Summary
The Solar Armor is one of many ways that players can play a support role inFallout 76, especially with its benefit of healing capabilities being a passive ability. The Solar armor is considered an end-game armor inFallout 76, and it provides players the ability to heal themselves and nearby players effortlessly. Part of what makes the Solar armor an effective part of any build is that players can also invest in other ways to heal nearby players and stack them all together for the best results.
Like the otherLegendary Vault Steel armor setsinFallout 76, players will need to spend Gold Bullion, Legendary Scrip, and other highly valuable resources to obtain and craft the Solar armor. When wearing all five pieces of the armor, players will have access to its unique set bonus as well as any legendary effects and mods on each of the individual armor pieces.
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How the Solar Armor Compares to Other Healing Sources and Armor Sets in Fallout 76
The Solar armor does not have any Radiation or other Status Effect resistances without specific mods or Legendary armor effects. Comparing its base damage and energy resistances to other end-game armor set inFallout 76, Solar armor is slightly weaker than the other popular armor sets, but not by much. Since the armor’s set bonus doesn’t rely on having any specific legendary armor effects, players can generally mix it together with additional builds inFallout 76. However, it does require players to be above half-health, so this excludesFallout 76’s meta Bloodied build.
On its own, the Solar armor isn’t the most effective method for players to heal themselves or other players because the amount healed is very small and slow. Unlike most of the other healing methods, the Solar armor’s set bonus is a static number instead of a percentage of each player’s max health. The Solar armor heals at a rate of four health/second, and for reference, this is only around 1% of the health of a max-level player with fifteen Endurance.
The Empath mutationcan take the Solar armor’s healing properties to the next level for players who want to provide a support role to their teammates, although it meanwhile compromises the host’s health. There are ways to both improve the positive and reduce the negative effects of the Empath mutation, although there is no way to fully remove the penalty that the host of this Mutation will receive, so it’s not a necessity for support builds inFallout 76.
The Friendly Fire Perk, Team Medic Perk, and the Medic’sLegendary weapon effect inFallout 76are a lot cheaper to obtain than a full set of Solar armor, but they are all active methods of healing while the Solar armor’s healing is both passive and continuous. Other than requiring players to actively manage their teammate’s health, these other healing sources have a lot better healing properties than the Solar armor. There’s nothing stopping players from combining as many of these healing methods together as they desire, so all together they can offer impressive healing capabilities.
The Solar armor is best used for playing with an intimate group of friends or when doing activities with multiple other players in close proximity, like Daily Ops andPublic Events inFallout 76. The armor’s set bonus pairs extremely well with other methods of healing nearby players, although it can be underwhelming on its own. The main upside to using the Solar armor is that players can essentially use whatever build they want on top of it since many of the additional ways to heal other players don’t conflict or require much further investment. Solar armor is generally worth the investment for anyone who isn’t playing solo, however, there are stronger armor sets and more efficient healing methods available.
Fallout 76is available now for PC, PS4, and Xbox One.
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