cfarevival

So. I was doing PI radio missions, when suddenly, after bank, I was forced (I could have autocompleted it, I suppose) to do a mission for "BOSS_NAME" and it was full of cimerorans! My team struggled through the whole time! It was tough. Coincidence?

I love experimenting on possibilities! I have seen fold space utilized amazingly, particularly by toons named Astral Projector and V O I D on indomitable. They are phenomenal tanks. I am currently building and designing a sapper tank (Electric/Ice). I am pleased to note that it works very well thus far! I will be presenting him as a concept toon in the tank forum soon!

Don’t give up! Let me review mine and get it typed up and I will post it within a few days. In the mean time, show me what you got already and I will look at it. Let me know if there is anything you absolutely want to keep on it. Also remember that I am running a toon that is in the high 90s vet level and has all the accolades. It took a lot of work to get him there, but it is a fun toon.

For my toon, I took the resistance, but you really need to look at how you are slotted. If you are at res cap, you only receive the regeneration and status protection bonus so you should take the defense. If you are capped defense, it may be better to take resistance. If neither is capped, I recommend taking resistance AND Diamagentic interface with 100% tohit debuff (which acts like defense). Either one will give you the same regen/status protection. However, for my SD toon, this is my “Oh Crap!” button. It functions to boost my regen and res in the event that I am dealing with enemies (arachnos, Malta, etc) that can put me down over an extended time. That being noted, this power will only work well against several enemies. Soloing an AV will provide little benefit as the buffs are minor but become effective per enemy surrounding you. If you are soloing, take assault hybrid and rebirth radial epiphany (+heal, +regen). Hope this helps!

Agreed, however I do have 1 brute that takes melee (Elec/SD) and it is purely because he functions like a tank. He does a lot of damage but not what he could. However, he is basically unkillable. It is a trade off that I am willing to make just so I can have a toon like that available. Double hit is important for brutes, especially if you are eating reds constantly and staying close to damage cap.

That's sweet! HAHA! Glad to hear there are others!

I do not use mids, as I like to build all my toons from scratch. Some suggestions that I have that should help: You don’t need Cloak of Fear or Soul Transfer. Cloak of fear is less effective at locking down enemies than Oppressive Gloom. It isn’t terrible and if you prefer the fear effect, then don’t take Oppressive Gloom, but I have found that the massive AoE kills baddies affected by fear very quickly, leaving only Lts and Bosses that are not affected. Oppressive gloom does cause the baddies to wander a bit, but rarely far enough to matter. The fact of the matter is that oppressive gloom acts like bonus defense. The enemies simply do not attack you. As far as soul transfer goes, you won’t need a self Rez hardly at all. In the event of an endurance crash, you can use a Rez from the p2w. That event should be exceedingly rare once the toon is completed. In order to try not to be too wordy, I will offer these other suggestions: Pool Powers needed: Speed (Hasten), Fighting (Tough and Weave), Leadership (Manuevers, Assualt, Vengeance), And Leaping (Combat Jumping). Slot all of the defensive toggles with at least one Luck of the Gambler Recharge Proc and 1 LotG Defense. Slot weave with an additional Defense standard IO. For Epic Pool, there are two possibilities that I equally enjoy: Mu Mastery for its two AoE (Electrifying Fences and Ball Lightning) and Pyre Mastery for Melt Armor (Foe -def and -res). However, Energy Mastery is also a consideration if you don’t want to use Incarnates to manage endurance. Superior Conditioning and Physical Perfection will be your go to here. I prefer to avoid Energy Mastery because I don’t want to be boxed in to taking the one power everyone says I should…lol! Incarnates: Alpha: Musculature Core Paragon Judgment: Whatever fits thematically with your toon. Interface: Either Reactive Core Flawless Interface (-res) or Degenerative Flawless Interface (-max HP). If your defense is lacking, take Diamagnetic Core Flawless Interface (100% -to hit debuff) Lore: Whatever fits thematically. Destiny: This is a tough choice. Each T4 has pros and cons. If you are going solo, you need the debuff resistance offered by Ageless Radial Epiphany. If you are teaming and moving very quickly, you need the Recovery offered by Ageless Core Epiphany (unless you have Energy Epic). If your defenses and res are lower than 45/90, you need Barrier Core Epiphany. My recommendation, get them all starting with Ageless Core Epiphany. Swap them out as needed. Hybrid: I always pick Assault Radial Embodiment on Brutes for chance for double hit. However, if you feel like survivability is an issue, pick Melee and choose whichever T4 fills in the gaps of your defense or resistance (not likely). I hope that helps. Toon design and function is my favorite thing about COH. I love making concepts and rolling them. My goal: make the toons fun to play and ignore conventions everyone has agreed upon in order to discover what works for me. These are suggestions, but with so many options available to you, you can go far beyond what I have come up with. I have discovered that Capped resistance is key with brutes. Capped defense is one way to avoid hits, but so is -tohit and locking down baddies. Max damage is nice, but -res, -def and -max hp simulate greater damage. So run some tests and have fun, because the possibilities are endless!

So the extra damage comes from the mechanics found within the attacks. ***EDIT*** There is a global damage boost when obtaining stacks of blood frenzy from the blood thirst power! ***/END EDIT*** Some of the attacks do bonus damage per stack of blood frenzy you have, it is not a global damage boost, as far as I can tell. Fury is a global boost, however. Each stack of fury gives 4% recharge and 6% endurance. So that is a 20% recharge boost at 5 stacks and a 30% endurance reduction at 5 stacks. You need to be in combat and have those two numbers displayed to see the effects, but they are there. Also, just a word of warning: Dark Armor will absolutely become an endurance hog around level 24 and beyond. It will not settle down until about level 50. Be sure to add the +endurance and + recovery procs early on to mitigate this problem. It is a personal preference, really. Scrappers are great, but I love playing brutes. My playstyle synergizes very well with brute mechanics. I am sure I would enjoy scrappers, but since I am in a habit of just jumping into the fray and aggroing multiple groups at a time, I don't find scrappers to be a compelling choice in the survivability department (although they are certainly better than the Corruptors and Dominators that I do the same thing with!). Also, I frequently run my brutes as close to damage cap as possible. I have keybinds to create and eat reds for me. I take assault and musculature for incarnates and I really work to keep their damage high in slotting. That being said, I prefer a mixture of tankiness and damage--and I get that right out of the box with a brute. Of course scrappers can do more damage at times, but they don't have the resistance that brutes have. The chance for criticals with scrappers is great, but brutes can gather and hold aggro far better (they basically have mini gauntlet). Since I run a lot of teams, brute is just the way I usually go when I want a solid melee that can lead. And to be perfectly fair, I have teamed with a fair number of scrappers who seem to survive just fine. I am a little slow to branch out beyond what I have found enjoyable. I JUST got into stalkers a few weeks ago. I am working on mastering a tank build I have designed. Yet, Scrappers won't be far behind. Certainly going to work on them before I try to hit defenders, squids, and VEATS.

I have 3 toons with savage melee. It pairs marvelously well with Dark Armor. My oldest 50 (Nux Aukairo) is a force to be reckoned with when combining Oppressive Gloom, Death Shroud, and Reactive or Degenerative Interface. I also have a fire farmer that is Savage/Fire. He is exceedingly fast and one of the fastest fire farmers I have seen, clearing Big Gotter’s Road Tunnel Farm solo right at about 7.5 minutes at +4/8. I just made some changes to him that I am testing that I believe will allow me to shave 20 seconds off that time. That being said, I think I have mastered Savage Melee. Oddly enough, there are three mechanics going on in a Brute’s Savage that are make or break. The first has already been mentioned: the fury mechanic. Building Fury is so essential to Brute viability that ignoring it will result in erratic and sub-par performance. The second is Blood Frenzy. This mechanic is the heart and soul of Savage Melee and must not be neglected. Stacks of Blood Frenzy will boost your recharge, damage, and reduce endurance consumption. Stacks of blood frenzy also give special abilities to Shred, Hemorrhage, and Rending Flurry. Rending Flurry is the only attack of the three that I take (although I will soon be experimenting with Shred as well on a fourth toon). 5 stacks of blood frenzy make Rending Flurry go from an okay AoE to freaking phenomenal. For a Brute, Blood Thirst automatically grants 5 stacks of Blood Frenzy (the homecoming wiki description of this power for Brutes is completely wrong). Vicious slash also grants two stacks of blood frenzy. The third mechanic that is largely ignored but equally essential for max carnage is found in Savage Leap. This attack’s base damage scales up depending on distance away from the target (as you approach the maximum range of Savage Leap away from the target, the greater the damage). This works in conjunction with the Blood Frenzy Mechanic as well, granting you 1-3 stacks the further you are away when initiating the attack. Combined, you need an attack chain that will give you Blood Frenzy, and the sufficient recharge the make it sustainable. To build Blood Frenzy and incur maximum carnage, I propose this attack chain: Savage Leap (from max range) (+3), Vicious Slash (+2), Rending Flurry (-5), Blood Thirst (+5), Vicious Slash (allows for recharge of next attack), Rending Flurry (-5), attack until exhaustion wears off, jump backward (or TP if you’re up for some clever keybinds), start over. The carnage is beautiful and brutal. Just to make clear, this chain is dependent on recharge, so get it up as high as possible. That’s probably more than you wanted to know, but it is this player’s take after an extensive use of Savage Melee.

This is a Standard tactic when leveling. I always 3 slot hasten with recharge when I get it and respec and dump a slot for 2 +5 recharge IOs. Do you mind copy and pasting the build details? I don’t have Mids but am fairly proficient at creating non conventional builds that are exceedingly successful. Is this primarily a solo or team build?

Thanks, I have chosen Cadiac (endo, res, and fear) duration for this build. But this was information I did not know, so I appreciate it!

I am currently running a Psi/Dark/Soul build with a full set of Gaussian. I appreciate it this info greatly! I have found that this particular build I am making absolutely needs the 6 slot benefit from GSFC. I am super excited about it and can’t wait to finish slotting it to see how he shapes up (I never use mids because I like building characters from scratch).

I have noticed something about myself: only toons that I have spent hours creating costumes, planning power sets, creating bios, and testing make it to 50. I don’t know why, honestly. But it’ll always start the same: I will suddenly get inspired. I will then spend all day (usually at work) daydreaming about it. Then I will go create the costume (which takes me about 4 hours!!). After that, it is the bio, which take about an hour. All of my toons online personas (I don’t even roleplay!) are affected by these factors, especially the bio. For Example, my toon RoidRage always balks at any baddies bigger than he is. CLERIC makes rash combat decisions when facing Recluse or Arachnos (LR killed his wife). Isotope cares about being remembered and dresses up like a radioactive cowboy and self destructs as a gag. Coal, my farmer, woke up from a coma only to find he was getting forced to be a fighter by hero corps. It is an immersive process for me, lol! And as many of my friends can attest, I tend to focus on one toon at a time.

I play a high-level loyalist controller (psi/mind) and a high level blue side controller (plant/poison)—both of whom I have been working on to perfect. I also have an incredibly fun dominator (fire/grav) and a powerful corrupter (Dual Pistols/Time) and am currently building the ultimate control Stalker (Psi/Dark/Soul). That being said, I have an affinity for controlling toons. If you are running radios, any tank or brute is likely going to be able to solo that content. Why even need a team? Because it is faster and more fun that way. When I run teams, there is an array of goals: lowbies want xp, newbies (and vets!) love content, some want to chill and wreck shop, some want to test toons abilities, and some want to solo (WHY DID YOU JOIN MY TEAM!?!?!?!?). For all situations except the last, controllers are the bread and butter that bring it all together. They CONTROL the battlefield. If it was a game of chess, controllers have unilateral permission to move everyone’s pieces to disadvantage the opposing side and nearly guarantee a win to your side. This is more true as the content gets more difficult. I believe the problem is two-fold: 1) People fail to recognize what the controller is actually accomplishing. 2) You lack the ability to time travel and see what-would-have-been-minus-a-troller. This leads to trollers being under appreciated for the massive effect they have on speed and survivability. You haven’t thought this through @Ultimo. If a troller immobilizes a bunch of melee toons, they are sitting ducks. Sure, ranged toons can still fire, but the most powerful combatants in-game can now be totally hampered. Sleep is nice when dealing with too much aggro. An effective troller can see the potential problem and mitigate it instantly. Not to mention the incredible array of other controlling powers powers. My encouragement to you: roll a psi/mind troller and figure him out. Oh! Almost forgot! My friend Monk frequently controls the composition of his teams. Let me tell you! He is mightily good at it. Some of the most powerful teams I have seen and some great strategies. We +4/8 Katie (AV was +7 to us) and it was epic! Perhaps you should consider controlling the composition of your teams…

Brother, of course you would have won if your standards were used. I have entered many of these and always think that I might have a shot. This costume contest I made a toon named BasiIisk that I had spent many hours on. From bio, to power sets, to look—he is everything I could hope for in a good toon (and a freaking blast to play!). He lost. Am I disappointed, not really, because the only person I desire to please and entertain is my own self. If someone comments on my look, that’s great! If no one does, I am pleased with my toon so much that he is likely to become my main (if I can solve his endo problem…lol). On the flip side, I worked equally hard on another toon named EVENT HORlZON. He won indom’s technology contest, beating a friend’s toon KlLLSHOT whom I judged as superior in every way. What’s my point? It is only what we have ALL known all along—from Hami raids, to Bank Missions, to Incarnate Trials, to Costume contests—you win some and you lose some. Winning is a blast! Losing is lame. But I will take a thousand more losses if it means I get to have fun while doing it! So here is a solution for you: host your own CC. Judge it by your standards. Get the whole supergroup on board! Take the problem you are having and do something about it in a constructive way, dude.

What up, dude! I couldn't stand it and finally entered the discussion. <.< >.>

I love procs. Every one of my toons has a few and I am working on a “proc monster” build right now. Thank you, COH, for making it so that I can experiment and have fun with this! However, I hear the concerns many of you are voicing. I have a solution that my be out of place in this particular thread, but may be worthy of your consideration. It will allow those who want to make proc monsters able to do so, it will increase the desire for control toons to be actual control toons, and it will make some of the content more difficult without support toons. Before I begin, you need to ask yourself: are PROCS THEMSELVES (besides the few that need to be reviewed) the problem? Or is the problem ATs being utilized in a way that does not operate in a way the AT was intended? Some of these changes may not seem intuitive at first, but taken as a whole, I think they will give everyone a lot of what they want. 1) Increase the aggro cap, but shorten aggro times as the number of aggro’d baddies increases. This is the first step in solidifying a need for controllers. Or, without nerfing the tank, introduce an “overwhelmed” mechanic that causes tanks to lose hold of the extra Agro beyond what they have already, causing the baddies to turn on the team. 2) Give enemy ranged toons a higher resistance to taunt. There is no reason in the universe an enemy blaster, defender, etc should put themselves within melee range of any toon; giving them heavy resistance to taunt can do just that. TP them into melee for sure, but they shouldn’t willfully run directly next to your tank. Of course, a sufficient amount of taunting should do it, but they need the resistance. Controllers and Doms will have to work to deal with the baddies that are on the fringes of the tank’s range. 3) Decrease the damage away from the epicenter of AoE or multi target attacks away from the epicenter, including proc bombs. This will give greater cause for consideration on self-balancing holds away from extreme damage. Make the average damage the same overall, but give players the need to be choosier about attack placement. 4) Increase all proc attack frequencies but make those numbers subject to diminishing returns. The average damage might be the same across the board, but now proc order and theory crafting will become much more important. Mitigation will also receive higher consideration. Think some these suggestions through. Maybe a good consideration. Maybe trash, but it could be a good solution that won’t break everyone’s toons.

34 here. Been playing since 2005.

We do this very thing during the evenings. Usually around 11pm CST, a group of us gets on and runs missions. We are currently running Goldside content, trying to get to 50 while staying a Praetorian. You are more than welcome to join us. What time are you thinking, if that doesn't work for you?

Oh, I understand that there are people there. And generally, I have experienced the same thing as you. But something else I have experienced is what appears to be a mass exodus from Indom to the other servers. I have asked the question: where is so-and-so, and MOST of the time the response is that they left for Everlasting. Seems strange to me. I am pretty loyal, so I am sticking with Indom, but just trying to figure out why many are leaving.

I have been playing since 2019. I chose the Indomitable server at total random, but once I got in there, I never left. Nowadays, it seems, aside from a few players (Monk and team, Killshot, and those on my SG) there are very few people. In fact, it seems like Hami Raids, MSR, and iTrials are about all that goes on there. Not that I am complaining, those things are great, but there is so much more to be done. What can be done about it? I would love to see Indom carrying the numbers Excelsior carries, but that might be a pipe dream. Is there a way to attact more people to the server? Just throwing this out there as a discussion. Thanks!

HAHA! Working now! Thanks so much!

So Yesterday (Before the Server Crash or during?) I opened Island Rum and it began to install and updated version. Once installed, it closed and reopened...with nothing but a small, black screen. If I click on the bottom right corner of the black screen, it closes, but other than that, nada. Here is a screenshot of what I am getting: As you can see, it is very exciting. Anyone have any ideas at all about what is going on? Thanks, Nux