Maelwys

The short answer is "it depends". To gain the benefit of a Special IO; the pet summon ability needs to accept slotting it and the pet themselves needs to possess subpowers that also accept slotting that flavour of enhancement. And the Special IO itself needs to be coded as a proc (rather than as a set bonus) and have effects that are capable of affecting non-players (most of them are flagged as affecting "self" with no restrictions on the entity type, and so will work ok if they're slotted in the pet). More reading here:

https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Clear_petnames_(Slash_Command)

Lots of us older hands use rotating bind files; and the top method (file1 pointing to file2 pointing to file3 pointing back to file1) should still work fine as long as the syntax is ok. Can you post a few examples to aid troubleshooting? Many of my characters use a ridiculous amount of bindloadfilesilent commands and there is a fair bit that can go wrong. The most annoying recently was a "modifier key" which worked but due to occasionally being released too quickly often appended a new keybind to my character rather than overwriting the existing one (eventually resulting in a "too many binds" error) which was resolved performing a full bind clear/reload each time the modifier key is released!

"Dr. Phosphor" (With Water Blast and the Medicine and Concealment pools; obviously)

The Nefarious Necroposting Dogooder "It's Alive!"

Whatever else you do; make sure to take "Thunder Strike" from the Mu Mastery pool and procbomb it. The other thing I'd suggest is to look at MARINE AFFINITY rather than Nature. Marine is by far the best MM secondary these days; and one of its more useful powers is Whitecap (which teleports you into Melee range for a big wallop, and produces excellent damage when Procbombed!) Necro is a popular primary and its henchmen are pretty self sufficient as long as you take the Pet +Def/+Res Aura IOs and stick a Panacea Proc in their second upgrade power (Dark Empowerment). There are plenty of example builds on the Forums and Discord.

Swapping to Intuition Radial would give you +33% Hold, +33% SlowMovement and +20% Range in exchange for -33% ImmobiliseDuration, -33% EnduranceModification and -33% RunningSpeed. PermaDoms generally don't need as much Recovery and losing some RunningSpeed isn't very gamebreaking; so it'll come down to if you value longer immobilises over longer holds + blasting things from greater distances...? (the +SlowMovement is likely irrelevant!)

If only the game had some method of representing a hero who is was unpowered Naturally, but uses a wide variety of Inventions to gain an edge against more powerful foes and situations... And whilst we're wishing on a star... perhaps they could implement some way to represent how that character could intentionally choose to fight stronger opponents to gain Experience, seek out different established masters to Train themselves up, build up a Contacts list, gain Influence and develop a reputation and maybe even ultimately join a Group of Superfriends who all have different powers/abilities to fight crimes that none of them could handle alone (or just hang out in their superbase having a games night and pizza)...? Nah, it'll never happen.

IIRC all of those sort of effects overwrite each other - so later activations effectively just extend the duration. https://cod.uberguy.net./html/power.html?power=boosts.attuned_achilles_heel_c.attuned_achilles_heel_c

Yes; whenever you activate the power both those procs will get a separate chance to kick in and they can both do so simultaneously. The limiting factor is on the enemy - the effects of these procs will all stack with each other but not with multiple copies of themselves (even from different players). So you can stack an Achilles' Heel, a Fury of the Gladiator, and an Annihilation proc together on the same enemy... but not two copies of the Achilles' Heel proc.

If we're getting into the nitty-gritty of constant taunt coverage... it might be worth pointing out that whenever you cast PA the decoys don't all appear simultaneously. Instead they're staggered. The first Phantom appears right away (1.067s into the animation of PA) then the second appears after another 1s has elapsed; and the final one appears after yet another 1s has elapsed. And EACH of them has a SEPERATE duration of 60s... so technically to have at least one Phantom out constantly you only need 58.7s recharge on the PA power. However it takes a beat for NPC mobs to recognise that new Phantoms have appeared and start being capable of attacking them. The Phantom Army Summon's "+Threatlevel" multiplier kicks in after 0.5s ; but for them to actually properly lock down aggro by "Taunting" something they need to hit it first - and their fastest attacks also have an AnimationTimeBeforeEffect of a little over 0.5s... so best-case that means aiming for ~58.1s rather than 56.7s. But if you can't survive a single hit from whatever you're fighting then it's probably best to err on the safe side and get more recharge from an Alpha slot or base Empowerment buff or whatever. Never mind that being hit with a stray AoE recharge debuff can ruin your day. The first toon I had with "Perma PA" back on live was an Illusion/Empath Controller; and checking their old circa-i19 build their PA had a recharge time of 56.62s (using a Spiritual Alpha slot plus 190% global recharge and drastically overslotting PA for recharge aspect enhancement). I remember using them to "tank" on an awful lot of AV fights... and they were one of the safest support toons I ever played; but there were definitely occasions where I caught a stray hit or two.

Alpha = Musculature Core for Max Dmg; Intuition Radial if you have noteworthy Ranged Attacks and/or ToHit Debuffs. and/or Slow Movement effects. Judgement = 100% Void Radial. The -Damage debuff effect is excellent on-demand mitigation and the additional spike damage from going Core is negligible. Interface = Degenerative Core for fighting AVs/GMs, Reactive Radial for everything else. Typically Radial > Core if you're teaming and folk have multiple copies. Lore = Either Carnies/Seers Radial (buffs your damage + some healing), Banished Pantheon Radial (Mix of Raw Damage + AoE Buffs) or Talons Radial (team buffs). Destiny = Ageless Radial; for Defense Debuff Resistance and Endurance Recovery. But pick up Barrier Core too for teaming. Hybrid = Assault for Scrappers; and typically Core if you're soloing because Crits. But Teammate buffs and Build Up + Gaussian Proc can make Radial better.

There is literally a pinned thread for this very purpose; with multiple Triform Warshade builds (including mine). There are even a few images of builds there rather than Mids files... but yes, you'll want to download and use Mids Reborn to display and tweak things once you start buying Invention Origin Enhancements (typically this starts at level 7+ for the more important procs/globals) unless you have an exorbitant amount of free time on your hands. Also don't burn respecs on the live server. Copy your toon to the test server and then autolevel it and kit it out with whatever enhancements you want. Building umpteen copies of a min-maxxed toon to compare/contrast things is quick + free on Brainstorm. That's a big part of what it's for.

This. They're currently going for 500k inf (or 1.5m for "buy-it-now" prices). That's blink-and-you'll-miss-it territory for most of us. If you need a respec, just ask in chat in-game or link your server + global here and your inbox will be bombarded with them.

*.mxd was an old format used in earlier versions of Mids. Newer copies of Mids Reborn should be able to import those builds OK; but it won't always get everything 100% right (some powers may have since had their mechanics or prerequisites changed by a patch or even been replaced entirely... and stuff like Accolades and Incarnates will likely need reselected!). So some poking may be required! 🙂

Just checked my Ill/Time and they're sitting at ~312% total. Like wot @Carnifax says; a few seconds downtime is hardly noticeable in practice and often teammate buffs will push you over the threshold anyway. It's not like you have to constantly make them hold something's aggro otherwise your team all faceplant (argh, oldschool hamiraid flashbacks!) Personally I'd rather not make extreme performance sacrifices elsewhere in my build just to hit that magic 56.7 second recharge time figure.

Read the very first few lines of the very first post in the thread. FWIW, as far as I'm aware these days the only Brute that will comfortably survive on +4x8 AFK AE farms without huge performance tradeoffs is a (non Granite) /Stone.

Phantom Army's base recharge is 240s and it has a cast time (adjusted for Arcanatime) of 3.3s You want to get it cycling every 60s or less; so that's: ((240)/(60 - 3.3)) - 100% = 323.3% additional recharge needed (from some combination of slotting, global set bonuses, alpha slots and other buffs like Hasten etc)

I had a quick dig and can't find any recent Robot/Sonic builds. Icesphere's dropbox has a Thugs/Sonic that doesn't too bad at a quick glance. The closest in my own stable would be Robots/Thermal and Robots/Kin. zMastermind - Robotics - Thermal.mbd (note that this one was last poked at prior to the Bonfire nerfs) The Bots/Kin I've discussed at length and most recent build(s) are here.

Unfortunately /Sonic is bottom of the pile for MM secondaries, just above Poison (which is worse in terms of survivability but probably has better damage output). When soloing Bots/Sonic will be tricky to micromanage as the bulk of /Sonic's added damage comes from the ally-anchored -res aura; and Bots are "prefer ranged" so you'll need to anchor it on the AssBot and manually GOTO command them into melee range before they fire off their Swarm Missiles. Epic AoE immobilises will be your friend. If you mostly team then it gets a bit better - Teams tend to be Defense softcapped but not Resistance Hardcapped; so your buffs are usually welcome... and having a melee teammate with a Taunt aura to anchor Disruption Field onto will alleviate a lot of your micromanagement issues. Most of the other powers in Sonic are pretty hands-off - just Bubble up once every four minutes, slot Liquefy for Recharge and -Tohit; and use Sonic Siphon on Bosses/EBs/AVs. So you'll have time to blast a bit with Procbombed Photon Grenade and maybe even an Epic attack or two (Thunderstrike from Mu Mastery is fantastic there; and you'll likely want to take Charged Armor and Electrifying fences anyway). Note that taking the +Def Pet Aura IOs and Maneuvers and slotting Protector Bots for +Def can get your henchmen most of the way to the Defense Softcap; and Incarnates (Barrier Destiny/Support Hybrid/Talons Radial Lore) can get you the rest of the way even when soloing.

Back on Live I had a Human-only form Peacebringer which was styled as a Guyver - their Bio specifically mentioned that although frequently mistaken for one they were NOT a Kheldian; but instead a Human bonded with an extra-terrestrial Bio-Boosting organism... and they were always the first into the mix to wallop Void Stalkers/Quantum gunners/Nictus Crystals (because obviously they were all Cronos Corp cronies and/or "Zoanoids"!) Whilst I've watched the Guyver II Movie; I much prefer the 1989 Animated OVA (I still have them on VHS somewhere; but I ported them to MP4 more than a decade ago) Anyways, Guyver's schtick is: (i) Insanely high levels of Self Healing (Very Rapid Regeneration; and can fully Revive even from only a few cells as long as their Control Medal is undamaged) (ii) Heightened Physical Strength and Resilience (their main weakness is Toxic damage) and resistance to mind control + psychic assault. (iii) Flight (technically Gravity Manipulation; but they've never been shown to use it in this manner on anything other than their own body) (iv) Energy Blasts from their head (Control Medal/Eyes) and their hands (the gravity weapon "Pressure Cannon") and their chest (the "Mega Smasher") (v) Melee attacks in the form of punching/grappling plus extendable bladed weapons built into their forearms (vibrating "High Frequency Swords") (vi) Shapeshifting into larger forms - the "Guyver Gigantic" (roughly 3m tall) and the "Gigantic Exceed" (roughly 50m tall) If you're basing the toon on the movie version then you can skip (vi); but you'll likely still want Healing/Revival, energy blasts, punches/slashing weapons and flight. For the Eyebeams and Gravity Cannon, taking the Energy Mastery Epic Pool (for Laser Beam Eyes/Energy Torrent) and/or possibly the Force of Will pool (the animations don't quite mesh; but they might be close enough) would work. The Mega Smasher is an issue - you can sort of recolour "Void" Judgement Incarnate and "Ground Zero" from Radiation Armor to look like a PBAoE bright energy blast... but Energy Blast "Nova" and Peacebringer "Dawn Strike" are tailor made for it. If you're dead set on a Scrapper... I'd probably go Claws/ (with the Vanguard Blades) with the Flight Power pool and Energy Mastery. Willpower is probably the secondary that meshes best with canon... but if you're going /Bio then turn on Minimal FX and take Void Judgement (recoloured Bright/White) for the Mega Smasher.

My Bane's "optimal" Single Target Attack Chain does not actually use either the T1 attack (Bash/Pummel/MaceBeam) or Crowd Control. The former is used when I exemplar; and the latter when there is enough around me to justify AoEing (which is pretty frequent!) It's Venom Grenade > Poisonous Ray > Dark Obliteration > Gloom > Shatter > Poisonous Ray > Pulverize > Gloom > Shatter and with the Decimation in Gloom and -Res (plus averaged -res procs) that works out at ~325.4771 DPS. In theory the "Call Reinforcement" pets can add up to ~121.1431 on top of that; but not in practice... 🙈 If I focus more on AoE then I can swap Pulverize for Crowd Control. The resulting chain becomes a bit less neat (it's still seamless but now requires two activations of Venom Grenade before it starts to loop) however it's nearly the same average damage over time (~317.7212 DPS plus ~122.9119 for the pets). Whilst both chains can run indefinitely without any gaps; in practice it's rare that there are a constant supply of enemies (outside of AE Farms at least!) and I'd typically want to pop Build Up and Placate and occasionally take a moment to reposition myself. So this is mostly theoretical "what's my potential damage output versus a big immobile sack of infinite HP" stuff... but it proves the point that I don't need a T1 attack; and that I could even in theory drop Pulverize entirely (or at least juggle some slots around and move my Hecatomb proc from it to Shatter!) and be no worse off...

That's probably fair. I've always viewed VEATs as passive ally Buffers with decent damage, personal defenses and mez protection. They're all capable of fulfilling multiple "roles" on a team simultaneously without crippling their own damage output (unlike Kheldians who outside of their animation-cancelling exploit are still stuck in a bad place) Whilst it's a drastic oversimplification; Banes could be pictured as something of a "Stalker analogue" since they lean more towards Stealth and Melee attacks (with forced crits); compared to Crabs who are more of a "Brute/MM Hybrid" being a lot hardier with more pets. However the -res and -def they both output makes them powerful debuffers too. Widows probably veer a bit more towards "Scrapper" territory (insane DPA and better survivability but very End heavy) and Forts towards "Dominator" territory (less survivable but with more Control plus a +mez passive, and they love global recharge) I'll typically reach for my Bane if I know that the team is AoE heavy; because it acts as a force multiplier (AoE -res plus the leadership buffs) and has high levels of ST damage for focussing tougher Bosses/EBs/AVs. Whereas the Crabbermind comes out if the team is more balanced and has solid aggro control (the pets are great at mopping up but I don't want them to die too quickly) or if I just fancy some extra crazy bedlam. And since I have both builds on the same toon, switching between the two is just a matter of hitting a single macro button... 😁

“I DON'T KNOW ABOUT YOU, BUT I COULD MURDER A CURRY.”