Cutter

Did some tweaking on one of my older heroes and figured I'd share - meet my Elec/Dark troller, Borealis! I just wish screenshots did more justice to her - the constantly shifting colours in her wings especially.

Yeah, the aesthetic on those boots is super clunky, and that jut-out on the back... Opinion yadda yadda but those are fugly! 🙂 However... From a quick look through the Male Tights options, combined with Cybertech 1 boots, there are a few that might be made to work: Alpha isn't terrible Clockwork (with or without pads) could work in a pinch Retro ScFi 3 at least picks up the glow on the back of the boots, but is largely uninspiring aside from that Spectrum? Tucked In Pants > Resistance does a little to mitigate the squashed look of the only Cybertech boots option available there, and Elemental Order in the same group is passable too. Hopefully that's something to go off?

Yup, I've done the same thing on my Shield/Elec tank and it's a constant stream of green numbers!

Thanks! My only concern would be in the second Power Transfer +heal that you added. Simply because - unless they've fixed it - these are bugged in passive powers so you don't actually see the expected payoff from multiples. Essentially (and this is prolly not 100%) all PTHeal IOs in passives have their proc timing synced, and each treats the others as itself, so when one fires off, all the rest go "whoop, that was me" and do not fire themselves. The rest of it is bootyful!

That's a solid build, @Camel. 50+ def to all positions and immense resists behind that. I'd be curious what else you could do with it now?!

Fair point. What about a "select an origin power pool" option added during character creation, with a simple statement of "this pool does not have to match your chosen origin"? The creation process would then have those powers show up in customization (so players can see what they look like, view the numbers, etc.), and just like everything else, would be changeable right up to the point of clicking "enter the game". Yes this would bake that pool into the character along with primary/secondary, but in theory at least being able to see what all the powers look like, and customize them accordingly, would do something to mitigate that concern.

Here's an early morning thought (and if someone else has mentioned this before somewhere, consider yourself credited!)... what if choice of origin during character creation came with that origin pool as a set of inherent powers which don't count against other power pool picks? They would NOT all be available at level 2, but rather open up on their current tier unlock schedule. They would be easily ignorable by those who wish to ignore them, but otherwise having a "free" travel power, attack or two, buff etc. seems like it would be a good thing?

Moonless Moonless.costume Moonless.powerCust

I think, while not necessarily a consensus, that there is a strong sentiment favouring improvements to all things not named Hasten, Maneuvers, Tactics, Tough, and Weave. Basically make more powers competitive, and make the choice between going into the Fighting pool vs say, Medicine or Presence more of a meaningful and, perhaps, agonizing decision. I'd be all over seeing more synergy within each pool. Just as the Fighting pool attacks get better the more of them you have, and a couple of Medicine's powers improve with deeper commitment, perhaps the other pools could get a similar treatment. Maybe (maaaayyyybe) it's time to rethink the whole "power pools must never be better than a primary/secondary" concept? Especially since Hasten kinda blows that idea up anyway.

Military variant and spec ops variant, for your consideration 🙂

You're absolutely right, neither is perfect. But together they mitigate a good amount. I'm no tester so I can't give you percentages and numbers, but strictly on feel based on what I've done thus far, I have no complaints, or doubts that this approach isn't doing something useful. Snagging an epic immob is probably the most straightforward approach to managing the stun wander problem. I'm tight on slots for my approach, so instead I've got to leverage the +immob proc in Oppressive Gloom, and wait for Control Radial to apply a much better +immob proc throughout. Honestly tho, til now the fear control is much more consistent and noticeable anyway. These are good questions. At my level I can really only answer the first and third, to which I say "yes, easily" and "no, but...". I just ran a Numi yesterday, and my bar only moved once to the point where I needed to heal. Haven't gone back and done a Posi yet with more powers slotted, but given that Dark really gets all its "core" powers by what, level 8? I can't see it struggling. (My memory is fuzzy from when I ran it actually at the appropriate level.) With respect to def debuffs, well, Dark doesn't get any DDR so that gets shredded, but with projected melee def sitting around 43% (technically soft-capped with Cloak's debuff applied) it should be a while before that first hit lands; and at any rate it boasts solid resists and a sub-13-second heal under that defense. I've only ITF'd once on him, and yeah I did hit a few dicey spots, but that's the famed Dark Armour Health Bar Cha Cha Slide (TM) in all its glory 🙂 For endgame content, It's entirely likely I'll invest in a second build that pushes the conventional numbers more. Can't say for sure however til I get there.

Been running a Dark/Elec feartank experiment lately. Heavy into the Presence pool, complementary slotting, all that jazz. /Elec has a whomping great KD+stun in Thunder Strike, as well as the sleep chances in the ST attacks. Sitting at 42 so no incarnate yet, but planning around Control hybrid - likely going to build both sides of the tree: Radial to stack fear/immob/stun, Core for the extra mag and damage. The fear effects are very noticeable - between Cloak of Fear and Invoke Panic it's not uncommon to see most of a spawn shaking in their boots, including bosses. Stuns are less reliable, but I'm working on it! Overall he's all kinds of fun to play, and picks up comments from time to time so I know it's not just me seeing what he can do. (The final build also hits very respectable resists and defenses - its biggest hole is +recharge.)

With respect to the 3-colour theory, depending on how different you want those colours to be, you can pseudo-achieve the effect of 3 colours using only 2 plus creative use of "light up" costume pieces (e.g. Ascension bits, Fire/Ice "veins", Bioluminescence). Great when you want a look that emphasizes two "shades" of the same colour without having to actually fight with the colour picker. In a similar vein, a number of pieces tend to include either (uneditable) blacks and greys in them, or segments that take the base colour but significantly darker (Ascension again, particularly the boots and gloves). So again you can gain that third colour without actually choosing 3 colours. Finally, don't be afraid to experiment with colour combinations that you wouldn't typically use. They're not always going to be winners, but I guarantee you'll surprise yourself! Snippets of some of my several palette-swapped cow costumes as examples. Each one only uses two colours (plus brown for the fur), but thanks to brightness and baked-in shading, appear to use more without being overwhelming or jarring.

Trying to stick near-ish to your original aesthetic, plus taking into account your comment about wanting to be more hero-looking... radregen.costume

OK, so it's not FULL full armour underneath.... but still closer to your design spec than the first version! Also, playing with colours 🙂 street shock.costume

Well, since the name was available... Sonic Deathmonkey! (I erred on the pinker side of the pink/orange shade - couldn't make a match I liked) sonic.powerCust sonic.costume

Adapting a look I've used for a couple of my ladies who also fell into the heroic life by accident... The cyborg HUD aura is a subtle choice that will prolly get lost in the rest of the gfx, but I think it works here. street shock.costume

I'm greatly enjoying my Sav/Rad brute (far more than my Shield/Sav tanker). Dunno if it's the armour set making all the difference but yeah...

Late to the party this week, but here's Neapolitan, an Ice (Cream) / Cold Corrupter!

Honestly that's why I'm doing this build. I've got plenty of "by the book" tanks - at some point it needs to be time to try something new, and DA felt like the set that best lends itself to that.

I'm doing a very similar thing with my Dark/Elec, Currently (hah!) at 42. Presence pool > Cloak > Vigilante for fears, Oppressive Gloom > Thunder Strike for stuns. Also looking forward ti Vigor, tho I'm considering the other side of Control hybrid to add some much-needed immobilization, plus more stuns. I'd be very interested in seeing what you've done, as I have diddly-poop for recharge (but I suspect somewhat beefier res/defs). Mine spoilered below for reference.

Blue Neapolitan?

Don't have a shield stalker, but my Sh/Sav tank uses a pointy one, The spikes really add to the whole ripping and tearing aesthetic. I combined with dark red slime aura on his hands (in combat) for extra gore 🙂

Not a numbers person by any means, but I'll take a stab at a very simplified explanation of Defense and Resist capping. To begin, Defense is what you "soft cap", and Resistance is what you "hard cap". Defense first: A basic, even-to-your-level Minion, in normal content, has a 50% chance to hit you. Each % point of Defense your hero has essentially subtracts from that value to give a final to-hit chance for that Minion. However, that chance cannot go below 5% for any enemy no matter the rank or level. You would achieve this by attaining 45% Defense. This value is the same for every archetype. Hence, "soft cap" - you can push your Defense higher than 45%, but it's never going to reduce the enemy's chance to hit you below 5%. Attaining higher than 45% Defense is useful for resisting debuffs, as well as in Incarnate level content where the enemies' minimum chance to hit is higher. There are different flavours of Defense (typed vs positional) to consider, but they all work with the same numbers. Also consider that some classes start with powersets that increase their Defense, while others start from zero, so the ability to reach Defense caps varies. Resists: Each archetype has a maximum value ("hard cap") of Damage Resistance that they can never exceed: the highest is 90% for Tankers and Brutes, down to the lowest cap of 70% for Sentinels. Resistance is always typed. Again, consider that some classes start with powersets that increase their Resists, while others start from zero, so the ability to reach Resist caps varies. Edit: Ninja'd by @Hyperstrike! That's what I get for breaking to put children to bed 🙂 I'll also second the suggestion of a Sentinel as a good, beginner-friendly ranged class. Some of their armour sets are Defense-based, others are Resist-based, and still others are some combination.

Looks solid to me (with the caveat that I'm relatively new to the world of bruting - I tank far more). Anyway, I did a quick and dirty adjustment to my Sav/Rad build and came up with the below. It hits better SLEN resists, at the expense of FCTP. Defenses overall are similar, with the notable exceptions of my FC being much worse but Melee being much closer to softcap. I'd say your build could prolly make better use of some enhancement boosters to get more defenses a small purple away. Anyway, have a look and see if anything catches your eye.