What's the flavor of the month PVE farm brute?

[crimson72]

If your goal is to merely destroy large packs of mobs as quickly and efficiently as possible?  

 

I just want to make a brute so I can kill tons of mobs, get tons of inf, and drops, and even power level some people.  

[Xhi]

Rad/ Elec Brute all you need for a farm is 45% defense in whatever category your farming

[Outrider_01]

2 hours ago, lordzenu said:

Rad/ Elec Brute all you need for a farm is 45% defense in whatever category your farming

Eletric Armor you can go Smashing/Lethal defense, then run energy farms preferably with out Electric Melee / Blast (endurance drain), Energy Blast / Melee is easier to fight against if you have some +KB resist.

Edited May 26, 2023 by Outrider_01

[PLVRIZR]

Couple threads to help you out:

 

 

[PLVRIZR]

Personally, I'm still rolling with an old school Spines/Fire brute, dual boxing, with a Inv/SS tank on follow (w/ Foot Stomp on auto).  Still running @BigGotter's tunnel fire farms, usually with EBs.  Certainly not AFK-able and probably not the fastest or most optimized out there, but it works.

[honoroit]

i hate farming, only do it because of my new obsession with prismatic costumes (prisms were over 4.5m each yesterday!)

 

spines/fire. dont dual box. the character cant die normally, but recently if i zone out/micronap (regularly) while farming ive noticed a crash that happens where theyll end up killing me.

 

dunno what it is, sometimes my health just plummets, and youre needing like 4x good lucks to plug the hole. 

 

i do that big mob tunnel one mainly, no elite bosses, it seems slower to have them on, less inf and no appreciable drop change i notice.

[PLVRIZR]

4 minutes ago, honoroit said:

i do that big mob tunnel one mainly, no elite bosses, it seems slower to have them on, less inf and no appreciable drop change i notice.

 

I've never done a direct comparison (time vs. infl), but my "feels meter" says I get more purple drops with the EB one.  Probably should "farm" some data...  I do average right at 15 min. on the non-EB and about 20-25 on the EB version, depending on how focused I am.  I don't use any of the insp combining binds, either, I just chew what drops and when I notice three of a kind, convert to reds.  Whatever drops for the tank, I give to the brute, as well.

 

I also move on, after all the Lts and Bosses are dead, dragging the remaining EBs with me, to the next mob.  Having the tank tagging along is a HUGE plus, to keep stragglers aggro'd and hugging close.  Even though NUT's an ITF-focused build, he just stands there and shrugs off the fire attacks, while stomping away.  Lots of AOE to keep whittling them down and I'll reach over to the other keyboard and throw some KoBs in there, as well.  

[Hjarki]

On 5/26/2023 at 9:50 AM, honoroit said:

dunno what it is, sometimes my health just plummets, and youre needing like 4x good lucks to plug the hole. 

Some fire farms have enemies with Fire Sword. Since this also does S/L damage (which fire farm builds are weaker against, especially if they turn off unnecessary toggles and skip the Defense uniques that increase resists, ATO, etc.), it can chew you up fast.

 

You also might be short on Regen.

 

In terms of the overall topic, I tend to run Spines/Fire these days in my "el cheapo" build with only 6 purples (both procs, 5-slot for 10% recharge). Spines works a bit better since I can use 5xIce Mistral's to boost defense/recharge. It does pretty good AFK farming and has a ton of recharge so chomping reds while active farming really ramps up the damage.

[Sanguinesun]

On 6/22/2023 at 9:59 PM, Hjarki said:

Some fire farms have enemies with Fire Sword. Since this also does S/L damage (which fire farm builds are weaker against, especially if they turn off unnecessary toggles and skip the Defense uniques that increase resists, ATO, etc.), it can chew you up fast.

 

You also might be short on Regen.

 

In terms of the overall topic, I tend to run Spines/Fire these days in my "el cheapo" build with only 6 purples (both procs, 5-slot for 10% recharge). Spines works a bit better since I can use 5xIce Mistral's to boost defense/recharge. It does pretty good AFK farming and has a ton of recharge so chomping reds while active farming really ramps up the damage.

 

The main danger from fire sword attacks is the -def.  On the older farms that werent updated, those mobs when they start hitting cause a very quick -defense cascade due to the -def stacking that pretty much is what kills you.

 

Since the update, there have been plenty of farms where those attacks are taken out of the farms custom mobs and replaced with other attacks/powers to get as close to or at the max exp on those farms. 

 

Spines/fire is ok as a farmer.  But it isn't capable of the same damage output as other choices like rad/fire.  It is more akin to being considered a farmer that can take it slower but has better protections such as the -recharge and slows from the spines attacks causing those mobs they fight/attack less often of course.

 

That said, I have both rad/fire and spines/fire brutes, and both can do some of the older maps even as well(albeit slower and as long as chewing some defense skittles or just simply stepping out of a group until the -def stacks time out).   Again though at a much slower pace on those older maps.  Put them on non fire sword farms and they're faster but rad much more so in either case.

[Hjarki]

6 hours ago, Sanguinesun said:

Spines/fire is ok as a farmer.  But it isn't capable of the same damage output as other choices like rad/fire.  It is more akin to being considered a farmer that can take it slower but has better protections such as the -recharge and slows from the spines attacks causing those mobs they fight/attack less often of course.

The Spines/Fire is more a matter of having it laying around and wanting an AFK farmer.

 

In terms of farming speed, I think Radiation is... ok. However, I usually play Martial Arts. Since I can slot Spinning Kick with Force Feedback, it ends up firing procs a lot faster than Irradiated Ground can while also reducing the recharge on Burn. The knockdown also provides a degree of mitigation.

[Sanguinesun]

3 hours ago, Hjarki said:

The Spines/Fire is more a matter of having it laying around and wanting an AFK farmer.

 

In terms of farming speed, I think Radiation is... ok. However, I usually play Martial Arts. Since I can slot Spinning Kick with Force Feedback, it ends up firing procs a lot faster than Irradiated Ground can while also reducing the recharge on Burn. The knockdown also provides a degree of mitigation.

 

AFK farming is a completely different creature. All indications were to this point that the discussion revolved around active farming.

 

If you're wanting an efficient AFK fire farmer, a Stone/MA tanks is going to be more efficient with Dragon tail (what you refer to as the spinning kick) set on auto, procs etc etc.  They're much more suited for that.

 

As for an MA/fire brute, it is still compelling that it may not have the active fire farming damage that various rad/fire ones can achieve.  Even if you're slotting dragon tail and crane(since it too can have a FF and you include it in your rotation) to get you at or close to 300% -chance- for +recharge and your proc'ing it like you would an AFK version or similar.  If you're lucky at best getting 3-4 sec hits with it, the damage just isn't leveraged as well on the brute versus a tank due to the larger number of mobs it can hit.  

 

Some things then to perhaps take into consideration regarding rad/fire brutes:

 

You may perhaps be assuming the auras should be heavily proc'd instead per what you stated.  This hasn't been the case since the changes last year, either. They're better suited for the ATO sets though Achilles (from defense debuff set) -res in at least IG is of merit. Some still leverage lots of procs in the auras. I do not.

 

Some may be overlooking the relevance of contaminated and the build up Fusion's mechanics to help with it (similar to fire's fiery embrace in extra damage regards).  It isnt to be underestimated, especially on brutes actively farming for additional damage.   

 

And then again as mentioned above, one's maps and mob designs have relevance, especially since various newer maps  since last fall dip into defense sets(super reflexes being the more common one) for mobs to get to the exp/influence max's.   Rad's -def helps with that considerably since every single attack and the aura have -def. Not a single attack in spines nor MA has -defense in them.

 

And then there's the other aspects of builds such as pools, and patrons(never to be underestimated), and incarnate choices.  You'd be surprised how many farmers I see in AE's underestimate those options too.

 

All in all, its a recipe and when making those considerations, rad/fire brutes still are more optimal for active fire farming.

 

Unrelated but worth mentioning, S/L farms as well are completely different AFK and Active set of choices(with both being best suited to tank sets).

 

 

But again, there's nothing wrong with other brute, tank etc options for farming, they're just going to be taking different paths up the mountain so to speak.

 

Edited June 25, 2023 by Sanguinesun