First Serious Defender

Okay...so a little background; I've teamed with HUNDREDS of awesome 'fenders over the years, and I've always been a little jealous about their force-multiplication and baddie-neutering abilities.

However, the only two 'fenders I've ever actually tried were an Emp/Dark (deleted) and FF/Sonic (currently languishing at 26, haven't played for 700+ days).

With the change to Vigilance since the last time I played a Defender making them (apparently) much more solo friendly, I want to try again. I like to solo and go at my own pace until at least SOs if I can, because of my weird schedule, so something that can decently handle itself until 22-25 would be good.

I also don't want to go unnoticed on teams, up to and including iTrials when the time comes.

A few ideas I was kicking around:

Cold/Ice
Dark/Ice (my 50 Corruptor is Fire/Dark, and I <3 Fluffy)
Cold/Dark
Kin/Sonic

Any other ideas or guidance?


TL;DR: Me want new Defender. Solo early. Team Late. Be awesome.

Quote:

Originally Posted by EarthWyrm But I do understand that there is an internet rule that any bad idea must be presented by someone at least twice a year to remind everyone who hasn't already read every previous thread on the topic precisely why the idea is bad.

Kin/Sonic is fun.
I would also say rad/sonic, rad/psi, cold/sonic(is a beast), Storm/Sonic, Storm/Psi, Cold/Dark, all are fun toons to lvl up and play.

You can be Awesome with any defender combination. The thing you should really be asking yourself is what type of defender matches your playstyle. That way you are not only happy with your force multiplication but also with the way the character plays so that you actually play the character instead of getting frustrated or irritated and shelving/deleting the character.

With that said, a few caveats:

1. Even with the vigilance change the defender will solo slower than your corruptor and possibly even your troller. Don't expect a lot of speed because you still just won't have it.

2. Unless you slot for solo play and ignore vigilance you'll either need to create another build for teaming (especially in the case of a buff heavy primary) or spend alot of time resting solo. Defender DPE stinks, especially solo.

3. Buffing sets are tedious to solo. You will probably want a primary that debuffs or that has mostly debuffs and a few buffs.

The questions you need to ask yourself are:

Do you want a click heavy primary like Kin or are you most interested in a fire and forget primary like Cold?

Are you interested in any special synergies such as stacking -res from combos like Storm/Sonic, Cold/Sonic, Rad/Sonic. or Dark Sonic?

Stacked -Damage from a combo like Dark/DP? Stacked slows and -rech like Storm/Ice? Stacked -to hit from combos like Dark/Dark or Rad /Dark?

Is concept more important to you or is efficiency regardless of concept your goal?

Cold/Ice is amazing and very safe. It's even more silly once you get Ageless Perma.

Throw down sleet and then hit them with Ice Storm...if that wasn't crazy enough follow up with Frost Breath and Bitter Ice Blast.

Also If you want to kill/neuter any thing from a elite boss or weaker throw out Sleet-->Ice Storm-->Blizzard. Hello over 2000pts of dmg and that's just on a defender!

Cold/Ice-like negate said, cold/ice is safe. solo friendly and definitely great for teams. Av's and Elite bosses turn into butter with the debuffs and make soloing easier for you. the double dosage of slow really makes this character help with incoming attacks and good for pvp. Since the numbers haven't changed for ice storm and blizzard, we do great damage.Focuses more on single target. Bosses are way easier solo.

Dark/Ice- Super versatile player. Your control with this toon just goes out the window. You get the best rez in the game (aoe) that works as an amazing debuff/soft control when soloing or not. The fears and holds and immobilize will really help you get noticed when combined with your other debuffs. You get an aoe heal as well as the -to hit to lots of people. The one thing that the dark/ has over cold/ is the ability to affect many foes. the pet is always nice too.

Cold/Dark- probably safer than cold/ice just because the debuffs and extra immobilizes.You get a small self heal here which would help because any self heal for the healer is a great idea. debuffs galore as well. A really fun play style that made it to be my fifth level fifty. Since you get a pretty good sized bebuff abilites that hit multiple people, this set leaves you an active player to constantly cast your debuffs attack on all. Both abilities really cover the battlefield so people will be able to see your work best with this one.

Kin/Sonic-Probably the most damaging defender that you can make. I love mine so much. Super great for soloing and for teaming. Everyone loves sb (even if they can only use it outside of battles) and you get a self heal. Endurance is not an issue later on either. Falcum shift is your prized power that really combines well with sonics constant resisitance debuffs that help stack at chance to reach the damage cap. A character that requires constant playing though. Not one you can walk away to go to the restroom or make a quick sandwhich. When you stop people notice...so this could qualify for what you may want. /sonic is really active and great for soloing defenders and shines brightest in your later levels. Also can get quasi permanent travel powers from this set so you can have more slots to use on other powers. Hasten is definatley recommended for this set....if not most. With kinetics it's all about the speed.

May I nominate storm/ice. Definitely a very "safe feeling" set particularly solo because you can easily floor an enemies recharge. Less attacks = less damage. It comes into its own earlier than cold because freezing rain is available a lot earlier than sleet (oh and snow storm compliments freezing rain beautifully at lower levels).

Storm is great with any powers that have a "rain effect" AOE such as Ice, Archery or (when i21 is out) Fire. Sit back and laugh as you dish out death from the sky.

In regards to Cold solo...I gotta say you're always going to be better off with a Corruptor version. Having played both to 50, the defender was not very noticeable on teams and not really any safer solo compared to the Corr. Pretty much can blame vigilance scaling on that one there though, and Corruptor support being very closely the same.

That said Kin and Rad do offer a different feel compared to their corruptor equivalents, since their values are a bit more tweaked up and feel like a better tradeoff as vigilance scales your damage down on teams. Same can be said about Sonic Blast due to the higher debuff values.

I love my Traps/DP/Mace.

It's easy to cap defenses and it has some great offensive debuffs.