Brute vs. Scrapper: Specific Combinations in Mind
By
Bill Z Bubba,
Posted on: 2010-06-21 10:12 in Brutes
All of those characters would be numerically better off as Brutes. The difference would be fairly small, though.
I'd say it comes down to which side you prefer to play on (GR coming soon but not that soon) and whether you prefer the mechanics of Fury or Crits.
Of those combos, both Claws and Fire are great for taking out hard targets. Fire has better AoE, though. Spin is a stupidly good AoE but it's got a smaller radius than FSC. Shockwave is a good cone but the KB might piss you off, especially with /Inv.
Since you want to do both single hard targets and AoE minion munching, I'd definitely go with Fire as the primary.
For the secondary, SR with just SOs, Weave and a Steadfast +3% def (very cheap and attainable) gets you to just under 40% defense to all three positions. Combat Jumping would push you over into 41ish. For a cheap build, /SR is really, really easy to softcap to all positions and you've got 20% recharge built in. The downside is you've got nothing but inspirations/natural regen to regain any lost health unless you take Aid Self.
/Inv with similarly basic slotting gets about 21% def to all types with 1 foe in Invinc range, 70% smashing/lethal res and all other resists in the low 20s except for Psi. For that, you've also got Dull Pain which is a fantastic heal/+hp power. With SOs it's up 2/3 of the time.
Hope that helps 
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All of those will perform very well for what you want. The invul toons will, however, perform better in AoE environments because of Invincibility.
I'd say the brutes are a better choice because their damage is equal or better to than that of scrappers and they have more HP. Since you are already considering them, I'm saying this under the assumption that you have no problems with fury.
Specifically, at 80% fury, claw brutes do a bit more damage than scrappers with all attacks except Follow Up which does a bit less. Fire melee brutes do significantly more damage than fire melee scrappers because the DoT from fire melee is not affected by crits but is affected by fury.
With only SOs I'd say that invul toons would be more survivable than SR toons, but with minimal investment (50 M inf or even less) and proper power picks you can softcap a SR toon. And you'll earn much more than that just on your way to lvl 50.
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I'd just like to address this briefly. The only advantages that Fire Sword Circle has over Spin is a bit larger radius (10' vs 8') and fire instead of lethal damage. FSC at 80% fury and 3 damage SOs does 277 damage on average, while Spin under the same conditions does 327 with double-stacked Follow Up which is a reasonable expectation even only with SOs. With a single application of Follow Up, it does 303.|
Originally Posted by Silas
Of those combos, both Claws and Fire are great for taking out hard targets. Fire has better AoE, though. Spin is a stupidly good AoE but it's got a smaller radius than FSC. Shockwave is a good cone but the KB might piss you off, especially with /Inv.
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In fact, of all AoEs available to brutes in primary sets, only Lightning Rod and 1k Cuts do more damage. Shadow Maul also does with even 1 mob worth of Soul Drain, but hitting more than 3 targets with it reliably is practically impossible.
Brute Claws also have 20% less endurance cost and 20% shorter recharge times than the scrapper ones.
@Scorpio EU
Whuh? Check your Mids m8, scrapper claws have lower recharge and end costs than brute versions.
Hmmm, seems that you're right, my bad... Although I pretty sure I've seen something about in patch notes quite a while ago, gonna look for it now.
@Scorpio EU
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The biggest difference comes with Invulnerability. Brutes have more base hit points and Tanker caps, which means that Dull Pain and accolades amount to significantly higher HP levels. Brutes also have a 90% resistance cap, making them markedly superior to Scrappers when Unstoppable is used. |
Originally Posted by BlackAdam
Claws/SR Brute or Scrapper
Claws/Inv Brute or Scrapper Fire/SR Brute or Scrapper Fire/Inv Brute of Scrapper |
Claws for Brutes can be better than it is on Scrappers, but requires more global recharge to do such-- just look at the recharge differences on their skills. I'd probably roll the /SR combos as Scrappers if you are just using SOs or employing light use of IOs. The Scrappers can access Conserve Power and Physical Perfection from their APPs, while the Brutes will need expensive IOs to maintain endurance.
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Uh, yeah. I said that Spin was a stupidly good AoE, just that is has a small radius. As someone who is spoiled by Footstomp, I can't stand the 8' radius on other PBAoEs.
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Originally Posted by Exxar
I'd just like to address this briefly. The only advantages that Fire Sword Circle has over Spin is a bit larger radius (10' vs 8') and fire instead of lethal damage. FSC at 80% fury and 3 damage SOs does 277 damage on average, while Spin under the same conditions does 327 with double-stacked Follow Up which is a reasonable expectation even only with SOs. With a single application of Follow Up, it does 303.
In fact, of all AoEs available to brutes in primary sets, only Lightning Rod and 1k Cuts do more damage. Shadow Maul also does with even 1 mob worth of Soul Drain, but hitting more than 3 targets with it reliably is practically impossible. |
Support Guides for all Corruptor secondaries and Fortunatas
The Melee Teaming Guide for Melee Mans
The Melee Teaming Guide for Melee Mans
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Ah, right. I myself haven't gotten to try FSC out yet (unlike Spin and FS) so I'm not sure if a 10' radius is much better than 8'.
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Originally Posted by Silas
Uh, yeah. I said that Spin was a stupidly good AoE, just that is has a small radius. As someone who is spoiled by Footstomp, I can't stand the 8' radius on other PBAoEs.
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Claws, the set regardless of AT, has as its secondary effect a 20% reduction in both end cost and recharge.|
Originally Posted by Scorpio_
Hmmm, seems that you're right, my bad... Although I pretty sure I've seen something about in patch notes quite a while ago, gonna look for it now.
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This is how a power is built:
Pick recharge of attack.
An equation is applied which assigns the damage based off of that recharge value.
Another equation is then used to determine the endurance based off of the damage. (Yes, you can rework the equation to go from recharge straight to end cost.)
THEN the 20% discount to recharge and endurance are applied.
And nowadays, ANOTHER equation based off of the cast time of the attack is used to modify the damage done.
What's all this mean? Claws doesn't really get a 20% end/rec discount anymore. It varies based on the cast/damage tweak.
Be well, people of CoH.
I had a similar conundrum a while ago and I went with Claws/SR Scrapper:
- Scrapper because I wanted Physical Perfection, not just for the +recov but for the +regen so I could eventually drop Aid Self. The biggest annoyance of Aid Self on a Brute is that I can see my Fury bar dropping while healing myself. As such, I just don't play powersets that require Aid Self on my Brutes. PP also allowed me to take Weave/CJ/Stealth without running dry to help get well past the softcap with minimal IO investment.
- Claws cuz it does more damage than FSC with Follow Ups. The 2' difference with FSC is negligible. Now if the difference were 15' like Footstomp or Tremor it would be a tougher decision.
- SR cuz it's easy to get close to softcap plus u will not have to worry too much with cdf. Just don't go trying to solo Overseers surrounded by Wisps for the Rularuu Claws badge. I did that once, it was not a pleasant experience.
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I wouldn't call ~50% difference in area negligible but if you're mostly soloing, I'd go Spin/Claws. Mostly teaming, I'd take FSC/Fire for AOE. Clearly, Fire looks better which, as we know, is the most important consideration. |
Originally Posted by tarrantm
- Claws cuz it does more damage than FSC with Follow Ups. The 2' difference with FSC is negligible. Now if the difference were 15' like Footstomp or Tremor it would be a tougher decision.
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@SBeaudway on Pinnacle, TaskForce Titans Supergroup.
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BRING OUT THE MATH!|
Originally Posted by SBeaudway
I wouldn't call ~50% difference in area negligible but if you're mostly soloing, I'd go Spin/Claws. Mostly teaming, I'd take FSC/Fire for AOE. Clearly, Fire looks better which, as we know, is the most important consideration.
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We'll slot both with a 5set of Armageddon. That's 89.92% to recharge and damage. Both have max 10 targets.
FSC does 48.49 fire and 48.49 lethal damage with an 80% of 52.05 extra DoT fire. Recharges in 20 seconds.
Spin does 98.85 lethal. Recharges in 9.2 seconds.
Buffed the values become:
FSC w/ averaged in DoT: 263 every 10.53 seconds
Spin: 188 every 4.84 seconds
We'll say buildup is ED capped on recharge (25% uptime) and followup is double stacked. We'll also use a 7.5% crit rate.
FSC: ((96.98*(1+.8992+.25))*1.075)+(52.05*(1+.8992+.25) *.8) = ~314 every 10.53 seconds
Spin: (98.85*(1+.8992+.75))*1.075 = ~281 every 4.84 seconds
Out of the 10 possible enemies, lets say we're ripping on a spawn for 1 minute using the average times above. Because FSC does have a larger radius, we should let it hit more enemies. Let's go with 8 and 7 respectively.
FSC: 60/10.53*314*.8 = ~1431 points of damage in 1 minute
Spin: 60/4.84*281*.7 = ~2438 points of damage in 1 minute
Claws wins. Even if we drop the number to 6 enemies for spin we get 2090 damage in 1 minute.Spin's low recharge more than makes up for the smaller radius.
EDIT: Over the last few months I've come to realize that most players grossly underestimate the AoE damage output of claws. My current build has spin, eviscerate and shockwave and even I'm surprised at how quickly I tear through x8 spawns.
Be well, people of CoH.
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This is why I hated my claws stalker.
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Originally Posted by Bill Z Bubba
[Math]
EDIT: Over the last few months I've come to realize that most players grossly underestimate the AoE damage output of claws. My current build has spin, eviscerate and shockwave and even I'm surprised at how quickly I tear through x8 spawns. |
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Always happy when Bill Z brings out some math.|
Originally Posted by Bill Z Bubba
BRING OUT THE MATH!
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Originally Posted by Bill Z Bubba
We'll slot both with a 5set of Armageddon. That's 89.92% to recharge and damage. Both have max 10 targets.
FSC does 48.49 fire and 48.49 lethal damage with an 80% of 52.05 extra DoT fire. Recharges in 20 seconds. Spin does 98.85 lethal. Recharges in 9.2 seconds. Buffed the values become: FSC w/ averaged in DoT: 263 every 10.53 seconds Spin: 188 every 4.84 seconds We'll say buildup is ED capped on recharge (25% uptime) and followup is double stacked. We'll also use a 7.5% crit rate. |
This being the Brute sub-forum, would you mind adjusting that for Fury?
Also, out of curiosity, in what way does it change if we're looking at a more typical grouping situation vs. a pack of mobs?
That is to say, you only get 15s for example against any 1 pack of mobs. I.e. the typical burst damage scenario.
This seems a more realistic situation, since AoE DPSing a group of mobs for a full 1 minute is highly unlikely.
In this burst situation would you need to adjust Spin's recast numbers to keep up double stacked FU? (in otherwords, does needing to chain FU affect spin the amount the number of times you can activate spin? I don't think it does, but I don't have mids here).
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/looks up... DOH!| This being the Brute sub-forum, would you mind adjusting that for Fury? |
If we're looking at straight burst, then we're looking at a single attack. Let's go with 75% fury, 80% from buildup, 60% for double stacked followup, 89.92% from enhancement.
Please note, Spin on a brute has a higher base recharge and thus deals more damage.
Brute Spin: 78.83
Brute FSC: 64.64 w/o DoT or 81.42 w/ DoT
Spin: 78.83*(1+1.5+.6+.8992) = 315.26 damage
FSC: 64.64*(1+1.5+.8+.8992) = 271.44 w/o DoT or 341.9 w/ DoT
So for a single spawn and a single hit of FSC, it wins when the DoT goes off.
But buildup won't be up every spawn. Double stacked followup should be.
The recharge differences between brute FSC and Spin are less, however. FSC is still at 20 (10.5 slotted) versus Brute Spin's 14 (7.4 slotted)
And since spin is still under 10 seconds recharge when slotted, it can still benefit from double stacking FU. But barely considering its 2.5 second cast time. Hmm. Why do I always forget when recharge starts... is it after cast is completed? If so, there's a good chance FU would be only single stacked on a brute. Drops it to 291 but still beats FSC w/o DoT.
Other variables to take into account will be enemy difficulty and resistance to type.
Edit: And if you really want a more accurate comparison of AoE output, you have to take into account spin, eviscerate, shockwave versus fsc and breath of fire.
Be well, people of CoH.
Well to be fair I was only referencing area of effect. That whole area of a circle math thing. FSC wins that by being a bit more than 50% better than Spin. It's recharge is not a factor if the team kills the spawn before you can get it (or Spin) off a second time. So as I said, Spin for soloing, FSC for teaming is my suggestion. But we all agree FSC looks cooler!
Oh and who even considers taking Breath of Fire?
@SBeaudway on Pinnacle, TaskForce Titans Supergroup.
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<.<| Oh and who even considers taking Breath of Fire? |
>.>
Folks that know how to 'sploit cones.
Be well, people of CoH.
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Interesting.|
Originally Posted by Bill Z Bubba
/looks up... DOH!
If we're looking at straight burst, then we're looking at a single attack. Let's go with 75% fury, 80% from buildup, 60% for double stacked followup, 89.92% from enhancement. Please note, Spin on a brute has a higher base recharge and thus deals more damage. Brute Spin: 78.83 Brute FSC: 64.64 w/o DoT or 81.42 w/ DoT Spin: 78.83*(1+1.5+.6+.8992) = 315.26 damage FSC: 64.64*(1+1.5+.8+.8992) = 271.44 w/o DoT or 341.9 w/ DoT So for a single spawn and a single hit of FSC, it wins when the DoT goes off. |
Looks like some pretty solid balance right there.
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Originally Posted by Bill Z Bubba
Edit: And if you really want a more accurate comparison of AoE output, you have to take into account spin, eviscerate, shockwave versus fsc and breath of fire.
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So I generally go with a PPP TAoE, usually Dark Oblit. Which probably puts Claws ahead a good bit.
Ok, so I want to build a well rounded (single target, AoE, survivability) character and I'm not sure which AT to make it in. A character that could choose to either run +3 missions to take out hard targets or 0/+3 missions to AoE minions to oblivion. I want that flexibility of playstyle.
The only combos I'm considering are:
Claws/SR Brute or Scrapper
Claws/Inv Brute or Scrapper
Fire/SR Brute or Scrapper
Fire/Inv Brute of Scrapper
I want it to be somewhat viable with SO's. Not looking to invest super heavily in the character.
Any opinions/suggestions?
Thanks a bunch!