Anybody use Multiple Builds on 1 Character?

[VV]

After maining her in both Live and Homecoming, I finally broke down and did up a second build for my Fire/Fire/Pyre Tanker. The original one is based on durability, of course. Tried out a second one based around damage. Lots of procs, fewer sets, less durability. Very fun. Yes, you can only change at a trainer, but if you put one near the door of your SG base, this is not much of an inconvenience. Anybody else regularly use multiple builds? If so, on what type of alts?

Edited August 22, 2022 by VV

[Six-Six]

I do that with my MM toons. One build has all 3 tiers of henchmen, and another only has 1. The latter is more for flavour and RP, but optimised enough to be viable for most content.

I also used to have a Dual Pistols Sentinel with 3 distinct builds that switched whenever he switched Ammo type: Incendiary rounds + Mace Mastery was built around damage (haha, on a Sentinel, right); Cryo rounds + Ice Mastery was built around slows, holds and -recharge; and Chem rounds + Ninja Mastery for debuff. I even made a macro button for the switch along with a subtle costume change. Again, RP won over Meta as the build switching reset ALL the cool downs so he couldn't really do it in the middle of a fight. Incidentally, 3 sets of purple IOs, pvp IOs and ATOs made it quite expensive. Not sure if it was worth it.

Aside from those, I found that rolling a new toon and grinding it over was more fun than just setting up additional builds. Hence why I have 8 Soldiers of Arachnos and 3 Widow/Forts, each with different builds (i.e. Huntsman, Crab, Bane, Hybrid + X mastery, Hybrid + Y mastery, so on). Besides, each toon (and thereby, each build) takes on its own personality. I also have 3 DP/Dev Blasters... again, each one with his/her own personality and slightly different build. I do have plans to make a 2nd build for my PB and WS when page 4 rolls out to try out tri-form... then again, I just might roll new ones and level them up all over again. 😃

I have a friend who uses 1 build for solo and one build for team. I remember chatting with him/her that the 3rd build is more fluid and tailor-fit for specific content.

[Mezmera]

I have two characters I do this with.  My main being my dom; there's just so many ways you can go with a build with subtle changes of power picks and pool choices. I have a team build, a solo build and a best I can be hard mode build.  My other is my tank; I have my nostalgia build with flight and laser eyes, then there's my damage build and last is the supreme tanking build which I never seem to switch off of.  

 

Mostly if you're looking to switch a build you're doing it to bring variety to the team which to me seems better to have variety in well built other characters.  I can see wanting to do this with a select few favorite characters though.  

Edited August 22, 2022 by Mezmera

[Hedgefund3]

3 hours ago, VV said:

Yes, you can only change at a trainer

 

You can change your build on the fly using /select_build N

where N = 1 to 3

 

https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Select_build_(Slash_Command)

[High_Beam]

I've done dual builds on characters that aren't kitted out hard with Set IOs, mostly on my support toons.  I have a Emp/Psi Defender who has a Team build (heavy slotting on Empathy) and a Solo Build (Heavy focus on the Attacks) which also means tweaking pool powers a bit; if they can only (mostly) buff others but not themselves they are dual.

[electric_emu]

Only character I could see doing this for is my farmer, since all that f/c def doesn't do much in the "real" world.  But when I think about pouring hundreds of millions of inf into a second build I usually just make an alt instead because it's more fun.  

[Neiska]

I run two builds on my SoA.

 

Build 1 - Typical Crabbermind, used for teaming. Full double set of toggles, ranged debuffer/AoE damage.

Build 2 - Resistance/Def focused crabber. Has pets but they aren't perma, and aren't focused for pet survivability. This is the build I use for solo +4/8 content, as pets can't survive on that setting. Defense capped, with several resists are at 85%, her lowest being psi which is 60 or so. Quite tanky, especially for a hover character. Awesome to solo with.

 

I swap between the builds as needed, solo or teaming. I can play as a normal crabber with pets and all the toggle buffs, or I can go supercrab mode and be extra tough when I am running my own missions.

[KaizenSoze]

My Night Widow and Fortunata build have two builds.

 

VEATs get great use out of multiple builds.

[Aracknight]

Yes, I do. 

 

I main an MA/SR Scrapper, and I use different builds primarily for Epic power pool options.  Build 1 is electric based, with Mu mastery, Ion Judgment, Diamagnetic interface, and so on.  Build 2 might be for a fire theme, or a mace mastery theme, and so on.  I've also played with travel differences.  If I'm adventuring in the shadow shard, I might rock flight/mystic flight instead of my usual Infiltration, and slap on some rocket boots to make it fun.  

 

I've also played with a "Scraptinel" thought, where I "overslot" my epic ranged attacks and hover/fly around blasting at things as a change of pace.  Or I might do some Scranking by taking taunt and slotting Tough and Weave more aggressively.

 

I really don't enjoy the alt game (I know, I'm the different kid).  I have trouble coming up with other characters I want to play, so alternate builds really give me a chance to play a little differently without having to struggle to come up with a new toon to play on, name, design in the tailor, and so on.  

[biostem]

On 8/22/2022 at 2:44 PM, VV said:

Anybody else regularly use multiple builds? If so, on what type of alts?

I have a shark-themed bio armor/savage melee tanker.  His main build centers around durability, and uses uses the immob and quicksand from earth mastery (tinted red) for theme.  His second build is more damage-oriented, using Mako's PPP for additional debuffs and some range.  His final build is basically a joke one, which is generally pretty survivable, but uses a heavily procced whirlwind as his "Sharknado"...

[TungstenShark]

I am currently doing this on a Stone Tanker. One build is only focused on using Granite Armor, the other is focusing on using the other armor toggles. You can have both in one build, but you have to take slots away from your offense to do so.

 

And yes, the macro makes it easy to switch builds (though there is a short cooldown...I think it's 1 min?).

[VV]

On 8/24/2022 at 3:41 PM, TungstenShark said:

And yes, the macro makes it easy to switch builds (though there is a short cooldown...I think it's 1 min?).

Whoa whoa whoa there's a macro to swap builds!???

[Doomguide2005]

1 hour ago, VV said:

Whoa whoa whoa there's a macro to swap builds!???

     Yes @Hedgefund3posted a link above.

And yes I have/had multiple builds on my Claws/SR.  The primary build focused on mitigation and survival  (+max health, high passive regen), a second focused on high recharge (Hasten, Red Fortunes etc) and a 3rd with Flight/Fly designed more for buzzing around the Shadow Shards in particular. 

     I also had two very different builds on one of my Emp/Sonics.  The first was a GM compliant build for teaming, standard play.  The second was a design in progress for taking on a lvl 54 3 boss spawn of Rikti in the RWZ (the RWZ challenge).  She could defeat such a spawn of lvl 53's, but the 54's were a draw.  They couldn't kill her and she would get mezzed just enough to keep her from killing them.  The build was pre-Incarnate and other issue changes,  created around i13 or so.  I've no doubt these days with crashless nukes etc., she'd own them (doubly so after this last update to Sonic Assault).

[User]

So far I've always preferred to build an alt instead of a second build. I could see dual building a Widow though. 

[arcane]

4 hours ago, VV said:

Whoa whoa whoa there's a macro to swap builds!???

Yes. I like to use the icons for Staff Mastery that have the little “1”, “2”, and “3” on them for Build 1, Build 2, and Build 3. Lot of fun to be able to swap builds mid-mission etc.

[tidge]

I use multiple builds, after level 50.

 

Each and every one of my VEATs has three builds. (Curse you Crab pack!)

 

My MMs will have 2 builds: One has all three Henchmen, the other will have only one. If I ever considered going petless, that would be a third.

 

My Tankers will sometimes have a slightly "tankier" second build, usually tuned for 50+ content. The "default" build is usually more for solo play and will scale to level.

 

I have at least two characters (Defender, Corruptor) where I wanted to try some subtle differences; I simply splurged on a second build for them.

[carroto]

I did this with one of my tankers.  Since they get attacks so much later than other melee ATs (and can't skip the usually horrible first attack) it's hard to make a build that maximizes the lower-level attacks and also the higher ones, which tend to be the better ones.  Not enough slots to go around.  So I made one build for exemplaring to low levels and one for playing at level 35+.

 

An expensive proposition so not something I do often.

[SeraphimKensai]

Each of my VEATs run 3 builds a piece, and I use macros to hotswap builds on the fly.

 

My Kheldians also have 2 builds a piece, one with shape shifting and the other without.

 

Otherwise I haven't had much compulsion to make multiple builds for my other toons, aside of one that I have as an experiment that has hasten, adrenal booster that I'll click and then switch builds to make use of those powers that I couldn't fit in the rest of the build.

[carroto]

On 8/22/2022 at 1:44 PM, VV said:

you can only change at a trainer

 

/selectbuild 2

[Yomo Kimyata]

On 12/30/2022 at 12:05 PM, carroto said:

 

/selectbuild 2

 

Yes, but you have to wait for all your powers to recharge before use.  It looks like switching builds functionally activates then de-activates all your powers.  So you can't really use this in the middle of a fight, although you could use it between missions.

 

Although, now I'm curious what Burnout would do for this, if anything.  I suspect that it would probably act as if it had been activated and take 30 minutes to recharge, but it might be really interesting if you could switch builds in the middle of a fight, hit Burnout and go to town.

[Snarky]

I have a Dark Invul Brute that has a solo build for running story arcs and a team build for everything else.  Nearly the same, just more damage powers on the solo from epic, and taunt and energy mastery on the team build

[kelika2]

Yes and no.  When you really start using epics, pvp and atos on a character you can do low level stuff with a decent build because of scaling

Some characters I use a second build for low level stuff.  frontloaded slots and stuff as well as low level sets and anything past level 24 are picked randomly and used for set bonuses.  ya know for posi/synapes/virgil/random groups

 

my widow on the other hand didnt need rerolling, just two builds

[Unclemarty]

For multiple builds, has anyone experimented with a traditional slotted build and a proc slotted build? So instead of slotting sets in the attacks, you'd slot procs. The tradeoff would be sacrificing mitigation and utility from set bonuses and instead gaining a bit more damage.

 

I'm curious about how these builds might differ in terms of power picks and also the situations these slotting strategies would be used (solo vs team for example).

[kelika2]

I ran so many fire armor scrappers, stalkers, sentinels and brutes on synapes wst thanks to second builds.

3/4 pounding slugfest and 3/3 pulverizing fisticuffs in two melee attacks to stack that energy defense

3/6 eradication (pbaoe) and 3/6 scirocco's to stack that energy resist and defense

now take pool travel powers and stack x5 2 piece Zepher for that ranged/energy defense

overwhelming force in whatever for even more energy defense and knockback protection

 

i also learned that at level 20, a level 23 SO is stronger than a level 20 generic invention.  and that freed up enough slots to 6 slot buildups with gaussians for even more ranged defense.  oh and ranged damage sets are terrible for energy/ranged defense slotting