Protection

[chasinchad]

Is it really needed? Like, is the extra armor from it really that much of a dmg buffer, or will over healing work?

[Otukura]

*bookmarked*

I really want to see what people think about this, I don't want to put points into it on my engi.

Edit: no one's posting anything :(

anyway, I don't really see a need for it; once I saw the armor reduction thing, bleargh. Going with pro shield.

[noneo]

This is something that I am on the fence about and not sure which way to go. Originally, Protection offered a group stacking buff and could pump up your armor a few hundred points. But now, since we know that armor vs. damage in SL is not a 1:1 ratio, things got messy. It is estimated (I have not done any actual testing, but this is based off of what I heard on the forums) that 35 - 50 points of armor reduce your taken damage by 1 point. When the buffs stacked, that meant you could reduce damage by around 6 points. This may not seem like a lot, but think about yourself walking into a group of mobs all doing damage on you; you were essentially reducing your damage intake by 6*(8 or 10 mobs) = 50 - 60 points every time they hit you. However, with the removal of the stacking ability, protection can now impose a maximum of 60 armor points, which gives us a reduction of 1.5 damage taken (maximum). Do the same calculation and we see 1.5*(8 or 10 mobs) = 12 points every time you get hit by the group of mobs. So this definitely does add up in a mufti-combat scenario, but realistically, I can't see this amount of damage being a "make-or-break" amount. Alternatively, when you are facing a boss such as Guardian, this buff does basically nothing. Sure it reduces your damage intake by a bunch of 1.5's but your Engineer in the group will be casting Transference and Empathy non-stop anyway and will cover this damage.

Additionally, it doesn't really make sense to only put a few points in Protection as that would do virtually nothing in combat (i.e. 3 points damage reduction is barely even noticeable in a multi-combat situation).

With that said, you should think, "are their any other skills I would like to invest these points in"? If not, then put them in Protection, if so, weigh the pros and cons and choose from there.

I sense that the skills being contemplated here are Protection and Force Shield. If that is the case, let us discuss Force Shield. This skill gives you a "shield" (that doesn't actually protect you), of which offers up to 120 armor and a +2 M/S increase. The bad portion of this skill is that the shield doesn't last AT ALL in combat (unless you have no aggro from any mob, which rarely happens because Engineers are aggro stealers). Sure the added armor would help, but if the shield goes down from being hit too much, your armor dissapears. The only real thing I use this for when running between groups of mobs, and for boss fights. When running, I only cast to build up some more Mana before the next fight, as this does reduce my powerpack usage slightly. And with boss fights, I will only cast if I do not have the aggro and want to utilize the +2 M/S. If you have aggro, this skill is a total waste, it will last for, let's say 2 seconds; Wow! You gained a massive 4 mana! i.e. a waste.

The only other skills I may invest in with these points would be Wither or Leech, and more preferably Leech. Leech would at least do a decent amount of damage to a boss in a fight (pretty pointless in multi-combat), and give you some healing in a pinch. Or, if the devs decide to reduce the cool-down of Sonic Boom (since no one uses it now), I would invest them in that skill to give me a good AOE boost.

Oh how I dream of the day where the Engineer get a buff that is actually worth while, like dodge, or a damage buff.

[kamikazees]

This is something that I am on the fence about...
Noneo's analysis is spot-on, but I am not on the fence. The answer to your question is, Do NOT invest points in Protection right now.

If it reduces damage by 1.5 points on average, then a character has to get hit TEN TIMES with Protection active to save 15 points . Even in Outer Limits the burrower enemies hit for about 25 damage. Getting hit ten times means the character takes 250 damage, or 235 with Protection. If all 5 characters get hit 10 times, 1250 damage is dealt, or 1175 with Protection. It is going to save your team? No.

Compare that with just 1 tick of Empathy, which heals something like 50-60 damage. It takes Protection 30 or 40 hits to "protect" as much damage as Empathy can heal in 1 tick. All 3 ticks? Then you need to get hit 90 to 120 times. Forget it. You are dead. Do not pass go, do not collect $200. And to think you would have used 6 points to get there, or 1/4 of your total skill points! No way.

And enemy damage goes up from the burrower guys in Outer Limits. I have a theory (not yet tested) that the harder the enemy hits, the more Protection protects. With Guardian, for example, I think Protection might offer something like a 5 or 6 point damage reduction. So it would only take 10 hits from him to equal 1 tick of Empathy. That's nice, except that Guardian kills you in 2-3 hits. Heck no.

I put those 6 points into Force Shield. At 4 points, the Shield gives 2 m/s and only needs to be active 5 seconds to return its cost. If you keep it up the whole 30 seconds, you get a net return of 50 mana, which is really good. Anything over 5 seconds is good, though. And at lvl 6, you get 120 armor and it absorbs 75 damage. It's great to have if you get trampled by a Vular. His attack, which can spike half your health, is immediately reduced by about 80 points (considering the armor), which can and has saved me numerous times. It is thus a great utility or "oh crap!" skill.

[chasinchad]

Wow you guys. Just wow. Yall have been absolutely helpful. I read all that, and decided I am going to buy plat to redo my skills. Why is it that they totally nerfed the skill? They took away the stack, making it useless.

[shannong]

I agree with 0 protection. We clear huge mob fights in Numa Uncharted Ruins just fine without it. 6 Empathy and 6 Transferrence is all you need. I prefer maxing out Pain to 6 with the points I saved from Protection.

[MaxxSteele]

Is Protection really needed? No. Will it increase your survivability twofold? Yes.

There are 3 types of Engineers, 2 of which are the most effective: support, damage, hybrid.

[Ebalere]

Is Protection really needed? No. Will it increase your survivability twofold? Yes.

There are 3 types of Engineers, 2 of which are the most effective: support, damage, hybrid.

Lol, thanks for backing up your arguement with a pointless statement..

[thequickone]

Is Protection really needed? No. Will it increase your survivability twofold? Yes.

There are 3 types of Engineers, 2 of which are the most effective: support, damage, hybrid.
This is the second time I have seen you defend Protection as being useful without offering an explanation behind your reasoning. We really would like to hear what you have to say, so please elaborate. Specifically, I would like to hear how Protection will "increase your survivability twofold". Based on the abundance of information being presented on the matter and my personal experience with the skill, I do not see this being the case.

And for my guess which of the 3 types of Engineers is least effective: Damage? Do I get a cookie? :p

[Acezero]

I was under the impression force shield does not absorb damage, just added armor and break.

[WhoIsThis]

I was under the impression force shield does not absorb damage, just added armor and break.

Force shield does absorb damage and will collapse under once a certain threshold is reached. That threshold is raised the more points are added. Admittedly, the threshold is not very high.

A secondary benefit is the small increase in mana regeneration.

[noneo]

Force Shield does not "Protect" you from damage. Your shield and your character both take the same amount of damage when you get hit. (i.e. when a mob hits a 50 on you, your shields HP reduces by 50, and so does your characte's HP).

[Archyx]

Noneo.. You seem to be the man in the know. How many points do you personally invest in shield to get the optimum mana regen?

I currently have 1 point and i use it between pulls when my mana is lacking just to help with regen.. Is it worth investing more points?

I dont see any point in using it for the armour increase as it breaks in litterally 2 hits.

Thanks in advance, look forward to your responce.

[shannong]

Force shield does absorb damage and will collapse under once a certain threshold is reached. That threshold is raised the more points are added. Admittedly, the threshold is not very high.

A secondary benefit is the small increase in mana regeneration.

Incorrect. Force Shield absolutely does NOT act like an absorb shield. All it does is increase your armor rating and increase your energy regen rate for either 30 seconds or you take X amount of incoming damage, whichever comes first. You still actually take all that incoming damage; the shield does NOT "absorb" it.

[WhoIsThis]

I think you misunderstood what I said when I said absorb. Full damage is still sustained (slightly reduced by the armor), but it is done so by the shield.

Here though are the thresholds (from IBNobody):

*** Force Shield adds +20/+40/+60/+80/+100/+120 armor and +1 regen to your character for 30s, has a 45s cooldown, costs 10 Energy. The shield only works for the first 25/35/45/55/65/75 damage your character takes. Rank 6 equates to ~2-3 damage points reduced per hit. With Protection, that equates to ~3-4 damage points per hit.


At level 6, you get 120 armor, and the shield can take in (which is what I meant by absorb) 75 damage. Plus while up, you a slight boost to mana regeneration.

[Hullukko]

Noneo.. You seem to be the man in the know. How many points do you personally invest in shield to get the optimum mana regen?

I currently have 1 point and i use it between pulls when my mana is lacking just to help with regen.. Is it worth investing more points?

I dont see any point in using it for the armour increase as it breaks in litterally 2 hits.

Thanks in advance, look forward to your responce.

Between mobs? I've heard that argument before, but how many seconds is that? Not that many. It costs to cast and it takes too long to break even, let alone gain some. The theory would be there yes, but in practice the time between mobs is just too short.

Standing in the starting area after a prior run is the place where you can use it, or in solo runs where you can take the time to regain mana by standing still sufficiently long. Outside of those two (insignificant) circumstance your skill points are better spent anywhere else (besides protection naturally).

[WhoIsThis]

+1

Even if you spend 6 points, the damage the shield can take is not very high.

1. If you use it between mobs for mana, then the "burst" damage argument is questionable, because it takes 45 seconds to recharge and if you are heading towards a boss or mini, that isn't enough time for the shield to rechare.

2. At bosses, if you use it, the shield will not last very long, so you won't get much mana regen out of it.

[shannong]

And the main point to understand at this point in the discussion is that Force Shield offers truly ZERO protection against "burst" damage. This is the point I'm trying to convey by stating clearly that its is not an "absorb shield" as shields work in most other MMOs such as World of Warcraft (or even Order and Chaos if you want a mobile MMO comparison). An absorb shield offers true burst protection because it literally absorbs the burst and passes through to you only what it could not absorb. For example, if your absorb shield absorbs 500 points of damage, the shield itself eats all damage up to that 500 point mark and you don't take a single point of damage. After the shield hits its capacity, it "bursts" or "poofs" and now you take the full damage again.

Force Shield in this game does not work like that. All it does is increase your armor by enough to mitigate at most 3.33 points of damage from each hit of the tough minibosses such as the Vular in Uncharted Ruins, and more like only 1-2 points of damage per hit from most other mobs. It works like this because all it does is increase your total base armor percentage for as long as the shield is alive. Oh, and by the way, the typical mob in Uncharted Ruuins will kill the shield within 2 hits. So you spend that energy to cast it and don't even recoup your energy spent casting it, and it lasted only two hits so it mitigated all of 2-6 points of damage total. When you consider that the small dogs in Uncharted Ruins hit you for 30 per hit on average, the flowers hit you for 45-ish on average, and the big Vular hit you for 65-ish on average, you can see how this whopping total of 6 points total mitigation is a laughable amount, right?

As the other thread on this forum points out clearly through number-crunching and test results, Force Shield is not worth a single point. Not until and unless Spacetime devs change the way armor works or makes this a true absorb shield. Right now, it's utterly, completely worthless to have. So is Protection.

[CrzyAzn]

Seems ppl forget that force shield at higher level has more m/s. Mine is at 4 and it says +2 regen. So when I use it I have 3 m/s. Not sure if the change from 1 m/s to 2 m/s is at lvl 3 or 4 Shield but I know it is 2 m/s at lvl 4 shield.

[shannong]

Seems ppl forget that force shield at higher level has more m/s. Mine is at 4 and it says +2 regen. So when I use it I have 3 m/s. Not sure if the change from 1 m/s to 2 m/s is at lvl 3 or 4 Shield but I know it is 2 m/s at lvl 4 shield.

No one's forgetting that fact. :-) I recommend you read this thread carefully, because it explains why even that +2m/s regen isn't worth the point investment. Read the entire thread and you'll (hopefully) understand.

http://www.spacetimestudios.com/showthread.php?35828-Why-Force-Shield-and-Protection-are-a-waste-of-points

[Archyx]

Link does not work Shan.

[piyoni1]

imo may be in near future updates protection should give dodge bonus, and force shield should absorbs the dmg.

[shannong]

Link does not work Shan.

Tested the link when I made the post and again just now after reading your comment. Works fine for me. Tested in Chrome on Mac OSX and also in Mobile Safari on iPad.

[Raulur]

I disagree with the consensus. What is your goal, and why do you play engineer? Are you:

1) Trying to keep the team alive and doing their job?

Or 2) Only engineer because you can heal yourself.

In the case of (1), protection IS worth it. Your teamates will spend less time wondering if they will have to use stims, and more time using their skills. Without protection they will be concentrating on staying alive, wondering when they will have to spam stims next. You are trying to help the tanks, not make them leave because they ran out of stims.

You can attempt to overheal, but you will most likely not be able to keep up. I've seen it when on my alts too many times. The only thing that annoys me more than an engineer without protection is one that doesn't heal.

In the case of (2) then you should probably play another class or go back to PL. You are obvoiusly infected with PL mage syndrome, and engineers are NOT mages.

Seriously though... what else are you going to spend the skill points on? Shield rarely lasts long enough to regen the energy spent, making it worthless. Pain doesn't benefit much from extra points. Sonic boom has a rediculous cooldown. The first skill is ok now, but you can get it to a decent level without dropping protection. Leech doesn't heal enough at high levels to be considered, imo. So that leaves supression, which can be useful in rare occasions. Mostly it is just annoying because it changes your target, and the first aoe will cancel it out anyway.

[Hullukko]

Seriously though... what else are you going to spend the skill points on? Shield rarely lasts long enough to regen the energy spent, making it worthless. Pain doesn't benefit much from extra points. Sonic boom has a rediculous cooldown. The first skill is ok now, but you can get it to a decent level without dropping protection. Leech doesn't heal enough at high levels to be considered, imo. So that leaves supression, which can be useful in rare occasions. Mostly it is just annoying because it changes your target, and the first aoe will cancel it out anyway.

Leech deals damage akin to wither, and as such is a rather decent skill. The healing part of it is just an irrelevant bonus.

Other than that, to me it's a clear cut case of choosing between "puny little per-hit damage reduction that's helpful against little critters and horrible against anything that hits harder than my daughter" and a "decent damage skill".

They just might change it though. It's odd that the protection and force shield are both in such a terrible condition that no one who has had an in depth look at them use them at all.

[IBNobody]

their skills. Without protection they will be concentrating on staying alive, wondering when they will have to spam stims next. You are trying to help the tanks, not make them leave because they ran out of stims.

...

The only thing that annoys me more than an engineer without protection is one that doesn't heal.



That's why we put 1 point in it. It's unfortunate that we have to waste 1 of your 8 skill slots on a feel-good placebo, but it that's how people react. You're just proving it.


Seriously though... what else are you going to spend the skill points on? Shield rarely lasts long enough to regen the energy spent, making it worthless. Pain doesn't benefit much from extra points. Sonic boom has a rediculous cooldown. The first skill is ok now, but you can get it to a decent level without dropping protection. Leech doesn't heal enough at high levels to be considered, imo. So that leaves supression, which can be useful in rare occasions. Mostly it is just annoying because it changes your target, and the first aoe will cancel it out anyway.

Leech heals for about 1/4th-1/3rd of Empathy per tick. That's significant, and its your only other source of healing besides TF and Empathy.

Wither does decent damage on long-lasting enemies, too.

If you have to choose between a skill that mitigates a handful of damage and skills that improve your survivability when you get aggro and reduce the duration of long boss fights, what would you choose? It's not about being selfish. It's about being smart.

[Raulur]

I'm not debating wither being useful now, I dropped shield and reduced my points in pain/revive to pump it up to 5. It is clearly worth it on high hp critters like vular / guardian. I'm just not convinced that leech is any better than protection.

Leech dot damage is still reduced by armor, right? So how much damage does it really do against the gaurdian? Is it really more than sonic boom would do, even with the long cooldown?

The armor study was done assuming everyone is 25/26 with green gear. Not all players have that gear. Also once the cap is raised, these maps will be ran by mostly sub 25 toons with much less armor. Much like Delta 7 is being ran by mostly 15-18 toons with lesser gear than what most of us had at that time. I'm sure I don't need to remind anybody of the pains of helping guildmates with the Miner. I also regularly help players with the last 2 cycorp maps. At those levels, every bit of armor helps. So now you can easily see why I'm sticking with protection, as it doesn't start to lose it's worth until 25.

One last thing. Those of you with 1 point in protection are not fooling anyone. The only thing you really do is hurt the party when someone with the skill maxed shows up. Do not be so arrogant as to assume nobody will notice. You know what they say about people who assume...

[kamikazees]

The armor study was done assuming everyone is 25/26 with green gear. Not all players have that gear.... I also regularly help players with the last 2 cycorp maps. At those levels, every bit of armor helps. So now you can easily see why I'm sticking with protection, as it doesn't start to lose it's worth until 25.

The armor study I completed was done with toons that were level 25 and 26, but with various levels of gear, including none. My control measurements were taken with 2 armor (the least I could get).

In the last part this quote, you indicate that level may play into armor as well. I haven't done any tests to see whether armor in Cycorp, for instance, protects a level 15 chracter better than a level 25 character. I unfortunately don't have any spare character slots to find out. Hmm maybe someone else can do it...

[WhoIsThis]

I disagree with the consensus. What is your goal, and why do you play engineer? Are you:

1) Trying to keep the team alive and doing their job?

Or 2) Only engineer because you can heal yourself.

In the case of (1), protection IS worth it. Your teamates will spend less time wondering if they will have to use stims, and more time using their skills. Without protection they will be concentrating on staying alive, wondering when they will have to spam stims next. You are trying to help the tanks, not make them leave because they ran out of stims.



The thing is, with protection, the amount of damage reduced is so little that you are doing your job more effectively for the team by investing in something with more a better effectiveness to skill point ratio.

Against low hitting opponents where it is reduced by 1 damage with +60 armor, well, you don't need protection. Against harder hitting opponents where protection can reduce by maybe 3 - 4 points per hit; well if they hit that, 3-4 extra damage per hit is not significant.

Empathy and transference, unlike protection are useful skills and are powerful enough to make a real difference. They should be maxed on any 20+ engineer.

Perhaps the reason is because when I do guardian runs (you really don't need protection expect in the harder levels of Numa and perhaps the last 2 levels of Delta 7 at this point), the majority of my guildies are armed with top notch armor, but I have seen even the ones with the lower level Neutronics (or the op and and commando equals) are still able to hold their own without protection in Guardian.