Jade_Dragon

I think I'm more concerned about the high end performance. Once a Scrapper has softcapped SR with IOs and a Tanker has softcapped SR with IOs, what has the Tanker got left that continues to give him an advantage? Hit points, certainly. The magnitude of the status protection in Practiced Brawler. Possibly, that Evasion will come sooner, and in fact that all the toggles will come sooner since they will be in his Primary. Anything else?

Sure, the Tanker is soft capped with only SOs, but what do you do with the IOs then?

Unless I misinterpret what you are saying, your argument is, "Super Reflexes doesn't need to be changed for Tankers, because it would suck so badly no one would ever consider it overpowered." Correct?

That was exactly (well, not in those words) what I was saying. I can see that you would probably think the devs would be likely to just release an underpowered Set as it is. I am probably giving them too much credit in thinking they wouldn't, or maybe suggesting what they might do.

I see what you mean. However, the OP did say "that Fury must be making a big impact in the game". You are making the case that much greater against him. I dropped the Fury down to half, you've eliminated it entirely.

I'll also add that the person that quoted me messed up his quote, and now it looks as if his words are what I said. This is made worse by the number of people who have quoted that response without correcting it.

I don't think you understood. Fury does effect psuedo-pets. The devs fixed that some time ago. So the problem now is that Fury is capped at 400% on psuedo-pets, instead of what it is supposed to be. (850%?) What I was saying is that getting about half of your Fury is better than getting none at all.

Also note that previous to this change, Tankers and Scrappers were doing Brute damage with Shield Charge WITHOUT the Fury bonus. So likely the reason you don't see Scrappers going around LR/SCing through groups is because the damage was minimal compared to a Brute with full Fury. Now that they do considerably more (~50% more?) you may actually see some of those LR/SCes through a spawn that way.

Understandable, since the Res is not really well known for Shield. That's kind of what I was trying to say, though, Shield has a big "gap" for Scrappers, because it's a very offense oriented set, but it has a small "gap" for Tankers, because it's not very Resistance or healing oriented. Like, say, Stone. That's bad, but it's not Tankers that are at fault, it's Shield. Not that a more offensive set isn't something that some Tanker players want.

I think in the end, there is still enough advantage to resiliance for the Tanker. A Tanker can leverage Shield to make it possible for him to do what he does, which is wade into a huge spawn and laugh as they try to dent his armor.

Well, I must admit taken out of context, it made me go, "Wait... what?" as well.

Then I had to say, "Ah the OP was talking about with Defense softcapped. And forgetting totally about the Resistances in Sheild".

Which, totally on a non sequitor, is why I suspect we will never see Super Reflexes for Tankers, at least not in its existing form. If we do, it will probably be with reduced Defense, so Tankers can sit at the soft cap without exceeding it, and much greater values on the scaling resistance. A hodgepodge of powers like healing or a debuff/taunt aura might be possible, too.

I'm pretty sure Nihilii's post was sarcasm. "Yes, if you don't count the weaker protection a Scrapper is just as survivable as a Tanker. And if you don't count the weaker damage a Tanker does just as much damage as a Scrapper."

I was also surprised that the higher Resistances of Shield didn't come up as well, but that's why I replied. But yeah, if you eliminate everything that gives the Tanker the advantage in the comparison, obviously the Scrapper looks better.

Note quite. In addition to having less HP than a Tanker, a Scrapper also has 25% less defense. If you soft cap Defense, the Scrapper will have the same Defense as the Tanker. However, the Resistances, healing capabilities and I think Defense Debuff Resistance will be higher. (Actually, no, that's the same, but Tankers do get higher status protection)

So I think the original quote should have been:

"So aside from the HP difference, the greater Resistances, and assuming that I am at the Defense cap and not being debuffed by a foe, the Shield Scrapper is going to have the same survivability as the Shield Tank, right?"

It would be way worse if Brutes did not get Fury on pseudo-pets at all, though...

I suppose the damage could be boosted somewhat so Brutes would be somewhere in the midrange of their damage cap. Boost it too much, though, and SC will do too much damage before the Brute builds Fury. It would probably be easier to come up with a way to give Brute pets a higher damage cap. (Maybe double the damage, and then give the pet a -100% damage debuff? No, scrap that, that would quadruple damage at 300% Fury, and at 400% Fury the damage would be 6x. If we could somehow make the target 50% resistant to the damage it would work, though)

Yeah, this has always been my thought. SR seemed like it was trying to fulfill two concepts, the super speeder or super agile type, like Flash or Spiderman, and the ninja type. Well... like Batman. Sure, Batman is Batman and he can like breathe in space and defeat Superman because he's Crazy Prepared, but it still doesn't quite mesh with me that he is JUST as agile and good at dodging as The Flash. Ninjitsu throws in some gadgets and heals which fits a bit better for me.

I've found that extra 9% defense and the scaling resistances turn the balance a lot more than you think they would. And the devs have a tendency to make that extra 10% Def cost UNGODLY amounts of End. Compare Weave to Combat Jumping, for instance. So SR's three toggles against Nin's two, even though they seem imbalanced for those five powers, actually are okay if you compare the whole set.

Which doesn't mean I wouldn't like the three toggles to be folded into two, it would be really nice for SR to actually get some AoE defense sooner than level 28. I think any chance of that went away when the scaling resistances were added to the passives, instead of making a new power. Cottage Rule and all that.

Okay. No harm done.

It was a joke. It was a non sequitor. I was going off on a rant about power colors because it was off topic. Because the topic was starting to get a little too serious. When I got down to the point, as you pointed out, I said exactly the same thing you said about the Forms being the reason customization is being put off.

I am really sorry if you feel I was being argumentative, but it sounds to me like you are being overly defensive. I don't want you to feel that I'm contradicting you, and I don't want you to feel that I am attacking you. I am in favor of Customization, I'm even trying to make suggestions about how it might work.

Well, while I'd love to see total customization, like on the lines of our costumes, I don't think that'll ever happen. Not because it's not possible, but because it would just overly complicate the interface. OTOH, I did once ask whether or not Kheldian players would be willing to sacrifice a costume slot or two for our Kheldian forms. SoA have a special costume for their first slot, and in fact they get six total, although they can only access five of them. So technically speaking we would use that sixth "locked" costume (which I guess everyone has) for Nova, and devote slot 5 to our Dwarf form. (or vice versa)

It also comes down to what is possible for Granite Form, though. BaBs suggested, since he didn't think he'd be able to customize the Granite costume, replacing that with a normal "accessory" added onto the character's frame. So you would add stone "blocks" to the current costume to "fill out" the Granite Form, essentially covering the character underneath with a coating of stone. This is kind of the concept, in some cases you might want to say your character has transformed into stone, but you could also say he just encased himself in stone for protection.

The problem is, while this would probably work okay for Dwarf form, it wouldn't work on Nova. We could "coat" our normal frame with the Dwarf "costume", and then make our human form invisibile underneath it, but the Nova form uses a totally different skeleton. And I'm not really sure the Dwarf skeleton isn't different enough as it is, it uses the Huge model, which tends to lean forward a bit more. So doing our Forms like Granite might completely change the way they look anyway, maybe still making them look alien, but more based on a humanoid frame.

Even if a solution could be found, there would be the question of what customization we would have through the Power Customization interface. We would have primary and secondary colors to choose from, yes, probably with a limited pallette, but we wouldn't really have the ability to pick and choose individual parts. We might be given a limited number of different "bodies", say three or five, and then get to choose the color. That would be it.

Honestly, I think I would almost rather go back to my original idea of the "weapon accessory", that appeared whenever you went into a combat stance. Say, make it work like a current weapon, where you can choose from a list of different styles, and then pick colors. You don't change all of your character, but because the "accessory" is smaller, it can have a lot more options without overloading the graphics devs. And instead of a weapon, it can be like a gem that appears on your chest, or a gauntlet on your claw, or a swirling "eddy" inside your body. Since you can have two weapons, maybe you could even have your pick of two accessories.

Of course, there is the added complication that the devs have said you can have Weapon customization OR you can have Color customization. OTOH, that's on the same power, I don't know that the devs have said that you can have Weapon customization on one power in a Set, and Color customization on another power in the set. Anyway, the same option could be used for Granite, too, they could keep the current form, but have a couple of "extras" you can add on and colorize for additional individuality.

Well, I was actually SUPPORTING your argument, but if you're going to blindly attack an attempt to inject a little levity into the thread, then maybe I won't any more.

So much for levity anyway...

As Seldon said, this is likely holding up Masterminds, as well. Although it's likely that the problem is even MORE complicated for them, or at least complicated in a different way. (They do signify upgrades with a costume change, though, so that could be the limiting factor)

Well, see, while I like the pulling strategy, and use it, I'm not patient enough to use it all the time. Most of the time I prefer to steamroller into the spawn, instead of making them come to me. With my Thugs/Dark this is simple enough, I just send the Bruiser into the middle of the pack, following immediately with a Fearsome Stare. Between the Stare (it's heavily slotted for -Acc) and healing, if needed, I can keep the Bruiser tanking until he gathers the group to him, then my Enforcers start dropping Blast Clips on them.

Bots/Traps I don't move in so closely, typically I will flank the group with my Assault Bot and one Drone on one side, and the other two Drones on the other. As they open fire, the return fire is split between them. I don't spend a lot of time laying traps, but I do drop an Acid Mortar, and then basically watch for where I am needed. I'm more passive as the MM on my Bots. I pretty much only use Bodyguard when things are going south, and I try to run in and grab aggro myself to save the Bots. (Or the team)

Honestly speaking, 90% of the time I don't need Bodyguard either, that's why only half of the Henchmen on my team are even in that mode. It's just a sense of security, in knowing that even if I draw some aggro, I will be well protected, even better protected than my Bruiser. I've never used the Tankermind strategy, even though I will likely end up using it for my Ninjas/FF once I get her up to higher levels.

I think it comes down to whether you can stand the way the AI acts. If you can't stand it even in Defensive mode, then you likely will prefer the Passive/Attack strategy.

Exactly. It's a balancing act. But the opposite is true, as well. If you concentrate fire on a foe, particularly a Boss, the foes will all aggro on whoever does the most damage. By splitting up their fire, though, your henchmen split up the return fire as well. You already have enough of this with the Arsonist or any Tier 1 that tends to run into melee, they typically die before the battle is over because all fire gets concentrated on them.

It's a matter of personal preference, though. Like whether a single target strategy or an AoE strategy is better for Tankers. And I can choose the target for my henchman to aggro on, I just do it by moving him into aggro range with goto, instead of using the attack order. And I always have attack to fall back on. I just don't direct ALL my pets to attack all at once, just enough to take out the foes I think are the greatest threat.

Oh, and for the Tankermind strategy, that's basically diverting attacks away from the henchmen. If they're taking damage as well as you, that's just going to be too much to handle. Plus, you really can't access all of the HP of your henchmen anyway, because of the way it's divided. You'll start to lose your Tier 1 first, and then Bodyguard pretty much starts to fall apart.

I suspect this is the answer. The sets that now have the slower recharging, heavier hitting behavior also lack Aim and Build Up. Fire being a possible exception, although it's somewhere around the midpoint.

I think this was always true, though. The sets with Power Boost were more seen as supporting the Primary, instead of being more about damage. Energy was boosted to make it no longer the worst there is, period, but it's probably still about single target damage and stacking a lot of stuns.

It's also true, though, that Fire and Thorns, which both have a damage boost, are more AoE oriented. Electric is single target, but it now does less melee damage than before. Even so, it's still the only single target oriented set with a build up.