Why you should never play a Dark Armor Brute.
By
1_800_Spines,
Posted on: 2008-02-12 18:02 in Player Guides
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I thought energy aura was weaker than this set lol
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If there's any set that does compete with it for the lowest spot for Brute effectiveness, I think it might be EA just due to the general lack of effectiveness of Defense. It works for casual PVE, but the higher end play, it can start to suffer.
It still has a Tier 9 that isn't built around you dying, which gives it a plus, but it's probably -worse- in PVP outside of that.
Of all the points on my guide I debate about Dark Armor, the fury gain issue is the one Im quickest to surrender about. It's really great also, if you happen to have a Dark Armor brute you enjoy, and I noticed you did skip Acro. You mentioned Hami's, so Im guessing you've slotted with a solid mix of IOs and HOs to bring DA up to better performance levels?
God im glad I read this before I bothered leveling my DA brute anymore , hello delete bin !
Thanks for the guide Haet its nice to see viewpoints that aren't all sunshine and ponys .
I have to say: I played a dark/dark brute to 38 mostly for thematic reasons.
However, it was VERY frustrating to play. As a (now 42+ month) vet I had several respecs, so I used 3 on this caracter in a pointless attempt to make her more playable. Nothing I did or maxed out was enough.
A little more S/L protection and a bit of easing on the toggles would go a long way.
Malakim
-Playing since COH beta and still love the game!
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If there's any set that does compete with it for the lowest spot for Brute effectiveness, I think it might be EA just due to the general lack of effectiveness of Defense.
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The problem isn't that it uses Defense, but that it uses *only* Defense, and not nearly enough of it. Its strongest defense, Energy, is only 20.625% (unslotted, since that's the baseline we're using here). To Smashing and Lethal, it gets a whopping 16.5%. It doesn't even get the utility powers that /Dark gets; Energy Drain isn't quite capable of providing mitigation through end drain and -recovery. Conserve Power ends up being overkill. And don't forget that it has two holes: absolutely zero Psi and Toxic protection (not even resistance).
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It still has a Tier 9 that isn't built around you dying, which gives it a plus, but it's probably -worse- in PVP outside of that.
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Overload is quite possibly the best Brute Tier 9, I'll not deny that. But I don't think it overcomes /Energy's shortcomings.
Overall, I think you sell Dark Regen a little short and definitely overestimate /Elec, but it's a solid analysis. I can see where all those complaints over the years came from.
We'll always have Paragon.
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If there's any set that does compete with it for the lowest spot for Brute effectiveness, I think it might be EA just due to the general lack of effectiveness of Defense.
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The problem isn't that it uses Defense, but that it uses *only* Defense, and not nearly enough of it. Its strongest defense, Energy, is only 20.625% (unslotted, since that's the baseline we're using here). To Smashing and Lethal, it gets a whopping 16.5%. It doesn't even get the utility powers that /Dark gets; Energy Drain isn't quite capable of providing mitigation through end drain and -recovery. Conserve Power ends up being overkill. And don't forget that it has two holes: absolutely zero Psi and Toxic protection (not even resistance).
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It still has a Tier 9 that isn't built around you dying, which gives it a plus, but it's probably -worse- in PVP outside of that.
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Overload is quite possibly the best Brute Tier 9, I'll not deny that. But I don't think it overcomes /Energy's shortcomings.
Overall, I think you sell Dark Regen a little short and definitely overestimate /Elec, but it's a solid analysis. I can see where all those complaints over the years came from.
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Yeah, but I think a lot of people sell Dark Regen's endurance usage short. The power gas great potency, but I think that Dark Armor's reliance on it, and it primarily, is what hurts the set in general practice, because it's such an expensive and also situational heal. I can't count how many times I've come to the point where I can either use Dark Regen and have my resistance toggles drop, or try to ride the fight out on resistance alone, and when it hits that point, it's usually a no-win situation. You're either going to get a brief burst of hitpoints, lose your resistance, and suffer larger incoming damage numbers, or you're going to be working with the generally inferior resistance on the set.
And yes, I know IOs work to correct this, but really. Why put forth the effort and infamy to correct the problems with a sub-par set when you can just start out with a higher baseline, unless you're either wanting a challenge, or, you're doing it for theme?
Edit: And I have nowhere near the experience with actually playing EA to say if it's better than DA or not. I know I've seen people do well with it and wondrous things once they hit their T9, but that's the same issue of having one REALLY GOOD power crutching up a sub-par set. Im -considering- giving it a shot in the future, but my brief post CoV launch era experience with it really soured me. I would not reccomend it to anyone, but at the same time, I don't have the experience with the set that I have with Dark Armor to make a reccomendation AGAINST it either.
I see that your experience with Dark Armor was less than satisfactory...I would disagree with you, but I can see hardcore Bruters not wanting to play DA in the way that it needs to be played to maximize its performance.
Those of us who grew up on Scrappers tend to look at the optimal Brute playstyle as that of a faster-paced Scrapper. When I watch good Brute players who have never played a significant number of Scrapper levels, I see a completely different playstyle that doesn't really resemble Scrapping (except for the killing part).
The one criticism that I would offer of your guide is that you should have played a DA Scrapper rather than a Brute in the first place. 
The two acc/mez are the only Hamis I have. I do have quite a few set IOs, still working on this department though.
But to me, she has always felt powerful and a breeze to solo. I wish I could figure out what the disconnect is with so many people and this armor set. Guess some mysteries will never be solved.
And yeah, she did respec out of acro, though my 50 Dark/dark brute has kept acro, different needs, different playstyles.
And what do you consider good peformance levels? Too tired right now to remember if you mentioned it before...
I guess I am asking for criteria on what a brute needs to do (specific details here) in order to be considered 'performing well'.
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You realize you just put someone on ignore because they made a completely legit argument concerning this power set, right?
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Plus, when he went and hit "quote" on an ignored post, he also learned that he can see the text rather than "blah blah ignored" thing.
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But to me, she has always felt powerful and a breeze to solo. I wish I could figure out what the disconnect is with so many people and this armor set. Guess some mysteries will never be solved.
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My guesses :
1) Some people use random keys during the fight, instead of thinking.
Dark regen gives you Instant-healing like regen ALL the time, *if* you time it well. If you use it too soon or too late... you're dead.
2) Hey... what's...... going........ on........... guys?
It seems crazy to see people saying "disorients/fears suck because I can't get my Fury bar up", while we all know it's easy to get from 0 to 90 with only 3 minions. It's because these guys take a coffee break between each power activation. Or maybe they just hit random keys. See 1).
3) Inspirations give cancer.
You've all seen these guys. They're usually the first to die in a PuG, and when you try to give them a wakie, you get the "Couldn't give inspiration to Faceplantedbuddy - Inventory full" message. Well, DA is awesome against normal groups, but pretty much sucks against AVs if you have no support and aren't willing to use inspirations.
4) We need teh heal0rz. Everything else is garbage.
Sets with no/low heals get a lot from heals. Stacking heals on top on resistance tier9 is pretty great.
DA mitigation comes mostly from Dark Regen. It doesn't get as much as other sets from heals... and as people don't know how great RES/DEF/HP buffs are and focus on getting more heal0rzz, they think DA sucks.
5) Which is better, 70 + 70 + 70 + 70 or 50 + 115 ? Screw this, math is too hard !
Some people use only SOs, and slot really poorly. Like, 2 acc 4 damage for attacks, 6 res for shields, and so on.
This can "work" for other sets, but as a DA you need to slot a lot of end reductions, or use IOs.
Started playing an EM/DA brute back in Beta, thinking that the EM stuns would be a great compliment to OG...
Switched to DM/EA at Live and never looked back. Never have I found an anti-guide that I agreed with as much as this one. Though I'm playing a DB/DA off-and-on as a concept character (looks great, plays horribly).
All that is planned fails. All that is born dies.
All that is built crumbles. This will always be true.
But memories remain, And that is beautiful.
Hi,
First let me state that this is an opinion based upon my experience with the dark armor set. I disagree with the OP overall conclusion about survivability given how OG and CoF work, and stipulate that Fury issue has already been refuted. Is fury delayed with OG and CoF? Maybe. I have gone into mobs with them down just to get the Fury bar up, then toggled them on followed by Dark Regen to heal the damage I just endured.
Experience:
39 month player with 7 50s
First DA toon was a brute, DM/DA.
Second DA toon was a scrapper, Spines/DA
Both are level 50.
Experiences with survivability:
Before OG, sucked.
After OG, OMG! What a difference. And IMHO you cannot argue survivability without considering this power. A comparison that leaves this out (irrespective of fury) is fundamentally flawed.
Cloak of fear ugh the end cost
I do hope people who do run this are using it more for accuracy debuff. I only run it on my scrapper who went to the trouble of getting enough IOs to improve recovery so that I could run both OG and CoF as much as I wanted to constantly. I am now considering getting IOs for this for my Brute, but the cost red side is so intimidating.
Finally, let me say that I really enjoyed reading the OPs post and thank them for the time and effort that went into writing it. I disagree with your conclusions about survivability and acknowledge your point concerning delayed fury building. But I would like to see the Devs back off the end cost of CoF and the accuracy penalty somewhat. I also would like to see a decrease in the end cost of Dark Regeneration. Why should it be such an end hog when it needs an accuracy check unlike other brute heal powers?
I apologize for the double post, first one went awry.
All in all, I found your summary to be an interesting read. I am having a little trouble with some of your points though--it seems rather biased. Maybe you can clarify for me...
1. So you're saying that DA sucks because it has control powers. Interesting. I kinda get the impression from hearing others that this is not a common complaint. Is building Fury the only thing that a Brute should consider when choosing powers? Do DA users have problems getting to full fury bar joy? Why can't they just keep those toggles off while they're running around taking out the first mob or two, then turn those toggles on, and then smash the dizzy, helpless mobs that they come across for the next loooong time?
2. I'm having some trouble with your argument that DA's toggle PBAoE is awful. To compare with Stone Armor: Stone Armor has some secondary effects limiting mobility of your opponents, which is good. But DA does more damage than Stone Armor and does it using an uncommonly resisted damage type, and also uses only 2/3 the endurance. Why is SA so obviously superior to DA there?
3. You seem to be deeply dissatisfied with DA's resistances. The one you complain about most is poor Energy resistance. Why shouldn't I view this as being offset by awesome Psi resistance and very strong Negative and Toxic resistance?
4a. You're also unhappy with DA's mez protections. DA has no KB protection. I will grant that this is a common status effect. But are you aware of the existence of KB protection IOs? I'm not sure I see why I'd need to have Acrobatics to circumvent this problem--I think I can do it with one slot. Am I incorrect in my thinking on this?
4b. DA also has no protection from Confuse, Placate, Taunt, or Repel--as you rightly point out. Which other brute sets offer protection from those?
4c. You discount its resistance to Fear as "very uncommon". Is Confuse so much more common than Fear that I should be deeply offended by a lack of protection from one, but unimpressed by protection from the other?
5. I am deeply confused by your comparison of Cloak of Darkness with Combat Jumping. CoD does cost more endurance. But it also has more than twice the defense bonus of Combat Jumping, +Perception, and Stealth--in addition to the Immobilize resistance. Why is it such an obviously inferior power? It seems quite useful to me.
6. You're unhappy with Dark Regen because--to paraphrase--when your pals tell you to go and tank that AV, Dark Regen is NOT up to it. Are you a Tanker? I thought we were talking about Brutes.
7. Are you seriously telling me that you just can't see situations in with a Mag 3 PBAoE Fear plus Acc debuff toggle power might come in handy?
8a. You complain that OG sucks, then you list something that sounds really great--a PBAoE Stun toggle that costs minimal END and a minor amount of HP. Your chief complaint seems to be your bizarre refusal to acknowledge any utility to being able to control how quickly everyone around you can attack you. Can you really not see a situation in which this might come in handy?
8b. You also complain that OG only has melee range. Can you explain to me why you don't think melee range powers would be exactly what a Brute might want to have? Can you list for me the ranged attacks found in other Brute secondaries?
9. Do you think that you could similarly put the hate on any other powerset, if you did a similar degree of downplaying the advantages of the set, spotlighting the disadvantages, and complaining about the set using arguments that can be applied with equal effectiveness to the entire AT? If not, why not?
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1. So you're saying that DA sucks because it has control powers. Interesting. I kinda get the impression from hearing others that this is not a common complaint. Is building Fury the only thing that a Brute should consider when choosing powers? Do DA users have problems getting to full fury bar joy? Why can't they just keep those toggles off while they're running around taking out the first mob or two, then turn those toggles on, and then smash the dizzy, helpless mobs that they come across for the next loooong time?
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Because, if you want to use crowd control as a damage mitigation tool, there's an entire AT designed around that? Not to mention it's only melee range mitigation. This doesn't come up much in PVE, as mobs will generally rush into melee range as a rule, once aggroed, BUT, there are the occasional mobs that do not.
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2. I'm having some trouble with your argument that DA's toggle PBAoE is awful. To compare with Stone Armor: Stone Armor has some secondary effects limiting mobility of your opponents, which is good. But DA does more damage than Stone Armor and does it using an uncommonly resisted damage type, and also uses only 2/3 the endurance. Why is SA so obviously superior to DA there?
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Because, the status effects caused by SA's PBAOE damage toggle are actually beneficial, keeping the mobs within melee range if they try to run. Since everyone wants to keep mentioning IOs as well, it also has some more slotting options available as well.
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3. You seem to be deeply dissatisfied with DA's resistances. The one you complain about most is poor Energy resistance. Why shouldn't I view this as being offset by awesome Psi resistance and very strong Negative and Toxic resistance?
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Because, energy is a painfully common damage type, compared to Negative, Toxic, or Psionic.
Add in that Dark's Toxic resist is -not- "very strong", its base 15 percent. Willpower can tie this while SoW is up with HPT ((Which is required on Brutes)). Stone Armor ties it with Earths Embrace. Invulnerability gets 13.1 from Unyielding/Resist Elements, with a potential 65.6 when in Unstoppable. Fiery Aura gets 15 percent per use of Healing Flames, and I've not tested this personally, but since it's duration is 60 seconds, it could possibly be stacked, with recharge slotted. ((Going strictly off not seeing the indication it -doesn't- stack, if it does not, this still leaves it tied with Dark Armor.)) Even Electric Armor, which has a "hole" to toxic normally, can utilize Power Surge for a 52.5 percent resistance for 180 seconds. THis leaves Energy Aura as the only set without the capability to exceed Dark's Toxic resist.
Psionic, there's no room to debate. Dark Armor does actually do this best, though what it gives up for it is honestly not worth the cost, in common practice.
And finally, the Negative resist. This, is tricky, because while Dark does offer healthy Negative resist ((Its exceeded by Electric in Power Surge, Invulnerability in Unstoppable, and Stone in Granite)) this is where one of the major flaws comes through on Dark Armor. Almost -all- Negative Energy attacks come with a ToHit Debuff. Dark Armor's crutch, Dark Regeneration, relies on being able to hit. Thus, when you're being hammered by Negative Energy, you're losing your ability to heal in a reliable manner.
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4a. You're also unhappy with DA's mez protections. DA has no KB protection. I will grant that this is a common status effect. But are you aware of the existence of KB protection IOs? I'm not sure I see why I'd need to have Acrobatics to circumvent this problem--I think I can do it with one slot. Am I incorrect in my thinking on this?
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The slots you're wasting on IOs to counter knockback are still slots other sets don't have to rely on. Again, the reliance of Dark Armor on IOs to reach the levels of performance other sets are already capable of is not a strength.
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4b. DA also has no protection from Confuse, Placate, Taunt, or Repel--as you rightly point out. Which other brute sets offer protection from those?
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Willpower and Energy Aura offer repel resist in their base Mezz protection toggles, and Invince, Electric, and Stone offer it in their T9s. Ignoring that, we've established that Dark Armor does give up protection from the common status effect of Knockback for the rare effect of Fear.
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4c. You discount its resistance to Fear as "very uncommon". Is Confuse so much more common than Fear that I should be deeply offended by a lack of protection from one, but unimpressed by protection from the other?
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Didn't really make a huge deal out of the lack of confuse protection, and not many other sets have it, but the sets that do, do not sacrafice Knockback protection to get it.
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5. I am deeply confused by your comparison of Cloak of Darkness with Combat Jumping. CoD does cost more endurance. But it also has more than twice the defense bonus of Combat Jumping, +Perception, and Stealth--in addition to the Immobilize resistance. Why is it such an obviously inferior power? It seems quite useful to me.
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Stealth is of limited importance in PvE, as is +Perception. This is a good toolbox power for PvP in some situations, but in that enviroment, most people are maximizing their stealth and +perception anyway, if they do have access to it. In the end, it's another toggle to run to drain your endurance, and for PvE, CJ provides Immobilize protection just as well, half the defense, but an increase in movement speed. Plus, it helps lead the way to shoring up the other mezz hole, Acrobatics.
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6. You're unhappy with Dark Regen because--to paraphrase--when your pals tell you to go and tank that AV, Dark Regen is NOT up to it. Are you a Tanker? I thought we were talking about Brutes.
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Have you actually -played- Red Side? The role of "tanking" the AV almost always falls on the Brute's shoulders, and while I agree Masterminds are probably better at it, ((And certainly better at it than Dark Armor)) finding a MM that wants to play that role, or a team that will let a MM play that role, is the exception, not the rule.
And aside from MMs, which AT do -you- want soaking the big hits from the AV?
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7. Are you seriously telling me that you just can't see situations in with a Mag 3 PBAoE Fear plus Acc debuff toggle power might come in handy?
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Mag 3 Fear isn't really that useful except on mobs that can be dispatched without much effort, anyway. The ToHit debuff is 5 percent, which is not really anything -great-. And it chews your endurance bar at the rate of .56/s. Oh, and it has an accuracy penalty, as well.
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8a. You complain that OG sucks, then you list something that sounds really great--a PBAoE Stun toggle that costs minimal END and a minor amount of HP. Your chief complaint seems to be your bizarre refusal to acknowledge any utility to being able to control how quickly everyone around you can attack you. Can you really not see a situation in which this might come in handy?
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Sounds great in practice, have you -used- it? There's never been a situation where I said "Boy, I sure am glad I stunned those minions that were in melee range of me!" and the only situations where it proved moderately useful, it meant more self inflicted damage, which meant more dark regeneration, which meant more endurance loss. Truly, a great power.
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8b. You also complain that OG only has melee range. Can you explain to me why you don't think melee range powers would be exactly what a Brute might want to have? Can you list for me the ranged attacks found in other Brute secondaries?
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Now you're stretching for counterpoints. One, for implying I considered Oppressive Gloom a "ranged attack". Two, for misstating the purpose of OG, it's not an -attack- tool, it's mitigation. Mitigation that doesn't take effect unless they're within the 8 foot melee radius.
Oh, and if you want to really know about other "ranged attacks" Energy Drain/Power Sink provide more valuable effects, and have a larger radius. Well, it's only 2 feet, but you didn't specify how much more range.
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9. Do you think that you could similarly put the hate on any other powerset, if you did a similar degree of downplaying the advantages of the set, spotlighting the disadvantages, and complaining about the set using arguments that can be applied with equal effectiveness to the entire AT? If not, why not?
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No. Because the other sets don't underperform and underachieve as well as Dark Armor does. 
I really enjoyed reading the guide, and Haetron has been brilliant about responding to people, but seriously, I think it all comes down to complaining that the resistance set with controls doesn't have resistance values on par with with reisitance sets without controls, which is entirely how it should be.
If Dark Armors resistance were raised closer to that of the other resitance based sets, combined with it's controls, and a half way competant player, it would outshine the other sets.
Actually using the controls is the flavor of the set.
Centinull
Nearly every response you've offered in regards to why not to play Dark Armor apply to Firey Aura. Obvious exceptions are FA's ability to stack Toxic DR through HF and the fact that HF has no toHit roll dependancy. However, FA suffers the same weakness to knockback (with attendant cost in either power picks/endurance or slots for IOs) and the lack of a "real" Tier 9. In fact, many of your comparsions include the use of their Tier 9 to show the superiority of the other sets - something which obviously one cannot do with FA. I assure you that it's a bad idea to ask the FA to tank an AV.
Mostly then that leaves the dislike of control as a mitigation tool because you feel that it diminishes Fury gain.
So I'm curious then why this guide is only about Dark Armor, since most of the same complaints can be applied to FA.
Let me note that I have a SM/FA Brute at 50, so I'm interested in your response.
Blue
American Steele: 50 BS/Inv
Nightfall: 50 DDD
Sable Slayer: 50 DM/Rgn
Fortune's Shadow: 50 Dark/Psi
WinterStrike: 47 Ice/Dev
Quantum Well: 43 Inv/EM
Twilit Destiny: 43 MA/DA
Red
Shadowslip: 50 DDC
Final Rest: 50 MA/Rgn
Abyssal Frost: 50 Ice/Dark
Golden Ember: 50 SM/FA
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There is also a Fear protection, and it's one of only two sets that does this, but Fear is almost non-existent in the PvE game anyway.
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Given the points made about teleport, placate, confuse and repel - I'd assume the OP was leaning towards PvP.
Repel isn't something I saw much of hero-side in PvE, nor was confuse or teleport. The only time I've seen placate PvE is bane spiders.
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I really enjoyed reading the guide, and Haetron has been brilliant about responding to people, but seriously, I think it all comes down to complaining that the resistance set with controls doesn't have resistance values on par with with reisitance sets without controls, which is entirely how it should be.
If Dark Armors resistance were raised closer to that of the other resitance based sets, combined with it's controls, and a half way competant player, it would outshine the other sets.
Actually using the controls is the flavor of the set.
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Except most of the resistance sets -without- controls aren't just, resistance and nothing else. Electric and Energy Aura get endurance manipulation, Willpower gets a nice hybrid of Regen, Resistance, and comprehensive stat resists. Invulnerability and Earth Armor don't have much as far as "non resistance/defense" goes, but they increase their own defensive capabilities further with Max HP boosting.
It's not the controls that would make the set "outshine" the other sets, it's the crutch that is Dark Regeneration. It's tremendously effective when it works, and it will work enough to make a Dark Armor brute "playable". But due to it's situational limitations, yet the set's total reliance on it, the set falters in the late game. The controls DONT add anything of note to a team, cause if a team wants Mez, they don't go "hey, let's get a dark armor brute" they pick the AT intended for it.
Fire Armor... well, UberGuy asked specifically.
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Nearly every response you've offered in regards to why not to play Dark Armor apply to Firey Aura. Obvious exceptions are FA's ability to stack Toxic DR through HF and the fact that HF has no toHit roll dependancy. However, FA suffers the same weakness to knockback (with attendant cost in either power picks/endurance or slots for IOs) and the lack of a "real" Tier 9. In fact, many of your comparsions include the use of their Tier 9 to show the superiority of the other sets - something which obviously one cannot do with FA. I assure you that it's a bad idea to ask the FA to tank an AV.
Mostly then that leaves the dislike of control as a mitigation tool because you feel that it diminishes Fury gain.
So I'm curious then why this guide is only about Dark Armor, since most of the same complaints can be applied to FA.
Let me note that I have a SM/FA Brute at 50, so I'm interested in your response.
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Because Fire Armor offers MOAR DAMAGE. Well, yeah, that'd be my main point of preference. I also feel that it's heal is superior, and it's Tier 9, even if it is a self ress, is still superior to Dark's as well. And let's not forget the fact that it runs less toggles for similar resistance numbers, for less endurance drain, does more damage output, and gets an endurance recovery ability in Consume.
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Given the points made about teleport, placate, confuse and repel - I'd assume the OP was leaning towards PvP.
Repel isn't something I saw much of hero-side in PvE, nor was confuse or teleport. The only time I've seen placate PvE is bane spiders.
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I didn't address PVP in the original post, because I thought it was much more widely accepted that Dark Armor is not good there, either. As much as I may not be a fan of the set, and think it underperforms compared to the other options available to brutes, it is playable, as long as you make sure you take and six-slot Dark Regeneration appropriately.
In PVP, you're dealing with a low resist level to the most commonly delt damage type, and your "controls" are easily avoided by bunny hopping and jousting. Sure, it's a problem all brutes have to deal with, but other brutes aren't built around keeping things in melee range and stunned to avoid dying. Even if your mezzes do "take", during the jousting, any PVPer of worth is carrying breakfrees or is properly buffed. Of course, the highly mobile nature of PVP makes Dark Regeneration less appealing, as you will rarely hit more than one to two targets, and if you're hit with a proper To-Hit Debuff, you're done pretty quick. The same goes if you do luck up onto the SR scrapper/Ice Armor Tank that does decide to stay in melee range, you're probably not hitting them with Dark Regen or any of your control toggles anyway.
Even the sets that Dark Armor should shine against, Dark Melee/Dark Blast is a horrible match up for the Dark Armor user. Dark Melee packs enough potent To-Hit debuff to over power your toggles and Dark Regeneration to the point they will not be reliable, and your own attacks are of course, generally going to suffer as well. So, the fight Dark Armor is supposed to be moderately good against winds up turning into a slow erosion of the Dark Brute's HP with little to nothing to prevent or counter it.
But wait, Psionics should be a good match up, right? No, not really, because there's no Psionic Melee set, so any ranged used worth their salt will never be at mercy of your controls, or in range for your Dark Regen to hit. Add in the hammering your recharge rates are taking anyway, and much like the Dark ((Offense)) fight, you're basically fighting a losing battle unless you specced into Aid Self.
The -only- use of Dark Armor in PVP in the end game is the Mag 30 stun on Soul Transfer, as since you'll die at pretty much the blink of an eye of any dedicated PvPer, you can de-toggle and stun any toon in range of the effect.
But, even then, the result is that you're really just being a sore sport, as even if you do manage to get a sufficient heal from the ress, ((Which isnt likely)) and you do rise and kill the person that killed you, you'll get no benefit (other than petty revenge satisfaction >
)) from it. There will be no PVP rep gain, and in an Arena event, you're still flagged as taking a KO, and the opponent still gets their +1. Worse, in arena of course, is the fact it sets you up to get smacked down for another quick add-on KO.
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I've never found a scrapper secondary nearly as fun as DA. However, I don't think I'd like it on a brute, for many of the reasons above, the primary being AVs and my tank mindframe of brute playage.
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I am sure that you are aware that brutes were not designed to be tanks. Brutes are brutes not tankers, they never have been or ever will be.
Ebony Fists: Level 50 DM/Regen Scrapper, Gloom Piston Robotics/Dark mastermind level 34, QueenFireMare: Level 34 Fire blaster (pure fire),
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I still don't think the OP is being serious.
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Im being completely serious. Im hearing a lot of "OMG UR POST IS WRONG" but nothing disputing the actual numbers or observations in the guide.
Fury generation is caused by two conditions. One is attacking, the other is being attacked.
If you're surrounded by five enemies, you attack one, the five attack you, that's Six times Fury is generated.
If you're surrounded by five enemies, and using Cloak of Fear you fear all five, and attack one, the one attacks you, the other four quiver, that's two times fury is being generated.
If you're surrounded by five enemies, and you use oppressive gloom to stun those five enemies, and attack one, that's 1 time Fury is generated.
And that alone is only a small part of why Dark Armor is an inferior brute set. This isn't as large an issue on Scrappers, because A. Scrappers aren't competing with tanker armor sets in their AT, and B. Scrappers don't rely on fury for damage.
I'll address other issues brought up with the guide at a later point, posting time is limited right now.
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First I would never make a guide suggesting that players never take any power or powerset. You have already been told that DA is a good secondary for brutes. I know that it is not the secondary that you can turn on all of your toggles and mindlessly mesh your attack buttons and win the fight. It requires some thought and some planning to make it work.
Also if I were to look really hard I would not doubt that I would be able to find that just about every set in all AT's at one time or another have been declared the worst by other players and they defend their stand vigorously. Meaning that if I went by that then I would never play this game again. At least not until the sets made you into a god.
Ebony Fists: Level 50 DM/Regen Scrapper, Gloom Piston Robotics/Dark mastermind level 34, QueenFireMare: Level 34 Fire blaster (pure fire),
FA's "moar damage" comes in two forms. Burn, which not all FA Brutes take without access to their PPP immobilize, and Fiery Embrace. FE is not a significant contributor to its overall survival. It is +80% damage for 10s if you have any primary besides Fire Melee, for whom it is +100% damage for 30s. For Fire Melee that's a significant buff, and that much addtional offense can translate into survivability, but I challenge you to show that the damage buff from FE is worth the difference in mitigation tools available for DA. After all, you can't defeat it if it defeats you first, and I don't think any of us are talking about soling standard missions here.
Healing Flames is not superior to Dark Regen. Yes, sure, you can come up with conditions where it can be. You might be facing one foe. You might be severely toHit debuffed. Your foe might have massive defense. In trivially common team situations DR is going to be a full heal, every time. DA's mitigations scale proportionally with number of foes (though DR saturates quickly) while FA does not scale at all.
Basically, I believe that your attempts to claim superiority of FA over DA reveal your bias. This guide isn't a factual one, though it contains facts. It is an opinion-based guide. While many guides contain opinions, I believe this one combines a negative spin with a certain amount of disinformation motivated by your bias against Dark Armor.
Personally, I disagree with your use of this section of the forums to negatively promote something. While I'm aware of no rule that says you can't post such a guide I think it violates the spirit of the section, which is to promote how to be successful with a given AT or powerset, not how to avoid it because it sucks - something I contest you've proven factually.
PS: I have a SM/Fire Brute which I enjoy dearly. I'm not down on FA. I just don't think you've given a fair, unbiased comparsion of the powersets in this "guide".
Blue
American Steele: 50 BS/Inv
Nightfall: 50 DDD
Sable Slayer: 50 DM/Rgn
Fortune's Shadow: 50 Dark/Psi
WinterStrike: 47 Ice/Dev
Quantum Well: 43 Inv/EM
Twilit Destiny: 43 MA/DA
Red
Shadowslip: 50 DDC
Final Rest: 50 MA/Rgn
Abyssal Frost: 50 Ice/Dark
Golden Ember: 50 SM/FA
My SS/DA Brute hit level 50 during Double XP, so I'm really getting a kick out of these replies.
I have my Heal slotted up pretty well at this point (accuracy is very high, end reduction is down to something like 95%). It's sort of irrelevant, though, because I think I had to use it once, maybe twice, running about six missions on Relentless last night. (I didn't use any Health inspirations, either.)
Dark Armor far surpasses what I expected from the set. Overall, my Health stays at a significantly higher level than friends with /FA or even /Invuln at times, and I can almost guarantee I spent a lot less on IO sets than they did. I expected to be much, much squishier than I am. I was warned of the horrible end use from both sets, but it's very seldom an issue. (Smart slotting is CRUCIAL to Dark Armor, a lot more so than something like Invuln or Electric.) As much as I've dreaded fighting them with just about every other toon I've ever had, Circle of Thorns are a joke with Dark Armor. Carnies are about the only outfit that worry me.
Are your resistances as high as some other sets? Of course not. Honestly, some of the numbers look downright unimpressive "on paper," but when you see them in action, the synergy is amazing.
Here's what I've realized: the Resistances in Dark Armor aren't your "First Line of Defense" like they are with Electric Armor or Invuln. The Resistance shields in DA are, in fact, tertiary defenses. They don't even factor in when the majority of the mobs you're attacking are Feared, Disoriented, or both. Resistance is also not a factor when the un-mezzed mobs are consistently whiffing their attacks off of your Cloak of Darkness (and its "laughably low" defense rating).
Dark Armor is all about damage mitigation. Instead of taking the hits that your Invuln and Electric Armor buddies are taking, you're standing in a ring of mobs that aren't able to even ATTACK you most of the time, much less actually HIT you consistently enough to do serious damage. Of course, you might still take enough damage that you'll be forced to use your Heal -- arguably one of the best Heals I've seen for a melee class -- and you're back in business.
My only complaints with the set are that the res is kinda poor (not a huge issue, I don't usually take enough damage to worry about hitting 0 health anyway), and that Death Shroud uses too much end for it to be of much use to me.
I got a /DA brute to 50 and I know I have plenty of fun playin' the guy. Overall I like that set the most out of all the brute armors, and I only ever had problems with it when I was a noob and did everything wrong.
So in summary, you just don't see the point of many--um, in fact, all--of the things that others might call strengths of DA (very high Psi resistance; high Negative resistance; good Toxic resistance; a stun toggle; a fear toggle; a good damage/end trade-off on the PBAoE attack toggle; +Perception; Stealth). Situational. Rarely useful. Bleh.
You also find it at very least noteworthy that DA has weaknesses that are shared by other Brute powersets (lack of resistance to Taunt, Placate, Confuse; lack of ranged powers; the ACC check on Dark Regen) and needs to fix its lack of KB protection with a single slot containing an IO.
On the other hand, you're not similarly bothered by similar problems in other powersets (EA has to fix its lack of a heal power by using at least two of your power choices and several slots; Consume and Power Drain both have ACC checks). And you're not bothered by the highly situational nature of DR boosting that is part of many of the other Brute powersets.
Sound about right to you? To be sure, I'm not arguing that DA is better than other Brute powersets--but I think your case that it is unambiguously worse is very unconvincing.
Plus, I'm enjoying my DA Brute.
I thought energy aura was weaker than this set lol