Redlynne

Insert reference to Arachnis Deathicus here ...

Is that 95% chance to hit versus +0 $Targets? Because I can tell you right now that if you're going to be fighting stuff above your level, you're going to need more than just (a mere) 95% chance to hit a +0 $Target ... /em gives you a knowing look

Always had fun using that for "drive by" attacks when out street sweeping ...

Siphon Speed ... I always used this as a travel power. Pick random $Target in zone, Siphon them ... "superspeed" run to wherever you need to get to. And that didn't include what I'd be doing in combat when I wanted my long recharge time powers to recharge faster. Also, Siphon Speed will boost Fly speeds (including Hover), so that's another benefit for travel. Siphon Power ... you do know that when you use it you buff all Allies in a PBAoE around you ... right? You aren't just leeching for yourself. You put -20% Damage for 30s on your $Target and give +Damage buffing to the Team you've got around you. For both of these powers, rather than working them into the rotation as a "standard" thing to do, instead you simply use them "whenever you can" so as to boost your recharge and damage (at the expense of your $Targets). And that's why I wanted to provide you an alternative. Personally, I'd put the Force of Will pool at a lower priority than getting Power Boost. I'd also argue that getting Hover, Fly AND Afterburner is a waste when you could have Siphon Speed, Inertial Reduction and Mystic Flight instead ... a combo that gives you running, jumping, flying AND teleporting(!) with just 3 power picks and which will all have additional uses beyond just merely easy travel. Likewise, adding Tactics will be enormously beneficial to you ... especially in Teams if you One Slot Wonder™ it with a Gaussian's Build Up proc, not to mention in League play(!!).

Working As Intentionally Designed.

I'd settle for MAG 1 Protection vs all Status (including Knockback) per Human form bubble shield (toggle on all 3 to get MAG 3 Protection vs all Status effects). Would certainly give a needed excuse to pick (and toggle on) all three shields. NO. As mentioned above, I'd settle for MAG 1 Protection vs All (including Knockback) in each Human form shield power while toggled on. Yes ... although I would personally recommend limiting them to higher level play. Random Void Hunters appear at Levels 30+ and Shadow Cysts appear at Levels 40+. Nictus Dwarves would appear at Levels 25+ (after you can get Dwarf yourself) and Nictus Novas would appear at Levels 12+ (after you can get Nova yourself). Quantum Gunners can appear at Levels 2+. Counter-proposal. In an ideal world (minus spaghetti code), you'd make Quantum damage a SCALING UNRESISTABLE damage attack. What do I mean by that? (Quantum Level - 4) * 2 = Unresistable % of damage to Kheldians This means that at Quantum Levels 1-4 the Unresistable damage is 0% of the damage dealt ... and at Level 54 the Unresistable damage is 100% of the damage dealt. I shudder to think what kind of voodoo pasta twirling would be required to implement that using the codebase for City of Heroes ... 👀

NPC 1: "They're just trying to save face, it's their culture." NPC 2: "What are they trying to save their face from?" Hero: "PLANTING ..."$$powexecname Knockout Blow

This. Not this.

Here's an idea that will make EVERYONE angry ... but in relatively equal measure. I would argue that global recharge bonuses from sets (only!) are ... overtuned. Contemplate what would happen if global recharge bonuses from sets ... ALL SET BONUSES ... were cut in half. So instead of +100% recharge from set bonuses, you'd be looking at more like a +50% recharge from set bonuses instead. Such a change would "shift the center of gravity" involved in building for recharge from set bonuses towards Hasten, Alpha Slotting, Luck of the Gambler recharge IOs (which aren't set bonuses in and of themselves) and Force Feedback procs ... which would remain unchanged in this scenario. Would that change a LOT of the builds out there? No question. Would it bring IO Sets performance profiles closer to what you can get out of SO slotting? Unqualified yes. IOs would still be "better" but not "as better" as they currently are. Just something to think about, since it would be a LOT easier to nerf every global set bonus in this way (there's a limited number of them and it's a single parameter in a data table to edit) rather than trying to do a Clean Sheet Of Paper™ overhaul of ALL set bonuses for every single set so as to shift things around for how many slots do what.

That thought occurred to me as I was reading what you wrote. Swapping Assault for Maneuvers and then slotting Kismet +6% Accuracy ToHit would certainly be useful under conditions in which additional +ToHit is desired (which amounts to "always" in effect) so as to relieve the pressure on slotting up Kinetics powers for accuracy. So that's another option.

Ideally speaking ... take Taunt no later than Level 20. The Positron TF (and Villain counterpart SF) have Level 15 upper bounds on them, meaning that you'll have access to your Level 20 power pick at Exemplar Level 15 for those TF/SF situations.

Just to look at things from the other end of the tube (so to speak) ... consider this: 9 Mind primary powers 9 Kinetics secondary powers 1 Speed pool power pick for Hasten 3 Primal Forces Mastery pool picks for Conserve Energy, Energy Torrent and Power Boost = 22 total power picks ... leaving 2 more (for travel or whatever) I would argue that if you were going to "skip" getting a travel power (because you've got Inertial Reduction and Ninja Run in this formulation) you could go ahead and pick up Assault and Tactics (Maneuvers just isn't that useful to you in a lockdown build) ... and you'd be at 24 power picks. I would argue that the most "skippable" powers in Mind and Kinetics would actually be Telekinesis and Repel ... for "opposite ends of the burning candle" reasons. Telekinesis just isn't worth it with a max 5 $Targets limit on it (it just isn't, sadly) ... and Repel is of little use in a build that can lock $Targets down as easily as Mind Control can. Confused/Sleeping/Held/Terrorized $Targets don't come charging into melee range all that often. So at the very least, Repel can get dropped for Hover (the other way to keep stuff out of melee range that's more useful than Repel). So swap Repel for Hover (or Mystic Flight, I'm not picky) and drop Telekinesis for Vengeance (trust me, you'll use Vengeance more often than you'll use Telekinesis) so as to put a Luck of the Gambler into Vengeance as a One Slot Wonder™ set mule, and Assault is another One Slot Wonder™ for you so as to save slots for elsewhere. Or keep Telekinesis and 2 slot it for endurance reduction only so as to combo it with Conserve Power (after Telekinesis gets toggled on) so as to be able to afford to attack with Telekinesis running (for 90s). Slot Energy Torrent with a Force Feedback proc (in addition to whatever else you slot into it) and just use Energy Torrent as often as possible on groups to leech even more recharge from them. I personally recommend the following slotting 5 Positron's Blast (with proc) plus the Force Feedback proc and deliberately avoiding the Dam/Rech IO in the Positron's set so as to maximize the proc chance for Energy Torrent. Between Siphon Speed (which stacks up to 3 times!), the Force Feedback proc and Hasten you should have not only perma-Hasten but pretty much all the recharge you "need" in the build to bring up Total Domination and Mass Confusion more often. And with Power Boost increasing the durations on all mez powers (and recharging twice as fast as those AoE controls) you should have Power Boost available every time you want to use an AoE control. After that it's basically just details of what powers get picked when and how many slots to put into them. One other thing I'll mention is that I personally like putting 5 slots of Call of the Sandman (skip the Sleep/Range IO) into Mass Hypnosis so as to use the power as a Heal(!) if needed.

Rise to the Challenge is a MAG 3 Taunt for 1.25s with a 1s activation time. In order to "double stack" Rise to the Challenge for Taunt, so as to perma a MAG 6 stack (to keep the attention of a Boss, say...) then you need to extend the duration from 1.25 to at least 2s. 2 / 1.25 = 1.6 = +60% Taunt duration A single +5 common 50 Taunt IO will get you +53% Taunt duration, while a pair of +0 Taunt SOs will get you +66.66% Taunt duration. I personally recommend putting 2 Level 50+5 common Taunt IOs into Rise to the Challenge if you want to be a better aggro magnet than what Willpower Tankers default to (which is to say, not great).

/jranger

Defense vs Ranged Defense vs AoE Defense vs Energy (I think) Endurance Drain Resistance That's about it. The defenses prevent the attack from landing/connecting with you, preventing the drain from happening in the first place. The drain resistance reduces the amount of endurance drained from you when you do get hit. All of that is pretty much Standard Operating Procedure for how to deal with attacks that you don't want to have messing with you. I'm not aware of there being a 100% permanently effective in all circumstances "IWIN!" button for this though. It's not like endurance drain follows the "rules" for mez where it's about getting enough protection so that the mez doesn't "grab you" and do whatever the mez type is to you as a status effect.

The ability to use the Teleport in Mystic Flight to "skip past" ambush clusters at choke points on maps is something you have to experience first hand to be able to appreciate. Being able to avoid the dogpile of over-aggro so as to take things on in more easily digestible bite sized chunks at your own pace is a really huge advantage and something that doesn't "yield" itself or make itself apparent to spreadsheet analysis ... but it's totally a quality of life bonus to Mystic Flight.

Controlled enemies that take no damage from being controlled still need to be defeated. Nuked enemies are "controlled" FOREVER (unless if they have a self-rez power) by damage defeating them. Controlled but not defeated = BAD Defeated without needing control = GOOD I'm trying to contain my hilarity at the hypocrisy on display by some people (who shall remain nameless to protect their guilt). Because when is a control not a control? When it's a faceplanter nuke of course!

Use the Pillar of Fire and Ice to give you a mission that will exemplar you down to a lower level. While at that lower level, go deal with drawing ghosts into traps.

Mystic Flight is GREAT as a travel power which isn't TOO expensive to use while in combat (Fly is simply too expensive to keep toggled on while in combat). The ability to teleport PAST choke points in order to get superior positioning can be invaluable in certain situations (I recently used teleport to get past everything guarding the entrance of an Orenbega Prison map module so as to pick stuff off from the INSIDE at the far end of the room, rather than needing to deal with the HORDE clustered up by the entrance hiding to the sides and below ready to swamp me). Under most circumstances I wind up using the teleport feature of Mystic Flight as a combat distance teleport, rather than trying to rely on it as a way to speed up travel (although I do that too sometimes on longer trips).

Your costume choices put me in mind of Gang Orca ... particularly with the Leviathan Pool choice ...

What I do is make sure I've got backup copies of all of my bind files saved to a different drive on my computer, just in case I not only need to do a clean re-install but also suffer a drive failure. It's not hard to do copy/copy updates to that periodically after making any changes/updates to my bind files. Slightly more complex than what you're describing, but also more crash resistant, so ... you get what you pay for I guess.

Unnecessary. According to @Sir Myshkin's research on Defender Proc Monsters you can slot a Positron's Blast proc into Acid Arrow (base recharge 20s with 8ft radius) and pretty reliably proc Energy damage ... which is exactly what you need to light an Oil Slick (and doesn't require a power pick).

This is going to be your best option. Tactical Arrow is what "Trick" Arrow (who are you tricking? the PLAYERS??!) honestly wishes it was and could be. You don't lose much (if anything?) out of the debuffing of Trick Arrow and you get MUCH better damage production out of Archery. Choose this if you're going to play a "pure" archery type of character. Trick Arrow, as mentioned above, is just flat out/no questions asked INFERIOR to Tactical Arrow for Blasters. Don't believe me? Cross compare the T1 power between the Archetypes. On top of that, Defenders and Corruptors will output less damage with Archery than a Blaster will ... except in the context of Scourge for Corruptors hitting a $Target that's below 50% HP, but that's functionally an edge case scenario since you won't Scourge on every hit. In aggregate, a Blaster will do more damage on a consistent basis than a Corruptor will, since the Corruptor damage output is not as consistent due to Scourge. Can't help you there ... although I'd like to imagine that Archery/Ninjitsu might be an interesting combo. NO. Friends do not allow friends to think that Ninja/Trick Arrow will EVER be worth the blood sweat and tears of playing. I speak from experience. I played a Ninja/Trick Arrow Mastermind to Incarnate levels on Virtue. NEVER AGAIN. To quote a great philosopher ... "This is wrong tool. No ... no. Never use this."

The answer is ... IT DEPENDS ... One of the main problems with putting Resistance Debuff procs into AoEs is that the area of the AoE "dilutes" the proc chance, meaning that you'll have a lower chance of getting the proc to affect specific $Targets caught in the AoE. Depending on the details of your build that may or may not be a problem for you. It just really depends on what you're trying to achieve (and why) and how "reliable" you need the proc(s) to be in order to consider the effort worthwhile. This isn't something that can be decided in a vacuum, since the context is EVERYTHING for the question as posed (and you've provided no context whatsoever). Best thing you could do is post your build in the Archetype subforums and ask over there with a post of your build.

We make every pretense of competency around here ... 😎