Define a defender

[DrInfernus]

I absolutely love defenders but I find expectations on you from teams can vary massively. There seems no consensus on what defenders are specifically for and what they should be. For the most of the rest it’s generally simple:

 

Tanks/Brutes: Take alpha

Scrapper/Blaster/Stalker: Deal damage

Controller/Dom: Lock them down

 

But what about defenders? Heal? Buff? Debuff? Damage multiplication? Take full responsibility for a team’s green bars? I’ve had expectations of them all depending on which character I’m actually playing, sometimes by any of compliments for what I can do and sometimes criticism for what I can’t do. 
 

I’ve always considered defending to be all about simply making a team greater than the sum of its parts, in any way you can depending on your power set. So my questions are:

 

1) Do you agree with that, or is there something more specific to it?

 

and 

 

2) Based on your experiences in-game, do you think the wider CoX community share a common definition and expectation of defenders?

[nihilii]

Agree with you. "Force multiplier" is what a Defender is.

 

I've seen enough people expecting Defenders to be healbots, but the mentality has died down over the years. I think there's probably an idea of the Defender as a protector more than a damage amplifier, just based on the name.

[Underfyre]

Back in launch everyone wanted a bubble defender. Sets and IOs weren't there to massively inflate defense numbers, so having a bubble there to basically max out your defense was a necessity. But then you also wanted an empathy healer to keep everyone standing through streak-breakers and buffing the DPS.

 

The proliferation of defense bonuses in sets has made needing a healer less and less of a concern. So bubbles are almost entirely unnecessary, and the empathy is reduced to patch heals and buff bot.

 

So yes, force multiplier at this point, whether it be by reducing resistance/defense, increasing damage, or flooring regen.

[Psylenz0511]

Playing a Trick Arrow defender compared to empathy or thermal is as different as a blaster from a tank. I love Trick Arrow on a team and think they are one of the best for team multiplying for -def -res soft control with the oil slick slip and slide and some good AoE dmg.

In short, it depends on the Defender primary and the player's playstyle emphasis what to expect from a defender.

[Greycat]

3 hours ago, nihilii said:

Agree with you. "Force multiplier" is what a Defender is.

 

"Force multiplier who will get very annoyed at being called a healer." 🙂

(Yes, I really wish the H word would drop from peoples' vocabularies.)

 

A few things in general. These talks about who's useless or... less needed make a few assumptions. Like that everyone's at 50, and that everyone *at* 50 has ubermegamassive capped to everything builds. And that's just not the case. Yes, someone casually building after a while might hit... say, 15-25% defense, a bunch of resist, etc. but that leaves room for buffing. (Not to mention how many fairly common things will start debuffing that defense - like machine guns - once they get a hit in.)

 

The other thing is that people seem to just focus on the primary in these discussions. No, defenders on a team are not damage powerhouses on their own. So embrace that. Make a team build and build up your secondary's debuffs, if possible. It certainly doesn't hurt - though some, of course, are not as impactful as others (the common complaint about Electric's end drain not really doing much, for instance.)

 

[Ankhammon]

I like the term nihilii uses, "Force Multiplier". It allows for all the variations of Defender goodness that many miss.

 

This has been an issue since Day 1. Players see "Defender" and have their own opinion (usually based on some other game they've played) about what they should be doing.

 

I've had many discussions over the years, but the char that exemplifies the what are you doing mentality the best to me is the Sonic/Sonic I had on live. I'd constantly have to tell someone on the team what I did for the team. I had a whole speech prepared on how I created Tank Mages out of the whole team (pretty close to true).

 

An honest part of the trouble was that some of our powers and sets don't have a flashy graphic that can be easily seen on a team with the rest of the light show.

[Ankhammon]

6 minutes ago, Greycat said:

The other thing is that people seem to just focus on the primary in these discussions. No, defenders on a team are not damage powerhouses on their own. So embrace that. Make a team build and build up your secondary's debuffs, if possible. It certainly doesn't hurt - though some, of course, are not as impactful as others (the common complaint about Electric's end drain not really doing much, for instance.)

Very true. Your secondary can be very potent in working toward team or individual success. Most of this is related to the "other" effects beyond damage.

 

Just think of how much mitigation a /Psy set can pull off with controls and -Rech. Or how much -Res is supplied (and controls) with the /Sonic.

 

Example: /sonic can easily keep 60% -Res on an AV for most of a fight. Assuming standard slotting on a team, you are adding somewhere in the neighborhood of 25% total damage on that Target with your offense.

*incredibly simple example taking nothing into consideration from any other players but damage.

 

So, someone asks "why play a defender" and "what do you add", you can just smile and know the awesomeness of you. 🙂

[kiramon]

I do think the “everyone is def capped” is hyperbole- I definitely don’t see those teams regularly where everyone is capped especially with the “35+” teams for a lot of content. Not saying it’s not common but they definitely aren’t always useless

[Underfyre]

32 minutes ago, Ankhammon said:

Example: /sonic can easily keep 60% -Res on an AV for most of a fight. Assuming standard slotting on a team, you are adding somewhere in the neighborhood of 25% total damage on that Target with your offense.

Damage * %Damage * %Res.

 

If you're debuffing by 60%, you're allowing for essentially more than 60% more damage to be done.

[Linea]

Defenders are the most versatile AT in the game.  That makes them very hard to define.   No most of community just don't get it.

[Hjarki]

For me, the issue is that a novice player is likely to bring expectations from other games. Those expectations will be along the lines of "I'm not all that tough and I don't deal all that much damage, but my support justifies my presence in the team/league".

 

However, those expectations don't really line up with how the game plays at 50. While some support remains useful, most of it - including virtually all the abilities from some sets - does not. So the person who rolls up an Empathy Defender with the expectation that everyone will love them at 50 for being the best healer around is going to end up very disappointed when they discover no one really needs them.

 

This also impacts which support AT you'd choose to play. I think an Empathy Defender is a bit silly - you have a nearly worthless primary coupled with one of the lowest damage offensive sets in the game - but a */Pain Mastermind can be justified.

 

 

 

 

[Apparition]

21 minutes ago, Hjarki said:

For me, the issue is that a novice player is likely to bring expectations from other games. Those expectations will be along the lines of "I'm not all that tough and I don't deal all that much damage, but my support justifies my presence in the team/league".

 

However, those expectations don't really line up with how the game plays at 50. While some support remains useful, most of it - including virtually all the abilities from some sets - does not. So the person who rolls up an Empathy Defender with the expectation that everyone will love them at 50 for being the best healer around is going to end up very disappointed when they discover no one really needs them.

 

This also impacts which support AT you'd choose to play. I think an Empathy Defender is a bit silly - you have a nearly worthless primary coupled with one of the lowest damage offensive sets in the game - but a */Pain Mastermind can be justified.

 

 

 

 

 

That brings bad flashbacks of seeing all those level 50 Empathy Defenders with only their tier 1 attack back in April/May/June of last year.  *Shudder.*  The best were the level 50 Empathy Defenders with only their tier 1 attack and the full Medicine power pool...

[Bastille Boy]

I think the only widely shared expectation of defenders is that they will contribute somehow to tough fights.

 

My personal expectations:

• The defender's primary will contribute offensively, not only defensively, to fights against AVs, EBs, and GMs, either by buffing or by debuffing.
• The defender will use their secondary actively.
• The defender will not be squishy. Not as tanky as a tanker, but tougher than a blaster.

I do not expect healing, at all (except of course in PVP). I am very happy to get a Cold/Sonic defender on my team.

 

I agree with the consensus that Empathy is not a top-tier set, but I think it's a solid B (on an S/A/B/C/D/F scale) if played properly, with buffs rather than healing as the priority. From a roleplaying or fiction-writing perspective, it is the most versatile set in the game. The origin story for an Empathy defender could be almost any story. So I don't want to discourage people from playing Empathy if they have a cool character concept. I want to encourage them to roll the toon and to play it effectively.

[Doomguide2005]

An AT whose primary is focused on buffing allies and/or debuffing foes paired with a blast secondary with debuffs.  Owing to AT modifiers those buff and debuffs are typically the strongest in the game.

 

When found in groups approach with extreme caution until friendliness is determined as teams composed of only defenders are among the strongest team compositions in the game owing to the force multiplication of said buffs and debuffs.

[Doomguide2005]

As for Empathy in the end game and Incarnate content I think in part it is related to the predominately single target ally focused nature of the set.  Only Healing Aura, Recovery Aura and Regeneration Aura can effect multiple allies.  Quite arguably only Regeneration Aura is significant in this content.  You combine that with the fact that pretty much no single character is truly vital (whether dead or godly buffed) to team/league success then no matter how potent a single target buff is it is rendered relatively insignificant you render Empathy less significant as a result.

 

That said multiple Empaths operating together especially /Sonic's GM-style ... well look out they are going to leverage those single target buffs.  A full team of Incarnates will be well beyond the I-cap defensively (+90%ish), at the hard cap for damage (+400%), at the -resist floor (-300%) against single target(s) of choice and things heavily -resist in general --> you can take a crack at what that means for crashless nukes going off every spawn.  Likely approaching the recharge cap in powers, at the AT resist caps and at the hard cap for regeneration (+2000%), absurd quantities of +recovery etc., etc..  There's a reason such a grouping is called a Superteam.

[Hjarki]

1 hour ago, Doomguide2005 said:

That said multiple Empaths operating together especially /Sonic's GM-style ... well look out they are going to leverage those single target buffs.  A full team of Incarnates will be well beyond the I-cap defensively (+90%ish), at the hard cap for damage (+400%), at the -resist floor (-300%) against single target(s) of choice and things heavily -resist in general --> you can take a crack at what that means for crashless nukes going off every spawn.  Likely approaching the recharge cap in powers, at the AT resist caps and at the hard cap for regeneration (+2000%), absurd quantities of +recovery etc., etc..  There's a reason such a grouping is called a Superteam.

Part of the problem I have with Empathy is that Pain is basically the same thing except defense instead of resist and +damage/-resist rather than minor +damage. Given that neither set has particularly striking visuals, almost any time I see Empathy/* or */Empathy, I have to ask why they aren't just doing Pain/* or */Pain.

 

[Greycat]

8 hours ago, Apparition said:

 

That brings bad flashbacks of seeing all those level 50 Empathy Defenders with only their tier 1 attack back in April/May/June of last year.  *Shudder.*  The best were the level 50 Empathy Defenders with only their tier 1 attack and the full Medicine power pool...

Want worse?

 

Admittedly this was live, but... fighting a GM. Get a Rad/ defender. Who had... just the AOE heal, or pretty close, and all the secondary.

[Doomguide2005]

9 hours ago, Hjarki said:

Part of the problem I have with Empathy is that Pain is basically the same thing except defense instead of resist and +damage/-resist rather than minor +damage. Given that neither set has particularly striking visuals, almost any time I see Empathy/* or */Empathy, I have to ask why they aren't just doing Pain/* or */Pain.

 

Short answer ... for the same reason 'you' aren't.  

 

Long(er) answer will have to wait as real life calls.

[kiramon]

11 hours ago, Hjarki said:

Part of the problem I have with Empathy is that Pain is basically the same thing except defense instead of resist and +damage/-resist rather than minor +damage. Given that neither set has particularly striking visuals, almost any time I see Empathy/* or */Empathy, I have to ask why they aren't just doing Pain/* or */Pain.

 

I do like pain more personally, but group wide endless end is pretty effective. 

[Peacemoon]

Support and Damage.

[Peacemoon]

12 hours ago, Hjarki said:

Part of the problem I have with Empathy is that Pain is basically the same thing except defense instead of resist and +damage/-resist rather than minor +damage. Given that neither set has particularly striking visuals, almost any time I see Empathy/* or */Empathy, I have to ask why they aren't just doing Pain/* or */Pain.

 

Fortitude, Recovery Aura, Regeneration Aura and Adrenalin Boost do not have any comparatives in Pain/, and the sets are quite different aesthetically.

[kiramon]

18 minutes ago, Peacemoon said:

Fortitude, Recovery Aura, Regeneration Aura and Adrenalin Boost do not have any comparatives in Pain/, and the sets are quite different aesthetically.

I think Painbringer is pretty comparable to AB

[Frosticus]

They are the expectation of success.

 

More so that any other AT, when a blue shield icon joins you expect that things are just going to be better by a significant degree. The how and the why they can do that isn't all that important - they just do.

That's why when you encounter one that is built poorly, or played poorly, it tends to be glaring. 

 

The only other AT with similar weight upon their shoulders is a tank.

Corrs and trollers can do similar things as defenders, but they don't come with the same expectation attached. 

[Peacemoon]

3 minutes ago, kiramon said:

I think Painbringer is pretty comparable to AB

Not really for me, AB does massive recharge bonus which is much superior IMO. They are very different buffs in my opinion just similar recharge and duration. 

[Ankhammon]

22 hours ago, underfyre said:

Damage * %Damage * %Res.

 

If you're debuffing by 60%, you're allowing for essentially more than 60% more damage to be done.

I was doing damage at ~200% (dam +standard enhancement) + 60%. My bad. was doing a +dam instead of a -res