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Post by PoochieHellhound on Mar 15, 2011 14:08:49 GMT -5
Firstly, you will get your second Travel Power at level 35, it's not listed on the F2P matrix because there's no difference between Gold and Silver at that point.
Secondly, if you want a good Travel Power for PvP, no one will argue against me when I say Teleport. Every great PvP build is, or should be, using Teleport, unless you want a challenge or are avoiding it for thematic reasons.
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Post by Susanno on Mar 15, 2011 15:45:45 GMT -5
ok thx^^ i'm preparing for my entry to unrestricted pvp room, i know i'm gonna be slaughtered lol but it won't be that easy so i'm trying to get all what can help me for pvp! thx again, all i need is avalanche now cuz my damage still sucks  |
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Post by TheBlueRabbit on Mar 15, 2011 20:11:59 GMT -5
all i need is avalanche now cuz my damage still sucks Avalanche is a thing of beauty. It's my not-so-mild case of death. |
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Post by Susanno on Mar 16, 2011 13:21:11 GMT -5
oh now i'm all excited! i can't wait for avalanche  my snow storm is good but not enough! it takes an eternity to some ATs! |
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Post by delfinclutch on Mar 21, 2011 9:51:08 GMT -5
Trip report: I've leveled my Glacier to 40, gone through Blood Moon and some lairs, and have to side with tribeca. The Glacier as designed makes a wonderful tank but an iffy DPSer.
The synergies are really nice as you're leveling. Your defenses do nothing but get better and better, and by level 15 or so you've got Invulnerability and Ice Shield and are pretty well set from then on. Between Frigid Air on Ice Shield, Snow Storm and Ice Blast, getting enemies Chilled is pretty easy, and Ice Blast + Hard Frost does excellent chip damage when Tapped. Snow Storm with Eye of the Storm is just awesome; blast a group, then turtle and watch them kill themselves with their own attacks while doing single-digit damage to you and building your energy bar.
It's a long gap between really useful powers (Ice Shield at 14 -> Avalanche at 40), but that's also a testament as to how well the early levels set you up.
Against Blood Moon bosses at L40, I could solo many of them (albeit slowly), or tank quite effectively while the DPS guys did their thing. In a test run against Kigatilik last night, I could get but not hold aggro (the main melee guy held most of that), but I was in no danger and hadn't redone my upgrades specifically for aggro.
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Post by not1stepbackwards on Mar 21, 2011 13:32:44 GMT -5
Trip report: I've leveled my Glacier to 40, gone through Blood Moon and some lairs, and have to side with tribeca. The Glacier as designed makes a wonderful tank but an iffy DPSer. The synergies are really nice as you're leveling. Your defenses do nothing but get better and better, and by level 15 or so you've got Invulnerability and Ice Shield and are pretty well set from then on. Between Frigid Air on Ice Shield, Snow Storm and Ice Blast, getting enemies Chilled is pretty easy, and Ice Blast + Hard Frost does excellent chip damage when Tapped. Snow Storm with Eye of the Storm is just awesome; blast a group, then turtle and watch them kill themselves with their own attacks while doing single-digit damage to you and building your energy bar. Thanks for this insight. I just switched to Snow Storm (w/ Eye of Storm) from Frost Breath (w/ Frost Bite) and the I'm going through missions much faster now. I started noticing this when I found Blocking works real well with the Glacier (as opposed to other ATs), and Snow Storm allows me to take advantage of that. Before, I would use my (really low DPS) Energy Builder. Now, Blocking IS my Energy Builder. I've become an PvE AoE Tank, which from what I've read in the Gold forums on Ice/Fire/Electricity, is a little bit of an unconventional hybrid (which I historically like...in good ol' D&D, I really dominated with Sorceror/Paladin and Cleric/Monk builds). Essentially, the AoE quickly takes care of the mobs that make up most of the missions, while the Tank can deal with bosses well. The trade-off I'm seeing is that this is really PvE-centric and won't deal enough single target DPS for PvP. However, that's something I can live with as my other main toon's a Behemoth. What I got from your post is that the Snow Storm approach is scalable to level 40. What I'm seeing now is that those powers I already have are all the tools I need already. That's real comforting to know. |
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Post by TheBlueRabbit on Mar 21, 2011 13:45:58 GMT -5
One of my favorite crowd-control tactics is to start a group of enemies out with an ice cage. Then, when the rest of the group collapses in to attack the ice cage, maintain your snowstorm until they turn on you. Henchmen level baddies will mostly fall before they can get too many hits in on you.
This works best with melee enemies, such as Qularr drones and Viper infiltrators, but ranged enemies may need to be handled slightly different as they seldom collapse in quite as much.
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Post by not1stepbackwards on May 9, 2011 12:05:45 GMT -5
I just reached level 40 with my Snowstorm Glacier. Truly a great AT.
I ranked up Avalanche with Ranks 2 + 3 and Crippling Strike and found it far superior to Snowstorm.
I'm wondering if I should re-spec the back, investing in something different? I'd like to see what you veterans think.
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Post by PoochieHellhound on May 9, 2011 12:42:39 GMT -5
I just reached level 40 with my Snowstorm Glacier. Truly a great AT. I ranked up Avalanche with Ranks 2 + 3 and Crippling Strike and found it far superior to Snowstorm. I'm wondering if I should re-spec the back, investing in something different? I'd like to see what you veterans think. Thanks to the lingering effect of Snowstorm, it can work alongside with Avalanche, making for a double-AoE cold inferno of destruction at a fixed location. This is mostly useful against bosses and really tough critters, but that's what you mostly will be facing at 40 anyway. Frost Breath isn't really important at 40, since you have so many ways of applying Chill. However, it is a lot faster than using the other ways, since you can tap it and have a bunch of targets chilled in less than a second. It's really your choice. Other than that, I can't give any other suggestions unless you give specific suggestions to what you are considering changing. After all, I don't want to steer you, just direct you Also: Updated my comment on the Level 11 choice to reflect Snowstorm being superior in solo play. |
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Post by underwerekng on May 9, 2011 14:23:16 GMT -5
The lvl 11 choice of Snow Storm/Frost Breath is by no means an easy one. i have lvled my Glacier up to 30 using Snow Storm but with Avalanche on the horizon i am considering retconing back and taking Frost Breath. How the advantages work is my biggest concern.
First up is Accelerated Metabolism this is widely considered a waste of a point. Can this trigger multiple times on a single cast/maintain? If so its presence on 3/4 Glacier AoE skills could mean big energy, if not its reputation is more than justified.
Next is Challenging Strikes. As a Protector role a.k.a. tank this is useful for both agro gain and dmg mitigation, do these stack if used with both Frost Breath and Avalanche? If yes then that's a ton of agro and a 10% dmg reduction. If no then the Avalanche/Snow Storm combo mentioned earlier looks better.
Frost Breath + Shatter with Frost Bite/Crushed Ice looks like a great AoE combo how does this compare to Avalanche/Snow Storm?
Finally and less to do with advantages than PvP, Snow Storm has a DoT component. i use this to kill off teleporters as they try to run away they continue to take dmg and die mid air. I love it. Do Frost Breath or Avalanche have this kind of use?
These are my personal questions regarding the choice. i'd like to hear the opinions of you other Glacier fans before i make my final decision. not1stepbackwards i hope these questions can help you out and not just pile on more confusion.
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Post by PoochieHellhound on May 9, 2011 14:34:27 GMT -5
First up is Accelerated Metabolism this is widely considered a waste of a point. Can this trigger multiple times on a single cast/maintain? If so its presence on 3/4 Glacier AoE skills could mean big energy, if not its reputation is more than justified. Accelerated Metabolism can only activate, to my knowledge, once per power, making it largely a waste of an advantage point. Next is Challenging Strikes. As a Protector role a.k.a. tank this is useful for both agro gain and dmg mitigation, do these stack if used with both Frost Breath and Avalanche? If yes then that's a ton of agro and a 10% dmg reduction. If no then the Avalanche/Snow Storm combo mentioned earlier looks better. The debuff doesn't stack, but you will get the extra threat on both the powers no matter in which order you use them. In other words, if the target already has the Challenging Strikes debuff, they will not get another stack of the debuff, but the extra threat provided by the advantage will still be applied. Frost Breath + Shatter with Frost Bite/Crushed Ice looks like a great AoE combo how does this compare to Avalanche/Snow Storm? I'm sorry to say that I have not done any thorough testing on this point, but I can say as much as the Shatter combo, especially coupled with Cold Snap, Ice Barrier or both, provides high spike damage, whereas Snowstorm/Avalanche provides higher, sustained damage. Spike damage is useful against bigger threats, and even more so in PvP, since almost every passive works the worst against spike damage (barring Lightning Reflexes, I believe). Finally and less to do with advantages than PvP, Snow Storm has a DoT component. i use this to kill off teleporters as they try to run away they continue to take dmg and die mid air. I love it. Do Frost Breath or Avalanche have this kind of use? By 'DoT component' I'm guessing you mean the lingering storm that the Snowstorm power creates, making sort of a DoT in that area. I can say that Frost Breath or Avalanche does not have any lingering DoT effects, but Teleporters are easily shut down by this Archetype through the use of Ice Cage or, if you want to be even more efficient against them, Ice Burst with the Freeze, Dirtbag advantage. |
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Post by underwerekng on May 9, 2011 17:13:34 GMT -5
Thanks for the fast reply, your insights are greatly appreciated.
One last question, the Serrated Shards advantage for Avalanche (and less importantly Ice Impaler for Ice Shards) adds a 10% crit chance and 20% crit severity. How do these increases apply? Does a 5% crit chance become a 5.5% or a 15%?
Again thanks for the help.
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Post by PoochieHellhound on May 10, 2011 1:37:23 GMT -5
Thanks for the fast reply, your insights are greatly appreciated. One last question, the Serrated Shards advantage for Avalanche (and less importantly Ice Impaler for Ice Shards) adds a 10% crit chance and 20% crit severity. How do these increases apply? Does a 5% crit chance become a 5.5% or a 15%? Again thanks for the help. The crit chance is applied directly on top of the crit chance displayed on your character sheet, making a 5% crit chance a 15% crit chance. It is like this for a couple of powers, and they are not affected by any diminishing returns. |
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Post by PoochieHellhound on Jun 26, 2011 13:09:42 GMT -5
Updated the stat recommendations in the guide to reflect that PRE is not needed to tank.
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Post by PoochieHellhound on Jun 27, 2011 8:10:01 GMT -5
Added not1stepbackwards' tanking rundown in my OP.
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my snow storm is good but not enough! it takes an eternity to some ATs!
