dave_p
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Posts
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Quote:It boggles my mind how some people still haven't figured out different people have fun doing different things. Some people have "fun" making min/max builds. Some people roleplay or have heavy concept builds and never even open up a planner. And some of us find a happy middle ground.Originally Posted by Roofles
I've never played a tank where my travel power made a bit of difference. You're a tank just get to the mish in any fashion that tickles your fancy and tank. It boggles my mind how caught up people can get in min/max builds sometimes, really this game isn't that hard...... -
Lots of conflicting advice. My thoughts from playing a Fire tank from I0 to now.
FA is considered "offensive" for not just BA & Burn, but also FE. Being Fire/Fire, you can fully leverage all 20 sec of FE. Burn's fear (Afraid) can also be used defensively, though I strongly disagree this is "working as intended" (read: Devs, fix Burn!). FA was balanced around Burn as a truly offensive tool, though horribly overbalanced at first (seriously, most ppl have no idea just how overpowered Burn was at launch when you could lay down multiple patches). It is no longer balanced correctly, IMO.
Pools: Pre-IOs, the 4 "must have" pools for Fire were Speed (Hasten, for faster HF & Consume), Fitness (Stamina = must), Fighting (Tough = must, Weave = maybe) and Leaping (CJ for -immob, Acro for -KB). Nowadays, the Leaping's optional, but still recommended. Speed & Fitness are sorta optional too if you can IO the hell out of your toon, but still, they're highly, highly recommended. Never enough recharge or recovery for Fire tanks (note, w/Stamina and heavy IOs, my Fire tank never has end problems, even w/o Consume). Fighting, otoh, has become even more important w/IOs, esp w/high def builds, since Weave is essential to most of those. Of course, then Leadership also becomes a viable option to grab Maneuvers for those last few points that'll get you to softcap.
Oh, capping def w/o debuff resistance is absolutely effective. There are only a handful of situations where true cascading failure is a risk, and frankly it's overrated since you still have decent-to-good resists to fall back on most of the time (plus a very good heal). My Fire/EM tank w/capped S/L defenses is about 1000X tougher than he was pre-IOs, though he punches a little softer. And yes, if you really want to tank w/the big boys, you need a high def build. +Rech, regen, HPs are all nice (and you should strive for them too), but +def is where it's at. Anyone can tank w/a good team and/or solid tactics (and again, you should strive for this too), or you can cherry pick your enemies to fire dealing mobs, or crawl through maps "patiently" to fight manageable groups... but let's face it, you want that heroic feeling, and as a tank, there's nothing better than being able to jump into most +4, X8 spawns w/impunity.
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Quote:This would also clear out much of the riff-raff from the billionaires club.Originally Posted by Werner
for every table
for every field with a unit of measure of INF
divide by 10
BTW, I sorta like the -inf from debt idea. I mean, if you're constantly going down fight after fight, you're not doing a very good job (thematically here, not how we might play, oh say, our scrappers), right? Supes only died once, and let's face it, his rep went down a bit (hey, if Doomsday can kill him...). I bet like Booster Gold (before he got killed for good) went to the hospital all the freakin' time. -
See 2nd link in sig.
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I think I capped mine for well under 100M, but then I bought up tons of Kin Combat sets before ppl figured out how good def-capped builds were. It'd be tougher with Flight too unless you were hovering in combat (PitA w/FS).
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If you're doing a lot of high level TFs and raids, ELA >>>> Fire, because of Rikti. Rikti feature tons of Energy & Psi damage, both of which eat Fire alive, but ELA yawns at (okay, doesn't quite yawn at Psi, but you know what I mean). MS raids & LGTFs far favor ELA. ELA ends up w/higher S/L (and Cold, which is just wrong) resists too so even on like ITFs, ELA should do better, but that maybe more of a tossup. Of course, ELA will never have your toggles drop on cuz PS wasn't charging fast enough, unlike Fire w/Consume.
Mind you, my Fire tank never has (much) problems on MS raids or LGTFs, but I'm willing to bet my ELA tank (once I have him similarly IOed up) will survive a lot greater stress test than what my Fire can handle. Then again, I really like laying Burn patches down on grates and such (or many spots in the LGTF/ITF), so Fire has its benefits too.
Oh, my original calcs based on Brute #s show the same Neg resist for Fire & Elec. I too am waiting on CoD to update for ELA/ELM before updating my own tables. -
Quote:Oops, I meant Whirling Sword (WS).Originally Posted by Leo_G
Hmm, WH? Are you referring to Whirling Hands?
Interesting point raised by Arcana about DPC for AoEs. I was going to dispute that a bit (still might), but I'm doing some AoE/ST mixed DPS chains for BS & Kat and the disparity isn't quite as great as I thought so I'm going to normalize all ST attacks for DPA and start again. Might take it to the scrapper board for more input. -
Quote:I softcap S/L def on all my Fire, Dark, WP & Elec toons, scrappers & tanks. Some sacrifice a bit more than others (none too badly, btw), but it's *well* worth it. IK has a good build as an example, though I'd do it a little differently, of course (Zinger in Taunt, more damage for LF for startersOriginally Posted by StrykerX
How are you going to softcap S/L defense (or an defense for that matter) on Electric? You're starting with no defense at all except Weave and maybe Combat Jumping, so you'd need over 30% S/L defense from IOs. Even if that's possible I can't see getting it without seriously gimping the rest of the build... it seems like going for +HP and +regen (and S/L resists if you can actually afford Gladiator's Strike sets) would be a better build.).
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Also, Acid has a fast recharge so you can cover multiple "patches" with it during its duration. Yeah, the small area sucks, but it's one of the key powers of the set and is also generally one of the 1st debuffs I put down w/my TA.
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You originally asked, "Why would it 'get it the way of actual gameplay'?" I assumed the "it" in question was my reference to the Flight pool, which is why I answered the way I did. Thus, it *is* a question of Hover (or AS, I guess, but I never liked AS for a melee toon either) vs. CJ, at least in the context of how I answered.
If I could take every travel power in the game, I surely would, but usually, ppl have tight builds, esp for pools. If it's not CJ for Hover, it's Tough/Weave for Hover/Fly, or maybe Aid Self. Taking the Flight pool restricts how I have to build my character, and more often than not, it results in a lower performance toon (a good exception would be my Fire/Rad AV/GM soloer who uses every point of Hover & CJ to hit def cap). Concept matters a lot (thus the dual build comment from me), but so does performance, and my melee builds w/o Flight and w/Leaping (Med, Leadership, etc) do better.
Even looking at CJ in a vacuum, as I stated, CJ + Hurdle will give you some of the best combat mobility available, not to mention a ghetto travel power for the lower levels. Hell, w/temp travel powers, I often don't bother w/a "real" travel power til way later on. Also, 2-slotted (LotG rech/def + def--CJ's a good mule too) CJ can be the difference bet. 41.8% and 45%, and that close to cap, that 3% is huge (and expensive). Of course you can do the same with Hover, but then you're stuck in Hover while fighting, which as I mentioned isn't so great for melee. Considering that Kin Combat triples are going for like 70M+ on the markets, I think most ppl value a "mere" 3% or so defense quite a bit.
As for vertical travel and mobility, every one of my toons have the Raptor Pack, and now it's even easier to get since you can get in the Shard at lvl 1. No reason to spend a pool anymore unless you explicitly want Hover and/or AS, want to slot Fly for speed, or just don't want to look like you're wearing a jetpack (again, concept matters a lot to me too). Again, this is all why *I* feel taking the Flight pool means making a sacrifice of fun for concept, at least w/melee toons. YMM(obviously)V. -
Quote:Foot Stomp for one. For another, Hurdle + CJ gives you very good, unspressed, maneuverability in combat. Hover, unless Speed Boosted, can't match that for melee (I use it on my controllers tho just fine, a few non-blapping blasters too). Finally, Fly is a slow a** travel power.Originally Posted by Finduilas
Why would it "get it the way of actual gameplay"? CJ does gives some additional mobility, but IME any advantage it gives in "actual gameplay" is very minor.
However, I suppose it could be playstyle dependent. I know in my case, having CJ made very, very little difference in how I play my characters.
Yes, playstyles differ, but I find CJ + Hurdle infinitely preferable to anything else for my melee toons in combat. -
Yeah, Mids' is often inaccurate. Esp for scrapper #s cuz they bake in crits as a % of damage. I redid all my calcs for my DPA tables w/CoD #s and they seem to be a lot more accurate.
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Quote:Did you even look at Panzerwaffen's numbers he posted above before posting that?Originally Posted by Brynstar
How does Katana have "Much" better AoE dmg than BS?? The cones do similar dmg and the PBAoE are almost the same as well with the same Rech??
Which, btw, look a little off. My own numbers (from City of Data) show:
DPA calcs w/Arcanatime for base damage at 50. Kat DPA numbers are clearly higher than BS's. Lotus has flat out more damage *and* is faster animating. FS also has a shorter recharge than Slice (base 6 vs 8 sec). If you think 54% more (LD vs. WH) is "similar" damage, I really don't know what else to say.Code:BS Dam Act DPA Kat Dam Act DPA Slice 80.80 2 36.01 FS 65.04 1.17 49.27 WH 84.47 2.67 29.09 LD 88.22 1.83 44.55
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I've taken flight for melee toons for concept and always regretted it (which is to say, it got in the way of actual gameplay). Thank goodness for Raptor Packs and dual builds.
My WP/SS is of the Superman mold. In one build, I take SS & Flight, LBE & Energy Torrent (super breath), and is less effective and a bit of a PotA to play compared to my 2nd build w/Leaping & Fireball. But then concept counts for a lot too, so again, thank goodness for dual builds. -
Earth/TA is horrible solo. You just don't do any damage til 32, and really, not til 36/37 when you have both your pet & OSA slotted. After that, you can roll along solo well, but until then, your damage output is very, very poor.
On teams though, you're absolutely a controlling & debuffing beast. Earth/TA is prolly the most controlling combo in the entire game. In addition to keeping your team safe, you'll help them hit more and to more damage. Seek teams out, even though they may not appreciate your contributions, esp if they don't see any big green numbers from you.
Glue is nice to have early in addition to QS--QS is wanted because for the -def debuff. You and your team will hit a lot more once QS is laid down. Glue has a -recharge component which QS does not. Combined, they should hit the -slow movement cap (90%) on most things you fight. Later on, you can choose to respec out of Glue at your discretion. My Earth/TA has neither Glue nor Flash (nor Poison Arrow) and don't really miss any of them. Those are the 3 TA powers that are prolly the most "skippable".
Of Earth, Salt Crystals is very skippable as is Stone Prison, though I take it as an IO mule. It can also help add some damage early on, but when I did it during my early levels, it ended up not doing a whole lot. Cages annoys a lot of ppl w/the graphics, but it's a pretty key power and once procced up, will do some okay damage. Plus it sets up containment. Other than those, take every other Earth power.
For early damage, Air Sup is a popular choice for soloing. I never go that route myself and just find teams, but if you must solo, it's a good option. Either way, stick with it--Earth/TA is really an amazing combo. -
Quote:I'm guilty of dispensing advice on just #s alone, since I crunch a lot of them, but there are times actual experience proves greater. TS has a weak, weak AoE "splash" component. Its ST damage alone is also pretty poor, considering the animation time, so I'm actually really down on the power despite what a lot of ex-Brutes seem to think about it. Anyway, back to the OPOriginally Posted by Heraclea
I assumed it was an AoE; it takes PBAoE sets. For ordinary tanker play, the difference is probably difficult to notice.
ELA has comparable, but slightly higher resist #s than Fire or Dark, and more comprehensive than Fire as well. Dark is even more comprehensive as Elec has a Toxic hole, but heroside, that's not that big a deal. With Tough, all passives, and everything Slotted w/3 SOs, the #'s look like:
So on the surface, ELA looks better, though DA has better Toxic & Psi coverage. Considering the S/L advantage and En damage is the 3rd most prevalent, ELA clearly wins out. Having actually played all the sets though (though my ELM is still young), ELA definitely feels a bit squishier w/o the uber heals that FA & DA get. Then again, all 3 sets feel a bit squishy (compared to the other sets) until I get some serious IOs into them, so it's a bit early to tell. My gut feeling is, once fully IOed out (and that means soft-capped S/L defense for all of them), ELA will be tougher than Fire, but weaker than Dark.Code:EL FA DA S 79 71 71 L 79 71 71 F 55 90 47 C 55 31 47 E 90 47 31 N 47 47 63 T 0 0 31 P 55 0 79
As for ELM, its ST damage is actually a bit weak (not as bad as, say, Ice Melee), and doesn't hold a candle to Fire Melee, which has some of the highest DPA (and DPE) attacks for tankers, period. What Elec gets is LR, which is just all sorts of broken (in a good way), but it's a slow recharger. Since I only crunch DPA #'s, I usually rely on guys like Stars to show the long term effectiveness of various sets, but I suspect Fire & ELM would be comparable for AoEs (LR does about 80% more DPA than FSC, but recharges in 50% more time; JL > BoF; Combustion >> TS; Elec also gets CI). My gut feeling is, the effective tanker AoE ranking would go like Fire > Elec > SS > Ice. -
Quote:Kat has flat out higher DPA values across the board except for Hack over GC (actually SotW, but GC is used in an optimized chain, thus the comparison). Granted, because of the frequency of Hack/GC in their respective usual attack chains, this evens things out a bit, but your own DPS calcs still shows Kat ahead. And that's both ST chains optimized, which again, takes more recharge to do for BS. Then there's the proc advantage for Kat.Originally Posted by Umbral
Here, you're wrong. They have roughly identical DPA. This is why their attack strings can generate such similar DPS. The only reason that Kat pulls ahead is because of procs. The faster animating attacks allow for more proc attempts in any period of time.Quote:
Originally Posted by GeminiProject View Post
They are identical except for the fact that BS has lower DPA.
There's also no "burst" advantage for BS either, since you can pretty much fit in GD + GC in the same time it takes for 1 HS to animate. There are certain 10ths of seconds burst measurements where BS seems to be higher (say at exactly 2.3~2.8 seconds), at least for the first swing or two, but for any meaningful burst measurement (say, how much damage you can do w/BU), Kat still wins.
Combine this w/the fact that FS & LD blow Slice & WS out of the water and, asthetics aside, Kat >> BS in pretty much every regard. So yeah, I think BS's damage should be bumped up a touch. Otherwise, other than for concept (and concept is very important, no doubt), there's really zero reason to play BS. At the very least, normalize Slice & WS's damages to match the Kat counterparts' DPAs. -
BS has terrible numbers... well, terrible DPA, anyway. On the upside, it recharges super fast and has a low end cost, but seriously, it does Brawl level DPA. So what's a typical early attack chain for Spines? Lunge > Impale > Lunge, SB whenever up, and wait for Ripper? Boxing as an early filler (taking Tough & Weave anyway)?
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Has CoD updated for Elec Melee yet? My Elec Melee numbers are from Mids', which are 1) not as reliable, and 2) bakes in crits. Using *those* numbers, CI has a higher DPE than most scrapper PBAoEs, but lower than most melee cone. It also has a higher DPA than almost every cone so I think it sorta balances out. In fact, CI would be a pretty kick a** ST power in & unto itself, though an end hog. While I agree w/all of the OP's arguments on their face, I sorta treat CI as a high damage, short cone that I don't need to line up to use, which is to say, with minimum fuss, I'll almost always hit 2 or more mobs (yes, missing on the earlier mob screws the pooch), which means it's well worth the end costs. At least on average. Personally, I have much bigger issues w/TS's DPA (like half of CI's for the main target, paltry for the "AoE") than anything w/CI.
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Quote:Win.Originally Posted by The_Bronx
You agreeing with Rags is more reason you should not be posting anymore.
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Yay for non-Wed raids! I'll try to be there for both.
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For damage, esp for DPA, Fire wins, hands down.
Base DPA's at 50 w/Arcanatime...
Fire Ball: 33.22
Fire Blast: 29.91
Ice Blast: 25.75
Frost Breath: 14.75
*Ice Storm: 52.14
(*yes, IS does awesome DPA, and as a controller you can ensure things stay put for the duration of the DoT, but... it *is* a DoT and more importantly, it recharges in 120s base compared to 32s for Fire Ball)
Those are really the two best, Ice for Ice Storm (even adjusted for my comments above) and both Fire & Ice have two solid ST blasts.
Hurl Boulder: 19
Fissure: 10.49
Seismic Smash: 46.34
Fissure is weak on damage, though the added mitigation is obviously nice, but we're talking damage only. SS seems to be popular lately, but it's ST, and it's melee. Again, not a big problem for many controllers, but I'd rather have AoE.
Power Blast: 16.55
Energy Torrent: 22.25
Mental Blast: 16.55
Psi Tornado: 10.67
Really lame damage for both (again, the KB/KU can be nice). Psi 'Nado's DPE, btw, is a pathetic 1.16, and is a DoT to boot. Roots does almost as much DPA & has a higher DPE than Psi 'Nado.
Of course, there are other reasons than damagefor which to choose your epic, which is why most of my controllers take the Psi pool, but when I want (AoE) damage (for my Ill/Kin and Earth/TA), I go Fire and never look back. -
Have purp prices tanked already? I was thinking of selling off a bunch of sets stored in my sg base in anticipation of just this. Not that I really need the extra billions, but I hate missing out...
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Quote:Yeah, I was gonna add that purps don't really even do that much for many top end builds that aren't recharge based. Most of my AV/GM/Pylon soloers do fine w/o a single purp set, though I usually throw a few in as just icing.Originally Posted by Reptlbrain
fixt.Quote:
Originally Posted by TopDoc View Post
Purples make it easier to do some silly hard things, like solo AVs, or Rikti Pylons, or massive spawns of high level mobs.
Otherwise, great post by the OP. Won't reduce the silly complaints, of course. -
My rule of thumb for my melee toons is that if you can cover all 3 positions, do that over typed. If you can't, go for S/L, and if possible, add some ranged on top of that. In practice, that *usually* means my resist (or regen) based toons (DA, WP, Fire) get their S/L def capped, but my Shields guys (and if I had an SR) get all 3 positions capped. Exceptions are like Invul, where I argue that since S/L resist is already capped, I go for F/C/E/N typed + ranged capping. Also, Stone isn't really resist based, but since the S/L def was already high w/Rock, it was a small push to get it capped. They all work out great, btw.
FWIW, pretty much all my non melee toons go for ranged def cap w/decent to good AoE def.