Just in: new Tank powersets

If damage is the only major difference betwee the two when both are buffed to their max, isn't it, in fact, the only metric that matters in that comparison?

Im not suggesting that, not intentionally at least. Nor do I say that nothing else was capable of tanking, heck, I've seen a bubbled Blaster tanking before.

What I'm saying is with levels brutes are capable of reaching on their secondaries, means that if you invest in your secondaries, you get an awesome mob smashing machine, with nearly as much durability as a tanker. Which I say, given the new freedom initiative and with the ability to have hero brutes, may mean that people will shy away from rolling tankers in the future, unless they want specifically to tank. That's it, nothing else, Im just musing and theorising.

Good grief yes. A scrapper is more than an adequate sub for a brute. No fury bar to chase, critical hits, if you just want to beat things to a pulp and be a fighter first and foremost, a Scrapper is ideal for you. Almost as tough though, not sold on that, 15% is a lot and that 15% could be the gap between life and death. And unless Im mistaken, even on SO's Brute durability is still worth more than a Scrappers is. So why roll a brute over the scrapper? Well you got a nice multi tasker in a brute, it can gain agro quite easily with its taunt and poke-voke so can turn its hand to tanking roles rather well, certainly better than a scrapper, its more durable than a scrapper, and finally, for the time being at least, it has powers scrappers don't have.

I have 3 tankers hero side 1 villain side. I enjoy tanking, and it makes me feel like Im contributing two fold to the group. Not only am I flattening things like pancakes in the secondary, in the primary, I am preventing my group being flattened like pancakes. Which unless Im wrong, is the main reason one would want to play a tanker.

I have a personal reason and, I did make one character a tanker, not to tank in truth. The reason it came out as a tanker was because, I didn't want the fury issues that Brutes have. Had War Mace been available to scrappers, she would have been a scrapper for sure.

But really if you look at it like that, if I didn't care about having a fury bar to keep fed, then, I'd probably go for a brute. 90% resistance, and scrapper level damage. Sounds good to me.

IME not even gauntlet, or even sometimes taunting like mad will pull aggro off of a dedicated high DPS Brute (all of the ones I have for example).

Gauntlet is not a hindrance, because Gauntlet lets even a single target focused melee set draw AoE aggro.



Just because you keep saying it, doesn't suddenly make it true.

His survivability is not theoretical.

Higher Base Starting HP
Higher Base HP Cap
Higher Regen due to Higher Base Starting HP
Higher Base DEF numbers allowing for more flexibility and freedom in build choices for IOs and less reliance on IOs for Defense
Higher Base RES numbers which are basically all but unreproducible on any consistent/permanent basis.
Higher Magnitude Status Protection




So you are saying that the harder hitting, mandatory higher level enemies do not favor the Tanker's mitigation advantage in the slightest?

Not every league, or every team is running around with 24/7 resistance capped Brutes with Frostwork on them.

Not every Brute or Scrapper has a multi-billion INF build allowing them to leverage added survivability from IOs with extra offense gained through purples for recharge.

Not every Brute or Scrapper even HAS a coherent build.


If your point is that no one needs the tanker to hold aggro, I could just tell you that no one needs the Brute or Scrapper either.

If you want to talk high end, I've done all ranged/support/VEAT BAFs and Lambdas that were fast and had no major issues.


The only thing that isn't right, and hasn't been, is your inability to accept that for the higher mitigation you get you have to trade off for a lower damage output for the sake of balance.

And if that design of lower damage for higher mitigation is not what you want, then its very very clear that you have long been suffering to squeeze the Tanker to be something that it is not.



So let us all know when you are willing to give up:

• Higher Base Starting HP
• Higher Base HP Cap
• Higher Regen due to Higher Base Starting HP
• Higher Base DEF numbers allowing for more flexibility and freedom in build choices for IOs and less reliance on IOs for Defense
• Higher Base RES numbers which are basically all but unreproducible on any consistent/permanent basis.
• Higher Magnitude Status Protection

...for more damage, and then you can just play a Brute or Scrapper since those ATs already exist and stop torturing yourself (and the rest of the forums) over wanting the Tanker to have better mitigation AND better damage than both of them.



All true.





I ignored the rest of your comments Johhny, because its basically twisting reality to suit your standpoint.

That is an interesting point:

Why is it a max survial buffed Brute gets ~99% of the suriviability of the Tank?
And a max buffed Scrapper gets ~85% the surviability of the Tank?

And yet the Tank max damage buffed does a whole lot less Damage than either?

Shouldnt that Tank get something else in return. Bigger Aggro Cap? Better Taunting? Something?


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Although to be fair - it takes a whole lot less buffing to get that Tank to Max Survivability.

They do get something in return.

They get the higher base numbers which mean when you are not running around on this theoretical team/league where you are perma-res capped, perma-damage capped and perma-def capped, you are still much tougher than either of those ATs.


They also get bruising, which might not be some world shattering ability, but it does allow a Tanker to be a small force multiplier.

It would be nice if Bruising had a chance to occur beyond the Tier 1 power. I'm not saying that the Tier 7-9 should get them, but say 100% on Tier 1, 67% on Tier 2, and 33% on Tier 3 for it to occur, and maybe 33% on the PBAOEs and Cones.

Just a thought.

And Scrappers and Brutes were NOT designed to solo task forces and Pylons. To do THEIR intended jobs, they don't need the base resistances they do get; throw a couple bubbles on a Scrapper and their secondary becomes largely irrelevant. If they're letting the Tanker take the damage, all they need is to survive the AoE. They get way more than they need and I think they're too tough for the damage they get, especially in the case of Brutes. Incarnates underscores this. The Incarnate system is allowing Brutes and Scrappers to get WAY ABOVE the immortality line but Tankers are quickly hitting the wall for damage. That is a double standard.

My Brutes and Scrappers have no problem with this. Thank you team buffs. Perhaps you need to play better. Eat some purple inspirations. He wont be hitting you at all.

Unless both are ABOVE the immortality line for the incoming damage, which is getting easier and easier for more and more Brutes and Scrappers in an ever-growing percentage of the game's content, thanks to the Incarnate system.

No one has to hold aggro as well. Ever.


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Yes, this is what is being ignored.

The base values for Brutes and Scrappers may be lower, but when you've got them capping their Defenses and walking around with Destiny-level self buffs and team buffs that take them WAY ABOVE their base values, that narrows the survivability gap considerably; it pushes them further above the immortality line for most content where more survivability doesn't really matter. But the damage gap and low Tanker damage cap remains.

This is what Deus and Claws refuse to get.

Um no. The last thing Tankers need is more taunting capability.


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I don't think they would eclipse Brutes. A Brute at his 750% damage cap would still be doing considerably more damage than the Tanker. Which I say is a problem as long as Brutes keep their 90% resistance caps.

And it wouldn't eclipse Scrappers any more than Brutes do or don't now. A Scrapper at 500% damage buff would still trump a Tanker at 500% thanks to Criticals.


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Oh SHI--

Johnny's right guys!

Blasters are getting the exact same* survivability as tanks in trials, and they deal way more damage with AoEs and such from range even! This isn't fair for anybody! Blasters have the best damage, and the highest damage caps! NERF BLASTERS! BUFF EVERYONE ELSE.

*Or marginally close when buffed to all respective caps by a perma destiny team, since they all are.

Right.

Since the Incarnate system exists now, it is the only thing that matters, and levels 1-50 are completely irrelevant. That is completely ridiculous.

Can a brute survive as well as a tank, unassisted, while slotting nothing but SOs? Because contrary to what you seem to believe, a lot of the players in the game still use SOs.

IO usage is NOT as predominant as yo are trying to have us believe. And the kind of IOed out brutes and scrappers you keep going on about certainly are not as common as you'd have us believe.

Yes, you see a lot of forum posters with awesome builds, and using IOs out the wazoo. Guess what? Those people are less than 10% of the game's population.



When Dr. Aeon 1 shotted me, I was sitting at over 75% defense to everything thanks to team buffs. And you know what? He still hit me. You could have 200% defense to everything there is defense for, and if you can't soak a hit you can and eventually will be turned into a grease spot by something. Tanks are meant to take those hits, and take more than one of them.


Again, you're bringing up the Incarnate system as a reason why this needs to change. Still no mention of how those ATs perform on SOs, which the game is still balanced around. No mention of how those ATs perform at level 25, or level 35, or level 40.

You keep going on and on about the Incarnate system like the rest of the game ceased to exist when it was introduced. I don't know about you, but *I* still spend the majority of my time in the game leveling characters, so I am wel aware that there is more to the game than level 50 awesomeness. And whether you want to admit it or not, when you are leveling and using a mixture of SOs and maybe the occasional IO here and there, tanks have a significant survivability advantage over brutes and scrappers. I have YET to see a brute that will survive as well as a tank at level 25.

You CANNOT balance ATs based on how they perform at level 50 with all the best enhancements the game has to offer slotted in them. You have to balance them based on the minimum performance available, which is SOs, because that is what is available equally to everyone.

The game is more than what you do at level 50. NAd you should remember that in your attempts to browbeat us into agreeing with you. Funny how you're the ONLY player that is this bent out of shape by the "unfairness" of tanks dealing less damage than brutes. If it were as big of a deal as you're making it out to be, why aren't we seeing posts like yours all over the place?

You seem to be confused as to what a tank's purpose even IS.

Tanks were not, and never will be, designed to be damage dealers. Their purpose is to redirect damage and any debuffs to themselves, instead of the team.

Yes, a scrapper or brute can be built to survive almost as well.

And yes, all 3 ATs are perfectly capable of being the last ones standing while the rest of the team is on the floor.

The difference is:

If you are a scrapper or brute and you're the last one standing, you're awesome. You can kill everything and get the glory for saving the day.

If you're a tank and you're the last one standing, you have failed at tanking. If you were a good tank, the rest of the team wouldn't be laying on the floor.

I build my brutes and scrappers to dela damage, because that's their purpose. I build my tanks to hold agro and survive it, because that is their purpose.

Saying a tank should put out the same damage as a brute while retaining their survivability, is exactly like saying a defender should have the damage output of a blaster while retaining their buffs.

You don't invite a defender to a team because you want more damage, you invite them because you want buffs and debuffs. I have never, ever invited a defender to a team because I wanted the damage output their own personal attacks provided, I invite them because I want what their primary powerset brings to the team.

Same goes for tanks. You don't invite them to a team because you want more damage, you invite them because you want someone to hold agro. If I want a melee damage dealer, I will invite a scrapper or a brute, and if I do so, I am not expecting them to hold agro.

You don't seem to understand that at all in your insistence that it isn't fair that one AT deals less damage than another, when those two ATs were designed with 2 different purposes in mind.

Tanks are not brutes, brutes are not tanks, and it is not at all reasonable to expect them to be.

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.

It'll be even worse for tankers unless they get some kind of addition, assuming its only unique feature on scrappers(extra crits) won't be available.

Maybe it'll get critical taunt.

All good points.

That being said, most players cannot count on being in a team 100% of the time. That really curtails ATs like Tankers and Defenders when they have to be soloing (for whatever reason they are) and burn a lot of Endurance trying to put out damage, but have to take a longer route in order to do so, all the while, they burn the same amount of endurance per shot as their damaging cousins do, and more over time as they usually have their better defenses up and running so they can last long enough to DO that damage.

Nobody starts at level 50, they have to spend the time getting them TO 50. If a character isn't fun, a person will usually stop playing them before 10, even before getting access to the simplest IOs! I can't tell you how many characters I have done that with myself! A character should be fun from level 1 to level 50 and beyond. When soloing, Tankers are not always fun. My main tanker has to use his Build Up and Energy Transfer to start feeling fun when soloing. My time is limited, and he's my main character, so I can't always team up, so soloing is what I do with him.

And you don't see anything wrong with that. If you did, you won't admit to it.

This. This is the heart of the problem. Brutes and Scrappers have a good thing going. They're extremely popular, extremely powerful ATs. Brutes at the caps are 100% numerically superior to Tankers at the caps and there's no denying it. You don't even try to.

Brutes and Scrappers have got loads of enthusiasts backing them, and those people know how broken good they are. And they will say anything to keep that status quo and keep their little min-maxed toys on top. And the devs are reluctant to change the status quo because keeping people quiet is easier than fixing things. That is the ugly, ugly elephant in the room.

The same people who argue that Scrappers and Brutes and how they relate to Tankers are fine are the same ones bragging about soloing TFs and killing pylons in under four minutes. Their bias is blatant and it disgusts me. I've put as much if not more time and work into my Tankers as they put into their Brute/Scrapper, but the difference is, Tankers hit a wall with the damage cap, a wall those people dance all over with their brokenly tough 'damage dealers'.

My Tankers deserve to be as awesome offensively as anyone's unkillable Incarnate Brute or Scrapper and I damn well intend to rock the boat and make noise until the devs allow him and all Tankers the same freedom and room to grow. And if you don't like it, tough.


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If there's one thing I will get behind you on, it's that there's too much defense available in the IO sets and not enough damage boosts.

But this other stuff you're spouting? You can't balance the game around top end performance and what happens at the caps. If you do, then like I jokingly referred to earlier, Blasters are the true be-all end-all. After all, they're just as survivable as these "brokenly tough" scrappers when they're at their caps, and they deal loads more damage because their base damage and damage cap is even higher, and they get more AoE attacks.

The game is balanced around SOs. Take it or leave it. But please, shut up about it.

You are more than welcome to get the Stalker version which has a bit stronger Eagle Claw with ZERO aoe attack. :P

But seriously, the dev may need to buff a bit for Tankers. Is Dark Melee different?

Dark Melee is awesome, and Martial Arts needs a buff regardless of AT.

True to a point, but IO boosts don't matter much when the Tanker is hitting the damage cap. Like I said, I didn't build for damage and my SS Tanker does, fairly often. I'm sure SD/SS or SD/KM must ram into it constantly.

No.



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How about addressing the rest of my point about blasters and balancing things at their caps first?

If you don't think balancing the Incarnate system and the caps should matter, then what's it to you if Tankers got higher damage caps?


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