Ice Armor/Dark Melee...what is the word on the street?
By
Aett_Thorn,
Posted on: 2010-10-02 11:33 in Tankers
All of your eggs are going in one basket: making enemies miss you and slowing them down. They will occasionally hit you and when they do it will hurt. Think white knuckle boss fights. You're going to have a self heal from dark melee which is good. You could also dip into the pool powers for "Aid Self" and maybe the fighting pool for a little smashing/lethal resistance. You'll have have hibernate for soloing emergency "Oh no!!" moments and when teaming you'll have buff/heal help from allies on teams. You'll be able to herd very well and you have some options to help ameliorate endurance problems that other tanks won't have.
Could be fun.
I disagree. You will have a solid single target chain (Shadow Punch > Midnight Grasp > Shadow Punch > Siphon Life), 2 heal forms in Hoarfrost and Siphon Life, 2 forms of End recover (Energy Absorption and Dark Consumption), an emergency protection in Hibernate, a to hit/damage boost in Soul Drain, and excellent agro inducement (Chilling Embrace and Icicles).
I would ask what your other options are? Compared to a Shield, you'll do lower DPS, have a harder time softcapping, have worse resists, and be down one monster of a PBAOE. However, Ice has gobs more utility and toggle mez protection. Which seems more fun to you?.
On a related note, once you hit softcapped defenses, how helpful is the to-hit debuff from Dark? Isn't there a minimum chance to hit, no matter what the to-hit vs. defense is?
I already have em/shield, elec/shield, km/shield, mace/shield, ss/shield Brutes. Yeah the debuffs are going to be wasted a bit, but I can't softcap to all typed defense only smash/lethal, and energy/neg energy and the debuffs in dark (-to hit) and the debuffs in ice (slow/recharge/dmg) aren't purely beneficial to me, they help the team as well. The way I built it the 1000 pt heal should be perma,along with the small heal in siphon life.
Trying to find something fun and effective, if possible. I've deleted all my other tanks, they bore me. Maybe this will be different, as in fun.
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Sounds like someone knows nothing about Ice Armor. |
Originally Posted by somnambulist
All of your eggs are going in one basket: making enemies miss you and slowing them down. They will occasionally hit you and when they do it will hurt. Think white knuckle boss fights. You're going to have a self heal from dark melee which is good. You could also dip into the pool powers for "Aid Self" and maybe the fighting pool for a little smashing/lethal resistance. You'll have have hibernate for soloing emergency "Oh no!!" moments and when teaming you'll have buff/heal help from allies on teams. You'll be able to herd very well and you have some options to help ameliorate endurance problems that other tanks won't have.
Could be fun. |
As pointed out already, you have two heals and two end recovery powers. Dipping into the healing pool would be a huge waste. You also have -dmg in Chilling Embrace as well as a lot of -rech. You'll not only be hard to hit, but you'll also be reducing your enemies to hit, which stacks with your defense. Not only that, but your single target damage will be very good. You'll be a good boss killing machine.
There's also the fact that you can easily cap S/L/E/N defense with IOs and Weave+Combat Jumping. You'll have a +HP and Hibernate to make that defense even stronger.
Ice/DM is a good solid combo. People will sit there and tell you Shields is awesome, and it's definitely good. But there are other things out there other than the FotM.
@Rylas
Kill 'em all. Let XP sort 'em out.
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I rolled one up and got it to 20 in less than two days.|
Originally Posted by lmt1979
I admittedly do not much like tankers, but am considering a real go at this build, any advice/insight would be great. Thanks.
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You cannot kill it. I tried. I herded as many ghouls as I could into one corner of an Underground mission.
It. Didn't. Die.
I jumped into a 15-man spawn of PPD.
It. Didn't. Die.
I CAN'T KILL THIS CHARACTER!
.... and I love it.
Roll one up, seriously. I did it on a whim since I know Dark Melee like the back of my hand and heard Ice had a very respectable defense. I thought to myself, "Dark Melee has gobs of -ToHit! Ice Armor has gobs of Defense! I should mix them!" I haven't looked back.
1/2: Hoarfrost
16: Siphon Life
26: Energy Absorption
32: Hibernate
35: Dark Consumption
Enemies can try to stop your green and blue bars from regenerating. They won't, though. I'm sitting at 22 with Combat Jumping and SO's with about 27% defense S/L/E/N. It's a beautiful thing. Make one and love it!
My guides:Dark Melee/Dark Armor/Soul Mastery, Illusion Control/Kinetics/Primal Forces Mastery, Electric Armor
"Dark Armor is a complete waste as a tanking set."
Could it be used in pvp?
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I just wanted to reply to maybe clarify the difference between your perma "1000pt heal" and the "small heal in Siphon Life". |
Originally Posted by lmt1979
The way I built it the 1000 pt heal should be perma,along with the small heal in siphon life.
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If you have the recharge for Perma Hoarfrost, that's the equivalent of healing ~40% of your HP per minute. Not too shabby and certainly with the +HP, an essential power.
However, the "small heal" from Siphon Life will heal about ~50% of your HP per minute without adding a single enhancement. Even if you slot Siphon Life as an attack and only have the about one IO's worth of heal enhancement in there, you would be able to heal ~137% of your base HP per minute. (assuming the same huge IO recharge buffs you'd have to perma Hoarfrost).
Don't underestimate the healing of Siphon Life. It's a great attack but it's an incredibly useful defensive power as well. Just as a quick comparision, even slotted with a single heal IO, Siphon Life can provide almost as much healing over time as Reconstruction, the Regen Scrapper Click Heal.
Also, for Hoarfrost, sometimes it's actually more useful for you to use it after an alpha strike instead of before due to the nature of the heal and +HP effects. Though when we're talking about perma, it's not as important to use it as carefully.
Level 50 is a journey, not a destination.
▲Scrapper Issues List - Going Rogue Edition▲
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Ice, harder to softcap? You mean easier since it can softcap with just Ice's defense powers, weave and a steadfast +3% def IO?
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Originally Posted by streetlight
I would ask what your other options are? Compared to a Shield, you'll do lower DPS, have a harder time softcapping, have worse resists, and be down one monster of a PBAOE. However, Ice has gobs more utility and toggle mez protection. Which seems more fun to you?.
On a related note, once you hit softcapped defenses, how helpful is the to-hit debuff from Dark? Isn't there a minimum chance to hit, no matter what the to-hit vs. defense is? |
"An army is a team. It lives, eats, sleeps, fights as a team. This individuality stuff is a bunch of BS." -General George Patton
-Lord Azazel
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There seems to be a misconception about what the soft-cap is. It is not the maximum possible defense you can get. It's the point at which more defense doesn't buy you anything against even-con, 50% to-hit, PvE enemies on the first attack.|
Originally Posted by streetlight
On a related note, once you hit softcapped defenses, how helpful is the to-hit debuff from Dark? Isn't there a minimum chance to hit, no matter what the to-hit vs. defense is?
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This mean that:
1) If you're soft-capped against even-con opponents, you are not soft-capped against +2 level opponents.
2) You are not soft-capped against opponents with higher accuracy/to-hit bonus, which includes PvP opponents.
And 3) if you do get hit by, say, an assault rifle burst your defense will be reduced by 7% for 8 seconds. Voila! You're no longer soft-capped. If you get hit by other such attacks (as you often do when facing large spawns containing Council Marksmen), you will quickly lose a great deal of defense in the infamous defense cascade failure. Since defense debuffs are extremely common this is a serious consideration.
Because of this, the soft-cap is not really a cap at all. It's just a convenient term used to describe the point at which striving for more defense provides diminishing returns. Exceeding the soft-cap is still very desirable because it lets you fight higher-level enemies more safely, and prevents defense cascade failures. But because it can be so expensive to do so, it's usually deemed sufficient to hit the soft-cap to create a solid character.
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I think he means that it's relatively easy to soft-cap Shield to all three positional defenses, but that Ice can be easily soft-capped only to Smash/Lethal and Energy/NE, leaving significant holes in Fire/Cold and Psionic defense. (I also had to throw in two-slotted Combat Jumping to hit 45.1% S/L/E/NE defense in my quickie Mids build to test this.)|
Originally Posted by Lord_Thanatos
Ice, harder to softcap? You mean easier since it can softcap with just Ice's defense powers, weave and a steadfast +3% def IO?
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Ice is hard-capped for Cold resistance, but has very little defense or resistance against pure Fire and pure Psi.
Since most Fire attacks contain some Smash/Lethal component and Psi is less common, it isn't usually a problem. But Ice tankers can be extremely vulnerable to a few specific attacks.
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The same can be said of Invul, Fire, and Stone, and Willpower (-regen attacks). The same can be said of any melee class. When taking on regular content with my Ice/Dark tanker I found very few things able to take me under 75% health.|
Originally Posted by Rodion
I think he means that it's relatively easy to soft-cap Shield to all three positional defenses, but that Ice can be easily soft-capped only to Smash/Lethal and Energy/NE, leaving significant holes in Fire/Cold and Psionic defense. (I also had to throw in two-slotted Combat Jumping to hit 45.1% S/L/E/NE defense in my quickie Mids build to test this.)
Ice is hard-capped for Cold resistance, but has very little defense or resistance against pure Fire and pure Psi. Since most Fire attacks contain some Smash/Lethal component and Psi is less common, it isn't usually a problem. But Ice tankers can be extremely vulnerable to a few specific attacks. |
Then I used Siphon Life and all was well.
My guides:Dark Melee/Dark Armor/Soul Mastery, Illusion Control/Kinetics/Primal Forces Mastery, Electric Armor
"Dark Armor is a complete waste as a tanking set."
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Yes you are. 45% Defense will soft-cap you against anything up to +5, unless they have ToHit buffs. A +2 Mob gets an accuracy bonus against you, but not a ToHit bonus. 50% Defense and 45% Defense against a +2 minion will get you hit exactly the same amount.
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Originally Posted by Rodion
There seems to be a misconception about what the soft-cap is. It is not the maximum possible defense you can get. It's the point at which more defense doesn't buy you anything against even-con, 50% to-hit, PvE enemies on the first attack.
This mean that: 1) If you're soft-capped against even-con opponents, you are not soft-capped against +2 level opponents. |
Let me never fall into the vulgar mistake of dreaming that I am persecuted whenever I am contradicted.
~Ralph Waldo Emerson
"I was just the one with the most unsolicited sombrero." - Traegus
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Just rolled an Ice/Stone for variety. Like Ice/Dark, there's a lot of synergy there; looks to be a fun ride.
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Originally Posted by lmt1979
I admittedly do not much like tankers, but am considering a real go at this build, any advice/insight would be great. Thanks.
|
I have to ask because I'm naive in the ways of Tankers. I have a couple, and they've never really excited me that much. Lately, they seem more survivable, so soloing is a possibility. This thread made me get interested in Ice/Dark, but I rolled one, keep looking over the powers, and really? /Dark seems so single target focused, which seems contrary to what I imagine a tanker's role to be. Shouldn't you be able to both aggro and damage (to maintain aggro) large numbers of foes surrounding you? Or am I misunderstanding the tanker altogether? Is taunt and your inherent enough to keep enemies clustered around so you just take punches and eek out a hit every now and then while the rest of the team takes the bulk of the enemies down? I guess I don't understand. And I can't for the life of me figure out why Ice/Dark would be a great combo, when the -ToHit can only be applied to one enemy at a time.
Thanks for adjusting my attitude in advance and filling me in on what I'm missing.
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Aett already corrected this, but it's worth emphasizing that there's a lot of misunderstanding in this post. You ARE soft-capped against anything up to +5. They may have a higher-than-5% chance to hit you, but you cannot reduce that any further by adding defense: hence the term "soft" cap...you can go over the "cap" but it has no effect on the chance to be hit.|
Originally Posted by Rodion
There seems to be a misconception about what the soft-cap is. It is not the maximum possible defense you can get. It's the point at which more defense doesn't buy you anything against even-con, 50% to-hit, PvE enemies on the first attack.
This mean that: 1) If you're soft-capped against even-con opponents, you are not soft-capped against +2 level opponents. 2) You are not soft-capped against opponents with higher accuracy/to-hit bonus, which includes PvP opponents. And 3) if you do get hit by, say, an assault rifle burst your defense will be reduced by 7% for 8 seconds. Voila! You're no longer soft-capped. If you get hit by other such attacks (as you often do when facing large spawns containing Council Marksmen), you will quickly lose a great deal of defense in the infamous defense cascade failure. Since defense debuffs are extremely common this is a serious consideration. Because of this, the soft-cap is not really a cap at all. It's just a convenient term used to describe the point at which striving for more defense provides diminishing returns. Exceeding the soft-cap is still very desirable because it lets you fight higher-level enemies more safely, and prevents defense cascade failures. But because it can be so expensive to do so, it's usually deemed sufficient to hit the soft-cap to create a solid character. |
Opponents with large to-hit bonuses will indeed hit you more easily, but a) there are not that many of them, b) you can plan for it and take out the bigger dangers first, and c) usually the amount of bonus is so huge that it's almost moot; it's really hard to get enough additional defense to make these bonuses useless, so most folks just play around the problem. And it's not as bad as it sounds.
Lastly, cascade failure happens to people without DDR (defense debuff resistance). Higher DDR can make these debuffs essentially ineffective. My Invulnerability Tanker, for example, runs about 5% over the soft cap with one foe in range, and has only 50% DDR, and rarely gets driven down to the soft cap even by masses of debuffing enemies. My SR Scrapper has 95% DDR and shrugs off pretty much all resistable debuffs.
I've never played Ice, and someone who has will know more...but it has 3 powers granting DDR, and one of those appears to be enhanceable, so it gets significant DDR. Coupled with the slows dramatically reducing the enemy's chance to stack click-type debuffs (like sword attacks), it should be pretty hardy against cascade failure.
Exceeding the soft cap does give you some protection against cascade failures, particularly if you have only a medium amount of DDR (it's not really necessary for SR's 95% DDR), but it does nothign to help you fight higher-level enemies, unless you're fighting above +5. In which case, good luck!
If we are to die, let us die like men. -- Patrick Cleburne
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The rule is that they must be loved. --Jayne Fynes-Clinton, Death of an Abandoned Dog
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Originally Posted by GreenBone
I have to ask because I'm naive in the ways of Tankers. I have a couple, and they've never really excited me that much. Lately, they seem more survivable, so soloing is a possibility. This thread made me get interested in Ice/Dark, but I rolled one, keep looking over the powers, and really? /Dark seems so single target focused, which seems contrary to what I imagine a tanker's role to be. Shouldn't you be able to both aggro and damage (to maintain aggro) large numbers of foes surrounding you? Or am I misunderstanding the tanker altogether? Is taunt and your inherent enough to keep enemies clustered around so you just take punches and eek out a hit every now and then while the rest of the team takes the bulk of the enemies down? I guess I don't understand. And I can't for the life of me figure out why Ice/Dark would be a great combo, when the -ToHit can only be applied to one enemy at a time.
Thanks for adjusting my attitude in advance and filling me in on what I'm missing. |
The main issue is that you don't really *need* AoE from your secondary to maintain aggro on an ice/ tanker. Ice armor has two aggro auras, and between them they do a superb job of holding the attention of foes next to you - it isn't called the king of aggro management for nothing. It is true that /dark doesn't supply as much AoE aggro generation as other sets, but this is one of the reasons to pair the two sets together - ice/ covers for dark's lesser abilities in this area.
Similarly, /dark's abilities complement ice/'s nicely. The tohit debuffs aren't going to apply to the whole spawn, true, but you don't really need them to. Between touch of fear and the rest of your attacks you can keep a fairly hefty debuff stacked on a couple of bosses, and those are usually the biggest threats. As well, the tohit debuffs aren't really the biggest piece of utility in the set - siphon life is the real gem here. As a defense based set without a quick-recharging self-heal or a regeneration boost, ice/ benefits very strongly from this additional source of healing. Finally, soul drain's persistent damage boost amps up icicles, your only real source of AoE damage - and ice/ is very good at gathering up fodder for soul drain to leech from. Soul drain also allows you to kick out respectable ST damage on a boss or two while your teammates mop up the rest of the spawn.
Basically, the two sets' abilities complement each other extremely well, and /dark's lack of AoE isn't going to stop you from holding aggro.
@MuonNeutrino
Student, Gamer, Altaholic, and future Astronomer.
This is what it means to be a tank!
This is very helpful, and clarifies a few things for me. Thank you. I guess I've been mistaken in thinking that a Tank couldn't be a good source of single target damage where other ATs are far more adept, and therefore their role was to hold groups to them and whittle them away all at once. This new perspective is interesting, and I'll test it out. I'm glad to hear holding aggro will be less of a big deal than, say, my WP/ Tanker.
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Tanks can be a very good source of damage, if used right. However, a lot of that type of perspective comes because a Tanker usually, in his early career, is taking more of his Defensive powers over his offensive powers, and then in the 20s and 30s takes a lot more of his attacks. So it just takes them longer to get to those attacks, and a lot of people can tend to give up in those early levels because of the lack of offense.|
Originally Posted by GreenBone
This is very helpful, and clarifies a few things for me. Thank you. I guess I've been mistaken in thinking that a Tank couldn't be a good source of single target damage where other ATs are far more adept, and therefore their role was to hold groups to them and whittle them away all at once. This new perspective is interesting, and I'll test it out. I'm glad to hear holding aggro will be less of a big deal than, say, my WP/ Tanker.
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However, if you think about it, a Scrapper wouldn't do too much damage either if, until level 20, you only took two attacks and the rest were defensive powers. Certainly, a bit more than the Tank, but not by too much.
But yes, this is a very good combo, and you should have a lot of fun with it. If you're worried about AoE damage, once you get Soul Drain, Dark Consumption, and (if you were to go with something like the Pyre Mastery pool) Fireball, you'll be fine. Also, if you focus on attacking the boss, Icicles will do a huge portion of the damage needed to kill the minions, if it doesn't just kill them outright.
Let me never fall into the vulgar mistake of dreaming that I am persecuted whenever I am contradicted.
~Ralph Waldo Emerson
"I was just the one with the most unsolicited sombrero." - Traegus
I admittedly do not much like tankers, but am considering a real go at this build, any advice/insight would be great. Thanks.