Regen and an epic'ed out build

[Stormwalker]

1 hour ago, Troo said:

 

Without going into a long debate

 

SR has great defense

Regen can have that same defense (until debuffed) plus it's regeneration. SR can't ever have the same regeneration.

Elec has great resistance.

Regen can have nearly that same resistance plus it's regeneration. Elec can't ever have quite the same regeneration.

**This is baseline to some people's position which can put Regen possibly having a higher upside than some other sets. (not necessarily the ones listed)

 

I don't completely agree with that because I don't like using inspirations on the regular.

Instead I pair Regeneration with a bunch of resistance from powers, set bonuses, etc and simply accept that I am gonna get hit. This feels very sturdy and a good base to operate from. I'm at full health at the end of most fights.

• Now if I get hit with debuffs I need to know how to  counter them.
• If incoming damage is coming in fast than regen heals at a sustained pace that is devouring the health bar, I need to know how to counter that as well.
• Sometimes the counter is a power, sometimes a tactic.

 

Defense debuff is so prevalent in the game that I don't think the argument about defense holds water, to be blunt.  Remember, my regenner on Live was Katana.  I know very well about what can be done with defense on a Regen.  It's a nice survival tool, but defense on a set with no defense debuff resistance will not go remotely as far as on a set that has it.

 

Also, how much offensive potential are you giving up to build to high levels of defense/resistance on a regen?

 

Of course, when I say these things, I'm not really considering Incarnate powers.  Most of my time spent on my Regen on Live was before the Incarnate system came into play.  I would presume that Barrier on a Regen is probably highly effective.

 

EDIT:  Also, why do you people keep insisting on rehashing the basics of a regenner like you think I don't know how to play one?  My first 50 on Live was a Katana/Regen and I played her for quite some time as my main.  I built the hell out of her, using pretty much every trick that was available at the time (which is most of the tricks that are available now, barring Rune of Protection and Incarnate powers).  I DID all of those things.  I rotated Shadow Meld and MoG to manage alphas.  I used IO sets to shore up my resistances.  I know how to play a freakin' Regen scrapper.  Just because I think Regen underperforms does not mean that I am freaking incompetent at playing one!  Stop making assumptions about other people's skills when they disagree with you!

Edited June 27, 2022 by Stormwalker

[Troo]

1 hour ago, Stormwalker said:

Also, why do you people keep insisting on rehashing the basics of a regenner like you think I don't know how to play one? 

 

1 hour ago, Stormwalker said:

Katana/Regen

 

[Bill Z Bubba]

3 hours ago, Troo said:

 

Without going into a long debate

 

SR has great defense

Regen can have that same defense (until debuffed) plus it's regeneration. SR can't ever have the same regeneration.

Elec has great resistance.

Regen can have nearly that same resistance plus it's regeneration. Elec can't ever have quite the same regeneration.

**This is baseline to some people's position which can put Regen possibly having a higher upside than some other sets. (not necessarily the ones listed)

 

I don't completely agree with that because I don't like using inspirations on the regular.

Instead I pair Regeneration with a bunch of resistance from powers, set bonuses, etc and simply accept that I am gonna get hit. This feels very sturdy and a good base to operate from. I'm at full health at the end of most fights.

• Now if I get hit with debuffs I need to know how to  counter them.
• If incoming damage is coming in fast than regen heals at a sustained pace that is devouring the health bar, I need to know how to counter that as well.
• Sometimes the counter is a power, sometimes a tactic.

 

This is ridiculous. SR can have as much green bar as a regen with respites as a regen can use lucks. Same goes for Elec. Unless you're constantly pulling insps from email, you're rapidly back to square one with no defense and shitty resistance, leaning on 3 or 4 long recharge clicks that can be debuffed into uselessness.

 

And of course you're at full health right after a fight... except for all those times you're at zero health instead.

[Troo]

7 minutes ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

as much green bar as a regen with respites as a regen can use lucks

 

Good point.

As I said, I don't go for the inspiration method.

 

8 minutes ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

And of course you're at full health right after a fight... except for all those times you're at zero health instead.

 

Yes, like some other sets it works until it doesn't and then we gotta have a plan. (unfilled psi hole, almost capped defense, etc. Big game lvl 1-50-T4)

[Zepp]

Can everyone agree that:

• Regen underperforms compared to other sets
  • a major weakness is the lack of debuff resistances
  • another weakness is DPS loss due to clickies
• Regen offers a different style of play
  • maintaining the active play while providing a benefit is ideal
  • this does not mean that reverting Instant healing to a toggle is off the table

Is there any disagreement on these points?

Are there any other points of agreement?

Edited June 27, 2022 by Zepp

[Troo]

42 minutes ago, Zepp said:

Can everyone agree that:

• Regen underperforms compared to other sets
  • a major weakness is the lack of Recharge and Regen Debuff Resistance
  • another weaknesss is a marginal DPS loss due to clickies and additional loss due to lack of damage power
• Regen offers a different style of play
  • maintaining the reactive play while providing a benefit is ideal
  • this does not mean that reverting Instant healing to a toggle is off the table

 

fixed it for ya zeppers

 

Spoiler

Recharge and Regen could use a boost. Could even be enhanceable similar to SR's Defense Debuff Resistance.

 

Regen Stalker with all powers active and SO enhanced  

 

SR with all but Elude & un-enhanced enhanced with SOs

 

Edited June 27, 2022 by Troo

[Jeff Krock]

I have a Dark Melee/Regen scrapper build focused on regen and recharge.  It has perma-hasten, perma-dull pain, and shadow meld is up for 15 seconds, down for 9 seconds.  Instant healing is up for 1:30 seconds and down for 1:14 seconds.  In my opinion it is a strong fun build...HOWEVER it is VERY click heavy.  Very far from the "fire and forget" toggles of WP. With dull pain up he has 65.9 HP per sec regen and scrapper max HP at 2409 all the time. 

[Koopak]

ho boy we doin this again.

 

20 hours ago, Zepp said:

Can everyone agree that:

• Regen underperforms compared to other sets
  • a major weakness is the lack of debuff resistances
  • another weakness is DPS loss due to clickies
• Regen offers a different style of play
  • maintaining the active play while providing a benefit is ideal
  • this does not mean that reverting Instant healing to a toggle is off the table

Mostly, but not entirely, and not in the same ways Troo disagrees.
 

On 6/26/2022 at 6:03 AM, Bill Z Bubba said:

What the pro-insp/pro-temp crowd misses is that what you're using to bring regen up to tolerable can also be used by everyone else.

 

And what the other side keeps missing is that this is false. Respite =/= Dull Pain or Instant Healing, there is no inspiration that will give you the HP cap, no inspiration that will give you regeneration rate, and precious few pool powers or temp powers that can do those two things either.

Meanwhile if you are defense capped, purples are useless, if you are resist capped oranges are useless, if you are both, they are both dead weight. This goes too for pool powers, an SR character cannot make significant use of +defense powers, a resistance character the same for +resistance. At the end of the day you can cap Resistance and Defense from numerous outside sources, both when solo, and ESPECIALLY in a team. You cant cap your hp and regeneration as easily from outside sources.

For this reason alone, on a mathematical scale, assuming perfect execution, Regeneration is actually the strongest armor. That doesn't translate well to human play however because this game lacks for tells, its hard to tell when a damage spike is coming and the animation time before a power takes hold is a constant challenge to master. As such in practice it often falls far behind the other powersets, this goes double if you are coming from any other armor or expecting it to perform similarly.

If you want to argue this is a poor match for the games inherit systems? I agree
If you want to say the set requires to much effort to perform at its maximum? I agree a little
If you want to say the set mechanically, mathematically, is inferior? You are dead wrong.

If you asked me what Regeneration needs? Well my answer has shifted over the years as I've worked to master the set, but my answer now would be:

-Debuff Resistance buffs, Defense would be great but not on theme, but recharge and regen are on theme and recharge at least will matter (regen debuff resist is overrated, there is very little -regen in the game and much of it is of a magnitude so high you'd need 99% resistance to not just be turned off)

-Shortened or removed 'animation time before effect'. (Note that's not cast time, that's just how long it takes to get the damn power to start working, you can lock me up all day in a fancy animation but if its a self heal to save my life, can it please take effect quickly? I'll do the dance after, just heal me NOW)

-An absorb layer or a way to exceed the max hp cap, a system that staggers damage, or just some more resistances. Anything to just take the edge of damage spikes as Regen has a very low Effective Health compared to other sets, especially resist sets, and runs the risk of being alphaed more than any other armor. (This is a maybe, and the last issue that id focus on only if the others didn't bring its average performance up)

The issue with buffing regen though is that if it is mishandled, the set tips over into OP territory FAST, and even if you handle it well, those who are comfortable with the demands of the set will begin performing much higher than the average. Its a catch 22 leftover from the live devs, the only people left maining regen are the hardcore players who have committed to reaching its theoretical maximum, and those playing it for theme. If you buff it, sure more people will play it, and the theme players will be happy, but the hardcore players will start soloing things that shouldn't be soloed. If you buff it in a way that prevents that, you risk ruining what draws those hardcore players to the set in the first place.

tl;dr: Nerf Regen, it is the only way

Edited June 28, 2022 by Koopak

[Troo]

1 hour ago, Koopak said:

Regeneration is actually the strongest armor.

 

whoa whoa whoa shhhh I really want those debuff buffs..

 

he really means

 

Edited June 28, 2022 by Troo

[Zepp]

Just to clarify, @Koopak, you mean that if you swallow inspirations like Tic Tacs, it can be the strongest (because it has holes huge holes that match existing inspirations whereas there are  no +HP or +regen inspirations that other armor sets can use to patch those needs)? Is that what you are arguing?

 

That being said, I think there are basically a certain set of adjustments/fixes that we are all talking about:

Most agree:

• Add a recharge debuff
• Add a regen debuff
• Front-loading heals (not just for Regen though)

Some agree:

• Add a way to improve offensive output (+dmg buff in Reconstruction or Dull Pain, for example)
• Add an absorb shield (probably to dull pain)
• Add defense debuff

Slightly controversial:

• Revert Instant Healing to a toggle
• Reduce the T9 to 60s (4x uptime, to reflect the formula used for Rad armor, this should be done for all armor T9s)
• Do nothing / nerf Regen

Is there anything that I missed? Is there anything that should be moved up or down a tier?

[Koopak]

1 hour ago, Zepp said:

Just to clarify, @Koopak, you mean that if you swallow inspirations like Tic Tacs, it can be the strongest (because it has holes huge holes that match existing inspirations whereas there are  no +HP or +regen inspirations that other armor sets can use to patch those needs)? Is that what you are arguing?

 

This is not my argument and that's a rather reductive way of phrasing it. Regen, numerically, stands with its brethren in the armor power set category just fine BEFORE you factor these in. That is to say that in terms of the raw amount of damage it can theoretically take per second and remain standing (Effective Regeneration), it is fine. When you factor in the fact that its weaknesses are easily patched by outside sources the result is that it becomes extremely strong.

The weakness is not holes in defense or resistance, but in timing of power usage and enemy attacks, and how that plays against Effective Health, and the lack of protection from debuffs that uniquely harm it, or harm it especially badly. This means that the performance of the set fight to fight is dependent heavily on both RNG and a players ability to mitigate that RNG, which is why raising its Effective Health would patch up its only weakness in the case of damage only considerations.

To make myself abundantly clear, Regen is not 'weak' because it cant handle damage per second, its 'weak' because it cant handle damage spikes specifically, and debuffs specifically. At least not without an unreasonable amount of game knowledge and experience to mitigate those effects since those weaknesses are to somewhat obscured mechanisms. Predicting alphas and monitoring/knowing debuff sources.

These issues largely fall away with support, especially the damage spike issue, and makes the set vastly stronger than its contemporaries. However without support Regen demands to much of the player for admittedly I believe the strongest THEORETICAL performance, even solo. The trade is not worth it to 90% of players.

Edited June 28, 2022 by Koopak

[Zepp]

Thanks for clarifying. It wasn't clear what you meant by "Regeneration is the strongest armor" in your previous post.

[Bill Z Bubba]

Ya know what? Nevermind.

Edited June 28, 2022 by Bill Z Bubba

[Seed22]

On 5/1/2022 at 10:49 PM, Bill Z Bubba said:

Still seems like the best course of action, and one I see the regeners that dig it lean on, are the big buff powers. Eye of the Magus/Demonic, Rune of Protection, Unrelenting and the like. You know... crutches like blasters use.

 

<grin>

Aight first of all dont besmirch my fave AT. BAD blasters lean on those :P. Secondly I agree. Look, regen can be made playable…with goddamn near 800mil inf. Im not wasting that kinda inf on ‘playable’ performance

[Seed22]

7 hours ago, Koopak said:

 

This is not my argument and that's a rather reductive way of phrasing it. Regen, numerically, stands with its brethren in the armor power set category just fine BEFORE you factor these in. That is to say that in terms of the raw amount of damage it can theoretically take per second and remain standing (Effective Regeneration), it is fine. When you factor in the fact that its weaknesses are easily patched by outside sources the result is that it becomes extremely strong.

The weakness is not holes in defense or resistance, but in timing of power usage and enemy attacks, and how that plays against Effective Health, and the lack of protection from debuffs that uniquely harm it, or harm it especially badly. This means that the performance of the set fight to fight is dependent heavily on both RNG and a players ability to mitigate that RNG, which is why raising its Effective Health would patch up its only weakness in the case of damage only considerations.

To make myself abundantly clear, Regen is not 'weak' because it cant handle damage per second, its 'weak' because it cant handle damage spikes specifically, and debuffs specifically. At least not without an unreasonable amount of game knowledge and experience to mitigate those effects since those weaknesses are to somewhat obscured mechanisms. Predicting alphas and monitoring/knowing debuff sources.

These issues largely fall away with support, especially the damage spike issue, and makes the set vastly stronger than its contemporaries. However without support Regen demands to much of the player for admittedly I believe the strongest THEORETICAL performance, even solo. The trade is not worth it to 90% of players.

i see. But even theoretically it’s not. Bio andRad exist.

[Stormwalker]

On 6/27/2022 at 1:04 AM, Zepp said:

Can everyone agree that:

• Regen underperforms compared to other sets
  • a major weakness is the lack of debuff resistances
  • another weakness is DPS loss due to clickies
• Regen offers a different style of play
  • maintaining the active play while providing a benefit is ideal
  • this does not mean that reverting Instant healing to a toggle is off the table

Is there any disagreement on these points?

Are there any other points of agreement?

 

Apparently, yes, there is some disagreement on the underperformance of Regen.  I'm not sure how, based on my experience with the set.  I mean, once again, I am not saying Regen is completely terrible (I will confess to calling it "pathetic" in another thread, and I will admit that was hyperbole, but I haven't leaned on any such exaggerations in this discussion), I just feel like - based on my experience with the set - that it's not quite as strong as the other Scrapper defense sets.

 

As I've said before, I would start by adding debuff resistances to Regeneration, and then playtesting to see how much effect that had before making any other changes to the set.  I don't think that's an unreasonable approach to it.  I think giving Regen a small offensive buff of some sort (like Energy Aura gets, though I'm thinking a small +damage buff rather than a +rech buff in this case, for thematic reasons) would be appropriate, but let's give it the debuff resistances it clearly needs first and then re-evaluate whether anything more is needed.  And I do agree that maintaining Regen's requirement for an active style of play, thus forcing players to be "on the ball" to get the most out of it, is a good idea.  I just think it should reward that effort a little more than it does.

 

Also, @Troo, my Katana/Regen on Live wasn't my only Regen.  She was just my first 50, and the one I had the most playtime on and invested the most effort and inf into her build.  I also had a Martial Arts/Regen and a Dark Melee/Regen, both of whom reached Level 50 on Live.  So I am well aware of how to play the set without leaning on Divine Avalanche as a crutch.  That said, DA does make a nice survival tool.  I've also re-created both the Katana/Regen and the Dark Melee/Regen (though I made the DM/Regen a Brute this time, because why not have the best Regen I can get?) on HC (I re-made the MA/Regen as a Street Justice/WP instead, as those sets suit her better; neither was available yet when I created the original character on Live).  And for what it's worth, I choose my powersets based on concept and not on what is optimal.  Optimization for me is a matter of "let's see how far I can go while remaining in concept".  Fortunately, that Katana/Regen's concept (she is a ninja with Regeneration and Superspeed mutant powers, essentially) made dipping into Soul Mastery for Shadow Meld possible.

 

 

[Stormwalker]

7 hours ago, Koopak said:

 

This is not my argument and that's a rather reductive way of phrasing it. Regen, numerically, stands with its brethren in the armor power set category just fine BEFORE you factor these in. That is to say that in terms of the raw amount of damage it can theoretically take per second and remain standing (Effective Regeneration), it is fine. When you factor in the fact that its weaknesses are easily patched by outside sources the result is that it becomes extremely strong.

The weakness is not holes in defense or resistance, but in timing of power usage and enemy attacks, and how that plays against Effective Health, and the lack of protection from debuffs that uniquely harm it, or harm it especially badly. This means that the performance of the set fight to fight is dependent heavily on both RNG and a players ability to mitigate that RNG, which is why raising its Effective Health would patch up its only weakness in the case of damage only considerations.

To make myself abundantly clear, Regen is not 'weak' because it cant handle damage per second, its 'weak' because it cant handle damage spikes specifically, and debuffs specifically. At least not without an unreasonable amount of game knowledge and experience to mitigate those effects since those weaknesses are to somewhat obscured mechanisms. Predicting alphas and monitoring/knowing debuff sources.

These issues largely fall away with support, especially the damage spike issue, and makes the set vastly stronger than its contemporaries. However without support Regen demands to much of the player for admittedly I believe the strongest THEORETICAL performance, even solo. The trade is not worth it to 90% of players.

 

I thumbs-upped your post because even though I don't agree with everything you said, you certainly made some valid points and made me consider something I previously had not.

 

I have to grant you this much: in a team where you have support that raises the team's defense and resistance, Regeneration probably is the strongest of all Scrapper secondaries.  In a full team, the Regenner can have the best of all worlds: soft-capped defense (and then some), hard-capped resistances (and then some) and its inherently superior regeneration and recovery rates, and that's going to be very difficult for any other set to match.  This is, in fact, a very valid point and one that is definitely a factor in the balance equation.  I will admit that I hadn't thought of it in those terms because when I think of Scrappers I generally think of solo play (the fact that I don't team very often due to sound sensitivity issues - this game gets very loud in teams when the AoE's start flying - probably has something to do with not considering the team perspective as well).

 

In terms of solo play, I still maintain it is the weakest Scrapper secondary (though not by a huge margin).  And I still think it at least needs debuff resistance.

 

Fair?

Edited June 28, 2022 by Stormwalker
rephrasing something that could have come off as pejorative and wasn't meant to

[Koopak]

2 hours ago, Stormwalker said:

As I've said before, I would start by adding debuff resistances to Regeneration, and then playtesting to see how much effect that had before making any other changes to the set.  I don't think that's an unreasonable approach to it. 

I agree this is where things should start.

 

 

2 hours ago, Stormwalker said:

In terms of solo play, I still maintain it is the weakest Scrapper secondary (though not by a huge margin).  And I still think it at least needs debuff resistance.

 

Fair?

Ish? As I mentioned, theoretically its one of the best if not the best, even solo. The problem is, like some strategies in speed running (GDQ is live i have it on the brain deal with it) it may be optimal, but human execution of it isn't. This is part of why there is such a wide disparity in opinions on the set. I feel confident that anything you can do on a scrapper of another armor set, Regen can do too, it just might take a bit more practice.

That all said I 100% agree that you have to put far more effort to accomplish the same performance of other sets for little to no reward. Your only reward is that Regen can uniquely survive situations other armor sets cant and almost always has an option to handle any situation, assuming you can recognize and use that option quick enough. Now, that's an awesome power... but only for a tiny fraction of the game. 90% of the time, you are working hard for no reward and I think that should be changed.

[Stormwalker]

12 minutes ago, Koopak said:

I agree this is where things should start.

 

 

Ish? As I mentioned, theoretically its one of the best if not the best, even solo. The problem is, like some strategies in speed running (GDQ is live i have it on the brain deal with it) it may be optimal, but human execution of it isn't. This is part of why there is such a wide disparity in opinions on the set. I feel confident that anything you can do on a scrapper of another armor set, Regen can do too, it just might take a bit more practice.

That all said I 100% agree that you have to put far more effort to accomplish the same performance of other sets for little to no reward. Your only reward is that Regen can uniquely survive situations other armor sets cant and almost always has an option to handle any situation, assuming you can recognize and use that option quick enough. Now, that's an awesome power... but only for a tiny fraction of the game. 90% of the time, you are working hard for no reward and I think that should be changed.

 

I mean, I agree that in a perfect world Regen has all the ability to perform at that level.  But in practice, I found that there was always some variable in play that prevented Regen from ever quite achieving that potential.   Oh, sure, I could find ways to survive almost any situation I put myself in, but that was true of nearly all my scrappers, and frequently the extra effort that it took to accomplish that survival on a Regen ended up compromising offensive performance in the end.  And, as I noted, I mained a Regen for quite some time on Live, so I was very practiced at surviving.  This is one of the reasons I think debuff resistance would really help - it reduces the number of variables in play.  Just having regeneration debuff resistance alone would help with managing certain problematic enemy groups.  Oh, sure, some of those groups (Malta comes to mind) are throwing lots of different debuffs at you, and giving you regeneration debuff resistance is not going to prevent those other debuffs from sticking, but it does mean at least you can count on your regeneration working for you so you can focus on managing those other challenges a bit.

 

As an example of this effect in play in other sets, compare Super Reflexes to Energy Aura.  /SR's 95% DDR means you almost never have to worry about whether your defense is intact.  It's always there for you.  As such, you can focus on avoiding and/or compensating for other debuffs.  Energy Aura, even with it's ~65% (I don't remember the exact number) DDR is still very prone to defense failure (not to mention the fact that it has a Psi hole and a deficiency in Negative Energy defense), means you actually have to pay attention to defense debuff and be careful not to let it lead to a defense crash.  This is only one of several ways that /EA is more difficult to play than /SR (though if you successfully manage it, it's stronger because of the extra tools it brings that /SR doesn't... unless you're fighting Carnies, who are very nasty in areas /EA is weaker).

 

Note that I'm not saying /Regen shouldn't still be the most difficult set to play.  I am saying it needs just a little boost (i.e. debuff resistance) to reduce the number of monkeywrenches that can be thrown into its works, to make it more possible to actually achieve its potential.

 

Am I making sense here?

 

Or, to put it in other terms, as it stands right now Regeneration is such a juggling act when fighting enemy groups that throw multiple different kinds of debuffs at you that you pretty much never get to run at that maximum potential efficiency.

 

Edited June 28, 2022 by Stormwalker

[Koopak]

Essentially agree with all of that. My biggest issue tends to be with the rather common assertion that Regen needs hard stat buffs when the real problems are, like you mentioned, an over abundance of edge cases that make otherwise solid stats insufficient. Other armors take debuff resistances and high Effective Health for granted.

[Blackjoy]

 

5 hours ago, Stormwalker said:

I'm not sure how, based on my experience with the set.  I mean, once again, I am not saying Regen is completely terrible (I will confess to calling it "pathetic" in another thread, and I will admit that was hyperbole, but I haven't leaned on any such exaggerations in this discussion

I believe it was your claim in my /SR thread that /Regen was pathetic that got me to replay it this last month.  Glad to see you are admitting to hyperbole.

 

As someone who has recently (last six months) played /SR, /WP, /Regen, and /Shield (but a on  Brute), I paid specific attention to how /Regen compared up to 40 (/SR and /WP to 50),  I can say without hesitation that if we look at xp/hour solo, /Regen out performs /SR by a significant margin up to 40 and is probably about equal to /WP.    I've run all these sets without Tough or Weave or Maneuvers, or inspiration.    I did have Hasten on all the scrappers.  Infrequently use it on /SR, and used it to cycle DP and IH on /Regen.  I also did slot Overwhelming Fear and may have put in a Shield Wal +5 def at lvl 41. 

 

At lvl 40, my /regen can ran solo at +3x0 and  typically take out three purple minions with just Recon.  If you put a LT in there, I will either have to burn my build-up power, or use Dull Pain.   Any mobs with Energy Melee and Total Focus are particularly dangerous to /regen.   But that's true for /SR as well.  

 

Comparatively, /regen easily out performs /SR for up time.   Without Hasten, I would venture that /WP is slightly better, but at 40, /WP doesn't have that peak performance.  If the incoming /DPS is greater than the effective mitigation, you just die slowly. 

 

17 hours ago, Koopak said:

That doesn't translate well to human play however because this game lacks for tells, its hard to tell when a damage spike is coming and the animation time before a power takes hold is a constant challenge to master. As such in practice it often falls far behind the other powersets, this goes double if you are coming from any other armor or expecting it to perform similarly.

In my opinion, this is the crux of the player experience.    /Regen is fairly unique among scrapper secondaries in that maximizing the set's mitigation is dependent on timing.   As Kopak suggest, you have to have an internal sense of the incoming DPS to play /Regen effectively.    The first time I went to Cimerora at 35, I fought +1's  (stepped it down because I knew of the debuff).  I died three times in two mission.  Then I was able to completely clear three more of the timed missions without a single death.   No inspirations, no Tough/Weave.    At 40, I cranked it up to +2 and same results.   With /SR, there isn't a need to understand what you fight other than avoiding toxic, psi, and PBAoE patches.   /Regen's mitigation, however, is capped by a players ability to anticipate and react.

 

Based on my experience (no inspiration, almost no Set IO bonuses, and essentially no pool powers beyond occasional Hasten), /Regen's max performance far exceeds both /SR and /WP.   As a /Regen, biding my time is actually a tactic I can use against hard targets. 

 

 

5 hours ago, Stormwalker said:

in a team where you have support that raises the team's defense and resistance, Regeneration probably is the strongest of all Scrapper secondaries.

In theory yes, in actually game play, that's not been my experience.   As Kopak points out, /Regen's real issue is spike damage and a human's ability to react to it..  On large teams, you're exposed to larger amounts of spike damage.  Especially at higher levels when running +4.    Because you can't run at Max HPs the entire time, and because you will have moments where you are not getting mitigation buffs from teammates, /Regen is more prone to spike death than most other sets. 

 

3 hours ago, Koopak said:

I agree this is where things should start.

I disagree.  The entire point of debuffs are to debuff those things which cannot resist it.   It's nonsensical to create a debuff and then give everyone resistance to it.   It's like arguing /SR should have +DEF to Psi.  

 

IMO /regen's problem is that that the baseline expectation for what scrappers are suppose to be doing changes.   It goes from soloing +1 or +2 content, to soloing 4x8 content with every power at your disposal.  

13 hours ago, Koopak said:

To make myself abundantly clear, Regen is not 'weak' because it cant handle damage per second, its 'weak' because it cant handle damage spikes specifically, and debuffs specifically.

Exactly.  And the lack of protection against debuffs is intentional.   So if you also make /Regen more survivable against spikes, then you're essentially making it overpowered.  

 

It's also important to point out that the comparative problem for /regen is that people are not able to separate the impact of off-AT mitigation on their experiences.   /SR isn't good without Set IOs and Pool Powers bringing it to the cap.  If you're at 90% mitigation, that last 5% you're getting from a pool power or set IOs, is providing you with more effective health than all your secondary powers combined.   IME, /Regen is fantastic naked (Hasten just stop me from having to wait around).  

 

I think Kopak may have suggested it already, but the line between /Regen being better and /Regen being OP is thin and grey.   If the developers want /Regen to be able to compete with /Shield or /Rad, or even /SR,  on 4x8 solo, then they're going to have to solve the spike damage issue and good luck doing that without either turning it into WP, or making it OP on everything else.

 

 

Edited June 28, 2022 by Blackjoy

[arcane]

On 6/26/2022 at 6:03 AM, Bill Z Bubba said:

What the pro-insp/pro-temp crowd misses is that what you're using to bring regen up to tolerable can also be used by everyone else. The performance difference stays the same. Regen stays dead last. Regen continues being the set where you get to spend vastly more time clicking insps/temps/Rune and its ilk while the rest of us spend those clicks killing things.

 

I can use the regen mindset while playing a blaster, too. Doesn't mean regen is worth a shit.

No one’s missing that - rather it simply doesn’t matter to me if Regen comes in dead last (not seeing evidence if that but let’s assume it’s true). What matters to me is if it’s viable - which it is with extremely modest inspiration usage. And by modest inspiration usage, I mean a level of usage that is reliable and should never require any inspiration planning or purchasing.

 

Comparing to other sets is extremely limiting thinking when all that really matters is can the character do the job within reason, which it undoubtedly can. Who cares if most other sets are better - we all have dozens of meta builds already, and we’ve arrived at regen for the sake of variety. There’s already enough top tier sets for the meta-builds-only powergamer to enjoy for a lifetime.

 

Now, I would like to see some more focused survivability testing (insps must be involved for the testing to mean anything to me) with things like Electric Armor and Fiery Aura. Because I’d actually like to see it proven that Regen is dead last. Unfortunately citing Bio, Rad, SR, EA, etc over and over doesn’t prove anything on its own.

Edited June 28, 2022 by arcane

[Stormwalker]

I'm honestly not that concerned about performance of sets below 50.  I mean, I'm not completely unconcerned with it (as I've previously said, I'd like to see the power order in /SR rearranged so the AoE defense comes sooner, and I'd like to see sets like /Regen and /Invuln get their mez protection sooner), because I do level up my characters the old-fashioned way...  but for the most part when I compare powersets, I am comparing them at Level 50.  This is mostly because I really don't push my builds very hard until they get to 50, generally.  Also, unless you largely stop playing a character once they get to 50, they're going to spend a lot more time playing at Level 50 than they are in any of the level ranges below that.  Therefore, to me, performance at level 50 is more important.

 

I'm not going to get into a deep discussion of /SR in this thread, since this is a /Regen thread and it's off-topic, so I'll just make this observation and leave it at that: a correctly built /SR (which is to say, one who has softcapped all positional defenses, invested in IO's to add damage resistance, max HP, and regeneration, and who is built appropriately for the offense set selected) is quite capable at 40.  And I'll note that increasing enemy level as opposed to increasing enemy number slants your results somewhat against defense sets.

 

Another thing that has to be taken into account is that what enemies you are fighting has a whole lot to do with performance.  For example, my Energy Melee/Energy Aura (who recently hit Level 50, and has unlocked all of her Incarnate slots but most of them are still at T1) can run +2/x8 against pretty much any enemy group I have thrown her at - including IDF - save for one exception, that being Carnies, where +2/x5 seems to be about as high as she can go in her current state (it should be noted that her IO build isn't completed yet, either).  The reason for this should be apparent.  Energy Aura has a psi hole, and has a hard time soft-capping Negative Energy defense.  Carnie bosses throw out a whole lot of both, and fighting three Carnie bosses at once is something she just can't do yet (without heavy inspiration usage to plug the psi hole, that is).

 

By contrast, my DB/WP at level 43 finds Carnies to be no challenge at all, but struggles mightily against Malta, who both my Claws/SR and my EnM/EnA both hold in utter contempt.

 

Point being, who you are fighting and what they throw out against you makes a big difference in performance.

 

Regen has issues with large spawn sizes where lots of debuffs are being thrown out, especially when those debuffs include regeneration debuff.  It needs regeneration debuff resistance, at the very least - it needs to be able to protect its primary survival mechanism, just like defense sets need DDR to protect theirs.  I think recharge and maybe even recovery debuff resistance is possibly needed as well, but I would start with the regen debuff resistance and observe the effects of that change before changing anything else.

 

Spike damage is a different problem, but there are ways to mitigate spike damage.  That said, outside of MoG most of those methods come from outside the set, which can severely limit build flexibility for a /Regenner.  That's definitely a problem (I really don't like how Regen tends to funnel you into either Rune of Protection or Shadow Meld), but it may be the price /Regen has to pay for its high theoretical maximum performance.  Of course, one could argue that certain other sets with really difficult endurance problems funnel you into the Body pool for Conserve Power and/or Physical Perfection, but it's hard for me to judge that (as I tend to go Body on most scrappers regardless, because I can fit it in almost any concept build). 

 

My point, though, is that tools for mitigating damage spikes do exist, and there really is no tool for mitigating regeneration debuff (other than "don't get hit by it", which becomes unrealistic as spawn sizes approach x8).  Thus, I would qualify the lack of regeneration debuff resistance as the primary problem facing the set.

 

 

[Bill Z Bubba]

37 minutes ago, arcane said:

Comparing to other sets is extremely limiting thinking when all that really matters is can the character do the job within reason, which it undoubtedly can.

 

Which job? Soloing radios at +0/x1, soloing an ITF in under two hours, not dying on a team of 8?

 

38 minutes ago, arcane said:

(insps must be involved for the testing to mean anything to me)

 

We've gone around and around on this before. I'll never consider any test WITH insps valid. It tells us nothing but how good the player is at inspiration management and tells us absolutely nothing else of worth.

[arcane]

8 minutes ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

 

Which job? Soloing radios at +0/x1, soloing an ITF in under two hours, not dying on a team of 8?

 

 

We've gone around and around on this before. I'll never consider any test WITH insps valid. It tells us nothing but how good the player is at inspiration management and tells us absolutely nothing else of worth.

See, this is where we put it down and agree to disagree. You and I have irreconcilable differences on what we want and need from our characters. Good game.