Most relaxed defender?

Hey gang! So I've gotten the leveling bug out of my system for now. Got my 50 emp/dark, 50 kin/elec, 50 ill/rad, and a PB closing in on it. That'll do me for a while. Now i just need to kick back and relax. Now, the defender class has always been my fav. Support is just plain awesome and I couldnt solo if i wanted to with my SG pounding down the doors. (fun folks) So I'd like to know what you guys think would be the most relaxing defender to play as? I totally dont mind starting a new one really since my SG doesnt care what toon ya bring as long as you have fun. So im just looking for something nice and relaxing. I heard about FF being pretty laid back but didnt know if it would be "too laid back". What with 4 minutes of thumb twiddling in between buffs. Any feedback would be good. So far my emp/dark is pretty darned laid back. I run my leadership toggles, I buff them with fort and grant invis for the def bonus, I spot heal, then the rest of the time us fun and games with tenebrous tentacles and nightfall
But is there anything more relaxed than that? I dont want to purple him out, I dont care about being uber. I'd just like a defender who is as relaxing as humanly possible to enjoy my few hours after work. So, suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

Pretty much any combo should have something to do the majority of the time, even FF Defenders. Relaxing to me is not having to keep track of buffs. IMO, Dark Miasma is probably the support set that I find the least stressful. You don't have to worry about buffing every four minutes or hitting as many people as you can with PBAE buffs. You just debuff the stuffing out of mobs and be generally awesome. You even get a pet later on to make your job easier. Mind you, there's always something to do, but it doesn't feel monotonous to me like buffing sets do. I think it depends on what you feel is "relaxing" in a video game.

Make a D3 Defender, very strong and full of control. And when you feel like flexing your muscles if you take Dark Embrace and your other shields you can easily tank for the team if need be.

Another voice for a D3. They control so much of the battlefield. Fearsome Stare on its own is usually enough to trivialize most PUG content. Toss a tar patch and watch badguys melt away. D3 is very chill.

Rad/Son is also a well-documented BEAST, especially as a force multiplier and hard-target tenderizer.

If you play like Fulmens suggests, FF is pretty relaxed. If you play like I suggest, it can be as relaxed as you want it to be. It'll be relaxed if you're doing well with just the bubbles, and you can amp up the difficulty to make it harder. Once you've made it harder, you can use your "other" tools to keep things busier. If you choose of course.

I had a FF/Sonic but it got too boring for me. Bubble up, press attack buttons, repeat

i really love my FF defender. but that is why i was looking forward to i16 i wanted colored bubbles! it is relaxed for me, but im not usually a defender type person haha

Force Field is definitely relaxed.

Sonic Resonance allows you to improve your teams surviviability and offensive power without doing much at all. Sonic Barrier and Haven every 4 minutes, Sonic Dispersion and Disruption Field running pretty much earn your place on a team. Before Stamina, you can claim that you dont have the endurance to attack.

Radiation Blast is a good laid back secondary.
Load up Neutrino Bolt with procs (Devastation chance to hold, Achilles chance for -Res, two damage procs) and set up a macro to toggle it on and off auto, eg.

/bind 1 "powexecauto Neutrino Bolt"

You can now sustain a worthwhile contributing attack chain by pressing one key and then switching targets. Every now and then activate Cosmic Burst and youre done.

Throw in another vote for Dark Miasma. Not really a great deal of difference in play between solo and group except mobs shouldnt be gunning for you.

I would say Radiation would be a close second, depending on whether you prefer having two anchor toggles for the times that teams kill your anchor. When I play Radiation, its kind of rare that both my EF and RI anchors get removed at the same time, so I have time to bring up one while the other is still in effect. With Dark, when your DN drops, your team has no debuffs unless you and fluffy have everything held or feared.

Every other set (That I have played significantly) seems to be either very active or very buff centered.

Empathy or radiation always seems to be most relaxing for me when on a defender. Both have aura heal which can help multiple people if need be and emps can heal with the best of um and rad has choking cloud which is awesome for when baddies get too close to ur healin butt.

FF is very relaxed in one sense since you can spend almost all your time blasting. Those four-minute-long buffs are fairly easy to maintain.

TA is relaxed in a very different sense. Yes, you have lots of clicking to do in combat, but you never have to buff or heal anyone.

I guess it just depends on what you find relaxing.

Consider making a Force Field/Ice Defender. That combo will simply require you to shield people, drop rain powers when you can, and allow you to spend the rest of your time plinking and holding enemies if you want. The bonus is that Ice's two rain powers (a standard AoE and a nuke) get Blaster level modifiers. You can use the standard rain about once per fight, and the nuke every 4 or 5 fights. The nuke will make you drop your big bubble, but it does so much damage that no one will care--just make sure you've refreshed everyone's bubbles before going for the shot.

I get tired of having to buff people, so I prefer sets like Dark Miasma and Radiation Emission. These have powers (Lingering Radiation, Howling Twilight, Enervating Field and Tar Patch) that have huge regen and damage resist debuffs that can make it possible for very small teams to take on AVs, as well as accuracy and damage debuffs that make the bad guys miss you and do less damage.

For survivability I think Dark Miasma has the advantage because of the pet (it's a great aggro magnet, healing spammer, immobilizer and acc debuffer). Also, Tar Patch really slows most mobs down, keeping them clustered together. With Rad they can scatter more easily, and if they get too spread out they can get out of range of the acc debuff anchor.

Thanks for the awesome suggestions guys! So looking into what I was going for and going with your suggestions, I went with Dark/Dark. Part of the reason is that the debuffs will really help with the hard targets. That and I had totally forgotten about Fluffy. I mean, a pet that does pretty much the same job as you? Awesome. I mean if i went off the deep end getting chatty and in team chat, Fluffy would still be doing part of my job for me. Sure I won't be just setting follow on the tank and let the pet do the work, but its nice to see when i get all chatty and lose some of my focus that Ill be able to have a little help in the debuff and heal department. I tend to run at the mouth when on a team. What with 7 other geek-inclined folks to talk to, who can miss that opportunity? So when I was looking for something relaxed, much of the reason came from how much I like to talk. So Dark/Dark it is. Thanks so much for the suggestions. Im sure my altitis will kick in eventually and I'll make the others as well.

Give Traps a try too. You buff and debuff with your toys, so you are defending the team without having to actively click on teammates. Very strong and very fun. Love mine.

Unless you're on a kin or emp, where people pester you for buffs/heals like baby birds chirping for their next meal, being a defender is pretty relaxed most of the time. By relaxed I mean you do what you want, when you want, at your own pace and nobody pesters you for anything.

Very few players will have the situational awareness to notice what, if anything, the rest of the team is doing unless there's a team wipe. Even then they're likely to just figure it means they need more healers anyway.

I would say Dark, Rad, Traps or Trick Arrow

I like /Sonic with my Dark/ , counter to the multiple calls for D3.

My Trick Arrow/ is very laid back too, forgot about that one.

I think kinetics and empathy are the busy defenders. Empathy is busy if the team needs healing, and you've to buff as well. Actually, if defenders have thermal radiation, then thermal will be the most busy one because you have to bubble, heal, buffs on a different timer from the bubble, debuff enemies, and people want you to attack too.

Most relaxed defender is harder to answer. Because the most relaxed defender should be the ones who only have AoE buff toggles, so you only need to stand there to fulfil your role of defending. However, none of the sets have only AoE buff toggles. Maybe if we can bubble all the team members with a single click, I would call FF pretty relaxed.

I don't feel particularly stressed out on my rad/archery defender. My heal is nothing to write home about. On a strong team I don't have to do much specifically until an AV appears, and you know when that is happening. The only time I have to act fast is when somebody dies to make sure I get Fallout off before I rez them or they rez themselves.

<《 New Colchis / Guides / Mission Architect 》>
"At what point do we say, 'You're mucking with our myths'?" - Harlan Ellison

A Sonic/Sonic Defender, especially if there are TWO of them on one team, is a very relaxed, yet powerful character. You can dramatically increase the survivability of your team mates by using a power on all of them once every 3 minutes and following them with your big bubble, but instead of sitting around and twiddling your thumbs you can use your powers to debuff enemy resistance into mush and use powers like Screech, Siren's Song, and Liquify to control enemies. I've found it to be a solid solo character and a great team character.

I love my Kinetics/Archery Defender now that he's in his 40s, and I find it VERY relaxing. Mostly, this is because I picked Psychic as my Epic pool, letting me add Telekinesis, Mass Hypnosis, Mind Over Body, and Dominate to my arsenal. With unlimited endurance at my disposal via Transference, Telekinesis is a LOT of fun, and it takes a lot of the "OH NO I HAVE TO DO THIS NOW!" factor out of playing a Kin. I just use Mass Hypnosis, Fulcrum Shift, Telekinesis, and Rain of Arrows, with Fistful of Arrows and Blazing Arrow on anything still alive. Throw in Transference whenever needed. It' easy and fun.

Radiation/Sonic is also a good, safe combo. You have control in Siren's Song, nice debuffs in both the primary and secondary, a heal, and AM. It's a good set for beating down just about every enemy in the game without too much hassle.

Force Field/Energy is a build that I made for the exclusive purpose of teaching myself how to handle powers with Knockback, but it ended up being a lot of fun. It does surprisingly well as a supporter in PvP because I have Force Bolt 5-slotted with a Knockback IO set. With its quick recharge and ridiculous knockback, it's my favorite toy for playing Minion Batting in Atlas Park (Minion Batting is where you teleport a nearby hellion to the top of the statue of Atlas and then use your best KB power to see how far it flies. It's a lot of fun when you're bored).

A Storm/Dark Defender would give you hardcore control, and also look neato. I have a Thugs/Dark MM with Soul Mastery's Tenebrous Tentacles, and that power combined with Hurricane is great.