Psylenz0511

For some reason, I cannot launch the latest Mids hero builder on my machine, I guess I need a Windows 11 machine now 😞 One thing to look for to increase your recharge rate reduction is the force feedback proc for -recharge. You can put one in water burst, gale, lightning storm, etc and the proc will cut into your recharge time on tornado and lightning storm. You should be able to have 3 tornadoes running, and 3 lightning storms at a time for a short duration. My co-main is Storm/water and I love it to death.

the 3 DDD, the darkity/dark/dark is full of awesome sauce. It's a friend to teams. Fearsome stare is a strong to-hit debuff that also fears foes in place (terrorize is what tornadoes do to scatter spawns). Howling Twilight is one of the strongest regeneration debuffs, it slows targets and is an AUTO-HIT low level stun and as a side effect only, it resurrects defeated allies in a nice large radius. Twilight grasp is also a strong quick recharging debuff of regen and to-debuff that also is one of the strongest AoE heals, centered on the caster, second only to kinetic heal > transfusion. To follow up, dark mastery thematically fits Dark defenders, and in practice fills 'holes' nicely- resistances, +damage, and end drain. By the way, Howling Twilight creates a pseudopet to resurrect the allies, if you time it just right, you can rez yourself should you fall before the pseudopet starts the rez animations

Very suitable choice.

Ok there WAS a diplomatic discussion for comparison between thermal and other defender debuff and buff sets that went into some detail. There were preferences expressed but no personal attacks that I saw. What happened? I thought there was useful information in the discussion from all sides. I think the moderation of this thread went overboard.

I hear you friend. Most of my heroes get maxed out incarnate and get shelved. I gain incarnate levels helping lower levels on WSTs. Thermal is an excellent support set that includes heals as one of its tools. While at higher levels you probably won't have to heal as often, the thermal shields do NOT go out of style with the added Resistance buffs 🙂 Thermal also has a 'clear mind' clone that is single target, which is less than ideal such as the forcefield, sonic, and electric affinity aoe style mezz protectors. Also, Thermal has a 'clone' of fortitude called Forge Ally (+DMG, +To Hit) without any defense buff. Additionally thermal has two mighty fine debuffs: heat exhaustion ( Ranged Foe -DMG, -END, -Recovery, -Regeneration) and melt armor ( Ranged (Targeted AoE), Foe -Res, -DEF ) Heat exhaustion is your boss killer with the -regen. The thermal shields, and the debuffs all make thermal superior to empathy in my book, but I am biased. I can tell you about the keypad binds to make thermal buffs, heals easier, (check out the sandolphan keypad binds for Masterminds for an idea) That said masterminds such as demon summoning, Necro, ninjas can definitely use thermal shielding. Personally I think demon summoning/thermal is quite the beastly build. For secondaries, I like AoEs. Fire, Water blast, sonic, and dark all have great aoes that can make your thermal defender valuable to teams at all levels with the secondary bonuses. Fire blast has a secondary effect of more damage. 🙂

whichever way you go on patron/epics, I usually take an immobilize for av's and holds for green mitos, silly but I got to have me a hold, too edit for truth: Don't skip howl, it's like tar patch in a can for -resistance, no slow, but a good defender debuff for sure.

My main was FF/psychic attack on live, the 2nd week after the game went live so many years ago. I really wanted a sonic blast at the time, but with the Homecoming server I was able to rebuild as intended Forcefield/Sonic. I suggest you play through your play through your levels to incarnate level, to flesh out what attack sequence you like. The listed powers are great for solo, small team play. On big steam-rolling teams you want to strike AoE style. Set up that Damping Bubble and sonic WAIL nuke for debuff, jump out of melee, hit Howl, Force Bomb, and Shockwave. Be sure to put Sudden Acceleration KB>KD in your knock back powers or teams will forget about you next time. You won't take down bosses, elite bosses or archvillains solo this way, but you will debuff the foes significantly. Tossing the Weaken Resolve > Electric Shackles > AIm > Screech > Repulsion bolt cycle after the minions and trash spawns are wiped out, is your single target attack stream on tough targets, too. The kb in Force Bomb and Shockwave will knock much of the problematic minions and lieutenants on their butt, which is almost as good as a hold 😉 My defender took pool powers of FLight, Teleport (for teammates), leadership, and Psychic mastery for some psychic blast resistance. Nothing wrong with the electric mastery. I made this to rebuild my original character. I have another FF/Energy blast defender to take advantage of multiple knockdowns, more leadership, fighting, and mace mastery to make him beefier. This guy doesn't benefit from -resist in sonic blast, but everything except AV's can get knocked down. Now the bad news: Forcefields are nearly obsolete in post-incarnate build teams because of all the Barrier, flying around. Forcefield Defender blasts and primaries don't debuff the way TA, Dark, Rad, Kinetics do. It's the nature of the primaries. ROCK that FF defender and carry on.

Fire blast and scourge is a beautiful thing.

Nitpick, I think you meant to say siphon power here instead of siphon speed, as siphon speed has no effect on damage or damage debuff. I take siphon power for the debuff on hard targets. I take siphon speed because the speed debuff is IRRESISTIBLE. carry on

Hang on, this is why I read forums for little tidbits like this. I had not conceived of putting shifting tides on my barrier reef. I wonder who else overlooked that potential.

From what you have posted, I would assume you do not care to exemp down to help on lowbie task forces. You have lingering radiation selected at level 41. On my Rad/* defenders */rad corruptors, I have to have EM Pulse for the burst -regen in fights with the hard targets, bosses, elite bosses, archvillains, monsters, and giant monsters. I also run a high recharge build and actually use EM Pulse as often as possible to neuter large spawns where I can. I took recall friend, Teleport, and Fold Space for just such emergencies. You wouldn't have to use EM Pulse as frequently as I do, but it's very nice for boss fights. By the way, I do not 'wade in' to large groups with choking cloud, I teleport directly in the middle to hold as many minions as possible. With the lockdown +mag 2 hold proc in choking cloud, most lieutenants and even bosses will be held, Random nitpick, 3 slots seems like a lot in super jump. I do like how you procc'ed out neutrino bolt and x-ray beam. I didn't take mutation on my later builds of Rad/* defenders I get the day job resurrection to patch up the team after fights. I end up getting myself killed tracking down defeated allies and using mutation in the middle of hot fights. Enjoy your rad-ness

I made a Thermal - water defender, concept is he is a maintenance man in an old school building and he keeps the boiler running.

Between what I call kinetic range and the aforementioned 'animation gated', these are two issues not mentioned often enough in kinetic builds that quickly become evident with any kinetic that uses siphon speed to maximize utility. The third feature of kinetics being overlooked is Siphon Speed is irresistible by targets. Eat that Diabolique.

I would not waste 3 slots on hover for defense. Positioning out of melee range will be mitigation enough IMHO. Hover has miniscule defense. I would slot 2 accuracies in Repulsion bolt. I would put 3 defense in Deflection shield and Insualation shield 2 end redux and 3 defense in Dispersion bubble 2 accuracies and 2 or 3 damage in Force Bomb 1 Recharge and 3 Defense in Damping Bubble If you were to take Personal Force field you only need the default slot for defense Nobody takes Detention. You might take Repulsion Field if you solo, on an alt built. It's hard to justify in teams. I also like the teleportation pool, I like having Grant Invisibility I like Leasdership, and I think to be the most beastly chewy Forcefield defender, you could take fighting for kick, tough, and weave.

I play most defender sets. I am more comfortable playing Thermal. On a team the resist shields out-perform the aoe heals of pain dom, and thermal has an aoe heal. The debuffs in heat exhaustion and heat exhaustion together are better than anguishing cry. The suggestion for a Demon/Thermal is a powerful combo. Another Mastermind combo that is hella powerful is Necro/thermal. The fire shields are huge to cover a big weak spot in zombie fire resistance. The graveknights become a true killing machine. But, that's a topic for a different forum.