tidge

This won't help you recycle slotted enhancements, but the second (and third) builds of characters can be used for testing. Writing only for myself: The few times I want to do something like "move a single slot", I've done testing with unslotters first to see what sort of pieces I can do without. This won't help with wanting to add slots, but I do consider it important to know what I might be sacrificing first. When I am not that familiar with a power (or how it behaves for a certain AT), I definitely play around with it before level 50. Occasionally, powers that may not need many slots get 'extras' to make it easier for me to slot/unslot different pieces in them as I am leveling up. I've tried many powers that looked good "on paper" but ended up being rather inferior in practice. There certainly are powers and slotting approaches that are often highly recommended in builds yet range from mediocre to hot garbage IMO. The only way to know is to test... and the best tests are done while leveling up.

My Hot Take: If a Blaster is going to make "Range" the primary focus of the build, unless effort is put into making the ranges of all the attacks roughly equivalent the effort is not well-directed.

The Upgrade button is not something I'd ever see myself using...setting aside that I'm constantly reusing/resupplying Enhancements from sets... I'm willing to bet that some low bids on common IOs (especially 25/30/45/50) would end up being cheaper than trying to keep SOs updated.

I'm leaning towards this being a ridiculous question, if only because I believe that many different MM builds could end up with similar sorts of clear times. Critter AI behavior can also factor into "map clearing" in ways that some combos could be better suited to handle than others. The secondary choices that I think would have relatively slow map clear times would be those builds that focus on buffing/healing the henchmen... because buffing and healing don't directly contribute to clearing. As for primaries? I want to say that Robotics may be the top, only because the henchmen are nearly pure ranged attackers. If the henchmen don't need to move, that ought to improve x8 clear times. If the maps are filled with x1 spawns, then other primaries should be faster.

I think Burst of Speed is a necessity for /Martial. I dislike Water Jet, Dehydrate is IMO a more reliable ST-attack. You should not need Hasten, especially with this combo able to switch between range/melee ST/AoE. EDIT: I would not put the Ice Mistral pieces in Reaction Time, two of those should probably be 50+5 Healing IOs.

Even though I like the changes to the first upgrades to allow pieces other than Endurance & Recharge, I still think it makes no sense that the first upgrade is available before the T2 and T3 henchmen AND that the T2 and T3 henchmen require the application of that first upgrade. That first upgrade comes early enough to T1 summons that there is literally no content except at a character's initial pass through levels 1-5 that the T1 won't have the ability to apply the first upgrade. There is no flashback content when the first upgrade wouldn't be available. My preference would be: Henchmen get summoned with the first upgrade applied The first upgrade be replaced with a buff pet (not a henchmen) to provide something (I'd suggest the current options, or something to further help with henchmen ToHiT); this would allow the power to take (recharge intensive) pet enhancements I'm not hurt that what I suggest was not the path taken, as the more recent HC changes are improvements I can work with... it is more that I am scratching my head about the peculiarity of the first henchmen upgrade.

Red/Blue Characters should get the "admissions" contact when they reach a certain level. At least my recent characters have gotten him.

I completely agree that this would not be to "solve a KB problem", I make the suggestion more for consistency among general advice along the lines of "immobilizes mitigate knockback".

I can explain why I tend to not take Leviathan Mastery, even though I agree that "Sharks are cool". I'll stick with Defender-specific reasons, but some of these are applicable to other AT: The biggest reason is that I prefer to have my characters' core powers, including attacks and controls, well-established before the Epic/Patron pools become available. Unless such a power wasn't available at an earlier level, I simply don't find the AoE attacks/controls to be a good use of slots, and especially not single-target controls. MMV, my thinking is this: If I have to invest slots in Epic/Patron powers to make them sing, then those slots are almost certainly ones that I could be using on lower level powers. I exemplar all the time, so I tend to see slots put in higher level powers as wasted. I can of course have multiple builds, but that is a more advanced form of character crafting. To expand on the point above... Spirit Shark Jaws looks to be an excellent single-target Hold. Hold powers offer the opportunity to slot for some excellent set bonuses, as well as for %damage. My issue is that this power won't be available for content below level 36. I'd lean to the set bonuses and try to increase hold duration, but maybe 3xGladiator's Net, and then %damage... but Defenders who want to improve DPS get better results by adding %damage to AoE (i.e. other) powers... so essentially this starts to feel like (to me) like a rule of cool choice. The next biggest reason is that the alternate choices for Epic/Patron pools offer different sorts of powers, and often those other choices don't require many slots to be excellent. This is min-max thinking of course. I think Storm/Water/Leviathan is a fine thematic choice.

A good point worth repeating was made: Setting aside the applicable (but not for new characters) comment about "HO", I want to repeat the point about the Enhancement sets with pieces that increase multiple, individual aspects of a power when slotted. Using pieces like these (from different sets, or from the same set) is a good way to "enhance more" of a power using fewer slots.... plus of course the possibility of getting enhancement set bonuses. There is an inherent "diminishing returns" effect, known colloquially as "ED (Enhancement Diversification)... which would be worth learning about before planning on doing something like slotting more than two of the same level 50 IOs. Elsewhere on the forum there was a recent post by a player who appeared to believe that 5-slots of IOs in an attack (1x Accuracy, 3xDamage, 1xEndurance) was the "best" way to slot that power... which I disagree with. Yet I suspect the player was relatively new and didn't have a holistic view of build strategy. An easy thing to do in-game is to "hover" a potential enhancement over the power to see what the effect of slotting will be for a given enhancement. It won't factor in things like global bonuses, but it is a quick-and-dirty way to see the first-order effects of adding/replacing an enhancement.

I pretty much use the search function(s) (including /whoall) exclusively for open-world hunts, zone events, and Giant Monster fights. If the player is hidden, obviously I'm not going to notify or invite them. I can live with the cooldown period, because database queries... yet I still find it annoying because the of the 50-player display limit. If I had to guess why there is such a limit, I suspect it is probably more to do with the UI (e.g. window, scrollbar) than anything else... the window UI seems to get flaky above a certain number of lines to display... for example, with recipes. The biggest issue IMO is that I can't query across red/blue/echo sides/zones. Maybe this exists for PvP reasons?

This isn't a super important change, but with the Immobilize powers adding knockback resistance to their effects, I was somewhat hoping that the %proc immobilize would also apply a knockback resistance to the immobilized foes. I can see through testing with the Winter's set Frozen Blast that this is not the case... I'm guessing it is the same for the other proc %Immobilize pieces. At first I hesitated to even make this suggestion, because I wasn't sure if it was possible in the PPM code to add a secondary effect like this to the immobilize, but I sort of believe that this may be possible... if only because in addition to the effect of a PPM we also get a graphical indicator that the %proc was applied. As I led: This isn't a big deal, but I rather like that actual immobilize powers can mitigate a lot of player knockback... so I happened to be looking at options other than KB->KD slotting to (sometimes) do the same trick. If implemented it would not be a particularly great solution (i.e. lead with an attack that includes %immobilize, followup with a KB attack), I think this falls more into the category of requesting a subtle tweak.

Normally, I don't like the sort of default advice to "Slot a Force Feedback %+Recharge" in all/most powers that do Knockback... I especially don't like it for the Energy Blast primary for Blasters. Why you ask? Energy Blast attacks are mostly already pretty quick to recharge The quick recharging attacks don't have good %proc chances Blasters benefit quite a lot from set bonuses (Range, Accuracy, +Recharge, etc.) Energy Blast (and Atomic Manipulation) is pretty much doing pure Energy/Smash damage, an off-type %damage would probably be a better choice than %+Recharge Knockback doesn't bother me, but with the combination of range and melee I think a 100% Sudden Acceleration/Overwhelming Force KB->KD piece in those Knockback AoE might make attack chains go smoother than just hoping for %+Recharge There is something else about this combination (Energy/Atomic) that is I think slightly more subtle and disfavors seeking %+Recharge. There is IMO a nice combination of both range/melee and single-target/AoE attacks available. This allows for a good variety of set choices (again, bonuses) and would allow an Energy/Atomic Blapper to shuffle up attack sequences based on the enemy spawns... this will be most evident if soloing x8 when there will be lots of spawns (that survived Nova) and are not standing near each other. I don't have this specific Blaster Combination, but I do have both Energy primary Blasters and Atomic secondary Blasters. Neither of them need %+Recharge, or Hasten, to be effective murder machines. All of these are "Blappers" that have solid mixes of range/melee/ST/AoE attacks.

You can email yourself Rez inspirations.

Spring-boarding from the two quoted posts: Players tackling +4 low-level TFs/SFs should IMO try to make sure that the attacks they have are slotted for Accuracy and/or the character in play will have +Accuracy/+ToHit bonuses from somewhere. Writing only for myself, this is one of the main reasons why I slot Purple sets in attacks (few Accuracy pieces, but good +Accuracy set bonuses), and if not... I am slotting Accuracy/- pieces from non-Purple sets. Since Homecoming lowered the levels at which T7/T8/T9 powers can be taken, I find it rare that my builds will have something like Tactics available for the lower level content.

This is one of those things where the player who has Clamor's aggro really cannot be standing near other players on the team. That TF at +4 is going to be a challenge, but when a teammate is actively debuffing teammate defenses (courtesy of Clamor), bad outcomes are almost always guaranteed. The most common culprit in this scenario is a melee character standing toe-to-toe with Clamor while other melee characters are trying to get their attacks in. I don't care what other melee/PBAoE powers a 'L33T' Tanker or Brute has: I think player that Taunts Clamor and moves away from the rest of the team is a smarter and better player than 99% of the game's population.

Heh, I just checked: Sting of the Manticore has a level range of 35-50, so there are no set bonuses below level 32! Yeesh! I'll admit this about my (current) slotting preferences for Blaster Snipes: I lost a lot of interest in adding %procs to them after the HC change to them, and even before that I was mostly adding %damage to Stalker/Scrapper versions. I find the %damage to be generally "OK" if used on the "slow" snipes, but after some testing (for my own mind, I didn't collect the data) I found that a faster snipe w/ more global +ToHit was on average yielding more (single-target) damage. I want to say that the experiment was comparing 5x Sting of the Manticore + 1x %damage, on a level 50 build where that 6th slot was moved eslewhere to add a Kismet +ToHit piece, or buff ToHit (and/or Endurance reduction) in a +ToHit toggle. Once I convinced myself that more +ToHit was on average better for Blaster Snipes (if the Snipe is part of a regular attack chain, so mostly the "fast" version is used), I changed my attitude around Snipe slotting for Blasters. This is also one of the reasons why I occasionally use the Experience Marksman set.

I agree with @Frozen Burn about the Snipe sets. I used to like Sting of the Manticore, but I realized I liked it because Scrappers/Stalkers don't get their snipe until the Epic/Patron pools open up. Blasters typically get their snipes so much earlier than that, and the set bonuses for SotM cut out at level 27 IIRC. For Blasters, I am almost always slotting Apocalypse or Winter's Bite in the Snipe. I have one character that had so much intrinsic +ToHit that I 6-slotted Experience Marskman, and leveraged the Fast Snipe. While leveling up, I've used recycled attuned Gladiator's Javelin or Experienced Marksman while I waited for Apocalypse to be slotted.

I have not seen converters at 57K for a while. As for PvP pieces... I can describe my own (increased) interest in some of them, relating to the game changes: (At least) two PvP sets provide a 3-point KB protection bonus for using only three pieces (Gladiator's Armor, Fury of the Gladiator)... with FREEM! now part of the game, I find those two bonuses to be extremely helpful in getting characters to 10/14 points of KB protection just through slotting choices. (14 isn't enough for FREEM! but with a SG base buff, it is). Those sets also tend to offer enhancement of values that characters would want anyway. The PVP pieces (and also Winter) tend to be the ones that have an Accuracy+Endurance components, which I like for franken-slotting attacks. I can speculate that with more players, more have become more attuned (pun kinda intended) to the value of old no-brainer pieces (Panacea, Gladiator's Armor, etc.) as well as the value of boosting, and possibly even franken-slotting powers. Personally? I use (recycled) PVP pieces along with ATO when leveling up. For the final builds, it is mostly Purples, then PVP for certain types of powers, and then Winters get considered.

My opinion: I think the enhancement choices are only part of the issue. A bigger issue IMO is that there are so many attacks, and there isn't a lot of synergy between the Melee attacks/aura/PBAoE and the Knockback from the Energy attacks (and Mace Beam Volley). Web Envelope may be helping to mitigate knockback. I'd say this is a fine rookie experiment to see what all then different attacks do, and then consider trimming back on them an repurposing slots. Minimally, I'd replace at least one of the attacks with Combat Teleport, to be used with the melee/PBAoE followups.

I don't know if it is the best, but I have a FF/Beam Rifle that is pretty good solo, and is an awesome teammate. What I liked about this combo was that I could lean heavily into the Beam attacks (which include -Regen) to add %-Resistance in addition to the -Resistance of Repulsion Bolt. I still don't like Force Bomb, it feels clunky considering what the BR attacks can do, YMMV. The offense and debuffing potential is on top of the Defensive potential from FF. Edit: I want to share this specific opinion about Water Blast and Beam Rifle. I think Water Blast is best used by Blasters, whereas I think Beam Rifle is best used by any AT other than Blasters. I'm not saying those set are wrong for those AT, but playing those sets on different ATs has shaped my opinion. Also, specific to Water Blast: I am not a fan of Water Jet. It used to have a problem (consuming Tidal on a miss) that made it easy to hate, but even after that was fixed I'm not at all impressed with it as an attack. I think the "sometimes you get a fast recharge!" is a lure to pick a somewhat inferior power (and an inferior use of Tidal) I'd use the FF Force Bomb in a FF/Water Defender's attack chain before I picked Water Jet.

I suspect that you've been fighting enemy groups resistant to Smashing and Energy damage. As an aside: Do you know about Attuned Enhancements Enhancement Diversification

The current Group Fly visual effects also makes travel in maps/zones with ambient darkness (e.g. Echo Dark Astoria) terrible.

You seriously misunderstand *my* point about map clear times. I make the point NOT because I think faster map times are better, I make the point because RELATIVE map clear times are a viable metric for how different ATs play the same content. Any AT can be taken through missions at a snail's pace, but the AT that can't stay within a factor of three of other ATs is IMO working from a seriously hampered position.