I guess I'll be the odd ball and say a sonic is awesome to have against any hard target. To be honest, though, I'll take just about anything to a TF.
Cold Dom.
Roll a Cold/Sonic, make some friends, always win.
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On paper Traps/Sonic is better than Cold/Sonic. Perma -1k regen, double mortars for -60-80 resist as well as comparable +def inside the bubble (also status resistance). Speedruns, traps is a little on the slow side most of the time tho.
Huh, interesting how high Cold Domination features on the list. Considering I don't think I've ever seen a cold domination character...
"Men strunt �r strunt och snus �r snus
om ock i gyllne dosor.
Och rosor i ett sprucket krus
�r st�ndigt alltid rosor."
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The character I most prefer to play for support is my Cold/Sonic, no contest. You are right that it is less popular (to play) than the other 'best' sets: lack of a self heal and the need to buff everyone regularly (or annoy your teammates by not taking/using the major buffs in your primary).|
Originally Posted by Arilou
Huh, interesting how high Cold Domination features on the list. Considering I don't think I've ever seen a cold domination character...
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But Neuronia is right - Cold/Sonic gives teammates superb survivability while bringing stupid amounts of -res to every fight in addition to being packed with every other debuff you need for AVs.
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In general the most popular support sets are the ones that combine good team support with good solo abilities which mostly means rad, dark and kinetics. Traps is also on this list but due to the fact that it's only recently become available on blue side and that red side has always had a lower population it lacks the raw quantity of the other three. Empathy also tends to make it into the high end of popularity due to people who enjoy reactive support (i.e. healing) as opposed to pro-active support.|
Originally Posted by Arilou
Huh, interesting how high Cold Domination features on the list. Considering I don't think I've ever seen a cold domination character...
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There are several very good sets (Cold and Sonic in particular) which provide very good support but lack the strong soloing tools of other sets which makes them less popular overall.
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Assuming the even level AV, a sonic/sonic can comfortably add 21% (12% comming from the sonic blast set) -resist to the battle. Even without a -regen component that is a highly valuable addition to the challenge. |
Originally Posted by LuxunS
Dark falls short on -regen. Since an even level AV has 85% regen debuff resistance, twilight grasp only reduces the AV's regen by 7.5%. While I am a fan of Dark, there is a noticeable difference between its effectiveness against AVs and the other sets mentioned.
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It would be important to note if anyone is discussing "Best TF Defender" that they include whatever the secondary blasts can do.
Personally, i think the primary combo for this would be a Cold/Sonic. The -resist for it would be at 16.5%. Add to that the -recharge numbers adding up, the insanity that is Benumb, the -defense, the added endo and even the added defense for your team and it sounds good to me...
Damn altitus. Gotta go.
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Actually, it would be considerably more than that since AVs don't resist resistance debuffs the same way they do most others. Basically a Sonic/ will add 30% resistance debuff from siphon speed and 30% from disruption field for a total of 60%. There's more to the calculation, but the important thing is that the team will be doing 60% more damage to the AV with the Sonic/ defender using those two powers. Then there's /Sonic for more resistance debuff.
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Originally Posted by Shadey_NA
Assuming the even level AV, a sonic/sonic can comfortably add 21% (12% comming from the sonic blast set) -resist to the battle. Even without a -regen component that is a highly valuable addition to the challenge.
It would be important to note if anyone is discussing "Best TF Defender" that they include whatever the secondary blasts can do. Personally, i think the primary combo for this would be a Cold/Sonic. The -resist for it would be at 16.5%. Add to that the -recharge numbers adding up, the insanity that is Benumb, the -defense, the added endo and even the added defense for your team and it sounds good to me... Damn altitus. Gotta go. |
I'm biased due to them being the first two sets I used for defenders, but I'm very fond of Dark Miasma and Kinetics for AV fights.
Kinetics primarily due to the masses of -dam it can stack, reducing most AVs to minion level damage, along with its ability to keep the team topped up on both health and endurance. Of course the +rech, +dam, and weak-but-spammable -regen help too.
Dark Miasma because it also provides masses of -dam (slightly less than Kin, but still well beyond the other sets), and even with AV inherent debuff resistance, it can still stack enough -tohit to make a difference. It also has a moderate amount of -res and -regen; while other sets do those things better, it has enough to give most teams the offense boost they need to defeat the AV its just debuffed down to a harmless sack of hitpoints.
I actually prefer both sets to Rad for AV fights due to the increased mitigation they provide in that particular scenario.
Personally, I'd take a well-played stormie against an AV any day. You get -Def, -Res, -ToHit, serious slows, and damage thrown in from Tornado and Lightning Storm. You also have a buffing "heal" in case of problems, +Def, and +Res. While you don't have -Regen, you don't always need it unless your team suffers from a lack of damage.
7+ year vet with too many alts to list...
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As stated before, Sonic primary adds 60% resistance debuffing. Cold primary can also reach this, but requires a lot of global recharge bonuses to maintain the debuffs.|
Originally Posted by Shadey_NA
Assuming the even level AV, a sonic/sonic can comfortably add 21% (12% comming from the sonic blast set) -resist to the battle. Even without a -regen component that is a highly valuable addition to the challenge.
It would be important to note if anyone is discussing "Best TF Defender" that they include whatever the secondary blasts can do. Personally, i think the primary combo for this would be a Cold/Sonic. The -resist for it would be at 16.5%. Add to that the -recharge numbers adding up, the insanity that is Benumb, the -defense, the added endo and even the added defense for your team and it sounds good to me... Damn altitus. Gotta go. |
Sonic Attack adds 20% resistance debuffs every time they hit. I calculated the optimal attack chain for debuffing, and discovered they can maintain an average of 90% total resistance debuffed.
Combining the Cold or Sonic and /Sonic would result in your team doing 2.5 times their otherwise un-debuffed damage. I think that is far more effective than bringing a Kinetics, especially when you consider how many AV fights involve a single target instead of the ten it takes to maximize Fulcrum Shift.
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Sleet can be easily double stacked for -60% resistance with some recharge slotting and hasten. Powers that use pseudo pets can stack with themselves.|
Originally Posted by Syntax42
As stated before, Sonic primary adds 60% resistance debuffing. Cold primary can also reach this, but requires a lot of global recharge bonuses to maintain the debuffs.
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Sleet itself lasts for 15 secs and and the debuff lasts for 30 seconds. With a base recharge of 60 seconds, it is very very easy to double stack Sleet, it would make more recharge to triple stack, but its possible.
Sleet can also take the achilles heel proc for more -res, something that Sonic/ can't do.
"An army is a team. It lives, eats, sleeps, fights as a team. This individuality stuff is a bunch of BS." -General George Patton
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That is very good to know. The way you describe it, it sounds like the debuff lasts 30s longer than the pseudo pet. Basically, one sleet debuffs for a total of 45 seconds if the AV stays in it.|
Originally Posted by Lord_Thanatos
Sleet can be easily double stacked for -60% resistance with some recharge slotting and hasten. Powers that use pseudo pets can stack with themselves.
Sleet itself lasts for 15 secs and and the debuff lasts for 30 seconds. With a base recharge of 60 seconds, it is very very easy to double stack Sleet, it would make more recharge to triple stack, but its possible. Sleet can also take the achilles heel proc for more -res, something that Sonic/ can't do. |
The build I plan on using for my Cold/Sonic Defender will have Sleet on a 20s recharge, which is easily enough to double-stack the -res debuff if it lasts 45s like you describe. Now, I'm looking at being able to debuff up to 190% of an AV's resistance between Sleet, Heat Loss, and Sonic attacks. On top of that, AVs won't be able to use their healing or god-mode powers like Unstoppable. I'm getting excited about my Defender's potential overpoweredness. I just need this semester to end so I can take the time to level it.
The way the Sleet debuff works is weird because of a bug. The full mechanics of it all continue to elude me but my basic understanding is the resistance debuff fades immediately if the enemy is inside the rain pet when it vanishes. So if my understanding is correct, the only way to stack Sleet's debuff is if the AV runs out of the patch before it expires.
(There have been some discussions about having Castle fix this bug, but given the overall ridiculous power of Sleet, it seems likely to me the proper "fix" should probably be to just remove any lingering debuff at all. At least for the Cold set. Storm Summoning is in a slightly different situation and maybe deserves the stackability given the huge nerf Lightning Storm took when pet recharge got "fixed.")
IMHO i would prolly rank them in this order:
- cold dom
- trap
- rad
- kin
- dark
- TA
- storm
- sonic
the only thing that is better than having 1 is having multiple lol, having a cold dom, rad and trap makes the AVs just melt and most mobs will have a hard time even lasting more than a few moments lol
IMHO i would prolly rank them in this order:
- cold dom
- trap
- rad
- kin
- dark
- TA
- storm
- sonic
the only thing that is better than having 1 is having multiple lol, having a cold dom, rad and trap makes the AVs just melt and most mobs will have a hard time even lasting more than a few moments lol
edit: apologies for double post
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Gotta keep in mind that resistance resist resistable resistance debuffs. So when facing an AV (or EB) with high resistance, you want -regen to floor them, else you have a stalemate situation like what happens in the RSF and LGTF when Statesmen and Honoree pop unstoppable and get over 100% resistances to certain damage types. In those cases, even at 100% -resistance, your just turning 1 damage into 2 damage.|
Originally Posted by Siolfir
The -res is almost always better than the -regen, unless you're trying to solo them. It's actually why I didn't list Kinetics higher, since you're more likely to get a higher damage contribution from the multiplicative effect of -resistance as opposed to the additive effect of +dam.
Traps and Cold both do -resistance very well. Defensively, I can see due to the stacked -damage. That's why I mentioned the set - and while I knew that the slow in Siphon Speed is flagged unresistable, I never bothered to try to quantify it so usually discount it entirely. Offensively, see my comments above.  |
Most -regen values, even after AV resistance still do 75% or more -regen, which can cut AVs regen from .33%hp/second to .0825%hp/second, effectively boosting your DPS by that .2475%hp/second, as you don't have to deal that damage anymore.
Keep in mind that the 75% number is what you'd get on a same level AV. On a TF like Apex (I think) where the AV is forced to level 54, I think the actual value should be reduced by 85% [EDIT: Correction, 87% due to higher level AV] and then again by 52% because of the purple patch.
I also think -Resistance is affected by the purple patch.
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But AVs don't resist -Resist debuffs in the same way that they do most other debuffs. A 30% resistance debuff means that the team will do 30% more damage to an even level AV.
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Originally Posted by Oedipus_Tex
Keep in mind that the 75% number is what you'd get on a same level AV. On a TF like Apex (I think) where the AV is forced to level 54, I think the actual value should be reduced by 85% [EDIT: Correction, 87% due to higher level AV] and then again by 52% because of the purple patch.
I also think -Resistance is affected by the purple patch. |
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Originally Posted by Wyatt_Earp
But AVs don't resist -Resist debuffs in the same way that they do most other debuffs. A 30% resistance debuff means that the team will do 30% more damage to an even level AV.
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While true, 30% more damage of 1 point of damage, is 1.3 damage. That's the issue with resistance debuffs on high resist targets.
http://paragonwiki.com/wiki/Purple_Patch
Unless your target is +3 or higher, the debuffs aren't affected much by the purple patch.
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I was refering to -Regen on a +4 AV. I agree that AVs don't have in-born resistance to -Resistance, unless they have an armor power that grants resistance. But some AVs never spawn at even level, and always at level 54, so you will never actually get the 30% debuff, but closer to 15%. This effects both Regen and -Resistance I believe.|
Originally Posted by Wyatt_Earp
But AVs don't resist -Resist debuffs in the same way that they do most other debuffs. A 30% resistance debuff means that the team will do 30% more damage to an even level AV.
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In short, AVs don't natively resist -Resistance, but they still get benefits of the Purple Patch just like any normal enemy. As far as I'm aware very few things ignore the Purple Patch; the knockback in Repulsion Field and Repel appears to be one (it always knocks enemies the same distance--I'm actually unclear on whether Knockback IOs have any effect at all).
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Agreed. But most AVs don't have huge damage resistances. Just a quick look at the arachnos AVs, most of them have 30% resistance tops to any given damage type and a lot of them have 0 resistance to multiple different damage types.
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Originally Posted by Arbegla
While true, 30% more damage of 1 point of damage, is 1.3 damage. That's the issue with resistance debuffs on high resist targets.
http://paragonwiki.com/wiki/Purple_Patch Unless your target is +3 or higher, the debuffs aren't affected much by the purple patch. |
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Ah, ok. I thought everyone was still talking about resistance.
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Originally Posted by Oedipus_Tex
I was refering to -Regen on a +4 AV. I agree that AVs don't have in-born resistance to -Resistance, unless they have an armor power that grants resistance. But some AVs never spawn at even level, and always at level 54, so you will never actually get the 30% debuff, but closer to 15%. This effects both Regen and -Resistance I believe.
In short, AVs don't natively resist -Resistance, but they still get benefits of the Purple Patch just like any normal enemy. As far as I'm aware very few things ignore the Purple Patch; the knockback in Repulsion Field and Repel appears to be one (it always knocks enemies the same distance--I'm actually unclear on whether Knockback IOs have any effect at all). |
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The +dam from kinetics can push most archtypes to 400% of normal damage, so yes, it's multiplicative. It would be additive if it added say a flat 5 damage to any attacks.|
Originally Posted by Siolfir
The -res is almost always better than the -regen, unless you're trying to solo them. It's actually why I didn't list Kinetics higher, since you're more likely to get a higher damage contribution from the multiplicative effect of -resistance as opposed to the additive effect of +dam.
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As to which is more effective at increasing damage, it would depend on the strength of the de/buffs. I'm not aware of anyway to stack -300% res from one character (but that doesn't mean it doesn't exist), but that's what it would take to match a kin that's maxxed damage. Well, with only one target, the buff might be more like +250% not +300%.
I think kin/sonic (which I play) is a scary combo because +dam and -res are both multiplicative and multiply each other.
If you are doing 400% damage from Fulcrum Shifts and Siphon Powers, then hit the target with a single sonic debuff with -20% res, you increase your total damage by 20%. So, 480% not 420%.
I love my cold defenders for TF's and AV's. Great debuffs, great buffs. Sleet + benumb + heat loss = unhappy AV. Ice shields and arctic fog combine for a huge defense bonus for teammates. If you have maneuvers you're well into the 30%+ range. If your blast set has debuffs that's even more gravy on your biscuits (or whatever food analogy you prefer).