Guiding principles for endgame IO builds

[oxmox]

So as I've gotten more comfortable with the IO system I'm leaning into putting together my own builds rather than rely on online help. 

 

Typically my focuses are:

 

1) Tank up via defense and resistance bonuses (usually more emphasis on defense).

2) Recharge buffs. Nice on everything, especially important if I'm aiming for a particular goal (permadom, perma eclipse, perma hasten etc)

3) Slot powers that I actually use and for their main purpose. I'll sometimes 'waste' a few slots just for set bonuses, but try to make sure I'm focusing on the actual main function of each power.

4) Save a few slots for stamina/health or other sustain if I'm on an end heavy build (dependent on alpha or destiny choice since either of those can go a long way to solving end issues).

5) Important unique effects (KD protection, KB/KD conversion, ATO special effects, etc)

 

Other set bonuses I just kind of treat as a little extra benefit and rarely weight them when deciding on sets compared to the above 3 requirements. I'll put a little effort into getting a few global accuracy bonuses, but those usually come hand in hand with bigger recharge bonuses so it rarely forces any changes. Am I hamstringing myself by more or less ignoring other set bonuses, or do people agree that the above priorities are the most important aspects of a build?

 

[Heraclea]

My first priority is to turn endurance into something I don't have to pay attention to, and to get the characters to a point where they can run their main attack chains indefinitely.  Getting enough accuracy into attacks is a related problem.  I extensively use frankenslotting because I find that the most desirable sets for bonuses tend to have less accuracy than I am happy with,  This is especially important on melees who tend to slot as many Kinetic Combats as they can get.  Typical slotting for a ST melee attack is four KC + 2 Crushing Impact Acc/Dam and Acc/Dam/Rech. 

 

Core functions - damage on a blaster, defense or resistance on a tanker, recharge on a dominator - come next.  Making, say, a defense capped blaster may be interesting exercises, but builds made for that sort of thing tend to use slots in ways I consider perverse. 

 

I then start looking at ATOs and choose attacks to slot them, starting with the procs.  My understanding is that, contrary to old wisdom, the slowest recharging attacks have priority here. 

[nihilii]

I feel there's so many ways to skin that cat. Your approach sounds fine to me, even though it's completely different from mine.

In order:
1) Make sure I have all the great uniques: Reactive Defense, Shield Wall, Glad Armor, Steadfast, Kismet, Preventive Medicine, Unbreakable Guard, Gaussian, Winter's Gift
2) Put as many LotG +rech powers (up to 5) as I have defense powers
2b) Slot ATO procs where needed, if ATOs are particularly good (think Scrapper Critical Strikes)
3) Shoot for great individual efficiency for my core attacks, generally using 5 pieces of a purple set to get, in order: a) 95%+ damage slotting b) enough accuracy to hit +4s once levelshifted c) as many damage procs as possible, purple first then regular d) as LITTLE recharge as I can get away with while still running my attack chain in order to maximise proc chance e) as much endurance reduction I can manage
3b) Slot ATO sets where they'd replace lackluster bonuses, i.e. targeted AoE or non-purple sets
4) Add a second slot to Resistance, Defense and Healing powers; using X + X/End or X + X/Rech as baseline slotting
5) Use whatever is left for misc powers and extra slots to Res, Def and Heals
6) If there's still more slots to use, add +1 slot to Brawl/Boxing or other unused attacks to grab more slow resistance through Winter sets

If I can get a particularly juicy set bonus by adding a slot here and removing a slot there, I'll do that. I'll also put +4 slots to Boxing if I really need an extra +10% rech to run a specific attack chain. As a rule I don't aim for particular set bonuses, although that can change for specific build goals.

[VV]

19 minutes ago, oxmox said:

So as I've gotten more comfortable with the IO system I'm leaning into putting together my own builds rather than rely on online help. 

 

Typically my focuses are:

 

1) Tank up via defense and resistance bonuses (usually more emphasis on defense).

2) Recharge buffs. Nice on everything, especially important if I'm aiming for a particular goal (permadom, perma eclipse, perma hasten etc)

3) Slot powers that I actually use and for their main purpose. I'll sometimes 'waste' a few slots just for set bonuses, but try to make sure I'm focusing on the actual main function of each power.

4) Save a few slots for stamina/health or other sustain if I'm on an end heavy build (dependent on alpha or destiny choice since either of those can go a long way to solving end issues).

5) Important unique effects (KD protection, KB/KD conversion, ATO special effects, etc)

 

Other set bonuses I just kind of treat as a little extra benefit and rarely weight them when deciding on sets compared to the above 3 requirements. I'll put a little effort into getting a few global accuracy bonuses, but those usually come hand in hand with bigger recharge bonuses so it rarely forces any changes. Am I hamstringing myself by more or less ignoring other set bonuses, or do people agree that the above priorities are the most important aspects of a build?

 

I've been using IOs since they dropped and this is generally how I do it, as well. Depending on the build/AT, I may rearrange priorities on numbers 1 and 2. For tankers, I focus def/res first, for most everything else, I focus recharge first.

[roleki]

I generally focus on Controllers, so my priorities are a little different than most, but even amongst controller builds I see on the forums I tend to go a different direction.

 

The way I play a controller, I want global recharge ahead of anything else -  theory being, they don't make Recharge inspirations. 

 

Once I have +Recharge plotted out, I try to go for Endurance, whether that's from procs, +recovery, global discounts or max buffs; I go one further and get the Atlas Medallion ASAP on everything I roll.  Once slotted up, my controllers usually sit between ~110 and ~117 endo and recover about 3.5 endurance per second... plenty of fuel for all those toggles and clicks.

 

After I feel I have squeezed all the +Recharge and +Endurance I can into a build, I try to survey what's left to slot and whether I can max out one thematic bonus over another, usually +regen or + HP (just works out that way) but occasionally that's mez resistance or whatever.

 

ETA: i tend to 3-slot both Health and Stamina, one-each at lvl 5 and one each somewhere in the teens.  If I can afford the procs, I go Miracle/Numina/Panacea in Health, and then 3 pieces of Perf Shifter in Endurance.  Did I mention I like to have endurance available?

Edited November 25, 2019 by roleki

[Seed22]

It depends on the AT. But in general I focus on:

1. Recharge; Perma Hasten and perma-dom is nice
2. End management: Great to support #1
3. Defense or Damage Res: Great for survival and freeing up Incarnate choices
4. Damage: The AT usually has built-in damage which makes this less of a priority for me. Or set choice solves this I guess
5. Regen: I don't care about this and generally hate regen. It's less immediate and useful to me
6. My own headcannon for how I view the power-level of a toon in respects to my others. Some get lucky and have higher power due to IOs, and I adjust accordingly(my headcannon, that is)

[Xeres]

Usually I focus on the toggles I have - Regen vs Defense vs Resist (or a combination of these).  I slot up the toggles first.  That then dictates if I take tough and or weave.  Usually I take both but sometimes not.  Then I do end management.  Then I slot offense taking sets that fill out holes.  I'm not worried about perma anything - except status effect toggles - so that *really* affects how I do this.

Edited November 25, 2019 by Xeres

[EmmySky]

I am just learning about sets and bonuses and procs.

 

Question:  this morning on in-game help channel some people said Numina should always be in a passive power but the others can go anywhere.  Now on my tank I have Numina in Healing Flames so am I doing it wrong?  Why must Numina be in a passive power I guess is what I need to know?  Or was I listening to the wrong people?

 

Thanks for all the info, I am actually kinda starting to understand this whole business!

[Lines]

23 minutes ago, EmmySky said:

I am just learning about sets and bonuses and procs.

 

Question:  this morning on in-game help channel some people said Numina should always be in a passive power but the others can go anywhere.  Now on my tank I have Numina in Healing Flames so am I doing it wrong?  Why must Numina be in a passive power I guess is what I need to know?  Or was I listening to the wrong people?

 

Thanks for all the info, I am actually kinda starting to understand this whole business!

I guess it depends on how often you use healing flames versus your endurance issues.

 

In health (or any passive with a healing component) the proc fires off as often as it can, which effectively makes it permanent. If you use healing flames often enough, then the proc fires regularly anyway. It lasts 120 seconds, so if you use it within that timeframe I think it’s permanent for you too.

 

If you don’t use healing flames often and are having recovery issues (or regen issues, but I suppose if that were a problem I’d say use healing flames more), maybe consider moving it.

 

6 slotted numina’s is a good bonus for ranged defence, so that’s worth factoring too. You won’t want to be 6-slotting health.

 

edit: edited with I think more accurate information, having read on

Paragon wiki that Numina’s proc fires 100% of the time.

Edited November 25, 2019 by Lines

[Seigmoraig]

3 hours ago, Heraclea said:

Getting enough accuracy into attacks is a related problem.  I extensively use frankenslotting because I find that the most desirable sets for bonuses tend to have less accuracy than I am happy with,

There are a bunch of set bonuses scattered around with +Acc that will give you the accuracy bonuses on all of your powers. If you account for a few of these you can more than make up for sets you find lacking in accuracy. Hecatomb for example has a 15% accuracy bonus as it's 4 piece bonus which single handily fixes any and all issues you might have with accuracy

Edited November 25, 2019 by Seigmoraig

[roleki]

36 minutes ago, EmmySky said:

I am just learning about sets and bonuses and procs.

 

Question:  this morning on in-game help channel some people said Numina should always be in a passive power but the others can go anywhere.  Now on my tank I have Numina in Healing Flames so am I doing it wrong?  Why must Numina be in a passive power I guess is what I need to know?  Or was I listening to the wrong people?

 

Thanks for all the info, I am actually kinda starting to understand this whole business!

I prefer to slot the Preventive Medicine proc in a click/active power, since it fires when the conditions are met (i.e. when you need it) then drop Miracle/Numina/Panacea in Health, because then those 3x are always firing with no input needed from me.

 

There may be a better/more recent post on this subject, but early on I found this to be very helpful:

 

Reddit Post re: Proc Firing (PPM)

[EmmySky]

Thanks y'all!  Healing Flames is on auto-cast so it fires, needed or not, so I think from the logic and timing presented it is fine where it is.   She has no end or health issues (except with knives of vengeance...they hurt) but I will keep that in mind for my future builds on other toons. 

[Seed22]

2 hours ago, EmmySky said:

I am just learning about sets and bonuses and procs.

 

Question:  this morning on in-game help channel some people said Numina should always be in a passive power but the others can go anywhere.  Now on my tank I have Numina in Healing Flames so am I doing it wrong?  Why must Numina be in a passive power I guess is what I need to know?  Or was I listening to the wrong people?

 

Thanks for all the info, I am actually kinda starting to understand this whole business!

I tend to throw it in passive powers as a fire and forget or just simply forget, proc. In this upcoming build I have it in triage beacon(I think) and in another build I have planned I have it in soothing aura. Really depends on how often its used or what you want from it I guess

[Myrmidon]

Procs

Numina, Miracle, Panacea - All of those of in health as early as they can be slotted.

 

Gladiator’s Armor, Steadfast Protection +Def - these also go in every single build as early as they can be slotted.

 

Any of the various utility procs as needed and the rest is based on the full IO build of the character, with the full IO build either slotted or waiting in their Enhancement Trays. I’m up to 19 (of 25) fully IO’d characters so far (from level 23-50).

[tidge]

On 11/26/2019 at 6:31 PM, Myrmidon said:

Procs

Numina, Miracle, Panacea - All of those of in health as early as they can be slotted.

Here is a slightly different take on the (commonly given) advice above: I have quite a few characters that don't run into serious Endurance problems, and so the Panacea proc is more than enough for them, even allow them to run with Sprint on at all times. This is dependent on attack chains and toggles, but if the character has other set bonuses and +End accolades extra Recovery may not be necessary. I will grant that I almost always have 2 slots in Stamina for the Performance Shifter +End proc and another Endurance IO. (I like the movement bonus from 2-pieces of Performance Shifter, but with so many 'rescue' missions I'm seriously considering avoiding all +Movement bonuses).

 

Similarly for +Regeneration, for characters with sufficient Defense (or lots of HP) I find I don't always need more Regeneration.

 

On characters with a healing power, I include the Preventative Medicine +Absorb proc there. I agree with the wisdom that PM ought to be slotted either 1-slot (the proc) or 6-slot (for recharge bonus), but depending on the actual power (and build) a second slot to get more Heal and/or Recharge may be worthwhile.

 

Since this post has been heavy on the healing, here is my general approach to healing at level 50 (and beyond). At endgame I try to have some mechanism by which I can either heal a significant chunk of my health bar, or I have some mechanism such that health can regenerate at such a rate that I don't worry about taking damage. My current favorite approach to the former has been to use the Presence pool to 6-slot Unrelenting (with Preventative Medicine). This isn't a pure heal, but on Defense based builds (which also have the Reactive Defenses Scaling Damage Resistance proc) this works really well. With enough +Recharge it's ready every 3 minutes or so.