Nick_Riviera

Oh, come on, Hobo. You know that any-controller-set/empathy is the only REAL way to get through any content in this game. After all, Controllers are so much better than Defenders they might as well just remove Defenders from the game. They fill the exact same role on a team as Controllers, but they do it much worse, so why does anyone even bother playing them?



Edit: Good to see you around again, Hobo.

I agree with Shadow on many points.

As far as I am concerned, ID is a personal choice. I choose to have it on the occasions that it is helpful, i.e. someone popping an awaken, STF buffing before fighting GW, Defender on the team filling the tank role, stuff like that. It is certainly not necessary, but it has its place. Oh, it's good for PvP, too.

Your secondary is Electric and you're complaining about weak attacks? You're a Kin; your damage is usually capped. Capped-damage Ball Lightning does very respectable damage, and it is very fast to animate, which is important on Kins. I'm not a big fan of your holier-than-thou attitude about ZOMG BUFFING, but even on an 8-man team, you have plenty of time to do things other than cast speed boost and Fulcrum Shift. Ball Lightning's approximately 1 second activation time can usually get squeezed in as often as it recharges. Spending your time using Zapp would be the real waste of time, even solo.

There is absolutely a point where you have too much accuracy. A slotted Tactics (full Gaussian's set FTW) plus a single SO's worth of accuracy in each of your powers is usually more than enough for PvE. You tend to get more than that amount of accuracy from sets, and global accuracy bonuses tend to accumulate, as well. For me, I like overkill on accuracy on Transference and Transfusion for obvious reasons, but that is also satisfied by slotting sets. Going for more accuracy than that is truly a waste, as you could instead slot for more recharge.

I would say Stamina is a personal choice, as well. I am like you; my Kin/Electric has no Stamina, and my Kin/Ice does. I like not having that pressure to constantly be using Transference. Stamina lets me relax a little bit, and it opens up room in my attack chain for more blasts by not having to use Transference every 20 seconds.

As far as the second build goes, he wasn't talking about 2 builds at 50 fully IO'ed out, one with Stamina and one without. He only meant that you could build Stamina into your character for the first 25 levels, then use your second build at 26 like a respec, skipping Stamina from that point on. It's not a bad idea, though I would probably wait until 27 so I could get some slots into Transference.

I like Tactics and Vengeance on all my Defenders, but I don't usually find the room in their builds to fit it in. My Kin/Electric has both, and he doesn't have Stamina. My Kin/Ice has neither, and he does have Stamina. It would not be a mistake either way, so go with what is fun to you.

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Having played literally hundreds (300+) levels of defenders of all flavours, I am interested in hearing about others' perceptions of damaging sets and combinations.

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I must admit, most of my Defenders don't do damage in an amount that would make me want to brag. They get the job done, but it's nothing special, really. More often I'm impressed by the difficult situations they can solo, or the profound impact they can have on a team. They do okay damage, but many Scrappers and Blasters will put them to shame.

Not so for my Kin/Ice. Obviously, Kin is the damage king for Defenders without outside buffs. Considering most people have roughly 100% damage buff from enhancements, each percent of damage resistance debuff is roughly equal to 2% of damage buff. Fulcrum Shift means you're nearly always running at your damage cap, so that's 300% damage buff, which roughly equals 150% of damage resistance debuff. I don't think any other Defender primary can exceed or even match that amount of damage boost.

Add that to the fact that Ice Blast for Defenders uses Blaster-scale damage for Ice Storm and Blizzard, and Kin means lots of +recharge, which means lots of Ice Storms and Blizzards, and the damage potential of a Kin/Ice without outside buffs becomes extremely significant. My Kin/Ice doesn't just do good damage for a Defender, he straight-up does good damage.

Of course, your Fire or AR Blasters and your Spine or Fire Scrappers are still going to kill things faster than my Kin/Ice, particularly when they're getting my damage buffs, too. It's just that many times I have found myself on teams heavy with Defenders, Controllers, and Tankers, and in those instances, I might as well be a Blaster for all the damage I do. Things die fast when I'm around, and a lot of times it's my damage that is killing them.

You said your next project is a Kin/Sonic. I expect the damage you will be able to put out will be dramatic, and you might not feel so weak on that toon. Sonic bugs me due to its lack of personal AoE potential. I went Kin/Ice, and I loved every minute of it.

I could see the argument being made that Kin/anything does good damage. Defenders at their damage cap really do a large amount of damage. Things die fast.

Just want to add one quick thought.

AR and Kinetics might not pair up so well. AR likes lots of range, and Kin likes to be in melee. Sure, you'll be able to make it work, but you'll be moving around a lot.

Personally, I wouldn't want to play a combination that I had to "make work." I would prefer it worked out of the box.

Edit: Of course, that's my own opinion, and other people who like the combo will disagree with me shortly, I'm sure. There's room for all kinds in CoH.

Well, Corrupters do more damage than Defenders, so if offense is your main deciding factor, you should probably roll a Corrupter.

Along that line, if offense is what you're looking for, you should probably pick a different blast set. I can understand thinking that Electric Blast goes well thematically with Storm, but Ice Blast kinda works as well, and Ice does a whole lot more damage. Ice also has 2 rain powers it in, and Storm likes rain powers, since you are very good at keeping people in a specific area, but it takes work to do so. Rain powers allow you to be killing them while you are herdicaning them, so it's win win.

If you hit them with Hurricane, they get 10 seconds of debuff. You could get them where you wanted with Hurricane, drop Freezing Rain on them, pop Aim, then hit them with Ice Storm and Blizzard. Blizzard will make your Hurricane drop, but they will probably all be dead before 10 seconds is up.

Eh.

Damage bonus is one of the attributes I monitor on my Kin/Ice (the other is recharge). On a mid-size to large team, sure, I'm running at 300% pretty much all the time. Solo or in a duo, however, it's not as common. Particularly solo, I'll run anywhere from 100-300%, with 150% being closer to the norm.

In that situation, I'm glad I have actual damage slotted in my attacks. There are times when I wish Bitter Ice Blast came back a little faster, but I like the boost I get from slotting damage when I'm solo. It usually means I can BIB a white minion from full to dead, but just barely, so those slots really help.

Besides, I think it's all moot once you start talking about sets. I suppose frankenslotting could get you spare slots to place in other powers if you went light on damage, but there are good set bonuses in most of the blast sets, and those bonuses tend to come with 5 pieces slotted. Not to mention the fact that Kin is pretty easy on the slots, anyway, so you probably don't really need the extra slots.

Ultimately, I think they should just increase our damage cap to match Brutes. Then everyone would be happy (everyone being me in this case).

I have a 50 Kin/Electric; I will add my opinion.

The short answer: Endurance draining is slow and defensive, Kinetics is fast and offensive. After my experience with the character, I have decided the two sets don't go together very well, particularly now that Defenders have Ice Blast.

The long answer: Endurance draining can be awesome in the lower levels. In the high 20s my Kin/Electric was fantastic at both speeding a team up and providing a lot of mitigation through Short Circuit spamming. I had Hasten, I had SOs, and I had Siphon Speed stacking 2-3 times. That meant perma-debuff, and a completely endurance-free mob after 2 SCs, including the boss. Even the occasional AVs/GMs that my teams would run across weren't immune: admittedly, they would be almost dead by the time I got them drained, but I could still drain them completely all by myself.

The real problem came in the high levels. Controllers are much better than you at locking a spawn down. Tankers are much better than you at keeping a spawn occupied and under control, and they might need a little healing, but all Kins do that easily. Scrappers and Blasters might benefit from your draining, but they can't help keep you alive, so you probably won't survive long enough to drain the whole group. Other Defenders can help keep you alive, but unless they're another Kinetic, they're probably doing more for team survival than you provide with your draining, at least for the first 10 seconds.

Next, AVs stop being susceptible to draining. In my experience, the low-level AVs could be drained, but I never made a dent in any of the AVs I fought past 35-40. AVs are also where mitigation becomes more important, because AV fights tend to be a little harder than run-of-the-mill spawn groups. So, when you need your draining the most, that's when it's the most useless.

For all of those reasons, I retired my Kin/Electric. I really enjoyed playing him, but I love Kin, so that's a given. My new Kin/Ice is much more capable, both solo and on teams, and he does a whole lot more damage. I came to decide that Kin probably shouldn't worry too much about team survival, because it doesn't have a whole lot of tools to facilitate that. Instead, Kin should focus on speed and damage, and let other people worry about mitigation.

That being said, there's nothing wrong with the combination if you find it fun. My Kin/Electric could solo pretty well once I hit the mid-30s, though it was a little slow. On teams, I was still a Kin, so I was still very effective.

The towers in the STF are very drainable, which stops them from spawning repair-bots. The Hami in the LGTF is also drainable, though I don't know exactly what that accomplishes (I have very little experience with that TF). If you do happen to find yourself on a team of Blasters, Scrappers, and Kin Defenders, your draining would probably be decent, though I doubt it would be the cornerstone of the team.

I like to ramble, and it shows. Regardless, I am a big proponent of the philosophy "play whatever is fun to you". If you don't like it, try something else. If you do like it, then to hell with what other people have to say. Kin/Electric is not for me, but that doesn't make it bad. It just doesn't fit into my playstyle.

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Right now a Storm/Ice, TA/Dark and an FF/Sonic are at the top of my "try out" list!

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Any of those combinations will be great on a team, and they should also solo well, too, though FF/Sonic will probably be the slowest of the three.

You said in your original post that you liked the idea of a Controller-ish style of Defender, so I think you should take a long hard look at Dark Miasma. Dark, and particularly Dark/Dark, plays quite a bit like a Controller, so keep that in mind.

Personally, I think you have made a fabulous choice of an AT to play. No matter how many times I roll something else, I always come back to Defenders. They just suit me perfectly.

I will close by agreeing with Psylenz: You get a lot of character slots. Make all the toons you think sound fun.

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I also like slotting tornado for mez.

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I like slotting Tornado with the Achilles' Heel proc, but I love that proc, so I try to put it almost everywhere I can.

I have been wanting TA/Fire since they first announced power proliferation. I really think a TA/Fire will be a monster in PvE.

I'm curious whether a Kin/Fire would beat a Kin/Ice. /Ice has two powers that do Blaster-level damage, where /Fire would just have one. I'm sure the higher damage in RoF would make a difference, and Fireball and Fire Breath do a lot of damage, too.

Still, the Kin/Ice Blizzard would do a whole lot more than the Kin/Fire Inferno, so maybe Kin/Ice would do more damage than Kin/Fire in spurts? I don't know.

Regardless, if Defenders get Fire Blast, it'll be a TA/Fire I roll, not a Kin/Fire.

Looking at just SOs, you'll want 3 Heals, and then either 1 Recharge and 2 End Reduction, or 2 Recharge and 1 End Reduction. Go for more recharge if you don't have any endurance troubles. Go for more end if you do.

Once you start looking at IOs, it becomes a lot more complicated. Personally, I really like the Doctored Wounds set, so I slot that whole set into my HA. I also have that whole set in Heal Other and Regen Aura, and I have 5 pieces of that set in Adrenaline Boost (the 6th slot is an End Mod).

I'm no expert (by any means) with IOs, though, so look to someone else for better IO slotting advice. Ideally, you'll want to max out the healing, the recharge, and the endurance reduction, and sets will let you do that fairly easily.

I would just like to say that I don't think Storm categorically slows a team down. It just depends how you play.

On my Stormie, for example, I frequently create tight clumps instead of ruin them. Admittedly, my Storm is Storm/Dark, so mobs stay where I put them, but the idea is still the same. Storm doesn't always cause scatter, even when they're in the thick of it.

Honestly, I read the title of the thread, and my first thought was, "re-roll."

That isn't to say that Dark/Electric is a bad combination, because it isn't. It's not spectacular, though, and if you're not enjoying it yet, then I think you should bite the bullet and choose a different secondary. In that vein, some suggestions would be Dark/Ice, Dark/Sonic, Dark/Rad, or Dark/Archery. All of those have the high-damage short-range single-target blast, which should help a lot solo. By virtue of being Dark/*, they are all awesome on teams.

If you do decide to stick with /Electric, I also suggest lots of damage slotting. I might skip Short Circuit entirely, however, because is has a very long animation. Then again, I love AoE attacks, so I guess I probably wouldn't skip it after all.

In my opinion, Electric is good for Short Circuit and Voltaic Sentinel, but I have never been a fan of VS. They changed him relatively recently, but I still don't like him. And, as has been said, end draining is pretty mediocre when they already can't hit you, so that doesn't leave much to recommend about Electric. You'll be useful on teams all the way to 50 because you're Dark, but you honestly would probably be more useful with one of the other combinations I suggested above, and those combos all solo very well, too.

Kin/Ice

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i wanna make an ice concept char but can't decide between storm/ and cold/ ,i wanna be able to solo efficiently, but still bring mitigation to the team

cold/ fits the concept better but i don't wannabe a buff bot
i hear storm/ is fun but i dont want that much chaos

i also considered ice/storm controller but im not a pet person and the lack of dmg at low lvs would drive me nuts because i can't always find a team

anyway tell me which you think is betterand why

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You say you don't want chaos, so my knee-jerk reaction is to say Cold/Ice. There is no chaos with Cold/Ice, so no worry there. Also, Cold isn't really a buff-bot like Kin or Emp, and it's arguably better than FF and Sonic, as well, because it has Sleet and the two single-target debuffs.

I hear Heat Loss is nice, too, but its recharge is too long for me to enjoy it. Kin has a power to grant nearly infinite endurance (Transference), so I don't see why Heat Loss couldn't do the same. Heck, I would even take a decrease in the per-target buff if it had the same recharge as Fulcrum Shift. Not too much of a decrease, though. If it was only like 15% or 25%, then that's just too low. But now I'm off topic.

I think the real trick to Storm is to do one of two things: either learn to love the chaos and embrace it, or learn to control the chaos and use it. Of course there are those people who just go nuts with no concern for the consequences, but I bet they stop playing their Stormie relatively quickly. Blowing foes around without actually killing them gets old after a while.

Storm will solo about 100 million times better than Cold will, so keep that in mind. I'll try to give a little run down on what each set will do so you can decide for yourself:

Cold/*:

Obviously, your shields are good for mitigation, which you say you want to do. You'll want to keep them up as close to all the time as you can manage. Snow Storm and eventually Sleet will also considerably help your mitigation, because they slow recharge, which combines well with defense. Sleet alone is substantial mitigation, as well, by consistently knocking foes down and applying all the tasty debuffs. Put enough recharge reduction into Sleet and it should be ready for every fight, even when the team is moving fast.

Infrigidate and Benumb are great for single hard targets like AVs, and combined with Sleet and the shields, you'll bring many many good things to a team facing AVs. So much so, in fact, that I could see the argument being made for Cold to be the best single set to bring to an AV fight. It may not be true, but there's a lot of evidence to support that claim, so it should be close to true.

Solo is a different story. A lot of the general mitigation Cold provides resides in the targetted buffs, which means you don't get their benefit. You still have Sleet, which is big, and you've got Infrigidate and Benumb for the hard targets, but there just isn't a lot of protection in Cold for the Cold user. You can build and slot for it, but it will be a lot of work, and I don't think you'll ever be able to take on huge numbers of +3s on your own without a lot of inspirations. It's just an uphill battle.

Storm/*:

Storm is a whole mess of fun. It's much more in-your-face than Cold is, so it feels more active, even if it actually isn't. Storm plays best as the center of attention, as well, so you'll probably want to assume the role of "Tank" on your teams, or at least "off-Tank". If you hang back and let other people deal with the aggro and positioning, then all you really bring is Freezing Rain and Lightning Storm, so you really might as well just play Cold.

Storm probably doesn't bring as much to AV fights, either. Storm is all about debuffs and damage, and AVs resist those debuffs to a staggering degree (85%, I believe). That means you really just bring damage, and while that damage is usually enough to beat the regen of an AV (making it better than -regen debuffs) the damage alone is probably not enough of a reason to bring the Storm along.

The good news is, actual AV fights are a pretty small percentage of the game as a whole, and it's not like Storm is useless versus AVs. As I said, the damage from Lightning Storm and Tornado + Freezing Rain is usually enough to beat the regen of the AV, meaning you beat out powers like Lingering Radiation or Howling Twilight with regards to the speed an AV falls. It's just that Storm is really unremarkable against AVs, not bad but not amazing. You'll really shine in all the other encounters, however.

Solo is a whole other world. You are a beast solo. Storm/Ice is a good combination for solo play, as well, with a couple single-target holds and good single-target damage. I have been running the MA stuff on my Storm/Dark pretty regularly, and I tear up most of those missions solo, even on invincible. I have a Cold in the low 30s, and my Storm is much MUCH more capable solo than my Cold. It's really just no contest.

So, ultimately, it depends on what you want to do. Storm is better solo, Cold is better versus AVs, and they are both pretty great on teams. Both sets are great, so there's no wrong choice here. If you don't like one, you can always roll the other and see how it goes.

Whichever you choose, good luck, and have fun with it.

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Personally, I find FF to be completely and totally fine where it is. FF/* might not provide the same debuff punch, but, just because you choose not to use all of the other indirect methods for keeping your team alive (knockback, knockdown, repel, onlyAffectSelf), doesn't mean that it needs changes. Personally, I think that the extra 5% +def and the mez protection that FF/* provide make up for any lack of debuffs or other functionality.

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Maybe this is heresy, but I think FF could use a little more of a nudge in the offense direction, though I wouldn't want that to come at the expense of mitigation. I don't know exactly what I would want, but it wouldn't be much.

For example, I think giving FF an AoE -30% damage resistance debuff would be going too far. I think that would be broken. I don't know what other alternatives are left, though. Maybe give Force Bolt the Repulsion Bomb treatment? More damage, KD, longer recharge?

I don't think I'd like that change, though. Force Bolt has a purpose already, and changing it to KD or making the recharge longer would drastically alter that.

I guess this is stupid to say, considering my long post, but I just don't know what I would do to FF. I think it could use a little more punch, but I have no idea how to get that punch in a way that makes sense.

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Kinetics/rad blast is one of the two premier Kinetic combinations in my experience.

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I hope the other premier Kinetic combination is Kin/Ice, but I fear it is Kin/Sonic. If my fears are correct, I think you should add Kin/Ice to your list, for 3 premier combinations.

Personally, though, Kin/Ice replaced Kin/Rad for me on my list. Kin/Ice and Kin/Sonic for me, in that order.

Also, I'm a recent convert to FF (Storm was my gateway drug), so count me in there, too.

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I find the hate for controller bubbles on these boards funny.

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There is hate for Controller bubbles on these boards?

Admittedly, I don't have a lot of respect for someone who plays FF and only takes the bubbles, but that is true for both Defenders and Controllers. I do, however, respect their choice. If that is what they find fun, then more power to them. I find it mind-numbing.

I will also admit I was using hyperbole to make a point. Not all Controller powersets play the control-and-wait game. I was merely trying to point out that all Defender secondaries are blasts, powers which tend to be used as often as they recharge.

If all you are doing with FF on a Controller is bubble the team, then your secondary will sit idle for 4 minutes at a time. That leaves just the primary, and many of those powers won't be spammed, either.

Now, will that Controller be effective at protecting the team? Almost certainly. I would never want to play like that, however. I like doing things all the time. If there was an EMP Arrow powerset, where all 9 powers were EMP Arrow, that toon would be amazing at protecting the team. Every spawn would be held until it was dead. It wouldn't leave much room to do anything else, however, so I would never play it. Effective? Yes. Boring? Yes!

Personally, I look at the numbers a lot of the time, so I would be looking for sets that will shine for being noticeably better than their Corrupter counterparts. Unfortunately, I really think Sonic is the only set that fits that bill. In my opinion, all the other powersets that Defenders and Corrupters share don't really have a noticeable difference in effectiveness, at least not at the higher levels.

Of course, bringing a powerset Corrupters don't have will be great, and I think in that vein, both FF and TA are great options. TA is also very compatible with a villain theme, and I could see an FF villain working. Use Force Bubble to push the mobs away from the Brutes and you'll be hated in no time!

I don't really like the idea of pairing FF with Archery or Psi, though. I think Ice or Sonic or Energy would work better, at least for my own enjoyment. TA I have no experience with, so I can't say either way.

Personally, I am much more interested in bringing a Corrupter over to the good side. I'll probably end up deleting him, since I never can seem to play Corrupters, but that's my plan for right now.

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the player has little influence on its effectiveness. All you can do is buff shields and try to keep dispersion on everyone.

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*double facepalm*

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What, didn't you know? FF only has 3 powers.

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Be fair. Repulsion Bomb was mentioned in passing, as well. FF has 4 powers.

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Personally I think forcefields is a much better set for controllers, despite the fact the controller version is not as powerful.

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I think FF is actually a much worse powerset for Controllers than Defenders, if all you're looking at are the bubbles. At least on the Defender, you give as much defense as possible, and when you're done bubbling, you're free to blast away.

On a Controller, not only are your bubbles not as strong, but once you buff the team and control the mob, then what do you do? Hold them again? Admire all the cool looking animations everyone else is using to actually accomplish something in the fight? I would go bored out of my mind playing like that.

If that's what is important to you and that is how you want to play, then I encourage you to pursue it. Me? I'll be taking all the powers in FF (except maybe Detention Field; I never have like intangibles), because they are all good, and I like them.

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I honestly like the AT, but it just doesn't ever really feel 'super' to me.

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Wow, really? Have you ever played a Storm Defender?

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Decided to go with Rad/Sonic...he's level 14, whee. Thanks for the replies.

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You picked a not-so-great primary and a not-so-great secondary. If it's raw performance you're looking for, just about any other combination of defender sets will do.


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I agree completely. Rad/Sonic is about as mediocre as you can get, with no raw performance capability whatsoever. Anytime I see a Rad/Sonic Defender, I send them a tell advising them to re-roll, because they will only experience unmitigated heartbreak and impotence from 1 to 50.



Of course, I know you weren't replying to his post, Rigel, but I got a kick out of reading those two messages in succession. I had a good chuckle.

That's true. Ice Storm isn't something you can really spam. I suppose that's where Frost Breath comes in.

So, the $64,000 Question: How do you manage the KB from Energy, particularly in the AoE Blasts?

Energy Torrent only has a 60% chance to KB, which means it is built to scatter. I've never used Explosive Blast, but I understand the power knocks everything away from the center of the explosion, which sounds both awesome and difficult to control. All the other blasts have a chance to KB to varying degrees.

I love positioning tools. I am a big cheerleader for Gale, and I feel like I'm in the minority there. I like having options to move enemies where I want them. The thing is, most of the time, when I get them there, I want them to stay put. How do you do that when every blast can potentially move them again?

I know that tunnel vision helps. Pick a target, single-target-blast him until he is dead, then pick a new target. This doesn't stop the KB, but at least what you're knocking away is dying.

I'm not a big fan of single-target blasts, though. I love spamming AoEs, and it seems like the Energy AoEs do nothing good, because you can hit them all once, but then they're scattered, and you have to reposition them again before hitting them with another AoE.

Now, I've never really played Energy Blast, so I don't know if what I'm describing is anything like how it actually plays. I'm only extrapolating.

So, what's the secret? How do you play Energy Blast, actually use the Blasts regularly, and not cause scatter? For this question, assume you're out in the open with no convenient obstacles.

Energy has good AoE damage?

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the point of the defender AT is to protect others

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Honestly, I completely disagree with this.

I see the function of Defenders to be much more like lubricant. The presence of a Defender on a team should mean that things are easier and faster. That can come from added damage (both directly and through debuffs), less damage taken (and thus less time for resting), less endurance used or greater endurance recovery, or any of a number of other options Defenders have available.

Sure, a consequence of a Defender on a team is very likely to be a safer team overall, but I would never say the job of the Defender is to protect the team. I am no one's babysitter.

Kin and Storm are my two favorite sets, and I would never call Kin a good set at protecting a team. A very specific team can be protected, sure, but generic teams having trouble surviving are probably not going to get much help from a Kinetics Defender. That's not what Kin does.

Blah blah blah counterarguments about Transfusion being a massive AoE heal and Increase Density giving status protection and damage resistance. Further blah blah blah about Siphon Power and Fulcrum Shift debuffing damage.

As far as protection goes, Kin pales in comparison to FF, Storm, Dark, and Cold, and it's also worse than Rad and Sonic, though not by as much. If it's a small team, Emp beats the crap out of Kin for protection, but large teams will see a smaller difference, though Emp still wins. I don't have any experience with TA, so I can't compare the two.

Does that mean Kin is a bad Defender set? Was it designed poorly? Should they change Fulcrum Shift to give a damage resistance buff instead of a damage buff? Over my dead body. Kin doesn't really make a team safer, but it sure makes things easier and faster.

Bad players need protection. They won't be getting it from me. I'll be too busy completing another all-Defender MoSTF...