Can a melee build really solo an AV? Really?
By
Andferne,
Posted on: 2012-06-11 11:57 in Archetypes and Powers General Discussion
I've solo'd AVs with my DB/WP scrapper at 51 (I'm shifted at +1), and at lower levels. It's mostly just a bit tedious against, say, Ghost Widow, unless you don't dodge her uberhold. Sorceress Serene was a bit more of a challenge at 39, since I lack some of my Incarnate Make Everything Easier powers. I prefer duoing or small teams, personally.
Managed to duo the endbosses to Night Ward as AVs with my DB/WP scrapper and a friend's Elec/Elec brute. Was pretty tricky until we realized to kill the debuffer AV first (Serene is not the most dangerous one in that fight).
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Half of fixes on average SHOULD make characters stronger, half should make them weaker. I have a feeling the fixes that actually make it into the game are 80% buff, 20% nerf and I blame you, and people like you, for that.|
Originally Posted by Darth_Khasei
Never fails these threads ALWAYS produce someone calling for nerfs.....Bloody brilliant...
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Ideally any counterargument to this should mention free Stamina and Health.
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Hush you. Using Brawl only is hard enough as it is, and you wanna NERF HIM?!|
Originally Posted by JayboH
All that tells me is that brutes need the nerf bat, but that doesn't seem likely. It's been the same argument for years, and brutes are just the latest target.
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That would require altering the caps entirely, and increasing base resists and such for Tankers, since they'll be more able to survive the extra damage.|
Originally Posted by Vitality
A change like that doesn't make any sense.
A Tanker should want to protect his team...and be the "best at doing so"...but an increase in threat is not the way to go about improving this. An increase in a threat modifier just makes them the center of attention if they are teaming with Brutes who can tank...while that Brute could still perform the same exact task when a Tanker is not on the team. This would also "make" Brutes who can tank, not want to team with Tankers...because then they would easily lose all agro to Tanker...therefore reducing their damage output...in situations where a Brute could just as easily tank those 17 enemies. I made a suggestion in the Tanker forums about increasing Tanker's survivability and their agro cap. This would make them the "best at protecting the team". Therefore...while Tankers could still "lose agro" to "tanking Brutes"...they would be able to hold more agro than them and have better top end survivability. So in situations where two groups are pulled...the Tanker can still maintain control over all the agro...while the Brute could not. |
More survivability and higher aggro caps could work, but I don't see that happening any time soon.
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It is true though, not necessarily nerfing directly, but nerfing the caps.
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Originally Posted by Darth_Khasei
Never fails these threads ALWAYS produce someone calling for nerfs.....Bloody brilliant...
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Originally Posted by Aggelakis
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Originally Posted by firespray
I saw the video of Werner's 6 hour fight.
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No, what doesn't make any sense is an aggro management specialist AT that does only that at the cost of all else.|
Originally Posted by Vitality
A change like that doesn't make any sense.
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Especially in a game where there are already three other ATs that are intended in part to share aggro management(and do), where often you don't need ANY aggro management to begin with and where even two of said specialist AT is already largely redundant on teams.
Taking that AT and making it MORE about aggro management is insane and stupid. You don't try to sell refrigerators to Eskimos by telling them the new models can get even colder and you don't make Tankers any more appealing to the general player population by playing up a role that the vast majority of players just aren't interested in, especially when it also cripples your damage capabilities. Which is why they aren't as popular in the first place.
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I don't post on the forums for years, and I see JB is still the same guy as ever.|
Originally Posted by Johnny_Butane
No, what doesn't make any sense is an aggro management specialist AT that does only that at the cost of all else.
Especially in a game where there are already three other ATs that are intended in part to share aggro management(and do), where often you don't need ANY aggro management to begin with and where even two of said specialist AT is already largely redundant on teams. Taking that AT and making it MORE about aggro management is insane and stupid. You don't try to sell refrigerators to Eskimos by telling them the new models can get even colder and you don't make Tankers any more appealing to the general player population by playing up a role that the vast majority of players just aren't interested in, especially when it also cripples your damage capabilities. Which is why they aren't as popular in the first place. . |
I'd say to never change, but you clearly haven't so that'd be pointless.
You should probably stop trying to use the "vast majority of players" argument, as you have no real insight into what those players want. All you have is what you want (which is basically to turn Tankers into Brutes) and what your circle of friends want, which I guess is the same thing.
It's pretty ridiculous that Brutes can do the aggro control just as well as a Tanker and produce much more damage, but you don't fix this by giving Tankers more damage. You fix this by making Tankers more like Tankers, or adding content that facilitates a desire for an AT that specializes in aggro management. This last bit is the real crux of the issue here, since the game has progressed to the point where most groups can just point their massive cannons at every spawn and blow them up without much, if any, regard for the aggro (since the mob is dead, or almost dead).
In all actuality, it's really a flaw of a key design choice from the day the game was released, which was the "we don't use the holy trinity here" design. For the most part, the game is designed to be handled by all kinds of groups, with no AT absolutely required. Because of this, some ATs (like Tankers) become less desirable because what they bring to the table isn't that useful, which became even more true after the aggro limit was implemented.
In any event, giving Tankers more damage isn't the answer.
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Im not sure where this thread is going but giving tanks brute'ish damage is not an answer at all indeed.|
Originally Posted by _Laxx_
I don't post on the forums for years, and I see JB is still the same guy as ever.
I'd say to never change, but you clearly haven't so that'd be pointless. You should probably stop trying to use the "vast majority of players" argument, as you have no real insight into what those players want. All you have is what you want (which is basically to turn Tankers into Brutes) and what your circle of friends want, which I guess is the same thing. It's pretty ridiculous that Brutes can do the aggro control just as well as a Tanker and produce much more damage, but you don't fix this by giving Tankers more damage. You fix this by making Tankers more like Tankers, or adding content that facilitates a desire for an AT that specializes in aggro management. This last bit is the real crux of the issue here, since the game has progressed to the point where most groups can just point their massive cannons at every spawn and blow them up without much, if any, regard for the aggro (since the mob is dead, or almost dead). In all actuality, it's really a flaw of a key design choice from the day the game was released, which was the "we don't use the holy trinity here" design. For the most part, the game is designed to be handled by all kinds of groups, with no AT absolutely required. Because of this, some ATs (like Tankers) become less desirable because what they bring to the table isn't that useful, which became even more true after the aggro limit was implemented. In any event, giving Tankers more damage isn't the answer. |
0n the aggro management issue I think one of the bigest problem is that taunt aura are so different from each other. A SD scrapper will generate so much more threat than a WP tanker and I dont see any reason why it should. Imo taunt auras should be all the same with a number depending on the AT (Tanker>Brute>Scrap) not on the powerset.
Another thing about brute is that they seem to outperform scarpers and tankers because they scale so good with buff. The highter level you are, the more incarnate powers you get, the more in a group you are the closest you are from stat caps and brutes are the kings of high stat caps. In a 3man team with no support a tanker outperforms any brute by a wide margin.
Its like all blasters complaining about how corruptors are better. In a large team with already defense cap, res buff and Kin, a blaster will be so much more damage than a Corr.
NB. on the threat:
Historically, the first AV soloers were Scrappers. Most Scrap/Brutes/Stalk and some tanks still can solo many AVs, of course they tend to be more dependant on the attack type (SS/FA/Dark brute is a classic but will be eaten alive by any Psy AV with some kind of defense debuff) than Illusion controllers but thats only because of the particular nature of Phantom Army.
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I think a change to the modifiers and caps that brutes get can easily wedge them between scrappers and tanks without stepping too much on eithers toes.|
Originally Posted by Nightchill_EU
Im not sure where this thread is going but giving tanks brute'ish damage is not an answer at all indeed.
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The fact the game doesn't really need tanks even in incarnate content means people should be shouting at poor game design rather than for buffs or nerfs.
If tanks were the only things that could resist all AV's damage it would go a long way (IE: Make maybe 20% of an AV's damage unresistable and let only tanks resist that). You can still get by without a tank, but a tank makes things easier. Letting them stand in death patches or pull things like Marked for Death away from the random targets onto themselves (And then having less impact) would be nice.
Thus brutes stay where they are, but the very top end which most don't reach anyway is lowered, and tanks get some unique mechanics that people will actually want on a team.
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Originally Posted by Aggelakis
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I second this.
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Originally Posted by PrincessDarkstar
I think a change to the modifiers and caps that brutes get can easily wedge them between scrappers and tanks without stepping too much on eithers toes.
The fact the game doesn't really need tanks even in incarnate content means people should be shouting at poor game design rather than for buffs or nerfs. If tanks were the only things that could resist all AV's damage it would go a long way (IE: Make maybe 20% of an AV's damage unresistable and let only tanks resist that). You can still get by without a tank, but a tank makes things easier. Letting them stand in death patches or pull things like Marked for Death away from the random targets onto themselves (And then having less impact) would be nice. Thus brutes stay where they are, but the very top end which most don't reach anyway is lowered, and tanks get some unique mechanics that people will actually want on a team. |
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That accomplishes nothing to make Tankers more fun than they are now. Tankers can already stand up to AVs. |
Originally Posted by PrincessDarkstar
If tanks were the only things that could resist all AV's damage it would go a long way (IE: Make maybe 20% of an AV's damage unresistable and let only tanks resist that). You can still get by without a tank, but a tank makes things easier. Letting them stand in death patches or pull things like Marked for Death away from the random targets onto themselves (And then having less impact) would be nice.
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At the same time you're nerfing all the other ATs so they'll take more damage against AVs.
Tankers causing people's Brutes and Scrappers, and all other ATs, to be nerfed is sure going to make people like Tankers then. /sarcasm
Plus, Marked for Death and death patches are the only things keeping me from nodding off playing my Tanker since there is literally no threat from anything else. If you make a Tanker able to ignore them, why have a human playing the Tanker at all? Just dual box a taunt bot. TANKERS DO NOT NEED MORE SURVIVABILITY.
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| and tanks get some unique mechanics that people will actually want on a team. |
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Which is the point of what I wrote.|
Originally Posted by Johnny_Butane
TANKERS DO NOT NEED MORE SURVIVABILITY.
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Tankers are never going to get a lot of damage, the best you can (I think) hope for is that your niche of not dying will actually start to have a reason for existing. I agree with quite a lot of your posts (Though I don't eactly know much about you) but wasn't the reason you picked a tanker because you wanted to be the 'tank'?
In other MMO's (Which CoX now seems to be taking after) the tank takes more damage than anything else and keps the team safe by active use of their powers. Letting other characters get slightly more affected by damage so that they are actually in danger, but without completely overpowering everything with death patches is a good way to allow tankers to take advantage of that survivability. 20% unresistable damage on AV's isn't going to have any real effect on squishies which die in 1 hit anyway and will actually put brutes and scrappers in danger slightly, but not by a great deal.
You still won't be able to fall asleep during Marked for Death etc because you will have to pay attention to make sure you save the right person at the right time, and then you will get hurt by the power, so might have to make sure Dull Pain or similar is available for you which makes for a more active tanking style.
If you don't want tankers to tank then that is a different story and I think I know enough to stop the arguement there.
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Originally Posted by Johnny_Butane
"Not faceplanting" is not a unique mechanic.
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Edit: The death patch thing could be set so that if you are actually IN the death patch you take a certain % of damage away from everyone else to the point where most people will probably survive but you might be in a bit of trouble, which means you will have to pay attention even more than now. And bad tanking will be very noticable as it is in other games.
Edit 2: I do agree that you need something to help solo as well, but that can be entirely seperate and wasn't what I was talking about.
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Originally Posted by Aggelakis
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As the point has been made several times, soloing an AV is quite common. Thus far, the only non-trial AV my KM/FA scrapper can't solo would be Akarist, due to his high resistances and regen. Recluse, as of recently, is my latest victory, but it can be a very close call, and I may have had to rez a few times. If we're counting AVs that were made in AE, then throwing a Willpower AV at me will proove to be a hassle, especially if they have RttC.
Considering most things, the bigger achievement would be, as others have said, what difficulty they can do it on, as well as how much they need Incarnate Powers in their builds.
On the subject of Tanks, I doubt they need more damage and/or survivability. Thinking about it, they seem pretty fine as is, and the Bruising condition can help their damage a fair amount, especially if they couple it with a Weapon set to reduce the target's defence, and maybe the Reactive interface to increase that resistance debuff.
The general rule when it comes to classes would be the idea that all of them should be capable of the content availible to them, but not to the point where it robs them of their unique values; by that logic, it should really be possible for all ATs to solo AVs, each one does it in their own way.
That's my two-cents, anyway
Not only is it possible, I would suggest for a scrapper or brute, with IO bonuses - if you can't, it's possible that you need to rethink your build.
That's not to say you should be able to beat EVERY av - but a fire/fire brute really shouldn't have much trouble with say, marauder in Maria Jenkin's arc.
I can say that before lore pets - but after Alpha Cardiac, my katana/invuln soloed Battle Maiden and Marauder. It took about 8 minutes - and the reward wasn't worth the time. But, hey, it's not about the reward sometimes.
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With my DM/SD Scrapper I was able to solo every Praetorian AV in the PI story arc, and this was well before Incarnate stuff came out. Like many Scrappers with high end builds I'm looking for newer obstacles to overcome. Suck as soloing the iTF, which was time consuming, but fun none the less.
Like Ukaserex said. Scrappers and Brutes should not have much trouble with soloing an AV.
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