No Claw love?

[FiveDiamondJack]

I've been looking through a few posts here, but I haven't come across any discussion on any good */claw ideas for a tanker. Why is that? Just better secondaries to pair with primaries other than claws generally?

[marcussmythe]

Claws doesnt really stand out in any way.  Its not super good or super bad.  It gets decent AOE, and a ranged attack.  It has a wierd damage builder.  Its got no real cool riders or debuffs or mechanics.  And finally, its core ‘schtick’, good DPE (and its DPE is very good!) has been reduced in value over time by ED, Free Fitness, Sets, and finally Incarnates.

 

Its fun, its fluid, its got a big cone, a melee cone, a melee radius, a ranged attack, and its performance is in every way reasonable.  Ive played it, and if a concept that fit it struck me, would play it again.  Its much much less fiddly than later sets with their combo points/combo chains/momentum/etc.  On a tank, I might appreciate a low mantenance/attention set with solid AOE, better single target performance than spines, and none of TW’s management.

 

Theres just not much that needs talking about other than to say its a solid set with little mental overhead.  Logical parings are SR, Dark, Invuln, and similar sets that have no end regain mechanic and or high end costs, and stuff like Bio thats fiddly and requires your mental focus and animation time, but Id not question claws on any pairing.

 

Not every powerset has to have a manual and a list of mechanics.  Sometimes its nice to have something where you can just press the button and have it work.  Id also consider Claws in combination with WP on any AT that gets both, for the sheer carefree play of it all.  This could be really useful on a tank or similar character, or in situations like Apex where you can be punished if you dont react to changing in game situations because your busy micromanaging your primary and/or secondary.

Edited July 28, 2019 by marcussmythe

[KelvinKole]

I wasn't actually aware claws was available for tankers now, but will likely roll one. I played it quite a bit on scrappers and it has really underrated single target dps. Follow Up is easily double stacked and the single target chain is smooth and fast. The PbAoE has a very small radius, but higher damage than most; it might work better on a tanker where you can get mobs piled on top of you. I could see the little bit of range from Focus being useful to tag mobs that pull away from you too. 

 

Overall it's a classic and still very solid set. There's no particular reason not to play it. 

 

 

[Frostweaver]

I have run claws on scrappers, stalkers(not so good), brutes, and finally just got a claws tanker to 50... List of Pros and cons,

Cons:
Simple slotting: Most of the attacks are very, very simple... which means IO slotting options are limited to mostly ST and PBAOE. Not a whole lot of extra options from out-set procs.
No Burst: Because of the lack of build-up, you don't have as much burst damage (snicker) as other tankers.
Lethal: a LOT of stuff resists lethal damage. very few things resist a LOT of lethal, though...mostly malta gun turrets, other players, and some other robot type enemies.
Few secondary effects: Not much additional mitigation, special effects, or other sorts of debuffs except for a bit of knockback and slash -defense.
Slightly lower st dpa than some other sets.

Pros:
Ranged: Unlike many melees, it has some decent range in two attacks

AOE: It has a LOT of aoe in it... Perhaps not as much as spines, but it's not as slow as spines either.
Follow-up: Probably the crown jewel of the set, FU adds +30% damage to pretty much everything you do. While it sacrifices BU for this ability, tankers are not as desperate for burst as most other AT's. This meshes extremely well with powers like damage auras from your primary, and raises the overall non-built-up damage to 'higher than most tanker sets'

DPE: the attacks are both fast and decently low endurance. dropping a few slots from your attacks are not going to cripple your build, if you need them for set slotting.

Fast: Because of their speed, recharge, and endurance costs, hasten is optional, and you don't have to spend half your build just trying to drag your recharge up. I found myself using sets that gave other bonuses and even looking at some sets I never usually consider.

Spin: Spin does twice the damage of spine burst, with only 2/3rds of the animation time. In fact, it is one of the fastest cast, fastest recharge, highest-damage, and lowest end costs of all melee set pbaoe's. It does not, however, get spine's secondary poison dot's

In short it is a very very solid set, Ideal for farming and very very good at holding aggro, and offers a more varied set of power options, without the fuss of combos.

Powers Rundown:
swipe: typical rank 1 mandatory power. great for filling minor gaps in your attack chain.

Strike; solid ST attack, nothing special. Kind of a workhorse, since it has a shorter animation time and faster recharge then most of it's contemporaries.

slash: another workhorse, although it has lower damage than a lot of tier 3 attacks, it gives a nice -defense and is good for slotting achilles heel

Taunt: Taunt

spin: helps you do your job as a tanker. nice DPA, DPS, and DPE. Great for slotting avalanche proc for a little extra mitigation, or obliteration for defense.

Follow-up: Get it, use it, set it on auto. It slightly lowers your dps because of it's short animations and low damage, but raises dps for everything else. the best place in the game for a gaussian proc.

focus: a decent ST attack, but skippable if you hate range. It has a 40' range, and moderate damage for the level you get it. fast recharge and a good place for a force feedback proc

Eviscerate: This is your workhorse aoe. with a 90 degree arc, fast recharge, and the best daamge in the set, it's worth taking a step back from combat to catch several in the cone. good place for fury proc.

Shockwave: definitely not my favorite tier 9. It has moderate to low damage, a 90 degree arc. However, it also has 30 range... This is a good and bad thing, especially since slotting a KB to KD is almost mandatory.

 

while some may be better at specialty tanking, but claws is a solid generalist, that's good at every job a tanker may face, and as marcus has mentioned, it's much lower concentration than many sets.
 

[JCMcBoo]

After reading this thread I was intrigued to try Claws as a tanker. I played the set as a scrapper on live  but had honestly given up on Claws with the advent of Savage Melee.

 

I went WP/Claws and ran him through DFB to 14,  joined a team of 8 for the Midnighters arc and got another 7 levels and then finished up the session at level 24 after teaming with my wife for a few radio missions.

 

He's been an absolute hoot to play! There was some survivabilty concern early on; early being relative for so fast an ascension. In the rush of levels I inadvertently favored my secondary over my primary for slotting and didn't buy any enhancements until level 22. At that point I was going to be respec into a more classic "primary first" slotting but I decided to see how I did with SOs in place. I wound up respeccing anyway when I noticed that, in my haste at the trainers, I had over-slotted Indomitable Will. So I got back 3 slots for some added defense, damage resist and to hit debuffs and the end result was an eminently fun character that has a slightly brutish feel to it.

 

Mayhaps I could coin the term Brank as Tute is bound to illicit giggles.

 

Thanks for the inspiration!