Does dark armor maybe in need of a buff

I have been having fun leveling up my STJ/DA brute and while /DA certainly is not a bad set i can't help but think that it is a little lacking compared to similar armors ELEC and FA. Dark regeneration is incredible and the psi resistance is sweet but DA doesnt have all the the bells and whistles that the other 2 sets have.
I'm thinking that maybe DA needs a little dev love...elec/fire and recently EA have all been given nice buffs so it's only right to give DA a buff too.
I'm not thinking anything huge like what EA got but just little things like kb and imob protecion...shadow cloak having the same defensive numbers as energy cloak...toggles requiring less endurance...and so on.
so what do you all think??

Dark armor gets a damage aura, the strongest heal in the game, arguably the strongest self rez in the game, fear protection, psi resistance, toxic resistance, endurance protection, two different control auras, stealth and defense, and just overall high resistance numbers. All it sacrifices for all of this is KB protection, which the other damage aura sets also lack to one degree or another, and high endurance usage. I'd call that a bargain at twice the price.

You could say it's a late blooming set, in that it benefits greatly from incarnate powers to mitigate its endurance problems, but it isn't as though there's nothing you can do about them earlier on. Pair it with certain primaries, use certain IOs, just slot your toggles and attacks for end reduction...

Let's put it this way: if the devs take another look at dark armor, it won't be to increase its power.

YES! YES IT SHOULD!

INCREASE IT'S NEGATIVE ENERGY RESIST SO IT CAPS!

...other than that, I'm pretty okay with the set as it is now.

Thanks for the awesome responses so far.
I really am enjoying my stj/da and i see that it is a late bloomer and dark regeneration is so addictive. I do have the ToE proc in dark regen.....it helps immensly. I will not be taking the fear toggle but i will be taking the stun toggle. I have mostly solo'd my toon to 30...i am currently running at 0x6 and i am having few problems except for having to pop blues from time to time. I am heavily slotted for end reduction but end is still an issue from time to time but i have played other brutes with far more end problems then my /Da toon.
After reading these 2 responses im starting to think that /Da may actually be underated. You don't see that many toons with DA and the general feeling towards DA is that it's not very good. I chose DA because i have leveled every other brute secondary except DA, stone, and regen to 50 and i wanted to try a new set despite everyone in my SG telling me it was horrible.
So far i am liking it and maybe i just thought it needed a buff because i was focused on the negatives of the set and not the positives.

DA is great, my dm/da scrapper ignores minions just because of a one-slot wonder power (OG). The thing I would change is reduce the end cost and raise the accuracy of Cloak of Fear (it was overnerfed before I started playing, dunno how it was before, but the nerf was too big according to what people say), I keep wanting to use it without having to dip into Physical Perfection. But even six slotted at the cap for acc and endred it's still too costly for a mag 2 fear. Which is a pity since it looks so cool and I like it more than OG.

There's only one thing that I believe should be addressed with Dark Armor.

Lightning Field has a debuff: -end.
Blazing Aura has no debuff, but does extra damage.
Death Shroud has no debuff, and no extra damage.

Either Death Shroud should have some kind of debuff (-tohit is thematic), do some more damage, or have some other advantage like a larger radius or cost less endurance.

Like PleaseRecycle said, though, if the devs start looking at Dark Armor, I think buffs are the last thing I'd expect from it.

Check my signature.

Dark Armor is a late bloomer. And when I say 'bloomer' I don't mean like a flower, I mean like a jagged maw of iron-plated teeth and hatred that eats enemies and ****s raw power.

Edit: BOOM DARK ARMOR ENTHUSIAST TAG-TEAM DOUBLE POST

In short, no.

Good answers abound further up the thread.

Dark Armor rocks and even talking about touching it scares me.

I'll chime in for dark armor. It is not a set for the feint of heart but if you can slot it to handle the endurance and use its control powers to your advantage it is great. The heal is over the top (just make sure you don't trigger it to late since it has a long cast time). If you happen to die the self rez at mag 50 will stun just about anything and you generally emerge with a full green and blue bar to go to battle again (although turning on all those toggles is a pain).

Two things.

First this:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dechs Kaison There's only one thing that I believe should be addressed with Dark Armor. Lightning Field has a debuff: -end. Blazing Aura has no debuff, but does extra damage. Death Shroud has no debuff, and no extra damage. Either Death Shroud should have some kind of debuff (-tohit is thematic), do some more damage, or have some other advantage like a larger radius or cost less endurance. Like PleaseRecycle said, though, if the devs start looking at Dark Armor, I think buffs are the last thing I'd expect from it.

I agree, but it isn't just Death Shroud. AFAIK Ice Armor's damage aura is the same way. Same damage/End/Range as Death Shroud and it also has no secondary effect.

Second (and this is just a general statement):

While IO's can't be ignored, the game isn't balanced around them. If, without IO's, a set isn't performing to the same standard as other sets; then that is an issue that needs addressing. Along the same vein, if the set is balanced without IO's then it's just gravy if it pulls ahead with IO slotting.

As to Dark's standing vs other sets? IDK, but if comparisons are made it's best to be mindful about not considering IO's as a part of a set's balance. I.E using the Theft of Essence proc, recovery/+maxend, or IO softcapping as a consideration toward Dark's standing in balance considerations between the sets.

You know everytime someone told me X melee defense set sucks I have rolled it and found it didn't.

/FA, was fantastic to play fully IO'd out.
/EA(BEFORE LAST BUFF) was fantastic to play fully IO'd out.
/ElA stalker was fantastic to play Fully IO'd out.
/DA stalker was fantastic to play Fully IO'd out.

One of the changes I could see happening to DA would be to re-balance Neg/Psi resists so that DA had more Neg resist then Psi resist. Not that I'm complaining about where DA stands at all. I'm not as vocal about my love of DA as Dechs and Nalrok, but I am a big fan none the less.

As for Death Shroud vs. Lightning Field, I'm surprised that LF didn't have a higher end/sec cost similar to Mud Pots because of the -end effect. If not an end cost somewhere in between Death Shroud and Mud Pots.

Also, I'd be curious to see how many people actually take Cloak of Fear. This would be a power I'd like to see modified to make it more attractive to the general populous. Not sure how I'd change it off the top of my head, but if anything deserves a second look in Dark Armor, here's where I would start.

Emberly I DO have the theft of esence proc in dark regeneration. I bought it at level 22. It only cost me about 20 mil...which in these days is a bargain.
I totally agree that it is a must have and most certainly a game changer.

I hesitate to ask for capped Neg resist for DA to bring in in line with the other elemental armours because most likely we'll have to pay the price they do: a huge gapping hole against something else. I like the fact that I have at least some resistance to any of the typed damages. I'd go for changing the psi/neg balance however, as long as it doesn't drive the psi resist to low.

As for game play with DA, I solo a lot and in the lowbie days I adopted a very lazy style of setting Brawl on autofire against the LT/Boss, and letting Oppressive Gloom and Death Shroud take care of the minions. You can go through a surprising amount of content that way.

Dark armor is amazingly versatile. It has great bones as-is, but if you throw some infamy at it, it goes from great to scrumtrulescent.