New Blue Item: Shock Absorber

Basically a shield but instead of an HP stat it has a defense stat. Additionally, talents can be applied to make the ship more resistant to splash damage. Fire damage will still penetrate all defense, and it'd be neat if frost also countered the effects (meaning a frost breaking shot ignores the shock absorber).

This should be a 2 pt item as high defense should come at a high price. I'm not sure what the defense values should be, but I think they should be pretty high. Considering you have to drop off a big shield to equip one of these, it needs to compensate by doing its job really well. Possible defense rework needed (we know those perks are near useless).

Pros

• High resistance to splash damage
• High resistance to low damage weapons
• Works great with repairing items as less hp is lost per hit

Cons

• Vulnerable to fire and frost
• 2pt item makes it difficult to allocate slot points (mainly sacrificing a hefty amount of hp)
• Fixers can make the best use out of this, but cannot equip any other blue item at the same time

 

There is a 100 defence limit and defenders can reach that with 4 epic defence perks. If your shield overrun that limit balance of the game affected this so bad. I like your idea but because of that probably most of people don't use it. Also current defence is good and balanced.

 

If a defender used one of these then carronade would be useless. Imagine having 200 or even 300 defence. It would hurt weapons massively.
(Thinking of you Hokuse)

 

Agree, but what top-tier defender uses shield perks?!?

This really just points out how badly shielding needs to be reworked. It's not even a choice - everyone stacks HP perks (and for good reason). Wish there was a meaningful tradeoff between the two, but as it is, there isn't.

 

I use defence perks and i love them. Healt is powerful against burst damages, defence is powerful against sustained damages. Real problem in there is burst weapon meta not defence.

 

Yeah, what if it was % damage reduction, instead of flat, so it helps equally against all types of weapons? Also, I'd like to point out that 1 item rendering 1 other item useless isn't really a problem, it's a counter, but I agree that the carronade isn't really in need of another counter considering how unpopular it is.

What if instead it was just a 1pt item that helped against splash damage?

 

I think one point is the way to go, and I could see that being used. If by splash you mean mortars as well as anything else that splashes, it could really help some players.