Which Roles/Archetypes are most needed for endgame?

[Beansicus]

Hi everyone! I played CoH back in the day and didn't get very far, but it was by far my favorite game. Right now I'm raiding and pushing M+ in WoW. It seems like no one can ever find a tank or a healer in that game and if you can get one who knows if they're any good. I play both tank and healer to overcome this.

 

With that: Which roles and/or archetypes are in short supply in endgame? I want to get there this time but I want to be a contributor not just another random rangedDPS standing in fire and not doing mechanics.

[Snokle]

A player that can play the game and know there character if you are going to 4 star. Most raids can use anything.

 

/cold support is common if you need a power type.

[Adeon Hawkwood]

Most endgame content can be completed "come as you are". There is some content that benefits from specific builds (like main tank for Hamidon) but it's kind of the exception rather than the rule. 4-Star Task Forces do benefit from specific builds but even those can be beaten with less optimized builds, it's just quite a bit slower.

 

However that being said, if you want something good for endgame you can't go wrong with a support AT (Controllers, Defenders and Corruptors), especially ones with Regen debuffs since those help a lot with the regen that AVs have (espeically on 4-star TFs). I believe that Cold Domination Corruptors are currently considered the "best" of that set due to the combination of solid damage and resistance debuffs to accompany their regen debuffs (I forget which primary is currently considered the best).

Edited Thursday at 07:52 PM by Adeon Hawkwood

[MTeague]

Keep in mind, CoH is extremely friendly to "bring the player, not the class".  I've seen All Scrapper Task Forces, All Blaster Task Forces, All Defender Task Forces (loads of fun when that many support classes turn each other into steamrollers of DOOM). CoH is also extremely friendly to alting.  Back when I played WoW (Burning Crusade through Pandaria), the time demands to fully level and gear alts was... considerable. I knew several players in WoW who didn't even have a single Alt, becuase they didn't want to take focus away from their main. I knew others who had four raid-geared characters, but at that point WoW had completely consumed their entire life. That's not a concern for CoH. Getting multiple charactrers to max level and fully kitted out will feel like no time at all if you're coming from WoW.

 

So, don't overthink your first character that much.

 

How do you like to play? Sneaky and Stabby?  You'll have loads of fun as a Stalker.  If you'd rather be the one who has full court vision and plugs any holes on the battlefield, Controller or Dominator will do you right fine. Ranged damage with big numbers? Blasteriffic.  King of buffs or debuffs?  Defender or Corruptor. I will say Debuffs tend to matter more late game than Buffs, but I have never hated having a ForceFielder or Empath on my team.  And if you just enjoy being the Unkillable Man, Tanker is hard to beat, and a well built Brute does not suck, either.

 

MM's can be fun but I would not start with them. Pet Management is just one extra hurdle as you get into it.

[Psyonico]

As @MTeaguesaid, this game is very alt-friendly.  There’s no such thing as bound items, so any character can benefit from a drop from any other character, even different players’ drops.

 

 I am, however, going to say that /Cold corrupters are very meta right now for true end game content.  I say “true end game” because most level 50 content can be completed with pretty much anything, as long as it’s played by a semi-competent player.  When you get into 4 Star content, builds matter more.

 

I personally don’t do much “starred” content, so I can’t recommend anything specifically for that, but I know Sonic Blast and Beam Rifle both bring some good extra support for your team.

[Seed22]

Alright so to actually answer the question, the only endgame content in CoH that I would consider really making a toon for, which seems to be what you're asking here OP,  is 4 star content.

 

In that case, I'd recommend cold/ice defender or corruptor for support and as far as tank goes? Im gonna go against the grain and recommend Stone Armor. There's potentially something in p2 coming out...eventually, that I would recommend, depending on if it makes it in. But for now, Stone/BA or Stone/EM for tank. Stone gives great def and res, while offering granite for oh shit moments. 

 

4 star, compared to WoW, does not have any mechanics of any real difficulty so dont worry about that. It's pretty mind numbingly easy, especially compared to M+

Edited yesterday at 02:29 AM by Seed22

[TheMoneyMaker]

Incarnate really goes a long way toward balancing everything out in the end game

[Snarky]

I am maining a Dark Dark Corruptor these days.  Sure, I love the power and style of a Fire3 Blaster.  But the harder the content the more powerful Dark Dark Corruptor becomes.  When plowing through easy stuff a hot rod with a bulldozer blade is great. But Corruptors are turbo charged fat tracked monsters that dig into tough terrain and maintain serious forward momentum.  I personally believe all hard content is most easily solved with as many Corruptors as allowed and one Tank.  Yes, anything works. It is a great game.  But optimally, for truly difficult situations, …. Play what is built to make hardest modes easy.  Corruption always wins…

Edited yesterday at 07:35 AM by Snarky

[Water]

Endgame to me is a fully Attuned character.  ⚡

 

[Forager]

1 hour ago, Water said:

Endgame to me is a fully Attuned character.  ⚡

 

 

What do you mean by this?

Edited yesterday at 11:56 AM by Forager

[Snokle]

16 minutes ago, Forager said:

 

What do you mean by this?

 

All Invention Enhancements that are not purple, or PVP, like the Archtype, Winters, Uncommon, and Rare have been upgraded with an enhancement catalyst. Which makes them usable through their respected range.

 

So an example Positron's Blast if you have them at a 50 IO slotted, you loose all their bonuses at 47. If you gave them a catalyst you get the bonuses from 17-50.

 

Archtypes, and Winters become Superior Versions with more % additional and bigger bonuses numbers.

[Maelwys]

17 minutes ago, Forager said:

 

What do you mean by this?

Guessing "a character that has all their enhancement slots filled with Attuned Set IO Enhancements"

Many players exemplar down to play lower-level content again after they reach level 50. "Attuned" IO Enhancements keep their set bonuses whenever your level drops lower than -3 to the level of each enhancement... so if your build relies more on Set Bonuses than it does on raw % enhancement aspect and you like running low-level Taskforces or Story Arcs; then it can sometimes make more sense to fill your build up with Attuned IOs rather than Boosted IOs. For other people (like myself) merely attuning the important Global IOs is enough by itself, and the rest get Boosted.

(Note that Procs and Purples and PVP IOs gain no benefit from attunement - so they can always be safely left as-is or boosted instead!)

[Psyonico]

39 minutes ago, Snokle said:

All Invention Enhancements that are not purple, or PVP, like the Archtype, Winters, Uncommon, and Rare have been upgraded with an enhancement catalyst.

Are you really upgrading all of your IOs instead of just buying attuned IOs on the AH?

[Snokle]

36 minutes ago, Psyonico said:

Are you really upgrading all of your IOs instead of just buying attuned IOs on the AH?

 

No I do not upgrade all my IOs though catalyst. I did that with my first character when I started with HC, as I had no experience with that as I did not play much of CoH Freedom at the time and that was new to me. Now a days, I just but attunded versions in AH when I am looking at using those in specific powers.

 

I was just more or less in an awkward way answering the persons question about being a fully attunded character. Nothing more, nothing less. And used Positron's Blast as an example.

Edited yesterday at 01:36 PM by Snokle
exanded explantion

[Jacke]

1 hour ago, Snokle said:

Now a days, I just but attunded versions in AH when I am looking at using those in specific powers.

 

It's cheaper to use the Auction House to attune your own IOs you craft from materials dropped or carefully bought on the Auction House.  You can do this with careful play on 1 account, but like many things in the game, it's easier with 2 accounts and sell from one account's Toon to the other account's Toon.

 

 

[Snokle]

58 minutes ago, Jacke said:

 

It's cheaper to use the Auction House to attune your own IOs you craft from materials dropped or carefully bought on the Auction House.  You can do this with careful play on 1 account, but like many things in the game, it's easier with 2 accounts and sell from one account's Toon to the other account's Toon.

 

 

 

Probably, I just have set prices that I know what stuff usually goes for and I set them there, and let it sit for a week or two till I get them. To note, when I did my first character buying IOs and doing catalyst way was when Homecoming came out originally back in 2019 so it has been some time.

 

I play on a low enough basis now, that I can wait long enough that I can wait than do the two account system.

[Uun]

Don't rush to get to max level. Take the slow route leveling your character(s) and enjoy the content along the way. There's far more content at lower and middle levels than there is end-game content. While it's incredibly easy to sit in a farm and hit lvl 50 in a matter of hours (plus a few more hours to unlock all your Incarnate slots), end-game content is pretty limited. There are about 12 task forces/trials designed for lvl 50s (3 of which have hard mode or "starred" versions), plus 8 Incarnate trials (typically done by leagues of 16-24).

[The Trouble]

20 hours ago, Beansicus said:

Hi everyone! I played CoH back in the day and didn't get very far, but it was by far my favorite game. Right now I'm raiding and pushing M+ in WoW. It seems like no one can ever find a tank or a healer in that game and if you can get one who knows if they're any good. I play both tank and healer to overcome this.

 

With that: Which roles and/or archetypes are in short supply in endgame? I want to get there this time but I want to be a contributor not just another random rangedDPS standing in fire and not doing mechanics.

You suggested that ranged DPS wouldn't be appreciated, but even that has a welcome place in any scenario.  

 

So let me reiterate the wisdom already shared here: everything works. 

 

My suggestion is to find the archetype and powerset that excites you the most.  Find a character combination that's so fun that you literally forget about the experience bar.  You'll re-learn the game in short order, and become the player everyone wants on their team.  There's no gearscore.  Forget the "build police". 

 

Fun will lead you to victory in City of Heroes.  It's what makes this game so special.

[Forager]

7 hours ago, Snokle said:

Spoiler

All Invention Enhancements that are not purple, or PVP, like the Archtype, Winters, Uncommon, and Rare have been upgraded with an enhancement catalyst. Which makes them usable through their respected range.

 

So an example Positron's Blast if you have them at a 50 IO slotted, you loose all their bonuses at 47. If you gave them a catalyst you get the bonuses from 17-50.

 

Archtypes, and Winters become Superior Versions with more % additional and bigger bonuses numbers.

 

7 hours ago, Maelwys said:

Spoiler

Guessing "a character that has all their enhancement slots filled with Attuned Set IO Enhancements"

Many players exemplar down to play lower-level content again after they reach level 50. "Attuned" IO Enhancements keep their set bonuses whenever your level drops lower than -3 to the level of each enhancement... so if your build relies more on Set Bonuses than it does on raw % enhancement aspect and you like running low-level Taskforces or Story Arcs; then it can sometimes make more sense to fill your build up with Attuned IOs rather than Boosted IOs. For other people (like myself) merely attuning the important Global IOs is enough by itself, and the rest get Boosted.

(Note that Procs and Purples and PVP IOs gain no benefit from attunement - so they can always be safely left as-is or boosted instead!)

 

Whoopsie. I was asking @Water what he meant... but thanks for the definitions for attuned enhancements I guess.

Edited yesterday at 08:00 PM by Forager

[Snarky]

6 hours ago, The Trouble said:

You suggested that ranged DPS wouldn't be appreciated, but even that has a welcome place in any scenario.  

An extreme example is the toon i used for weekly Really Hard Way Magisterium runs when Cosmic Council was rolling hot. I came in late, the last year or so.  They ran Saturday night incarnate trials starting with Master Magisterium/ Really Hard Way.  That trial, and many 50/incarnate trials, have HUGE AoE damage patches.  So….

 

I made a Beam Rifle Temporal Blaster.  And then focused on +range bonuses.  I buffed with everyone at the start of the fight then just hung out way away from everyone and hammered the DPS.  Beam is fully ranged.  It does good ST damage.  I never had to dodge “crackle, you dead”.  Works in the Tin Mage with the blue damage patches real good too.  In trials where you need to constantly juggle barriers it is less effective, but still viable.  Just always keep a dummy, er a teammate, between the bulk of the mobs you are shooting at and you.  

[Latex]

Like others have said, you can bring whats needed by just being there. But there's some outliers if you are asking more along the lines of 'what is the minmax OP', but for the most part you can build anything to be very strong.

Most people will agree at the super min-max level, a Kinetic Corr, or Kin at all (Not the melee set) has the potential to make every team you're on a breeze due to +DMG capping.
Ice/Cold Corr brings the perfect balance of defense buffs, endurance buffs and most importantly -RES buffs.
Sonic/Sonic Defenders bring absurd amounts of -RES, which when paired with +DMG capping from a Kin will translate to doing the most damage possible in this game.
Worth noting though, you won't be doing 'the most damage' your team will be, but they'll be thanking you for the buffs and debuffs.

Most the time, this stuff is completely overkill for 99% of content, or most the time they'll be another /Kin, or a /Cold making your character worse off. Even saying that damage isn't everything, all classes and builds have their place, you generally need a Tank of some sort (I'd recommend Invul, that's my fave). But really, don't get too focused on the build, no one really cares, and for super high end endgame content like starred stuff most of the time as long as the box is checked for the debuffers/buffers and you've properly setted out, it's fine, your knowledge of the raid/taskforce will be far more important.

 

[Water]

On 5/16/2025 at 12:55 PM, Forager said:

 

What do you mean by this?

 

Only that I build a character in mind to PUG. Kit it out with Attuned enhancements with Catalysts so I can be an effective player on most any team.

 

[Water]

On 5/16/2025 at 1:21 PM, Maelwys said:

(Note that Procs and Purples and PVP IOs gain no benefit from attunement - so they can always be safely left as-is or boosted instead!)

 

Unless they are in a set for bonuses, then the attuned and unattuned have their own set bonus each.