Gone

Hand Clap with KB to KD IO and Foot Stomp, and force feedback +rech procs in wherever you can slot them make everything pretty much stay on the floor. Stone Melee is good, Fault is very good and objectively better than Hand Clap, but Tremor is a pale shade compared to Foot Stomp, with a much slower activation time and anemic damage. Stone Melee is great single target damage though and the single target attack chain will have more knockdown in it than SS. I've played both into the ground and Super Strength almost always wins because of the clearly better AoE potential, fast recharging Foot Stomp is better than almost anything else out there for AoE control and damage on a Tanker. If you don't want to deal with Rage though, Stone Melee will work out just fine for what you want to do. As usual, play the one that looks fun, the gap is rarely so big that it will make a difference in practical play.

The only sets that could be called resistance based are fire, dark, and invul because a majority of their damage mitigation comes from +res powers. Dark and Fire have always been considered some of the least survivable secondaries do to their trade offs for AoE damage and Invul is usually considered one of the most survivable secondaries because it trades off a ton of +damage compared to other sets. For teaming Fire and Dark are great because AoE damage matters most at that level but for anything like solo'ing AVs and Pylons you're going to get squashed most of the time using either of those two. Most scrapper secondaries have a mix of def/res/regen because having only res or def or regen opens you up to cascading buff failure so to say that res is the best for endgame content is not correct. Fire isn't a good secondary on a scrapper in most situations, I can agree with that, The rest of your evaluations are a little sketchy, especially if you are lumping fire and dark in the same bucket. Dark brings defense (a toggle equaling weave), a huge fast-recharging heal, very good resist types (energy being weak and also the easiest to build sets for) and two CC mitigation toggles. This is not fire, this is not a 'damage' set, maybe you should look into it again so that you're more aware of the capabilities? It's OKAY to say that you need layered defenses as a scrapper, I have no issue with that, it isn't 'wrong'. The question was RESISTANCE OR DEFENSE though. Super Reflexes and Energy Aura and Ninjitsu and Ice Armor, the defense based sets, are not good choices compared to the resistance based sets Radiation, Dark, Invuln, and Electric, because all of those sets have powerful mitigation tools and the ability to cap a defense on top of capping resistances. Defense or Resist, I'm picking Resist every single time, because it is clearly the right choice when factoring in set bonuses. Build high resists, build high defense, and build in your other mitigation. That was the answer to the OP's actual question. I've played dark that was soft capped and it still got squashed so maybe it was user error. SR should not have any issues and has always been considered a highly survivable build. There is a reason you don't see many high res builds in the pylon thread or solo'ing AVs is partly because res builds on scrappers is no where near as effective as it is on tankers/brutes. The other is that it requires a much higher investment than a mixed build or a pure defense build. I never said anything about SR having issues, and if the crux of your assertions are based on pylon and AV soloing numbers I'm not sure we can come to any kind of agreement as that covers a minuscule portion of gameplay that few people bother with and if you are taking budget into consideration you probably shouldn't be worrying about pylon or AV soloing as a primary goal, because you won't compete with a budget build the same way an unlimited budget would. SR is fine, and it actually has debuff resistance (although that's available to all through incarnates so it isn't that big of a deal) and doesn't crumble to cascades as easily as the other defense sets do. SR is still SO MUCH BETTER with capped resists. I'd also still feel a lot safer on any of the resist sets (there are quite a few, it seems in other posts you've noticed there are more than two resist sets so I won't get into that) with softcap defense. I'm not trying to say defense powersets are bad. I'm saying that resist powersets have a better ceiling that is easier to achieve and more durability. You need both Defense and Resists. That's the real point. You should have both. You should build for both. The difference is, Resist powersets get defense easily. Defense powersets do not get resists easily and have to sacrifice more to get them. It isn't a huge gap. It doesn't matter that much. Like my first post stated, none of this actually matters because every build stomps everything in the endgame given enough creative building.

The only sets that could be called resistance based are fire, dark, and invul because a majority of their damage mitigation comes from +res powers. Dark and Fire have always been considered some of the least survivable secondaries do to their trade offs for AoE damage and Invul is usually considered one of the most survivable secondaries because it trades off a ton of +damage compared to other sets. For teaming Fire and Dark are great because AoE damage matters most at that level but for anything like solo'ing AVs and Pylons you're going to get squashed most of the time using either of those two. Most scrapper secondaries have a mix of def/res/regen because having only res or def or regen opens you up to cascading buff failure so to say that res is the best for endgame content is not correct. Fire isn't a good secondary on a scrapper in most situations, I can agree with that, The rest of your evaluations are a little sketchy, especially if you are lumping fire and dark in the same bucket. Dark brings defense (a toggle equaling weave), a huge fast-recharging heal, very good resist types (energy being weak and also the easiest to build sets for) and two CC mitigation toggles. This is not fire, this is not a 'damage' set, maybe you should look into it again so that you're more aware of the capabilities? It's OKAY to say that you need layered defenses as a scrapper, I have no issue with that, it isn't 'wrong'. The question was RESISTANCE OR DEFENSE though. Super Reflexes and Energy Aura and Ninjitsu and Ice Armor, the defense based sets, are not good choices compared to the resistance based sets Radiation, Dark, Invuln, and Electric, because all of those sets have powerful mitigation tools and the ability to cap a defense on top of capping resistances. Defense or Resist, I'm picking Resist every single time, because it is clearly the right choice when factoring in set bonuses. Build high resists, build high defense, and build in your other mitigation. That was the answer to the OP's actual question.

Resistance based powersets will always be better for endgame content due to how easy it is to softcap a defense type purely with IO sets. If you don't plan to build a character with IO sets, then defense powersets are fine and probably easier to level up with than resistance due to the factors Heraclea mentioned, as getting hit stacks debuffs (although obviously I do not agree with anything else stated, resistance based sets are clearly better for endgame and defense based sets are clearly better for leveling). Resistance powersets for endgame: You can softcap a defense type easily with IO sets, while having capped resistances as well. Defense powersets for leveling: You can softcap defense without IO sets or with minimal IO sets, making leveling cheap and easy. Once you are doing endgame content you will not be able to easily add resistance with IO sets, meaning you have half of the layers of defense that a resistance powerset would have since the resistance set added capped defense on top and the defense powerset didn't add much in the way of resistances. None of this really matters though, because in endgame every build stomps everything due to incarnates and sets. Even a defense set can get to capped S/L resists with enough creative building, but it is more difficult than adding defense.

I'm especially curious as to how the incarnate business is achieved. It seems to be taking me a couple weeks or more before I have collected enough geemies on a fresh level 50 in order to slot anything in the alpha slot. And even then, what I slot is based on what I have rather than what I want. Apparently some content is gated through level shifts; of my four level 50s only Heraclea is +1, and collecting enough doodads to move past seems an unconscionable grind, especially since I don't play 'mains'. It annoys that there is any content I likely will never see, even if that way lies only Praetorians and more confusion, fear, psi nukes, and don't-stand-here zones, and other catherding generic MMO crap that makes tankers irrelevant. Gain levels and do incarnate content and high level content? By vet level 12 you basically get all of the doodads you need to tier 3 everything, and if you do incarnate stuff that gives random salvage you can decrease that time by a large margin. I have lots of alts at level 50 (8 or 9 I guess now) and the first thing I do is tier 3 everything, and while I'm not as fast as the post you're pointing at, it definitely takes me only a couple of days or so to get every ability to tier 3 just by doing some itrials, some high level TF's and whatever else comes up. If you just want level shifts then focus on the three that give them for gated content (Lore/Destiny/Alpha) and that will decrease the time even more.

It depends. If you mean for just leveling without set IO's, either will work fine but the defensive set may be better because defense works well just on basic enhancement. If you mean a completely built character, then the answer is almost always the resist based set, since you can easily build defense into a character with IO set bonuses (and later incarnate powers) compared to the more difficult task of building resists with IO set bonuses that the defensive sets face. In the end, I think they are about equal for leveling up, pick whichever looks fun. If you want the stronger endgame build, pick Elec, because you can add defense later on top of already strong resists. Also note that in endgame just about every build is on a similar plane, everything stomps the content available because everything is extremely maximized, so again, you can honestly just pick what looks fun to you.

The OP meant recharge in individual defense toggles. So, 15% enhanced recharge rate on an IO slotted into a Defense power that is toggled on. When it is toggled off, it recharges faster and can be toggled on again. When you are slotting normal IO's or SO's, you would never slot recharge into a toggle because toggles are always on. However, IO sets force you to slot recharge rate into your toggles due to the multiple enhancing nature of IO set pieces (Red Fortune: Defense/Recharge or Red Fortune: Defense/Endurance/Recharge). As to the OP question, if it is a toggle and you are looking for slot efficiency, you would slot the highest defensive values first. So three slots (Def/End > Def/Rech > Def ) and four slots (Def/End > Def/Rech > Def > Def/End/Rech). The three slot method gets you a strong defense amount with the minimum number of slots, while the four slot method maximizes your defense before enhancement div kicks in hard. Usually, with incarnates and IO sets, four slots is overkill, but you need to work out what numbers you want to see in your build to know for sure which to go with. Basically ignore the +rech and focus on the +def aspect unless you are using a clicky defense power that actually uses recharge (there are a few out there and it does matter).

Great to hear! Thanks. Forgot to mention, skip the toggle stun, it's not very good.

It's good for PVP and PVE. Energy Aura has a heal, endurance recovery, and +recharge, and StJ has very high single target damage and the mechanic works particularly well with stalker mechanics. You'll do fine with it.

Radiation, Electric, Bio, Invuln and Dark seem to be the winners when it comes to fully built characters (including IO's and Incarnates). I think Radiation is the strongest. I'd pick Dark or Elec over the other two, Dark for the high resist capacity for all including Psi, Elec for some tools to go with good resists. No experience with Bio so I can't REALLY rank it. 1: Rad 2: Dark (People oddly think of the CC powers when they see dark, but it's really incredibly strong for resists and defense building, and includes a virtually 100% heal that you can get recharging every seven seconds... just ignore the t7/8/9 gimmicks and you're good) 3: Elec 4: Fire 5: Invuln Defense based powersets are fine but you're going to get more mileage out of Resist based when slotting set IOs. (Edit: Added fire in where it should be, I always forget about fire. It's fine, I'd definitely pick it over Invuln if I were going to choose between the Psi-hole sets.)

I don't know if it's an AT-wide problem, but my Sentinel is endgame-built and incarnated so I can give you my experiences with Dark/Energy. The damage feels very low and while survivable the durability doesn't feel much better than just a well-made blaster. I have stopped playing my Sentinel altogether because my blaster hits what feels like twice as hard (or more!) and has no issues with surviving either. Dark/ has me in a headspace where I don't think I'll ever play another Sentinel, because it feels very, very weak. Since I have no interest in playing another sentinel though, this one completely souring me on it, it isn't likely I'll find out whether it is a poor performer or if the AT is fine or otherwise.

Thanks for the build example. It's fairly similar to what I was working on and does give me some slotting ideas which is very helpful. I'm considering Arcane Bolt again, but the slots are where I'm having problems, although I may be overslotting some things when I compare to your build (for example I have three slots in both stamina and health for the four recovery procs) I'm also running on the Agility incarnate path, but looking at spiritual with Howling Twilight and Heart of Darkness really makes me think I need to switch. If I can come up with a few slots, I'll post the build.

If you aren't going to PVP, you don't need stealth. Hide is enough, you can put a +stealth IO in sprint if you want. Don't take recall friend unless you really want to. Taking teleport was a way to get teams to take old style stalkers, you don't need that anymore, you're better than a scrapper now. They need you for your DPS. Stalkers don't have a lot of AoE options. Elec is great, and the single target chain is better (Assassin Strike in place of the Clap power) and the other AoE's are intact. Spines has two AoE's in Burst and Throw. Otherwise, most other sets have one AoE and usually small radius, so if AoE is your thing, I think Elec or Spines is your best option. Street justice is a standout for single target damage but minimal AoE. Secondary doesn't matter much if you plan to build with IO sets, you can make any of them work. Resist sets you build to softcap S/L defense (or positional if you can), defense sets you get to softcap and then build for additional resists (S/L first). Secondaries with a recharge boost built in are probably best (Energy, Elec, SR,) followed closely by those with damage boosts (Shield, Rad), and the rest are just 'fine'. Not mentioning Bio, of course, since you don't want Bio. Use Assassin Strike from hide only when there's obviously enough time to do so, otherwise start with a heavy hitting fast attack for the crit in teams, otherwise you're wasting DPS. You can skip Placate if you have a tight build, it is a waste of time usually and is relegated to just a minor useful tool occasionally now. Plan to take combat jumping, tough and weave and possibly maneuvers to either strengthen your resists or defense as needed. Slot your ATO's as early as you can, they're great.

Thanks for the suggestions. These don't seem like compromises I can make however. Fearsome stare is the best Tohit debuff in the primary by a large margin, and is unskippable for a team-oriented build. Dropping Fly and Afterburner would offer no slots, making the Arcane Bolt pickup much more difficult to fit as well as removing the recharge necessary to maintain permahasten and permafade. I really want to fit Arcane Bolt in but it looks impossible right now. Maybe I can drop Maneuvers or something, but that will significantly decrease defense and put me farther away from softcap. Feels like a bad trade still, but it might be necessary.

If you want one REALLY GREAT AoE that you can spam often, and a decent single target attack chain go for Super Strength. If you want several less impressive AoE's and one slow recharge telenuke with a slightly weaker single target attack chain, go for Elec. I prefer Foot Stomp to everything Elec offers, but Elec is right up there so I understand your trouble picking, they are both great sets. If it comes down to it, choose thematic powerset.

People can be a little stingy with builds, don't know for sure why, and this is especially true for farmers (don't help competition I guess?). Also, the amount of people who use the forums is very small compared to the amount of people who are actually playing, making builds more rare to find for anything.

I would only be taking the Sorcery pool for Arcane bolt, otherwise I'd be taking nothing from it at all. Which power would you drop to take Arcane Bolt? Hero Plan by Mids' Hero Designer 2.22 http://www.cohplanner.com/ Click this DataLink to open the build! Level 50 Magic Controller Primary Power Set: Darkness Control Secondary Power Set: Darkness Affinity Power Pool: Flight Power Pool: Speed Power Pool: Leadership Ancillary Pool: Soul Mastery Hero Profile: Level 1: Dark Grasp -- Empty(A) Level 1: Twilight Grasp -- Empty(A) Level 2: Tar Patch -- Empty(A) Level 4: Darkest Night -- Empty(A) Level 6: Living Shadows -- Empty(A) Level 8: Fearsome Stare -- Empty(A) Level 10: Howling Twilight -- Empty(A) Level 12: Heart of Darkness -- Empty(A) Level 14: Fly -- Empty(A) Level 16: Shadow Fall -- Empty(A) Level 18: Haunt -- Empty(A) Level 20: Fade -- Empty(A) Level 22: Hover -- Empty(A) Level 24: Shadowy Binds -- Empty(A) Level 26: Shadow Field -- Empty(A) Level 28: Soul Absorption -- Empty(A) Level 30: Hasten -- Empty(A) Level 32: Umbra Beast -- Empty(A) Level 35: Dark Embrace -- Empty(A) Level 38: Dark Servant -- Empty(A) Level 41: Dark Obliteration -- Empty(A) Level 44: Soul Drain -- Empty(A) Level 47: Maneuvers -- Empty(A) Level 49: Afterburner -- Empty(A) Level 1: Brawl -- Empty(A) Level 1: Containment Level 1: Prestige Power Dash -- Empty(A) Level 1: Prestige Power Slide -- Empty(A) Level 1: Prestige Power Quick -- Empty(A) Level 1: Prestige Power Rush -- Empty(A) Level 1: Prestige Power Surge -- Empty(A) Level 1: Sprint -- Empty(A) Level 2: Rest -- Empty(A) Level 4: Ninja Run Level 2: Swift -- Empty(A) Level 2: Health -- Empty(A) Level 2: Hurdle -- Empty(A) Level 2: Stamina -- Empty(A) ------------

Working on a Dark/Dark/Soul build that is primarily for teaming, but I would like to have some kind of solo capability so that I can more easily get specific goals completed (accolades, mostly, so it doesn't need to be mega-efficient solo, just capable of +0/x1 in relative speed). So, that in mind, is Arcane Bolt or the ST Immobilize (shadowy binds) the better choice, given that I only have room for one of the two? Bolt does more damage, the Immobilize, well, it immobilizes and I guess can be useful for AV's that run around. Either one would probably need to be slotted for damage right? Soul doesn't bring an additional single target damage power so I'm mainly relying on the ST hold and one other power. Not sure, what do you think?

Stalkers have virtually the same defensive capability as a scrapper. I suggest you try a different secondary for your next stalker if you're having trouble with regen, as Stalkers are defensively very competent. Poorly built characters will fold under stress for either a scrapper or a stalker though (again since they have almost exactly the same defensive capabilities).

Slight increase in durability (very slight, usually barely noticeable and particularly only on specific powersets) due to higher hp total. Slightly better base damage. Some powersets have better translations for stalkers and some better for scrappers (Stalkers lose some AoE potential, scrappers don't have an Assassin Strike to fill single target attack chain, Stalker secondaries have to give up something for Hide and occasionally that means a good power although not always). In a more practical sense, when I play both in game, Stalkers feel more powerful than scrappers now. They seem virtually as durable and can control their crits, while outputting superior single target DPS. In teams they are even better with their crit buff for being in a team and additional versatility due to Hide being available. Scrappers are still fine and the gap feels small, but I notice the difference. People often quote playstyle being different, but the way Stalkers work now you should be playing them nearly identically to how you would play a scrapper, just with the ability to start a fight stronger through hide occasionally (not always, since with a fast moving team you should be just fast-attacking a crit out to start a fight instead of wasting time with a long cast assassin strike). The AoE capacity of Scrapper Primaries is what I would consider the strongest reason to play them, especially in today's city of heroes which is all about AoEing a spawn down in seconds. There are more scrapper answers for this than there are stalkers (Stalker Elec/Shield are insane though, since they have the AoE's, double telenuke AND a better single target attack chain than the scrapper equivalent). So generally if you want to primarily AoE, probably go Scrapper for most powersets. Also, Titan Weapons wins, so scrapper? Stalkers don't get Titan Weapons.

Dark Melee is excellent for hovering builds.

According to Kaeladin's DPS sheet, the ideal ST chain is Clobber-Shatter-Jawbreaker-repeat, so I won't be skipping that one. It appears WM has a decent amount of powers for me to take, but that's ok. The only thing I may have trouble fitting in and slotting is Maneuvers. I'll have an initial build sometime in the next day or two, so I'll see then. What are people's opinions on skipping Energy Cloak? It has good defense numbers, but I strongly dislike the look of always being cloaked, so I'm thinking of not taking it when I respec. Energy Cloak is an essential power from the powerset. If you don't plan to take it, I suggest rerolling a different powerset instead, that you like the essential powers from. Yes, you can make it work without Energy Cloak (you can make anything work in this game if you want, with enough money and creative building skill really), but 6% all defense is not easy or cheap to come up with and will save a lot of space either in sets or pool powers you'd have to take to make it up. It would be very inefficient to skip it. So, yes, you can skip it, but no, I don't think you should. There are other defense based powersets that won't stealth your character.

No. Actually Tanking is soft combat-control. Either by controlling aggro, or absorbing damage from enemies so your teammates don't have to. And by absorbing I mean: Avoiding (Defense) Reducing (Resistance) Surviving (Heal/Regen) Sorry, that's incorrect at a base level. Avoiding damage requires you to have aggro for damage to avoid. Reducing damage requires you to have aggro for damage to resist. Surviving requires you to have aggro for damage to heal/regen. Yes. Because there's NOTHING a Sentinel can do to generate aggro. Nothing I say! Nothing AT ALL! C'mon man. My default playstyle is "tank it all". And, pretty much, I have. On every AT available. Your assertion didn't mention Sentinel at all, you were asserting that all tanking is 'taking or mitigating damage'. I didn't say a sentinel can't generate aggro. I said that a sentinel cannot generate aggro like a tank or brute or even a scrapper. That's all. Reread if you misunderstood, sorry for any mixups.

No. Actually Tanking is soft combat-control. Either by controlling aggro, or absorbing damage from enemies so your teammates don't have to. And by absorbing I mean: Avoiding (Defense) Reducing (Resistance) Surviving (Heal/Regen) Sorry, that's incorrect at a base level. Avoiding damage requires you to have aggro for damage to avoid. Reducing damage requires you to have aggro for damage to resist. Surviving requires you to have aggro for damage to heal/regen. At a base level tanking requires aggro, otherwise you have nothing to avoid/reduce/survive. All three of those qualities are meaningless if nothing is paying attention to you. You start with aggro, then you survive and avoid/reduce/survive. Any AT can do this at onset with alpha strikes, but only those I mentioned can do so at length. I appreciate your addition and all of the points you make are valid except that aggro is the source of tanking. As soon as you escape into the land of control beyond aggro control, you're instead CCing, not tanking. I agree that aggro control can be considered 'A' soft control, however, and will cede that point, but you need it to tank, without it you're just a sponge on the side hoping something shoots at you.

Endgame, you should be able to come up with enough endurance fixing that you don't need Energy Drain at all if you're looking for powers to dump, otherwise you can just keep it and minimally slot it. Leveling up, you probably want to keep it. Overload as you've already assessed isn't necessary. Bash and Confront or Pulverize and Confront would be the picks for skipping from the primary, so you're good there. I think you've already answered your own question well enough!