Burnt Umber

I think the trick with VEATs is that much of their power comes from being a passive force multiplier on teams with non-obvious powers. That is to say, powers like Tactical Training: Maneuvers should be taken as soon as possible and also stacked with the normal Leadership: Maneuvers pool power. Similarly, Mask Presence and Foresight are quite good defensive powers and benefit from being slotted as such. Mind Link is another great defensive power but it can have a long recharge; I use it as a pre-fight buff when things look tough rather than this forum's commonly held belief that you should try to make it "perma." From there, things vary depending on which path you take. A Night Widow will feel a bit like a pre-revamp claws/super reflex stalker with a bit of Willpower mixed in (the new Pain Tolerance power is a nice addition in this regard). Mask Presence is particularly valuable because it provides you with the "Hidden" status as Hide does on stalkers. Slash operated like you "Assassin's Strike" power and build-up/placate operate as your critical strike management tools. Placate also helps manage aggro and has a relatively quick recharge. Spin also crits from hide so it can be a great opener rather than the single target powers. (It should be noted that spin can have a heavy endurance cost so it can leave you drained if used too frequently or is under-slotted.) A ranged Fortunata is sort of like a cross between Mind/Psionic dominator and a Psychic Blast/Willpower sentinel. You have primarily have ranged psychic blast attacks and mind control powers. I paired mine with Soul Mastery and have an attack chain of Soul Tentacles > Psychic Scream > Psychic Tornado > Dark Obliteration. I also get to use Psychic Wail as a nuke when I can. Other than that, Scramble Thoughts is now a potent DoT psychic attack that will stun even bosses (it's MAG 4). Dominate/Total Dominate work as as holds for more traditional lock down powers (dominate is also a good damage/proc-bomb power but I personally don't slot it as such). Aura of Confusion is a melee AoE version of Mass Confusion, so it can be a very useful power too. A Fortunata-Widow hybrid (i.e., a Fortunata that uses the melee claws powers) is a combination of both of the above. You draw on the base Blood Widow powerset and can mix in the Fortunata powers. As such, it can vary a bit depending on which powers you take and how you slot them. However, it can be particularly nice to chain Aim > Follow-Up > Psychic Wail to clear spawns near effortlessly. I hope this helps a little. I've also attached my current builds for mine as examples, but they are by no means perfect. NoxWidow.mbd NoxFortunata.mbd NoxHybrid.mbd

It's no problem! I honestly have a bit of inf. banked, so I'm happy to help if folks want to upgrade their builds or to respec them before this weekend.

Oh, if anyone needs some inf. for a build for this weekend, send me a line in game and I'll send a sum along.

I'll bring Nox Atrissima

I'll try to bring Super-Radiance - Kin.Energy Defender.

Ah, okay! Thanks for clarifying.

I'd like to bring Kataigis - Elec./Storm Controller. But could you please clarify on what "Be your original self" means here?

I'll bring Umbrifer - Dark/Elec. Brute.

I'll bring my Crab Spider Veneficio in his my Night Widow Nox Atrissima in her native Arachnos Costume (does that work for the theme?).

I'll try to be there next week (on time maybe?) with Caelum - Elec./Eng. Blaster.

At the risk of being a bit brazen, I believe that article - a player's guide - is mistaken. I can't recall having Bodyguard working without my henchmen following me; I also don't recall the actual Developers describing it as working that way, with the Patch Notes themselves saying that henchmen have to be in Defensive Follow.

Although I understand the OP's frustrations, I'm not a fan of the suggestion because it would mean that pets would not be summoned in Bodyguard mode. The reason they summon to the default stance of Defensive Follow is for them to be in Bodyguard mode; it has been that way since Bodyguard mode was introduced. The OP's suggestion would mean that the MM is more squishy when (re-)summoning pets rather than more protected.

Looking at the build, it seems like you are frequently breaking your sets to frakenslot more expensive sets into the mix or over-/underslotting things with expensive uniques. I think that might be contributing to your "muddied" feel. Some of that might be fixed by taking more essential powers sooner, and reallocating slots from passives to you active powers. For example, you take aim early on and 4-slot it with Gaussian's, but leave the more important TT: Maneuvers until the 40s - even though it's a core power to your defense - and underslot it. I'm not sure I fix your problem and it certainly isn't perfect, but here's a revised version of yours: Crab 2024 revised.mbd

I slot Dark Servant with two To-Hit Debuff IOs and three Acc./Mez. HOs. I feel that maximizes what the pet generally does with the heal being a nice bonus.

I'll try to bring Nuntius - Sym./Thermal Controller. If you need to do that "arc," I may be able to do it on an alt. sometime after Theme Team on of these days when we do one of the shorter TF.

I could definitely log in with another alt. afterwards. I'd also be up for doing any of the Spring Fling missions people might want to do before the event ends (soon?).

So, besides Venom Grenade, Wide Area Web Grenade and Frag Grenade are great power picks, and the immobilize will certainly help keep your foes at range. Your +25% range goal would lend itself to the cone damage powers Heavy Burst and Suppression; dipping into Leviathan also gives the Bile Spray and Arctic Breath cones, with the latter giving more -Resist on top of Venom. Although it will perhaps compete for slots for Bombardment, the Artillery ranged AoE Damage sets will give more range to your powers and give lots of Ranged defense. On that note, ranged defense is relatively easy to come by for Crabs, I think. The Tactical Training: Defensive passive gives unenhanced 7.5% ranged (bumped up to 12.5% with enhancements). 6-slotting your native Manuevers as well as Leadership's with Red Fortune will provide some ranged defense; 6-slotting Lightning Strike in your couple of single target ranged attacks also will provide some ranged defense; and 6-slotting Blood Mandate into whatever pets you get gives a good amount of ranged and AoE defense. Your resists are middling natively, but that can be upped a bit depending on your slotting. Serum (the Dull Pain like power) can become permanent without heavy investment into recharge, and I like slotting it with Preventative Medicine. I'd temper my expectations for Omega Maneuver (the quasi-nuke): it does poor damage and has somewhat poor range so it may end up a dropped power, but your mileage may very. Unfortunately, you are remembering the way that Banes get capes from their backpacks. Crabs get the gnarly arms instead. Additionally, you didn't mention it, but be sure to slot the SoA ATO enhancement for global toxic damage somewhere in your build. It procs frequently enough to be really helpful.

I'll try to bring Sideros - Beam/Invul. Sentinel.

Though less vehemently, I too am not fond of the new tip system. Previously, I could hold onto tips and discard the one I didn't like at my leisure. Now, the game discards tips based on whether I've actively committed to doing them. Further, I find I get the tip notification even when I have three active tips - the system now gives the notification whenever it would have been possible. It's quite irritating. Like the OP, I realize there are restrictions when things need to be put out, but also like the OP, I am disappointed that actual additions with need for testing were still being added to the release candidates just before it was pushed to the Homecoming servers from Beta. This feature should not have been tacked on at the last minute.

For a while on the Beta Servers, the power Water Spout in the Leviathan Mastery (Mako's) Patron Pool was changed to take Pet and Recharge Intensive Pet enhancement sets and not to take Ranged AoE enhancement sets. However, in Release Candidate 1 and following releases, the change was reverted for Controllers/Dominators but retained for Scrappers/Stalkers. I wish that the reversion were itself reverted. Now, there is an inconsistency where Controllers/Dominators and Scrappers/Stalkers do not follow the same rules when slotting the same power. I also feel that the initial change made sense and added consistency because Storm Summoning's Tornado - from which Water Spout was cloned - takes Pet and Recharge Intensive Pet enhancement sets and doesn't take Ranged AoE enhancement sets. Additionally, Controllers/Dominators are both classes that are more likely to have pets, so they were more likely to have benefited from that initial change than Scrappers/Stalkers do.

I'll try to bring Alichino - Demons/Pain MM.

Hmm, I think it will work if you copy that whole block - including the == at the end - and open it in Mids under "Build Sharing>Import Datalink" in the menu bar. I'm using 3.6.6 if that makes a difference. Here's a screenshot of the build: Based on your screenshot here are a few suggestions: You may want to keep the Huntsman/Wolf Spider version of Venom and Frag Grenades to go with the Wide Area Web Grenade (WAWG) for consistency/speed of animations. Having a chain of WAWG>Venom>Frag is a potent opener for any group. With the upcoming update, you may want to invest more slots into WAWG once it gains the damage aspect. Similarly, you may want to grab Heavy Burst (or Suppression if you choose to use Crab versions of the grenades) to round out your ranged Area of Effect (AoE) damage. My understanding is that Heavy Burst is a surprisingly effective damage power, so you don't want to forego it. Relatedly, you may wish to drop arm lash as a power; you'll likely play mostly at range and benefit little from the melee cone. You may wish to move the slot placed in Combat Training: Defensive to Stamina; putting two slots for Endurance Modification into Stamina will help you greatly to reduce the down time between fights As for slotting, I personally go for the attuned invention sets at your level rather than the basic inventions/single origin enhancements. That said, there are a fair number of people who wait until 50 to fully slot invention sets. If you are such a person, slot at least the level 30 common inventions into your powers because that would be cheaper in the long run compared to slotting/upgrading the single origin enhancements you have now.

After getting to test the two revamped groups here and there, I feel mostly mixed about the CoT's. I really like the addition of new minions at this level, especially because it's a little boring to be otherwise facing the same cultists (e.g., thorn weilders) that I've been facing since level 1. However, I wish that the "Blizzard" casters were renamed to something like Typhoon, Tempest, or Storm Casters to reflect their powers and inform players better. I generally dislike these additions. I don't find that the Spectres add challenge as much as annoyance. They can spawn in large groups and floor to-hit, which does make fighting harder but not it a way that requires greater strategizing (I mostly just stack yellows to bulldoze my way through). Similarly, Succubi becoming lieutenants adds difficulty in that their confuse and placate powers prolong fights and, effectively, prevent me from attacking (and, in the case of confusion, buffing as well). I do need to strategize more with them, but I wish they remained bosses only. Furthermore, although I didn't exactly have trouble with Hellfrost Lords, I'm a little concerned about the design and addition of a more "anti-meta" enemy; they deal strictly cold damage with toxic DoTs, thereby countering the more common smashing/lethal defense builds and requiring either harder-to-get cold defense or reliance on positional defense. It feels a bit as though they were balanced around players having inventions rather than single origin enhancements. I found these really fun. They added great variety and, barring the times I got a horde of Death Mages on top of me, interesting challenge. I definitely had to plan as I scanned groups for these enemies and strategize how to approach them versus the group on the whole. Also, to me, it's great to see something that builds up to the various "Archmage of" enemies found in the portal missions, so it makes sense for these sorts of bosses to exist. Overall, the changes to the Circle of Thorns don't make them terrible. Sometimes, they're a neat challenge; other times, they're erring toward the other avoided groups like Malta. I also found that my characters who were already juggernauts were slowed down less than my squishier ones, so there's a bit of compounded difficulty with the revamp. Nevertheless, I do like that older groups are getting revamped and that there is some attempt to make these groups not totally "mindless face-rolls" when encountered.

I haven't gotten to try it on test; just saw it in the patch notes. I've only puttered around the island on a villain getting the exploration badges and trying a few of the new arcs. My understanding is that villains ought to be able to complete them but I'm not sure if Hess still needs a hero/vig./rogue to have unlocked it or if either tf bugs out for some reason if none of the team has blueside access.

Oh, since villains are going to be allowed on Striga soon, I'd love to do an all villain version of Moonfire and Hess at some point. I think we can do that?