Damage output?

Level 19 Rad/Psi Defender who hasn't trained up from level 18. No set bonuses. No Stamina (obviously). Unimpressive overall slotting.

He was an EB for me set to +0/x1/Bosses/No AVs.

Result? Victory (← That's a link to the image)

Here's my slotting.

I didn't know the guy would be invisible, so I stumbled across him and he basically one-shotted me. His focus deals 412 points of damage, and I have 403 HP. On my next pass, now though I was ready for his stealth, he still killed me again with Focus. 3rd try, I took him down.

I have vet attacks. I didn't use them. Yes, I used my inspiration tray. I used a total of four lucks (2 at a time), 4 reds (two at a time) and one blue. I'm level 19. I would have had to use inspirations on anything I've ever played taking on a foe like that at that level. I would have needed a different mix depending on AT, and I quite likely would have needed fewer on something like a Brute or Scrapper.

Yes, I know, Rad has debuffs and self buffs. The debuffs did help, but because I didn't have the sense to use yellow inspirations, any time he re-hid from me my toggles dropped. AccMet was no help to me because he killed the 1st time before I ever got to attack him with it running, and it never recharged before I defeated him.

I didn't really have a problem defeating him except for Focus, which I did find frustrating. Him having Focus wasn't a problem with my damage output.

At higher levels the EB will have more powers. So would my character, and much better slotting.

I saw him spawned as a boss.



To get him as an EB you have to adjust your difficulty UP. Ergo if you are having issue with him as an EB run on the default difficulty.



Mister Wales, a rad/rad defender happily took him down.

Wow... a bunch of defenders talking about soloing EBs. Imagine my complete lack of surprise.

I just looked at what could be done with IOs at level 39 on a FF/Ene defender.

I wouldn't be able to raise the diff much... maybe run at +0/x4, but for what *some* say isn't solo capable, I'd be tearing it up.

Even dropping everything back to basic IOs, +0/x2 would be a breeze.

Hover in, drop detention field on primary boss, Explosive Blast, Repulsion Bomb, Energy Torrent, single target attacks, keep boss in detention field, when surround spawn is gone, aid self, single target chain of p-burst, p-bolt, p-blast, p-bolt, repeat. Use PFF/AidSelf if things get hairy.

What's the problem here again?

Why is it that the people who start these "my defender can't do enough damage" threads always seem to use as their example one of the defender primaries that contributes basically nothing to their own damage output?

I'm getting 77 DPS using Etorrent, Pbolt, Pburst, Pbolt, Pblast, repeat with no gaps in the chain on the build I slapped together in mids. This includes averaged out Aim uptime and a chance for buildup in pbolt. However, that's calculated for a level 50.

How many hitpoints does the EB in question have and what is its average regen rate considering the self heal?

We know some sets do better than others. So I took a setup that's known to be pretty capable, and is also heavily IOd at level 50, and I upped the stakes.

Dark/Psi Defender
+2/x4/Bosses/NoAVs

First, I felt I really had to clear the map. Such a small, narrow map with so many patrols set to x4 is just asking for something to come join the fun when you are trying to fight the main boss. As it was, even just trying to clear the patrols I still ended up in a fight with 3 spawns at once, each of which contained what appeared to be a Soldiers/Empathy LT and a boss with dual pistols. That fight was the hardest on my endurance bar, and at one point, Assault detoggled when Hasten expired.

Next, I went looking for mister catburglar. He was easy to find on a character with Tactics. When I switched on Tactics to keep him in sight I turned off Assault to keep my end expenditure the same.

I found him next to what appeared to be a 2nd spawn containing a boss and LT. Either that or the AE decided to make his a really nasty hard spawn. I managed to pull the boss, LT and two minions away, which is why I think they were actually separate. I defeated those down the street a bit and came back for the EB.

I dropped a Dark Servant, dropped Darkest Night on the EB, feared the rest, killed the empathy LT, and started in on the EB. He never hit me once.

Here are a few images.

Here he is almost dead.
Here I have just defeated him.
Here I realized I wasn't showing my difficulty settings. (I've also got a nice cascade defense failure going on.)

You can see this character has an almost ridiculous assortment of extra toys beyond passives and IOs at my disposal, none of which I used. None of a full tray of 20 tier 3 inspirations. No accolade clicks. No Shivans or WB nukes. I break those toys out when I want to solo an AV.

(By the way, if you think this Defender and the level 19 have awfully similar appearances... I made the Rad/Psi first and then decided I wanted a Dark/Psi instead, but I kept the original too.)

Was this slow compared to some other ATs out there? Well, honestly, it depends. I have some melee characters who would have had a horrid time with the multiple patrols piling in on them like that, plus the cascading defense failures. All my "slow" time was spend in clearing the map, not so much the EB itself.

Edit: Oh, by the way. I soloed this character to 45 before we had IOs.

Ok just ran the arc, all the EBs spawned as bosses and had no problems with them, maybe an insp or two during each fight. What caught me was the EB Merc/Poison MM final boss. With my settings he is dropped to that lvl so he would be an AV is turned up for it.

I had use quite a bit of enrages, and lucks to pop this guys down. I did it though not too badly, so if you are having problems with one EB -> boss, then you should look at you own work as the writer of the arc.

here is my proof on it

Im probably evenly split between deciding a combination to play and coming up with the concept, and making a concept and trying to find the right combination that fits.

One of the reasons I have so many blasters on my CIT list, is that I wanted a fire/* blaster and basically rolled up a /fire /NRG and a /mental to see which worked better. The /NRG was the most fun and is now 45, but the others are also proving fun in their own right, and therby survived the 'teen deletion' hammer.

I do think I have a better base understanding of game mechanics than an 'average' player, which helps fit a concept to suitable builds that should be fun.

Yup. We can't make Iron Man in this game. Can't make Thor or the Hulk either.

The best we can do is close approximations.

Why is that? Because this is a game with rules that separate it from the fiction it's based on. A lot of people don't seem to get that.

If the OP had started a thread explaining that what FF had to offer a character and/or a team was less than what the other defender primaries offered, I'd probably not even post in the thread. It doesn't appear to be the case, however. FF gets 2 get out of pain free powers, and how many other defender primaries get an AoE damage attack?

But he didn't. He stated that he couldn't beat some boss and because of that, defender damage should be cranked up.

When I started the thread on buffing PB damage, I did so because I don't see PBs offering something that counters what their AT counterpart offers. I was seeking balance between those two powersets.

While I can understand that some people don't see the difference between the two requests, I fail to understand why they don't see the difference.

For those that want the defender base damage modifiers raised, you can make it happen. You only need to find a proper argument backed by solid reasoning showing that it won't knock the AT out of balance when compared to what defender primaries bring to the table.

Considering what the Repeat Offenders are capable of doing, I don't see that happening.

First, thanks for the more considered responses.

Bio:
Yes, I probably too get a little defensive, but I've been given plenty of reason in the past. I do try not to, though.

Like you, I've learned a lot from the forums. I do try to at least test many of the suggestions I'm given. I just wish such wisdom could be had without having to be disrespected. Not in every case, but enough to make me get defensive.

1) EBs appear in solo missions. To me, that makes them solo content. Again, to me, that means ANYONE should be able to solo it, regradless of AT or powers. If anyone can't, then there's a problem somewhere. I wouldn't complain about being unable to solo AVs or GMs, because they don't appear in solo situations. EBs can, and do.

2) Defenders, like all ATs have their strengths and weaknesses. Obviously, I do have some issues with this one, but I've played other classes I dislike MORE (Blasters, anyone?). I'm not suggesting anything utterly radical here, just a tweak.

3) Choice of primary shouldn't preclude players from playing certain content. If it's going to prevent me from soloing solo content, then a problem exists there. Perhaps altering Force Fields would be a btter course of action, but I don't really think making a defensive setmore offensive is the way here, as it doesn't address the same issue (endurance/damage balance) I'm seeing for all other sets, and it's not quite in concept. I recognize it means slower soloing, but it shouldn't mean NO soloing (an exaggeration, but you get my point, I think).

I appreciate the good wishes.

Storm:
I realize there are temp and vet powers available, but they shouldn't be neccesary to be effective. They should be supports for your own powers, not replacements for them (consider that the Nemesis Staff does as much damage in one shot as my WHOLE attack chain!).
I'd never call any TF solo content. However, if it could be initiated by a solo player, I would call it solo content, and would expect anyone to be able to solo it (discounting deliberately gimped characters, like petless Masterminds).

As I said, not all combos suffer from excessively low damage output (such that there are things they cannot defeat because they just can't do enough damage), however, they still suffer from an excessive endurance cost. I'm suggesting that fixing this excessive endurance cost might be enough to overcome the offensive deficit of the underperforming combos without overpowering the ones that perform adequately.

Uberguy:
Content that appears when you're solo must be soloable. It's definitive. I'm not saying it should be easy, just possible. As I've said, I've encountered situations where I simply cannot do enough sustained damage to overcome a solo challege. I'm not saying the damage has to be boosted to Blaster levels, or Scrapper levels; I'm not saying it should be boosted at all, really. I'm juggesting equalizing the endurance use so the AT can sustain damage longer, thereby inflicting more damage over time.

I'm not using flawed logic. The subject has come up before, and has been discussed by many others before me. The example I cited was just for illustration, to describe why I'm posting. It's not definitive, just illustrative. You may be right, I may be etter off not including illustrations, they just seem to confuse things.

Again, if it appears when I'm solo, then I should be able to overcome it solo. Even in the AE, AVs appear as EBs so that they're soloable (though, Catburglar isn't an AV, just an EB).

I'm not saying the Defender is too slow, that's not an issue to me, I play Tankers! I'm saying their damage output is so low, there are some things they simply cannot defeat (at least, this power combo).

Regrding your attack on him with your rad Defender, that is a set that helps your damage output (Radiation Infection, etc.), as well as your endurance efficiency (Accelerate Metabolism). I would expect it to perform better, whatever the offensive set chosen.

I originally made Catburglar spawn without an escort, but because he starts invisble, I figured I needed to have something to clue players to where he was. I'm not sure why his escort has been so nasty recently. I'm looking into it.

Arcana:
I've had him spawn as a Boss, but also as an EB. I'm notsure what decides that. Notably, I've beaten him as a Boss, on all my characters (I always playtest my arcs on all my characters before publication, so I have a sense of the difficulty across ATs and level).

Regarding your assertion that players are only guaranteed to be able to solo standard PvE content, I'll only add that should say "solo content." It's a minor thing, but as I say, I wouldn't expect to solo things that are expressly team content. However, I wouldn't expect team content to appear in my solo content.

I agree, he's harder than most PvE content, but I've had difficulties in regular content situations too; I just used this as an illustration.

Cat:
I actually play on LOWER difficulty most of the time (ie. -1 level).

Penny:
I'm not ignoring you, I think I've addressed what you were saying though.

Bill:
I don't have Detention Field, but I used movement and such to spread the enemy out so I could pick them off one at a time until only the Catburglar was left. Took a while, but I'm patient. The problem came after that, tat I couldn't do enough damage to overcome him. Even with a full tray of blues, I just ran out of endurance, and couldn't sustain enough damage to overcome his regeneration and heal. It wasn't that he was killing me, he had a hard time connecting (33% Defense, and close to 50% Resistance - I'd have to check the actual numbers, but Technaught has become fairly tough in his later levels).

Skeet:
The fact is, such a combo exists. If it isn't supposed to be able to solo all the solo content, it shouldn't be put in solo situations. If my primary isn't going to boost my offense to adequate levels, then my secondary has to be able to achieve those levels without such help.

Necro:
Perhaps an adjustment to the Defender inherent is in order then? Make it work when the Defender is solo? The only issue I have there is that it rewards poor play, and Defenders are too squishy to rely on that. That is, I find that I'm either fine, or dead. There's little middle ground that would allow the inherent to work.

Strat:
I'd love to have a redname come in and just say they're looking at the issue. That would go a long way with me; just the recognition that there may be a problem.



I apologize for any spelling errors, this computer at work has a wonky keyboard. I've tried to catch them all, but it's a long post.

I also apologize if I didn't mention everyone, but I did read everything. I just didn't think I needed to address everything being said as most of it had been addressed in my responses to others.

I'm afraid it is definitive. It's like saying "red content should be red." If something is going to presented as a challenge for a solo hero, it has to be soloable. If the devs are saying different, then they're wrong too. Solo content has to be soloable, or it's not solo content. If it's not solo content, then it shouldn't be appearing to solo players.