IronJuke

That is a nice build. The use of Force Pool made me rethink my Storm/Ice Blaster a bit. Blaster Storm Ice Manipulation Force.mbd

I have one too. I picked up Energy Torrent and slotted it with Knockdown. Enemies are mostly on their backs.

Inv/Axe was my main for years when the original game went live back in 2004.

Yes, I built the farm myself. One of the low-level skills is Throwing "Stuff" Darts and whatnot, and it does minor -DEF. It got pretty annoying lol. But. I got a lot of practice with DA there. I've revamped the farm and taken that out, however. Was testing my Psionic Dart Brute this week on the S/L farm and no -DEF happening anymore. If you look up "Droogs" in AE you will see my farms on 2 accounts. Also Fire Sword now does -DEF, which can be bad for some folks. I never used that skill in my Custom Enemies.

I agree with what you are saying largely. Invulnerability is fine without a Parry/DA. I tested DA by doing S/L Farms in AE, and I found it useful when getting hit by lots of lethal damage, it seemed to stop Defense drops pretty quickly. But is that a valid test, or will it be useful outside of AE? I also like War Mace and it has no Parry. It does have some cool Weapon options.

Invulnerability is a really great set. If you want a weapon that displays then Katana, Battle Axe and War Mace are really solid choices that I play. You should probably check out a powerset Tier list. There is currently an active post on "what's the most damaging Tanker?" Katana gets mentioned there. Katana works well with Invulnerability because Divine Avalanche gives you a defensive parry. Staff and Broadsword also have it. Lethal damage inflicts a defensive debuff and if you can start losing Defense quickly. But, going Snicksnack with Divine Avalanche a couple times helps a lot. Battle Axe will be the biggest damage and recently got a nice rework. Claws is decent damage and AOE's, if that's your thing, but does it count? Not sure. Dual Blades has a complex mechanic and doesn't get played a lot (not sure why). Staff has great defense with a bit lower damage. Some people love the play style. Broadsword has issues. Attacks are slow. Damage is meh. Titan Weapons, I used to play it on my Brute as my main, but TW has had a significant nerf. It has very long animations, that are terrible while you are leveling. I rebuilt the character as War Mace/Radiation and it's totally awesome now. Hope this helps. I've attached my Inv/Katana Build. Suggest you install MIDs Reborn and get started. You will have other questions I'm sure. Silverblade Tanker w Weave.mbd

Katana is awesome. So underrated!! The first toon made on Homecoming is my Inv/Katana Tanker, How many procs would you add to the powers you mention. Why use Sting of the Wasp in the rotation?

These are my current my Brute Builds as requested by Reddit users. Radiation Melee/Fire Armor War Mace/Radiation Armor Psionic Melee/Dark Armor They are all kitted out and perform well. Absolution Radiation Melee Fire Brute.mbd Iron Juke War Mace Radiation Armor Brute.mxd Xenobia Splice Brute Psionic Melee.mxd

My guesses for highest damage (other than Fire) would be ... Energy Melee Super Strength Battle Axe Psionic Melee Rad Melee Bio and Fire would probably the best armor sets. I am trying out a new Tanker with Shield/Energy Melee to see how it will work as I don't have any experience with Defense Tankers at this point.

S/L Farms work great! You can even farm them on your Fire Farmer unless they are purely one dimensional. I've setup Custom Enemies for my Smash Lethal Farms. I found the following groups to be easy to work with: Does anyone else have any special tricks??? These work fine for my Tanky Farmers but not so well for squishy folks who try to help. Primaries Dual Blades (avoid defence debuffs) Claws (avoid defence debuffs) War Mace avoid stuns, KB except 10% stun OK, low level KB OK. Secondary Super Reflexes (take passives and status) Street Justice (take Throwing Knives) You pretty much have to take Throwing Knives, which hurts hitters who have low S/L defence When taking double throwing knives with Street Justice secondary, do the powers cancel each other out or are the Mobs getting an extra attack?

Hi There, I am leveling a toon for this build now. It has maxed out S/L Resists, good accuracy and recharge, etc. You can always take it and proc it out or do whatever. There is alternate Enhance slotting also in the build. I'm probably going with the version that has Moonbeam and Shadowmeld, as I don't believe this build requires Hasten. https://www.midsreborn.com/builds/download.php?uc=1684&c=714&a=1428&f=HEX&dc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crapper Axe Shield.mxd Scrapper Axe Shield Moonbeam.mxd

I hear you on MA. Guess I misread your message. I may try axe again myself, I just read it's on Scrapper's now (what the heck?) All of the attacks do very high damage and with the knockdown, that has to be the ticket.

Glad to see axe got buffed! I used to play Inv/Axe Tanker on live. Maybe Axe is the new Titan Weapon in terms of fun factor.

Go Martial Arts/Rad for reasons below: Hasn't Titan Weapons been nerfed? I quite playing my Titan/Rad brute after the nerf to TW. The animations were super long unless you get the momentum flowing. But the damage was amazing. After they nerfed it, I didn't want to endure the animations if there was no payoff at the end. If they ever fixed it, maybe I will bring him back. I rolled a War Mace/Rad to take his place. Quite fun, plays well and is super tanky. Radiation Armor is my favorite defensive set for Brutes. It has one of the best T9 as it has no downside. I heard Fire Melee was buffed, which is great, but I'm not a huge fan conceptually because it lacks AOE unless (unless, unless) you roll a Fire/Fire because you get some nice AoE and Fiery Embrace, so two Damage Buffs, one that buffs your Fire damage for a long time. Also the change to Rise of the Phoenix is great. I really like Rad/Fire a lot as it has two damage auras. My farmer is Rad/Fire but is kitted out to handle any content. I rolled a Psionic Melee/Dark awhile back, I recently fully kitted her out. It's decent! Went Psi/Dark/En to get some more Endurance buffs. She's end heavy without Incarnates. Maybe not great for beginners. If you run out of End, just die and hit Soul Transfer and come back with full health, full end. Katana/Rad would be awesome. I have an Inv/Katana tank. Katana has Parry which is super helpful to clear defense debuffs, also improves your melee defense A TON. The other powers with Parry are pretty meh, except maybe Martial Arts. But Titans Weapons has Parry in Defensive Sweep, but they nerfed TW.

My favorite Brute was Titan/Rad, but then they nerfed Titan Weapons I remade him as War Mace/Rad which I really like. He is extremely Tanky. Rad is one of my favorite Defense sets. The Smashing damage does not seem to be a huge drawback. I leveled up a Psi/Dark Brute awhile back that I haven't played, decided to give that a try.