Call Me Awesome

@Call Me Awesome on Guardian, same global handle here on Excelsior. Slowly working to recreate and level some of my characters; at shutdown I had 24 Incarnates and I've no idea how many lower levels. As of right now I've the following in the 20's: Call Me Awesome - Invuln/Broadsword tanker (Mutated from Inv/Stone at shutdown) Delta Farce - Fire/EM blaster Gortak - Broadsword/Shield scrapper Bogus Wave - Water/Rad corruptor

Frankly the "Healer Only" mentality was quite prevalent from launch to shutdown as well. I found on most PuG's that if a Defender took Empathy more often than not they were worthless. Far too many players couldn't get their heads around the fact that in this game buffs and debuffs were MUCH more useful than heals in the vast majority of situations.

Well, I was in my upper 30's at launch and had owned and run a video production company since 1985. Currently I'm no longer in my upper 30's :P but I still own and run the same company so not a lot has changed.

I'd look for anything modern with a discrete graphics card and it should run COH just fine on near max settings. Yes, Ultra Mode was pretty poorly optimized and way too hard on graphics cards but that was close to 10 years ago now. Any gaming computer should work just fine so plan your budget accordingly. If it runs modern games nicely it'll run COH at max settings. Frankly if you play any modern games then base your decision on what you need for them, if it plays a modern game it'll kill this one. My setup was last updated a couple years ago and with an Nvidia GTX 960, admittedly at the time a fairly high end card, my framerates have never dipped below 58fps at 1920x1080. (I run Vsync so it's capped at 60fps) My old system from shutdown wasn't half as powerful and I still had framerates in the 40-60 range most of the time.

Invulnerability and the defense soft cap. (I haven't yet had a chance for an in-depth study on what's changed but here's my Soft Cap defense guide from the old forums) Invulnerability is, in my opinion, probably the best all around tanker primary. You get great durability, a very strong taunt aura and excellent protection against the most common types of damage. Yes, that Stone tanker wearing Granite armor will survive more types of damage but he’s a slow moving brick wall. The Willpower tanker will take almost as much of a beating but he has a lousy taunt aura so he really has to work at holding agro. Ice has unmatched agro handling ability but a couple of lucky hits past his defense and he’s in trouble. Fire outputs a lot of damage but pays for it with relatively weak (for a tanker) protection. Super Reflexes shares the potential weakness of Ice and the horrible taunt aura of Willpower. Only Invulnerability puts top flight durability, very good agro abilities and full mobility together in one package. I'm not going to sit here and proclaim "Thou shalt build thy Tanker according to these Commandments"; I'm just going to give you a loose framework that you can use to make your Invuln as durable as possible. There's many other valid choices you could make, this is simply one method that works well. For those of you who may not already know, there are several types of damage in CoH and each requires its own defense/resistance to counter. The damage types are: Smashing – typically punches, kicks and the like Lethal - typically bullets, swords and similar Fire – Flame attacks Cold – Ice or Cold attacks Energy – Lasers and other energy attacks Negative Energy – typically Dark attacks Psionic – Mental attacks Toxic – The rarest type, usually limited to either low level monsters or a few high level ones. The protection from these damage types are usually paired up, Smashing/Lethal (S/L) makes up the vast majority of damage from 1-50 with Energy/Negative (E/N) being second most prevalent and Fire/Cold (F/C) being somewhat less common. Psi is extremely rare in the lower levels and outside of a few specific enemies (Carnies, Rikti) remains uncommon even in the end game. Here’s the basic numbers from our powers: Resist Physical Damage gives us 10% S/L resistance AND 25% resistance to defense debuffs Resist Energies gives us 10% E/N resistance AND 25% resistance to endurance drains Resist Elements gives us 10% F/C resistance AND 20% slow resistance Unyielding gives 5% S/L and 10% E/N/F/C resistance Invincibility gives 5% S/L/E/N/F/C defense plus 1% per mob in melee range (note, if no mobs are in range it provides no defense) Tough Hide provides 5% defense to S/L/E/N/F/C and 25% resistance to defense debuffs Debuffs are attacks that reduce your stats with Defense debuffs being the most common. Many Lethal attacks will debuff your defenses; this makes it easier for enemies to hit you. The debuff resistance in RPD and TH amounts to 50% and makes it much harder for mobs to knock down your defenses. Now let’s look at IO set defensive bonuses; these will add to your base stats and can transform you from a decently sturdy tanker into a nearly unkillable godling. A small digression here about just how defense works in this game… Defense works by making an attack miss you; if it doesn’t hit then you don’t take any damage. The mobs have a base 50% chance to hit you with their attacks; your defense directly reduces that chance. If you have 25% defense then the mobs have a 25% chance to hit you… 35% defense means they have a 15% chance to hit and so on to the “soft cap” of 45% reducing the mob’s chance to hit you to 5%. We call it the soft cap because while you can have a higher amount of defense you can’t reduce the mob’s chance to hit you to below 5%. Now when a mob attacks you the game takes the highest defense amount you have to any part of that attack and uses that for your total defense… for example let’s take a fictional ranged power that does 100 points of energy damage and 100 points of smashing damage. You have 45% smash/lethal defense, 40% energy/negative defense and 20% ranged defense… which is roughly what this guide will aim for. Since the attack is ranged you have 20% defense to it… but it’s also energy so you have 40% defense to it… but it’s ALSO smashing and you have 45% defense to that. The game takes your highest defense, smashing, and therefore the attack has a 5% chance to hit you. While not all attacks will have a Smash/Lethal portion, the vast majority do, so this is your most important defensive number; it’s the one we want to get to 45% the most. OK, enough of the lecture! I just wanna know how to build my tanker! Here’s your shopping list for Wentworth’s for your soft capped Invuln tanker: 5 sets of Reactive Armor – you need 4 pieces in the set for the bonuses we want, which are 1.5% defense to E/N and 1.5% defense to S/L. I suggest the Resist, Resist/Endurance, Resist/Recharge and Resist/Endurance/Recharge 2 sets of Kinetic Combat – 4 pieces of the set (1.5% hit points and 3.75% defense to S/L) Full set of Perfect Zinger (10% regen, 5% recharge, 2.5% damage and 3.13% defense S/L) OR full set of Mocking Beratement (1.8% endurance, 2.5% defense S/L, 3.13% F/C and 7.5% recharge) Steadfast Protection 3% defense/resist unique IO Why not use Aegis instead of some of the Reactive Armor? The reasoning here is simple. S/L defense will protect from most elemental attacks and pure elemental damage without a S/L component is quite rare in the game. That being the case, I’d rather concentrate on the more common damage types. If you’re taking Resist Elements in your build, then by all means slot Aegis there, as that makes 6 resist powers… you can only get the bonus from Reactive Armor 5 times. Now that we have the IO’s we need, we need to put them somewhere. (If Inf is tight as an alternative you can substitute the Smashing Haymaker set for the Kinetic Combat set, you'll just need 3 sets of them. Back before Shutdown they were MUCH cheaper than Kinetic Combat) So, here are the powers you’ll need for this build: Temporary Invulnerability– 4 Reactive Armor and the Steadfast Unique Dull Pain – 3 recharge/3 heal or 5 of the Doctored Wounds set Unyielding – 4 Reactive Armor Taunt – full Perfect Zinger Combat Jumping – 1 common defense or 2 Zephyr IO’s Invincibility – 3 common defense, 1 endred or, at level 47+ 3 Cytoskeleton Hamidon Origin enhancements. One common taunt if you have the slots. Tough Hide – 3 common defense and it’s done Resist Physical Damage – 4 Reactive Armor Resist Energies – 4 Reactive Armor Boxing OR Kick Tough – 4 Reactive Armor Weave – 2-3 common defense, 1-2 endred 2 single target attacks to slot the Kinetic Combat set. You can finish out these attacks with the Acc/Dam and Dam/Recharge from Pounding Slugfest for an 8% regeneration bonus. At this point you should have roughly: 45% Smash/Lethal defense 40% Energy/Negative defense 30% Fire/Cold defense 20% Melee/Range defense (this covers most Psi damage) 13% Psi defense Your resistances will be something like this: Smash/Lethal – 90% capped Energy/Negative – 30% Fire/Cold – 17% Very little damage will actually get past your defenses, and of what does very little will be Fire/Cold. This is a build I played with occasional tweaks for several years and it’s nearly as durable as my Granite tankers without the drawbacks of mobility & recharge you get with Stone Armor.

Invulnerability - The first 20 levels (Note that I haven't yet had a chance to do an in-depth study on what's changed but thought I'd repost some of my older guides) I've seen people asking about just how to build their Invuln tanker, and I thought I'd post a mini-guide to help new tankers through the first 20 levels. Many Invuln tankers end up with very substandard builds in the early levels, mainly because they had no idea what the critical powers to get were. This guide applies to any secondary you might want to pair with your Invulnerable tanker. Those of you who already know the game can skip this part. For those just joining us I should probably digress a bit and discuss the way damage and your powers work in the game. First, you need to know that damage comes in different types, with Smashing and Lethal being most common (abbreviated S/L) while other types such as Energy, Negative, Fire, Cold, Toxic and Psi being less common (E/N, F/C, T, P). Defenses and resistances typically protect against a pair of damage types hence they're referred to as S/L for a power that protects from Smashing & Lethal, E/N for a power that protects from Energy & Negative and so forth. Expanding on that a bit any attack that uses punches, kicks, hammers or anything like that is what we would call "smashing" damage. "Lethal" damage includes things like guns, knives, swords, claws and similar. "Energy" damage is things like electricity, lasers and other "light" attacks while "negative" would be dark attacks. An example of negative damage is the blasts that the Skul's gang in the low levels use. "Fire" and "cold" are pretty self explanatory, fireballs and flamethrowers are fire while ice bolts are cold. "Psi" is the catagory that mental attacks fall under and it's quite rare in the game. "Toxic" is poison attacks and it's the rarest damage in the game. Smashing and Lethal are the most common damage types and those you'll encounter most often throughout the entire game; from the figures I've seen roughly 70% of all damage falls into that category. Energy and Negative would be the second most common damage and it accounts for about another 20% of what you'll face while Fire, Cold and Psi are quite rare. Toxic is almost nonexistent outside of a very few situations, although you'll face a fair amount early dealing with Vahzilok (sp?). After level 20 Toxic nearly vanishes from the game until a few high level encounters in the 40's. Here's an outline for your Invuln tanker's early career: A good thumb rule for building an Invulnerable Tanker would be something like this: Level 1 - Temp. Invulnerability & tier one attack - TI is one of the four most vital powers in your build so get it right away. It provides three times the protection that your other choice, Resist Physical Damage, does (30% S/L resistance vs 10%). The Tier one attack is an example of Hobson's Choice although thanks to the new Tanker inherent power of Bruising it's usefulness has climbed dramatically. Level 2 - Dull Pain - This is another of your four cornerstone powers; I wouldn't delay it much and given the lack of choices this is, in my opinion, the ideal time for it. It provides a huge heal for you and it drastically increases your total hit points for 2 minutes after you hit it. Level 3 - 2 slots available, place in TI or Dull Pain. Level 4 - Tier 2 or 3 attack depending on your secondary, some you're better off with one over the other. For most secondaries the Tier 3 is the better choice. Level 5 - two slots into your level 4 attack Level 6 - Open selection, you could start the Fighting pool, grab your travel power or another attack. Personally I typically pick up Combat Jumping here. Level 7 - 2 slots to distribute, candidates are Temp. Invuln, Dull Pain or your level 4 attack. Level 8 - Unyielding - this is your Mez protection and the third and arguably most vital of your cornerstone powers and you want to take it ASAP. With this power active you're almost totally immune to all hold, sleep, knockback, immobilize and stun effects and it provides minor S/L resistance and a bit more E/N/F/C resistance. Level 9 - 2 slots in Unyielding Level 10 - Taunt, you have to wait until 18 for your taunt aura. Alternately whichever of your attacks you didn't get at level 4. Level 11 - 2 slots to distribute, candidates for them are TI, DP and your attacks. Level 12 - This is an "open" selection, good candidates are Resist Physical Damage or Boxing (from the Fighting Pool, you'll need that pool if you want to build for maximum durability) If you didn't select a travel power at level 6 this is another place to get it. Level 13 - 2 slots available, by this point you're probably starting to notice endurance being an issue so I'd put them into Stamina. Level 14 - Another open selection, candidates are the Fighting pool, RPD or a power of your choice. Level 15 - 2 slots available Level 16 - This is an "open" selection, good choices are RPD, Boxing or Tough (Fighting Pool) or another power. Level 17 - 2 slots available Level 18 - Invincibility - this is the fourth of the cornerstone powers in your build and should be taken immediately. It provides a large amount of defense that increases with the number of baddies around you, provides a tohit bonus that also increases with the number of baddies around you so it's easier to hit them and it's your taunt aura so it attracts attention and makes the baddies STAY clumped around you. Level 19 - 2 slots in Invincibility Level 20 - Another "open" selection, candidates are your tier 5 or 6 attack, another power from the Fighting Pool or a power of your choice. Level 21 - 2 slots available At this point you should have roughly the following: TI - 4 slots Tier 1 attack - 3-4 slots Dull Pain - 5 slots Tier 3 or 2 attack - 5 slots Unyielding - 3-4 slots Invincibility - 3 slots Stamina - 3 slots Your other powers are fine with the default slot for now, you may look to add some to them later on in the build. Now on your slotting... I would suggest slotting TI & Unyielding with 3 resist/1 endred, Dull Pain should get 3 recharge/2 heal and your attacks should get 1-2 accuracy/2-3 damage and 1 endred. Invincibility should get 2-3 defense/1 endred. You'll save more end with one endred in an attack than you will by slotting 2 endred in ALL of your toggles, so keep that in mind if you have end problems. That pretty well covers your bases to level 20, from there on it will depend on your secondary. Boxing/Tough/Weave from the Fighting Pool are needed if you want to maximize your durability. Also be sure and pick up Tough Hide at level 26, it's a nice chunk of endurance-free defense. I recommend fitting in Resist Energies sometime, probably in the 20's... it can wait until very late if you're really tight on your build though. Resist Elements is entirely skippable. If you're building for the defense soft cap (see my other Invuln guide) you may find Unstoppable to be skippable as well.

For the time being I've landed here as well, although restarting at level 1 from a max Incarnate character is a bit disappointing. Call Me Awesome has been reborn as an Inv/Broadsword tank, Delta Farce stayed a Fire/EM blaster and Gortak became Broadsword/Shield instead of /regen. All three are approaching SO levels, although I miss having the cash to IO them out in the 20's. I suppose I'll probably recreate a few of my other 50's... at shutdown there were 25 of them all together.