Hedgefund2

You are not RC (recalling correctly) here. End Mod slotting in Chrono Shift definitely increases recovery for 30 seconds. https://cod.uberguy.net./html/power.html?power=defender_buff.time_manipulation.chrono_shift&at=defender The 15% endurance boost is not enhanceable.

I agree with the sentiment that Merc personal attacks are worth taking, but the actual number is 3.33%, not 33.33%. See the description for Burst, for example. https://cod.uberguy.net./html/power.html?power=mastermind_summon.mercenaries.burst&at=mastermind

Just so you know there's an icon in your buff bar that lets you know if you're playing debuffed. I find it to be a good practice to scan the buff bars for anything unusual. This especially after I was on a MC where the leader had clicked "players debuffed" and it took a couple of minutes of whiffing and drawn out fights before the team said something. That numnut leader - was me! It was a mis-click. I certainly very carefully peruse those buffs when I began a tf now.

I have a Bots/Cold that I played before the p5 changes but I have made an updated p5 build. It hasn't gotten a lot of play since this update but I wanted it to be ready if I did. To OP questions: Nothing in Robots upgrade slotting includes anything that makes me say "did they really mean for this to happen?" like some of the other pets have (no beans spilled from me regarding this). I put 3 Glad Armors, including the unique in Equip and +5d the pieces that enhance resists. One basic heal IO, +5ed in Upgrade. Impervious Skin was tempting but between prot bots and Maint Drone regen really isn't that much of a factor for bots. If Miracle or Numina affected all bots I'd consider them for Upgrade but alas, it's only for prot bots (as noted above, after they heal). To the question of "how did I build it?" 1) Build up some defense 2) Recharge, recharge, recharge. Benumb and Heat Loss have high base cooldowns and it takes a lot to even get them close to perma. Some lucky rolls with FF proc in Pulse Rifle help. I only took 2 primary attacks because I ended up with a seemless chain of Infrig (proc bombed out) >Grenade>Burst. My rating - A+. As for lack of a heal, as a MM it behooves you to git gud at using macro/binds for inspiration usage.

I don't know if talking about other servers abstractly is frowned upon, but one of them allows buff sets to apply ally buffs to the caster. I don't even remember which server it is so I couldn't name names if I wanted to.

I decided to give this a go after seeing this thread bumped up. I've got a LOT of lvl 50 MMs across 3 accounts and many of them Cold. I did a little back of napkin math to see that 3 colds give 67.5% fire resists with no resist slotting, so I just needed to fill in 22.5% resists to get to 90 from 0, which is covered by the one of the two pet IOs granting 10% and the superior Mark of Supremacy resist/regen IO which grants 15%. I fired up an asteroid map with a bots + thugs + demons, all Cold. All the minions checked out to be well in excess of 45% to all the defenses and 90% fire. I didn't monitor time, didn't think it would be relevant given that I wasn't trying to set records, just wanted to experience it. It was... effective. I only resummoned 1 pet for each of the 3 MMs (so 3 resummons total). I did nothing to put a leash on them which I think would have made a huge difference because there were a lot of runners and subsequent chasers and a lot of dispersion amongst the pets. I just kept changing windows to drop sleet and perhaps heat loss. So I think I get the appeal, if I were in a phase of "stuff accumulation" I'd consider this as a means of farming, but those days are long behind and I shan't be doing this again. Most distressing, when I was checking all the resistances of the pets, I noticed one was at 30%, where I was expected 35. It turns out I never made superior the ATOs (3 groupings of 2 Mark of Supremacy, 1 set of 4 Command of MM). Making those superior took 26.25% recharge bonuses up to 40%!!!!!, taking me from "close to perma Hasten" to "easily perma Hasten". This was on a vet level 25 (no farming) so I put in a good amount of time with this character. Ugh, I feel like I shortchanged him all that time.

Real talk - this would just lead to afk PVP farming like people used to do when PVP drops only dropped from PVP.

I would absolutely /signoff on the ability to knock out and carry out a hostage, I'll happily take a -speed debuff (about -10) in exchange.

Stealth does stack, you can see in the first image. 35.5 (AF player 1) + 35.5 (AF player 2) = 71

"Toggle exclusivity" is for A player's toggles not stacking, for example Steamy Mist and Super Speed. It does not involve interaction with other players. All my Stormies happen to be on the same account, but I do have Colds on different accounts so here's the result for Arctic Fog's stealth using 2 different Colds: This one shows def and res stacking for different AFs.

Odd, the top 2 threads in the Corr forum at this moment are about aoe stealth/def/res auras (Steamy Mist and Shadow Fall) and how some players are saying don't take them because Stealth is a better power. I wish it were easy to get them to be more informed, these are obviously not just good powers but even keystone powers. There are just dum-dums out there that want to stay dum-dums it seems. To directly answer the question posed in the OP - Steamy Mist (like Shadow Fall and Arctic Fog) is fantastic and I can't conceive of ever skipping it. All of these even have a "secret" (not really a secret it's in the info but not a primary reason people take these powers) resistance. Mist for confuse, SF for fear and fog for slows/rch debuffs.

I'm a MEGA fan of the Surfer. I periodically do homages to my favorite characters but refuse to do so for Norrin because nothing in game is going to remotely approximate his power. Having said that it seems Energy Blast (or Energy Assault) would be part of the answer.

SOs at lowbie levels (sub 20) are downright game-breaking and I can't imagine skipping them unless it's a financial thing. Lowbie enemies are designed for TO/DO equipped players and the SO jump enables fighting higher level, larger size spawns solo. If the "money thrown out the window" I spend on SOs from 1-22 (or 27 depending) exceeds 2M I'd be surprised. If it does exceed 2M, then who cares? That's an infinitesimally small number for most anyone that's played HC from day 1.

I like Quicksand but from the attached build, I personally don't see what I'd swap out for it. Not EE because (and this is a "how I roll" thing) I like having an "uh oh" plan B power and EE will probably keep you upright and going more than Quicksand ever would. At lvl 50 I tend to go entire sessions without using QS. You'll appreciate it for lowbie SFs/TFs but I wouldn't make the swap.

Oh I know it's not happening. I'm just playing "if I were king for a day..."