Super Reflexes buff
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Defense is also slightly better than resists because of multi typed attacks.
25% defense versus a smashing type attack is equivalent to 50% resist to the same type of attack but if you split the damage type to be smashing AND energy the resist's damage mitigation is halved while the defense's remains the same. At least I'm pretty sure that's how it works
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This is a valid point: incomplete defense is better than incomplete resistance, because typed resistance is only effective against the specific damage types its typed for, but typed defense is good against all attacks with any component of that type of damage at all.
Hidden in here is a subtle problem with low level SR scrappers: a typed defense character could focus on smash/lethal defense, and immediately cover at least 75% of all attacks in the game (in the lower levels, and in melee range, that percentage is even higher). But SR has to cover melee and ranged defenses to get similar coverage. SR focusing on melee only is getting less mitigation overall than Ice or FF focusing on smash/lethal only (an interesting advantage energy stalkers have over SR stalkers).
But once you get to high levels, SR does have a slight qualitative edge over damage-typed defensive sets: toxic defense doesn't exist.
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Why then are lucks much stronger than resistance insps?
[/ QUOTE ] I believe Statesman, or maybe it was Geko, answered this specifically. He said the values were based on how many it took to reach the cap for each respective power. I think it was 14 small lucks to reach the cap for defense, so they wanted to require 14 small +res. The over sight is that most mobs are floored after a handful and any extras do you no good. Not true with +RES insp.
oh well.
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If you were attempting to balance with even level minions, then about 40% defense and no resistance at all gets pretty close: with 30% resistances on top, we'd need slightly less defense (about 37% or so). See my sig for some I5 calibrated comparisons between SR and the other scrapper mitigation sets, particularly against even level minions.
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There you hit the reason I was suggesting the 40% instead of the 60%. Against even con minions...they can't hit you....they only get like what 55-60% base to hit without buffs/etc?
So 40% seemed a nice balanced good number....and yet bosses and lt and AV mostly ignore that defense....there the 30% resist kicks in.
So DEF would be primarily good against the minions and lt, while the RES would help keep you alive for things that tend to laugh at your defense.
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The mitigation gap, in I5 terms, between SR and invuln and regen is on the order of 5-10% defense. In I6 terms, I don't exactly know yet. It might be closer numerically, but it might also be much harder to acquire the additional defense, in effect widening the gap overall.
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I think SR has some addittional problems besides numerical differances that make as much of an impact.
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Super Reflexes Auto powers (Agile, Dodge, and Lucky) now add some minor damage resistance. This Damage resistance starts at 0%, but improves as the caster loses HP. The Resistance kicks in at 60% HP (when HP bar first changes color) and markedly increases at 40% and 20% (again, when the bar changes color). We have not yet determined the exact values.
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I haven't read the whole thread, so there's probably a lot of good information here, and I hope I don't repeat it.
The idea of a scheduled resistance added to the passive powers has a fundamental flaw. It skews the necessity of taking both toggles and passives for defense to just get coverage.
If the resistances are high enough to make the set useful, the passives will be selected first, and when the toggles follow the character will become too strong. If the resistances are balanced for all 6 toggles and passives to be taken and slotted, it leaves the SR scrapper hamstringed well into his mid/high 30's.
SR has 3 passives and 3 toggles just to cover defenses. With the toggles effectiveness being higher, and thus enhanced effectiveness greater, they are the defenses an SR need to take first to achieve some survivability. Now, the set is being balanced on the presumption all 6 basic defenses will be taken, yet a player can't afford to sink that many powers into defense early, especially since they will also be taking Practiced Brawler and Quickness to attempt to fill in some performance gaps.
Sorry, but this is another bad idea stacked on SR's need to take all the defensive powers (which costs the SR scrapper offense).
If you want to add resistance, add resistance in its own power and balance it appropriately. Combine all 3 passive Defense powers so the Scrapper can actually get coverage (AoE specifically) at an early enough level. Balance this value appropriately. Adjust the toggles such that they bring about a final value for the end game. It will still cost the SR scrapper 5 powers to get full coverage (3 DEF toggles, 1 DEF passive, 1 RES passive). And because of the scaling effect of accuracy and defense, it won't be overpowering even if an SR scrapper takes all defenses as quick as possible. Lastly, with an extra power slot in SR, a small amount of self-regen can be added, or something totally different.
But, for the love of all that is probability, don't make me take passives over toggles just so I can get resistances and supposedly be *balanced*. Don't make me take all 6 defenses at the cost of offensive capability.
Just to say, i dont think this can be called a "Buff"...
Why? Its a coincidence this so called "buff" is coming with ED?
I dont think so...
While they give us "minor resistance" with our passives they are taking away a little more of our defenses with ED...
To me, this is more like a exchange... if we stay like we are right now, with the same defense and they give us resistance, then i could call this a buff, but thats not the case...
Its a fact, our defense will be reduced with ED, right?
So we will get hit more, but to "balance" that they will give us this so called "buff"... Sad...
But this is what i think, everyone else is free to think whatever want...
SR needs some help to verse "1 shot" and "autohit". Resist might help. But it's not useful now.
Increase Resist by HP is not good idea. When you have high HP, there is no resist. SR keeps losing lots of HP by few attacks. If a boss could get your 40% HP in 1 hit, even you have 75% cup resist is still useless.
There is nothing at high hp. And it's useless at low HP.
I've PMed them. I don't know how they feel. But I think SR need second chance.
If foe hit SR, SR has second chance to check again.
If the foe pass the second chance, Resist won't work. However, if SR pass the second check, the Resist will work.
The second chance could depend on HP, or personal DEF.
And, if the foe use autohit power, the resist will be always on.
In this way, Devs could give SR more Resist, let SR slot Resist. The Resist might work at full hp, but it's not always on.
In this way, and compare with Invul, SR won't be overpower.
Don't forget, all other sets could heal themselves when they really need some hp. But SR has nothing.
After running around on Test, I've yet to notice this buff. I dunno. Maybe it's because I only have 2 of the 3 passives. (No Agile.) Maybe it's because I don't stare at the numbers flying through my combat tab. But the only thing I'm noticing from the I6 changes is that I'm getting hit a lot more often. And if I don't have spare greens in my tray, that means a lot of hurt.
Oh.
And is it just me, or does it just seem silly to give a set whose sole focus is not getting hit an ability that requires getting hit to activate?
I was thinking something like this myself. I know it's been said by a few people, but this is my own personal spin on it.
Using Spider-man as a reference, we've seen, in BOTH movies, Spidey not completely dodge an attack, but miss the brunt of it. For examply, in Spider-man (One), the projectiles the Green Goblin hurls at Spidey in the burning building. He misses all but one, which leaves a nasty little gash on his arm. Also, I believe in both films he's missed the brunt of damage from explosions by turning/ducking/etc at the last moment.
That said, I agree COMPLETELY, SR taking a second check would be BEAUTIFUL, and while it is resist as far as game mechanics goes, I don't think this should be how we all interpret it (Even though my SR is a vampire and would be a bit tougher than normal... but anyway...) This would be similar to a "Reflex Saving Throw" in D&D PnP or PC games. I'm a little torn on how to handle the second check, but here's my opinion.
The First Check
The defense check, if you pass the check, woohoo! We don't get hit at all, end of story. This is obviously slottable and is the primary focus of the set. This base percentage SHOULD be higher, but we all know that so I'll move on.
The Second Check
Should you fail the first check, the second check occurs. Should you fail this check, you take the FULL brunt of the attack. Ouch.
There is, however...
The Graze - Should you PASS this check, I personally think you should take a RANDOM percentage of the damage from the attack, which, yes, keeps SR somewhat "luck" based, but also fits concept very well, I think. What would also be satisfying I think, to many SRs, would be, when we only take a percentage of the damage from any attack, the word "Graze" appears above the amount of damage, much like how we see "Critical" now. We'd know the power was doing it's job, at least, and I think it would be very visually satisfying.
Ideas as to how to implement this
Idea 1.
The Graze ability is completely a random percentage, which means you can take anything from 0-100% of the damage. You can still effectively completely miss the attack or completely take the damage from it. But eh, I know it's not much, but the other option is to make it 1-99% of the damage. This is unslottable.
Idea 2a.
The Graze ability's maximum percentage taken decreases with level. Example, at level 1, you can still take 100% of the damage from an attack that grazes. This percentage perhaps decreases by 1% with each gained level, resulting in a level 50 SR scrapper taking a maximum of 50% of the damage from a grazed attack. This is also unslottable.
Idea 2b.
The Graze ability's minimum percentage taken decreases with level. Example, at level 1, you cannot take less than 50% damage from an attack that grazes. This percentage decreases by 1% with each gained level, resulting in a level 50 SR scrapper able to take 0% of the damage from a grazed attack. This is also unslottable.
Personally, I like option 2a better.
Idea 3.
You begin with the full range of 0-100% damage taken from grazed attacks, and the maximum and minimum percentages do not change inherently as you level. However, you are able to slot for damage resistance, which I believe should do one of the two effects listed for number 2, either lower the high or low end of the range. I'm not really keen on this one, as slotting it for resist makes me feel even less like we're actually getting grazed and more like we're just lying to ourselves.
On the chance to Graze vs. Taking full damage
I'm not sure on what the chance should be to either take full damage or be grazed. My two ideas were these the following. One, the same defense percentage from the defense aspect of the set. The same chance applies twice, this effectively doubles the chance for an SR scrapper to not take the full damage of an attack. Two, after the first check is missed, it's a 50-50 chance that you will either take full damage or be grazed. Obviously, with the now paltry defenses for SR, the second option would be better here.
Honestly, out of the ideas for implementing this, I like 2a the most. Mainly because I feel that the SR scrapper would feel they ARE better at 50 then they were at any level before that. We'd feel like we'd accomplished something, and we didn't have to slot anything to do it. I also think I like the 50-50 chance to graze more than the same defense percentage checking twice (though that may make more sense concept wise).
What do you all think? Personally, I think this would be a joygasmic improvement to the set.
Devs, is this feasible? *Drops to her knees and begs* It would make us all so happy!!!!
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And is it just me, or does it just seem silly to give a set whose sole focus is not getting hit an ability that requires getting hit to activate?
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Not at all, Quest. Forgive me for not being politically correct, but that aspect of the idea is retarded.
its not the best buff, I rather just have more defense...*sigh*
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its not the best buff, I rather just have more defense...*sigh*
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Oh don't get me wrong, so would I!
I just don't think that's going to happen. *Weeps*
Course, I sincerely doubt the idea I just proposed would ever happen either, but here's to hoping!
I'd certainly take this over this crappy scrapper defiance thing, wouldn't you?
I think the 'Grazed' idea is beautiful, conceptually, Ravenbane. Of course, I know nothing of the implementation side, not being an mmo coder.
You could even make it a single calculation based on a multiplier of the defense. The closer it was to a miss, the less damage taken. The closer to the multiplier, the more the damage taken until normal damage is reached.
"With everything that I do, I hope that they see people struggling to live decent, moral lives in a completely chaotic world. They see how hard it is, how often they fail, and how they get up and keep trying. That, to me, is the most important message I'm ever going to tell." - Joss Whedon
Couple things about the Spider-Man analogy.
First, Spidey in the movies is different from Spidey in the comics. Comic-Spidey doesn't get nicked nearly as often as movie-Spidey. They do this in the movie so they have an excuse to lose his mask and let the audience see Tobey McGuire.
Comic-Spidey is nigh-untouchable. Granted, this may be too much to base an RPG class on, but that's what he is. Maybe Spider-Man isn't the best example of SR to work with. Kinda like using Superman for an Invul example (when CoH Invul is more like Power Man or The Thing).
Second, if +RES is supposed to represent a SR hero reducing the severity of the blow, then it should be on all the time to some degree. The powerset should be rebalanced so that the +RES is more important in the set, rather than being this last-ditch (and virtually pointless) boost you get when you're about to die.
The problem with it activating at 40% and 20% of your health is that, especially at 20%, you're in one-shot city. A small boost in RES there won't help, and a large boost will seem... odd. Unless they mean it scales and hits its max when you're at 20%.
Still not happy with the idea. Seems to somehow neuter the SR concept (SR was too powerful, so we made you more like Invul).
Erie FF:
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I think the 'Grazed' idea is beautiful, conceptually, Ravenbane. Of course, I know nothing of the implementation side, not being an mmo coder.
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Agreed, I don't know the first bloody thing here.
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You could even make it a single calculation based on a multiplier of the defense. The closer it was to a miss, the less damage taken. The closer to the multiplier, the more the damage taken until normal damage is reached.
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Oh yeah! Good call! I knew I was forgetting something. I like that idea too!
To chriz:
About Spidey, yeah I know that much. I've read enough Spider-man comics. Spidey's like an SR scrapper back in the beautiful days of Perma-Elude, which, personally, was what I always thought an SR scrapper should always be like. I still died enough times with PE to feel like I was in danger. It still only took a few good hits to take you out. Le sigh...
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Second, if +RES is supposed to represent a SR hero reducing the severity of the blow, then it should be on all the time to some degree. The powerset should be rebalanced so that the +RES is more important in the set, rather than being this last-ditch (and virtually pointless) boost you get when you're about to die.
The problem with it activating at 40% and 20% of your health is that, especially at 20%, you're in one-shot city. A small boost in RES there won't help, and a large boost will seem... odd. Unless they mean it scales and hits its max when you're at 20%.
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Agreed, I think we all hate the way that the SR defiance is being implemented. We're going to be take down after one more hit regardless of some meager resist ability. That and, as Quest (Lady Andreca) and others have said, it's completely idiotic that our supposed buff only kicks in when our set isn't doing it's bloody job.
Also, my idea is always on, and is a secondary effect after the chance occurs to miss this attack completely.
And trust me, I said it in my first post about the graze thing but I didn't dwell on it. If it were up to me, I'd just increase the base defense up to at least pre-I5 levels (higher if it were my call) and say to hell with any kind of resist at all. Right now, you can pretty much replace the whole SR set save Quickness and Elude with one first tier defense inspiration. We all know that's a big, steaming pile of bullsh*t.
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And is it just me, or does it just seem silly to give a set whose sole focus is not getting hit an ability that requires getting hit to activate?
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Second that. I think I mentioned it myself about 20 pages ago.
I have not been able to get on test, but my guess from Statesman's words (a minor resist) would be about 5-8%. I have to tell you, one of the respecs for my SR scrapper included Tough, which at the time was 15%. Slotted with 5 SO enhancements was 30%. 30% was nice, undoubtedly overpowered, but nice. 15% was low enough that I could not justify running it for the End cost unless it was a big boss or AV.
The problem is, just like Defiance, once you hit 60, 40 or 20% of your hit points as an SR scrapper, the next shot is likely to faceplant you anyhow, and probably nothing less than 30% resistance would save you. I can remember exactly ONCE in 20-some levels where I hit a string of bad luck with my DEF, got hit several times in a row and went 'Whew! Glad I had Tough turned on!'
The values are going to need to be significantly higher for this to do any good, and they need to be on all the time. I do think SR needs some resistance, but tying it to damage taken is just stupid (IMO).
my response was in regards to the damage resistance buff proposed by states. I'm glad they are looking at SR now with ED really nerfing it, but this dam resist in the passives doesn't seem like the right way. I would be all for it if it prevented one shots but the damage resist increases as your health bar falls? By that time you are screwed, just gives us a 5-10% increase in defense and the debuff resistance and we'll be happy, not this solution and then they will consider SR fixed.
This hardly makes any sense. Reflexes are about not getting hit, and now it's getting DR?
Reflexes don't help you soak damage, so why not increase there base rates? Y'know, like before I5?
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Bah. Late response, I know. But let me point something out here:
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In terms of actual math, unless they have changed the formula, minion to hit = 50%. FF is 12% base. With two trainers it's +10% or 13.2 base. This drops a minion's to hit from 50/100 to 36.8/100. Admittedly since I was doing "out of 10", I rounded up to 4/10. Pop a Luck on top of that, now you're at 38.8% base, or you have almost floored the minion (he's at 12.2% to hit). I didn't even say what the with-luck numbers were. I just said, "Now you have some actual defense."
I stand by my statement. At low levels when you have few slots and only trainers, Luck is a much better defense than our entire powerset. That's all I was talking about.
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No. You said that "Our defenses are a slight bonus to luck", this was in specific response to the argument that SR made luck inspirations more valuable then they were to those without SR.
While I agree that the relative value of SR as a whole is questionable at that level, and can be overshadowed by a Luck, that's a one time issue. You get the benefits of SR all the time, and when you do pop a luck, you'll get *more* benefit from it. How much more? Lets do some math:
Take your numbers. A normal hero will be hit by a minion 50% of the time. An SR hero running just his first toggle with two trainers in it will get hit 36.8% of the time (your numbers).
A normal hero using a 25% luck inspiration will get hit 25% of the time by that same minion. That's a halving of the relative hit rate (50/25=2). So his def can be said to be twice as good after using the luck (taking def as a very broad "chance not to get hit" value, and not just things that add to that).
The aformentioned SR guy upon dropping the same 25% luck inspiration will get hit 36.8-25=11.8% chance to get hit. The relative def "value" increase is figured the same way (36.8/11.8=3.12).
An SR scrapper's "defense" is improved by 3.12 times by dropping that luck, as opposed to the normal hero's defense improving by 2 times.
I'd say increasing the relative value of the luck inspiration by over 50% is a bit more then a "slight bonus".
You have to remember that the relative value of defense increases the closer you get to either end of the percentage scale. So the same factor that says that +def buffs aren't as valuable against opponents with a high base to-hit works in reverse when we reduce that chance to hit (whether via to-hit debuffs *or* adds to +def like luck inspirations).
That 12% bonus to +def seems *really* small by itself. But it stacks very very well. While I agree that at the lower levels, it's not as significant, I think it's very misleading to say that it's worthless, or even a minor effect.
When I was working my SR scrapper through the low levels, what I typically did was balance the use of my toggles to the damage I was taking (or was likely to take). When I knew I'd be in a tougher fight, I turned them on. If I knew I'd be in a really tough fight, I'd turn them on and drop a luck inspiration. The point being that those stack, and really are a big deal.
And I can show you mathmatically that you're better off stacking two values of +def then a value of +def and +res. Obviously, the fact that by dropping two lucks you can make SR pointless is a problem. No one is arguing that. Like I said. I agree with you on that issue. My only disagreement was your assessment of the relative value of SR in conjunction with lucks. Even at the lowest levels, it's still very very significant. Implying otherwise is misleading to any valid discussion of the issue.
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And is it just me, or does it just seem silly to give a set whose sole focus is not getting hit an ability that requires getting hit to activate?
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Second that. I think I mentioned it myself about 20 pages ago.
I have not been able to get on test, but my guess from Statesman's words (a minor resist) would be about 5-8%. I have to tell you, one of the respecs for my SR scrapper included Tough, which at the time was 15%. Slotted with 5 SO enhancements was 30%. 30% was nice, undoubtedly overpowered, but nice. 15% was low enough that I could not justify running it for the End cost unless it was a big boss or AV.
The problem is, just like Defiance, once you hit 60, 40 or 20% of your hit points as an SR scrapper, the next shot is likely to faceplant you anyhow, and probably nothing less than 30% resistance would save you. I can remember exactly ONCE in 20-some levels where I hit a string of bad luck with my DEF, got hit several times in a row and went 'Whew! Glad I had Tough turned on!'
The values are going to need to be significantly higher for this to do any good, and they need to be on all the time. I do think SR needs some resistance, but tying it to damage taken is just stupid (IMO).
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So far in my testing I have only dodge and agile and I do not have the free respec to get lucky thanks to the test server taking over 5 days and 10 different tries to get my toon copied over
The initial when it starts in is so minimal it is like yawn I ran the same limited parts of the mission I ran tough which is 5 slotted (gave me about 18%) it went from 91 to 74
ran away healed up came back no tough running took 91 91 and then about 40% health it kicks in i went from 91 to 88 that is a freaking joke right I was down to about 20% before I hit the same % as my tough
Yep that helps with little damage but it does nothing for me in av fights I will be dead period end of story since I been 1 shotted by AV's with tough running and elude; tough has like 28% s/l resistance on live and now. Sorr with 28% defense it will be more often since this buff does nothing against the hard hitters because my health is to low for that % to make a difference that late in the game. Just put it a flat % let us enhance them with res enhancements. This defiance type ability is flat out asinine.
The buff does seem to stack with tough on the s/l side when I tested that.
Sorry states this is under whelming I rather have just a chance to enhance from passives to flat 15% from hit one
Pinnacle
Langar Thurs-Katana/SR 50; Hejtmane-DM/DA 50
Rogue Spear-Spines/DA 50; Hypnosis-Ill/Rad 50
Sir Thomas Theroux-DM/SR 50; Melted Copper-Fire/Shield 50
Byzantine Warrior-DB/ELA 50;Blade Tempo-50 DB/EA
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I fought Babbage last night. He spawned +2. None of his attacks could one shot me. His big one did do ~80% of my bar though.
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Babbage is a Giant Monster. Giant Monsters are level-less.
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If it were up to me, I'd just increase the base defense up to at least pre-I5 levels (higher if it were my call) and say to hell with any kind of resist at all. Right now, you can pretty much replace the whole SR set save Quickness and Elude with one first tier defense inspiration. We all know that's a big, steaming pile of bullsh*t.
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Stop beating around the bush Raven... tell us how you really feel.
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I fought Babbage last night. He spawned +2. None of his attacks could one shot me. His big one did do ~80% of my bar though.
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Babbage is a Giant Monster. Giant Monsters are level-less.
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Actually, Psi-Babbage is an AV, and thus has levels. Course, I couldn't find the original post, but Moonlighter know his stuff, so I assume he was talking about the AV.
Edit: Forget it. Not worth continuing the discussion with someone who refuses to actually read my statements.
F
I'd like to introduce the concept of the near miss for the super reflexes set. Basically, you have a chance to roll with the blow or be grazed by an attack and only take a certain percentage of the damage, after all being able to react faster doesn't mean you simply stand there and take it every once in awhile, just to see what pain feels like.
It could be an inherent property of the passives or toggles or however you want to work it...have it with ranged and melee (all but psionic?), and change the AoE/cone defenses to damage resistance to better simulate rolling with the blow or jumping out of the way(because we all know that bomb would have killed me had it not miraculously exploded all around me).
You could even try working it into the number of opponents your fighting. Something like more bad guys = lower defense but more near misses and less damage taken per hit, so yeah, I can take on five guys at once, but it's really hard dodging everything...or not, anyways...
Just an idea I had...food for thought. I like the basic idea, but I'm sure there are flaws in my implementation.
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I also absolutely don't understand why in game mechanics +def is considered numerically to be worth double +res for balance purposes, yet the bonuses from the relevant inspirations are totally wrong. Each level of +res inspiration should be worth twice as much +res as the same level +def inspiration. Why on earth they did it backwards is beyond me.
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That's a good question. Its obvious why smaller values of Defense are considered equivalent to higher values of Resistance: because Defense and Resistance are scale balanced against even level minions which have base 50% chance to hit.
Why then are lucks much stronger than resistance insps? There is no real good numerical answer to that question. Therefore, it has to reflect a prejudice or a preference on the part of the devs. Its most likely the case that its one of these four reasons:
1. Lucks are unbalanced against Resistance insps, and the devs know this, but they don't want to change luck insps for whatever reason, possibly because they've been in use for so long. They might also simply not want to take a good insp away because they don't consider "balance" to be a sufficiently strong reason to nullify something a lot of players like to have.
2. Lucks are unbalanced against Resistance inspirations, and the devs know this, but they were never meant to be balanced: the devs want each deliberately to function differently, and to provide not just qualitatively different benefits, but also quantitatively different benefits. For example, they might really want lucks to be so strong that you can pop them in an emergency or just prior to a sticky situation, to temporarily make you extremely unlikely to get hit by anything, but they expect res insps to be used more steadily as a minor damage mitigator.
3. The devs figure that since all resistance in the game has inherent resistance to debuffing, but defense does not, they needed to make defense insps stronger than resistance insps, regardless of what that did to the balance between mitigation sets.
4. They actually think its balanced, for some reason they haven't shared. If so, they're almost certainly wrong, as they often have been in the past when dealing with Defense and Resistance: the devs seem to be just as easily caught up in errant Defense and Resistance pseudological balancing as everyone else is.
You have to keep in mind that the devs do not actually consider balance itself to be a priority: they've implied as much. They consider "balance" within the game to only be important insofar as it somehow directly impacts the experience they are attempting to create with the game. One of the responses I got to a PM asking about a particular imbalance (it wasn't an SR vs invuln issue per se) was that so long as both sets of people could still solo heroic missions, that imbalance wasn't a real issue.
Resistance insps are set to the value they are set to, because thats the value the devs think they ought to be *now*. Lucks are set to the value they are set to, because thats the value the devs thought they ought to be *then*. They aren't balanced with each other, most likely because unless that lack of balance hurts some specific vision they have for the game, its not a priority to do so.
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