Sovera

They were already tweaked. Prior to that the Sentinels were what the 'previous'(?) team's idea of them was. But now that they were tweaked by HC this is what they want them to be. And tbh it's fair. They are the City of Heroes version of the Beast Master Hunter from WoW. Which is fine by me (yes, I only play BMs in WoW too). My problem with them is less about their damage and more about the pervasive flee code that the NPCS have because a Blaster will burst mobs down and nothing is alive to run, but the Sentinel will take them to half or even one third HP, which is fine, sure, it would only need a few more hits to defeat so it's a fair exchange for the extra sturdyness, but since they were not defeated then INVARIABLY we have ALL the survivors legging it to the hills. Which would not be a problem (if an accumulative XP loss) if the game did not have kill all missions where we can't leave runners doing their thing.

The only reason I bring it up is because I don't agree with the methodology. We look at the builds being used as the standards for the testing and it's '4-6 damage procs, incarnates to sustain endurance (despite being fought against easy soft non incarnates) and/or survival, and against soft +3 Arachnos'. It's the whole '-res procs are amazeballs' fiasco since the testing is done on a +0 enemy and now it's become a truth that some sets are just bad and some sets are amazing while ignoring the 'better' sets invariably can slot two -res procs. I just don't argue much because the results are there and I'm not a truth denier. It IS true, the testing does not lie. But does 90% of HC build in the same way (I know I don't) that these results must be touted as the way-things-are-and-things-need-to-be-balanced-around-those-results? I don't know. Maybe 90% of HC DOES build like this and it's prevalent. But, my gut, between what I see, the builds I see posted even by people who know how to build, the conversations about pugs etc doesn't show this. But what do I know? I'm no seer. Maybe it is. But as long as we get 'Tankers are OP because Rad/SS can X!' while conveniently slipping out SS allows to skip accuracy and boosts damage in 160% and Rad comes with two proc bombs, and SS' Footstomps reliably help the recharge the proc bombs and four-two-six-procs-per-attack are missing then I will keep on weakly raising a hand and saying 'c'mon, it's not really like that...' I'm not even a rabid Tanker fan. I have easily twice the Brute builds and playtime than I have a Tanker. I like Tankers because I level one at by level 10 I'm usually x6 or x8 and I like the early feel of being a super-hero even if later on everyone can do it where my damage does not keep up with everyone else since I don't do level 50-only-six-damage-procs-and-live-off-incarnates. But I could, I just choose not, so I can't and won't bury my head in the sand and say it's false.

Decimation itself is full of nice bonuses. The proc is complete and utter garbage.

I don't much care to be honest. This is not aimed at you, Erratic. But I just don't much care. We are playing an easy mode game where what is considered the norm is soloing at +4x8. That's how easy the game is. So the arguments, much like my remark about the GW2, is how one class/AT does it 30 seconds faster. But both are still soloing at +4x8. It's not that one can do it and the other not, not like a Blood Death Knight from WoW being able to solo a dungeon while the other 99% of the classes and specs can only watch. As for Tankers the nerfs are on the horizon already. Hopefully they will be light because no one wants to go back to slowly whittling our way through missions.

You could work in Tough and be at the S/L cap, and then move some slotting towards more E/N. No Gaussian in Aim either? Boo! You have no Hover or Combat Jumping so you're just using Sprint for combat mobility? If you like Mystic Flight that's fine though, but consider Hover + Fly and then an aura from the tailor for fancy glyphs, mebbe? You can boost your nuke by triple proccing it which one of the few times I recommend it since Sentinels need the help. It would go from 666 (I see wut you did there!) to 774. You do lose the global accuracy but according to Mids you grossly overcapped, so much so the Kismet can go and still be at 150%+ against +3 enemies. I'm trying to find out where this coming from (found it, you had the useless Decimation proc slotted in and it was messing the numbers). The Sentinel nukes only need damage, endurance and recharge, and then triple procs, because accuracy is handled by Aim. Because of Aim slotting any accuracy is a waste unless doing high level plays of alternating Aim and nuke due to how fast the team is going. Honestly you don't need both Cloak of Fear and Oppressive Gloom considering how bad both are (you can fear and stun minions, not even lieutenants) though I suppose you could keep Oppressive Gloom and stack it with Abyssal Gaze to hold bosses, assuming you even go into melee and stay there. But this can definitely be a theme/aesthetic thing so fair. Splitting the ATOs is really minimal IMO. Sure 20% range, but, heh. There is no point in 6 slotting Dark Blast since you're not building for E/N defenses anyway, but there is also no point in allocating a damage proc since it's a T1 and they are terribad for damage procs. That frees a slot that can go to Aim and the missing Gaussian. I'm leery to mess with it too much since the build seems to be a lot about theme but perhaps you can use something from this: Sentinel Dark Dark Dark 2024 v1.01.mbd The last 5% for S/LN from Barrier.

I think so as well, but the thing with rolling buffs, especially Barrier, is that any paper thin AT becomes a bulky barbarian as the Offender teams showed. I haven't even done hardmodes to be talking.

Didn't we have a whole thing a few days ago because someone looked at Brawl in Mids and though it was a viable skill? Mids is great (long live the Mids god devs and may their pantheon last a thousand years) but it does not give a whole picture. Regardless with double XP and all it's not a big problem to spin one alt up. And let me know when because I haven't made that character on whatever server you're playing.

Sure, but it's still 0.5% of the total content of the game, and it's something people go in to be slathered in buffs with rolling Barriers and etc. It's not like we're talking bringing in a Sentinel. 🙂

The number of people who say 'if Brutes are not the best at something then there is no reason to play them' is baffling. Considering the easy game CoH is this reeks of Guild Wars 2 during the dungeons era with the game so easy but the community so loud if someone did not play the bleeding edge meta builds.

You can also NOT use your Sentinel inherent and not have the crosshair show up if it breaks immersion. As for the raw numbers they don't tell half the tale. What ever you may think you're seeing the Sentinel will do half the Blaster's damage in practical terms, further compounded by the icky target cap. This gap is shortened by the fast nuke allowing to have it at each spawn unlike a Blaster.

If you like the Psi Mastery then it can be reworked in. Respecs are cheap and all gear can be sold back or given to an alt anyway so there is no loss if it does not work out.

Check the normal Will of the Controller. It's usually 8-10 million. A Catalyst from the AH is invariably 1 million.

.... FIRE BREATH.

Cremate is godly. 100% chance of KU on demand and decent damage. But Combustion ALSO is godly as two PbAoEs makes maping a breeze. A pity we are not allowed to have both.

Yes, as the peregrine falcon said. If you want to have zero taunt you should play a Stalker or a Scrapper, but even with a Scrapper some of the armor sets have agro auras. So, Stalker is safe since it has zero of that.

If you use Mids you can see the direct damage improvement of slotting a proc. Recharge time and animation plays a factor and sometimes slotting a damage proc can be as little as seven points of extra damage averaged out. But it's easy to slot for damage, look at the numbers, then slot a damage proc and look at the numbers again and just compare. Even so much as single damage procs are nearly always an improvement but more than that usually costs things like IO bonuses and recharge. Sometimes its worth it, sometimes its not, sometimes the build is made for level 50 only with incarnates and/or full team coverage providing buffs to cover the deficiencies the slotting has wrought.

I suggest sticking to Ourobouros and just do random arcs. I would not recommend soloing TFs despite being nearly the same as Ouroboros as TFs always end with an AV which you might or might not be able to solo. Ouroboros lets you log off mid-way and come back to it later and you do not outlevel the mobs or the contact. With half hour gaming sessions that exclude teaming this is the way to go. Don't do random AE mission arcs or radio missions as these only give XP and random loot (since double XP cuts off influence). Ouroboros will also give XP and loot, but always give merits as a reward for the final mission. If you CAN spare an hour then ITF is the absolute best bang for your buck.

Focus is KD, not knockback, and Shockwave has the the IO to make it a KD as well. Shockwave can do a lot for survival since it is a wide and 40y deep cone constantly knocking things on their butts. That said neither my Claws/Fire Brute nore the Tanker take it and just went to town with Burn and Spin. My own dragon used a mix of Vanguard claws colored firey since they glow and look cool, and then an 'in combat' tailor aura (which is when we pop out our claws) to further make fists wreathed in flame with one of the firey auras. If you took Maneuvers you can safely replace it with Combat Jumping as it gives almost the same defense and costs 0.06 instead of 0.28. If you don't want to use Hover (though you could have wings and flap flap in combat) then Combat Jumping is great for combat mobility. I never bothered to use Cardiac of ageless in any of my builds. Consume is enough. It's not as high as it looks because A) Focused Accuracy costs half than what the tooptip said since this last patch but Mids did not update that, B) there are four endurance procs in the builds that Mids does not account for. At worse just toggle off Focused Accuracy and only use it for debuffing mobs but I can say I never bothered to. If I meet recovery debuffing mobs I can always fall back on Recovery Serums. Other mobs that make other combos quake like Sappers are a joke for Fire Armor since Consume makes us immune to endurance debuff (just not *recovery* debuffing). S/L defense is still useful-ish as not ALL attacks were changed, just some in some factions. The devs did not want to castrate that approach and just wanted it to not be so OP. So it's not what will save you if you're in too deep, but then rarely does salvation come from one single thing. It's just another layer for mitigating danger. You can skip it if you want, but, I don't see much else to go for barring some super procced out 4-procs-per-attack approach. You don't really need to take SS if you want more KB protection. Replace the LoTG for a Karma -KB. Or do take SS. Same end result. Tbh I barely noticed KB, but, I also play with Hover and Evasive Maneuvers and EM has a ton of KB resistance and when in Hover even when get KB we just do a lil twirl in the air. If you're not hovering your mileage may vary.

Nowadays Fire Melee is just entrenched as #1, we can't beat two PbAoEs AND early AoE AND fast animations AND exotic damage. I just haven't updated that thread in a while. But Claws and MA then I'd say MA. Dragon's Tail is amazing even if Spin does more damage and it is satisfying to build the Turtle and have each block slide in place.

You can still take it, and the penalties were even alleviated in the last Stone Armor rework. There is just not much of a point nowadays as the rework made the other armors pick up the slack that Granite was carrying by itself.

You can't increase the magnitude of powers except with procs. Two magnitude CCs minions, three magnitude CCs lieutenants, four magnitude CCs bosses. But you can't make a 2 mag CC stun, for example, work on a lieutenant. They CAN stack though. So if you have one power that has 2 mag and a second that has 2 mag and you use them both on a boss it will CC the boss. Or if the power recharges quickly enough you can use the power twice. You probably knew this but just to make sure. So if you want to, say, hold a boss but your Hold is a mag 3 (they usually are) you want to stack it twice. That's where increasing the % and recharge comes in. If it lasts 10 seconds and you max it you get 15 seconds of the CC lasting on the boss. It won't do anything since it has not reached the threshold, but it's there. But that gives time for your Hold to recharge and use it a second time and have it become a 6 mag. With that said the chance a power will have of working is not beholden to anything in your power. If it's 50% then it's 50%. As the others have pointed out you can slot KB procs into the power if applicable to give yourself two chances of applying the power though there is a chance of both happening at the same time and the stacking making it a very large knockback (unless you're using the Overwhelming Force unique which works with different mechanics). First, if you have a KB that is at least one magnitude it will push enemies away. Less than 1 magnitude will make the enemies just knocked down. Knocked down is the much less obnoxious version and is a good source of soft CC with the mobs spending time getting back up and not using their attacks. If you have powers that knockback then consider slotting the appropriate procs that turn KB into KD. And then you make more powers do KD if you like the idea. Keep that power with the 50% as is, but slot the Avalanche proc in any other PbAoE or aura, slot the Overwhelming Force proc in any power (it works in all powers as it is an universal set) and now you have three powers doing KD.

Rad is resistance based. Brutes get resistances to 90% instead of 75% and a bigger HP pool so Brutes. There is the interaction of Fury boosting DoT numbers which is Savage's thing. Ultimately there is the 'are going to level it or play it?' because for leveling Brutes feel a lot better than Scrappers do. The thing about Brutes not having Fury in teams is pretty obsolete. Brutes have little problems with Fury even in teams after the Fury pass the HC devs did precisely to mitigate this problem.

It doesn't 100% if wanting to reach certain thresholds but you can level it just fine and worry about respecs once/if at 50. For leveling you just slap the usual culprits on since reaching thresholds while leveling is not easy or even necessary. Tbh I'd stick with Claws/Fire purely on playing the game without looking at theme. Savage Melee can feel a lot like flailing at the air since it's a DoT set and you notice bosses melting when the DoTs stack but for hitting a minion it kinda feels bad to flail three times to kill it since the DoTs take a while to get going. But if the heart wants Savage then listen to the heart. I happened to just have fixed a Savage/Fire Brute for someone else so I'll respost it here: Master Rune Brute (Savage Melee - Fiery Aura).mbd Since it was for someone else it doesn't have Fly as I usually take but it's not hard to move things around.

My dude, I have this, like, whole thread about Fire Armor being made for general content. 😄 My own dragon was a Fire Armor/Claws and how I got into Fire Armor. Rad Melee isn't that great (wasn't to begin with) and didn't get better with Irradiated Ground being fixed, but if you skip Devastating Blow (it hits hard and it increases your ST damage instead of the alternative, but, slow ass animation) and go with just Radiation Siphon, Contaminated Strike and Radioactive Smash you have a pretty simple and forgivable ST rotation. Do try Devastating Blow though and it might click. Keep in mind that the tailor lets you faff around like wreathing your body, or just the hands, or just the eyes, in a dozen different auras likes flames or such so you can take something else and dress it up.

You could say that 😄 Most of your questions, and others, can probably be found in my signature. The build you want is the Turtle.