Brutes & Scrappers after Going Rogue?

Maybe it's cause i play a lot more on redside, but my observation are the opposite. I've seen very few corruptors with only there tier1 secondary power and just attacks. On the other hand, i've seen a lot of "pure support" defender that only get the tier1 of there secondary.

In average, corruptors seems to be the most balanced ones.


[To the topic]
I doubt any AT will have problems. Some people prefer to independant nature of redside AT, while others prefer to build a one-trick poney with blueside AT. (not saying they can't be independant... just that some people like to build that way) And there will always be the challenge of trying something new to old vets that already have lots of 50 of the "best ATs".

A Mastermind could take Provoke AND SURVIVE THE AGGRO IT GENERATED, while arguably a Stalker could not. (Or at least, not anywhere near as well) Masterminds are not unable to tank because they cannot take the damage, they are unable to tank because they cannot hold the aggro. If you provide the tools to hold the aggro, you already have the capability to take the damage.

And you are also ignoring that only Brutes and Tankers have a higher Threat rating than MM henchmen. And there are other factors you may be ignoring as well, as the Threat formula isn't known exactly. It's entirely possible that a henchman in melee has a much higher threat rating than any AT at range, as long as it is not itself Taunting. (also once you have aggro is is much harder to pull it off of you, so MMs are better at keeping aggro than trying to take it)

No MM is going to pull aggro off of a Brute or Tanker that is building aggro with punchvoke, (or a Scrapper that's Taunting) but that's not the point. An MM doesn't have to draw aggro off of a Brute to protect his team. He has to draw aggro off of everyone ELSE to protect his team.

Now, with a Brute it is the opposite. He may be able to hold aggro as well as a Tanker, but without a team behind him he's not going to survive it like a Tanker. He's not even going to survive it as well as a Mastermind. Neither is a "full" tanker, only a Tanker is a full tanker. Both Masterminds and Brutes have strengths and weaknesses in trying to fulfill that role, that's the whole concept behind both of them. (After all, if a Brute could tank like a Tanker, he'd do damage like one)

I suppose I could also add that solo, especially in the 18-25 levels, a Mastermind definately feels very much like a Tanker. The ability or non-ability to draw aggro is not important when solo, and you have that same feeling of being invulnerable, but it takes forever to kill anything. Mix with that the fact that due to the nature of henchmen you are doing very steady but low damage, and you have no burst damage whatsoever. Past 32 that changes with Bots or even other MMs that can do major damage with their upgraded henchmen, but you are still more of a defensive AT than an offensive one.

Playing redside 95% of the time as I do, I have never seen that.

Getting back to stalkers - one reason I feel they've always been thought of so "lolstalkers" (even when not deserved) is because of the Brute AT. They're a button-masher's dream AT and, far as I can tell, are only matched in solo DPS, survivability and so on awesome-itude by MMs. Being easier to play than MMs, they tend to be THE AT of choice for a lot of players, especially the lazier ones (no offense, I'm not trying to paint all brutes that way, just some). (I'm guessing I've just stoked a lot of fury bars... )

If stalkers had been somehow in the mix of blue-side, I don't think their reputation would have been so rotten for so long. I could be wrong on this since I don't play blueside much though.

Most of the primaries lose out on AoE powers in exchange for AS. Some sets have ZERO AoE powers. They also lose out on HP (especially max HP; ask a WP how they feel about their HP cap) and defenses in their secondary.

Stalkers are ST specialists. But the reason they suck is because they aren't good enough at that to warrant all the cons they come with. 95% of the game's content doesn't need high ST damage. The few situations where you might want it (AVs, GMs), other ATs are just as capable as a Stalker. And for that other 95% of content, the Stalker is kind of just dead weight.

Now MAYBE if Stalkers were just REALLY GOOD at doing ST damage, that would be different. But they really don't push that far ahead of Scrappers or Brutes, and that's even when they're on a full team.

Stalkers, Defenders, and Tankers all suffer from this problem as I see it. They only do one thing, and it's something that other ATs can do well enough that their "specialty" isn't necessary. Blasters are the other AT that only does one thing, but the one thing is tons of damage, and damage isn't a waste. Stalkers would need to do more damage to be worthwhile.

Originally Posted by PRAF68_EU Dispari has more than enough credability, and certainly doesn't need to borrow any from you.

I think the devs have still allowed for their vision even in the latest wave of Patron updates, but most players have taken a different approach.

As I understand it, the most effective Masterminds on these forums either don't have or scarcely use their ranged attacks. This makes the class entirely built on damage from the Henchmen and support from the Mastermind himself. This is all well and good (and extremely entertaining), but does not constitute a red-side Tanker, as you have stated.

On the other hand, Masterminds can be built differently from the norm: what some people actually call "Tankerminds" for the very way they are played. My belief is that the devs implemented Bodyguard for the express purpose of supporting "Tankermind" play style, and that they eventually overhauled how Henchman upgrades work to discourage rapid re-summoning and persuade Masterminds to protect their Henchmen as well as work with them.

The fifth powers added to the Mastermind epics (Thunder Strike, Oppressive Gloom, Knockout Blow and Power Boost) are all focused on aggro management. Power Boost makes the Mastermind's mez and debuffs more powerful, but that's the odd one out. Look at the others: they're all melee powers. What's the point of melee powers on a Mastermind? Well, it's for aggro control: if the Mastermind is dealing heavy damage or messing with groups while in the middle of it all--sucking up damage using the aforementioned Bodyguard--then he's in a prime position to A) take alpha, B) survive and persist through the fight, and C) be able to hold the attention of numerous enemies to prevent them from attacking his allies.

While Masterminds aren't typically used for aggro management purposes, it's certainly possible, and I'm of the belief that the devs have been accomodating that functionality all along.

Untrue! You forget the fear that an AS can raise in the nearby survivors.

But yeah, if AoEs (that cause damage) are your thing, then stalkers are not for you. I only have one toon I made as an AoE monster and he's fun and all, but it's just not my raison d'etra in this game (neither, obviously, is min-maxing, DPS or XP/sec).

I still think stalkers are far less loser-tastic than they are made out to be; like any powerset combo, some do less ZOMG-SPECTACULAR than others, but they are all eminently playable. But obviously this is all getting down to matter of personal play-style choice at this point.

Aside from the differences in powersets, Scrappers have a higher base damage than brutes, as well as the ability to crank out critical hits. This means that scrappers can crank out more damage at the start of missions. Also, most scrapper attacks don't have built-in taunts like Brutes, leaving them much more free to hammer on enemies without fear of retaliation (provided that there's a tank doing its job) than a brute, who needs to attract attacks to itself in order to better build fury.

And aside from all that, remeber, the dev's promised extra special milk and cookies to the ATs who stay true to their original sides, meaning that no changing goodie-two-shoes Brute would ever see those. Who knows, it might make a difference.

People who are serious about tanking for a team, will still pick the tanker at IMO. It's the best at what it does, and can function effectly without buffs, where the brute generally can't. A brute can tank if conditions are right, but people who are serious about tanking want something that can stand up when the crap hits the fan, as it were, and will stick with what works the best.

People who are less serious about tanking and just looking for a tough melee char, will pick brutes or scrappers. So, IMO, i don't think much will change over what's happening now, other then the fact they'll be even FEWER villians for me to team with then there is now...

My new em/inv brute was created specifically to utilize GR, swap sides, and become my primary "tank." Between darkest night, invincibility and taunt, aggro control won't be an issue. After properly IOing out, survival won't be an issue. Whirling hands and Dark Obliteration won't be awesome levels of aoe, but they'll work.

If my dm/wp speced for solo work can be the main tank on the LRSF, I find it very hard to believe that an em/inv speced specifically for tanking is going to have any problems at all.

As for it being harder to find teams villain side... yea, probably.

I have a suspicion there will be lots of Villains that just turn into 'Rogues' and lots of Heroes that are 'Vigilantes', meaning all these will be able to spend a good bit of time in the Rogue Isles. I'm betting that many (esp. the Hero ATs) will be visiting the Rogue Isles alot, if only for the occasional change of Pace (God do I get tired of PI, haha). What I'm saying is I think you'll have plenty to team with in the RIs, likely more than you have now.

I have two Brutes who can handle +2/x8 WITHOUT buffs. And it would be a cold day in heck before I formed a team with ZERO support, since even if the tank was a 500b ubergod Granite/Dark Tanker, something's going to kill the Blaster over there.

Most Brutes, even before being IOed out, backed by basic support, should be able to tank for a team.

Originally Posted by PRAF68_EU Dispari has more than enough credability, and certainly doesn't need to borrow any from you.

When things hits the fan and half or more of the team is dead, brutes will usually handle themselves better than a tanker, and have more chance of finishing the AV.

For exemple, in an all-brute LRSF, we got Numina to about 5%....when everyone started to die. With unstoppable and a few insps, i was able to stay alive long enough to finish her (took about a minute), making the next shot a lot easier, without numina to buff the Heroes. If it was a tanker, i'm 99% sure that he couldn't have done the DPS to overcome her regen, solo.

As for brutes being less survivable, as soon as you bring a little support or insprations, they are pretty much the same (same cap =P). And if you don't even have support or insps, you really don't need that much survivability, unless you're doing something you shouldn't.

I dunno, nowdays my Spine/ stalker feels pretty damn nice as far as AoE. I'm sure there are builds that outdamage me in pretty much every other villain AT, but I'm at least able to make a good impact on teams that aren't steamrolling.

Ok ok, i think my first post was poorly writen, and made it look like i was saying brutes are weaker then they are. I have a Elec/SR, softcapped, that can take +4+8 spawns... solo, with inspreations. Yeah, they have major survibility, and great damage. And they can tank and do a good job. I don't dispute that.

But, there's a difference IMO, from being able to do a job, and being the BEST at your job. It's a mentality. I know i have it. When i'm in a situation that needs a tanker, (and in this game, the word "need" is kind of subjective. Rarely is anything needed as much as wanted.) I get a TANK. They'er better at tanking. They are more surviable, with and without buffs then a brute in the same situation. (assuming the builds are comperable. DM/Invlun brute and a Invlun/DM tank lets say) They hold argo better. They just make better tanks because they ARE tanks.

And, again, it's just IMO, but people who are wanting to be a TANK will make a TANK.

Truth be told, i like brutes over tanks myself. I always have. And i do think brutes will be a more popular AT, but i don't belive for a second tanks are going to die off once GR happens.

I think your right, but at the sametime, wrong. It'll make since to have it too where your guys cant play both sides of the game at the same time, but i'm betting the greater majority of people will play blue side reguardless. *shrug* Granted i am a pessimest.

Course, any redsider i make can and will be able to run to blue when they need teams, so, in reality, yeah, i'll be able to find teams MUCH easer with my villians... on the blue side. heh.

Maybe you're right...*Shrug*... I just have a feeling most of my Toons will end up being Vigilantes/Rogues, and that alot of my former 'Heroes' will be exploring the Rogue Isles a good bit. The reward for staying Pure Hero/Villain will have to be pretty hefty for me to want to keep a toon restricted to one side.

RP-wise, most folks are Shades of Gray anyway...

After a while, once the 'newness' wears off, it could be that most Toons (Villain & Hero) will gravitate to Blueside for most of their playtime. We'll just have to see. For higher levels, it could be the opposite. Grandville is *much* cooler than Peregrine Island, after all

Just to set the record straight about Stalkers: It's not really true what you're saying about defense. Stalkers don't *lose* defense from their secondary. More often than not, they *gain* defense such as in Super Reflexes (loses out on passive resistance but gain more base defense via hide) and Regeneration's case (who does lose great utility from Quick Recovery but gains some +def via hide). They have the same armor numbers as Scrappers or Brutes with the difference being they have a lower base and cap for HP (and brutes having higher res caps than either).

As for the damage, it's the same as Scrapper: set by set.

You don't pick up a Dark Melee scrapper and then complain it has weak AoE. That's just how the set was designed.

Same for Stalkers although less forgiving.

Some Stalker melee sets are just built to capitalize on ST while others are a mix. You want ST? Go EM, MA, DM. Want AoE? Spines, DB, Elec. etc.

And while some sets get the shaft, other sets actually shine *better* on a stalker. Take Elec Melee? Every other AT gets non-dmg Thunderclap. But stalkers replace that with a strong ST attack (something that set is lacking in) *plus* it can unleash the AoE attacks of the set in huge bursts thanks to Hide, Placate coupled with BU.

Dark Melee is similar. A set that has weak AoE? Yeah, just remove Dark Consumption (nice utility, yes) and replace it with an *actual attack*? It only strengthens that set.

Or Dual Blades, a set that loses an *actual* AoE attack, is compensated for losing that PBAoE by having longer range in 1kcuts and capable of dishing out *better burst* than your average DB thanks to AS and having BU rather than BF. There's other little quirks within that set that make it awesome but I won't go into it...

Nothing's going to die off with GR. That doesn't mean that Tankers are going to be at an acceptable balance point when they have to compete directly against Brutes for team tanking positions.

Tanking is a binary proposition - either you're good enough, or you're not. Either you control the aggro and don't die, or you lose control of the aggro, or you die. Or both. There are no bonus points dealt out for overperformance with tanking. If you're still alive at the end of the fight, and you kept the baddies from murdering your teammates, that's that.

There are always bonus points dealt out for dealing more damage.

That's the problem. The only way Tankers can really hold their own against Brutes is if there is stuff in the game that Brutes just plain can not tank. Maybe we'll see that with the new content coming in GR. I'm willing to wait and see, but I'm quite sure that with current content, I would rather have a tanking-specced Brute tank for my team than a Tanker, because the Tanker's extra capability is pretty much wasted, and the Brute's extra damage isn't.

Brutes do not fear retaliation. They thrive on it.


It's one of the things that sold me on the Brute AT completely.



As a side note, most Scrappers I've played with have no fear of retaliation either - they just don't get as much of as it Brute's tend to.

Um, Stalkers definitely lose defense by having low HP. And the cap is VERY significant. A Stalker who has accolades only needs 13.5% HP to cap his HP. That means not only should a WP Stalker not slot HPT, but he can't even get the full boost of the BASE amount it gives. It means a Stalker can't get the full benefit of Dull Pain or Overload.

It means the heals in Regen, Ninjitsu, Willpower, Dark Armor, Electric Armor, Energy Aura, along with the regen in Regen, Willpower, and Electric Armor -- basically EVERY set but SR -- is weaker and the Stalker is squishier.

In addition, the passives in SR give +5.625% DEF, while Hide only gives +1.875% DEF (when suppressed). So SR has lower AoE DEF than it should. It does get slightly more M/R, but it still loses out due to HP/regen. Energy loses its passive RES too.

So yes, EVERY single Stalker set has reduced survival to some degree over even Scrappers. Even if that's just a small bit of AoE DEF in SR, but that also counts their HP, and the resulting regen amount from the lower HP. Adding 1.875% DEF to regen doesn't make up for the fact that DP can only add 13.5% HP at most instead of 60%, and there are 5 powers in the set that are diminished in strength due to the lower base HP.

No it isn't. Scrapper base damage is 1.125 and Stalker is 1.00. Scrappers crit 5% on minions and 10% on everything else. Stalkers crit 10% on everything, unless they have a large team. With the addition of hide, placate, and AS, the Stalker can get some burst damage in, but those are all time-consuming activities. And only in ST DPS. And that's discounting that Scrapper BU is +100%, while Stalker is +80%. And Scrappers have access to secondaries like Shield and Fire which add more damage. A Stalker is only outdamaging a Scrapper if he has tons of friends nearby, and even then, loses out on AoEs:

Elec: -1 lame power; only set not severely hampered (and popular for this reason)
Spines: -1 PBAoE toggle
BS: -1 PBAoE
Katana: -1 PBAoE
EM: -1 PBAoE
MA: -1 PBAoE
DB: -1 PBAoE, Sweep/Empower restricted by BU timer, AV is ST
Dark Melee: -2 PBAoEs, SD -> BU (severe loss to DPS)
Claws -1 PBAoE, Eviscerate is ST, FU -> BU (severe loss to DPS)

There are two sets with ZERO AoE powers, one being MA which previously had a rather good AoE damage. Then the remaining sets outside of Elec and Spines are left with only cones, no PBAoEs. Sets like Dark Melee, which you mentioned, had poor AoE before, but between the two long-recharge PBAoEs it was at least "poor to okay," while with the loss of those it's mostly just "almost nonexistant" having to rely on SM exclusively.

In addition, various powers are reordered for Stalkers, making good powers come super late, making them much harder to play and attain DPS chains at low levels:

Parry: 8 (Scrapper), 18 (Stalker)
Impale: 8 (Scrapper), 18 (Stalker)
Siphon Life: 8 (Scrapper), 18 (Stalker)
Crane Kick: 8 (Scrapper), 26 (Stalker)

DM does have weak AoE on a Scrapper. But note that it's EVEN WEAKER on a Stalker.

EM has really weak AoE. But it has ZERO AoE on a Stalker.

Unfortunately, Katana, Broadsword, Claws, Martial Arts, and Dual Blades all have pretty good AoE. But they don't on Stalkers. Instead of having a couple ST-oriented sets (DM, EM), Stalkers turn EVERY set into an ST-oriented set, and then your only option for AoE is Elec.

Elec is the ONLY primary that shines so well on a Stalker. And there's a reason it's so popular. It lost a useless power to gain AS, while all other sets lost GOOD powers to gain AS. Elec has its full strength in everything it does still in-tact, while all other sets lost something important.

If instead of dropping PBAoE powers the sets had instead lost stuff like Stun, Cobra Strike, and Touch of Fear, we'd be having a different conversation. That's not an option for every set though (DB, Katana). It's just unfortunate that the ONLY set they chose that route for was Elec.

Originally Posted by PRAF68_EU Dispari has more than enough credability, and certainly doesn't need to borrow any from you.

The actual values of the armors may be the same, but having 89%/80% the base hp of Scrappers/Brutes and ~66.9%/50% the maxhp is a very large decrease in survivability. There are two problems caused by this.

First, since Stalker base hp (~1200) is so close to their cap (~1606) it means +maxhp buffs are easily trivialized. A Stalker with Accolades can only get around +14% more maxhp before they cap. This means powers like DP, HPT, and Overload don't yield nearly the benefit they do on the other ATs.

Second, it means Stalkers are much more susceptible to burst damage. Stalkers tend to favor defense oriented sets where their biggest danger is spike damage. If you dodge 90% of what comes your way, but can't take two consecutive hits (hyperbole) - someone who can dodge 90% of attacks but can survive 3 to 4 consecutive hits is a large survivability jump.

At any rate, there have been defensive set changes - for example, WP losing RttC in favor of Reconstruction.

Stalkers have a lower base damage mod than a Scrapper (1.0 vs 1.125), but they do have a higher crit rate. I'm just mentioning it because it's technically not exactly the same.

Yes and no. You're correct in saying that if a character can hold aggro and not die, then you don't need more survivability. On the other hand, if you survive every fight by the skin of your teeth, it means that if anything deviates from the norm, things will go south really quick. One spawn may be fine, but if two are too close to one another? What if there is an ambush? A spawn with more bosses than usual? A 'tank' that is just barely making by will likely die while one with some reserve will handle it much better.

Now, if you're on a buffer overrun team it's very possible a Brute will have excess of what they need. However, there is a place for having more than the bare minimum.

Yet people hate corpse blasting.

Let me reiterate that we don't know all the changes that are coming with GR, so any assumptions made now are premature. There could be powers/abilities given to certain ATs that make them more desirable. There could be a much different design philosophy compared to before. Another possibility is direct changes to ATs as they extist now. (Maybe Brutes will have lower taunt duration mods, for example.)

Until we know more, we can't make educated decisions about how things will work in Going Rogue.

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Oh Bill Z, to answer your question, yes, I'm looking forward to it. I wish I didn't have to wait so long to learn more info, though.

That's why I included the caveats that I did - that maybe things would change in GR, but that with current content (implying to me also current AT balance) I'd prefer Brutes in nearly every situation.

We can't know what GR is going to be like. What we can know, or at least believe and debate about, is how the AT's balance up today, now that we have reason to believe that faction based barriers preventing villain and hero AT's from competing with each other are going away. To whatever extent any discussion of balance on these forums is worthwhile, this one is - after all, understanding the balance for the status quo is key to moving it to where it needs to be in the future.