A flight of (mostly) dragons

morigosa

This is another build collection thread; there are many like it, but this one is mine.

Edit: as of October 2016, there have been enough power changes that basically all of the builds here are obsolete in subtle but important ways. Probably the top of the list is the recent change to Illumination that renders the power... well, basically worthless. I'll make a new thread at some point; until then, if you happen upon this one, just be aware that you probably shouldn't copy a build from here without at least running a basic sanity check of what the build is doing.

First off, I'd like to give a thank you to the people who've helped me get to where I am: Turbo Raptor, Bluegrass Beast, Jimhsua, and Flowcyto stand out, but I'm sure there are more that I'm forgetting.

And with that out of my way, on to the builds. I'm starting with my most recent level 40, Magpie, since someone actually asked about her build the other day and I had - at the time - no link to offer.

Magpie's current live build. Edit: There's a revised build a few posts down that's been adjusted a bit for recent Cosmic content (and to account for her improved gear.)
Magpie is a dodge tank, and - despite the slightly scattered look of her build - surprisingly tightly themed. Of course, that theme is "Trinkets!", which does make things a bit easier; any power that might otherwise be out of place - like the choice of Landslide for her lunge - can be explained away with "Oh, yes, that's from her Lodestone of Precipitous Assault", and on you go. Still, her powers boil down to just three trinkets (plus clawed boots and a limitless supply of shuriken): the aforementioned lodestone, a Talisman of Mending Light (justifies BCR, Ascension, and Illumination), and the Blade of the Ruby Eye (justifies Laser Sword and Dragon's Wrath - the latter uses the invisible blade costume piece, with the power's residual glow effect managing a remarkably good match for Laser Sword's look).

This is, obviously, not a leveling build; I got her to 40 with a modified version that used Shred as her primary attack, but that experience has left me with this advice for leveling as a dodge tank: Don't. Pick up Regen instead, and respec when you're done; your life will be so much better.
The reason is that dodge tanks are heavily gear dependent - certainly the most gear-dependent build I've ever put together. Optimally, you're going to want Justice offense/utility, legion defense (make sure to get one that's level 40!), and Onslaught secondaries, slotted with as much dex as you can afford. Minimally... well, Magpie's current gear should showcase the minimum requirements fairly well:
Heroic Gloves of Piercing, with r6 dex / growth mods
Legion's Breastplate of Elusiveness, with r7 dex / gambler's mods
Heroic Helmet of Speed, with r6 dex / impact mods
...and assorted secondary items of dexterity totalling another +99 dex; yeah, you can get up to 111 from purple secondaries, but I used what I had on hand, and (with the Flippin' advantage on swinging) it was just barely enough for 100% dodge, and I plan on replacing these with Onslaught secondaries, so I haven't gone out of my way to buy +37 items for all three slots.

There are also a few obvious adjustments I'll make as she acquires better gear. First off, I plan to drop swinging when I can make do without the Flippin' advantage. (I'm not yet sure what I'll use for her second travel power - jet pack plays nicely with wings, and is decently fast even in combat. Maybe r2 acrobatics for decent mobility at a minimal energy cost?) And second, replace r3 of Laser Sword with the Particle Acceleration advantage once I have enough dex / cost reduction to reliably fuel it; I know it's possible to get there with optimum gear (because I tried that on the test server), but I definitely can't manage it on live yet. (Why does dex play into this? Because it's her energy stat - more dex means a stronger rush buff and more energy from gaining a stack of focus.) I'm also not yet sure where the extra advantage points from dropping swinging will go to. Perhaps Nailed to the Ground on her lunge? Perhaps ranking up Ascension? Eh, I'll figure something out.

While I hope that most of her build just makes sense, there are a few particular things I'm going to call out.
* Upper Hand spec from Warden: I hear this is bugged to grant crit chance instead of damage. Fine by me! More crit means more energy. Magpie can only trigger it herself using Landslide for Stagger, but that means bonus crit during the first few seconds of a fight when her energy is at its lowest. In larger team content, it's good odds someone else will apply something that triggers this... and if they don't, well, what else were you going to take anyway? The other options either add a fairly pathetic amount of offense, or a fairly irrelevant amount of defense.
* Unranked Block: You'll want to block against Gravitar's yellow bubbles (and maybe also hit MD or EM if you're not 100% sure you'll still have The Elusive Monk buff running by the time the hit lands). Almost any other character I'd recommend ranking your block power; for a dodge tank... meh, better things to spend points on.
* Unranked BCR: This is at its strongest against a swarm of weak targets, where the Resurgent Reiki advantage will fill your health back up in short order. Against single targets... see next bullet point.
* Illumination: As an ally buff... meh. 1% won't matter. As a debuff on your enemies, though... Pop ascension and drop this on alert bosses, cosmic class enemies, and whatever else you're facing that might survive more than a few seconds. Most of the time that will be enough healing, which means you can avoid losing damage to BCR.
* Evasive Maneuvers: In theory, this allows you to maintain 100% dodge when tanking Frosticus. In practice? I don't have the timing down just right yet, since you have to hit EM before you get imprisoned. He seems to use his ice cage at roughly one minute intervals, and with the recent cooldown nerf, you simply can't get MD below a minute without taking drastic measures - like trading out all of Brawler's damage boosts for Defensive Expertise from Protector. It may be better to replace this with Nanobot Swarm and an Amazing Grace device? Things to think about...
Edit: Ended up removing EM in favor of Fluidity (see revised build a few posts down). Which does also allow dealing with Frosticus' ice cages, though the timing on doing so is even more finicky than with EM.

flowcyto

Getting Laser Sword w/ PA adv funded is not going to be easy. Ya can still get fine dps just from R3 of it, though.

Crashing Wave Kick is another option to bridge that small dodge% gap, if ya can find room for it. Otherwise, ranking up Evasive and trying to lower its cd can work, though I never liked having to use EM for melee builds, and its even worse w/ the CDR nerf.

Brawler w/ Setup can be better for dps, depending on ur rotation, but I'd still prob use Wardicator and the TBD/AS loop for a melee tank. Protector is fine if ya mainly just care about having more health/threat and lower AD cds (over anything else); I wouldn't recommend it otherwise.

morigosa

Agreed on Laser Sword - r3 is working just fine, so I'll only swap over if I'm certain I can fuel Particle Acceleration. On the test server I was able to, but that was using full onslaught secondaries w/ r5 dex mods and full justice primaries with r7 mods, at which point focus was returning ~+75 energy every time I gained a stack. (And the +25 end from the justice set bonuses helped, too; having a deeper endurance pool is useful when your energy gain is partially governed by RNG.)

Evasive Maneuvers is in there exclusively for Frosticus' frozen spires, as way to keep dodge at 100% when I know The Elusive Monk buff is going to fall off (and when Masterful Dodge is already on cooldown); I literally don't use it outside of that. Interesting comment on Crashing Wave Kick, though; that's a power I hadn't thought to try. Will have to test it at some point; if its dodge buff lasts for a decent amount of time (as opposed to TEM's 2 seconds), that could work too.

Wardicator may be worth it at higher gear levels - the offense bonus from full justice gear makes it kinda silly. At the moment, though, I don't think it is - Magpie has less than 80 of both defense and offense, so wardicator would gain me only about 16% resistance. If I were going to drop damage output in favor of survival, I'd be better off going Protector so that I'll just have Masterful Dodge up for every Frozen Spire - and that would let trade out EM for something more useful.

morigosa

Next up, my main, Razula, a literal serpent mage (and former VIPER agent / experiment). She's also the first freeform character I was really satisfied with - as well as the one I've spent the most time on fine-tuning that build for best effect.

Razula's build.
This actually is a viable leveling build; respec at level six when it's free, and go from there. If you're going to level with this, though, I'd suggest swapping around a few points in the spec trees; Aggression to 2/3 Swole, and Modified Gear to 2/3 Mass Destruction. I only swapped specs over to boosting offense from gear after I got a full set of justice gear (and had tested and concluded that I didn't need the bonus HP from Swole to survive tanking Frosticus). Other than that, I'd suggest keeping the powers up to level 14 in order; powers after that are much less vital to the build and can be adjusted as you like. (You could also, if you wanted, swap Night Warrior in for Invulnerability; you'll be a lot squishier, but that'll only be a problem if you poke your nose into alerts or other supposed-to-be-team content, and the extra damage + stealth can be quite handy.)

This is also the only character I have that makes extensive use of CO's builds feature, as ways to quickly adjust damage output versus durability.
* Her primary build is Hybrid role, with both Invulnerability and Energy Shield slotted. This is what I use most of the time.
* Second is Tank role, Invuln and Energy Shield, with Dark Transfusion actually removed from her power bars so I can't hit it by accident. This build is used exclusively for tanking Frosticus (or, now, TA as well); against anything else you actually have better survival from Hybrid role's bonus healing. (A side note: Razula only became a really solid Frosty tank once I got her a full set of Justice gear - though these days Onslaught gear might get you there a bit faster. If you want to tank Frosty with lower gear levels, you'll want to invest in 3/3 Swole, and may also find it wise to swap out some of the offensive power choices for more survival - perhaps trading in Energy Shield, Night Warrior, and Circle of Radiant Glory for Ebon Void, Circle of Primal Dominion, and Unbreakable backed up by a collection of self-res devices for when Frosticus manages to kill you.)
* Third is Melee Damage role, with Night Warrior and the default block slotted in place of Energy Shield. This build has massively reduced survival, but significantly increased damage output; it sees use primarily against lair bosses, alert bosses, and anything else that starts to feel like a slog through a giant pile of hit points. (Careful, though! It really is much weaker survival, and there are some lair / alert bosses that can kill you if you try this.)
* Fourth is very niche, using Ranged Damage role with Night Warrior and Energy Shield. This build is for optimum AoE damage, since Epidemic is tagged as a ranged power; it keeps Energy Shield for a bit of extra survival if you have to resort to DE. There are very few places in game where this build is worth using, but if you're in an alert or lair with someone else that has stronger AoE threat, for example...
* And the last two I use for some intermediate options inbetween the full survival focus of her primary build and the full offensive focus of her third build. These don't actually end up seeing much use, though.

Some other notes on specific power choices:
* Ebon Void r2 with Voracious Darkness would outperform Energy Shield. It would offer a stronger defensive bonus when you need it, and no damage penalty unless / until you actually decide you do need to block. I use energy shield anyway; it's good enough, and - given Razula's origin as a former VIPER agent - highly thematic. (Aside on Energy Shield: the color of the shield you get from Laser Knight depends on the color you set for the melee attack power that triggers it. Make sure to color your melee attacks to match!)
* Dark Transfusion is there solely to fuel Fire Snake; Supernatural Power is great for keeping the rest of her attacks running, but doesn't reliably generate the larger spikes of energy needed to use Fire Snake on cooldown.
* Speaking of Fire Snake: rank 3 is better than Trailblazer if you're dropping this on top of an enemy you're already fighting. Get yourself into melee range before you use this power. (Razula's Fire Snake is, of course, colored green to match her toxic attacks.)
* Also speaking of Fire Snake: The recent change to this power makes it less effective as a debuff, offering only 9% toxic resist reduction (versus 12% I could get from Defile). However, Fire Snake also does a not insignificant amount of damage per click and, well, I'm kinda used to having this power by now. Still, if I were rebuilding Razula from scratch, I'd seriously consider using Defile instead.
* Night Warrior isn't the only viable choice for an offensive passive; Fiery Form, Pestilence, or Unstoppable would all be decent choices as well. Personally, I like having stealth (even if I don't use it much), so Night Warrior it is.
* Rank three of Devour Essence; don't go for the Phlebotomist advantage. Not only does this build not have any reliable way to apply bleeds or poisons (Epidemic can apply poison, but often won't), DE is its main attack; the damage output from rank three is simply a better investment.
* Circle of Radiant Glory is just a fun power to have. I'll admit, I use it more for the looks than anything else - it particularly amuses me to drop a circle in midair - but it does see actual use against Frosticus, where having a self-rez is just handy.
* Razula originally used Ascension r2 instead of Ego Surge with Nimble Mind. Unfortunately, with the removal of the initial burst heal from Ascension, there wasn't any reason for me to keep Ascension, and Ego Surge is now stronger in all situations - including defensively; the self-healing from Devour Essence crits when the attack portion does, and Nimble Mind's increased crit chance outperforms Ascension's healing bonus.
* Razula originally used Flight instead of Jet Pack. Jet Pack is significantly faster in combat, however, and given the importance of mobility in TA, I couldn't justify keeping the slower power.

And a last note on gearing: Heroic gear and whatever random secondaries you can scrounge up is fine, and all you'll need for anything short of tanking Frosticus. At level 40 you'll want maybe 200 dex to get decent bonuses from Form of the Tempest, and then as much con as you can get to fuel juggernaut spec. Strength from gear is okay, but generally less useful than adding more con (Raz has some str from Vigilante secondaries that I haven't yet replaced with Onslaught gear). Other stats should be avoided - your talents should give you all the end/rec you need.

morigosa

Hm. I have a number of other builds I should post here... but I'll start with just a few updates to Magpie.

Magpie's revised build.

The important thing to note is the addition of Fluidity; Parry with Elusive Monk is great for most things, but means you'll die if you ever have to block for more than three seconds - and the new cosmics (not to mention TA) are just full of mechanics that require you to block or die. Fluidity isn't as much better as one would hope since the buff it gives decays over its duration - meaning it gives you either 1 or 6 seconds of survivability depending on whether you have Thundering Kicks going - but the ability to just stand there blocking indefinitely without going squish makes a huge difference against foes like Cosmic Teleiosaurus.

The other note is that she's up to 600 dex thanks to two Onslaught secondaries (and a +37 dex purple for the last slot) - and it's still not quite enough. She's at 74.9% dodge chance just standing there, which means blocking with Fluidity (and no other buffs active) only puts her at 99.9% dodge chance. This hasn't been a problem in Cosmic fights, since it's safe to assume there'll be someone around with AoPM for a bit of extra dex (which turns into extra dodge chance thanks to Con primary), but I'll want to see about upgrading a few of her mods before I try to take her into TA.

flowcyto

Yeah that's one of the rare cases I can see using Fluidity (not its special adv, just the block itself)- in high dodge builds where it pushes you to_past 100% dodge when its up. Otherwise I'd value the large dmgRes from a normal block more.

morigosa

Next up is Kiirtalarak, an "energy" dragon, who uses infernal supernatural powers recolored to blue. The build does reasonably decent DPS, but is unfortunately fairly squishy; I've been contemplating revising Kiir to a two-passive setup, but haven't worked out what that would look like yet.

This build isn't exactly what I'm using on live, but that's largely because I haven't taken the time to apply yet another retcon. (Footnote: While the listed build shows two unspent advantage points, the powerhouse hasn't yet been updated to include the price increase on Voracious Darkness.)

The basics of the build are pretty straightforward:
For single-target, once you have poisons up, tap-spam Defile until you get an Avenger Mastery proc, then full charge Infernal Blast to maintain your poison stacks and trigger Preemptive Strikes, full charge Defile to take maximum advantage of Preemptive Strikes, then go back tap-spam to fish for more crits.
For large groups, hit a hard target or two with Defile for the debuff, then use Epidemic to take them all down. (For packs in alerts, hit MD first, or let someone else lead the charge, or you'll just go squish though.)

Survival is a bit of an issue for this build, though; there's a reason it has Palliate. (Make sure to turn auto-assist target off, though, or you'll end up Palliating someone else!) Used to work much better, but then there was the cooldown nerf.

As with Magpie, when fighting targets that are going to live for a bit, hit Ascension, then put Illumination on the boss. The heals will help you... and also help everyone else on your team. Illumination is great like that.

If you end up with aggro again before Palliate is off cooldown, block and stack up Voracious Darkness to 5, then continue to block occasionally to keep those stacks up. If you're still having problems, swap to hybrid stance instead of ranged dps stance; that will significantly boost your self-healing.

And I have no idea if Epidemic should have Outbreak or R3 these days; it used to be that Outbreak was the obvious choice, back when poisons stacked to 10. Now? I dunno. Using outbreak here anyway, though, just for a bit of extra convenience when using it to help stack poisons on a single target; it's a strong enough AoE that I'm not really concerned about whether it's optimal or not.

Gearing: You want crit chance. Pretty much everything else is season to taste, however; there are arguments to be made for gearing for both cooldown reduction and cost reduction, hit points or defense, etc. For stats, I suggest a relatively even split of int/con/end in the primary gear's slots, and going mostly int on secondaries - since you can still find some dropped purple int secondaries that are over-budget relative to the ones you can buy with SCR.
(Kiir's actual gear includes a heroic breastplate of agility slotted for dodge chance; that gives him better on-average survival than gearing for hit points or defense would have. Unfortunately, recent content really favors emphasizing worst-case try-not-to-be-one-shot survival, and these days it's pretty clear he'd be better served by different gear. Oh well; I'm not going to farm up a replacement heroic piece for him.)

flowcyto

I typically take R3 over Outbreak for Epidemic. Its lower rate of DP apply means it won't stack AotI as effectively, but ya do get more base dps per target w/ R3 when fully channeling.

And for single target, R3 Epidemic spam may be better dps than Defile spam here, sadly, due mostly to activation delay and energy issues w/ the latter. Plus, Epidemic will proc Avenger Mastery quite more frequently due to the 0.5 sec ticks. You could also go w/ Ego PSS for a higher crit chance via 6th Sense, and still get cost discount via Insight. It will mean somewhat longer cd timers, though.