Help Picking Archetype and Sets

[oedipus_tex]

Hello experienced Scrappers,

 

I recently got an itch to recreate an old Dungeons and Dragons character in City of Heroes. While I usually stick to playing more "punny" characters, this time I'm being (slightly) more serious by importing this character. His original backstory is he was a Monk who always wanted to be a Sorceror, so he "decorated" his attacks with elements like Fire, Electricity and so on in order to be flashy. Over time, his "magical' side grew in power and he took on a more and more mystical feel, ultimately resulting in a deal with a djinni for more power, which also resulted in a streak of his black hair turning fiery red. Here's his recreation in CoX:

 

 

His basic aesthetic is:

• Martial arts type powers, particularly involving fists or feet of fire/electricty
• The ability to dodge rather than absorb damage (tho I could be flexible on this)
• High mobility--particularly the ability to teleport, rush or hide

 

I'm looking at the options in City of Heroes and am unsure what archetype and powersets to pick.

 

My basic thoughts at the moment:

 

Armor:

• Fire Armor is out. While I can see it working conceptually, I am just tired of it after playing it so many times.
• Ninjitsu is cool, but maybe not elemental enough?
• Tried Energy Armor but am somewhat put off by no control over the fact that the powers hide your character model

 

 

Melee:

• I like the leap in Savage
• I like the overall powers in Psi Melee
• I like Martial Arts but the lack of AoE and mobility put me off a little
• I'm really put off by the clunky animation in Fire and Electric Melee, so they are out. 

 

 

What are your suggestions?

[Ironscarlet]

So I was really stumped at first until you said psi melee but you might not like the answer, but let me start at the beginning

 

Fire and elec armor are res base not dodge  so against the concept your going for.

 

SR or Ninjitsu  I  would say  go SR and the animation of him ducking and weaving all the time might help concept.

 

I would go Psi melee and re-color the Psi Blade as the color of fire

 

For the Epic pool take Mu Mastery to get Elec attacks with Aoe ball lightning combined with Mass levitate AOE are covered you also get a snipe in Zapp and elec shackles as a aoe immobalise.

 

Concept wise I would say this fits and psi melee can be just fine with out TK blow or mental strike that might brake concept or might add to monk concept of a huge mental fist hitting opponent.

 

 

The last part gets into the min maxer in me and as the above is great the only flaw is Psi melee just works better on stalkers.  I had a psi melee scrapper and if u hate clunky feel then roll a stalker it just works better as I will explain below. The Insight concept works better on stalkers but if you can get over this you will have a strong char strong in endgme , pvp or whatever  you want.  But I could be wrong IO out scrapper with Archetype IO  you might have a better aoe damage. So play what you want feel it out but that's my 2 cents and have a blast with your new character. Whatever you pick remember its going to take you 35 levels before you get the elec attacks but end game it might fit the best concept wise with being great at well rounded character.

 

 

Spoiler

  I deleted this but its good info Insight works better and plays smoother on stalkers.  You can better plan and determine rotation

 

Coming out of stealth Mass levitate is like a mini nuke with everyone thrown in the air and out of hide its a critical.  Really fun but the reason to go stalker is insight just works better with assassin  strike but wait there more assassin strike dose not need to be used in stealth so my opener in groups is as follows  Mass levitates, greater psi blade then psi blade which  proc Assassin strike to crit outside of hide and then procs insight greater psi blade for massive damage. 

  I promise the stalker will be just as survivable as the scrapper but if you insist on going scrapper get the  IO to increase crit

   

Edited January 24, 2020 by Ironscarlet

[Redlynne]

7 hours ago, oedipus_tex said:

His basic aesthetic is:

• Martial arts type powers, particularly involving fists or feet of fire/electricty

Well that rules out Staff Melee ...

[KelvinKole]

This is tough. I think the armor selection is slightly easier. You're really looking at Sr, ninjitsu, and possibly willpower. Neither are very elemental, but the elemental armors are resistance based not dodge (defense) based. All three of those options perform well, so pick what you like the best. 

 

I want to say Kinetic melee, styled the elemental colors, but it sounds like you're not going to like the animation times. So I'm going to agree with the above poster and say psi Melee. But... I also agree that it's better on a stalker. 

[Cutter]

I was also going to suggest Kinetic Melee. You might also consider Street Justice if you want to have a slightly "grittier" aesthetic to his attacks. Don't forget you can use auras to accomplish the flaming fists (and feet?) part of your vision.

[Menelruin]

Third for KM, the overly dramatic strikes are kinda like somatic spell components.

[oedipus_tex]

How do folks feel about a Psi Melee/Shield Defense Stalker? I could possibly make the shield one of the more "elemental" looking ones.

 

I noticed Psi Melee loses its cone attack on Stalkers which is why I stayed away initially, But I like the "zoom" of Shield Charge. 

 

My only question is whether the animations on Psi/Shield will look too stiff. Any thoughts?

 

FWIW I rolled Psi Melee/Energy Aura to start and happened upon a farm that got the character to level 27. It's not terrible. I might stick with it if not for the character model constantly being hidden. That's an issue for Stalkers too though I guess.

[Frosticus]

I'd do savage/shield. And then I'd unselect scrapper and pick stalker. 

I'd pick either mu or fire app.

 

2 teleports, more aoe than you can shake a stick at. Terrific single target. dodgy.

you only fail to see your character when you choose. I dont wait for hide to kick in on mine, it has little impact on my ability to mow stuff down. It is nice for reaching g objectives though sometimes. 

 

in fact you could shut hide off and as long as you have the proc is AS I'd still highly recommend it. 

 

[ninja surprise]

Regardless of the sets you choose, you can get the effect you want by using auras on your hands and feet and body (for instance SR with a fire or electric aura), and you can color the attack animations. 

Plus you start with 6 costume slots and you can do binds or macros to change your costume with an attack. You can use the same body costume with different auras and attack colors. 

So you can make dark Melee look like fire, or Psi blades all sorts of colors for different elements, or street justice that has electric, fire, or frosty fists.

 

Man this is a great game!

[oedipus_tex]

Remind me, do Shield players usually take Aid Self to self patch? If so maybe I should be thinking of a different set. 

 

I could easily see Savage Melee as the primary, mainly for the teleport attack. The character frequently wielded claw weapons in D&D.

 

What do folks think of a Savage/Energy Armor Scrapper? 

 

Also, even though it's a Resist set, I can totally see how Electric Armor might work as well. Thoughts on it?

 

 

Edited January 25, 2020 by oedipus_tex

[Call Me Awesome]

37 minutes ago, oedipus_tex said:

Remind me, do Shield players usually take Aid Self to self patch? If so maybe I should be thinking of a different set. 

 

I could easily see Savage Melee as the primary, mainly for the teleport attack. The character frequently wielded claw weapons in D&D.

 

What do folks think of a Savage/Energy Armor Scrapper? 

 

Also, even though it's a Resist set, I can totally see how Electric Armor might work as well. Thoughts on it?

 

 

I've never taken Aid Self on a Shield character and I've played 3 of them to 50, BS/SD scrapper, Elec/SD stalker and SD/Fire tanker.  Of the three the Elec/SD stalker is the most capable of dropping huge spawns very quickly... 3 moves and everything but a boss is dead.

 

One thing you may want to consider about a Stalker though is you'll always have Hide active, it's a significant amount of AOE defense even when suppressed and a core part of a stalker's functionality.  If you don't want the transparent effect then roll a Scrapper or Brute.

 

It does sound like SR fits your character concept; it offers defense, recharge and run speed bonuses.  For the primary you could go with MA or Street Justice for unarmed attacks.  As an option you can go with Claws and choose the "widow claws" option giving you spiked gloves instead of actual claws.  Would that work with your idea?

[Frosticus]

1 hour ago, oedipus_tex said:

Remind me, do Shield players usually take Aid Self to self patch? If so maybe I should be thinking of a different set. 

 

I could easily see Savage Melee as the primary, mainly for the teleport attack. The character frequently wielded claw weapons in D&D.

 

What do folks think of a Savage/Energy Armor Scrapper? 

 

Also, even though it's a Resist set, I can totally see how Electric Armor might work as well. Thoughts on it?

 

 

No to aid self. Shield has pretty decent resistances and the +hp all work together to make you quite stable.

If you really want to tackle hard late game content you can cycle melee hybrid and one with the shield for 6 out of every 8 minutes. Very robust.

 

if you go stalker suppressed hide is 1.8% def (all). 

 

I personally wouldn't go savage scrapper. Nothing wrong with it as the aoe is still quite good and the critical strikes proc can get a bit crazy. However, blood thirst isn't as good as build up (instant 5 stacks is actually kind of annoying imo and the damage buff is tiny) and the st damage of the stalker version of savage is leaps and bounds better than scrapper. 

 

my sav/shield stalker just hit 47. It is quite good.