Toughness v Vitality

[Brimstone Jack.3462]

On a core necro bunker build that spends more time in shroud than not, with the dmg reduction taken into account, wouldn't it make more sense to use Carrion over Paladin amulet? Lots of extra life which goes twice as far with shroud up? Or does the power loss and extra Toughness actually make that much of a difference?

[Dantheman.3589]

When you are in shroud, vitality means nothing and also no healing so toughness is actually more valuable on things like reaper and core necro, though vitality is also amazing. Precision is also nothing to laugh about on bunkers but I digress just vitality doesn’t equal better especially on core necro

[Brimstone Jack.3462]

> @"Dantheman.3589" said:

> When you are in shroud, vitality means nothing and also no healing so toughness is actually more valuable on things like reaper and core necro, though vitality is also amazing. Precision is also nothing to laugh about on bunkers but I digress just vitality doesn’t equal better especially on core necro

 

Vitality doesn't determine your base Life Force?

[Dantheman.3589]

> @"Brimstone Jack.3462" said:

> > @"Dantheman.3589" said:

> > When you are in shroud, vitality means nothing and also no healing so toughness is actually more valuable on things like reaper and core necro, though vitality is also amazing. Precision is also nothing to laugh about on bunkers but I digress just vitality doesn’t equal better especially on core necro

>

> Vitality doesn't determine your base Life Force?

 

It does. But when in shroud there’s nothing u can do about your hp, meaning no one can heal you. When in shroud you need to be tanky and toughness just does a really good job at soaking up the damage. Also, though I don’t have the charts available- toughness is actually superior to vitality when you have passive sustain which comes from a few things in shroud but even more out of shroud, also someone may be healing you when your out of shroud so again in any situation like that toughness> vitality.

Also some simple math even if you assume defense gained is equal between toughness and vitality- Paladins 500 vit + 500 tough = 1000 defense points while Carrion = 900 defense points

So Paladins is alittle tankier

[Brimstone Jack.3462]

Ah. I was looking at it as having that larger Life Force bar with bonuses and 50'% dr meant it took longer to kill you. Most of the scrubs I get teamed with don't heal or revive on purpose anyhow. XD

[KrHome.1920]

> @"Brimstone Jack.3462" said:

> On a core necro bunker build that spends more time in shroud than not, with the dmg reduction taken into account, wouldn't it make more sense to use Carrion over Paladin amulet? Lots of extra life which goes twice as far with shroud up? Or does the power loss and extra Toughness actually make that much of a difference?

Paladin compared to carrion:

- more damage (power + precision)

- roughly 100% crit chance in lich form (your main damage source) (lich form doubles base precision)

- more sustain (500 toughness + 500 vita is overall better than 900 vita (even better than 1000 vita), because it improves the effectiveness of your heals)

 

I've already made a thread, right after the balance patch went online, where I said removing paladin amulet (as every other amulet that grants toughness AND vitality) would kill bunker necro and other problematic bunker builds, without the need of further nerfs as this amulet is the new soldier amulet (which has been removed from the game a long time ago because it was too tanky).

 

We got the nerfs instead... that did also nerf other builds which have not been problematic. And so the game ended up with less build variety again.

[Eurantien.4632]

All the good necros use carrion right now.

[Exedore.6320]

> @"Brimstone Jack.3462" said:

> Vitality doesn't determine your base Life Force?

Your life force bar is filled in percent, but the actual amount is based on your total HP which is affected by vitality. If your total HP is higher, you can absorb more damage in shroud before your life force is depleted.

 

So if you think about it, vitality has increased benefit to necro. However, toughness is also active for that entire time, reducing the damage you take, and higher vitality means that your heal skill helps less overall. And many necro builds are fairly adept at handling condition removal already (toughness doesn't affect condition damage), which lessens benefit of extra vitality.

 

In the ideal situation, you'd want a balance of toughness and vitality, but the PvP amulet choices don't support that. So the result is usually to pick the amulet based on the overall benefit (offense and total defensive benefit), over having the ideal choice of toughness or vitality.

 

 

 

 

[Brimstone Jack.3462]

Got it. One last question: Does the extra Condi dmg on Carrion and the recent Power nerf make that much of a difference here?

[Lighter.5631]

tbh, necro use carrion because there's no power/toughness/condition

[Exedore.6320]

> @"Brimstone Jack.3462" said:

> Got it. One last question: Does the extra Condi dmg on Carrion and the recent Power nerf make that much of a difference here?

It's more that core condi necro benefited from the global damage reduction (it's an attrition spec; living longer helps a ton), as well as receiving a few buffs. Core condi necro used carrion in the past as well.

[Brimstone Jack.3462]

Alright, thanks everyone! Looking forward to applying this knowledge and testing it out!

[KrHome.1920]

> @"Eurantien.4632" said:

> All the good necros use carrion right now.

Of course they do. And you did not understand what we are talking about.

 

We are talking about bunker power necro that is hard to kill 1v1 and abuses lich form damage multipliers and not condi necro, which is just a mediocre condi build (not a bunker at all!) that can chain-fear noobs for 5 seconds.

 

[Exedore.6320]

Okay, to clarify:

 

There is core bunker necro, which basically just survives. I believe it uses paladin amulet. It doesn't do any noteworthy damage outside of Lich form, and that can be relatively easily avoided with LoS and projectile hate. You can usually identify it by the stacking carapace buff.

 

There is core condi necro, which uses carrion amulet. It's squishier, but has decent power and condition damage. It usually has increased fear duration and will try to keep an opponent CC locked with a llike of conditions.

 

At top skill levels, bunker necro doesn't fare well because payers know to rotate around it or focus it hard. However, you see a lot more condi necro because of the pressure it provides and top players know how to use positioning to stay alive. But bunker necro below top skill is reminiscent of turret engi from core in that it's low effort compared to the returns.

[Vancho.8750]

They should probably lock amulets by class or maybe by elite, so there is more options and the bullshit should be removed from the pool. Some amulets were removed since they made certain classes op, but on others they were just ok.

The other option is to have just 4 one for power, one for condi, one for support and one for defense.

[Brimstone Jack.3462]

> @"Exedore.6320" said:

> Okay, to clarify:

>

> There is core bunker necro, which basically just survives. I believe it uses paladin amulet. It doesn't do any noteworthy damage outside of Lich form, and that can be relatively easily avoided with LoS and projectile hate. You can usually identify it by the stacking carapace buff.

>

> There is core condi necro, which uses carrion amulet. It's squishier, but has decent power and condition damage. It usually has increased fear duration and will try to keep an opponent CC locked with a llike of conditions.

>

> At top skill levels, bunker necro doesn't fare well because payers know to rotate around it or focus it hard. However, you see a lot more condi necro because of the pressure it provides and top players know how to use positioning to stay alive. But bunker necro below top skill is reminiscent of turret engi from core in that it's low effort compared to the returns.

 

What I'm seeing even in silver is that players with a fair level of skill can cc core necro bunkers to death pretty quick. 2v1 means popping everything, hopping into shroud, and hoping they're both melee and kinda glassy. At my admittedly low skill level, a better player on almost any class can 1v1 me and avoid death unless I pop lich where they can't LOS. Otherwise, KITE ME HARDER, DADDY! My role as a bunker is to hold down a small area for a brief time under pressure until help arrives, then mainly to support. Correct? I shouldn't be getting a bunch of kills outside of group fights unless they try to just facetank me 1v1 like an idiot.

[Bast.7253]

I found toughness to give me way more sustain than vitality. I tried a 34k vitality build and it felt like I had a huge life force pool but it was just burning through at the same rate. If you reduce the damage you take with toughness your life force will drain slower and you can survive longer out of it.

 

For all others I think vitality is pretty good. Except maybe warrior and holo.

 

But if you’re a necro you don’t really have to worry as much about conditions if shroud is absorbing them or you’re transferring them so the only source of damage you have to be worried about is power, which is reduced by toughness.

[Bast.7253]

> @"Brimstone Jack.3462" said:

> > @"Exedore.6320" said:

> > Okay, to clarify:

> >

> > There is core bunker necro, which basically just survives. I believe it uses paladin amulet. It doesn't do any noteworthy damage outside of Lich form, and that can be relatively easily avoided with LoS and projectile hate. You can usually identify it by the stacking carapace buff.

> >

> > There is core condi necro, which uses carrion amulet. It's squishier, but has decent power and condition damage. It usually has increased fear duration and will try to keep an opponent CC locked with a llike of conditions.

> >

> > At top skill levels, bunker necro doesn't fare well because payers know to rotate around it or focus it hard. However, you see a lot more condi necro because of the pressure it provides and top players know how to use positioning to stay alive. But bunker necro below top skill is reminiscent of turret engi from core in that it's low effort compared to the returns.

>

> What I'm seeing even in silver is that players with a fair level of skill can cc core necro bunkers to death pretty quick. 2v1 means popping everything, hopping into shroud, and hoping they're both melee and kinda glassy. At my admittedly low skill level, a better player on almost any class can 1v1 me and avoid death unless I pop lich where they can't LOS. Otherwise, KITE ME HARDER, DADDY! My role as a bunker is to hold down a small area for a brief time under pressure until help arrives, then mainly to support. Correct? I shouldn't be getting a bunch of kills outside of group fights unless they try to just facetank me 1v1 like an idiot.

 

Maybe an ele could. Or a warrior. I’m not sure what else would have enough cc to do that. Ranger maybe? Else can do it from a distance to some degree. Warriors can pop resistance. Maybe some gimmicky engi build?

 

Meanest generally struggle because they have to sacrifice a lot for condi cleanse, and power mes is kind of useless on shroud unless you time it in between shrouds and they aren’t running the shroud on low health trait. But fear and reveal also kind of screw that up.

 

I feel like the biggest threat to Necros right now is just other Necros and occasionally eles. Lol

[Exedore.6320]

> @"Brimstone Jack.3462" said:

> What I'm seeing even in silver is that players with a fair level of skill can cc core necro bunkers to death pretty quick. 2v1 means popping everything, hopping into shroud, and hoping they're both melee and kinda glassy. At my admittedly low skill level, a better player on almost any class can 1v1 me and avoid death unless I pop lich where they can't LOS. Otherwise, KITE ME HARDER, DADDY! My role as a bunker is to hold down a small area for a brief time under pressure until help arrives, then mainly to support. Correct? I shouldn't be getting a bunch of kills outside of group fights unless they try to just facetank me 1v1 like an idiot.

Mostly correct for bunker necro. Your job is to find a point you own (or an undefended one) and sit your butt on it until you die. You likely won't kill anything. The point is that you did be able to survive forever in a 1v1 or minutes in a 1v2. That let's your team play 4v4 or ideally 4v3 across the other 2 nodes.

 

I'm not entirely sure why you're dying so quickly in 1v2 without seeing your build or gameplay.

 

[Brimstone Jack.3462]

> @"Exedore.6320" said:

> > @"Brimstone Jack.3462" said:

> > What I'm seeing even in silver is that players with a fair level of skill can cc core necro bunkers to death pretty quick. 2v1 means popping everything, hopping into shroud, and hoping they're both melee and kinda glassy. At my admittedly low skill level, a better player on almost any class can 1v1 me and avoid death unless I pop lich where they can't LOS. Otherwise, KITE ME HARDER, DADDY! My role as a bunker is to hold down a small area for a brief time under pressure until help arrives, then mainly to support. Correct? I shouldn't be getting a bunch of kills outside of group fights unless they try to just facetank me 1v1 like an idiot.

> Mostly correct for bunker necro. Your job is to find a point you own (or an undefended one) and sit your butt on it until you die. You likely won't kill anything. The point is that you did be able to survive forever in a 1v1 or minutes in a 1v2. That let's your team play 4v4 or ideally 4v3 across the other 2 nodes.

>

> I'm not entirely sure why you're dying so quickly in 1v2 without seeing your build or gameplay.

>

 

Oh, it's 100% my lack of skill and experience. That's why I'm seeking input directly from the pvp community. :)