Over at the official Champions Online website, the developers have updated their "Ask Cryptic" feature and they've posted a rash of new questions including some that focus on defensive powers, where powers come from, and how weapons affect the look of a power. To be honest, it's one of the most information community Q&As yet!

We’ve heard relatively little about defensive powers in this game. How will comic-book staples like invulnerability, super reflexes, or regeneration be handled; are they passive stat bonuses, toggle powers, click abilities, some new mechanic, or a combination of the above? And will defensive powers play a big role in character creation? (The_Altruist)

There are four basic categories of defense in CO: resistance, dodge, forcefield, regeneration. Each of those different defense types functions a little bit differently based on the circumstances. Resistance is for the classic tank type character who can withstand a hail of bullets, barely noticing it. But if you hit with a big enough ray blast, you’ll knock him through a wall and daze him for a few seconds. Dodge is the opposite of resistance – the more and faster the attacks come after the dodge character, the tougher it’s going to be for them to mitigate the damage, whereas the big, slow, heavy attacks that might put down a resistance character are easier for him to avoid. The other axis is forcefields and regeneration. Forcefield functions extremely well early in the fight. The forcefield at maximum strength will mitigate all of the initial hits from essentially everything, however the forcefield will degrade over time. Regeneration is the opposite of that. Regeneration starts off slow, but the more times the character gets hit, the faster the regeneration will build up, up to a certain cap. It comes down to what’s your personal preference and what works best for the support characters working with you. It’s a question of which type of defense works best with which type of healing and how you want your party to work together as a whole.

Check out the whole Champions Online Q&A by clicking here!