That One AT...

[Safehouse]

I was big into controllers and defenders with tankers becoming a "late love" as well. I never actually managed to get a Blaster very high because most of the secondaries made me feel like I was playing with only a primary set since I didn't want to melee. Devices and later Mental were the only exceptions but both of them were thematically difficult for me to work with. I was finally psyched to make a Blaster when I tested out Martial Manip on the I24 beta. THAT would have been a blaster I could take to 50.

While I always loved defenders in the end I began to have a renewed appreciation for them due to the base values they got on buffs specifically. Using defender mods you could make some very sturdy characters. They might not be uber damage dealers but they could have incredible mitigation if built right.

Although melee wasn't a big focus of my play, I began to see some interesting concept possibilities with scrappers. I had planned out a great staff/energy/soul scrapper using the sorcery pool to make a melee mage character with some ranged capability. All in all thematically it looked great. I am only sorry I never got the chance to see it come to life.

OMG Martial Combat was my love. I wanted to see that go live more than anything else. I was one of those people pulling for it a LOT for a long time. I had an energy/martial blaster made in the beta - one who I had outlined, story in all, for about a year.

[Ashen Fury]

Anything other than Scrapper/Tanker/Defender. Made hundreds of chars, the only ones that ever stuck around were these 3 classes.

[Safehouse]

Anything other than Scrapper/Tanker/Defender. Made hundreds of chars, the only ones that ever stuck around were these 3 classes.

Did you ever end up making a Staff Melee toon? I know it came around pretty late in the game, but I was able to make one and it turned out great!

[Ashen Fury]

Did you ever end up making a Staff Melee toon? I know it came around pretty late in the game, but I was able to make one and it turned out great!

Sadly, no. I came back from a break a month or two before the announcement and I'd only had time to buy a couple sets, and titan weapons was the one i really wanted to try. I really really wanted to try street justice(id been waiting for that set since the beginning but i already had a few bare fists fighters by then) and max out a water blast hero but sadly I never got the chance Staff would have been next.

[Lucretia MacEvil]

I always wanted to love the Dominator AT, especially since my first-ever character was a Dominator.  Sadly, I just couldn't get the hang of them for the longest time.  I finally rolled one that worked just right for me when NCsoft decided to pull the plug!    I WILL NEVER FORGIVE THEM!!!  Unless they decide to bring our game back, of course.

[Ad_Astra]

I almost always preferred blasting things - which meant that I concentrated on Blasters, and also played Defenders, Corruptors, Controllers and even Dominators like Blasters/Blappers. I loved my SoAs, again, playing them like Blasters.

But that meant that I really didn't click eith any of the Meless classes, although I had a couple of Scrappers, Stalkers, and Brutes that were fun because they were high damage (I also played my stalker like a blaster in that I was very careful of where the aggro range was and picked my fights the same way as my blasters because of perceived fragility).

I never got a Tank above about level 9 - 12. I also found my Kheldians becoming sadly neglected.

[srmalloy]

I was big into controllers and defenders with tankers becoming a "late love" as well. I never actually managed to get a Blaster very high because most of the secondaries made me feel like I was playing with only a primary set since I didn't want to melee. Devices and later Mental were the only exceptions but both of them were thematically difficult for me to work with.

You should have taken a look at Energy Manipulation as a secondary. Yes, it was loaded with melee attacks, but your tier-1 attack was a punch with a sizeable knockback -- useful for re-establishing distance, particularly when slotted a bit for knockback -- and the tier-9 was a similar emergency fallback to use when a mob got too close. Between them, though, was the gem of the set: Boost Range. With a single Recharge SO, it was essentially perma out of the box. With a few sets of Positron's Blast for the 16% range bump and the opportunity to slot the under-desired Dmg/Rng HOs -- my AR/EM/Mun Blaster slotted LRM Missile with three Dmg/Rng HOs, two Acc IOs, and a Rch IO, and with Boost Range running could deliver AoE fun out past the range where you could see the effects, and a Snipe slotted with Positron's Blast, with Boost Range up will hit from far enough away that you almost always have time for a second shot before your target even reacts.

[Kyriani]

You should have taken a look at Energy Manipulation as a secondary. Yes, it was loaded with melee attacks, but your tier-1 attack was a punch with a sizeable knockback -- useful for re-establishing distance, particularly when slotted a bit for knockback -- and the tier-9 was a similar emergency fallback to use when a mob got too close. Between them, though, was the gem of the set: Boost Range. With a single Recharge SO, it was essentially perma out of the box. With a few sets of Positron's Blast for the 16% range bump and the opportunity to slot the under-desired Dmg/Rng HOs -- my AR/EM/Mun Blaster slotted LRM Missile with three Dmg/Rng HOs, two Acc IOs, and a Rch IO, and with Boost Range running could deliver AoE fun out past the range where you could see the effects, and a Snipe slotted with Positron's Blast, with Boost Range up will hit from far enough away that you almost always have time for a second shot before your target even reacts.

Yea it really wasnt enough. It's nice that there's a useful power or two in the secondaries but they never felt like full sets to me (barring devices and to a lesser extent mental manipulation). One or two useful powers just made me take a step back and see I was drowning in pool power picks because I wanted virtually nothing from the secondaries I had available. Martial COmbat was the first breath of fresh air since mental.

Here's what I saw as useful in the secondaries. If I don't list it, its not useful to me and my style of play.

Energy: Build Up, Power Boost
Darkness: Penumbral Grasp, Dark Pit
Devices: Web Grenade, Caltrops, Targeting Drone, Cloaking Device, Smoke Grenade, Trip Mine, Gun Drone
Electric: Electric Fence, Build Up, Lightning Clap, Power Sink, Shocking Grasp
Fire: Ring of Fire, Build Up, Consume
Ice: Chillblain, Build Up, Ice Patch, Freezing Touch
Mental: Subdual, Psychic Scream, Concentration, Drain Psyche, World of Confusion, Scare
Martial: Ki Push, Reach for the Limit, Burst of Speed, Reaction Time, Inner Will, Throw Sand

[Phaetan]

Probably Peacebringers.
Now don't get me wrong, I had one and I loved her (Prismatic Surge was my first EAT,even,) but The powers never quite clicked together for me like my Warshade, Fortunata, or Crab.  I was starting to almost get a rhythm to her powers when the big announcement hit, and I had a hard time playing her compared to other ones I had and truly loved running amok with.
Some day she'll pop another wakey and leap back into the fray...

[Safehouse]

Sadly, no. I came back from a break a month or two before the announcement and I'd only had time to buy a couple sets, and titan weapons was the one i really wanted to try. I really really wanted to try street justice(id been waiting for that set since the beginning but i already had a few bare fists fighters by then) and max out a water blast hero but sadly I never got the chance Staff would have been next.

Street Justice and Water Blast were two AMAZING additions, and I had two toons that leveled fast when I finally made them. SJ/regen and WB/Dark were SO FUN. I read a lot about Street Justice before it came out, and some of the stuff surprised me, because it didn't seem overly popular. But when I finally started it I was extremely pleased - not super strength, not martial arts, but something that to me kind of combined best aspects of the two. I liked the combo aspect of it and the effects looked really neat. It was just a plum fun set to train!

[General Idiot]

Street Justice in my opinion was one of the few sets to be more fun on a stalker than it was on a scrapper. Though that may also have something to do with the stalker changes around the same time. The sped up version of SJ assassin strike was just so satisfying.

[Safehouse]

Street Justice in my opinion was one of the few sets to be more fun on a stalker than it was on a scrapper. Though that may also have something to do with the stalker changes around the same time. The sped up version of SJ assassin strike was just so satisfying.

Seriously! So cool. They should have called it SWEET Justice.

[Altaranalt]

Thinking back on it, I don't recall hating a single AT. Although I must admit I haven't tried all of them.
Not only that, but game sorta encouraged you to give it a try. Rather then have you log in, be unsatisfied and remake your character. Maybe that's just me though

[Turboski]

Scrappers/Stalkers never clicked for me, would rather run a tank or brute instead.  I played defenders and controllers mostly til CoV, then pretty much abandoned those ATs for Corruptors.

[Safehouse]

Thinking back on it, I don't recall hating a single AT. Although I must admit I haven't tried all of them.
Not only that, but game sorta encouraged you to give it a try. Rather then have you log in, be unsatisfied and remake your character. Maybe that's just me though

Altaranalt, unless I'm mistaken I'm pretty dead certain that I watched your CoH let's play last week. It was really great!

[Cryfire]

Dominators and warshades are the only two I never got to level 50 on, had 38 lvl 50s when the game ended, tons of scrappers and blasters, a few controllers and masterminds, and a bit of everything else too. Really missed the game today and ended up watching 2 hours of the last demo records I took on the last day. So many players that I hadn't seen in ages logged in that last day inculding players I hadn't seen in over 7 years. okay, back on track, Loved my scrappers more than any other AT but didn't get my first scarpper to 50 until the game had been out for almost 3 years.

[Gothenem]

I loved Controllers and Masterminds. They were by far my favourite AT's. No other MMO seems to capture the feel they had. None.

[Safehouse]

I loved Controllers and Masterminds. They were by far my favourite AT's. No other MMO seems to capture the feel they had. None.

I concur. I mean, controlling powers exist in so many MMOs, but not in the capacity that Controllers used them. And I don't think Masterminds (or whatever you wish to call a pet heavy archetype) exist anywhere else. The closest I've seen were Summoners from the FF series

[Phaetan]

My very first villain (and third character at all) was a Mastermind, and I miss playing him very badly (Demon/Time/Soul inspired by the Courts of Chaos.)  Once I got an idea of what I was doing, he was insanely fun to play.  Controllers took me longer to get into, but at the end, I was on a serious Troller spree and agree that there's not really anything out there quite like them.

[Safehouse]

See, I think the reason I could never get into Masterminds was because I was the kind of player who NEEDED to get into the action. I wanted to be the one diving in (even if, in the case of blasters, it meant I kept going to the hospital). As a Mastermind, I just felt I couldn't do that as much as I wanted to.