Pros and Cons of Invulnerability versus Willpower

Hi guys,

I'm considering Invulnerability (because I've never played it past level 10 or so and it's been in the game *forever*) or Willpower (because it looks very well rounded) for my next Brutes/Scrapper/Tanker. Can anyone give me a rundown of the major pros and cons of each as they compare to each other? Commentary on the different play-styles between them and subjective experiences is welcome as well.

One point I'd like some info on is the differences between their Tier 9 'godmodes', but really just tell me all about these two sets.

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Invulnerability gives superior resistance to Smashing and Lethal, the most common damage types. It also offers a power called Invincibility which is a signature of the set. It buffs your defense for each foe in melee range, as well as taunting. In addition, for each foe in melee range, it buffs your accuracy.

Over all Invuln is a well rounded set, but somewhat weaker against some of the off damage types. It offers good resistances and a fairly high amount of defense. It's not a toggle-heavy set so it's also relatively endurance friendly.

Willpower is fairly unlike Invuln. Will excels at damage recovery, not mitigation. While it has some mitigatory powers, the main thing is that it allows one to recover well and keep on fighting. For long duration combats, Will is among the best in the game. Not only does it have good healing abilities, it also has powers that buff your endurance recovery. This makes it an exceptional counterpart to endurance heavy sets, like Broadsword, Axe, or Stone Melee.

One of the signature powers of this set is one called Rise to the Challenge. It provides a heal bonus for each foe in melee range, causing your regeneration rate to increase. It also has a taunt aura that works by debuffing the to-hit of those in range. With the debuff to hit and the buff to heal, it makes the set fairly "tanky," though perhaps not as much as some of the other sets out there. However, it doesn't need as much "you can't hurt me" as the theme of the set is "damage recovery."

Both are excellent sets and both are fun to play. Hopefully this gives you some ideas for the feel.

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Happy gaming!

-SunderX
Sset - 50 DM/Regen Scrapper - 8 years of out-tanking any tank but Granite, with 5x the DPS.
**Making Altaholism a socially acceptable disorder**
"Scrappers are just like chainsaws. Somewhat hard to handle, EXTREMELY dangerous, and by far the most fun when wielded by the slightly insane." -Alissara

Ive played both into the 30s on Tanks, and have a 305 WP brute and low 30s Inv Scrapper.

The two sets play very similarly - both make you tough as nails in a fairly passive way, and at your toughest in the middle of a crowd.

Invulnerability has a big self heal for when things go south, I find myself missing that on Willpower.

But Willpower has a far superior Tier 9 in my opinion. Its up exactly 40% of the time, and its like having a spare pocketful of orange and purples to swallow every now and then. When you're not quite tough enough, you get a good bit tougher.

I haven't taken Unstoppable, but it looks much more drastic in every way. Huge recharge, huge boost, huge crash. I think I'd hardly ever use it.

Both my tanks really benefitted from Tough in the Fighting pool, by the way. I can't recommend it enough.

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WP has the weakest taunt aura in the game. So if tanking on a Brute/Tanker, Rise to the Challenge needs to be slotted for Taunt and/or you need to actively use the Taunt power to keep the baddies' attention. Big AoE powers help too.

Otherwise though, WP has no downsides. I understand why people might miss Invuln's heal, but, that's what Green insps are for and it's a small price to pay for never having to worry about health otherwise (you can't be whittled down).

Invuln's deal breaker for me is the lack of resistance to Psi. Even when slotted to compensate, a psi-damage heavy mission will be crippling.

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OMG! How like, totally kewl are these characters?!1

I was crazy in luv with my will brute right up until I tried an ITF.

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The answer is likely to change depending on how much you invest into it. I'd say Willpower probably is more survivable just "off the bat" but they are very similar with the same kind of IO investment.

Willpower has an advantage very noticeably against Psychic damage that Invulnerability really doesn't have answers for. It has a heal but there's not much else going for it.

Invulnerability has a stronger taunt aura. If you are going to play Willpower and want to hold aggro, you'll need Taunt and you'll need a good few AOE attacks. With those you should be okay.

Willpower used to start off much easier with Quick Recovery, but now everyone has Stamina at level 2 this doesn't count for as much any more.

Both I would say are great powersets and are fantastic choices.

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My issue with Inv's tier 9, Unstoppable, is that it's either too much, or too little.

It's either going to be overkill when you use it, making you wonder if you really needed it in the first place, or, it's going to have a negligible impact on your survival and you're going to faceplant anyways. The end recovery is nice, but with Stamina, Physical Perfection, Conserve Power, Dark Consumption, set bonuses, etc, it isn't as useful as it once was.

As far as survivability, they're comparable enough that I wouldn't really factor it into the decision. Inv is definitely better for holding aggro though. Inv has the 'dreaded' Psi hole in its defenses, but since Psi damage is delightfully rare, it's not as big an issue as some people like to make it.

With inherent fitness, I'll probably be picking up the inherents on my Inv tanks a lot sooner for some of the debuff protections, especially the end drain resistance.

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Invuln Pros:

1. Hard capped S/L resistance possible with Tough.
2. Massive heal and HP boost power in Dull Pain, possible to make permanent and cap HP.
3. Relatively inexpensive to soft cap defenses to S/L/E/N damage
4. Invincibility offers considerable defense to all but psi and additional def per enemy in melee.
5. Great taunt aura.

Invuln Cons:

1. Weakness to Psi damage. However, Psi is rare and mostly where it exists it's fairly low damage.
2. Unstoppable (tier 9 power) is highly situational. It offers capped resist to all but Psi while it's up but it's very dangerous when it crashes.
3. Fairly low resistance to E/N/F/C damage types.

WP Pros:

1. Set and forget powerset with no click powers.
2. Good passive regeneration and HP boosting powers.
3. Good endurance recovery with Quick Recovery
4. Decent resistance to most damage types including Psi.
5. Regeneration boosting power based on the number of mobs around you in Rise to the Challenge.
6. Moderate defense.
7. Decent tier 9 power that adds a bit to your durability with decent uptime.

WP Cons:

1. By far the worst taunt aura in the game, it's duration is less than 10% the duration of every other aura. This is it's biggest drawback.
2. No tools for recovering from burst damage.

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