In the Age of IO's, is SR obsolete?

Werner, I don't think that solution will really work unless you offer set bonuses that offer comparable forms of damage mitigation to what is capable of being achieved through building defense. People aren't going to go after other forms of mitigation because they don' offer as much as building for defense does. If the devs just keep adding more defense debuffs you get to a point where the devs have punished defense so much that everyone using it without DDR suffers, or only enough that people are so focused on building defense that there is even less diversity amongst the various powersets preferred mitigation than there is currently.

I don't think the problem is just that defense is too strong, but that other options are too weak. Defense probably needs to be nerfed a bit, and other mitigation options need to be buffed.

Unless I'm missing the point, and the idea is to make it so that sets without DDR can't utilize defense, I don't think that idea will work out as intended.

I agree that in the SO game, SR is fine, but with IO's, it gets surpassed by most secondaries, not drastically so, but passed nonetheless.

I would suggest a few changes to SR. One, lessen the endurance usage of the set a bit. Two, do something with elude to make it more usefull in the IO age where SR is ridiculously easy to softcap already, maybe add a heal to it.

I also agree that the biggest strength SR has, and it is a notable one, is defense debuff resists. While building defense is easy, resisting debuffs is not. Go take a soft capped defense toon with no debuff resistance into a roman mob and see how fast you get beaten down. This should be noted by those who call for further nerfs to SD. While I agree that SD should not be able to reach the same debuff resistance as SR as easily, I don't see it as a problem being done as it is (late game with very expensive HO's).

The devs should avoid weakening sets that players enjoy and improve those they avoid. I think werner has the right idea in that you can balance things by altering enemies and content without making this game city of nerfs.

And when I hear people talking about what the devs 'intended', I often think maybe they should rethink what their intent is. If I'm not mistaken, it was never originally intended for players to be able to do things like soloing av's. This forum should be evidence enough how much players love being able to build toons to solo av's. Being able to build toons to high levels of performance should not automatically be frowned upon and incite the devs to draw their nerfbats.

I don't think there is a problem with + defense in IOs, considering how many attacks debuff defense. Personally I think the amount of resistance that SR gets for losing health is laughable, I think that is the biggest issue with SR.

SR's niche is that it can hit the cap with less IO slotting than the other sets, meaning you have more leeway to slot for +recharge, +HP, +regen and +damage, and also the DDR. Alternatively it can be reasonably uber cheaper. Also it can go with some sets shield can't.

The sets that require typed defense give up a lot for that because the sets that give typed defense pretty much suck otherwise. Other than a few +HP bonuses, none of the sets that are used to cap typed defense offer any other benefits. The typed defense sets aren't even available at the higher levels, so the overall bonuses are lower and make it harder to slip in procs and the like.

Soft capping other sets requires a lot of powers. It basically requires Maneuvers, which pretty much negates the option for Hasten. Unlike SR these other sets can't devote sets to secondary effects.

With the *gratuitous* amount of -Def in the end game, the set's DDR is really good. SR really doesn't fall that far behind. Even Family and Council have -Def with the machine guns. Heck I cascaded -Def grinding Council a couple of times on /Dark. I had to SJ away while clicking pills. Against Council?

Don't get me wrong, I'd love to be able to slot up Slow resistance into Quickness, or maybe get the Recharge up a bit, but SR is not that far behind the other sets.

OP - /SR has it's niche - it's the easiest and least expensive option for Av soloing. In addition to this, it has the easiest god-mode by allowing an "average" player to soft-cap with a single purple inspiration. I don't think this particular aspect is considered often enough, because the average player is not we forumites, who have a grasp of IO and game mechanics. Besides these points, as has been mentioned, it allows you to play Claws, Kat, and DB with it while helping achieve their top-DPS high-recharge attack chains. I wouldn't mind seeing Quickness be upped to +30% recharge, especially if Castle won't give Evasion the Brute's taunt aura.

Werner/BillZ - I am hoping that they go the route of increasing the viability of /SR's ability to more easily soft-cap in Incarnate-level content. At least my FM/SR does. My DM/Shielder is decidedly against it.

Cybernaut - Elude being altered would be nice. It would require a re-name and complete overhaul, but I think it would be much more beneficial to have it be a +Regen/+Recovery power that also gives +Resist and give it a recharge and crash equivalent to Strength of Will. I'd certainly find that much more useful compared to the obsolete T9 it currently is.

Thanks, that gives me some ideas.
/end off topic.