Without_Pause

Are both top tier? Yes. The differences is how they feel. Energy is a single target death machine with one overly long animation time. It's AoE is okay. I will just point out you will lose count the amount of times you overkill various things. Having a damage aura will help in the AoE department. Energy also has some decent mitigation with its stuns. Savage pours out some of the best AoE damage, and more so for Brutes as Fury loves DoT. It's single target damage is okay. Part of the issue is that Hemorrhage isn't worth taking so you are pushed towards using both of the first two attacks as where other sets can skip one. You can take something like Gloom from the epics to help out with single target damage, but that also locks you into taking that pool. It is worth noting Savage Leap will help you keep Fury going as downtime between mobs is cut down as you zoom between mobs. I prefer it on sturdier armors as mitigation is minimal and Stone covers that. Me being me, I would pick Savage because I loath TF's animation time, and if I describe to you a Brute, Savage feels the most like what its primary would be about.

I two slot Stamina on my /stone Stalker and Brute. Using the +End Proc in Dark's heal goes a long way to fixing it's end issues. I do need to relevel a DA based character so I can further explore it at higher levels, but End honestly wasn't that much of an issue the last time I leveled it. For me, iIt partly depends on the AT and what powers they have. It also depends on how many slots I deem I can afford to put into them. I would outright question anyone saying they need to be 6-slotted. It feels like someone who never understood ED happened. If you 6-slot both, then your build is underslotted elsewhere.

I would suggest popping a respect in Beta and trying out Hurricane. If you want to be the bull in a China shop, that option is there. I used it on my Earth/storm far more as to paint the mobs with the debuff and leave it at that. Once Hurricane touches a target, that debuff sticks for 10 seconds. As does reducing their range by 60%. Your AoEs are ranged and the only PBAoE thing you have is your nuke, so running Hurricane outside of that shouldn't be an issue. I only leveled to 32. Look at it for the slotting or even IO ideas. I intentionally went on the cheaper side in certain cases. I did load up on one offs. You get some baseline def, and hopefully enough End management. Changing Tactics to an End Reduc helps as well. I also might favor a lower level build, and then a more end game one as I would weight the later ST attacks higher. If currency is an issue, I would start looking at threads on the Market forum. @Yomo Kimyata does a great job covering how he generates currency. You can also email him in game and get a free 100 mill if for no other reason to help with getting the Defender ATOs. Even on the high side those shouldn't be more than 96 mill. I prefer more in the 84 mill area. Defender (Storm Summoning - Psychic Blast).mbd

I might later pop an attempt and doing a quick run at the build. I kind of assume the level 32 area here. The biggest thing which stands out is the lack of Hurricane while taking Thunder Clap. The only way you have to stack the disorient currently is with the nuke so by itself it is rather lackluster. Hurricane is a huge To Hit Debuff. The second other thing is how poorly slots are done. Yes, Maneuvers is nice coming from a defender, but you have it slotted more than any Storm power or attack outside of Subdue. Similar in how you have slotted Tactics.

Damage type would also matter. I feel like I can always tell when a Fire blaster is on the team.

I was on a Posi 2 TF a few weeks ago and a player couldn't find Faultline. I do mean after instructions, and then I came back and gave even more detailed instructions until they figured it out. They literally went to a wrong zone even after being told where to go. I do remember doing a SF for the first time about a year ago, it was such a blitzkrieg I always felt behind. and what we did was a blur. I think it lasted all of 15 minutes due to the speed run nature. It finished, and I went, 'Well, that happened.' I get speed running various things, but I don't think I enjoyed that SF even 1% and again, that was my first time running it.

Single Target: 1 Acc, 1 End, 3 Damage, Optional 1 Recharge. Multi-target: 2 Acc, 1 End, 3 Damage. This is on a basic SO/common IO level. EA offers +Recharge so that will help in that regard. You can pick up Hasten as well and 2 slot it with Recharge. I would say for combos, Attack Vitals will be the best one with adding in BF to get the benefit of it and Typhoon's Edge for more AoE.

In the end there are no best combos for max DPS for DB. I forget what the ideal chain is. I just know it needs a high amount of recharge. By no means can this be copy/pasted, there are some ideas here to look over. I would skip over 1K cuts and its ridiculous animation time.

I also found this thread fairly informative although as always, any data which is based on pylon and Trapdoor testing should be taken with a grain of salt as they use non-general gaming builds.

Savage stands out on a Brute more due to the DoT nature of Savage. End reduction is universal for any AT and the +dmg technically works better on a Scrapper. It's basically S tier on any AT which has it despite Hemorrhage being skippable.

Try 35-50. My auto default is doing the one newer contact's arc to hit 4. Run a DFB with a team so I can go to the Hollows, pound out the first two contacts in the Hollows solo while teaming for Frostfire at +2, being level 13, and no 2x XP booster, and that can be done in a night's session. Next night I go do the Posi TF. I'm like level 17 already. I can do the Midnighter's arc or some other arc and ding 20+ in no time if I'm teaming. On the opposite end, I ran a team for Tina's arc at +2, went through 9-10 missions, and got all of 1.5 levels. WTF is this 1-22 slog? I would be insanely okay if 2x XP boosters never existed. I would also be all sorts of fine if AE was locked out until a player dinged 50. Lets be honest, vets know how to get to 50 asap without AE anyway. So no, this is not some terrible restriction for vets of the game. What honestly blows me away is the lack of in depth guides for power sets. This game is old. There is no sticky in each of the AT sections or the guides section where a player can come in and look at a run down of each of the powersets and come away with a solid idea about about the powerset and ideas for slotting. We have players with hundreds of characters. Some of them have 100+ characters at 50. Even on the 'lower' end having 40+ characters isn't that out of the question and that's just on Homecoming. Odds are that player had just as many on Live. And yet, where are the guides to the things we are playing? That's what new players need. In the history of the game the Scrapper forum has been one of the most active, and yet as of late it feels like there might be one post in a week. Fine, all of the pylons have been soloed. Trapdoor is seeking retirement, but where are the guides? And yes, the kettle being black, I am currently waiting on some things to happen in my life so I have more time to sit down and write out some guides to some of the things I have played.

If/When you do switch in purples, put in the damage proc for Hecatomb versus the D/R IO since damage is already so over the ED cap, and recharge is partly so.

I'm not saying get rid of 2x XP boosters. What I am saying that those might be my most love/hate thing which has gotten added, and it is far more on the hate side.

You should take the primary and secondary data and incorporate it into the actual build area so it is a single column format. Case in point, in the Build area, I would show what sets are used for the power selected just below where the power is listed versus in a completely different section.

My guess is the +Recharge it offers aids the other attacks to where it increases DPS enough to warrant being added in. I also know Gloom helps Claws for DPS, but I can do a attack chain without it, so I never grab it. As the OPs states, these are builds done with a specific goal in mind. These are by no means builds you are going to see doing everyday content. My biggest take aways are just how poorly Kinetic and Psionic perform and just how good Battle Axe is. This confirms my initial plays of the Kinetic and Psionic. Kin is just simply too slow for the damage it produces. Let it be a slower but harder hitting Claws as there is virtually a 1:1 correlation for powers between the two sets. Psionic has an issue with Insight. More so since Boggle helps trigger it but it is poorly implemented. Almost no one wants to take Boggle when other sets get actual attacks which are used in attack chains. Rename Boggle to Insight so that's where it gets generated and make it a toggle. Two easy fixes for sets in desperate need of balancing.

I thought about that after posting. People would instantly go that direction in terms of thinking before ever really thinking Red Hulk. This is why it is so simple to avoid being so obvious, and yet people feel like they have to do an outright copy.

I'm drawing blanks on the names of the games partly because it was some time ago, and I never played them, but there have been character designers which go into far more detail. I still think CoH is really good despite its age. I recently took a character and redid their look. Even though the new look is incredibly basic, the change is significantly better. I was poking around and went, 'Wait, when did this pattern get added?'

I think it should be fine. You aren't even referencing one of the many versions of Hulk. I don't think any big green skinned guy = Hulk needs to really happen considering the trope of green Martians. I'm not sure how much adding in a bio would help the case, but it wouldn't be difficult to give the character a bio which further pushed it away from Hulk. In short, if this character is an issue, then pretty every time I log in I see a character in violation. It is kind of frustrating that you could simply make a non-green skinned guy and no one thinks about Hulk although I wouldn't recommend being red skinned.

Read the room. You're quoting something from 6 days ago.

I did a terribly quick run through of the blast sets. Note, I have yet to play Seismic or Storm, so YMMV. I essentially looked at 5 areas and rated a set 1-3 based on how well they did at that aspect. The areas are: ST Damage: Can one skip on of the T1 or T2 attacks and feel like they have a decent attack chain. AoE: Do they have 2 AoEs without a nuke. Secondary Effect: Does it have one, is it meaningful, can it lead to procs? Control: What meaningful aspects of control does it bring? Damage type: S/L get a 1. Dark and Psy get a 3, although I fully accept just how much blow back I can get for saying Psy is a 3. Both seem to fall into the category of hardly resisted, or incredibly resisted. I bumped Psy down a tier anyway. Everything else is a 2. By all means, I know people will argue specific numbers so I will merely focus on the grouping of the sets and why they land where they do. Hell, I repeatedly admit I changed sets from one tier to another. I won't claim to sets being ranked within their tiers. Tier 1 Assault Rile: The pro for this set is that it does well in AoE. The downside is pretty much everything else. While KB is okay in the land of IOs, the fact that all of its AoE do it means someone is slotting a lot of that proc in order to keep things contained. Defenders to a default like mobs packed together for debuffs. Assault Rifle actively goes against that. In the end, you use IOs to fix the issues of AR versus improving it. Archery: It has better ST damage and there isn't the KB issue outside of one power. The nuke rotates fast, but that's about it. I don't think lighting your own Oil Slick Arrow is going to really bump it since that's a single instance of why Archery works. Tier 2 Energy: This honestly feels like it should be higher because it just feels like it is the poster child of being a middle ground set versus being higher. It's just an incredibly average set which needs some IOs to contain it. Still the best looking nuke. Dual Pistols: I'm likely under valuing this as I know people like to use this set with proc heavy builds. In all honestly, its base damage type is what holds it back from being higher. Seismic: My biggest complaint is that any Earth/Stone type sets are great at control as where this deals a lot with -Fly which is way less exciting and not something you can IO into. Storm: Again, I'm pleading ignorance here, but I find it telling there are four powers which are labeled as being better for Corrs. Tier 3 Electric: I had this in a tier lower even after the rework. I knew the backlash would be coming. It likely still will. It's hard to factor in how much the pets adds, but also needing a pet isn't really helping one's case. Short Circuit requires the Defender into melee and with a long animation time. It's still rather average overall with a great secondary effect even if that aspect is questioned just how it really impacts things. The damage boost is nice and needed. Old school Electric cakewalks into Tier 2. Dark: The ST damage isn't great, but when you factor in how much a heal comes in handy with sets which don't have one, it is a bit more excusable. It's a nice rounded set which can compliment other sets while ultimately not being that much of a 'Wow' factor with so much of the damage being DoT based. Sonic: And coming in with arguably the best secondary effect even though you can't slot IOs for it. AoE is light, but control is high and it makes it super easy to solo. This is one I can see being higher. Dirty hack, one can slot the Call of the Sandman: Chance to Heal Self in Siren's Song. Fun fact, I had a Rad/sonic on Live and even just using common IOs it lead me to soloing defenders. Water: Another set I bumped despite its score. It's just too damn useful overall and the heal helps fill in similar to Dark. I have a Water Blaster at 50. I need to make a build for it. Maybe after I get a better idea of Water it will move higher. I really like the set despite the numbers. Psychic: This might be the one set I debate more than anything because this was tier 4, and I'm like, 'Is this better than certain others?' Maybe some day. I've also debated a number of times when trying to decide on making a character or not and just using a different and higher ranked set instead. There is still a lot to like here. Tier 4 Beam: I only briefly have played it, but it very much is one of the sets where when it is on, it feels incredibly good, and then you have to wait for Disintegration to kick in again. Tons of control and KD versus KB. AoE is deceptive since Disintegration adds to it even when using ST attacks. Another which was ranked lower, but I think it as a harder target killer is worth mentioning. I need to reroll my low level Time/beam over to my main account, or maybe try a different primary as I have 4 other Time characters already. Rad: It's control and damage type are middle ground, and that's about it for negatives. Sure, -Def isn't as important in end game fights, but you can still proc for it and it still makes low level gaming that much easier. In all honestly I hardly ever think to roll a /rad defender even if it was what I used on my first hero on Live. But yeah, I am continuing to invest in my Time/rad. I played it last night, and I was like, 'This feels good.' Still surprised I got the name Irradikate. Fire: No, drugs and alcohol were not involved, but yes, I had this in Tier 3. At some point, you can't overthink things. Fire's control is Rain of Fire and things being dead. You can't slot for its secondary effect, but said secondary effect is better than a proc anyway. Fire is simply Fire and Moar Fire, and that is enough. It's basically a Blaster and Corr set given to Defenders. So yes, for Defenders it is 'Tier 3,' but again, let's not overthink things. Ice: Ice Storm and Blizzard are DoT heavy, and that's about the only negative I have. Ice has been historically stupid good at damage and utility for a blast set while Ice Control languishes at damage for reasons I have no idea why. Oddly enough, Ice is one of the more lightly resisted sets. Also, this is the set which simply outclasses Psychic for me. You can't be Tier 4 if someone already has your seat.

I should add, there was some wonkiness with the polls as T1 powers were listed as under 100% when they were still mandatory, but the thread talking about what percentage of the player base taking powers within a powerset was a gold mine for figuring out what to pick at least on the initial go of playing a new powerset. This would be all the more interesting now that players aren't forced into taking T1 secondary powers.

Power Transfer: Chance of Heal Self in Stamina and Call of the Sandman: Chance of Heal Self in PGA help out nicely in this regard.

Something must be up, as I know of no plans to move it.

Strongest how? En doesn't have DoT which is what is going to be an advantage for a Corr versus a Blaster. En gets better DPS wise once you added in KB to KD IOs oddly enough, and you will want to do that as Kin absolutely doesn't want things being KBed away. I like En, but I prefer it much more on a Blaster.

Fire/storm also has to balance Hurricane and Hot Feet so I would lean Fire/rad.