"I Need Healing" - A Beginner's Guide to Defenders

[Teklord]

Very true. FF revamp has given it -res debuffs and debuff resistance including defense debuf resistance. The stats on Trick Arrow -tohit for flash arrow have changed and it looks like the set had a rework. The tier list was garbage when it was written and is worse now. Mob reworks have also changed the priorities of what a defender wants to be able to do.

 

[Ringo]

Could probably unsticky this thread and replace it with a new and updated one

 

5 years of changes add up to a lot of irrelevant hot takes

[Hew]

On 4/30/2019 at 1:36 PM, Overclock said:

It seems like we're getting not just people who played CoH years ago but some new folks putting on the cape. Welcome!

 

...

 

Hope this all helps!

 

I don't know if this person still visits, but we should update it to include the new powersets that have come out like storm, fish, and gunz.

[rksr9997]

Yeah does this really need to still be pinned? It's like 6 years old.

[legendaryjman]

I agree that Kinetics is the best defender set in the game, but on live Force Fields made me a believer. The J-Force and I ran a contest to see which of the known defenders on Freedom could keep us alive. We would run a task force and compare the deaths in the end. We had a rad, an empath, an kinetics. We would frustrate them to no end by running off and getting them killed. it was a great time.

 

Then a force field stepped up. No one in the J-Force played a FF. We lawled and lawled at the n00b thinking they could keep us alive. Then the mission started ... and we couldn't die. I had no idea the bubbles were so powerful. We tried. I TRIED everything I could to get killed and I couldn't. The force field defender won the contest handily. 

I became a believer that day. While Force Fields isn't the most sexy of the defender powers I think it is the strongest defender primary in the game.

[High Sportsmanship]

What are the best (or expected) pools to get into as a defender? I'd think leadership? What else? What epic pool? I'm asking this from a mostly game balance/effectiveness pov; flavor and conception wise it is, like most things CoH, wide open! Thanks.

[Psyonico]

There aren't really any expected pools.   Leadership is a good choice though.   Depending on what combination you are,  Hasten is usually a good choice.   I like the fighting pool because I tend to play pretty aggressively and the extra defense and resistance are nice.   Sorcery for Rune of Protection is another good choice for the offensive defender.

 

As for Epics... most sets benefit from power boost, so Soul Mastery is a good choice for a lot of pairings.  Depending on if you have a self heal, Mu mastery can be helpful.  Mu is also nice because its shield covers the three most common damage types.   Finally honorable mention to Mace for the +def shield.

[MonteCarla]

Power pools I take most commonly on Defenders:
 

Leadership - adds some extra buffs. Tactics also prevents blindness status effects from sticking.

 

Speed (for Hasten) - if you have Aim and a Nuke you'll want them up as often as possible. Also, many powersets have long cooldown buffs that benefit from taking this, especially Empathy

 

Teleport - Teleport Target can bring a dead teammate to you for a safe rez via an inspiration or the START vendor device. Teleport can be used to teleport to a teammate in trouble with a macro eg "\macro TP powexeclocation target Teleport" even if they're in a neighbouring room sometimes! 

 

Fighting - Tough and Weave make you sturdier. With the right IO sets a Defender can get to softcapped defence of 45% and resistances of 75% vs Smashing/Lethal (depending on primary powerset)

 

Medicine - don't take this if you have heals in your powerset. But it can be handy if you've taken Force Fields, Cold Domination or Sonic Resonance to patch heal a teammate who's health is slowly dropping.

 

Concealment - Stealth will make you fully invisible these days. Taking this and Teleport Target makes you a great scout, able to find the end of mission boss/objective and bring the whole team in.

 

But there are no hard and fast rule. Experiment, and see what works for you.

[Black_Assassin]

17 hours ago, MonteCarla said:

Medicine - don't take this if you have heals in your powerset. But it can be handy if you've taken Force Fields, Cold Domination or Sonic Resonance to patch heal a teammate who's health is slowly dropping.

 

Fixed it for you 😂