BlackSly

To be fair, Blasters probably got the biggest overall boosts to effectiveness. Once upon a time, "Blaster Defense" was a laughable topic. Now it's quite possible to end up with Hovering Blasters that have capped Ranged Defense. Damage increases both as base and for Defiance have them doing more damage.

Yes, other ATs got buffed, but Blasters have improved a lot from the time of "we are looking at Blasters because they underperform at all levels". They are now a solid class, with the best AoE damage in the game (especially if you properly take into account area of coverage and target limits), and while they still have the worst defenses, they at least now can be called "the weakest defenses" as opposed to "defenses? You mean, killing the enemies first?"

Well, as you say, they would get the benefit to their base damage, just not to Containment. And no one argues that Controllers aren't premium teaming ATs. And no one really argues that the reason that they are premium teaming ATs is because of their damage-buffed, Contained Fireballs. So while I think you're correct in the "will mess up controller (damage) values while teamed", I don't think it's an important issue. Seriously, if Controllers get this (relatively minor) nerf and it puts a nail in the whole "OMG, Controllers do too much damage" argument, I think it's quite a worthwhile nerf. Most of the arguments do center around damage-capped, Contained damage.

That would achieve a similar goal, but not exactly the same as respecting damage caps.

Right now, a damage-capped Kin does 400% base damage, and 800% with Containment. By removing the enhanceability of Contained damage, this would have the character do 400% base damage, and 500% with Containment.

By contrast, an unslotted power would do 100% base damage, or 200% with Containment, both currently and under this mechanism. So it's basically a method that lowers the effect of damage increases (via enhancement or buffs) upon Containment.

Another though is this: since we have "ignores Enhancements" and "ignores buffs" separately, we COULD have Containment damage ignore buffs but NOT enhancements. So Controllers who don't have damage buffs wouldn't see a change, but those who do, would find that they could only reach 600% base damage instead of 800% (400% on the base damage, and Contained damage increased to about 200% at best via enhancements).

At one time Defender damage was lowered to keep them separate enough from Blasters.

Since then, Blasters have had several rounds of damage increases, with a base damage increase, Defiance, and several animation improvements (granted, Defenders also had several animation improvements).

It seems that if they were separate enough in 2004, and since then Blaster damage has gone up, while Defender damage has gone down (lowered -Res on a few powers, weaker Fulcrum Shift, although Tar Patch got -Res), it would be possible to improve Defender damage while still keeping them separate from Blasters.

That's especially true given that a Blaster can cap Ranged Defense now, giving them some defensive ability, whereas years ago the defensive abilities of Defenders were way above those of Blasters. Granted, Blasters did need some improvement.

So in conclusion, increasing Defender damage seems possible without taking over Blaster roles. However, don't imagine that you can discuss Defender damage increases and IGNORE their -Res / +Dam powers. Any damage increase should be done considering the effects of their potential -Res powers... it will not do to increase their damage and have Kins, Rads, Storms, TA, Dark, etc, do comparable damage after applying their debuffs, with the same powers, as Blasters.

You misunderstood. We mean a +Dam buff for the power when it is used upon a locked-down target, not a +Dam buff to the user for a period of time.

Currently, a power like Blind does 30 damage (enhanceable), +30 damage (enhanceable) if target is locked. If instead it received a +100% damage enhancement to its values if the target is locked down, then we wouldn't have Containment breaking past damage caps.

Granted, I'm not sure if this is possible to code. The way powers have their abilities coded, I'm not sure that a power can self-affect its own values.

They are in single-target damage, especially once loaded with the procs available to -Def sets.

Agreed. Storm has bigger graphics, but Plant has cooler graphics.

WoW forums are clueless and hardly anyone does meaningful mathematical comparisons there. It's all "Waah, so and so destroyed my X in PvP, thus their class needs nerfing!". I have seen on CoX forums a lot of good math showing the damage of Defenders vs Controllers over these last couple of years, and it pretty much shows:

1) Defenders are, in general, alright in damage.
2) Controllers are, in general, alright in damage. They do more single-target DPS than Defenders, by a bit, and less AoE. Also, by a bit. Their AoE damage is at far higher End cost.

However, there are:
1.1) While Defenders in general are alright in damage, Dark Blast is pretty weak in single-target damage and should get a buff to Life Drain.
1.2) Similarly, FF has no team damage boosting, and no self- damage boosting, and should get something that can be used to increase damage. Best idea seems to be that Repel and Force Bubble are very similar powers, and instead FB should give -Res/-Def within its area.
1.3) Similarly, Empathy has relatively low team damage boosting, and no self-damage boosting, and should get something that can be used to increase their own damage. Absorb Pain may work, though it's hard to see what powers aren't that great for Empathy, and I dislike the idea of merging it towards Pain Domination. An enemy-targeted -Res power on the basis of "I can see where you'd be most hurt" would work, but that would require completely changing a power in the set.

2.1) While Controllers in general do okay damage, /Kin Controllers multiply the damage of the primary. So when you get a primary like Fire, that does 20% more damage, then multiplied by Kin's bonus, it can do 40% more damage than a non Fire, non Kin. It is hard to argue that Fire shouldn't do more damage than other sets since it has weaker control, and Fire is always considered to have more damage as its main characteristic. Similarly, Kinetics isn't an overpowered set on its own, but its main weakness (lack of defensive ability) is perfectly covered by Controllers, while its main strength (damage increase) works great with the higher-damaging primaries to separate Fire/Kin from Earth/Empathy.

The solution to this would be to change /Kin for Controllers to be more defensive, so that its +Dam buffing is weaker, and its -Dam is stronger. But that's clearly a nerf, as Controllers rarely need or use the extra defense, and look to Kinetics purely for damage. So the solution is a nerf, not very surprisingly.

Another solution is to make Containment deliver a +Dam effect. This would be a benefit to sets such as Empathy that don't normally have this effect, and a nerf to Kinetics that normally delivers a lot of +Dam. Still, might be the best solution.

If by Icestorm you mean Freezing Rain, be aware that the rain lasts for 15 seconds and applies debuffs to targets within the debuff area every second, but the debuffs last for another 30 seconds after the last debuff upon the target. Thus even if the AV steps out of FR soon as it's first affected, it will still be debuffed for another 30 seconds.

A mob's resistance to the damage type will resist -Dam debuff for that type of damage.
So a mob with 30% Smashing resist, will resist 30% of any -Dam debuff to its Smashing damage.

However, that also applies if the mob's resistance has been debuffed. So a mob with -30% Smashing resist, will take 30% extra debuff from any -Dam debuff to its Smashing damage.

So Tar Pit (and any other -Res power) will increase the strength of -Dam debuffs that are placed upon their victims.

Well, you'd also end up with capped Defense vs AoE and Melee, not just Ranged.
And with no build sacrifices.

And with 1000% Regen, and enough Recovery to fire a Nuke and still gain Endurance afterwards.
And with +100% Recharge.

Not "about as tough as a SoA", but "about as tough as a SoA with a free fully slotted Regen powerset".

Damage would be lower due to lower base, but defensively it would be the toughest squishy in the game, tougher than Scrappers, probably Brutes, and on a par with most Tanks.

I am pretty sure that they do, since Defenders used to have a higher base damage modifier. I don't recall if this was Beta or Issue 1. They also had higher values on Enervating Field, I think -35% or -40% Resist.

This was also when Blasters had lower damage modifiers.

Those factors combined to make Defenders, with their buff/debuff sets giving them higher survivability, able to do more damage with the SAME blast than Blasters. Rad was the biggest offender since it had easily deployed debuffs and excellent defense, but Storm could do the same with Freezing Rain.

So they lowered Defender base damage multiplier because of -Resist powers.

First, I don't think that it's possible to have the power be both aimed at an ally and aimed at an enemy. That's why I created the "buff pet", he is treated as if he were an enemy in effect, making you "waste" a buff by casting it at the pet instead of at a true ally. Given lower self-buff values, in a team, you would prefer to fire Fortitude at an ally for the higher buffs, but if soloing or in a team small enough to buff everyone including yourself, it wouldn't hurt to spend a Fortitude on the buff pet, since he'll then counter-buff you at lower values.

And second, to reiterate, that's the purpose of the buff pet, to eat up a buff cast, and then return it to you. He IS taking a Fortitude (or an Andrenaline Boost) from an ally, if you want to have the buff yourself. That's counter-productive on a team, if you're only getting 1/3 the values, thus it wouldn't increase Defender strength in teams. At least, not for buffs that you can't keep on everyone.

Both of these statements are hardly "fact" even on the internet.

Why is it so important that Corruptors do a bit more damage, but Defenders doing a bit more buffing/debuffing is inconsequential? The fact that the primary is Buff/Debuff should be a clue that the AT's main focus isn't about doing damage.

I have seen lots of Defenders solo well. Those that have problems will have them in exactly the same place that Corruptors do: dealing with mezzing foes. If they defeat mobs a bit more slowly, they still defeat the same mobs with the same difficulty in most cases, long as you balance your use of both sets. A bit of slowdown is reasonable in return for giving better buffs/debuffs on teams.

There are some points to be made about Controllers, but usually they are just caused by the fact that for some reason the Devs are willing to let Controllers have very strong versions of the buff/debuff powers, even while they correctly gave MMs relatively weak versions of buff/debuff powers. Corruptors are a non-issue, IMO, as they do a bit more damage, and buff a bit worse, and while that's better for soloing faster, it's hardly likely to win a Corruptor a spot on a team over a Defender. MMs play too differently, and have too low buff/debuff values, to compete on the same merits as Defenders.

If Controller buff/debuff values were lower, Defenders would be just fine.

The real advantage, actually, is not just the 16% damage increase. Frankly, I'm not sure that's alone worth it because you also lose Acc and End slotting.

The advantage is that TT is a relatively slow DoT, while the proc damage is instant. You often lose a good amount of potential TT damage due to killing a mob with 1-2 TT effects upon it already. So you're not really seeing that "true 66" damage out of TT over the life of a spawn, it's more like 55-60 due to the lost damage. So the effective damage increase is bigger than 1/6.

Or really good. I mean, who else can manage to leave the topic twice... wonder if he'll pull off a third time?

Almost like he has Thread Teleportation, where he exits the thread through the door, then turns invisible and teleports back into the middle of it so that he can again exit for dramatic effect.

The problem with Ultimo's posts, although they aren't specifically rude, is that he is repeatedly posting with clear and obvious errors. Which he shouldn't be making, if he's going to argue on the topic. He shouldn't be saying "Defenders don't do enough damage when soloing", and use as an example a character who didn't take an available hard-hitting single-target blast.

He's not rude to people specifically, but he is rude to all of us by coming in here and telling us "There is a problem here, and these are the reasons why", and not checking that most of his reasons are clearly wrong. Wrong numbers, wrong character builds, wrong premises. I am offended that someone is spending so much effort on arguing, and so little effort on ensuring that his arguments are correct. Less time posting, and more time checking hist facts, in other words, is what we all want to see. And we're not getting it, and thus the hostility to him.

Imps vs Phant: Imps are actually pretty safe because you are outdamaging any single Imp, thus the aggro is on you. Unless it's something like the Envoy, with a pulsing damage aura, you will keep the AVs aggro on you, and you will stay out of AoE range so the Imps don't get hit. So the Imps easily outdamage Phant... do they beat Phan PLUS perma-PA? That's a tougher one to call, and I think that Illusion gets a bit more damage out of the pets than Fire.

Hot Feet: I think the radius of Hot Feet is enough that you aggro the AV from one side, where the Imps start to fight. Then you Immob the AV in place, and go to the far side. At this point you're able to keep the AV at max Hot Feet range, and if the AV hits you with an AoE, the Imps are still out of the blast radius.

So you have Hot Feet, which is reasonable damage. You also have Ring of Fire doing more damage than SW, because their long-term damage is about the same but SW has a 6 second recharge while RoF has a 4 second recharge. Also, I think both RoF and Char have as their "secondary effect" a slight damage increase, about 10%, over other Immobs/Holds.

But the real key is simple: Containment. Illusion has no Immob, therefore they can only get Containment when the AV is Held. Fire has an Immob, thus the AV is always under Containment, which doubles the damage of their RoF vs SW, and usually of Char vs Blind, as well as the epic blasts.

Even if you don't run Hot Feet due to the endurance consumption, Containment pushes Illusion down in terms of anti-AV damage, enough that it's about average after you add in perma-PA. Meanwhile, Fire is tops in direct damage, and still is right up there in pet damage with Illusion.

Note: Fire is tops in direct damage although for most of the game Mind and Gravity beat it, because by the time you're soloing AVs with epic blasts, their fewer attacks (2 primary vs 3 or 4 primary blasts) plus the epic still fill out an attack chain, and they have the fastest animations. Mind and Gravity beat them as long as Fire's attack chain isn't full, but in Damage/Activation, Fire is the best, and just needs to fill out its attack cycle to be tops overall in sustained DPS.