InvaderStych

Wait. I don't even see what I did there? 😄

Can you demonstrate, specifically, how these choices are problematically inferior to the ones available to other ATs? Bearing in mind that Sentinels get the most available EPP/PPP options to choose between.

Glowing Tinfoil Wrench. Got it.

May I recommend Elec/SD? Since it's a solo project you'll get to use AS more often than on a team, and Elec's AS sounds like a rattlesnake during the wind-up. 😉

Lots of good stuff in here. Glad to see the "Betrayal..." series getting so much love. A couple of games I've not seen posted but might have missed: Quoridor - An absolute gem. Picked up the mini version long, long ago on a whim. One of those Easy Learn/Complex Play games. https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/624/quoridor The "We Didn't Playtest...." series. Surrealist Recommended. 😉 https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/31016/we-didnt-playtest-all

2021 and designers are still putting these things in games? I'd rather just install Progress Quest and watch it run. 😛 http://progressquest.com/

Correct me if I am wrong, but wasn't there an event at some point where Brawl gets comic-esque effects and ludicrous amounts of knockback? If am am remembering correctly, and that event swings around again, your project is going to seem like the work of a prescient genius.

This. It doesn't take much to render sending 10-25mil over to a new toon a trival matter. Merits -> Inf is plenty for my purposes, but it is far from the most lucrative. I'll also run SOs while leveling a toon; the number of them slotted does start to taper off after about level 22 though as more unique/global pieces become available, or if I know I'm chasing a specific set for an eventual build. I'll grab the ATO proc pieces early if they are valuable (scrappers!), but the rest depends on how early I decide I want to keep the alt. After a certain point it starts getting into the 1.2-1.5mil mark per upgrade, and that is a bit much. At low levels, if I were not gifting new toons with coin I would probably do things differently. Ballpark estimate? Starting slotting at level 3 or so, I probably dropped about 15mil (maybe 20) fake money units in total on SOs to level 50 on a scrapper with a mix of solo/team/tf play and intermittent use of 2XP buff. When it hit 50, probably about half SOs and half IOs/sets. FWIW: Before the "Upgrade" Button, common IOs were the go-to. The problem is that I find crafting tedious (I know, it's just me, no value judgements, I just don't have the attention span) and searching around for an available common can be frustrating at certain levels. I recall trying to find IOs at 30, and having to settle for 15s as the only ones on market, nothing rare, recharge, acc, etc. SO's are more expensive during leveling, beyond a doubt, but so much less tedious, imo, than dealing with Commons.

DOMi & JD Beck - Jump Sniff

FWIW; This part is a blaster-wide thing. The -Res is Sonic's secondary effect, but all blasters get a rolling dmg buff from attacking, different powers are different +%.

Don't hold your breath. 😄 I can dig it. Honestly, the HC Forums Official Tradition should be to reply to threads that the OP never bothers to read anyway with food related diversions.

Yeah, IG apparently is an extra-special kind of pseudo-pet, and the ATO buff would go to the pet. I was speaking in jest, slightly bitter jest, lol. I say "extra-special" because there are a couple other sort-of-pseudo-pet powers where ATOs work just fine. I don't see why not; it's not like it's a game-breaking request, lol. Seems mechanically possible as well.

The place where we want it that it cannot go is Irradiated Ground. 😄

I prefer to think that this thread is now Officially About All Things Toast. To wit:

Well, not exactly. I never quite landed on build for my Kat/Rad, though I am considering circling back to it for [Reasons]. Here's some of my thoughts on Rad armor from a while a ago; scroll down-thread for some excellent counter-points and a build from another player.

In fairness, Keyes' Disintegration is pretty much auto-death for most anything without outside support or massive self-healing with an immediate dose of GTFO to prevent all other damage than the disintegration effect. It's not as bad as the original version (nerfed during retail), but it's still brutal on those of us with permanent Scrapperlock, lol. On a side note, where are you guys finding Keyes runs? I was just saying the other day in another thread that I've almost never seen them going.

Orbital - The Box, Part 2

Couple things I just noticed: -- That Frozen Blast is supposed to be the Superior version, probably messed that up when moving the sets around. -- Repulsion Field is strictly for solo play. Pretty sure it would be annoying on most teams, besides it is easier to manage range on a team. Double post instead of an edit as I've edited posts with builds in them in the past and it broke the build display, so I'm being lazy and avoiding the need for multiple edits. 😛

Well, I can't speak to munitions personally, but here is a second-draft version of the target build for my Beam/Dev/Force (Hover/Ranged Focus) just to add another style into the mix. There's likely a lot of room for improvement: I like the ancillary bonuses in the 3 sets used in the secondary to get 9.39% of the ranged defense, but it feels like a massive slot cost. I looked into using Thunder-Strikes instead, but the loss of some layering didn't seem worth another ~1% additional defense. Probably overkill on the -KB in BotZ sets, but the AoE defense is interesting, and I freaking hate being knocked. Mag 4 is fine most of the time, but outliers are often >10. It would be nice to shuffle one or two of these slots into other places; another Hami in either TD or TI, or both... Talk me into moving some of those. I go back and forth on Cutting/Piercing Beams. Same sets in either, and both are situational, Cutting is faster and includes debuffs, but Piercing has interesting applications and does big dmg. In general, deciding what to drop out of Beam is the toughest part of the build for me. Smoke Grenade because I was on a TF with another /Dev blaster who was using it to stealth glowies without aggroing the mobs around them. That's some baller utility, and shout-out to that player for the idea. Repulsion Field is interesting. Initially took it as a pre-req, but it's actually effective at staving off swarms. (And HIL-AR-I-OUS on Rikti Monkeys) If I can figure out a single button bind to swap between EvM and RF that could work nicely. Both at the same time is too endurance heavy. Earlier version had a Red Fortune in Weave and 47% Ranged defense, but I think ~44.5% is probably fine and the SW bonuses + LotG are more valuable. I'm not sold on filling up with -Res procs on this one. I do have the one in there, but I might replace it. Any BR vets want to chime in on the topic? I can't tell which of the Res Uniques is more valuable. Aegis in there for now, but was Unbreakable +HP previously. Thoughts on which is best for blasters? Doesn't lean into Gun Drone as much as the Burnout builds, but at lvl 40 the toon can already overlap them, so having 2 out at a time should work just fine. So, with all that said, here's my "Current, but probably not very good" build. 😄 This Hero build was built using Mids Reborn 3.0.5.6 https://github.com/Reborn-Team/MidsReborn Click this DataLink to open the build! Level 50 Mutation Blaster Primary Power Set: Beam Rifle Secondary Power Set: Devices Power Pool: Flight Power Pool: Speed Power Pool: Fighting Power Pool: Leadership Ancillary Pool: Force Mastery Hero Profile: Level 1: Single Shot -- SprDfnBrr-Acc/Dmg(A), SprDfnBrr-Dmg/Rchg(43), SprDfnBrr-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(43), SprDfnBrr-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(45), SprDfnBrr-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(45), SprDfnBrr-Rchg/+Status Protect(45) Level 1: Toxic Web Grenade -- TraoftheH-Acc/Rchg(A), TraoftheH-EndRdx/Immob(11), TraoftheH-Acc/EndRdx(11), TraoftheH-Immob/Acc(27), TraoftheH-Acc/Immob/Rchg(29), TraoftheH-Dam%(29) Level 2: Caltrops -- PcnoftheT-Acc/Slow(A), PcnoftheT-Dmg/Slow(3), PcnoftheT-Acc/EndRdx(7), PcnoftheT-Rng/Slow(7), PcnoftheT-EndRdx/Rchg/Slow(9), PcnoftheT--Rchg%(9) Level 4: Hover -- BlsoftheZ-Travel(A), BlsoftheZ-Travel/EndRdx(5), BlsoftheZ-ResKB(5), LucoftheG-Def/Rchg+(21) Level 6: Cutting Beam -- FrzBls-Acc/Dmg(A), FrzBls-Dmg/EndRdx(40), FrzBls-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(42), FrzBls-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(42), FrzBls-Dmg/EndRdx/Acc/Rchg(42) Level 8: Disintegrate -- SprWntBit-Acc/Dmg(A), SprWntBit-Dmg/Rchg(36), SprWntBit-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(36), SprWntBit-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(37), SprWntBit-Dmg/EndRdx/Acc/Rchg(37) Level 10: Targeting Drone -- HO:Cyto(A) Level 12: Fly -- BlsoftheZ-Travel(A), BlsoftheZ-Travel/EndRdx(13), BlsoftheZ-ResKB(13), WntGif-ResSlow(48) Level 14: Evasive Maneuvers -- BlsoftheZ-Travel(A), BlsoftheZ-Travel/EndRdx(15), BlsoftheZ-ResKB(15), LucoftheG-Def/Rchg+(46) Level 16: Lancer Shot -- SprBlsWrt-Acc/Dmg(A), SprBlsWrt-Dmg/Rchg(17), SprBlsWrt-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(17), SprBlsWrt-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(19), SprBlsWrt-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(19), SprBlsWrt-Rchg/Dmg%(21) Level 18: Aim -- GssSynFr--Build%(A) Level 20: Field Operative -- PrfShf-EndMod(A), PrfShf-End%(37), Rct-ResDam%(48), LucoftheG-Def/Rchg+(48) Level 22: Penetrating Ray -- Apc-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(A), Apc-Acc/Rchg(23), Apc-Dam%(23), StnoftheM-Acc/Dmg(25), StnoftheM-Dmg/EndRdx(25), StnoftheM-Dam%(27) Level 24: Hasten -- RechRdx-I(A) Level 26: Smoke Grenade -- Acc-I(A) Level 28: Kick -- Empty(A) Level 30: Tough -- Ags-ResDam/EndRdx(A), Ags-Psi/Status(31), GldArm-End/Res(31), GldArm-3defTpProc(31), StdPrt-ResDam/Def+(34) Level 32: Overcharge -- Rgn-Dmg(A), Rgn-Dmg/Rchg(33), Rgn-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(33), Rgn-Acc/Rchg(33), Rgn-Dmg/EndRdx(34), AchHee-ResDeb%(34) Level 35: Weave -- ShlWal-Def(A), ShlWal-Def/EndRdx(36), ShlWal-EndRdx/Rchg(43), ShlWal-Def/EndRdx/Rchg(46), LucoftheG-Def/Rchg+(46) Level 38: Gun Drone -- ExpRnf-Acc/Rchg(A), ExpRnf-Acc/Dmg(39), ExpRnf-Dmg/EndRdx(39), ExpRnf-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(39), ExpRnf-EndRdx/Dmg/Rchg(40), ExpRnf-+Res(Pets)(40) Level 41: Repulsion Field -- EndRdx-I(A) Level 44: Temp Invulnerability -- HO:Ribo(A) Level 47: Maneuvers -- ShlWal-Def/EndRdx(A), ShlWal-ResDam/Re TP(50), LucoftheG-Def/EndRdx(50), LucoftheG-Def/Rchg+(50) Level 49: Tactics -- EndRdx-I(A) Level 1: Defiance Level 1: Brawl -- Empty(A) Level 1: Sprint -- UnbLea-Stlth(A) Level 2: Rest -- Empty(A) Level 1: Swift -- Empty(A) Level 1: Hurdle -- Empty(A) Level 1: Health -- Pnc-Heal/+End(A) Level 1: Stamina -- PrfShf-EndMod(A), PrfShf-End%(3) Level 1: Disintegrating Level 12: Afterburner Level 49: Quick Form ------------ | Copy & Paste this data into Mids Reborn : Hero Designer to view the build | |-------------------------------------------------------------------| |MxDz;1367;651;1302;HEX;| |78DA6593C952135118856FA73B3284C890304F26806090264171A955A8A00255143| |C40AA256D485524A92454E9CAB1CABD0B5170582ACAFC06FA02BA70A5BE8282E2BE| |FDBBCF2162D955C9D77DFA1FCEFDFBDEE95B976A3627EE5D505AF062D62A169363F| |25FB20B95D34B25AB94C92D2AF7AA905F2BDF2467ADC5B49D32C76CEB6672367323| |6B371FBE995BCAE77385923961A5D276A9A80233B95CD61CCF66D20BA56AEF7E2E6| |FDBA9206457CD2CA66BBDA729DB4AD985E24226DF70399F9937C77385793B39EDD5| |BDDD22EDA3F24B86152FC7AF94A154C250318DF481A775D220FDE01D7524F789E66| |9D5CBE453B0ED19D8B142AE8277254B63AEB601CDB7091EDB22B7C1CA1D7217AC92| |D9E95EB2A3EB5F7C9E667C25BF81E146C45AB23E3FFA18FE4DF8EEDF024F6D933BE| |42E783D8CCFE3E654BC81D6B346BE057BDF91EBE07D89AE82275535AABC5106A448| |0075F4007DD6D0670D7D0EB7EB1E3FC4940A724D41C61E67EC71C60E714D29F157C| |BD9D5AE20BF6E957C0E36BC205F82E157E0BCE4D62357D5AFA1EE43790AB177E831| |B4DE65FA3B40DE307BDB92DFC8DE8D26629A86C904D8F251819FC0B6CF6054E6D1C| |C19350F427BE01E03FA696D83E693B8766AED8E5C4A17A5139946671C4EBA46C904| |1C768D8011B745A7A1D2E2B41B39FEEE11383B71863C4B8E829173E47B61487691F| |48BB25FF41AEAF68C83B12BE0D055FD9FAFF248A2FB3899BE3DD43BB94FFE247F81| |FD07E46F705D4A0D70C503114C6143B4414E6BF0BCBBA374552FBE4C7E29937E129| |3641D7C24E82724B171E6C75933621C1E3BC7E930CAA7D77D94294F1D5574389B31| |CAE754695ED4F7EA720DE6FDF84FD93BAA44E06FFFAFA629EE321F77D9EB58B9B3A| |39ACAA7C699143DCEFB3F7C47CE47| |-------------------------------------------------------------------|

Generally speaking, attributes like Mez Protection (magnitude that nullifies the effect if it is less than the protection level) and Mez Resistance (expressed as a percentage that reduces the duration of any mez that gets through "protection") are not enhance-able in the way that Dmg Resistance or Defense are. There might be exceptions to this in Support powersets that I am not familiar with, but in terms of self-defense toggles/clicks, that is almost always the case. Edit: Turns out KB/Acro is one of those exceptions, see below.

The high 90s is possible with substantial over-slotting. Tends mostly tends to happen with dmg and high-end sets. Musculature Core at T4 will push that into the mid 130s tops, if I am remembering the numbers correctly, maybe 140 something in an extreme case. Those partially ignore diminishing returns though; so outside of using the Alpha slot to by-pass ED then Sched A tops out in the 90s, B somewhere in the mid 50s, also requiring substantial over-slotting and also typical in sets when slotting 4-6 pieces. Edit: looks like one can hit 101.3 via 5 slotting VR/Winter sets. There's a lot of tapering off at that point though.

Circling back to this because if this thread isn't going to die then I'm going to repeat something I've already said in response to sentiments similar to the one expressed in the highlighted text above: No one is responsible for meeting the unspoken expectations of any other person. Full Stop. If one is leading a team, then it is incumbent upon them to speak as to the their plans for leading said team. I've been running the Shard TFs this month, and I always explain we will speed where we can, we will use Port tools between missions, and if one cannot survive on their own to rally on my toon as the main pod for the team. Works a treat. As @Ukase deftly pointed out, if someone was on my Dr. Q. and complained about the group not "sticking together" or not "waiting to herd" I would politely ask them to find another team because there's just no time for a 4 hour task force in my life. The bottom line is this: Communication is Key. If a team leader does not speak their expectations, then no one is to blame for having not met them. If someone "With The Star" approaches leadership with silence and insta-kicks, then they are no leader at all.

I haven't messed too much with Fold Space; the AoE tank that leaned into it sort of stalled due to my not being able to get over Rad Melee's animations and it felt sort of slow on the (savage/I forget) scrapper that I tried it on. Leveraging it for Soul Drain is on another level though; that sounds like good times. I have, and will continue, to preach upon the altar of Combat Teleport. It's just too good; any single-button bind (I use a mouse thumb button) to "target." The only time I drop Combat Jumping to keep it is if the toon flies. I've gone so far as to drop Hasten on a Blaster in order to keep it, heresy, I know. 😛 Don't care. It's too good for mobility. Combined with binds to find pesky targets (Sappers, *** of Sorrow, etc) and their basically done for. Click on a teammate in trouble, CT to them and save them from the floor. Double Edit: One of my new favorite tricks, though it works better with Burst of Speed because of the longer range, is to select the team mate who has stealth'd or sped their way forward on the map, then port to their location when within range. Click on a trainer or vendor and *bamf.* Also, it tricks NPCs into *sprinting* after you during rescue/kidnap missions. They'll go casual walking pace normally, but something about CT's 100' range makes them want to sprint to catch you. Edit: It does have its limits. Those who are practiced at jousting might find it more cumbersome. Take Shadow Meld, for example, you can move during it's activation, letting you close into melee while it activates. CT you have to wait until it is done activating before you port into melee. Ditto for anyone really good at nuke-jousting... which I guess less of a thing here in scrapper-ville, but ymmv. One more trick to try: If you can hit it fast enough after taking down Carnies you'll port out of their sapper-patch before it activates on you.

I actually scrapped an alternate costume idea because it wanted some form of graphic on the back of a jacket, *and* picking a graphic on a baseball cap would have been an excellent bonus for that look. Not a big deal, plenty of ways to do plenty of looks. Though if the some form of the this suggestion is technically feasible, seeing it on the "someday roadmap" would be sweet.