Dark Armor Tweaking...

Samuel_Tow · 12-23-2009 05:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by New_Dark_Age

All Tier 9th self-rezzes are garbage and should be replaced. Any power that requires the player to die can always be replaced by something more useful. There is no logic in defending powers such as Rise of the Phoenix and Soul Transfer, especially now will all the sets we have. Anyone who advocates ST and ROTP remaining in FA and DA is a fool who is pissing on the wheels of progress.

No matter what you do, you WILL die. Having a power to use then is a benefit, not a loss, and if you can't see the logic behind that, then go to hell.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arcanaville

Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

New_Dark_Age · 12-23-2009 06:48 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow

No matter what you do, you WILL die. Having a power to use then is a benefit, not a loss, and if you can't see the logic behind that, then go to hell.

Good players do not die to often so the stance of all the people supporting these Tier 9th Rezzes falls flat on its ***. It simply shouldnt be used that much if the rest of the set is doing what it is suppose to be doing. If good players find themselves using ST/ROTP often then there are inadequacies of the set in question.

Having a rez like Soul Transfer would be benefical....IF THE POWER WAS FREE. It isnt free so there are more logical powers to take. The only benefit ST and ROTP could have to a Brute/Scrap/Tank is that the power can be skipped. Any improvements to these rez powers as someone was advocating would be meaningless and a waste of time.

Furthermore the mere existence of such powers in Dark Armor and Fire Aura could only hinder the Devs from repairing their deficiencies. If they made FA and DA as strong and surviviable as WP, Invul, Shields, then there would very very little use for such rez powers making them virtually useless. The Philosophy behind them is asinine and it is especially asinine for Tankers. Every other set on the game has a Tier 9th that improves surviviablity , except DA and FA. I am certain that if Strength of Will did not exist and in its place was a Rez these same people would here defending Tier 9th Rezzes , completely ignoring the fact that there is a better way. If there is to be a Rez power in a set, it shouldnt be a Tier 9th.

FA and DA are two of the weakest secondaries. FA has pathetic mitigation and lacks the damage it promises and DA is just a series of high end cost mediocre powers which do nothing special. Either the entire set should be buffed making the Tier 9th rez worthless or the Tier 9th should be something powerful to improve surviviablity as it is in all other sets.

Leo_G · 12-23-2009 07:28 PM

Then just shut up and play those other sets?

I dunno what to tell you. Having the ability to get right back up if you fall down is a great way to keep the team from wiping. Because relying on inspirations isn't always efficient (not to mention using up precious space) and running back from the hospital is a gamble to get back in time.

Then, if you actually have players that took Vengeance, you can help the whole team by sacrificing yourself for the chance of +def, +dmg, +toHit, etc. for your team and then getting right back up.

And if *you're* not dying ever, I truly feel sorry for you. The game must be horrifically boring for you with no risk of failure *at all*.

Clouded · 12-23-2009 08:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Leo_G

And if *you're* not dying ever, I truly feel sorry for you. The game must be horrifically boring for you with no risk of failure *at all*.

This.

ClawsandEffect · 12-24-2009 06:07 AM

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Originally Posted by Techbot Alpha

lolDarkArmour

I think (personally mind) that it needs more than just that. A good few number tweaks to make it able to stand up would be nice.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Oathbound

I entirely agree...

/Rant

For one it needs the end cost of it's toggle reigned in.

Invulnerability has 3 toggles that use 0.26, 0.26 and 0.21 end/sec or 0.73total.

Shield has 4 toggles with costs of 0.21, 0.21, 0.21 and 0.16 end/sec for a total of 0.79 end/sec

Dark Armor has four toggles (And that's only counting the armors) that cost 0.21, 0.21, 0.21 and 0.26 for a total of 0.89 AND needs to run Acrobatics for KB protection piling an additional 0.33 end/sec for a grand total of 1.22 before you even consider adding the damage aura, Fear Aura or Stun Aura.

Dark Regen's end cost is also completely unreasonable. Yes sure it's a potentially massive heal but almost all of it's potential is going to be wasted anyhow. What does it matter that you can heal back 300% of your hitpoints when you ONLY HAVE 100%? If you only get 1/3rd of the power's benefit, why do you still have to pay for it as if you were getting the whole thing?

Now, I'm fine with Dark's end use being balanced soley around it's defensive toggles, with the auras having added costs on top of that, But IMO it should either be balanced to include an alotment for Acrobatics, OR have KB protection added in so that you dont need to add the extra end cost of Acrobatics anyway.

With regard to the auras, CoF really needs work Either get rid of that huge accuracy penalty, make the -tohit debuff autohit, or chop it's end cost down to 0.33end/sec. As is it's most often skipped and rarely worth it anyhow.

/Rant

Quote:

Originally Posted by Techbot Alpha

^ Massively /signed

Armour sets that purposefully leave holes while still costing the same ammount of end are horrible. I managed to get a DB/DA Brute to 32 before deleting him from frustration. The actual resistance values of DA are sub-par and, even if you do get all the sparklies for it, thats at the cost of a massive chunk of endurance which is, in the end, crippling.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow

Ugh... Yeah, Dark Armour is a huge mess, especially in terms of endurance cost. Protection-wise, it sort of works, between the relatively low static protection, the nice heal and the control auras, but it costs so damn much it's often just not sustainable. Even just the shields by themselves are too expensive for what they are, especially Cloak of Darkness. Why is that power so gosh-dang expensive when it provide benefits which so rarely come into play?

And Cloak of Fear is just insulting. It costs a hideous amount, it does barely anything and it hits so inaccurately. This power is simply not worth its endurance cost for what it does.

Dark Armour really needs to be balanced with cost in mind. The set has seven toggles, four of which are shields that are necessary pretty much full-time. From then on, you just have to account for the fact that people may want to run a heavy toggle on top of that, seen as how they're what the set gets for lacking so much self-protection, but they're just so incredibly expensive and do so little.

Personally, I'd like to see Dark toggle costs lowered across the board and some small-scale knockback protection added in Cloak of Darkness. Enough to resist the simple things, like baseball bats and pistols, but not quite enough to resist boss knockback attacks and such. The set has more than enough utility. Making it a little easier to use that utility and at least nodding at a patch towards the biggest hole would go a long way, in my opinion.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shard_Warrior

/signed

DA does need some serious adjusting to bring it in line with the rest of the sets.

Yer doin' it wrong. I have a BS/DA scrapper built for less than 400 million that is softcapped to all positions, and actually GAINS endurance half the time when I use Dark Regen. (Theft of Essence Chance for +End)

Also, DA has the cheapest end costs of any resist based set. Invuln, WP, Fire, and Electric all have .26/sec costs.

SR, Energy Aura, and Stone have .26/sec costs on their defense toggles as well (and EA has just as many as DA)

Only Shield is as inexpensive to run. Cloak of Fear, Oppressive Gloom, and even Cloak of Darkness are not strictly necessary to run to play the set. You can get Immobilize protection from Combat Jumping, which is MUCH cheaper than Cloak of Darkness. So the absolutely mandatory toggles are 3 at .21/sec each.

The only way you should have any problems with DA is if you flatly refuse to use ANY IOs at all. 2 IOs is all you really need to eliminate the 2 biggest complaints about the set, lack of KB protection and the massive endurance cost of Dark Regen. When properly outfitted with IOs Dark Armor is on par with (and occasionally surpasses) anything but Stone in Granite form. You don't even need to spend that much. Even before IOs my DA scrapper was solid, if not stellar.

You get Fear protection, and better Psi resistance than anything else in the game (yes, including Willpower). Oppressive Gloom has a very low end cost (less than Combat Jumping) and effectively removes minions from any fight you're in.

About the only thing I will agree with, without reservation, is that Cloak of Fear needs to be tweaked to even be worth taking.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dechs Kaison
See, it's gems like these that make me check Claws' post history every once in a while to make sure I haven't missed anything good lately.

Techbot Alpha · 12-24-2009 06:39 AM

Since when was running on IOs meant to be necessary to run a set without dying?
Last time I checked, balance was still centered around SOs, as it should be.
Less than 400 million? Some of us rarely see 2 million, let alone a couple of hundred.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zwillinger

GG, I would tell you that "I am killing you with my mind", but I couldn't find an emoticon to properly express my sentiment.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Captain_Photon

NOTE: The Incarnate System is basically farming for IOs on a larger scale, and with more obtrusive lore.

Seldom · 12-24-2009 07:29 AM

Okay, a couple things.

The endurance costs should not even consider acrobatics, as some have claimed. Acrobatics is not a necessary consideration, as there are other avenues to the same solution: breakfrees, IO's. If it's bugging you, carry some of your indigoes or you can invest in steafast knockback protection....please, don't talk to me about "I can't afford those!" They are easy to get. For those out of the know, and without cash, run a couple AE arcs that give tickets, and use the earnings to roll bronze recipes in the 10-15 range. KB protection shows up pretty regularly there, and those are cheap.

Secondly, comparing to fiery armor is a bit faulty. Electric, I can see a bit, but still not quite there. Why? Dark armor is balanced around its control auras. Like it or not, the fact is not only do you as a dark armor user have a way to regain your health and reduce incoming damage, your have a means of preventing incoming damage. Stunned foes don't fight back well, nor do ones quivering in fear. Electric is close with its sapping, yet this is a bit is faulty as it is not balanced around its heal the way dark armor is. Unfortunately, you must prove from its own merits why dark armor needs its buff.

A cloak of fear tweak? I could perhaps see that. When it was set from "+afraid" (Run away! Run away!") to "+fear," the thing was overpowered. The fear effect was downgraded, the endurance cost should probably now follow. After all, the toggle is doing less for just as much. With reduced effects, a reduced cost seems fair.

ClawsandEffect · 12-24-2009 08:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Techbot Alpha

Since when was running on IOs meant to be necessary to run a set without dying?
Last time I checked, balance was still centered around SOs, as it should be.
Less than 400 million? Some of us rarely see 2 million, let alone a couple of hundred.

You only need 2 IOs TOTAL to counteract the inherent weaknesses of the set. One KB protection and the Theft of Essence +End proc. If you put the KB protection IO in Combat Jumping you just filled both the KB and immobilize holes. You stand a decent chace of getting a KB protection IO between level 10 and level 30 just playing. If you don't, run a few AE missions for tickets and make a few bronze rolls until you get one.

The Theft of Essence proc might be harder to come by, but it shouldn't be too awfully expensive.

Also, what makes you think I had 400 million all at once? I built the character over a span of about 4 months, after he had been level 50 for over a year. I've never had more than 200 million at once on ANY character, and that was only because I got a couple lucky drops, which I sold.

My point was, Dark Armor is not nearly as gimped as you make it out to be. Even before I had ANY IOs on mine he was still a perfectly solid character. For me, IOs made an already good toon better.

What other set can CAP Psi resistance? A DA scrapper can with minimal IO slotting, and a tank can get damn close to the cap. You can go from .1 HP to full with ONE use of Dark Regen, that's why the end cost is so high, because no other heal in the game can even come CLOSE to doing that.

If they "fixed" all the things you claim is wrong with the set, to put it on par with Invuln or Willpower on SOs it would be overpowered with IOs. Maybe even brokenly so if built right.

The set is balanced around things it can do that no other set can:

A built in stealth power that does not suppress it's defense in combat. Only Energy Aura has anything similar.
The absolute best self heal in the game, no other heal can bring you back from the brink of death like Dark Regen.
Not one, but TWO control powers. Oppressive Gloom will completely incapacitate any minions in melee range with you, and it will stack with any stuns in your primary(secondary for tanks) to stun bosses. Also, if you run a PAIR of Dark Armors, bosses will be stunned just by enetering melee range of both of you.
One of the better damage auras, mostly because it is a not frequently resisted damage type.
It also has a self-rez that surpassses every other one but RotP. It has a MASSIVE stun effect that is auto-hit, just like Romulus's in the ITF.

Now with all that in the set, if they adjusted it he way people in this thread want to see it adjusted, it would be quite overpowered.

We were given IOs as a tool to make our characters better. Dark Armor is perfectly playable without them, but it becomes one of the better resistance sets with them.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dechs Kaison
See, it's gems like these that make me check Claws' post history every once in a while to make sure I haven't missed anything good lately.

Santorican · 12-24-2009 08:05 AM

Power sets are based using SOs. I'd love to see dark armor updated, before I dumped a few hundred million into my spine/dark I was gnashing my teeth and waling in torment. I was either face planting a lot or running out of endurance and then face planting, it came to a point where he was at L48 48! and I was about ready to give him his walking papers.

I also have to point out that my spines/dark runs 11 toggles not including travel power rofl!

Something is seriously wrong with that picture

Virtue: @Santorican

Dark/Shield Build Thread

Leo_G · 12-24-2009 09:04 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Santorican

Power sets are based using SOs. I'd love to see dark armor updated, before I dumped a few hundred million into my spine/dark I was gnashing my teeth and waling in torment. I was either face planting a lot or running out of endurance and then face planting, it came to a point where he was at L48 48! and I was about ready to give him his walking papers.

I also have to point out that my spines/dark runs 11 toggles not including travel power rofl!

Something is seriously wrong with that picture

You're doing it wrong?

I'm not particularly in the camp DA is fine, but I have a Spines/DA stalker that doesn't run out of endurance like that and he doesn't have stamina.

Santorican · 12-24-2009 09:49 AM

I have CP and that usually helps but if I run SS I'll run out of end in 1 or 2 mob fights.

Virtue: @Santorican

Dark/Shield Build Thread

Leo_G · 12-24-2009 11:06 AM

Ah, maybe that's why. Mine uses grandville jet pack + teleport as a travel power.

BrandX · 12-24-2009 04:59 PM

As was mentioned. One KB resist IO is easily obtainable. Run a Posi and a Synapse, and you just got enough merits to buy a KB resist IO, with merits left over.

Hate Posi? Run Synapse then Sister Psyche. KB resist IOs are 75 merits. You don't have to farm for them.

I did fine on my Spines/DA, using Hover/TP as travel power (concept), and running all those toggles.

I stay with the stance of OG or CoF. And I admit, I think CoF needs some tweaking. But over, all, except for the inability to cap NE damage resistance, I'm happy with the set.

I'd roll another if I could think of a concept for it (that I'd stick with).

Now I won't lie. I still find it one of the worsts to run in some situations (ITF), but then at times I find it to be one of the best (Shadow Shard just didn't seem like a problem at all to me with my /DA).

BrandX Future Staff Fighter

The BrandX Collection

ClawsandEffect · 12-25-2009 10:16 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BrandX

As was mentioned. One KB resist IO is easily obtainable. Run a Posi and a Synapse, and you just got enough merits to buy a KB resist IO, with merits left over.

Hate Posi? Run Synapse then Sister Psyche. KB resist IOs are 75 merits. You don't have to farm for them.

I did fine on my Spines/DA, using Hover/TP as travel power (concept), and running all those toggles.

I stay with the stance of OG or CoF. And I admit, I think CoF needs some tweaking. But over, all, except for the inability to cap NE damage resistance, I'm happy with the set.

I'd roll another if I could think of a concept for it (that I'd stick with).

Now I won't lie. I still find it one of the worsts to run in some situations (ITF), but then at times I find it to be one of the best (Shadow Shard just didn't seem like a problem at all to me with my /DA).

Mine is fine on the ITF, the only real problem he has is when those defense debuffs start piling up, and he can usually survive on his resistance and Dark Regen until they go away.

Shadow Shard is a cakewalk for me. I did laps around the Storm Palace for an hour one night and only came close to dying once (and one Dark Regen got me back to full)

About the only thing I'll agree with (in my experience with the set) is that CLoak of Fear needs a buff. Either increase the accuracy and leave the end cost the way it is, or leave the accuracy alone and reduce the end cost significantly. Doing both would be the ideal, but that's probably too much to ask.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dechs Kaison
See, it's gems like these that make me check Claws' post history every once in a while to make sure I haven't missed anything good lately.

Techbot Alpha · 12-25-2009 11:16 AM

I had the KB IO in my Brute, before I cleaned him out and delted him. DB/DA.
Sure, he could cut stuff up great. But he got mauled in return. I was fighting run of the mill Longbow. Not higher level, -res nading and ungodly powers Longbow, level 30 longbow. I was getting slaughtered regularly.

Either way...it just wasn't fun. So, meh. More power to you if you can make it work. But its harder than it should be to balance out.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zwillinger

GG, I would tell you that "I am killing you with my mind", but I couldn't find an emoticon to properly express my sentiment.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Captain_Photon

NOTE: The Incarnate System is basically farming for IOs on a larger scale, and with more obtrusive lore.