Tank the game, solo

bluecenturion

I am planning to settle into Champions Online and solo the game. I used to do this on CoX about once a year. The rules are I do every single mission in order, more or less. CO seems more forgiving in picking up old missions, but I will stay on my pattern, finishing up one contact/arc, then moving on to the next.

I plan on running a Power Armor Tank, Freeform. Can anyone give me ideas for a good Stat rundown? I was thinking CON 1st, but was unsure what to pop in next. Prob need EGO for at least the 3rd?

Also, any must have powers, must avoid? I like a real tanky feel and have the immense patience in a fight as long as I can see a win way off in the future coming nearer.

Thanks in advance from the help. In case you are wondering, yes, tutorial as well. Gonna make this my badger or w/e they call it here.

cornivic

I forgot what the Mechanized Innate characteristic, you need INT and STR, I don't remember. I think DEX and CON will be good for Power Armor too. If you get the power Regeneration you will be able to solo the entire game alone, but most of the 5 men missions.

Good luck getting all the badges

iwontpostderp

Snake Wildlife made a really good guide for a tank char, you might want to take a look at it.

http://co-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=208991

flyingfinn

You can solo the game with any Defensive Passive. Hell, you can solo it with a Offensive Passive.
And you don't need STR for the Power Armor.

wesleytansg

A good block, a good self-heal, a good defensive passive, enough knock resistance and good common sense.

chaelk

I'm using Electric form with PA, for the 3extra energy, plus ego/dex/con.

talents for any other stats

with BCR/resurgent reiki and resurgence as heals, you do need your dodge/avoid for these though, 4

concentration and ego surge for extra damage


Skarns bane- just for alert bosses

Yes I know you said Tank but I've seen plenty of people tanking in melee, ranged and support. as long as you can get their attention and survive. who cares what build you're in.

cheesesloppy

PowerHouse (Link to this build)

Name: PA Tank

Archetype: Freeform

Super Stats:
Level 6: Intelligence (Primary)
Level 10: Constitution (Secondary)
Level 15: Endurance (Secondary)

Talents:
Level 1: The Invincible
Level 6: Daredevil
Level 9: Amazing Stamina
Level 12: Ascetic
Level 15: Academics
Level 18: Negotiator
Level 21: Quick Recovery

Powers:
Level 1: Wrist Bolter (Automated Assault)
Level 1: Mini Gun (Rank 2, U-238 Rounds, Challenging Strikes)
Level 6: Invulnerability (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 8: Concentration
Level 11: Micro Munitions (Rank 2, Rank 3, Challenging Strikes)
Level 14: Overdrive
Level 17: Fire All Weapons (Rank 2, Rank 3, Challenging Strikes)
Level 20: Masterful Dodge
Level 23: Bountiful Chi Resurgence (Resurgent Reiki)
Level 26: Nanobot Swarm (Rejuvinating Injectors)
Level 29: Force Shield (Force Sheathe)
Level 32: Electric Sheath (Matter ? Energy Union)
Level 35: Power Gauntlet (Crippling Challenge)
Level 38:

Travel Powers:
Level 6: Jet Pack (Rank 2, Rank 3)
Level 35: Teleportation

Specializations:
Intelligence: Preparation (2/2)
Intelligence: Enlightened (1/3)
Intelligence: Tactician (2/2)
Intelligence: Revitalize (3/3)
Intelligence: Tinkering (2/2)
Guardian: Fortified Gear (1/3)
Guardian: Locus (2/2)
Guardian: Ruthless (2/2)
Guardian: Find the Mark (2/3)
Guardian: The Best Defense (3/3)
Vindicator: Aggressive Stance (2/2)
Vindicator: Merciless (3/3)
Vindicator: The Rush of Battle (2/3)
Vindicator: Mass Destruction (3/3)
Mastery: Guardian Mastery (1/1)


(Note: This build may take a little bit to get off the ground. Also good as a primer, I guess?)

Gear for +Crit and +Dodge.

Rotation would be: FAW, BCR, (Masterful Dodge if needed), Nanobot swarm(If not on cooldown), Tap Block, Toggle Wrist bolter, Minigun, Micromunitions. By then, FAW should be, or almost be, off of cooldown. Repeat the cycle.

With Revitalize, Wristbolter will keep shaving down your cooldowns to the point where you're a constant salvo of damage and healing, which on top of your already powerful resistance(Yay Invulnerability), you'll have no sweat doing anything. You got your AoE Damage, Threat stacking, Single target Crippling Challenge, healing and all that jazz.

A lot of things are pretty interchangable too. The block can be changed for Energy shield for obvious reasons, I just like never running out of blue. Electric Sheathe can be changed for virtually any Active Offense. Notably, Ego Surge for the massive crit boost due to Constitution. You could possibly do without Power Gauntlet too, but I wouldn't ditch it. I've also left the last power open for whatever it is one might wish to add. Another active defense, pets, a rez--whatever. In the end, as long as you have the powers up to 26 you'll be golden.

On the topic of specs, they're pretty balanced for Offense/Defense. I can offer a more specialized setup if requested, but the only other thing I'd recommend is going Protector.

bluecenturion

I've decided CON/REC/END. My theory being it is hard to pick a combo that cannot walk this game into the ground firstly. Secondly rather than chasing crits or recharge or w/e with the stats I am chasing raw survivability and energy. The corollary being rather than having say, EGO and grabbing an extra X% damage all the time I will have a THICK blue bar and just bring another AoE toggle to bear and basically double my damage. One of the benefits of choosing PA is the abusive ability to fire the weapons of 2 or 3 heroes for a short time after all. This breaks down in an extended fight I am guessing, but that is when I turtle up, go for attrition, and actually have to use tactics like pulling and thinking lol.

polishlightning

I think you're putting to much attention on energy. With the new specializations, Rec/End are not as important, I may take one but not both. You're not pigeon holed into only taking your SS as you're only stats just so you know. you can add to Rec/End with gear later if you want.
If you're truly tanking you shouldn't have energy problems anyway because all you're trying to do is keep the enemies attention.
Try changing up your Primary SS in the Power House and see which Spec tree you like best. You may be surprised with some of the options you're given.
As far pulling mobs, that's not really a problem in Champs, any good toon can take them out, the hope for tanking the hole game solo would be to stay alive vs the big bad bosses.

bluecenturion

er, by "tank the game" i meanmt grab a tank and solo the game. i do actually need to kill everything. well, a lot of stuff. I am gonna try the CON/REC/END trick and see if I like it, if not I'll respec. I will be using Crit gear in Primary, and havent decided on what else, need to research what to chase in Defense and Utility.

pursuivant

Sounds like fun.

I'd be interested to hear back how you go - what was hardest, what was grindiest, what you'd do differently next time.

bluecenturion

So.... Not off to a good start. I have not had a lot of time to get this project running, but everytime I did have a few hours a horrible thing happened. I would go to the tutorial, do all the missions (including Fox and Cat, get location badge, everything) then I would complete it and NOT get the final badge/perk. After many times I finally did get it last night.

Now, I thought that with the much smaller content here and the ability to pick up most of the missions no matter what level I would breeze through all content. But it seems that Champions Online has a tougher monster to face than most games to achieve this goal: Unskilled Programmer monster lololol.

bluecenturion

Okay, things are looking up. Still going slow though. Mostly because I kept going back to the costume editor. After many alterations I believe I have the outfit set up for the job.

Another thing that slowed me down was powers. I respec'd out of wrist bolter, because I just find Power Bolt quicker. Also, was unhappy with bolter clipping and animation. When i did this I happened upon the realization that I did not need to take Tactical Missiles. So i freaking did not. Currently at 11th level, with a solid power mix of Power Bolt, Mini Gun, Micro Missiles, Invulnerability, and Overdrive. I have experimented with a few PA builds into the 20s, and I find no need for the mediocre ST Tac missile. I will be looking at the DPS guide and EPS guide I saw here to verify, but I know I can get by without it. I will need a solid ST attack, but I am pretty sure PA has a better one. Invul is cranked to the last rank, and Mini Gun is running U238 and larger AoE. My next move is to increase its damage to rank 2, using all 5 points there. It will be my 'bread and butter' AoE (and ST!) attack until low 20s I think, maybe past that. I prefer to pull, walk backwards and let them line up on that tube of hate. I love hallways. I call this manuever the 'Kaufman Retrograde' which I borrowed from the board game version of Star Fleet Battles.

Tonight I'll probably finish Westside, and then do the Canada and Desert Crisis Zones, if i have time. Wish me luck there. Both of those have perks that cannot be achieved elsewhere, AND I have no idea if they are glitchy. I would seriously hate to reroll this guy.

polishlightning

bluecenturion wrote: »

Tonight I'll probably finish Westside, and then do the Canada and Desert Crisis Zones, if i have time. Wish me luck there. Both of those have perks that cannot be achieved elsewhere, AND I have no idea if they are glitchy. I would seriously hate to reroll this guy.

I think you can get back into the Crisises after the fact, I'll try to remember to check tonight. It's completely possible that they're just open to me because I never did them to begin with with my newest characters.

chalupaoffury

solid single target? try the plasma beam. That thing melts single mobs, and can pretty well mow down a pack if they line up right. Which they probably will.

There's a spec power that gives you health back when you kill stuff. I run it on Chernobyl and lemme tell you... Soloing gets a lot easier when you're getting an hp kickback every time a mook dies.

bluecenturion

I actually tried Plasma Beam last night, and respec'd right out of it quick. I like some things about it, but its defining characteristic is that it is untargeted/targeted by facing. Since I plan on trying to run 3 powers at once I need my weapon systems to be smarter than that. I know the build can run 2 toggles at once in mid 20s, and I see no reason to not get 3 going by 30s. Having to put that much attention in Plasma Beam just doesnt work for me.

I finished off Westside, all missions/arcs, including the secret auction thing. Also have completed the 'level 5' get Lumurians out of UNTIL basement. Yeah, level 5, roflmao.

I am currently in the Canadian Crisis, which I am mostly done with. I am looking for info on the open mission there, something about zombies and a lost patrol. My other bit of current research is the Phalanx system for PA Block. What exactly does that do? Besides animate a shield. CO data is so.... nonexistent.

After finishing Canada I will immediately bop into Desert Crisis, and do all those missions/perks. If i get all the badges/perks/missions for both I will move to Canada for the Steelhead missions, then back to the Desert for the Atomic Wasteland stuff. If the perks glitch like they did in the Tutorial I will probably take a week off and reconsider. I do not mind not getting every perk, but I do get irritated to have earned the perk and get nothing.

bluecenturion

Made it through both Canada and Desert Cises with all badges/perks. Discovered the open mission in Canada crisis was removed. (it had been in the wiki last week, I think is updated now)

I was going to solo the entire game this way, in progression. However, there are a number of problems with that, mostly revolving around me outleveling the content. I am not worried about no exp, but once the challenge is gone it gets less fun, more grindy. Also, the rewards are geared to the mission level. THe 16th contact giving out a Blue Primary piece is great at 15th level, crap at 20th. Finally, it is very hard to tell if my build concepts are working if I am not challenging them in +1 to +3 level content. So, this project will have to be rethought.

I am currently finishing up the Snake Gulch stuff. I love that content. I wish i could get the Belle's saloon piano and dancing girl scene as a screensaver, with music even. After that i will head to Canada, then back to the Desert for the Prison stuff.

maendor

'I was going to solo the entire game this way, in progression. However, there are a number of problems with that, mostly revolving around me outleveling the content. I am not worried about no exp, but once the challenge is gone it gets less fun, more grindy.'


Maybe it would help if you did not feel obliged to do complete everything, as you will certainly outlevel the quests. An alternative could be to move on to another part of the map or another zone entirely; that way when you create more toons, you can get a bit of variety in the quests. The CO-wiki has a list of the mission levels and locations.

Only offered as a consideration in the hope it helps.

gavinruneblade

bluecenturion wrote: »

I was going to solo the entire game this way, in progression. However, there are a number of problems with that, mostly revolving around me outleveling the content. I am not worried about no exp, but once the challenge is gone it gets less fun, more grindy. Also, the rewards are geared to the mission level. THe 16th contact giving out a Blue Primary piece is great at 15th level, crap at 20th. Finally, it is very hard to tell if my build concepts are working if I am not challenging them in +1 to +3 level content. So, this project will have to be rethought.

There is an interesting bit of difficulty in that the content we have is not enough, but we level so fast that we miss lots of it. Even just staying in either canada or desert or millenium city, I have outleveled everything every time (4 times so far).

Teaming is one way to get around this as you can revert to the lower level of your teammates. But solo like you want, that isn't an option. So the only suggestion is to do it twice. Once skipping as much as you need to in order to stay at a challenging level and get appropriate rewards. And a second time after when it is stupidly easy, to just get the story and perks.

I am currently finishing up the Snake Gulch stuff. I love that content. I wish i could get the Belle's saloon piano and dancing girl scene as a screensaver, with music even. After that i will head to Canada, then back to the Desert for the Prison stuff.

I know, I love that stuff myself. The open event is quite fun (Ascii Oakley hehe, love that name) and the enemies have a great character. My parents loved some of the older black and white cowboy tv shows and movies and so I'm waaay to young to have seen them "live" I still have a lot of fond childhood memories of singing cowboys so those robots were just awesome to me.

Other bits of the desert have more challenge, but Snake Gulch has the most fun feel. Also the rewards for collecting snake bucks are pretty cool.