MoonSheep

blaze + blazing bolt quicksnipe will be a core part your attack chain, not taking it would really reduce your damage output unless you only play end game content i would also pick singularity at 26, blazing bolt at 28 and blaze at 30 your attacks and control powers will all be pretty much entirely ranged, as a result you will likely not as much defence as you think you need i haven’t got much def on my mind/fire dom other than shark skin and one or two set bonuses, it survives quite well as a mezzed foe deals 0 damage edit: i would also highly recommend choosing fire blast over flares, it does a good amount more damage overall i would mostly just recommend playing the character first and getting familiar with the powersets and archetype then focus on the build second. the player is more important than the build

a few months ago the game also changed the level at which you can access your powers. e.g you can pick singularity at lvl 26 and fulfcrum shift at lvl 30, rather than 32/38 unless you play solely end game content i would consider picking these powers earlier. you’ll be able to use FS on things like yin TFs

tanks tend to out damage brutes, the 50% larger AoE inherent helps a lot. better survivability too

make sure you have whirlwind and repel active on your energy blast/kin corrupter so you can fold space them into the air and then scatter them as far as possible alt name: Tornado of Hatred

my man! nice to see someone else who also chooses a defender to maximise their buff/debuff contribution

that's it, you've twisted my arm! i'm going to make the ice melee stalker i've been mulling over @Troo i organically levelled an elec/shield to 50, it's been really good fun. the double nuke is nice, however they don't crit and their ability to use procs isn't great i'm hoping ice/shield will be the perfect combo. fast recharging AoE and cone damage through Frost and Frozen Aura, a fast and heavy hitting ST damager in Freezing Touch to compliment AS in a nice 1-2 succession. shield charge into mobs without breaking hide (as it essentially deploys a pseudo pet) and then get some crits with frozen aura @Dungeoness Eloora how are you finding ice/ice? i have a build for it in mids and it looks quite fun. i'd mostly be taking it for chilling embrace, a nice herding tool for extra chaos

i won’t accept people talking smack about our lord and saviour Fold Space ”For God gave us a spirit not of fear, but of power and love and self-control. And also Fold Space in the Teleport power pool” - 2 Timothy 1:7 ESV 🙏📿 @JasperStone

ooh, i didn’t know it was an AoE - i only remember it from Ye Olde days where it was single target

playing a mastermind is bad enough, but playing one with group fly is just adding another layer to the lasagna of disappointment

need an energy manip blaster with slotted TP and perma boost range 😀

thanks, i’ll have a look later and see will how i get on

i’m looking to replace the rather horrible looking patron pool colours within stalker soul mastery with the icons within the blaster dark blast set for dark blast and moonbeam, does anyone have a view on whether this will be possible? i assume it’s a case of finding the folder for the soul mastery powers and replacing it with the icon files for dark blast, renamed with the previous soul mastery file names?

if it was a full team of 8, one person wouldn’t impact the speed of the run 3 players lagging behind are unlikely to impact the duration if the other 5 players are experienced and fully slotted i wouldn’t worry about it mate. a good team knows how to make the best use of everyone onboard. even if that means sometimes letting people die for a nice vengeance buff

forum PvP is the hardest part of CoH, the turn based combat element of the game

yeah, i usually lead TFs but thought i’d tag along and see what was going down me being abandoned was what was going down

i agree completely - i’ll make a few attempts to politely get someone’s attention, including team messages and a tell so it’s a different colour mostly only on MO or speed runs though, i don’t notice as much on regular TFs or mishes if someones wandering around - they’re usually tasty veng bait

or just kick them from the team and carry on - usually the easiest option for non responsive players

in contrast.. i logged on last night ready to play for the first time in 3 months or so. saw several TFs were recruiting and nabbed the last spot on a KM ITF - sweet realised i forgot to line up my LFG port before accepting the invite, so i sent a message to explain and that i’ll be right there ported into zone, messaged lead.. no response.. waited for a min and sent a follow up.. lead jumps off to the first mish alright.. nevermind

i’ve also been tempted by an ice stalker - i levelled an elec/shield a while ago and enjoyed the AoE, i feel ice on stalkers has an even better combo of AoE and ST damage i agree with you too regarding the controllable crits, it makes for a really involving and strategic melee experience the only thing stopping me is the allure of ice melee on tanks having an even wider cone for frost and the PBAoE

i didn’t know this, thanks. will give it a go at the weekend

just to make sure i have the order of events correctly, you put your brain in a jar and are now experiencing flawless PuGs? 🤔

yes

looks not too bad, will check it out - thanks for the analysis @Glacier Peak i haven’t been playing much over the last months but started a poison/ice def before waning out. ice mastery could be a nice addition rather than psi mastery for Dominate with 5 procs in it on an alt like poison with lots of -res, dominate is near enough a delete button for enemies

there used to be 10 core superheroes and he ate 2 of them he’s now eating manticore’s lunch, that’s why the lil red squirrel man is so small

@Ultimo i see your point of view that enemies should never have significant damage levels, especially for solo individuals, but unfortunately that just isn’t a feature of the CoH mechanics which has largely had a focus around team play hopkins for example is behind a TF “wall” where you need a certain amount of players to start the TF. it’s only accessible solo because HC removed the “wall” when the private server had a smaller population - it was designed for team play i’ve been playing since 2005 and soloing an AV has always been a mark of a truly strong alt - a feat that not every alt is able to achieve if you want to solo AVs, there’s a lot of guidance on the forums of the right builds, powersets etc that are capable, but it does require a two way mindset mate. there’s a bunch of stuff i still learn every month the game also does have a mechanic to stop us from being killed instantly, outside of DoT attacks, a single hit wont kill a full HP character an AV - and some EBs - are a significant battle, it takes preparation and coordination especially on lower level teams. when solo, it takes even more thought and tactics the right alt makes a difference. a poison defender for example can easily flatten an AV even in the mid range levels, an empath however would die rather quickly without challenge, the game becomes boring very quickly. challenge can be overcome, dullness is trickier to resolve