Cascading defense failure is a nun-issue for /SR because you have +YES resistance to defense debuffs. It's all the other, inferior, soft-capped toons that have to worry about it.
As for your actual question, yes. Enemies can have to-hit buffs and to-hit subtracts from defense in the final hit chance equation much like a defense debuff:
An even-con minion 10% tohit buff will hit a 50/50/50 character 10% of the time: (50% defense - (50% base+10%)x1.00Acc = 10%
It'll hit the 45/45/45 15% of the time.
However, the number of enemies with to-hit buffs you can significantly mitigate with extra defense isn't really big: DE quartz gives a whopping 100% tohit, and Nemesis Vengeance will rip through Soft-Cap+Elude if it stacks more than a couple of times. Malta Gunslingers and Rularuu eyeballs use extremely high accuracy, not tohit, and so extra defense doesn't help any... You get the idea.
Eyeballs actually have ludicrous to-hit. Maybe there's accuracy too, but they hit through defense.
Global = Hedgefund (or some derivation thereof)
Critters with higher than 50% to-hit are rare. Off the top of my head, I can think of a few: eyeballs, Battle Maiden, Devouring Earth with their crystal buff, and Nemesis when buffed with Vengeance. For all of those except Battle Maiden, the difference between 45% defense and 50% defense will be insignificant. When fighting her, your team will make up the difference through tanking or buffs.
Defense debuffs are not an issue for SR as stated previously. Most of them debuff 7.5% defense, but get reduced to 0.375% after DDR.
of course, now that we have the high level task forces, with lvl 54 foes, 50/50/50 becomes a lot more attractive.
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A level 54 AV has the same to hit as a level 50 minion. 45% defense will minimize their chance to hit you just like it minimizes the chance of a level 50 minion to hit you. Now, a level 54 Av WILL hit you a lot more than that level 50 minion, don't get me wrong. But adding more defense isn't going to help you at all, outside of specific enemies with to hit buffs higher than normal.
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Originally Posted by Shisui
of course, now that we have the high level task forces, with lvl 54 foes, 50/50/50 becomes a lot more attractive.
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"That's because Werner can't do maths." - BunnyAnomaly
"Four hours in, and I was no longer making mistakes, no longer detoggling. I was a machine." - Werner
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Originally Posted by Werner
A level 54 AV has the same to hit as a level 50 minion. 45% defense will minimize their chance to hit you just like it minimizes the chance of a level 50 minion to hit you. Now, a level 54 Av WILL hit you a lot more than that level 50 minion, don't get me wrong. But adding more defense isn't going to help you at all, outside of specific enemies with to hit buffs higher than normal.
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Resistance is going to be a lot more attractive. Love your local sonic!
More importantly, the BEST approach is, was, and remains: Layer your mitigation!
1) Defense
2) Resist
3) Hit Points
4) Regeneration/Heals
5) Hard mitigation (holds, confuses, etc.)
6) Soft mitigation (immobs, knockdown, etc.)
7) Manuever (A moving mob never attacks.)
If you can stack up all seven of these, you're in a fine place indeed.
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This is why the term soft-cap was coined: it's not actually a cap, but for most purposes, going above it won't help you, so it's a "soft" cap.|
Originally Posted by Werner
But adding more defense isn't going to help you at all, outside of specific enemies with to hit buffs higher than normal.
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I really don't know why this belief, that "higher level enemies make it useful to exceed the soft cap" has become so popular lately. The way it works was understood fairly soon after the change, and has been explained exhaustively. Even the term soft cap is a clue: "Wait a minute, there's that other word there, "soft." Why is that there? Maybe I'd better do some reading." But noooooo, everyone either just assumes higher level enemies will require more defense, or they parrot something they've heard.
For the record: it's NOT TRUE. What Werner said is true.
If we are to die, let us die like men. -- Patrick Cleburne
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To expand on this for the benefit of the OP: theoretically, more defense would be better for these specific situations of to-hit buffs. The problem is, you'd need a lot of it -- more than you can get, or more than you can slot without totally gimping your build in other areas. 100/100/100 or 150/150/150 would probably be quite helpful against those situations, but even if you could get it (which you pretty much can't) you'd be carrying it around all the rest of the time, against "regular" enemies where it does you aboslutely no good, but still takes up slots and power picks.|
Originally Posted by Syntax42
Critters with higher than 50% to-hit are rare. Off the top of my head, I can think of a few: eyeballs, Battle Maiden, Devouring Earth with their crystal buff, and Nemesis when buffed with Vengeance. For all of those except Battle Maiden, the difference between 45% defense and 50% defense will be insignificant.
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So for that reason we advise that you get allies or get tactical for the few specific situations that overwhelm the soft-cap.
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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And as a final (?) point of clarification, there is a situation where 50/50/50 is probably better than 45/45/45 -- the one you ruled out, defense debuffs. Against characters with some defense debuff resistance (DDR), but less than /SR's amazing 95% DDR, the extra points can come in handy. For example, Invulnerability on a Tanker has "only" 50% DDR; I find that a few points above the soft cap are quite helpful when facing numerous, moderately debuffing enemies like Cimerorans.
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Originally Posted by Darkaj
Ignoring defense debuffs, is there ever a situation where a scrapper with, say, 50/50/50 positional defenses will do better than a scrapper with 45/45/45 positional defenses?
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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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Is that because of the level 54 AV's higher accuracy?
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Originally Posted by Werner
Now, a level 54 Av WILL hit you a lot more than that level 50 minion, don't get me wrong.
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Yes
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Originally Posted by Darkaj
Is that because of the level 54 AV's higher accuracy?
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"All right, they're on our left, they're on our right, they're in front of us, they're behind us...they can't get away this time"- Chesty Puller US Marine Corps
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To amplify, a level 5 AV has two sources of enhanced accuracy just for being a level 54 AV. They get the AV accuracy rank bonus of 1.5, and they get the +4 level bonus of 1.4 (against level 50 players). Those are independent and not additive: the net is 1.5 * 1.4 = 2.1. In other words, 54 AVs have 210% accuracy, or they hit over twice as often as normal. Even if you floor them with defense, that 5% floor gets multiplied by 2.1 (accuracy takes effect after the floor) to get to 10.5%. At the defensive floor, a +4 AV still hits you one time in ten, not twenty.|
Originally Posted by Darkaj
Is that because of the level 54 AV's higher accuracy?
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From a purely accuracy point of view, the nightmare scenario is a +4 AV Malta Gunslinger. Gunslinger attacks have 2.0 accuracy or +100% accuracy if you prefer. A +4 AV Gunslinger would have a net accuracy bonus in each attack of 4.2, and even at the defensive floor he'd still hit you a whopping 21% of the time, about one time in five. Defense can do no better against that dude.
On the subject of higher tohit: its uncommon, but not rare. Rularuu eyeballs, DE Quartz crystals, the DE in Tip missions, some other special Praetorians (including in Incarnate content) have higher tohit. Some LTs like the guards in Bank missions have tactics. Nemesis Vengeance as +tohit. Critters with fortitude also buff tohit (some vanguard do this, as well as some CoT scientists among others). On the red side some critters even have build up. Oh, and if you have build up or aim, your double in doppleganger missions probably has them also.
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Don't forget pets! 75% to hit and fairly common. I think usually fairly harmless unless you go into Architect Entertainment. I might be forgetting something nasty, though.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
On the subject of higher tohit: its uncommon, but not rare. Rularuu eyeballs, DE Quartz crystals, the DE in Tip missions, some other special Praetorians (including in Incarnate content) have higher tohit. Some LTs like the guards in Bank missions have tactics. Nemesis Vengeance as +tohit. Critters with fortitude also buff tohit (some vanguard do this, as well as some CoT scientists among others). On the red side some critters even have build up. Oh, and if you have build up or aim, your double in doppleganger missions probably has them also.
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"That's because Werner can't do maths." - BunnyAnomaly
"Four hours in, and I was no longer making mistakes, no longer detoggling. I was a machine." - Werner
Videos of Other Stupid Scrapper Tricks
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A lot of Malta summoning Auto Turrets at once can suck if your character doesn't have high regeneration or Aid Self.
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Originally Posted by Werner
Don't forget pets! 75% to hit and fairly common. I think usually fairly harmless unless you go into Architect Entertainment. I might be forgetting something nasty, though.
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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. |
I've got a spines/SR with dual builds. One is a soft-cap build with numbers slightly over 45% on the 3 positions and the other a "Perma-Elude" build with 226.25% recharge (which includes perma-hasten but does not include my +33% spiritual incarnate, nor Geas of the Kind Ones). With Geas, Elude is only down for a for a few seconds after the crash finishes. Without it, its like 12-15 seconds or so after the end of the crash (I have yet to die due to a crash since respecing in i19).
From my perspective, the perma-elude build is drastically much more fun to play and is able to do things the soft-cap build cannot do, such as function as the primary tank for a TF (I have 2 taunts because they can get +15% recharge bonuses together). When not tanking, I have freedom to jump into as many mobs as I want spamming ripper and throw spines back and forth, with an occasional water spout (this is due to the extra +recharge I have which also drastically boosts my DPS, as I have build-up recharging much more often that my soft-cap build can do).
So what's the drawback? My build is incredibly expensive and elude crashes DO get annoying because I have to do quite a bit to protect myself (pop a blue & hibernate or Demonic Aura) and re-toggling 4 powers gets old. Also, every other toon you play after running a "perma-elude" build with insane +recharge just seems well...deflated.
I'm not hating on soft-cap builds--they're great. But if you have the money to spend and you can stomach having to retoggle every 3 minutes, a "perma-eluder" may be the way to go for some of you.
Just my two cents worth, math guys don't freak out.
Also, if anyone wants my builds, just PM me.
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I have no idea how to send PM's on this forum, so consider this my best effort. |
Originally Posted by Murdok
Also, if anyone wants my builds, just PM me.
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Pls send builds, kk!
One way is to click on the name of the poster, there's a drop down menu with the option to send a PM.
One other place that's not mentioned where having 50/50/50 is better is the Statesman Task Force against Lord Recluse. Softcap against him is, IIRC 70-75% defense. However you either need purples or buffs from your teammates to GET that high a defense, and when all those are factored in the extra 5% over the normal softcap is liable to be useless.
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The real question here is what about running Elude is more fun. Is it the significantly improved +recovery, or +jump and +run speed over your soft capped build, for instance, or even the "rush" of knowing in 3 minutes I'm facing that crash (and may or may not have cleaned up most of the spawn), as it isn't the defense ... that's the whole point of all that number crunching 'soft cap' posting above.
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Originally Posted by Murdok
I've got a spines/SR with dual builds. One is a soft-cap build with numbers slightly over 45% on the 3 positions and the other a "Perma-Elude" build with 226.25% recharge (which includes perma-hasten but does not include my +33% spiritual incarnate, nor Geas of the Kind Ones). With Geas, Elude is only down for a for a few seconds after the crash finishes. Without it, its like 12-15 seconds or so after the end of the crash (I have yet to die due to a crash since respecing in i19).
From my perspective, the perma-elude build is drastically much more fun to play and is able to do things the soft-cap build cannot do, such as function as the primary tank for a TF (I have 2 taunts because they can get +15% recharge bonuses together). When not tanking, I have freedom to jump into as many mobs as I want spamming ripper and throw spines back and forth, with an occasional water spout (this is due to the extra +recharge I have which also drastically boosts my DPS, as I have build-up recharging much more often that my soft-cap build can do). So what's the drawback? My build is incredibly expensive and elude crashes DO get annoying because I have to do quite a bit to protect myself (pop a blue & hibernate or Demonic Aura) and re-toggling 4 powers gets old. Also, every other toon you play after running a "perma-elude" build with insane +recharge just seems well...deflated. I'm not hating on soft-cap builds--they're great. But if you have the money to spend and you can stomach having to retoggle every 3 minutes, a "perma-eluder" may be the way to go for some of you. Just my two cents worth, math guys don't freak out. Also, if anyone wants my builds, just PM me. |
On a SR, I have to say I don't see the point of not getting the softcap, even if you build around Elude... It takes like 2-3 pool powers and a steadfast res/def.
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I'm not entirely sure I follow your point, but the fun part is, by going for insane +recharge you drastically improve your damage. My attack chain fro the perma elude build is BU+throw spines+Ripper+water spout, repeat. I can run build up 10 every 20 seconds. When I run my defensive soft cap build, I can't generate that kind of damage, or even come close. Also, I can tank just about anything with my perma-eluder. I was the primary tank for my SG last week on a ITF and did better than most tanks I've done it with. My soft-cap build could not have done that without popping purples.
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Originally Posted by Doomguide
The real question here is what about running Elude is more fun. Is it the significantly improved +recovery, or +jump and +run speed over your soft capped build, for instance, or even the "rush" of knowing in 3 minutes I'm facing that crash (and may or may not have cleaned up most of the spawn), as it isn't the defense ... that's the whole point of all that number crunching 'soft cap' posting above.
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Not only has my soft-capped /SR scrapper never had any trouble surviving vast crowds of aggro on the ITF, but it hadn't occurred to me that any /SR would have trouble with it. /SR pretty much completely neutralizes the Cimeroran defense debuffs.
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Originally Posted by Murdok
I was the primary tank for my SG last week on a ITF and did better than most tanks I've done it with. My soft-cap build could not have done that without popping purples.
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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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There are places Elude would be stronger than the soft-cap. The ITF is not one of those places. If your Eluder has better performance in the ITF than your soft-capped build, something is amiss with your soft-capped build.|
Originally Posted by Murdok
I'm not entirely sure I follow your point, but the fun part is, by going for insane +recharge you drastically improve your damage. My attack chain fro the perma elude build is BU+throw spines+Ripper+water spout, repeat. I can run build up 10 every 20 seconds. When I run my defensive soft cap build, I can't generate that kind of damage, or even come close. Also, I can tank just about anything with my perma-eluder. I was the primary tank for my SG last week on a ITF and did better than most tanks I've done it with. My soft-cap build could not have done that without popping purples.
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The only reason my soft-capped SR doesn't tank ITFs is because she doesn't have taunt. There's nothing in the ITF that can penetrate her defenses except a bad-luck string of hits that Elude would do no better at deflecting.
My guess is that your "soft-capped" SR is *too* soft-capped: its dead-on 45% defense (you say "a little over 45%"). Mine sits at about 47% defense, which means I have a 2% cushion against defense debuffs. Which translates, after 95% DDR, to perfect protection against the first -40% defense debuff. If you are at exactly 45%, then even with 95% DDR some defense debuffs will leak through and elevate your tohit from the 5% floor (before accuracy) to something like 5.5% or even 6%. That's a whopping 20% increase in incoming damage and a significantly higher chance of having a string of hits take you out.
Some primaries can benefit a lot from ultrahigh recharge, but martial arts is not one of them so I went with a high survivability MA/SR build. It has about 47% defense to all positions, 14% defense to psionic, 19.9% resistance to smash/lethal before passive scaling resistances, 403% regeneration, 143.6% health, and aid self is recharging in about 7.1 seconds after cast and healing for 42.6% health (with Spiritual Core Paragon slotted).
My guess is that except for high tohit areas (which the ITF is not), selling out totally on recharge will radically outdamage my build, but it will come at the cost of being far less survivable. Every one of my SR builds prior to this one had Elude for those high tohit cases. This one doesn't, and to be honest what I've lost in those cases I think I've made up in being almost indestructible in most others.
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Neither of my spines/sr builds have trouble "surviving" the ITF. But surviving and tanking are two different matters. After running numerous ones over the years on my scrapper, the perma-eluder is better at tanking, better at damage, and, as a result, better all around for the team. In my experience, I seem to get hit more on the soft-cap version than I do on the perma-eluder. I even got to save the day one time when our primary tank DC'd on the last mission. I've also functioned as the primary tank on other TFs.
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Originally Posted by Sailboat
Not only has my soft-capped /SR scrapper never had any trouble durviving vast crowds of aggro on the ITF, but it hadn't occurred to me that any /SRwould have trouble with it. /SR pretty much completely neutralizes the Cimeroran defense debuffs.
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Ignoring defense debuffs, is there ever a situation where a scrapper with, say, 50/50/50 positional defenses will do better than a scrapper with 45/45/45 positional defenses?
The reason I say ignoring defense debuffs is that I'm aware of the possibility of cascading defense failure, but I've never experienced it on my /SR scrapper and it seems to be so rare as to not be a concern. My question is directed more to the situation of fighting higher level mobs and mobs with a to-hit bonus who have a greater than 1 in 20 chance to hit you -- and I'm wondering if positional defenses that exceed the soft-cap can reduce the chance that those mobs will hit you back down to 1 in 20.
I've read Arcanaville's excellent posts on defense and I think the answer is "yes" but I lack the math ability to work through her formulas and would really appreciate a bottom-line answer.