Defense...maybe I just don't get it.

Ok...maybe someone like Arcanaville can explain this better.

I've never been a fan of defense sets. Mostly because anything remotely based on 'luck' generally means it will fail for me. But even I am kind of appalled at how quickly and easily I died in this situation.

Was doing a tip mission with my level 22 SS/SR brute Parity.

Now I have Focused Fighting and Focused Senses each 4 slotted with two 25 common defense IOs and a 20 common defense IO as well as a single 20 end reduction IO. That's 21.04% to melee and ranged.

Then I have both Agile and Dodge two slotted with a 25 and 20 common defense IO for 7.57% to melee and ranged.

I have evasion only slotted with a single end reducer so it is at its base of 13.88%.

Ok...I do a tip mission and engage a +1 slag golem boss and a minion. I hit rage and dispatch the minion first. Then I start in on the boss. And it is just hit after hit after hit on me like I have no defense at all. Ironically...his AoE attack missed. But every melee just landed before I could even get him down to 1/3 of his health.

Now I had a small and medium green and used them both over the course of this fight but he just kept hitting. I know I have lousy luck...but that was insane. Is that level of defense simply inadequate for fighting +1 bosses? Even my elec/elec never got taken out quite so fast by a slag golem boss at 22. I felt like wet tissue paper.

And that's not the first time I have gotten beat down due to insane hits time after time. What level of defense is even considered adequate in a situation like that?

The defense sets don't really get good until you get really high defense of 40% to 45% (max). You'll want Combat Jumping, Weave, and whatever IO bonuses you can get especially the +3% defense to all special IO.

But try this, instead of carrying a lot of green healing inspirations, carry some luck inspirations. Pop a Luck inspiration before fighting a boss or big group. You will see a dramatic increase in survivability as that will boost you up into the 40% range. If you are losing the battle, pop a second Luck inspiration. That will put you past 45% and then you will feel nearly invincible.

You will be a lot more out of using a single Luck inspiration at the right time rather than using multiple greens for healing. Without using inspirations, you will be hit hard and often until you reach very high levels of defense.

perception plays in, not much really can be done, you will remember the faceplants because they are when things go wrong, but as you said, they seem to be binary and there are times when you are perfectly safe. plus, slags hit really hard, i had difficulty with them on my widow as well. I have polayed sr since near launch, and i feel your pain, but like i said, its perception, plus, when you get a heavy hitter like slags or rikti chief soldiers, the times that things go wrong leads them to go REALLY wrong.

Take the Magic: The Gathering 'What Color Are You?' Quiz.

That's the trade off with def. When you get hit, you get hit HARD. It's all or nothing (kind of).

LEGION OF VALOR - Be a part of the Legend!

do slags have rage? maybe they have a to hit buff, those are hideous to sr's, i know their attacks are generally using ss based strikes, so if they have rage, life sucks.

Take the Magic: The Gathering 'What Color Are You?' Quiz.

Doesn't rage also have a -def during the crash; or am I crazy and remembering something from like, five years ago?

Most of what people are saying here seems to be accurate. I probably never really noticed because my only other SR toon(a spines/SR scrapper) teamed almost exclusively up into level 30 where he currently sits unplayed.

It seems like some NPCs have a sneaky +to-hit though. I have noticed some of them hitting consistently even on my Fortunata who has higher defense than my SR overall.

I think its not so much defence as the fact you're at level 22.

By then your best option for fighting a Slag Golem is probably Invulnerability, and even with that you'd only be mitigating 50% of incoming damage on a Brute (slotted TI, Unyielding and RPD). Thats equivalent to the 25% Defence or so you're already packing.

In the early game, Ive found the sets that do better are the ones with self-heals. As the game progresses, resistance and especialy defence overtake them.

Thing with defense is the closer you get to the cap the more effective it'll become.

at 0% defense, the "normal" mobs will have a 50% chance to hit you, or 10 out of 20 hits will land.
Add 5% on that and you bring it down to 9 out of 20 hits. It's one hit less, but diffrence between 9 and 10 isn't much.

Now think that you're at 40% defense, it'll mean they have a 10% chance to hit or 2 hits in 20.
Add 5% defense on that, and you'll only take 1 hit out of 20. It's one hit less still, but now you're take half the amounts of hits and it's VERY noticeable.

I'm going to suggest you read the softcap guide in my signature. It explains what various levels of defense do for you from a probability standpoint.

While I don't have the numbers on hand, my main is a Shield Defense Scrapper. At lvl 50 and her defensive powers maxed, she does great without needing to dip into Weave and whatnot.

At least in PvE. In PvP, defense still sucks donkey butt.

Carrying purples is a habit I heartily endorse for facing bosses and EBs.

To add to what others have stated I'd suggest getting as many +HP accolades and set bonuses as you can any regen bonuses help also. I'm working with around 1,445 on my main with about 24 HP/sec regen. The BoTZ nerf threw my ranged defense to about 43% which sucks because SR doesn't have a taunt aura to pull enemies from ranged to melee, but always carrying purples helps a lot.