Looking for Pros and Cons with Rad/TW and Dark/TW

[Ghimel]

I have a WS that is full build and tons of fun to play, and I want to play a tank as my next toon.  First, I just want to swing a huge sword around.  Second, I hate carnies and mezz worries me at higher levels.  Lastly, I'd like to be able to solo as much as the game as possible, once slotted out.  As I understand, Rad is great for soloing, but Dark is best vs. mezz.  Thoughts?

[oldskool]

What mezz is worrying you?  Rad and Dark both have the same degree of protection against Hold, Sleep, Stun, and Immobilize.  Rad has protection against knockback and Dark does not.  Dark has protection against fear but Rad does not.   That's really the difference there when it comes to status protection.  Rad has some slow resistance where Dark does not.  Dark has perception resistance where Rad does not. 

The two sets are both heavily biased towards resistance (Rad more so than Dark) and both have their share of additional perks.  Dark Armor's side perks include soft control options, some weak stealth, and a potentially powerful (albeit very expensive) heal.  Rad Armor includes perks like absorb shield, recharge boosts, regeneration, and a heal over time.  Both sets can contribute to increased damage.  

Resistance gap wise, they are almost opposites.  Rad Armor has higher protection to Energy and Toxic than Dark does.   Dark has higher protection to Cold and Psi than Rad does.  Of these damage types Energy is more common.  Psi, from Carnies, is more lethal when you stand near them when they die.  Their powers like Dominate aren't the real threat.  

Dark Armor can, potentially, have very high endurance costs if you try to run everything without a plan to deal with it.  Rad Armor has Gamma Boost and it may help in certain situations.  

Total resist, both can become very solid.  They both have their own quirks that you may or may not care for.  Rad Armor benefits greatly from being released later as it has more quality of life benefits but Dark Armor is still very powerful on Tankers.  

So, on one hand Rad/TW may be easier to build while still offering a lot of benefit, and Dark Armor may be a bit more complicated to offset the drawbacks it comes with.  Both can be very good choices in the grand scheme of things. 

Edited September 3, 2021 by oldskool
typos and stuff; its early.

[Ghimel]

Oh man, great write-up and yet now I feel a tad more confused.  Hmmm.... What would you recommend to someone who wants to solo the majority of end-game content?

 

Edit:  What you wrote wasn't confusing, it was great.  It just provided more info than I was prepared for - but still super important to learn!  Thanks again.

Edited September 3, 2021 by Ghimel

[oldskool]

7 hours ago, Ghimel said:

Oh man, great write-up and yet now I feel a tad more confused.  Hmmm.... What would you recommend to someone who wants to solo the majority of end-game content?

 

Tankers are in pretty good shape right now.  It may sound like a lazy answer to say "just about anything", but really that's my answer.  

My best answer is to maybe play around with a few variants of your concept and see which one grabs you.  You can make 1000 characters or so on HC.  No real reason not to mess with a few by joining a couple teams or tinkering in some AE missions to quickly level up to around 20.  
 

Edit; I guess it seems like I an dancing around around the whole "I wanna solo end stuff".  A well built Tanker is nearly immortal and they were buffed for doing more respectable damage (sometimes even amazing damage if you know what you're doing).  So, the ability to solo on a Tanker is really trivial once you get going. 

Edited September 3, 2021 by oldskool

[Ghidorah]

On 9/3/2021 at 7:41 AM, Ghimel said:

Oh man, great write-up and yet now I feel a tad more confused.  Hmmm.... What would you recommend to someone who wants to solo the majority of end-game content?

 

Edit:  What you wrote wasn't confusing, it was great.  It just provided more info than I was prepared for - but still super important to learn!  Thanks again.

 

Oldskool gave a great write up to the comparison between the 2 sets...found the thread myself as I often debate between the 2.

 

The way I have picked between the 2 is based on my secondary and how end heavy they are.  I just made a Dark/Staff and end was never a problem because staff can mitigate the costs with body stance...so dark had the dmg aura and uber heal which I wanted.  Now at max I dont even use Cloak of fear with everything max and a 10sec full heal who needs another layer.

 

For TW/Mace I would def go Rad because the end use on both is much higher, but I will miss my damage aura and trade uber heal/for uber absorb.

Edited September 12, 2021 by Ghidorah