Resistance Builds

[MonteCarla]

(This is a discussion on making Brutes (and Tankers) where you're chasing damage resistance as your primary goal. These will not necessarily be the best builds ever. 🙂)

 

I normally default to making "tough squishies" - Defenders and Blasters with good defences through IOs and the Fighting pool. For a change I decided to make a super-tough resistance-based Brute, and was amazed with the results.

By level 46, Optimadam (Elec Melee/Elec Armor) had 90% resistance to all Damage types except Toxic and Negative!

 

As well as the sheer joy of seeing numbers turn blue in my Combat Attributes, this plays really well. I feel like Wonder Man from the Avengers, like I'm made out of indestructible energy and literally nothing can hurt me.

Unlike Defence, Resistance really has no counter, since resistances resist resistance debuffs. You're taking 10% normal damage, but even if you get your resistance debuffed, you're still talking 10% of what you would without any resistance. (I intend to test this theory fully in Gaussian's arc, which is heavy with res-debuffing Longbow enemies)
Defence based characters tend to take less damage and ignore most debuffs to boot, but have many counters such as To Hit buffs (Nemesis, Devouring Earth) or Defence debuffs (Arachnos, Praetorian Clockwork, Earth Thorn Casters etc) 

 

This got me thinking about the numbers for other resistance based sets.

The Tanker values look like this, with all resistance-granting powers and Tough taken:

 

                         Tanker Base values
Powerset                 S/L       F       C       E       N       Psi     Tox     Godmode
Electric Armor           50        35      35      80      30      35      0
Fire Armor               45        90      10      30      30      0       40
Dark Armor               45        30      30      20      40      50      20
Rad Armor                45        35      7.5     45      35      15      50      20
Invulnerability          55        20      20      20      20      20      20      70
Willpower                37.5      0       0       0       0       20      0       30

 

(Fire Armor assumes two Toxic res boosts from Healing Flames are active)

Slotted with 3 SO's or equivalent (x1.58) they look like this:

 

                         Tanker Slotted values
Powerset                 S/L       F       C       E       N       Psi     Tox     Godmode
Electric Armor           79.0      55.3    55.3    126.4   47.4    55.3    0.0     0.0
Fire Armor               71.1      142.2   15.8    47.4    47.4    0.0     63.2    0.0
Dark Armor               71.1      47.4    47.4    31.6    63.2    79.0    31.6    0.0
Rad Armor                71.1      55.3    11.9    71.1    55.3    23.7    79.0    31.6
Invulnerability          86.9      31.6    31.6    31.6    31.6    31.6    31.6    110.6
Willpower                59.3      0.0     0.0     0.0     0.0     31.6    0       47.4

 

And Brutes, getting 75% of Tankers values look like this with all powers slotted (and Regen added in for comparison):

 

                         Brute Slotted values                                             
Powerset                 S/L       F       C       E       N       Psi     Tox     Godmode
Electric Armor           59.3      41.5    41.5    94.8    35.6    41.5    0.0     0.0    
Fire Armor               53.3      106.7   11.9    35.6    35.6    0.0     47.4    0.0    
Dark Armor               53.3      35.6    35.6    23.7    47.4    59.3    23.7    0.0    
Rad Armor                53.3      41.5    8.9     53.3    41.5    17.8    59.3    23.7
Invulnerability          65.2      23.7    23.7    23.7    23.7    23.7    23.7    83.0
Willpower                44.4      0.0     0.0     0.0     0.0     23.7    0.0     35.6
Regen                    32.6      14.8    14.8    14.8    14.8    14.8    50.4    83.0

 

(Regen assumes 2 Toxic res boosts from Reconstruction are active)

 

Each set typically has good S/L, a hole in one type and a strong exotic type covered. Psionic resist was Dark Armor's thing, but crept into the modern sets too. And Electric Armor for some reason gets better resist values in its main toggles. I'd say that Electric is the set to go for if you want to try this yourself.

 

Other common sources of resists:
Shield Wall unique: +5% to all resists
Reactive Defence Scaling resists unique: +3% to all resists at all times, increases to 13% by 0 health.
These two uniques are a must have - put them in Weave or Combat Jumping or whatever defence power you might have.

 

P2W Vendor Defence Buff: +7.5% resists. Costs from 1000 per hour at level 1 to 2,500,000 per hour at level 50. Very nice if you can afford them (like me)
Empowerment Buffs in Base: +5% per type for 90 minutes per damage type, just costs cheap salvage and planning. ZONE-8888 has a empowerment station, all it costs is common salvage and some forward planning.

 

Orange pills: +10%/+15%/+20% - these are the cheapest and least desired of all inspirations, but great to have when you're closing in on the 90% mark as you level. Use them for AV fights or double spawns or other tricky situations.

 

Tanker and Brute ATIO's
Slotting a full set of each gives you the following bonuses, which increase to +12%/+6% at level 50 when you catalyse them.

                         S/L       F       C       E       N       Psi     Tox     Variable bonus
Tanker ATIO              10.5      5.3     5.3     3.8     3.8     4.5     4.5     21.0
Brute ATIO               9.8       4.5     4.5     4.5     4.5     0.0     0.0

 

The Tanker ATIO unique also gives you up to +21% resistance to all (3 stacks of 7%) while you fight, but this wont help with a first alpha, or be 100% reliable.

 

As for other set bonuses...

 

Smashing/Lethal 
You'll probably get a few of these in other sets you might slot anyway: Crushing Impact, Obliteration, Aegis, Preventative Medicine, Touch of Death, the ATIOs. For a Tanker, the two uniques and ATIOs get you to 90% for most armors, for a Brute you have to find another 20% on top of toggles, Tough and Brute ATIOs. This is pretty easily done, especially with the P2W bonuses.

 

Energy/Negative
This is one of the harder ones to get.
Pages like this are handy (sort in order of descending bonus)
https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Category:Sets_that_improve_Energy_Resistance
Shield Wall at 4 pieces isn't a bad idea, since you're already slotting the unique.
Tankers can pull the odd move of slotting Gauntleted Fist as 2 3-sets in different powers to get a great E/N res bonus twice (and forego the S/L bonus). This might be a good move for Invulnerability or Fire Armor looking to fill this gap?

 

Fire/Cold
Generally, the most abundant.

A full set of Unbreakable Guard gives +5.25%. You can only do this once because of the unique +HP piece.
Impervium Armor gives +3.75% per set at 5 pieces.
The Winter pieces can pull 3% bonuses for very few slots.
Purple sets nearly all give +6% for 3 pieces.
Preventative Medicine gives +3%
I put 2 Fury of the Gladiator and 3 Avalanche in Lightning Field to get +6.75% Fire/Cold. Not the best move, but if you're single-mindedly chasing resistances, it works.
And Winter's Gift can give you +3.75% for just one extra slot in a travel power (but not a sprint)

 

Toxic/Psi
Sets often have a big bonus to this for six pieces, eg Crushing Impact and Doctored Wounds give +3.75%, Rare sets often give +4.5% Toxic/Psi for 6 pieces.
Impervium Armor has the +4.5% bonus at six pieces, including the +6% Psi Resist piece, so each set gives you +4.5% v Toxic and +10.5% v Psi. You can slot this set 5 times! Aegis is similar, with its Psi Unique (only +5%) and a six set bonus. Any set with native Psi resistance can easily hit the 90% mark on Psi, even on a Brute.
Most purple sets give +6% for six pieces, which counts as a different bonus from the Impervium +6's for the Rule of Five
It's possible to build up say 4 * 10.5 (Impervium sets) + 3 * 6 (purples) + 5 (Aegis unique) + 8 (Shield Wall and Reactive Defences) = 73% Psi resist (and 44% Toxic) or so purely from uniques and set bonuses! You can probably push that to 90% vs Psi if you try, even on sets with zero natural Psi resist.

My next project with all this will be a Regen Brute, with the following base targets to aim for, and then build on top of.

 

                           S/L       F       C       E       N       Psi     Tox
Regen w ATIO+Uniques+P2W   57.8      34.8    34.8    34.8    34.8    30.3    65.9

 

I've seen a number of threads about Regen Brutes recently, and I do like a challenge!

[Zect]

On 7/15/2023 at 9:44 PM, MonteCarla said:

Unlike Defence, Resistance really has no counter

 

Counters/Weaknesses of resistance:

• Debuffs. Def sets double-dip since missed attacks do not debuff and def sets are primarily concerned with -def resistance. Resist sets eat much more debuffs and careful attention needs to be paid to patching up key debuff resistances (e.g. -rech). I often see poor build design where high-rech resistance armors fail to build for >80% slow resist resulting in complete loss of offensive and sustain capacity against something as lowly as the moonfire TF mish full of council galaxies.
• Low slot-efficiency. A Huge def bonus is 3.75% def; a Huge resistance bonus is only 4.5% res. An Ultimate def bonus is 5% def; an Ultimate res bonus is only 6% res. Hence, against enemies with standard tohit, Resistance bonuses of the same tier provide less mitigation than defense.
• Build tension with offensive power. Generally, the most slot-efficient resistance bonuses come from attack sets (ATIO's, purples and winter sets). This is unlike def where considerably more of the most slot-efficient options come from non-attack sets.

Strengths of resistance:

• Enemy tohit agnostic: You are much less affected by enemies with bonus tohit, incarnate mobs, or hard mode mobs. This makes it substantially easier to determine breakpoints for general-purpose builds that are meant to go anywhere and do anything. This also makes resist stronger in a high tohit environment because the slot-efficiency required for defense sets to softcap vs incarnate/HM mobs tends to be costly if not prohibitive.
• Spike damage resistant: You have much more time to react to incoming damage. High def low res armors tend to face spiky incoming damage profiles which demand faster reaction times.

The order of resistance set bonuses, from most abundant to least abundant, goes approximately:

• Psi/F/C (psi is higher than tox, due to the presence of impervium armor)
• Tox
• EN
• SL (however, SL is usually covered by toughness, so you usually need less of it)

Since resist set bonuses always have lower slot-efficiency, it's important not just to look at a list of set bonuses in the mids set bonus finder, but also be aware of situations where you can double-dip and get good resistances to two or more damtypes, or also get a large recharge or other bonus, for maximum slot-efficiency. For example, I often see awfully made builds that slot only 3x purples for the FC res. In some cases I see terrible slottings such as 3x armageddon 3x avalanche for a total of 12% FC res. A better slotting such as 6x armageddon provides 6% FC 6% psitox res (12% total) - the same amount of res, but packing massive acc and rech bonuses as well. You can then trade-out psi res for FC res elsewhere in the build to meet your FC res build goal (or just do the same thing again with a different purple set).

 

An important tip is to look beyond typical brute power choices and be aware of where else you can slot sets that achieve the above. Ranged, mez and taoe powers in particular open up many slot-efficient choices not usually available in brute primary attacks. For example, 6x bombardment is a rare set that offers 5% rech, 2.2% SL and 4.5% EN res. Even though its slot-efficiency on any single of those bonuses is kind of mediocre, the complete package is actually a worthwhile consideration. Another of my favorite examples is the prestige sprint SL trick - you can take all 4 prestige sprints and slot 2x Celerity in each of them, getting 2.25% SL res every time. Consider also the ability of some powersets to use unusual IO sets - for example 3x FF can be considered in KO blow or Crushing uppercut (a decent proc and 3% EN res, or in other words 1.5% RPAS, on par with shield wall - plus the KB enhancement is actually a good thing since both these powers do KU). And remember that brutes can often live with underslotting damage enhancement, because most of brutes' +dmg% comes from fury.

 

On 7/15/2023 at 9:44 PM, MonteCarla said:

My next project with all this will be a Regen Brute, with the following base targets to aim for, and then build on top of.

 

                           S/L       F       C       E       N       Psi     Tox
Regen w ATIO+Uniques+P2W   57.8      34.8    34.8    34.8    34.8    30.3    65.9

 

A rule of thumb is that there is approximately 35% ~ 40% of reasonably achievable resistance set bonuses in the invention system available for brutes (though this figure includes ATIO's and the res uniques), and slot-efficiency starts to fall off a cliff after that. This means a regen brute will get to around 50-55% res to all, maybe close to 60% if you're willing to cut back slightly on some other build goals, on set bonuses alone.

 

This can be boosted with other defensive powers for when you really need lots of mitigation. My favorite regen brute uses the Defense Chain concept to cycle multiple powerful defensive clickies one aftter another, achieving superlative mitigation with high uptime. I have a gimmick build that has hardcapped (yes, hardcapped) resistance to all with > 90% uptime, and for the rest there's IH. It's a gimmick because it sacrifices a lot of offensive power (no procs, notably), but this shows what is possible with the state of the art.

 

[Snarky]

Resistance is odd.  It is very simple, and that places it as the odd duck in CoH game mechanics.  
 

I cannot stress this enough.  Resistance is it’s own Resistance debuff Resistance.  Weird sentence.  What it means.  If you have 100% resistance you can ALMOST never be debuffed.  
 

There are a very few (and i mean just a couple) beings in CoH that ignore res debuff res.  One is an odd all Longbow Warden which you will encounter almost freaking never.  But that shithead is out there.  I am sure there are one or two others who do the same.  They are much rarer than a sapper for instance.  But just to be clear, that power exists in game.  

 

So… when I build a Res toon I build for 100% values rather than 90%.  Then my Res cannot be yoinked out from under me.  In say a Dr Aeon. Those brickers tear through resistance like its tin foil on a candy bar.