How is Regen these days?

Originally Posted by IridiumMaster

On the stalker front, I've been soloing +4x8 Dark Astoria content. Total of 2 deaths on Mu Draken arc up to the AV. Woulda been one death if not for a phone call. :/ Bear in mind, this is not for the faint of heart. Requires pretty good concentration / situational awareness to get it done. That said, I'm pretty comfortable saying that this ele/regen stalker can do a lot of things that my Dark/Invuln uber scrapper cannot do. AV soloing is probably not going to work, though, heh. At least at +4x8.

Originally Posted by John_Printemps

I'm not so sure that a well-built Regen Scrapper vs. Brute is going to be that noticeable. Brutes do get an advantage in "throwing their weight around" with nearly 600 more HP potential, but Scrappers also have a higher Regen cap, so at full-throttle their gaps aren't going to be that big. Comparing a Scrapper HP capped vs. a Brute HP capped at ~1700 Regen was 180 hp/s vs. 215 hp/s respectively.

May be a 35 HP difference, but I think the biggest applicable item of interest that really defines the secondary on either AT is the fact that Brute must stay in combat with a target to keep Fury up, and are likely taunting in some fashion in the process. They're inadvertently forcing themselves to take more damage than the Scrapper would have taken. In a sense, the Brute requires that extra breathing room just to function at the same level. In the case with a Scrapper, they can willfully (and rather artfully) skip in and out of combat ("kiting") without any real loss in damage output.

So, in that analysis, I--personally--feel Scrappers get more mileage out of top-end performance versus Brutes.

Originally Posted by John_Printemps

So, in that analysis, I--personally--feel Scrappers get more mileage out of top-end performance versus Brutes.

Originally Posted by Moonlighter

This assumes that the extra Brute staying power doesn't allow them to stand and deliver longer. I find when you are operating at edge cases this is often the case.

High health is protection against the alpha strike or rapid changes in incoming damage which is typically a weakness of Regen. Scrappers are much more susceptible to this. High health also boosts Reconstruction and the heal portion of Dull Pain, thus increasing the character's ability to recover from damage spikes.

It's an interesting discussion. Brutes don't get access to Shadow Meld so that's another factor in Scrapper's favor.

Originally Posted by John_Printemps

Brutes, do to their inherent need to be in-combat, suffer more incoming damage and thus require the larger window of HP just to survive. A Scrapper is in no different a condition than the Brute when dealing with incoming damage, but they have the ability to get out, if need be, and still be at the same level of performance. In a ratio of 2:1, a Brute's Dull Pain or Reconstruction might do twice the amount of a Scrappers, but they're also--generally speaking--taking twice the amount of damage in the process.

Just saying: Unless a Brute Kites like a Scrapper, their excess HP means very little; and in the case that a Brute does Kite, they're effectively lowering their damage output in Fury loss to do so, giving the edge to Scrappers wholly. Kind of like a toss up between Stalkers and Scrappers on Regen. Scrappers have a slightly better opening hand, but Stalkers can deliver meaningfully lethal blows in short bursts and excel at Kiting, even if they don't get the same level of performance that a Scrapper or Brute would.

Originally Posted by Moonlighter

I get what you are saying, but I rarely kite as a scrapper or a Brute unless I am testing my build at edge cases; ie. recently read a Werner post. In fact I set my difficult to be just at the edge of where I would have to kite to do normal content.