Biography

Copied from Danneth

Update: As of 14.01.2014 (01.14.2014 for you 'muricans) I am now Blue prestige. woot :)


Why should I play Cyclops? Pros and cons:

Pros:
Good party buffs with veteran command and tactical command.
Aoe CC cleanse with rallying command
Instant resurrection of a party member with veteran command
Great aoe dps

Cons:
Survivability hurt by dodge nerf
Spirit regen "fix" nerfed Dps and build diversity
Fighting tree is weak, bland and uninspired



Now let's talk about Cyclops's build. Why i choose to use the abilities I have listed, and Why I do not use some of his others.


These are the skills that I max. There are many other viable options that Can also be maxed.

The "Max" Skills: skills that I choose to max at 20 points:


1 : Optic Barrage or 1 : Channeled blast. One or the other, do not max both. Both of these skills are great for what they do. Barrage provides powerful, easy to use single target dps, all you need to do is hold the button down on the target to keep firing.


Channeled blast, also provides decent single target dps (although, on it's own, not as good as barrage) but also can be used for AoE purposes. Due to an exploit however, it is possible to have this skill deal more single target dps than optic barrage via what the community have come to call "twitching". In order to twitch the skill, you must aim channeled blast at the target, then quickly sweep channeled blast left and right (off the target and then back onto it). If you do this quickly enough, you can actually get "4" ticks per second instead of 2. While this exploit will be fixed in the future, It provides cyclops with a better ttk than barrage, at the cost of less mobility.

1 : Ricochet blast Is easily cyclops's best basic, And will wipe out most non elites on the screen really fast. This skill always bounces 8 times no matter how many points you put in it, but the damage increases a lot, so it is a definite max.


1 : Concussive force. This skill is great now! it provides a very large damage bonus on energy attacks. Worth maxing for sure. Note that this is a toggle not a passive. You must toggle this skill on, reserving some of your spirit, to use it,


1 : Uncanny focus will provide cyclops with a large amount of spirit regen per second, as well as a "pym's shrinking serum" effect, in which dodging will provide spirit back (although a percentage amount and not a flat amount). Note that the spirit regen effect does not scale, but the dodge amount and percentage of spirit gained when dodging and attack does. Because of this, I advise maxing this skill. Cyclops is very squishy, and so any amount of extra dodge can and will help him a lot. Note: Either max this or defensive tactician. If you want to max both, then just put 1 point in sweeping kick.


1 : Precision combat is a passive that lowers your spirit costs for your abilities and grants spirit on kills, and gives you a chance to cause a bleed to targets when you hit with any power. Now that the bleed has been moved here from explosive blast, this shall be maxed instead.


1 : Veteran command has changed significantly since I quit, and returned. It now grants a huge damage rating and attack speed buff (Optic barrage scales very well with attack speed) and will revive a nearby ally. Very useful for midtown Manhattan bosses, and incredibly useful for the cow commanders (where your allies will more than likely die in 2 hits) at least 1 point is a must for any cyclops build. Edit: hiimjoc from the marvel heroes forums (red cyclops player) has pointed out that veteran command seems to be bugged and is not guaranteed to resurrect a nearby player. While I have never seen it fail to resurrect, make sure to take this into account. You may want to use it solely for the dps boost until this is fixed. This skill is much more useful in a group than when soloing. if you do not group for x defense or cow levels very often, I advise putting the points into another skill (martial arts or defensive tactician) and leaving this at 1 point.

After maxing out these skills, you'll still have a few points left over from quests and such. These points will go into your 1 point wonder skills:



1 : Tactical command marks enemies in an area with a debuff which will increase you and your allies damage dealt to them, while reducing the damage caused to you. One of cyclops's useful party abilities. After patch 2.1, this ability's vulnerability and weakness no longer scales, only it's duration. Keep at one point and put your spare points into.


1 : Combat roll is a must have for any cyclops build. It can get you out of most sticky situations, and obviously help you get around the map a lot easier. Not really much to say here as it is similar to most rolls.


1 : Rallying command is cyclops's crowd control cleansing ability. What sets this cleanse ability above others is that it is actually aoe. Anyone around you that has been affected by crowd control will also be cleansed of it, and gain a brief cc immunity. putting more points into the skill extends the duration of the cc immunity. Decent in pve. Amazing in pvp.


1 : Martial arts is a new passive skill in the fighting tree that provides cyclops with a passive defense bonus and crit rating to physical attacks. While the crit sadly doesn't benefit you, the passive defense bonus will help you. Definitely put 1 point into this skill at least. I usually put my leftover points here.

:1 : sweeping kick. This skill is actually useful now! It provides a fairly decent damage rating boost (which will be buffed with the punchclops unique and other uniques and artifacts). However, after using this skill for a fair amount of time, I have decided that it isn't worth cancelling barrage / channeled blast to run / roll / ziggurat up to your target to kick them, and as of such, I have decided it will be best to keep it at 1 point and

Other viable skills: Cyclops has other Viable skills which can be taken to 20. While I personally do not max them, they are certainly viable and can be powerful in some situations.


1 : This is a viable alternative to sweeping kick, and fairly useful in a channeled blast build. If you prefer the defense buff to the damage buff then you can use this instead. With the punchclops glove unique, this will have a pretty decent rank as well.


1 : optic devastation. This skill deals great damage again! Yay! the reason I don't use it is because the damage seems to be bugged at the moment, as the damage it deals seems to be completely random.

Situational skills: These skills may be worth a few points at lower levels or pvp, but are rarely useful at higher levels / out of pvp.



1 : Optic blast, the basic that you will use before getting ricochet blast. This skill deals 1.5x damage to slowed targets, but most bosses will be immune to your slows due to their cc reduction effects, and actually deals less dps than optic barrage at higher ranks, even with the slow.


1 : Wide beam is Cyclops's first aoe ability before gaining ricochet blast. Worth 1 point to help you out at the lower levels, but not really worth any more as it will be quickly outclassed by ricochet blast.


1 : Cunning blast is useful for kiting in pvp (as your rolls will have a cooldown) but in pve they don't. Only really useful for pvp.


1 : Side roll causes cyclops to roll to the right of where he is facing (or around the target if you are mousing over one) and provides him with a flat dodge bonus. Harder to use than combat roll, but provides a flat dodge bonus for 5 seconds after using. In my opinion, Cyclops gets enough dodge from the other 2 passives, but it may be worth finding some gear that grants this skill at a high level.


1 : Defensive tactician grants a passive dodge rating aura to you and your allies. While the dodge rating to yourself is not as good as uncanny focus, It will still help your survivability by quite a bit, and a higher dodge rating will increase the likeliness of gaining spirit back from uncanny focus, and of course, will help your allies out as well (they'll love it if they're using pyms shrinking serum :) ) Note, as of patch 2.1, this skill gives the same dodge rating as uncanny focus. Due to diminishing returns, I would advise maxing only 1 of the dodge passives, and maxing martial arts if you want a second defensive passive.


Useless skills: some of cyclops skills are pretty much useless atm. whether it being due to not enough spirit to maintain or just flat out not enough damage. These skills should be avoided at all costs:



1 : piercing blast is cyclops's 3rd basic, is learned later than ricochet, deals less dps and is much less likely to hit multiple targets. avoid.


1 : Explosive blast. This skill was good after 2.1, but the bleed was changed to precision combat after 2.12. Even after the damage buff, this skill isn't worth it. instead max precision combat.

Note, the punchclops skills could have been viable this patch, but the dodge nerf ruined that opportunity. once again avoid these


1 : tactical kick. bad animation, poor damage. avoid.


1 : Team leader. On paper, this ability seems fairly useful. bonus experience per kill seems amazing right? well, not really. it doesn't affect experience orbs at all, and most of your experience will come from orange legendary quest orbs. Tumedus, who I consider to be one of the top cyclops players at the moment, did the maths and came to a conclusion that this skill is simply not worth it. A screenshot of his post on the forums can be found here.



Even after putting points into your 1 point wonders, you will still have a few points left over. There are 3 abilities that I can think of that are worth putting the rest of the points into, and why


1 : Martial arts: Provides you with extra defense rating. Since you're most likely high into Dodge DR, defense rating will most likely end up being your next best best defensive stat.

1 : Rallying command. Extra points will increase the duration of cc immunity after the cleanse.

1 :Defensive tactician. Provides a decent amount of dodge to you and your allies.

Gear choices, costume affixes and cores


Now that we've allocated all of our skill points, lets take a look at the gear we will be using.


Weapon slot: Cyclops currently has 2 uniques that beat pretty much every cosmic weapon. those are Phoenix force Visor and Ruby quartz sunglasses. After patch 2.1, I would reccommend the sunglasses. Cyclops has a lot more useful abilities in his optic tree now. However, the visor is still viable, especially due to a bug which is causing the visor to proc on the bleed of explosive blast.

Armour slot 1: I went with clan rebellion bodysuit. A good cosmic that gives spirit, reduced spirit cost on optics powers, health, power duration and a grant to one of the "3" point dump skills could be viably used in it's place though. Tactigon is also a great and viable choice if you can find one.

Armour slot 2: I wouldn't recommend the punchclops unique here. Instead you'll want some gloves that give some of the following "+ max spirit, reduced spirit cost for optics powers, + max hp, + Power duration (longer veteran command) and a grant for one of the 3 spirit dump abilities (timely renewal, concussive force and rallying command) There may be a "all heroes" unique which you may use here, but I haven't found anything that would suit cyclops well yet.

Note, The punchclops glove is quite useful now, even if you aren't playing punchclops. The +'s to the tree increase uncanny focus and martial arts, increasing your survivability, and sweeping kick increases your damage.

Armour slot 3: I would use x factor mutant hunter boots. While they Don't give the reduced spirit costs for any powers, Phoenix force visor already gives a LOT for optic barrage, which is where you will dump quite a lot of your spirit, and these boots give a large amount of bonus spirit. The proc is very nice for in parties (although not too great when soloing)

Armour slot 4: Headmasters leather jacket. Yes, this is a mask slot for some reason. the damage rating is what made me choose it, but it gives what you need on a head slot, which is crit rating. It gives brutal rating instead of crit damage sadly, but it gives you quite a bit of attack speed (barrage scales very well with attack speed).


Legendary item, Artifacts and relics.


For relic, use lemuria, It scales the best out of all of the other relics, and gives you more survivability.

The legendary Item which I use is the Golden bow of apollo. I currently have it at rank 3. Cosmic control rod and gungnir however are also viable. I personally do not like cosmic control rod, as I am not a fan of it's rank 2 and 4 affixes (For me punisher synergy is enough).

This is what the rank 3 proc looks like:


I have listed the artifacts which I use above, although there are a few other options you could choose from.

Advance starstone tooth, suggested by Hiimjoc (Red cyclops player) from the forums, Could be a viable alternative to starstone tooth. He says , quote on quote, " I can contribute to the alternative gear part by suggesting to put advanced starstone tooth there. I've been using it over oculus ouroboros and have been very successful with it. I believe that it could be better than OO because it gives 2 really important defensive stats for Cyclops as well as a health on hit proc to go with ricochet's good proc rate. I use it along with a life leech core and I'm still at max energy due to having the clan rebellion bodysuit and the cosmic control rod."

Advanced flames of the faltine: Suggested by Tumedus. in his own words, If you have a lot of crit rating, this is a still a great choice, even after the nerfs.

Shield motion tracker: Suggested by Tumedus, for if you want to be able to see red dots on the map

Adv kree hyper optics: An alternative to the above, depends if you prefer crit over damage rating

Ziggurat of kargul: Gives a nice amount of crit chance and damage, but would be used for the teleport. A viable alternative to combat roll (beware it uses your hp as the cost not spirit!)

Xerogen crystal: Suggested by tumedus. More of a dps increase than non advanced metasensory array, but doesn't give the +1 to all skills. personal preference.

medallions


Now onto the medallions.

Doctor doom: In my opinion, this medallion is now king on cyclops. Every stat that it gives is useful on cyclops, from bonus spirit to power duration. Power duration is so useful on cyclops now

Mandarin and electro. Powerful proc medallions, the bleed from explosive blast is bugged and is proccing these way more often than it should. After patch 2.1, Procs are not as good as they used to be. I would suggest against using these for now.

Madame hydra: Decent for soloing, great for partying. Damage rating to you and nearby allies and also a chance to proc an invulnerability shield to you and nearby allies when you are hit.

Affixes and costume cores

There are quite a few affixes you could choose from. I would choose from one of the following:

Damage rating: I recommend this.
Critical rating: (Not damage on crit, which is inferior to Damage rating)
Dodge rating: More survivability and more uncanny focus procs (beware diminishing returns!)
+ Max health: If you fear you're going to hit diminishing returns with extra dodge.

I would choose to use one of the above in all 4 slots in the costume, but you could mix and match if you wish.

For the core, I would say that all of the following are viable:
+1 energy
+1 speed
%Life on hit
25% hp and spirit on medkit
invulnerability on medkit

I went with energy and lifesteal.

That about concludes my guide. If you feel I have missed anything, or wish to contribute, please either email me at "d.bond6464@gmail.com" or please comment in my cyclops guide post on the forums, which can be found here
http://forums.marvelheroes.com/discussion/49479/i-m-back-updating-cyclops-guide-as-we-speak#latest
edit: In case the link doesn't work (marvelbase doesn't seem to like direct linking to other sites) try this http://forums.marvelheroes.com/discussion/49479/i-m-back-updating-cyclops-guide-as-we-speak#latest



Special thanks:
Shonailo: pointing out typos
Tumedus: for the numbers behind team leader and for contributing other useful information
hiimjoc: contributing information
testmonkey: contributing information
http://cooltext.com/: Image hosting (optics, fighting, tactics Logo´s)
Cool Text: Generador de Logotipos y Gráficos.
Imageshack: for hosting my alternative builds





11.8.2013 v1.0: Guide released.
11.8.2013 v1.01: Fixed a typo, thanks to Shonailo for pointing it out.
12.8.2013 v1.02: Added more line breaks to make finding a specific part of the guide easier.
12.8.2013 v1.03 Fixed some more typos and errors. Added Logo´s to make finding the specific sections of cyclops skill tree much easier.
12.8.2013 v1.1: Quite a good update! my guide now contains alternative builds within my guide. Buildception!
13.8.2013 v1.11: Added Juggernaut medallion as a possibility to increase survivability.
15.8.2013 v1.12: Updated metasensory array to prove that it is viable. Thanks to Poghy for pointing this out! Also added Pym shrinking syrum as an artifact which shouldn´t be used!
17.8.2013 v1.13: Updated guide for 1.14. No channeled blast fix boooooo D:
21.8.2013 v1.2: Build change! updated for patch 1.15. Channeled blast fixed and is great! moved old build to alternative builds.
06.12.2013 v2.0: Big update! I'm finally back!
20.12.2013 V2.1: updated for patch 2.1. I feel like i may have missed updating a few abilities. if you notice something out of place please let me know.