evetsleep

I've tried both Power Transfer and the Performance Shifter +END proc and I didn't see either proc firing outside of the initial cast with the combat log open.

As someone with fire/Marine controller I can say Marine takes the edge off running hot feet in a very meaningful way as soon as I picked it before making any QoL slotting choices while leveling. If anything Marine Affinity is a fantastic set to combine with endurance intensive sets. I friggin love getting in a Super Stunners face and not worrying about what'll happen when they die the first time.

Well necro is primarily a resist primary which benefits from the +RES bubbles, whereas then ninjas benefit later on from the +DEF power, but also from the RES bubbles which makes them more durable. Really it's about experimentation for me. Ninjas and necro play similar, but often I feel like ninjas put out a little more damage in certain scenarios. I haven't decided which one I like more with Marine yet. I would say necro is much stronger when all the uniques are slotted which is kind of unique to them (which makes me wonder if it'll be ...ahem.. adjusted one day).

Let me just say .... I LOVE Whitecap my marine builds so far... but sometimes you need to gauge when to use it (if on a team, let the tank get aggro first). So far I have Fire\Marine Controller Necro\Marine MM Ninja\Marine MM Marine\Sonic Defender Marine\Seismic Defender I have plans to eventually go super aggressive and to a Marine\Fire defender (or flip it and do a corr) and also a gravity\marine controller. All of the above I've found ways to make whitecap useful and fun. As others have said this innate fear of close (not necessarily melee) range can cause you to leave a lot of damage on the table. That's perfectly ok if that's your thing. The thing is whitecap offers up some really good -RES debuffs along with KD and a little damage, which makes it extremely useful to use (especially if you add in procs). It really is a risk vs. reward scenario..very much like the old hover blaster vs. blapper debate. I have been treating my marine toons like a KIN (where you have to be used to getting close) and I've found it pretty darn rewarding and fun.

It is a little early, however I would think a number of MM primaries would mesh well with it (necro and bots come to mind...especially with the +END from Toroidal Bubble). It seems like it can do well both in melee and out of melee (beyond whitecap). I feels like a powerset which has a lot of useful powers which means .... tight builds. I have a number of thoughts on some interesting combos where I'm thinking of corruptor\defenders with PBAOE nukes to combine with whitecap (the usual suspects .... fire, dark, sonic, dual pistols, and rad). Time will tell which one feels the strongest and ... importantly fun. Personally I have a number of these in the works, but currently I'm having a lot of fun with my fire/marine controller :).

I think the thing I come back to is before the update that buffed some MM sets beasts were pretty decent (strong even). That hasn't changed. It's just that the updates really pushed some sets forward in a way that, numerically, makes beasts look worse. There is something to be said about a set that is reliably in melee all the time. That's the issue, for me, with zombies, ninjas, and to some extent thugs. They spread out when some decide to get in close vs others are at range. This makes a turtling MM difficult. With beasts you know they'll always be in melee and so you can tutle-up there and reliably heal, buff, etc. This is part of why beasts pairs so well with kinetics (and time, dark, cold). So if you like beast have fun with it! There is nothing wrong with them other than they don't have a new sexy mechanic to work with (yet).

Berserker: storm

I mean you could pick up Air Superiority and kind of close your eyes and pretend it's Cremate with the fire proc from Brimstone. 🙂 (This is sarcasm btw) I've been running a stone/fire tank since you opened this thread (what's one more alt as I close in on 800 on Excelsior) and there is a lot to love in that package. It definitely matures early which is really nice as I enjoy the lower level TF's.

I really hate endurance drain. I've been leveling an ice melee/energy aura brute and I've been really digging to combo. It doesn't necessarily have any obvious synergy other than that it has: Tons of mitigation tools in the primary (slows, hold, low mag sleep) Heal, +Regen, and Endurance discount (Energize) Endurance drain, +DEF (Energy Drain) Endurance drain resistance +Recharge +Exotic Resistance Really everything pairs with energy aura reasonably well, but I've been having a blast with this guy. If you're looking for pure DPS increases thanks to the mitigation tools, @PLVRIZR is spot on with ice\fire. You could also do ice\bio for something a little more safer (or ice/rad). I prefer the playstyle of ice\ea though personally since it's the one secondary that tanks don't get.

I kind of depends. The prevailing problem with ninjas is when they do get hit they tend to take a lot of damage (and if your lucky they have their heal queued and don't get hit again so they can use it). With forcefield your giving them the absolute best chance during combat to come out on top, however even with high defense the debuffs will still be their Achilles heel. I wouldn't run +4x8 with them personally and some baddies with -def debuffs (or +ToHit) will be a huge pain. That said on teams, with power boosted shields, I can just set them on aggressive and let them do their thing and they do just fine. Power boosted /time +DEF is another solid choice that includes a heal for those rare times when the RNG fails you.

Just one small nitpick to add. Forcefield shields can be boosted by Power Boost to push the ninjas defense to really high (insane) levels, which is important if you're Fighting +3 or more due to the level difference of T1 and T2 henchmen. Can't do this with cold, but that balances out because cold offers stronger debuffs. When I feel like chilling with an MM I bring out my ninja/FF. Power boosted shields mean they very rarely get hit and it's a very low stress play. Not as low stress like bots/FF, but close.

Right. Maybe it's the way it was worded but I thought you were saying that defense sets have various levels of defense debuff resistance and that resistance sets do not (resistance debuff resistance). Guess it depends how you read it :). That said there are exceptions. Pretty sure /inv has defense debuff resistance.

Just wanted to point out this actually isn't entirely accurate. The amount of resistance you have to a type is also the amount of debuff resistance you have to that type. https://forums.homecomingservers.com/topic/39896-resistance-resists-resistible-resistance-debuffs/

I have a stupid concept character that is a troller who fights in melee. Cross punch actually benefits from containment, which makes it a solid melee attack if you're willing to go into the fighting pools. It's not as amazing as arcane bolt, but it absolutely slaps on held/immobilized/slept/stunned baddies and doesn't result in corpse blasting nearly as much due to to faster activation time.

I think this is the real answer. It buffs/debuffs and does damage and is uninterruptible. That's why it has the recharge it does... probably.

Just wanted to add that while sleep canister isn't static field, it does work in a similar way where mobs that wake up can (and do) get put back to sleep as it's a pulsing sleep. One thing I've been doing to squeeze out as much AOE damage as I can is open with smoke canister, then flash bang to set up containment and then used sleep canister as an AOE damage power. It works quiet well once recharge is in a good place in a build (and macros set up). It's no nuke, but it does respectable SAFE damage on my arse/kin controller since I can drop smoke canister, run in and fulcrum, then pop out and drop flash bang and sleep canister. What is left is cleaned up pretty quickly between me and the Tri-cannon (which gets containment damage boosts too!).

I have a bots/sonic that perfoms quite well. I do often send in the assault bot into a pack with sonic resonance running, but honestly it's rarely necessary. Most baddies come into melee range without me needing to do much. The heals that bots offer helps /sonic tremendously. So I wouldn't say it's purely necessary to have a melee pet.

I'm pretty sure when I tested it by holding a baddy each shot got containment damage. I'll retest tonight. When I was running around on brainstorm the damage boost was very noticable.

Agree with @Uun on the slotting, but I just wanted to add that often I take the arrow attacks for the crit chance bonus for the ninjas, not for the damage. Keeping them going gives 9% (3% each attack) increased crit chance to all the ninjas for 30 or 60 seconds (can't remember how long). The attacks don't even need to land to get the crit bonus.

If only brutes got combustion like tanks. Cremate isn't horrible, but the loss of that AOE hurts sometimes. I suppose that's why brutes are better at single target over tanks. But yeah... All in on fire is a fantastic combo albeit squishiest of the brutes.

I've got poison all over the place and I agree with @Uun. I really want it to work with my MMs, but it just falls flat. I know that's not what you're looking for @LNXFOX and maybe someone does, but as fun as ninjas are poison just doesn't help them in the way it should. I've tried ninja/psn since the update and got it into the 30s (with all the pet uniques for improved survivability). It does reasonably good in small encounters. But the small splash debuffs and single target heal make it a chore (for me). If anything since Noxious Gas is obnoxious.. I wish they'd at least give it an AoE heal. But you do you! If it's fun for you knock yourself out!

Frank and Beans!!!

There is a new mechanic coming to Tri-cannon which I think is kind of interesting and will help the damage output of Arsenal. They're adding containment damage to the cannon so that anytime it hits a mezzed baddie that would normally proc containment for a controller it also procs for the cannon. I gave this a spin on brainstorm and the cannon does indeed get the containment damage proc on mezzed mobs. For builds that don't offer a lot of damage this'll be a nice way to squeeze out more. For those that have a lot of damage already...sploosh.

Yeah sorry. I was referring to the Tri-cannon now doing containment damage which I had though was new.

Agree with everything Carnifax has said (I have an arsenal/TA and its solid). The damage from archy can be painfully low. I'd go corruptor if I were you to get access to scourge (which works on the nuke if memory serves). The debuffs will be a little lower, but I think it would be worth it.