Why a tanker rather than a scrapper.

I would have to disagree. I see no reason why tanks couldn't have a straight port of brute SR. The PSDR still won't kick in until 60% health. The tank will still suffer from tohit buffs, non-positional attacks and defense debuffs... heh... ok.. scratch that last one. Being defense based, even at tank levels, it will STILL suck until SOs. And, of course, it will still lack a self-heal.

Easy to soft cap early? Yes. REAL early. But that's all it has going for it.

I'd play it if tank damage didn't suck so badly. And I teamed more.

your math skills betray you. Also you didn't see scrappers and tanks L-rodding through groups because they didn't have the power and they were SC'ing through groups just fine albeit not with the same intensity as an elec/shield brute because again no L-rod blueside.

Old Scrapper
(1.95+.81+1)*133
3.76*133
500

~approx 32 damage away from SC cap

In fact because SC and BU are on the same timer, fury is largely wasted on a brute that uses AAO. Observe.

Brute
(1.95+.65+.8)*133
3.4*133
452

So a brute needs 30 fury to cap out SC, ya 30. What is nice on a brute is not needing to saturate AAO or even use BU (though you usually do anyway to make sure it hits everything) as sometimes it is nice to just rip off a full power SC from range.

The same scrapper will now to 752 damage with SC.

A much better case can be made for L-rod in that fury helps it perform much closer to the new scrapper version (other than on an elec/shield of course), but I think that is why the L-rod changes were welcome and the SC changes are causing some raised eyebrows.

Tank SR would get 40.56% def just from primary powers alone. Slotted CJ would softcap it. Or unslotted CJ plus a Steadfast. I don't think Castle would allow a set to have that much mitigation base. (I have a feeling that despite peaking so easily, it'd plateau lower than other sets.)

Which is precisely why I think Castle would allow it. If he were to decide on some tweak for the feel of the set or to make it more tanky, I'd expect one of the two following ideas:

PSDR gets the axe and replaced with static DR passives. This would lower base defense values.

Lower each toggle value and add heightened regen and/or hp buff to quickness and call it something else.

Oh, I could see a modified SR being ported to tankers - just not a straight port from Brutes. If the game is balanced around SOs, then I think a straight port would be broken.

You're right, that's exactly what I meant. I didn't intend it as sarcasm though, these statements are pretty much true... They're also irrelevant, and wording it that way shows that well.

Unless I misinterpret what you are saying, your argument is, "Super Reflexes doesn't need to be changed for Tankers, because it would suck so badly no one would ever consider it overpowered." Correct?

That was exactly (well, not in those words) what I was saying. I can see that you would probably think the devs would be likely to just release an underpowered Set as it is. I am probably giving them too much credit in thinking they wouldn't, or maybe suggesting what they might do.

I see what you mean. However, the OP did say "that Fury must be making a big impact in the game". You are making the case that much greater against him. I dropped the Fury down to half, you've eliminated it entirely.

I'll also add that the person that quoted me messed up his quote, and now it looks as if his words are what I said. This is made worse by the number of people who have quoted that response without correcting it.

Noooo, SR only sucks until SOs. That's level 22. And that's if you didn't have a boatload of low level IOs sitting in your group enhancements bins with a level by level plot to crank up at least melee defense as high and as early as possible.

SR on a tank after SOs, *I* feel, would be comparable to the other tanker sets in exactly the same way that SR on a scrapper with SOs is comparable to the other scrapper mitigation sets.

You're still going to have crap damage output which will mean fights take that much longer which means that there's more chances for the RNG to say, "Today is not your day."

However, I am willing to listen to discussions on the topic.

Well, Shield CAN feel squishy (well, squishy for a tank)... if they can get through your defenses, that is. So the mobs to be aware of are Nemesis, Devouring Earth, and Cimerorans. Nems are interesting, as you can be fighting them just fine in a team and suddenly run into trouble when Vengeance gets stacked enough that they can hit you frequently through your defenses. Same for those quartzes or whatever that DE throw down: you want to destroy those ASAP, as that will let any DE in the area hit through your defenses. Cimerorans are only an issue if they manage to debuff you to low levels.

There are ways around those issues... being aware of your defense levels is the biggest thing. Grab Tough to help curb damage that comes through, more regen, or Aid Self. Popping One With the Shield preemptively is also key... if you're on an 8-man team and Vengeance is really stacked, you will survive if you hit OWTS quickly enough. If you wait until you're in the red... not quite a guarantee. For Cimerorans, just get out of melee range for a few seconds to shed all the def debuffs.

Other mobs will be pretty easy, which is why those three groups stand out (there are some Praetorian mobs that debuff defense, but I didn't notice them as much for some reason). Carnies were no issue at all, and Rikti are laughably easy... I hardly got singed on the couple of raids I was on with my Shield Tanker, and I helped out fellow raiders around me with my defense aura.

Probably the biggest thing I missed on my Shield tanker was a heal for when things went south. Other than that, it should be tougher than Ice Tankers, I would say (though Ice can handle things going bad a bit more easily).

I always feel bad when I'm scrapping and I see a squishy being attacked. Sometimes you can help by running in and attacking, but it's usually not enough. I try to maintain scrapperlock/scrapperfocus, but it's still hard... always makes me wish I was a tank.

I can't see a problem with a SR tanker tbh. It's resistances will kick in at low hp but atleast they'll kick in. It is one where once you add aid self to it *drools*. Oh wait the fact I might be drooling over it maybe why there maybe a problem.

I think I'm more concerned about the high end performance. Once a Scrapper has softcapped SR with IOs and a Tanker has softcapped SR with IOs, what has the Tanker got left that continues to give him an advantage? Hit points, certainly. The magnitude of the status protection in Practiced Brawler. Possibly, that Evasion will come sooner, and in fact that all the toggles will come sooner since they will be in his Primary. Anything else?

Sure, the Tanker is soft capped with only SOs, but what do you do with the IOs then?

The performance on my SR scrapper is where it is because of his power buff accolades and setIO buffed HP and regen on TOP of the softcapped defense.

Since a tank won't have to put in near the effort to get softcapped, it will be able to work on even MORE HP, Regen and Damage.

My scrapper has about a 40% buff to base hitpoints right now.

If a tank gets the same amount, he'll be sitting at 2624 HP.

If I regen at 27HP/sec, the tank will be regening at 37.5HP/sec.

The PSDR will be kicking in at 1575 HP for the tank.

But that's with my scrapper's current IO slotting. Since the tank won't have to be working nearly as hard to hit the softcap, it will be able to crank those HP and regen levels higher.

I wouldn't be worried about end game SR tanking anymore than I would be about other tanking sets. It's going to be better than some and worse than others.

My problem/concern with SR being straight ported to Tankers is that it provides too much mitigation up front. SR would give as much mitigation as Invuln vs s/l with 4 targets and more mitigation than even saturated Invincibility vs the exotics. With slotted CJ, you could just about double that survivability too. (These numbers don't even include the scaling res, either.)

I just don't think it's wise to design a set that is that high on the mitigation curve out of the box, especially since it's all in one stat (def) and how it scales up exponentially.

This is the main point in this debate in my opinion. It's entirely a matter of preference and play-style. The scrapper's fine if damage is what you're concerned about, but you can't confuse their tanking abilities with an actual tank. There is no comparison there.

Because Tankers have the best damn monthly event in the history of CoX, and scrappers aren't invited.