CoH Power Pools

Please note that these tips are based on my opinions and style of play. They work for me but may not work for everyone. There are many ways to successfully play coh while having great fun.

CoH Tip No.1 - Pool Powers
Yay! After 440 hours of play, I hit level 40. Weeeee. After all the hours I worked behind the counter at Steve's Technology Shack. Starley worshipped my new status for a few seconds, and then we got jiggy. CoH has been excellent fun, and for the next few days, I want to blog on some of the things that helped me get to level 40. I think some of these ideas will have you levelling faster and having more fun in CoH. I don't consider myself a power leveller, but I do consider myself and efficient player that avoids wasting time.

My first tip is one of the most important. If I could choose any three weapons or powers, the ones I am going to show you today, are the ones I would choose every time. The great thing is that they are pool powers, and so anyone can choose them. I found out about the three powers used together from some excellent guides written by early power levellers.

My favorite three powers are

Hasten
Super Speed
Stealth

Here is where you can find them.

Hasten
I would start with Hasten. Hasten makes every weapon you have shoot faster. Hasten makes all your heals and skills, recharge sooner. Hasten makes everything you own, better. You turn it on and forget about it. I used to time it but I forget the stats...I think it speeds you up 20%-30%. Hasten makes you a more efficient hero. Hasten should be six slotted. Most people six slot it with recharges. With six, it is always on. With five, it is down 5 seconds. I prefer to five slot it with recharge and one slot it with defense. Heros can never have too much defense and this is a great bonus way to get some.

Stealth
I have all four invisibilities, and the best one of the bunch is stealth. It was sadly the last one I picked! Stealth is awesome...it allows you to be almost invisible, yet you can still fight. You can get maybe 5' away from a bad guy and they can't see you. You can even touch them if you're brave and most of the time they can't see you. This allows you to:

- position yourself better at the start of a fight
- run through town hunting and not aggro
- solve boring missions fast by running to the end

Stealth should be six slotted. Since I am an endurance burner, I slot it with one endurance and five defense. Yep! Stealth is another secret cool power that helps you with your defense. Check it out, with Hasten and Stealth, now you have six defense working for you already. You will find you die less often in battle than your buddies.

There is one drawback to stealth and that is that you travel a little slower. This is where the next power comes in. Remember, these three powers all work together.

Super Speed
Travel powers tend to cause religious wars, but take my word, this is the best travel power. I have Teleport and used it from maybe up to level 25. I then got superspeed and wow...it made the game 100x more fun. Let me start with the drawbacks to superspeed and there are a couple:

- burns endurance
- small accuracy reduction
- get stuck in holes in boom town

You can fix the endurance with an enhancement. I leave super speed on all the time and I'm level 40, so the accuracy penalty can't be that horrible...I honestly didn't even realize there was this penalty until I read it today. In some cities, boomtown and a couple others, you might also need hover or tp or friends. SuperSpeed is not good in these cities, but honestly, I bet I never spent more than 5% of my time in such cities and if you go into them with a group, you should be ok if you ask politely for a tp if you fall into a hole. :)

And now for the good news...SuperSpeed rocks. You tear around cities, you hunt way faster, you sell enhancements way faster, you can solve missions that are hell when you miss something by running back faster. Running fast is really fun! The fastest travel power of all is teleport, but that is only in a wide open space! 90% of the time you are in a city with buildings, or in a map, or hunting. SuperSpeed is the fastest "practical use" power.

Now check this out...using SuperSpeed with Stealth, is almost total total invisibility. In 40 levels I have only been seen four times and I am guessing the times I have been seen are from other hero aggro. Snipers can see everyone so they don't count. Every day I run up to badguys and stand beside them to plan my attack and with SuperSpeed and Stealth, I am safe and happy.

Try these three powers on your character and I think you will be very happy with them. :) Here is a screen cap of how mine are slotted. I plan to three or four slot SuperSpeed someday. SS maxes speed out with two slots. Since I need one for endurance and stealth slows it down...I might try and four slot it on the way to 50, but you really only need the one slot for it to be hella useful.

For newer players, you don't get your travel power until I think 14, so you should take hasten before that so SuperSpeed is ready when you are.

An Alternative Route
Here is one other way you might go with the three powers. I don't consider this path as good as the one above. You could go Stealth, Combat Jump, SuperJump. SuperJump is super fun and probably the second best travel power. Combat Jump is excellent defense. The trouble with these three is that hasten is important and so I would still want to take it at some point.

I just talked to Starley who uses both fly and superjump and she said that superjump is fun, but she would take fly over SJ since its more passive and simpler to use. Starley also made a great point "2 travel powers is a good idea though". I totally agree. Once you get higher up, it never hurts to have a second travel power.

Re-Roll
You don't have to re-roll. I was teleporting my lips off until mid 20s and then discovered SuperSpeed. I had taken all the invisibilities and finally tried stealth. I think players are too quick to reroll. There are no horrible choices and there is always time to pick things in the future. :)

Coming Tips
CoH Tip No.1 - Pool Powers
CoH Tip No.2 - Defense
CoH Tip No.3 - Enhancements
CoH Tip No.4 - Maxing XP
CoH Tip No.5 - Missions
CoH Tip No.6 - Grinding