Erratic1

Not for those with high Endurance Drain Resistance.

Disadvantage...of being unkillable since the Machine would bring you back. Admittedly, Lilith comes up with a wickedly warped way of dealing with that. I hated her but I have to admit, it was brilliant. Darn I miss that game.

Oh my, one can dream The Secret World would get fresh blood and development. Besides, in The Secret World/Secret World Legends you could always go back to New England and casually own things...something you would know if you had suitably exposed yourself over time to many microdoses of The Filth like Dr. Klein had.

My understanding is the targets at the destination count for AAO.

KB happens. I only mentioned it as it added to my crankiness. But I was not bashing KB.

Now I really feel old.

Yes, because at level 20 people have incredible AoE defense and everyone is running one of a limited set of armor sets. It just is not that hard, especially with ranged attacks on the team, to avoid the stunners.

Yeah, xp which won't even dent the debt the defeats are causing. Something about penny wise and pound foolish.

If that is giving you problems, let me present my latest Brute: If there were men's shorts which ended mid-thigh, I would use them. Another problem is getting certain clothing to also keep Spectrum for the body (as I would have settled for Barbarian leggings but you can only have your underlying flesh tone showing on those). So I tell myself the belt wraps around and covers all the less presentable parts.... ...almost works but definite exposed rear end from the other side.

I enjoy KM ITF, and I enjoy +4 ITF, but I'm not doing the latter until I know I can survive if I am playing a melee. On non-melee characters I want whomever is tanking to be survivable, as determined by checking out their character info.

Actually the MM in the group was doing a masterful job of keeping their pets away from the Summers. The Brute however had a wholly different idea. "Simply kill them again" is a difficult thing when you're out of endurance because they've drained you...at least judging by the defeats.

Do it all the time on my SS/Bio brute.

When I say, "You know they do not rez if you are not standing near them when they die?" it is not a question, but a hint you should perahps not stand near the Super Stunner when, well...they are ABOUT TO DIE! Normally I am fine if a person decides they want to invoke endurance drain on themselves along with some damage, but thow in someone using knockback (Did I mention I was playing the Tanker?) and going down once because the heal which would have kept me standing did not hit anyone because suddenly everything flew away from me? Normally I find complaints about PUGs overblown on the forums, but yeesh...19 defeats (including a TPK) doing a Yin--Yins I did twice before on the same character with no defeats (at lower levels) and a total of three the last time?

Notably, has the Scaling Resistance IO from Reactive Defenses, so the value climbs as you lose health.

Take out the guy who summoned the Singularity and let it despawn.

The tradeoff in any more difficult content just is not worth it, especially since Offensive stance just is not worth it. S/L resistance takes a significant hit in Offensive stance. I run my SS/Bio Brute in Efficient, though to be honest, Defensive is not that much of a damage hit. Only when things get particularly nasty does he depart Efficient for Defensive though. As goes running in Offensive, yes, you are right. It would take a lot of investment. That is why I noted a Brute in Offensive as something better suited to Incarnate powers being available. I think you are presuming me advocating running Offensive stance. Above I was only mentioning the possibility and where I saw the best potential for doing so. Outside Offensive, reaching S/L resist cap is considerably more doable. But to be fair to your point, there are places where you may have to skimp. A lot comes down to what powers you are focusing on. As goes the build you posted, it has some nice defensive numbers. I am a bit less comfortable with its low inherent endurance generation, but with the +Recharge you have and the ability to use Parasitic Aura and DNA Siphon, that discomfort is more in regards to time spent needing to activate one of those two powers and how the build would fare when facing a single AV/monster as opposed to having crowds around. Mind you, all of that falls mostly into a personal taste/comfort zone as opposed to being any sort of serious flaw. I am curious what type of Savage/Rad build you might offer. As I noted above, I am less experienced on Rad armor builds.

My objection was to the notion that Rad is sturdier than Bio. As goes Bio overall, yes, Defense Buffs exists and you do not get DDR with it. That is one of its drawbacks. Every sets has those. WP is miserable as goes slows and endurance drain. Energy Aura struggles achieving even Scrapper cap for resistances, with most builds falling short of that. Environmental Modification, slotted, with the two +3 Def IOs gets you more than halfway to FCEN soft cap for an investment of 7 slots. Weave, with fairly minimal slotting is worth at least 5% more, as is a full set of Winter's Grasp IO*s. Call that another 7 slots. Given you were going to be slotting offensive powers anyway and you were going to be slotting your defensive set powers anyway, those are not lost opportunity costs. Weave and whatever slots you put there are your investment and that is one power and two slots (at least as I have it on my SS/Bio brute who softcaps FCEN defense and caps S/L resistances). With just what I have outline you should be in the area of 33.5% or so FCEN Defense. That is three powers and 14 slots versus a total of 24 powers and 67 slots--12.5% of your powers and 21% of your slots. Presuming you were going to slot your other armor set powers like Hardened Carapace, and Evolving Armor, your also pick up +Def via your choice there--two birds, one stone. An investment of 3 slots in each gets you +6.25% F/C Def if you use Aegis IOs, or 9.37% if you invest two more slots. F/C is now at 43% and trivially and softcap with any other bonus to it. Presumably you were going to take and slot Hardened Carapace. This is also not some investment you were not otherwise going to be doing, as presumably you are taking both those powers and slotting them. Tough is where you are making an investment. So again, "...a LOT of investment..." seems a stretch. As for staying in Offensive mode, I think I made it clear it is not something I really see a brute doing short of Incarnates, if at all. You want to talk about juice not worth the squeeze? That would be the damage boost from Offensive stance compared to what you are getting out of Fury on Brute. *Requires a ranged attack power, but hey, Epic sets exists if one is not found in your primary.

This is completely opposite my experience (and apparently the experience of @Haijinx as well). You cap F/C/E/N defense on Bio and cap S/L resist. For the most part you are good, but for when things get nasty you have three click powers--a heal, a shield, and a regen/recovery boost--which, used appropriately, make you incredibly sturdy. Bio is widely considered the best defensive set in the game, with many considering it to be overpowered. Granted, that is best for all that it does, not for being the absolute toughest--but Invulnerability and Stone do not do a lot of the things Bio does. Rad almost never gets spoken of in those terms.

Someone would have to math out the options to see where Tanker in Offensive Stance comes out with DoTs versus Brute Fury upping DoTs. I suspect Offensive Stance on the Tanker is only going to give one package of damage on hit. And if Brute on Incarnates can survive Offensive Stance, its DoTs should come out on top. Obviously Tanker will retain its area superiority.

Scrapper might be fine for Bio (though S/L being capped at 75% on resistances will hurt as Bio relies on S/L resistance and defense for everything else), but for Rad, Scapper strikes me as an inferior choice to Brute and Tanker as goes survival, with Tanker obviously being king of that hill. As goes Bio, you might be able to reasonably pull of living in Offensive Stance with Bio though whereas on a Brute, I would probably suggest Efficient (at least until Incarnates).

Bio and Rad are both good, both have usable T9 abilities, and will give different feels from each other as you play. Bio has excellent survivability, powerful regeneration/recovery, and brings a damage aura to the table to take you further down the road of dealing damage over time. You really cannot go wrong going with Bio. It is an easy powerset to recommend. However.... ...while I am less proficient at building Rad, it has some serious plusses it brings to the table. Like Bio it has powerful regeneration/recovery, but it also grants +Recharge, which should stack with the +Recharge from your Blood Frenzy. While you do not have a damage aura, you do have two powers which will apply DoTs over their own, and you have a couple of ways to lower enemy Defense, making it easier for you to hit harder targets. I think you would do well with either.

I ended up making a Rad/Dark as I have done Inv and Elec paired with Dark previously on Scrapper and Brute.

A few things from looking at your build; Pretty uniformly across ATs, I find I run out of endurance cannot sustain attacks if the gap between endurance usage and recovery is under 2 end/sec. There are things which adjust this range (like endurane cost reduction or recovery powers) but as a rule of thumb, I push for at least 2 endurance more recovery than usage. What tends to cost the most endurance are your attack powers-- you're using them repeatedly after all. Particularly when using SOs, on your T3 and higher attack powers you probably want a single Endurance Cost Reduction SO slotted. Toggle powers may or may not warrant Endurance Cost Reduction SOs depending on their base cost. For my money, unless the power at base costs 0.3 end/sec or more, I probably would not slot it for reduction. You have two SOs dedicated to Grant Cover, but that is only saving you 1 total endurance every 14 seconds--probably not the best use of two slots. Slotting a single Endurance Reduction SO in Spinning Strike saves you four times as much endurance over the same period of time. Another example, you have Combat Readiness slotted with two slots of Endurance Reduction saving you 2.36 endurance very 49 seconds--that is 0.048 end/sec you are saving for using two slots, again not really worth it. Unless you are fighting with your difficulty set way up, two slots for Accuracy in your attacks is likely overkill. I would set your Fury value to somewhere around 80-85 for a more true value of how much you can expect your hits to land for (well, before resistance comes into play).

Just about anything other than Ice, Dark, Fire, and Stone seems like it could be justified for offensive set.

It should be noted that both the "Build Up" mechanic and the Endurance Drain deal damage as PBAoEs which is boosted by Offensive Stance. Edit: Should also be noted, neither are quick recharge, so their use for damage is limited.