Soldier Guide

[august]

SMG doesnt need ranking or any of its adv at all . its already doing ok in pve. unless your rich to retcon once u get gatling gun. recommended to leave it as it is and rank or adv other skills

[lunar]

I disagree badvember: > Playing around with both, gattling does NOT replace smg in pve. The ST dps is undoubtly superb. But with gatling root, HIGH energy cost, and very bad cylinder (smg's cone is way bigger), i found smg the better lvl power. In pvp AR with mow outdps's gatling as well, so why not rank smg. 100ft range is okay but thats it+lvl 32 retcon=100g only:>

[august]

My gatling gun out dps lotsa people in Open missions like Mega Desteriod etc etc without getting aggro.

SMG cnt out dps that dmg with gatling gun.
AR might out dps. but with crip challenge = boss targets youu..
And AR = single dmg DPS. yea it might be good in a single target terms. But Gatling gun totally Pawns in terms of single and mass target.

In terms of PVE. Example Therikel Temple. Where theres always a Tank to aggro all mobs to him. Gatling gun still owns..
Then again in self lvling up sessions PVE. My smg with no ranks and no adv still kills.

So in terms of usefullness aspects of AR SMG and Gatling gun.
AR = Single Target . With Crip Challenge you cnt use it in PVE much.
Smg = Good DPS. but Avg DMG. Not useful at PVP at all.
Gatling gun = Good DPS. Good DMG. Useful in PVE n PVP. wont aggro mobs to you.

Another example. Go MI. SMG on a Bunch of Stags n Bears.
Then use gatling gun on them again.
You can see the difference

[lunar]

Jun 5, 2011 6:09:54 GMT -5 august said:

My gatling gun out dps lotsa people in Open missions like Mega Desteriod etc etc without getting aggro.

SMG cnt out dps that dmg with gatling gun.
AR might out dps. but with crip challenge = boss targets youu..
And AR = single dmg DPS. yea it might be good in a single target terms. But Gatling gun totally Pawns in terms of single and mass target.

In terms of PVE. Example Therikel Temple. Where theres always a Tank to aggro all mobs to him. Gatling gun still owns..
Then again in self lvling up sessions PVE. My smg with no ranks and no adv still kills.

So in terms of usefullness aspects of AR SMG and Gatling gun.
AR = Single Target . With Crip Challenge you cnt use it in PVE much.
Smg = Good DPS. but Avg DMG. Not useful at PVP at all.
Gatling gun = Good DPS. Good DMG. Useful in PVE n PVP. wont aggro mobs to you.

Another example. Go MI. SMG on a Bunch of Stags n Bears.
Then use gatling gun on them again.
You can see the difference

I agree with this all (outside the MI part), but hence why i called it a level up power:) At lvl 40 (as you pointed out yourself ingame) you want AR as crip power anyway, were mow becomes less usefull, and gattling more usefull^^"

Ps: With this all we ignore rocket, it does not replace snipe in cage imo, but thats PURELY playstyle based. But noone can deny it is fun, a lot of fun: >

[foolerrant]

For PvP, I'd say the Aggression advantage on SMG is quite useful, if situational. There's a couple of different ATs (Soldier and Marksman w/Focused Shot being the ones I can immediately recall) and freeform builds (primarily those who, like Soldiers, rely on Sniper Rifle) who have to fully charge their main PvP attacks without being hit, knocked back, or suffering a DoT effect. So, I'd say Aggression is valuable in PvP builds that can spare the points, particularly as it appears to 'frontload' some of the maintain damage into the bleed, which usually seems to happen early on, and spares the need to continue using it further. Given the number of advantage points available, I think it's easily doable.

I recommend folks considering cradock's original build to consider saving 2 advantage points by removing R3 on Smoke Grenade. I would also shift the remaining advantage points on Smoke Grenade over to Escape Artist. Straight perception stealth, while advantageous in PvP, has very, very limited PvE use for a Soldier, as Soldier doesn't get any combat pets to throw aggro off onto nor an additional means of gaining stealth beyond the travel power teleport, which has a very large internal boost to perception stealth, one comparable to R2 Smoke Grenade. The reason to pick up Escape Artist is that Escape Artist turns Smoke Grenade into PvP-usable partial threatwipe that is also a forced detarget and makes it impossible for the affected enemy to retarget the Smoke Grenade user for up to 10 seconds. This makes Smoke Grenade an *amazing* PvE and PvP escape mechanism, and makes ranking Smoke Grenade up kind of pointless, as the Soldier will either escape successfully or die from someone else attacking in the meantime, something R3 Smoke Grenade would not probably have helped with anyway due to lack of pets.

I'd also remove the extra advantage points in Retaliation. It may help early on, but eventually, particularly on higher difficulties, it seems like the difference between 'got through it ok if a bit roughed up' and 'nearly got pasted in one hit' is quite small and doesn't change enough to be worth ranking up block, particularly once the more binary abilities come into play that are basically "one-hit kill if unblocked, otherwise minimal effect", as without a means of self-healing beyond escaping combat, it's often better to continue attempting to DPS than risk getting pummeled while failing to run away because you're blocking.

For PvP-minded players, another important consideration is that the ability to block is removed 90% of the time by PvP-focused builds, so ranking up block is kind of pointless in that environment. That would save an additional 4 advantage points, making it possible to get R3 Acro + Versatility as well as R3 Teleport, offering very significant mobility advantages in PvP.

[tkolter]

You do know there are many mission items that create pets once your hitting the 30+ level missions a friend who is a f2p Marksman has a device that creates zombies every time he is hit almost and they are high level ones (end of the Burial Caves group mission), there is the Horn for killing the Warthog boss on Monster Island and he found a Russian Zombie one in Lemuria.

A solder with just the Bural Cave one can get up to five pets to draw off attackers just for getting hit anyway (and its not a click to activate its always on) and add in personal shields you can have your damage absorbers near you. Its just a matter of looking for them or buying a good sidekick or both.

My Inventor doesn't use them she has good pets but my others will try to have one good one to back them up in the summoning help when they get there.

[foolerrant]

However, the dropped pets also have the disadvantage of being charge-limited or time-limited and generally have long cooldowns. Sidekicks and henchmen are a different story, but are also generally only available from the C-store or from folks who put them on the AH for a quick injection of globals, and they're still limited to 1 hr of use per device. Most device pets are also fairly expensive for the benefit, so I'd rather not use pets except as needed, or for fights such as Therakiel or Shadow Destroyer in Dimensional Destroyer mode, where additional DPS that doesn't affect your personal threat is always handy due to the length and difficulty of the fights. This goes doubly so for Cosmics, which can take even longer to kill, unless you have a very large group. Even there, the 'side' benefit of even partial threatwipe can mean the difference between repeatedly dying versus cruising through with having enough room for even a relatively inexperienced tank to have a comfortable safety margin of threat if you're willing to wait 5-6 seconds at the start of the fight before you begin to DPS, if you cycle Smoke Grenade into the rotation every 30 sec or so.

[tkolter]

Not all the zombie item has a percentage chance and all you have to do is get hit, its not activated and always on. And you can swap them out. But would a Soldier always need them most soldiers are pretty sturdy for the common fight its the more robust enemy you would need them. Its how you use them.

As for the two weapons both have value SMG to spray an area boss and henchment once the close and gatling gun for the narrow cone of death good if you are in a defined space (tunnel). But it comes down to tactics Soldiers are first and foremost a ranged arms attacker so the right tactics and grear is vital and picking fights to your advantage when you can.

If your just barreling in there your better off with another AT.

[Zed Brightlander]

- bounce -

[Zydrate]

May 28, 2011 15:36:49 GMT -5 august said:

SMG doesnt need ranking or any of its adv at all . its already doing ok in pve. unless your rich to retcon once u get gatling gun. recommended to leave it as it is and rank or adv other skills

I've bottled this opinion for entirely too long.

I have to get this out; the "advice" on SMG's, I've found to be a bit unfair. I've even spoke to several people ingame that say aside from bosses, SMG's are almost the sole ability they use.

I've discovered that for myself as well.
Frankly, I've done -every- upgrade for SMG and I'm not sure if 60g is considered rich (Considering the 250 limit) but I probably don't plan to retcon any of it.

So, SMG naysayers be damned. Sorry. (I'm not.)

[quettzlcoatl]

In my kind of irrelevant opinion, smg is awesome as a quick attack power (relatively low energy cost, etc), but as an opening shot, I find it hard to match something like gattling gun, or maybe a fully powered up assault rifle (haven't tried this). Also, the spread on smg isn't quite as effective as gattling gun. But both of them are useful still

[fraenhawk]

I'm new to CO and been trying out different silver ATs and am really liking the Soldier. I'm confused though. In your writeup of shotgun blast (and from reading the tooltip for breaching rounds) it gives the bonus from being enraged, but nowhere do I see how a Soldier would ever be enraged. Any searches I do just talk about the enrage and defiant which I thought was tanks only. Is there some innate way that soldier's get enraged?

[PoochieHellhound]

Sept 28, 2011 13:50:16 GMT -5 fraenhawk said:

I'm new to CO and been trying out different silver ATs and am really liking the Soldier. I'm confused though. In your writeup of shotgun blast (and from reading the tooltip for breaching rounds) it gives the bonus from being enraged, but nowhere do I see how a Soldier would ever be enraged. Any searches I do just talk about the enrage and defiant which I thought was tanks only. Is there some innate way that soldier's get enraged?

The only way that I see is to fully maintain Gatling Gun.

[fraenhawk]

Sept 28, 2011 13:51:09 GMT -5 PoochieHellhound said:

The only way that I see is to fully maintain Gatling Gun.

If I'm understanding ranks and advantages though, that would require Listen to Reason, which means you couldn't get Rank 3 like the guide says. So is it worth losing the rank to gain the enraged effect?

[Kieran]

Sept 28, 2011 16:47:59 GMT -5 fraenhawk said:

If I'm understanding ranks and advantages though, that would require Listen to Reason, which means you couldn't get Rank 3 like the guide says. So is it worth losing the rank to gain the enraged effect?

Looking back over the guide, I do not understand why I so excitedly spoke of the enraged side effect of Shotgun Blast. You're right in that Listen to Reason on Gatling Gun is required for the Soldier to become enraged, so quite frankly, I'd just ignore that whole "knock back targets in front of you" as it really doesn't apply to anyone following this guide (R3 is definitely the better choice). I've already gone and removed that line from the guide - lol, I'm trying to remember for the life of me why I was so excited about that when I originally wrote this guide.