Curveball

(GOOD wtf.)

A few nights ago I created a fire/fire tanker because I never played one before. It was a lot of fun, it was a lot like playing a Scrapper with more hit points. I then created a fire/fire brute because I always create brute versions of the tanks I play...

...holy cow. The damage. The raw, unslotted damage...

Fury combined with fire is just downright scary, ladies and gentlemen. Terrifying. One-shotting minions? Dropping bosses after going through an attack chain once, maybe twice? Watching your damage field tick up as you build fury and having a lieutenant you hit once drop because of it?

wtf. That damage is addictive.

It will be interesting to compare the tank vs the brute when they both get to 22 and can start slotting the big kid IOs. Right now the brute is actually more survivable because of the sheer speed at which he takes down enemies, but I suspect in the higher levels that might begin to flip in the other direction. For the moment... yeesh.

Ah, I knew it was cross-faction, didn't know it was cross-server.

CJ + Weave looks like a good starting point. Do tankers get higher bonuses from those powers, or is it just their primaries where their defence bonuses are higher than other classes?

I may go with acrobatics, simply because the recipes for the IOs, while extremely cheap compared to, say, LotG, are still more than my mid-level tanker can afford right off the bat. Last night they were trading for 10-15 million on Virtue.

Yes but if you get the debuff combo it stacks with bruise. Sure it's not as useful when you get the top two combos... but you need something till then.

So... if someone has an attack that does 10% smashing and 90% energy, but my highest defence is smashing, then that is the defence used against the entire attack? That's interesting. Most melee attacks (not all, but most) have some element of smashing or lethal to it, so I guess that's why everyone says s/l defence is the best bet for close combat defence?

Yeah, I get it now. Thanks for clearing it up everyone -- the defense values make a lot more sense the way you guys explain it.

Ha! Well, that's a lot easier to understand.

Thanks for the clarification.

"Softcapping Defense" (i.e., hitting the magic 45% mark) is, apparently, a very good idea. So I started looking into figuring out how to do it, and my brain immediately locked up.

The problem is, it looks like you have to add at least two, maybe three sets of defense categories together in order to figure it out, and I'm not sure I properly understand how to do this. I'm going to describe what I see. Someone tell me if I understand this properly...

When I look at the Defense category in the combat attributes window, I see TWENTY different categories of defense, which can be, I think, separated into three groups:

Base Defense

Ranged/Melee/AOE defense

Smashing/lethal/Fire/Cold/Energy/Negative/Psionic Defense

If I understand this right:

Base Defense is a value that can work against any kind of attack.

Ranged/Melee/AOE is a value that can work against a specific method of attack delivery -- i.e. Ranged is single-target attack from a distance, Melee is single-target attack up close and personal, AOE is attack hitting multiple targets.

The rest of the values are for specific damage types.

When I look at these categories, it looks like you need to add your base + method of attack + damage type defenses together to get your entire defense against a specific kind of attack.

If this is true, then powers like combat jumping and weave are very desirable, because (and this is just based on what I'm seeing in this window, I could be completely off here) the value for these powers are being used THREE TIMES -- they show up in the base calculation, then show up AGAIN in the method category, and yet AGAIN in the damage type calculation.

Is this right? That would mean a tanker with combat jumping (2.5%) would actually have a 7.5% defense bonus against all types of attacks, unslotted. Though it's possible I'm being fooled by a very poorly designed layout of information, and the Base Defense isn't intended to be considered a distinct value, in which case you're still getting a 5% defense bonus against all types of attacks, unslotted.

Am I interpreting that information correctly? Or is there another/better/more accurate way of reading it? And how do I manage to reach the soft cap without this headache driving me into a blind, desperate rage?

Freaking math. Thanks a lot devs.

Hey, thanks for the responses! Of course they have spawned more follow up questions. Sorry for the question aggro.

Re. knockback protection: if the best solution is to buy io's, when should they be bought? How expensive are they? For the most part I ignore io solutions in posts because they're always posted as part of a "this is my end build" description and I assume (perhaps incorrectly) that it doesn't reflect what the build is like level 1-49. I can't imagine effectively having no knockback protection at levels 1-49.

Re. taunt, yeah, I reckon it's still invaluable, I just figured fire was sort of a built-in taunting machine with the aoe damage field combined with gauntlet.

Re. defense... if you basically get all your defense through io set bonuses, then doesn't that mean you don't hit the defense cap till 50? Or until you get several billions worth of influence to buy it all, which is still basically 50? If defense is so important for survivability, how do you actually get to to 50? I hope that doesn't come off sounding snarky, it's genuinely something I don't understand, partially because I really don't understand the way the defense soft cap works. I know 45% is the magic number, I know combat jumping will give you 2.5% and weave will give you, uh... I can't remember... maybe 5%? That's 7.5% defense for a fire tanker, and the rest has to be built in with ridiculously expensive io set bonuses. That's a lot of work, and by the time you get to a level where you can afford to bump up your defense to the magic 45, wouldn't you already have come up with other ways to survive all the content you had to go through to get the influence you needed to hit the 45? In which case, why bother?

(Again, this is from the perspective of someone who doesn't grasp the mathematics behind it. Be gentle.)

Oh, one other question:

fire/ doesn't seem to have any knockback resistance, and in one of the guides I saw (i16, I think) the main suggestion was to slot one of your powers with an io that provided knockback resistance. Is there any reason why Acrobatics couldn't be used in its place? The main advantage of the io is that it doesn't cost end, but I think fire/ only has two toggles anyway...

So last night I realized that I'd never really played a fire/fire tank before, and I figured I'd give it a shot.

He was a lot of fun in low level Praetoria... he felt more like a scrapper than a tank, he just plowed through everyone without stopping. End wasn't really an issue either, though I expect that will change at higher levels. But I had some questions, and I've done some research (looking at guides in the forums, etc) but since there seem to be some important changes to the set since the last guide was published I was hoping some experienced fire tankers could chime in:

1. How necessary is taunt? I know taunt is a useful power because it cuts into the affected targets ability to use ranged weapons, but I would think of all tanks a fire/fire isn't going to have any trouble generating and keeping aggro. Is this generally true? Is there anything specific taunt does that a fire/fire can't do? (other than attracting targets from a distance?)

2. It seems to me that because the fire/fire powers focus on resists and a heal rather than defense (there isn't any defense at all in the set, right?) there's really no point in trying to hit the defense cap at higher levels. In general it seems the play style should be "resist damage for as long as you can, then hit your heal, resist damage for as long as you can, then hit your heal, resist damage for as long as you can, then hit your heal." Is this generally true? and if so, what supplemental powers should I get to make that easier?

3. The tier 9 power for fire/ seems very interesting. It appears as if you could legitimately make faceplanting a part of your tanking tactic: essentially you use your fire powers to get as much aggro as you can, everyone is focused on you, your defenses crumble, you die, then you come back, stunning the entire group long enough for you to get your toggles back and then you use burn and they all die a horrible firey death. That looks like it could work from the outside. Would it work in practice?

and finally...

4. How does burn work these days? The last fire/fire guide I saw was written for i16, and I thought in i18 they removed the fear component, at least to a certain extent? Is it closer to the OMG levels it had in i1?


Thanks for your help. Fire/Fire is a combo I really don't have any experience with at all, so advice from people who have actually used it will be invaluable!

I think I've actually turned off bloom completely. That helps some but not completely.

One of the things I've noticed about both areas is that they have rooms that are freaking huge, and in those huge rooms there tends to be some kind of nonstandard graphics -- either the weird blue mist in the warehouses or the semi-transparent tubes and consoles in the tech areas. This is contrasted with the tunnel maps, which also have large rooms but they don't really have any sparkly effects, they're just dim and... well... tunnel-ish.

It's a shame you can't set multiple graphics settings -- i.e., set effect to x indoors, y outdoors.

Usually when I'm playing I find framerates are usually a problem in outdoor zones -- those are usually the really graphic-intensive zones that hit my graphics card. In Praetoria, however, I find the outdoor zones are usually fine... it's the INDOOR zones that really kill my framerate.

To be specific:

- any zone that uses the "high tech laboratory" layout (with the semi-transparent windows and metallic floors)

- warehouses that use the weird blue mist in the big warehouse rooms

Whenever I get into those areas my framerate drops. Sharply.

What are those rooms doing that the city zones aren't? It's really weird.

But I'd just be taking it for the set bonus, right? Because with a 180 second recharge it would be a pretty useless taunt power...

Another AOE taunt would be nice but even slotting for recharge I don't think I'd get much use out of a taunt with a 180sec base recharge. Though doing that just for the set bonus might not be a bad idea. OTOH, I could just slot Taunt with that set and get the same effect...

I wouldn't say I was worried about sappers per se. I mean, nobody likes fighting them and it's awkward when you're not paying attention and your toggles drop, but sappers aren't the end of the world. I just included the option because it seemed like a possible tactical choice with the power, though not necessarily the best one.

Another thing that occurred to me was that if I slotted it for damage the +end component would essentially make it a "free" aoe attack -- I.e., if it hit a group the end bonus would negate the end penalty for activation... but ultimately I think the 180s recharge makes it impractical as an aoe...

My wp/dark melee tanker is reaching the point where I have to decide whether to take dark consumption. My initial thought is there's really no point, since a wp tank has quick recovery and stamina stacked together. But I decided instead of simply assuming that, I'd post here for feedback first.

I see three general options here:

1. Skip the power. WP tanks don't need to worry about end.

2. Take the power and slot it for damage, use as an aoe, the +end is just an added bonus.

3. Take the power and slot it for end, to have on hand as a defense against sappers.

What do you all think?

The reason why I posted is because this didn't used to be an issue, and now it is. At one point in time Scrapper Jack would just go and go and go and go, and the rage crash just meant that for 10 seconds his damage would suck, and his end would go down a bit, but it would never seriously affect him. Now it is, and I wondered if it was a change in rage specifically, or ss/ in general.

Doesn't look like it is, based on comments, so I'm gonna look at some other stuff now. Thanks all.

I know there are half a billion posts about Rage. And I know they changed the recharge times so that you need set bonus enhancements to get the recharge rate down to below 2 minutes. That's not the part I'm confused about.

What I'm confused about is harder to explain, because it's just a perceived change and I don't have any data to back it up. But in essence: Rage is mostly a liability to my SS/WP brute these days... not because of the rage crash, but because the end drain KILLS me.

Rage used to never be an issue for my WP Brute... when Rage dropped I would get hit more often, and my damage would be reduced to 1's and 3's for 10 seconds, but I would still be able to use foot stomp and KO blow to keep my foes at bay until my damage came back. Now when Rage drops my end winds up going through the floor, then my toggles drop, then I wind up in trouble.

Has something changed over the last few issues in the SS set? I wondered if I was attributing it to Rage, but that maybe the end cost of SS as a whole was bumped up, and it just hurts more when you lose 1/4 of your bar.

The title says it all. During the beta for Going Rogue there seemed to be a general consensus that it was pretty, but mediocre. At the end of beta I think it got tweaked a little but I didn't really pay attention to it.

So have any tankers tried it? What do you think? What are its strong and weak points?

Touch of fear is single-target, yes? So how effective is it against the targets you'd really want to use it on, like Elites, AVs, etc.? I assume it won't do a whole lot to an AV. When would I want to use it?

The Whispering Man is a Willpower/Dark Melee Tanker... like most of my characters he is concept oriented, sort of a Shadow/Sandman (original guy in gas mask, not Gaiman era) guy. He had originally been Dark/Dark but the swirly misty things kept obscuring his outfit... I switched him over to Willpower and found that the Dark Willpower effects are nice and gloomy without actually obscuring anything.

Ever since i19, with the Stamina pool out of the way, I've discovered that the mid-teens were a breeze for the guy (teens have always been a pain in the butt for my tanks). And it seems to me that WP is synergizing really well with the dark set. Siphon Life seems especially well suited for a defensive set that doesn't have a toggle heal, and while the DM attacks always seemed kind of end-heavy that pretty much disappeared with Quick Recovery and Stamina, and will probably be negligible when I get to the point that I'm putting the fancy invention sets in.

So what I'm trying to figure out is, what guidelines should I use when developing this guy? I'm not asking for a specific end-game slotting map because he just hit 22 -- it's going to take a while to get there and I want him as effective as possible throughout.

First question: Siphon Life -- slot for accuracy and heal, damage secondary, or slot for accuracy and damage, heal secondary? It's one of the highest damage attacks in the set, and it's not DoT, so there's a strong argument (in my mind) for emphasizing the damage part... but... it is a heal, and I can see the tactical advantage in being able to get a bigger boost of healing when it's needed.

Second question: Defense soft cap -- any point in trying to reach it in a WP tank? WP does have some defense, but it's primary mitigation seems to be healing, and it's total defense for smashing and lethal isn't really all that high. I know there are inventions that can boost defense overall, though I'm not really familiar with them, and I don't know how much I'd have to sacrifice in order to meet that cap.

Third question: Rise to the challenge -- the description says it applies a to hit debuff for every person in range, but it's not very big (3%). Is this like Invincible (i.e., it stacks per target?) I haven't noticed any benefit from this at all, but it's slottable. Is there any reason to slot to hit debuffs in this power?

Those are all my questions for now. Thanks.

My WP/DB Tanker is a lot of fun to play, but I rarely use Nimble Slash and Ablating Strike any more. The biggest problem with WP/DB is that it's a very TIGHT build... you need so many attacks in DB to get your combos, and so many powers in WP are so darn useful, that you can't afford too much else.

This will change with i19, since fitness is now becoming an inherent.

Well it the change will definitely give my wp/db tank some room to breathe! He'll even take taunt!

Claws... yessss...

To be honest, the animations of the three basic attacks are kind of uninspiring (though, let's be honest, a vast improvement over the original claws animations). Basically you're stabbing people. Nothing fancy like the dual blades attacks, just stabbity stab stab stab rip rip.

But... it's low end and you build fury fast. I play a claws/wp brute and I got stamina out of habit, but it actually feels excessive at this point.