Maelwys

having 'em in a bunch of different powers would increase that probability (three attacks would make it like a coin flip each rotation) That's not how it works. Each ability has its own chance of proc'ing the stun, the chances are not cumulative. If you've ever converted enhancements, same thing. I mean... that's kind of how combining probability chances works... Although 43.9% likelihood isn't quite a 1 in 2, so perhaps the coin in question is a smidge weighted towards one side?

The Gaussian and Soulbound "Chance for Build Up" procs both have a chance to grant a short-lived buff to Damage and ToHit chance on their target (e.g. you or your pets). It's essentially a bit like if they'd just activated the "Build Up" power from one of the game's melee damage powersets, which is where it gets its name. The exact values granted by the buff differ a bit depending on the target's modifiers; so your T1 henchmen get +60% Damage and +30% ToHit and your T2 Henchmen get +80% Damage and +40% ToHit and your T3 gets +100% Damage and +50% ToHit. The buff itself is also very short lived - only 5.25 seconds long (which is delayed after triggering by an extra 0.5 seconds due to another value named "Animation Time Before Effect") so it'll typically only affect your next 1-2 attacks at most. But whenever it kicks in you'll hit noticeably harder; and placing the Soulbound Proc IO into a power which spawns multiple pets (like Battle Drones) makes all of them get affected by it. [EDIT] - Here's an example screenshot showing the Soulbound Proc's buff in action on a set of three Battle Drones. In the icon list next to the pet names it's shown as a little purple circle with a clenched fist in the middle. Note also that the buff can stack with itself + in the listed attributes of my targeted Battle Drone you can see that the buff values are getting doubled (shown as separate +30% lines in the To Hit Bonus section and a single combined +120% line in the Damage Bonus Section).

Support Pets are generally where it's at as the others die too quickly to remain useful. + Carnies grant Forge (Permanent +15% Damage; +20% ToHit) + Seers grant Fortitude (Permanent +15% Damage, 5% Defense) + Banished Pantheon deal substantial AoE damage (as an unkillable support pet, no less) and buff your Recharge time and Recovery rate (about 50% uptime on that buff). + Clockwork grants you and up to two other pets a permanent +5% - 7.5% Defense buff. Most of the time BP wins out performancewise; but take your pick. The rest tend to either have buffs with poor uptime; only have heals; or are better at buffing large numbers of allies/pets rather than a single target. You can also check the entire Lore pet DPS tier list here and their raw power numbers here.

Apologies, I missed this bit for some reason... 😕 I'm not aware of any exhaustive official HowTos; but a few helpful user-created guides exist like this one. There are also a smattering of youtube videos. Most of those look great; although the Interface slot may be better swapped to Reactive (-Res) or Degenerative (-MaxHP) rather than Diamagnetic unless you're purposely fighting a single very tough target upon which you really need the additional -Regen. And I'd always lean Radial over Core on a MM because all of the stackable debuffs cap out quickly enough (with six Henchmen constantly shooting!) that you generally want them at 25% and the Damage DoT at 75% rather than the other way around. The Robotic Drones Lore pets aren't wonderful performancewise, but they're certainly thematic. Technically the best performing Lores tend to be the Intangible Support ones (the rest tend to die too quickly to be useful) and in order to affect MM Henchmen they'd need to have decent AoE buffs. So that's Arachnos Radial (which you can treat as an on-demand 90s +Defence buff plus a little additional healing) or Talons Radial (their buffs are much better over time than Arachnos) or Banished Pantheon Radial (the only Lore with an immortal support pet that DEALS DAMAGE and can pull aggro!). And if Heavy Mechs with -Regen is what you're after, take a good look at Longbow. There's a Developer-built guide to all Lore pets available here (it's a Google Sheet with pictures) and exact power stats here. The differences between the different Judgement abilities essentially come down to personal preference; however there is a major -damage debuff that comes with Void Radial Judgement (-50% damage for 30 seconds to 32 targets is a LOT for a power that deals substantial AoE damage and is up every 90s) that is worth picking up on almost every character as an additional utility option. Alpha and Hybrid are both 100%. Technically you can leverage Assault Hybrid on a MM, but getting the buff to reliably affect your Henchmen requires a lot of juggling of power activations and resummoning of pets and IMO is generally not worth the hassle. For Destiny; Barrier Core (not Radial) is the usual goto; but having Clarion Core available for permanent Mez Protection for both you and your pets can be very useful. Note that Core lasts for 120s and Radial only 90s; and the power recharges in 120s so with Core your downtime is next to nothing. FWIW, I always find the quickest way of capping out my T4s solo is to repeatedly run Burdens of the Past (Dark Astoria Incarnate Arc Part 1) via Ouroboros and choose the Incarnate Salvage option at the end.

I'll generally at least LOOK at forum builds; just in case there's anything in them that I've not considered before which is potentially useful and worth remembering. Occasionally you'll come across someone who really knows their stuff; or someone who has done a lot of VERY SPECIFIC testing on lesser-used powers. And IMO any unusual interactions between certain powers (like the infamous Oil Slick + Howling Twilight trick which when used during a Hamidon raid back in the day caused Back Alley Brawler to mutter expletives) or unexpected enhancement behavior (such as slotting a Panacea Proc into Spirit Tree, Triage Beacon or Spirit Ward) is always worth keeping in the back of my mind. The thing I most appreciate is whenever someone takes the time to actually explain their build choices properly and backs it up with in-game proofs/testing; even if it's not a choice I would choose to make in their place. Whilst lots of "bad" builds definitely exist on the forums (seeing every power six-slotted with one full enhancement set is my personal bugbear and always provokes an immediate mental facepalm!) I'd be unlikely to ever simply recommend any specific pre-existing build to someone without stating caveats... because almost everyone is looking for slightly different things. The same powerset combination can have multiple GOOD but VERY DIFFERENT builds depending on your preferred playstyle (a classic example here is a Blaster player who prefers to stay at range versus another who prefers to stay in melee) or your desired goal or performance level (e.g. players who spend most of their time teaming in +4 Hard Mode content tend to pursue maximum damage output at the expense of everything else). Even what might seem to be a minor admission such as "I spend a lot of time exemplaring to join low-level TFs" can drastically change both power selection order and slotting. So ultimately providing an example build with "I want to do X. How can I make this better?" is probably not a bad way to approach things; even on the forums. And I'm definitely not a fan of the whole "builds from the Discord are better" idea. Most builds have a lot of room for improvement regardless of where you find them; however a lot of Discordians in my experience tend to be very vocal about hyping their builds as "awesome" or at least "better than that cack on the forums" regardless of whatever its actual level of performance is. And woe betide you if you dare to point its failings out to them... 🙉

Caveat here - Procs. Currently the chance for activating a proc decreases with the amount of recharge enhancement in the power that the proc is slotted in; which means for maximum damage output often you will want to slot your attacks with lots of damage procs but NOT with any recharge enhancement (the power's Radius and Base Recharge time and Animation Time etc. all factor in and there are maximum-minimum limits that always apply; but in general "the less recharge slotting the better"). This is why most high-end builds rely on GLOBAL recharge (from Hasten and Set Bonuses etc) to get their attack chain lined up properly. This "no recharge enhancement" consideration is thankfully not relevant for the OP slotting their Mastermind Henchmen; but it is for their Rifle and Epic Power Pool attacks. - - - - - - - - [Warning - Ramble follows, ignore unless you're overly interested in Proc mechanics...] Nearly all builds benefit from Procs. Masterminds are no exception - in the example build I posted further up, the Drones and Assault Bot each have a Damage Proc (from the Explosive Strike Knockback set) and the Drones also have a "Chance for Build Up" proc (from the SoulBound Allegiance Pet Damage set) and there are more damage procs in Choking Cloud, Night Fall, Soul Tentacles and Soul Storm; plus another "Chance for Build Up" proc (from the Gaussian's +ToHit Buff set) in Tactics. The way Procs work is possibly best described as "an additional benefit which completely ignores ED and often even the regular mechanics of the power". Damage Procs are straightforward (ish) in that they have a chance to inflict additional damage over and above whatever the power normally does. A power that deals low raw damage but can slot a lot of damage procs (such as "Night Fall" in the OP's build) will often benefit from fully slotting that power with damage procs instead of enhancing its raw damage at all. However damage procs only get an opportunity to kick in whenever the power they are slotted in triggers an effect which matches the "set" that the proc belongs to. This means that in a power that only has a chance to apply a hold (for example) a damage proc belonging to a "hold" set will not get an opportunity to kick in all of the time. This is especially true for pets like Mastermind Henchmen - if you slot a damage proc from a Knockback set in a pet then that proc will only get a chance to kick in whenever that pet activates a power that inflicts Knockback; and if you slot a damage proc from a -ToHit Debuff set in a pet then that proc will only get a chance to kick in whenever that pet activates a power that inflicts ToHit Debuffs; etc. The upshot of this is that you need to carefully investigate what powers each pet (including pseudopets) actually possesses in order to see how well each type of damage proc will perform. For Robotics, fully-upgraded Battle Drones get a lot of powers that inflict Knockback. The Assault Bot gets a decent number too (particularly the Swarm Missiles). But the Protector Drones do NOT. Lots of other sorts of procs exist and some of them have very interesting interactions with specific powers. For example: Procs slotted into toggles only get an opportunity to activate once every ten seconds, however slotting a Gaussian "Chance for Build Up" Proc in Tactics means that each creature affected by Tactics (including all your teammates and pets) triggers a separate chance for the proc to activate. This makes it especially good for Masterminds since they will nearly always have six henchmen within range of Tactics; and on a full team the buff from this proc can often approach maximum uptime. There are so many ins and outs and caveats that it's not feasible to list them all here; and different people will have different preferences and biases (see "Night Fall" above where I opted for a mixture of -ToHit and Damage output rather than simply raw damage output!) so if you want a properly twinked build, you really need to know what your aim for the toon is before you go looking for targeted advice within the relevant AT subforum and/or discord.

Technically I'm never completely done with any of my characters. I like all my toons to be "useful for something"; and if I think one of them would make a better teammate than whatever I'm currently playing for a particular team then I'll switch to them. Even the back-of-the-cabinet toons occasionally get logged back into and rejigged after developer power changes occur; since I'm OCD about them never being sub-par within whatever particular niche they occupy. Realistically I'll usually switch "mains" once: (i) Their planned Level-50-no-holds-barred Mids build is completed. (ii) All the incarnate abilities they're likely to find useful are at T4. This nearly always means multiple T4'ed Lore, Destiny and Hybrid options. (iii) They're at least Veteran level 100+ (so no more free Empy Merits!) (iv) I've made back whatever I spent on them (although typically the process of getting them to Vet level 100 and fully T4ed ticks this box passively).

By all means, place the bid orders now and the instant everyone else decides they're only prepared to pay 99 inf or less: Kerching! I know it annoys certain folks no end that some farmers regularly place sell orders on the AH for buttons... but IMO fulfilling whatever lowbid offers are currently in place (i) helps keeps the supply ticking over and (ii) allows anyone who genuinely needs the loot in question to have a better idea of how much inf they'd realistically need to bid in order to actually get their paws on it within the next day or two. (The "buy it now" crowd are always going to spend more anyway...)

To be fair; Robotics got a lot of changes in i27p5 (Oct 2022) so any older builds will no longer apply. The most recent Robots/Rad build I found with a quick hunt yesterday was posted on Discord in May of last year and even that one wasn't updated for the Equip Robot changes (and the slotting of the rest of it was... well, let's be charitable and call it "suboptimal"). /Rad is a powerset that tends to be avoided on MMs for some reason. I suppose +Recharge doesn't apply to pets and busy debuffs generally aren't as loved as fire-and-forget buffs whenever you have a gaggle of henchmen to micromanage; but my Bot/Kin is much busier than a Bot/Rad and handles themselves just fine...

To give you some practical ideas... keeping the same power choices (I would grab Hasten and Group Fly in a heartbeat, but that's just me) here's an example rejigged Mids build: zMastermind - Robots - Rad.mbd Whilst I've played robotics to death, honestly I'm not a great fan of playing Radiation Emission on any AT (let alone a MM) so others will likely be better placed to perform further tweaks there... however the bones are at least in place. Accelerate Metabolism has a bit of downtime without Hasten, but Lingering Radiation is still perma without it. There are some spare slots in Radiant Aura (drop one of the Doctored Wounds) and Choking Cloud (drop the NS proc) which could be moved to Stamina (a 50+5 recovery IO) or Health (Numina Proc) if you feel you still need more Recovery. I've left the Rifle Attacks with the default slot (Accuracy and Endurance Reduction) but everything still has enough accuracy to cap the ToHit rate vs +3s without Radiation Infection running. Night Fall and Soul Tentacles are slotted as usable + useful AoE attacks; and Soul Storm + Choking Cloud should allow you to you keep tougher targets locked down (and can stack if required). Defensewise - +19.01% def to Everyone (15.07% from Protector Bots; 3.94% from Maneuvers) plus +8.5% to you (Set Bonuses from Tactics and the two +3% Def IOs) and +10% to your pets (the two +5% Aura IOs) -19.795% ToHit debuff minimum on everything short of an AV (-32.15 Rad Infection and -9.09% Night Fall = -41.24% Total. Versus +4s that's 41.24*0.48= -19.795). Therefore you'll be well over softcap in regular content and most Incarnate stuff. The Henchmen will also be getting +35% resistance to everything from the Aura IOs; plus extra on demand from Barrier and/or Lore. A few points of KB Protection is important on any toon, and in this case it's coming from the 3-piece Gladiator's Armor set bonus in Equip Robot (+3). You could gain another +4 if needed by sticking a Blessing of the Zephyr in Teleport Target and moving the Winter's Gift unique to Fly; but the difference in performance between +3 and +7 KB Protection is minimal - it's mainly just AVs and Longbow plus a few Pets/Pseudopets) Sprint can also take a +Stealth IO (Celerity or Unbounded Leap) in the event you ever fancy trying to ninja your way through a mission or two without your henchies.

Level 1: Inherent Fitness Health Crafted_Panacea_D (50) Crafted_Panacea_B (50) Crafted_Panacea_C (50) Crafted_Panacea_A (50) Crafted_Panacea_E (50) Crafted_Panacea_F (50) Level 1: Inherent Fitness Stamina Crafted_Recovery (50) Crafted_Recovery (50) Crafted_Recovery (50) Crafted_Recovery (50) Crafted_Recovery (50) Crafted_Recovery (50) For starters, rip those out. Health = Panacea Proc, Miracle Proc, Numina Proc. Plus a Preventive Medicine if you've nowhere else to put it (personally I'd just 6-slot Radiant Aura with the entire PM set) Stamina = Performance Shifter Proc, 2x Level 50+5 IOs. Power Transfer Proc if you've no reliable means of self-healing (you're fine since you're /Rad) - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Level 2: Mastermind_Summon Robotics Pulse_Rifle_Burst Crafted_Damage (50) Level 14: Mastermind_Summon Robotics Pulse_Rifle_Blast Crafted_Damage (50) Level 16: Mastermind_Summon Robotics Photon_Grenade Crafted_Damage (50) This looks like you're not actually using these attacks much? I'd swap the inherent slot to an Accuracy IO if you're leveraging them occasionally for the -Regen debuff; otherwise drop them. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Level 1: Mastermind_Buff Radiation_Emission Radiant_Aura Crafted_Heal (50) Crafted_Heal (50) Crafted_Heal (50) Crafted_Recharge (50) Crafted_Recharge (50) Crafted_Recharge (50) Level 8: Mastermind_Buff Radiation_Emission Radiation_Infection Crafted_Defense_DeBuff (45) Crafted_Defense_DeBuff (50) Crafted_Defense_DeBuff (50) Crafted_ToHit_DeBuff (45) Crafted_ToHit_DeBuff (45) Crafted_ToHit_DeBuff (45) Level 10: Mastermind_Buff Radiation_Emission Enervating_Field Crafted_Endurance_Discount (50) Level 20: Mastermind_Buff Radiation_Emission Lingering_radiation Crafted_Snare (50) Crafted_Snare (50) Crafted_Snare (50) Level 24: Mastermind_Buff Radiation_Emission Choking_Cloud Crafted_Hold (50) Crafted_Hold (50) Crafted_Hold (50) Level 28: Pool Leadership Defense Crafted_Defense_Buff (50) Crafted_Defense_Buff (50) Crafted_Defense_Buff (50) Crafted_Defense_Buff (50) Crafted_Defense_Buff (50) Crafted_Defense_Buff (50) Level 32: Pool Leadership Tactics Crafted_ToHit_Buff (50) Crafted_ToHit_Buff (50) Crafted_ToHit_Buff (50) Level 35: Epic Mastermind_Soul_Mastery Night_Fall Crafted_ToHit_DeBuff (50) Crafted_ToHit_DeBuff (50) Crafted_ToHit_DeBuff (50) Level 41: Epic Mastermind_Soul_Mastery Soul_Tentacles Crafted_Immobilize (50) Crafted_Immobilize (50) Crafted_Immobilize (50) Level 44: Epic Mastermind_Soul_Mastery Soul_Storm Crafted_Hold (50) Crafted_Hold (50) Crafted_Hold (50) Here's the actual problem. These powers all need better slotting - don't just focus on enhancing the main component like ToHit Debuff in 'Radiation Infection' and Hold Duration in 'Choking Cloud'. You can look up the raw values here or just use Mids like the rest of us; but Radiation Infection, Enervating Field and Choking Cloud are all real Endurance hogs. Also, you may want to look up "Enhancement Diversification" to understand the implications of using lots of the same sort of IO enhancement within a single power (like you have for Maneuvers and Stamina)... in general, 2x Level 50+5 IOs are enough to "cap". (Your Henchmen slotting could also be made a *lot* more effective by mixing IOs from different sets rather than just 6-slotting the Soulbound and ATO sets. Robotics lends itself to frankenslotting a very bedlamatic mixture of Sets, HOs, Aura IOs and Damage Procs; and everything except the Drones needs some assistance managing their Endurance usage. But that's likely a conversation for another thread...)

Don't let it bother you too much. There have been so many "change XYZ has ruined the game forever!" flamewar threads over the years that it can trigger PTSD for some forumites. Whenever you read Luminara's comments, picture a cat that's just been woken up from a nice nap by a blaring fire alarm. The eyes are burning, the mouth is frothing and the hackles are permanently standing to attention; but some naïve comfort may perhaps be gleaned from the thought that all the savage disembowelling claw swipes might be at least partially directed at the cruel waking world rather than at you personally... 😉 If memory serves whilst the typed defence rebalance threads got a smidge heated it didn't quite invoke forum ragnarok. A very quick poke at this particular historical wasps nest shows up this and this. Oh, and this.

Found it (Not my own post, but describes the thing being referred to quite well!) BellaStrega - Posted 01-16-2006 03:36 PM Under the new damage system, yes, ignoring the context of not getting hit versus getting hit. Yes, SR takes fewer status effects than Invulnerability, but takes larger hits when they do land. This isn't news to anyone, and doesn't change the fact that damage mitigation for 1% defense is, under the new mechanic, equal to 2% resistance. Essentially back in issue 7, the effectiveness of Defense suddenly "changed". It became useful against Archvillains and Mooks alike, resulting in many lengthy arguments now long since lost to forum purges; but "1% Def == 2% Res" became the generally accepted rough equivalence metric used on the forums. Although it wasn't like we didn't have fuller and better informative breakdowns even back in those days. (Most of my older UK board posts are gone/inaccessible; but fast forward a few issues and we were definitely still arguing about Healing versus Bubbles...)

Posting numbers certainly sounds like something I'd do. (perhaps not *all* the numbers though... only whatever ones were left in the box after Arcanaville was done...) The "1% defense equals 2% resistance" bit rings a very vague bell - I think this is from the old "flat mitigation (Regeneration) versus scaling mitigation (Defense/Resistance)" discussions in Days of Yore, long before IOs and real numbers displays...? Back then Regeneration Scrappers were getting a bit big for their britches (due to being the only thing capable of solo tanking Hamidon indefinitely, etc) and many forum arguments could be boiled down to "Just because a /Regen can survive anything dealing less than X HP per second to them, doesn't mean they can't be two-shot. But an /INV or /SR won't". Oversimplification was very much a thing but it was often pointed out that gaining ~10% Defense or ~20% Resistance would result in them on average taking the same amount of reduced damage. - - - - - - - - - - Anyways, Defense vs Resistance overall mechanics hasn't changed; but there are a few recentish developments worth noting... TYPED defense (Smashing/Lethal/Cold/Fire/Negative/Energy/etc, as opposed to positional defense like Melee/Ranged/AoE) has been tweaked a smidge. It used to be that a disproportionately large number of enemy attacks were flagged as Smashing or Lethal (things got rebalanced so that now it's more of an even spread... which is possibly what your comment about Scorpion Shield relates to since S/L defense is not as widely applicable as it used to be?) and Toxic Defense is now a real thing. Incarnate (and Hard Mode) Content effectively has a higher defense requirement due to the enemies having higher ToHit than they do to in regular content. In most content your Defense will floor enemy ToHit rate at +45%. In Incarnate Content it's +58.75%. Having additional defense can be handy because of defense debuffs. There's a well known scenario where a character gets surrounded by enemies that have attacks which inflict defence debuffs... and as soon as the first hit lands they're as good as dead due to "cascading defense failure"! For Damage Resistance... nothing has changed at all AFAIK. Tankers, Brutes and Pets still have the highest Hardcap (90%), VEATs/EATs are next (85%), and everyone else is stuck with 75%. Having additional resistance can be handy, again because of debuffs. Possessing 100% resistance to a particular damage type (regardless of what your cap is) effectively makes you immune to getting it debuffed.

There have been a few changes that *impact* upon the best way to build such a character though. (Can take that Gaussian out of FA and stick Power Transfer Procs in Stamina, QR and PP ASAP. Drop Maneuvers and Superjump and grab Infiltration, etc etc.) ((Also Dull Pain isn't Perma despite having 5x LoTGs and 5x 10% Rech set bonuses plus change. Integration and Reconstruction aren't ED-Capped. The Claws attacks are overslotted for Recharge% and underslotted with Damage procs, and the 50% Crit Rate Proc is in the wrong power. There's also no sign of any panic buttons other than MoG and IH. RoP? Shadowmeld? Even Barrier destiny? Nope on all counts. Although I can at least understand some of the power choices if it's going for a Wolverine theme over functionality...))

https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Servers

Oh, we got a brand new regen powerset to Idle in A.E. Come on lets get together in perfect farming glee. I got twenty Hitpoints, and you got forty-three. Now we got a brand new regen powerset to Idle in A.E. (Who loves ya baby ha) (and just in case that wasn't bad enough and you're still semi-conscious....)

Last I checked non-Granite Stone Armor Brute still gets an honourable mention due to Fury affecting Brimstone Procs (and DoTs from the Spines Primary; even if RadMelee is objectively a better farming set)? Also SA is one of the few Brute defensive powersets that can get high enough passive mitigation AND passive regen to survive AFK AE farming at +4x8 without major build sacrifices. Downside is that even the Damage Auras on a Tanker are wider than on a Brute these days (12ft vs 8ft IIRC...)

Srsly, this Necrobump is older than my eldest child... ((Also, the build in question isn't even Softcapped?))

Bio gets a lot of S/L resistance and a large amount of absorb/regeneration/recovery buffs. It has a decent smattering of defence as well; but it has a hole in Smashing/Lethal defence and no Defence Debuff Resistance, so it's prone to being hit by cascading Defence Failure... however it seldom actually gets overwhelmed in regular content because it has three clicky powers that can grant high Regen/Absorb on demand (and the regeneration scales up with the number of enemies hit by those clicks). You can overcome its defensive shortcomings via taking certain melee powersets and/or with IO investment. With sufficient IO investment (it really benefits from Global Recharge Rate buffs to increase uptime on DNA Siphon, Ablative Carapace and Parasitic Aura) Bio can get very good. The stats display in Mids for Bio toons can get a bit funky due to all the stance mechanics; but here's a quick rough example from my IO'ed-out Rad/Staff Tanker, with no special stance toggles or Guarded Spin activated: Throw in Parasitic Aura and DNA Siphon and you can get insane levels of Regeneration and Recovery (it's not uncommon for me to see HARDcapped numbers with enough mobs around me on my Bio/Staff in-game; and you can keep that up almost indefinitely with enough global recharge!) The Stances tweak some of the values slightly... however with a decent build most players will just find themselves running in Offensive mode 24/7. + Give up a little less damage resistance in favour of greater damage output and a damage proc (Offensive Stance) + Give up a little damage output in favour of a little more MaxHP, Defence/Resistance and a self-healing proc (Defensive Stance) + Greater regeneration/recovery and endurance discount (Efficient Stance) And as mentioned previously, you can obviously plug that Melee Defence hole by taking certain secondaries like Broad Sword, Katana, Titan Weapons, Staff, etc... In-game... my own Bio/Staff in Offensive Mode with just one foe in range (in this case a Pylon) hits the melee softcap with one copy of Guarded Spin active (stackable to 67.4% with two copies active). Resistancewise they'll be just short of the S/L resistance Hardcap even if they're not activating any powers - and when actually fighting they end up firmly at the S/L Hardcaps, a little shy of the Toxic Hardcap and hovering around 45-55% to F/C/E/N/P (due to Form of the Body Combos and SMoT IO Procs) before any other shenanigans like Barrier or Melee Core Embodiment. And that toon is definitely not built to be the most "survivable" Bio Tanker; merely a well-balanced "all content" one.

Not sure what you mean here. Incarnate defense cap and purple patch are two different things. It's not hugely obvious unless you go delving... but if you're even +1 higher level than the Critters you're fighting then those Critters get a sizable ToHit penalty. Whenever the Critter is higher level than you (typical "purple patch" thinking) they gain accuracy buffs instead (which doesn't directly counteract and negate a player's own defense buffs) until they're +6 to you or higher. From the Attack Mechanics page:

So a few things... (i) You're correct in that different enemies can have different levels of resistance/defence - a good example is Robotic critters which tend to be resistant to Lethal Damage. You can find a full list of these within each mob's individual City of Data entry, and a few old tools exist like This Spreadsheet. (ii) Different Enemy Ranks have different modifiers; but these don't by themselves grant any extra powers/resistances - it just affects things like their Accuracy, HP, Perception and the base Damage of their attacks. All ranks should take the same raw damage and debuff % from you... with one notable exception. Archvillains (and a lot of EBs) all inherently possess a large amount of additional protection and resistance - their Resistance to Debuffs always applies; the rest continually toggles on and off with a visual indicator (Purple Triangles) whilst it's active. For inflicting CC "Mez" effects, rank DOES play a part - it takes a higher Magnitude CC effect to successfully mez critters of higher rank. (iii) Level Difference is it's own thing called the Purple Patch. Most things (including damage inflicted and debuff%) increase in effectiveness if you are higher level than the thing you're attacking; and decrease if you are lower level. A difference of up to 5 levels is generally surmountable - after that it becomes vastly more difficult with each level due to ToHit/Defence boosts and harsher and harsher Damage scaling. (iv) In Incarnate and "Hard Mode" content there are slightly different mechanics in play - notably crittters have a better chance to hit you, so the defence softcap becomes 59% rather than 45%.

Check here: and here:

According to the Tabloid Rags; they "allowed their opponent to douse their groin area with lighter fluid" as part of a stunt... but neglected to have a Fire extinguisher on hand. Another promising mensa candidate then attempted to put the blaze out by hitting them with a Garden Strimmer (I swear I'm not making this up) I'd call everyone involved a dumbass; but I suspect the ass in question is no longer recognisable.

I tried to understand, but I'm drawing a