An Offensive Guide to Tanker Ice Melee.

Enkmar

1. Introduction

After dispensing much unwanted advice on the forums for more than 5 years now, this will be my first attempt ever at a guide of any sort. Why now and why Ice Melee? And why Offensive? Well, for a while now, it’s been a pet peeve of mine to constantly see the “Ice Melee has bad damage” mantra among the tanker faithful. I’ve posted many rebuttals on these topics, but still, the myth persists, so to set the record straight about just how much offense Ice Melee can output, I thought I’d just write a guide.

First, a bit of history: There was a time, not too long ago, when Ice Melee did in fact deal absolutely sucktastic damage. It was widely regarded to have excellent, if not the best, damage mitigation among all tanker secondaries, but you’d spend about a month trying to whittle down a red boss. Then, due to some impassioned work by many noble Ice Melee tankers (of which I wasn’t really much of a part), the devs granted us much needed buffage, mainly in giving Frozen Aura (FA) a great amount of damage, as well as other minor (and not so minor) buffs, such as extending the range on Frost.

Unfortunately, this change seems to have gone largely unnoticed by many people starting up new tanks who only remember the bad old days when Ice Melee was only known as the “mitigating set.” I will admit that Single Target (ST) damage is still woefully low, and that red boss will still take a long time to put down, but Ice Melee’s Area of Effect (AoE) damage is now among the best that tanks can offer. There have been various analysis by many of the number-crunchers on these boards and one of them by Starsman have found Ice Melee lagging only behind Fiery Melee and Super Strength for AoE effectiveness. Ice Melee also deals cold damage and has a slow component in most of its attacks, which is one of the less resisted damage types in the game. It also has many pure cold attacks (see each individual power description), which means when facing enemies with high Smashing/Lethal (S/L) defense, your attacks will land as if they had no defense at all. Combined with Ice Melee's excellent mitigation abilities, I think Ice Melee is one of the more effective tanker secondaries we have.

A special note on IO slotting and “Frankenslotting” in particular. You’ll find that term used in this guide and in other places often. If you’re not familiar with it, it simply means to take IOs (and Hami-Os) from different sets not paying attention to set bonuses, but just to maximize your +attribute values. Ice Melee is especially good for this, because for its attacks, you can not only pick and choose from melee or (PB)AoE sets, but also from Taunt (for being a tank) and maybe even Slow sets with the added bonus that those sets are usually dirt cheap on the markets. I have some examples of such Frankenslotting below, but always try to mix and match different things yourself to get the most out of your slots (and influence). For a more detailed explanation, check out Fulmens' mini-guide here.

Some disclaimers and thanks: First, thanks to everyone who gave me some great feedback on the guide. Special thanks to Ice_Ember for his fantastic slotting suggestion of the Taunt IOs in certain attacks. I should point out that this guide is also written with the late game and IOs in mind, though I try to throw in some SO slotting advice here and there. Also, Ice Melee is a bit rough going at first, especially if you’re not using Frost very well, which is why my section on Frost under [3. The Powers] is especially long. A lot of people will point to the fact that Ice Melee is a late blooming set, but frankly, many tanker sets are late blooming. Super Strength doesn’t get its signature power until 38, but it’s well worth the effort, and so too is Ice Melee, except there are ways to make the earlier levels more bearable.

2. Gauging the powers.

First, a list:

Ice Melee               Dam      Act        Rech    End       DPE    DPA
Frozen Fists            37.37     1.33      3           4.368     8.56     23.59
Ice Sword              58.72     1.33      6           6.864     8.55     37.07
Frost                     72.06     2.27      11         11.024    6.54     28.73
Freezing Touch       74.76     1           16         10.192    7.34     62.93
Gr. Ice Sword    87.2      2.33     10          10.192    8.56     34.77
Frozen Aura            63.2     2.1        20         18.512    3.41     28.16

These are each attack powers, base damage at lvl 50, their activation times, recharge, end usage, and then two calculations. Damage Per Endurance (DPE) is simply an indication of how “end efficient” a given power is and is the damage divided by the end cost. The higher the number, the less endurance you need to expend for each point of damage dealt. Simple. This number will go up as you both increase the base damage, and decrease the base end usage through slotting, and in fact, if your recovery is high enough, the DPE is largely meaningless, though it might take a long time (and influence) to get to this happy point.

Damage Per Activation (DPA, the last A is also sometimes used as Animation) is how much damage your attack does during the time it takes to activate… and a little more. You’ll notice that it’s not a straight up division of damage/act time because of something called Arcana-time. That is a topic for another guide (not surprisingly written by Arcanaville)—if you’re curious, please by all means research the topic, but rest assured all the numbers in that table are accurate insofar as City of Data is accurate. DPA is the best measure of how effective an attack is at doing damage. A lot of people also calculate Damage Per Second (DPS) on an individual attack, but I feel this is largely meaningless, since if you have no gaps in your attack chain, all short recharge times do for you is allow you to bring your highest DPA attacks up more frequently. It is with this measure that I will make various recommendations below for what attacks to favor and how to slot them.

The three secondary powers not included above are Taunt, Build Up and Ice Patch, because they deal no damage and have no meaningful DPE/DPA data, but I will take about them in the individual power section.

Enkmar

3. The powers.

Frozen Fists
Melee, Minor DMG(Cold/Smash), Foe -Recharge, -SPD

You get this at level 1. In fact, you’re forced to take it at level 1. I wished it wasn’t so, because it’s a weak power. How weak? Both Boxing and Air Superiority have higher DPA values, and believe me, they’re not that high. It recharges fast so it’s always up as a filler, and it has a slow component like all of Ice Melee’s attacks.

Slotting: Early on, you’ll likely need this attack as a filler. It’s unfortunately, but also unavoidable. As you gain more attacks, you should try to use this power as little as possible, and eventually respec out of the slots entirely, or just slot for IO bonuses. I have it 4-slotted with Kinetic Combat for the defense bonuses.

Tactics: Try to use it as little as possible.

Ice Sword
Melee, Moderate DMG(Cold/Lethal), Foe -Recharge, -SPD

Available at level 2, it’s no great shakes for DPA either, but you need something in your ST attack chain and this is your bread and butter attack. Take it, slot it, deal with it. Sorry, that’s about as much good as I can say for this power. It’s just not that good, but you don’t have any choice.

Slotting: Standard melee attack slotting: 5 or 6 slot with an IO set of your choice, or 2 Acc, 3 Dam, 1 End redux or Recharge for SO slotting. I have it w/4 Kin Combats and 1 Crushing Impact A/D/R.

Tactics: This should be your filler attack while your heavier hitters are recharging.

Frost
Close (Cone), Moderate DoT(Cold), Foe -Recharge, -SPD

Available at level 4, this is maybe the least understood and most widely skipped power of the set. It’s also your best attack. Read that again. It’s Your Best Attack. Ever. Better than Frozen Aura (FA). Maybe. See the table above—it has a higher DPA per enemy hit and far higher DPE. So if you’re catching the same amount of critters in Frost than FA, Frost wins. You’ll likely catch more in your radius with FA though, so in practice, Frost is not quite as good, but then if you look at their recharge numbers, you’ll also see that Frost is up about twice as much as FA, so for overall contribution to your damage output, Frost is number 1. Don’t believe me? Run Herostats and track each powers’ damage output over the course of several missions. While playstyles will vary output somewhat, you’ll find that Frost has if not the absolute top, very close to the highest output.

So why is Frost so misunderstood? Two reasons come to mind. First, it’s a Damage over Time (DoT). People hate DoTs. They want immediate impact. They also don’t’ want damage “wasted”, as in hitting an enemy with a DoT and seeing someone else (say a blaster or scrapper) finish your opponent while your own DoT is ticking away. Second, it’s a melee cone, and people generally like their AoEs big. Frost is a short cone. It used to be really short, but nowadays, it has a 10’ range, which is extendable to around 15’. It also has a 90 deg arc, which isn’t horribly wide, but not too narrow either. What this means is that with proper slotting and a little practice, it’s trivial to hit 5 or more enemies in 2 to 3 rows in front of you. It take far less skill and practice to hit twice the number of enemies with Frost than say with Shadow Maul or the ubiquitous Sands of Mu. Do by all means increase that range, since it will allow you to hit more critters with your cone. This is very easy without sacrificing damage or accuracy and the like (too much) with IOs.

Take it at 4 when it becomes available. Slot it as a priority. Use it as often as you have 2 or more foes around you, which really should be all the time. Hell, even against a single foe, it’s not a bad option since it’ll outdamage Frozen Fists at least. Even the DPE isn’t all that bad for 1 critter, and of course it leaps in bounds for end efficiency as you add more foes in the area of effect. See Tactics for how to accomplish this.

SO Slotting: SO slotting really should be avoided, but if you must, 2 Acc, 3 Dam, 1 Rech.
Recommended Slotting: Frankenslotting is very good option for Frost as it allows you to increase your Range with many cheap Damage/Range IOs from various sets while getting adequate Acc, Rech and End redux values. At 47, one of the best possible slotting would be 2 Acc/Rech IOs from the Taunt sets (Mocking Beratement and Perfect Zinger) and 1 Rech from the Mocking Beratement set for additional end bonus. Finish off with 3 Dam/Range Centriole Hami-Os (HO) and you’ll find yourself with 53% Acc and (nearly) ED capped Damage, Range and Recharge. Prior to lvl 47, the Dam/Range IO recipes are also very cheap, though less effective than HOs.
My IO Slotting: 5 Posi’s (all but the Dam/End) and 1 Range IO, mostly for the set bonus.

Tactics: If there are just two enemies in range, use Frost in favor of any other attack save Freezing Touch or FA. If there are three, it’s just FA. Learn to group two or more critters in range with your tanking skills, and kill them en masse. Attacking and “arresting” one enemy at a time is maybe the most painful way to play Ice Melee Also, if you have a nice thick group around you, it’s easy to hit 5-10 foes with frost (try just jumping straight up while aiming down, hitting Frost at the apex of your leap), but if you aren’t quite that crowded, you’ll need to maneuver a bit to maximize your cone. It’s well worth the effort to get some practice at this, and as mentioned above it’s really not hard at all. This is especially important early on when endurance is at a premium and your attack chain won’t be complete and you’ll have gaps in which to maneuver around, circle your enemies and lead them to tight chokepoints. Learn to maximize the use of Frost for its damage and end efficiency and the relatively painful early levels of Ice Melee will go a lot more smoothly.

Taunt
Ranged (Targeted AoE), Foe Taunt

Taunt is like every other tanker taunt. Entirely up to you if you want to take/slot it or not. I’m not going to devote any time in this guide to it, other than to say that an an AoE-oriented tank, you may find Taunt less necessary than with a more ST-oriented set like Energy Melee.

Build Up
Self +DMG, +To-hit

As in with Taunt, Build Up (BU) is the same as with other tanker BU powers. Take it or not at your leisure. I will say BU + Frost + Frozen Aura is a beautiful thing.

Ice Patch
Location (PBAoE), Foe Knockdown

Ah, glorious Ice Patch. The reason people played Ice Melee for years and years despite having really low damage. This power, available at level 20, is so damn good, I took it before taking Stamina. Ice Patch (IP) by itself is better than most of your early shields. In fact, when I’d run low on endurance on my Ice Melee tank, I’d just turn my shields off, cast IP and swing away in relative safety.

What’s it do? It Knocks Down (KD) up to 5 foes in its relatively small, 10’ radius. It’s more than enough though if you’ve properly gathered your foes around you. And even though it only technically knocks down 5 critters at a time, with its fast pulsing and the fact that while one critter is getting to its feet, it may well knock down another, you can actually “control” more than 5 at one time. Best of all, it needs almost no slotting since with just one recharge, it’ll come back in time to keep it more or less perma.

Slotting: 1 Recharge SO or generic IO.
Tactics: Use and use often. Use on choke points, around corners, near objects to protect, etc. Good for team surivival away from you too; if your foes are scattered to the four winds, you can gather to one spot some enemies, “hold” them there with an IP and move to another group to aggro. Beware, the KD will turn into Knock Back (KB) on certain enemies and those who Con low to you. Similarly, stacking IP may also KB even cons and above.

Freezing Touch
Melee, High DoT(Cold), Foe Hold

Another somewhat misunderstood power. This is not a hold that does damage. This is your Best Single Target (ST) Attack… that happens to hold. See the table again. It’s not only IM’s best ST attack, it’s one of the best ST attacks among all tanker attacks. Only Energy Transfer, Seismic Smash and KO Blow have higher DPA values. Freezing Touch (FT) has higher DPA than Incinerate or Greater Fire Sword!

So what’s the problem? Well, FT is another DoT power so it doesn’t seem all that damaging on first glance. Also, let’s face it, its animation (along with that of Frost) aren’t all that impressive, especially compared to something like KO Blow. And I should point out, there are benefits to “Burst” damage where a given power (or short chain of powers) do a whole lot of damage at once regardless of the activation time. If Ice Melee had a 2nd high DPA attack to chain with FT, I’d say its burst potential would be fantastic, but alas, we don’t, and FT by itself won’t quite pack the same punch as some of the aforementioned big hitters, even though it animates quicker and you can be well on your way into another attack in the same timeframe.

Also, it’s a hold. People get distracted by that or are tempted to slot to maximize its mitigation potential. To that I say… Frankenslot! The same 2 Acc/Rech Taunt IOs from Frost, a Mako’s Acc/End/Rech and 3 Peroxes gives FT 74% Acc and Rech, 21% End redux and (near) ED capped Damage and Hold values. Even at lower levels, there's no reason to eschew damage in favor of holds since you can do both if you're willing to delve into IOs and frankenslotting.

Enkmar

I should also mention that because it also holds, its DPE is a bit lower than normal, so you should also keep that in mind when slotting. Depending on your recovery, you might want to consider extra End redux in the mix than what’s above.

SO Slotting: If you absolutely must, I'd go 2 Acc, 3 Dam and 1 End redux, with a Hold SO in favor of one of the 6 slots at your preference. Remeber, this is one of your best attacks.
My Slotting: 4 Kin Combat, 1 Perox HO, 1 Unbreakable Constraint (Purple) Acc/Hold/Rech, again for the IO bonus more than anything.

Tactics: This is your heavy hitter. Use it as you would any other big attack, which is to say early and often. If you have an epic hold (Char, Block of Ice), stack to hold bosses. Use on Sappers and other potentially dangerous foes. Remember that it’s a DoT so if you tag an opponent with only a little life left after the 1st tick, just let it go and the following ticks will finish it. Some practice and you’ll be able to gauge when this applies.

Greater Ice Sword
Melee, High DMG(Cold/Lethal), Foe -Recharge, -SPD

The “heavy hitter” of the set that’s really not. Again, see the table above. Its DPA is laughably low, especially for a late, heavy power. It’s lower than Ice Sword, for goodness sakes. By way of comparison, Greater Fire Sword does almost twice the damage in the same activation period and Seismic Smash does even more damage and faster to boot! This is a totally skippable power, and in fact, I heartily encourage you to do so. Both Ice Blast and Fire Blast in the epic pools have higher DPS values and recharge faster (Fire Blast has a higher DPE too). There is zero reason to use GIS over either of those two powers since you only need to wait a few extra levels to pick up your Epic blast.

Frozen Aura
PBAoE, Moderate DMG(Cold), Foe Sleep

Ah, finally, our very own Foot Stomp (FS). Yes folks, FA now does Foot Stomp damage, albeit without Rage to back it up, but hey, we get Build Up. Oh, it’s a sleep. I don’t care about sleeps. I know there are those of you that like the sleep aspect of this power, and can leverage it to good ends. You don’t need me to tell you how to do that. Just make sure that if you do want to use the sleep aspect of this power, not to pick a primary with a damage aura (Fire, Ice (optional, I guess), Dark, Stone), because they’ll just get woken up a 1/2 second after being slept. Also, don’t use on top of Ice Patch which will also wake stuff up.

Anyway, it’s a great PBAoE (Player Based AoE) that does impressive cold damage in a 10’ radius around you (if you’re used to FS, it’s a smaller radius than FS’s 15’). Use in conjunction with Frost and maybe Build Up, it’ll quickly kill most minions around you and put a serious hurt on Lts. 5/6 slot it fast and use it and love it. Straightforward, really.

My Slotting: 6 Obliterations. You can also Frankenslot to your liking. I highly advise against slotting for sleep, even if you’re tempted to slot the (relatively) cheap purple Sleep set. FA does far too much damage to waste its potential as an attack.

Tactics: Er, use, and use a lot.

4. Tactics, builds and other thoughts.

So as I’ve repeatedly stated, Ice Melee is terrible at ST damage, but great at AoE. So how do you leverage this? Well, for one thing, don’t fight single foes. Choose your missions and select the even numbered difficulties to increase spawn size rather than just making them difficult. If you only see 2 or 3 in a spawn, lead them to the next spawn and fight them together. Herd! Yes, that’s a dirty word these days, and not always efficient (in fact, usually not), but it can still work in many instance.

Better yet, just team a lot, and bigger the better. On big teams, you’ll get large spawn sizes that you’ll be able to mow down with Frost and FA. During these fights, your ST attacks should be saved for the bosses so that as you whittle down the minions and Lts with your AoEs, your ST attacks also take down the boss at around the same rate. This is fairly basic fighting tactics for any ST & AoE mixed damage dealing, but IM really needs to pay attention and not waste a FT attack on a mere minion, unless it’s to hold something dangerous.

As for attack chains and builds and such, they really depend so much on your primary and epic selections, global recharge and other factors so I hesitate to say too much in this guide other than to generalize. So… some generalizations:

Attack chains should lead with FT, incorporate an Epic Blast and Ice Sword as your ST fillers, but more to the point, try always to hit 2 or more foes with Frost (see the Frost section again). Really, avoid using Frozen Fists and you shouldn’t even have GIS to rely on.

Good primary combos are Ice (slow and more slows), Fire (Burn + Ice Patch = Win) and Stone (biased, since that’s what I run, but this really is the ultimate in toughness). Really though, any primary combo can work well. Invul, WP & Shields all have playstyles that cater to gathering many foes around you, which is where Ice Melee is most effective. Dark can also mix Cloak of Fear and Ice Patch for some serious PBAoE mitigation.

As for epic pools, I really like Pyre & Arctic Mastery, not only for their very effective AoEs, but for their ST holds that you can select at 41 that you can stack with FT. Earth gives you a hold, but not til later, and it and Energy offer very little in the way of added damage, esp the ST variety which IM needs. Ice Blast, Fire Blast and Ring of Fire all offer better ST DPA values than all but Freezing Touch in IM’s arsenal, sad as that sounds (Char and Chilblain don’t fall too far behind either). I’m particularly fond of Arctic since it matches the theme nicely, and combined with Frost & Ice Patch, you can make sure most things stay within the radius of Ice Storm for its duration, which does more damage than Fireball, though it recharges slower. Having said that, sometimes it’s very good to have mixed damage types; for example if you’re faced with foes with heavy cold resistance or damage. As rare as they might be, they exist and you might want a nice Fireball to throw in their direction.

this guide form offical from view the full story http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=186523

hope it useful