CO build questions

[Microcosm]

So I picked up that free freeform slot last weekend (thanks for posting about that, by the way), and decided to give CO another try. I played it for about a month in 2012, had mixed feelings and dropped it.

Anyway, hoping you guys who have been playing could give me some build advice. The information I've found online seems to be either seriously lacking or outdated. The first build I'm trying is mostly heavy weapons, trying to focus on enrage buffs, with the goal of doing as much damage as possible while surviving "enough". To that end I've picked strength and con to support enrage, and dex to try to make the high damage crit as much as possible. I've also just grabbed Night Warrior, for thematic reasons. Using Cleave and Eruption, I have no problems keeping a full 8 stacks of enrage in a normal mission. The health from endorphin rush is helpful, but not good enough. My problem is survival in harder stuff and energy.

The questions:
1) Do I need an energy unlock or will I get energy elsewhere? Seems like Molecular Self Assembly would be the only one that would work.
2) Reconstruction circuits says it's a click in one part of the description and a toggle elsewhere. If it's a toggle, and assuming I can take the endurance cost, would this be good?
3) Blocks, should I grab one, and which one? The retaliation from the heavy weapons one looks not super useful. Force Shield with its advantage looks good for endurance and lingering defense. Or maybe TK Shield... or even Fluidity if I get some dodge going.
4) Active Defense, was going to go with Unbreakable or Resurgence because of enrage, but since I am maintaining 8 stacks without them, should I grab Masterful Dodge?
5) Active Offense, Aggressor, but again I don't need help with enrage, so should I look elsewhere?
6) Also having issues in some scenarios by not having a ranged attack. Should I try to pick up a ranged attack, or live with a lunge?

Finally, probably a dumb question, and not really related to my specific build, but is there a difference between a Form and an Energy Form (does having a Form active mean you can't have an Energy Form active)?

Thanks in advance for any guidance. Also might have questions on an ego build later

Edit: This is what I'm thinking, not necessarily in this order
http://powerhouse.nullware.com/powerhouse.html?v=11&n=&d=1132abA9G137090G000G10DG205GC0CAA077G003704G905GD00GG05GB079U03PB04GH0025yk0rWr3bIm

[Xev]

See now this is my kinda post...

Energy unlocks for melee..

I'm a newb on this one too. I've used the Rush mechanic with my Unleashed which scales off of Focus which scales off of Dex and is an alternative to Enrage and is something you probably don't want to use. I've used Supernatural Power but that only gives energy when you use Supernatural attacks..

Then there's Overdrive but you don't use maintains enough so that's out.

You could use something like Thermal Reverberation.. I think there must be at least 1 Heavy Weapons power that uses Clinging Flames, I know heavy weapons uses some Fire, and there are some Fire powers that lay down clinging flames that you can use in a click (Fire Snake, Flashfire. I think there is a Fire power that has a Knock and lays down Clinging Flames all in one (Pyre?)...), and Thermal Reverb is a decent energy unlock.

There are all kinds of things that trigger MSA and it's a solid energy unlock. I've not used it on a low int or melee toon but it likely can be made to do what you want.

Force Shield w/advantage (below in Blocks) can help.

There is also an advantage in the Con primary tree that can give nice energy return when you take damage.

There are also energy cost reducing advantages in the spec trees.

Something or some combination of the above should do the trick. There is a Circle power that gives energy return I think (yuck...) and I'm sure there are other alternatives too. MSA + Conviction (+ BCR + Masterful Dodge) just might kill two birds with one stone for you. You just have to see what fits.

Recon Circuits

This is a toggle. If you aren't using a toggle build, which you aren't, it will likely drive you nuts due to it deactivates all your non toggle powers until IT deactivates and even then you have to wait a second after it deactivates. This is generally not a dance you want to do when you need heals and have bad guys pounding on you. It also doesn't crit if I remember right. After taking some time to learn toggles I like it in my 1 toggle build but have no plans to use it outside of toggle builds except maybe in this hybrid toggle build I've been thinking about.

Conviction is a popular heal. It will also trigger MSA and often.

Bountiful Chi Resurgence is another popular heal - especially if you have a fair amount of Dodge. I usually get the advantage and don't bother ranking it otherwise, when I do use it. It triggers MSA too.

Bionic Shielding can be decent. It's a fire and forget heal shield basically.

There's other heals. Munitions has an attack with a heal advantage... There is a Circle buff that give knock resist, damage resist, and heals over time... and etc. And glory be, do not forget your devices. If nothing else have some vendor heal devices. Until Rec will buy Major HoT bots which is a very nice HoT. Supernatural Possession is a good one. Nimbus of Power...

Blocks

Blocks can really help a build. On the other hand, I went through a long period where I thought taking a block power was a near total waste and I don't have one in most of my builds.

It depends on how many advantage and power points you have to play with, for one thing. Sometimes I just can't squeeze a block power in. There are some really nice advantages on them, though, as well as block itself just being really really useful so why not soup it up if you plan to utilize it often.

Some nice advantages include...

Laser Knight from Energy shield has to be one of the very best melee block advantages. Virtually always-on block at the cost of some dps can be a very nice trade.

That advantage on Force Shield... After you hold block for a second a buff lingers which gives you penalty-free damage resist and energy return. Not bad. Especially if you need just a liiiiitle bit more defense and/or energy return

The advantage from Telekinetic Shield works like the Force Shield one except you get no energy return and more damage resist on the buff.

Oh and another really nice block is the one from Darkness. It heals, has the highest possible damage resist w/advantage, and the damage resist buff (100%?) that takes some time to build to full, lingers.

Active Defense

Unbreakable is always good. Some people like Resurgence. If you get Masterful Dodge. try and sneak in Bountiful Chi Resurgence w/resurgent rikti (or something like this.. har) advantage. Some people like a combination of all 3.

With Heavy Weapons, I'm thinking you shouldn't have probs to get stacks of Enrage due to it is a pretty knock heavy powerset iirc.

Active Offense

It's up to you on this one. Do you want/need a button to mash that gives you.... crits, melee damage bonus, hp's, healing bonus, or whatever else + damage boost + breakfree from holds or do you need to take a Block power or something else instead.. Active Offenses are gravy powers to me. Kinda like Block powers. If you can fit one or more in, groovy, if not then it's because something more important to this particular build at this particular time needs to go there.

Issues with not having a ranged attack.

I played my Unleashed exclusively for like a year and I rarely ever even thought to use his ranged powers. I don't even use lunges. I use Acrobatics + Versatility.

Now.. having said that.. Yes, it can be very handy to have a ranged power. And/or a Lunge. Especially one with the Nailed to the Ground advantage to cancel out mob travel powers such as.. flying.

I kinda put this in the gravy category too, along with lunges. There are also devices that are ranged powers and have Nailed to the Ground. Like errr Omicron Induced Strength (SP...).

This is a highly dependent on your playstyle. If you are having probs getting to mobs there are ways you can do it within your playstyle and not all are the same.

Forms and Energy Forms

I'm gonna give the easy answer first. These two things are not mechanically the same.

Forms are toggle buffs. Enrage is a Form. Form of the Master that give stacks of Focus instead of Enrage - that's a form. Concentration is a form.

All these things are Forms..

http://web.archive.org/web/20130819145247/http://champions-online-wiki.com/wiki/Form

Energy Forms are.. well.. ya know... Errr... Energy forms!

http://web.archive.org/web/20130916135638/http://www.champions-online-wiki.com/wiki/Energy_Form

These links are your friend.
http://www.arcgames.com/en/forums/championsonline/#/discussion/225717/de-buffs-and-debuffs/p1
http://www.arcgames.com/en/forums/championsonline/#/discussion/234470/specialization-tree-info/p1
http://web.archive.org/web/20130825235946/http://champions-online-wiki.com/wiki/Power_Sets
http://powerhouse.nullware.com/powerhouse.html
http://www.arcgames.com/en/forums/championsonline/#/discussion/175864/faq-for-bindings-commands/p1
http://champions-online.proboards.com/thread/564


WELCOME back and thanks for the great questions. GL. You'll get it. Hope things turn out fun for you this time. There are things I would like to do in the game that I can't but I always have more playplans than playtime.

PS.
I'm betting EVERYONE here builds differently...  : ) Take the advice and pwn it into something unique of your own.

[Microcosm]

Thanks, Xev! That's really quite helpful. I picked up Force Shield with the advantage last night. Just have to tap shift before a fight and I get a small survival boost and small endurance boost. It seems to help more against lots of weaker foes than against fewer harder foes though, since the energy return is from attacks received. I think I'll still need an energy unlock. If the energy unlock does the trick, I may switch Force Shield for that Laser Knight and just deal with the loss of damage, because the survival numbers from that post you linked look a lot higher.

The ranged attack issue was specific to a certain mission, where you go inside a computer to get rid of a virus. It was already too difficult because I was soloing it and it's meant for two players, but the jerks would hover above my head and blast me down. Waiting for them to slowly come to melee range from my taunt was not the best.

With recon circuits, I could just toggle it on and leave it on, assuming I can take the endurance after energy unlock. Or is toggle different in CO? Sounds like it might turn itself off after x seconds.

The circle powers seem quite interesting... It would depend on how they play with stealth, I guess, since I use Night Warrior. If I could lay a circle down during my setup and not remove stealth, that would be super useful. Wish I could test this out before purchasing a power...

[Xev]

Totally my pleasure.

You can test powers out before permanently purchasing them by going into any Powerhouse and choosing your powers there. Maybe you remove a few powers here, and then try a few new ones out and then a few more new ones before you go back out into the world again.. Any Power/Specialization/Advantage choices you make in the Powerhouse are reversible for free. You can test your choices there too by going into the difficulty level adjustable combat simulator (a pale memory of CoH's AE) or using the various target dummies. You may know the Powerhouse already but if you don't, don't feel bad, I played for weeks or months before learning everything about it.

This is where most of my G's go. Partial to full retcons at the Powerhouse. It made me go old school. I don't rush the levels anymore I try to learn my powers and how they fit together into a build first. I still spend all my G's here..... Most anyway.

I think you need to go to the Powerhouse Training room and get the Recon Circuits bug out of your system.... hehe. You can't truly get a feel for how to use it... until you use it. If you aren't using a build that takes advantage of toggles then this power basically becomes a low rate Block power due to it shuts you down like Block does but doesn't give near the benefit of a ranked block power that fits your playstyle for the build you're putting it in. You have to try it out, though. Then you'll get an idea of how toggles work. Differently than everything else.. Toggles are weird at first. I was about to give up on them completely but I really like my first toggle build now.

Force Shield w/advantage works nice for Unleashed toons due to they use the Rush mechanic (that next to no one uses - everyone goes Enraged) that already gives them energy return. I bet it would work really well with a Con primary and ~ 200 End and that advantage that gives you Energy when you get smacked. One way I look at energy return on being smacked, is, if I'm not getting smacked, I don't need as much energy anyway... Because... I'm not getting smacked!

Laser Knight is good stuff and hasn't stopped me from taking damage agro.

I'd try MSA and/or Thermal reverb for energy unlocks. There is gear that gives cost reduction. There are cost reduction Spec Tree advantages. Int gives cost reduction and boosts MSA's energy return. And then there are things like Force shield and that Con primary advantage.  It may end up being a combination of things that works best for you. If you try MSA, play around with your Int if you're not getting the Energy return you want. Not only will higher Int give more cost reduction but at the same time it will boost MSA. For Thermal Reverb, try boosting End & Rec. I try to put as little into Energy stats as possible but I've found just a few points too little is worse than too many after everything is added up.

There are some really good players that use Circle powers. I tried Primal Majesty and the one that gives you a res. I'm not a real Circle powers person but they're definitely worth trying to see if they are for you.

I've never used Night Warrior but it's a must try and I will try it eventually. I've been on this Offense Passive Ranged kick for awhile and still have at least... 2 more builds to try before moving on.

Oh hey, find any power in the list of powers in the Wiki that has Dodge (Lightning Reflexes from Unarmed) and then find and click on the Dodge hyperlink on that page to see all powers that add or utilize Dodge. A little dodge can be a good thing. It fuels that Bountiful Chi heal advantage and it gives you another layer of protection. Evasive Maneuvers can give you over 15% Dodge and 50% of the time it will wipe your agro if you (want it to) take the advantage. There is an attack that adds 50% avoidance... etc.

Speaking of Dodge.. If Night Warrior doesn't work out for you I like Way of the Warrior. Even if you don't take advantage of the Bleed damage boost it easily gives over 100% melee physical damage boost at level 40 with average gear and it also adds some nice Dodge that layers well with things like Laser Knight and Bountiful Chi.

Kaos might advise you to look at Defense Passives too. Any defense passive layered with a heal and anything else defensive will skyrocket your survival chances. If you have the spare power choice you can take 2 Passives and switch to the Defense one as needed.

Not trying to scare you off of Night Warrior, for sure. Just some alternatives.

Oh and on retcon costs.. ~ level 25 and below it's not so expensive to reroll your entire build. Try and put the powers you are most sure you will keep towards the beginning. That way when you retcon in the future it's cheaper. At level 40 it's not that expensive to swap out your last few powers but if you have to go all the way back it's over 500 G's or you have to buy a retcon token. Been there, will be going back soon.

----

Something else I just remembered about Force Shield working well with Unleashed is that Unleashed has Rec for a SS. Force Shield scales off of Rec iirc. As do Energy builders as far as that goes. Unleashed happens to have an excellent AoE energy builder too. A sufficiently large End pool and a fast way to fill it can do wonders.

Often, ample energy return with as little dps/survival sacrifice as possible is a mini game all by itself. To me anyway.

[Hyperstrike]

Here a copy of a Dex/Con/Presence life-drainer I run.

PowerHouse (Link to this build)

Name:Jovian

Archetype: Freeform

Super Stats:
Level 6: Dexterity (Primary)
Level 10: Constitution (Secondary)
Level 15: Presence (Secondary)

Talents:
Level 1: The Hero
Level 6: Acrobat
Level 9: Agile
Level 12: Finesse
Level 15: Enduring
Level 18: Intimidating
Level 21: Shrug It Off

Powers:
Level 1: Bestial Fury
Level 1: Frenzy (Rank 2, Rank 3, Challenging Strikes)
Level 6: Supernatural Power
Level 8: Defiance
Level 11: Devour Essence (Rank 2, Crippling Challenge)
Level 14: Ebon Void (Rank 2, Rank 3, Voracious Darkness)
Level 17: Bountiful Chi Resurgence (Resurgent Reiki)
Level 20: Summon Shadows (Rank 2, Devouring Darkness)
Level 23: Circle of Primal Dominion (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 26: Inertial Dampening Field (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 29: Pounce
Level 32: Defile (Rank 2)
Level 35: Planar Fracture (Rank 2, Double Vortex)
Level 38: Miniaturization Drive

Travel Powers:
Level 6: Superspeed (Rank 2)
Level 35: Flight

Specializations:
Dexterity: Gear Utilization (3/3)
Dexterity: Brush It Off (2/2)
Dexterity: Evasion (1/2)
Dexterity: Expose Weakness (2/2)
Dexterity: Quick Reflexes (2/3)
Protector: Fortified Gear (3/3)
Protector: Bulwark (2/2)
Protector: Debilitating Challenge (2/2)
Protector: Exhausting Strikes (2/2)
Protector: Resolute (1/3)
Sentry: Fortified Gear (3/3)
Sentry: Precise (1/3)
Sentry: Sentry Aura (3/3)
Sentry: Fortify (2/2)
Sentry: Persevere (1/2)
Mastery: Dexterity Mastery (1/1)


Played right, she's damn near unkillable.

[Xev]

No Shred w/adv??

: )

What an imaginatively funky tank build. Tons of defense for sure. You even have Presence! And a life siphoning/sharing pet. Dex primary probly helps make your DE proc heal crits nicely too as well as adding some nice AoE dodge and dps. Can't beat Defiance + IDF for defense if you have enough Con. Bulwark advantage is nice if you're building for HPS, too. Toss in a Sentry Aura and two Fortified Gears and Fortify and and..

Looks hard to faceplant to me.

Supernatural power is an excellent energy unlock if you have the powers to use it with such as in this build.

--

Oh and Circle of Primal Dominion... I called it Primal Majesty above... This power helped me solo Andrith the first time and I used to tank Gravi with it and my healer used to use it in Gravis too.

[Microcosm]

Hyper, I can see how that would survive just about anything. Just point at something and let Devouring Essence go essentially. I need more free slots!

Xev, I found the area you were talking about in the power house and tried a bunch of stuff out, after half retconning to get rid of the lunge I decided I didn't need. Reconstructing Circuits is ... awful. It's a toggle, but it toggles itself off after a little bit... It seems there are multiple behaviors for toggles in this game. Enrage is a toggle which only detoggles when I am defeated; Sneak gets suppressed during attacks but only detoggles when I get held. Bleh.

After testing a bunch out, I dropped the block (for now, might grab it later) and have grabbed MSA with Eruption and Arc of Ruin to fuel it. With both of those fueling it it actually does quite nicely for energy, and they're both powers I want to use for other reasons as well. I also grabbed Circle of Primal Dominion, and tested that it does not decloak me. Haven't tried it in actual fights yet, but since I can position myself for the fight perfectly cloaked then drop the circle, it seems ideal combined with Night Warrior.

Night Warrior, by the way, is awesome. The assassin's strike is excellent for soloing hard targets, and the stealth allows for easy fight prep.

[Hyperstrike]

And here's Hyperstrike in CO.

PowerHouse (Link to this build)

Name: Hyperstrike

Archetype: Freeform

Super Stats:
Level 6: Constitution (Primary)
Level 10: Dexterity (Secondary)
Level 15: Strength (Secondary)

Talents:
Level 1: The Savage
Level 6: Acrobat
Level 9: Agile
Level 12: Martial Focus
Level 15: Physical Conditioning
Level 18: Enduring
Level 21: Mighty

Powers:
Level 1: Clobber
Level 1: Defiance
Level 6: Iron Cyclone
Level 8: Demolish
Level 11: Aggressor
Level 14: Enrage
Level 17: Havoc Stomp
Level 20: Shockwave
Level 23: Miniaturization Drive
Level 26: Ebon Void
Level 29: Bountiful Chi Resurgence
Level 32: Resurgence
Level 35: Mighty Leap
Level 38: Unleashed Rage

Travel Powers:
Level 6: Flight
Level 35: Superspeed

Specializations:
Constitution: Unyielding (2/2)
Constitution: Fuel My Fire (1/3)
Constitution: Resilient (2/2)
Constitution: Quick Healing (1/3)
Constitution: Adrenaline Rush (2/2)
Constitution: Armored (2/2)
Sentry: Fortified Gear (3/3)
Sentry: Sentry Aura (3/3)
Sentry: Persevere (2/2)
Sentry: Reinforce (2/2)
Protector: Fortified Gear (3/3)
Protector: Bulwark (2/2)
Protector: Exhausting Strikes (2/2)
Protector: Resolute (3/3)
Mastery: Constitution Mastery (1/1)

[Hyperstrike]

Please note that Hyper's powers were NOT taken in the order shown.
This is just as close as I could easily come in rebuilding him in PowerHouse.

Additionally, both he and Jovian are sporting high level gear with Level 8 enhancements in them.

Always fun to fly around toting my own armored car...

[Xev]

I have CO toggles differentiated in my brain, finally, but I didn't translate them to paper for you and if you don't know the difference between CO toggles, then toggles, which are already confusing, are even more confusing. Almost all toggles in CO are in the two categories below.

First off, FORM toggles. We already talked about Forms. Form Toggles work more like how I remember CoH toggles - minus the cool auras like Ele had. Flip them on and off as you want. Main difference being you are very very rarely De-toggled. Generally nothing will knock your toggles off as would happen in CoH. These are the only toggles in the game I can think of atm that behave similarly to what I remember of CoH toggles.

Then there are the rules that govern Power Armor toggles. Such as ReconFrustratingWithoutaToggleBuild Circuits. These toggle powers all have a Duuuration. Generally ~ 4 or 5 seconds. And then they shut off. They will of course shut off sooner if you don't have the Energy to keep them going, too.

Also. PA toggles will essentially shut you down, similarly to Block - if - you have no other toggles to run at the same time. If you noticed, when you hit Recon Circuits to try it, Allll your other Powers became unavailable until like 1 second after Recon Circuits deactivates. Extremely frustrating if Recon Circuits is your only toggle power.

The Cool thing about CO PA toggles, and why you generally only want to run toggles in a Toggle Build, is that if you have the Energy for it you can run up to 3 toggles.....at the same time.  Want to run 3 attacks at once? How about 2 attacks and Recon Circuits? Maybe all you have the Energy for at the time is a heal, or a heal + a (debuffing, maybe?)  attack. Maybe you even want to heal and AoE attack 2 groups of mobs that are on the opposite sides of you.... At Once! (Plasma Beam + whatever attack that is Shoulder slot + Recon Circuits),

PA toggles occupy what is called Armor Slots or something like this. There are 3 Armor Slots = Chest, Shoulder, Hand. Any combination of these 3 slots can be ran at once.

So in a (PA) toggle build, toggles can be awesome. In a non (PA) toggle build they really annoy me up to this point.

I dropped the block (for now, might grab it later) and have grabbed MSA with Eruption and Arc of Ruin to fuel it. With both of those fueling it it actually does quite nicely for energy, and they're both powers I want to use for other reasons as well. I also grabbed Circle of Primal Dominion, and tested that it does not decloak me. Haven't tried it in actual fights yet, but since I can position myself for the fight perfectly cloaked then drop the circle, it seems ideal combined with Night Warrior.

Night Warrior, by the way, is awesome. The assassin's strike is excellent for soloing hard targets, and the stealth allows for easy fight prep.

Sweet..

There are other attacks that take advantage of Stealth btw.. Gas Pellets (from Gadgetry) (I think it was this one) will throw down twice the gas pellets when in Stealth. There is a Ranged AoE attack that says it does double damage when stealthed. I bet if you went to the wiki and found a Stealth hyperlink like for Dodge, above, it would list all things yummy while Stealthed.

*rubs eyes* awwww man I just critiqued almost all of Hyperstrike's second build (from a melee standpoint) before I realized it was... Hyperstrikes! Tank build.. lol.. ugh..  : )

Must be more caffeine time.

I also grabbed Circle of Primal Dominion, and tested that it does not decloak me. Haven't tried it in actual fights yet, but since I can position myself for the fight perfectly cloaked then drop the circle, it seems ideal combined with Night Warrior.

This is where unique builds come in. Bravo.


'''
By the way... When you say you haven't been able to test in actual fights... You did find the Training room within the Training room, where you can set mob levels and group sizes and then go in and fight them?

[Xev]

I've been toying with some tank build ideas. Might finally make my first Ranged tank (not even sure how that works in some situations..) and I want to level something Behemothish.

My one level 40 tank squeaked through some of the first Fire and Ice's and still tanks them sometimes with a good healer if no one else will. Gravi's are no problem and Alerts are a breeze.

I keep rerolling him in and out of Melee builds and toying with his Tank build. He's melee again atm but I have another Tank build for him to try out which will hopefully give me the dps and agro I've been looking for. With a few tweaks I think F & I's will be easier too.

The only thing worse than a team full of low dps tanks is a tank that loses agro to D P S... I don't mind losing agro to another Tank, as much..., but man when I lose agro to a DPS when I have full poison stacks going and am spamming CC with sprinkles of CS and debuffs while sporting full Justice gear I just log off and play someone else.. lol

Hat's off to tanks with superior Agro, DPS, And survivability in any encounter in the game. This kind of build is truly an art form. Like a sweet sweet dps.. Healers toot their own horn enough that we should All know how great they are by now.. (I play one Too so I'm allowed..)

[Microcosm]

Wuuuuuuut? I didn't know that there was a combat test section. Tried it out, can't tell if the circle or laser knight gives me better survivability. I went with the circle for now, will probably pick up laser knight later to add more survival. I'm finding that as I level and add to my con superstat my survival is rising quite a bit on it's own. I can handle +3s pretty easily, and only get trouble sometimes when I aggro 2 groups or more. Ranged adds that stay out of my aoe's are the problem there, really. Anything in the aoe's doesn't last long enough to matter.

Have you guys tried ice barriers? It looks pretty interesting. If you take the ice offensive passive you get cold snap when you crit which doubles the barriers' resistance. That passive also buffs ice fire and toxic damage. I'm thinking a dex based build with that and you could pull what you want from those sets...

[Xev]

See, this is decent proof that the Powerhouse needs better explaining to newbs. The training room-training room is obvious to find for us now but in the beginning when Eeeeverything is new, it was not. Going there always makes me miss Architect Entertainment. I was just getting good at extreme salvage farming and  getting to know the other farmers and getting a nice set of player made mishes to run on x4/+8 or whatever was max and it was one of my joys in life. Ah well. There are Powerhouses in different zones, too, btw. The main difference being that they allow you to fight different mobs. I rarely use them. Just tossing that out there.

Con is always a good thing. Even at the cost of losing superstats. My Unleashed has more Con than Rec or Str (two Unleashed SS's), which has gotten me some comments.., but he still grabs dps agro and his survivability is at a way more comfortable level.

As you level, your gear improves exponentially...too. Starting at lvl 30ish or so slotted gear becomes more available and mods become more powerful and more options are available and it is game changing and for the better. Some of the things you struggle with now will vanish with better gear that has more abilities and stats to spread around.

I'm glad you brought up Ice. We just got new Ice powers in the last patch, ya know. And GOOD ones. The Concentration toggle alternative that scales off of DEX is game changing because now we have another dps oriented stat to fuel our Ranged damage toggle buffs. The new Rimefire fueling single target 100' range Ice power looks good too for laying down some nice sustained high dps w/burst damage. Ice just got a new Energy unlock that looks very promising and Cold Snap...? it just got Buffed.

Ice also has a nice 100' ranged power that has an Advantage that turns it into an ice trail that you can toggle on (it has a small duration) and it will follow you, encasing mobs in ice (as you run circles around them?) and then the ice cages Explode. You can be firing off your other powers as you do this.....

Fire is awesome. I have One Of the most played and badass Fire builds in CO and have completed over 5 billion Smashes and other Alurts/Nemcons/Lairs/etc with him with which to validate and prove this statement. In my mind.

Thing about CO, is, what is good for me is not always gonna be good for you and visa versa. It's way better if you go for what fits your playstyle and what looks fun vs. what may very well be a tried and true uber build but doesn't fit the way you play.

I like your ideas. Fun reading them.

Just a thought, in case it helps...

You're kinda running into a Silver FF wall already, which is, trying out everything before committing to a build idea. I still do it every time even when I start out with what I think is a full build.

As a subscriber, the retcons and FF slots and gear money flow like water and I can just make whatever I want and level that baby up, who cares how it turns out (relatively speaking..) because I can just make another and maybe come back to this one another day. And then there's the play test server and you know how much I can do by being able to transfer my characters.

I would imagine. Based on subscriber perks and my experience with PTS's.

As a Silver player there are two ways to fix this problem that I have found, so far. 1.) accept it. 2.) get a sub.

I've put money into the game but I've never been subbed so don't think I'm selling them. Just saying.. I know the road on which you travel  : )

Continued GL and I'll be following your progress with smiles because toonbuilding is fun stuff and I like following yer journey..

[Xev]

Any progress?

This was ~ the time I was lost in a sea of power choices on my first FF build. Looking back it was a horrible build even after pouring hundreds of hours of thought and research into it but I managed to solo Andrith with it somehow and now the builds get easier and better.

If you ever want a hand with gear or levels or whatever like maybe some XP boosts, no problemo.

[Microcosm]

No, no progress. Haven't gotten to the game for a bit cause of holiday and work stuff. I did log on quickly enough to see that Ice Barriers is classified as an active defense, which apparently it wasn't on that archived website and why I thought it could be so good  Bummer. I may resub for a bit to see if there are other things I want to do. The non-freeform silver slots really don't seem worthwhile to me. Thanks for the gear offer, though I don't think I'd know what to do with it yet 

[Xev]

Not all in-game descriptions are accurate/up-to=date either. Some things plain just don't even work - some Spec choices come to mind.

The main gear I had in mind was lvl 40 Heroic gear. I have enough currency (Silver Champs) to buy gear for my newbs and then some. If you keep playing it is good first gear to save up for. In case you don't know already you can get 2 - 4 silver champs a day just by running the Custom Dailies. If you aren't in turbo leveling mode and start running these when you are high enough level to do so you might have 'free' level 40 Primary gear waiting for you when you ding 40.

The next step up from Heroic is expensive or a lot more time consuming and I don't even bother unless it's for one of my mains. Especially if you sub and have the currency for it laying around, you might want to check out Q store gear. There is some cheap (11kish) gear available that offers nice boosts for newbs - and it levels with you so you don't have to go looking for gear in those slots again until level 40 when more options open up.


GL! Happy Holidays.

[Microcosm]

Well I bit the bullet and resubbed for a month. When I had originally tried the game was right when  vehicles came out, and I remembered I had a hawkwing on my main gold character that I wanted Apparently while subbed I can't play the silver AT characters I've made, just the freeform, but oh well. Looking at these gold builds I had I will need to redo them all I think, now that I have the better power understanding from this thread. Will probably attempt a real go at power armor now.

Side note, I've always been intrigued by the "become" powers in the z store, and now i find myself with 20 zen less than required to purchase one since they are currently on sale. Has anyone tried these and are they worth it?

[Xev]

That's kinda weird. If I was subbed I think I wouldn't miss my AT's either but it's good to know that they should be stripped of anything I share - like becomes and vehicles.

My builds are aging better than they were in the beginning but yeah, those first builds were pretty clunky.

The best Becomes to me are the ones with Rocket Flight, and, Celestials which come from Lockboxes. Rocket Flight is me going at vehicle speeds without having to buy a vehicle. Celestials have a RES. I hear. Wouldn't know. They're to rich for my blood.

As for the other Becomes - they can be OK, for example, if your early power choices on the build you are leveling are less or similarly survivable than on a Become you happen to have and you are, say, running through some Outdoor mishes with your Rocket boots.

They can be a way to insta try out a different power/powerset on a high level toon.... They can take up a slot in your bank and bag... They....  : )

I dunno what else people use them for except maybe the look (on occasion) or to collect or something like this.