Olly

Ok, so to consolidate the comments on this thread. Because of the 3PPM proc rate, the proposed ideal slotting scenario for the Crit Strikes Scrapper ATO is: In a power right before 1-2 "hard hitters" to take advantage of the 3.25 seconds critical strikes window. This gives the hard hitters +50% to hit crit chance per successful proc. (2 stacks = 100%+crit chance) In a power in a dps chain that has a chance to proc 2-3 times, for a double or triple stack. Note this means the time between the last ATO proc in the current chain and the first ATO proc for the next dps attack chain sequence should optimally be 18 seconds or slightly more. This is calculated for single-target attack ATO placement, but works as a nice rule of thumb for other attacks. So, say, given a simple attack chain: GC -> GC -> Wait -> DA -> GD Chain = 10 sec total time and GD is a hard hitter: Power Activation Recharge Act+Rx Gamblers Cut .67 sec 3 3.67 Gamblers Cut .67 3 3.67 Wait* 5.5 Divine Avalanche 1.33 3 4.33 Golden Dragon 1.83 10 11.83 TOTAL: 10 sec 20.5 sec Holding all else equal, the ideal slot placement is on DA. It will have a chance to proc; as well as affect 3 attacks: GD, GC, and GC. Please correct if logic is wrong. * Waiting for GD to recharge. Not an ideal in-game chain!

Isn't it actually following the same rules as the other proc IO's? So that optimal is to slot it in a power that is used every 10 seconds or so? I'd say @Bopperwould probably be the expert on this, I personally am not sure.

I had a fun time testing this on a "tried and true" build -- localman's ill/rad perma-pa (Phantom Army with less than 60 secs recharge) with 213.75% recharge rate, PA at 58.67 sec recharge. Test #1 conditions: Max generations, max iterations. No enhancements slotted, 100pts to Recharge rate. Result #1: 212% recharge (1% less than localman's), and lesser resistances. Test #2 conditions: 125 generations, 17 iterations. Used slotted results for Test #1. 100 pts to recharge, 10 pts to smashing resistance. Result #2: ~233% (?) recharge, and better resists. With a little tweaking, I was able to get Perma-PA to about 56 seconds, or 2 seconds less than orignal. The biggest tweaks I had to make was to add more Luck of the Gambler 7.5% enhs. Somehow, powers with 1-slot available were being filled with generic IO's instead of LotG. I also suspect setting another constraint "minimum" forced a better solution (it was likely falling into a local optimal recharge rate that setting an additional constraint kicked it out of). I haven't tested the build on test, but darn that was fun. Really cool work here. Ofc it's not an "I win" button, but it does help a lot to help me re-think some cemented notions such as health slotting, stam, etc. Soon I will test the build for playstyle!

I make it a point to use Tray 1, slot 10 for travel powers across all alts. Then I bind button4 to powexec_slot 10. I do the same thing to slot 9 for related powers like CJ. I'm lazy so I have sprint on a separate slot and manually toggle it on whenever I feel like it.

Any toon, just depends which diff settings you pick Titan/Bio scrapper, ill/(rad/storm/traps) controller, i read doms (psy/dark? dark/mind?) and sents (rad/fire) as well, but never tried. Blasters all the way Fire/ice corruptor, dark/* doms, any debuffers (beam, sonic, rad?) dps-minded defender, or my blaster in the glass cannon build

Blaster are definitely balancing on the fine line between death and destruction, more so than scrappers. For level 50, I have two */fire builds, and two scrapper builds. In the old times, I also had a decked out peacebringer perma light form tri-form; which seemed to play somewhere between the two. With the new incarnates and event sets (winter's blast +def), my blasters can hit ~42% S/L defense without insps and with incarnates and insps, can hold their own solo killing the nictus fragments in a +4 ITF. Damage reduction in the form of knockdowns and slows (bonfire w/ kb:kb IO, rain of fire -type powers). But yeah, you definitely need to be more careful about which powers to pick, as well as spend a lot more influence to be as survivable when compared to a scrapper. On the upside, having that nuke, man! Definitely not my go-to if I want to solo AV's at +3/+4. But definitely my go-to if I want to speed run and farm merits solo. But I'm confident my blasters could solo +3/*8, just haven't tried. My blasters can run the fire (or is it S/L?) farms at +4/*8 and survive -- it just takes longer than a brute would. I love my blasters on a team, and my scraps solo. Particularly satisfying on teams is hitting a straggler running away, and the nukes(!). And if there's some AT gathering mobs together for me to nuke. Even better, when there's also an AT that nudges my recharge to the "nuke every mob" zone of play (it's usually around 35 seconds, just a tad short). It will take a lot to face plant skilled and/or well kitted blasters. That being said, most people don't play blasters that way, which is probably why you see more blasters faceplant. But in i25, all the tools are there to keep them from doing so, especially in teams. Tho I think for speed running level 50 TFs, either all-corr or dom (or troller even) teams would win the AT race.

Scrapper's Strike ATOs offers 5% S/L & melee defense when 3-slotted. So... I split it into two separate powers for 10% def. Kinetic combat +3.75% def on Boxing (mule only) and the Vorpal incarnate offers 30% defense when on. EDIT: WRONG AT, SORRY. TW is soooo slow to attack that building around an optimum (recharge rate, dps) attack chain seems to make the most sense. At least how I feel when I play it. Also, I use mine for solo efforts, not teams. Ageless is my lore of choice over barrier.

Well done!!

I pondered this myself. My gut agrees TW/Bio is a a DPS outlier, but where I ended up was somewhere else. I think balancing would need to revolve around damage, -res, and defense% numbers. That is, the arbitrary 350 DPS calculation needs to take into effect the other buff/debuff bonuses each set inherently gets. I'm following a thread on the Blaster forum and someone has done every tf with an ill/rad. Ill/rad has long been known as king of AV/GM killing, but they do so because their effective defense (Perma PA zero chance tohit, essentially) and -res are outliers.

I approach gameplay a little differently. I rarely use my titan/bio for teams. It's my "solo semi-hardcore mode" build. I don't use TW/bio in teams because, what's the point of murdering mobs all by yourself, *when you're in a team*? (speed ITF's not included) My favorite to play when teaming is either defender or blaster. I actually find TW/bio far too slow with the dps on teams, especially if a blaster is around. It is kind of sad that scrapper feels a little out of place in teams now, but that's a different can of worms. I still have loads of fun looking for new builds to try. Currently for solo efforts now that I know what it takes for all the TF's. I'll probably spend more months to see what else with I can replicate TW/bio's success with, while having fun doing so. I don't find it as "pretend", because it won't be exactly the same playstyle or even success. It might not even be the same mechanics. It's just like when you're in a group and have to adjust playstyle based on group composition..except you're solo. Something to ponder: a lot of builds can hit ~700 DPS solo if they have access to incarnates, temps, and inspirations. In that case, is it still game-breaking? I guess my take on it is that again, do that stuff in solo mode and roll with a team-friendly playstyle or build when you're not solo. And certainly TW/bio is not the only build that can be guilty of "hey look at me I'm awesome".

@Elmyder, have you managed to solo all the Trials & TF's on your ill/rad? Super curious, and might make me want to bring my old one back.

You're gonna hate me but... I did Siege at +4. Also did: Chimera, Shadowhunter, Nightstar, Marauder, Neuron, and Anti-matter. Working my way through the rest via Oro. I didn't take pics of those, tho. Honestly, I think the worst/hardest challenge is no temps/no insps. And that, honestly, I don't think any build can clear the board (solo all TF's and Trials, Level 54 AV's, Apex/TM) with. Especially if you don't have a build with strong inherent -regen powers.

Exemplaring is an exercise in patience, but still doable. And I've posted the STF tactics because I'd like to see other melee builds try it too. (Apex/TM was already done by TW/fire, as noted above.) I do think STF at least should be doable, and I'm curious if new tactics need to be developed -- much like I had to do something different to beat LR because scrappers are melee and not ranged attackers. Unfortunately, it's a very expensive habit, so I'm not really up to investing that much time and influence on another melee build to try myself. I wouldn't cry if TW/bio gets nerfed. Every game nerfs something at some point, people should be used to it by now. All that happens is the next best combo becomes the new FotM. Although, I've always wished they *buffed* everything slightly to make up instead of the lazy nerf-hammer every time. And I don't really know what the point is in nerfing a not-for-profit game.

I rolled two fire/* blasters, and had a fire/kin troller back in the day, so I really wanted to get away from fire.

Wrote this guide up for soloing Statesman's Task Force aka Ms. Liberty's Task Force. It's definitely one of the most challenging solo attempts I tried. Once I figured out the mechanics and buffs I needed, I was able to finally solo the STF/MsLTF task force using a melee, ground-based approach. I’ve focused my detail on the spots that gave me particular trouble. I ran it on the lowest difficulty setting, but because it’s a TF, I don’t think it makes a difference with the boss spawns. For sure I had a level 54 Lord Recluse to contend with. In before the nerf! Text in spoilers, thanks for reading massive wall of text. A. Build notes and mission prep B. Missions 1-3 C. Mission 4 D. Mission 5, up to the four villains E. Mission 5, taking down the towers F. Mission 5, Lord Recluse

Well done! So now we have a scrapper (me), sentinel (Nihilii), and a blaster reporting to have solo'd STF/MsLTF. Your next challenge: Khan =D To be fair, I cheated severely on that one. But I still got it done solo, so.... all's fair in love and solo TF's.

Ok! That is is the best answer for me. I can definitely work with that, and I can see how that works with the Dom AT power sets. Even the "cat & mouse" aspect works.. the skinny, made-fun-of guy who finally (IO'd and lvl 50+) gets to pay back everyone who tortured him when he was weaker.

I think I will pass on redefining what I call mob to 'mobile' which outside of gaming could also be construed as 'cell phone' or relating to physical challenges. I'll stick to using the word "mob" defined as "a large crowd of people, especially one that may become violent or cause trouble". I don't think there's a need to try and make words niche when they don't have to be. To the OP: a very simple alternative is to go into the Options tab and keybind Tab to "target closest enemy". Effectively does the same thing as using a slash command or keybind for /target_enemy_near.

How do you get around Ill/Cold not having a heal? Medicine pool power is so meh and Controller Epics don't have one. Pack a ton of green insps? The other thing that frustrated me with controllers is the lack of a -fly power for Ill/Cold or Ill/Rad. Granted, there's only 1 or 2 AV's this is a problem for, but still...

I haven't tried that. I assume it works because no one else is within LoS of LR.

You don't need a taunt. Otherwise, we wouldn't have AT's that have no access to taunt able to tank him. (scrappers, blasters, etc.) You just need to hit him enough. And I did not have taunt on my scrap whilst I tanked him next to the towers.

I tanked LR on my scrapper. To tank LR, you need a few things: (1) Accuracy -- if you don't hit him, you won't keep his aggro. Ideally you have a toggle attack power. If not, even your fastest attack power will help. Use 1-2 small insps to get past the red tower and give your tank some breathing room. Note that wiping after red tower is down and all repairmen dead, or running away back to the boat, is a fine strategy. Also note you can go back out and grab more insps from the AH/hosp at this point for your tank. (2) Defense -- If you're not kiting him, you need about 70% S/L defense until the red tower is down. Either pop inspirations or get your teammates to up your defense. (3) Some backup blue insps. As someone mentioned, his end drain power can sometimes hit and take 85% of your end away. You want to carry 1-2 blue insps just in case he hits you before red tower is down. Losing aggro can also be caused if the other team members (like a kin healer, for example), target and hit LR while your tank is whiffing. So keep him far enough away from any AOEs being used for the tower while tanking and make sure your tank isn't missing their attacks. With regards to the repairmen, they start to spawn after a tower is 50% damaged. And 1-2 will spawn sporadically after that. You have 2 seconds to kill them before they heal a tower. Either have someone on repairman duty or spam knockdown/flee attacks like bonfire or rain or sleet. Again, you can disengage after each tower. I love (hate) when teams just keep trying to rez and return from the boat to get a tower down. That is almost always a fail tactic. Reset, get your tank the insps to hit their acc & defense numbers, and reset again @ 50% tower health if your tank needs an insps refill. I am a big fan of the tower order: red, yellow, green, with blue optional. Especially for teams with tanks on the ground. If you're kiting, the red isn't as big a deal. I'm also a fan of using the center alcove once all towers are down. If the flier respawns, it won't get aggro if your team is whaling away at LR in the alcove; whereas sometimes even in the corners I've gotten flier aggro on teams. But the alcove is almost a guaranteed no-flier-aggro spot. None of this matters if you have 8 vet level 20 or whatever on your team, but it does matter if your team is short on dps one way or another.

TW/Bio. Liberal use of temp powers and inspirations. Solo'd: - All GM's including Kronos and Jurassik, except Lusca. (Lusca when I get around to it) - ITF +4/x8. Tyvm to the community for helping me crack this one and thus helping me figure out STF & Khan. - ITF MoITF solo - STF (!) - Khan (!!!) - All hero-side trials up to level 50 - All other hero-side TF's except Yin, Numina, and Sara Moore (all on my to-do list) To try: - Apex Trial - Tin Mage Trial Khan was absolutely the worst. Massive abuse of the email system and ultimate insps. But yeah, I got it done solo. STF was also pretty horrific, but nowhere near as trying. I did manage STF without kiting, which I'm quite proud of. I took notes of what I thought were key tactics for STF and Khan. I'll post them at some point.

I have a chat channel solely dedicated to NPC chat. When Aeon says "preparing..." something or other, I run away for about 20 seconds or until Aeon stops glowing purple. It's usually a one-shot if he hits me at that point. I don't re-use the thorn on him, and afterwards, he is still hitable, and I go back to whittling him down. Not sure if that will work for ill/rad, but good luck.

On a side note, has anyone solo'd Khan?