What's your "tool kit" of characters look like?

[FFFF]

So back on Live, I used to have purpose built characters that I used for specific circumstances.

 

Hard TFs? - My Fire/Shield Scrapper. Teaming/support? - Sonic/Sonic Corruptor or FF/Sonic Defender

 

I never got around to build a GM killer though I had a build worked out for a Rad/Psy Defender and a Thugs/Traps MM. And while I had a Fire/Kin Controller who I used for occasional farming, she mostly became my AV soloer. However despite that, I felt I had a rich variety of characters to play to suit most situations. I had a lot of concept characters too, some of which became surprisingly powerful, but most were just quirky.

 

Right now, I have a single level 50, a farming character who is completely finished, decked out in the finest IO sets, but whom I'm already bored with. I miss having my tool kit, but I'm having a flight of altitus trying out power sets and even whole ATs (Sentinels) that I've never tried on Live. I don't have anything close to a complete variety of characters and am hoping that inspiration will strike at some point.

 

What's your "tool kit" look like? Or maybe it's better to ask, what's your portfolio of characters look like?

[Snarky]

I used to run a lot of brutes and a few tanks.  Now i run mostly blasters and a few corruptors. There are odds and ends but that is about it

Edited June 4, 2023 by Snarky

[furniturepolish]

solo I play masterminds. only AT I have more than one 50 of. I am not confident in my ability to play them in a group however. I can't walk and chew bubblegum at the same time. being a buffer or debuffer while also keeping the kids from blocking a doorway or worse... mmmm.

teams I have defenders and a blaster. the small group I play with tend to stick to a mix of brutes and defenders/corrupters so I end up bringing the blaster if we are actually doing something that requires more than brawl and a can-do attitude. not need brian cell for click of nova. please resurrect me.

[Lusiphur Malache]

When I was on Indom was on a small supergroup that ran together a lot.  Most of the players stuck to one or two toons.  I became the glue guy so i made a library of different archetypes to play.  Funny things is while I had a lot of different toons I played them all as blasters for the most part.  When I left the server, I moved all my toons.  Made a few more, realized they were becoming cookie cutter copies and stopped.  I now manage and play around 30 toons and play them randomly.  Current faves, a dark/martial blaster, symph/sonic dom, elec/time controller, and an ice/ice blaster 

[Techwright]

My toolkit:  illusion/storm controller =

 

As to my portfolio, I run mostly ranged powers: controllers, blasters, corrupters, and a few sentinels.  I do have 2 decent tanks, 1 good brute, and 2 scrappers with potential.  The rest are just experiments and variety for interest.  I play a limited amount of melee because, for me anyway, I've trouble, even with taunt, of getting NPCs in melee range with either a team of range strikers or some chucklehead who delights in running into a herded group and hitting some major AoE knockback.  I'd much rather be a part of the action than just a taunt for the team.

 

  If I had to narrow it for a core team of 8 (including my "toolkit"): 

1 energy/energy blaster,

1 dark/dark corrupter,

1 storm/storm corrupter,

1 fire/ice blaster,

1 ice/cold dom. controller,

1 mace/invulnerable brute,

1 water/willpower sentinel

[High_Beam]

Until HC I almost exclusively ran ranged types; (original) hero flavor, Blasters and Controllers.  Conversely that is where I am both most comfortable and experienced.  I had a single tank and Scrapper but didn't like melee so never ran up a Brute and hated the concept of a Stalker.  I had a few Defenders as well as a Corruptor and an Mastermind but never a Dom (I hated obsessing over perma-dom . . . I got beter).  It just wasn't me at the time.  I also had an Arachnos Soldier, boring.

 

Anyway when I found out about HC and made my promise to do different and new stuff, I made a few Brutes and a Widow and I was like wow, these are cool.  Tried Dominator and Stalker . . . yeah I will play them but meh; still no like.  But I still rolled more Blasters and Controllers.  So my toolbox toons, are the ones I play the most and find have the most to offer a team, regardless of composition.  Most of the time a tool box toon is one that isn't stuck doing things from just one power set.  But they have to be fun.  I have plenty of very utilitarian characters parked in semi-perma retirement because of the absence of that.

 

- Di Di Guns/Runeslinger/Two Gun Trixie - All Dual Pistols Blasters with MC, Atomic and Ninjas respectively.  All Blappery with strong strong survivability and loads of fun.  TGT lays the best damage while Runeslinger has a lot of support in the mix and Di Di, well come one, she is freaking awesome.  They can fit into any team and are rarely on the concrete/carpet.

 

- Betty Beatdown - Awesome tank (Inv/EM), built specifically to be a full function, full armor tank even while doing low level flashback/TF.  She is a machine and it makes me tingly. I can insert her anywhere in anything and she is gold.  Of course Damage lacking at low levels but that was the point.  I hold aggro, the rest of you shoot.  I have a Brute Highland Hammer who is also pretty damn good (Mace/Elec)

 

- Boom Boom Britta - Corruptor DP and Kin so everyone loves them some Boom.  Such a toolbox toon with all the Kin stuff yet also a blast to play and can dish it out.  FS and Hail then cleanup makes for secksi time.   I mean solo or team she can handle it.  Set IOs make her even better.

 

- Tempus Fabulous - Controllers are by default toolboxes to me but Tempus is my fav with her Gravity and Time.  So much variety in action and so team helpful.  Yeah.  Most of my other controllers dont feel as helpful and fun

 

- My Widow, Operative Violet - Hard to hit, hard to hurt, lays out damage, lockdown and team buffs - The very definition of a tollbox toon.  Forgot how fun she was to play until I ran her on some TF/SFs.

[tidge]

On 6/4/2023 at 2:49 AM, FFFF said:

What's your "tool kit" look like? Or maybe it's better to ask, what's your portfolio of characters look like?

 

Generally (for me) I (eventually) have a plan for each character that I will take to level 50 that involves:

• Being able to solo "survive" (or self-rez) large spawns via defense/resists/controls
• Being able to solo "defeat" large spawns

Typically I try to do this via power choices and slottings, but the Inspiration tray and SG buffs can also play a part. I'm never trying to build level 50+ characters for +3/+4 solo content... I can understand the challenge but I simply don't enjoy what I see as a grind.

 

Once I have a level 50, I'm pretty comfortable taking it through any content with any PUG because I know what I can do and I can alter/leverage my play style to improve team performance. For example, if content demands a particular debuff... I may end up spamming the debuff in a way I would almost never do while playing solo.

 

I have a few characters at level 50 that I don't particularly enjoy playing on level 50+ hard-mode PUGs mostly because those characters are so single-focused that I can't really change what they bring to any rando PUG. An example of this is my War Mace/Invulnerable Scrapper. He can do a little bit of extra herding, but otherwise he's just a hard-to-defeat melee machine. There isn't a lot of changing of tactics with this sort of character, even with my various power pool choices.

 

[Gorgar]

Making difficult content easy: dark/dark controller or dark/sonic defender

 

Need a front line: inv/axe tank, mace/shield brute

 

Damage: fire/fire blaster, fire/kin corruptor

 

Am grumpy/bored: bs/da stalker, savage/sr stalker, ill/storm controller, dark/dark scrapper, storm/energy defender, en/en blaster

 

Keeping tank or duo partner alive: emp/sonic defender, mind/emp controller, thermal/fire defender

 

Need a tank but there are  immob-happy controllers: dark/dark brute with fold space, fire/fire brute

 

Lowbie TF (Positron or something): kat/inv brute, claws/wp brute, one of the "make difficult content easy" ones, fire/fire blaster

 

I have other characters I like, but those are the ones I go to for those conditions.

Edited June 8, 2023 by Gorgar

[Mythical Creature]

I like to keep close tabs on 30 characters (3 pages) of alts with a minimum of 1 for each archetype, that have complete builds. I do have a lot more alts but it is hard for me to focus on too many more than 30. Each of course has a focus or a specific toolkit, but I do have multiple to fill some roles. Here is the list:

 

(Tanker) All built to be tanks and more

 

Rad/Dark: Great at debuffing to-hit which helps the whole team survive and also gets the cool aoe team heal. It is a tanker with mild support (like a paladin).

 

Dark/Sav: Feels like I achieved a holy trifecta nearly capped resists, positional defense capped (no ddr though), and that fast recharge aoe heal that pretty much always fills your health bar up to full. 

 

Stone/Rad: No protection holes in stone armor as you can either get the defense or resistance to the damage type capped. The double taunt aura gives you a lot of passive damage and taunting possibilities. After page 4 changes no need for granite form. 

 

Shield/Electric: Probably the best defensive set for high end content on a team with maxxed defense, high ddr, high resistance and a t9 that will cap them out. Really great for aggro grabbing and generally being tough. Not so great for when I really want single target damage, but epic powers can fix this single target gap. 

 

Bio/Spines: Another great aggro grabber with double damage auras. Bio can achieve really great +HP and Absorb which makes up for the lack of defense debuff resistance. This feels like  early page Regeneration on steroids. 

 

Electric/Fire: My proc tank. Electric armor is the easiest path to capped resistance. Fire Melee has plenty of proc opportunities and two pbae attacks. Energize gives you end reduction which is very helpful so you can focus on slotting procs in your powers. 

 

(Brute) I have trouble feeling motivated to play these, more or less I just make them like knock off tanks.

 

Psi/Energy: Energy Aura is a really great defensive set that would be OP if tankers had it, but they don't so I play the brute version. Energy Aura is a lot like electric armor but with defenses, ddr, and minor resists instead.  Also like electric armor this is a great proc build candidate due to the ease of capping defenses. 

 

Dark/Invul: Invulnerability is one of the best armor sets out there. Dark melee is a classic compliment to it with the -to hit stacking with the supreme defenses. It felt overkill on a tanker and just right on a brute. 

 

(Sentinel) My solo/oroborus arc characters

 

Seismic/Energy: Basically you never have to worry about your attacks being down. Between the +recharge in energy aura and the seismic pressure recharge I can spam my attacks as often as I want. Energize also helps you keep your endurance up because seismic is thirsty. 

 

Electric/SR: This combo feels amazing. Electric blast loves to be up close and personal and super reflex allows that. Super Reflex is tough gets more powerful as your health gets lower, but that requires the enemies to use their endurance which you also sap. It sort of all collides into perfection when your enemies are out of end and your sitting at capped defense, resist and absorb shocking them to death.

 

Water/Bio: This is an aoe sentinel as it seems that some of the powers in these sets ignore the target cap, maybe rains just seem like they do? Water is a utility set that loves the boost in damage provided by bio and both love to be up close.

 

(Defender)

 

Time/Seismic: I can pretty much cap my teams defense with time manipulation. It took pretty much no investment to cap my own defense. Seismic has lots of secondary effects and there is lots of room to fill them with procs.

 

Poison/Rad: The best boss debuffer around. Rad Blast is great for making it easier to land buffs and loading up with procs. 

 

Kinetics/Sonic: This is my force multiplier. I can do all the kinetic and sonic things but with defender values. Being a defender I could also cap my ranged and aoe defenses fairly easily. This character is able to help on fire farms and will hang out right next to the brute without dying. 

 

Dark/Dark: This is the classic to hit debuffer it is almost like the inverse of time, I can make it so the enemies can't hit my team at all apart from default 5% chance. The tar patch and other control like abilities make it so I can control the battlefield well.

 

(Corrupter)

 

Fire/Dark: For all the same reasons as dark/dark defender the easy path to not being hit but with an emphasis on doing my own damage and having less control over movement.

 

Fire/Time: For all the same reasons as my time defender. This is an easy path to max defense allowing me to focus on fire blasting.

 

Water/FF: This is basically a sentinel that can also buff. Force Fields has CC protection and a large value shield. Water is very busy and force fields allows me to focus on water blasting.

 

(Scrapper)

 

TW/Bio: This is a heavy damage dealer build. TW seems like a great set for scrappers because the momentum is less of a hinderance because critical works on it no matter what.

 

Dark/Shield: This is a tough scrapper leaving plenty of opportunities for procs. Dark by itself isn't the most damage as it is more utility but with procs you can bridge this gap at least a little bit.

 

(Stalker) Are all focused on damage

 

Staff/Bio: A damage dealer. Stalker staff is probably the best version of staff because you get a great single target attack and don't need to change forms because you are always the damage form. Bio armor gives you a second damage form on top of the one from staff. I find it actually nice not to have to deal with 6 of then as any other combo like this would have too. 

 

Energy/Bio: This is my boss canceller. I can 3 shot many +4 bosses with this character. The weakness is a near complete lack of aoe in energy melee. Bio armor helps bridge this gap with its own aoe attacks.

 

(Blaster) this probably sounds weird but this is my favorite of my least favorite archetypes, which are all listed after here and have 1 representative for completion. 

 

Fire/TacArrow: A damage dealer. I am obsessed with feeling like I have capped some means of survivability (wrong or right). With this combo I have hover and 45%+ aoe/ranged defense, which satisfies my requirement. Tactical Arrow is the only blaster secondary that gives you a defensive ability that is not stealth, which I want to pick up as a pool power to stack with it. This still manages to do great damage, especially with bonfire and oil slick.

 

(Controller)

 

Illusion/Time: Pets/Control/Buff Basically I like time manipulation and illusions basically plays itself. This is my I am not actually playing this controller, controller. Control isn't much my thing.

 

(Dominator) the hardest archetype to cap defense with

 

Dark/Dark: Control/Debuffer I couldn't find a way to get the defenses I want (I know thats the wrong way to think about a dom). This is as close as I could get, gather shadows increases my defenses over 45% to all for 15secs, which gives me time to control and do -to hit, which then makes me soft cap defenses with the debuffs after gather shadows fades. 

 

(Mastermind) 

 

Beasts/Time: A buffer and healer, once again, played because I like time and wanted to have at least one mastermind. It seems like an effective combo for a mastermind. My beasts all have over 45% defense and I can do my time manipulation stuff. Time is fun.

 

(Epics) listed after my least favorites because they are their own category but I like the epic archetypes play style just not their locked in theme.

 

Peacebringer/Warshade: The utility knife, if your willing to tri-shade than you can do almost anything. If you wanted to be able to fill any role on a team but not have 11+ alts, this would be the way to do it. The Peacebringer is easier and the warshade is stronger.

 

Widow/Fortunata: A damage dealer, a pleasant mix of psi blast, claws, and super reflex with a bit of stealth. This is like a mixture of a sentinel and a stalker. Your theme is less locked in after your first costume slot. 

 

Soldier: Also a damage dealer. Plays like a mix of mace, assault rifle, and ninjutsu. Also feels like a mix of a sentinel and a scrapper. Your defenses are a little harder to cap than the widow but you get higher resistance out of the box.

 

I probably went wayyy too in depth with this response, but this is my toolbox of characters.

[FFFF]

2 hours ago, Mythical Creature said:

I like to keep close tabs on 30 characters (3 pages) of alts with a minimum of 1 for each archetype, that have complete builds. I do have a lot more alts but it is hard for me to focus on too many more than 30. Each of course has a focus or a specific toolkit, but I do have multiple to fill some roles. Here is the list:

 

(Tanker) All built to be tanks and more

 

Rad/Dark: Great at debuffing to-hit which helps the whole team survive and also gets the cool aoe team heal. It is a tanker with mild support (like a paladin).

 

Dark/Sav: Feels like I achieved a holy trifecta nearly capped resists, positional defense capped (no ddr though), and that fast recharge aoe heal that pretty much always fills your health bar up to full. 

 

Stone/Rad: No protection holes in stone armor as you can either get the defense or resistance to the damage type capped. The double taunt aura gives you a lot of passive damage and taunting possibilities. After page 4 changes no need for granite form. 

 

Shield/Electric: Probably the best defensive set for high end content on a team with maxxed defense, high ddr, high resistance and a t9 that will cap them out. Really great for aggro grabbing and generally being tough. Not so great for when I really want single target damage, but epic powers can fix this single target gap. 

 

Bio/Spines: Another great aggro grabber with double damage auras. Bio can achieve really great +HP and Absorb which makes up for the lack of defense debuff resistance. This feels like  early page Regeneration on steroids. 

 

Electric/Fire: My proc tank. Electric armor is the easiest path to capped resistance. Fire Melee has plenty of proc opportunities and two pbae attacks. Energize gives you end reduction which is very helpful so you can focus on slotting procs in your powers. 

 

(Brute) I have trouble feeling motivated to play these, more or less I just make them like knock off tanks.

 

Psi/Energy: Energy Aura is a really great defensive set that would be OP if tankers had it, but they don't so I play the brute version. Energy Aura is a lot like electric armor but with defenses, ddr, and minor resists instead.  Also like electric armor this is a great proc build candidate due to the ease of capping defenses. 

 

Dark/Invul: Invulnerability is one of the best armor sets out there. Dark melee is a classic compliment to it with the -to hit stacking with the supreme defenses. It felt overkill on a tanker and just right on a brute. 

 

(Sentinel) My solo/oroborus arc characters

 

Seismic/Energy: Basically you never have to worry about your attacks being down. Between the +recharge in energy aura and the seismic pressure recharge I can spam my attacks as often as I want. Energize also helps you keep your endurance up because seismic is thirsty. 

 

Electric/SR: This combo feels amazing. Electric blast loves to be up close and personal and super reflex allows that. Super Reflex is tough gets more powerful as your health gets lower, but that requires the enemies to use their endurance which you also sap. It sort of all collides into perfection when your enemies are out of end and your sitting at capped defense, resist and absorb shocking them to death.

 

Water/Bio: This is an aoe sentinel as it seems that some of the powers in these sets ignore the target cap, maybe rains just seem like they do? Water is a utility set that loves the boost in damage provided by bio and both love to be up close.

 

(Defender)

 

Time/Seismic: I can pretty much cap my teams defense with time manipulation. It took pretty much no investment to cap my own defense. Seismic has lots of secondary effects and there is lots of room to fill them with procs.

 

Poison/Rad: The best boss debuffer around. Rad Blast is great for making it easier to land buffs and loading up with procs. 

 

Kinetics/Sonic: This is my force multiplier. I can do all the kinetic and sonic things but with defender values. Being a defender I could also cap my ranged and aoe defenses fairly easily. This character is able to help on fire farms and will hang out right next to the brute without dying. 

 

Dark/Dark: This is the classic to hit debuffer it is almost like the inverse of time, I can make it so the enemies can't hit my team at all apart from default 5% chance. The tar patch and other control like abilities make it so I can control the battlefield well.

 

(Corrupter)

 

Fire/Dark: For all the same reasons as dark/dark defender the easy path to not being hit but with an emphasis on doing my own damage and having less control over movement.

 

Fire/Time: For all the same reasons as my time defender. This is an easy path to max defense allowing me to focus on fire blasting.

 

Water/FF: This is basically a sentinel that can also buff. Force Fields has CC protection and a large value shield. Water is very busy and force fields allows me to focus on water blasting.

 

(Scrapper)

 

TW/Bio: This is a heavy damage dealer build. TW seems like a great set for scrappers because the momentum is less of a hinderance because critical works on it no matter what.

 

Dark/Shield: This is a tough scrapper leaving plenty of opportunities for procs. Dark by itself isn't the most damage as it is more utility but with procs you can bridge this gap at least a little bit.

 

(Stalker) Are all focused on damage

 

Staff/Bio: A damage dealer. Stalker staff is probably the best version of staff because you get a great single target attack and don't need to change forms because you are always the damage form. Bio armor gives you a second damage form on top of the one from staff. I find it actually nice not to have to deal with 6 of then as any other combo like this would have too. 

 

Energy/Bio: This is my boss canceller. I can 3 shot many +4 bosses with this character. The weakness is a near complete lack of aoe in energy melee. Bio armor helps bridge this gap with its own aoe attacks.

 

(Blaster) this probably sounds weird but this is my favorite of my least favorite archetypes, which are all listed after here and have 1 representative for completion. 

 

Fire/TacArrow: A damage dealer. I am obsessed with feeling like I have capped some means of survivability (wrong or right). With this combo I have hover and 45%+ aoe/ranged defense, which satisfies my requirement. Tactical Arrow is the only blaster secondary that gives you a defensive ability that is not stealth, which I want to pick up as a pool power to stack with it. This still manages to do great damage, especially with bonfire and oil slick.

 

(Controller)

 

Illusion/Time: Pets/Control/Buff Basically I like time manipulation and illusions basically plays itself. This is my I am not actually playing this controller, controller. Control isn't much my thing.

 

(Dominator) the hardest archetype to cap defense with

 

Dark/Dark: Control/Debuffer I couldn't find a way to get the defenses I want (I know thats the wrong way to think about a dom). This is as close as I could get, gather shadows increases my defenses over 45% to all for 15secs, which gives me time to control and do -to hit, which then makes me soft cap defenses with the debuffs after gather shadows fades. 

 

(Mastermind) 

 

Beasts/Time: A buffer and healer, once again, played because I like time and wanted to have at least one mastermind. It seems like an effective combo for a mastermind. My beasts all have over 45% defense and I can do my time manipulation stuff. Time is fun.

 

(Epics) listed after my least favorites because they are their own category but I like the epic archetypes play style just not their locked in theme.

 

Peacebringer/Warshade: The utility knife, if your willing to tri-shade than you can do almost anything. If you wanted to be able to fill any role on a team but not have 11+ alts, this would be the way to do it. The Peacebringer is easier and the warshade is stronger.

 

Widow/Fortunata: A damage dealer, a pleasant mix of psi blast, claws, and super reflex with a bit of stealth. This is like a mixture of a sentinel and a stalker. Your theme is less locked in after your first costume slot. 

 

Soldier: Also a damage dealer. Plays like a mix of mace, assault rifle, and ninjutsu. Also feels like a mix of a sentinel and a scrapper. Your defenses are a little harder to cap than the widow but you get higher resistance out of the box.

 

I probably went wayyy too in depth with this response, but this is my toolbox of characters.

Honestly, that's an amazing portfolio of characters! I had a few (around 11-12) characters who were fully built during Live, and just a bunch of characters in the teens to late 20s to goof around. I wish I had built more teaming characters as for a long time I just built scrappers and blasters (who were solo oriented). The most fun I had was when I started building tanks and assembling teams around my tanks. I probably clocked the most hours on an Ice/SS tank who was modestly IO'ed but I could always build a team around. She was fun largely because she ran so beautifully even exempted down. By no means was she the toughest tank, but probably my most fun character from a teaming standpoint.