Defender Debate

Mezzing the enemy mezzers (Dark/, Rad/, TA/, /Archery, /Electric, /Ice, /Psychic, /Rad, /Sonic)
Having mezz protection from your primary (FF/, Sonic/)
Debuffing their ToHit or Special to hell and back (Cold/, Dark/, Rad/, Storm/, TA/, /Dark)
Knocking them on their rears (Cold/, FF/, Kin/, Sonic/, Storm/, TA/, /Energy)
Throwing pets out to grab the alpha (Dark)
Just plain killing them before they can do anything. (Just about any combo.)

I can't think of any defender combination that doesn't have some good options along those lines by the late twenties. Most combos have several of those options. For everything else, there's Break Free. Yes, certain sets have more problem with it than others, but I wouldn't call any of them unsoloable, let alone the AT as a whole.

Most ?
Useful when solo (60/81)
Infrigidate
Snow Storm
Artic Fog
Debumb
Sleet
Heat Loss
Twilight Grasp
Tar Pacth
Darkest Night
Howlight Twilight (Stun and -regen
Shadow Fall
Fearsome Stare
Petrifying Gaze
Balck Hole (arguable more useful solo than on a team)
Dark Servant
Heal Aura
Recovery Aura
Regen Aura
Personal Force Field
Force Bolt
Detention Field (*same as Black Hole)
Dipersion Bubble
Repulsion Field
Repulsion Bomb
Force Bubble
Transfusion
Siphon Power
Repel
Siphon Speed
Inertial Reduction
Transference
Fulcrum Shift
Rad Aura
Rad Infection
AM
Enervating Field
Lingering Rad
Choking Cloud
EM Pulse
Sonic Siphon
Sonic Cage (* same as Black Hole)
Sonic Dispersion
Liquefy
Gale
Snow Storm
Steamy Mist
Freezing Rain
Hurricane
Thunder Clap
Tornado
Lightning Storm
Entangling Arrow
Flash Arrow
Glue arrow
ICe Arrow
Posion Gas Arrow
Acid Arrow
Disruption Arrow
Oil Slick Arrow
EMP Arrow

Not useful Solo (21/81)
Ice Shield
Glacial Shield
Frostwork
Heal Other
Absorb Pain
Resurrect
Clear mind
Fortitude
Adrenalin Boost
Deflection Shield
Insulation Shield
Speed boost
Increase Density
Mutation
Fallout
Sonic Barrier
Sonic Haven
Disruption Field
Sonic Repulsion
Clarity
O2 Boost


Useful when solo Boosts up to 69/90 come I16.

'Most' is simply inaccurate.

I'm missing something--what's i16 change there to make more defender powers useful solo?

comment I got the follow (anon) rep comment

Which is quite correct, but then again 8 of anything cannot run the Hami raid. I should have eliminated specifically the Hami raid from that, rather than leaving it assumed.

The RWZ Ship raid itslef is doable, depending upon how you judge sucess.
In terms of getting onto the ship and getting merits - yes.
Defeating Ukon is likely going to limited by team juggling to ensure that you can plant enough bombs. (it takes what 3 or is it 4 bombs planted to get him out)

It is interesting just how well an all defender Hami raid goes though. A couple were run on test which lacked a little in numbers showed by bringing down mitos showed that it was a) feasibility and b) required more than 22-23 defenders to be successful without many team wipes.

Get 4 teams out there (32) and it would be a different matter enitrely

Yellow Mitos (high non-melee defence) are taken out by massed tactics (and other +tohit) overcoming the ranged defence.

Blue mitos (ranged damage) fall easily

Green would probably be the trickiest, but there are enough defenders with holds that it shouldn't be an issue.

and of course no other heroside AT has howling twilight and its ability to return a tightly clustered raid group to full strength in a single activation.

I would just like to point out that the only status protection IOs are the ones that protect against knockback. Everything else is status resistance, which is not the same thing. If you're going to imply that people are lying, you might try to avoid material misstatements in your own post.

Shockingly, I played my empath up to 50 and soloed around the Shadow Shard for fun before IOs even existed. (He held the top of the Storm Elemental nemesis board for months.) I soloed with him before the difficulty slider let you turn bosses into lieutenants, and during the period when bosses were amped up to effectively elite boss levels of damage, health, and regen. When the slider was added, I soloed with him on Invincible, just to prove he could hack it--still with just SOs. He's heavily IOed now, of course, because I get a kick out of making him as powerful as possible, but he paid his dues long ago.

Damage output is a hard ceiling on soloing capability. You can't kill faster than you can kill.

Of course it is obvious that builds with high potential damage output are hindered by concessions to survivability. However, once you've dealt with the problem of not dying, damage output is the limiting factor.

Also of course, on teams everything changes. But no class II AT can rightly complain about their team performance (except Tankers, and that's only because they don't stack).

I'll be right there with you! Oh man a Mind/DM 'troller, just thinking about that.....<brainplosion>

A minor caveat to this--it's not strictly damage output, it's the damage:target regen ratio. You can eventually solo anything with unslotted Brawl, if you can survive and keep the target's regen zeroed out, and the more your effective damage (after the target's other defenses are accounted for) outpaces the target's regen, the faster you can kill it. That's why -Regen debuffs are so prized, since the devs insist on sticking with the Big Sacks Of Hit Points model of challenge so often.

You are technically correct. However, to the best of my knowledge, the types of enemies for whom -regen begins to have a significant effect are simply not a good investment of time to take on alone, and it's solo performance I was discussing. Again, on teams, much changes.

Of course the idea that debuffs are wonderful for soloing defenders is harmed by the behavior of bosses running all over the map dragging a glowing green cloud and drawing agro from all around.

Thank you!

Not every DeBuff is a toggle. Some of the most important ones for killing stuff faster (Tar Patch, Freezing Rain, Sleet, Sonic Siphon, Disruption Arrow) aren't. In fact, the only real culprits there are RI, EF and DN. Never mind that most people I know have long since stopped anchoring on Bosses, at least with Single Target builds. You usually want the Boss gone first due to concerns regarding spike damage.


And regarding the OP, he's woefully off. If anyone becomes redundant in the higher levels it's Tankers (might still want them for AV/GM fights) and Blasters (anyone can do appreciable damage at this point; Scrappers spike hard targets, Defender AOEs will deal with the chaff swiftly enough, Controller Pets do stuff). Granted, Controllers infringe upon Defenders in a massive way due to being 'good enough' Buffers/DeBuffers, but considering that both need the same amount of time to ramp up damage and Controllers then need one extra step to set up for dealing real damage and considering the presence of Defender AOEs, I've never felt redundant.

"If you're going through hell, keep going."
Winston Churchill

Seconded.

Also, to Catwhoorg, the defender version of Ice Storm is an aberration because it's using the blaster version of the pseudopet that creates the effect. The same is true for Blizzard. Just an FYI.

Repeat Offenders consistently make the stupidly difficult easy. -Castle

While 8 Tankers could be quite a sight, even they'd have difficulty getting the 'Master Of' badges.

I wasn't aware of that little oddity. Thanks

You need to update your list some more Repulsion Bomb is most definitely useful solo nowadays.

I understood it still needed to be targeted on an ally. I am incorrect in that ?

(My highbie FF troller doesn't have the power)

My Blaster's only 39 and SKed, I can wipe out entire spawns of Cimerorans with Build Up+Full Auto. Let's see a Defender do that!

low damage, low hit points, weak inherent; ever going to happen, not even with a level 50. I think that since the devs seem stone set on not giving defenders an all around useful inherent, they should at least increase defenders hitpoints so they can survive long enough to... well defend. I think increasing the hitpoints is a good way of buffing defenders without infringing on the other ATs turf. It would also give players a reason to pick defenders over corrupters.

It's irrelevant. You're SKed, which means you're on a team. Any of Freezing Rain, Sleet, Tar Patch, Enervating Field, Disrupting Arrow, Acid Arrow or of course Fulcrum Shizzle plus a quick volley of regular AOEs will accomplish the same. But if everyone else is a Defender, they can do that AND add something useful beyond sheer damage to the team. Also, since we're waving AT dicks, Cold can use Heat Loss plus any regular Nuke and just keep on going because they've just managed to overcome the -Rec part under their own power.

"If you're going through hell, keep going."
Winston Churchill