The Storm
Golem
Depends on how much damage Master Mode enemies will deal, for all we know they could kill a max defence and damage reduction player in two hits
Menacing instead of Warding? (Expert)
- Thread starter Usagi Tsukino
- Start date
Mille Marteaux
Empress of Light
I'm going to bet it'll be somewhere around 2.5x the damage of Normal mode as anything beyond that becomes a little ludicrous.Depends on how much damage Master Mode enemies will deal, for all we know they could kill a max defence and damage reduction player in two hits
As an invasion example (an event where a tank player shines), Pumpking's Scythe attacks will do 120 on Normal and 240 on Expert. That's a lot of damage to bridge, but this theoretical attack on Master will do anywhere from 300 to 360, depending on if it becomes 2.5x or 3x. I'm going to err on the side of caution and assume 300 just for a number to work with.
You, ideally, do not want to be taking this theoretical 300 damage attack. But when tanking in one spot, it's going to happen, so let's figure out just what we'll need to take as much edge off of this as possible, assuming Master Mode uses the same Defense scaling mechanics as Expert mode.
A full Warding player using defensive Beetle will be sitting at ~126 defense when further boosted by Well Fed, Ironskin, and the extra stats granted from the Celestial Stone, Celestial Shell, Paladin's Shield, and Ankh Shield. The last two accessory slots are going to be slotted with Worm Scarf and Cross Necklace, because those are near mandatory for this Herculean task. (If on a Crimson world in multiplayer, consider swallowing your pride and getting a Worm Scarf from a Corruption world at this point.)
Beetle Armor's damage cut will not be taken into consideration here as you will not be getting any time to build it past 15% due to the massive pile of enemies.
So, this puts us at the following defensive index:
-94 raw damage, before cuts (Mechanical Cart was not considered due to the sheer memery the arena setup involves, but it's bonus of upwards of 7 defense and extra free damage from the lasers is not to be ignored if you can slip it into your setup with minimal jank)
-27% final damage (Worm Scarf is apparently on the same modifier as Endurance. Fascinating!)
So, the theoretical 300 damage attack is now down to a 206 damage attack, which is reduced further into a 150 damage attack.
In a worst case scenario, you will be eating one of these every 80 frames, or roughly every 1.33 seconds, so you wil need enough HP regeneration through many sources (Honey, Regeneration, Heart drops, Heart Statues...) to be able to outheal an incoming ~120 DPS.
A single Pumpking tends to drop 10-15 hearts, so as long as your friends have enough AOE damage spam to take them out, you should be more than fine on that front, as realistically speaking you're going to be eating a lot of smaller hits as well in the meantime (damage taken from its swords will be reduced to a theoretical 50 per hit; Greek Fire down to a theoretical 77...)
It'll be possible, but not comfortable. Crimson will be in a much less comfortable spot due to a different defense index (~100 raw damage reduction but only 10% damage cut), but it will be able to mostly bridge the gap with Vampire Knives assuming lifesteal effects aren't further nerfed in Master.
If damage is tripled, things get scary but still manageable.
Just don't try to tank a Phantasmal Deathray.
All numbers are of course theoretical; Master could use 3x damage scaling but only give us 50% defense scaling as well for maximum nonsense.
At which point..... uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
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The Storm
Golem
Or the enraged Martin Saucer Deathray which already deals 450 damage on expert.
Mille Marteaux
Empress of Light
I mean, realistically speaking, if you're trying to adhere to the "stand in one spot and outheal your highly mitigated damage" school of tanking and you aren't putting a ceiling above your head to stop the two highest damage attacks that can be stopped by four blocks of dirt... You deserve the swiftly-earned yet grim reminder of your own mortality.