Regen Brute, what primary set?

[Gobbledygook]

Disclaimer: I have not attempted Regen since the great nerf of the dark times.

 

Unnecessary background info follows:

Back in Issue 0, I made a Claws/Regen Scrapper as my first toon. This was my first MMO, and I did not know a great deal about the powers, or even how to play. I did not have tough, and I never knew about perma MoG. I didn't even know about the forums. All I knew was one day Gobbledygook was amazing fun to play. He would get hit, and his health bar would drop dramatically, I would hit reconstraction or Dull Pain, and it would rise, quickly. The passive regen was good enough that it would take at least 6 mobs to cause to need to use a click heal.

 

As there have been quite a few threads and discussions on Regen lately, I have decided to test Regen myself.

My plan is to run a Regen Brute, 1-50, with no farming or PL'ing at all.

 

I am having a little trouble deciding what primary set to pick though, as I am wanting to test Regens effectiveness, not the mitigation that an attack set can provide Regen. That means sets that provide +def, like Katana or Browdsword are out. Same with DM, as it provides a self heal.

So, I come to you good people. And you too, @Snarky, for opinions and advice.

I may even log this experiment for posterity.

 

[Snarky]

7 minutes ago, Gobbledygook said:

Disclaimer: I have not attempted Regen since the great nerf of the dark times.

 

Unnecessary background info follows:

Back in Issue 0, I made a Claws/Regen Scrapper as my first toon. This was my first MMO, and I did not know a great deal about the powers, or even how to play. I did not have tough, and I never knew about perma MoG. I didn't even know about the forums. All I knew was one day Gobbledygook was amazing fun to play. He would get hit, and his health bar would drop dramatically, I would hit reconstraction or Dull Pain, and it would rise, quickly. The passive regen was good enough that it would take at least 6 mobs to cause to need to use a click heal.

 

As there have been quite a few threads and discussions on Regen lately, I have decided to test Regen myself.

My plan is to run a Regen Brute, 1-50, with no farming or PL'ing at all.

 

I am having a little trouble deciding what primary set to pick though, as I am wanting to test Regens effectiveness, not the mitigation that an attack set can provide Regen. That means sets that provide +def, like Katana or Browdsword are out. Same with DM, as it provides a self heal.

So, I come to you good people. And you too, @Snarky, for opinions and advice.

I may even log this experiment for posterity.

 

Super Strength will test that thing.  Great set, no mitigation, and every two minutes a -def for extra stress lol.  But the set is mean and powerful...well footstomp is good mitigation at high levels.  let me look.  maybe energy melee?

Edited February 25, 2023 by Snarky

[Spaghetti Betty]

Ever since this thread, I've been rolling an SS/Regen Brute and it's been loads of fun. PL'd to 35 and solo'd the rest of the way up. Never had a dull moment. Now I'm using it for Hard Mode content and it's going swimmingly.

 

PS: If you come across my build, I've ended up switching out Musculature Radial for Vigor Core.

[Spaghetti Betty]

Some other suggestions for a primary:

 

Stone Melee

Has a lot of the same synergies as SS without Rage crash. Provides AoE KD spam at a low lvl (8 IIRC), pumping up Recharge will not only benefit your attack speed but your defensive clicks as well. Might feel end heavy and low dmg for a little while.

 

Titan Weapons

You can give yourself a decent foundation of DEF to build off of with Defensive Sweep. Pretty much every attack does KD in some form. Lots of AoE. Will be tricky to balance Momentum mechanics and click mitigation, but can become poetry in motion with some practice.

 

Staff Fighting

Will probably provide the smoothest ride from 1-50. You can start building DEF super early thanks to Guarded Spin at lvl 2. Tons of built in AoE. Stances allow flexibility for whichever stat you feel is hurting the most. Not as KD spammy as other options, but still provides some.

 

Claws

This is still a classic combination that fares well. It'll start slow but flourish once you get into the 30s. Leverage Shockwave and Spin with a KD proc for consistent crowd control.

 

34 minutes ago, Gobbledygook said:

Same with DM, as it provides a self heal.

 

I wouldn't go with Dark Melee either way. I've tried this and it also spawned a whole thread where the only solution I (and some great minds) could come up with to make it work was to leverage Whirlwind to inject some KD spam into its gameplay.

[Erratic1]

Energy Melee, because its attacks have a chance to disorient, stunned enemies do not attack, and time you are not being attacked plays to your strong suit--healing.

 

To it add two powers:

• Cross Punch - It knocks foes down and you want the extra area attack as well as the recharge trick to be discussed below.
• Energy Torrent - Same reason as above.

Slot Cross Punch and Energy Torrent both with Force Feedback. You will want at least enough recharge (global and individual power) such that Total Focus, after being followed up by Energy Transfer, is amenable to reaching reset following your plowing Energy Torrent into a group of enemies. Cross Punch is there to help out with Energy Torrent. You should be able to deal with tough single targets pretty quickly with fast recycling Total Focus/Energy Transfer and deal with groups between Energy Torrent, Cross Punch, and Power Crash (I know some people do not like it, learn to use it and it is quite useful both as damage and disorient). 

 

You could do similar with Super Strength and Foot Stomp, but I think the package is weaker for lacking the disorients and the Rage penalty when it expires.

 

Edited February 25, 2023 by Erratic1

[Nyghtmaire]

Similar to @Spaghetti Betty’s recommendations, Ice Melee can be a contender with Ice Patch (and the other attacks proc well). Also can’t say enough things about how great Vigor is.
 

59 minutes ago, Gobbledygook said:

I am having a little trouble deciding what primary set to pick though, as I am wanting to test Regens effectiveness, not the mitigation that an attack set can provide Regen.

Having a hard time picturing an attack set with no mitigation. Even Fiery got into the KD game! For a challenge though, pair with kinetic melee.

[moobiman]

Savage is also good since no one else mentioned it. 

[Psyonico]

I was going to suggest Martial Arts specifically for Storm Kick, but then you said you aren't trying to test a primary's defensive capabilities.  That really limits your options a lot, as most sets get something pretty good in terms of extra mitigation.  Have you thought about a "gobbledygook 2.0" claws/Regen?

[Yomo Kimyata]

5 hours ago, Gobbledygook said:

 

 

I am having a little trouble deciding what primary set to pick though, as I am wanting to test Regens effectiveness, not the mitigation that an attack set can provide Regen.

 

 

In that case, Fire Melee is your huckleberry.  No specific mitigation inherent to the set.  Kill them before they kill you.

[Marshal_General]

I did an ice regen on test at 4/8 and hardly ever had to use my heals other that the basic one.

[twozerofoxtrot]

Regen Brutes I've run:

 

Energy Melee

Pretty bad. Suffered with this from 1-50 and while the stuns were handy they weren't consistent enough and at low levels I really struggled. Caveat that I tried to do this "organically" without pimping the build until I gave up in the early 30s and slotted a bunch of IO sets. It got a lot smoother after that but still not a keeper. Deleted the toon after getting to T3 Alpha. 

 

Dual Blades

I thought I could double dip on high recharge for both sets but I was over ambitious and also didn't consider how Regen clicks with mess with the optimal DB chain. Deleted somewhere along the way to 50.

 

Battle Axe

The best Regen character I've played and this was before the BA changes and the earlier access to MoG. Concept was originally "Lol what if every power had FF+ proc slotted??" And you know what? It worked like a charm. Got to T3/4 for all slots. After the BA changes came in, it only got stronger. My top pick. Probably as good or better than SS.

 

Conceptually sound:

 

War Mace

Hey this is still a killer set, and three of the attacks have KD so you can use FF procs in to keep a high uptime on the buff. Big advantage over BA is that the KD on Crowd Control (and Shatter) 100% so you'll get more consistent soft control mitigation. 

Edited February 27, 2023 by twozerofoxtrot

[TygerDarkstorm]

2 hours ago, Marshal_General said:

I did an ice regen on test at 4/8 and hardly ever had to use my heals other that the basic one.

This is the primary I was thinking of that seemed like it might benefit regen, though OP doesn't want a set that offers any sort of mitigation.

[Captain Fabulous]

I'm a big fan of Stone. Greatly underrated set. SS is iconic and you can't go wrong with that either. Street Justice is also a fun set. Has a nice crunch to it.

[Nemu]

Staff/Regen with whirlwind is the only regen brute you need to play.

 

Staff makes regen 100x better, whirlwind makes staff 10000x better, together that's 1000000x more better.

 

The numbers do not lie!

[biostem]

Go savage melee - while the end cost reduction may not help that much, the extra recharge will make recon, dull pain, IH, and MoG available more often.  It's also a solid set, IMHO.

[Gobbledygook]

36 minutes ago, Nemu said:

Staff/Regen with whirlwind is the only regen brute you need to play.

 

Staff makes regen 100x better, whirlwind makes staff 10000x better, together that's 1000000x more better.

 

The numbers do not lie!

I'm a Floridian, I don't speak numbers, so I'll trust you on that.

[Gobbledygook]

34 minutes ago, biostem said:

Go savage melee - while the end cost reduction may not help that much, the extra recharge will make recon, dull pain, IH, and MoG available more often.  It's also a solid set, IMHO.

I was thinking Savage, as it's a set I haven't played yet 

I'll read up on it tonight/tomorrow and then start him up.

 

Any suggestions Savage Melee,

Or which side to start?

Blue/Gold/Red?

[biostem]

1 minute ago, Gobbledygook said:

Any suggestions Savage Melee

There are, IMO, two core ways to play savage melee - one where you work to maintain your stacks of blood frenzy, so as to maximize the recharge and end cost bonuses, and one where you spend those stacks for the extra damage of rending flurry and hemorrhage.  What I tend to do, as I usually want tough and weave, is to take boxing as a filler attack, use it so I drop to 4 stacks of blood frenzy, thereby not consuming them if I use the 2 powers I mentioned before, then go back to 5 stacks w/ the other powers, and repeat as needed.

 

As to which side to start in, it really shouldn't matter...

[Spaghetti Betty]

3 hours ago, Gobbledygook said:

Any suggestions Savage Melee,

Skip Hemorrhage and get Cross Punch (or an epic blast) if you can!