Which mod set bonuses are actually worth it?

Spyda

Primarily I would like to know if the speed and/or defense mod set bonuses are worth the effort...

Initially I thought that the Speed mod set bonus would be worth the investment into some Resistance toons, but then I realized that the 10% modifier is based off of the characters native speed prior to any modification from other mods or abilities. If I understand that correctly, that would mean that it's really only providing an additional 10-15 speed, whereas you could potentially get that amount or more as a secondary bonus on any one of your mods. Would that ever be worth the investment or would I generally be better off going with offense, crit dam, or a pair of other set bonuses?

Also Defense is much easier to get but I've never really noticed it make much of a difference, and I saw someone else's post say that they're garbage and shouldn't be used. Is that accurate or just a misguided opinion?

Ig88isboss

Defense mods are worthless. Speed set mods are very good tho, especially on characters with naturally high bas speed. Don'trestimate them.

Vertigo

Ig88isboss wrote: »

Defense mods are worthless. Speed set mods are very good tho, especially on characters with naturally high bas speed. Don'trestimate them.

That being said, you still need speed secondaries on those speed set mods. The set is just like having an extra speed secondary, it doesn't make up for losing 4 secondary speed stats, just 1 secondary.

StormTro0p3R_H

https://forums.galaxy-of-heroes.starwars.ea.com/discussion/57119/how-to-tell-when-defense-mod-set-is-better-than-health-mod-set-it-is-for-sth/p1

One character can justify use of defense mods. So don't farm them. If you want defense, then go with health mods.

Support characters or attackers with good debuffs need speed every ounce of speed they can muster. So EP or SA of a zMaul team, zYoda, STH for initial speed buff, etc.

After first turn crit damage or offense mods are both better than speed assuming certain thresholds can be reached with speed secondaries.

Holio

My strategy is to go for health, potency, and crit chance bonuses.. primarily cause they only take two moods for the bonus. Health for reasons above, potency for any toons that stun or apply other negative effects, and crit chance to hopefully do more damage.

I can't farm speed mode at the moment but I'm usually more interested in secondaries so putting 4 good ones together seems a huge challenge. Not that 4 awesome speed moods wouldn't be most desirable .... just the hardest to collect.

Huatimus

Assuming that your character has 150 speed, and you're using a Speed set Speed Arrow, you're getting 15 bonus speed spread across the 3 remaining mods. That's equivalent to rolling an extra 5 speed as a secondary stat on each of those 3 mods. And the average speed for most characters is about 120, so that still comes up to 4 bonus speed each mod. If you're putting Speed mods on slow tanks with 90 speed then you're doing something wrong...

sneeekypants

They all give positive benefits, it's all a trade off of which is better given you have to chose. The improvement of making a set vs the lost secondary stats from having to chose a non-optimal mod to complete the set.

Are all defense mods on a tank better than a mixed set that have the _exact same stats_. Obviously yes. Is it better if you have to sacrifice high secondary stats? Usually no.

As a general rule crit damage and speed provide a lot of benefits to the right toons, so you can give up more secondary stats to complete them.

SkyeLeonne

Huatimus wrote: »

Assuming that your character has 150 speed, and you're using a Speed set Speed Arrow, you're getting 15 bonus speed spread across the 3 remaining mods. That's equivalent to rolling an extra 5 speed as a secondary stat on each of those 3 mods. And the average speed for most characters is about 120, so that still comes up to 4 bonus speed each mod. If you're putting Speed mods on slow tanks with 90 speed then you're doing something wrong...

isn't that 15 spread across 4 mods? so about 3.75 each

Mojavelandbaron

For attackers like Maul or Leia that already have high base crit chance and damage, but are a bit squishy, I like health mods with good speed primaries or secondaries.

Huatimus

SkyeLeonne wrote: »

Huatimus wrote: »

Assuming that your character has 150 speed, and you're using a Speed set Speed Arrow, you're getting 15 bonus speed spread across the 3 remaining mods. That's equivalent to rolling an extra 5 speed as a secondary stat on each of those 3 mods. And the average speed for most characters is about 120, so that still comes up to 4 bonus speed each mod. If you're putting Speed mods on slow tanks with 90 speed then you're doing something wrong...

isn't that 15 spread across 4 mods? so about 3.75 each

Speed arrows max out at 30 speed.

Woodroward

Crit damage, offense and speed sets are the best sets.

That's right, the 4 piece sets.

Which is best really depends on the characters. Your high dps toons will do well with any of them. If they have below a 35-40% chance to crit, the offense set will give them a bigger damage boost than the crit damage set. If they have a really high speed to begin with, they will get a bigger effect out of a speed set than others (TFP could get 17 speed from the set), but TFP has so much tm gain, I would probably end up going crit damage for him.

There are some niches that other sets can be better. Stacking full tenacity sets with tenacity crosses under a tenacity boosting lead can reach the point of resisting all of Grievous's debuffs from what I've read.

Potency mods are really good for tm removal teams. and a bounty hunter team. They are good as a second set on anyone that puts out a lot of debuffs.

Someone that already has a really high defense stacking defense mods on can be ridiculous. Fives has a really high natural armor. Combining defense mods with Defense leads (Gar, Chewie) or comps that give defense up can be quite effective too.

Health mods are best used for Healers and people with health based abilities.

In general though, gearing defensively isn't as effective as gearing offensively, hence why a 4 set bonus is, as a general rule, better than any 2 set bonus doubled. They should just be used to fill in the holes left over by the 4 piece set.

UltimateSeaDog

Jyn, the goddess of the rancor, needs speed and nothing more.

RacerDejak

Depend on base defence stat.. if big, sure the defence mod set will help. For speed, it always great.. but it sacrafice something. You've get super speedy char that attack like tickle (nihilus not include).

Mazurka

I love speed sets. More speed, more turns you take, more damage you do, less time waiting for cooldowns. Speed will always be dominant in this game

Vohbo

The amount of times speed is gamebreaking in any game should give a clue now that it is the most dangerous statistic to use and should be balanced extremely carefully from the get go.

I have a small list of games where speed or its equivalent has completely broken the game:

- Diablo 3: attack speed bonuses were reduced by 50% (!!) in one of the earliest patches. Since then stacking Cooldown Reduction (simply a different kind of speed), is the key to making many builds busted.
- Divinity: Original Sin: casters (but really most classes) became utterly broken by stacking speed
- Civilization V: Combat becomes completely broken after units get Logistics
- D&D 3rd edition: Game balance evaporated at higher level because of multiple attacks per round, not to mention spells like Haste and (god forbid) Time Stop.
- Magic: the Gathering/Hearthstone: Both of these games are often dominated by tempo oriented playstyles, and mostly break down when that tempo becomes so high nothing else is viable anymore.

This concept of Tempo is pretty universal. How much stuff you can get done in a certain amount of time is already very important, but combining it with having the initiative creates a problematic game state. Balancing tempo is therefore crucial. I think what has been said before is there true: the meta in SWGOH has become Speed mods. The character carrying those mods may change from time to time, but the people with the most broken speed mods have a long-term advantage that is almost impossible to overcome. The meta will always be speed, as long as speed modifiers are found on mods.

Best solution in my opinion: hard cap speed from mods to a reasonable number, and release 6 dot mods that respect that hard cap (so speed will stop going up in the long run).

evanbio

Looks like pretty decent advice here. The thing is, mod set bonuses are probably the least important aspect of mods. Speed secondaries is first, followed by the primary stat, followed by the set bonus. There are a few times where the primary stat may trump a speed secondary....but that's pretty rare IMO. Potency is the only item I will consider increasing over speed secondaries. And with Rex becoming more and more powerful, and debuffs becoming harder to stick, the potency buff is becoming less important.

Exletion

evanbio wrote: »

Looks like pretty decent advice here. The thing is, mod set bonuses are probably the least important aspect of mods. Speed secondaries is first, followed by the primary stat, followed by the set bonus. There are a few times where the primary stat may trump a speed secondary....but that's pretty rare IMO. Potency is the only item I will consider increasing over speed secondaries. And with Rex becoming more and more powerful, and debuffs becoming harder to stick, the potency buff is becoming less important.

Depending on the type of mod, but if the speed secondary is lower then +5 and I have a gold four set secondary with primary crit dmg or chance, I will sometimes choose this mod instead. You are definitely right about potency not being that great anymore though. All of the meta counters to Zaul make potency nearly useless.

Spyda

So it would seem unanimous that that speed set bonus is definitely worth it.

As for Defense mods, some still seem to think that they're worthless, and others have said they're great in the right situation. Would anyone care to expound upon that? In which situations, or on which characters would Defense mods provide the preferred set bonus?

Also, I failed to mention earlier that the squad I'm primarily focusing on is First Order. Does that change anything? Given the fact that most FO characters will have advantage active during most of the battle, are there any of them that would more fully benefit from a speed set bonus then from a crit damage set bonus? Phasma, and/or FOST perhaps?

ItsJarJarBinkz

For me critical damage and chance are the best.

Twin

My opinion?

If you have to ask you probably aren't ready for speed sets. Focus on speed secondaries for other sets. As many have mentioned, crit chance, crit damage, Health are probably the most commonly helpful. Though potency/tenacity can be helpful on some characters in some situations.

They are really only REQUIRED for those round start initiative toons like StHan, Palp, SA etc in ARENA. And even then if your shard are running speed sets also, AND you don't have a counter team (which becomes less likely the most good toons you get).

Speed sets are high tier end game. Unless you have other reasons to farm the resistance toons needed for the challenge, don't do it. Though if you are looking for a new project it is a good one because you will eventually need at least one good speed set WITH uber secondaries.

Does that mean you shouldn't buy every Speed set with speed secondary from the store.. HECK NO, BUY EVERYONE!. You will probably get a good speed set together doing this before farming the challenge.

IMO a speed set mod WITHOUT speed secondary is worth less then other sets.. I would rather complete another set if the mods didn't have a speed secondary. As people have said a speed set is worth at most 4 per mod, you should have enough of those in other sets by the time you can farm the speed challenge.

Olddumper

Spyda wrote: »

So it would seem unanimous that that speed set bonus is definitely worth it.

As for Defense mods, some still seem to think that they're worthless, and others have said they're great in the right situation. Would anyone care to expound upon that? In which situations, or on which characters would Defense mods provide the preferred set bonus?

Also, I failed to mention earlier that the squad I'm primarily focusing on is First Order. Does that change anything? Given the fact that most FO characters will have advantage active during most of the battle, are there any of them that would more fully benefit from a speed set bonus then from a crit damage set bonus? Phasma, and/or FOST perhaps?

I run a GK Zarris squad and I wish I had more defense mods. I'm primarily interested in increasing the healing margin between a crit and how much the toon heals. By the eye test defensive mods are much better than health mods when trying to increase that gap.

morgan1109

I have a general reference list I use. It doesn't fit every character, but it mostly tracks well. The "P" is for preferred. I don't have secondary's on there primarily because you want speed, plus what is most advantageous to that particular character.

Here is my reference sheet:

Primaries
Square – Offense
Rhombus – Defense
Circle – Offense, Defense, Health(P – healer only), Protection (P – everyone else)
Arrow – offense, defense, health, protection, speed (P), accuracy, and crit avoid
Triangle – offense, defense, health, protection (P), crit damage(P – after 35% crit chance), crit chance (P)
Plus – offense, defense, health, protection (P), Potency (P- for landing status effect), Tenacity (P – everyone else)


Sets
Health: Solid increase in hp pool, but favors tankier characters.
Defense: meh
Critical Damage: Nice for a 4 setter! Great when combined with Critical Damage on Triangle for an attacker. Also good when combined with a Critical Chance set bonus.
Crit Chance: Nice! Best when combined with a crit damage set
Offense: viable only if crit chance is under 30
Tenacity: Meh
Potency: Teebo and other raid exclusives where status is necessary(Jyn?)
Speed: Only viable with high base speed characters

Healers, tanks – Health sets
Attackers – crit damage, and crit chance sets
Status effect specialists – potency first, then health

davinhalcyon

Vohbo wrote: »

The amount of times speed is gamebreaking in any game should give a clue now that it is the most dangerous statistic to use and should be balanced extremely carefully from the get go.

This concept of Tempo is pretty universal. How much stuff you can get done in a certain amount of time is already very important, but combining it with having the initiative creates a problematic game state. Balancing tempo is therefore crucial. I think what has been said before is there true: the meta in SWGOH has become Speed mods. The character carrying those mods may change from time to time, but the people with the most broken speed mods have a long-term advantage that is almost impossible to overcome. The meta will always be speed, as long as speed modifiers are found on mods.

Best solution in my opinion: hard cap speed from mods to a reasonable number, and release 6 dot mods that respect that hard cap (so speed will stop going up in the long run).

I agree with you but I dont think we are there yet. But youre right, they need to make sure it doesnt happen.

But I still dont get the "speed is meta" argument. I dont buy it because if it were true there would be more diversity at the top. Any team would be viable, as long as you have the best speed mods on them.

Why dont you just build a team of the 5 fastest characters in the game: TFP, dooku, leia, rey, and Jyn, slap the best speeds mods on them and then dominate the leaderboard? This doesnt work because team composition and synergy are more important. The slowest character in the game, Baze, is used in the best squads. That alone should tell you something.

Exletion

davinhalcyon wrote: »

Vohbo wrote: »

The amount of times speed is gamebreaking in any game should give a clue now that it is the most dangerous statistic to use and should be balanced extremely carefully from the get go.

This concept of Tempo is pretty universal. How much stuff you can get done in a certain amount of time is already very important, but combining it with having the initiative creates a problematic game state. Balancing tempo is therefore crucial. I think what has been said before is there true: the meta in SWGOH has become Speed mods. The character carrying those mods may change from time to time, but the people with the most broken speed mods have a long-term advantage that is almost impossible to overcome. The meta will always be speed, as long as speed modifiers are found on mods.

Best solution in my opinion: hard cap speed from mods to a reasonable number, and release 6 dot mods that respect that hard cap (so speed will stop going up in the long run).

I agree with you but I dont think we are there yet. But youre right, they need to make sure it doesnt happen.

But I still dont get the "speed is meta" argument. I dont buy it because if it were true there would be more diversity at the top. Any team would be viable, as long as you have the best speed mods on them.

Why dont you just build a team of the 5 fastest characters in the game: TFP, dooku, leia, rey, and Jyn, slap the best speeds mods on them and then dominate the leaderboard? This doesnt work because team composition and synergy are more important. The slowest character in the game, Baze, is used in the best squads. That alone should tell you something.

Take the same team synergy against the same team synergy and slap better speed mods on the second team, and the second team will win 100% of the time with some few bad RNG exceptions.

Crazylazyguy

Critical damage and Speed hands down.
Critical Damage in my opinion are as much important as speed, if not more.
Critical damage as a stats can't increase. There are no mods in the game that come with a crit dmg secondary, so the only way you get it is either with a triangle that has it as a primary or a full mod set. While the current meta isn't the greatest when it comes down to crits, they are still extremely useful in both raids and even GW when you face different kinds of teams.

RacerDejak

morgan1109 wrote: »

Potency: Teebo and other raid exclusives where status is necessary(Jyn?)

I have question.. if someone base potency is zero, is it ok to give them potency set? The potency primary in plus/cross mod i think will better that potency set bonus. Or use both? potency primary and potency bonus.

Yeah.. i talk about jyn.

Meeraval_Marnath1

They are all useful depending on what you are trying to do with mods. Yes, even defense and tenacity have their place, primarily on tanks.

Woodroward

Olddumper wrote: »

Spyda wrote: »

So it would seem unanimous that that speed set bonus is definitely worth it.

As for Defense mods, some still seem to think that they're worthless, and others have said they're great in the right situation. Would anyone care to expound upon that? In which situations, or on which characters would Defense mods provide the preferred set bonus?

Also, I failed to mention earlier that the squad I'm primarily focusing on is First Order. Does that change anything? Given the fact that most FO characters will have advantage active during most of the battle, are there any of them that would more fully benefit from a speed set bonus then from a crit damage set bonus? Phasma, and/or FOST perhaps?

I run a GK Zarris squad and I wish I had more defense mods. I'm primarily interested in increasing the healing margin between a crit and how much the toon heals. By the eye test defensive mods are much better than health mods when trying to increase that gap.

Stacking health on them increases the size of the heal. Stacking defense on them decreases the size of the attack. So which is better is really situational. If a toon has low hp and defense, defense mods won't do much, stacking health is better because of Barriss's regular heal/healing equalization. If they have somewhat decent defense to begin with, then it is better.

Exletion wrote: »

davinhalcyon wrote: »

Vohbo wrote: »

The amount of times speed is gamebreaking in any game should give a clue now that it is the most dangerous statistic to use and should be balanced extremely carefully from the get go.

This concept of Tempo is pretty universal. How much stuff you can get done in a certain amount of time is already very important, but combining it with having the initiative creates a problematic game state. Balancing tempo is therefore crucial. I think what has been said before is there true: the meta in SWGOH has become Speed mods. The character carrying those mods may change from time to time, but the people with the most broken speed mods have a long-term advantage that is almost impossible to overcome. The meta will always be speed, as long as speed modifiers are found on mods.

Best solution in my opinion: hard cap speed from mods to a reasonable number, and release 6 dot mods that respect that hard cap (so speed will stop going up in the long run).

I agree with you but I dont think we are there yet. But youre right, they need to make sure it doesnt happen.

But I still dont get the "speed is meta" argument. I dont buy it because if it were true there would be more diversity at the top. Any team would be viable, as long as you have the best speed mods on them.

Why dont you just build a team of the 5 fastest characters in the game: TFP, dooku, leia, rey, and Jyn, slap the best speeds mods on them and then dominate the leaderboard? This doesnt work because team composition and synergy are more important. The slowest character in the game, Baze, is used in the best squads. That alone should tell you something.

Take the same team synergy against the same team synergy and slap better speed mods on the second team, and the second team will win 100% of the time with some few bad RNG exceptions.

Meh. If I fought another droid team with more speed on mods on them but no crit damage set, I would destroy them.

Muaddib

Spyda wrote: »

So it would seem unanimous that that speed set bonus is definitely worth it.

As for Defense mods, some still seem to think that they're worthless, and others have said they're great in the right situation. Would anyone care to expound upon that? In which situations, or on which characters would Defense mods provide the preferred set bonus?

Also, I failed to mention earlier that the squad I'm primarily focusing on is First Order. Does that change anything? Given the fact that most FO characters will have advantage active during most of the battle, are there any of them that would more fully benefit from a speed set bonus then from a crit damage set bonus? Phasma, and/or FOST perhaps?

Some tanks like 5's are helped by def primaries, but I tend to think he's better served with other options like offense or potency. Chewie isn't helped much by anything either than def. But I think Chewie is sadly pretty useless to begin with.

If you're focusing on FO team, I'd suggest the crit damage with a side of potency for Phasma and Kylo.

McBee

I've found that crit chance sets are worth it - I've got a couple of toons with all crit chance mods maxed out, and they never stop critting everything they hit. With good secondaries like speed, offense, and protection, they are very good builds.

ViperPete

The game revolves around speed.