Sovera

I've killed them with pretty much anything from MA, to Fire, to Ice, to Stone. Some will have a harder time if they face particular AVs with strong resistance to their damage types. Try Fire Melee, its recent tune up made it top tier and the damage type is not commonly resisted.

I'm not actually sure what does the Fortunate passive even do. I'm not sure why we don't have numbers posted with patch notes and instead have to log in, check for ourselves, then come back and post them So what Fate Sealed does is add 33% strength to CC (and since we don't usually slot for CC it's a free 33% untouched by ED) and 15%-34% resistance to CC (scales from level 1 to 50). Looking at the damage Scramble Thoughts can be worked into the ST rotation now between damage boost and animation trimming, which is nice. I hit a pylon in the RWZ for numbers and got this: Scramble Thoughts: 46 over 4 seconds. Subdue: 45. Dominate: 36. TK Blast: 21. TK Blast is the least damaging but that FF proc in there can help speed the build, otherwise Subdue is 'only' an immobilize where Scramble is a stun, Dominate is a Hold and TK Blast is a KB, with KD tax, but, FF. We are no longer forced to take Combat Training Defensive since either Pain Tolerance or Fate Sealed replace it.

Generic IOs are something you start replacing as soon as level 20-ish so don't plan too long on sticking with generics. Most of the cheap stuff will cost less than 2 million and you can earn money selling merits. If you're new my signature has tips about this. That said you're making a few small mistakes. Charge up does not need To-Hit buffs, only recharges (and a Gaussian proc the moment you can afford it). Combat Jumping gives too little defense to be worth slotting defense, and it makes more sense to use Hover and blast from the air. There is no point in slotting Tesla Cage with Hold IOs, and you're taking it waaaaay too late. Thunderous Blast is your nuke and you want that back as soon as possible. It's cooldown coincides with Charge-up which provides a large boost to accuracy (plus the Gaussian I mentioned) so you can skip all accuracy on it. Hasten wants both slots +5 to skip one slot, or three while leveling, and again it is too late in the game since you want it to help your nuke return faster. All your defense and resist toggles want one more slot, and maybe one for endurance discount. Though most of your attacks CAN take an endurance modifying IO it is just to drain enemies which is a mechanic with little use. You will do more damage to enemies the lower their endurance, true, but it's not worth slotting for. Particle Shielding gives regen, shields, and has a large 50% recovery buff. The regen is only up for 30 seconds but the endurance is up for 60 seconds, so you want to beef its recharge to have this triple whammy up as often as possible (in fact, click it the moment it's off cooldown instead of saving it). Ground Zero is not very useful without being 90% damage procs so no rush in grabbing it. If you do grab it then immediately start slotting it with damage procs, but it casts so slowly that while leveling and IO-less I would just focus on slotting my other powers, but this is something for you to decide. Because its recharge coincides with Charge-up as well you don't need to slot accuracy since they will be all used at the same time. Meltdown is a panic button with bad uptime and long cast time. I don't touch it despite the damage boost it brings because the damage boost hits the ED cap which we are at anyway. You have too many attacks. These are needed as you level but level 22 you should be down to a rotation of Lightning Bolt, Charged Bolts, Zapping Bolt, Charged Bolts once you have minimal IOs slotted instead of generics. I left all the attacks in since you won't have the recharge for a gapless rotation with just three. You don't need Boxing/Weave soon in the build since their effects are minimal. They are taken to boost already present defenses to reach a certain cap but with a generic IOs build you'll be nowhere close to those caps. So you use inspirations when needed and keep flying above the heads of the enemies and save Tough/Weave for later. Even Ground Zero and Short Circuit can be use flying just out of melee range while over the mob's heads and it will still hit them. Hover is, in my opinion, more important than Fly since you're 90% of the time fighting and 10% of the time travelling to another mission. But because you're taking so many attacks there is no way to have both early. I suggest picking Hover early and then use a cheap 5k jetpack from the P2W vendor to travel between missions. These are all small mistakes easy to make and not a big deal, you would have reached 50 with your build regardless. I'm going to do a few tweaks as if a leveling build, AKA 3 slotting hasten, only one slot for accuracy (because we usually only fight +1 enemies while leveling), and etc. If you want I can post a cheap build with IO sets. Cheap IO Sentinel v2 (Electrical Blast - Radiation Armor).mbd

Cobalt Arachne best Arachne.

Here's a tinkered build. Pushed your resistances up without extras like Rune of Protection, improved damage a bit, shored your negative defense. You forgot your Brute's ATOs which made your slotting harder so you should be able to get some slotting ideas from this to incorporate into your build. mids_build.mbd

You're not going to have high resistances with Energy Armor since it's a defense set. But everything looks somewhat in order. What are your actual goals and what are you fighting that is making you feel squishy?

Radiation Armor should have zero endurance problems so to reiterate what others have already said: Hit your absorb shield on cooldown since it has 50% recovery (unenhanced Stamina has 25% to put it in perspective) Theft of Essence proc in Radiation Therapy will fill your blue bar with just a few mobs around.

Tried a new Storm/Stone Sentinel on the +1 and ran out of endurance, but two minutes in and it had shaved half the HP of the dummy, sniff.

Well, you're arguing to keep it as is for the nichest of nichies niches, so the 0.5% of the content. It's a solid argument if dev time is devoted towards the 0.5% and the players are told 'yeah, well, you know, it sucks for everything, but, if you decide being one of the dozen people who do X content then definitely take Y. It will still be useless for 99.5% of the content but you will shine in the 0.5%'. Perhaps a middle ground can be reached which is what people are asking, and this is the time to get it because once the set is shipped it will not be touched any time soon. And go easy on the sneering for the easiest content in CoH BS, you're acting like an hipster turning their nose up at people who don't drink soy milk hand pressed by virgins from Guatemala.

Well, that and having no heal, no endurance clickies, and being a mixed bag of melee and range. The lack of endurance tools in particular has always ended pushing me away. At least they have a CC toggle.

I wonder if this is going to make better Sentinels than Sentinels

I was testing a character on the dummies and they work, but I can see it being a nuisance if more than one person wants to test, and the whole thing of how long does it take for a dummy to respawn. Would it be feasible to have an instance we could go with pylons so we could just go in and out? Or, hold on, what about a dummy with the same HP that we can place in our base?

I have brought this up in the past almost verbatim. I actually had another long post already typed in the epic AT feedback thread and then looked at it and deleted instead of posting because it was just reiterating what I had already said in the past. It is a design philosophy of the current devs and not something that can be tuned up or down. But at the risk of repeating myself, so much time and effort and coding that ends being effectively wasted because in the end no one touches those sets since they are balanced to the point of becoming milquetoast. I feel that there is a divide because tune ups like Fire Melee were a resounding success but then when we pointed out how Storm Blast was mediocre and some QoL was needed we were told that 'not all sets are meant to be top tier'. My brother in christ, you're making this from scratch, it CAN be top tier so that people will decide based on aesthetics and theme instead of 'this hits harder'.

Nothing beats using the market, but farming the AE is a solid option. Simply playing the game is one as well since we are showered in money at 50.

No need for AHK, you can use the in-game bind system. Something like /bind 1 "powexecslot 1$$follow" will do the trick. Now when you press 1 it will use your power in the first slot and run to (and stay glued to) your target. As for the camera there are a lot of camera options in the options so see if one fits your needs. Check my newbie guide for more 'hidden' things in the options.

A Sentinel would be really easy to start with if you pick Hover with Fly from the Flight pool. You stay at range in the air and hitting mobs and though they have ranged attacks to retaliate they are weaker than their melee attacks. Plus you can either whittle or kill a few before they even get close. Storm Blast/Bio Armor would be my advice since Storm is flashy and cool, and also comes with built in soft CC and debuffs. If you prefer melee then a Fire Armor/Ice Melee is also a good choice with Ice Melee getting Ice Patch at level 20 which will do a lot to keep you safe on top a Tanker's resistances. Unlike other games Tankers here don't need to memorize attack patterns, be forced to lead the group, have to sweat their defensives to survive and etc. They are just expected to jump into the fray before the others and that's it.

To be fair it IS a nice butt.

After all the hype about the sybil clothes I'm surprised at the lack of reaction about them.

I have to agree if you're intending to be in melee then make a melee guy. That said we have petless MMs and whom am I to get in your way. So, lets think it over. You want a sturdy armor set, some CC to help staying alive. Hmm... Stone Blast seems to be good for a primary. Lots of CC will help keeping you safe and you can spam your nuke betweent Stone's mechanics and slotting Force Feedback procs. I would suggest my favorite as well: Storm Blast. It comes chockful with soft CC and debuffs and makes surviving easier. For a secondary I don't think there's a particular reason to move away from Bio. Pop the shield before going into melee to nuke and you'll be soaking the damage with it while dealing the hurt, but I have been pondering Stone Armor lately since defense is superior and you do get some goodies like extra recharge, extra recovery and a damage proc. But you could probably go with Fire Armor since Burn is not only more damage but the fear will make mobs run away... which you don't care since you're ranged and sitting in your patch of napalm. Radiation Armor will give you a PbAoEs extra to toss at the same time you nuke. I haven't had good results with it myself but others have and got solid results in the trapdoor tests that testify to its effectiveness. A Storm/Rad is something I've considered as my next character since Storm is a bit light in AoE so throwing Ground Zero would help with that. Fire Armor has Burn, but Burn is tiny with 8f while GZ is 15. GZ is, unenhanced, only 125 damage which is about half of primary nukes, but extra damage is extra damage.

I've been hankering for a new Storm Sentinel (yes, another) and holding off since seeing this. Soon, soooooon.... Pity we can't get rid of the travel time of Cloudburst though. I accept it's a DoT, we have other powers that are DoTs. But this one doubles the DoT duration by leisurely travelling to the target before drizzling. If we consider 5 seconds DoTs as too long then what do we call a power that can take as much as 6-7 seconds to actually finish doing its damage?

Magneto hasn't been a villain in two decades. But again it also falls in the lack of agency. Magneto, the hero, would help if people need help. He might grump but he would not refuse to help. Magneto the villain would do things for himself, work with others at best and not under them, and then not if he disagrees on the goal. And 'lo to people snarking him to his face. All of these we go through as a redsider. We are snarked to our faces, we are insulted, we are threatened. We are literally treated like idiots and backstabbed. And we take it like a chastised puppy. All of this by little boss level mobs we'd put down in 3-4 hits. It doesn't feel good, y'know? A hero takes the high road because they are a hero, but a villain? It's my opinion that a more epic villain side experience would draw more people in. Number one a choice to beat up an NPC that is threatening or insulting us and henceforth their dialogue is a lot more respectful. Number two mostly ignore the other villains and focus on fighting good guys or stealing from big corps (everyone loves that and each day that passes it just gets stronger) such as banks or Crey. Seriously, we don't rob nearly enough banks or jewelry stores, not all villains want world domination. Number three... perhaps multiple choices for missions. Again, this is a lot of extra work. But, lets say current mission is rob an orphanage. With this change the choice is now rob an orphanage, or break into a jail to free an associate. I know I'm describing radio missions with the latest but as they are radio missions are pretty shallow and are especially not rewarding in Homecoming with how they don't grant merits and double XP eats influence. Number four we stop being treated as a rookie but by level 15 we're already treated as a danger and worthy of hiring. By 30 we get blurbs like 'I had a job and thought of you right away'. By 50 we are a Deathstroke, a recognized name and the NPCs treat us accordingly. I don't feel these are feasible ideas because they involve a hefty rework of the missions and dialogue.

The reason is, IMO, simple: it's niche. We don't root for Lex Luthor or the Red Skull. Plus the blue side is simpler in motivation. We are a hero, we help, bad things are happening or going to happen, we strive towards preventing or stopping them. Red side, we are bad guys. Well, to begin with there is not much bad guy-ing happening for a chunk of the playstyle. We actually go against other evil factions, and yes, it makes sense since we are taking territory, but it should be later. We fight against villains most of the time. Then the implicit narrative of being a bad guy is that we are not altruistic. Helping others? We're helping ourselves. Even the rewards are seldom mentioned and it's worked out as favours or whatever. Tangible rewards like 'do this and you'll get X dollars' or 'do that and I'll get you upgrades to your powers' stated explicitly would flow better. But the very narrative of someone going red side to play is (generalizing) not someone looking to a henchie for the Joker. They want at least to be a Deathstroke. I do play redside very once in a while but I skip all dialogue because it irks me to no end to be treated like crap by the NPCs where in blue side there is no such show of establishing dominance and we're just told of problems that need fixing. My truly unfeasible suggestion would be having more choice in our replies. The NPC is bad mouthing us? We should have an option to fight them. They say to go do this or that and we pick the option we want and that aligns to our idea of how a character would behave. But man, it is nuts the amount of work this would involve for 10% of the population. People STILL do not root for Lex Luthor or Red Skull. In a more simple fashion the suggestion above of a boost in influence gain or merits if playing redside might work better and more players will snowball more players playing.

If it works it works. But I have to appreciate the Dreadful Wail + Burn combo with DW keeping mobs stunned and preventing them from fleeing. I found Sonic to be a bonanza of AoEs (and one of them takes a FF proc) and I don't know if the interaction with Opportunity still exists after both their revamps but it used to be great to spam the defensive. Now I don't think that's going to be all that useful even if it still exists since we cannot reapply on the same target and there is not much point in spreading it at the pace teams kill. I haven't tried Sonic since the tuning patch but I see some of it trickled to the Sentinel. The 2.5 second cones were too much for the damage that they did as I remember hitting +4 mobs for middle double digits. It's no longer a character for me since cones don't do well in solo play but in teams the ability to chain -res cones plus soft CC made me feel pretty useful. Looking at the build I have to agree that Psychic Shockwave would fit for a whammy that would stun even bosses when combined with Dreadful Wail. Dreadful + Burn + Psychic = hurt. But at that point we need to be comfortable with running out of melee range for the cones, then run back in for Burn + Psychic. That's a lot of work. I would swap out of Howl myself and take Shockwave because of the FF proc. That will speed your nuke and Aim.

The thing about Blaster VS Sentinel is not one looked at in spreadsheets but actual tests. What is the best Blaster Trapdoor time? What is the best Sentinel Trapdoor time? What are the best pylon times? In all of these Blasters are comfortably ahead of Sentinels. This does not make a Sentinel useless. WTF. Obviously the glass cannon all damage AT will do more damage than the armored ranged AT. But what about those people who don't want to play a glass cannon? Well then, you get Sentinels! Is the person comfortable being a glass cannon? Then Blaster. A Blaster can reach a Sentinel's durability, but at end game and with a castle of cards of gimmicks, being locked into certain incarnates, IOs, and epic pools. Is the player intent in breezing through leveling, never exemplar, have the know how to build (or copy) a strong build and earn the cash for it, as well as stick to max level content? Then a Blaster. Is the player intending to play at all levels, spend less money, is more annoyed by deaths, and have flexibility in picking incarnates and epic pools (or in my case not even using epic pools in their Sentinels)? Then a Sentinel. Also important in the choice between both is that the extra damage from Blasters comes with the caveat that 'half' of it comes from melee damage. A Blaster that wants to be purely ranged is gimping their damage to, yes, Sentinel levels of damage. Is the player someone who likes going in and out of melee (especially with a squishy character (and for some reason did not just roll a melee character since going into melee anyway))? Then Blaster. Does the player prefer doing all of their damage from range? Then a Sentinel. As a last thing I play/played for a long time and I have yet to see a Sentinel be snarked or refused from a team. This is completely a forum thing.

You should have the 25% damage all the time since it's a toggle and has no downtime. It costs you 7% to all resistances though but Tankers are well equipped to deal with that. I only soloed AVs with Fire Armor since it's my baby but it depends on your attack set rather than your armor set. Also depends on the enemy. I had a great leveling experience with Stone Melee up to fighting the last AV in Manticore and then its stupendous Smash resistance made it so I couldn't dent its regen. If we look at single target damage then Bio is better than Fire, and both are better than Radiation Armor. If we look at AoE then Radiation Armor can be first if you trick out Ground Zero with procs (and perhaps Radiation Therapy too), Fire Armor second, and Bio's 25% damage does not help as much when it comes to AoE since damage pales to having another AoE. So you can have the best of both worlds by playing something like Rad Armor for more AoE and then couple with Energy Melee, the strongest ST set. I did this combo with Fire Armor and really had no complains with Fire helping Energy's mediocre AoE and Energy's ST pairing well with Fire's ST boost in the form of the second build-up (Fiery Embrace). Something like Rad/Fire Melee is also a strong pairing since Fire has two PbAoEs and then you add Rad's while the ST is pretty snappy and probably close to EM.