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Both are effective, but the +def bonuses tend to be a bit harder to come by; the sets that add major defense bonuses at less than 5 or 6 slots are often insanely overpriced for their level on the auction house. Boosting hit points and regen is going to be much easier and cheaper. |
Originally Posted by Sparky_McShocker
I've been wanting to IO my WP/WM, but I'm not sure which route I should take. It seems that I can either go for max HP and regen bonuses or maybe try to soft-cap def. Which is more important? Is it possible to do both? Anyone have a good build in Mids?
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Achieving soft caps for defense is rather hard to do on a WP tanker without serious misplacement of slots for set bonus pursuit as well. I'd go with some easy +defense (the Steadfast global, and defense bonuses from Mocking Beratement or Perfect Zinger - as a WP you will be slotting up Taunt anyways) but go for HP and regen overall. A little bit of defense is better than a little bit of resistance.
<《 New Colchis / Guides / Mission Architect 》>
"At what point do we say, 'You're mucking with our myths'?" - Harlan Ellison
Cool...you basically confirmed all that I had suspected. Thanks for the input. 
SparkyMcShocker- main: Elec3 Blaster
If you intend to get the FPR,PJ,TFC and the AM accolades then you can afford to change your build for less +HP. Clobber is a decent damage attack + secondary effect so much so its OP.
Mace tanks tend to keep aggro well without the aura, you can keep aggro well on gauntlet and taunt alone and I say that not for you to lose RTTC but from my experience I just dont get taunt slotting of RTTC at all.
In your case with the +Per from HS I just don't get Foc Acc. If your not going to have stamina and additional defense then I would consider conserve energy.
Soft capping def ends more problems than just getting hit.
He will honor his words; he will definitely carry out his actions. What he promises he will fulfill. He does not care about his bodily self, putting his life and death aside to come forward for another's troubled besiegement. He does not boast about his ability, or shamelessly extol his own virtues. - Sima Qian.
I can, and have, done both at the same time without damaging a build too much. One's WP/Fire, and I've got a theoretical WP/Dark that is actually a couple of threads over in "What's your Regen?"
The thing to remember is that you end up shorting your melee set in order to make it work. On a Fire, that's really not a problem, Combustion and Fire Sword Circle get the job done all day long, and on Dark, there's several situational powers that I didn't take. On a WM, you could probably go with about four of your favorites and make it workable.
The other thing to remember is that it's easy to slot things like Obliteration and Luck of the Gambler to pick up +recharge in the mix, too. The builds work because those four attacks make a contiguous attack chain and any more are unneccessary.
Defense will be more effective if you can muster softcapped levels of it, but it'll be more pricey as well (if you're talking S/L defense, since F/C/E/N is generally cheap).
You can build for both defense and HP. Here's my tank build, adopted from my brute that I'm in the process of rerolling. It's WP/SS, which has the advantage that it can fit more Kinetic Combats than your Axe build, but hopefully it'll give you some ideas. Note that it has around 20% HP from set bonuses as well.
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Originally Posted by Heraclea
the sets that add major defense bonuses at less than 5 or 6 slots are often insanely overpriced for their level on the auction house.
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Plus WP's FCEN def is already decent. Combined w/capped S/L and you're in fantastic shape. My WP/SS has capped S/L and around 42% FCEN, and around 720% regen w/1 in range of RTTC.|
Originally Posted by Laevateinn
Defense will be more effective if you can muster softcapped levels of it, but it'll be more pricey as well (if you're talking S/L defense, since F/C/E/N is generally cheap).
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| Considering how effective defense bonuses are, they're actually significantly underpriced for what they do. |
An Offensive Guide to Ice Melee
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On the most valuable defense bonus sets like Kinetic Combat and Eradication, my banker characters keep reasonable bids for them open for weeks at a time; if one fills it's banked for future use. The rest get bought with merits or rolled at. |
Originally Posted by dave_p
Yeah, I remember building for softcap 6~8 months ago spending laughably low prices and outperforming most purp'ed out builds (which themselves were relatively cheap back then). Good thing I stocked up on a lot of the now silly expensive IOs (which are still well worth it) back then.
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Looking to "exotics" is another way to get defense bonuses. The taunt sets Mocking Beratement and Perfect Zinger are obvious choices for tankers. Electric Melee players can slot for accuracy, recharge, and endurance in the sleep set Lethargic Repose for some of their attacks, and then add regular damage buttons when they get the bonuses they want. If your attacks have stuns, there's Razzle Dazzle. If you have slows, there's Curtail Speed. All of these sets give you some defense bonuses at fewer than six slots and allow you to choose them for other desirables like accuracy, endurance, and recharge; you can then slot generic SOs or IOs or frankenslot other sets for any defects in damage.
Tankers for solo and farming generally do not need to approach softcapped defenses; they're tankers. Team build tankers that benefit most from softcapping do not need to be ED-capped for damage on their attacks. I have a big stable of tankers, so I can build both ways; if you have only one tanker, you can use a second build for the two approaches.
<《 New Colchis / Guides / Mission Architect 》>
"At what point do we say, 'You're mucking with our myths'?" - Harlan Ellison
Not being insanely rich, I just Set WP for regen and eat a purp when things get nasty.
Masterminds annoy everybody, sooner or later. Heck, Masterminds annoy themselves.
-ShadowsBetween
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I would aim for max HP & softcapping SM/L.|
Originally Posted by Sparky_McShocker
I've been wanting to IO my WP/WM, but I'm not sure which route I should take. It seems that I can either go for max HP and regen bonuses or maybe try to soft-cap def. Which is more important? Is it possible to do both? Anyone have a good build in Mids?
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I personally think going for regen bonuses are largely unnecessary as most will be too small to matter once you cap your HP and have Fast Healing, Health and RttC. You do want the regen procs though.
Alternatively, you can survive for sure with less than softcapped SM/L defenses (I do it on my brute without issue), something around 33-35% (so you can softcap with 1 small purp when needed), and then let your resistances and regen do the rest of the work allowing you to build for more exotic defenses to which you have much less resistance to, but significantly higher starting numbers to work with.
Hiya Sparky, I went for capped HP and as much SM/L defense as I could get on my WP/Axe tank. 40.7% SM/L is as much as I could get without dropping below the HP cap.
Best regards,
Tommy Truestar
With my elec/willpower brute I am leveling now.. I am going for HP and regen.. And then recharge..
I want to thank all of you for answering my questions regarding a WP tanker before I even asked them.
I have a WP/Fire slotted for +HP who is at the HP cap and is now being tweaked to increase the +Def, but based on my testing in RWZ you don't really NEED to softcap any of the +Def to be insanely tough. Said tank can take on 3 spawns of +4s in RWZ, as well as solo the +3/+4 EBs there, and the only defense close to softcap is F/C at 38% (incidental bonus from a +HP slotting).
I do not have the Fitness pool on said Tank, so no Health, but I haven't really missed it since I have other places to slot the Miracle and Numina procs (I really should break down and buy a Regen Tissue +Regen...). No Stamina either, but I do have a PS proc in QR so I never run out of END unless a Sapper hits.
I have not really slotted for +regen, but it tends to come with slotting for HP (many of the sets that give one give the other) so said Tank's regen is fairly high anyway(I'd have to look to get the exact number).
It's a pity that +Res bonuses are so anemic as it would be interesting to try slotting for that as an alternative to the usual +Def/+HP/+Regen schemes.
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Originally Posted by Blunt_Trauma
Not being insanely rich, I just Set WP for regen and eat a purp when things get nasty.
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I agree. I built a willpower tank when the powerset first came available, and Major Will was impressively solid from 1 - 50. So I went with the flow and maxed out hps and haven't regretted it.
Damage spikes are the achilles heel for willpower, so if I'm going to charge into a bunch of Dr. Aion clones or something high end like that I eat a purple or two to prevent getting insta-gibbed by the spike.
Of course, I freely admit that defense capping is wonderful protection for any tank, but imho willpower is, like granite, solid enough without going to all that trouble. Invulnerability, on the other hand, needs all the typed defense you can layer on.
Goldbrick 50 inv/ss tank
Other 50s: Power Beam, Rocky Mantle, STORMIE Agent, Matchless, Major Will, Knightmayor, Femstone, Space Maureen, Crimebuster Ako, Dr. Twilight, Doc Champion, American Gold Eagle
I've been wanting to IO my WP/WM, but I'm not sure which route I should take. It seems that I can either go for max HP and regen bonuses or maybe try to soft-cap def. Which is more important? Is it possible to do both? Anyone have a good build in Mids?
Here's my planned build slotting for HP/regen:
SparkyMcShocker- main: Elec3 Blaster