cohRock

Curve ball -- he went with Vigor and is at tier 3, partial core revamp. This grants 33% to healing, accuracy, and end reduction. Since he followed the advice of @Frostbiter and slotted the Numina proc in Health and Miracle in Physical Perfection, the Vigor health boost restores the "lost" normal healing enhancements. (He also slotted the pure healing/absorb enhancement from each set, giving a recovery set bonus from one and a regeneration set bonus from the other.) Actually, Vigor covers so many bases it might become my goto Alpha for most other 50s. While it doesn't include any recharge, Poul doesn't really need it. He did not bother with Hasten, and the only really long recharge time he has is on Conserve Power. And unless he is sapped or something, I think that will have become a very situational power anyway. As he incorporates various sets, I'm sure that future sets will add to the 20% recharge he gains from Quickness.

@Nemu thank you. Any reason not to 6-slot, with 3 end mod and 3 healing?

The Atomic Manipulation power Metabolic Acceleration says it will take an endurance reduction enhancement, but the toggle appears to use no endurance. The Info on the power does not show endurance cost. Looking at the character attributes tab (accessed above Powers; not sure of actual name), the endurance usage does not change regardless of whether the toggle is on or not. Is this just a bug, or is there some use to putting an endurance reduction enhancement in it?

Thank you, everyone, for your feedback. The only "extra" he has to help endurance right now is the Atlas Medallion, but he will be getting Portal Jockey and the Numina and Miracle procs, as well as various sets to further help with endurance. That said, I think I will be switching him to Cardiac.

I have an SR/Axe tank (Poul Bunyan) who runs 8 toggles (3 SR shields, Assault, Tactics, Tough, Weave, and Combat Jumping). Endurance is a problem. even with an end reduction in my attacks and toggles (except CJ). My first 50 had similar issues, and he went with Cardiac, essentially adding an end reduc SO to every power that could use it. So I thought with this tank I'd work supply side, and he is at tier 1 Agility. This adds an SO to Stamina and Physical Perfection, which already have 3 SO End Modifications in each. So, at least at tier 1, Agility helps very little. So why don't I just switch him to Cardiac? I may well do that, but I thought I'd get some feedback first. I'm sure Cardiac will be instantly noticeable even at Tier 1, since it would be adding a second SO to my powers, instead of a 4th. But I see at Tier 4 Agility, the end mod buff can be 45%. Does any of that bypass Enhancement Diversification (ED)? Is there a bypass below Tier 4? If not, the main use I see with Agility is allowing you to double slot end mods in Stamina and Physical Perfection, depending on Cardiac to bring them to full power. The other issue is secondary effects. At higher tiers, Agility buffs Defensive shields, while Cardiac buffs Resistance ones. In his build, the only Resistance shield Poul has is Tough, but he has a LOT of Defensive ones. I know that ED will limit the effectiveness of either buff, but I'd rather buff a lot of things a little, rather than one. Also, SR has scaling resists: as your health decreases, you gain resistance to just about everything. I doubt the Cardiac Resistance buff will affect that, but I'd like to be sure. Does it? He is a new 50, and hasn't chosen a Destiny power. My first 50 chose Ageless to further help with endurance issues, as well as some extra recharge and range. I was hoping Poul could check out something besides Ageless, but I'm pretty sure if he sticks with Alpha:Agility, he'll need it. But Destiny:Barrier seems like a great fit for SR, and I'd like to try that. Advice and opinions, anyone? (days later: Poul went with Vigor -- see my post near end of this page.)

@Ironblade, I think your source had it backward. I know for a fact that bio armor was on the Live Test server. I don't know if rad armor was available on Test or not, but I do not remember it. Meet my brute, created August 2012: * Rued Rude Rudy

Not drama. I'm not asking for a change, or even complaining. I was simply bringing up something I view as extraneous, but I don't believe it will ever change. One point I will make is that if a player's vision is not correctable to 20/20, extra dialog and unnecessary choices can be a bit frustrating.

I believe this quality of life "improvement" predates Homecoming. What is the purpose of obviating tailor shops by having trainers be able to change your costume? It wasn't long after they added a shop to Atlas Park that trainers gained this ability. (It might have strangely even been the same issue.) To me it just clutters the trainer's dialogue window with cr*p that has nothing to do with training. That and being able to modify your title is enough. IMO, almost all tailoring should be done in a shop. The one exception I might make is for newbies in Atlas, Mercy, and Nova Praetoria (?). Up to level 10, keep the free tailoring sessions they offer. After that, if you want to update or add another costume, what is the problem of going to one of the shops?

This is best demonstrated during a respec. The process allows you to slot any power in any order, which would make it impossible to somehow backtrack exemplarred stats to match "exactly" what they would have been if you were say, 19, again. I will admit, though, for a long time on Live I believed the backtrack theory. But as Greycat says, it is all or nothing. If you have a power active, you have all of its slots. That said, the enhancements might well be weaker that what you actually have slotted. For example, if you are a level 44 character exemplarred to 19, the enhancements will be about as strong as DOs. You will still have any set bonuses in available powers however, and, I'm pretty sure at their full strength.

@PatriotMusic, I have never heard that slotting order would make a difference. My assumption has always been that the various components are added together, with ED being applied to the sum. I do not know if this assumption is correct, however.

@Frostbiter, Thank you. So it only applies to powers that have slottable resist? As a stoner, that would be Brimstone and Granite Armors, and Stone Skin. I was hoping it would be 20% resist to all powers, but that was probably unrealistic. At least it is still useful to him, unlike, say, an SR tank who doesn't even have any resist. (Well except for the unslottable scaling resist as health goes down, and possibly Tough.)

My stone tank just reached his Alpha tier 4 (Cardiac Core Paragon), which is documented as adding 20% resist to the benefits he had at tier 3. But when I look at the resistance values shown in the Combat Attributes window, it shows no extra resistance. Is this just an oversight in Combat Attributes or do I misunderstand what actually happened? I relogged and rechecked, thinking that maybe the new value had to clock in. It didn't help. Also, the new tier 4 alpha is equipped.

@You, this isn't the one you asked for, but it might still be useful: * Armor & Archetype Cross Reference It compares all of the major armor sets with each archetype that can use them, as level 1 values. It also shows which archetypes can use which armors.

You are welcome. Keep in mind I am referring to base (unslotted) damage. So an attack may do 60 points of damage with no enhancements and 115 when slotted. A 3% bonus would be 1.8 (60 * 3%) more damage, not 3.45 (115 * 3%).

Sets are limited by the same diminishing returns as regular enhancements (aka Enhancement Diversification, or ED). If you look at the elements of a set and add up its various characteristics, you can see that this was taken into account in the design. For example, a set might contain 4 enhancements with damage: damage only damage/accuracy damage/accuracy/endurance damage/recharge/endurance If you add up the damage components of each, you will see that they don't push the ED limits. That all said, set bonuses are fully additive. For example, if a set bonus offers 3% damage, that is a true 3% more base damage to all your attacks, bypassing ED limitations. If an element of the set is a damage proc (5% extra fire damage, for example), that also bypasses ED and adds 5% to the base damage of the power, in this case expressed as fire.

Yes, as an Empath I have felt that. To be a buff-only defender, on a high-level team when buffs are rarely needed, can feel pretty lonely. Other defender sets offer both buffs and debuffs. (Or wait, is Poison debuff only?) That's why I still like playing support characters -- just not Empath ones.

( and @Crimsonpyre ) I believe the reason shards may seem extraneous now is Homecoming "streamlined" the original design, making part of it (the shards) seem confusing. IIRC, shards used to drop in non-incarnate content, while threads and incarnate components would drop only during incarnate content. Shards were the gateway to the new end-game content system. The Homecoming mods seem to have crippled the end-game system. No one seems to be running incarnate missions any more. They'd rather just keep running AE farms or PI scanner missions over and over and over... In making threads drop anywhere, many assume now that shards are close to worthless. That's a silly thought, IMO. You can still use shards to build alpha-slot abilities. Think of them as extra freebies. 1 shard is equal to 5 threads in building components, so their relative rarity makes sense.

@Lex Talion and @srmalloy , thank you for the information. I appreciate learning stuff I didn't know enough to ask about.

If one is trying to get incarnate shards and threads, does mission level make a difference? For example, would a +3*4 mission yield more incarnate salvage than a +1*4 mission?

Probably. Of course he might also exemp below a level where Physical Perfection becomes inactive. 🙂

He is a fairly new character, and has just started slotting sets in the past week. Eventually all the attacks and armors will be slotted with various sets, adding native endReduc to each. With the -65% recharge penalty of Granite armor, he doesn't swing that quickly, even when Hasten is active. Thank you for suggesting the +End procs.

With the addition of level 1 Alpha:Cardiac, here is his current build: Hero Plan by Mids' Reborn : Hero Designer 2.7.2.10 https://github.com/Crytilis/mids-reborn-hero-designer Click this DataLink to open the build! Glowie Me: Level 50 Natural Tanker Primary Power Set: Stone Armor Secondary Power Set: Radiation Melee Power Pool: Fighting Power Pool: Teleportation Power Pool: Leadership Power Pool: Speed Ancillary Pool: Energy Mastery Hero Profile: Level 1: Rock Armor -- GifoftheA-Def/EndRdx(A), GifoftheA-Def/EndRdx/Rchg(13), GifoftheA-Def(13), GifoftheA-Run+(17) Level 1: Contaminated Strike -- Acc-I(A), Dmg-I(3), DefDeb-I(5) Level 2: Earth's Embrace -- RechRdx(A), Heal(3), Heal(5), Heal(21) Level 4: Kick -- Acc(A), Dmg(23), Dmg(40), Dmg(46) Level 6: Stone Skin -- ResDam-I(A), ResDam-I(7), ResDam-I(7) Level 8: Rooted -- EndRdx-I(A), Heal-I(9), Heal-I(9), Heal-I(23) Level 10: Teleport -- EndRdx-I(A), Range-I(31) Level 12: Brimstone Armor -- EndRdx-I(A), ResDam-I(17), ResDam-I(21), ResDam-I(27) Level 14: Taunt -- Acc-I(A) Level 16: Recall Friend -- Range-I(A) Level 18: Mud Pots -- Acc-I(A), EndRdx-I(19), EndRdx-I(19), Dmg-I(37), Dmg-I(39), Dmg-I(40) Level 20: Crystal Armor -- GifoftheA-Def/EndRdx(A), GifoftheA-Def/EndRdx/Rchg(25), GifoftheA-Def(25), GifoftheA-Run+(34) Level 22: Assault -- EndRdx-I(A) Level 24: Tactics -- EndRdx-I(A), ToHit-I(43) Level 26: Minerals -- EndRdx-I(A), DefBuff-I(27), DefBuff-I(40), DefBuff-I(42) Level 28: Irradiated Ground -- Acc-I(A), EndRdx-I(29), Dmg-I(29), DefDeb-I(37) Level 30: Hasten -- RechRdx-I(A), RechRdx-I(31), RechRdx-I(31) Level 32: Granite Armor -- EndRdx-I(A), ResDam-I(33), DefBuff-I(33), ResDam-I(33), DefBuff-I(34), ResDam-I(34) Level 35: Devastating Blow -- Acc-I(A), EndRdx-I(36), Dmg-I(36), Dmg-I(36), Dmg-I(37) Level 38: Conserve Power -- RechRdx-I(A), RechRdx-I(39), RechRdx-I(39) Level 41: Physical Perfection -- EndMod-I(A), Heal-I(42), EndMod-I(42), Heal-I(43), EndMod-I(43), Heal-I(45) Level 44: Atom Smasher -- Arm-Dmg/EndRdx(A), Arm-Dmg(45), Arm-Dmg/Rchg(45), Arm-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(46), Arm-Acc/Rchg(46), Arm-Dam%(48) Level 47: Boxing -- Acc(A), Dmg(48), Dsrnt(48) Level 49: Weave -- GifoftheA-Def/EndRdx(A), GifoftheA-Def/EndRdx/Rchg(50), GifoftheA-Def(50), GifoftheA-Run+(50) Level 2: Swift -- Run-I(A) Level 2: Health -- Heal-I(A), Heal-I(11), Heal-I(15) Level 2: Hurdle -- Jump-I(A) Level 2: Stamina -- EndMod-I(A), EndMod-I(11), EndMod-I(15) Level 1: Brawl -- Acc-I(A) Level 1: Gauntlet Level 1: Prestige Power Slide -- Empty(A) Level 1: Sprint -- Run-I(A) Level 2: Rest -- IntRdx-I(A) Level 4: Ninja Run ------------ If Cardiac and potentially Ageless alleviate the need for Conserve Power and Physical Perfection, I plan to swap them out for Cross Punch, taking full advantage of both a tank's larger area for melee cones as well as maximizing Fighting Synergy.

(also @kiramon ) His build originally did not have Weave. I was remembering my stone tank on Live standing in the shadow shard in Granite armor and Rooted, surrounded by +8 foes and barely getting scratched. Of course he couldn't do much damage to them either. That must have been pre-ED though. On Glowie Me (current stoner) he could do a +4*8 smash/lethal farm (due to the help of the Stone Skin passive resistance being active alongside Granite), but he had to really tone down the level to like +2*6 for Fire or Energy farms. A tanker forum thread suggested adding Weave. Adding it allowed him to handle +4*8 mobs on both Fire and Energy farms. Outside of farming, he probably wouldn't need it, but now he is pretty much a universal farmer. Well except for psi, where is only defense is about 7.5% from Weave and I think 7.5% from Armegeddon. His Granite form is currently slotted with an endReduc, 3 resist, and 2 defense. Now that he has Cardiac, he might replace the endReduc with a 3rd defense, though. Even with Weave, the +4*8 farms get a little hairy if they have wandering mobs and you end up fighting 2 or 3 large groups at once.

Currently the tank ("Glowie Me") has the Atlas Medallion, three minor recovery and +maxEndurance buffs via Gift of the Ancients, a 4% recovery bonus via Armegeddon, and he is working toward Portal Jockey. Besides the current 4 sets, his enhancements are at least level 35 vanilla IOs. He got Cardiac slotted yesterday, but I haven't really tested out the effect on his sustained endurance stamina.

I have an alt with end problems. He has taken the Epic pool powers Conserve Power and Physical Perfection. He is 50+ now, and almost ready to slot his Alpha with Cardiac. What I wonder is after he gets the 33% - 45% end reduction on all powers due to Cardiac, will the two Epic Pool powers still be necessary? Note he is also slowly buffing up max endurance and recovery via Accolades and sets. The alt is a stone/rad tank. In his Granite form he will typically have 7 toggles on -- Granite, Rooted, Mudpots, Irradiated Ground, Weave, Tactics, and Assault. They all have at least one end reduction already (Mudpots has two). I don't want to respec out of the epic pool powers (replacing with two attacks) unless the endurance load is low enough that he can continuously fight in an extended battle. When Granite is not on, the situation is even worse. Its single toggle is replaced by up to four others -- the individual armors for smash/lethal, fire/ice, energy/negative, and psi+perception.