Without_Pause

DNA Siphon is a click with Taunt. Also, Ice has slows in it so even if a target looks elsewhere, it might not actually get there.

It might be an end hog, but it also can use a proc it mitigate the heal and gets end recovery from an attack.

Ice/ice. Chilling Embrace and Ice Patch are where it is at.

I have a hard time thinking there is another set which does more regen than WP. It is commonly referred to as a fixed version of Regen.

No ill will sent. I blame the lateness. I have been talking to someone via messages about Claws, DB, and Kat offering pros and cons. They came away with all three sets seeming to work out. I have rolled a couple DB including one recently who is up to 16. I never really did IOs on live so I'm revisiting various sets now. Some of us don't have a problem thinking of a character once we get past the idea of playing Claws and not be THAT guy.

Plant/ta. Seeds is cheat mode as a control. It almost feels like you use that and anything else is gravy. TA doesn't have to look at health/end bars or worry about buffs. Shoot some arrows and move on. TA is a silver platter of a buffet for a Controller as well. More control on a ST and AoE level, debuffs, and more damage. As a Defender, I think TA/ice can be made one of the more solo friendly ones although soloing isn't fast. It took me about 90 minutes to solo FF, but that included a death, being level 8, and zero slotting. If you simply want something for teams, TA/water as Water offers a self heal. A side benefit of these builds is you really get to play around with procs. Everyone should try the Scrapper version of Claws. One of the smoothest rides to 50. Everyone should try playing a support character on a team just to get the experience of what that is like. More so if you lack heals. Nothing better than being on a support set without heals, someone with heals, and then the team going "Thanks for the heals." Literally a thankless job.

It's super obvious, but doing the WST earns double Merits. Each Posi and Yin can be done in 30 minutes or under on sane teams. Posi is 11 and 15 Merits. Yin is 20. I was on a red side TF doing a speed version, and I think the time was like 13 minutes or some sort of whiplash time. Stalkers are actually quite good at Merit farming when factoring in non-TF content although I think maybe the old Yin TF is one they can specialize in.

I think the point is are you doing kill alls at x1 or are you actually pushing the mobs size? I would love to see how many blasters are taking masses of Mu and their end drain at x8 with a leveling build. They can task my Brute which has actual end drain protection. Kill alls aren't really in the favor of Blasters you think they are. How many Blasters are doing x8 before level 50? If I can take a Brute through 3 missions to get a level during my 30s, how many does it take for a Blaster? You aren't winning a leveling race at +0/x1 with mission completion bonuses. Any famer can verify that.

This works to the advantage of the melee characters actually since they can handle the additional mez coming in far easier. It is much easier for a blaster to ghost to the end and kill the boss.

That's neat. What to talk about mitigation with two different KD powers and the fact Claws has two ranged attacks? Did you factor that into your spreadsheet DPS? Claws can AoE KD from range while DB is still moving into melee.

I can't recall what level range and certainly those missions took time, but I think even in my 30s I could crank a level in 3 missions and pretty consistently. You can't do arc missions due to traveling between zones if you are looking for completion bonuses and speed. If one pushes their diff setting, they will see they fully go T4 much later Vet level wise than other builds.

I haven't really done proc builds on a Scrapper. I go for set bonuses. Saying that, I default to one proc or one off in an attack. If for some reason a set has 6 slots with one being a proc, I see if I can switch out a D/R and add another proc in. Without looking, I'm not sure how much that happens for Scrappers. I see it more with controls where you swap out the mez/recharge for a second proc. Usually proc builds are done for DPS test builds(Pylon/Trapdoor), but do so at the sacrifice of mitigation. BS is a slower set so the procs should in theory proc fairly often.

It's more important at lower levels. The -Def is important due to Def Debuff -Res procs.

The server can know it is safe for another day from the tyranny of Frostfire as my Def soloed the mission. When I logged on of the 47 characters on, 27 are level 50 with four more in their 40s. Only been on a few days, but here's what I am seeing. The player base is heavily leaning towards level 50s. I have seen one LFG message outside of level 50 content in the number of hours I have been on the server. One. Even they admitted they were prepared to solo it if need be, This isn't even to say there are that many LFG messages. It feels like people are playing with their SGs and that's it. In the 90+ minutes I was on the server today a grand total of 1 LFG was sent out which wasn't my own. One. I put out a couple LFG messages and made sure to wait in-between. I got no takers. It hurts my brain to think of a FF advertised and run and still being done solo. I've seen higher up characters run lowbie content on Excel. I guess not here. In the end, if people organize things then they can be done here. If not, you basically know you are going to be soloing it. A player base dies once the character base gets too old. Sub level 40 life is so vacant here what is the motivation to roll a new character? I'll keep the character there, but likely use the one on my main server as well. If people want to team on Saturdays let me know and we can figure something out. As is, I don't feel the need to solo a defender when during the same time frame roughly of gaining a level, I could have essentially run the same mission plus Posi 1&2 on my home server and be something like level 17 versus 9.

If I was coordinated I would say when I was logging on beforehand. I was thinking 10am Eastern, but, uh, I'm not coordinated nor on at 10am. I'm playing Winter's Bow. Logging now though.

My only qualm with DB is I don't know what it does better than Claws. More so on a Scrapper. You have an attack chain by 8. An even better one at 18. You only need two of the AoEs. You can skip Evis. Plus, you get two ranged attacks out of the box. Now, Scrapper Claws has lower recharge on Spin so if we are talking Claws on a Brute or Tank, then I can see more of a case for DB. I'm not even saying DB is bad because it isn't. It is still quite good. It just isn't Claws. :)

That is my guess as well. You "phase out" and come back ready to scrap. I don't have a Stone Scrapper, yet.

Stone on a Scrapper since it is more Def based. Scrappers get less out of Res based armors. I haven't looked at a Scrapper yet, but any Stone build I have looked at has looked really good number wise. It basically excels in not having much of a weakness. For kicks and giggles I tried to solo a mission on my Ice/stone Brute with EB level LR at +4/x8. I did die once after he spammed his summons well enough, but I've only T3ed the build and I need to pop a respect for a minor change in terms of a power slot for more Def. I posted and realized you meant EA and not Elec. The only issue I have with EA is the Psy hole, but that can be dealt with easy enough with inspirs.

Hybrid Melee also offers +Res and Regen. I can see just using that as heal support for a /shield or /sr character. Shield isn't turning down +End and +recharge from Ageless although Rebirth is certainly nice.

Or once you have Melee capped you can skip DA and get better DPS. I really need to roll more Kat builds. I only had one(Kat/sr) at 50 on live. I like Scrapper since the crits help with lethal being resisted like it is.

Convert inspirs over to greens as needed. This obviously gets easier as you level. Level 25 is a nice bump. Needless to say I try to eat inspirs like the free candy dispenser they come from. Bigger mobs mean more inspirs.

This is one mere example as it is currently one of many I have done and there are even more ways to do this. Grab any level 41 Red Fortune recipe. They are going for roughly 2 mill right now. Craft and convert it for two converters using the same Defense type. Do not do same rarity or within the same set. You will get a rare Def IO. Sell that for +2x times what you bought the recipe for depending on what you get. You will over time figure out what the market sells things for so you can kind of put brain dead pricing on what you list. LotG go for more more. The LotG +Recharge is the ideal. 7 mill is what they tend to go for. I list a bit under. Why does that work? At level 41, the only other sets are rares so there is zero chance of getting another uncommon. This happens for other recipes. This is likely just the best bang/buck instance. You can do this for higher level recipes, but the crafting cost is higher. The market doesn't care about IO level or if it is attuned or not. You sell a level 41 IO to someone who is magically buying a level 25 version of said IO. You can by all means take any LotG IOs which aren't the +Recharge and convert within the same set for 3 converters. Odds are the profit off of the IO will cover the additional converters used. I don't do this as I'm lazy. Craft, 2 converters, list. At some point you do this in stacks, ie 10 at a time. I'm working towards the last crafting badge(2k) so I'm grabbing 10 stacks at a time and work through them as I can. Yes, all of this is kind of repetitive annoying, but I can be done with the market in like 5 minutes and go back to doing content. I also have a second account and do farm, but only due to PLing my own characters as needed, and that's honestly rare. I know at one point I did it once in 2 months. "Won't my knowing what you do impact you?" No. My current marketer has generated 1.6 billion on hand. This says nothing of what they and my previous marketer has raised for builds or the 100 Winter packs and some other Hero packs I have bought. I'm borderline making a plan for semi-retiring from the market anyway. When I can plan out to have bins full of the IOs you find "sooooo expensive," then I can afford to take some time off. Any build I strip of IOs for any reason get stored for the next time I need them. Them being attuned just means they can be slotted asap. RE: Any/any Scrapper. Let's not act like a Scrapper using a Melee AoE isn't looking to slot a Obliteration set in it and those go roughly for 2 mil per IO. Slotting isn't THAT different. P.S. People on live would kill for prices we have now.

Got my TA/ice up to 8 with Frostfire unlocked. I figure that and some Posi action is next. I need to be on the server longer and certainly during the weekend, but LFG is essentially end game content so far. I've seen one Citadel advertised and that's it for sub 50 content. It feels like I take a breath on Excel and a DFB is being formed.

1. The best way to make currency is via the market. I'm putting this first since people just assume farming is the best way to get the fat loot. I can get a lot of builds as in most of them done for under 200 Merits. Worst case scenario would be 600ish Merits. 2. Any/any Scrapper will work. It depends on what you have planned with the build once you meet your goal. I look for fun. What that is can be very different than the meta or even what you like. Case in point, I'm not in love with EM, but I recognize why it is popular as I have a level 37 Em/ea. 3. What specific build you take is of minor issue as slotting and total cost for a cheap build will likely be similar enough. Cheap for me is grabbing attuned uncommon IOs. Like in the 1-2 mil range. You slot once and don't care about whatever bonus you are getting since they will be better than SO and common IO slotting anyway. This is what I have planned on a new build who is self funding. Once you have your bank rolling, pop a respec, and switch over to something closer to an end game build. Honestly, you need to hit 27 anyway before some of the better end game options open up. 4. While this might be obvious, the common IO market is dirt cheap compared to what it was on live. I can't imagine a fully done level 25 common IO build is more than 2-3 million. Most of my 50s have level 25 common IO builds. For a new player, this would be the path I would have taken until working the market knowledge kicked in. Now, common IOs for me are essentially End Reduc and Recharge.

Or you know, just play a Stalker and have mez protection, Def/Res, and a possible heal early. On the flip side, a build which can handle larger mobs might solo faster. I don't know. I never tested it, and certainly not at what point larger mobs take over. I never felt like my Brute soloed slow going from 1-50 never using a 2x XP booster, and I'm sure I could have pushed it further. I was eventually at x8, but I was no higher than +1 sans a Council mission. Damn you red side. I know someone was soloing a Tank at +4/x8 pre level 50, so yeah. Hell, set up Council farms and my Ice/stone Brute was doing +4/x8 at 48. Not recommended as it was slow as hell, but add in 2x XP and that's some fat XP right there. Best of both worlds might be a Elec/shield Stalker. Granted, Shield takes some time to get going and isn't that great sub level 50 so it kind of defeats the purpose. In terms of a Blaster, Ice paired with a number of things is to going to solo very well. EDIT: I should add, Either EM or StJ with EA or Stone is likely the best options for a Stalker.