Sanguinesun

If your original toon is a brute, but you posted a mids version of a tank and you were having trouble with afk running actually in game as a brute, but came to the tank forum for help....do you not see how that lack of information being moved around skews trying to offer you advice. If you're saying something different though please clarify. AA's builds suggested are specifically for tanks as brutes in her and others testing are not as efficient for influence per hour as a tank. As for differences between brutes and tanks, there are several that all relate to play of them and farming as well. Most of this you can read in the descriptions of mids for some(like tank vs brute main inherents ) and as well as in game when making the toon and other sources but I'll try to give you a simple run down here: Brutes: 1. Fury is their inherent which allows them to scale more damage they can deal as they do and receive damage from sources. This in essence means they do a tad bit damage per damage they deal over that of Tanks (but there is a caveat I'll mention later). 2. They're capped at a max(depending on the powers) of holding aggro and dealing damage to a max of 10 mobs. 3. They can cap to 90% on resistances but take more % values to do so than that of tanks(ie you have to slot more/higher %'s to achieve the same capping. Tanks: 1. Gauntlet is their inherent and allows them to get higher aggro values for their attacks than that of a brute. They can also hold more aggro(up to 16 mobs). 2. Some tank melee sets AOE powers can hit up to 16 targets. To give you a contrasting example, Atom Smasher on a brute can only hit up to 10 targets and doing damage to them. On a tank they can hit 16 with Atom Smasher. So the trick is that while a brute may hit 10 and do a bit more damage per target with Atom Smasher, a Tank is going to hit a total potentially of 16 and thus statistically be doing over all do more damage. In farming terms, this arguably can be potentially faster clearing depending on the power sets chosen. 3. Tanks base values for defense and resistance scale better so that you do not have to slot as many enhancers etc to achieve resitance caps etc. This means when using a tank you can then also try focus on damage more or flesh out resistance/defense more depending on the priorities. So the differences are that both can tank and do damage but the differences between them really depend on how you build them and with some combos not necesarily being as optimal on one as the other, especially if you try to take say a tank 1 for one copy paste build and port it to a brute as the brute will have likely less capabilities on some points potentially. There's some other points of difference(like Brutes can use the Energy Aura power set and tanks cant etc) but hopefully this helps start to have you see the differences. So when it comes to farming, you're gonna usually hit more mobs with a tank and even if its slightly less damage than a brute build, you're likely going to clear mobs faster due to the higher volume of mobs getting hit. But again, it really depends. On an afk build of a brute, you're basically hitting 10 mobs each with your 2 toggle auras(elec and irradiation) and then your auto set atom smasher. Tank version would be hitting 6 more mobs. Tank will also hold up to 16 mobs aggro letting them typically come in melee range then and usually builds have better melee than ranged positional defense of course. So overall the brute can still do ok but its gonna likely get hit more at range and (again depending on the build) likely take longer to clear groups. What you want is a clear cookie cutter answer to your issue seemingly though..... to which then I say follow exactly the build and directions AA speaks to in their guide. But truly there is no cookie cutter answer to be given for you if what they posted isnt something you want to go with. Instead, you're likely going to then just be testing and experimenting until you find something that works with your play style and choices. To that end, you may not be aware of it but you can go to the beta server from the launcher and then create a toon and once you're on the map, you can use the tools there they give you to not only instant 50 the toon but you can also give it any and all enhancements and boosts etc you wish for free. Takes maybe 40min to an hour for some to set up as they wish from a theory crafted mids build or some other plan someone makes but then you can head over to the AE, load a farm mission and see how it fairs.

So since sunday you earned all the accolades you didnt have and got all your incarnates max'd out. Grats! That can be a bit of a grind of course. You said you read the thread but felt unsure as to what information was current. If you read on the next to last page (page 10 currently of that thread), you'll see that AA reconfirms this past early spring that the information she last updated in Feb '23 remains accurate according to her. That includes a build for your set and AFK missions... As I mentioned before, your build is different from her recommended, top AFK earning build which is an Ele/Rad tank. She also lists the missions. Again nothing wrong with using something different if you're capable of earning as you say decent amounts of influence. Ukase just posted his spines fire afk brute farmer too. Id argue even that statistically you still see more fire farmers per capita than the s/l ones if what you see daily in the AE areas is of any indication. There are people that use AFK stone/ with a few options too(because of the toggles with extra benefits) with staff, MA, Rad etc too of course over the years which can also be viable but again influence earned per hour varies. but not significantly in so much as that people would be discouraged from using them.

Also I just read your post this past week or so from that thread: Not having your accolades nor having your incarnates fully and properly set up means that typically you have to reduce the difficulty or even the mob numbers or both until your build is fully finished too. This may be a contributing factor in addition to all mentioned above and this information was omitted really in your thread here and hence why I linked your post from there here. Also as AA points out with her suggestions, that using amplifiers is recommended however you can skip those but you're just less time effective at clear (and again with the variables you need to adjust that I just mentioned). On my farmers, I dont use the amplifiers and while my farmers (and I also dont use my farmers much anymore as I've developed other methods and a different play mindset) and they're just only a smidge less exp per hour.

Yeah that was removed years ago and since there other changes occured with farms so be mindful if you have an older build..

Yes any of the interface ones that add damage will work with any damaging attack like atom smasher. Also, if you're clicking while using this build, you're playing it like an active farm. If you want to play it as an active farm build, you may wish to consider other options as with active, its about applying much more aoe damage power options along with as reasonably fast as possible recharge and of course your resistance cap'd and decent defense(more focus on positional melee and range if can be helped and this secondarily that of s/l def damage type. And also too the attack chain you'd need to employ for both aoe and single target cleanup needs. That's why other power set combos for active are are favored and more suggested than yours for consideration. Again your build is an AFK build. And again you need to be mindful of those specific maps you employ for it and -how- its employed. That's not to say you're not capable of farming, you certainly are, its just in a min/max influence per hour consideration that you're less efficient potnetially using a mismatched build of course. Its basically an AFK farm build/combination(and you even list it as such in the build mids name) so its literally throw in, set up the auto/initial boosts and go -afk- and forget then come back to reset the mission. Its meant to be a low influence producer because while its AFK, you do other things, up to and including running an active farmer build on another account. If you hop around trying to run it like an active build then it becomes troubled due to the build not meant to impart damage outside of its AOE toggles and auto set atom smasher. Best I can give an analogy on it is that you can use a wrench to hammer in a nail but its better that a hammer does and the wrench sticking to its normal tool functions 😛 So because you're very new to farming, you really need to take some time and both read the entirety of AA's thread on s/l farming as well as the 22 pages of posts to help you understand running farms and builds to help you match things up. Thread also has recommended mission ID's too. If you struggle after that, its likely because you're either playing an afk as an active on the wrong map, or you're fundamentally not doingsomething else that matches the information you've provided on the build or the actions taken in the mission etc etc etc.:

As much as I hate to say it(because I like brutes more than tanks), arguably, you're going to get more damage overall done with this as a tank since it can build the fire resist and defense easier and lets you focus more on the damage. Remember that while fire's burn is an 8ft radius 5 max target only power for either brutes or tanks, Blazing aura for both also being max capped 10 mobs, the real difference is in footstomp which is 16 max capped for tankers and 10 only for brutes. That's 6 more mobs taking the same calculated damage and thus more expediently killing the mobs, even if there is a damage difference favoring(only more just a bit more) brutes. Spaghetti Betty showed off a toon she tested on Ston's new test mission made they made to replace trapdoor(because of the dev changes to council)mission and granted they used more things that typically are used in a farm run to boost things but you can see at least the multiplicative damage due to the tank having 6 more it can hit in the 15ft range with footstomp at least. And that's not a fire farmer build they made either (though that build they used is fire capped). It could be tweaked for better fire farmer functions of course.

😉

As others have eluded to, its all about your attack chains for situations. On a brute its towards the top(not top) for damage on brutes but its middling on tankers per se. Ston did a while back a melee set comparison thread(though testing does need to be considered loosely in these regards its a relatively ok set of guidelines) and you can see his results: But as you can see it (like the fastest savage) is meant to mechanically function more on faster attack chain use to kill and not an aoe clearing powerhouse or massive single target damage kill style set either. For all intents and purposes, its just that you have to change your mindset on playstyle of it really and not expect it to win min/max, super cereal style play.

1. The map is everything first and foremost. People often build their builds around the maps they use. What specific farming maps are you using? As silly as it is to say, if you for example were using fire farm maps on that, it'd obviously not work. But more nuanced, if you were using this build on an --active-- s/l farm and you were attempting to play this build as an active farm play, then you'd find yourself having a challenge as that build is of course specifically afk farming only. Also obviously if you were using an active farm mission/map but attempting to play afk farming on it, (that's less likely though there are some meteor maps meant to be active farming...) you'd also incur similar problems. Also some older afk farm maps may be obsolete due to changes from years ago that affected farming(though more so fire farming unfortunately) so make sure you're again using a more commonly and currently used AFk farm mission. 2. Drop super jump and acrobatics. Neither are needed and you could make other choices to improve the passive needs of an AFK build. 3. There is a build in America's Angel's thread for ele/rad tank s/l farming. Its rather different from your build and you may gleen some insights into how to improve your build as well. If they're playing this as an afk farmer and switch to making energize auto instead of atomsmasher, well, that's going to be an unproductive farm to be sure 😛

Ever seen dogs that are taken on walks in the early evening(as of course I'd not expect you to see them during the day :P) and they have to stop and mark every tree? Well, there's your answer.

1. We have a hero planner called Mids Reborn. You can come up with various build options for yourself from it. Keep in mind that some details and stats in it have incorrect values though but over all for casual play and build considerations, its of merit to use. 2. Your questions for sets can better be met checking in with the AT's that correspond to those sets and doing a search there. 3. Overall you're looking to make casual concept toons. Nothing wrong with that but due to the concept's being very much specific to your tastes/wants, expectations for builds that match you may be more of a challenge. As an example most folks making builds do not take necessarily 2 travel powers because that's reducing choices you'd take that may be better use of the toons. Again, this isn't necessarily an issue if you're just making a toon to rp with or run around with otherwise, again, casually. 4. However, if you're looking to make a min/max toon that is extremely effective for specific goals in game play otherwise, your wants may not match up well. All in all, head to the subforums for your AT's, present a build you're thinking of that you've made in Mids, and then people can give you advice from there.

This vote kick system has been often abused in other games, especially by infantile, immature people. It just leads to more issues. As said before, if you or someone else thinks that either the leader, or an individual on a team is bad, simply global ignore them. Over the years this helps to self marginalize people who are prone to causing trouble. A counter then may be by some that their ignore list will become too big. To that I'd say, then likely the problem isnt with those overall being ignored (especially with this small community) but with the person doing the ignoring who may be exemplifying misanthropic tendencies.

Nope as you can see from his build cited by Bopper, outside of psychic wail(pbaoe) its all ranged. It has perm mindlink and vengence as well with both up they're over 100% on melee and ranged positionals and 97% on aoe. Even if both werent up, its 72 melee, 69 range and 52 aoe. Damage wise they're also decently strong with a 3 single target attack chain they can constantly run and every 40 sec that pbaoe. And that's without having selected anything but their alpha incarnate either(cardiac either). Comparing your Mind Hunter 1c build: 1. You took twice as many attacks as he did. But because he's limiting to 3 attacks and took both the fort's assault and leaderships assault, they've 30% more damage to his build as well. That's why his 3 attacks in his chain do 3 times as much damage meaning he's doing more damage for the same time spent. 2. You went more into resistances. He always builds his challenge builds first prioritizing defense. I think he could explain why more if you asked him his builds justifications but he's vids pretty much speak for themselves as to why. 3. You also took aura of confusion(which is really more or less melee) vs his focus to single target range confusion. Contagious proc also btw tends to work more effectively in single target use to spread than in aura ones but I suspect again he focused on ranged confuse for helping wittle down groups. 4. Both of your builds are older ones and do not include fate sealed which I would be curious as to voltaks take on it given its guarantee for secondary effects from powers and mez protection. Obviously because the older build worked well, it could be still skipable but with mob changes that occurred just a while back it may have more merit to consider. His build would be tighter to add it in than yours currently though but I could see at least 1power he could consider switching it out for if he felt it was needed that would not change the stats on the build really.

1-50? Post 50 casual? Post 50 hardmode? etc etc Arguably 1-50 and post 50 casual, any darn thing is truly fine as you're contributing to the team no matter what. And there will be a spectrum of "preferences" that'll mirror and exceed any responses people will give you here which further supports the point of just being a team member being the most impactful part. As for post 50 hardmode and similar content, you'll be more likely to see specific types of corruptors preferred though some defenders may make the cut too of course. Point is, a team mindfulness in how you play vs the set choices you make for the majority of the player base is going to be more welcome than anything. Over the years similar "what's best" roundabout asking threads will have pretty similar answers be it in the defender forum or elsewhere.

Doesnt your friend Voltak have a commonly discussed build for a strong, range focused fortunata? How would that compare/be contrastingly different from your concept considerations?

Sadly, statistical information transparency is lacking(and getting worse really), from Homecoming but I would be most curious to know statistically over the last 2-3 months what was the least played armor sets on scrappers consistently. I have a feeling that'd be a compelling way to look at a set as being the most lacking. That said, my conjecture in the frame linea has put forth for "worst" in this order(first being worst): Regen (it has virtually nothing giving it comparisons to the overall survivability with other sets pre and post 50) Will power (its the end of the week table scraps thrown together into a pot to make something to last the weekend sort of amalgamation of regen/invuln). Fire (intentionally an offensive based set with reistance holes more challenging to cap, and only minor KB help in temp protection) Each has their own reasons for their lacking but regen's sheer volume over all of lacking viability is much more pronounced than will or fire. It essentially laps the two in the race to worst. I agree as well with linea that regen should be virtually -regen immune but it'd still not give the set viability overall. As the HC devs continue feel the game needs to change mob groups to be "more challenging", regen just continues to be a tricycle with wobbly wheels trying to pedal its way in a NASCAR race.

To be clear, in order to make a solid post 50 farmer, its going to take time and lots of influence to do so. For new players, that can be a catch 22 seeing as your wanting a farmer because you dont have influence but need influence to make a decent farmer. As for playing the market, there's a guides section as well as the market subforum section too you can look in but for most, its a matter of having, seed money to start then choosing one or all (and more) below: 1. flipping low bids on good recipes/enhancers listed 2. buying low priced recipes to then craft and list for profit as enhancements 3. buying low priced recipes/or enhancers then spending for enhancement converters to switch(gamble) it to a better priced enhancer for proft. etc. As for post 50 farming as a whole, you're wanting to have mobs eventually(as most farmers have to ramp up over time as they increase in their incarnate tiers and their sets being all up to task), being 54 (+4 dif) and yes with a team size of 8 set as well so to ensure you have the most mobs per the farm mission's settings. But also important of course is which mission(s) you choose matching your specific build/AT power sets etc. There are hundreds if not thousands of player made farm missions, some being old and out dated that can wreck players. Some prefer to focus on boss lt minion vs EB boss LT minion missions(or the reverse, large map, small map, other aspects of the map, AFK farming missions vs active(and of course those are two different builds) and much much more. Its a recipe of things all trying to have goals of the most exp per hour efficiency for your goals.

Word of mouth, influencer vid etc are likely ok(as that's how it was before too). What you propose with paying for advertising on sites etc isn't likely to fly because that's getting a bit more commercial and this isnt meant to be so and could potentially be incongruent to the licensure from ncsoft.

No right way to defend the wrong thing.

The majority of the player base dont pedestal the starred content.

Mostly, starred content starts to really be a puzzle game. AT, powersets, builds, and the composition of the group/group dynamics. One could even say there's merits to having different combinations for the different 4 stars as well (though to lesser degrees). In the most distilled essence of what is good to have on these runs: people in dedicated teams who know how to work together and build builds solely around this niche of the game. Pugs otherwise at this stage of HC's evolution of this content are just a dice roll with modifiers :P.

Be warned as well that the newest version has lots of issues even if you do get it to properly install the update/program. Various stats(yet again) are inaccurate and other issues.

Unless Im min/maxing a farmer or decide to kit a toon for min/maxing reasons other wise(ie almost never even though I've billions of influence and thousands of merits stocked), fly or sorcery are the most common choices I take.

Honestly, Mids has become a mess.

Its a shame that trapdoor testing is also yet another victim of the over tuned changes to council that never needed to be implemented in the first place. Thanks Ston for your trying to come up with alternatives.