Maelwys

Also it was Elec Armor in general that was changed, not just on Brutes...

QFT. Ninjitsu can set up one big initial Critical hit. The other Defense-focused secondary powersets don't have anything that improves spike damage (aside from "Shield Charge") . Using it to set up a Martial Arts "Build Up + Eagle's Claw" opener; or Street Justice "Combat Readiness + Crushing Uppercut" is decent and can get your ATO2 chain off to a flying start. IMO if you're not worried about DDR and you don't need the additional global recharge to gets your Single Target attack chain seamless then Ninjitsu is IMO better for most content. However Super Reflexes is a lot more survivable in more challenging content (despite Scrappers capping out at 75% resistance)... even if I prefer it on Stalkers!

It could always be worse. They could have OB/GYN staffers outsourced from Doctor Vahzilok.

Any arc that involves handing anything over to M.A.G.I. for "safe keeping". They might as well install a big revolving door in their vault with Azuria stood outside hawking tickets. 🙄

100%. My typical main goal for non-support toons is "optimised attack chain with 95% hit chance vs unbuffed +3 foes" plus "sufficient self-survivability". Often I won't require a Kismet to get all of my attacks to a 95% Hit Chance; so less than half of my builds take it. Likewise, some of my builds don't require Hasten in order to get a gapless optimised Single Target attack chain so it may not be taken at all; or only taken to get a few AoEs and specific clicky buffs up sooner. I will say that I always pick my Alpha slot before I slot up my attacks though - Musculature Core's +30% ED-ignoring damage buff is too hard to pass up unless I'm a Brute or a Kinetics (although occasionally I'll go Musculature Radial or Intuition Radial in order to sacrifice a little bit of damage for additional +ToHitDebuff plus +EndMod or +Slow...) Honestly Scrapper is the only one I've ever bothered. Blasters already get plenty of additional +Damage via Defiance stacks plus access to both Aim (with a Gaussian Proc) and Build Up. Stalkers get lots of extra Build Up activations (with a Gaussian Proc) via their ATOs. Therefore just like Brutes; on those ATs the effect of any minor +damage buffs tends to get diluted by the sheer amount of regular non-set-bonus damage buffs in play. Scrappers however have a very high melee Damage Scaling - meaning they get a lot of extra raw damage output from +Damage buffs (that's why using the Assault Core Hybrid with its stacking +damage buff rather than Assault Radial with its "chance for double hit" is always better on a Scrapper unless you're teaming with a Kin) and aside from a few specific powersets (e.g. Claws) they don't get many worthwhile constantly stacking damage buffs to dilute the effect of minor +damage set bonuses. And their Critical Hit schtick stacks with any/all damage buffs just fine. The real problem is that in order to gain worthwhile global +Damage buffs via set bonuses you're looking at a pretty hefty "opportunity cost" to slot the appropriate IOs that grant you those set bonuses. The Scrapper ATO sets, the Obliteration PBAoE set and the Purple Apocalypse Ranged set are the only ones that spring to mind which grant Global Recharge and +Damage - for about +15% total (plus another +3% per additional set of Obliteration). However all of those require 3-4 set pieces and also require you to end up with some local recharge in the slotted attack (which hurts your proc activation rates; which in turn REDUCES your damage output!). The Mako's Bite and Touch of Death sets both grant a bit of +global +Damage plus some Defense and S/L Resistances; and you can just about get away without taking any local recharge with a Touch of Death set... but they're much less common in min-maxed builds and it's almost always more effective to just use "Acc/Dam HO, Dam IO + 4x damage procs". So often any global +damage buffs from all these sets ends up being a byproduct of intentionally chasing other things like recharge and defence set bonuses. There are a few non-damage IO sets that grant global +damage (like the Red Fortune and Shield Wall Defense sets) but other alternative sets (like Unbreakable Defenses and Luck of the Gambler) often have multiple attractive bonuses; so IME unless you're suffering from a glut of spare enhancement slots it's still not worth it. Personally about the only time I'll consciously opt to grab a global +damage bonus is whenever it involves very minor slotting tweaks (e.g. a 2-piece bonus; like Dampened Spirits -ToHit, Undermined Defenses and Achilles' Heel -Def, Adjusted Targeting +ToHit, and Lockdown +HoldDuration!)

An Arsenal/Savage permadom would be pretty mechanically effective if you can headcanon a gun-toting wildling... 😹

I probably put a bit more emphasis onto +Accuracy and +MaxHP, but otherwise the list looks very familiar. Adding more global enhancement allows you to take local enhancement aspect slotting out of the individual powers, freeing up room for Procs or even just freeing up entire enhancement slots so that they can be moved elsewhere. But you can quicky reach a point where the tradeoffs outweigh the gains. And after a certain point, most builds stop benefitting from global accuracy (eg whenever you're hitting 95% hit chance vs +3 foes) and many builds benefit only very slightly from additional global recharge (eg whenever your attack chain is seamless). I'll almost always chase Global Recharge, Global Accuracy, Damage Resistance (on the sets that get some natively I like to hit at least one Hardcap) and Defense (not always to the softcap, 20% and 32.5% make good breakpoints due to purple inspirations and team buffs and are far more achievable). I'll often chase a little +recovery too, as the vast majority of my builds aim for at least +2 Endurance per second after toggle costs are deducted, unless I'm planning to run Ageless (and/or be a Permadom). MaxHP is never a central focus, but I'll always include an Unbreakable Guard global and the passive accolades and if there's a minor slotting choice between a smidge of extra MaxHP and something else I'll usually take the +MaxHP. Then at the end of the build I'll normally try to get past the next big round number (1200, 1600, etc) otherwise my OCD nags at me. I hate capping out at something like 1195, and I've been known to redesign entire builds because of it. Some of my builds will chase Recharge Debuff resistance. Typically that's mainly on powersets that rely on clickybuffs (like Regeneration, before the recent changes). Chasing +damage (set bonus, not Procs) is usually only something I do after all the other aspects of my build are covered and I'm having to decide between very minor "superfluous" set bonuses. And certain ATs (like Scrappers) gain more proportional benefit than others (like Brutes).

Just stick the Proc (as well as the one from the Vigilant Assault set) into reasonably high recharge attacks that you use regularly. You'll gain more benefit from doing that than from trying to spam Aid Other/Aid Self in combat, particularly if you don't have 2x Interrupt SOs in the latter. FWIW on my own Forcefields I'm a big fan of Spirit Ward (with a Panacea Proc in it).

Think of an economy based on Football Sticker/Baseball Card/Pokémon Card (delete as appropriate depending on your vintage and side of the pond) trading and "swaps". (i) It'd be hilarious. (ii) I'll trade you 3x EndMods and a ToHit/EndRed Shiny for your Acc/Dam Shiny.

(i) A lot of powers have a less than 100% percentage chance for knockback to occur. (ii) They added randomized higher-Mag knockback already. Everyone hates it. "FREEM".

As mentioned it's not finalized yet, but the most promising current variants are below: Stalker - Savage - Psionic Armor (BallLightning + ProccedAS).mbd Stalker - Savage - Psionic Armor (WaterSpout + ProccedAS).mbd zStalker - Savage - Psionic Armor (ShadowMeld + ProccedAS).mbd zStalker - Savage - Psionic Armor (SpiritShark + ProccedAS).mbd zStalker - Savage - Psionic Armor (Shiver + ProccedAS).mbd Savage_Stalker_DPS.xlsx

Stalker. Savage Melee is IMO best on Stalkers by a country mile. Having on-demand Critical Hits is especially good for Hemorrhage and Savage Leap; and Build Up is miles better than Blood Thirst (assuming you're attempting to keep below 5 stacks so as to avoid the 15s Blood Frenzy lockout period!). It's also one of only two Stalker Primaries that doesn't utterly suck for AoE damage. SM doesn't really require much else other than Global Recharge to excel, so any secondary will work; but the obvious standouts are Bio, Rad and Energy. Personally I've got a Savage/Psi build that looks very good on paper and Brainstorm, just need to find the time to roll it up on live...

It was an effective toon but it's sitting on the shelf. Hit 50, soloed a few AVs and played a few TFs then got a bit fed up with it. I found the -ToHit from Dark Blast was largely superfluous on teams (perhaps except vs AVs, but Incarnate clickies neuter them anyway) so I kept thinking that the powerset combination itself was simply suboptimal. And that Water Blast would therefore have been an all-round better pick. Then I just ended up rolling a Water/Cold Corruptor; which indeed rocked... 🤷‍♂️ IMO Dark would have contributed far more mechanically to a Primary that was lacking both allied Defence buffs and Self healing. So I suspect it may work best on the likes of Sonic Resonance, Trick Arrow and maaaaybe Marine.

You can't cast Vengeance on a dead henchman. Regarding henchmen Slotting and Accuracy Requirements, can look here and here but the short version is to Frankenslot and Take Tactics and Research what pets make the best use of what procs.

(i) Pop some Purple inspirations before engaging them. Sapper Endurance drains are coded as Energy typed so you can floor their hit chance. (ii) Mez/Kill the sappers first. Targeting binds are your friend. (iii) Get Endurance Drain resistance. As a /Rad, Gamma Boost ought to be reducing its effect by 69.2%... which realistically should make you functionally immune to them as there's only ever one Sapper per group of Malta. So I assume you just haven't taken it yet. Ageless Radial Destiny helps too at Endgame.

Firey Aura gets Consume at Lv20, so I'm not sure that's the main reason for the struggling? (Sure Consume's base recharge is a bit rough, but it doesn't require Accuracy these days for the +End aspect and once your build gets going during missions it's effectively a full Blue bar refill once every 60-90s. Even 1vs1 it allows my BA/FA to keep attacking full pelt indefinitely without Ageless...) Agree /Bio is a very nice combo for it though if /Rad and /FA aren't your cup of tea. /Psi is powerful too but more of a late bloomer as IME you really want Acc/Mez HOs for maximizing Aura of Madness/Insanity.

The real ones are 6800 miles along each edge and made of rubber. Someone's been slipping you counterfeit coinage. Belgium! (I always preferred Flainian Pobble Beads anyway...)

It's not going to save you in a tough fight; but it can certainly help keep a team (and henchmen) topped up with Health and Endurance in a static confrontation. I do find it useful for helping to keep henchmen blue bars topped up; for example. Realistically min-maxxed /Traps tend to push for a fair amount of Global Recharge anyway due to Acid Mortar stacking. I have two endgame /Traps builds and the recharge time for each's Triage Beacon is under 54s; which means they're able to have two of them out (with the Panacea Proc firing on both) more than half the time. Their Acid Mortars likewise both have a recharge time of a little under 24s; which means they're getting the effect of three of them constantly (60s summon duration + 20s debuff duration. I still don't particularly enjoy playing them because constantly resummoning them on the move when teaming grates on me... /Traps isn't the most mobile powerset 😞

Yup. In a 40ft radius passive like the active effect of Triage Beacon, a Panacea proc will have a 9.09% chance to activate on each allied target once every 10 seconds (on yourself and up to 254 other allies) and multiple copies of the beacon (even from the same player) will happily stack with each other.

The Forcefield variant doesn't anymore. The Sonic Resonance and Kinetics variants both still do.

Assuming you mean the "Alpha Slot Ability"... for that character I'd strongly recommend either Intuition Radial or Musculature Radial. Both increase your powers' Damage (including your henchmen) and ToHit debuffs. Intuition also increases Range and Slows (Tar Patch) and Hold Duration (Petrifying Gaze, Soul Storm)... Whilst Musculature increases Recovery and Runspeed and Immobilize Duration (Soul Tentacles). If your current Tar Patch slotting isn't already flooring the Movement Speed of +3 foes (e.g. a -138.5% debuff) then I'd go for Intuition. Otherwise it's a toss up.

I had a decent time with Illusion/Time, even if it leant into procbombed /Time powers (like Distortion Field and Slowed Response) and Contagious Confusion to make up for the pitiful native AoE prior to Perma PA. To be fair, Illusion has benefitted from the i28p2 changes which let Spectral Terror's Fear and Blind's AoE Sleep both set up containment.

"Bullshido" And I swear I'm not making that term up. (Although its practitioners on the other hand...) 🤣 https://www.facebook.com/reel/814110690846243 https://www.facebook.com/reel/740099061632099 🥋💩