scrapper info

I like surviving. I played some brute combinations and while they do good I really don't like their buildup mechanic a whole lot. I can never get it past 50 percent or so.
How much different are scrapper and brute survivability giving the same secondaries? I really like invul and willpower. Shield I haven't tried yet but been hearing good things.

I understand that brutes are capable of going more damage but that build up sucks. I want more steady damage output.

Im only using so's also as ill be dropping to premium soon Thx.

Scrapper

Base HP: 1338.6
Max HP: 2409.5
Resist Cap: 75%

Brute

Base HP: 1499.3
Max HP: 3212.7
Resist Cap: 90%

The bare-bones, simplistic view is to know that Brutes start off with 12% more HP than Scrappers and have the ability to be at a 33% advantage.

More health = even more effective health when mitigation is applied.

Also, since regeneration always works off of a percent of max, it is always more effective on Brutes.

Edit: Brutes *can* do more damage than Scrappers, but it has been much harder for that to be the case since the Fury nerf a while back (Harder to maintain extreme levels of it).

I am slowly (very slowly) transitioning from Brute to Scrappers for the same reason you mentioned, primarily. I have ran Brutes for four years. It's an addiction lol. They actually made getting Fury easier, but made it much harder to top out. That is just awful for me. Anyways, I too have issues with the Brute system. I tend to run "Tankier" characters in all video games. However, the "Tank" in this game is a weird version of controller, whose main power is agro suck, and the tools this controller gets is giant survivability. That's my take on it.

Anyways, the first Scrapper I am seriously trying is Dark Melee/Invulnerability. I had a Brute one of these at 50 I ran for almost half a year. I have heard this is one of the most survivable scrappers. The trade off, of course, is damage output. Mostly in the form of no AoE in the Invulnerability Armor. Also, some hate the whole DM attack set. At first I had some problems with it, it seems very funky (Super Strength is my "go to" Brute set). Then, with my brute, I really started to realize the awesomeness of the set, and why it pairs so well with Invulnerability.

Another great secondary is Willpower, again, no AoE. However this set will give you everything you need to stay in the fight, lots of energy, huge regen. Slightly fragile to giant amounts of spike damage. But, wait, there's more. It has a Rez right in the set.

My last set I am pretty familiar with is Fire Armor. I have a Super Strength/Fire Armor Brute. Flavor of the month for a while. Very fragile to anything besides fire damage. Again, however, a rez built right into the set. But wait, there's more. The Rez acts like a giant Bomb!!! Funny as it gets. And Fire has very nice damage aura, great for melting minions (And drawing agro!) My advice, kill it fast, kill it all very fast, that is your armor.

There are plenty more sets and playstyles out there. I hope you are happy with what you discover.

Can you even get to 90% resist and soft cap defense 45% with a brute while only using So's? Im betting no. So if only using so's the amount of defense/resist I can get will be pretty close on both At's. Anyone have any experience with this?

I think you can cap fire res w/ fire armor using just SOs. Most other resists / defenses are not gonna cap. Special cases like electric armor w/ elec protection you got a shot. I ran SO builds only for the first two years I was in the cities. Not even the I/O non set things, just SOs. Granted, I was not extremely far ranging on my choices, a lot of SS/Invul in there. However, I did explore some and know how tough some of the builds can be with just good power picks and a modicum of careful slotting. End reductions in Attacks more than Toggles for instance. As experienced players many of us know this, but beginning players might fall to the trap "It's always on, End red it!" A dozen other tricks like that which seem counter intuitive to someone just starting the game come up.

You can get softcap defense with SR set only SO's but you will need three pool powers (maneuvre, weave, combat jump/hover) or oversloting your defense powers and still need two pool power (weave and any one of others) Or with burnout and elude you may get a 6min softcapped character in every 15 min or so.

Can't granite stoners cap on SOs also?

As brutes? Not even close defense wise, nor even resistance wise to smash/lethal.