Mercy_n_Misery

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You still arent addressing the fact that in Issue 5 (the "End to Herding" issue) Ice and Invulnerability tanks are being basically forced to herd up enemies to max out their defense using EA and Invinc since the rest of their defenses have taken a large hit.

Wouldnt it be better to increase the buff per mob and cap the total def (still allowing it to hit more mobs for the taunt effect)?
Also, can you give us an idea how Ice tankers will deal with Energy and Fire attacks before 18 and 26 respectively? It really seems like this slipped someone's mind when they were coming up with these changes.

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I would like to add my voice to concern on the facing energy attacks prior to level 18 with Galacial Armour and getting attacked by fire ( I will have to experiment with Permafrost now ). Is Blade, a test tank on the test server has found the outcasts much tougher then the other groups do to their high usage of pure energy and fire attacks. There are other groups that can also leave you with almost no defense. The .5% protection in Wet Ice even if it was maximum slotted to 1% would still leave minions with an accuracy of 49%. Galacial Armour is a basic defense and should come earlier than level 18 and it would be good if it included the same value of defense that energy and negative energy provide.

I would like to say thanks to you Statesman for giving us some feedback and discussing ice primary with Geko. The adding of Toxic to Permafrost is nice as is the damage debuff in Chilling Embrace. The review of maximum damage in one hit is also great news. I look forward to testing these changes.

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Sorry, I tried editing my post this morning but I guess the time limit had expired.

I just wanted to add a couple of things.

1> Invincibility for Invulnerability occurs at level 18 while Energy Absorption occurs at level 26. This order leaves Ice Primary lagging for 8 levels to get a similar defense.

2> +0.5% buff per mob from Energy Absorption. That means that means that the base value verses 10 mobs is 5% ( I know that it could theoretically hit 14 mobs for 7% but on live it is sometimes hard to even get 5 mobs ). This compares to the base value of Frozen Armour and Galacial Armour of 16%. That makes Energy Absorption at a base comparison rougly 1/3 as good. This is a power that has the limiter that it fluctuates to a low of 0.5% base if there is only one mob to draw upon ( which happens in many fights particullarly when fighting AVs and bosses ). It also carries the value of the defense for 45s which is less time then the recharge of 60s ( to get the maximum defense that is used for consideration of 6 defense SOs then you would need to 15s without the benefit of Energy Absoprtion ). The last limiter is that Energy Absorption takes time to work because you need to get in melee range and then activate the power. If you have gone to the trouble of getting close to activate Energy Absorption rather than choose to attack, should you not get a better reward for risk then something that is 1/3 as good as your basic toggle defenses? Compared to the value being used for Weave, a pool power, of 4 to 4.5% base defense which is a constant toggle, Energy Absorption does not offer very much and has a higher risk to use.

Sorry again for the extra post but it took me a while to get caught up on the information and implications of the developer posts from the last 48 hours.

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You still arent addressing the fact that in Issue 5 (the "End to Herding" issue) Ice and Invulnerability tanks are being basically forced to herd up enemies to max out their defense using EA and Invinc since the rest of their defenses have taken a large hit.

Wouldnt it be better to increase the buff per mob and cap the total def (still allowing it to hit more mobs for the taunt effect)?
Also, can you give us an idea how Ice tankers will deal with Energy and Fire attacks before 18 and 26 respectively? It really seems like this slipped someone's mind when they were coming up with these changes.

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I would like to add my voice to concern on the facing energy attacks prior to level 18 with Galacial Armour and getting attacked by fire ( I will have to experiment with Permafrost now ). Is Blade, a test tank on the test server has found the outcasts much tougher then the other groups do to their high usage of pure energy and fire attacks. There are other groups that can also leave you with almost no defense. The .5% protection in Wet Ice even if it was maximum slotted to 1% would still leave minions with an accuracy of 49%. Galacial Armour is a basic defense and should come earlier than level 18 and it would be good if it included the same value of defense that energy and negative energy provide.

I would like to say thanks to you Statesman for giving us some feedback and discussing ice primary with Geko. The adding of Toxic to Permafrost is nice as is the damage debuff in Chilling Embrace. The review of maximum damage in one hit is also great news. I look forward to testing these changes.

Just putting in my own experience from making a lvl 1 Ice Tank and going through to lvl 9 ( within a bub of lvl 10 ) on the test server.

Is Blade, has done well for the most part, I try to blog the experience on the Tanker Forum under title, "Is Hammer, Is Blade, and I5 a first encounter" thread #3357579.

I have found that Wet Ice does not seem to be helping any ( or very miniscule amount ) when dealing with Energy and Fire using mobs. If this the way this is supposed to be then it would be good to move Galacial Armour down from lvl 18 to lvl 8 ( Permafrost spot ). Galacial Armour is a basic armour type covering one of the most common types of damage. Waiting to lvl 18 for a basic type of armour is a long wait for a young tank.

My experience with Is Blade is that I am having a struggle in some encounters because I do not have the same defense I do against Smash/Lethal attacks. A pure energy or fire attack has almost no protection that I am really noticing.

If these attacks were not too common then I would use luck inspirations to make up the differance. I am starting to find things that are using this type of attack commonly.

This is different from my previous experience leveling Is Hammer on the live servers.

It would also be good if Galacial had fire defense included of the same amount as the energy and negative energy ammounts.

Ok, I have been doing this on Pinnacle for a lark.

Every few days when I want a change of pace I bring out my Elec/Elec build with the focus on Electicity Secondary.

I have made it so far to lvl 10.

The build so far.

1) Charged Bolts
1) Electric Fence
2) Charged Brawl 5 slots
4) Lightning Field 3 slots
6 ) Air Superiority 3 slots
8 ) Boxing
10 ) Havok Punch

Thoughts so far.

1) The exta melee attacks are great to make sure you are doing maximum damage in melee.

2) Endurance is a concern especially when you use Lightning Field. I have it 1 endred and 2 damage and it still sucks end when I am in combat very quickly. Good for when you have a crowd to kill as the damage adds on fast.

3) This build is best used for doing patrol where you simply are hunting the streets for groups to harvest. This build does not do well in missions solo because minions are your level or sometimes higher. Poor defenses mean that this hurts rapidly. Ideal mobs to hit are pure minion or with a single lt. Avoid bosses if you can in the first 10 levels unless you have an assist. If you are teamed with a tank or scrapper that is drawing aggro then the damage is great to quickly clear mobs. I teamed up at one point with a scrapper and it was hunting spree even though I was a couple levels higher than him.

4) Take care to pick your fights. Pick small mobs of 3 preferably and no more than 5 if solo. Quick fights are over before your endurance runs out. If you are using the Lightning Field then use your main attacks to damage a variety of people and let the lighting field do the finish.

5) Air Supperiority is your low level protection from lt and boss. When they are knocked down they are not hitting you and the Lighting Field continues to tick away on them.

6) Charged Brawl is a wonderful attack and it often clears blue and green minions in one punch with 4 training damage and one training accuaracy. Havok Punch is too new to get a feel for yet and will need slotting to start to come into its own.

7) It can be fun being all offense. It is also a real challenge.

Currently, I do not have Hibernate but plan to get it at lvl 32. You may thus freely dismiss my comparisions based on what other people on the boards have reported.

When discussing the tank lvl 32 power we should also take a look at the competition in Tank primaries as of I4.

Invul has Unstoppable - A 90% resist to all but psi. Mez protection in a click power which helps because Unyielding Stance is a toggle that drain attacks can bring down. Currently has a huge recharge time that with haste fully slotted and 6 slotted recharges makes it useful at maximum of 3 out of 4 minutes. When the time is up then the power causes a crash to 10% HP and 0% End. Powers like Conserve Power can help as do inspirtations and Dull Pain. Currently good to get you out of trouble as a panic button.

Stone has Granite Armour. The only set that now has a constant 24hr combat toggle. This gives good resistance and defense to all but Psi. The down sides are that you have one toggle that makes it a big target in PvP. Most travel powers do not work. You have a penalty to damage, speed and recharge rates that require powers like Swift, Haste, and recharge enhancements to offset.

Fire has Rise of the Pheonix. A power to use when you are already dead. You come back strong and do damage but still get an xp penalty for dying in the first place.

Ice has Hibernate. I4 increased the activation time. Not sure how fast it does activate but a long activation time is not good. Hopefully, it is not longer than Unstoppable to activate. If it is longer to activate then Unstoppable then that is a bit unfair. The good stuff is that you do not need to die to use the power. It offers a 100% protection to everything ( compared to a Invulnerability Tank that is at cap resistance and is thus not adding any real defense but switching to a click power over a toggle defense -- if they are taking enough damage with their toggle defenses then Unstoppable will not likely help much ). Ice provides a safe place to heal. Ice has the least negative IMO in I4 ( now that Unstoppable is not permanent ) because we are imobile for 10+ seconds while healing to full ( I am almost tempted to think a few greens in the insp tray would cover the situations I might want/need hibernate but I am going to game this out in the 30s and see what I find works ). The power also recycles fairly quickly which makes it useful. The best is that it is a power that is good right out of the box without needing special slotting or other powers to avoid the penalty of using it.

Is Hibernate the best 9th power in CoH? Probably not the best but it compares well with the Tank competition if not surpassing several in the I4 game.

I do hope that the activation time is not greater than Unstoppable and if it is greater that this gets changed to an equivelent panic button choice.

Someone said something very interesting relating to hibernate. The problem with hibernate is that you can usually not turn it on fast enough to protect yourself from the type of attack that would kill you in one-shot ( AV and Monster ).

The thought was that ice needed some resistance to balance off against the damage to allow time for hibernate to work.

I think that what might be an interesting way to improve hibernate is to have it so that it when it is active there is a response to damage. The more damage the more the mitigation effect would grow as you shifted into the hibernation ice. The down side of the effect is that you would get -SPD while the hibernation worked to repair the damage. This would make the effect of hibernation a bit more reactive to damage rather than as it exists now as a passive power choice.

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One thing that is positive with Ice Tanks in I4 is that we get Wet Ice at level 6 and there is no -SPD with the usage. The new knockback can be pretty severe ( a scrapper alt I was using today got knocked around like a ping pong ball by the council ). Wet Ice gives Ice Tankers a great built in anti-knockback power that allows you to tank without getting bashed by the villians. This alone has probably raised player's stock in Ice Tanks as we have mobility and knockback protection.