Mezmera

It's a very good power to be sure. If I had 2 powers to spare on an epic pool this would be top two pick. I don't skip my armors from primaries or pools and like to dabble in some transformative power picks like Unleash Potential for these new 4stars and even skimping on attacks for the very important ones to get I find it hard to have extra powers to play around with. On my tank I had one power at the end to play with which I usually end up as @Spaghetti Betty pointed out and just go with FA for the large -tohitt resist and the additional accuracy and small tohitt boost. But yes if I had an extra power pick to choose from it would totally be this uber toggle debuff.

You're missing out! This made me overhaul my tank which I didn't play as often because as you say tanks are default sturdy enough for regular content without much thought required. Getting my tank highly tuned to lead these has gotten me to enjoy playing her so much now that there's actual challenge.

High hp and near capped resists across the board is all fine and dandy but endgame incarnate content you want positional defenses near that 59% mark plus then the 4star HM content adds another 30% you'll need to attain. Those capped resists and high hp will serve you well but you'll really want to avoid hits as much as possible too in that content. Then there's the Cim's on the ITF that'll debuff that defense and unless you also carry high DDR you're gonna get walloped. Run that thing through a 4star to see just how sturdy it is.

I have a StJ/SR stalker too. I haven't really touched her much since the Energy Melee revamp where I made my EM/Invuln. StJ was king ST damage before the revamp and still is great with a bit better pbaoe potential but if I'm hopping on a stalker I'm doing it to kill the hardest target so either I find myself on the EM or going to my Elec Melee stalker if I want to add to the aoe mix. StJ is a good set. If I had to redo her it'd be more of a tossup between EA or Invuln. Invuln you can build into a quite tanky armor it just takes more devotion of slots and being aware of building of elemental defenses or certain positionals where EA seems a little easier to build for a bunch of stuff. On my SR I took Rune though since resists are lacking.

I will usually run Stealth, Hasten and then some of the Leadership powers like Maneuvers and Tactics and I can also pick up Vengeance for a nice situational power that can be a lotg mule. Typically I'll end up weighing my options for defense toggles from pools and usually Stealth and Maneuvers wins out just ahead of Combat Jumping, that is if I can manage the endurance cost which should be no problem for blasters. Leadership powers are just so good for most all of what you're going to be doing in this game and sometimes even solo. There's a reason why you'd see coordinated power teams back on live with every character having Leadership. There's a good 5-6 power pools and Leadership is typically in my top 4 on just about all of my characters.

The stealth procs work only from one. The stealth radius does stack with powers with stealth components. But the regular powers with stealth baked in were changed so that they mostly no longer stack with one another and you will get the highest value stealth from one of your powers if you have more than one that provide stealth. For the new hardmode content where baddies have high perception there was a return to usefulness for having Stealth, Super Speed and a stealth proc to maintain true invisibility in this content. With the change to stealth powers now the best value you will get is from your Stealth power which can still stack only with the stealth procs. The change allows players who run toggles like Arctic Fog which provide stealth to also be able to run powers that provide stealth so they can still get the defense values from them where they were excluded from being able to run powers like Stealth before. With this change I believe they wanted to put more emphasis on characters that are supposed to have sneaky abilities being higher value on hardmode content than where any Joe Shmo could get away with taking Stealth/SS/Proc to get a knockoff invisible character.

Soul is a great pool on doms, not the all being one no. Doms have quite a good selection from their Epic pools. Ice is a nice pool too but pretty much a one trick pony with Sleet which you can drop a -res proc into Dark Consumption and get some of the same effect while also having access to some more great powers in that pool. Yes I have an Illusion/Nrg/Soul, I agree Illusion is top notch and not so OP I feel dirty playing it.

Soul Mastery is my favorite Epic Pool on Doms. Soul Drain is a no brainer, I slot mine well to use as frequent as I can. The shield is a very nice armor. Dark Obliteration is an awesome aoe blast. I also take Dark Consumption it's a very good proc'able power you can get real creative with. Highly adaptable power, you have it to use if your endurance is running hot or if you want that extra bit of pbaoe damage. I slot a gladiator fury -res proc and a few damage procs at minimum. Fire/Psi/Soul will be an aoe machine.

I've got one of these hybrid Fortunatas, lots of fun. Of the claws attacks I went with Lunge (fantastic ST attack), Follow up and Spin. For the Fortunata powers I took Psychic Wail, Aim, TK Blast and Total Domination proc'd out so I could bring aoe control and more aoe damage when necessary. For the secondary powers I took just about all of them except for Assault and the ST Confuse. I also went with Mace Mastery to pick up Shatter Armor, there's an abundance of aoe powers available but beyond Lunge beefy ST attacks are hard to come by on Forts.

This. I have 5 procs in mine along with a 50+5 accuracy. All that debuff alone makes this a must have arrow then to top it off its capable of being one of your best ST attacks. Likely the best thing in your kit. Agree too that PGA is a great power to have, it does -50% damage to all enemies for a minute, half unresisted so even a 54 AV you're still getting around -40% damage which is a fantastic help to team survivability. Just look at it like its a resistance shield for your team but this damage debuff isn't encumbered by a resistance cap. I 2 slot this with the purple sleep set for the acc/rech. All the arrows are fantastic each in their own way. About the only ones I could see skipping are Glue Arrow and Net Arrow and even still I'd look to fit them in.

I've set my Shield up nice. With most of my base resists high I can cap most of them when I need to easily through using One With the Shield or Melee Hybrid with Toxic being in the 80's and Psi in the 70's (with Melee Hybrid, naturally built to 50%) and even Demonic. So I can cap or get real high on my resists at will and maintain them which is really only necessary on the new 4-star content. Plus being able to build in additional hp to 3100 multiplies the effectiveness of your resists and defenses along with any regen you can pull in. I also have the tanker and entomb +absorb procs slotted to fire nicely which based on my hp lets me maintain an additional 900+ hp which is a quasi heal so long as I'm staying aggressive attacking. Paired with the high positional defenses you can get along with the 91% DDR I can get without using Ageless you get one hell of a balanced tanker. About the only thing missing which gets highlighted most in the HM stuff is the lack of a heal which I use Unrelenting and Rebirth for. Or having an endurance debuff get through your defenses like what those Smelters hit you with so I also picked up Unleash Potential to ward that kind of thing off which also comes with the additional benefit of lots more defense and high regen. You also bring a nice team buff to the table with Grant Cover which will net your teammates a nice 15-18% defense buff plus some DDR. Then you have the fun offensive powers like AAO and Shield Charge which I use to maintain aggro that may come from the side. Shield is just a fantastic set on tankers with plenty of options to shore up any holes it might have.

It's a very great set with the revamp. The thing about it is that it's a very busy set, a lot of target location arrows. I HAD to learn binds for this one to get all those arrows out in short order so I could get to fighting. Once I set up some binds this one became a blast to play. EMP Arrow will allow you to solo real well, TA as a whole is adaptable to however you want to play it, be it in teams or solo. Like @Psyonico says there's not really any arrows you'll want to skip. The only ones to be on the fence about are Glue Arrow which is a great tactical arrow and the Net Arrow which does some decent ST -resistance. Personally I skipped the net arrow to be able to fit in my wants but yeah they are all hard to pass on.

It's astounding to me to have this game not only resurrected but progressing forward giving us fun new stuff to do. Having it in the care of those with the expertise to develop more on top of it is a gift in itself. Merry New Year!

Additional team defense buffs are always a plus on these HM thingies since the necessary defense caps have raised significantly. The one thing I do look for most when making these are lots of debuffing. The team can always slot a bunch of Barriers to maintain high defenses but you just can't get significant debuffing from incarnates. That's why I'll look for debuffers first who might also add some buffing as well, that's why Colds are so in demand on these things. So it's really more about how much debuffing Time can bring to the table as well. I've had Time players come along and the team did well, I just don't look for a bunch of them like I would Colds and well played TA's.

This passage seems like it was originally written by some scaly creature to lead others astray. This feels more like a hype job than anything, and anything worth its salt won't need parable's written for them. What's next? Gonna offer us some apples? Those with more ingenuity and foresight will know to see the forest of better Dominator Epic Pools behind this tiny bush of a tree one trick pony Ice Mastery. Ezekiel 12:35 Amen! *whispers* Soul Mastery my child.

Yeah I was backing up your observation while also adding my experience to this topic. When I respec'd out of Taunt on my tank for Provoke so I could chase Unrelenting I had to look real hard at the two variants of the Taunt/Provoke so that when I got made fun of for not taking Taunt on a tank I had some kind of retort.

Yes Provoke is 5 but you can always tab targets and call another group of 5 names. Taunt is 5 as well but like @tidge was pointing out it is auto hit except for any procs slotted and it also does -range. That's most of the difference between the two, there's likely higher taunt values from the main taunt powers too. On tankers though you'll draw so much aggro from other abilities that you can sneeze to maintain max aggro. My tank's accuracy is pretty great so I went with Provoke so I could pick up Unrelenting. I never notice any drop in being able to attract attention unless there is another tank spamming their real Taunt.

On the plus side for the next run all of you will now know for certain to take the respec reward and skip the merits.

Shield defense is a great set and can be built into a top tier tank. I'm not so sure about Kinetic Melee though as others are pointing out the long animations sap the fun out of anything you play. Plus as the tank you won't want to get caught up in animation if you need to be grabbing unforeseen aggro all of a sudden or some attacks get through and you don't have time to fix yourself being stuck animating. As far as Shield goes though it depends on what your goal is. I wanted on mine to add in some good psi resist so I have some of those impervium armors sprinkled in. I'll give you a quick look at how a good slotting of Shield powers would be. Battle Agility: 4 Shield Walls w/unique (if this is your only set of Shield Wall) True Grit: Gladiator armor (resist) plus the unique and steadfast unique. 3 Numina's (heal) with the unique Deflection: 4 Unbreakable Guards and 2 LotG (defense and global recharge) Active Defenses: 50+5 recharge Against All Odds: 50+5 end redux Phalanx: Lotg + recharge Grant Cover: Lotg + recharge Shield Charge: 6 Armageddon One With the Shield: 4 Unbreakable Guard w/unique I +5 just about all of my stuff since endgame is where you'll want to eek out all the tankiness you can.

Yeah I'd have no problem letting guys wear those fancy robes if the girls can run around bare chested. Typically women don't wanna walk around willy nilly with their goods hanging out seeing that they may attract some untoward advances. Last I checked though all of my characters had super powers, so they could handle whatever unwanted attention comes their way. Robes for walking around Au Natural, fair trade, the guys can keep those ugly haircuts to themselves though.

Energy Aura is a great armor, top tier for sure without IO's. Like all power sets it gets even stronger building it with the right IO sets, it is a bit more forgiving armor with more plug and play appeal. Ice Armor isn't as strong at first but built right it's a bit more tankier than EA in my opinion, Icy Bastion on its own is worth taking Ice Armor on Stalkers but it is a bit more busy armor you have to get used to, there's lots of gear shifting due to that great t9 and energy absorption. I like both sets but Ice Armor is a bit harder to play and a bit more rewarding if it's tailored right. The other thing though is that thematically covering your character in blocks of ice might not be a look you care much for although being a Stalker you'll be hidden lots anyways so it may not matter much to you.

I like to slot the shield with 4 Unbreakable Guards with the hp unique and the other 2 resist uniques unless if I also take Tough which I will 3 slot and put those defense uniques there. Don't sleep on Dark Obliteration its a great ranged aoe blast with nearly the same dpa as Whirling Hands per target with a higher target count, a 1s animation and better adaptable range. Yeah I had to make some hard decisions about slotting. I like to slot Soul Drain with 5 Superior Avalanche and the Gaussian proc if I don't have tactics. Soul Drain is far too good of a boost to your damage so I like to get this one to recharge fast and its a nice pbaoe damage power of its own. Dark Consumption is your mighty proc power which that -res proc is big against AVs and along with Weaken Resolve with the Achilles its real noticeable how much faster AVs whittle down. This is a very optimal proc power and hitting 2-3 targets will fill your blue bar back up regardless, at minimum I like to 3 slot DC with a 50+5 Dmg/Acc/Rech Armageddon and the dmg proc plus the Fury -res proc. I can see 4 slotting Blind sure. I do take Spooky and 4 slot him with 4 Clouded Senses. The powers I skip on Illusion are the Immob and t9 pet (he's tissue paper tough). The incarnates I use are Agility, Diamagnetic, Barrier and Assault double hit.

My new Illusion/Nrg/Soul is an animal you've heard correct. I do go with Force of Will pool myself for power boosted Unleash Potential and Weaken Resolve with the Achilles proc. I build in good defenses on my doms and then let that major defense from Unleash Potential carry me to high numbers. This lets me not to have to chase all defense bonuses but target the good ones and build for other things since that one power can do so much more for me for when my controls aren't recharged to keep targets from attacking me. Rarely do I go with the Ice pool. It's such a one dimensional Epic Pool when there's so many good ones on doms. I can take Dark Consumption from Soul Mastery and drop a Fury of the Gladiator -res proc into it for nearly the same effect as Sleet granted at a longer recharge, but you're building for recharge on doms so it should recharge well enough anyways. Based on the recharge of this power it will fire any proc you toss in there on 90% of the targets. So not only are you getting almost equivalent -res to Sleet but you're capable of detonating all kinds of damage plus it fills back your endurance bar all in this one power. Then you get access to Soul Drain, Dark Obliteration and the resistance shield which are all great powers of their own. I'd have a look at what all powers there are from the Epic Pools because any time I consider making a dom I consider what primary, secondary and epic pool I will use. Total Focus is a nice power to put this ATO. Personally I don't like splitting that set up and put all 6 into my most used ST control like the hold. Whirling Hands is very bland. It doesn't do extra damage like when they first revamped Energy it now has the gimmick where it insta recharges with the release mechanic which doesn't matter much since it recharged super fast anyways so they halved the damage for double the animation. The bread and butter of Energy is Total Focus, Power Burst with +dmg from release, Bone Smasher with +debuff from release, and Snipe. Proc'ing long recharge powers like Total Focus and Snipe are the way to go. The rest of the powers have high recharge values so procs are wasted elsewhere which is where I use sets in those ones. I always build for a decent amount of defense around 35-45% positionals and let Unleash Potential and Barrier Destiny carry my defenses high when I need it especially when my aoe controls are a ways off from recharging.

When they first revamped Energy Assault Whirling Hands release mechanic allowed it to do double damage but you were locked out from building Energy every 15s. When they removed the lockout they had to nerf WH as it would be silly constant damage. As it is I skip Whirling Hands, that instant recharge gimmick is meh since it recharges fast enough anyways, it's not worth getting caught up doing twice that animation. I go Soul Mastery and get all of my aoe from Soul Drain, Dark Obliteration and Dark Consumption (which can detonate some nasty procs AND refills your endurance if you ever need it)

Yes Energy is a melee fighter but Power Burst and Snipe are quite the strong ST blasts, its no slouch in ranged attacks. To get the full potential out of Energy though you'll need to make use of Total Focus' 100% chance to build the mechanic, it hits hard so regardless you'll be wanting to use it often when you're needing to build the mechanic. After TF you follow up with either a Power Burst for nasty damage or Bone Smasher for a nice debuff (and decent damage). I alternate these two releases on AV fights. If you play Energy get in the habit of using Total Focus after you've locked things down then Power Burst and Snipe the things still standing without having to move. Total Focus, Power Burst, Snipe and Bone Smasher is a wicked amount of damage, you won't need other attacks outside of aoe which I dip into the epic pools for those.