Grimm2

I've not done either Illusion or Arsenal Assault, could you elaborate further on why you enjoy the pairing so much? Looking at your build (nice), I'm guessing you use Unleash Potential as an oh-shit power? Do you miss Spectral Terror as another layer of control? I also see no +FF procs, it'd be tempting to put one in Buckshot.

Yeah, Scrapper Claws compares so favorably to Anything Spines. That being said, I like Spines' look, and I've had tons of fun with it despite it not being a top performer with Brute, Tank, and Stalker (144 vet levels on Spine/Stone Brute, and I have a Bio/Spine Tank). With Bio, you probably have the best case setup for Spines (I think Stone Armor is a close second). I'm not a build savant and I copy a lot of builds, but here's my 2 inf. - Spines needs Throw Spines to come together. It's always amazing to me how shit the set feels before Throw Spines is slotted, and how it makes sense after. -Barb Swipe is superior to Impale (except on Stalker). I agree with Maelwys. Stalkers appreciate the bigger predictable crit, but weaving in a Swipe feels better to me otherwise. Even in a team Swipe-Lunge-Swipe gets you in on that boss-mashing action. Throw Spines has a comparable DPA to Impale, as well. -Work on a hard target, letting Throw Spines and Ripper hit everything else. Spine Burst will slow you down. As you've seen, hard targets are the sticking point for clearing a spawn. I only use Spine Burst when I'm lazy about pressing buttons or I'm exemplared. Spines has some nifty slotting options worth mentioning. -Ripper will take a FF+rech, always good for Bio. -Most attacks do minor -Spd, but Throw Spines does a hefty 40%. This works well with 2 Winter IOs + 4 Ice Mistral's, getting you 25% slow resist, HP, some acc, and 50% slow. Slow res is excellent for Bio, and the slow messes with enemy AI. -In your case, you have 2 dmg auras, excellent places for the Brute ATO sets.

This warms my heart. I've always enjoyed Brutes over the years, and though the Tanker changes absolutely made them much more powerful and enjoyable to play, some of my favorite toons are Brutes. I very much recommend sets that can take advantage of the big HP cap and resist cap...Invuln will eat up every s/l bonus you give it, and Stone is my favorite.

Claws/Rad Brute sounds great to me, I always wanted to do one. Cycling Meltdown/Rune of Protection/Melee Core would actually keep you at the 90% resist cap, a scrapper could never feel that tough. Though you have less returns from Followup's damage buff compared to Scrapper, you could still stick a -res proc in Slash, and another in Rad Therapy. Claws is primo for FF +rech procs, I'm sure you know how much Rad armor loves that. Grab that Focused Acc and build for slow resist. I usually find resist armors fun to play only when they've been IO'ed from the toes to the teeth and back again...I have 2 rad armors, but several Stones, EAs, Nins...Defense armors I find more forgiving in the leveling process, due to how much a small Luck insp gives you once you reach 32% def on your own.

This is a fun combo! I put one together that also uses Enflame for additional dps.

This is a fun combo! I put one together that also uses Enflame for additional dps.

I'm the OP, I've been away from the game for a bit and I only just saw this. I got the combo to 50 and did some incarnates. I found the TP pool to be awesome, the TP-to-foe trick works great and Fold Space comes in handy. EA is a very solid armor that has a T9 worth taking and cycling with Barrier. Rad melee I soured on because of the animation speed. I tried it with Katana and got it in the 40s before altitis kicked in, and it was much snappier.

I stand corrected! I thought it was a special Sentinel thing. I should play Elec Blast on other ATs.

Also, Sentinel Elec Blast's Aim clone has a +endmod tag for its duration, so you have a better chance of chunking a hard target's end right off the bat with your alpha strike.

We're talking about nu-Council, here. I've noticed that... - the uniformed Lts and bosses have some kind of leadership buff. Sometimes it's Tactics! Sometimes 2 of them have Tactics! But not all the time. I target those Lts first above all else. 2 spawns of these close together can be really hard. - the Doggies have a claw swipe that is way more accurate than their other attacks. -i haven't clocked the Galaxies' TP as a combat tp, but yeah, that would make them hit more often too. And their rez is auto hit. I have the best luck if my defense- based toons have 54%+ def. My high-res tanker has the easiest time.

They do. Each application of a power applies the debuff and stacks it up. I think it's worth mentioning that according to Mids, the recharge reduction does not get enhanced, only the slow movement portion. So a target's recharge penalty is the same no matter how much effort you put into making your Spines slow more. I'll look later to see if that's true in- game.

Throw Spines has the highest slow value; 40% base, compared to 16% to the other powers. Throwing 4-6 Ice Mistrals into Throw Spines has worked very well for me.

Stalker Savage has been on the back of my mind, but I've been trying out an off-brand Stalker-lite Sav/Nin Scrapper (in progress) and a dot-madness Sav/Stone/Enflame Brute (built out and working on incarnates, great tough fun build). If I did a Sav Stalker...I'd have a hard time not going Stone Armor again, maybe a gargoyle buddy for the Brute mirror. I recall you liking procced Ice Blast/Ice Spear a while back? Is that still true? That might make for some odd exemplaring attack chains and hamper Assassin's Focus?

Dang! Thanks for correcting me. So its strength won't be reduced by higher- con foes, but higher resists will cut its effective contribution.

I don't think anyone mentioned it's best attribute, which is that it is unresistable. The value is a little low, but it'll always do what it says it does.