Is Ice Armor any good for scrappers?

[DirtyBoxerz]

is ice armor any good on a scrapper? thinking about making a DM/Ice

Edited October 6, 2019 by DirtyBoxerz

[Uun]

It's pretty darn rare. According to the stats the devs posted a month ago, there are only 64 lvl 50 /Ice scrappers. Of those, 8 are DM/Ice. Try it out and let us know?

[RobotLove]

I don't think scrappers had it on live. A number of sets were proliferated with the i25 changes, and when we all came back and recreated all our old characters, there's a good chance many who would have rolled scrap this time around didn't know they could.

Then there's thematics. Ice is low tier on the 'rule of cool' (pun intended), and even though there are lowFX options for it now, it still has a reputation for ugly visuals.

 

Performance wise, it's known to be strong, but is possibly the latest blooming defense based set. However, it's original draw was for it's amazing aggro holding capabilities. which means Tankers wear it better.

 

No reason not to give it a try though, and I would assume DM to pair nicely.

Edited October 7, 2019 by RobotLove

[ZorkNemesis]

On 10/7/2019 at 12:19 PM, Uun said:

It's pretty darn rare. According to the stats the devs posted a month ago, there are only 64 lvl 50 /Ice scrappers.

The main reason I rolled one a short while ago.  Axe/Ice is the combination of the least used primary and secondaries based on that data (at level 50) with only one player having that particular combo at 50, so I wanted to try it and see if it was garbage or just underused.

 

So far: endurance is a non-issue with Energy Absorption; it's available sooner than Tanker's version, but as a trade off no Icicles for a longer while.  Axe recharge remains slow, but Ice Armor provides plenty of opportunities for LotGs (except for Wet Ice for some reason) while Axe can practically go 100% FFB recharge boosts.  Fights are slow at the mid 20s where I am, and mobs often run away from me after I take too long to kill them; almost considering Provoke from the Presence pool to keep things close by.  However I hardly take hits, my defenses are usually 30%+ to all environmental damages except Psi or Tox (Hoarfrost gives Tox resistance, but not a substantial amount) and that will only get better with more enhancements and slotting.  I've been rolling +0/x4 with Bosses and making slow and steady progress, though in truth the combo makes me want to repurpose it into a Tanker instead.

 

My conclusion: functional, but sluggish.  Build Up with Axe hits like a truck though and especially when they crit.  The combo is fun to play in high speed though, I actually had a ton of fun rolling it through a Yin TF where I would just rush in like a madman and take the alpha instead of waiting for the actual tank.  Very survivable.

[Generator]

I've got an Ice^2 Rogue up to about 18 now.  The decision to go Scrapper was mainly b/c the Brute version has Hibernate as the T9 instead of Icy Bastion.  Feels promising so far, but it'll take a bit more time to get him tricked out.

[Redlynne]

Ice/Ice is just a slow to mature combination.  It takes a LOT of slotting before it starts getting "really good" at what it does, so there's a lot of "growing pains" as you level up.  Once you make it to 50 it's pretty strong, but it's getting to 50 that's a slog for most people.

[BrandX]

I loved it on a Tanker, when CoH was live.

 

I'd actually love to have it on a Stalker, but the Stalker version lost Ice Patch, a great ability of the set imo.

[ViciousCabaret]

2 hours ago, BrandX said:

I loved it on a Tanker, when CoH was live.

 

I'd actually love to have it on a Stalker, but the Stalker version lost Ice Patch, a great ability of the set imo.

Ice Patch is part of Ice Melee, not Ice Armor. Stalker Ice Melee gets Ice Patch; the ability they trade for their Assassination power is Greater Ice Sword.

[Redlynne]

1 hour ago, ViciousCabaret said:

Stalker Ice Melee gets Ice Patch; the ability they trade for their Assassination power is Greater Ice Sword.

Filed under the heading of Good Riddance to Bad Rubbish that one.  Greater Ice Sword is perhaps one of THE most disappointing powers in any powerset.

[Generator]

4 hours ago, Redlynne said:

Filed under the heading of Good Riddance to Bad Rubbish that one.  Greater Ice Sword is perhaps one of THE most disappointing powers in any powerset.

Are we shoveling dirt on GIS's grave again?  Goody!

[BrandX]

10 hours ago, ViciousCabaret said:

Ice Patch is part of Ice Melee, not Ice Armor. Stalker Ice Melee gets Ice Patch; the ability they trade for their Assassination power is Greater Ice Sword.

O.O  I've just been looking at Mids and Ice Armor *facepalm*

[Errants]

I've a tweaked Spines/Ice/Soul as my main. Looked at all the combos, and felt it might work out. Endurance HOG until I got sets into him, however, now he's near perma Hasten, Perma Hoarfrost, spitting distance of S/L soft-cap (3 mob EA to hit it), E/N/F/C soft-capped... and just does stupid Scrapper tricks. I only wish that Icicles would crit, and/or one of my two damage aura's would get a taunt component.

 

Also, I had an Ice/SS on Live... Icy Bastion >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Hibernate - crashless Tier 9 with Reg/Rec/Res boost? Gets me out of what little trouble I can manage to get into. I run on +2/3x8, regardless of the content, just missions and TF's... can't stand to farm.

[Frostweaver]

Ice armor on scrappers is sick.

Incredibly powerful.

More powerful than any other AT's version, and absolutely top-tier for scrappers. And BECAUSE icicles does not crit, it's a perfect mule for superior critical strikes... You are not going to 'waste' the 50% opportunity on a crappy icicles spike.

Little hint... Repec out of fighting when you get to incarnates. Instead, get Melee Radial. Why? Because bastion fills the downtime, Perma-Hoarfrost keeps you topped off, and the most important part, MELEE RADIAL IS A TAUNT AURA!!!! (only 2 about 9-10 targets, but still. kick ass)

I cannot emphasize that enough.
BTW, the reason Brutes are better farmers than scrappers is not the Damage... On the PBAOE's that brutes and scrappers share, The scrappers actually have a total of about 25% more dps (fully ato'd) and can hold aggro fairly well with melee radial.

What kills scrapper is one thing. patrons. It's absolutely retarded that Brutes get so much damned aoe in their patrons that Scrappers cannot even approach HALF of their dps. BLASTERS cannot do more than 2/3rds of their Aoe DPS on a farm. and this for an AT that has tank-level defenses.

And the scrapper Epics and patrons SUUUUUCK in comparison. Honestly, so do most other AT's. Brutes should NEVER have been migrated or They should have given tanks and scrappers the same patron pools. I mean, seriously, a scrapper or tanker is forced to take crappy tier 1 ranged attacks just to get a SINGLE aoe? and brutes can immediately step into two ranged cones or targetted aoe's without being forced into any crap to get it? I guess we could just take caltrops 😛

[BrandX]

Does the +50% to Crit Proc actually go off that often in damage toggle?

[Riverdusk]

8 hours ago, Frostweaver said:

Ice armor on scrappers is sick.

Incredibly powerful.

More powerful than any other AT's version, and absolutely top-tier for scrappers. And BECAUSE icicles does not crit, it's a perfect mule for superior critical strikes... You are not going to 'waste' the 50% opportunity on a crappy icicles spike.

Little hint... Repec out of fighting when you get to incarnates. Instead, get Melee Radial. Why? Because bastion fills the downtime, Perma-Hoarfrost keeps you topped off, and the most important part, MELEE RADIAL IS A TAUNT AURA!!!! (only 2 about 9-10 targets, but still. kick ass)

I cannot emphasize that enough.

Nice tip, lack of a taunt aura is what really puts me off a lot of the scrapper armor sets (although as said you could take provoke, but that's an extra power pick and an extra cast/animation time).  For some reason I didn't even think about the incarnate power that has one.

 

Side note: I do wish the scrapper taunt in their primary sets was an AoE so it would be auto hit and we wouldn't have to waste a pool pick on it, if we DID want an active taunt that would make it more useful.

[Errants]

12 hours ago, Frostweaver said:

Ice armor on scrappers is sick.

Incredibly powerful.

More powerful than any other AT's version, and absolutely top-tier for scrappers. And BECAUSE icicles does not crit, it's a perfect mule for superior critical strikes... You are not going to 'waste' the 50% opportunity on a crappy icicles spike.

Little hint... Repec out of fighting when you get to incarnates. Instead, get Melee Radial. Why? Because bastion fills the downtime, Perma-Hoarfrost keeps you topped off, and the most important part, MELEE RADIAL IS A TAUNT AURA!!!! (only 2 about 9-10 targets, but still. kick ass)

I cannot emphasize that enough.
BTW, the reason Brutes are better farmers than scrappers is not the Damage... On the PBAOE's that brutes and scrappers share, The scrappers actually have a total of about 25% more dps (fully ato'd) and can hold aggro fairly well with melee radial.

What kills scrapper is one thing. patrons. It's absolutely retarded that Brutes get so much damned aoe in their patrons that Scrappers cannot even approach HALF of their dps. BLASTERS cannot do more than 2/3rds of their Aoe DPS on a farm. and this for an AT that has tank-level defenses.

And the scrapper Epics and patrons SUUUUUCK in comparison. Honestly, so do most other AT's. Brutes should NEVER have been migrated or They should have given tanks and scrappers the same patron pools. I mean, seriously, a scrapper or tanker is forced to take crappy tier 1 ranged attacks just to get a SINGLE aoe? and brutes can immediately step into two ranged cones or targetted aoe's without being forced into any crap to get it? I guess we could just take caltrops 😛

I've actually got Melee Radial and Assault Core/Radial on my Spines/Ice - And, yes, Melee Radial is amazing when I'm duo'ing. When solo, though, since I don't have to worry about aggro overflow, I've found the faster clearing of Assault Core means less time spamming EA or Ageless... Yes, VERY end hungry, still. Just sustainable, now.

 

Agree on the shitty APP's for Scrappers... I'm debating swapping Dark Blast to Moonbeam... But there's no AoE present to complement. Now, I realize that cottage may have the Brute pools locked... but I do feel that Scrappers should have some better options for Ranged AoE in APP's (or just make Throw Spines and Impale longer than 40'? And maybe swap their animations? Gods, Spines needs help in ST DPS.).

[Frostweaver]

scrapper taunt always has been a joke. Seriously.

I actually have both T4 assault and Melee Radial on my rad/ice, depending on whether I am in standard content/cave farming or running comicon asteroid.
In asteroid, the insp come so quickly that staying at damage cap is too easy to use assault (and the double hit one kinda sucks) the taunt, plus slows from CE and slows from caltrops as well as the dribbling

And, to put the icing on the crap cake, I found that I needed both Caltrops from munitions slotted with annihilation proc AND spring attack with....you guessed it.... force fedback -recharge, The dribbling from spring attack and slows from ce/caltrops tends to keep stuff clustered pretty tightly despite Calt's scatter effect, and my DPS tends to hover right around 450 dps per target for an average of ten targets. That doesn't really hold a candle to Brute's 600 dps per target for 16 targets, but I like to think my procs and -res will squeeze out another 50 dps that a rad/fire brute just cannot exploit.

[goatriderman]

Ice armor just isn't what it used to be.  Hibernate used to be it's saving grace back in the day.  The recharge was/is easily under 45-60s or something like that and lasted for 30s.  It really made the armor set imo because at the time defense was very underrated and you'd struggle because you couldn't stack enough defense to make up for basically 0% resistance.  Fast forward to today and you can get good defense and ok resistance (with sets) and the same recharge on hibernate but it gets the phase shift debuff so regardless of if it is recharged or not you can't use it more than once every 2 minutes.  That probably doesn't seem like a big deal to you now...but you'll 100% notice with difficult gameplay.  It's really fking annoying having your "Oh shit" button recharged and ready to go but even though you click it you still die because you have a debuff that won't allow you to use it.

[Frostweaver]

1 hour ago, goatriderman said:

Ice armor just isn't what it used to be.  Hibernate used to be it's saving grace back in the day.  The recharge was/is easily under 45-60s or something like that and lasted for 30s.  It really made the armor set imo because at the time defense was very underrated and you'd struggle because you couldn't stack enough defense to make up for basically 0% resistance.  Fast forward to today and you can get good defense and ok resistance (with sets) and the same recharge on hibernate but it gets the phase shift debuff so regardless of if it is recharged or not you can't use it more than once every 2 minutes.  That probably doesn't seem like a big deal to you now...but you'll 100% notice with difficult gameplay.  It's really fking annoying having your "Oh shit" button recharged and ready to go but even though you click it you still die because you have a debuff that won't allow you to use it.

Dude. you are in the SCRAPPER forum.

[goatriderman]

1 minute ago, Frostweaver said:

Dude. you are in the SCRAPPER forum.

do ice scrappers not get hibernate

[Frostweaver]

5 minutes ago, goatriderman said:

do ice scrappers not get hibernate

Nope, they get icy bastion. a massive resist, regen, and recovery boost. WAY better than hibernate. It's like 40% resist all but psi, 200 recovery, and 400 regen. with sick recharge it can be up about half the time.

Edited October 13, 2019 by Frostweaver

[goatriderman]

Just now, Frostweaver said:

Nope, they get icy bastion. a massive resist, regen, and recovery boost. WAY better than hibernate.

ah my bad i just assumed.  whoops

[Hopeling]

24 minutes ago, Frostweaver said:

Nope, they get icy bastion. a massive resist, regen, and recovery boost. WAY better than hibernate. It's like 40% resist all but psi, 200 recovery, and 400 regen. with sick recharge it can be up about half the time.

Frankly, I feel like it should be the other way around. Hibernate seems like a more suitable power for an AT that doesn't need to hold aggro and can reasonably drop out of the fight for a few seconds, while Icy Bastion seems more suited to a tank. With the history of the set, it obviously couldn't be the other way around, but in the current game it just feels strange.

 

Frankly, I wouldn't mind if all melee ATs got Icy Bastion rather than Hibernate, but maybe that just means Ice/ Tankers aren't for me.

[Microcosm]

6 hours ago, Hopeling said:

Frankly, I feel like it should be the other way around. Hibernate seems like a more suitable power for an AT that doesn't need to hold aggro and can reasonably drop out of the fight for a few seconds, while Icy Bastion seems more suited to a tank. With the history of the set, it obviously couldn't be the other way around, but in the current game it just feels strange.

 

Frankly, I wouldn't mind if all melee ATs got Icy Bastion rather than Hibernate, but maybe that just means Ice/ Tankers aren't for me.

It was done this way because when ice was given to stalkers they already had hibernate available in the Leviathan patron pool. Which is fantastic, because now you can have both plus the goodness that is waterspout 🙂

[Frostweaver]

to be honest, There are some changes to sets like icy bastion for ice and instant regeneration on regeneration that desperately NEED to be propagated.

The only problem is there are always numbnuts that whine about 'ruining the challenge!' whenever a significant change for the better is presented that eliminates some badly balanced, poorly thought out, or utterly outdated mechanic that should have been ditched when IO's went live.

 

I can guarantee that if they removed Granite's weakness to gutters SOMEONE would whine and bitch about it endlessly.

Was anyone here around when innate fitness went live? I bet that the crying from people who favor sets with better than average regen and end management was EPIC. "You ruined what made willpower special!"

Edited October 14, 2019 by Frostweaver