tidge

The most "efficient" play is almost certainly solo play.

For me: Brainstorms are something of a meh salvage drop. I've only ever used them to craft rare salvage, and there isn't a huge need to do that IMO considering the rare salvage drop rate + fungible salvage on the AH.

I haven't found a combination of Poison ATs that requires me to be in melee. This Mind/Poison character spends a LOT of time in melee range... but it doesn't have to start in melee range (for a debuff, of all things) nor does it need another player to generate more threat against whatever spawn. These are the sorts of things that have the greatest effect on mission completion times in my experience (taking personal defeats out of the equation). On teams, where the PBAoE debuff is presumably most important, I've found it is very much like @WuTang described: We are fast moving, and whatever is slowing us down doesn't need a PBAoE debuff from me... for the character build I shared I have multiple ST debuffs (which cycle relatively quickly) as well as controls to apply for really problematic enemies. As I wrote before: I've taken Venomous Gas on all of my Poison characters ASAP specifically to try to make it work effectively... because I'm one of those players that wants to try every power (especially T9s!) to best understand how they can be used and how they can contribute to different builds and play styles. I haven't yet found a combination of powers and play where Venomous Gas is making my characters (or the teams they are on) more effective than other choices. Where I am with my Poison characters isn't based on theory, it's an experimental outcome based on leveling them up.

@twozerofoxtrot has identified the most likely issue. The thing being inspired (player, pet, whatever) has to complete its current power, including animations, in order to "use" an animation. The only subtle point about EoE is (I think) that because a Mastermind can use EoE to buff henchmen, the henchmen don't need to have completed any animations in order to accept the EoE effect (similar to how team inspirations behave).

Betteridge has the answer.

So here is my favorite Poison build... It is a Controller (not a Corruptor). It is circa page 5, I haven't seen the need to refactor it since then. The concept is that this is character that causes enemies to be discombobulated, fall down, wander confused, etc. I want to note: Powers that take Defense Debuff pieces that have a %damage proc in them will have and %damage swapped out for %-Resistance when I am teaming (via unslotters). This Controller has no pets, so being a force multiplier in solo is less important than simply doing damage. I always keep in mind: "Resistance resists resistible resistance debuffs", so against any rando enemy a resistance debuff might note be having as much of an effect as the base values of the power indicate Controllers have some of the worse damage scales of any AT, so %damage makes a HUGE difference for their clear times... so specific to the Venomous Gas discussion, the typical cycle of damage-dealing (or %damage-dealing) attacks for Controllers don't mesh well with a PBAoE -debuff... especially for the ranged cones. There are powers in this build that are PBAoE, and they get used when they are ready... but otherwise it is ranged attacks/debuffs/controls that are being used. I can almost see why a Corruptor with a PBAoE nuke and one other AoE attack that requires them being in might want to lean into the PBAoE toggle... or if the concept has something like 3 attacks from the Fighting pool (moar Smashing). However... my experience with melee armor sets that include a variety of PBAoE toggles has put my thinking in a place where I will use some toggles when they layer with what else the character is doing in melee, but if it is a one-off toggle that doesn't synergize with what I'm doing (and isn't a good enhancement mule) I will probably skip/delay it. From my PoV Venomous Gas offers no practical synergy with whatever else I might be doing with the character.

I'll post my favorite Poison build (it is a controller) some time in the next day, which should reveal my play choices. I never play afraid of melee but there is a clear difference between which characters can hang out in melee which ones can defeat everything in melee near instantly and which cannot. Part of what made my solo +0x8 times pretty good and possible for the lvl 40-50 PI content was NOT having to jump into a spawn, so that if any were still coming to me they were already hurt, debuffed and about to take more control or damage. I typically don't solo +4 (boring for me) but I have no trouble with +4, even with just one other player

As I wrote: I found that trying to use Venomous Gas was slowing down my solo times. If I made the choice to get VG, for solo play I had to be able to hang in melee range. On teams, when we were facing enemies that needed the debuffs from VG, I needed to be able to hang in melee or I was getting hit/mezzes/etc. My team experiences were that unless there was some coverage (typically Incarnates) to help me to hang in melee, that out team performance was superior if I stopped trying to make VG a thing and swapped over to other personal tactics. If a team or solo doesn't need the VG debuff to defeat enemies in the same amount of time, I see the power pick and slot investment as mostly wasted. I won't deny that VG looks like a good debuff on paper, but in practice I found trying to use it to be holding my characters' back, after hanging with it on multiple toons for a LOT of content, solo and on teams.This isn't the only power like this in the game for me. If others feel it is improving their times because they've tried other strategies and have seen the opposite of my experience, great for them. I'm sharing my experience to provide another players' perspective.

I don't want to have to take Boxing/Tough/Weave and/or Combat Jumping and/or a patron pool to hang in close combat to leverage a T9 debuff. I don't want to have to take Combat Teleport to BAMF in/out while I wait for a debuff tick I don't want to have to take 2 powers + Rune of protection, or 3 other power pool powers just to have extra survivabiity to toss off a ticking PBAoE debuff. I want to have other power picks that make my character engage in enemy defeating. I'm not saying other players are stupid for taking Venomous Gas; I'm saying Venomous Gas doesn't work for me. The only other complete miss for me in Poison is Antidote. As for the linked thread? The build includes 6-slots of Word of Confusion at level 47. I'm sure there are players for whom that suggestion rocks their socks... but not for me. MMV on Hasten as a power pick at level 8... but also not for me. EDIT: I want to add... I've tried to make Venomous Gas work for me on multiple ATs, taking it ASAP and leveling up to 50 with it... my rejection of it is not on some theoretical basis. I found that VG was slowing down my solo completion times and that alternate choices improved my characters' performance. I have Poison characters I like, but certain powers simply don't synergize with my playstyle or other powers. Is that worthy of the aggressive thumbs-downs, I guess so!

But... but... the devs will listen to me, and take my suggestion as an improvement over whatever they may have seen before and will be helped to recognize the brilliance of the suggestion! /s WhO R yOU to GatEKEep WAHT the DeVs WoRK oN? /s

The most common powers I use 6-pieces of a Defensive set (with mucho rechargo) is Mind Link/Link Minds, or a long recharge power like Unleash Potential.

There have been suggestions made by others that I advocate for (when appropriate). There have been suggestions made that have improved my own thinking about both the game and suggestions I might make in the future.

When I have sad feels abut enhancement set options, it is usually because: Almost all enemy-affecting powers benefit from Accuracy and Endurance Reduction, but there are relatively few such dual enhancements set pieces available at 50 A 6th piece that only boosts a single attribute that is already enhanced above 90% is mostly wasted Non-damage enemy affecting %procs are generally a poorer choice than %damage (primarily because of duration... it certainly feels like enemies most don't take 10 seconds to regen the damage from a %damage piece) Player-affecting buffs from %procs are typically less useful that other %procs Some sets just don't have (m)any choices for a piece that would be useful in powers...typically I look at Threat and Fear... when threat was reworked I feel like a new pair of sets with different combis was added, certainly recogizing that many threat powers require accuracy and/or endurance reduction. (See #1)

Isn't it primarily Endurance Reduction (and a little bit Accuracy) that is deemphasized in the Purple sets? This seems like a specific choice that only seems to affect my builds when I want to frankenslot with %damage.

My PoV is that if an enemy could be defeated by me being within melee range of my debuff for less than 10 seconds, my debuff was probably not necessary. As I noted why I skip Venomous Gas: I don't appreciate having to invest in pool powers to make a T9 power useful.

FWIW, I always skip Venomous Gas. It doesn't fit my play style; I can't make the character with it sturdy enough to use it well (because I have other priorities besides trying to make a capstone power useful); I don't need it (solo or on teams)

I thought the response (in that thread) to prefacing the bind with the "+" key alleviated the need for a rotating bind; pressing the (bind) key starts the follow (or I suppose face, but I don't use that) and then releasing the key triggers the soothing wave. Did this not work? [AFAIK, we would need a rotating macro, but should not be needed for a keybind]

As noted by @aethereal Savage Melee is almost certainly best on a Brute... because Fury, but also Brutes have higher HP etc. so they can better stand there while most everything late game resists the damage type. I have personally filed Savage away with Psionic (melee, blast) and Dual Blades as sets that I will only use when the concept demands them... entirely because building characters that can smoothly run through whatever end-game content without being painfully slow on defeats is just not my game. My characters leveraging those sets are fun, except when solo against certain enemy types. Street Justice is IMO better, but it takes some getting use to the way the attacks work. The Street Justice combo system is easier to ignore IMO.

I lurv ya Yomo, but reading some of your more recent 'market' posts often sounds like you are teetering on the edge of an abyss where you've grown bored accumulating in-game Inf, and are contemplating how to generate some 'excitement' for yourself by massively disrupting the market via one way or the other. If you really wanted to "make everything free", you could probably keep listing "everything" for 1 Inf, even if you had to buy "everything" first. When the time comes that you come to believe that you are above the petty interests of 99.9% of the market, but also cannot walk away from it, you go the altruistic route instead of another path.

There is a Malta arc (from Crimson) that gives the origin of their robots. We don't get a good explanation of 5th Column/Council robots (MekMen, Valkyries, et al), but it is pretty clear they are simply being manufactured. The Nemesis werfers and automatons are pretty clearly just brasspunk, but the dialog and various arcs are wildly inconsistent about their behavior and how they are perceived IMO.

John Houseman originated the role of Uncle Jesse in the Mercury Theatre of the Air's "Full House".

"Solution looking for Problems"

Slow down there partner... why aren't you entertaining the idea of +50% Absorb for nuRegen?