JJ_Jason

[ QUOTE ]
Jason: He's working on it. It was complicated to get it added.

He's been working on the spreadsheet all this morning.

[/ QUOTE ]

As good as from the man himself. Thanks MissDale. You've got quite a man there. I myself feel lucky to have my Wife play CoH, so I bet he really enjoys it too.

I'll keep checking back. Good numbers are better then fast numbers.

JJ Jason

Yeah, if the Damage Debuff in CE is against all damage types, I can see Ice Tankers finally becoming popular. We may not have defense against Psi/Toxic/Fire, but we 1) don't have a defense debuff to Psi/Toxic and 2) can reduce the damage from Psi/Toxic that we take, and others take.

As I previously posted, this could make Ice Tanks the "Team Friendly" Tank, that Scrappers and others love to group with. As long as the damage reduction is good (50% debuff, yielding a 1/3'rd damage reduction), I think we can make due with the defense pains we've got.

I'm still hoping we get some of our defense back. Especially in EA (like 1% per mob, at least).

My only concern for the Devs, was that the changes they made look horrible, without adding this Damage Debuff into the equation. So while we didn't know it was coming, the defense reduction of Ice Tankers looked overly harsh. Now at least we have more of the picture, to know what to expect.

Perhaps Circ could try to figure into his Excel sheet, what level of Damage Debuff we would need to match up with Invincibility tanks? We ask so much of him... I'm almost afriad to ask.

[ QUOTE ]
Oh - one other change coming soon to the Training Room...

This was an idea taken right from this forum. Since Ice Armor has no Resistance, it's a zero sum sort of power set. In other words, you're hit or your not. Well, someone (I've forgotten who) suggested adding a Damage Debuff to one of the powers - and we did! Chilling Embrace gains the ability to debuff mob damage (though it's Recharge debuff is slightly slower now).

[/ QUOTE ]

* Blink *

I remember posting this on the original EA changes post, for I4... Good gravy, it was heard?

I'll just wait to see some numbers on how good the reduction is, but you again have my attention.

Thank you.
Posted here first...

Wow... And I had my hopes up that States had addressed Ice Tank problems.

1st, thank you for at least posting that it is a "known issue" that Ice tanks are the weakest Tank, and a good bit below the others. Now just for those fixes:

Are the changes above for Ice Tanks only? If not, everybody will love them. But Ice doesn't take special advantage of this. In fact, since Ice is supposed to be the "best" at defense, we stand the best chance of flooring a mobs chance to hit us. Thus, lowering Accuracy makes it easier for us to do that, but helps everybody else MORE.

Ice tanks on LIVE are currently having problems with AV's and Monsters and accuracy [censored]'s. We currently have tons of defense to throw at them. Assuming a good Ice tank has the AV down to 5%, we are still currently getting squished by them if they hit us one time (for some of them). Now take I5 into account, and lower our defense. No change to AV damage, thus unless we can try to maintain that 5% chance for the AV to hit us, they are now more likely to instantly kill us. Lower their To-Hit (as you post here), and we're back down to 5%... but still no better off then on live, which is a KNOWN ISSUE as to problems Ice Tankers are having.

I understand that you don't want to throw the whole set into chaos. But really... Permafrost. 'Nuff said. Hibernate?

I love the ideas for damage debuffing from Ice Tanks. I love the idea that Hibernate would be our "unstoppable" click-power for late game AV's. I love the idea that you could introduce resistance inspirations. I love the idea that Permafrost could give me a fancy looking aura and make loud sucking sounds on my PC and still do more then it currently does.

But lowering mob To-Hit, as a Helping Hand for Ice Tanks? I'm not feeling the love.

I can understand that some people are not very happy with the new comic... There are still some issues with it, that may not have been done as well as we'd like.

But overall, I think the new series is much better then the Blue King run.

Some people have indicated that they think the old series better represented the "game" we played. But every time they tried to do that, it seemed so forced that it broke my suspension of disbelief.

In the span of what, 12 comics, our trio fights as many as 5 or 6 Archvillans. Assuming they are whatever "level" they needed to be, I found it highly wrong to see them hande Archvillans so easily. The Carnie AV kicked them around, but reading the last issue, and watching them take out THREE 5th Column AV's, all at the same time??

To me, the problem was that it was a comic series about "nothing", with little more then some light romantic play hinted at for two of the leads. They take down baddies, and they call it a day. The Juror two part was more of a story, but it had no depth to why Malta was doing what they were doing.

I enjoy the new stories, because the characters themselves feel more human. I think I can suspend disbelief long enough to say that, as people used to being super-powered, they would be horribly humbled by the loss of said powers.

Not so sure that "all crime" has stopped, but at least super-powered crime has stopped. The police still exist, mind you.

The "God" connections with Zeus and Prom. is not the direction I expected at all, but I'll stay tuned to learn more.

So write on, and I'll be waiting for Issue 3.

[ QUOTE ]
Nothing special. Other than GA with +perception and an WI with improved Res to Slow... Slot resistance that doesn't work againts caltrops and swarms because... Well... Because they're auto-hit, and 6-8 slows is all we can handle. Oh! And the changes to Hibernate, a power that still as useless as ever.

[/ QUOTE ]

Thanks for the update LeMoi. Playtesting my Ice tank since I4 hit, and all is as you say. Now, I can't complain that EA is broken in the defense we get. I was still able to heard a portal mission of level 50-52 Paragon Protectors, in groups of 40+. I have FA now, but only use it for AV's and Monsters, so between WI, Tough and EA, I still had no problems with large numbers of higher level mobs.

So why'd we change EA again? So I couldn't do that? Didn't change a thing.

I'm still hoping that they didn't decide that it's not worth the time to "fix" EA so the drain and taunt still work. But thanks to some farming of said Paragon Protectors, Nanoc is 48. And I'm of the mind that no significant changes will come to Ice tanks before he hits 50.

Another patch to the Training Room. Another big goose-egg for Ice tanks. I'm so glad I talked my wife out of rolling an Ice tank, and that she decided to go Invulnerability. They're so good, they even have Resist Nerf as a power!

I hope they don't water Inv tankers down further. Just show some love to the other sets.

Oh, and my burn tanker also says thanks... At least he runs with a controller, so I don't have to worry about the mobs running out of burn now.

Now just to wait for some sort of "Epic" AT for Tanks. Perma-Unstoppable, Burn and Rooted in a single set! Uber-Tank (tm).

Ok, somebody who is lucky enough to be home, tell me if they did any of the following:

1. Increased the number of mobs EA can affect (more then 5)
2. Fixed the "bug" where EA doesn't endo drain off a mob that isn't one of the affected mobs
3. Changed anything else in Ice on Live or Training that may indicate they tried to help Ice out

I'm hoping for an updated Training Room "now testing" post, but I won't hold my breath.

And if they do push a new patch to the Training Room, and it still hasn't got a single change for Ice, then I guess we can just spam PM's to the Devs, and I'll start a "why the devs hate our Ice tanking guts" thread.

Those seem to get Dev attention, instead of the locking/ignoring they deserve.

[ QUOTE ]
Not necessarily a reply to anybody here, but I was just curious if we have any confirmation or not about EA's change coming about due to the ... poor ... testing ground that was used to investigate regen last week or so?

[/ QUOTE ]

Not a word. Since Stateman dropped in and said they'd look into Tankers, we haven't heard anything else. EA is still the same on the test server as it has been since they added Issue 4. We still have this sticky thread, but all 15 of the posting Ice tankers have stopped posting in almost all the Ice threads.

We're currently waiting for changes to test, and hoping we get a boost, instead of others being taken down to our level.

Woot! Another patch hits test!

Oh... still no Ice changes. Unless my chilling aura was speeding recharge rate in PVP. Thanks for the fix.

[ QUOTE ]
First off, I think that JJ_Jason is completely insane (no offense intended *grin*) for not taking GA/FA. On my ice tank, I still take quite a bit of the alpha, and I imagine that JJJ takes 90% of it. If you don't think the alpha from 2 spawns is enough to drop a tank in a large group, you're simply incorrect.

[/ QUOTE ]

Crazy like a fox... but I also have perma-Group Invisibility. I can fire off EA before the mobs turn on me. Thus, the Alpha-strike hits post-EA defense.

God bless duos!

Jackdrek, I'm glad you decided quote every line you've ever said about our "weaknesses". But it's not the spirt of your posts.

I never said I tanked Siege (+4 to me), and managed to floor his accuracy at 5%. He hit much more often then that. He hit me quite a bit more then that. I'd bet more in the range of 50-75% of the time. For 20 or 25 minutes of continuous combat. And that's with multiple debuffs to his accuracy. With any fight against an AV/Monster, after the first 30 seconds, nearly all nearby minions/lt/bosses will be dead. EA draws from one target, and thus only as good as that when fighting AV/Monsters

I expect an AV at that level to hit right past my defense for most attacks. I've told you I'm not a "pure" defense build, since I don't run FA/GA. At 47, I just took FA, to help manage situations with AV's and Monsters.

But what I AM saying, is that only with Tough (yeah, the Resistance buff), did I survive the attacks that hit me. Energy Transfer was a bear, and did over 1/2 my hit points in a single hit. Followed up by whirling hands, he'd have me in the red or orange.

Tough kept me alive in that fight. Tough is from a Power Pool. The devs have always maintained that Power Pool powers should not be a requirement for an AT to do their "job".

The other point we made, is that even with a full defense build, with 6 slots of defense in WI and FA and EA, and the changes on Test... an AV/Monster will still one-shot you, at even level. Defense may floor them at 5%, but the one shot that goes thru can kill you.

When I said I get a "decent" boost from just two guys, I look at it as 60% defense. I have some defense slotted into EA, so that should be fine. But that's only against mobs who don't have uber-Accuracy. Or any of the other situations we mentioned where Defense suffers.

We don't need 500% defense? Then why take it away? If, as you claim, there is never a need because we're always maxed out anyway, why nerf EA? On live I see fights where my defense is not flooring all at 5%. These are normal door missions we're talking about here, set to invincible. With FA, I expect even fewer hits... But DE could still drop frightining amounts of Acc+, and then EA is my only protection worthwhile.

Ok, the horse is dead, and that's fine. Just remember...

Invulnerability tankers can slot for 95% Resistance vs all but Psionic. 100% of the time. Why shouldn't Ice tanks have 95% defense 100% of the time? It's the least they can do. Then, we can try to balance out the AV/Monster issues, and be given our due as equals among Tanks.

[ QUOTE ]
You want it to not be about supposition? Get hard numbers. High random samples that show that you're getting hit more than 5% of the time, using EA only, by +4 bosses or lower. Yes, that's an awful lot of work, but players do that sort of testing.

[/ QUOTE ]

Hard numbers? You really haven't seen any of the info Arch and Circ have been using, have you?

You want experience? How about Nanoc. From level 26-47, he's never had Frozen Armor, or Glacial Armor. He picked up tough around 30, and slotted it from there. I've played at least 50-100 hours getting to where I am now. Wet Ice, and EA. Nothing more for defense.

Over the weekend, on live, I had a chance to play with my SG, and do some very high level missions. I tanked the AV Seige at +4 (after SK). After beating on every minion/Lt/Boss group from a 7 man group, without much problem, he knocked me around quite a bit. Thanks to two Rad's (one controller, one defender) a storm defender and a kinetics defender (increased density), I had reasonable resistance to him. Oh, and an Empath. I had a team of Defenders boosting me with everything they had. And he still nearly took me out. With two scrappers tearing into him, it took us around 20 min to take him out. I kept aggro on him the whole time, because I think it's wrong to have regen take over for me.

Do I think EA will now be worthless? It would have been in that mission. Instead of my worry about the AV, the normal packs would have knocked me out too.

In closure, with the current (live) state of EA, a level 46 Ice Tank, with WI, Tough and EA, can Tank mobs of level 52-53, in large packs (7 man spawn). Those mobs use energy blasts and energy melee. I still got hit, but with a good healer and lots of debuffs going around, I could manage. But I did survive alpha-strikes, because I could hit EA before they attacked me. Is this special for Ice?

Every other type of Tank can currently do what I just described. And likely, need fewer buffs to do it. And can Tank AV's and Monsters.

If they changed things to how they are on the Test server? Limit me to 5 targets? We've already had many posts on the limits that will place on us. I doubt I could manage what I did Sunday. Would I need to take FA and GA to compensate. Sure. There go two more powers I currently have.

Why are we calling you a Troll? Because you seem to be defending the idea that Ice is just fine, and EA needs toned down. If you feel EA needs toned down, you are entitled to your opinion.

But unless you've played an Ice Tank, please don't lecture us about how good we have it. Your time as a SR Scrapper gives you insight, but that hardly makes you an expert on Ice Tankers. I would be equally wrong to say that SR Scrappers play like a my Ice Tank does, with fewer hitpoints. I know very little about their set, so I don't go on their threads. And I don't try to take a "positive" thread, looking for creative ideas to help a set, and try to inject a need for hostile defense.

[ QUOTE ]
- And finally: This is the last time I reply to one of your comments. All you're doing now is trolling... Or at least it looks that way since you do nothing to find information about the issue (Information that is all over this thread, Tanker's forum and player guides' forum), and you're basing all your argument in nothing but suppositions.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yeah, I'm with you on that LeMoiCavalier...


/signed

[ QUOTE ]
To be completly honest at this point I would be perfectly happy if they take away the EA nerf on test and did nothing else. I love my Ice tank on live right now just the way it is. While some smash/lethal resists would be nice, I can fully admit right now that I dont need it.

[/ QUOTE ]

I followed your link, and saw the post where you listed your build.

First, congratz on hitting 50! I'm getting very excited, since Nanoc was my first character from the Beta, and my first on live. A year (and many alts) later, he's almost 50.

However, to your point that Ice is just fine as it is... Since I'm assuming you made the last few levels to 50 post Issue 3, can I ask how you handled AV's and Monsters? And Quartz from DE or Rularuu?

I'll admit that I avoid DE now if at all possible. I've done enough missions to get Kora, but doubt I'd fight Rularuu otherwise... Even against +3 Rularuu I seem to do ok with WI and EA as is, but they nail me more then any other mob type I've seen.

But it's the AV/Monster group that still has me worried. I'm going to start the "Hero's Hero" thread, and there is nothing but AV's in each and every mission. And for some reason, they all seem fixed at level 48. My little 46 rear isn't going to try that foolishness till at least 47, and only 47 with a dedicated empath, and some friends.

I'm burned out from this week, so excuse my small vent here. I'm starting to worry that changes to Ice won't happen till I retire Nanoc. I'm starting to worry that only the change to EA will be coming, and good Ice changes will be too late for me.

And if that's the case? To heck with it... I'll make 50 before I4, and start working on other characters.

Edit: States posted on one of the other Threads, saying that all defensive sets are being looked at. I'll keep my fingers crossed.

[ QUOTE ]
in short- up the 'max drained' to 10, lower the per foe def buff to 15%, remove the endurance drain aspect entirely, and add in a 45 second damage debuff. The endurance drain is a joke, and not even a good one- so let's replace it with a team-friendly effect that won't stop alphas (so that'll be our bane) but -will- help us tank medium-to-large sized groups without much worry. We won't be able to herd maps, but we will be able to handle AVs better, and make us -desired- for those fights.

[/ QUOTE ]

I think your idea for putting the Damage debuff in EA instead of something like CE would be interesting. Since it would stay on them for a length of time and not require they stay in range to be debuffed, it could be more useful since we wouldn't be locked in place.

Drop the endo drain in EA? I'm all for it, but I know others who use it. They slot it with tons of Endo drain, and recharge rate. I have a feeling that EA is our "other" controller-like power. But it's very weak for this use, since you are nearly required to hit mobs with EA twice to negate their endo.

But if you decrease the "per mob" bonus, and increase the cap, does that really help us? Now if I only have one or two mobs I can hit in a group, I get a decent boost. Your change would require I hit even more people to get a reasonable defense boost. And if my debuff is also in EA, then I can only debuff mobs who happen to be in range of the EA blast, when I use it. Not all groups stay that close to eachother. Putting our new "boost" in a power we really need to survive, seems like we'd shoot ourselves in the foot. Do I want defense from this group? Or do I hold off so I can debuff them.

And you say this would increase our desirability for AV fights, but not solve the Alpha-strike issue. If I'm not playing my Tanks, I'd be less inclined to invite an Ice Tank to an AV fight, knowing they could so quickly fall to one-shotting. A damage debuff is supposed to keep that from happening, directly from AV's and Monsters.

True, the need to boost your defense is even greater then normal. I suppose you'll have to slot more into FA/GA. Rage will have it's changes made, and this is another time when we deal with defense debuffs. On a positive note, at least you have more control as an Ice tank regarding your defense. If Rage debuffed your resistance instead, would the other Tanker sets be worse off?

Who knows...

Also, the latest patch (4/19) mentions only that some Ice powers for slow weren't working as expected, but says nothing of the Tanker Ice Primary. I guess we'll see next week if the next patch is ready to make changes, or if they're still just tweaking PvP.

Ok, your use of hibernate is a bit clearer to me now.

You use Icicles, and I would bet CE slotted for taunt (as I do), or some taunt in Icicles too. You dump a ton of aggro most of the battle, and as you said, as long as you don't have a blaster in the party, you'll hold aggro for something like 10 seconds.

I've got Phantasams in my group 24-7, and Rad fields out too. Unless I feel like sleeping on the couch, I can't let those bring aggro back to my wife's controller, while I'm sitting in Hibernate. I shouldn't generalize my experience with what other grouping Tanks see.

I guess I'm just disappointed that Hibernate doesn't work for me and my groups. But I'd wager that most Ice tanks here wouldn't mind something with a bit more utility. Something that we could always use with groups, not just with "non-blaster/non-aggro Defenders and Controller" groups.

I'm a Tanker, and you won't take any damage if I can help it.

Crenson,

So what you're saying is that Hibernate allows you to survive against AV/Monsters, and you maintain aggro because you slotted more then the initial slot of Taunt, with Taunt duration.

But that doesn't help you one bit from an Alpha-strike. You have no time to react to a nuke. If the Monster/AV is in "Nuke" animation, and you see the animation going, it's already registered as a hit, or a miss. One-shotted and down.

What you suggest sounds like you are trying to taunt an opponent, then hibernate while the taunt lasts. Then come back out and Taunt again, waiting to toss on Hibernate once it comes back recharged. If the nuke hits while you are Hibernating, you'll be untouched.

You can use it when grouping, but you're still just using it as a glorified rest power. You manage it with Taunt highly slotted, and Hibernate. But I don't want to be resting with the battle going on around us. I want to be mixing it up.

I've never found, in testing my new PvP build, that Hibernate in PvE maintains aggro. They seem about as taunted as they normally are, and lose interest in me after 5-10 seconds of attack. Perhaps if I dedicate additional slots to taunt, and heal to hibernate, I could drop in and be done with Hibernate quickly enough to manage.

But you're welcome to Hibernate as it is. Like I said, it does have it's uses. I just wanted to point out that while you use it, you are not managing aggro. A new group that drops in, or a boss that teleports into the group, is going to ignore you like the big block of ice you are.

And I'll have to try cycling Hibernate against an AV, to see what it does...

edit: Saw your edit, Cren. I didn't realize I was so rare to use only WI, EA and Tough. Sappers past level 41 are easy enough, since a single hold will stop them. But I'll admit that my duo makes Ice work much better. My wife is an Ill/Rad controller. Nothing like using confuse on a Sapper, and letting them use that nasty power to help you instead. I also avoided FA because EA did everything I needed in door missions with group spawns. It has made things tough with AV/Monsters, but the Rad fields give me bonus Defense, and Damage Debuff. I do intend to take FA at 47, to help with the AV/Monsters I now face.

[ QUOTE ]
(In response to those who don't like Hibernate)

Don't touch my Hibernate!

[/ QUOTE ]

Ravenlute, I understand that you enjoy Hibernate the way it is. I'm not saying the power doesn't have it's uses. It was one of the things I enjoyed adding to my PVP build, since I wasn't about to take Phase Shift, so I that I am nearly unkillable in a 1 on 1 match. (Now that I, like what seems to be everybody else, pack about 10 Break Frees)

Got me down in HP? Hoarfrost... got me down again? Hibernate till Hoarfrost is back up.

In PVE, Hibernate is not without use or value. Others have also argued that Hibernate is apart of their PvE builds, and they use it a few times during a night.

My dislike for the power, as it currently is, is that it goes directly against the Tankers defined role. And I say defined role because every change made to "improve" tanks, such as swaping Provoke for our in-set Taunt, was made to allow us to better draw aggro from large groups. It even says on the AT selection screen that our job is to protect others by drawing enemy fire.

Most uses of Hibernate seem to require a Solo tank (where it's a form of combat "Rest"), or with a second tank (or pets) who will take on Aggro when the Ice tank hibernates.

Unstoppable allows you to tank anything and laugh as they try to take you down, but you are vulnerable when it wears off. Granite Armor makes you a defensive juggernaut, at the cost of offense. Rise of the Phoenix may require your death, but if you die, you can blast things around you for massive damage, and reclaim aggro.

Each fills the role of keeping the Tank knee-deep in aggro, or able to continue tanking against more damage then usual.

Hibernate is the only Tank level 32 power that by definition, removes your ability to maintain aggro.

I can taunt, then hibernate. But once the taunt wears off, my friends are screwed. And nobody wants to hear "hey, the Tank is hibernating, STOP ATTACKING!".

The idea that it gives you a huge Defense and Resistance buff for 2 mintues, then freezes you solid (as currently done) for 15-30 seconds, would follow the same idea as other level 32 powers, and yet be our own unique power. Hibernate would be much like Rage, where everybody needs to know that when you Hibernate, you'll be kicking rear, but when over, you're out of the fight for a bit.

Until they change Hibernate to be useful for grouping tanks, I will ask for changes to the power.

[ QUOTE ]
1) EA scaled based on underlings/minions/lts/bosses/monsters/AVs
2) Permafrost gained 10% to smash/lethal/cold/fire
3) CE could take two routes: A) My preference would be for a major increase in the attack rate reduction of enemies; there doesn't have to be a new attack rate reduction enhancement, but CE's effect should be increased to maybe 30% (not sure what it's at right now); or B) a Damage or Accuracy Debuff. Or maybe but the Dmg or Acc Debuff on Icicles, so it has to hit, and also have an increase in CE's attack rate reduction.

[/ QUOTE ]

Well, I think some of these ideas have merit, but chances are still on the low side. I'm still keeping my hopes up that the "number of mobs affected" will be upped past 5, to say, 10.

As for our fixes to Ice, I think S/L in Permafrost would be nice, but would need 6 slots to be worthwhile. And I'd still want tough, so there is another 6 slotted power. And if I'm not trusting EA for all my defense, do I need to 6 slot FA and perhaps GA right? And how about those slots in Icicles I need for that power to be worthwhile.

As it is now, I like that Ice needs few slots to be effective. I'd made it from 26 to 44 without more then two slots in EA (End/Def/Permahaste). CE needs no slots since we can't slot for recharge reduction. And I got rid of Icicles before they fixed the endo cost on it, so I'm used to not having it. No FA or GA, and I've done fine.

Taking the punch out of EA just means more reliance on FA/GA. Perhaps that's what they had in mind...?

[ QUOTE ]
Oh, speaking of hitting streaks, this happened about one second after I taunted the Freakshow. I thought I didn't even have a chance to use EA before that, but you can see the message indicating that it went off.

[/ QUOTE ]

I also notice that most of the hits at the end of that string are ranged hits. Is it possible that these attacks had all started before you hit EA, then nailed you after EA was up? Your defense would have been weak when they made the attack roll, then blasted thru by the time it boosted your defense.

Which is still an issue with alpha-strikes and Ice tanks. If you can't lay down EA, your main defense power is sitting there wasted. And a room of Freak Tanks can smack you around. Resistance doesn't care where you are in the room, or if you fired off some power or another.

Without invisibility (Stealth... for a Tank?) of some form, we're at risk. Other Tanks have resistance to protect them, and then turn up their hardiness by being close (Fire/Damage, Inv/Invulnerability). Stone gets Defense and Resistance up-front anyway. Yes, even a debuff in Chilling Aura won't protect us from that, so god help us.

Btw, did a respec on the Training Server. Tried running with my Ice Armors (FA/GA), and no Tough. For those of you who said you don't run Tough all the time, I truely feel for you. You have perseverance beyond my ken. Never burned healing insperations like that before.

Much better post on that one Havok.

I agree, even if I don't have the numbers myself, that Ice feels heavy on endurance. Just a gut feeling on that one, but not really a drawback if we get something better out of it.

But for your contention that Defense scales better then Resistance, I think the numbers support that on the long run. But a fight is all about short-term probibility.

Hit a resistance tanker at 90% resistance with 10,000 points of damage, and they take 1000 points of damage. No attack I know of deals that kind of damage, yet a Inv. Tank would actually survive the attack!

Yes, the Defense heavy Ice tank has a much smaller chance of being hit by that one mega-hit. But we have a 0% chance of surviving it. Level 50 Tanks with perma-hoarfrost don't have half that much in hit points.

In the long run, Defense should even out, and may be better then Resistance. I bet that's why we do just fine vs large packs of +2/+3 mobs, that you would expect to see in invincible level missions. But AV's and Monsters don't attack us 1000 times with a 10k damage attack. They may use it two times a fight. Assuming we manage to floor them at a 5% to hit, against two killer attacks, we have a little less then a 10% chance of being hit by the first or the second. And dead we would be.

Resistance also gives a slower rate of being killed. One mega-hit, and I'm dead. Only a rez brings me back. A Tank hit for 1000 hit points, who survives the mega-hit, may have a healer available, or heal inspirations, to bring them back up to full. Spreading damage over time gives your natual healing rate more time to help you as well. And your spread-sheet lists 6 defense SO's in EA. You mention that 5 is still enough to floor mobs... but looking at the data, you've invested a lot in the defense buff of EA. Level 44 and prior, I had but a single SO of defense in EA. Knowing what may be coming, I've added a few slots of Defense to EA, but with a Defense/Recharge/Endo Red blend. With the cap, I am required to dedicate slots to Defense buff for EA, so I get the most of my 5, instead of just rounding up a few more mobs for a pull.

[ QUOTE ]
I keep refreshing the Training Room forum, to see if they've patched a new update.

[/ QUOTE ]

Now Testing in the Training Room as of 4/13/05:
http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showf...part=1#2092861




And nothing yet... I suppose there aren't any other major "changes" to powers listed, so we're still in a holding pattern. I do hope we get to test some Ice power changes. Just gotta be patient, I suppose.

[ QUOTE ]
But... it's got nothing to do with Ice Armor or Energy Absorption. So, it really doesn't belong here.

[/ QUOTE ]

Archimedes, I see you and I are watching this thread very closely... I thought I'd have the first post back.

I keep refreshing the Training Room forum, to see if they've patched a new update.

/e reads a book to pass the time

[ QUOTE ]
Ok I posted this in the Tanker Forum but I'm posting it here also.

BTW Kali there is virtually no way for you to tell the difference between the old EA and the new EA. You're flooring the foe ACC either way (at least if you are slotting properly).

[/ QUOTE ]

Umm... good breakdown on the numbers. But two things:

1. KaliMagdalene does have a valid point. Saying "if you slot it properly" doesn't change the point he is making. With a mob cap, you cannot simply floor the Acc of any mob you face. Those who have attacks that break thru high defense, and are themselves higher level foes, will still be able to get in shots. Somebody had also mentioned DE Quartz as an issue, and we have to KNOW that it's floored, since right now that's all we have.

2. No offense, please... but why post this on the Tanker forum? Or for a thread on EA? If you mean to equate Regen Scrappers with Ice Tankers, I think you'll be better off posting in the Regen thread. Ice Tankers are much more akin to SR scrappers then Regen, and they face the same problems we do, with fewer hit points. Changes are ongoing to Regen, and I do not want to see the Regen issue bleed over into our questions with EA and Ice Tanks in general.

Personally, I feel Tanks should be taking the alpha-strike from an AV/Monster (assuming Phantom Army isn't available). Scrappers with enough resistance can do what I can not. Scrappers with no resistance have it even worse then we do now.

Let's see if we can fix up Ice. The devs are obviously watching the regen thread on their own.