Frozen Burn

I completely disagree. @aethereal explains it really well. Invuln is great on any AT. Some nay-sayers may think otherwise since Scrappers have lower resist caps, but Invuln being a hybrid resist/def set - you can lean more into the defense component for great survivability. All armor sets are better on a Tank - the game is designed that way. But that doesn't mean they are crap for Scrappers. It's been a solid set for Scrappers since day 1 and even through all the changes over the years to its current form.

When I run solo on my scraper... it's usually my Katana/Dark or War Mace/Invuln. ...Both SO good. 🙂

For clarification, because you state it a couple times, I'm not saying to do Fire primary... but Ice primary instead. Regarding Bonfire and the /Fire secondary... I do not know the %proc rate of KD compared to ice slick. I do know the the radius is larger, so more can be affected. And yes, some foes can run fast into / through it between proc pulses or get a lucky proc roll and not fall down, BUT.... Your Hot Feet will also slow them down to keep them in the Bonfire longer and thusly increase the chance for being KD'd. Plus, you have your holds from Ice primary, Ring of Fire from Fire secondary, and/or Char from Fire epic to help keep them in the Bonfire. My build is below. Slotted Bonfire for damage and decent recharge. The power lasts 45 secs and I have it down to 37s recharge (more could be had, down to 24s max, if you wanted). Hot Feet slotted with Sup Avalanche to get max Acc and Damage and really good End redux + a -Res proc Consume slotted for Damage, not Endmod since Cauterizing Aura gives more end than needed. Again, stand in Bonfire with Hot Feet (and -Res proc), Burn, Fire Sword Circle, and Consume - such melty goodness. ST attacks rotated in as well, of course, and their inherent slow also stacks with Hot Feet to keep them in the melting zone longer too. I even use Frost breath - I know many people hate it for the animation, but it's AOE damage and it slows as well. And yes, I'll use a cone in melee to capture a certain slice of the pie I'm in as needed. Then with Ice Primary, again, Blizzard can KD and nuke a second mob, or if you find you're still waiting for Bonfire to recharge, you can stand in the middle of Blizzard and do your PBAOE rotation to quickly dispense the group. By then, Bonfire is recharged and you can open with that again. Ice Storm with the KD proc can usually get a couple foes upon casting and couple more 10s later - I'll use this to aggro a 2nd / 3rd group or to drop it on top of me and my Bonfire melting zone. Frozen Burn - Blaster (Ice Blast - Fire Manipulation).mbd

Understood. You do have to slot for hold duration and the holds are ranged attacks so you can keep bosses / EBs at bay, if needed. And sometimes, even if they are Knocked down, they can still get a hit or two in on you. EBs are less likely to be susceptible to KD. Holds are also useful for negating pesky ranged LTs or Mins that aren't in the immediate PBAOEs to die quickly - yes, they can die in 2-3 hits, but that's also 1-2 hits less on even higher priority targets. 1 hit to hold to them, while you deal with larger immediate threats - like burning down that boss / EB, or the entire mob surrounding you. It's just target selection and putting them on "pause" until you're ready to deal with them. Also, if you're mostly fighting a lot of Romans, yeah, holds are less useful because of their battle cry mez protection, but that's why Ice/Fire/Fire still has an advantage over triple-fire... You can rotate Blizzard and Bonfire every other mob so you're always knocking them down. With triple-fire... you generally have to wait and deal with a mob without Bonfire. Additionally, Ice Patch is a /Ice (secondary) power and it's not as large of a radius as Bonfire. And you also don't get Hot Feet and Burn to go with it. Personally, /Ice is one of the worst blaster secondaries, imo. Ice Patch being the only star, but also does no damage. With Bonfire, you can get your recharge down enough for it overlap (so, multiple ones out at once). You aren't the only one that is biased towards triple-fire builds. People swear by them, and they are good. But having played Ice/Fire/Fire since 2004 and Fire/Fire/Fire.... I still think Ice/Fire/Fire superior overall for survivability and AOE coverage of damage. ....just some more thoughts and I hope you do give it a try sometime. 🙂

Hey! I love Repulsing Torrent more than Burst. First of all, for me... Burst hardly hits anyone around me. I'll be in the middle of a mob, use it, and I'll 2 numbers go off... no misses or anything... it's like the range of the of the power is too short, although it's technically the same as other PBAOEs from other Scrapper sets. It's just frustrating to me. Additionally, the wind up is so long that I feel like the damage output should be much more than it is. So, with the not hitting as many as I would hope on top of this... I generally do not like the power - I want to... but these things make it difficult for me. Repulsing Torrent - I love the KB. I embrace KB. Yes, even on my melee toons. My "W" key works if i need to follow. The KB is also handy when those pesky -def hits start stacking and getting through my SR defenses... knock them back, give my shields a chance to "breathe" and shed off some of the debuff, while I whittle away at the other mobs around around me. It's also useful for getting foes off of squishy defenders, trollers, and such. I do find the damage to be good and it contributes a lot to my damage output. I will always take an AOE, if given the choice (hence me keeping Burst in my build despite my issues with it). 😄 LotG and other Defensive IOs.... I hate the LotG set bonuses - I only use the Def/+Global Rech special from the set. Reactive Defenses gives more HPs than LotG + resists, which I'd rather have than the bit o' regen and acc from LotG. Shield Wall gives even more HPs still. Many don't care about increasing +HPs, but when I can take 1 or 2 more hits and remain standing vs. others lying on the floor vs. giving more time for buffs, heals, absorb/heal proc to fire, powers to recharge, etc... It's worth it, imo. And unless you have powers that enhance +regen (other than Health), like Willpower, Regen, Bio, etc.... slotting for +regen is not really worth it, whereas you get more mileage from +HPs. There are many ways to build and play - which is what makes the game so great. Post your build when you get it done so we can all see what you ended up with. 🙂

I've played triple-fire.... but I still prefer my Ice/Fire/Fire.... You get bonfire (converted to KD), stand in the middle so Hot Feet gets them too, Fire Sword Circle, Burn, Ice Storm - I even slot Consume for Damage as an extra PBAOE... and then you have Blizzard to KD and Nuke an entirely different group AWAY from you + you have 3 holds that you can chain hold 2 bosses or an EB between all your attacks. Survivability is much higher and Damage can be more widespread - or highly focused, if wanted. ....some thoughts to consider. 🙂

Stalkers get this because they are Stalkers - it's their schtick and they are "experts" at assassinations. I do not think the ability to be able to attack and assassinate (even without the increased damage buffs for the initial strike like Stalkers get - should be ported to anyone who has a certain level of invisibility. And the majority of my toons have invis level stealth and I rarely play Stalkers. Just like the Op is okay with stealth breaking when clicking a glowie... which that happens because you're "doing something," the same can be said for us "non-assassins / stalkers" in that you're winding up your punch, slash, stab, blast, shot, whatever - and that movement does alert foes. Also, having pretty much all my characters with invis level stealth and across all ATs, and doing exactly as the Op says in trying to "assassinate" a critical foe first... it is a split second of animation before the hit lands, damage is done, and you generally succeed killing / mezzing / eliminating the target anyway. So, again, I don't see this request as needed, and it takes a bit away from what makes Stalkers so great. It also takes a bit away from the /Ninja sets (blasters, scrappers, and sentinels) that get critical hit damage when striking from stealth. Pool power Stealth, or stealth garnered from means of stacking non-stalker / Ninjitsu powers and Stealth IOs, and through other means - should not have access to buffed "assassination" attempts - imo (even if it's just buffing the timing of the hit with the stealth break - again splitting hairs over a split second of animation). That ability should stay with Stalkers and /Ninjas. ...That being said... I wouldn't argue or cry if it was implemented anyway. 😄

@Epistasis Sorry I missed your ask for builds earlier - just now saw this thread. Here's my build, for what it's worth.... Cobalt Fox - Scrapper (Kinetic Melee).mbd

Sorry, I meant //Mace. There is no Psy epic for blasters, unfortunately. But there should be!! Here is my build.... Librarian Archivist - Blaster (Psychic Blast - Temporal Manipulation).mbd

Additional blasters, which I didn't mention earlier as i was rushing to a work meeting 😄 ..... Energy / Martial / Mace DP / Mental / Mace DP / Ninja / Mace Psy / Temporal / Mace Archery / Tactical Arrow / Force Rad / Atomic / Mace All of these I will solo +4x8, and have a BLAST doing it. 🤣

I've solo'd for decades and farm with my Ice/Fire/Fire Blaster. I'm not even defense capped. But do use inspires, like all good blasters should. Target selection, kiting, 3 holds, heavy AOEs, all make it very survivable.

Base Code: STA-8822 Base Name: Steel Transit Authority Builder: @Frozen Burn Base Leader: @Frozen Burn Shard: Torchbearer Theme: Nature / Roman / Other Special Considerations: Don't have to have fly, but it can be useful. Honestly, it's more fun to run everywhere exploring, but it's also handy to fly to see the magnitude of the whole base - or if you get lost in the hedge maze. 🙂 Basic quick travel functionality with large city and nature areas. Many floating islands with an airport, shipyard with locks, natural parks, hedge maze, temple, casino, dance club, mystical energy, and more. There are hidden areas: 1 under the stairs above the ICON store in the SW corner of main island, 1 below that store, and go ahead and fall down the well in the SE corner of the main island. Base not entirely finished - still working on the "guts" of the base (most can't even find how to access it anyway).

All sets will have other attributes to it other than the main one, like: end reduction and recharge. Damage sets will also have accuracy mixed in as well. When slotting set IOs, you're after the set bonuses as well as the attributes they enhance the power. So, in the case of your Stalker with defensive powers, those powers mostly are toggles, which cost endurance. So, slotting LotG with 4 slots: Def, Def/End, Def/End/Rech, and Def/+global recharge will get your power to the cap of Defense for the power + some end reduction + a little recharge for the power (not really needed, but handy if you get de-toggled) + 7.5% global recharge. Additionally, those 4 LotGs provide +regen, +max HPs, and +Acc. ....or you could slot 3 generic Defense IOs and 1 Endredux (or using SOs) in those 4 slots and get way less over all, even though they enhance the power the for the same Def and End redux. Even in auto Defense powers, it good to slot sets, even though the endredux and recharge are not needed because the set bonuses are what you want. I hope this helps.

Burst of speed can do a decent amount of damage. I like to use a full Winter PBAOE set in it with the KD proc. It's a great opener to other PBAOEs you might have and follow up with your kicks and attack chain. @Ukase Being AR primary, you'll have little use for Burt of Speed since you will mostly want to be at range for your cones. As mentioned above, /MC is better suited to those primaries best for blapping. Earth/MC and Energy/MC are my two faves.

Hi. Mids being a 3rd party resource, no, there is no way - and probably never will be - a method of inserting / importing your Mids build to the game. For me, I make build before even making the character in game. And then as I level up, I allocate slots accordingly to the build and how the character plays - sometimes adjusting Mids to compensate for things I didn't expecrt from playing the character. If your character is already leveled up and and doing a large respec, then yes, you have to have a critical and scrutinous eye to make sure you allocate the right amount of slots to the right powers. I look at the Primary powers on screen, then one-by-one down the column find them in Mids to make sure they each have the right # of slots. Then repeat for the Secondary powers, then Repeat for the Pools / Epics / Inherents. This is what works for me. Another thing you could do is - enable in Mids the "Slot Placement Levels" by going to "View" and click "Show Slot Placement Levels." Then you can allocate slots in the same "level up" order, if you want. But I find the above method easier still. Good luck!

Quite frankly, Energy Mastery as it stands elsewhere is not needed on blasters. They do not need Conserver Power or Physical Perfection due the endurance sustain powers all blasters get. They don't need Focused Accuracy because blasters have access to Aim (other ATs do not). And they don't need Energy Torrent because that's already a power they can get in a blast set. Laser Beam Eyes would be cool to have, but Blaster Mastery sets generally don't give an extra ranged attack like this (albeit some do: Elec, Mu, & Mace - all others do not). If there was to be an Energy Mastery set for Blasters, it would have to have completely different powers. Typically, it would need to consist of: An armor / shield of some sort Sometimes an "unstoppable" type of power or a rez A cone or targeted AOE attack, or a melee attack 1 or 2 mezzes - one single target and/or an AOE A debuff / utility power of some sort Current Energy Mastery doesn't fit into this. Nor are there enough existing "energy" powers from other sets to fill in the mezzes, debuffs, or AOE power slots in the pool without repeating existing energy powers blasters already have access to in their primary and secondary. Certainly the armor and possible "unstoppable" power choices could be a version of Kinetic Field or Dampening Field, and Overload from Energy Armor set. But for the others, there isn't much else that goes thematically-wise without tapping into Kinetics (OP) or Electricity / Force Field which have already been done. New powers would have to be created, imo.

This request makes no sense to me. Slotting up walk would be like having Walk turned off and using inherent Swift without Sprint on... then slot up walk more and it's like turning on Sprint. I see no need for this.

Nope. Not accurate, The AM we defeat in Tina Mac's arc *IS* the Praetorian AM who came to Primal Earth which starts the "invasion." 🙂 And "Anti-Matter" doesn't exist on Primal Earth - the same person, Dr. Raymond Keyes, does and goes by "Positron" on Primal Earth - so any instance you find of "Anti-Matter" is the Praetorian Dr. Raymond Keyes. The Keyes Trial used to award credit for the Dim Warder badge. If it's not now, then it must be a bug.

Simple. Thugs are not gangsters. Thugs are hired hitters to do one's bidding for whatever random reason they want. Gangsters are a club / group / organization of like-minded individuals, who follow a leader in organized crime. Some gangsters can be thugs, but not all thugs can be gangsters. 🙂 But given all that, yeah, it would be cool to have your "thugs" be yakuza, mafia, triad, etc. Hopefully one day, we'll get MM minion alternate skins. But I think it will be a long while as it takes model and animation design to implement - and I've heard the HC devs doesn't have a volunteer animator. 😞

Hi. The ask for Resist and Defense Purple sets, along with a purple Healing set, goes all the way back to when the sets first came out. The Devs have always been adamant about not making these as they would be too overpowered, and I do not see the HC Devs giving in and making them either. We did get PVP versions, though, which help appease the masses. However, if purple resist and def sets were to be put in - I would be fine with it. I am sure they would enhance the same things the current sets enhance: Res/Def, EndRedux, Rech, and then have some sort of +HP, +Absorb, or other such defensive proc. But as @tidge stated, there is no NEED for these. Sure, there's want and desire, but there is no gap that these fill other than completion's sake for OCD people. 😄 However, there is GREAT need for Purple sets to boost Fear and Threat as Tidge stated. We have purples for practically every mez type: Hold, Sleep, Confuse, Immob, Stun - but nothing for Fear and Threat, and Slow too (not really a mez, but it is a status effect). Fear and Threat IO sets are sorely lacking as it is (4 each - 2 low lvl and 2 high) with not really good options. So, adding a Purple set to them is needed. There are already plenty of Resist and Defense sets - and they actually give bonuses better than Purple sets, imo. So - I am fine with these being asked for, and maybe the HC Devs will implement them. I certainly won't argue if they're put in for me to use once in a blue moon. But there is greater need for other purple sets besides Resist and Def.

I Agree with @biostem and would also make an Energy/Energy Blaster. Energy punching and shooting right there. You can solo and be survivable as well.

Welcome back to the game!! 🙂