nihilii

Can confirm because even though I apparently knew it in 2019, every year I forget, slot multiple ones, then end up having to respec. 🥲

It is unironically inefficient to slot acc/dam/dam/end and end/res/res or end/def/def. It was always inefficient, common knowledge was often wrong back in the day. Toggles have minimal end cost so you're generally better served by sticking that slot in your attacks. It's *doubly* inefficient on an Inv/SS, because Rage gives such a giga boost to your damage enhancement /and/ comes with an endurance crash. So the type of slotting you'd want to go for while leveling is closer to acc/end/end/end/dam/dam or acc/end/end/end/dam/rech in attacks. If you're struggling with end, don't take many poorly slotted attacks, instead stick to fewer attacks that you slot in full. Toggles, I don't know, during leveling all my characters including Tankers are pretty happy with the base slot which frontloads most of the benefit. Extra slots can come later. Extra tools: - get 8 hours of all 3 amplifiers at P2W at lvl 1. Costs 24k inf and can carry you for a while - get the Recovery Serum temp. It's so good it's not even funny - use inspirations as they drop. No need to prepare or even think. Simply using the things is such a large performance boost at low levels, regardless what you get I do this and tend to solo +1/8x by the teens, +2/8x by 20s, +3/x8 by 30s. Comparable speed to my scrappers because the increased AOE caps and radii do a lot of heavy lifting on these reputations, and the extra leeway afforded by greater survivability does the rest. Yet another Rage-related specific, /SS is a very special beast. It has 3 good native attacks but mostly by virtue of damage buffing you really are getting so much more out of alternate picks than anyone else would do. Super Strength with just Foot Stomp and no Hasten can take some time to clear out crowds. Super Strength with FS + Dark Oblit or Fireball, damage procs in both (which are affordable even while leveling, in AOEs these tend to run for 1M to 3M a piece)... You're now looking at a completely different beast, three times the damage output. Inv/ brings nothing offensively save for the +tohit; which is almost useless for /SS because Rage also gives huge +tohit. Inv/ relies on some +def but Rage crashes nuke defense. Unstoppable is a decent buffer but most casual players will not enjoy the T9 playstyle. Overall Inv/SS is a combo with fairly poor mechanical synergy and yet such obvious theme I consider it the ultimate "noob trap". I'd wager 90% of complaints about Tanker performance are tied to it. You really have to lean into non-Superman thematic choices here if you want to make it perform adequately. It is what it is.

The rez does not require a tohitroll. If you're completely overkill on endurance it may be worth just doing nothing. But if you don't, the rez may very well nuke your toggles and even cause a wipe in otherwise weakened teams. Simple heuristic: if you're confident, enjoy the double XP. If you're not, hop away.

I kill Singularities all the time with characters that have 7ft range attacks maximum (and lack repel protection). As far as I can tell, their Repel doesn't work if you're right up in their face. Or maybe they don't activate it there? If you're further away and get caught in it, there's nonetheless enough lag between each "pulse" you get the chance to close in and hit once. I won't claim to understand the mechanics, but empirically, it's doable.

/bio is slightly stronger (because it's one of the most powerful armor sets) but /rad is no slouch either. Seconding "can't go wrong with either". The two pieces of generic advice I'd give for your situation: - defense is broken good in this game, always. Even if you pick resistance/regeneration sets, you will get more mileage out of chasing defense bonuses than resistance or regen bonuses. Get the notable uniques like Shield Wall and Reactive Defenses, but beyond that, go all in on defense if you intend to build survivability. - Brutes operate with low base damage and high damage buff (due to Fury). This is largely a reversal from your Blasters, where you most likely picked Musculature Alpha and enjoyed any damage bonuses. On a Brute you might get more bang out of your buck exploring alternate routes. A favorite of mine is Vigor incarnate which pumps your accuracy, endurance and healing/regen all at once. Quite nice for both /bio and /rad, and frees up a lot of space in the build.

Tequila worked today, which let me pinpoint the issue by comparing old settings with new. HC Launcher set my Recharge Timer Location setting to "Center", which is what causes the awkward pulsing. Having it back to "Bottom" removes the pulsing.

Going to second using IOs.

Most AVs are actually rather weak to immobilizes. They fold the same way as regular bosses, even with the purple triangles up. So, 2 applications will do the trick - and if you use your immobilize as part of your attack chain, you will get a double stack with the base duration even against a +4.

I tried that, but disabling Power Tray Animations kills *all* animations. Which is similarly unplayable for me, if in a different way. I need the classic power icon slowly growing so my side vision subconsciously picks up on the rough state of those recharges, but without this new pulsing that was either introduced yesterday or due to a wrong setting on my end.

My only peeve with this is I got a couple bugs and I'm unsure if it's from the new launcher messing my settings or from the new patch. First, power recharge timers were colored for some reason. Took me about 5 seconds of tasting the rainbow to realise this wasn't for me. Thankfully I found an option to turn that off. Second, power recharge timers now make the power "pulse" at certain intervals (10s, 5s, 2s, 1s). This is distracting to the point I logged off unable to cope, and can't find any setting to turn *that* off. I guess I could kill power recharge timers and live it oldschool, but it's a rather convenient feature...

Same issue with Tequila for me.

I'm not sure if this is tied to the last patch or the new launcher, because I had to switch to the new launcher as Tequila doesn't work anymore. (As for why I was still on Tequila, the new launcher was previously bugged for me and wouldn't launch the game no matter what, but worked today). Once a power recharge timer reaches the 10 second mark, the power icon pulses visibly. It does this again at 5 seconds, 2 seconds and 1 second. This feels VERY disconcerting. It grabs my attention to the point of being borderline unplayable. When several powers do this at once, my brain goes mush. Of course, I could just turn off the power recharge timers and play like before... But this is a nice feature, minus this new pulsing. Am I missing a graphic setting to turn only the pulse off? Turning "power animations" off entirely wouldn't do it, I need these.

I have not found a way to make KM work on Tankers. My Elec/KM Tanker is a tragedy of a character. Weak damage, weak survivability. KM is an old flame and I really wanted this to happen. The +RES meshed with -DAM synergy exists on paper (I even went Void Judgement to stack some more), but falls flat in real gameplay. It's rare I find no redeeming feature to love about a powerset combo, especially a melee powerset combo, but this one really was eye-opening in that I could not squeeze any performance out of it.

I multibox, but I would never do so on a team that isn't friends only. It just seems bad mannered. I don't care what other multiboxers do but I think anyone has the right to not want to team with such a setup.

Yes, for sure! I love duos, trios, quartets. At that size it feels like you're closely working with each other's strengthes; and with semi-optimized characters, most of the "tough" tasks are a good challenge. Even though it's happenstance, the game on x8 actually feels designed for 4 friends playing together. IMHO this is the peak experience.