Erratic1

Powers on the tray, then Combat Attributes on top of the window that appears (can see it in the image I posted).

I will try to do some testing/logging tonight if no resolution is had before I head home. Okay, home now and here is a portion of a chatlog demonstrating what I was talking about (I have removed them hitting me and Blazing Aura damage): Using Atom Smasher I contaminate both a Rikti Headman and a Rikti Conscript. I then follow that up by using Radiation Siphon on the Headman. But the log shows a HIT check on both. On the squishiness front, what values are you seeing for your resistances? This is what I have on my Tanker:

I have both two characters with Radiation Melee (Rad/Fire Brute and Rad/ Shield Scrapper) and one with Radiation Armor (Rad/Psi Tanker). So my experience of Radiation as offense and defense will be different. I noticed I do not always see the orange numbers over other enemies but I quite often do and seem to recall when looking at the combat display something which makes me think the application of splash damage makes a to-hit check. For the longest time I saw very few on the Brute. I had been running Endurance Reduction Enhancements in it but swapped to Defense Debuff and started seeing more hits, which leans to there being a To-Hit check. Based on that experience, when I made the scrapper last Friday I made sure to slot for Defense Debuff as soon as I could and regularly see the splash damage. According to your build, you only have one enhancement which is modifying the base debuff. You might try adding slots to that end. (Edit: See you have a chunk in Beta Decay, so not sure why you would be missing the splash damage.) I have had no survivability problems on the Tanker. Admittedly Tankers start at higher resistance values. A quick comparison to other set's resistance values does not suggest Radiation Armor should be particularly squishy.

This post from the Brute forum may interest you.

There has been argument that having an all the time damage buff of 80% needs to be balanced against melee sets having short duration boost. I will ignore that it is not all the time unless you build for it, but instead ask what Shield defense pays for its situational buff of the same amount via Against All Odds. True, AAO bonus fluctuates depending on the number of nearby enemies so perma-Rage would be better when facing a solo Boss or AV. Even so, AAO is far better than Build Up in any situation where you have a crowd--situations Tankers and Brutes tend to be in. If AAO does not need a penalty then the point of comparison is not Build Up but AAO, and whatever penalty there is should be in line with (and preferably reflective of) the qualitative differences in situations where Rage is better than AAO. As example (not arguing this as a solution, just trying to give a sense of scale) since Super Strength mostly consists of single target attacks--something people arguing for the need of a penalty seem not to consider--how about the bonus damage gets divided by the number of targets be affected by a power? So Jab, Punch, Harmaker, et al would still get the full bonus. Foot Stomp and other area powers would still do bonus damage to each target but the bonus would drop--hit 5 targets and they each take 16% bonus damage.

DM provides goodies Shield does not have on its own--endurance recovery and healing--on top of augmenting what Shield does bring--damage boost. It is a marriage practically ordained in the heavens. Other primaries are going to struggle to match it I would imagine. Tradeoff being DM is not known for its AoE (but Shield helps there, so again a good marriage of powersets). Yes, I am familiar with DM's toolkit, I was more curious about how Soul Drain stacks up against other primary's +dmg gimmicks. And then possibly build around a slightly more AoE-centric primary while sacrificing little +dmg. An example would be Elec/SD. While the AoE potential is substantially higher, the ST is a very real issue aside from just farming. So what other primaries bring similar +dmg to the table as DM, but offer a bit more AoE, while not going too far in the other direction like Elec. I have some reservations regarding the strength of the combo (see final comment), but Psionic Melee has a (relatively) fast cycling AoE in its top power--Mass Levitate, and while it is not strictly an AoE in the normal sense, Greater Psi Blade hits up to 5 targets in a 7' radius. However there is no healing or endurance recovery in the set.

DM provides goodies Shield does not have on its own--endurance recovery and healing--on top of augmenting what Shield does bring--damage boost. It is a marriage practically ordained in the heavens. Other primaries are going to struggle to match it I would imagine. Tradeoff being DM is not known for its AoE (but Shield helps there, so again a good marriage of powersets).

I had thought about saying the exact same thing in my previous post since I had to repeat myself. But you know, the day is too short and it is no skin off my back if you think Savage Melee is underperforming. You're entitled to your opinion. I know I asked a guy I grouped with this morning who uses the powerset what he thought of it (he was level 26 FWIW) and he said he was quite enjoying it. But not everyone will and you're one of those. Easy solution, drop the character and move on.

Started a Rad/Shield Friday. Just got him to 25 as I type this (got a dozen other characters, so been playing him as I need a break). There are upsides and downsides. It is nice dashing into a group with Irradiated Ground running, popping Fusion to guarantee contamination, then going to town with the boost to damage from Against All Odds impacting both the direct damage you deal and the spillover damage. Groups melt quickly and if you time your Radiation Siphon properly you can walk away with a goodly chunk of health. Downside is you have no endurance recovery tools to speak of and your heal requires a contaminated target (hitting isn't too bad if you slotted Irradiated Ground for Defense Debuff). Will definitely be eyeing Body Mastery come level 35. While I do have a Rad/Fire Brute, I am surprised to see it being called, "...the hawt one." I have not seen many of those about. Spines/Fire I see all the time. (And Rad/Fire is an endurance bottomless pit of consumption. Love it, but think it is going to require IOs to work out well in the end.)

No. We're talking about Savage Melee, not Bio. What you're saying isn't about Savage at all. Like I said before, my Elec/Bio Stalker does the same thing your SM/Bio Scrapper does with slotting so the common element here is Bio, not Savage. It seemed you were saying you had to slot endurance reduction. But Savage Melee also applies a DoT on all of its attacks. Knockdown is nice but it does not shorten how long you have to swing on something to put it down. Control is nice but you do not control something to death, you apply damage to it to defeat it. Extra damage is worth something. Savage Melee again also expends its Blood Frenzy for a long lasting DoT or massive boost to AoE damage depending on which spender you use. Claws does not. And does Dual Blades cost more to use than Claws? If so then by your criteria above Dual Blades is lacking.

The way I monitor the bonuses is I just have Recharge bonus and Global Endurance Discount as attributes I monitor. Perhaps the set is bugged and isn't giving the proper amounts of bonuses for Brute. I had completely forgotten about being able to get number that way. Given they are continuously being updated, I would suspect them to be accurate and the info off the buff symbols to be suspect. Certainly it seemed that each stack of Blood Frenzy did indeed increase the Recharge bonus (and Endurance discount as well). Right, I know that. I'm more trying to get you in the mindset of why we're comparing sets in a certain way. Fire's niche is clean, less resisted, unassisted DPS and is a sort of benchmark. Claws is kind of similar in that it's a benchmark for efficiency. It's mostly quick animations with a reduced cost for its skills. What I'm trying to nail down is where Savage falls in in there with regards to efficiency, effectiveness, speed and damage (that's all it has besides a ranged teleport). Either that or maybe discover the hidden secrets of Savage that I'm not experiencing. Let's take for now that one can indeed stack up to 20% Recharge and 30% Endurance discount. My gut suggests to me that you still want to periodically drop your stacks for the benefit they provide to dealing damage, so you are not going to stay at that value. Given an action to drop stacks and multiple actions to build, I am going to consider that on average you are looking at a 10% Recharge bonus and 15% Endurance discount from the Blood Frenzy mechanic across your fights of any real duration. Couple with the bleeds and the periodic attack modifications. . .Do you think that is not enough for a powerset? But I'm not saving slots! I still have to slot endurance reduction on my attacks to get by. That's one of the things annoying me in the back of my mind: I should be 2 slotting for accuracy, not needing to slot for endurance reduction at all. I have no slots dedicated to endurance reduction on my attacks on the SM/Bio scrapper. Presumably the only difference between your Bio Armor usage and mine are the primaries--mine being Savage Melee. Does that not point to a benefit the set is giving?

I was making a comparison to sets that are fast and have extra mitigation utility. I'm trying to find why Savage doesn't have them. That is why I made this thread, I'm trying to figure out what niche the set fits into (not talking about concept-wise) and how the set stands out. I'm not here trying to shit on your heroes, I'm asking if the set can be improved lol The real problem in saying what niche Savage Melee occupies is the difficulty in getting numbers at this point. Detailed info on Blood Frenzy suggests it grants 4% Recharge and 6% reduction in endurance costs to anything you do. But a mouseover of multiple stacks shows the Recharge at the same 4% and 51% reduction to endurance costs (which I can see no way of getting to with 5 stacks starting from 1 stack granting 6% as additively you'd expect 30% and muliplicatively you'd expect 26.6%). I suppose if I don't mind lots of trips to the hospital and the experience debt that would need to be paid off I could do some testing (though waiting to 50 might be more palatable). I believe a design goal is for Fire, on any AT, to be the top damage dealer with damage being all Fire brings to the table. I would not expect any set to threaten Fire's position for top damage. Btw, Radiation's ability to spread damage it contingent upon hitting a contaminated target. A lot of times (at least at lower levels or when dealing with groups) by the time you get a target contaminated it dies before you can hit it again. Its a somewhat fickle mechanism short of using Fusion to guarantee your hits contaminate. Why not? That was one of my initial observations of the set in that Blood Frenzy gives you minor endurance and recharge bonuses. My observation comes from using a set that has no endurance management early on (Electric Armor) and has a need to reduce endurance costs. I'd say take a look at the build I posted and tell me what is wrong. I'm saying that even with Savage's Blood Frenzy discounting my endurance and stacking the 20% recharge bonus with the 20% recharge bonus of Lightning Reflexes, I still had management issues killing resistant foes without running out of END first and against larger sets of mobs, I wasn't killing before they chipped a chunk of my health off. In many situations, expending blood frenzy felt harmful for lack of return and if you become exhausted, you are required to manage it either via Blood Thirst or just not utilize max blood stacks in the first place. My criticism of that particular mechanic is, is it a feature you're meant to capitalize on (think Radiation Melee's contamination gimmick) or a limiting factor to balance a strong boon the set has (think Titan Weapons' momentum)? Or is it neither? Both? Am I using the mechanic wrong? I admit I am curious why you have not three slotted your attacks for damage (slots which could have come from ones allocated to Jump Kick and Leap Attack--two attacks which do not seem necessary to have given they do not help build Blood Frenzy and using them burns time during the life of a Blood Frenzy stack). That's the nature of the powerset system though (talking about how the character will eventually work out), but I'm specifically looking for tricks and tips for the set, it's areas of expertise, what to pair it with and what to not pair it with, or how to make the set better. For example, Dark melee: it's niche is being mainly a damage type that isn't commonly resisted and doesn't have many AoEs but it can bolster your attack to a ridiculous degree via Soul Drain and it's single target damage is fast and effective. Couple it with a defense set and the heal will make it easier when you take shots and paired with a resist set, Touch of Fear and the set's -ToHit can make you near untouchable to a few targets. I'm here to state my experiences that the endurance discount of Savage is moderately small whose impact is more felt when you use up your blood frenzy rather than when you are rocking with max stacks. The recharge bonus I could see being useful for clicky armor sets though...still doesn't make up for the fact that the exhaustion mechanic is bad and doesn't pay off for the effects you gain from using the skills. lol I'm not looking for a specific result. I'm asking what sells this set. Why would you pick this set instead of Claws? What does this set do that other sets don't or not as well? What tradeoffs does this set make to do what it does? Aesthetics? Claws never appealed to me as there are not that many clawed superheroes running about and most famous one is kinda known for a less than totally heroic approach to dealing with bad guys (cool though he is). Mechanically, does Claws build stacks toward extra damage or range on any of its attacks? You tell me. Do you feel the set does good damage? How useful has the set's utility been to you? As I noted, its been working for me. As noted, that might be because I am going it on a Scrapper and/or using Bio Armor to back it. I was enjoying the set before Savage Leap. Savage Leap is certainly a wonderful gain but I would seriously doubt it makes things so good that all your problems with the powerset will vanish. It (and its eqiuvalent--Inexhaustible for everyone else) is certainly nice though you figure that the slots you save on slotting endurance reduction in attack powers is consumed by the slots you stick in it (for health and endurance). Of course it is totally worth it.

Sonic not a good solo set? Use your area sleep, casually walk up and Fulcrum Shift and Siphon Power, step back, Howl, Sleep them again. Move into group and Dreadful Wail. If anything is alive, Transference yourself back to full endurance and then finish it off. That sounds so slow and tedious compared to fire. Run up, fulcrum shift, aim, inferno. But fair enough, I don't think Sonic is a good solo set compared to some others would have been a better statement. Sleeping things dont get to apply controls to you. You can of course play like you indicate. Handily Sonic gives you that choice.

I did not say the attacks were faster than ALL other powersets, I said than other powersets. I have a Rad/Fire Brute and I can assure you there is a day/night difference in how fast attacks occur. Upside of fast attacks is that if you miss on one, another attack is coming soon. Its consistent damage vs slower attacks where if you miss. . .its a while before the next one goes off (though on balance, big slow hits give a ponderous, inexorable feel to dealing damage). I am not sure it is fair to criticize the set for lack of controls when its perk is minor DoTs all over the place. Endurance savings via Blood Frenzy, bonus damage via DoTs and expenditure of Blood Frenzy. . .adding controls would seem to be overbalancing. I find myself more often in Offensive or Defensive Adaptation than Efficient but some of that is influenced by the nature of the primary it is paired with. Another difference in experience comes down I suspect to the Fury mechanic. As a scrapper, my character starts at his max damage output whereas you need to work up to it. I told someone that it floats in the back of my head that SM/Bio might perform better on a Brute given you could sustain attacks/being attacked long enough to build up sufficient Fury. I have played and am playing a DM/Electric Brute (both my Brutes are at level 34) and I like it as an armor set quite a bit (particularly paired with Dark Melee). I can see its benefit to SM as it grants both a heal and endurance regain. Sadly it does not also boost damage output like Shield or Fire. Even so, a bit of perma-Hasten and slotting up Energize and Power Sink, and I suspect you will have a pretty decent solo character. The question is what type of damage are you expecting Savage Melee to output. The following is from attacking a small group of +1/+2 Crey and Freakshow while in Efficient Adaptation. Against a trio of +2 Crey in Offensive Adaptation: Maybe our damage expectation are different?

If its damage is lower to make up for debuffing resist and debuffing resists increases its damage...how is it worse off than other sets?

Sonic not a good solo set? Use your area sleep, casually walk up and Fulcrum Shift and Siphon Power, step back, Howl, Sleep them again. Move into group and Dreadful Wail. If anything is alive, Transference yourself back to full endurance and then finish it off.

I am quite satisfied with how it works on my Savage Melee/Bio Armor scrapper. Not sure why the Brute experience would be so poor. If the individual hits are smaller than with other powersets, they come noticably faster than with other powersets. I am not experiencing any lack of capability in putting opponents down timewise.

SS has good amount of crowd control along with being a relative easy to go by set. It's simple and the animations/feedback feel good and impactful. Stone Melee has comparable controls, better damage (ignoring Rage), and greater chance at its controls occurring.

This is one that should. I'll explain further below. See my earlier post in this thread about existing comic book characters that are super strong. Yes they do exist, and no they're not "Tankers" or "Brutes". If you're still not convinced, we can talk about how Scrappers somehow have Titan Weapons. Now I've been playing Super Strength for years, and I've seen 3 camps - Camp 1 - INV/SS Tankers: They don't care much about the defense debuff as much as others because they have a resistance-based primary. They also don't care about the damage debuff very much because they're tanks. Camp 2 - SS/FA Brutes: Mostly farmers. Enough said. Camp 3 - Super Strength fans that want to feel super strong and punch things instead of using weapons or elemental powers. This is why we need powerset proliferation of Super Strength for Scrappers. Replace Rage with Build Up and be done with it. Comic book scrappers include such characters as Wolverine, Daredevil, Wildcat, Timberwolf, etc. Many are stronger than average, some stronger than human, but I have a hard time thinking of any that are in the juggling boulders, lifting tanks category. They are exceptionally strong, not super strong.

What is the purpose and perk of Super Strength if it has Build Up just like every other melee attack set? Because, maybe, it should be handled like any other melee attack set? Pretty sure any other set would love to have a perma build-up running, while they just sit with their 10 second one. Every other set does something no other set does. Why should Super Strength not get it's own special thing? You dodged the question with your, "I'm sure any other set..." reply. How about answering the question?

What is the purpose and perk of Super Strength if it has Build Up just like every other melee attack set? As for proliferation, not every set should be proliferated. There should be reasons to choose one AT over another. For that matter, it's not even thematic for scrappers to have super strength.

Why not just make it an Accuracy debuff for the duration of the endurance/damage debuff? The concept of the crash is you're too tired to do anything. This means your attacks are weak and listless (inaccurate). Note, this addresses using temporary powers as they too would be inaccurate.

Another difference would be in the Leadership pool powers, with Defenders having stronger effects.

I am not advocating here, but rather giving another data point for your consideration.... Since you are looking at TW and hasten, Beta Decay in Radiation Armor grants recharge based on the number of nearby foes. At max value that should be enought to roughly equal an SO Recharge enhancement. Moreover it also debuffs foe's defense and to-hit--you are more likely to hit them and they are less likely to hit you. You won't see hits as big as with Bio in Offensive Adaptation but you will cycle your powers faster and be able to take on larger groups.

Damage Cap explained.