Trick Arrow Defender vs Corr

[Timeshadow]

Greetings, Defenders. 

 

For the first time in a long time, I'm considering rolling a support AT. My very first character back in 2008 was a Defender but I found out pretty quickly that DPS was more my style. So what's brought me back to the more ally oriented side of things? A great concept, of course! 

 

I've got an idea for an Archery/TA toon but I'm torn between rolling it as a Defender or a Corr. I've heard about (and seen) the nasty debuffs TA can put out and I'd like to have at least one other toon (Besides my Khelds) that can do more for the team than just straight up kill stuff. I understand that the basic difference is a simple one. Defenders have stronger debuff values while Corrs are more damage focused. But that seems overly simplistic. What, specifically, am I missing and how do I choose between the two? 

[Carnifax]

I've one of each, a TA / Elec Defender and a Water / TA Corruptor who I've just started slotting out (and a Grav / TA Controller. I love Trick Arrow).

 

The Defender I've leaned into being a debuff / sapping machine, because the defender does that better. They are, weirdly a "Point blank arrows" defender. Want to be in close for Short Circuit and Power Sink from the Mu Patron. Thanks to Trick Arrows AoE debuffs I can do that anyway knowing their ToHit and Damage is severely debuffed (and some of the time I'm standing inside my EMP Buff Cage). 

 

The Water / TA is a Corruptor because Water does good AoE damage and specifically because Scourge works best with Rain powers (Rain of Fire, Ice Storm, Blizzard and Whirlpool). This time around I've no intention going NEAR the enemy, Trick Arrow is equally good. Can still lob in the -ToHit / -Dam alongside Disruption and Glue to keep them in the burning Oil Slick atop a Whirlpool (Steam Spray will ignite Oil Slicks).

 

Even the Controller. Trick Arrow is very controllery, with an Immob, a hold, a slow patch, an AoE Sleep patch (with a big -Dam debuff) and an AoE Hold. So it can complement a lot of Controller primaries (very good for all of them but especially for Illusion, Grav & Mind, plus probably Arsenal). It's just a top tier set. Very little it won't go with (I can't think of any set it'll clash with). 

 

Despite my crippling TA Addiction I've no experience with Archery So I can't tell you if Rain of Arrows is actually a Rain (and therefore good for Scourge) I don't think it is but unsure, for me that'd be the decider on which way to go here.

 

I will say that if you prefer a "blaster" style of play Trick Arrow definitely is the way to go. All the debuffs are attack-like anyway and Acid and Ice are proccable. Plus the animation times are nice and short so it feels very fluid to play compared to some older debuff sets (Tar Patch and its 3 seccond animation time vs Disruptions 1.1 second animation time for an extreme example, and I love Dark ). 

 

I'll lob this link to where I have my Macros for Trick Arrow patch powers. 

 

Use these and all you are doing is picking the toughest guy in the centre of the spawn and spamming 5 different debuffs and patches on top of them to give them a really bad day. 

 

Edited March 10 by Carnifax

[evetsleep]

Agree with everything Carnifax has said (I have an arsenal/TA and its solid).

 

The damage from archy can be painfully low.  I'd go corruptor if I were you to get access to scourge (which works on the nuke if memory serves).  The debuffs will be a little lower, but I think it would be worth it.

[Timeshadow]

Thanks for your responses, guys. 

 

@Carnifax I was just reading your thread the other day. From my understanding, your macros basically turn TA's location-based AoEs into targeted AoEs, which sounds much more enjoyable than having to manually place the patches all the time. Do I have that right? 

 

@evetsleep Really appreciate the insight on Archery. I've heard the set can be kinda wimpy in terms of damage, largely due to some powers having longer animation times and the general suck of majority Lethal damage. Knowing that Scourge effects Rain of Arrows is a big plus in favor of a Corr. 

 

One of the things that's really stumped me is slotting. Should I focus primarily on +Rech to keep my debuffs available, +Def for more survivability, or some kinda frankenslotting to maximize the impact of my effects? 

 

[Carnifax]

28 minutes ago, Timeshadow said:

From my understanding, your macros basically turn TA's location-based AoEs into targeted AoEs, which sounds much more enjoyable than having to manually place the patches all the time. Do I have that right? 

Yes, clicking the Macro button will treat it as a targeted AoE on your target. I keep the original power button in the tray above in case I want a manual placement version occasionally. 

[Timeshadow]

1 hour ago, Carnifax said:

Yes, clicking the Macro button will treat it as a targeted AoE on your target. I keep the original power button in the tray above in case I want a manual placement version occasionally. 

 

Perfect. I'll definitely get those set up ASAP. Any other tricks (See what I did there? 😝) I should know before taking the plunge? 

[Uun]

I have an Archery/TA corruptor on HC and had a TA/Archery defender on live (before the TA revamp). While defenders get higher debuff values, I find the corruptor values are good enough. Regardless of AT, the damage from Archery isn't great. It's mostly heavily resisted lethal damage (even Blazing Arrow and Explosive Arrow are at least half lethal) and doesn't have much in the way of secondary effects or proc opportunities. Although it does have an accuracy bonus, it doesn't have the -def most lethal weapons sets do.

 

3 hours ago, Carnifax said:

Despite my crippling TA Addiction I've no experience with Archery So I can't tell you if Rain of Arrows is actually a Rain (and therefore good for Scourge) I don't think it is but unsure, for me that'd be the decider on which way to go here.

It's a rain with 3 ticks and a 1s duration. It does scourge, but not in the way Rain of Fire or Blizzard does.

[Carnifax]

Here's my TA/Elec defender for slotting. My Water / TAs is going to be pretty much the same. You can of course go less proccy, I'm probably going lose some in Acid to fit the new Ice epic in (my mids refuses to update to the latest Mids 😞 ). 

 

 

Defender - TrickArrow - Electrical - Mu.mbd Corruptor - Water - Trick Arrow_cheap.mbd

[FlammeFatale]

I have a TA/A defender and I have never found it lacked damage. Actually, it does a ton of damage. TA has some good damaging powers: Oil slick and procced Ice Arrow. It also has good res debuffs: entangling and disruption arrow,  plus -res procs in a couple powers.

 

For mitigations, Flash Arrow + Power Boost and/or Clarion Radial Epiphany is really powerful. 

Miss Arrows - Trick Arrow TA Defender.mbd

[Timeshadow]

Awesome! Thanks for the builds, y'all. 

 

While I generally avoid sets that primarily deal Lethal damage because of the widespread resistance, I'm open to putting up with it for the theme. The character is magic origin but focuses on mystical weapons as opposed to things that could be considered spells or energy attacks. I'm open to considering other primaries if you have suggestions. 

[FlammeFatale]

12 hours ago, Timeshadow said:

While I generally avoid sets that primarily deal Lethal damage because of the widespread resistance, I'm open to putting up with it for the theme. 

 

This may not be a popular opinion: I do not think damage type matters much. 

 

There may be better information about resistances somewhere, but this is my source:

 

Comparing the second most resisted damage type, Lethal, to second least resisted one, Fire, one could say that Lethal is 10 to 11 times more resisted than Fire. But these are small percentages. Across the whole game, this translates into a 5% difference in resistance. This is negligible compared to the variance induced by AT choice, powersets, slotting and rotations.

 

Moreover, what I think matters  more than averages, is the specific resistances of some boss combos, in a 54/8 solo context. Playing at lower difficulties or in a team is easy. At 54/8, minions and most lieutenants are easy. But some bosses can be a pain in the neck for some characters. The amount of pain in the neck depends at least as much on character mitigation type vs boss damage type, as it does on character damage type. Let me give two examples based on what are considered more difficult enemy groups.

 

Example 1: two Mu Guardians.

They deal ranged energy damage. A toon with poor range or energy damage mitigation can get his endurance sapped very quickly. 

They resist fire, cold, energy and negative damage. A character with poor range/energy mitigation and a F/C/E/N powerset can suffer. A character with Lethal damage will do better.

 

Example 2: two Dark Ring Mistresses.

They have ranged debuffs and deal ranged psionic damage. Any character with no ranged defense and a psionic hole will suffer.

They resist psionic damage but have negative resistance to Lethal. These annoying bosses can be safely ignored by a character with ranged defense and lethal damage.

 

This is why I always create my characters based on concept and not damage type.

 

[Timeshadow]

@FlammeFatale Thanks for the analysis. Always good to see some data backing up a point.

 

I should be clear. I'm not saying Lethal based sets are bad by any stretch. I've just noticed when playing them that it seems to take an extra attack or two to down some mobs at higher levels. This isn't an issue on teams since there's a wide variety of damage types flying around all the time. 

 

As for solo play, I generally keep my settings pretty tame. +2 is usually as high as I'll go once I've got my build situated and comfortably slotted with IOs. Nothing against people who enjoy running at +4/x8 but I've never been a fan of games where enemies are just bullet sponges. XP aside, the slog just isn't fun for me to handle alone.