As a defensive boost late game, defiance just doesn't work. The increasing abundance of status effects and high-damaging foes combine to make the majority of my defeats happen while I am stunned or otherwise under a status effect; or they have been substantial enough to knock me from 30-40% health to 0% in a shot.
My feedback, adding to before, is this. In terms of being a level 50 blaster I found this inherent ability useless to me defensively and of less offensive benefit. Thematically it simply does not suit blasters at all. The entire idea of doing more damage (getting stronger) as a result of being severely injured (getting angrier) is more in line with a certain green-skinned tanker-type with anger management issues. Its certainly not reminiscent of blaster-type heroes that I've seen.
Please scrap this power for blasters altogether. Just take it away and please think of something new. This does not help/fix us. We don't want it. We'd rather not have it and have the developers thinking this represents a fix for the problems blasters have.
ok, so color me retarded, but isn't that MoG-like power in the epic power pool going to make this easy to do?
I've done a little testing of Defiance with my Blaster (E/E, 44), both in missions and the arena. To be honest, I see a little help in the field, but it doesn't seem to help much in the Arena, where everyone I'm likely to fight can either hold me or resist anything I can do to hold or stun them. What if, instead of making defiance boost your damage into the supposed stratosphere ... which still doesn't take down something if you can't hit it or it just has too many defenses (Like MoG for instance) ... why not have it start improving the Blasters resistance to such things and improve his chance of breaking through others defenses, and maybe bring down how much damage it does.
I've seen so many complaining about the nerfing of the regen scrapper ... well I've just seen that a regen still kicked two blasters around the Arena, and I couldn't see that defiance had much effect, especially since I still couldn't hit when he MoG'd.
Anyway, that's my suggestion. Instead of ramping up the damage so far, give some increasing protection from stuns, sleeps, holds, knockbacks, etc. and grant an increase in those effects getting through the enemy's resistances, and maybe a little damage increase. You're still about to die, and while I understand what Statesman is saying in his explanation, that's an awfully dificult way for a Blaster to fight ... since he has no way to stave off that last shot if he lets himself get that low. At least, that's been my experience so far.
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I want to stress that you actually can end up being buffed over 500% with Defiance. (500% is the max buff for Blasters) This actually does nothing except protect you from damage debuffs.
This is one of the rare instances in Issue 5 where a solo character is able to reach a cap without help (or inspirations).
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According to my testing it would be valueless for a solo to try to 'ride the line' when you start getting to upper levels. Even at level 24 any sizeable buff meant I was virtually guaranteed to be eating dirt.
Alright, I'm sure the devs are tired of hearing the same response over and over again.. I gave the long version of my views on Defiance a while back, so here's the short summary.
First of all, I have a level 50 Energy/Devices blaster.
I benefit next to nothing from defiance. If you insist on keeping defiance around it shouldn't factor into any kind of balancing what-so-ever. By the time Defiance kicks in I should be leaving, and will most likely serve to be a cute bar to distract me from running away at full speed, or as a tiny benefit right before I faceplant. That's assuming I get a chance to fire while it's active.
In short, if you were to remove the buff and leave the bar in there for a while on test, next to no one would notice the difference. This should tell you something about if it's the right thing to do or not.
I'd also much rather have the unresistable damage rather than this defiance. Why can't we have that? I mean look at the abilties, takers get inherent taunts with every attack, scrappers get to /utterly decimate/ things every few attacks and we get... defiance, a damage buff we'd be stupid to use.. I'm sure you can see why this is so un-appealing.
But I'm afraid you're going to pawn this off onto us no matter what we say. 
I sure do hope the secondary changes happen in I5.. as is I'm ending up in a bit of trouble with my tough, weave, cloaking device, and epic shield being nerfed. :/
Relax, they said they are going to start defiance earlier. How much earlier remains to be seen. I think it should start at 75%. That may sound too powerful to some but think about it. It only takes about 3 hits give or take to take down a blaster. To see any benefit that could help our survivability it would have to start around here.
I really wish they'd give up on this as some kind of help for blasters. Any good blaster will tell you and hundreds already have that this power is useless and totally out of character for a blaster. If this is some how taken into consideration as a balancing power this would be more than useless it'd be flat out unfair. I can't believe you guys are holding onto this. Its ridiculous. Nobody wants this! I'd rather have nothing than this. All it will lead to is an untimely death by hanging around when any good blaster knows better and healers not healing when they should be.
Listen to your customers your dealing with tens of thousands of hrs of experience on these boards and nobody wants this.
Here's something I recommend being added to Defiance:
Increasing mezz resistance as defiance kicks in. Maybe when Defiance first kicks in, a hero's mezz magnitude increases by one. That would mean that single holds cast on the hero would be ignored, and it would take 2 or more to hold them. Then as the hero's health drops, he gets more and more magnitude so that it would take more to hold him or mezz him. There would have to be some tweaking so that while a Blaster gets some mezz resistance, he's not at the level of scrappers and tankers.
I think this could add a lot to Blasters' survivability.
On another note..... I personally like Defiance, so that negates the "nobody likes it" statement. Everyone saying that the high damage in Defiance doesn't kick in until you only have a sliver of health left is not realizing something. And that thing is that you don't have to wait until you get to a sliver of health to hit the 500% damage cap! Your attacks are already going to be slotted with damage enhancers and running at least at 200% anyway! (That's assuming three SO damage enhancements are added to a power). Realizing that, you only have to hit the point of Defiance where it buffs you an additional 300% to hit the cap of 500%! And that's being very conservative that you only have 3 SO damage enhyancers. I know that with my main attacks, I have at least four, with the other two being accuracy and endurance reduction or recharge. Some of my attacks have 5 damage SOs, which brings up the damage to 260%. That means I only need another 240% to hit the 500% cap, and that point comes earlier in your health bar.
Arc ID#30821, A Clean Break
The only problem with defeating the Tsoo is that an hour later, you want to defeat them again!
"Life is just better boosted!" -- LadyMage
"I'm a big believer in Personal Force Field on a blaster. ... It's your happy place." -- Fulmens
i sid this in another post....and im sure someone else has said it as well....
defiance does not meld with what states is claiming to be his grand scheme of risk vs reward.....
hanging around NEAR DEATH for 3-5k xp...isnt worth the 110k i will get from the encounter if i fail.........
My impression of what's going on with Defiance. Please, let me explain a bit before getting there just so that you see my view of how balance seems to be "working as intended" and I want my 1 post to count. I apologize in advance for the length.
First, blasters are the damage kings in the devs minds. As a result that must balance with defense. Let me repeat this. If an archetype is about dealing high damage it will not get any defense. It's the glass cannon, looks beautiful on paper, and in the imaginative states. Big guns don't get armor. The blaster archetype is all about hitting hard. I have no problem with this concept. It makes sense. The devs have this image in their heads about blasters being the damage kings and as a result we must pay for it by being as fragile as a house of cards. However, in their attempt to "balance" they've left all the blaster advantages on the left hand side of the scale, and left a lot of other archetype advantages off the right-hand side of the scale.
Range. Any blaster in his 40s knows this is a problem. Range is not a defense. It is only a defense from melee, and in the 40+ game range fails as a defense because the devs see only damage-dealing attacks as a risk. Status attacks come from out of my attack range. Every other archetype out there can get some protection from status attacks that does not involve the inspiration tray. Using scrappers' need to be in melee range as their payoff for getting mez protection is unbalanced, as mez attacks do not always come from melee range. The tanker and scrapper are at no additional risk to sleep or hold than the blaster, yet they get additional defenses for them. Blasters are specifically not given any defenses from mez attacks because it does not fit the "glass cannon" vision. I feel blasters will never be given mez protection because of this stubborn view, and it infuriates me.
Aggro management. Blasters become the target of villains for no real apparent reason. I can single-target in an 8-man team even after waiting until the tank and scrappers have gotten the foes' attention, and still end up being the target of 4 or more foes. I have no problem with a foe that I attack turning on me, but when I attack with snipe or other single-target attack, his 3 buddies should not be turning on me when they're standing next to the tank or being attended to by the scrapper(s). If I use an AoE, then I've just annoyed a lot of villains, and I deserve the aggro I get, but single-targetting in a team should NOT lead to being multi-targetted in return.
Life-span (solo). I've seen it many times even at 35 where 2 shots from a foe take me out. The first is ranged with a status, the second is melee. A blaster's HP has three states in the 35+. Green at 90%+, 25% - 89%, or 0%. The speed at which his HP changes is drastic. Again, with no defenses this makes sense, and I expect it. It's why I plan my attacks instead of running in with guns (or gloves, I guess) blazing. When a blaster starts taking so much damage as to hit 40% he is not going to survive much longer. Like every other archetype, a blaster will have 1 of 2 results from a fight. He survives or he doesn't. But, blasters tend to reach the results a lot quicker in both cases. He either takes out the mob surgically and immediately, or he gets to see which flavor of Jello is being served at the hospital. The latter will generally occur everytime something Goes Wrong. To give definition to Goes Wrong, a blaster need only miss twice in succession to start the inevitible down-hill slide. The third successive miss is usually the fatal event.
Scrappers get random criticals regardless of their current state (it changes based upon the foe they target). Scrappers need not put themselves into any additional risk to get this advantage. Controllers will now get 2x damage to targets they hold. They get 2x damage for hitting a target that probably can't retaliate. Controllers need not put themselves into any additional risk to gain this advantage. Tanks get punchvoke for no additional risk. Defenders get....a rock, I guess.
Defiance, however addresses none of the problems the blaster archetype has. It provides additional POTENTIAL offense, but blasters are already offensive builds. Defiance is putting a more powerful engine into the already fastest car in a race as the frame is about to fall apart. All it will do is get you more spectacular fireballs for the audience. And we all know we need more spectacular fireballs in the late game.
Defiance is what the devs want because blasters cannot be allowed to have native defenses. To the devs, blasters must be a spun glass cannon. To allow them any native defenses would turn them from spun glass cannons into iron cannons. Still not titanium, but now too much defense for their power potential.
Sadly, Defiance will be the "you got your lovin', the money's on the table" response that blasters will get for the near future. Not only will this be the attitude we receive (if any, since we get no real response except vague "looking into it" or vague "increased/decreased" numbers), but blasters have taken a hit in the shorts in other departments too, which the devs seem to have overlooked in their zeal to "balance" the game.
Defiance as is is too situational. If we are to have an inherent power, make it less situational. To the point that it is useful. Scrappers' criticals cannot be relied upon, but they are useful. Controllers' 2x damage cannot be relied upon (have to lock the target down first), but useful. Defiance means has too many hoops to jump through, and even if I jump through those hoops, I've only just then put my lottery ticket into the box, because that +500% damage boost can still sail right over that foe's head.
In some ways, I feel like Defiance is an S&M dream. The more you get abused, the more you like it. Could we please have our increased damage shots at least appear differently when they miss? Maybe have it look like a giant pea, or a banana peel, or something equally amusing? I want to at least laugh when I faceplant because my "special power" failed. Perhaps a nice big Rube Goldberg type setup. First the mouse has to pull the plug on the HP beaker, which then drains into a bowl on a spring-loaded scale. As the scale goes down, it begins to jack up another spring on a giant boxing glove that eventually shoots out at your target. But it only hits the target if the mouse was able to eat the cheese at the end of the maze first. That's kind of what Defiance is, anyway.
Another open letter to all healers out there. If you team with Power Paladin, please keep him in the green. I don't want Defiance, but my mommy says I have to eat it for strong bones.
Cats are independent, they don't listen, they don't come in when you call, they like to stay out all night, and when they're home they like to be left alone and sleep. In other words, every quality that women hate in a man, they love in a cat. - Jay Leno
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You've weakened the tanker. He'll require more attention from dfenders now. they'll just shrug and say the hell with the blasters.... they'll do more damage if left unattended. Dead blasters deal no damage.
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Well said, as a tanker this issue has me greatly worried. Right now I'm fightin level 40's at level 35 with ease (not dealing damage just taking it.) now I battle a level 35 and I'm taking damage i would take from a 40 now?!?! Somethin just doesn't seem right here. I go into the test server d/l the updates reading while its updating that herding/ taunting has been brought down to be more realistic.....we're a game of super heroes...whats realistic about being a super hero? nothing. I love this game. I love playing this game. Hell even if the changes go threw with the Tanker damage decrease I'll still probably play the game. The fact is Tankers bread and butter is their ability to take damage and taunt enemies away from our teammates. This Issue 5 is kinda killin me. Please help me? help me, help you!!!
I happen to like defiance, I don't see why people are making such a fuss about it. If you don't use it....than so what!!
I was able to solo over half a mission on low health, just using defiance. I was having a great time!!!
When playing in a group it's not something that is used ALL the time in EVERY fight. I don't use all my blaster powers ALL the time. Many of my secondary powers are situational. Defiance is situational in team play. However, you can learn to use it more if you have a good team. I find it very challenging and fun to use defiance in solo and team play. It adds a little extra to an already really fun AT.
If your playstyle doesn't work with defiance, than that's just how it is, no sense in complaining about defiance. Saying things like just get rid of it!
I mean...PLEASE...whatever you do....DON"T change your playstyle.....EVER...!!!
this is how i think defiance could work....
de·fi·ance n. 1. The act or an example of defying; bold resistance to an opposing force or authority. 2. Intentionally contemptuous behavior or attitude; readiness to contend or resist. 3. A new auto-power given to all City of Heroes Blasters in Issue 5.
instead of when our health stays low...why not make it for damage taken over a period of time?
say if my blaster takes 500hp worth of damage in 1-2mins...his defiance bar is rocking...and the buff lasts for x amount of time.....this would be true to comic book form...as over time, i get angrier....my blasts get more powerful...this way i would be able to get healed.....and not risk the faceplant that would accompany the "stupid blaster trick" tactic.
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I happen to like defiance, I don't see why people are making such a fuss about it. If you don't use it....than so what!!
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While thats nice and all, some of us were affected other ways. There has not been a benefit in tankers, at least not from what I've seen. The only great things I've seen are the cool new bows and sonics (which in my opinion are actually pretty neat) Defiance is a nice add on for Blasters; I know I've racked up quite a bit of debt with my 31 blaster and could have only hoped to have just that little bit of strength to kill that last one, but I can honestly say I haven't died this many times on any issue with my invulnerable tanker since i was level 14 attempting to take on a group of baddies alone. While the blasters were looked into a little more extensively in this issue, the tankers took a great big one right up the keester. 
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We're making some tweaks with Defiance in the upcoming patch.
It is not getting a major overhaul though. Just tweaking the defiance so it starts to kick in earlier. The overall buffs posted earlier are staying about the same (getting only slightly better), but you will be recieving a damage buff earlier in your health bar now.
This will be reflected in the Defiance meter as well. We've made some tweaks to that as well.
I want to stress that you actually can end up being buffed over 500% with Defiance. (500% is the max buff for Blasters) This actually does nothing except protect you from damage debuffs.
This is one of the rare instances in Issue 5 where a solo character is able to reach a cap without help (or inspirations).
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How about adding linearly increasing amounts of Accuracy as Defiance builds?
The Defiance meter tweak would be nice. It was 1) delayed, as you could be in/out of Defiance before the meter updated, and 2) was incredibly hard to see low Defiances levels. Having it on a color gradient would also help.
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this is how i think defiance could work....
de·fi·ance n. 3. A new auto-power given to all City of Heroes Blasters in Issue 5.
instead of when our health stays low...why not make it for damage taken over a period of time?
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I like this idea, the harder you get hit, the harder you want to try and hit back. Maybe as a Martial Arts power, "Damage Polarity Reversal" 
Ha...
I managed to get in to Defiance range a few times on test. In the Outbreak map, where it wasn't easy to get to that much damage, but once I got there, there wasn't much risk. Also, in some CoT mission, where if I managed to hit defiance range, I was dead before I could get off any of my attacks. Seems that there's not much middle ground, where it's still risky to be Defiant, but not suicidal.
I don't think I've ever seen an MMO where the damage you dealt depended on how hard you got hit (how often, yes, how hard, no), but it seems to me to make sense in the Hero area.
However, I think I'd rather that be a power you could use, instead of an "all blasters get this". Maybe in the electrical secondary.
Oh, and yes, my main is an AR/elec, level 11.
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We're making some tweaks with Defiance in the upcoming patch.
It is not getting a major overhaul though. Just tweaking the defiance so it starts to kick in earlier. The overall buffs posted earlier are staying about the same (getting only slightly better), but you will be recieving a damage buff earlier in your health bar now.
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While I appreciate the fixes to the meter and adjustments to defiance, I still think the power overall is not useful to blasters and does nothing to fix the issues they have in the 40+ game.
Sorry, but thumbs down.
-AZ
Aside from the opinion that defiance needs to start sooner (80 or 75% health) than it currently does, a large problem with defiance is that it is useless when teamed with defenders and controllers. Their buffs will automatically put a min max (or if there are enough of them even a regular "Joe Bagof Doughnuts" type) player so close to or at the dmg cap so IF and WHEN defiance kicks in it wont do anything to contribute to the battle. One way to work around this (my uneducated - meaning I'm not a developer) answer is to have defiance A) ignore the dmg cap or B) have defiance work around the dmg cap.
Going with A) defiance could just surpass the dmg cap making a blaster who is at the 500% dmg cap be able to get to 100% dmg. The problems I see with this is in the coding. How do you make it so that the dmg cap is only removed for the defiance percentage of the dmg increase and not have it effect any additional buffs (rages, def buffs, cntrlr buffs, ect) that are in the game.
Option B) seems more reasonable to me. If you have Defiance work it's way around the dmg cap it would become much more useable and useful. I figure defiance could be an additional tick of dmg (ala the additional tick of dmg done with elec powers at enemies that are weak against elec) When a blaster is not in defiance range this additional tick of dmg would equal 0 and this number could be hidden until it is greater than .5 (or whatever number you consider large enough to be considered 1 point of dmg) Even if this is done for all powers within the game it is not going to make a significant difference in the players understanding of what is going on in the game. Additionally, the addtional tick can be based off of unslotted dmg (aka base dmg) for whatever power the blaster is using or even have it's own brawl index. In this way the dmg would only be a maximum of 2x what regular slotted/buffed/inspired dmg could be. If it has it's own brawl index the dmg could be adjusted very easily if it is deamed to be to great at a later date. We wouldn't be the only AT that is able to potentially bypass our dmg cap, but we would be the only one's that could potentially do it on a regular basis. In order to circumvent this little (what I think you guys would view as an) inconvience, the scale could be such that it is back loaded or lessened. The majority of the boost could come after 40 or 30% health or the max boost could be lowered. Now, we would have to be living dangerously (risk = reward) in order to benifit from an extreamely large boost or we would not be able to double but only do 1.3, 1.5 or 1.75 or whatever of our dmg either way the dmg increase in minimalized (is that a word) to a manageable/realistic level. There should also be some way of eliminating the defiance boost given to blasters falling out of the sky in order to increase their dmg. But, I don't have an answer for this an come to think of it if they're stupid enough to WANT their health that low they deserve what they're gonna get. Any which way, there are so many ways to mitigate the dmg potential of defiance with this suggesetion there is no way that it would become overpowered AND I don't think that it would take that long to implement AND blasters (the one's who don't play with a pen pad and calculator on their desk) would be able to see the actual benifit from defiance instead of having to guess what it all means.
States & company:
Rolled up a new blaster on TC last night and played up to 5. Also dusted off a level 10 blaster and did some street hunting on TC.
Get rid of defiance. Try again. From what I can tell, it didn't help me at all...and was actually an added diversion as I'd try to see when my 'defiance meter' was filling up. Pretty much every time I looked up, by the time I looked down, I was dead. It's a completely illogical solution for the problem at hand, considering our squishy-ness and the fact that we tend to get 1 or 2-shotted.
I appreciate the attempt at fixing our problems, but this isn't it. Even if you're leaning towards upping the defiance bonus or lowering the amount of damage it takes to 'kick-in'...well, I think I'd just rather you up damage across the board and not tie it to our our hit points.
Defiance seems like a power that would apply more for tanks than blasters.
Young blasters will benefit from this, but need less help. High level blasters aware of this change will die far more often for that "one more shot" rather than hiding/healing like squishies should.
Besides, as a 36 eng/eng blaster, even with stealth/combat jumping on, I go from 60% health to dead before I can get a shot off FAR too often.
Nice that it's there I guess... for the few times it might actually save someone, but it seems like a bunch of bother over something that will result in a lot of embittered blasters.
This my update.
Defiance doesn't do anything for me. For the extra damage to be mesaurable....it needs to save me a shot. This is not happing. There are three reasons for this.
1. The significant protion of the buff starts too late. Just running around you'll get an SO out of it on avg. This is based point 2.
2. Between 40% and 30% health is decision time for the Blaster. Fight or heal up. Below 30% the next hit from a minon or LT can kill you. A dead blaster doesn't make damage.
3. A Blaster finishes a fight long before defiance can help or is never hit in the first place.
I'm done with defiance.
Statesman/Devs please respond. You have said you like the changes with defiance but I don't see much in support from the user base. Blasters don't seem to be looking for more, high risk, damage potential. They are looking more for a chance to stay in the fight longer.
Lower 1 shot kill potential, increase somewhat defense or resistance. I just do not see where the whole concept of defiance as it is now was even thought up. our problem isn't our damage output its our staying power compared to the other arch types. If we are to be a glass sword then part of that equation is that we are able to stay in a fight an be effective through out.
So I've been reading some of these posts and heres my take on defiance. This is a good idea on paper, but it should have stayed there. I've been trying to use my defiance effectively and just cannot. I let a minion just hit me over and over to see how the defiance worked and it didnt kick in until I was between yellow and red. I could never get the defiance full since I would die. But even at 4 hp it still was not full. The increase in damage was really not that helpful since when it would get to the point of effectiveness, I would die. I have used this on a 32 blaster and been trying out the archer.
Instead of defiance I would much rather have more defense as a blaster. I'm tired of dying from one to two shots from a +1 lvl boss. I don't expect to be as defensive as a tanker or scrapper, but throw us something at the earlier lvls.
I like defiance personally, I think that it will be helpful. **You're fighting in an intense fight, you're taking a bit of damage, everyone's hurt around you. Oh no, your healer just fell, and your tanker is going down ferociously. But wait, look at your health bar, your almost dead! You unleash a blast that would make Statesman pee himself**
I like it. But I'm afraid this -does- push the "Vegeta DBZ" characters even more lol
As far as controllers and defenders having buffs to break holds...not true for empathy...unless they finally wise up and make clear mind an aura like recovery and regen.