IF or SF? (in General)

To save me 400k for reinking.
I guess it's MM vs CoC in another guise - but surely an IF does more damage in the long run?
Please note - this is not a "critique my stat" thread - this is my set up and I'm not changing (apart from an AoI when I can afford one), but I'm still curious as to whether an IF could cut it.

IF is quite useless in the game at this point.

Ok, looking at this from the point of view of your strat.


It isn't just SF vs CoC, but ranged vs melee. Try fighting your fightlist without the tattoo. If you can still beat the same people without it, then you're doing your best fighting in melee. In which case the IF might be a better deal, purely because of damage. If you lose people from it, then you know that the ranged attack is what's doing the trick. In which case an IF won't change that.

But remember, with the SF and your tank, you're hitting from both ends, concentrated damage. The IF will do a spread fire, so for the first couple of rounds of melee it might do less overall damage. Spread fire can be easier to counter than the single target attacks.

And AMF is a problem. I may stick up for CoC but it does have it's drawbacks.

The question should really be: FF vs SF... If you can make sure your FF dies before melee (hard to do, I know), an FF is wonderful for clearing out riff-raff and killing lead enchanters with pesky Decay on them. Especially if you use DM, FF can be very, very effective as long as your battles are all done in 4 rounds or less...

Yeah, on your build I would go SF. *smile*

My strat was originally 4E + SF, going for the long haul kill. I then changed the lead E for UC (still not sure I gave it enough of a chance), basically for evasion. I'm still really looking for loooong fights, which is why I thought an IF might be the better bet.
JW - I tried unequiping my tat, lost only a couple out of my top ten and then wondered if what I was doing had any merit.
Half my fightlist last 6 rounds or longer

The reason I asked about unequipping the tattoo, so many teams with two damage dealers don't actually need the second damage dealer for anything other than softening the enemy up.

If your team lasts a long time then the IF may be of equal value to you. Put it near the front on that junction minion with an AoI and see what happens. It certainly does a lot of damage. The trick is keeping it alive long enough to let it do it's damage.

That was my thought. Now - any cheap way of testing it ;-) ?

You could ask to borrow an IF from one of these guys:

http://www.carnageblender.com/directory/browse-by-item.tcl?item_type_id=63&item_type_name=Ice+Familiar&item_type=armor

lol I obviously have an AoF rather than an HoC on ;-)
Thank you very much NS my man