Did tanks get overbuffed?

[drbuzzard]

Oh, I should also mention the case that certain sets close the gap between tankers and brutes because of built in damage boosting powers which leverage the higher damage scalar of the tank. Claws (this case with followup which can stack 3 times for +60% damage pretty easily), rage, or soul drain.

 

You picked a test which isn't all that kosher. Pick a set which doesn't leverage a constant damage boost (and yes, build up will always help close the gap, but not as much).

[Bill Z Bubba]

5 minutes ago, marcussmythe said:

OTOH, slotting for procs means you are NOT slotting for set bonuses

In this case, I'm only losing the set bonus from the 6th slot which means resistance to toxic and psi in 1 case or defense to psi in the other. Neither affect DPS.

[marcussmythe]

Buzzard raises a good point.  Claws is (relatively speaking) stronger on Tanks and Scrappers than on Brutes (as would be say, Dark Melee, or similar).

I anticipate a set lacking such boni, or with smaller ones (Titan Weapons leaps to mind - as Momentum is a smaller buff than Buildup in terms of raw %) - would show relatively greater fury values.

 

And I do apologize if I over-generalized your point, BZB - I was speaking more of the general case procmonster-vs-set-bonus, where 3-4 procs per attack is the target value.  I do think in your specific case your results would be further apart on a set with less additional damage bonuses and more raw build-in damage, as the large fury buff tends to swamp the value of other buffs, and gives more return to higher base damage sets that rely less on in-set damage buffs to do their business.

Edited July 6, 2020 by marcussmythe

[Bopper]

1 minute ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

Again, I can easily replace the chance for +toxic with a standard lvl 50 recred IO which will in turn reduce the number of times the proc from the purple set goes off. Would yall like to see this data? If not, I'd rather not spend another hour killin pylons....

If you can show evidence that in general tanks are doing more damage and/or clearing content faster than brutes, then I'll revisit the discussion of Tanks being overbuffed. As of now, I still see the same ranking as before. Scrappers do most damage, Tankers do most survival, and Brutes live in between both. That is an over-simplification, but nonetheless, if those rankings are still intact after all this analysis, then the sky isn't necessarily falling.

[Bill Z Bubba]

3 minutes ago, drbuzzard said:

Oh, I should also mention the case that certain sets close the gap between tankers and brutes because of built in damage boosting powers which leverage the higher damage scalar of the tank. Claws (this case with followup which can stack 3 times for +60% damage pretty easily), rage, or soul drain.

 

You picked a test which isn't all that kosher. Pick a set which doesn't leverage a constant damage boost (and yes, build up will always help close the gap, but not as much).

Again, we're dealing with the same buff over the same amount of time.

The decrease in DPS caused by having to fire off buildup, and the corresponding increase in DPS, is the same across the board in exactly the same way that having to use followup for that triple stack of +damage on focus is the same across all archetypes.

[drbuzzard]

3 minutes ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

In this case, I'm only losing the set bonus from the 6th slot which means resistance to toxic and psi in 1 case or defense to psi in the other. Neither affect DPS.

I would never inflict the tedium of beating down a pylon on anyone I like.

[Bill Z Bubba]

Just now, drbuzzard said:

I would never inflict the tedium of beating down a pylon on anyone I like.

You're a kind man. Sadly... I'm sick in the head enough to enjoy it.

[drbuzzard]

Just now, Bill Z Bubba said:

Again, we're dealing with the same buff over the same amount of time.

The decrease in DPS caused by having to fire off buildup, and the corresponding increase in DPS, is the same across the board in exactly the same way that having to use followup for that triple stack of +damage on focus is the same across all archetypes.

But because of the tanker having a higher damage scalar, the power closes the gap in damage output between the ATs. Rage and soul drain do it as well. Those power de-emphasize the effect of fury which is the core of brute damage.

[Bill Z Bubba]

3 minutes ago, Bopper said:

If you can show evidence that in general tanks are doing more damage and/or clearing content faster than brutes, then I'll revisit the discussion of Tanks being overbuffed. As of now, I still see the same ranking as before. Scrappers do most damage, Tankers do most survival, and Brutes live in between both. That is an over-simplification, but nonetheless, if those rankings are still intact after all this analysis, then the sky isn't necessarily falling.

Ok. So running, say, 5 DA repeatables from Ephram, knowing that I fight the same way on all three ATs, timing them, and comparing the time between the three ATs, would be a useful data point to you all?

[Bopper]

For what it's worth, using the Pylon as the metric is only good in terms of looking at single target DPS (and expectations in an AV fight). Throw in some clear speeds of farms with Elite Bosses (maybe the Brigg outdoor S/L farm, set to +2/x8). Throw in whatever procs your build can handle, and compare the clear speed alongside the pylon times.

[drbuzzard]

That seems like a reasonable test and not even tedious. Go for it.

[Bopper]

Just now, Bill Z Bubba said:

Ok. So running, say, 5 DA repeatables from Ephram, knowing that I fight the same way on all three ATs, timing them, and comparing the time between the three ATs, would be a useful data point to you all?

yes, that works. Not familiar enough with what type of enemies are in there, but if you can run it with EBs and at saturation, great. Try not to set it so high that you're dying all the time, though. We want times to translate to DPS, not having to travel from the hospital. We already know Brutes are less survivable, don't need to incorporate that variable. The point is to isolate for damage only.

[Bill Z Bubba]

2 minutes ago, drbuzzard said:

But because of the tanker having a higher damage scalar, the power closes the gap in damage output between the ATs. Rage and soul drain do it as well. Those power de-emphasize the effect of fury which is the core of brute damage.

Now see... I like this. If that's the case, then the fury mechanic itself must be taken into account and adjusted for when attempting to balance the three ATs. My argument is that, currently, the three are NOT in balance. Granted, this is especially true when solo since brutes share tank caps but don't share tank base values.

 

If brutes are supposed to be between tanks and scrappers, then they should be. They should do more damage than tanks and have better mitigation than scrappers in ALL areas of the game regardless of solo or team makeup.

[Bill Z Bubba]

1 minute ago, Bopper said:

Try not to set it so high that you're dying all the time, though.

LOL. Yea, no. I don't die against +1s on any of my BZBs. So being max diff with +3 incarnate shifts makes that crap a consistent cakewalk.

[drbuzzard]

Not really sure what one can do about leveraging back out the effect of the damage boost powers in certain sets. It would have to be individual treatment to those sets since they are anomalies.

[VV]

So, two things.

1) Tanks have always been OP, it's just that most people don't know how to play them. The recent buff just made them a tad more OP, but still most people don't know how to play them.

 

 2) 

1 hour ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

Does anyone want to try to tell me that brutes are on average running around with 86% of the mitigation that tanks have? Cuz I ain't seeing it.
Something seems amiss here.

As I understand it, Tanks and Brutes are both capped at the same mitigation levels in terms of armoring (Def & Res). However, nobody plays an average character, so the question is kind of meaningless.

 

The problem is, by looking only at one, non-normal instance, the Pylon solo, you have completely skewed the results in terms of how the ATs actually play. This situation literally never comes up in regular play, so you are testing something irrelevant.

[MunkiLord]

I feel like this could all be solved if everyone just used Scrappers instead.

[Super Homer]

So... nerf procs so they stop ignoring AT modifiers?

Edited July 6, 2020 by Super Homer

[Bopper]

8 minutes ago, Super Homer said:

So... nerf procs so they stop ignoring AT modifiers?

That solution quite literally would only buff Tankers more.

[Bill Z Bubba]

17 minutes ago, VV said:

As I understand it, Tanks and Brutes are both capped at the same mitigation levels in terms of armoring (Def & Res). However, nobody plays an average character, so the question is kind of meaningless.

 

The problem is, by looking only at one, non-normal instance, the Pylon solo, you have completely skewed the results in terms of how the ATs actually play. This situation literally never comes up in regular play, so you are testing something irrelevant.

 

Interesting and horribly wrong.  The situation comes up every time I solo the ITF. Or STF. Or Maria's arc. In other words the situation comes up every time I run into an AV and monster or any other hard target.

 

Nobody plays an "average character?" Really? So why are there threads about running TFs with SO only builds? Sounds like someone out there is running "average" builds.

Edited July 6, 2020 by Bill Z Bubba

[VV]

3 minutes ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

 

Interesting and horribly wrong.  The situation comes up every time I solo the ITF. Or STF. Or Maria's arc. In other words the situation comes up every time I run into an AV and monster or any other hard target.

Okay, so that is a legitimate test. Let's talk about that. What is the problem you are having while soloing your ITF, STF, AV, GM or other hard target? Also, you just proved me horribly right. I said Pylon solos do not come up in regular play, and here you are NOT talking about Pylon solos.

[marcussmythe]

33 minutes ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

Now see... I like this. If that's the case, then the fury mechanic itself must be taken into account and adjusted for when attempting to balance the three ATs. My argument is that, currently, the three are NOT in balance. Granted, this is especially true when solo since brutes share tank caps but don't share tank base values.

 

If brutes are supposed to be between tanks and scrappers, then they should be. They should do more damage than tanks and have better mitigation than scrappers in ALL areas of the game regardless of solo or team makeup.

Perhaps?  But then what do we do about the part where different ATs have different resist caps, but the same def cap - as that impacts different resistance vs defense sets?

 

Or the way certain sets get BUFFED when you move them to Stalker, and some get pretty badly hurt?

 

Im not saying it wouldnt be worth doing - Im just suggesting it would be a huge amount of work out of a limited dev time budget.

[VV]

7 minutes ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

Nobody plays an "average character?" Really? So why are there threads about running TFs with SO only builds? Sounds like someone out there is running "average" builds.

So, SOs are the definition of "average"? Why?

[VV]

40 minutes ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

Ok. So running, say, 5 DA repeatables from Ephram, knowing that I fight the same way on all three ATs, timing them, and comparing the time between the three ATs, would be a useful data point to you all?

I would like to see that data, yeah. But, please include a Blaster, a Sentinal, a Controller, a Dominator, and all the other ATs. I mean, if we are talking about balance, why are we only talking about a few of the ATs? That makes no sense. Shouldn't ALL the ATs be balanced against each other?

[Troo]

1 hour ago, Bopper said:

the ranking of Damage potential to show:

Scrapper > Brute > Tanker 

5.625 (not including crits) > 5.25 (not completely factoring in Fury) > 4.75 (not factoring in AoE)

 

And the ranking of Survival potential will show:

Tanker > Brute > Scrapper

ahhh but where do Blasters and Stalkers fit in?