Show me your Defender tier list!

[Some Random User]

Show me your Defender tier list! What Powersets or combinations do you believe are unsurpassed, good but second tier, neutral, and unplayable?

[Apparition]

1. Force Field
2. Sonic Resonance
3. Everything else

[Auroxis]

I'd grade each set combined with the best secondary (Sonic Attack) on Offensive and Defensive Support, then tally up the score on a 10/10 basis:

 

Tier 1 (8-10)

 

Time/Sonic: 5/5 defense 4/5 offense
Nature/Sonic: 4/5 defense 5/5 offense
Empathy/Sonic: 5/5 defense 3/5 offense

Thermal/Sonic: 3/5 defense 5/5 offense

Dark/Sonic: 3/5 defense 5/5 offense

 

Tier 2 (6-7)

 

Cold/Sonic: 2/5 defense 5/5 offense
Rad/Sonic: 2/5 defense 5/5 offense
Kinetics/Sonic: 2/5 defense 5/5 offense
Pain/Sonic: 3/5 defense 3/5 offense
Storm/Sonic: 2/5 defense 4/5 offense

 

Tier 3 (4-5)

 

Sonic/Sonic: 1/5 defense 4/5 offense
Force Field/Sonic: 3/5 defense 2/5 offense
Poison/Sonic: 1/5 defense 4/5 offense
Traps/Sonic: 1/5 defense 4/5 offense
Trick Arrow/Sonic: 0/5 defense 4/5 offense

Edited August 21, 2019 by Auroxis

[Luigrein]

Defender primaries are so varied I’m not sure you can really do a tier list. How good a set is depends on what your team needs. For example: FF is generally considered fairly weak in teams where everyone has already softcapped their defenses. But in basically anything else? It’s great.

[Hjarki]

It might help to break down what is and is not useful in the late game.

 

Not Useful:

• Defense buffs. Most late game characters soft-cap their critical defenses and, even if they didn't, the sheer amount of incidental buffing players receive from Maneuvers and other sources tends to make these buffs pointless. The major exception would be defense buffs that also affect Psi - which is why Time Manipulation manages to be better than Force Fields at Force Field's strength.
• -hit/-damage debuffs. These are some useful when they're on a Tanker/Brute damage aura. But they're unreliable as defenses and provide no meaningful protection on AV/GM.
• -recharge/-speed. These are useful in PvP but of almost no use in PvE where you can simply Immobilize or tank enemies and -recharge is resisted so heavily on any target you care about.
• +regen buffs. These simply don't add enough in most cases. Empathy's Adrenaline Boost is close to being an actual heal, but it's long recharge makes it too inflexible to take the place of actual healing.

Somewhat useful:

• Resist buffs. While your tanker/brute is probably hard-capped on S/L, these can be useful for Fire farm Brutes that come out of the farm or all your Scrappers/Stalkers who aren't hard-capped (especially to unusual resists).
• +recharge/+recovery buffs. These are incredibly powerful in the mid-game but tend to be unimportant in the late game since most players solve these issues. However, there are some builds that can use almost unlimited amounts of recharge/recovery.
• Healing. The value of healing varies a great deal. In general, single target heals are fairly useful at any stage of the game but AE heals diminish in importance as players ramp up their defenses. Heals that require a target are especially weak not just because they can miss but because accurate healing sets are weaker than standard healing sets.
• Status protection. This is technically useful, but it's rarely useful in practice because status effects only tend to impact ranged characters and they impact them so frequently that keeping up the constant buffing isn't all that useful. Field status effect protection (Force Field, Sonic Resonance, Traps) is slightly more useable, but tends to have holes and doesn't function unless you're in the same place as the people needing those buffs (which isn't particularly common outside of leagues).

Very useful:

• Control/damage effects. While these vary in power, the ability to deliver control effects and damage from your primary is often important for a Defender.
• -resist. The only debuff that truly matters, this is the best way to amplify damage for yourself and your team in the late game.
• +damage. This isn't as good as -resist, but almost all damage-dealing builds have a fair amount of wiggle room before cap. Unfortunately, having more than one +damage build isn't all that useful.
• -regen. This deserves another asterisk. -regen is only useful against AV/GM and only in very long fights. In most non-solo AV/GM fights, -regen is inferior to simply increasing damage (either via +damage or -resist).
• Stealth and self-buffs. If you don't have Stealth at level 50, you're probably a bit of a hindrance to your team. Likewise, the primary use of support sets isn't to buff other people (whose needs you cannot know beforehand) but to buff yourself (and your pets) because you know what you need.

In general, high end (non-PvP) play tends to break down into certain modes:

• Farming runs. These are normally the province of custom builds explicitly for farming that selectively choose the exact defenses they'll need. Defenders are rarely ever used as a base for such builds and aren't particularly useful unless players are under-slotted because you can almost always replace the Defender with a decent farming build and get better results. People who make farm teams don't do 4 Brutes + 1 Defender - they just do 5 Brutes.
• Task Forces/Missions. Most of the time, you'll find that players tend to break into small groups rather than travel in a 8-man force since its faster. Stealth is at a premium in these groups. Also, if you plan on playing lower level content, the development rate of your sets becomes crucially important (which I haven't really addressed because it's far too lengthy a topic).
• Solo play. This is almost entirely about survival. In general, a solo Defender build will consist of the ability to wear down an enemy over a long period of time.
• Leagues. The short answer here is that it just doesn't matter what you play. There are so many buffs/debuffs flying around that your contribution is largely reduced to damage, -resist debuffing and managing to survive.

Given that, I'd rank the sets:

 

Tier 1:

• Storm Summoning. The addition of KB->KD and the ability to slot Force Feedback for recharge takes this set from curiosity to powerhouse.
• Time Manipulation. This set just covers everything that needs to be covered with top notch powers.

Tier 2:

• Cold Domination. This tends to be a weaker version of Storm in terms of its key effects.
• Dark Miasma. This is a compendium of nice effects, but at second rate levels of power.
• Kinetics. A set that provides some decent buffs, but few slotting opportunities and little benefit for its user.
• Nature. While it requires a lot of recharge, it provides some of the stronger buffs around.
• Radiation. A weaker version of Time.
• Thermal. The premiere 'healing set', it still suffers from an inability to protect its user.

Tier 3:

• Sonic Resonance. It's core features - debuffing and buffing resist - are done better by other sets. It's lack of other features beyond resist manipulation makes it weaker than those sets.
• Empathy. Superfluous buffs, excess healing and no real damage multiplier. Almost any time you'd be tempted to bring an Empathy Defender, you'd be better served with Thermal.
• Force Field. Buffing defense simply isn't all that useful due to its prevalence elsewhere and Force Field doesn't bring much else to the table.
• Pain Domination. Similar to Empathy, it's just out-classed by Thermal.
• Poison. Decent single-target debuffing, but no self-protection and little in the way of decent AE.
• Trick Arrow. It has a plethora of control/debuff effects, but they tend to be numerically inferior. It's always better to have a single strong power than a handful of weak ones.
• Traps. This deserves an asterisk. As a solo set, it's actually pretty good. However, it's tempo is so out-of-line with the rest of the game that it's almost unplayable in groups.

 

For Blast sets:

Tier 1:

• Assault Rifle. A balance between Water and Beam, albeit one that requires a great deal of comfort with cones.
• Beam Rifle. This set is relatively weak AE-wise, but the short cooldown ultimate makes up for the lack of other AE. It's difficult to build due to the Disintegrate mechanic, but it's the best set for single target damage.
• Dual Pistols. The PBAoE ultimate is problematic, but it's still a nice, short cooldown. The rest of the set is excellent with its variety of effects.
• Water. If this had a Sniper attack, it would be the perfect Blast set. As it stands, it's still an incredibly strong set with easily slotted abilities of all the important types.

 

Tier 2:

• Archery. Difficult to slot, but has one of the better target AEs and a strong ultimate.
• Dark. The emphasis on Cones is the big problem here. However, it's an overall strong set that only suffers from forcing Defenders to take the otherwise weak Dark Blast.
• Fire. This works better for Corruptors and Blasters (who don't mind its lack of slotting options).
• Ice. A generally strong set, this doesn't really have the diversity of effects necessary to make it Tier 1.
• Psychic. Another set that wastes powers on a basic attack you don't use, it has a very strong single target rotation but lacks slotting opportunities.
• Sonic. Not as good as its classically been, it's a pure team set that doesn't do well solo and doesn't bring appreciably more to the table than higher damage sets like Beam/Pistols do.

Tier 3:

• Energy Blast. A solid set of abilities tied to relatively long activations and knockback that needs suppression.
• Electrical Blast. A generally weak set with few virtues beyond the ability to sap a spawn if Thunderous Blast is slotted for it.
• Radiation. Terrible single target damage coupled with lack of decent non-PBAoE damage options make this a weak set for general play. Even if you can build your defenses up to the point where you can make those PBAoE worthwhile, Dual Pistols does it better.

[Ankhammon]

I have a different take. I’m including 4 key areas. These are personal offense, personal defense, Control and defending for the team.

 

These are from personal playthroughs. I’m sure I’ve missed some and several I’ve just not played through enough.

 

Tier 1 Sets:

·         TA/Sonic Offense 5/5 Defense 3/5 Control 5/5 Defending 3/5

Keys to this set is all the control you can muster (seriously enough to make a controller envious), -res to beat the band and sneaky good powers like PGA (sleep patch fast acting) and Flash Arrow (-tohit is unresistable so take that you AVs).

·         Time/Ice Offense 4/5 Defense 5/5 Control 4/5 Defending 4.5/5

Keys to this set is the beast of a Defense you can put together with the combo. The slows, -rech, and heals really add to the -tohit/defense to make this one of the best tanking chars I’ve ever played. Add some procs to the aura and you are taking aggro from everyone but a proper taunting tank.

·         NAff/DP Offense 4/5 Defense 5/5 Control 3/5 Defending 5/5

Keys to this set are HoTs and -Dam. That combo plus the NAff tier 9 make for fun and fast defending which all the kids will love. Just enough control added to allow you to play up front (where I like to play). Yes, you can toe to toe with an AV for a long but satisfying fight.

·         Rad/alloftheabove 5/5 Offense 5/5 Defense 4/5 Control 4/5 Defending

Rad is a special class all its own. Too many possibilities with it and its only real weakness is end usage which it partially takes care of with AM. Once you get the hang of anchors, AM and your end usage, the rest is basically cake.

Tier 2 Sets.

·         Poison/Beam Offense 5/5 Defense 3/5 Control 3/5 Defending 3/5

Keys are the awesome single target ability of the set. It can be a good aoe set but that relies on proc magic with Poison Trap. Overall, the set works really good for solo after you set it up IO-wise. At that point it can become something special, but until then you are on a steep learning curve.

·         Time/Elec Offense 4/5 Defense 5/5 Control 4.5/5 Defending 4/5

Keys are the end drain along with the upfront awesome of Time. This one may actually go up the list but I’m still leveling it up.

·         Dark/Dark Offense 3/5 Defense 4/5 Control 4/5 Defending 5/5

Keys are that it’s a better set than I’m giving it but I leveled it up as my first char when it had skills like a 3.5 second animation lock on my heal… other stuff was eww too.

[Crowcus Pocus]

I won't comment on Nature, since I haven't played it yet.

 

Tier 1

Storm/Dark

Time/

 

Tier 2

Cold/Ice

Dark/Dark

Rad/

Kin/

Thermal/

 

Neutral

Emp

Pain

Traps

 

Tier X

I can't think of anything "unplayable". However, the sets I consider in need of buffs/tweaks for 50+ content are FF, TA, Sonic and Poison.

[oedipus_tex]

No set is unplayable. I would put 3 in the bucket of needing serious love:

- Sonic Resonance

- Trick Arrow

- Poison

 

A few more could use minor tweaks:

- Force Field

 

 

Of the blast sets only Fire Blast stands out as very poor due to no fault of the powers themselves, but that the main point of a blast set on a Defender is IO procs and Fire doesn't offer enough to keep up with damage other sets can deliver, while offering low damage overall. Fire seems very much like a Corruptor set.

 

 

One overall comment I'd make is Defender and Corruptor are too similar as ATs and I which they were significantly more separated. A bit late for that now of course.

Edited August 23, 2019 by oedipus_tex

[Some Random User]

2 hours ago, oedipus_tex said:

No set is unplayable. I would put 3 in the bucket of needing serious love:

- Sonic Resonance

- Trick Arrow

- Poison

There's actually a thread going on right now in the Suggestions forum about Poison's animations.

[Without_Pause]

Skipping some of the posted opinions which make me go O.o. (whistles innocently) One thing of note is that some sets are better on controllers. I'm not sure it makes that much of a difference outside of Kin. I love the power set, but I'm beginning to think it might be mid tier on a defender. I wish Time didn't have annoying sound effects. I really do want to give it a good run. It might have been the first support set I tried coming back. I don't see how FF isn't dead last in today's endgame. I would only roll for it theme. Endgame wise, debuffs are king*.

 

* Outside of things like SB and Fulcrum.

[Crowcus Pocus]

3 hours ago, Without_Pause said:

Skipping some of the posted opinions which make me go O.o. (whistles innocently) One thing of note is that some sets are better on controllers. I'm not sure it makes that much of a difference outside of Kin. I love the power set, but I'm beginning to think it might be mid tier on a defender. I wish Time didn't have annoying sound effects. I really do want to give it a good run. It might have been the first support set I tried coming back. I don't see how FF isn't dead last in today's endgame. I would only roll for it theme. Endgame wise, debuffs are king*.

 

* Outside of things like SB and Fulcrum.

There's a guide on how to change/mute sound fx. Doesn't seem too complicated.

[gameboy1234]

On 8/22/2019 at 11:10 PM, Without_Pause said:

I wish Time didn't have annoying sound effects.

I'm the same way with Sonic Attack.  Like the numbers on the set, hate the sfx / sound of basically screeching at people.  I wish they'd add an alternate animation set that tones this down and maybe uses the "cast" animations and/or maybe adds a "gun" too.

[Leogunner]

Top tier:

Everything I play. 

 

Mid-Bottom tier:

Whatever someone else plays. 

[oedipus_tex]

I think Force Field is a much better set than people give it credit for, its just a question of what it is good at. 

 

Namely, it's good at making underleveled characters safe. Not that useful in (most) late game Task Forces. Hugely useful in the main situation I seem to find myself in lately though, running repeatable Dark Astoria missions. Those missions are harder than standard content, and usually a significant chunk of the team is underleveled. Force Field will keep those teammates alive better than anything.

 

It's still an issue for me that so many powers in Force Field are skippable. The set should have an absorption shield somewhere (come on, it's Force Field!). But I wouldn't count the set out entirely. Force Bolt should be a real attack and not a plink. Repulsion Bomb should do damage relative to its long animation time (by my rough calculations, it should do about 75 base damage to be respectable).

 

Sonic Resonance, Poison, and Trick Arrow though. They occupy my bottom 3. There isn't a piece of content I can think of where I can say "Sure glad I brought that set!" Can't say the same for Force Field, or many of the other buff/debuff sets. 

 

Edited December 23, 2019 by oedipus_tex

[agentx5]

As a Blaster main with a BFF who plays a top tier stalker, I must say we absolutely LOVE a geared up Kinetics Defender on the team.

He assassinates priority hard targets while I wipe everything else out with my AoEs, but add in Fulcrum Shift and that near-perma damage cap (quad damage) unlocks some absolutely jaw-dropping feats of damage.  I mean level 54's just absolutely melt, it's glorious!

 

Don't get me wrong, any support is great when you are on a damage-prioritized archetype like Stalker, Scrapper, Blaster, Corrupter, Brute, or Sentinel.  But as a non-Defender-main I must say I get giddy when I see a Kinetics Defender join the team, because I know what we can do together, provided mobs stay grouped up for Fulcrum Shift that is.

 

That's why I don't understand most of the responses here labeling it a B tier. Is it just something unique to Torchbearer's Defenders then at the hours I play? Is it player skills thing, where certain powersets in the with good enhancements in well-experienced hands do so much better?

 

And I'm also kind of concerned for my Empathy/Rad Defender character I'm leveling, now reading this topic and the other pinned topic shouting "YOU DO NOT NEED HEALING", as it doesn't look like she'll be able to help very much. (In fact the reason I went empathy is that I felt it fit her theme and I felt maybe some variety is better rather than just Kinetics).  I can already keep perma Fortitude on two members of the team, but it just doesn't seem to do as much to help? What is the primary focus power, Adrenaline Boost? Healing Aura?  If there's something to learn, please share.  I've not seen any other veteran level 50 Empathy defenders around to ask, and maybe there's a reason for that.,,

 

And finally, I'm a bit confused as to what is all the praise for Sonic secondary.  I can tell my defender is more about the secondary effects than the damage, but specific powers in Sonic have so many of you here singing its praises?

Edited December 24, 2019 by agentx5

[HelBlaiz]

Empathy is a heal heavy set,  which is a reactive playstyle. How useful it is depends entirely on how well or poorly the group is doing. If the group is doing well, the heals are a bandaid and a kiss, if the group is struggling, there are more impactful ways of improving the performance. That being said, Empathy is great, so long as you don't judge your effectiveness based on how critical your heals are. Fortitude is awesome, Clear Mind is awesome, Regeneration and Recovery Aura are awesome, Adrenaline Boost is awesome. Focus on efficiently using those the higher level you go.

 

As for Sonic Blast, it's popular for the same reason you live Kinetics, MOAR DAMAGE.  Sonic Blast has -res as it's secondary effect which means moar damage and can further boost dps even for a team at damage cap.

 

On topic, my favorite support set is Time, usually paired with Rad for irradiate and time's juncture synergy. I also have a kin/sonic that is a blast to play. For as much as I like Dark Miasma I haven't made a character with it yet on HC, I should change that.

 

I think the only support set that looks unappealing to me so far is Trick Arrow, and even then I still want to make one at some point to give it a fair shake. Even poison is interesting and fun thematically for me to have a few in my roster already.

[Leogunner]

I don't think Empathy is heal heavy.  It has 3 powers that heal while the rest is either utility (ally rez) or buffs.

 

If you're going Empathy, all I can say is:

a) don't tell me to gather for auras.  just cast them and try to hit the most people with it...unless the team is performing bad.  it's a waste of time and thus the buff as it destroys all momentum you had.

b) don't neglect clear mind. keep it on those squishies. it also has +perception  so you might spread it around to everyone when dealing with foes that have -perception debuffs.

[HelBlaiz]

It's a relative measure. Empathy and Pain are the only two sets (three with nature affinity? Not as familiar with it as I'd like to be, moar alts needed) with three heals. Thermal has two (to synergize with its resist buffs), while most other sets have either an area heal or a st heal, if they have heals at all. Empathy and Pain (and definitely NAff) have more than just healing, but they're the sets with the highest level of dedication to healing.

 

It doesn't help that the first three powers in the two sets are the heals. Though to be fair, the low levels are where the healing is most appreciated in my experience.

[Doomguide2005]

17 hours ago, Leogunner said:

I don't think Empathy is heal heavy.  It has 3 powers that heal while the rest is either utility (ally rez) or buffs.

 

If you're going Empathy, all I can say is:

a) don't tell me to gather for auras.  just cast them and try to hit the most people with it...unless the team is performing bad.  it's a waste of time and thus the buff as it destroys all momentum you had.

b) don't neglect clear mind. keep it on those squishies. it also has +perception  so you might spread it around to everyone when dealing with foes that have -perception debuffs.

Yes, please use CM.  While on my Emp/Fire on a team with another Emp against lvl 54 Arachnos I died several times by getting mezzed.  Began to wonder if they'd skipped it.  Nope just weren't using it.  Blinded I could deal with as I was running Tactics.  The other thing to keep in mind is AT's that normally have mez protection may lose it or have gaps while exemplared.

[Scientist]

On 8/21/2019 at 1:15 PM, Hjarki said:

 

Tier 1:

• Storm Summoning. The addition of KB->KD and the ability to slot Force Feedback for recharge takes this set from curiosity to powerhouse.
• Time Manipulation. This set just covers everything that needs to be covered with top notch powers.

Tier 2:

• Radiation. A weaker version of Time.

 

For Blast sets:

 

Tier 3:

• Radiation. Terrible single target damage coupled with lack of decent non-PBAoE damage options make this a weak set for general play. Even if you can build your defenses up to the point where you can make those PBAoE worthwhile, Dual Pistols does it better.

I tend to consider Radiation a Tier 1 along with Time, mainly because I play at a variety of levels, even at end game, and Radiation, like Storm, gets its key abilities at much earlier levels (teens) than Time (upper 30s).  Radiation also works pretty well even with a plain IO or even SO build, Time really wants some set slotting to shine, as well as inclusion of some Power Build Up type power.  I do agree Time, like Cold, is very good at high levels with an IOed out build.  

 

Regarding /Radiation for a blast set, I've found it actually helps keeps mobs clumped if I run in and fire off PbAoEs in my debuff cloud, so I prefer it with Radiation primary to the cone based powers.  I do agree that some end game content is too dangerous to allow that, but then it has pretty good ST ranged damage with a snipe plus Cosmic Burst, and with an Achilles activating very reliably in the snipe it has good ST -resist as well.  I guess I'd move it to Tier 2, as I found it more fun to play than /Sonic, even though I know Sonic is a great hard target melter.  

[Hjarki]

On 1/17/2020 at 5:13 PM, Scientist said:

I tend to consider Radiation a Tier 1 along with Time, mainly because I play at a variety of levels

My attitude on 'tier lists' is that they're primarily useful for helping people understand what happens in endgame. Unfortunately, CoH changes radically across the levels. Sets that look fantastic when you're level 14 often end up being mediocre at level 50 with full IO sets - and sets that look terrible at 14 often end up being fantastic in the same position. So when you're first starting out, it's easy to pick the 'wrong' set for what you want based solely on low level perceptions.

 

The primary reason I see Time as being a 'tier above' Radiation is that you get recharge bonus from both sets, but Time also gives you the massive defense boost. In contrast, most of Radiation's debuffs aren't terribly useful against very tough opponents - they certainly don't provide the near-invulnerability Time does.

[oedipus_tex]

At top levels of play any of the various sets with a Clear Mind type power are usually best served by skipping it and just taking Clarion for the Destiny slot instead. Most of those builds are just too tight to spend a whole slot on an anti-mezz when you can get an AoE one that also affects you. 

[Darkir]

41 minutes ago, oedipus_tex said:

At top levels of play any of the various sets with a Clear Mind type power are usually best served by skipping it and just taking Clarion for the Destiny slot instead. Most of those builds are just too tight to spend a whole slot on an anti-mezz when you can get an AoE one that also affects you. 

The two things that you can do with a lot of the ally mez protection powers that are useful is to either take the pvp +3% def IO and save a slot or 4 slot it with reactive defenses for the melee defense. If you have a mez protection (*sigh* empathy) that doesn't add resistance also though its essentially useless. 

Edited January 22, 2020 by Darkir

[Auroxis]

2 hours ago, oedipus_tex said:

At top levels of play any of the various sets with a Clear Mind type power are usually best served by skipping it and just taking Clarion for the Destiny slot instead. Most of those builds are just too tight to spend a whole slot on an anti-mezz when you can get an AoE one that also affects you. 

There are places where Clarion's protection magnitude is too low (ITF ending, BAF doorways), and in general a PBAoE power available once every two minutes isn't a reliable way to protect your whole team from CC's. Then there's Clarion Radial which I'd rather use to beef up my Fortitude/Heals/Veng/Hover speed than trying to catch all my teammates with it, especially considering its 3/4 uptime. CM is a useful power when exemping down as well.

[oedipus_tex]

7 hours ago, Auroxis said:

There are places where Clarion's protection magnitude is too low (ITF ending, BAF doorways), and in general a PBAoE power available once every two minutes isn't a reliable way to protect your whole team from CC's. Then there's Clarion Radial which I'd rather use to beef up my Fortitude/Heals/Veng/Hover speed than trying to catch all my teammates with it, especially considering its 3/4 uptime. CM is a useful power when exemping down as well.

 

I just generally think that by top levels most other players have already sorted out their mezz protection and since the Heal sets generally require you to take most of the powers, the mezz protection is the most natural power to skip.

 

Maybe if the duration was 4 - 8 minutes I could see taking them.