Focused Feedback: Tanker - Archetype Inherent Changes

[Maelwys]

28 minutes ago, Warboss said:

If the problem is that Tanks are faster than Brutes at farming

Personally I think there are multiple problems with the Melee AT balance at the moment on Live.

Tankers dealing too much AoE damage is definitely one of them. The global radius and target cap buffs that Tankers are currently getting; combined with the ease of attaining "enough survivability" (meaning they have more wiggle room that other ATs to buff their damage via offensive set bonuses and procs) means that an AoE-damage-focused Tanker can almost always blow an identically built Scrapper/Brute/Stalker out of the water. AoE damage output certainly has an impact on AE farming times, yes... but it also has an impact on any occasion where you're fighting more than 5-10 mobs simultaneously - which is most team content in CoX. (Nerfing Tankers is going to do naff all to Farmers - they'll just swap to a different AT and move on; never mind the fact that some of us have already been using ATs other than Tankers for ages...). So personally I fully accept that the current level of Tanker AoE damage needs reduced for the sake of balance... just not by quite this much!

ATO performance disparity is the other biggie. Take ATOs away and a Brute and a Scrapper and a Stalker all become very similar in terms of damage output. However the Scrapper and Stalker ATOs are capable of adding so much additional damage output that Brutes are left in the dust. Tankers have one ATO that grants +DamageResistance and is still very useful without being damage-focused. Brute ATOs are hot garbage.

Procs are definitely borked. PPM mechanics are both unintuitive and ridiculous (adding local recharge aspect is bad?!?) and should be nuked from orbit. But that's not unique to Melee ATs and so IMO is a battle for another day. Notably - Tankers are currently dealing too much AoE damage whether or not you include Proc effects - and the melee AT that is gaining the most benefit from procbombing their attacks is a Brute (due to their low base damage; plus Fury; they gain proportionally more from slotting their attacks with damage procs instead of for damage aspect!).
 

Edited June 13 by Maelwys

[Warboss]

1 hour ago, Maelwys said:

Personally I think there are multiple problems with the Melee AT balance at the moment on Live.

From the feedback and discussions we're seeing here, I'd agree.

 

1 hour ago, Maelwys said:

Tankers dealing too much AoE damage is definitely one of them. The global radius and target cap buffs that Tankers are currently getting; combined with the ease of attaining "enough survivability" (meaning they have more wiggle room that other ATs to buff their damage via offensive set bonuses and procs) means that an AoE-damage-focused Tanker can almost always blow an identically built Scrapper/Brute/Stalker out of the water. AoE damage output certainly has an impact on AE farming times, yes... but it also has an impact on any occasion where you're fighting more than 5-10 mobs simultaneously - which is most team content in CoX. (Nerfing Tankers is going to do naff all to Farmers - they'll just swap to a different AT and move on; never mind the fact that some of us have already been using ATs other than Tankers for ages...). So personally I fully accept that the current level of Tanker AoE damage needs reduced for the sake of balance... just not by quite this much!

 

Are they or is it a byproduct of the game (more minions than Lts., than Bosses)? "Standard" damage (or lower tier powers) are going to reduce minions and Lts. at a decent pace. If the argument is that power strength dissipates over range, then use that as a basis for decreasing damage as a power "spreads out". BUT, that mechanic should be consistent over ALL powers as it will become part of the Game World Mechanics. If diminishing the amount of damage output from Tanker AoEs is the goal then maybe the Damage Scalar is what needs to be looked at, but that will affect Bosses and above (which are already a slog for non-optimized builds (I can't say for sure as I don't appear to have one, bosses and above are a pain)). Can't say I'm onboard with this one, but seems preferrable to combined changes we're being shown. This would affect Tanker STs, so I'm not really a fan of it.

 

1 hour ago, Maelwys said:

ATO performance disparity is the other biggie. Take ATOs away and a Brute and a Scrapper and a Stalker all become very similar in terms of damage output. However the Scrapper and Stalker ATOs are capable of adding so much additional damage output that Brutes are left in the dust. Tankers have one ATO that grants +DamageResistance and is still very useful without being damage-focused. Brute ATOs are hot garbage.

 

To me, this seems like a fix first before resolving any issues with other Melee ATs. Excessively nerfing Tank damage will NOT fix this problem.

 

1 hour ago, Maelwys said:

Procs are definitely borked. PPM mechanics are both unintuitive and ridiculous (adding local recharge aspect is bad?!?) and should be nuked from orbit. But that's not unique to Melee ATs and so IMO is a battle for another day. Notably - Tankers are currently dealing too much AoE damage whether or not you include Proc effects - and the melee AT that is gaining the most benefit from procbombing their attacks is a Brute (due to their low base damage; plus Fury; they gain proportionally more from slotting their attacks with damage procs instead of for damage aspect!).

 

Again this seems like something that needs to be taken on outside of determining Tanker damage output. Fix this issue first, then take on other issues.

 

 

[Gobbledigook]

Why does the Tanker need to be AoE melee focused? Is it not enough that they have the highest health and mitigations?

 

Introducing the extra AoE/target caps to Tankers caused so many problems and upset to other AT's (Brutes mostly 🤣) and it probably should not have gone ahead. The damage scalar raise was enough.

 

 It seems you are at a loss as what to do with Brutes and you won't even give them a decent ATO. But don't dick with Tankers who needed very little but got too much. I've played Tankers for years and do not need them to become AoE melee specialists, especially the way this update is going about it. We do not need or want badly thought out changes to the class we have loved and played for many years.

 

Spend your time on giving the Brute a more defined role instead of dicking with an AT that needs very little to work really well.

 

I am afraid this will all fall on deaf ears though as that seems to be the developer stance nowadays.

[Shin Magmus]

2 minutes ago, Gobbledigook said:

Why does the Tanker need to be AoE melee focused? Is it not enough that they have the highest health and mitigations?

   Because that's what the HC devs wanted when they initially buffed Tankers, and still want even now in spite of the uneven and confusing nerfs.  Their exact words in multiple posts are "AoE Specialists", Tankers are going to be better at using AoEs than the other ATs.  Although if the AoEs do piss-poor damage, then that won't be enough.  Tankers were buffed originally because nobody played them at endgame.  Having the highest health and mitigation didn't matter, at all, to any good player.  Brutes have the same caps, and could be buffed to reach those caps and hit the same mitigation as Tankers.  Not only was that true in the past, but it will still be true after this patch goes through.

 

   This means that, despite what lower level and casual players may say, Brutes and Tankers have roughly the same survivability on end-game teams and especially on Advanced Mode team comps.  So the choice between the 2 ATs really comes entirely down to which one does more damage, and that is why Tankers were not made and not played.  Keep in mind that there are speedruns where the main tank is a Scrapper with Confront, and Brutes/Tankers are nowhere to be seen.  The scale of this problem goes further than you might think.

[Warboss]

As someone who promotes Tankers, actually runs with all Tank teams, and can see what "basic", "standard", and "extreme" builds can do, I don't think these proposed change targets any but the latter, but will affect all (including leveling). If some changes are needed, fine, but not these. They don't seem to really address the issues at hand or deal with AT performance compared to Tanks,  other than making Tankers less.

 

2 hours ago, Gobbledigook said:

I am afraid this will all fall on deaf ears though as that seems to be the developer stance nowadays.

 

Sadly I have to agree with you. 

Edited Saturday at 02:36 AM by Warboss

[Sovera]

I had a whole post but deleted it because it was not constructive. I already made my points a few pages back and though the squeaky wheel gets the oil I'm not going to play the game of being loud and obnoxious.

 

I'll resume my post:

 

1- In my experience my Tankers and Brutes had the same TF times. This was run in multiple characters over the years and those who remember my posts I had/have a thing about writting down what I find. I'm not talking of missions, but TFs. The Tanker can have the extra sturdiness and the bigger AoEs but the Brutes had better ST (my Brutes invariably break a pylon a minute faster than my Tankers).

2 - My builds may be shit by min max standards (6 damage procs) but I'd like to think they reflect a 'normal' slotting where we go up to 5 slots, one proc included, then add a second proc in the last slot. Because of this my times were, well, standard Tanker when doing Trapdoor averaging six minutes. Nerfing the 'average' player achieves what exactly?

3 - Six proc builds brought this on (reminds me of WoW devs nerfing certain powers because they did too much damage, it turns out to be a bug, they fix the bug, but then don't un-nerf the power). Fix the proc stacking with whatever mechanics (100% chance for one proc to go off, 75% for a second to go off back to back. 50% for a third. Adjust numbers) before adjusting the AT because AFTER having FINALLY addressed the proc stacking then ANOTHER pass tuning the ATs will be required.

 

This smells a lot like bringing back City of Brutes which was how the game ran for 95% of its life once Brutes got introduced. Only diehard Tankers played the AT if they came from other MMOs and gravitated to the role of a tank, and even them would move on to Brutes.

[JayboH]

My only post regarding these changes:

 

You ever try taking a nearly-maxed-out tanker with dark melee against a Dark Werewolf on the current patch?  takes forever...  and now it's going to be nerf time soon on top of that

[Gobbledigook]

2 hours ago, Shin Magmus said:

   Because that's what the HC devs wanted when they initially buffed Tankers, and still want even now in spite of the uneven and confusing nerfs.  Their exact words in multiple posts are "AoE Specialists", Tankers are going to be better at using AoEs than the other ATs.  Although if the AoEs do piss-poor damage, then that won't be enough.  Tankers were buffed originally because nobody played them at endgame.  Having the highest health and mitigation didn't matter, at all, to any good player.  Brutes have the same caps, and could be buffed to reach those caps and hit the same mitigation as Tankers.  Not only was that true in the past, but it will still be true after this patch goes through.

 

   This means that, despite what lower level and casual players may say, Brutes and Tankers have roughly the same survivability on end-game teams and especially on Advanced Mode team comps.  So the choice between the 2 ATs really comes entirely down to which one does more damage, and that is why Tankers were not made and not played.  Keep in mind that there are speedruns where the main tank is a Scrapper with Confront, and Brutes/Tankers are nowhere to be seen.  The scale of this problem goes further than you might think.

Yes i understand that and agree mostly.

 

But They are less specialist AoE melee in this update than they are on live and if you want AoE you do not bring a Tanker to end game for that, you will bring corruptors and blasters.

 

I understand the damage buff they got and needed but the extra AoE was not needed, but i guess that is just a matter of opinion. Higher mitigations and health, easier to build and slot procs and extra taunt would have been enough for me.

 

The developers wanted it but did the Tanker players? I do not remember anyone asking for it.

 

Seems heavy handed and clumsy so far. A lot more testing is needed imo. Will wait and see.

[ivanhedgehog]

4 hours ago, Shin Magmus said:

   Because that's what the HC devs wanted when they initially buffed Tankers, and still want even now in spite of the uneven and confusing nerfs.  Their exact words in multiple posts are "AoE Specialists", Tankers are going to be better at using AoEs than the other ATs.  Although if the AoEs do piss-poor damage, then that won't be enough.  Tankers were buffed originally because nobody played them at endgame.  Having the highest health and mitigation didn't matter, at all, to any good player.  Brutes have the same caps, and could be buffed to reach those caps and hit the same mitigation as Tankers.  Not only was that true in the past, but it will still be true after this patch goes through.

 

   This means that, despite what lower level and casual players may say, Brutes and Tankers have roughly the same survivability on end-game teams and especially on Advanced Mode team comps.  So the choice between the 2 ATs really comes entirely down to which one does more damage, and that is why Tankers were not made and not played.  Keep in mind that there are speedruns where the main tank is a Scrapper with Confront, and Brutes/Tankers are nowhere to be seen.  The scale of this problem goes further than you might think.

Why will anyone want to bring a tanker after this? poor damage and less ability to hold agro? a buff to brutes to bring them to par with tanks would be a resounding win. shanking tanks is not a win in any sense of the word.

[Maelwys]

4 hours ago, Gobbledigook said:

I understand the damage buff they got and needed but the extra AoE was not needed

 

The developers wanted it but did the Tanker players? I do not remember anyone asking for it.

 

The argument, as I understand it, is that if Tankers are the AT most suited for grabbing and holding aggro then having them deal damage to more targets simultaneously (via a bigger radius and Target Cap) helps them lock down aggro faster.

 

The problem with that is AoE taunting is very limited mechanically.

 

Currently you can only hold aggro on up to 17 enemies simultaneously. So when combined with punchvoke and your Taunt Aura a 16-target AoE is usually overkill, because a 10-target AoE will end up keeping the attention of the same (capped!) number of foes.

Also, these days most non-Tanker "squishes" tend to be just fine at surviving the attention of minions (and often LTs) long enough to kill them. So often the only things that are really worth Taunting are Bosses and above.

 

 

In my opinion the best way to achieve what the Devs appear to be going for here would be to:

 

(I) Completely revoke all the changes to Cones and AoEs. Return the global radius/arc buff to Gauntlet the same as it is currently on Live.

 

(ii) Implement the "Overcap" Damage Reduction mechanic for any targets hit above the regular caps (5 for cones, 10 for AoEs) using either a Single Exponential Reduction curve (so target 10 takes ~75% of the damage of target 9 which takes ~75% of the damage of target 8, etc) or a single flat reduction (so each Target takes ~50% damage). The exact figures can be tweaked over time to bring Tanker performance down to a roughly similar level as Brutes. This will allow the runaway extra damage dealt by Tanker AoEs when surrounded by targets to be reduced without impacting their regular performance, and affect damage from all sources including Procs.

 

(iii) Raise the Tanker aggro limit. Going from 17 to something like 24-32 will help those higher target cap AoEs actually mean something for aggro control purposes.

 

(iv) Give Brutes an ATO which actually affects their damage output and makes them more attractive to a team for damage purposes. Like "Each point of Fury grants an additional 0.5% damage buff, that applies not only to the Brute but also to any allies within 60ft" or "Brute punchvoke now applies a non-stacking damage resistance debuff of -10% for 5 seconds".

 

Result? Tanker performance stays put for regular gameplay; but their AoE damage when surrounded by mobs (Farming, +4x8 runs, etc) is drastically reduced in exchange for becoming much better at holding the attention of a very large number of foes. Brute performance gets a slight increase when soloing and it becomes more beneficial for a team to bring a Brute along for raw damage output but a Tanker along for AoE aggro control.

 

Edited Saturday at 07:37 AM by Maelwys

[Erratic1]

14 minutes ago, Maelwys said:

Give Brutes an ATO which actually affects their damage output and makes them more attractive to a team for damage purposes. Like "Each point of Fury grants an additional 0.5% damage buff, that applies not only to the Brute but also to any allies within 60ft" or "Brute punchvoke now applies a non-stacking damage resistance debuff of -10% for 5 seconds".

 

I doubt Brutes doing more damage is on the table. That would be going the opposite way of the previous adjustments (like dropping their damage cap from 775% to 700%) and would threaten the positioning of Scrappers and Stalkers. And if the narrative above is that Tanker damage being reduced means Brute ascendancy for tanking well enough while doing superior damage, giving Brutes more damage ends up in the exact same place.

 

Not sure why Tankers got an ATO which makes them better at survival when the inherent nature of the values they get out of armor sets sufficiently covers that. Give Brutes Might of the Tanker (call it Berserker's Endurance) and give Tankers a target cap/area boosting ATO, keeping the damage increase Tankers got previously but doing away with the area increase. Tankers would still solo better than they originally did, and once they get their ATOs in place become area damage specialists as intended. Brutes survive better than they currently do but do not hold aggro any better nor in any amount approaching a Tanker. 

[tidge]

18 hours ago, Maelwys said:

Procs are definitely borked. PPM mechanics are both unintuitive and ridiculous (adding local recharge aspect is bad?!?) and should be nuked from orbit. But that's not unique to Melee ATs and so IMO is a battle for another day. Notably - Tankers are currently dealing too much AoE damage whether or not you include Proc effects - and the melee AT that is gaining the most benefit from procbombing their attacks is a Brute (due to their low base damage; plus Fury; they gain proportionally more from slotting their attacks with damage procs instead of for damage aspect!).

 

I don't think the (what people call) disparity is due to procs; I think the whatever the disparity is... is due to Global Recharge. I'm not ignorant of the artificial inflation of %proc chances for (current, HC) Tankers that really ought to be addressed.

 

With Blasters having crashless nukes and beaucoup recharge, I don't know why there is such intense focus of Scrapper/Tanker/Brute when those three have repeatedly been shown (currently, on the HC shards) to all be pretty close in performance. Scrappers without their Critical hits ATO wouldn't be outputting more damage than Brutes (in terms of clear times) as near as I can tell. Right now we've got a whole lotta ATs that are fun to play and can reap similar rewards in roughly similar amounts of time. I can't wrap my head around trying to knock one of four (or five, or six) ATs out of that rewards-per-unit-time group. The game is IMO far past the point where we need to have role-specific team construction to earn rewards (in similar amounts of time/effort).

 

 

 

 

[Maelwys]

1 hour ago, Erratic1 said:

Not sure why Tankers got an ATO which makes them better at survival 

 

AFAIK the ATOs mostly follow the theme of the AT and often complement their Inherent.

 

So the two more damage focused melee ATs each get two ATOs that give them greater damage (via more regular Critical Hits and additional Hidden state and Build up activations) and the more resistance focused AT gets two ATOs that give them greater mitigation (via more damage resistance and absorb).

Brutes are supposedly more balanced and so get one of each: a damage boosting ATO (+Fury) and a mitigation boosting ATO (+Regeneration). Conceptually all that makes sense to me... but unfortunately in reality the performance of both Brute ATOs is pathetically poor.

[skoryy]

6 hours ago, Maelwys said:

(I) Completely revoke all the changes to Cones and AoEs.

 

Okay, I can get behind that.

6 hours ago, Maelwys said:

(ii) Implement the "Overcap" Damage Reduction mechanic for any targets hit above the regular caps

Okay, that's good as well, but keep it at a flat rate for targets over the cap. Players get confused enough with PPM, lets not break more brains with more math.

6 hours ago, Maelwys said:

(iii) Raise the Tanker aggro limit.

 

lol wut. Aggro cap stays where its at because there has to be some risk involved to everyone else if you pull too much aggro.

6 hours ago, Maelwys said:

(iv) Give Brutes an ATO which actually affects their damage output and makes them more attractive to a team for damage purposes

 

I'll have to dig into City of Data on how Fury is generated, but something that works all the time like Assassin's Wrath that allows Brutes to hit and keep 100 fury is something I've had in mind.

[bhiestand]

It's worth noting that at least some of the data being shown here is tankers at their absolute BEST under the current rules.  This means durable enemies that aren't instantly killed (lots of +4 testing going on) with as-much-as-possible overcap mechanic saturation.

 

This means the lower damage they're doing is going to magnified to a very great extent in more typical gameplay.

 

I assume that current perceptions of "too high AOE" from tankers is due essentially entirely to procs.  If so, then returning the "real" radius of aoes to pre-buff *but keeping the higher damage* (that is, not following the formula) may achieve closer to the goals as I understand them, by reducing procs.

 

I *really* wish we could address procs if they're the issue.

 

On a separate note, I'd like to test complete overcap saturation, which is better done in (for instance) the street tunnel map.  Is there an agreed-upon good testing enemy for this purpose?  To my earlier point, this would be best-case for Tankers, and closer to standard farming (I guess, I am don't have any characters built to farm).

[twozerofoxtrot]

7 hours ago, Maelwys said:

(iii) Raise the Tanker aggro limit. Going from 17 to something like 24-32 will help those higher target cap AoEs actually mean something for aggro control purposes.

 

Smart suggestion.

 

Tankers are the sturdiest AT, and we've had the discussion about how that enables proc building and also how it's less useful on teams with buffers who can close that gap on other melee ATs.

 

What hasn't been discussed is how trivial that beefiness is when you have one or more well-played control ATs on your team. Taunting stuff to chuck rocks at your sloped glacis doesn't really matter if they're all stunned or punching each other. And with adaptive recharge this will be even more the case (as much as I like the concept).

 

Giving Tankers a bigger Threat Cap helps bring their purpose of managing agro into focus among control ATs by enabling larger pulls and/or managing accidental agro that might otherwise swarm the team.

 

But it's a double edged sword if that Tanker hasn't really invested in their Primary or is still leveling/kitting it.

 

Unfortunately since we're at release candidate I think this unlikely to be considered for at least several months.

[Warboss]

1 hour ago, tidge said:

With Blasters having crashless nukes and beaucoup recharge, I don't know why there is such intense focus of Scrapper/Tanker/Brute when those three have repeatedly been shown (currently, on the HC shards) to all be pretty close in performance. 

 

I do find it funny how this is never addressed, yet Tanks are somehow breaking the game...

[KaizenSoze]

1 hour ago, tidge said:

 

I don't think the (what people call) disparity is due to procs; I think the whatever the disparity is... is due to Global Recharge. I'm not ignorant of the artificial inflation of %proc chances for (current, HC) Tankers that really ought to be addressed.

 

With Blasters having crashless nukes and beaucoup recharge, I don't know why there is such intense focus of Scrapper/Tanker/Brute when those three have repeatedly been shown (currently, on the HC shards) to all be pretty close in performance. Scrappers without their Critical hits ATO wouldn't be outputting more damage than Brutes (in terms of clear times) as near as I can tell. Right now we've got a whole lotta ATs that are fun to play and can reap similar rewards in roughly similar amounts of time. I can't wrap my head around trying to knock one of four (or five, or six) ATs out of that rewards-per-unit-time group. The game is IMO far past the point where we need to have role-specific team construction to earn rewards (in similar amounts of time/effort).

 

 

 

 

Pretty sure all of the things you mentioned are on the devs radar. But the devs are volunteers and they aren't able to get to things quickly.

[Maelwys]

20 minutes ago, skoryy said:

lol wut. Aggro cap stays where its at because there has to be some risk involved to everyone else if you pull too much aggro.

 

If the developer intention is that Tankers are to be the Tanky Melee AoE specialist, then either they need to deal more AoE damage compared to the other melee ATs (and we've already seen where that leads) or they need to be better at controlling the Aggro of a large number of targets.

 

As I pointed out earlier, currently for the purposes of aggro control there is no point to raising the target cap of Tanker AoEs from 10 to 16 whenever Taunt auras and AoE punchvoke mean that the Aggro limit is already being consistently reached at the lower caps.

 

Raising the Tanker aggro cap to about two full +4x8 spawns worth of foes (24+) would become capable of attracting the attention of more critters without dealing more damage to them. However there would still be an element of risk even on teams that choose to only pull two groups at a time because of the way the Taunt effect works (the threat level of the Taunter on each affected target is a multiple of both the remaining Taunt duration and the total damage that the Taunter has dealt to that target). Unless the Tanker is dealing consistent damage to each foe their Taunt effect on that foe will be "fragile"... certainly fragile enough that a Blaster (for example) will be able to peel them off the Tank.

 

IMO this approach would allow Tankers to occupy a sufficiently different niche from Brutes (and Scrappers/Stalkers) that they can each be mechanically desirable on Teams for different reasons.

[Maelwys]

47 minutes ago, bhiestand said:

I assume that current perceptions of "too high AOE" from tankers is due essentially entirely to procs. 

 

It's not.

 

Procs actually skew things slightly in favour of Brutes.

 

Tanker's AoEs and Cones being capable of hitting 60-100% more Targets for full damage (and having 50% more coverage area in most cases!) is the problem. However it's a problem that only really becomes overtly troublesome whenever you are surrounded by enough targets for those AoEs and Cones to consistently achieve full target saturation. Like AE Farming (which is irrelevant for AT balance) and when steamrolling through content at +Nx8 (which isn't)

[ExeErdna]

10 minutes ago, Maelwys said:

 

It's not.

 

Procs actually skew things slightly in favour of Brutes.

 

Tanker's AoEs and Cones being capable of hitting 60-100% more Targets for full damage (and having 50% more coverage area in most cases!) is the problem. However it's a problem that only really becomes overtly troublesome whenever you are surrounded by enough targets for those AoEs and Cones to consistently achieve full target saturation. Like AE Farming (which is irrelevant for AT balance) and when steamrolling through content at +Nx8 (which isn't)

 

To me when soloing getting surrounded is bad. I rolled up a Regen/Savage Tanker and I started pulling mobs and getting surrounded on purpose. The lost of attack power hurts now from when playing groups there wouldn't be this issue but, at that point I'm just a meat shield. So the "murderball" of having double damage auras is messing up the metrics of this whole design choice. Sure Fire/Dark/Elec/Bio and Rad/Spines can do what they do without much input. Yet what about the others that don't have that? Them now being weaker doesn't solve a problem it creates another one. To attempt to stop the murderballs the other sets get hit a bit too hard, especially with how enemy regen got bumped up it feels a bit excessive. 

[Onlyasandwich]

30 minutes ago, Maelwys said:

IMO this approach would allow

I like this too because it puts more pressure on tanker defenses, giving you more justification for having such high survivability, and having to make use of your resources to survive such aggro.

[Erratic1]

23 minutes ago, Maelwys said:

Procs actually skew things slightly in favour of Brutes.

 

Do Brute players procbomb themselves much? Because honestly, over the years, it has pretty much never been much of a discussion point in the Brute subforums.

 

 

[Gobbledigook]

13 minutes ago, Erratic1 said:

 

Do Brute players procbomb themselves much? Because honestly, over the years, it has pretty much never been much of a discussion point in the Brute subforums.

 

 

I think most Brutes tend to build their mitigations to be more like Tankers and Tankers just have it easier doing this. But a Brute could proc and still have better survival than Scrappers. No one expects Brutes to main Tank if there is a Tanker around, but a Tanker is probably expected to and have taunt.

 

I would be very happy for Brutes to get a nice buff/small rework to improve their role though.

[Erratic1]

5 minutes ago, Gobbledigook said:

I think most Brutes tend to build their mitigations to be more like Tankers and Tankers just have it easier doing this. But a Brute could proc and still have better survival than Scrappers. No one expects Brutes to main Tank if there is a Tanker around, but a Tanker is probably expected to and have taunt.

 

Ignoring Willpower/Regeneration, most armor sets focus on Defense or Resistance. The only cost differential between a Brute and Scrapper is when it comes to Resistance, as Scrappers cap at 75% as oppose to 90% for Brutes. So a Defense built Brute spends just as much as a Scrapper does to get there. The Brute gets 160 more hps, base, at level 50 than the Scrapper. That is basically meaningless as the differential between something which will kill the Scrapper but leave the Brute standing is less than a hit from most things they would be facing. The Brute's cap is 800 hp than the Scrapper, but in the myriad number of builds I have seen over the years, boosting health just about never happens. So that leaves Brute survivability being better than Scrapper really only in the realm of Resistance sets.

 

As contrast, Tankers have 375 more base hp at level 50 compared to a Brute, and 320 more at max, and that is on top of reaching their defensive maximums much more easily.