Hero A Day - Draco Rex

Back when I first started COH I made a dragon-looking character while experimenting with the builder and made him a fire & ice tanker. This short-lived experiment did not go well so I ended up deleting him. I really liked the costume though so once I had a better handle on the game I went back and remade him as a fire/super strength tanker and thus was born...

DRACO REX

Now this is heavily based off of one of my old Champions RPG characters so I had a pretty good concept already of how I wanted him to look and what kinds of powers he needed. The RPG character was basically a flying brick with a breath weapon and that's sort of the route I went here.

Fire Aura is probably my favorite Tanker primary - it's fun to play, it looks good, and it has a nice variety of powers spread across the level range while you're leveling up. It boosts the offensive capabilities of a tank significantly and that's what I wanted here. It's also no slouch as a resistance-based set and is easily boosted with set IO's if you feel a weakness in any particular area.

Super Strength is a great tanker secondary, one I have on many characters, and mixing up the animations should let you make it look exactly how you want it to look. The punches and slams are very comic-bookish, Rage adds to offensive capability (very nice with fire's powers) and hurl gives you a very brickish/tankish ranged attack at the later levels.

Combining these two sets results in a tanker that plays more like a classic superteam brick rather than someone whose main role is just to suck up damage while someone else beats people up. With Fire you have a damage aura/taunt aura, a self-heal, a self-endurance boost, a damage boost, and a self-rez. Super Strength adds a variety of single-target attacks plus a damage boost and a ranged attack. Both sets have a couple of PBAOE powers that are very useful, resulting a very versatile character who while among the toughest in the game has not sacrificed offense to the degree that some other tanker builds do. It's a lot of fun and I highly recommend it.

For pool powers he's a Flyer and a Fighter and I haven't decided on the rest. On tanks I may take Flight but I do not take Hover. Instead I take Air Superiority and in this case I use it instead of Punch (and then go straight to Haymaker from Super Strength). Since I am taking most of the powers from the primary and secondary there are not a lot of dead spots on the power tree until the higher levels.

Costume wise he's the monstrous -> lizard choices for body with armored shoulder plates and one of the chain chest details along with an animated lizard tail. Crafted draconic wings complete the package.

Draco was the first of the Draco Tanks (more on those later) and he runs on Infinity as part of the League of Super Justice Friends.

Hero A Day - Oakenshield

I decided to delete one (low-level) character from an account and move him to a different account where he fit the theme better. This left me with a tanker hole on Triumph server where I play with the family a lot. I had heard good things about Invulnerability/Dark Melee as a combo set and wanted to try it out. I was also out of ideas for the time being on stone looks or dragon looks so I decided to go in a different direction and thus was born...

Oakenshield

Invulnerability is one of my favorite defense sets, especially on a tank. It's pretty straightforward, there really aren't any tricks to it.  The offensive aspect of it comes late but it's a strong set and looks good. There's a good guide to starting it out here if you are interested in it and need some guidance.

Dark Melee is a set that I have more experience with on the scrapper side than the tank side but I am liking it so far. For Oakenshield. Combining Invuln's Dull Pain heal with Dark's Siphon Life heal. this should be a pretty durable character.

For Travel Power I'm trying out Super Speed and we'll see how that goes. Aong the pools this one may take Medicine for the thematic impact. Beyond that it's probably Leadership or Fighting.

For the look I wanted a nature spirit/walking tree theme as when creating Charcoal Man I had thought that the Omega set might work for a wood/tree look with the right coloring. I tried it out and thought it worked, so then it was just a matter of the face. Bio-organic face, organic armor on the head, green leaves for hair, big green full beard, and a glowing green alpha combat aura on the eyes completed the look. The Invulnerability powers are colored a bright green and I've given Dark Melee a bright green color to represent life energy.

I'm very happy with the look hough I admit I'm not sure what else I will do with him as far as other costumes and alternate looks. There's really no doubt about what he is and I think he fits the powers quite well.

Oakenshield runs on Triumph server, mostly solo right now but is always happy to join a team.

Hero A Day - Captain Saskatchewan

The second of my shield tankers was born when I heard good things about Shield/Ice Melee. I decided to give one a try and so was born...

CAPTAIN SASKATCHEWAN

Hero of the Great White North come to aid paragon City in its fight to survive.

Shield Defense is considered pretty strong for a tanker primary with a fairly good offensive power or two mixed in with a lot of defense.

Ice Melee is not especially strong for damage but a lot of it is cold which is pretty lightly resisted in the game. It is one of the most effective when it comes to control and damage mitigation as the attacks almost all have a slow effect which reduces move and attack rates meaning you take less damage because they aren't hitting you as often.. This is a set where I'm wondering if spreading attacks around will help more than concentrated fire on one target, as each target will be slowed as it is hit.

Captain S plays almost exclusively on teams because that's where I think his strengths lie. He works very well with a damage-focussed melee combatant on his team vyt he can hold the line even if it's all blasters  besides him.

Travel power is Spuperleap for now with Fighting and Leadership as likely pools in the near future.

His costume is fairly simple with white tights and the orange-red maple leaf added to show his affiliation. The flared boots add a bit of...flair...to his look and the ski-goggle facewear completes the "northerner" ensemble. I added the slashes to liven up the tights a bit and because I wanted to represent him as being from more of a wilderness province rather than a big city. I have run the shield both with and without the slashes and while I think they are almost too much right now, without them the maple leaf alone looks a little plain.

Captain S runs on Freedom where there's always a team forming for something - join in if you get a chance.

Hero A Day - Captain Transylvania

My first shield tanker was created to team with one of Aluminum Girl's alts, the Legendary Lorena. Lorena has a distinct vampire/goth chick theme as she is a Dark Melee/Super Reflexes scrapper with pale skin and blood red powers. She had run with various other characters but I felt the need for a specific partner for her to run with and a tanker seemed like the best choice and thus was born...

Captain Transylvania

Shield Defense is the tanker primary that has been a flavor-of-the-month for some time now, both because of the ease with which it can be softcapped and the offensive greatness of shield charge, even after it was toned down a bit. Being a Defense set it pairs well with a super reflexes scrapper in that if it can;t hurt her it probably won't hurt me but it has the downside of anything that tears through me will probably tear through her even more quickly. Certain enemies will not be fun with these two, but many will be just fine.

Dark Melee is a strong secondary with many good attacks including Siphon Life, a wonderful attack that is also a self-heal and one of the set-defining powers. Having similar attacks to my intended partner may turn out to be a weakness in some cases but having two dark attackers means that targets will have a negative to-hit modifier coming in from both of us which should stack, making our defenses even stronger.

Travel power is super speed to ensure he can keep up with Lorena as that is hers. He may end up with some Fly as well (in keeping with the theme) and probably Fighting or Leadership.

For the look I wanted pale skin with a dark uniform. Lorena's costumes tend to emphasize the blood red color so I went for more black with blood red as an accent. I wanted more subtle transitions than in many of my designs so I used the blend option. Boots and gloves were spiked as was the belt and the shoulder pads to keep with a pointy fang-ish theme. I needed a good symbol for his shield and chest so I went with the chalice with a red interior, a sort of "blood chalice" ala the vampires from Warhammer and various recent Dracula movies. It's unusual and I think it works.

Overall I am happy with the look and they do look good together. The pair run on Justice server so keep an eye open for us there.

Hero A Day - Captain Vesuvius

I keep hearing good things about shield tankers so I wanted to try a few out. I decided to place them all on one account (different servers).  One combination in particular that I heard quite a bit about was the Shield Defense /Fire Melee tank, so I give you...

Captain Vesuvius

All of my shield tankers are Captain Something because it's just something I do. there's only one notable shield guy in comics and he's one of my favorites so call it an homage to him. His short background is that he was exploring a volcano near Italy when a tremor revealed the entrance to a cave. Entering, he discovered a shrine to an ancient god of earth and fire. Taking up the helmet he found within gave him amazing powers and a mandate to do good in the world.

Shield Defense is a defense-based set meaning "try not to get hit" and it also has a medium to strong offensive component in some of the higher level powers like Shield Charge. Positional defenses are fairly easy to build up through IO sets and that's what I intend to do.

Fire Melee is a strong offensive set for single target but is really known for it's AOE attacks. Combining these with Shield Charge is supposed to be very nasty and I intend to find out.

Travel power is Superspeed for now as I am experimenting with Hasten - he is a more offensive tank after all.  Other pool powers will likely be Fighting and possibly Leadership, and I may throw Combat Jumping from the leaping pool in there as well after experimenting more with him.

Costume-wise I knew there was a flaming rocky shield available and I started with that. The majority of his costume is the new Alpha set along with the chest jewel and the Valkyrie cape. The helmet is the Warrior Fire helmet with the Valkyrie crest for a vaguely Roman-ish look. I went with a Red and Yellow color scheme to emphasize brightness and flame and fine tunes the fire melee coloring to match the shield as closely as possible. To top it off I gave him the Omega body and eyes combat aura, colored to match the fire powers and the shield too. I'm pretty happy with the look and have no major changes planned for now.

Captain Vesuvius lives on Triumph server for easier teaming with the family.  
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Hero A Day - The Awesome Charcoal Man

Continuing the theme of stony tankers I decided a few days ago (after some forum browsing) that I needed to try a Dark/Stone tanker. I have played Dark Armor on a scrapper but not on a Tanker so I thought it would be interesting to see the differences. Having already made stone-based and coal-based stony looking tankers I decided that I needed a new look other than the basic stone costume. Playing around with the new Omega costume set, aura, and looking at how to customize the Dark Armor look I realized that a suitable tank could be made with the right color choices and so was born...

The Awesome Charcoal Man

The brief and not-too-serious concept is that a horrible grilling accident involving experimental charcoal and way too much lighter fluid transformed an ordinary backyard barbecuer into something more than a man, and he decided to use his new powers to fight for what's right - and to speak out about grill safety.

Dark Armor is his primary and gives good resistance to most attack forms including psionics, which is rare among defense sets. It does have a reputation as an endurance hog but inherent Stamina will mitigate that somewhat. It also has a nice smoky look on many powers which fits the theme.

Stone Melee hits hard and hits early, inflicting significant damage and doing knockdown as a secondary effect which helps slow down the incoming damage - they can't hit you when they're picking themselves up off of the ground.

His movement power is Super Leap - I considered Fly but there just isn't much besides Fly itself that interests me for a tank. With Stone Melee it's not like he needs another attack in Air Superiority, and I never use Hover on Tanks, so there isn't much point to taking it when Super Leap has 3 useful powers instead.

For his look I went Omega for his whole body, leaving off the hair and the jaw, shaded as a black and a dark gray. I added the Omega aura in a dim flickering orange over his whole body including the eyes. hen paired up with the dark gray/light gray Dark Armor defensive toggle powers, he looks like a smoldering piece of charcoal, which is the look I was going for. His Stone Melee powers are done with the Lava look using a dark gray base with dark orange glowing cracks, emphasizing the burning charcoal look. When he hits 30 one alternate costume may involve the fireflies aura in a bright orange but I will figure that out when I get there.

Overall I'm very happy with this character - from the initial "hey these two powers work well - try them out" concept to coming up with an unusual but appropriate look - that's what really makes me happy when all the parts of a character concept come together into something decent, and perhaps a little humorous as well.

Hero A Day - Cinder - Block

We have several accounts here at the Fortress Alumina and I have always liked to theme my characters of the same type on a given account. Most of my blasters on one account are Aluminum Men. My Fire Tanks on one account are all dragons. My brutes on one are all knights. On one account, all of my tanks are stony-looking characters and that particular trend started with...

Cinder - Block

This character started when I kept seeing good things about Stone/Fire tanks on the forum and decided that I needed to try one. The back of a napkin concept is a gas line worker who falls into a crack in the earth during an earthquake while repairing a gas line. He emerges with fire powers and a new stony form - not very detailed I know but this was more mechanically-inspired than concept-inspired.

Additionally Triumph server is where a lot of our kid characters are located and we didn't have a solid tank there. When I run with them a tank would be good to have and I knew this would be a strong both offensively with AOE's and defensively vs. everything so it would be a good choice for this role - only tank, usually teamed up.

Stone armor is widely considered the strongest tanker primary having a mix of some defense and a lot of resistance. It also has some very harsh movement penalties with it's higher level powers so there are some tradeoffs to be made. I have not run a stone tanker up out of the single digits before so this is another new set for me, although I have teamed with one for 30+ levels so I've seen it up close.

Fire melee is widely considered the best AOE attack set among the tanker secondaries and considering that the job of the tank is to pull in and hold the attention of enemies they are usually surrounded by multiple opponents which makes AOE's a very strong way to fight. At low levels Fire has Combustion for its first AOE which combines with Mud Pots, the Stone Armor damage aura, for a nice AOE damage zone in battle. During the leveling up process fire has decent single-target attacks too so it works even then.

The synergy of these two powers is in their lack of synergy - Fire doesn't slow the opponent, or knock them back, or drain endurance, or stun them - it's "extra" is that is does more damage. Stone armor is so strong it doesn't need any mitigation from the offense - it can handle the load on it's own, having no real weaknesses in its defensive capabilities. This makes Fire melee a very good fit with Stone, as opposed to some other primaries which need some mitigation from the attack set.

His travel power is Super Leap - it just seems to fit, and Combat Jumping + Acrobatics just makes his defenses that much stronger.  Other pools will include Fighting and possibly Leadership. I don't care much for Hasten on tanks as it tends to burn through their endurance that much faster. Many Stone tankers like teleport as a movement power to bypass the speed penalties from Stone but I am not going to take it unless I absolutely have to.

For the look I wanted a huge flaming stony guy. Huge body model + Stone costume was the base. I wanted him to look as if his powers manifested from some internal fire so I gave his stone armor the "Lava" look and went with red as the main hot color. I carried this over to his attack powers as well tuning the color until the swords in particular looked just right. He still needed some personality though so sunglasses and a cigar topped off the look. For future costumes I may give him more color in his basic stone outfit and I may add the Omega aura in some fashion with a red tint to the flames. Down the road he might even get a cape as his "dress uniform".

Cinder - Block runs on the Triumph server and is usually on a team - if you see us passing by give us a shout.

Hero A Day - Arctic Crush

So I started off COH with a fascination for Blasters and I do still enjoy them, but lately I've had a thing for Tankers. With the right power choices they are very strong in solo play and they are always welcome on a team too so there is a lot of utility in playing a tank. Certain types of tank have been my major interest, namely Fire Aura tanks, but to start off the Hero-A-Day concept I thought I would go with my latest creation. I give you...

Arctic Crush

I wanted to try an Ice Tank and I liked the Stone Melee powerset already so I decided to pair them up and go with the concept of a mountain climber who fell into a crevasse and emerged much later as something new - the classic "accident" hero or "Altered Human" origin from the old MSH RPG.

Arctic Crush is an Ice Armor primary, giving him good defense at the expense of resistance (kind of like Super Reflexes for Scrappers). I have not played an Ice Armor character before so this is my first experience with it and so far it is fine at the low levels. The defenses are good and the taunt aura seems to work very well. Mez protection is a toggle power (my preference) and is available below level 10 so you do have options on when to take it.

He is a Stone Melee secondary giving him very strong (and very endurance-heavy) melee attacks. Stone is unusual in that the first 3 powers are all single-target attacks so that a tank who goes for offense can have a very strong 3-power single-target attack chain at level 6! Normally I try to work in more defense early in a tank's career but it's too good to resist and makes solo leveling quite a bit easier.as there's no waiting around for something to recharge. Issue 18 added bruising to the first attack in all tanker secondaries which reduces a target's defense, so a chain of Stone Fist -> Stone Mallet -> Heavy Mallet with an occasional use of brawl or a vet reward attack means he can throw attacks almost continuously. With the addition of inherent Stamina in issue 19 he also has the endurance to keep doing this for a while, though he will eventually run low without an occasional pause for breath.

For his travel power I took Super jump - I didn't see him as a flyer, a teleporter, or a super-speedster so concept-wise jump made the most sense. Mechancially SJ is a good choice for tankers anyway, especially with a defense based set as Combat Jumping adds to an already strong defense at low levels.

For the look I wanted an over all bluish icy/stony look and had a "glacier" concept to begin with.  I started with the basic Stone costume that I have used for multiple characters - usually tanks - with a light grey to blue blend. I toyed with the idea of going to the Huge body type but didn't want to look that hulking. I tried the Armored look for chest and legs but it was too fat looking and certain costume choices are unavailable with that format, so I stuck with "Tight".I wanted him to have some gear on like an explorer or mountain climber so  I gave him the Stealth harness for chest detail and added a complimentary belt.   I knew he would have the ice armor up much of the time so I didn't want to go overkill on the auras but I did give him the Omega Aura on his hands during combat in a light blue-white color so it hopefully looks like frost evaporating off of his arms as he makes his attacks. I like it so far and I may go back and put it on his whole body. To complete the look I went back and put Resistance Goggles on his face.

For power customization I started with the stone melee powers as I wanted them to look more like Ice than stone. Choosing the "Crystal" look I went for a light blue shade with some lighter blue highlights until I was happy with the look, then I set the colors to "all powers", ensuring that his ice armor has the same shading as his fists and mallets.

I am very happy with the character right now and expect that he will get a lot of play during the winter event this year. he is on Justice server so if you see him give me a shout-out.

Winter Event coming next weekend

The 2010 Winter Event is nearly upon us and will bring new presents and dangers to Paragon City, the Rogue Isles and Praetoria. You will be able to stop Lady Winter's plot to freeze the world, visit the Ski Chalet and race to win prizes. Unlock Snow Flake Emotes, Winter-themed costume pieces and earn special badges.

Starts: 9:00 a.m. PDT - 12:00 p.m. EDT - 5:00 p.m. GMT - 18:00 Central European Time, Friday, December 17, 2010
Ends: 11:59 p.m. PDT - 2:59 a.m. EDT - 7:59 a.m. GMT - 8:59 Central European Time, Sunday, January 2, 2011