Umbral

How does that solve anything? You're talking about diversifying the secondary effects a tiny bit and that's somehow better than providing Aim functionality? Seriously, do you have any idea what you're talking about at all?

Tohit is no stronger than -dam and it's less useful against stronger targets. There already is a KB secondary effect available so doubling up on secondary effects is completely redundant. A Defiance boost on the Ammo powers would be a complete joke because they have a .63 second animation time (4.1% +dam).

Those changes wouldn't do anything to appreciably improve performance. Your argument that somehow Aim is worse for the set because the AoEs are DoTs (regardless of the fact that they're DoTs that don't even last 2 seconds so they're not even numerically calculated as DoTs) is a complete joke as well.

Apparently your only problem is that the Aim fix isn't "creative" enough and that is simply just ******* stupid. I keep hearing "needs to be more creative" from all kinds of people about fixes for all kinds of things and yet, for some reason, it's never the people that actually come up with ideas that are actually useful that say such things. "Creative" is just a neophyte's buzzword for "I don't like things that we already know work".

If you have to say that a solution needs to be more "creative" give me a reason that it needs to be more creative. Give me a reason (and back it up with more than just idiotic drivel that doesn't even make internal sense beyond a complete inability to actually empirically gather information) and then support it. I call tell you with a strong degree of assurance that the Aim change would be a vastly bigger improvement than your "creative" solution that isn't even all that creative (more ammo types? really? that's been suggested since the very first beta runthrough. Incendiary is still going to be the only viable ammo for 99% of play regardless).

Go ahead and be creative but don't act like those of us that believe in using the Aim solution aren't somehow creative. Don't act like any solution that doesn't meet your arbitrary qualifier of "creative" is somehow flawed simply because we know it actually works (and, yes, we know it works). Try to actually think about what you're doing to the set and what end result you want before you simply claim that something is wrong because every other set has it.

Dual Pistols is already a different enough set simply because it has variable effects (and one explicitly unique effect). Just because you want it to be more different due to some arbitrary desire when you don't even know how to what to do doesn't mean that making a set more akin to those sets that are actually fully effective would somehow be bad. All it means is that you have no clue what you want except that you don't like what you've already got. Just because it's different doesn't mean it's good or useful.

Hell, if anything, Aim actually adds something to Dual Pistols' gameplay because it forces you to actually use a click power situationally rather than just turn a toggle on and run (which is all that DP has at the moment). Adding more toggles doesn't add anything to the existing gameplay because the existing toggles barely see any use beyond Incendiary Ammo. Adding a Defiance buff to the toggles wouldn't make people any more willing to hot switch between them unless you want to force them to bounce between 6 different toggles for 7 seconds before the fight begins so that they can get less than half of the +dam effect of Aim. All that you've suggested doesn't make the set any better, much less any different than it already is.

Alll that you're suggesting more of the same that we know doesn't contribute appreciably. At least my suggestion actually provides meaningful improvement (regardless of the fact that you're apparently too oblivious to note it).

"Hard-coded gimmicks are" actually substantially more common than you might expect. Critical, Scourge, the Dual Blades combos, and many, many others are just as hard coded so it's not like "hard-coded gimmicks" are somehow a bad thing.

The problem with this is that it starts becoming audaciously easy to manipulate such a system. The 60% chance allows the devs to prevent the damage from becoming completely crazy. Imagine what would happen if the attack had a .7 accmod (half of the 1.4 accmod I'm recalling off the top of my head since City of Data is down atm): with some baseline acc slotting (33%) and slotted BU (23.4% +tohit), you'd be able to deal more damage than a crashing nuke. Acc and Tohit are so easy to get in substantial numbers that any reasonable accmod (i.e. doesn't make it useless in the hands of a lowbie) would be completely laughable to break.

HoB already presents all of the same slotting incentives that every other power in the game does in the exact same ways. The fact that it has chances to deal damage doesn't change that at all. If it were changed as you suggest, you'd be providing more ways to improve it than there already are so you'd be making it better than it already is for no particular reason.

The jury is out on whether Archery (or DP) is going to get some dev attention (either Arch down or, more likely, DP up) but, yes, the difference between Arch and DP is going to be rather noticeable even before 50 simply because RoA is friggin' nuts. You can close the gap a bit with Incendiary Ammo, but you're still going to lag behind. There's also the issue that you don't get Aim with DP, so you're going to be missing a bit of burst damage capability.

With Incendiary Ammo on, Hail of Bullets actually edges out RoA on damage dealt on average, but RoA is still better because it recharges in half the time. When considering HoB though, remember that where RoA just does damage, HoB has the normal ammo secondary effect and provides you with a decent bit of positional defense while you're using it. RoA is still better, and by a large amount, but the difference isn't as significant as you likely believe it is.

Let me say this to you slowly because apparently you're not reading anything I'm posting in an intelligent manner (i.e. reading what I'm posting rather than what you want me to post). You aren't even staying internally consistent, much less actually applicable as you argue this.

Blasters are useful on teams because they provide lots of damage. Scrappers are also useful because they provide lots of damage. Blasters have range to keep them out of the ranges that would cause them to get killed. Scrappers have the defense to keep themselves alive while in melee. Blasters and Scrappers are balanced functionally.

Corruptors deal more damage than Defenders, but Defenders have better support capability. Corrupters and Defenders are balanced functionally. Controllers have lower damage and high support capability but support less than Defenders and on par with Corrupters. The three ATs are balanced functionally. Dominators deal more damage than any of the previous ATs but only offer support through control capabilities rather than direct support. The 4 ATs are balanced functionally.

The proposed ranged/armor AT (or assault/armor) would have to have lower damage than Blasters to prevent making Blasters irrelevant. It would also have to have lower survivability than Stalkers to prevent making Stalkers irrelevant (since, theoretically, Stalker and Blaster damage is roughly tied). Because of this, you get an AT that deals less damage than a Blaster and is squishier than a Stalker. Because of this, there is no reason to bring the AT onto a team because you could get any other damage based AT and deal more damage with less risk to the individual (because, as you have stated, the set would need to flit between ranged and melee).

Was that a simple enough explanation for you or should I go over it again (for at least the third time in this thread)?

No, I mean Blaster. Look at the line I quoted. You specifically said that Blasters deal less damage than Blasters and have higher survivability than Blasters. It's English. Learn to read it.

Not really. Blasters deal more AoE damage but Scrappers have Blasters largely beaten in the realm of ST damage. The only builds that can actually eclipse Scrapper single target damage are those builds that spend a vast majority of their time in melee where their lack of survivability will get them killed, even if only by incidental AoEs. The damage difference between Scrappers and Blasters is that Blasters are substantially better at mowing down hoards thanks to more AoE functionality within their sets and Scrappers are better at bringing down hard targets thanks to more ST functionality within their sets and an inherent that makes them even better at that job.

I'm hereby submitting my request that you actually read and understand what I'm saying before you start attempting to evaluate the points of my argument rather than blindly attempting to find logical fallacies that don't even withstand cursory examination from a person that has played this game for a week or more.

I have no problem with people attempting to find problems with my ideas and suggestions. I actively encourage it, if only by being a jackass so that people that I anger feel the need to overanalyze everything I say in an attempt to prove me incorrect (what? you think I'm incapable of being nice?). The fact that 99% of the time I'm having to explain a topic again (rather than having to defend my position) just because the people that disagree didn't understand me the first time I explained the topic lends a bit of credence to that argument. If you want to prove me wrong, it doesn't help your position when your flawed grasp of the situation is being pointed out by the guy you disagree with.

So you want an espoused soloing AT that is just as hardy as a Scrapper but deals less damage? Why don't you just come out and scream, "**** any design for an AT that requires it be viable on a team as well as solo! I don't give a damn whether a new AT is completely useless while on a team as long as I get to have what I want, and what I want is to solo!"

Right... Viable AT design meet Sam. Sam meet viable AT design. Is this the first time you've ever met?

Are you changing your position? You just said, in more words, that the entire point of designing an Assault/Defense AT was to make a Blaster that you could solo with.

Congratulations. You have a Blaster. In melee range, they get more damage but are put at more risk to discourage them from staying there. At non-melee range, they get less damage but don't get beat in the face as hard. See how easy that was?

That's kind of the point. Kheldians are a remarkably unpopular AT to bring into groups.

Are you just barely glancing over arguments before you read them? Corruptors have higher damage than Defenders and provide support that Blasters don't. That's the point.

So Blasters are like Blasters with less damage and higher survivability? Say what? Brutes have the advantage of tankability while on teams and average damage roughly equivalent to a Scrapper (the only time they drop below in heavily buffed circumstances). They deal the same amount of damage and provide a useful utility to the team.

It hasn't always been the theme as far as I can recall. I've heard gobs of suggestions like that that explicitly want Blaster primary blasts without any melee attacks. The difference between "ranged" and "assault" isn't splitting hairs any more than the differences between Broadsword and Katana.

Was I looking to convince you? Not really. I was saying that to BrandX. I'd also like to point out that whenever I talk about (armor + support) I'm not referring to anything even remotely similar to what Shield Defense did. I'm talking about having 2-3 shields, a mez toggle, and the rest of the powers in the set being ally buffs, debuffs, etc. taken explicitly from existing sets with a thematic equivalent. For example, a Fire Support set could include Fire Shield, Plasma Shield (self), Warmth, Thermal Shield, Plasma Shield (buff), Power of the Phoenix, Thaw, Forge, and Melt Armor. An Ice support set could include Frozen Armor, Glacial Armor, Wet Ice, Ice Shield, Glacial Shield, Frostwork, Arctic Fog, Snow Storm, Sleet, and Heat Loss. The Shield Defense model isn't (armor + support); it's armor with a couple support powers. Completely different.

I can tell you right now that it wasn't an oversight by the devs because Castle explicitly stated that it was given only positional defense for the exact reasons I've given you. What I've told you has been paraphrased versions of exactly what Castle said on the subject when it was brought up.

And yet it's not even close to the same thing. The FF bubbles are external buffs that another player applies to you. The APP armors are powers that you apply to yourself. The external buff has to apply to everything to make it useful. The internal buff assumes that it will be useful because you have control over what you will have. The only powers that apply to yourself that are intended to be generally applicable are those powers that can be taken by anyone (CJ, Stealth, etc). Just because you can take it doesn't mean that it's supposed to be able to stack with anything you could possibly take.

Cloaking Device provides typed and positional defense because all stealth powers provide both typed and positional defense. If you pay attention, you'll also notice that it's largely a token amount of +def (the same as CJ, if you're curious). 1.75% +def is hardly the same as 9.75%.

Actually, it doesn't provide "zero benefit". Frozen Armor and Scorpion Shield provide +def(s/l) (Scorpion Shield provides a small amount of energy as well). Unless you never plan on being attacked by attacks that aren't smash/lethal (of which there are plenty), you're going to get some benefit from HoB's +def because you're getting the full positional suite while you're only getting 2 of the 7 powers for the typed suite.

You can only get away with saying that because the only ATs that get APP shields are those sets that don't already have an existing defense structure within the confines of their AT. Do you honestly believe that if Scrappers ever got Scorpion Shield in Mace Mastery that it would somehow magically become more than just +def(s/l/e)? Just because you can get one specific variety of defense from a power in an APP does not mean that a power that provides some amount of defense should be made general to accommodate.

If it was done that way (which is actually what I've suggested numerous times when the issue of a "ranged/armor" AT is brought up), I think the devs would likely just rather create an entirely new basic AT with powersets drawn from existing powers rather than an EAT, especially if it's not really adding anything new (other than an AT). I can only assume that I've convinced you that, rather than having an AT that is simply ranged/armor, it would be better to have one that is assault/(armor + support) because of gameplay issues.

I just checked CoD and the Envenom listed there doesn't have the tag so it should be enhanceable since -regen and +regen are simply two sides of the same coin.

GFS>Incinerate>Cremate is the best attack string out there because GFS is actually an incredibly good attack, if only because it's not relying heavily on DoT damage to kill targets like the other two attacks in that string. Incinerate>Scorch>Cremate>Scorch is a close second that's a lot easier to manage, but GFS is still a good enough attack to justify taking.

The lack of knock effects isn't really all that telling simply because the Force Feedback proc is a bit of a joke. It's a 10% chance for 100% +rech for 5 seconds with a 10 second enforced downtime on the proc (i.e. it procs and it won't check again for the next 10 seconds). Assuming you make 2 attempts every 10 seconds, you're only getting ~9.5% +rech from that slot, one that you could be using to substantially better effect elsewhere in all likelihood.

Do you have any idea what you're talking about? Gambler's Cut is nice, but it's not the hallmark of the set. It has a DPA of only 61.1. Soaring Dragon has a DPA of 76.4. Golden Dragonfly has a DPA of 82.8. GC is nice, but it's nothing compared to GD or SD.

Follow Up. Seriously. Look it up.

You obviously have no clue what you're talking about here. Soul Drain is way better than Build Up could ever be. Better uptime, better values. DM works well with virtually any secondary because of the -tohit, the self heal (which I'm surprised you didn't mention in the least even though it's one of the big attractions of the set), and the endurance assistance.

Power Siphon is, over time, about as strong as Soul Drain and it doesn't rely on being surrounded by enemies in order to accomplish its goals. The -dam is also an incredibly powerful secondary effect.

There's such a thing as a good blaster? I thought that all they were good for was accumulating debt.

Not really. Consider how useful the FF buffs would be to an SR or Shield Scrapper if they were typed. Because only the highest of typed or positional is used, FF would be virtually useless to a positional defense user so the defense is generalized to make it useful to anyone and everyone.

Those are APP powers. Just because you can get APP defense buffs that are typed does not mean that any thematic +def efffect that you get (and, yes, the HoB buff is thematic) should provide some modicum of typed defense as well.

You're also ignoring the fact that there is a thematic definition to typed and positional defense. Typed defense is reserved for effects that are intended to represent an incoming blow bouncing off of you harmlessly while positional defense is intended to represent dodging an incoming blow. The Hail of Bullets dance isn't going to have attacks bouncing off of you harmlessly just like SR isn't going to suddenly manifest typed defense either.

You can try to argue "but it wouldn't hurt" all you want, but the devs have been pretty steadfast with their position on native defense buffs compared to external defense buffs: native defense buffs are specific because they're your baseline while external defense buffs are general because they're expected to modify the baseline regardless of what that baseline operates off of.

You are correct. It is only positional defense.

The powers that were modified were either ally buffs or pool powers. These powers were modified to make them useful to anyone and everyone. Hail of Bullets isn't an ally buff or a pool power so there is no reason for it to be a general defense buff. The reason why it got positional rather than typed defense is because positional defense represents dodging while typed defense represents deflection. Hail of Bullets causes you to flail around like crazy which means that you're dodging attacks rather than deflecting them.

It depends on what you plan on fighting.

Archery is 15.5% more accurate than standard (1.155 accmod). Targeting Drone provides 13.875% +tohit. Because of the formula to determine your chance to hit, Archery, thanks to its higher accmod, is going to get more out of Targeting Drone than other sets will.

Assuming that you plan on slotting up Targeting Drone, you'd be getting 21.645% +tohit from it. Without slotting any acc in your Arch attacks, you'll be managing a 95% chance to hit against +0s and +1s and an 89.7% chance to hit +2s. With a single slot, you'd be getting a 95% chance to hit against all enemies up to 4 levels above you.

No matter what you plan on fighting, Targeting Drone is going to save you a lot of slots. If you don't plan on fighting above +0-1s, then take Targeting Drone and revel in the fact that you've got 1 more slot to spend in all of your attacks (for a sweet 3 dam/2-3 rech/0-1 end redux set up). If you do plan on fighting higher level enemies, you can be secure in the knowledge that you're pretty much guaranteed to be hitting anything you can imagine.

Personally, I would take Targeting Drone if only because it saves you the slots. It's just like getting 1-2 "free" slots in all of your attacks at the cost of a single power and the 3-6 slots that you invest in it. This is also ignoring the fact that it provides a not insignificant amount of tohit debuff resistance, which means that when the rest of your friends are whiffing against the hordes of ghosts, you'll still be hitting them.

Are you suggesting that the devs make an EAT that doesn't have a backstory even though they've explicitly stated that the "epic" in "epic archetype" refers to the backstory of the AT rather than the capabilities of the AT? If it doesn't have an overarching backstory and it doesn't have a real role on a team, what's the point of spending all of the effort to develop it in the first place? And, even more, why would the devs want to arbitrarily make a DP/Armor EAT when they've shown no special proclivity to making EATs that aren't multitaskers of some kind (and a DP/Armor AT would definitely be a monotasker unless it was designed to alternate between ranged damage and ranged tanking) or are using powers largely unique to that EAT (which it wouldn't really do because you're asking for the EAT to explicitly use an existing blast set)?

You still haven't tackled the issue of "what is it supposed to do on a team" either. Just saying "make it an EAT" doesn't deal with that issue. Khelds were intended to be JOATs that could flit between roles (blaster/scrapper/tanker and blaster/controller/tanker) and SoAs are designed to be damage dealers with low maintenance support capabilities. If it's going to be made into an EAT, there would still need to be some justification for it within the confines of the game.

Asking other players to note differences in individual player damage output on a team is like asking 5-year-olds to explain the difference between a mile and a kilometer: they'll be able to tell that one is bigger than the other but they'll be hard pressed to actually tell you with any accuracy what the difference is. Differences in damage output are incredibly hard to quantify without assistance. Just because you're not attracting attention on a team for not having BU/Aim doesn't mean that the team wouldn't be better served if you did have it. There's also the big issue that BU/Aim's primary role within the confines of the powerset design isn't an issue on a team: BU/Aim are most useful to blasters when damage needs to be frontloaded to prevent them from dying. On a team, there isn't any spectacular need to frontload damage heavily because there are people whose job it is to stand there and take damage for the team.

Just because no one noted it doesn't mean that it didn't affect your performance significantly. You're assuming a lot about the intelligence of random people and how much they care about the capabilities of damage dealers. I can tell you with a measure of assurance that damage dealers get a lot more leeway in how effective people expect them to be because it's not a particularly integral role to the success of a party. And like I said before (and multiple times in this thread as well), Aim's use is to frontload damage which is the integral strategy for soloing, not for teaming.

Actually, it's more akin to suggesting that DA and FA get knockback protection and resistance than suggesting that EA get a damage aura. Damage auras are already rather uncommon (4 sets out of 12) so it's not especially apt because Aim is a functionality that is essentially standard. All but 2 armor sets in the game have kb protection because that mechanic is integral to the performance of the AT in question. The lack of it in those two sets is rather glaring and a substantial counterpoint to playing those sets. You can just as easily make the same counterargument ("just take Acrobatics, slot a KB IO, or bring insps"), but it doesn't stop the sets from missing something that is a standard for absolutely everything else.

If you agree that DP needs something to counteract the lack of Aim, I'm open to other ideas. Can you honestly think of something else that makes up for the lack of Aim without completely screwing up the design of the set and generates appropriate returns so as not to interfere with the overall balance of the set? I'd be curious to see your recommendations since, honestly, I haven't heard anything that appropriately addresses the problem from anyone that works better than simply providing [Swap Ammo] with short term +dam capability.

It depends on what other sets had in exchange for not having Aim. AR gets an extra AoE in exchange for Aim. Dark Blast gets an AoE stun (which I doubt will be proliferated, but it's what the only version we can currently play with gets). Dual Pistols doesn't really get anything for sacrificing Aim: Swap Ammo does nothing but allow you to access the basic schtick of the set.

As I have been saying from the beginning (in fact, I went back and counted; I've said this 3 times in this very thread and more than I care to say elsewhere), the set either needs Aim or needs to get something to compensate for the lack of Aim. The simplest solution (as I have said just as much) is to simply provide the [Swap Ammo] power with Aim functionality (or a modified Aim functionality to account for the naturally high acc of the set). I really don't care how it happens, but Dual Pistols should get something to offset the lack of Aim. The ammo toggles aren't that something because they're balanced around the fact that, in order to compensate for having multiple options for your secondary effect, the secondary effects are weaker. If the secondary effects in Dual Pistols were actually just as strong as the secondary effects of other sets, then the argument that Swap Ammo provides a substantive benefit would actually fit because you're getting to choose between 4 full strength secondary effects rather than 4 75% strength secondary effects.

I also say that Energy Aura has some good points but that doesn't stop me from trying to get that set buffed.

Where have I said that I want Dual Pistols to be mathematically superior? I have only ever said that I want Dual Pistols to be mathematically equivalent so that the choice isn't a question of effectiveness (which it is for many) and rather one of aesthetics, playstyle, and theme. As it stands, it's behind the other sets simply due to the lack of Aim (that and a rather lackluster tier 3 ST blast).

How would adding Aim functionality to the powerset without changing anything else (which is exactly what I've been proposing for this entire time) change that? You could play in the exact same way as you do now. Or is your problem that you would feel obligated to play differently because the set now has that capability?

Have you ever asked yourself, "Will this set perform decently?" because I can tell you that many players ask themselves that question just as much, if not more, than the questions you asked before. If anything, that question is actually more important because it's what gets players to continue playing a set beyond the first few levels. The number of players that I have seen amongst both vets and newbies that leave a set because they feel it is lacking in performance is simply staggering, especially when you're dealing with a powerset that relies as heavily upon a specific strategy to be survivable as Blasters do.

You're also ignoring the fact that the powers you're talking about are for ATs that are meant to spend long periods of time in combat without dying. Scrappers, Tankers, and Brutes get the variant BUs specifically because they're an AT that can survive without massive frontloading. Before attempting to say that the devs are somehow attempting to get rid of Aim/BU, look at the very sets you're talking about: Stalkers (which use largely the same frontloading strategy that Blasters do) got BU rather than any of the alternate powers. If anything it says that the devs realize that Tankers, Brutes, and Scrappers don't get much out of BU so they're designing new and interesting variations for them and preserving BU and similar short term damage frontloading powers for ATs that actually rely upon frontloading as a primary strategy.

In short, I think you're just being obtuse. You're seeing what you want to see regardless of the fact that, if I had my way, there would be no change to your playstyle, positively or negatively, beyond what you impose upon yourself while simultaneously arguing that numbers should be ignored because, apparently, those don't matter to people. While I'll agree that most people don't give a rats *** about the numbers, I can assure you that they definitely care about what those numbers entail. There's a reason that a lot of people abandon sets that are numerically inferior: people are only willing to handicap themselves so much for aesthetics.

The only legitimate reason (i.e. not just because you like not having it) you could possibly argue that DP doesn't need some kind of buff to account for the loss of Aim is if you think that it's somehow strong enough already when pretty much anyone that knows anything will present evidence both theoretical and empirical demonstrating that it's simply not even close to being that strong.

I've found HoB to be an excellent power for clearing out large mobs in between uses of my other two AoEs (I'm not counting Piercing Rounds because that's an AoE in the same sense that Headsplitter is an AoE). Even as a PbAoE, it's still useful because you can open with Empty Clips, close into range while using Bullet Rain, and then activate Hail of Bullets while your other two AoEs are recharging. Even with the long animation, HoB is still a better use of your animation time than ST attacks because of the number of targets that it hits. With Incendiary Ammo turned on, Hail of Bullets actually hits harder on average than Rain of Arrows does (of which the animation time is roughly the same).

The problem isn't making it balanced. The problem is making it balanced while still providing a reason for the AT to exist within the confines of the game (yes, it's a game; concept and theme are all well and good, but when it comes down to it, it's a game first and foremost before it's a superhero simulator). The only way to properly balance out the ability to have ranged capabilities and full on survivability is to drop damage or survivability. If that happens, then there isn't a functional role that the AT plays within the confines of the team beyond "soloer". Every AT fulfills some explicit role (or more than one): damage, support, and personal survival (each AT has some portion of each role to different extents).

If you trade away some portion of your damage or survivability for the ranged advantage (which you would have to do because otherwise you're getting something for nothing), there isn't a point to bringing the new AT because anything it does is done better by the pre-existing AT.

Every suggestion I have ever seen for a ranged/armor AT falls prey to this argument: if you create a balanced version of a ranged/armor AT (balanced both internally and against the existing ATs it would be competing against), there isn't a point in bringing one because whatever it brings to the party is brought more effectively by someone else. The only role it would really fulfill would be soloing, and the devs aren't likely to make an AT that pretty much only exists to solo.

It's because of this issue that whenever I see this suggestion (generally draped in the mantle of "we need it because I have a character concept" rather than anything resembling an actual reason that the game needs such an AT due to a role not being filled), I counter with a suggestion to create an AT that is assault/(armor + support). Even with damage low enough to justify an armored ranged attacker, there is a reason to bring them to a team because they're providing force multiplication coupled with a reason for the AT to actually have higher survivability (because it's designed to spend some portion of time in melee where the higher survivability is actually needed). There isn't a justification within the confines of the game (as a game, not as a superhero simulator) for there to be an AT with the ability to stay out of danger (ranged damage) coupled with the ability to stay in danger (survivability set) because they're both present explicitly to solve the same problem: how to deal with incoming damage.

"Uses Armor" does not necessarily mean that the character would have a survivability set. Even at level 1, Blasters can shrug off a shotgun blast or two to the face, so it's not like the Blasters are as squishy as a civilian would be (were they not simply immune to everything). Iron Man could quite easily be a Blaster (likely Energy/Dev or Energy/Energy depending on the writer) and simply use the durability of his armor to represent the fact that he can shrug off a few bullets before he goes down.

If you want canon demonstrations, Positron lives in a suit of armor and is a Rad/Rad Defender/Corruptor. He's not some special Rad/Invuln combination due to the fact that he lives in a suit of armor. The armor makes his normally humanly squishy body resilient enough to actually go out and hero about.

First, it's not a worthless taunt aura. If it was worthless, you wouldn't see people picking it up asap. It is a massively powerful taunt aura with a weak taunt effect.

Second, I'm not sure what you're looking at, but I can find plenty of reasons for WP to have a weaker taunt effect. WP is, quite simply, the strongest fully functional armor set in the game: it has a pittance of animation time consumption, excellent survivability, exotic mez protection, and no endurance issues. The set has no weakness from a survivability standpoint. The only weakness that WP has is that it has a weak taunt aura.

As has been pointed out repeatedly, all survivability sets have some weakness that you must tackle: Shields, Elec, and Fire have low baseline survivability, DA has endurance issues, Stone has mobility and damage output issues, and Invuln and Ice are jokes against psi. Willpower has none of those problems and actually lists the counter to 3 of those as explicit advantages (awesome v. psi, high baseline survivability, excellent endurance). The only "weakness" it has is a weak taunt effect in its taunt aura, and that's insanely easy to work around as a tank thanks to gauntlet and Taunt.

The numbers putting it in the middle when using Incendiary Ammo (i.e. all damage and nothing else). Standard rounds are slightly below average, but makes up for it with -res. Cryo and Chem ammo are a good deal below below.

I all honestly, I have to agree that it would make more sense to just give out the ammo toggles right from the start (since the "secondary effect" of the set is, in fact, the ability to change secondary effects and slightly alter your damage type) and turn Swap Ammo into some kind of Aim clone. I really don't care how exactly it's accomplished, but the set should get Aim functionality somewhere.

I already have a DP character that I leveled to 50, so I know what I'm talking about. I also have no problem making suggestions on the forum for problems that exist in sets that there are no real reasons for the continued existence of said problem. If the logic of "just don't play it if you don't like it" were applied to everything, nothing would ever get changed. I "complain" because there is a problem with the set that needs to be remedied.

And, yes, the lack of Aim is a problem.

No, Aim would make it perform at the levels that have been number crunched for it (since I haven't seen numbers that anyone else released comparing it to other blast sets and my assumptions ignored Aim because the only set without Aim was AR and I knew it would be a joke from the beginning). Aim isn't going to make any middling set top tier, since it only comprises a ~20% +dam boost (roughly a 7% increase in damage output) well slotted.

And that argument makes sense. Until you realize that there's no reason for the set to not have Aim, that is.

Swap Ammo could be given Aim functionality while preserving everything else in the set because it's a shell power as it stands. The argument works for AR simply because, in order to provide the set with Aim, it would have to lose something. DP would lose nothing to get Aim, and it's pretty easily demonstrable that the change wouldn't make DP any stronger than any other set out there (since it's middling at the moment and that's ignoring the use of Aim in the first place) and might actually allow it to be a set that is actually a numerical competitor rather than one that simply survives based off of aesthetics.

Are you just asking to be trolled by bringing up a singularly pointless dead horse yet again?