Pain/Elec feedback

[Uun]

I put together this build for a static weekly team. We level together until we hit 50, then roll new toons. We typically run TFs and story arcs at natural level. Am I missing anything? I've got another 8 slots to place.

Uunbearable - Defender (Pain Domination - Electrical Blast).mbd

[Soulsifter]

I took a peek and really can't see what I would do different that is meaningful. Personally if I changed anything it is a niggling thing. I'd put Adjusted Targeting ToHit and ToHit EndRedux into Tactics. It's a tad more endo for a tad more +to hit% and 2% damage buff/all. What incarnate are you planning to run, if I may ask?

 

 Can I just say I love that you asked for a peek when you are so very often the one offering advice. I appreciate the humbleness. 

Edited June 25 by Soulsifter

[Uun]

I really haven't given incarnates any thought yet. Since we only play these toons once a week, it'll be several months before we hit 50. As far as looking for feedback, Pain is one of the few sets I've never played. I know what I don't know.

[Wimbochismo]

Pain doesn't usually get a lot of attention so it's good to see another post about it. My first 50 on Homecoming was a Pain/Sonic Defender and I'm rolling the new Pyro as a Pyro/Pain so I've got a good bit of experience with it.

 

It looks like you've got the gist of what you need in the build. There's a couple things I see that you could switch up. World of Pain could use a bit more recharge to get it down to the 90s perma range. End consumption is pretty high, probably due to Voltaic Sentinel being a huge cost and running it with the additional Soothing Aura toggle. You should also be able to put the Panacea proc in Soothing Aura so that it hits your team as well.

 

The rest of my advice depends largely on your team composition and overall playstyle. Especially with what kind of buffs your team is giving.

 

Pain is an oddball with 4 of the powers being PBAoE. It plays best in the thick of things so you may end up finding yourself taking some heat. Low defense but higher resistance baseline with World of Pain will probably see you taking steady chip damage but Nullify Pain + Soothing Aura should mitigate most of this. The bigger issue I've found usually revolves around Share Pain and Anguishing Cry.

 

Share Pain locks you out of being healed for 15s and nerfs your regen. I ended up finding it totally brutal on a Defender. You have to be incredibly careful when applying aoe dmg and debuffs during the period or you'll drop fairly quickly. Having access to cc would help keep you up. Typically Nullify Pain, Soothing Aura, and Soothe is more than sufficient when it comes to healing. It can still be nice to heal someone's whole bar with one click and you can get away with minimally slotting it. I'm more inclined to use it on something like a Corruptor where I don't care as much about dying and the +dmg is more meaningful.

 

Anguishing Cry is a bit fiddly as a PBAoE debuff. Its usage may depend on how fast your Tank moves and rounds up enemies and/or if you have a lot of ranged AT's that are trigger happy with their nukes. I'll often find myself jumping ahead to apply it before the nukes start dropping. This is also why I built out higher defenses to mitigate an alpha. On Sonic I can also utilize the sleep cone and Dreadful Wail as cc to help an alpha. Electric won't have this in its back pocket so you'll be mostly working around your team composition.

 

Conduit of Pain is a nice self buff for 60s when a teammate dies. Just be aware that there's a 30s window after that which nerfs your dmg by 37.5% and tohit by 25% and can make applying damage and debuffs annoying. Especially before perma WoP and Tactic's comes online.

[Uun]

3 hours ago, Wimbochismo said:

Pain doesn't usually get a lot of attention so it's good to see another post about it. My first 50 on Homecoming was a Pain/Sonic Defender and I'm rolling the new Pyro as a Pyro/Pain so I've got a good bit of experience with it.

 

It looks like you've got the gist of what you need in the build. There's a couple things I see that you could switch up. World of Pain could use a bit more recharge to get it down to the 90s perma range. End consumption is pretty high, probably due to Voltaic Sentinel being a huge cost and running it with the additional Soothing Aura toggle. You should also be able to put the Panacea proc in Soothing Aura so that it hits your team as well.

 

The rest of my advice depends largely on your team composition and overall playstyle. Especially with what kind of buffs your team is giving.

 

Pain is an oddball with 4 of the powers being PBAoE. It plays best in the thick of things so you may end up finding yourself taking some heat. Low defense but higher resistance baseline with World of Pain will probably see you taking steady chip damage but Nullify Pain + Soothing Aura should mitigate most of this. The bigger issue I've found usually revolves around Share Pain and Anguishing Cry.

 

Share Pain locks you out of being healed for 15s and nerfs your regen. I ended up finding it totally brutal on a Defender. You have to be incredibly careful when applying aoe dmg and debuffs during the period or you'll drop fairly quickly. Having access to cc would help keep you up. Typically Nullify Pain, Soothing Aura, and Soothe is more than sufficient when it comes to healing. It can still be nice to heal someone's whole bar with one click and you can get away with minimally slotting it. I'm more inclined to use it on something like a Corruptor where I don't care as much about dying and the +dmg is more meaningful.

 

Anguishing Cry is a bit fiddly as a PBAoE debuff. Its usage may depend on how fast your Tank moves and rounds up enemies and/or if you have a lot of ranged AT's that are trigger happy with their nukes. I'll often find myself jumping ahead to apply it before the nukes start dropping. This is also why I built out higher defenses to mitigate an alpha. On Sonic I can also utilize the sleep cone and Dreadful Wail as cc to help an alpha. Electric won't have this in its back pocket so you'll be mostly working around your team composition.

 

Conduit of Pain is a nice self buff for 60s when a teammate dies. Just be aware that there's a 30s window after that which nerfs your dmg by 37.5% and tohit by 25% and can make applying damage and debuffs annoying. Especially before perma WoP and Tactic's comes online.

Thanks. Currently lvl 26 and just starting to slot sets. Team consists of a tank (Psi/Dark), scrapper (Elec/Bio), controller (Pyro/Elec), dominator (Pyro/Thorns) and me. Have run through DFB, Posi I & II, DiB and Synapse with no issues. 

[Wimbochismo]

1 hour ago, Uun said:

Thanks. Currently lvl 26 and just starting to slot sets. Team consists of a tank (Psi/Dark), scrapper (Elec/Bio), controller (Pyro/Elec), dominator (Pyro/Thorns) and me. Have run through DFB, Posi I & II, DiB and Synapse with no issues. 

 

Should be super solid with that comp! Having a Tank and being cc heavy will cover your usage of PBAoE's and being in the middle of things. The Electric Affinity will practically max out the rest of your resistances and provide extra end/recharge. It could be worth it to see if the Electric absorb shield will still work on you during the Share Pain healing lockout. Never tested it but it might cover that aspect nicely.