Erratic1

Dark Melee: Smite allows for the following enhancements: Accuracy, Damage, Recharge, Taunt, To-Hit Debuff, and Endurance Reduction. Thing is there are ways which are seriously poor ways to slot the power which most people simply are never going to do--all recharge, all taunt, some combination of endurance reduction and to-hit debuff, etc. If those bad combinations take up bonus you are forced to take a substandard collection of enhancements to get some given bonus. If only certain combinations get you bonuses then you're constraining the range of builds you were otherwise claiming would be a broadening. By spreading out commonly sought benefits as the currently used IO system does (there being a Acc/Dam/Rchg enhancer with lower than normal values but which will sum with other enhancer's like values) you give greater flexibility.

You may have missed my previous post: There are two issues this thread has gotten to: "Should the game be balanced based on IO sets?" and "Should there be development taking into account IO sets exist?" To clarify, I do not have a problem with some development aimed at the cutting edge crowd because as Luminara points out, the impediments to dealing with such content are mostly self-imposed as opposed to game imposed. I would be opposed to the notion the game should be balanced around IOs because what constitutes an IO build in most people's minds are powerhouse builds when in fact there is a lot of room to end up with subpar results. And that before we deal with questions like, "How many set bonuses does it take to qualify as an IO build?"

Are you suggesting that because some people do not bother to keep up with how the game is being developed it should not be further developed?

"IO Balanced" design leans towards the notion of being a powerhouse but it is quite possible to kit out a character with IOs poorly and having something which falls far short of what is theoretically possible with IOs that it is only marginally better than what SOs would get you.

There was also that ED made certain results previously attainable results impossible which IO brought back into existence.

Are you asking/suggesting that TO->DO->SO should have continued in some fashion ala TO->DO->SO->....->[x]O? Or are you asking why IOs at all?

I simply turn off the cloaking powers on my EA or Stalker characters when not on mission. Are you really admiring your costume while you're fighting?

Thing about Tankers is people then expect you to tank and hold aggro so the group doesn't wipe. Not a hard job but here is the thing... ...Brute can be made plenty tough enough and nobody expects you to do anything but wade in and start hitting things. Also Fury means you'll do decent damage at low levels.

You big disgrace! Waving your epeen all over the place. We will, we will, block you!

Truthfully is it now worth trying to floor endurance bars on things you fight over flooring health bars. AVs cheat in any event. If draining endurance inconveniences anything you are fighting, look on it as icing on the cake as opposed to something to shoot for.

The first four powers in Dark Armor are toggles. Leaving aside the damage aura (and its 0.52/s cost), if you want the full spread of resistances and mezz protection you are looking at 0.63/s cost for Dark Embrace, Murky Cloud, and Obsidian Shield (all available by level 10 in the secondary position). Electric Armor will run you 0.73/s for its equivalent powers (also all available by level 10 in the secondary position). Electric Armor is running you 0.10/s more. So Electric Armor does run more, but the amount is negligible. Compare that 0.1/s to the cost to use the initial attack in Savage Melee, Savage Strike, which is 1.2/s. Savage Strike, which you are highly likely to have taken and be using in the 1 to 35 level range, is consuming 12 times as much endurance. Slotting one SO in Savage Strike saves you nearly 3.6 times as much endurance as the difference between running Electric Armor's base required toggles and running Dark Armor's. There is also the prospect of facing Freakshow...heck, a much better chance of it in my experience. You kind of laugh at their endurance drain too. 😛 Yeah, but Electrical Armor brings its own endurance recovery to the party. 😁

Dark Armor is infamous for its toggle costs. Not sure anything comes close. Electric Armor's toggle costs are: 0.21/s Static Shield 0.26/s Charged Armor Conductive Shield 0.52/s Lightning Field Dark Armor's toggle costs are: 0.08/s Oppressive Gloom 0.21/s Dark Embrace Murky Cloud Obsidian Shield 0.26/s Cloak of Darkness 0.52/s Death Shroud Full activation of Dark Armor's toggles costs 1.48/s whereas Electric Armor's full activation is 1.25/s. You can use them but you of course lose the benefit when you do. It is up to you however when you do. I figured it for me when it was worth holding onto the bonus and when it was worth consuming stacks. I have yet to proc bomb a character though I am considering doing so on my Elec/Rad tanker. Did I mention that Rad is not kind to endurance? I must admit I seriously questioned in his mid-to-late 30s if I wanted to continue to work on the character. The trick was getting Energize to the point of being close enough to permanent that Power Sink would cover the portion of time when it wasn't.

Savage Melee's inherent mechanics give you an endurance savings when you maintain stacks (admittedly minor over time when you factor in them also boosting recharge). I have reservations about ascribing endurance woes to that set. I did for up a Savage/EA scrapper (so even more +Recharge at work) and do not recall endurance being a horrible problem (say like on my Rad Melee/Shield scrapper). DM may have mitigated some of the issues for me since it brings a heal to the table at level 8 and an endurance recovery power at level 18 so you have healing/endurance tools early. But I also am a stickler for slotting toggles with endurance cost reduction (one slot) and attack powers with either one or two slots of reduction depending on how tight endurance is since attacks are where you are really spending your endurance as a melee. It goes without saying that Stamina gets 3-slotted with Endurance mods ASAP. Edit: On a Brute at low levels you do not need to focus so much on Damage enhancements since you have Fury, so I am quite willing to put Endurance Reduction in attack powers and worry about getting them up to three damage slots post-30.

Well Bio does use its T9.... But I believe I already posted an image to this thread about Bio. 😄

One of my most powerful characters on Live was a DM/Elec Brute. Nigh unto unstoppable.

Yeah, DoTs are a shining point for Brutes. Wonder why I never see anyone declaring in other forums when damage auras come up (or here for that matter), "Better on a Brute"...because Brute aficionados are tasteful enough not to do that?

And you can always rename yourself Pie Shell.

My current machine's cpus are beneath the threshold to support it. So want it or not, it will have to wait until I am prepared to get a new machine.

In most groups, especially as you approach higher levels, no, not really. It is not even like it is for Tankers (Nice, but not necessary) but if you want to be one of the relatively few brutes who can force foes to look his way and/or it provides good set bonuses by slotting Taunt IOs (my SS/Bio brute did not take Taunt but slotted a full Taunt IO set because of the set bonuses) it can make sense. Depends on your comfort level with where your mitigation is at. I am increasingly of a mind to shore up where a powerset combo is deficient in terms of resistances/defenses/healing/recovery by looking to set bonuses rather than powers. In particularly with the build I posted I wanted to make sure endurance was not an issue because if that is everything falls apart quickly. The idea I think would best suit Shield would be if you are getting hit rarely enough with enough being resisted/absorbed then a certain level of Regen should keep your health relatively static. That is why Health is six-slotted with Panacea. It drives up your Regen, gets a hefty +Recharge bonus, grants Endurance cost reduction, and boosts S/L resistance. You could shift slots into Physical Perfection for more, but those slots will have to be taken from elsewhere. What Perma-Hasten allows are typically three things--[1] The ability to keep some other power up continuously, [2a] The ability to cycle a power more often, and [2b] If the power being cycled is an attack it means possibly being able to take fewer attack powers while maintaining an attack chain and hence freeing up the slots which would have gone into another attack power for use elsewhere (if you can cycle through four attacks without pause when would you use a fifth attack?). The build posted does not have Perma-Hasten so you could play it as is, drop Hasten, save yourself a slot and not miss it. You could keep Hasten as I have it on some builds and intended it here as an emergency, "I need powers to cycle faster now in the thick of things". Or you could push for more global recharge enabling you to make it permanent with an eye toward the above [2b] consideration.

I would say the issue is more Tanker aficionados declaring amongst themselves they are gods and showing up in this forum to declare how much better everything is on a Tanker and only back-pedaling when someone declares Brutes have been supplanted. Again, it is now far from unusual to flatly declare powerset X is "better on a Tanker" be it primary or secondary (if not Scrapper or Stalker). That is what leads me to asking in a thread where the OP specifically asked for help in building an Stj/Shield BRUTE what Brutes are supposed to be playing. Because in this thread alone have been repeated declaration that the OP should not be playing what he asked about. The -=ONLY=- person who has offered a build is me.

Except every AoE is routinely declared to be, "Better on a Tanker".

I have seen so many powersets claimed to be better on other ATS, I am actually beginning to wonder what others see as an actual combo which is acceptable to play as a Brute.

IIRC, the changes are tied to the AT powers rather than all the AoE powers being changed.

Not saying what follows is some sort of ultimate build or even a good idea. I was largely focusing on getting basics in place to end up with a workable character. Perma-Hasten might be possible with some refinement.

I did say, "almost" 😁 In a comic book superhero game one should expect a certain amount of nerdery.