new Dark Armor questions

[Tankshock]

Soul Transfer seems like a real PITA.  Like, it will be up only 30-50% of the time in the fights where you'll most need it.  Pretty much just a rez now, despite what it says on the box?

Does the Def from Cloak of Fear (sorry, darkness - and no wonder Dark gets picked on all the time.  Who wears 2 cloaks?) not work like other Stealth Def?  In other words, is it always at full effectiveness?  Seems that way in City of Data.

Is Oppressive Gloom a reasonable Crowd Control power?  Does it make a difference when you need it to?

 

Thanks!
 

Edited Saturday at 09:35 PM by Tankshock

[Psyonico]

4 hours ago, Tankshock said:

Soul Transfer seems like a real PITA.  Like, it will be up only 30-50% of the time in the fights where you'll most need it.  Pretty much just a rez now, despite what it says on the box?

 

It was just a rez, now you can use it as an absorb also.  Dark Armor has a lot of other mitigation so it doesn't *need* to have an absorb up 100% of the time.

 

4 hours ago, Tankshock said:

Does the Def from Cloak of Fear not work like other Stealth Def?  In other words, is it always at full effectiveness?  Seems that way in City of Data.

 

Do you mean Cloak of Darkness? That defense does not supress. CoF doesn't have defense.  However, CoF does have knockback protection, -damage and -tohit (as well as the Fear mentioned in the name)

 

4 hours ago, Tankshock said:

Is Oppressive Gloom a reasonable Crowd Control power?  Does it make a difference when you need it to?

 

Depends, I used to take OG and skip CoF.  CoF is a lot better now though, so I swapped to taking CoF and skipping OG.  Except on things like my DA/Stone tank who stacks AoE stune between OG and Fault.

[Snarky]

I play a LOT of Dark  

 

The two mez cloaks in the armors, stun and fear, do heavy lifting against the unwashed masses you face in melee.  You do need to address accuracy issues.  The more fear and stun these apply, the less you are getting attacked.  It is a "faux def" and it works wonderfully. If you take them, enhance them, and use them.  

 

Then your Resistance and Heals will mostly be just handling bosses. AVs, GMs.  The cloaks do help, if you understand and use them.  But I have met people that say that they die against everything using my Brute Dark/Dark.  Which I have Tanked with in two Master MLTF.  Successfully.  And yes, I stood alone vs Recluse.  A good build, decent play, and a small amount of good fortune.

[Tankshock]

3 minutes ago, Snarky said:

I play a LOT of Dark  

 

 Thanks!  What's your take on Gloom and Soul Transfer?

[Snarky]

5 minutes ago, Tankshock said:

 Thanks!  What's your take on Gloom and Soul Transfer?

Soul Transfer is your Rez, and it is a very good one.  I would have to have run out of all options to use it as a buff.  It is a wonderful rez.

 

Gloom from Soul Mastery.  It is okay.  It can give the build options for ranged set bonuses.  But the gem in Soul Mastery is Darkest Night.  A to hit debuff, that weakens the opponent, AoE, Ranged, and gives you a non stop Taunt of everything it checks against iin the AoE.  People often overlook Darkest Night, just like many do not take all their shields, or do not run them.  Dark plays different, and the trick is to lean into it, and I mean lean in HARD.

[Tankshock]

2 minutes ago, Snarky said:

 

 

Gloom from Soul Mastery.  It is okay.  

Sorry, Oppressive Gloom from DA

 

[Snarky]

Just now, Tankshock said:

Sorry, Oppressive Gloom from DA

 

Sigh.  See, i just told everyone how important all the shields are.  Yes, it is a very important part of the "faux defense" of Dark. 

 

[Tankshock]

Ha!  Fair, fair. 

[Tankshock]

Thinking about something like this then.  And thanks.

[Snarky]

here is my version

Brute Dark Dark Darkest Night 1.0.mbd

[Tankshock]

Nice.  Have you updated for the new DA, or just left well enough alone?

 

[Snarky]

23 minutes ago, Tankshock said:

Nice.  Have you updated for the new DA, or just left well enough alone?

 

i havent really played it in two years, still have it.  but...  HC put me off Brutes when they buffed Tanks to be better than Scrappers.  They rolled that back.  For Now.  I trust no one.

[Riverdusk]

Cloak of fear can even fear bosses now (if you slot it heavily for fear, slotting now affects its magnitude and not duration).   

 

They also improved its accuracy, but it is still low so need to slot fairly well for that too.   

 

Overall it is quite good now though and not one I'd ever skip.  I ended up slotting mine with two Endoplasm Hami-O's (Acc/Mez) and two nightmare (Acc/Fear, Endurance/Fear).  Absolutely maxes its fear (over +100% including the nightmare set bonus), +95% accuracy, and gives it some endurance reduction.  Might be overkill, but still experimenting a bit with it.

[Tankshock]

14 hours ago, Riverdusk said:

Cloak of fear can even fear bosses now (if you slot it heavily for fear, slotting now affects its magnitude and not duration).   

 

Is that true for Oppressive Gloom as well?  

Edited yesterday at 02:11 PM by Tankshock

[aethereal]

14 hours ago, Riverdusk said:

Cloak of fear can even fear bosses now (if you slot it heavily for fear, slotting now affects its magnitude and not duration). 

 

Can it?  I don't feel like I understand the new magnitude enhancement thing very much at all, but CoD claims that it has a mag 1 unenhanceable effect and a mag 1 enhanceable effect.  Can you in fact enhance that up to mag 4?

[Doomguide2005]

No as far as I know it remains the same magnitude, extends stun duration.

[Uun]

58 minutes ago, Tankshock said:

Is that true for Oppressive Gloom as well?  

No, Oppressive Gloom only stuns minions. I generally skip it in Dark Armor but find it quite useful on defenders/corruptors (Dark Mastery). 

 

I don't currently have CoF on my Dark Armor tank and don't plan to respec into the new version regardless of how much it was improved. A DA tank with capped resistance really doesn't need other forms of mitigation.

[Intermipants]

FYI…the unspeakable terror disorient proc fires frequently when you put it in cloak of fear and stacks with oppressive gloom to add more stun power to your mez cloaks. 

[Riverdusk]

28 minutes ago, aethereal said:

 

Can it?  I don't feel like I understand the new magnitude enhancement thing very much at all, but CoD claims that it has a mag 1 unenhanceable effect and a mag 1 enhanceable effect.  Can you in fact enhance that up to mag 4?

 

Believe you only have to break mag 3 for it to affect bosses, not actually reach mag 4.  Easy to confirm is to use the same logic for Lt's.  With even just 1 SO of fear you can easily test that CoF affects Lt's, which per CoD numbers would only push it up to mag 2.38.  So for Lt's you actually only have to break mag 2, not reach mag 3.   Another example is mesmerize from the controller set, it is mag 3.5 sleep but affects bosses.

 

Anyway, with my slotting is should work and from what I remember it did work on test server. 

 

I did forget about purple patch though, so probably only work on +0, so yes, very limited use against a boss unless you have something else to stack with it (my DA is a stalker so I have assassin's strike to stack if I really want).  I still like slotting it up regardless so it'll still affect higher level Lt's.

 

 

 

 

[Snarky]

The cloaks are for Lts, minions, that are swarming in to flea bite you to death.  
 

the strategy is stealth, non suppressed stealth, that allows youbto ignore most multiple spawn rooms, eating at your own pace. 

 

the stun and fear cloaks deal with the bulk of trash mobs.  Your Res armors deal with higher mobs, GMs, AVs.  When spike damage hits, best heal in the game. 

i cannot read anything more here.  Everyone asking about how useful (the improved) Cloaks are.  Saying they do not use them all.  
 

it is a tragedy masquerading as a discussion.  Goodbye.  Good Riddance 

[Doomguide2005]

11 minutes ago, Riverdusk said:

 

Believe you only have to break mag 3 for it to affect bosses, not actually reach mag 4.  Easy to confirm is to use the same logic for Lt's.  With even just 1 SO of fear you can easily test that CoF affects Lt's, which per CoD numbers would only push it up to mag 2.38.  So for Lt's you actually only have to break mag 2, not reach mag 3.   Another example is mesmerize from the controller set, it is mag 3.5 sleep but affects bosses.

 

Anyway, with my slotting is should work and from what I remember it did work on test server. 

 

I did forget about purple patch though, so probably only work on +0, so yes, very limited use against a boss unless you have something else to stack with it (my DA is a stalker so I have assassin's strike to stack if I really want).  I still like slotting it up regardless so it'll still affect higher level Lt's.

 

 

 

 

Yes you only have to exceed the protection of the target to inflict the mez on that target.  Resistance of the target reduces duration of the mez.  That's the norm anyway.

[Doomguide2005]

7 minutes ago, Snarky said:

The cloaks are for Lts, minions, that are swarming in to flea bite you to death.  
 

the strategy is stealth, non suppressed stealth, that allows youbto ignore most multiple spawn rooms, eating at your own pace. 

 

the stun and fear cloaks deal with the bulk of trash mobs.  Your Res armors deal with higher mobs, GMs, AVs.  When spike damage hits, best heal in the game. 

i cannot read anything more here.  Everyone asking about how useful (the improved) Cloaks are.  Saying they do not use them all.  
 

it is a tragedy masquerading as a discussion.  Goodbye.  Good Riddance 

Oh my Snarky gone full Snarky!

I'm prone to agree with our Master of Snark.  Less damage from mezzing the surrounding 'trash' is less damage for resistance to deal with which in turn means less to heal or passively regen.  That said the game is not difficult and therefore makes less than 'ideal' or even subpar solutions essentially equally viable in terms of survival.

[Tankshock]

The fact that the Cloaks can proc damage is also a selling point.  It all adds up.

[aethereal]

1 hour ago, Riverdusk said:

 

Believe you only have to break mag 3 for it to affect bosses, not actually reach mag 4.

 

Valuable point, thanks.

 

Still, that would mean you need to exceed 100% slotting, which seems tough with ED.

 

Does purple patch affect mag for powers where enhancements affect mag?  It doesn't ordinarily affect mag.

[Riverdusk]

18 minutes ago, aethereal said:

 

Valuable point, thanks.

 

Still, that would mean you need to exceed 100% slotting, which seems tough with ED.

 

Does purple patch affect mag for powers where enhancements affect mag?  It doesn't ordinarily affect mag.

 

Pretty sure it does.  Then the question is also whether it affects the base mag or just the enhanced part of the mag.   I'd test it more but I've been enjoying my electric controller too much. 😄  

 

Someone was complaining about it for Aura of insanity, which is the other power that works in a similar way.  They labeled it as a bug, but I'm not so sure about that.