Neiska

I don't use any software. Which I believe is against the terms of use, but don't quote me. I simply load 3 accounts and have the power bars set exactly the same, and alt tab between them. As explained in my original post, my two "box" mm's are on follow, with their own t3 pets as their target. This is so that they can use buffs/heals as their autocast powers instead of haste. The /Time has Heal, and the /Kinetics has Felcrum on autocast. Once all pets are up and buffed, I spend very little time on my "boxes". I simply tab to one, and pop a barrier, or click "all pets follow" and tab back to my EA. I actually spend about 80% of the time "piloting" my /Electric. Bodyguard and pet AI largely takes care of the rest. I would suggest try 2 boxing to begin before taking 3 on. And it honestly isn't that difficult as many tools are already provided in CoH and the MM class itself. As 95% of your damage is done by the pets, you can sit back and let them attack what they want to, and you heal and buff them, instead of using them to kill X target first. The pets will get to them in a minute if you are patient. About the only time I tell pets to kill X target is mostly to get runners/stragglers from the pack. 95% of the time I am in bodyguard mode with all 3 MMs.

Awe, made my morning! Thanks for that. ☺️

Its not just a matter of -regen, its also how much DPS you have with that. And while I have never tried Necro/Time, I don't think it has enough combined ST DPS with the regen debuff it has. I am not saying its impossible or anything, I am just saying I wouldn't expect it to be robots/traps level. And it's hard to say without seeing the actual build and numbers.

I only have limited experience with Necromancy, but I have leveled several /Time MMs. I think you may struggle a bit against AVs and GMs, but that is me musing, mostly to a lack of either focused damage or -regen debuffs. Where it would shine though would be in AoE situations, as you have both +def and heals, with your undead self taps and lich's CC, plus your debuff toggle and AoE slow effect. So if I was doing a Undead/Time, I would focus on the debuffs and additional effects. But /time is a strong secondary, strong enough to match with any pet set really.

Petless mastermind that uses Whips. Or your AT of choice that only uses Boxing, Kick, Crosspunch, Spring Attack. See how good you can make a character that only uses the nonstandard pool attacks.

Demons/EA was one of my most durable characters I have ever had, and I have several fully incarnate tankers and she still is as tough as them. I would ask if you are going for min/maxing or more for fun, or just to try new things out? I noticed you have no /Trick Arrow builds yet, and it was revamped recently so that might be something new? No /Time, Nature, Pain, Poison, Sonic, Radiation, Empathy. For pets, it looks like you have tried everything but Mercs. (not suggesting you do!) So there is nothing really new there. So here are some combinations off the top of my head that might do well. Robots/Time Beast/Nature Necromancy/Radiation Thugs/Pain Demons/Sonic Thugs/Trick Arrow I have never played Poison or Empathy, so I can't really comment on those. Hope this helps. Personally my favorites are Demons/EA, Robots/EA, and Robots/Time,

While I suspect troll, I would like to respond all the same. 1. "Most effective" (Dedicated role) firstly is largely subjective, both within the multiple powerset combinations as well as personal preference. Not all Radiation Tankers will be slotted the same. Nor would all Dark Armors, and so on. This goes for all armor sets, and its's largely give and take. Taking dark for an example, you could focus entirely on resistance values, and suffer with END use, and so on. Moreover, not everyone will enjoy the same slotting, or even have the same purpose/use/difficulty/budget in mind. And heaven forbid, someone does something "just for fun." 2. The OP speaks as if "Dedicated Role" and "Other Roles" are mutually exclusive here. Using their tanker as an example, it is entirely possible to build a tanker that has defense softcap, resistance cap, has good status resistance, good damage, and manages its END well. It need not be Either/Or. I do suspect that the level up process and the budget for a build affects this, as it might be best to focus on one area, but at level cap? Not so! Using the Tanker as an example once again, it is entirely possible to build a scrapper who can tank 90% of the content just as well as a "Dedicated Tank" can, and do more damage in the bargain. Again, this varies with levels, inf spent, and a number of other factors. 3. I have played many MMO's and I would argue that "Dedicated Roles" are virtually nonexistent here. I would suggest the AT control more if you are melee vs ranged, damage vs defensive, CC vs Support, and more. It is the "feel" of the character as you will, and you can even break this down further within each AT powerset combination itself - is it single target damage? Area damage? Damage types? Debuffs such as -regen? How well does it solo? How well does it team? Is it a smooth ride from level 1 all the way to level 50, or is it a late bloomer? How much inf will it take to make it flow? How well would it do if "money was no object"? There are entire scopes and aspects of the game more than "I am Tanker. I am Tough." 4. "Dedicated Roles" largely, aren't even needed here. One need not look further than Tanker Tuesdays where a group made entirely of tankers accomplish tasks. There are even mastermind groups and the like. The trinity of "Tank, Healer, DPS" doesn't exist here. It CAN if people focus on that when making their teams, but you really can put together a team of any possible combinations and make it work. Again, this is personal preference, but it is hardly REQUIRED for nearly any of the activities to enjoy in CoH. 5. And finally, I would argue all this... is a good thing, A grand thing, even. You truly can build your character from nothing - their powers, how they play/perform, their looks, their strengths, their weaknesses. All of this and more.. ..nearly without limit. If I wanted a game with "dedicated classes" where I HAD to play X class a certain way, well, no offense to City of Heroes, its community, or its staff, but there are other games out there aplenty if I wanted that sort of gameplay. 6. Part of the wonderful thing about CoH is the sheer freedom you have with your characters. So much so, that we should begin a community support group for those among our ranks suffering from the dreaded "alt-itis." Meaning people who feel so inspired for whatever reason, to roll character, after character, after character. We have 1000 slots for a reason. And personally, I find that people making such a dizzying array of characters, and are even encouraged to do so within the game world a good thing and a sign of City of Hero's success after its creation, more than a decade after it all began. 7. Anyway, back to the OP. A dedicated role is all fine and well, IF that's how YOU want to play. But make no mistake, CoH has so many layers of combat and mechanics in play, that I have found focusing on one "aspect" of it, only goes so far. Again, taking your tanker as an example, lets say you are focusing entirely on +DEF, to all else. Your defense is higher than anyone elses! You are the Supreme tank, right? Well, no, not really. This will work until the moment you run into enemies with -def debuffs, then suddenly your superior "dedicated role" of betting it all entirely on one thing, falls flat. In such a situation you would suddenly be rely on your resistances, healing, and other forms of sustainability. Le Gasp! Suddenly you, the Dedicated Tank go splat, while that stalker you sneered at happens to have more resistance than you, and finds themselves tanking like a pro. You might scoff, but I have seen it happen. Many times. This exact scenario in fact. In closing, I would highlight that there are many factors on what is good or bad, better or worse, and not everyone is going to agree. This is particularly true during level up and starting out. But we are able to "respec" for a reason, and can even have more than 1 build that you can swap between as you like between activities. With so many other factors against the "Dedicated role" train of thought, I would actually argue against it. But that is my personal preference. Just my opinions on the matter. City of Heroes is very much a "play your way" game, and that's partially why I love it so, and I suspect a great many feel the same. Best wishes to all, dedicated role or not.

Hello you crazy Necros, I had a question. I regularly run 3 box teams of MMs - I have Robots, Demons, and Thugs. I am debating if I want to try a 3 box of Necros, but I am wondering what synergy there might be between them. Robots = Lots, and Lots, of area damage. Stuff just melts if you stack it all. Demons = Stacking resistance buffs, making for some extremely sturdy pets. Its seriously like having a whole taskforce of tankers with you. Thugs = Stacking free leadership toggles, meaning everything is beyond defense caps. I have no great experience with Necromancy, think I leveled one the old fashioned way to 28ish? But from what I have read/heard, they are the debuffers/CC set. So here are my questions, about Necromancy specifically - 1. Do you have any guesses about their target caps? (as in, how many can be affected by Zombie Vomit/Lich Tendrils, so on) 2. What is their damage like? I know its mostly a melee set, but not sure how good/bad they are compared to the other sets. 3. How do they usually favor slotting? Go for the set bonus or do they benefit from damage proc slotting? 4. Do they have any built in buffs? All 3 I have tried so far all have built in features - Robots Bubble Shield, Demons Resistance buffs, Thugs toggles. But unless I missed something, they don't have any built-in features aside from a few -hit things and the liches fear. So do they have higher base stats to compensate, or are they heavily reliant on secondary pairings? I guess my main worry is that in such a high target environment (50-80+ things being fought at once), that possible low target caps on the debuffs/CCs would render them moot, particularly with what looks on paper to be "squishy pets". I power-farm with 3 Mms at a time, fighting 80+ things at once. Might try Necromancy out to give it a whirl, also thinking about beasts possibly as well later on. Thanks bunches!

For my Robot MM I like the Longbow pets. 1. They are thematic, so that's a big plus. 2. They have really good ST damage, which is something the Robots lack, so it compliments the playstyle nicely. Great for AVs/GMs etc. 3. They have an additional -regen debuff, that stacks with my robots debuff. Making a good thing, even better. 4. I sometimes use group fly with robots, they are all ranged so it works great. Well, it turns out group fly also works for longbow robots, as they are completely ranged as well. So longbow are just an all around win for my Robot MMs. For my Demon MMs, I plan on going Banished Pantheon. I use experimented with them before, but not to any great extent. I have heard/read they are the highest DPS pets, but on other ATs they always seemed to die quickly before I could do much with them. I am hoping with my Demon setup they will be more effective. I have also experimented with the Knives of Vengeance, the defensive/buffing sorts. They seemed to have pretty good effect overall and tend to stick around. I am uncertain which pets have the best buffs if people wanted to go that route though.

Another surprisingly tough character I had was my Demons/Electrical MM. The resistance buffs stack, plus +absorb, heals, infinite endurance, strong status resistance built in, plus its not hard to get a hard defense either. It really was everything in one package. Then you have bodyguard on TOP of all of that. Plus since you have infinite endurance and resistance in the set, that lets you take barrier for your incarnate, making your tough pets, even tougher. The damage was fair. I wouldn't call it great, but I wouldn't call it bad either. Tanks can boast def/resistance and status resists, but they cant perform other roles in a group such as a healer or support, offering absorb, endless endurance, and status protection for the whole team. Just saying, if they want a different playstyle with a build that's pretty much immortal that can do decent damage, Demons/Electrical is pretty strong. /Time would be another contender too. I mean you can pretty much go afk with a Demons/EA MM setup. Heal on auto, pets in bodyguard mode, go do dishes.

The point of my post was just to point out that 2 similar posts got closed this week, which I would call it a bit of a charged topic. And, no, I wasn't playing forum police. Going "hey they just closed other topics" isn't forum policing. Reporting, calling attention from the staff and such is. Was just trying to be helpful in light of some rather emotional few day son the forums. Agreed.

@Ironblade - with respect hon, a recent farmer vs anti-farmer discussion was just closed, in case you were unaware. Not trying to play forum police or anything, just saying they just shelved a recent discussion about that.

I had fantastic results with a Shield/Radiation Melee Tanker. Shield is all around good, only weakpoints being a lack of a damage aura and self healing, which Radiation offers. It is also energy damage which is lovely, and has contamination on top of that. Plus its very satisfying to Pop Fusion, Shield Charge, and follow up with Atom Smasher. It has good ST and AoE damage, it just can feel a bit slow when you first start off. But once you get some LotG globals slotted, its a thing of beauty. It hits hard, its survivable/durable enough to go afk with, has built in protection from defense debuffs, it can self heal, has a great damage type, and has both ST and AoE. No real downsides.

I'm capable, you ignore other peoples comments or opinions, as if your own were superior in the matter. You make vague statements, then when someone calls you on them, you claim strawman, when its your own point that gets questioned. You say you want all activities equal, and yet claim you aren't out to penalize people who play more efficiently than others, which in a sense, 100% is affecting their gameplay, despite your protests of "I'm not after your plaything".

Whelp, I foresee this thread getting locked. Just no compromise to be had, its not even a discussion but an argument now.

By "nerfing farms", you are, penalizing farmers. I am not suggesting anything. "You" are the one saying all activities should be equal, regardless activity type, and by extension, other factors such as how many enemies there are, how fast you complete, etc. I mean, if you want to split hairs here, you have to click a Glowie in farms to complete. So in essence, they "are" doing missions too.

orly? Sure about that? If all playstyles are rewarded equally, doesn't that mean harder missions give the same as easy missions? Hard effort vs easy effort = same reward? You exactly are saying that.

Right, you are the one who wants other people penalized for your own decision, and "I'm" the jerk. And no, that is not how "most MMO's" go, that is how single player games usually go. Most games use exactly what we have - the multi-reward system. You get things per kill. You get things for completing tasks. You get things for killing bosses/rare enemies. I mean, lets do a thought experiment here. For arguments sake, lets say they did just as you prescribed and suddenly made it so kills earned you nothing, and that completing tasks is what was rewarded. Do you realize what would happen? First, I suspect a sharp SHARP drop in "players helping players", pretty much immediately. Because you suddenly made resources more of a pain to get. Secondly, it would take much more "effort" to get far "less". Hello stale markets. Third, you can kiss the wide market goodbye. Farmers are likely a main suppliers of such markets. That means less converters, unslotters, catalysts, purple recipies, etc for everyone. Fourth, have you even considered things such as "completing missions 1/day" feature? Fifth, the farmers would figure out which tasks were the most profitable, and speed run those. And in all likely hood, they would do it alone. If you think this change would magically solve the inf/minute ratio across different people and playstyles, I suspect it would only increase it. Possibly dramatically. Because right now, anyone can get "something." Under your system, only certain people would get somethings. Namely those that teamed would be rewarded the most. Which could encourage multi-boxing more, further diluting the pool of players. So yea, that wouldn't pan out like you might think.

Then I am glad you aren't the one in charge, and I very much doubt I am the only one.

Right, lets explore that notion, shall we? You want "all playstyles rewarded equally", I don't think you have fully thought out the full implications of that. But here, lets have a spin at it. Levels - under your argument, a level one will make the SAME inf per kill as a level 50. Hey, fair is fair, right? It doesn't matter that the level 50 needs 1000x more inf than that level 1 does to gear up. Its Fair! Speed - Your rate of kills shouldn't matter either! That would favor bursty high dps classes, how dare they! We have to streamline it 100% for all speeds. Which means you shouldn't earn inf per KILL but per time played. Its the only way! Time - Your time invested in a character shouldn't matter either. Nonono, not at all. Why shouldn't a freshly made level 1 earn the SAME as someone who played their same character for years now, and long ago earned all they needed to gear themselves up? We cant have them earning excess they don't need! That would create a surplus and cause inflation! Team type - Task Forces, Raids, Rando Missions, Street Sweeping? No different activity should matter! Why signup for a task force for any increased reward when you can earn the same just flying around killing random's on the open world maps? Who cares about the higher difficulty or enhancement requirements? That shouldn't matter! All team activites should earn the same rewards! Solo vs team - Why should shy, antisocial, or the introverted be unfairly penalized economically? They will now earn the same inf that they would on a team! Its fair, right? Investment - It shouldn't matter what it COST for you to get where you are now, or what you are capable of. All characters should be the same, economically! Why should a build that cost 800 million infamy be rewarded more than someone who uses IOs 20 items below their level? The inhumanity! Equalize them out I say! Travel time - Why should something like mere "travel" penalize ones earning potential? They should be rewarded for just standing around! Now merely accepting a mission will earn you rewards! Yes. This is how you sound. As much as this has been talked about before, they have already nerfed farms already, to the point where other activities are just as lucrative, others are even more so. And any time one of us farmers point out that playing the market is by FAR the quickest most efficient way to get wealthy, I have yet to hear any single "anti farmer" address or even comment about it. Farming maps can be small. Consistent combat. And quickly repeatable. Sorry if your story mode requires things like travel time, or escorting, or clicking a glowie. Those are the kinds of missions that slow things down. And you would rather penalize people who put in what I would argue, far more time, effort, and money invested into what they have, than you are willing to just accept "hey, they kill more things than I do, faster." Yea, but no. If you want to break it down to the nit and grit, farmers kill more, faster. Its as simple as that. It shouldn't be any shock to anyone that they earn more than the slow-mode methods of play.

And that playstyle is open equally to everyone, others simply choose not to use it, and such is enough to give it the brand of Cain? And you aren't the judge and jury either. Just because you don't use the tools provided, don't push your choice onto others, particularly when it's unwanted. THATS the crux of the argument from where I sit. I care less about the economical aspects than the "I don't like what THEY are doing even though its perfectly allowed", particularly when the argument is defended with economical implications, when there are far more egregious actions with more severe impacts. Don't want to farm? Good for you. Then don't. How about you leave the people who do put in the time, effort, and patience into farming alone?

The advantage of multiboxing MMs is if you plan ahead it allows more freedom. You could 2 box a Ninja/Kin and a Ninja/Time and end up with quite sturdy and high damage pets. You could juggle the Power Boost + Farsight for a lot of Defense, then when that wears off you could pop Barrier to cover the gap in coverage. That would even leave you 1 spare incarnate power to pick, which you could take another Barrier if you didn't want to use the /time trick, or you could take ageless for END management. But I am sure you could pair a ninja/kin with another MM to make the pets touch enough for hardest level difficulty. I started with Robots/EA and Robots/Time myself.

At this point I think it's clear that not everyone is going to agree, as people have different objections or goals. Not everyone is going to like all playstyles either. Personally, I am at the point where I power level more than I farm, mostly to try out new ideas or builds. Inf isn't even really a concern to me anymore. But what does make me perplexed is how the crux of the disagreement here, is how some people are efficient with their play, and that seems to irk other players. Honestly it's starting to feel like a home owners association, with someone measuring my front lawn and going "Hey! That's too much!" when my next door neighbor has a veritable forest, they are worried about my lawn being a quarter inch higher than theirs. When "your boi" over there is planting entire forests. And I am genuinely curious as to where people get their data from. Do people actually have proof that farming does X Y and Z, have access to player numbers? Some sort of secret inner working knowledge or access to the numbers? Or are they going off what they think, feel, or suspect? (Opinions are not facts.) Personally I go off my own experience. I know what I make how fast I make it and how fast I spend. And I have noticed far less farmers now than there were a year ago. (it seems to come and go with playtimes as might be expected, but overall, it just seems lower to me.) Anyway, best wishes to everyone, if you are a fellow farmer or not. Just please be kind to one another, even if you disagree. Its okay to disagree, just please be respectful about it. This community is already small enough.

@I-Dirty - Hello I-Dirty, and welcome back. Rad/Shield would indeed be powerful. Shield is positional, with a fantastic teleport charge attack and the set has built in status things which is nice. The downside to shield is it has no set heal, but Rad melee has siphon in it. It may be strong enough to be your full heal, but even if it isn't, it certainly will save on green pills. Also as a bonus, Rad melee also has a damage aura, one of the best ones in fact. So there is that too. Rad melee itself is well balanced, its got aoe, single target, its energy based, its just a little slow for some. I also recommend joining the discord if you haven't yet, as there are AT channels there for help as well. Also if you were unaware, I would install MIDs to plan your character. And now that you got me thinking, I might make a Rad/Shield Tanker myself.

Well, you may have to start small first and work your way up. Everyone does for their first character, whether its a farmer or not. Since you are a budget build I would try to focus on either DEF or RES first, and get one of those up to par. Either one will work, but I don't think you could do both on a budget, would be an interesting experiment to do though. Either way I doubt you will be able to make a full AFK farmer on a budget either, so you will have to pilot it until you get him geared up. But with any build, persistence is key. I also strongly recommend planning builds in MIDs if you haven't yet. It's difficult for people to point out improvements without seeing your build. But any improvement is better, and you may have to upgrade your IOs 1 at a time, starting with the important stuff first like the unique enhancements and so on, go for the biggest bang for your buck.