Picking AT and sets based on concept only

[Rishidian]

My toons are created in a couple stages:

 

1) I'm in it for the experience - I want to see how different Archtypes play, along with different combinations of primaries and secondaries.  I don't have any that have started off the same as another.

 

2) I follow the concept that their powers are, more or less, random.  They can choose which and how to advance and/or enhance.  This means I rarely respec, unless I can't use a specific power.  Sometimes a backstory concept will emerge with a weapon or a costume choice.

 

3) Names are usually chosen for the amusement factor.  Word plays, alternative spellings, whatever.  None are worthy of mentioning here.  They have meaning to me, that's what's important.  I don't expect anyone else to care.

 

4) Back Stories are written...sometimes.  If I read something here that inspires me to write one or 2, then I will. 

[biostem]

I tend to work best when some limitations are imposed upon me.  To that end, I'll generally select a pairing of powers that I find interesting, (or just want to try out), then come up with a look and name after the fact.  For instance, I liked the way the Rikti Axe looked, and thought it looked good paired with one of the tech shields, thus came up with a concept for someone who found some Rikti gear that had been "liberated" from its owner by some random heroes...

[Six-Six]

My toons are created with these ingredients: power sets, costume, name and back story. 

Power set combinations lead to which powers he'll actually pick which leads to how he'll be using them. I call this the Petless MM mentality: just because the powers are there doesn't mean you have to pick them. 😃

For me, costume and name go hand in hand. I'm not a stickler for names, but their names and costumes have to make sense to THEM and ME. I have been known to give in to puns and copyright-skirting. A couple of examples are my GoT-inspired Zombies/ice MM, Dwight Walker and a Green Lantern knock off Gardener Guy. Costume-wise, I have a toon named Gorilla Girl that utilises the Huge Body Type with one of the young faces that can pass of as an Estrogen deprived lady (and yes, the large robotic tech gloves). 

As for back story, I don't write up all of them, but they do exist in my head. Even though I try not to go the classic tropes of genius money bags or military experiment gone rogue or any of the popular ones in the comics, they still somehow end up being those... just worse haha.

A lot of my toons evolve into their own after a few levels. This is why I have 3 DP/Ninja Blasters and a handful of other duplicate toons. I enjoyed the AT/powers so much that I wanted to go through the levelling process all over again. but the next one (subconsciously) takes a different route, plays differently, has a different personality, and provides a slightly varied version of entertainment than the others. 

Builds don't even factor in my concepts and toons, primarily because I suck at them. As long as the toon can hold its own with whatever means necessary, he's good to go.

Then again, there are days that the Wifi gods won't let me play and I'm stuck in the character creation screen. I just throw odd things together and occasionally I stumble upon a Eureka! end product that's worth keeping. So I cough up a name and figure out what powers he might most likely have (among the ones I haven't paired before). That or one of my multiple personalities is hit with divine purpose and given a rapturous name while I was taking a dump.

[Random Axis]

16 hours ago, Zhym said:

Human Trampoline (SS/Shield brute, with the idea that I'd pick lots of knock-up powers as he leveled, but I never leveled him)

I have a FF/NRG defender that's loaded up with aoe and pbaoe knockdown and he's tons of fun. Not very good at +4/8 since the mobs all resist the KD, but on weekly targets he can lockdown every fight by not letting the bad guys stand up.

 

To answer OP's question, I'm in the middle. I come up with an idea that uses power sets and the check the forums to see if I picked a terrible combo where both sets are END hogs. I'm definitely more theme than theory crafting. 

[DoctorDitko]

Many of my characters are based on old PNP/Tabletop characters I used to love, but never get to play any more.

 

As noted above, sometimes pursuing a concept lands you in a Flavor of the Month build (I guess the kids call them "meta" now).

 

I always write a bio, just because. And I'm a were-roleplayer. When the Moon is full, I don't break character.

(I actually had a friend on Live that refused to believe I was a guy because I played a girl so well! I took it as a compliment.)

 

I guess this game has let me relive a bit of my misspent youth, and sometimes that results in in-game awesomeness. Sometimes even teaming with old RL friends.

 

Love when that happens!

[Clave Dark 5]

Anything.  I want to try that power set, I want to avoid that power set having already used it recently, I have name which suggests that power set, I found a build with that power set on the forums that sparks interest, I have a groan-worthy pun of a name in mind so which power sets go with that, I have a costume idea that I bet would look cool now which power sets go with it? 

 

To demonstrate, the last few characters I can of that I've made are:

• MEWSIC (cat-looking character to try out Symphony Control with)
• SPECTRAL ENERGIES (I liked the name, and found a cool costume look for, based power set choices on the name, Dark and... something?  He didn't get too far)
• PINK BAMFER (I wanted a toon with all the Teleport powers that double as attacks, and when I came up with that pun I couldn't NOT use it; also cat looking)

Hm, maybe I'm just trying to make as many cat-looking toons as I can.

[Coyotedancer]

I've done some City characters that were concept-first and some that were build-first... and others that were a combination of the two. I'm sort of an oddball, though. While I can and have built some over-engineered min/max nightmares, I typically don't. I rarely give a rat's rosy red bum what's considered The Best by the power-builders. This game just doesn't require you to have exactly the "right" power picks and the "right" build choices. It gives us plenty of room to play around with (*gasp* *horror*) suboptimal choices. That makes Concept First a lot more viable and fun. 

 

Okay, yes. It's good fun to tear a hole in the proverbial world with UberL33TMan or his sidekick Meta-Monster.... But it's also fun to see if you can make it through the game with a AR Sentinel or a tri-form Peacebringer. Or some randomly-rolled combination of AT and powersets from the Slot Machine Challenge. Or a 'unicorn' combination that you've never seen anyone else try. You could even build that character WITHOUT TAKING TOUGH AND WEAVE. OMG. The heresy. 😆 

 

But yeah. Let go of that need to stick to Only What's Best. This is an easy-mode baby-game, remember? UberL33TMan is overkill. He's fun to play with, but so are a lot of other things. 

 

 

 

Edited October 2, 2022 by Coyotedancer

[DougGraves]

I create characters based on what fits the concept, then abandon them if they have problems.

For instance ice and earth control I just can't play at low levels due to clockwork flying off of ice patch and earthquake.  So I just avoid them now and go with electric control.

 

I still have the old characters.

 

If possible I just reskin something.  I don't like dark armor at low levels, so I use rad armor and just color it black.  It looks smoky enough for me to use on dark themed characters.

[MistressOhm]

I've gone with the concept first, then looked at how I could shoehorn a powerset into that concept. 

 

Baroness Samedi, straight Rule 34 of Geoffrey Holder's character in Live and Let Die... and as one of the original CoV characters (Beta, represeeent!) she was a dark/dark corruptor.  And now I see the Bone Daddy Skulls bosses branching out into Death Walkers and Death Dolls... and I'm thinking, "I did that already, and I'm -better- than you punks will ever be."

 

BUT... I've also seen new powersets come out, diversification of powersets into different archetypes, and thought, okay, what do I do with this? Seems like my Beam Rifle characters are all 50's sci-fi tropes (one is literally done up as a black-and-white version, no color hues anywhere, not even the weapon effects), and my scrappers usually end up as some kind of anthromorphic monster girls of some kind.  My Dual Pistol wielders are either cops, ex-cops, or hardboiled noir (need to break that habit) and there's all manner of other tropes that I should break out of when it comes to controllers, how many time-displaced vaudeville performers do we need anyway?

 

But, I never min-max.  I don't use Mids to map a build.  I see what works in the early game, and tweak it as I use it.  

Edited October 4, 2022 by MistressOhm

[Ukase]

On 9/29/2022 at 5:49 PM, Snarky said:

What do you folks do when writing up characters?  Backstory first or game knowledge first?

At first, when I only had a few level 50's, I went with backstory first. Some were revamps using old names/stories from live, some were new. After a couple dozen level 50's, with new powersets coming out, backstory became irrelevant, as how would you know what backstory to create if you don't know about the powerset? 

Eventually, you realize that the backstory you make is for yourself. And they only give us so many characters to create that story. For some characters, it's just not enough - particularly given how verbose I am. Words are necessary to convey specific information without misunderstandings. Further, it's not like anyone reads that stuff, either. Or if they do, they don't often comment on it enough to make it worth investing the time. 

Ultimately, it's not game knowledge that drives it for me - but a lack of knowledge. I still haven't made any character with storm powerset.

[Trike]

I go concept first. Heck, I barely even bother slotting enhancements in most of my characters until deep into their 30s.

 

This way I am *constantly* surprised when I get killed. All my toons have roided-out insurance policies.

[Snarky]

7 hours ago, Ukase said:

At first, when I only had a few level 50's, I went with backstory first. Some were revamps using old names/stories from live, some were new. After a couple dozen level 50's, with new powersets coming out, backstory became irrelevant, as how would you know what backstory to create if you don't know about the powerset? 

Eventually, you realize that the backstory you make is for yourself. And they only give us so many characters to create that story. For some characters, it's just not enough - particularly given how verbose I am. Words are necessary to convey specific information without misunderstandings. Further, it's not like anyone reads that stuff, either. Or if they do, they don't often comment on it enough to make it worth investing the time. 

Ultimately, it's not game knowledge that drives it for me - but a lack of knowledge. I still haven't made any character with storm powerset.

Well, if your backstory is that long you could write up a short story about it.  Then a synopsis for the game.  I learned good reporters use a pyramid when writing.  The first paragraph will have the core information.   The next couple paragraphs will expand on the important points mentioned.  Then below that will be in depth information.   If an editor needs to cut to fit the space available they just chop the bottom off and then what is left is what gets printed 

Edited October 4, 2022 by Snarky

[MistressOhm]

8 hours ago, Snarky said:

The first paragraph will have the core information.

 

When you don't do this (summarize, then expand, then go into detail), it's known as Burying the Lede.   That's when your headline doesn't match what the story is about (or it doesn't seem to match until someone finds it in the middle of the fourth page.)  We have another name for stories like that: Clickbait.  🙂 

 

(And there's a free concept for someone: ClickBait - A down on their luck social media influencer, playing a hero or villain specifically to pump up the rep cos they're reporting on their own exploits.)

[drgantz]

I usually begin with either a backstory or a punny name, and then choose the powers.  I try to make a good power combo, but always stay within character conception.

I really hate it when someone chooses a power combo which has no conception but is simply to make the most powerful.

One thing that really gets me is when someone makes a Natural MA with no backstory, but can fly.

[Carnifax]

On 9/30/2022 at 12:27 AM, Lines said:

I look for ATs and Powersets I've not tried before, and then build concepts around that.

 

Meta be damned.

Pretty much this. Elec/Poison controller looked interesting so I built a build for that. While doing that the concept of a glowy  neon green "computer virus come to life" happened. "Malwire" hit me as an pun on Malware when I was working on the cossie.

 

Fire/Claws tank I started thinking about rotisserie chicken and spatchcock BBQ so a giant chicken called Barbed DeQue was born.

 

So I tend to be set driven and concept hits while I'm build pondering. Pun name usually comes last. 

 

Except Mombie (Necro/Nature). That happened all at once.

Edited October 5, 2022 by Carnifax

[0th Power]

I go theme/name first then fit the powers in.  After I have the power sets decided, I will try to make it as powerful as I can while still fitting the theme.

[Communistpenguin]

I usually try and pick a power sets/at combo that I have not done before and sounds interesting, then try and create a concept around that. 

[Gulbasaur]

I'm concept all the way down, even if the concept is "let's see how hard I can break X". 

I really like matched sets. 

 

• Rad/rad on a melee artchetype  is small scale AoE glory. 
• Dark/dark on a melee archetype has nice synergy, particularly as one compensates for the other's shortcomings (low defence, but lots of -ToHit, endurance heavy but an attack that restores endurance). 
• Storm/water - strong area lockdown, very strong power combo synergy, knockdown can convert to recharge via procs and Storm scales in efficiency hard with extra recharge. 
• Dark/dark on a corruptor is cones-a-go-go and the -ToHit stacks very quickly. 

This is one of the best puns I've ever seen:

On 9/30/2022 at 6:57 PM, Zhym said:

• Siouxsie Tsoo: Kin/Sonic defender dressed up like a Tsoo.  Kin/Sonic is a great combo, of course, and this is a fun toon to play in groups. 

Edited October 6, 2022 by Gulbasaur

[oedipus_tex]

I do both. Once I come up with a concept I like, I tend to roll it as a few different versions of itself. A few of my concepts have been 4 or 5 different archetypes. Sometimes I settle on a specific, set combo, and sometimes I float between the different concepts. There's no cost to rename a toon if you decide to switch around later.