Rad Armor - Best Incarnates?

[PLVRIZR]

OK, so a loaded question, for sure, and there will be many opinions.  Fire away with your suggestions and reasoning.

 

Why am I asking?  My latest project, in preparation for an all Rad/SS Tanker Tuesday event, has now unlocked everything but Hybrid and I've amassed plenty of Emp merits to begin to finalize the incarnated build.

 

Here's the current 50 build and numbers.  Adding one stack of the MoT +res puts everything but N/C/P to cap.  Fires constantly in Haymaker...

110.1%+ Recharge/Slow resist. 

26.1% Melee Def, without even trying.

Accuracy?  Seems spotty, even with Rage (single stacked) up, but haven't drilled down enough to have hard data.

Near perma-Hasten @ 213% recharge, 145% bonus in the 20-ish seconds it's down.  Foot Stomp every 6.7 seconds.

End use 1.47, Recovery 3.4 - will probably take Ageless for self and team DDR, anyway.

 

 

Hit me!

[Thraxen]

I’d take recharge alpha to try and get rage double stacked perma or close to it. Helps with closing gap on hasten too.  Ageless is good for ddr but defense isn’t that high and shouldn’t need the end. Could get ole barrier too then. Or both for crazy recharge. 

[ZemX]

I'm not convinced Ageless is worth more than Barrier.  Maybe a full team that is coordinating and has x4 Barrier and x4 Ageless but I usually don't count on that.

 

I almost always go Musculature Alpha but I've also considered Recharge.  Rad has the recovery to fuel high recharge and recharge is life when two of your three main survival tools are a click heal and a click absorb shield.  On the other hand, I haven't really looked if that's going to affect any of the proc rates significantly.  That'd be the only real downside.

 

Here's the plan for my Rad/SS so far:

 

This is the same basic Rad Armor framework I have on most of my Rad Tankers.  I've started switching them over to Teleport for travel because as a bonus it gets me through jammed doorways or out of -jump/-fly traps.  It's also just cool to TP into the exact middle of a big spawn and let rip a Ground Zero with its Superior Avalanche knockdown proc while still hovering after the TP. 

 

I'll could consider dropping the Absolute Amazements from Hand Clap in favor of that Explosive Strike proc.  I'd lose some recharge in the power and 6% fire/cold res but fire would still be capped and cold just isn't that necessary.  I dunno.  I have it mainly for tanking on teams where the knockdown and wide AoE are nice for aggro and interrupting bad guys from damaging teammates.

 

Finally, I am more or less addicted to Focused Accuracy on my Rad Tankers.   It's just great for never being toHit floored.  Maybe it's not as critical with double Rage.  I dunno.  Haven't played this guy a whole ton.  Still schlepping through the 40s.

 

13 hours ago, PLVRIZR said:

End use 1.47, Recovery 3.4 - will probably take Ageless for self and team DDR, anyway.

 

This is not even counting Performance Shifters, Panacea, or Theft of Essence, which are huge.  Also, and maybe I just need to update Mid's.  But it's not calculating Gamma Boost properly for me.  I set the slider to 100% health and it doesn't change the recovery.   I just never have End problems.  It's why I didn't bother slotting Stamina or Health any more than the default.

[SeraphimKensai]

Damn I have Rad tankers but no SS, and I have a SS/Rad that is very sturdy, but no Rad/SS tanker.

[ZemX]

1 hour ago, SeraphimKensai said:

Damn I have Rad tankers but no SS, and I have a SS/Rad that is very sturdy, but no Rad/SS tanker.

 

TBH, I've been working on this one for a long time.  I've shot several other Rad Tankers to 50 in the same time no trouble.  This one... it hits hard for sure, but I like big AoEs and glorious as Foot Stomp is, it's the only real AoE in the set.  Hand Clap helps with area aggro and has a nice knockdown but it needs that proc to do it.   Rad Armor having two proc nukes in the set helps tremendously with that lack-of-AoE feeling.

 

I guess with double Rage you kind of have to view Foot Stomp as more than one AoE. 🤪  But it sure doesn't grab me the way Axe, Ice, and Savage Melee have.  We'll see if it's just a late-bloomer in the fun dept. for me once I have it all kitted out.  For sure, Foot Stomp puts a smile on my face already.  

[Warboss]

 

Hey PLV, did you cruse out the beta site and test the options? Might be the next best play prior to choosing one live.

[SeraphimKensai]

2 hours ago, ZemX said:

TBH, I've been working on this one for a long time.  I've shot several other Rad Tankers to 50 in the same time no trouble.  This one... it hits hard for sure, but I like big AoEs and glorious as Foot Stomp is, it's the only real AoE in the set.  Hand Clap helps with area aggro and has a nice knockdown but it needs that proc to do it.   Rad Armor having two proc nukes in the set helps tremendously with that lack-of-AoE feeling.

That's why I built mine as a brute as Tanker Foot stomp didn't benefit for a radius increase (although it has a higher target cap, my build gets FS down into the 5 second range with double stacked rage and rad therapy/ground zero proc'd out every 24 or so seconds.

 

I use a rotation of RoP, meltdown and melee core hybrid to res cap while capping slow resistance.

[PLVRIZR]

2 hours ago, Warboss said:

 

Hey PLV, did you cruse out the beta site and test the options? Might be the next best play prior to choosing one live.

I have not, but good idea.  Have actually been playing him (you all have seen him on TTTs "ATMSMSHR") and leveling organically.

[PLVRIZR]

19 hours ago, Thraxen said:

I’d take recharge alpha to try and get rage double stacked perma or close to it.

Ageless is good for ddr but defense isn’t that high and shouldn’t need the end....

Or both for crazy recharge. 

Liking this, alot.  Thanks.

[Spaghetti Betty]

Not to necessarily bring your build into question, but my Rad/SS runs max procs and has 0 end, recharge, or survivability issues. You've seen it in action. It basically ends up feeling like a melee blaster that can't die in regular content.

 

For that one I use Musculature Radial for most content and Vigor Core for Hard Mode. I always have Barrier Core loaded and Hybrid is Melee Radial or Assault Radial.

Edited December 3, 2023 by Spaghetti Betty

[PLVRIZR]

2 hours ago, Spaghetti Betty said:

Not to necessarily bring your build into question, but my Rad/SS runs max procs and has 0 end, recharge, or survivability issues. You've seen it in action. It basically ends up feeling like a melee blaster that can't die in regular content.

 

For that one I use Musculature Radial for most content and Vigor Core for Hard Mode. I always have Barrier Core loaded and Hybrid is Melee Radial or Assault Radial.

Thanks.

 

I dropped a damage proc or two in RT, KB and FS, for 2x winters, to get over 100% slow/recharge resist.  He's still a murderball of unkillable goodness, as well.  With the supposed "proc nerf", I don't see that much difference in damage, but again haven't parsed that deeply into the combat data.

[Spaghetti Betty]

crumpets - Tanker (Radiation Armor).mxd

 

This is how I'm currently running mine. It sacrifices a tiny bit in proc rate on Mu Lightning and Cross Punch but what I get as a tradeoff is capped Fire RES. I would say it trades for capped Slow RES too, but that isn't ever negotiable!

 

I might finally get around to giving this another pass.