Why No Winter/VR Healing Set?

[Milk Sheik]

I feel like someone must have proposed this in the past, but a quick search didn't turn anything up.

I'm not really sure why Very Rare sets and winter sets cover so many controller-friendly powers (Sleep, Confuse, Stun, Immobilize, etc.) and a good swath of offensive powers (Melee, Ranged, Ranged AoE, Melee AoE), but something as basic as Healing doesn't get to join the party. Maybe it's just because my main is an emp def, but the options to squeeze out the last drops of efficiency from Healing Aura and Heal Other feel like I'm a little shortchanged, even when I'm rolling in merits and inf. Obviously, this also goes for Absorb Pain, Radiant Aura in the rad set, O2 Boost, and melee AT self-heals that aren't accurate heals.

So when I 6-slot a heal power and start stuffing it, these are my options as I see them at present:

Option 1: Numina’s Convalescence. Except that only 5 of the Numinas really help. The unique gives a mild regen and end boost that I don't need because I've got a Healing Aura that is a million times better for Health, and the end boost isn't enough to matter; more pointedly, if I want the end boost, I'll stick it in an auto like Health anyway and throw another enhancement into Healing Aura like a Heal/Recharge D-Sync to try to maximize output. And if I'm doing that, the D-Syncs work better than some of the Numina's values anyway, so I'm only slotting 4 Numina's to score the 6% healing buff, and frankenslotting the last two.

Option 2: Preventive Medicine. Again, only 5 of them increase the numbers. Though the bonus for all 6 is great (8.75% recharge if I remember right), it comes at the expense of actual recharge on the power, keeping it closer to 73% unless you dump in all the boosters you can (again, if I remember right). So, I don’t like this -- downtime on a healing power’s recharge is anathema to me, particularly if it’s a long recharge like Dull Pain. Usually when I take this option, the proc goes in Health, and then I frankenslot, usually with a recharge IO in spot #6.

Option 3: Doctored Wounds. 6 slots gets heal and recharge up to 97.5%, end redux is good, great numbers, no procs... but its set bonuses are yellow so they aren't super optimal. This is what I've got in my Heal Other, since that +4% heal and +5% recharge are nice, but I'm missing out on that last 2% heal bonus from Numina.

Option 4: Panacea. Again, super nice proc. Goes in Health so it's on all the time. Left with 5 in the main power, and the really good stuff only shows up in PVP, so… not optimal for a lot of players.

I don't have a clear picture of what the set bonuses would be in a purple healing set; I'd hope for a big "all healing powers get a 6% boost" to be on par with Numina’s Convalescence (perhaps bumped to 8% due to being purple, or 5-6%, bumped higher if it’s a winter that gets catalyzed), but I'm not super picky. I'd hope they'd be slightly different than the usual purples’ 4% end discount (small potatoes if you’re a defender with Vigilance) and fire/cold resist just for some variety... and of course I’d be conscious of the limited utility of any regen buff if it goes in a self-healing power like Healing Aura, Radiant Aura, etc. (To be fair, if it were to be slotted in Reconstruction or Dull Pain, the regen rate buff would be welcome to all the melee types out there, but at the moment, my mind’s going to the support ATs who can spam heals).

What say the masses? Yea or nay? Am I missing something?
 

Edited March 21, 2023 by Milk Sheik

[FupDup]

IIRC, the user Vanden proposed a purple healing set as an advertisement of his enhancement set building tool a few months ago. 

 

I'm not sure what the live devs' reasoning was for skipping over certain enhancement categories, but there are definitely a lot of holes left to fill in and this is one of them. As for the HC devs, they've only added a few new sets that weren't on the live server and I've seen people say on the forum that they don't intend to ever make anything as strong as purple/winter sets (I don't know of any official source on that). 

 

But yeah, I wants more enhancements to collect. I wants them all. 

[Milk Sheik]

1 minute ago, FupDup said:

IIRC, the user Vanden proposed a purple healing set as an advertisement of his enhancement set building tool a few months ago. 

 

I'm not sure what the live devs' reasoning was for skipping over certain enhancement categories, but there are definitely a lot of holes left to fill in and this is one of them. As for the HC devs, they've only added a few new sets that weren't on the live server and I've seen people say on the forum that they don't intend to ever make anything as strong as purple/winter sets (I don't know of any official source on that). 

 

But yeah, I wants more enhancements to collect. I wants them all. 

 

Good to know. Last point I forgot to make -- this would probably have the side effect of buffing Regeneration as a power set, though of course other sets like Invuln, Fire and Willpower with self heals might benefit too.

[tidge]

IMO, Fear and Threat would benefit more from a PVP/Superior set than another look at Healing (accurate or vanilla). With a PVP set, many excellent other choices (including Hami-Os) I think that Healing is in a good spot.

 

My healing slotting choices for sets tend to be:

 

6x Preventive Medicine

3x Touch of the Nictus (for the "life-stealers")

2x Numina (good for Tankers in Health, because of large base HP)

5x Panacea (not common in my build, but I think I have at least one Tanker Build with this in a +HP power since I can boost these to 50+5)

 

After those, the global singletons show up as expected. There are also reasonable Hami-O options for powers with fewer slots.

[Mezmera]

Honestly the sets we do have are already quite good.  I think that's why we won't see new sets for Healing, Defense and Resists in terms of purples or winter sets.  With how good most of those sets already are and the various special IO's in those sets I couldn't imagine what kind of OP unique they'd have to come up with to top all of the current ones.  

Edited March 21, 2023 by Mezmera

[Greycat]

2 hours ago, tidge said:

IMO, Fear and Threat would benefit more from a PVP/Superior set than another look at Healing (accurate or vanilla). With a PVP set, many excellent other choices (including Hami-Os) I think that Healing is in a good spot.

 

 

I don't *dis*sagree, but on the other hand, it's not like the various damage forms (for the most part) were hurting for sets, either, before purples, winter or PVP sets. De/Buffs are fairly overlooked, at least VR side (though represented PVP wise, as I recall) - though I don't think defense needs all that much help getting ridiculous, or that we need that many *more* ways to stack ridiculous recharge in the quest for Perma-Everything.

 

I don't recall if i suggested it or if it was just a thought kicking around in my head, but I wouldn't mind "summer sets" either. Same rarity as winter (and I think thematically healing would be a fine one to start off with,) and - though it's added complexity - having some sort of interaction with the winter set of the same sort, if it exists. Treats the same piece on the "other" side (say, an acc/dam) as unique, so you have to choose, and maybe pulls a PVP so if you have some balance of summer and winter in a power, other aspects are unlocked - set bonuses, effects, something.

[tidge]

54 minutes ago, Greycat said:

I don't recall if i suggested it or if it was just a thought kicking around in my head, but I wouldn't mind "summer sets" either. Same rarity as winter (and I think thematically healing would be a fine one to start off with,) and - though it's added complexity - having some sort of interaction with the winter set of the same sort, if it exists. Treats the same piece on the "other" side (say, an acc/dam) as unique, so you have to choose, and maybe pulls a PVP so if you have some balance of summer and winter in a power, other aspects are unlocked - set bonuses, effects, something.

 

I like this thinking... but...  "Summer Blockbuster" exists and has Overwhelming Force.

 

I have always thought that it was lazy cruel that our "seasonal event" of Halloween never got a Fear set. The costumes are a very nice touch, but I want a PVP/Superior set that offers a little more (something boost-able!) OOMPH (plus another %damage!) for slotting Fear powers. I can almost believe that because of questions of balance (PvP?) and dev-tweaking that Fear and Threat never got more than their four sets. IIRC, except for %procs, the options in the Fear sets are all the same, and (again IIRC) it's only through DSyncs and IOs that Endurance reduction can be (meaningfully) slotted in Threat powers. I 99.99% believe we'd get another Hold set before we got either a Fear or Threat set.

 

[twozerofoxtrot]

3 minutes ago, tidge said:

I have always thought that it was lazy cruel that our "seasonal event" of Halloween never got a Fear set.

 

Rebirth did a big drop of Halloween sets and they are really cool concepts. There is a fear set included, but the new set types are really interesting with big implications on powers you might not use otherwise (eg: procing -Res debuffs from slow powers)

 

 

[tidge]

The "lazy cruel" comment is directed at Live development, not at Homecoming. I'd of course be thrilled to see new sets for those under-served power types.

[BrandX]

I would figure back on live, they may not have gotten to them yet.  Something to save for future updates and all.

 

I however, don't feel there would be a problem with them in other areas.  The sets themselves tend to follow a pattern.  I'm not 100% but I believe they're all the same in terms of set bonuses, with only the Range Damage and Pet sets having different bonuses and even then Range Damage has the 10% Recharge bonus the other purples would have.

 

Would only be the Proc that may really be interesting for players. 

[Greycat]

1 hour ago, tidge said:

 

I like this thinking... but...  "Summer Blockbuster" exists and has Overwhelming Force.

 

 

Which doesn't really say anything "summer," especially with the "event" being around permanently now.

 

I'm looking more at theme. *shrug*

[Rudra]

The winter sets can be acquired through Winter Packs all year too.

[Greycat]

27 minutes ago, Rudra said:

The winter sets can be acquired through Winter Packs all year too.

 

1 hour ago, Greycat said:

I'm looking more at theme. *shrug*

 

[Zect]

IO sets, and which categories of sets have what bonuses, are a very finely tuned aspect of balance. Resist/defense sets in general have weaker bonuses and lesser slot-efficiency, for example, because otherwise it would be too easy for armored AT's to stack up on powerful bonuses.

 

I have many of my own speculations as to why healing sets have no purple set, but the most obvious one would be the existence of spiritual alpha: notice how dps AT's are carefully prevented from having a dmg/rech, dmg/acc or even dmg/endrdx alpha, for example, but healing AT's are allowed to get rech/heal (in fact, the only alpha with rech as the schedule-A enhancement). The slot-efficiency afforded by a purple set added on top of that would be overpowering.

 

To answer your question, the way you squeeze slot-efficiency out of things such as heal other and heal aura is not to heavily slot them. 2x 53 D-sync reconstruction + spiritual core paragon provides more rech enhancement and only 14% less heal enhancement than 6x preventive medicine.

[Rigged]

I note that powers you cast on friendly targets - Resist, Defense, Movespeed, Endmod, and Heal - do not have purples. They sometimes do have PVP IOs, with normal IO scaling. VR sets generally occur in sets you use on enemies - the four damage categories and mezzes. Pet damage is a bit of a gray area, but I believe the devs added those in fairness to Masterminds, who would be severely lacking in places to stick VR sets if they didn't.

 

Obviously not all the set categories that you use on enemies have a VR set, but it seems the OG devs assigned them to categories which are common across specific ATs. 

 

I think that VR set categories were chosen so that each AT would have a more-or-less equally varied range of VRs to choose from. Mezzes had to be included because controllers had very few proper attacks.

Edited March 22, 2023 by Rigged

[tidge]

5 hours ago, Zect said:

To answer your question, the way you squeeze slot-efficiency out of things such as heal other and heal aura is not to heavily slot them. 2x 53 D-sync reconstruction + spiritual core paragon provides more rech enhancement and only 14% less heal enhancement than 6x preventive medicine.

 

I completely get the point about slotting efficiency, but the 6xPreventive Medicine slotting is giving:

• The %Absorb global piece, which partners nicely with Scaling Damage Resistance (Reactive Defenses*1, slotted elsewhere, I presume)
• 8.75% global Recharge (six piece bonus)
• 3.75% global Endurance cost saving (five piece bonus)

*1) I feel the same about slotting efficiency in Defense/Resist powers, but often try to 6-slot Reactive Defenses for the same reasons as Preventive Medicine.

[Xiddo]

On 3/22/2023 at 1:32 AM, twozerofoxtrot said:

 

Rebirth did a big drop of Halloween sets and they are really cool concepts. There is a fear set included, but the new set types are really interesting with big implications on powers you might not use otherwise (eg: procing -Res debuffs from slow powers)

 

 

That universal debuff set idea is a really nice idea.