I recently had a god-roll Forge holster drop, which is the named item that adds 50% to your shield health.
This got me back interested in my Bulwark build, so in playing around with a 3-pc (which already adds 50% shield health) I noticed putting the Forge on only bumped my shield health from 4,087,968 to 4,752,023 - roughly a 14% boost.
I am guessing the 4.7M number is max shield health the game allows? Or am I missing something?
Also, I do have enough pieces for a 4-pc Bulwark, but my build already has a lot of incoming repairs, and from my (unscientific) observation it seems that running a fixer drone is more effective than the Makeshift Repairs talent. Am I understanding correctly that in this situation a fixer drone also adds to shield armor as well as my own?
Lastly, what weapons do you use? I have a Mop for secondary and am currently using Merciless for primary, but I am not sure I like the latter. What do you find is a heavy hitter that covers at least some distance too?
P.S. I will say that with the drone running I can face tank a named Heavy on Challenging, which is quite interesting. He'll eventually wear my shield down, but so far I've killed him first - every time.
A tier 6 Bulwark shield should be more like 14mil HP. Also, the 50% shield health bonuses are additive on the base health, not multiplicative.
For my shield tank build I use the 4-piece Foundry Bulwark set with the backpack, Yaahl Gear mask, and either Pointman (for Perfect Vanguard) or Tardigrade chest piece. I have everything rolled for Hazard Protection and I use the best Disrupt Resistance mods I have to max out Disrupt Resistance at 100% so that EMP jammers and sniper wardog explosions do not force me to put the shield away from being disrupted. The 70% Hazard Protection is just generally useful as well so you can pretty much focus on positioning and dealing/tanking damage. For weapons, the only weapon I really use with it is Liberty as when I have the 30 stacks it's doing about as much damage as any other weapon I might use, and swapping out would mean losing the stacks and needing to rebuild. Also the Artificer Hive from the Technician specialization works well with the Bulwark as the hive drones will pop periodically without having to deploy the hive so you can just keep the hive ready and get periodic heals on your shield. This build is basically 5 armor cores and 1 skill core, so you'll be lacking on damage. If you can do without the hazard protection, I'd swap in a Punch Drunk mask and maybe the Claws Out holster to give you even more damage from the pistol since you'll be using zero red cores and your damage output won't be anything to write home about.
With my build, I basically never lose my shield except for perhaps against large groups at heroic or higher when they all target my shield down. Between Perfect Vanguard, Liberty, the Foundry Bulwark healing, and the Artificer Hive it can sustain almost any damage output from enemies and it is never disrupted away.
The bonus is additive with the other bonuses the health gets from scaling skill tiers, so the Forge is not really that great for people already invested in blue and yellow cores. I would say it's more for red core dps builds that are willing to hybridize a bit to buff their Crusader shields.
My Bulwark build is a typical Foundry Bulwark set with Technician and an Artificer Hive. I can face tank a heavy in Legendary and go afk, because I simply repair faster than they can damage me. The weapon to use is Liberty or the Named Kard pistol for added skill point.
If I'm just messing around in lower difficulty, I will switch out gear pieces for red cores and pistol damage. I also have a Claws Out holster, which is fun to use to just beat enemies to death with melee.
solkard and dejector make good points. I never went into detail with my build but I am only at ST 1, and have quite a bit of CHC and CHD built in instead. So rather than a pure tank build like dejector describes I am much lower armor but pretty decent firepower.
I wonder if moving to that much yellow will make me near-invincible but turn my damage into something more akin to a spitball shooter...?
Remember that both blue and yellow cores will scale your shield tier. But yes, it will definitely impact your damage output. That is just something you need to accept as a tradeoff.Originally Posted by Sock_Monkey Go to original post
If you're using a yellow core loadout, you can use skills to compensate your DPS. For example, instead of a healing drone, use a Striker drone and a pistol with In-Sync. That will give both you and your drone a 30% damage bonus.
If you want to stay with mostly reds, the named KARD pistol would work well with the free +1 skill tier. I got lucky and got one with max pistol damage and CHD so I rolled it with Killer so it does a great amount of damage when I have max CHC. It's kinda hard to farm, so understandably that may not be an option for everyone.Originally Posted by Sock_Monkey Go to original post
I'll check it out. I know I have a Kard, but I so seldom use sidearms that I couldn't tell you if the roll is any good.Originally Posted by dejector Go to original post
Another point I forgot to mention: the numbers I was quoting are for the Crusader shield. If I do nothing else but switch to a Bulwark shield my shield armor goes up to almost 13M. Maybe that was the discrepancy?
I tend to not like sidearms which is why I chose that, but it sounds like most prefer using the heavier shield and Liberty or Kard guns. I may try just for fun and to see if it's my style.
EDIT: I never realized the Kard also adds a skill tier, so equipping that bumped my (Bulwark) shield to 14.4M.
The 50% shield health is additive. It doesn't literally multiply the existing health by 50%, it only basically adds 1 skill tier to the shield, as explained by the devs. Which, IMHO, is not worth using it.Originally Posted by Sock_Monkey Go to original post
If you're going to run a shield/regen build, I highly recommend 4pc Foundry Bulwark and the Memento exotic backpack, along with a single piece of D&H brand gear to buff the damage of your pistol. Sadly, in a completely nonsensical manner, Massive is still restricting the chest and backpacks of the FB set, which means you'll have to use your chest slot for the branded piece. If you can get a FB chest from the raid, I would highly recommend using the Punch Drunk named D&H mask.
For pistols, I personally despise the way the Liberty exotic pistol fires. I hate the rate of fire, and I hate the way Weapon Handling doesn't reduce the kick when you fire. So I go with the Kard named pistol that gives a skill tier. It does some of the highest damage of semi-automatic pistols, has a great rate of fire and mag, and handles well.
For skills you should be using the Technician-only Artificer Hive. It will fix your shield every few seconds(I don't have it in front of me. Like every 10 seconds or so?). You could use Striker Drone if you want to add a little DPS at the cost of shield healing. Chem Launcher or even Decoy are also good in a lot of situations, but it's up to you.
Between the Memento Backpack and Foundry Bulwark, you should basically be almost invincible outside of legendary. I mean, you can't just ignore fire from your sides or back, but as long as you're even halfway trying, you should be able to walk through heroic.
What you end up with is crazy good armor regen from FB and Memento. A virtually unbreakable shield(Skill Tier 4: Kard, Memento Blue, Memento Yellow, Technician) baseline. And all without sacrificing any red cores for pistol damage.
The build I listed works almost as well with Crusader Shield. You'll lose a skill tier from not using the named Kard pistol, and some shield health. But overall the DPS from being able to use an AR or Rifle or SMG makes up for it. You could adjust your recalibration to swap a red core for a yellow or blue for more shield health anyway, and not lose much if that's what you prefer.Originally Posted by Sock_Monkey Go to original post
The main reason I don't use the Crusader shield with a Foundry Bulwark build is that the entire point is to become functionally invincible while you focus on damage output. Meaning that while you do less damage on paper due to using a pistol, the amount of time you're applying that damage is much higher.
The Crusader shield just can't do that. You have a totally different playstyle where you have to be a LOT more careful about incoming damage, because a FB crusader will be tough, but can not facetank a heavy or multiple elites. Even a handful of red/purple bars will burn down your shield relatively fast, so you have to play this game where you pop out of cover with your crusader, kill a few guys, then hide again. Which, IMO, means you should ditch the entire premise and go with a non-shield regen build that focuses on damage instead of halfassing a shield.
Don't get me wrong. FB Crusader is a VERY good middle-ground for when you're trying to learn the playstyle and farm gear. It's a jack of all trades. It's good at everything, but master of none. It just carries a lot more risk than a straight up dedicated Bulwark Shield invincible build.