_Starbird_

Originally Posted by BlackSly

There are some times in CoH when the application of overwhelming firepower doesn't work.

At those times, the solution is obviously to get more firepower

Originally Posted by Obitus

Apparently, you don't know how to read for context. No big surprise.

It would have been a waste of time to try to quote everything you've said in this thread, so I just chose one post at random and wrote a reply to them all. Context.

Just as, when the OP asked for suggestions, he was clearly referring to ranged-DEF slotting schemes -- as those are the subject of his post. Context.

Correct. Your opinion is worthless, because you've supplied no substantiation for it -- except for barely coherent, and vaguely insulting, generalizations.

By the way, an argument is just a process of reasoning. My use of that word doesn't necessitate acrimony; in fact, if anyone can be seen to have encouraged acrimony in this thread, it's you.

"Only people who don't know how to play their blasters cap ranged DEF. Enhance your attacks for damage, acc and recharge. Play how you want; I'm just warning you that you'd be an idiot to try soft capping."

Yeah, that's real helpful. Your posts suggest only that you have no clue what you're talking about. If you wish to disprove that natural conclusion -- based on your scatter-brained prose -- then supply a pure-offensive build for a Fire Blaster, and demonstrate how it's light years better than a soft-capped version.

Otherwise, you're just playing that dimwitted game of, "my opinion is just as valid as yours even if I can't explain why I hold it." Your equal right to express your opinion does not carry with it the presumption of equal value. Your attempt here to play the victim, as if I'm some sort of free-speech suppressor, is unintentionally hilarious.

This isn't about my shouting you down. It's about not having rational discussion shouted down by those like you. I'm perfectly happy to discuss differing viewpoints, as long as they're discussable. Saying that everyone who builds for soft-capped DEF is a noob or an incompetent -- and virtually nothing else -- doesn't encourage discourse. Quite the opposite.

Originally Posted by Obitus

The OP never asked for opinions as to whether it was good to build for ranged DEF. He asked for suggestions as to how to do it.

Even if he had asked for the former, it's a good bet he wouldn't find much value in your brand of argument -- for which, thus far, you've provided zero substantiation. "Blasters are fine without ranged DEF," and "only noobs want ranged DEF," are not a good basis for discussion. They're the desperate pleas of a troll for attention.

It isn't as if a character who can toss out Build-Up-and-Aim-powered Fire Breath, Fireball, Rain of Fire, and Blaze is precisely weak offensively. Somewhat weaker, perhaps, than a character who constantly dances in and out of melee range, but then he's also far more survivable.

And with IOs, there's no reason that even a Blapper can't have soft-capped S/L DEF and maintain levels of global +recharge that are commensurate, practically, with those achieved by pure offensive builds. A Fire/Fire Blaster doesn't have any crucial powers with extremely long recharge timers, after all -- and the difference between a Fireball with an 8-second cooldown, and a Fireball with a 6-second cooldown, means virtually squat when you have two or three other AoEs to throw.

The only noobish opinion displayed here, in short, has been yours. There are diminishing returns on +recharge bonuses. Likewise, IO +damage bonuses, while nice, are relatively weak when you consider that they're measured on base damage -- and when you consider that Blasters have a multitude of other damage bonuses from Aim, Build Up, slotting, and Defiance.

There is a place for the total offensive build, most usually on teams with sufficient buff/debuff support. It's not in this thread.

Originally Posted by Xanatos_NA

Your metaphor of ranged def being a fork is a good one. A blaster is like a knife, with ranged defense they have a fork also. A knife and a fork are much better at cutting a steak than a knife on its own.

Originally Posted by Psynder13

The craze is because you litterally can solo as effeciently as a scrapper if you do it right. Also I am a firm believer that BLASTERS ARE RANGED DAMAGE SPECIALISTS. If we were meant to be melee then we would have WAY better migitation. The whole blapper thing is stupid, and despite the fact it may work or not, its not the way the AT was designed and the devs will tell you that.

Ive been playing this blaster since beta so dont tell me I dont know how to play a blaster. I can solo on him just fine with the maxed Rech/Dmg/Acc/HP but when Issue 16 comes I want to be tackling 8 man spawns like my widow does, and unless I can do that then I wont be happy until I can.

So every trick helps and unfortunatly since this was the very 1st toon I made I didnt know what all would be different back in the day. All I knew was that I wanted a fire based ranged hero, and fire/fire was thematic so thats what I picked.

I dont want to reroll him after 60 some months of playing him, and I dont want a playstyle that I dont like. I dont get into melee ranged now unless its to mop up somthing thats giving me issues at range. So based on my playstyle and based on the fact that EVERY other toon I have is softcapped for some form of DEF, I would say that its a perfectly valid question for me to be asking for a little assistance is adapting a fire/fire to a playstyle that suites me.

ALSO...... we have dual builds now, so whats your problem again?

Originally Posted by PhroX

IMO, if it reduces something, it's a debuff, if it stops something, it's a control

Originally Posted by SheKilla

It's never fun to run a Positron task force.

Originally Posted by Orehrepus

What does YMMV stand for? What is a nuke? I have not heard of these terms yet and I am seeking for answers. What a great forum we have here, eh?

Originally Posted by Haruu

Really I would rather see "Blapper" get its own AT, Move damage on Defenders up to .8 or 1.0, and have Blaster drop all of its snipes and really long range attacks and just have 30-60 foot range ST attacks on primary except a ranged nuke as the T9, and melee/PBAoE as their secondary with a PBAoE Nuke as the T9, take away 20% of their max hp. Oddly enough that makes defenders the new ranged killers, and blasters become rolling glass nukes, with both AT's now distinctly playing differant, without defenders "having" to play healers.

Originally Posted by Dibolgia

An old blaster friend told me this once: NUKE EVERY TIME ITS UP.

And so I did. And still do. And destroy everything in my path.

Originally Posted by PhroX

Yep, seen several Bubblers not use their bubbles. Probably the worst was a MM (in RWZ) that would only bubble his pets and refused to bubble the team, despite the fact that the pets were almost never getting attacked due to us having two good tanks keeping aggro between them...

Same with Empaths and Fort (though they seem to be OK at using the RAs) and Kins and SB. The latter might keep it up on the Stone tank, but the chances of an AE'd kineticist keeping the whole group SB for most of the time is negligable.