StratoNexus

Sonic, Empathy, and Kinetics can also provide that status protection to others. FF, Sonic, Traps, and Rad are the only sets that can grant themselves protection from status (resistance in the case of Rad). If all defenders have status protection, those sets lose an advantage, thus some of their desirability is lost.

I also just happen to think this a decent weakness and one that defenders currently have to plan for, therefore it would be a big playstyle change if they could ignore the issue. I'd prefer to keep the playstyle similar, with mitigation being active and thought needing to be put into how to approach the spawn, as opposed to scrapperlock. Its also nice that this is an area where a defender/corruptor is dependent on a tank to keep mezzes off them or another buffer to protect them.

Bad strike force design (just the last mission, the rest of it is fine) should not dictate the majority of the game experience. Most teams do not include 7 corruptors and therefore that is highly abberant behavior and has little impact on overall play experience.

Blasters, scrappers, and brutes will still be the premier damage dealers and will still be highly desirable to play and to include on a team.

I think the point is that mobs hit with -Res are dead, making them significantly less dangerous.

I may be misremembering. I thought the developers said they felt that slows were controls, which is why they originally had the controller value higher. They changed the defender value to be the same, due to the primary/secondary complaints, but I do not recall them stating a change in opinion as to it being a control or debuff (which is probably a pointless semantic debate anyway).

Overpowered is probably not the best word, more like oddly powered. Way too much offense which is countered by the lower mitigation (until you team it up with mitigation). Fulcrum Shift's offensive buff, IMO, is too high, on all ATs, with all powersets. Its synergy with higher damage sets makes sense and is not the problem, IMO.

If synergy was bad, Storm/Dark would a major problem.

Its a matter of perspective. Isn't -perception a debuff, yet you did not argue that I called that a control. You aren't wrong, but I would not call someone who included slows as a control wrong either (the devs call it a control, or at least they did).

No, but six out of nine is most.
I see this when I look at TA:
Disruption - debuff
Acid - debuff
PGA - debuff

Flash - control (with a debuff)
Entangling - control
Glue - control
Ice - control
OSA - control (with a debuff)
EMP - control (with a debuff)

I am not sure of the details, but regardless, the game has changed dramatically since that time.

Increasing the damage of these two ATs to the levels I have suggested is not going to be a huge or dramatic shift into overpowered, stomps on blaster/scrapper/stalker/brute toes land.

It will be a noticeable and significant improvement. It will have big impact on soloing, which is important for all defenders, even Rad, Storm, Kin, Dark, TA, Traps, and Sonic. I believe it will also have a big impact on how the blasts are used and perceived in a team. It will not obviate the desire for blasters and scrappers, as those ATs will still have better damage and better caps (and for my previously mentioned playstyle reasons) which will be enhanced by those same defender/corruptor buffs/debuffs.

Increasing their hitpoints will not turn them into armored ATs nor will it obviate the need for good aggro control nor will it make them unkillable. It will aid in survival, it will allow for more margin for error, it will allow these ATs to be slightly bolder, and it will aid in differentiating them from the pet/control ATs.

I know you are generalizing and talking to more than just me, but I want to be clear: I think defenders are fun and powerful as is.

I think you are overrating the impact an analysis of defender vs controller vs corruptor power levels would have on Castle for several reasons. First, I think a paper analysis of how these sets play and interact with the game environment is far too unreliable because of how they actually play out in game and I think Castle would feel the same way. Second, I think a paper analysis would show defenders to be at least on par and in several cases even well ahead. Frankly, its not productive to my cause to do a paper analysis since I believe defenders are freaking awesome. Third, I believe a paper analysis might be a good way to show that Empathy needs a buff in relation to Rad (which I do not believe, but am using just as an example), but is a terrible way to demonstrate that defenders need a buff in relation to controllers. Finally, I do not believe I am saying that defenders need a buff in relation to or because of (insert other AT here). I think defenders need a buff because of the content they face and because the types of things they do on teams should be perceived in a better light than I believe they are.

I guess I could do a paper analysis showing what a defender needs to do to complete a solo mission and claim that it is too "difficult" (slow, mostly). However, I am much more concerned with how the blasts are percieved and utilized (or, as I believe, underutilized) on teams. Once again, I think a paper analysis might just show that defender blasts are, in many cases, very productive and useful to teams, so that would probably be counter-productive once again.

You might be right. I have this bizarre idea that he might be constantly looking at some of this information as part of his job. I think its posisble, although I am probably just being conceited, that he might look at the forums sometimes to gauge some ideas as to why the information in front of him is what it is. Since I do not have that information, I can only go by what my, possibly wildly abberant, experience teaches me. I will then say what I think based on that. If Castle happens to have datamining that shows an issue, then he might be able to look at the forums and correlate my (and others) griping (or praise) with said information.

I like defenders a lot. When I start forming a team, they are usually my go-to, first choice. As such, I see defender population quite frequently. When all the defenders available are teamed, I'll move to tankers and then controllers (I will freely admit to a bias against controllers, which is why they are my damage mitigation choice of last resort). I make a lot of tanker players happy, I am sure, but thats just because I can't get a defender more often than I like.

One, I play the game and enjoy discussing it. I do not like when it becomes work and so I avoid doing anything that is remotely like work. Two, I might be smart enough to do an analysis, but I am not trained enough. Three, I think the main thing that needs to be looked at here is unavailable to any non-developer.

Neither. He will take his own information seriously, and perhaps we can influence where he looks. So much of the analysis of defenders is far too subjective to use numbers as evidence of anything. Armored AT mitigation is much easier to calculate. Attack chains when you have just one set are easy. What is the difference in mitigation of Radiation Infection and Dispersion Bubble? What about if the FF defender is about to use a cone? What about in a big room with the spawns spread out? Which is better, Fortitude on the two blasters or a Stormy herding a room together with 'cane? Which is 7% better? What does 12% more mitigation mean in those situations?

I like being foolish!

Why would anyone do that? Do you think an analysis like that is going to matter to a developer? I certainly would not take on an undertaking like that just to soothe you.

Are defenders fun for a large portion of the playerbase? Only the devs have the datamining to know that. All I can do is add a datapoint and a voice for my beliefs. Detailed power-power analysis are much more useful for intra-AT balance, but not very important when it comes to inter-AT power levels. The primary things that matter there are rewards earned/time and relative population. That is a massive undertaking prone to major error with our limited knowledge. Only the devs can know, without major time invested (and even they have to spend some time). All we can do is suggest they look and tell them why we think they should spend the time looking.

I do not think defenders are underpowered, especially if they are played full tilt. I did not think blasters were underpowered pre-I11, especially when played full tilt. I do not think scrappers were underpowered before they decided to modify tons of animation times.

If you do a paper analysis of defenders, I think you will find that they hold their own quite well. If you play them very well, they will hold their own. If you get in game with the average defender player, they will keep one Fort on the Granite Tanker, CM at the beginning of (or between) missions, require the whole team to stop moving for 12-20 seconds to put RAs up less frequently than they could be, heal people barely hurt, and in general not shoot stuff a lot.

Or they will spam Radiant Aura, require the whole team to stop moving for 12-20 seconds to put AM up less frequently than it could be, throw out LR when the tanker is trying to move the spawn so now they are all running too slowly to gather reasonably, put their toggles up every fifth spawn on a minion sure to die first, no Fallout because they do not like powers that require a dead teammate, they will use Mutation and be proud that it recharges so fast because they slotted it for recharge, and in general not shoot stuff a lot.

Its not all that surprising that so many people think controllers are better. After all, the average controller player will lock a whole spawn in place, preventing good use of AoEs, throw out single target holds on minions who won't hurt the team anyway, be totally incapable of preventing even one Fake Nem or PP from using their annoying near end of life powers, spend time attacking one target with their immob and Sands of Mu, use an AoE immob on a spawn the tanker is trying to gather up, and in general not buff/debuff stuff a lot. But everytime they stun a whole spawn, people think its impressive and it is extremely visible. Everytime they AoE immob a whoe spawn, people think it is impressive and it is extremely visible.

No one notices that the two blasters do not die, even when they split from the group, because of the bubbler. No on cares that they do not get stunned becasue of CM. No one notices Frost Breath on the whole spawn + BiB on the boss, + Freeze Ray on the Lt. (and if they do, they think it's a controller anyway).

Plant/Storm!

Solo is definitely not a big deal to me at all. It sounds to me like you are arguing that defenders should not be able to solo even remotely close to the same speed as any other AT. You may not be intending to say that, but you are coming awfully close to actually saying it.

Solo, at the 0.8 damage mod, dropping Freezing Rain on every other spawn (or every spawn with good recharge, but now we are starting to talk endgame) and then unleashing your blasts is not all that dramatic. We are talking less than blaster damage after setting up the debuff. It certainly is no big deal to me if a defender can solo at 90% to 110% of the speed of any other AT.

On teams, I still believe scrappers and blasters would be popular, just because people want to play them and they have a different feel. After all, if people only played the best, wouldn't everyone be MMs, Fire/Rads-Kins, and Sonic/Rads?

Also, the time a scrapper needs to approach a spawn is actually irrelevant, except for the last spawn (and even then it is probably irrelevant). The defender is going to eventually need to traverse the same distance anyway, just to keep moving through the mission and the defender will also lose time to active mitigation techniques (although many armored ATs also use active mitigation, so that may be a wash, although I think it the armored ATs do have an advantage in needing active mitigation a bit less often). Defenders will also probably spend time moving OUT of melee range with many enemies.

It must be considered. You can't just ignore it. That being said, I think its effect is overblown and should not prevent a damage increase.

I am interested in seeing why I am wrong, but simply flashing some numbers going 1.3*X without considering things like tabbing through a spawn to find which target you will toggle, the animation time of the power itself, the fact that you aggrod without dealing any damage, the enemies you have to kill outside the area of effect, etc. will be mitigated in my head by those factors.

I am pretty sure it is a very small minority who takes any of that into consideration when making a character. You make a defender (or corruptor) because you want to buff/debuff and shoot stuff in the face. One could argue that the shooting stuff in the face part is a bit lackluster, thus my "What the Hell?" thread.

Powergamers should really look at defenders again, IMO, unless you are talking about only specific controller sets (which you might be, as some definitions of powergamers would preclude all but the most extreme).

I want both and I think it is important that both exist. After all, I doubt you would agree with the following statement: The idea with tankers being nigh unkillable aggro magnets is not that they should be dealing damage, it's that they make others better at dealing damage.

I also only suggested 0.8 for defenders (0.9 is for corruptors). As for how resistance debuffs stack, I am aware of that, and still feel 0.8 is acceptable. The targeting and animation time taken to put down those debuffs makes blasters and scrappers still very valuable. On teams with high damage ATs, it is quite frequent for Rads/ to lose all opportunity to toggle (except as a defensive reaction due to adds or crazy teams), FS to be near useless (and frequently blown due to the dead target mechanic), and Tar Patch to do its thing for all of 5 seconds (instead of the 7 it would have taken without the Tar Patch). One of the reasons I love Storm so much is that its resistance debuff also massively mitigates damage with just a drop and so has a use beyond just more damage.

Except vs. AVs and GMs (and I guess EBs to a lesser extent), resistance debuffing is overrated. It is very good, and can be helpful on teams lacking blasters/scrappers/brutes/etc. But in regular missions, I'd rather have more blasters as long as you can keep them upright.

Why bother with anything but defenders? More status quo. All defender teams are currently in the top tier. Certain controller builds can edge them, and corruptors are similar enough that whatever difference exists will be swamped by player skill anyway.

But on smaller teams, if you want to keep the team small, it is often wise to grab a blaster/scrapper for damage or a controller/tanker for lockdown, and that will still be the case even with my changes.

Why bother with anything but defenders? Because I want to kick, bash, rip, shred, punch, stabbity-death baddies. More than anything, the melee attacks that defenders, corruptors, controllers, and MMs do not get will keep armored ATs, blasters, and dominators doing just fine.

That is probably the reason I will never get to play a Katana / Kinetics character. If I can get buff / debuff with stabbity death, then we might have an issue.

A pet is an interesting idea and it has several pros. Pets add survivability because they get shot instead of the character, they add damage (practically endurance free, usually), and they can receive those buffs the defender cannot use on himself. A pet would definitely confer about the same benefit as increased HPs and damage (and indirectly add some mez protection, as mezzing attacks will go at the pet instead of the defender).

A pet feels wrong. There are already 3 pet ATs in the game, 4 if you include the VEAT with pets. Dark Miasma adds the pet for defenders and corruptors as an option.

When I pick a defender or corruptor, its about personal power. I want to be active, I want to be shooting. I like the concept of these ATs as is and pet wrangling plays differently enough that it does not appeal to me as a solution. When I want to pet wrangle, I play a MM, controller, or dominator. I play a defender to help my team and shoot people in the face, not to buff and control my pet. I also do not want another buff set that encourages buffing an NPC instead of teammates.

Why? If a Rad/ defender puts EF on an enemy, the defender's damage is increased. It is also true that a scrapper's and blaster's higher damage is increased. The defender does not replace them. If a Kin gets a big damage buff from FS, yes, his damage is increased, but so is his tanker and blaster teammates. The defender does not replace them.

I fail to see the danger, but am willing to try.

Yes, the late game defender is survivable and can even dish out enough damage with enough endurance efficiency to do decently. I would like to see them perform better from level 15 to 35 (and especially 25 to 35). The APPs are nice as a choice to become more resilient, no argument.

Tanker and defender playstyle is drastically different (even though they have similar issues in the early-mid game of low damage and not enough slots). Visually, mechanically, and on player approach to a spawn. The feel of the two ATs are so different, that even if one was dramatically better at earning in game rewards, people would still be drawn to the other AT just for the different look and feel.

Also, while a noticeable improvement in survivability, increasing defender HPs to scrapper level is not going to mean they are unkillable and should not have a drastic impact on playstyle, as defenders will still need to utilize their active mitigation in order to survive. It will give them a larger margin of error and make a difference for those defenders who rely on being close to the action. It may also help ranged defenders deal better with that boss that is not locked down (think DE and Freak Tanks who seem to love chasing defenders).

IMO, Empathy and FF are not the only sets that should be improved. That is a soloing argument, and while I do believe helping defenders solo is an important aspect of any plan to improve defenders, I feel it is more important to improve the performance of their blasts in a team setting.

The debuff values are generally already very high so improving those is not a viable option, IMO. As good as they are, those debuffs are also not readily apparent to most players. Improving the damage will have a visible impact that will encourage more players to appreciate the blasts. It will be a good contribution to a team, as well as an aid in soloing.

Simply increasing the cap lets tankers do things solo I doubt the devs want. Of course, increasing it at all, even my teamed mechanic, probably allows tankers to do things that might be frowned upon.

AR is truly an excellent set. Recent changes have made it better overall (although, a really strong item got reduced). If you like AoE punch, AR will please. It's low tier attacks have extra range as well, a nice feature. True, no Blaze, but it fits better for defenders because it has some controls and debuff.