Werner

True. But in my mind, it's now closer to what the set "should" be - the Scrapper version of a Blaster - strong offensively, weak defensively.

Nope, not yet. And with the Fiery Aura buffs, by the time I get around to it, it might be Katana/Fiery Aura instead.

perma hasten - So, what benefits does this provide you? You get to do the top chain (so can DM/SD). You get Soul Drain up a little more often than DM/SD (loses by a mile to Against All Odds). You get to spam Siphon Life a little faster (usually attack chain limited unless you want to gut punch your damage output). And you get to use Dark Consumption a little more often. OK, you got me there. You have slightly better endurance recovery than the equivalent DM/SD. OK, yeah, but woo.

perma build up levels of damage buff - DM/SD has Soul Drain too, even if it's not up quite as often. And Against All Odds is blowing you away.

both massive single target and aoe damage - not nearly as much as DM/SD

regenerates 41 hps/sec - You must be including Siphon Life here? Yeah, DM/SD gets that power too.

more than softcapped - ditto DM/SD

softcapped with defense debuff resistance - ditto DM/SD with the right build

Nobody's saying that DM/SR is bad. Nobody is saying it isn't good enough. I have one myself, and it's an excellent combination. But I DM/SD is BETTER than DM/SR in almost every way. Giving a list of DM/SR's good points, when almost all of those good points are equaled or bettered by DM/SD, doesn't support your argument, assuming you're arguing that DM/SR is at least as good as DM/SD. But if all you were saying was "I don't feel threatened by Shield Defense", well, nobody can argue with that, since it's just how you feel.

I'm playing my L50 cheapo leveling-build Fire/Shield these days, and I'm ALREADY feeling the obsolescence of my other characters, at least in the "turn brain off and kill everything" department. I just can't stop killing stuff. Alexei goes almost as fast, but doesn't have a taunt aura, so I get more lame runners. I feel like I should be leveling something, you know, doing something "useful". But it's just so satisfying. I really need to IO him out for real. Eh, I have bids in on the expensive stuff. It'll happen eventually.

Yeah. *chuckle* I DO believe that they shouldn't have added so much IO defense to the game. But to change it now would be epic. Even just changing the Blessing of the Zephyr set seemed to make a pretty big splash and affect a lot of people.

Please forgive the off topic, everyone.

Current build (no longer soft capped or endurance sustainable due to nerfs):

Still working on a solution, but this is the last variant I played with in Mids' (soft capped, probably sustainable):

And if it isn't obvious, I sacrifice DPS and flash for survivability. Still, I have Super Jump and The Lotus Drops, so I consider it a pretty practical build. Moreso than my AV specialists, anyway.

I should probably admit that while I talked about what the devs probably intended, I also couldn't give a flying rats *** what the devs intended. I care how enjoyable the game is.

Perhaps what I should have said instead was something like "I think this game would be more fun if the answer for survivability wasn't almost ALWAYS to add more defense. I think more variety of solutions would be nice, such as how Regeneration survivability benefits some from defense, but more from huge recharge. I would like to see something like Dark Armor be just as solid if you build it for resistance and healing, so that the sets have more variety in the end game. I think variety is good." It just so happens that I think this sort of variety is what the devs intended, so I used that as a poor sort of shorthand. It's more clear if I spell things out, though, and doesn't rely on a point that I think is irrelevant - what the devs intended.

Well, the "solution" is based on a particular "problem". The devs probably never intended, for instance, that I be able to soft cap Dark Armor. It was intended to be more about utility, resistance, and healing. But when I soft cap it, I get something significantly more survivable than my Super Reflexes (outside of defense debuffs).

But let's say that after 10 incarnate levels, enemy to-hit had climbed to 60%. There's no WAY I can keep up with Katana/Dark. In fact, I'd probably just accept my lot, drop back to something more sensible like 35% to 40% defense, and call it good. It would STILL be a good character, just not stepping on defensive secondaries' toes.

Super Reflexes, on the other hand, would still find it pretty simple to soft cap. There would be more compromises in the build, but it would be perfectly doable, and the way to go. Shield Defense could still soft cap, but it's going to involve a lot more compromise, as perhaps it should. Invulnerability will probably have a hard time of it, unless surrounded by enemies on a survivability build. But it's got a lot of resistance to fall back on, plus Dull Pain. Other secondaries would probably find it impossible to soft cap. They could have very good defense, but not soft-capped defense. They would probably then play more as "intended". And if buffs are necessary to their non-defense survival abilities to bring everything in balance, well, I'm not opposed. And it isn't like Super Reflexes is really being buffed as a result. It's still a one-trick pony, and that trick is getting harder and harder to pull off. Still doable, but you're going to have to work at it.

Still, perhaps you're right about defense not being too strong, just other options being too weak. The argument against buffing IO resistance, I believe, was how ridiculously overpowered the combination of both defense and resistance could then be. But if we can use the incarnate levels to buff enemies to compensate, perhaps you could improve IO resistance to offer better levels of mitigation without having an issue.

Yep. And I think an end game issue could be addressed with an end game (incarnate levels) solution, whatever that might be. I think that would be much better than doing it with nerfs, even if the net result for continued leveling is the same.

And if that leaves imbalances in place for level 50s with no incarnate levels, does it matter? It's almost like worrying in great detail about balance at exactly level 37. We'll hit it and move right through it. It's good to not be terribly unbalanced, but it isn't terribly unbalanced, so I'd call it good enough if it's just one more rung on the ladder.

Not that they'll do a great job of balancing the incarnate levels. To me, getting everything perfect out of the gate is basically impossible. But it just seems like a golden opportunity to address any lingering issues in a way that simply wasn't available before.

Well, OK, but that was the point. I think it'd be much better to negate some defense as you level than to nerf IO defense. The idea is that your character still performs just as flawlessly as ever against all the enemies you're used to facing. You weren't nerfed at all. Oh? What? Those new enemies? The ones you're going to need to face to get even better? Yeah... they're... a little harder.

OK, yes, debuffs would have similar effect. But generally speaking, I'm just not a fan of debuffs. I'd rather the enemy simply be better than that the enemy make me weaker, even if the net effect is the same. I want to see tigers tearing each other apart, not tigers debuffing each other into kittens.

That's pretty much my thought. Frankly, if you click on "Scrapper", you have guaranteed awesome. That's kind of the point of the experiment. I'm in my early 20s, so nothing special, but it's been fun so far, and that's been through the "bad" levels. It should only get better from here.

Since that would gut punch a whole lot of existing builds, that seems unlikely.

Still, it may be a fixable problem. Most of the "problem" is in end game builds. The end game is changing with ten new incarnate levels, right? Add more to-hit to incarnate enemies, increasing as the levels increase. Super Reflexes could keep up pretty easily. Other secondaries start requiring more compromises to soft cap against the new enemies, and others just can't do it any more. My Katana/Dark would be an early casualty. It's OK. I'll take one for the team.

Maybe if we get enough people to sign a "nerf Iggy" petition? Or they could solve it with buffs. Is there some way I can download Iggy's mad skillz into my wetware? Either way SOMETHING needs to be done. He done stoled all the awesome.

Perhaps there would be a way to grandfather in people who had taken powers that were no longer available at that level.

I'm talking about getting DDR to Super Reflexes levels, which to me means perma double stacking Active Defense, which means huge recharge, which means lots of purples and Luck of the Gambler globals, which means huge cost. I agree that you can make a great Shield Defense toon for less. But that Shield Defense toon wouldn't then be "everything that Super Reflexes is, and more", because its DDR would still allow for cascading defense failure. So to me, while it might arguably be better than Super Reflexes, it at least isn't better in every way, and Super Reflexes still has a niche.

Yup. And in combination with the Shield Charge nerf, would probably be plenty. Changing Active Defense in this way would affect VERY few people, most of them powergamers who should be aware of the discrepancy in performance, and that this isn't generally desirable in a game. Shield Defense would still be very, very good. But Super Reflexes' niche would be preserved, even in the top tier builds.

The subject is "In the Age of IO's, is SR obsolete?" It's very difficult to discuss that without discussing the main other secondary that arguably makes Super Reflexes obsolete. Ignore the elephant in the room if you want, but when the question was, "What the hell is this giant thing in the room?" I think discussing it is on topic.

I also believe that the only proposed nerf to Shield Defense so far in the thread was "removing the ability to enhance the DDR in Active Defense". This affects almost no one. It is also likely "not working as intended", so if you accept that as a reasonable rationale for nerfing Shield Charge, well, there you go.

(Edit: I think Against All Odds was also mentioned. Not sure I agree it's a problem, but it does mean that Active Defense wasn't the only thing mentioned.)

I agree that SR is great. That doesn't mean it isn't obsolete. A race car might be very fast, but it'll still lose the race if there's an even faster race car.

Before Shield Defense was released, Super Reflexes was considered by many to be the top of the heap. You don't buff #2 unless you also buff #3 - #8, and then you're just asking for a giant mess, because there's no way you'll get the balance for all seven other sets exactly right, and then we're right back where we started. I DO believe that Quickness provides too little compared to Hasten. I'm just not sure we can make even reasonable buffs to Super Reflexes without creating a mess.

Edit: I feel like I should perhaps clarify my position. I think Super Reflexes is slightly obsolete - in one obscure corner of the game that I happen to care a great deal about, top end level 50 builds, and only because Shield Defense can step all over Super Reflexes' tricks in that specific case. I don't think Shield Defense is massively overpowered. I don't think Super Reflexes is at all underpowered. I have two Shield Defense characters at 50, and I was very upset by the news that they were nerfing Shield Charge, and I whined about it stridently. But I'll agree that it's justified. One of my Shield Defense characters is using the Hamio trick, and I'll be upset if they nerf Active Defense to not have buffable defense debuff resistance. But if it ever happens, which I doubt, I would agree that it was justified. If I were a dev, that is as far as I would go if I even went that far, and then I'd see how things played out, particularly with Going Rogue and Incarnate levels coming up, which is almost certain to shake up any established order.

Edit: Clarifying further, I DON'T think that IOing up other secondaries to the soft cap makes Super Reflexes obsolete. 95% DDR is VERY nice, and worth taking Super Reflexes for. I have a soft-capped Katana/Dark that, generally speaking, is significantly more survivable than my DM/SR. However, if I were joining an unknown group for unknown content, I would prefer to bring along my DM/SR. He has ENOUGH survivability for almost any situation, and won't be debuffed into uselessness the way my Katana/Dark can be. Quickness is nice too.

And no temps, no insps if I recall. Or is that part of a master run?

OK, it's good to have that link so that people can come to their own decisions. But yes, I'm aware of that spreadsheet. I wasn't pulling 8% and 6% out of thin air; I was doing a simple average across every enemy in the game based on that spreadsheet.

Now yes, certainly, a simple average isn't overly useful. You have to look at which enemies you face, and basically what percentage of time you spend fighting them on average.

Unfortunately, that's a bit difficult with a list of 1600 or so enemies. So I've never bothered before, even though I've been confronted on this on several occasions when I've stated that lethal resistance isn't a big issue. So fine, I finally took the time. I estimated exactly how much time I've spent fighting every single enemy blue side, and from that calculated the average resistance I've faced.

My results?

The average enemy I've faced has only 5% lethal resistance, and 4% smashing resistance. And I highly suspect I spend a MUCH higher percentage of time in the 35+ game than the average player.

It has to be said, of course, that we can to some extent CHOOSE which enemy groups we face. I play a whole lot of lethal characters. Barring other considerations, I choose to fight enemies that aren't particularly resistant to lethal damage. It's not particularly high on my list of criteria, but I don't go seeking after 50% resistant robots either.

So thanks, I guess. I DO feel more educated now. I now believe that lethal resistance is even less of an issue than I've presented it to be in the past.