Any advice on my Dark Armor/Katana tanker? Bigger question... Is the next issue changing meta?

[Mindrivet]

Never seen in a thread anyone using katana as a tanker (but I like it, using the dark sword with the eyeball) and so far dark armor is very interesting compared to my invulnerable brute.

From what I gather, def is the meta... and dark isn't exactly high def.

Is there anything in the next issue (in beta) that will make Dark Amor better than it is now?

MAYBE I am getting my read wrong but it seems like I might be setting myself up for failure with DA/katana from what I see in these threads.

[ZemX]

tl;dr: Don't sweat defense being the meta.  Resistance, contrary to what you might have heard, is not futile.

 

Longer...

Can't say I've seen anything in the beta patch notes that is quite that momentous.  High level Council ARE getting tactics, it looks like, but this doesn't make them any worse than Nemesis who start using Veng.  And probably they are less annoying than that even.   A defense stalker on the team I was on noted the increased pressure, but seemed to be doing okay anyway.

 

As for Katana, I have a Rad/Katana Tanker and it's fun and stylish.  There are even some proc build options that can make it something of a damage beast if you want to go that far.  Rad is also not a defense set and it does fine.  My favorite armor so far, in fact.  If you build to its strengths, in my opinion.  Dark should be no different.  You can't protect defense without Defense Debuff Resistance (DDR) so building it is kind of a waste in my opinion with the caveat that it can be useful in some select instances.  Certainly against anyone without defense debuffs, it's fantastic.  But defense debuffs are VERY common.  Other than that, it provides a base to build on defense buffs from allies if you are in a situation where you can count on that.  I usually cant't. 

 

As a result, I build for everything BUT defense.   I jack up what Rad is already good at: Resistance, Recharge, and Regen.  Healthy dose of slow resistance from both Rad Armor and the Winter IO 2-slot bonus sprinkled around the build.   This is important if you are getting hit all the time due to low, zero (and sometimes negative) defense.  Debuffs can stack up on your more than on a defense tank.

 

Dark/Katana could be pretty heavy on endurance is all.  Katana can be fast and if you slot a few Force Feedback:+rech IOs in the build it can be even faster.  But faster burns fuel faster too.  And Dark Armor is also notoriously end heavy if you buy all its toggles.  Not everyone does but it is certainly part of Dark's layered survival to have those control auras messing with the lower rank enemies 

 

Question of whether you want to bother taking Divine Avalanche with Dark Armor though.  It is best taken with a positional armor set that can build on melee defense.  It won't make a big difference for Dark. You can probably soft-cap melee defense but again, not worth anything vs. defense debuffers, so grain of salt.

[Sovera]

As ZemX said defense is good, we could even say better than resistance (since it avoids debuffs that resistance sets have to eat), but resistance is not bad. There are groups of enemies who ignore defense or have such high accuracy they they end up ignoring defense as well which resistance based sets laugh at. So everyone has their own Achille's heel.

 

Dark Armor coupled with Katana will work just fine in the sense that anything works once we pour enough money into it, even if it has no exceptional synergies. If you want something a bit cray cray would be pairing DA with Martial Arts for a nutty 45% defenses to everything on top of 90% resistances to most things 😄

 

 

If you like DA/Katana then give it a spin and even if it doesn't work out you can just transfer the IOs to a new alt.

 

Edited January 28 by Sovera

[Mindrivet]

Thanks 🙂

[Mindrivet]

Looks like broadsword/titan weapons/staff all give defense like MA so I will try that.

[Nemu]

Broadsword and titan both suffer the same issue of high endurance, high recharge starting powers and I wouldn't recommend pairing them with DA unless you have a lot of funds to address endurance and recharge.

 

MA provides defense to all which is the primary draw of the set for tankers. If you want to pair something with a resist based primary and defense is your goal, this is the premier set to get you there.

 

The other weapons sets only provide melee defense (and either lethal or smashing but not both), that's not going to get you as far as you think. While melee defense might help you out against the 3-6 mobs that are in your face, it does nothing against mobs outside of melee range shooting at you. There are plenty of maps where mobs are scattered and if your playstyle is just to charge in and beat the first thing your tab buttons lands you on, you are going to learn a hard lesson - (Think late game resistance). You can herd them around a corner, that'll increase your chances of survival and clump them up for AoEs.

 

The other way to approach survival is to take a look at the tools available to you out of the box. Dark Armor has oppressive gloom and you can leverage that and stack stuns from other sources as a way to mitigate damage. The more successful builds have layers of mitigation, whether it's a combination of hard/soft control/more damage(kill them before they kill you)/resist/defense/healing.

 

Point is, if you don't care about theme but do care about function, don't put all your eggs in the Softcap Defense/Hardcap resists basket. Look at synergies, there are other ways to make a build successful instead of piling on those 2 hard stats.

[Mindrivet]

Good to know, thanks.

[Mindrivet]

Also unenhanced the early skills on titan weapons are 5.36 cost... 8.78 cost respectively.  So I think the endurance part is debunked. It is limited to smashing/melee though.

Should be noted I DO NOT LIKE MA and don't know how to make that clear without stating it.

[Sovera]

5 hours ago, Mindrivet said:

Also unenhanced the early skills on titan weapons are 5.36 cost... 8.78 cost respectively.  So I think the endurance part is debunked. It is limited to smashing/melee though.

Should be noted I DO NOT LIKE MA and don't know how to make that clear without stating it.

 

That's fine. MA's gimmick is more about the FF proc in Dragon Tail and the 10% defense it brings which allows for funny things like 45% to melee + range + AoE.

[ZemX]

9 hours ago, Mindrivet said:

Should be noted I DO NOT LIKE MA and don't know how to make that clear without stating it.

 

In that case, you might look at Staff Fighting.  It's interesting on a Tanker.  The two cone attacks are widened to 135 degrees and can hit 10 targets for a Tanker.  They were already 9ft range.  One of those is the +def melee/lethal attack which, for no known reason, is able to stack that defense buff, unlike MA or Katana/Broadsword.  But importantly, Guarded Spin is a decent cone attack for your AoE rotation.  The same can't be said of Divine Avalanche in Katana.  So essentially the +def buff can be thought of as a free bonus.  GS is also a great place to put one of the ATO sets, more or less guaranteeing a proc any time you use it in a group.  Eye of the Storm has an annoying break-dancing animation but it's a solid 15ft radius AoE on a Tanker and can slot FF:+rech, so there's that.  Animation looks better in a hover if you're into flying.

 

But what may interest you more if you are going Dark Armor is the Staff Fighting forms.  You can select one of three forms, one of which is an endurance recovery mode that is fantastic in early leveling.  Another, the damage stance, ironically might boost your survival the most because it has a finisher move that gives you a whopping +13.5% buff to all resistances. And it's easy to keep that refreshed.  Between that and the ATO proc stacking a couple times, you are looking at an extra ~25% res(all).  That helps a lot early in leveling and even later with the resistances that DA isn't so strong at.  It can also be used to give you more freedom in set bonus selection than just pursuing resistance bonuses.

[Psyonico]

I've got a dark/katana tank.

 

Katana is a really fun set, and dark armor brings a lot of different tricks.

 

As for the meta thing, I wouldn't sweat about it too much on a tanker.  The defense meta is partly because it's easier on non-tank ATs to cap defense and s also partly because non-tanks/brutes have a lower resistance cap.

 

Rad armor brings zero defense to the table but is still considered top tier.  In my experience, dark armor brings about the same level of survivability as rad armor does, the difference being that dark is way more endurance heavy.

 

Insert standard play what sounds fun rant here.

[Mindrivet]

Thanks all 🙂

[Frozen Burn]

I have a Katana/Dark Scrapper that is one of my absolute favs.  As a tank, you'd get bigger AOEs and of course Gauntlet which would mean less running and chasing down foes.  But there is no reason Katana shouldn't be for a tank as well.  Dark Armor is strong for any AT and don't let the lower overall Def worry you.  You have the potential for capped resists and one of the strongest self heals (if not THE strongest) in the game with Dark Regeneration.  With Endurance management solved and enough recharge - you are a beast.  

 

Continue enjoying!  

[Metatheory]

I would go so far as to say Defense is not the META for tanks; resist and absorb/heal is most likely superior. 

 

For DA you have the greatest heal in Dark Regen and it's not just a backup, it's part of your mitigation and you should expect to use it. So reducing endurance cost and enhancing recharge - both for the power itself and globally - are at a premium, as well as accuracy/+to-hit. The chance for +end proc is a no-brainer here. No one comes back from the last 5% of health like a DA toon surrounded by enemies!

 

Energy resists are the weakest important area, and relatively important later in the game, so that should be a focus for patching the hole. On the other hand psionic protection is second-to-none.

 

The stun and/or fear are important layers of protection - take at least one.

 

Katana is not particularly synergistic, but it's a nice enough set with a bunch of useful powers and a cool taunt. My most played character on LIve was a Kat/DA scrapper and was great fun. I encourage you to stick to your (metaphorical) guns. You won't regret it.