19 Fire damage (0% chance)

 

Specifically the first part makes MA a bit of a crit machine now on scrappers.

City of Data: Eagle's Claw

Cast Time: 2.53 seconds

Critical Hit Buff lasts 2 seconds starting 1.2 seconds into the animation of Eagle's Claw.

This means that from 1.2 through 3.2 seconds after starting Eagle's Claw's animation, you have a +33% Critical Hit chance buff ... but Eagle's Claw is still animating until ~2.5 seconds after initiating the attack animation.

This means that once Eagle's Claw has finished animating, you'll retain the +33% Critical Hit buff to your "next" Primary Powerset attack for 0.7 seconds ... which is shorter than the animation times for ANY Martial Arts attacks, meaning you get the buff for only ONE follow up attack after using Eagle's Claw.

In practice, thanks to latency/lag and other issues, this essentially means that the only way to "score" this increased Critical Hit chance on the attack following Eagle's Claw is if you cue your Martial Arts attack "halfway" through Eagle's Claw animating for 2.5 seconds so as to ensure that the Critical Hit buff "counts" on your next attack due to how game mechanically everything Resolves First And Animates After.

Storm Kick has a natively increased chance for a Critical Hit and therefore gets the "most" benefit out of following Eagle's Claw against a single target.  Use of Dragon's Tail to follow Eagle's Claw results in an increased Critical Hit chance against every $Target caught in the PBAoE which can dramatically improve the damage output/throughput of Dragon's Tail when dealing with dogpile situations.

On a Tanker, since Tankers don't get Critical Hits, the Eagle's Claw buff to follow up attacks is changed to having a 3 second duration, instead of merely a 2 second duration, and instead adds +33% damage for that duration.  This means that the damage buff duration extends from 1.2 to 4.2 seconds after Eagle's Claw begins animating for ~2.5 seconds, leaving about ~1.7 seconds clear for follow up attacks.  It is possible with the use of attack queue techniques to squeeze THREE attacks into that window of opportunity after an Eagle's Claw finishes animating.  You can fit Thunder Kick, Storm Kick AND one other Martial Arts attack into that 1.7 window of opportunity to queue up attacks while other attacks are animating (thereby securing the buff effect onto them) even though the animation time for all three of those attacks combined will easily exceed the ~1.7 second window when the buff is in effect ... thanks to the Resolve First Animate After system used for game mechanics.

Something I'm not sure everyone is aware of on only the scrapper version of MA attatched to eagles claw is this :

 

Self:

UnresistibleNo BuffsStacking+33% to chance of all effects tagged ECCritModPlayer for 2s (after 1.2 second delay)

UnresistibleNo BuffsStacking+33% to chance of all effects tagged ECCritModSmall for 2s (after 1.2 second delay)

UnresistibleNo BuffsStacking+33% to chance of all effects tagged ECCritModLarge for 2s (after 1.2 second delay)

Target:

PvE142.64 Smashing damage

PvE4.768s Stunned (mag 3)

PvPSuppression2.384s Stunned (mag 3)

PvP210.3 Smashing damage

tagPvPFloating Text210.3 Smashing damage (15% chance)

tagPvEFloating Text142.64 Smashing damage (15% chance)

tag64.19 Fire damage (0% chance)

 

Specifically the first part makes MA a bit of a crit machine now on scrappers.

 

City of Data: Eagle's Claw

 

Cast Time: 2.53 seconds

Critical Hit Buff lasts 2 seconds starting 1.2 seconds into the animation of Eagle's Claw.

This means that from 1.2 through 3.2 seconds after starting Eagle's Claw's animation, you have a +33% Critical Hit chance buff ... but Eagle's Claw is still animating until ~2.5 seconds after initiating the attack animation.

This means that once Eagle's Claw has finished animating, you'll retain the +33% Critical Hit buff to your "next" Primary Powerset attack for 0.7 seconds ... which is shorter than the animation times for ANY Martial Arts attacks, meaning you get the buff for only ONE follow up attack after using Eagle's Claw.

 

In practice, thanks to latency/lag and other issues, this essentially means that the only way to "score" this increased Critical Hit chance on the attack following Eagle's Claw is if you cue your Martial Arts attack "halfway" through Eagle's Claw animating for 2.5 seconds so as to ensure that the Critical Hit buff "counts" on your next attack due to how game mechanically everything Resolves First And Animates After.

 

Storm Kick has a natively increased chance for a Critical Hit and therefore gets the "most" benefit out of following Eagle's Claw against a single target.  Use of Dragon's Tail to follow Eagle's Claw results in an increased Critical Hit chance against every $Target caught in the PBAoE which can dramatically improve the damage output/throughput of Dragon's Tail when dealing with dogpile situations.

 

 

 

On a Tanker, since Tankers don't get Critical Hits, the Eagle's Claw buff to follow up attacks is changed to having a 3 second duration, instead of merely a 2 second duration, and instead adds +33% damage for that duration.  This means that the damage buff duration extends from 1.2 to 4.2 seconds after Eagle's Claw begins animating for ~2.5 seconds, leaving about ~1.7 seconds clear for follow up attacks.  It is possible with the use of attack queue techniques to squeeze THREE attacks into that window of opportunity after an Eagle's Claw finishes animating.  You can fit Thunder Kick, Storm Kick AND one other Martial Arts attack into that 1.7 window of opportunity to queue up attacks while other attacks are animating (thereby securing the buff effect onto them) even though the animation time for all three of those attacks combined will easily exceed the ~1.7 second window when the buff is in effect ... thanks to the Resolve First Animate After system used for game mechanics.

Pretty sure they do ...

Pretty sure they do ...

That's really cool about eagles claw!

Good to know, do brutes retain that 33% buff?

They do! Also, Tanks and Brutes both exchange the enhanced crit rate on Storm Kick for a defense boost to melee/ranged/aoe (Pines suggests it's everything but psionic despite the description, so who knows.) It's 7.5% on a Brute, and 10% on a Tank for 10 seconds, though it doesn't stack.

It's one of the more interesting proliferation jobs overall, I think.

Good to know, do brutes retain that 33% buff?

 

They do! Also, Tanks and Brutes both exchange the enhanced crit rate on Storm Kick for a defense boost to melee/ranged/aoe (Pines suggests it's everything but psionic despite the description, so who knows.) It's 7.5% on a Brute, and 10% on a Tank for 10 seconds, though it doesn't stack.

 

It's one of the more interesting proliferation jobs overall, I think.

Looks like I was using slightly inaccurate info in my post upthread.  I should have just quoted my calculations from my SR/MA post ...

Eagle's Claw +33% Damage buff to self has 3s duration that begins 2.5 seconds after initiating animation.  So from 2.5-5.5s after activating Eagle's Claw animation, the buff is in effect. Using power activation queue while previous power is animating, you can use this +Damage buff on up to 3 power activations:

• Thunder Kick + Storm Kick + (Cobra Strike or Crippling Axe Kick or Dragon's Tail)

 

This functionally equates to the damage bonus of a Scrapper critical hit (+33% across 3 attacks), but for the Tanker version the chance of this bonus damage is 100% ... instead of merely being a higher chance for a critical hit on one attack after use of Eagle's Claw in the Scrapper version, which if used on Storm Kick is no better than a 50/50 chance for extra critical damage on a Scrapper.  So to my mind, this makes the Tanker version of Eagle's Claw superior to the Scrapper version, with respect to the self-buffing effect on follow up attacks after Eagle's Claw.

 

It also goes without saying that the Tanker version of Storm Kick is superior for the purposes of getting to the defensive softcap for incarnate content, where a 59% Defense is needed, than relying on debuffing of ToHit which is resisted (heavily) by +4 Foes, and especially by AVs and GMs (see PToD).

So MA is better on brutes.... assuming the numbers line up like with Tankers?

That was my conclusion.  Martial Arts (and Super Reflexes in combo with Martial Arts) is simply better/more synergistic on Tankers (and presumably Brutes) than on Scrappers.  Of course, I figure that a major factor in that was the whole buff 'n' polish those sets got from being ported over to those other archetypes in a way that makes them "competitive" for the game as it stood when the ports were made ... as opposed to needing to struggle with a legacy of being "competitive" in Issue 0.

What about Blasters? Don't they get Eagle Claw too?

What about Blasters? Don't they get Eagle Claw too?

Redylnne, not going to quote everything you said but the TL:DR is crit should be checking the same time as a to hit roll (the beginning of the animation, this is really easy to see with powers like BFR and Will dom that have very long projectile travel times but the to hit rolls are instant at the start of the cast).

So you are pretty much always getting that 33% crit buff as long as you cast a power immediately after EC no matter which one it is.  And 33% crit buff on one attack on an AT with the highest base damage modifier is >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> than 33% damage on two attacks on AT's  with a nice and low +damage modifier. Especially considering scrappers now have an extra 6% base crit and a 50% buff for 3 seconds.