oldskool

That's a good question. I'm pretty open. I'm pretty open to even trying something new and adding some feedback too. I happen to gravitate towards underdog sets on the Sentinel anyway as I have 0 opinions on Fire. Dual Pistols has fun opportunity for analysis compared to all the other AT's. I've also made a Dual Pistols Corruptor which in many ways drove me to experiment more on the Sentinel. I also have experience with a few of the secondaries especially since they were ones I played as other AT's on live. Examples are Willpower (I had 4 characters with it) or Dark Armor (my first lvl 50 in 2004). Obviously, I have an opinion on Ninjutsu since I play it more than my other Sentinels. I can also just toss around ideas to the group too. I'm flexible.

First off, I am humbled by the call out. Thank you! Second, this sounds like an awesome, but big, undertaking! I'll help if I can. I've been considering writing up something of a guide or so at some point myself.

Justin has been a life saver! There has been some misinformation floating around about how procs work in Toggles that cost me some time and money. In actual testing of that, I learned a lot. This came after making that character and only having some cursory glances at "effectiveness". When I play I group almost 100% of the time. So efficiency was hidden by others contributing to the team. It wasn't until I really started scrutinizing my build that I realized I needed to re-evaluate everything. So I did. I've changed so many things in all my builds it isn't funny. I have a Dark/Dark project that will likely see a few iterations before I actually finish it. I may title that project "Putting Lipstick on Pig, or How I fell in Love with an Underperforming Set".

I had made a Dark/Regen on Justin that I was testing for a while before I just dropped it. Regen on Sentinels is pretty durable but not to the levels of like Invulnerability is or some of the crazy things Super Reflexes, Energy Aura or Ninjutsu are capable of. Regeneration has always had a fondness for trying to layer on extra mitigation since it's base is so heavily geared towards healing. Hover is extremely useful for avoiding melee early, but stacking Tough/Weave/Maneuvers is still a good idea. If you really want Link Minds from Psi, that can also help. Just don't expect to build to over 30% defenses, using things like the Event sets for example for their 5% bonuses, because it can hamper your offense. I don't have that Dark/Regen build anymore, but I think it got around low-mid 20's. Then again, I paired it with Dark because of the to hit buffs. I haven't gotten super far on Sonic. I'm trying to make sure I can skip Shout since I hated that power with a passion on Live. Screech is the backbone of Sentinel Sonic and makes it powerful for single target. Shriek and Scream are within tiny numbers of each other which fits well as a sandwich to Screech. I can't make a claim on the best attack chain on that yet though. There are about 4 attack chains that Defenders can use for Sonic and their version of Screech has a base 20 second recharge (Sentinel is 12?). I'd take a look at their board and see what Bopper has on that. I used the "classic" Shriek Shout Shriek Scream before (or Shriek Scream Shriek Shout - been a while). Shout is just so slow. I'd love to skip it, and I suspect Sentinels can. Edit, here is a thread on Sonic Blast between Bopper and Auroxis. Recharge numbers on Sentinels are different, but the ideal attack chains should be easy to adapt to Sentinels. I don't know how I feel about Siren's Song, but Shockwave and Howl you should take. Shockwave with KB to KD gets better and these cones all hit 10 targets, apply the universal -5% resistance as well as another -9.6%. I keep going back and forth on making a Sonic Defender or Sentinel. I'm really indecisive and both are great for very different reasons.

Pistols likes to play closer to the action and has a T9 that is Point-Blank in range. So any secondary that also like to be in PBAoE range also has some synergy with the set. Additionally, any secondary with innate stealth also plays well with getting into PBAoE range. Furthermore, Pistols does incredibly well with damage procs. The attacks have a lot of diverse debuffs/effects which opens them up to IO's from Defense Debuff (Achilles' Heel, Lady Grey, Shieldbreaker) or Knockback (Explosive Strikes, Force Feedback). Additionally, Suppressive Fire is actually decent damage with base values but gets even better since it can hold 2 purple damage procs. So if you're looking to make the most of the damage the set can offer, then you're likely going to want to get as many procs as you can into your most important attacks. That means you're going to be limiting the options on IO sets to your secondary set/other powers (like Empty Clips)/power pools/etc.. I think Nin offers a lot of synergy to ANY Sentinel Primary that can take on a lot of procs because the powers are so diverse. Since you can tap Defense, Resistance, Heal, Endurance, and Confuse right in the secondary this blows the doors off the creative process. There may be some other secondaries that will let you squeeze out recharge without relying on the primary (SR comes to mind with Red Fortune + LotG), but not many sets have as many options just right inside the kit. Sentinel /Nin has stealth meaning it also pairs very well with any sets that use PBAoE powers (Pistols, Dark Blast, etc.). The Ancillary and Patron pools can also add in a good bit of IO diversity too but this may conflict with what you want. So if you're looking for a total package secondary that allows a lot of creative planning, Ninjutsu has a lot going for it. I say this as having a DP/Nin myself that I have rebuilt a number of times now. I started dabbling in more procs after doing it on a Corruptor and realized just how freaking flexible Nin is for building characters. Nin just checks a lot of boxes. I also recognize I am really biased towards the set on Sentinels. So I suggest exploring what you can do in Pine's and see if you can get to a performance level you like with sets you're interested in. Sentinels have a lot of great options for secondary sets.

^ This is the conventional wisdom for Regen regardless of AT. The answer is not about what is mutually exclusive, but instead what helps the most without compromising too much offense.

It should not. The cool down is 300 seconds. The proc won't do enough to matter with a down time like that. Besides, they won't need it. Vengeance is indeed pretty amazing on teams, but it does require someone to die. It works as a nice base slot power to squeeze out recharge since I have no more slots to devote to Epics/Patron powers. I'm glad you found my ideas helpful. I'd suggest hopping on Justin to test it out for yourself and see how you like it. Edit: Also, thanks for the compliment on "expertise". I think that's a bit of a stretch for me personally. I wasn't going super hard into the numbers on things like proc calculations myself until more recently. I found a list of PPM #'s and an equation to judge for myself after having some disappointing results from initial base assumption out of older knowledge. Also, some pure stubbornness about adapting on my part. So expertise is humbling. I feel it is more "experience" and that experience is... do not go the route I did. Take advice where you can, but take it with a grain of salt. Test it yourself on Justin when you can. Don't take my for it and spend the time/influence only to be disappointed. I have 27 characters and counting because I like making heroes. I don't have the time for all of them though. When I build in Pine's I need to maximize my understanding to fit my preferences, but also not waste resources. So I try to pay forward the mistakes I have made so others don't do it.

For Incarnates I lean towards Musculature, Degenerative, and Assault. Barrier is also pretty good and any lore and any judgement. That said, here are some more ideas on the most recent build. If you really, really, really want Mind Link, you can save some slots by using some Hami-O's. 1 LotG for the Recharge, and 2x Membrane Exposures with +2 level enhanced will bring the recharge down to 88 seconds with your current slotting vs the 94s you have it at. You're pushing a ton of Energy/Negative/Fire/Cold. That's cool, but you could also get a lot more damage out of your powers. You really don't need to softcap any of your defenses. I'm honestly not a big fan of Decimation Chance for Build-Up. That proc has such a low chance to activate in reality, and you have no control over it. It has a 10 second duration and about half of that duration is a lock out period where the effect can't happen again. It would have around a 13% (+/- 1%) chance to activate. First Power - Single or Charged Shot - 5pc Decimation. Ideally no proc here since you'll rarely use this skill. This is purely for the global recharge. If you really need a choice, Single Shot at least has some utility you can make use of. Defensive Opportunity won't do much for you in an endgame build. Parasitic Leech with the slotting above gets you about 7 endurance a second for 45 seconds if used on all 5 targets. Even with just 1 target you're still over 4 end/s. Hardened Carapace, 4x Ubreakable is enough. Inexhaustible, I leave it default with a Performance Shifter. Environmental Adaptation - I like a minimum of 3 slots for LotG Disintegrate - 5x Opportunity Strikes + Javelin's Volley Chance for Toxic - You'll use this alot, put a proc in here. The defense from the 6pc is nice, but I like more offense. Aim - 6x Gaussian's for defense, or 5x Adjusted Targeting (for recharge) + Gaussian's Proc. Gaussian's is only 1.25% defense to all typed damage which is OK. Up to you. Lancer - 5x Apocalypse + Javelin's Volley - again, put another proc here for damage. Ablative, Refractor, Rebuild, Parasitic, Genome, - I agree since I suggested that. 😉 Tough - 4x Unbreakable is fine. Unique or not is also your choice. Unique for HP is fine. Weave - you can either under slot this with 3x defense set like LotG, 5x Red Fortune + 1 LotG or (my favorite) 6x Reactive Defenses. This is a power this ALL defense and it is higher base than Maneuvers. Piercing Beam - 5x Ragnarok or Positron's + Annihilation Chance for -Resistance. You skip Athletic Regulation. I like it. It is also the only source of DDR for Bio. It's not much so I guess it could be optional. YMMV Weave - I like at least 3 slots. Overcharge - Ragnarok or Positron. The cooldown is long and it's base DPA isn't so high that it takes priority over Disintegrate/Lancer/Piercing You can take or leave travel powers. I personally skip them most of the time. For my Beam/WP I actually have more from Leadership (Assault, Vengeance, Victory Rush) and Combat Jumping. You can probably fit those in with a Bio build too. Vengeance mules a LotG but on teams it is sexy stuff. Anyway, just some thoughts. I'm pretty biased to keeping ranged attacks. The Epic/Patrons would open some opportunity for Hecatomb, or other really sweet sets. I don't like swapping out my beam cannon for a melee attack though. Again, YMMV.

Single Shot won't trigger the ATO proc often. The Superior version has a PPM of 2 which means once per 30 seconds. Single Shot's a fast recharging and fast animating attack which the ATO further enhances beyond that. The real chance for that proc to go off is probably around 10%. If that is ok for your needs, then proceed. Lancer Shot is your highest DPA attack and is likely a better candidate for Apocalypse. I'd probably put Opportunity Strikes in Disintegrate, maybe. I can't view this in Pine's at the moment, but those 3 things stood out to me.

Jeez, I can't believe I forgot Piercing Beam in that Beam/Bio thread!!! *face palm* I don't have Pine's with me so I am mixing up powers and I hadn't logged in to my BR hero in a while. I probably need to revisit some things on that build anyway. Anyway, I do recall originally I felt that the T1/T2 just stopped being included in my attacks with only the occasional use for Opportunity. For that character, I was valuing Defensive more, but I can probably revisit some things to bring Single Shot back. I've been playing DP/Nin a lot and started retooling my AR/Bio as the next project. Edit, yeah, I have Piercing with both the Annihilation and Positron's Blast procs. I have 4 Sentinels I have been rotating with another one I made a few days ago (Water/Energy). I blame altitis and old age for not keeping these things together!

I mule the +end proc in Inexhaustible. I actually don't bother slotting it beyond the default. It's a cool power, but there is so many other goodies I don't have it as a high priority. Genomic Evolution on Sentinels isn't as cool as it is on melee. I think I have just 2 slots here for the two +3% global IO's. I use Tough and Hardened Carapace for Unbreakable Guard. I slot another +end in Stamina as well as a few other pieces of Performance Shifter for +HP. I put the Panacea, Numina, and Miracle procs in Health. I 6 slot Ablative Carapace with Preventative Medicine. I 5 slot Rebuild DNA and Parasitic Leech with Panacea. These three sets offer a lot of global recharge. I do not find it worth while trying to push Smashing/Lethal defense to the point where it hurts my global recharge. Why? Bio for Sentinels has very little in Defense Debuff Resistance. Lethal damage almost always comes with -Defense to the tune of 7.5%. That's any rifle fire or slashing weapon attacks. Against anything like that (Arachnos, Cimos, etc.) your defense will get floored. So instead I play more proactive with Parasitic Leech and Ablative Carapace. Those grant regeneration and absorb (Leech actually does a lot) with Preventative Medicine having a fall back plan absorb. If I need a direct heal, that is what Rebuild DNA is for. I actually removed Kinetic Combats from my build. Purple inspires are also something I consider as well as Defensive Mode, Efficiency mode, and even Barrier with Incarnates. Defense mode gets you a bit more defense. I think I hit around 25% to Smash/Lethal during that adaptation (no Pine's working from memory). My elemental defense (Eng/Neg/Fire/Cold) is around 32-35% base and goes up more with Defensive Adaptation. Though honestly, I don't use Defensive much. I either use Offensive Adaptation all the time and leverage proactive measures (Carapace, Inspirations) or I run Efficient where I can hit higher levels of regeneration during Carapace + Leech. For Beam, I play that with Willpower. Slotting wise, I don't use Thunderstrikes at all. I use the slots for damage, global recharge, the ATO's, and the occasional proc in select powers. Refractor Beam in Pine's is messed up. It's an AoE, not a snipe like how it is presented. The damage isn't right either. I prefer the Ward set in AoE's that aren't T9's. For Bio Armor, and Willpower for that matter, the potential to continually activate that proc outside of the T9 cooldown is pretty valuable to me. For single target, I only worry about Disintegrate, Lancer Shot, and Charged Shot. Single Shot has -Regen which I find has little value outside of big game hunting. The effects of Offensive Opportunity aren't worth the power selection to me nor the slots to enhance the power. I could keep it at the default slot, but I ultimately decided to not bother.

This is actually a pretty easy pairing. I'd recommend just playing the sets and getting a feel for what you like and don't. It's pretty hard to mess up Willpower, and AR isn't complex. You're probably thinking though, it is so many powers, what do I skip?! What is bad?! Ok, ok. For Sentinels, cone powers cap at 6 targets and targed AOE cap at 10 targets (edit: Ok, some primary sets and some powers break this rule, but in general the rule is true.). Assault Rifle has 2 cones capped to 6 targets and one targeted AoE capped to 10 (not counting the capstone, Full Auto, which you should take). You don't need both cones, but you really should take the targeted AoE. I eventually respecced out of Buckshot, and kept M30 Grenade + Flamethrower. M30 Grenade does slightly less damage than Buckshot (like around 1 pt less of base damage IIRC) but it hits 10 targets. So for bigger packs of enemies it will out perform Buckshot. M30 will scatter enemies with knockback but a knockback to knockdown IO will fix that. Flamethrower does more than double the damage of Buckshot but is also limited in targets since it is a cone. For single target, you can take or leave Slug. Burst and Disorienting Shot are both pretty good right from the start even ignoring the entire Opportunity mechanic. Burst recharges in 4 seconds and Disorienting Shot recharges in 5 seconds. With some recharge enhancement you should have them available often enough. Slug can be a helpful filler though since Incinerator doesn't become available until 26. This is of course assuming you are playing the game and not just getting powerleveled to 26+. I include Slug in my build since it mules a set and it makes exemplar content smoother. YMMV, Slug is optional. For Willpower, Resurgence is not necessary. If you are on the fence about what to do, I'd highly suggest you plan to take Strength of Will (though some do not care for this power). Slotting for Willpower is also very easy. Most of your toggles and passives only need a maximum of 3-4 slots unless you are going for some specific IO bonus. High Pain Tolerance is an exception since it can take both heal and resistance enhancements. Both types of enhancement do different things so a 50/50 split while leveling may be a way to go. Sentinels have really great selections in Epics/Patron Pools. You can take these or not. It really is a matter of personal preference. I am heavily biased towards keeping my Sentinels built with their ranged attacks in their primary. However, I do not ignore just how powerful some of the melee options in the Epics/Patron pools are. You can get access to Cremate, Knockout Blow, Havoc Punch, Mind Probe and so on. These are very strong abilities which you may or may not be interested in. There are also AoE immobilize powers like Fire Cages or utility powers like Mass Hypnosis (AoE Sleep) in the Psionic Pool. There are also additional melee range AoE powers which are not only potentially strong but can take on some sets Assault Rifle doesn't have access to (e.g, Avalanche for PBAoE powers). The Darkness and Soul options have Darkest Night and so on. Again, lots of really solid choices but they won't break your build by not taking them. I complete content just fine without them on many of my Sentinels. If you're looking to use IO sets for this early on, I can get a lot more specific, but for now the request is fairly broad so that is why the response is broad in kind.

You're welcome! Here are some ideas that could help you avoid dropping powers if you like what you have, improve your damage, and shouldn't break the bank. Some damage procs, and PvP sets in general, can be a little expensive but not purple set level. Thunderstrike, Acc/Dmg, Acc/Dmg/End, Dmg/End in Pistols, Dual Wield, Suppressive Fire, and Executioner's Shot. (None of that is mandatory if you want to move an ATO to one of these attacks. More on that below) Pistols - 3x damage procs (Lady Grey, Sheildbreaker, Javelin) - Pistols has the fastest base recharge making it a better candidate for pure damage procs over any utility procs (low uptime). Dual Wield - 2x damage 1x utility (Javelin, Explosive Strike, Force Feedback) Suppressive Fire - Loads of options from Hold sets like Chance for Mag 2 hold. I went purple here (Apocalypse and Unbreakable Constraint) though. The two purple procs make Suppressive pretty powerful. Executioner's Shot - 2x damage, 1x utility (Lady Grey, Any one of [Explosive Strikes, Javelin, Shieldbreaker, etc...], Achilles' Heel/Force Feedback). Any proc will have a higher chance to trigger in Executioner's Shot vs any of the other single target attacks. The higher base recharge makes it the most flexible power in the set for utility, damage, or a bit of both. This is also the best attack in the single target chain for the Opportunity Strikes set if you're interested. Even with 5pc and around 96% recharge enhancement, Executioner's Shot will trigger the ATO around 20% of the time. The odds get worse in the other attacks, and while it is virtually guaranteed in Hail of Bullets, that power deserves other things. I would caution against loading up Executioner's with too much utility and giving up on damage. Using a set like Thunderstrike is going to under enhance your damage and the entire point of doing this is to make up for it with damage procs. Hence the reason I recommend picking 1 and Achilles' Heel is one of the best damage/utility effects you could put there. *Edit, I've actually changed my build but the sentiments in the above are still largely true. I've decided to go with Apocalypse in Executioner's Shot which still has a good chance to trigger the purple damage proc. The utility of Pistols takes on Achilles Heel since it is fired off roughly every 2 seconds and Suppressive Fire takes on the old Executioner's Shot slotting. This grants a higher chance for Suppressive Fire to trigger Unbreakable Constraint and works to normalize some of the damage between Suppressive and Executioner's. It's an overall damage increase, but not one so great as to matter to a lot of people. I just figured I could squeeze out a few more DPS points on average by making the change. I was already in the process of a respec anyway which only sealed the deal. Entropic Chaos for Chance to Heal isn't a bad idea either if you can't afford or don't want a damage proc in one of the above powers (maybe put one in Suppressive Fire). I wouldn't put one in each though as you'd start giving up too much damage for unnecessary utility. Bullet Rain is a nice place for Force Feedback also. If you want the Sentinel Ward set, the proc from works well in Bullet Rain from my experience. The proc has a very high PPM value (5 for basic, 6 for Superior). I like Annihilation in Piercing Rounds, higher chance to trigger it, and I often use it on priority targets plus 2 friends anyway.

If you were to go through with this build, I have the following suggestions: Swap the Defender ATO out of Single Shot and into Disintegrate. Disintegrate will improve the uptime on the heal proc. You shouldn't plan to spam Single Shot anyway, even if the ability has a -regen component. Traps already has you covered there. Swap the slotting for Tactics and Aim. You'll have far more control over the Gaussian's proc in Aim than you ever will in Tactics. I'd reconsider a lot of the other slotting decisions too. The build seems focused on improving personal survival and damage at the expense of the primary. The debuffs of the set can be your offense and defense output.

I rarely, if ever, toggle ammo types in combat. If grouping, I look at what is available and I decide if I want to add support or just go damage. When solo, I run Incendiary Ammo all the time. For all elemental ammo, Suppressive Fire turns from being a stun into a Hold. The duration is around 3 seconds, but if you focused on damage in powers you should be able to Suppressive Fire -> Executioner's Shot -> Pistols/Dual Wield on a Sapper to drop it. For Willpower and Regen, I'd probably strongly considering keeping Dual Wield even with just the default slot purely for Defensive Opportunity to restore endurance. I don't need it on my DP/Nin since there are click powers in the secondary that grant me a substantial amount of either resource. If you solo a lot, have you thought about the Epics/Patron pools for more tricks? Specifically, I'm thinking Psi for Mass Hypnosis and Dominate. Mass Hypo is a sleep which will let you pick and choose what you want to take out first. Dominate is another hold to prolong a lockdown of a really obnoxious target. Just some initial ideas. I'd have to work on a build in Pine's to figure out how I would approach it, and also what kind of budget are you wanting to throw at it?

For Beam, Single Shot and Cutting Beam are skip options. As to the T1 vs T2 debate, I'd suggest trying to not view it so much in a vacuum. A lot of sets have stronger T2 attacks than the T1, but this isn't a universal truth. Also, some secondaries make it where you don't need Defensive Opportunity much or even at all. Some builds may value the utility of both and some may only need one. The only effect from Opportunity worth anyone's time is the -20% resistance.

That's a broad statement. So forgive me if the following holds anything you know about either set. Dual Pistols: For leveling, I'd recommend taking everything to find out what you like. For endgame, the best single target attacks are Pistols, Suppressive Fire, and Executioner's Shot. Dual Wield falls behind with IO slotting which includes using procs. Dual Wield does offer some utility which may or may not be of interest to you. I have skipped it for my Sentinel. A lot of Sentinel builds do not need Defensive Opportunity after a certain point so Dual Wield loses a little functionality there. The utility it does have is in the form of knockdown (standard ammo) and various IO sets (Forcefeedback). For AoE, Bullet Rain is a targeted AoE which means it hits 10 targets. It is a good spot to put Sentinel's Ward, one of the ATO's. Each hit has a chance to proc the absorb shield and against 10 targets it improves the odds. Hail of Bullets, the T9, is something you want. It does a lot of damage, but the caveat is that it is point-blank. So you gotta get close and personal (more on that in a minute). A lot of people hate Sentinel cones. They only hit 6 targets, but Empty Clips is a bit more than that. Empty Clips can take several procs from various sets like Forcefeedback Chance for Recharge. It will never wow you for AoE damage, but it can be useful for utility. Piercing Rounds is a debatable pick. I like it personally, but there are very good reasons to skip it on Sentinels (not other AT's though). It has a 3 enemy target cap and a long animation. I suggest taking it to try it out, but you can drop it if you hate it. Finally, ammo. The versatility is what Dual Pistols is actually good at. Standard ammunition gives some powers either soft control or a defense debuff (or resistance in Piercing Rounds). The other ammo types change some aspect of the power and replace either the soft control or debuff with something else. Cryo ammo replaces an effect with a slow and converts 30% of the default lethal damage to cold. Chemical ammo replaces an effect with a -damage debuff and replaces 30% of the lethal damage with toxic. Incendiary ammo replaces an effect with a short duration fire damage over time (usually about 3 ticks) and replaces 30% of the lethal damage with fire damage. The point of the ammo isn't really about picking a type to bypass resistances. You can get a little mileage out of that, but instead think more about what you can do to benefit yourself or team in a situation. Play to the strength of the set, and you'll have a good time. Regen: I can't think of a reason to skip anything in Regen. There are several power changes vs the melee version that don't leave a lot of room to skip stuff. You get a toggle absorb early on which helps to pad out damage, a passive increase to hit points (no Dull Pain), and a revive-like power that functions based on current hit points. That power, the level 35 one, has a stronger effect the lower your health gets. If you have 0 health, it picks you up off the floor. So it isn't an easy pass like Revive on a Scrapper's version of Regen. Moment of Glory is your only power source for taking an alpha strike before Incarnates. After Incarnates, probably Barrier(?), you could consider letting go of it. That's the basic gist of the two sets. Sentinels also have lower values for all defenses meaning that combining pool picks like Fighting, Leadership, and Leaping (the common 3 for boosting Regen defense) will net you around a starting base of 7.5% defense to all. So if this is a serious character for you, you may want to get some influence ready for some more powerful sets like the seasonal events for large boosts to defense they carry. Epics/Patron pools are personal choice. You can take them or leave them depending on your preferences. You can add some melee attacks if you like or some new utility. I mentioned earlier that Dual Pistols likes to be fair close to the action. You may be able to get by with Hover for a good bit while leveling, but this will conflict with using the T9. For that, you may also want to consider taking Stealth from the power pools and combine it with a Celerity: + Stealth IO to launch Hail of Bullets a bit more safely. You could also just use Moment of Glory.

Lot of good points. I had STRONGLY considered keeping Tactics for the 2.5% bonuses, but I figured I could improve my endurance consumption by dropping it. Plus I don't need the +to hit for most content. It is certainly nice against debuffs, but for fighting trash my accuracy in the AoE's is so high it doesn't matter. Plus Pistols has higher chance to hit by default. It's like a Kismet in the set all the time. The Superior Sentinel's Ward has a PPM of 7. This puts it around a 38% to trigger in Bullet Rain... per target hit. With a 10 target cap you should see the effect go off more. I swapped my set there. Superior Opportunity Strikes is 2 PPM with around 23% chance to trigger in Executioner's Shot assuming it has the 96.9% recharge reduction. When it triggers it can bring up Opportunity pretty quick which is nice, but I tested without it last night and learned I can live without it. Just speaking out loud on that. It is more food for thought than anything else. I also agree you have a lot of choice on AoE, and you can afford to skip some with Dual Pistols. Piercing Rounds can hit 3 targets, and even with a 4ft cone I can reliably make this happen. Since it does high damage, and it can debuff with Annihilation it cuts a path in trash packs. Empty Clips and/or Piercing Rounds are totally skippable on Sentinels due to their target caps, but I do find value in their use. My goal was for having options on the AoE side vs the single target. So having all of them works for my goals. The T9 in /Nin has nice functionality for making me run faster when I want and giving a boost to DDR or even endurance. I don't really *need* it (especially not with Barrier active), but I have it because I like hording primary/secondary powers. It's a fine mule too. I could probably replace it with anything, really. I completely get wanting fly/teleport for those reasons. ;) 100% with you on Dual Wield. Totally not necessary for the build. I have the same slotting in Stamina, and similar slotting in Health (I believe I have the PVP proc vs one of the others). I have no problems with endurance since the /Nin end power recharges ever 17 seconds for me and it is nearly a full end bar everytime. Health isn't a problem either with Preventative Medicine every 17s, or the Ward proc going off almost every time I click Bullet Rain. DP/Nin doesn't need Hasten either, but it is nice to have. Overall, your build looks good. Just adding some ideas if you ever decided to change it up (you don't need to though).

Oh I thought. ;) My thought on it is one of the reasons why I went back on the post in the first place. The Decimation buff lasts 10 seconds. It has a 5.25s effect of Build-Up and a remainder effect which is essentially a lockout period. You are also very deliberate with your slotting so I thought, nah, Red must have a reason for that proc and the 6th slot. Like you point out, for 5.25s you get a boost to damage to everything within that window of opportunity. However, the chance for that window of opportunity is small, and it is uncontrolled. Over a long period of time it can grant a burst damage effect when it happens, but the odds aren't in anyone's favor for consistency. I have a higher chance of having all 3 procs in my Executioner's Shot going off than I do of ever seeing Decimation fire off. The chance for Decimation with 5pcs is around 11-13% as I mentioned. My procs have, actually, a 58.9% chance to go off [0.589*0.589*0.589 = 20.4%]. I don't *expect* all of them to fire, but it is possible. I digress though, with such low odds of firing off, the real up-time of the effect is so small that it doesn't make an appreciable difference in damage. At least, not for my testing. Before Justin went down, I had tested a few Pylon runs purely to observe double Build-Up proc chance (Gaussian's and Decimation). Decimation activated about 1 time per Pylon with me just chipping away for 15 minutes. Last night Gaussian's went off once, and it wasn't even a great take down time. However, my fastest times were piling on actual damage procs which activate more consistently every attack cycle. In short, Build-Up procs are overrated for Dual Pistols in the most general sense. However, if you are going for the 5pc in Decimation that 5th slot may as well be the Build-Up proc. The 6th slot could function better in Hail of Bullets with a Gladiator's Fury for that wannabe Sonic Blast action unless you really want that final set bonus. Of course, everyone gets the YMMV. ;)

It was good info, I don't think the proc info took away from the discussion. Dual Pistols is a neat set with its swap ammo that opens up so many proc options: Slow, defense debuff, knockback. Fair enough. Originally I asked about the 6th slot for Decimation: Chance to Build-Up in Red's build. I totally get the 5pc for the recharge, but the proc is 1 PPM. With 0 recharge reducers in Executioner's Shot that's something like 18% chance to trigger. With the default 60-ish% from the set, it drops to 11-12% chance to go off. YUK. So I haven't had a lot of love from that proc. I have had a few times where the stars have aligned, and I have had it go off with Gaussian's in Tactics. However the lack of control on the results just isn't my cup of tea. For more group debuff fun, Hail of Bullets can take the Gladiator's Fury -20% proc. I messed with this tonight, and works like a champ. I moved my Sentinel Dual Pistol build to largely a proc based one and took out a Pylon in around 6 minutes. That's just ranged attacks, no melee at all or even any Ancillary powers (I do have Caltrops). No procs had a range from 12 to 8 (was trying some configurations). I didn't turn on any Incarnates either. I relied on my endurance power in /Nin vs turning on Ageless. Plus I was a little sloppy here and there. I may be able to get it closer to 5 or 5.5 minutes. Procs are a hell of drug! Tried a few test missions where I can leverage even more -resist with this character since Piercing Rounds has the Annihilation Proc. I put Positron's in there (5pc no Range/Damage) and figure it to be around 42% chance to trigger the debuff or the energy damage. Some may think, wait, that's all 3 -20% procs and what your class can do. Isn't that overkill? There is no kill like overkill. Also, when I play I do not play to expect people to have optimized builds. So I try to make my characters as self contained as possible. So if I team with people that have these things, then well at least I can add time to debuff duration. ;) Otherwise, this character of mine can leverage 94.6% -resistance if all the procs can trigger which includes the innate (-5% resistance) and Opportunity (-20%). Reality it is more like a high uptime on -45% with spikes around -65%, but that ain't shabby for a class many like to discount as subpar. Anyway, now on to the other Dual Pistols guy I have and make sure it works they way I want. P.S., My Corruptor is still low enough that I am tempted to restart as a Defender for the bigger debuffs. I'm quite torn about it hence the reason I keep hanging around here. Plus, Red's builds are just great inspiration and fun reads. I loved the Huntsman one too. That was one of my favorite characters back in the day. That write-up makes me really consider if I want to keep my Crab or convert it to a Huntsman... or better yet, both (Huntsman with a backpack!). I also made a SR/MA tanker because of you, Red. It had so many good ideas, I just had to make one myself with my own preferences adding to it. You're a true hero! :)

Some how you have Shinobi-Iri at level 4 in the above and it becomes available at level 6. With Achilles' in Executioner, can you run Executioner->Suppressive->Pistols? I've refined my build a hell of a lot. I was doing some testing before Justin went down, but logged in tonight to try out a proposed change on some Pylons and a few missions. I have had extremely bad luck with Tactics and Gaussian's going off. I rarely ever see the Decimation: Build-up proc going off. I think Executioner's Shot has around a 14-16% to activate it with little to no recharge mods. Pistols was worse. So bleh... I have a better chance of 3 procs with 3.5 PPM going off in Executioner's Shot (18% I think?). Anyway, give some heavy procs a try. I swapped Pistols and Executioner's Shot to Thunderstrike 3pc and put procs in the other slots. Pistols gets the Toxic Javelin, Touch of Lady Grey, Shield Breaker (approx 30% chance for one to go off). Executioner's Shot gets Toxic Javelin (whatever it is called), Lady Grey, Achilles' Heel (approx 58% chance for one to go off). Since Executioner's Shot has a high base accuracy, I could probably put a Hami-O there instead plus an Explosive Strike proc for a 4th. I may try that, but the improvement is pretty slight so may be not. Suppressive is as above with Apocalypse and Unbreakable procs (45-48ish% chance to go off). Anyway the damage procs work like a champ! Hail of Bullets has a Gladiator's Fury for -20%. It fires frequently due to the cool down. I moved the ATO sets into Empty Clips (only 5pcs no proc) and all 6 Ward into Bullet Rain. I still keep Piercing Rounds because I like it, and it works to clean up AoE. If I get a moment to share it, I will.

The Scrapper forums confirmed Achilles' Heel and Annihilation functioning as separate sources in the Pylon thread, I believe, by using the aura in /Radiation that accepts both. Another -20% proc can fit into Hail of Bullets too. I'm assuming it works with Annihilation and Achilles', but I don't currently own it. So in summary, Dual Pistols can slot 3 sources of -20% on top of what you get in Piercing Rounds with standard ammo. Using Piercing Rounds and Achilles' Heel elsewhere gives you a lot of uptime on at least -40% with some spikes of high debuffing. Edit: Removed a lot of stuff that was more a response about procs generally. It was probably too much for this thread and the response.

I have seen a few Raziel inspired Psi-Melee characters. One person had a really really good costume plus the blue tint on the psi blade was spot on.

The Sentinel ATO's add range in their bonuses. This will widen the cones on Empty Clips and Piercing Rounds. Positron's Blast also has a Damage/Range which modifies it a little more. The Annihilation chance to debuff resistance is the only one from that set I'd use. Dual Pistols has a lot of opportunity to add 2 more sources of -20% on top of what Opportunity grants which is why I suggest it.

Pages 1 and 2 have variations on builds. Is there something more specific you'd like?