drbuzzard

It's funny, a while back I decided I'd give stone another shot and made a stone/WM tank to see how it worked out. I wasn't PLing so into the sewers I went. Played for a while, then had a flashback to the last stone I played on live. I immediately deleted it since I absolutely abhor the stone penalties. Of course I was dumb and forgot I'd transferred 100M influence to the character. Derp.

Yeah, I find that on any tanker set which lacks an endurance power energy mastery is mandatory for how I like to play.

I don't know that I'd say rad is that much better, mostly I'd say rad is more convenient because of the endurance aspect. Personally I'd like to see a lot of the general defensive sets get the treatment from sentinels where all of them have some kind of endurance recovery tool.

I do have most damage types close to resistance cap or at it. I also have particle shielding on autoclick with a fast recharge. Though really most of my tanks at this point have to do something wrong on a +4 ITF to die. Of course I build around that in a way since I do so many.

I've generally found that my rad/SS tank only dies when I forget to pay attention to my health bar (which happens when I get fixated on SMASH!) and I do a whole lot of ITFs.

One thing nobody seems to have mentioned in radiation's favor is that you will basically have unlimited endurance once the set is up and going. I basically never see my blue bar go down. Invulnerability has no endurance recovery tools in the set.

Out of this world, even.

So let's take a look at what it says under Dark Melee for example: Shadow Maul: on top of the screen when you check info while building a tanker it says: 123.98 damage However when you check the details we get 4 ticks of 10.69 smashing and the same of negative energy. That's 85. I'd call that a discrepancy. Midnight grasp is also screwed up with a listed damage of 158.89 up top, but below we have 116.75+5 ticks of 5.81 which comes to 145.8 I did notice that Psi melee has one of those % chance DoTs and I'll just leave that alone since figuring that damage is annoying. I suppose I could go pound on a pylon to verify actual numbers, but I rather lack that level of dedication.

Whether or not aracanatime matters for most folks, if you intend to compare sets, you need to compare them at their actual numbers (which means arcanatime) when used optimally. You can't really do a meaningful comparison with variable gaps between powers. One can assume even in casual usage, the sloppiness will be roughly equal across sets, and the comparison will still be valid from the optimal case.

Just did a quick google spreadsheet to use arcanatime to derive DPAS (damage per activation second). Of course given how questionable the in game number are (as are the ones in Hero Designer), I'd take it all with a grain of salt. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1NS-91u75M8w59aXExuRSYkODoJQLQhH5CGcL7Dvk9hk/edit?usp=sharing I suppose I should be clear why I question the numbers: A) If you read the provided numbers for tankers, they very often don't add up if you look at the listed numbers at the bottom compared to the total damage at the time. Single damage type attacks seem to fare better in this (War Mace or Stone Melee). Psi melee, dark melee, or energy melee all have issues when you pull up the in game numbers. B) Because I was curious about why psi melee looked so bad when I collected numbers (using the below numbers, not the above numbers), I ran one of my tanks that used it and looked at what I was getting in the combat log. Of course resistance could be the issue to some degree, but it was higher than the below numbers certainly.

The damage from total focus and energy transfer are deceptive because of the long animations. Energy transfer is still pretty solid with a 86 DPAS (using arcanatime), but total focus does less damage for the time than energy punch (but about the same as bone smasher). I bet you'd do a better attack chain using ET, BS, G, and EP if you worked it out. Total focus may hit hard but that doesn't matter if it takes forever when you'd do more damage in that time with other attacks. Let's ignore how things actually work, and say we could just chain total focus or energy punch by themselves into an attack chain. EP, EP, EP... or TF, TF, TF... We'll do 10 TF to make it easy to give the picture. That will take 34.3 seconds and do 1880 damage In that time we can do 37 energy punches. Each of those does 52.83 damage. Summed up they come to 1961 damage. You lose damage in any time spent on total focus over energy punch. Though it's not a huge difference, it is there. Gloom also has better damage in the time, so in that 10 TF time it would do 2261 damage. Of course I did a bit of testing with my psi melee tank and it seems the damage listed for the attacks don't match what I see when I do combat log, so I question most numbers. However slow attacks are still slow attacks and make for lousy attack chains.

I think I'm going to be forced to work on a spreadsheet project.

The tanker buffs did change the ranged AT modifier for tanks. This is why I'm using in game numbers. Is that from Mids? If so, their numbers are often FUBAR as well. Maybe a mix of damage numbers between in game and Mids might get us somewhere close to the truth. I'll read up on arcanatime.

Yeah, but blasters (at endgame of course) don't really faceplant. When survivability is good enough for a 4 person blaster team to do a Master of Imperious Task force with no inspirations in 30 minutes, mitigation isn't really something to get fixated on. If the 'least' durable AT can blow through a reasonably hard TF when they set it to be as hard as possible, then a defensive secondary on a sentinel is like putting an bullet proof vest on an Abrahms tank. Except in this case the tank doesn't really have much of a gun on it. In a game without PPPs, IOs, and the blaster upgrades that happened right before the snap, sure. In an SO game, sentinel secondaries are wonderful, and being alive is a DPS consideration. We just don't happen to play in that game.

Nope, no arcanatime, just the numbers from in game for animation. I know they're off, but I don't know arcanatime well enough to figure out how that might skew things. I guess it adds some time to things based on counter clicks which puts a hit on lower animation attacks. It is a bit weird since the results from that chart don't make a lot of sense. Both energy punch and bone smasher are higher DPAS than gloom (and even barrage, which makes no sense at all) even though bonesmasher is longer animation, while energy punch is shorter animation and by listed time, both are behind it.

The fixation some people have on mitigation is a bit odd IMO. Mitigation doesn't get you experience. Mitigation doesn't get you influence. Mitigation doesn't get you drops. It does allow you to do certain things if you push the envelope and take on the hardest stuff around, but the examples one has to come up with are basically piss poor when one looks at return on time. Solo an ITF? Sure, there went an hour+ which could have gained you much more doing something else. Mitigation past a certain point doesn't do diddly squat for most people. For people trying to set records on the hardest stuff I suppose it does. Of course we also play in a game where people can simply AFK farm without actually playing, basically a step away from the auto granting functions on the test server. That makes it hard to care much about the rate at which one collects rewards while playing. It seems to me that the devs must think at least somewhat like I do since they substantially upped the damage output of the most durable AT in the game recently. I think the idea was that being tough as an impervium ingot is all well and good, but if it bores the crap out of everyone so the AT doesn't get played because being inert is not appealing, you might want to change that.

Gotta agree with Vanden, the heals in medicine pool are actually fairly powerful based on healing value and recharge. Only the interrupt is a real drawback.

One night, when it may have been the case that I had a few beers too many, I made a new alt, and was shocked that I was able to get a certain name. Upon waking up in the morning and logging in, I was greeted by Sister Psyco. Derp.

I doubt it. TF just has a lousy DPAS. 241+78+188+78/(2.67+3.3+1.1+1.1) = 72 That doesn't really change much since adding in more Gloom which has a DPAS about the same as the (not really chain) chain I posted can't shift it any. Energy punch has a DPAS of 63 iirc, so there's no helping it (and bonesmasher is even lower than energy punch though higher than total focus). For the hell of it, let's look at ET like it used to be (had a 1 second animation like power thrust) DPAS is stupid east to calculate 241/1 (derp) so 241 DPAS. Of course working up a chain is more than I want to figure out right now, but just imagine what that does to an average when most everything else tankers have seems to cap at 125. Back at the dawn of time I did a fairly extensive analysis of the tanker secondaries with chains and all that good stuff. This was back before war mace got buffed, with the original tanker sets. Energy melee was single target king, and it wasn't even vaguely close.

I think you are being rather hyperbolic. Sentinels are nowhere near as bad as you describe them. I think they need help, but they are not an utter train wreck (like khelds out of the box). Really sentinels need a bit more damage and they will be OK. Your suggestions were way too powerful. Though perhaps that's how the first iteration on the test server should be started and then whittled down from there. When we compare blasters and sentinels completely to the advantage of blasters, it's at end game with incarnate abilities, builds which cost around a billion influence, and the PPPs thrown in. This isn't the whole game. I'll admit, I like that part more, but I oddly enough also like sentinels. Truth is, sentinels have a much easier ride to 50 than blasters, so for those who don't just PL alts up to 50, and deck them out from farming money, they are a pleasant AT which is fun to play, lacking the frustration of taking a blaster up the levels. There is a space for them in the game, they just don't have a very compelling space at the top end of power at endgame.

That's not quite true. Have to take numbers from in game (and do the math myself since the in game numbers and math are often FUBAR). I'm also not going to figure out actual optimal attack chains since I'm lazy. I will put in what I recall from tanks I have and how I can chain. Energy Transfer: damage 241, animation 2.67 sec, DPAS: 90 Total Focus: damage 188, animation 3.3 sec, DPAS 57 Gloom: damage 78.32, animation 1.1, DPAS 71.2 So for the chain 241+188+78/ (2.67+3.3+1.1)= 72 Considering energy punch has a higher DPAS than total focus, you'd be wise to work it into the chain (but this is what you wanted to compare) Let's try War Mace Clobber: damage 154, animation 1.23, DPAS 125 Pulverize: damage 86.64, animation 1.5, DPAS 58 Jawbreaker: damage 104, animation 1.83, DPAS 57 Gloom: damage 78.32, animation 1.1, DPAS 71.2 so for the chain 154+87+104+78/(1.23+1.5+1.83+1.1) = 74.7 so a slight edge, and you also have AOE in the set. Let's try Stone Melee, always known for single target power. Stone Fist: damage 53, animation .83, DPAS 63.65 Heavy Mallet: damage 120, animation 1.63, DPAS 74 Stone Mallet: damage 86, animation 1.61, DPAS 53 Seismic Smash: damage 188, animation 1.5, DPAS 125 Gloom: damage 78.32, animation 1.1, DPAS 71.2 We can easily chain all these (which won't be optimal since stone mallet kinda sucks) 53+120+86+188+78/(.83+1.63+1.61+1.5+1.1) = 78.7 I'm pretty sure a better chain can be built using more stone fist and taking out stone mallet. (this is being tried on my SM/Bio brute without perma hasten, so it's the best chain I can do- numbers are still tanker) SS, SF, HM, SF, G, SF, repeat 188+53+120+53+78+53 /(1.5+.83+1.63+.83+1.1+.83)= 81.1 There might be better possible, but that's certainly not bad. I'd consider doing fire melee, but I hate the DoT calculations.

Invincibility gives defense based on how many enemies are around you. It stacks up to quite a substantial value (starts at 6% unenhanced for the first one and 1% more per add up to 10). It is far more powerful than weave, for less endurance cost. Tough hide is an autopower, so no endurance cost for equal defense to weave. To see those as even close is utterly fatuous.

Do you remember back in the day when an odd interaction of gauntlet made tanker single target attacks into effectively AOEs if you stacked the bodies close enough? Now ET was damned deadly in those days.

I think if the goal was to make it a well rounded set comparable to other melee sets, then yes. It would need a major re-tooling. However if they just wanted to put it back to where it was, which was king of a single target, but an AOE joke, then the tinkering would be minor. Heck, just putting energy transfer back on the original animation would likely make it a single target contender (not sure of the numbers against current sets, so I don't know that it would be king). If you also reduced the total focus animation, I bet it would clearly be king. Most people who ask for changes to EM want it back as it was, a mean single target set which was AOE LOL.

If you think MA is bad, EM will be worse. While it does appear that the devs will be buffing the set, we have no idea when that will occur. Hence you will be stuck with an underperforming tank for the interim. The important thing to realize when you look at EM is not how high the damage is on any given attack, it is how much damage it does in a given amount of time. Once upon a time Em was king of the single target hill because energy transfer was fast. Then it got nerfed into a slow animation, and this honestly broke the set.