Power Scrapping: DM vs Broadsword + Shield

But can you defeat every group with Shield Charge?

I get that DM/Shield is a powerful combo. I'm not trying to say it isn't.

My issue (and this holds true with ALL archetypes for me) is when players latch onto something and it becomes viewed as the BEST that AT can offer. Fire/Kin controllers, Stone tanks, Fire/Mental blasters, etc. all have gotten that treatment in the past.

It happens largely because people find something that a particular powerset combo is very good at, and sweep the things it isn't good at under the rug.

Yes, a DM/Shield will out-damage my BS/DA by a wide margin, but how well does it handle non-postional psi attacks, or insane to-hit buffs? From what I've seen, in the face of those two things, most DM/Shields will fold like a cheap card table.

Scrappers are the most well balanced AT as far as various powersets are concerned, and it's a disservice to the AT to imply that one powerset combo is the best and all the others suck in comparison.

Originally Posted by Dechs Kaison See, it's gems like these that make me check Claws' post history every once in a while to make sure I haven't missed anything good lately.

Indeed.

My personal suspicion is that the recent to-hit boost given to Praetorian Devouring Earth was (yet another) direct response to the OP nature of Shield Defense.

It also tends to favor the "resist with a heal" power sets, which have been sorely under-represented of late.

All I can say about the PDE is thank GOD the bosses no longer summon Swarms.

HATED THOSE.

That said, I'm currently tip-running on two toons: A fire/Fire tank, and an Elec/elec scrapper. Both have what I'd call modest builds, and both DESTROY.

ALL builds play well. The game is balanced around teaming. Take into account some buffs, and it all evens out nicely.

Indeed, I team often and I've started making and playing builds with deliberate 'head room' for buffs to take effect. Makes the defenders happy to see their buffs making a big difference, and it gives me a lot more room in my build for glee-making powers.

I doubt that.

If it's just the new Devouring Earth, it's no big deal, as they're easily avoided solo, and you'll probably be buffed to handle it on teams. If a lot more enemies are being given the 64% to-hit treatment, Shield Defense can be easily adapted and soft capped again. What CANNOT be adapted are things like my soft-capped Katana/Dark. It will no longer have the survivability, and lord knows it doesn't have the damage output of a */Shield. I'll stop playing that character, and probably IO out my Broad Sword/Shield, or maybe change the focus of my Fire/Shield, or maybe finish leveling my Shield/Dark Tanker and IO him out.

You might notice that the only characters I imagine playing in a 64% to-hit world are Shield Defense. So unless the dev reponse to Shield Defense supposedly being OP is to make it MORE OP, I assume the to-hit buffs either do not indicate a coming pattern, or if they do, the rationale has nothing to do with Shield Defense.

What are these new DE you guys speak of?

Broad Sword and Katana shouldn't have too much trouble with the new ToHit numbers. If you slot for a bit of defense(2 SO's worth) in Parry/DA, that's enough to get you above 64% with one Parry/DA(or two, or three depending on your defense).

Yes and no. I'm at 75% melee 74% lethal with two Divine Avalanches. But I've never considered melee/lethal to be very good defensive coverage. For ranged and AoE non-lethal attacks, I'd be getting hit almost four times as often. Yes, it'll still be a pretty solid build. But I'm fairly confident (though I haven't tried) that I could get better survivability AND better damage output from a Broad Sword/Shield defense. So why bother with Katana/Dark, at least from a numbers perspective?

Yes, fine, it'll still be better at some enemy groups. But I'd rather have the stronger general build.

People will still play plenty of combinations of course, even if 64% to-hit becomes the norm. But I believe it would only make Shield Defense more attractive comparatively, not less, at least when fully-IO'd.

Still, even if 64% to-hit becomes the norm, I suspect some of those incarnate abilities will have a LOT to say on the subject. It's way, way to soon to be making bets on the next great combination.

Lethal covers a lot of ranged attacks, and I wouldn't be surprised if the enemies with 64% tohit have lethal/melee components in most of their attacks if not all of them. Battle Maiden is a good example.

I guess I should have said *most* groups lol. My Dark/Shield handles non positional psi attacks like 99% of every other scrapper secondary, face down or popping the purple pills.

And yet there's a big difference in survivability between a regular Katana/Dark and a soft-capped Katana/Dark. I suppose I never tested out a fully IO'd Katana/Dark with only 31% defense, though. Maybe it wouldn't suffer as badly in comparison as I suspect. Maybe I'm just comparing to my leveling build, which isn't really fair.