Meruru

Just to clarify, only repulsing torrent does KB. Burst will only do KD unless you are fighting lower lv things, slot it for kb, or fighting stuff w/ very little kb resistance such as clockworks. Anyway, it should be fun in pve, I don't know much about pvp though.

Edit: Actually you can't even slot burst for kb, so ignore that part.

Well, simply having the ability to read will confirm my statement. There's enough posts on these forums over the years that says a lot of people don't like kb. I said nothing more than that. I never said anything like everybody, most, majority, or anything like that. For example, if there's a 1000 people that don't like something, but there's 10000 people, to me that's a lot of people even if it's not a very big percentage. It seems like you're trying to imply that I'm saying that everybody on a team hates kb even if they don't say it, which is in no way what I said. Do I think that there's a lot of people that don't like kb and never say anything to the team about it? Sure. Do I know this as a fact? Not really and I never said I did. Have I see plenty of people quit teams because of kb? Sure. Do I know it's because of the kb that they "have to go"? Not always, no, but I've had several people send me a tell not long after leaving and ask if I want to join their new team and they end up saying it was the kb that caused them to leave.

I agree with this. I also said most of the time I have no problem with it.

Just to let you know, since you apparently don't, blasters are not the only AT that has energy blast. Defenders and corrupters both have it and neither are a higher-damage AT than dominators. Doms have it to, but not with the aoes that imo cause the problems.

Now, as far as how/why a mob will have more of a chance to fight back when KBed, I actually can't see how it's not common sense, but I guess I'll try to dumb it down. Status effects do not have an infinite duration, and believe it or not, not everybody gets on steam rolling teams or have a perma dom with them to increase the duration. So for the teams that take a little bit to kill each group, it's very possible/likely that the stun/hold will not last the entire fight. Guess what, if stuff gets KBed away while stunned or held, they won't be returning to the group until it's over and will not be taking the aoe dmg the rest of the group is. This gives them more time for the effects to fade and gives them a chance to fight back.

The only sleep I mentioned was static field, which frequently causes stuff to go back to sleep after taking dmg. If that was all that static field did though, it wouldn't be nearly as good as it is. Even if they are not slept, run/jump/fly speed and recharge is debuffed, it helps sap the mob, and it gives endurance to the players in the patch. So yes, I would also say knocking them out of it will give them a better chance of fighting back.

Well yeah, but last time I checked energy blast doesn't have a reliable way of doing kb to more than one target. And yes, if something takes enough dmg it will die.

I'm not a very argumentative person, but I'd just like to say that I can pretty much assure you that even if nobody says anything about it, there's a lot of people that don't like kb. I'm pretty much positive that I have never once said a word to anybody that's used kb powers on my teams. I don't think I have the right to tell somebody else how they should play, so I don't.

Honestly, for the most part I find people with kb powers to do an "exceptable" level of kb (couldn't think of a better word to use). However, like you I also am almost always on PUGs, and I've been on tons of teams where the kb absolutely kills my fun, as well as the fun of other people on the team. This is actually more of an issue with peacebringers with solar flare from my experience than energy users, but I've had my fair share of energy players that couldn't care less if the group is scattered all over the place.

Btw, (not directed at anybody specific) for the ones saying the kb is always giving mitigation, are you actually sure about that? I can pretty much guarantee the overall mitigation becomes worse from the kb if you are grouped with a dominator/controller. If the group is stunned/held/confused then the kb is actually giving the mobs more of a chance to fight back because they are probably going to take less dmg during this time. If the group is on an ice slick with arctic air effecting them or in a static field with conductive aura draining them, the kb allows the mob to get away from the better controlled situation. Like I said earlier, I usually find kb to be fine, but that's just something to think about.

For the most part, powers in the primary get the mag doubled if it's effected by domination. Effects in the secondary vary. Some only get +1 mag, some double the mag, some are not effected at all.

Bone smasher and total focus will both get their stun mag increased by domination, but unfortunately, whirling hands doesn't.

On my ice/fire Dom, I actually find the ST immob to be very helpful against EBs. Since /fire is primarily ranged dmg, keeping most EBs in place increases my survivability a lot. For some of the other secondaries where melee is where a lot of your dmg comes from, then using a few purples is probably best and the immob isn't very useful.

I personally consider the aoe immobs to be generally worse than the st on doms, but that could be from all the times my ice slick was made useless.

To be fair, peacebringers only have 1 more knockback power than warshades......unless you count the kb from pets and then it evens out. Novas both have 1 aoe/st kb power and dwarf forms only do kd. Both human form targeted aoes have kb, both nukes (though the ws is more likely to finish off the group), both have a st range attack w/ kb, ws has aoe kb from blowing up bodies and the stun, and pb has st kb on a melee attack, aoe kb on the photon seekers........and the absolute worst/most annoying power in the set w/ aoe kb from solar flare.

If the kb from solar flare was reduced to kd, I think it would make pbs considerably more liked. That imo is really the power that makes people complain about the kb from a pb and not so much a ws. It's the only power of either AT that absolutely annoys me to no end. I honestly don't think I've ever grouped with a human form pb that didn't use it a lot either. I guess I can understand why since it's by far the best (dmg wise) aoe they can use, but wow it's annoying. I have it on my pb, but the only time I use it is soloing big groups.

Yeah, if the body despawns before the pet is out, you won't get it, but should get the pet every time if the body is still there. Soul extraction from MM set works like that to. Not played my WS in a while, but I remember some enemies despawn a lot faster than others.....don't remember what though since that's the only toon I play that I pay attention to dead bodies lol.

I kinda agree with that, but not completely. Since it gives no status protection/resists, dmg buff, or rec/regen bonus it doesn't seem to be quite like other god mode powers. But being able to cap all of your resists (pretty easily, including psi) and filling your end bar isn't too shabby.....and w/o the crash at the end. Though with the capped dmg from sunless mire and decent defense, it sure feels like god mode.....but that's combining multiple things.

Edit: I guess you might need dwarf mire to for capped dmg, but it's still a ton w/o it.

I'm pretty sure I read something similar to that somewhere (not going to look for it).......but I think it was somebody talking about it ripping underlings (like rikti monkeys) to pieces or something along that line. Which very admittedly, it will do (even though 1 aoe will almost kill them). But anyway, while the power should definitely do more dmg than it does and/or cost less end, it's still not a horrible power. I'd wager that on a big team, orbiting death would probably be at least close to the 2nd highest dmg spell available to a human and by far the cheapest dmg (well dark detonation would be better). Assuming you have 10 mobs around and do 12 dmg a tick, you are doing 120 dmg every 2 seconds for less than 1 endurance point. If you notice, human only has 1 aoe in it so not taking orbiting death would indeed lower the dmg. I'm not saying the power is great, because it's not, but it still absolutely does respectable dmg on big teams.

You'll notice that almost any scrapper w/ an aura will tell you it's one of the best attacks they have. True, their auras do more dmg (and cost less end), but their attacks also do more dmg. So I'd say there's not much difference really in it's effectiveness compare to the other attacks other than the end usage not being as good for what it does......but it's still is better end per dmg than a regular attack.

But let's face it, even if it's not the best dmg aura, it's still is by far the best looking.

I think this is the biggest reason for the argument. I could be wrong, but I don't think anybody is trying to say you have to have build X or your wrong, or trying to force anybody into any kind of build. I think it's more, if you want to have the highest dps you can, you will use these powers, need this much recharge to accomplish it, etc. Maybe a little different, but I think that's the main point. And as much as anybody wants to argue about it, there is only 1 answer to that question. There may be tons of builds that are nothing like it and still perform really well and maybe even a lot more fun, but there is only 1 "best" and I think that's what Obsidian is trying to get at. (though maybe a little more argumentative than needed).

I also think the comments about the scrapper forums are pretty good. If you go there looking for a certain build, there's a good chance you will get help with numbers that help justify the reasoning for it. If you ask what the best dps chain would be, there would be people that would provide the attacks to use and the recharge you need to accomplish it.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not the kind of person that really cares what's the best because of a couple reasons. The biggest reason is that I couldn't even afford to slot one of my attacks w/ a purple set, much less several attacks. The other big reason is that I play the way I enjoy playing. My warshade is not even remotely close to being considered the best at anything, but I have a ton of fun playing it so that's enough for me because I'm not a min/max kind of person. But even though I'm not that kind of person, I can fully see the reasoning some people have for wanting these types of builds.

Hopefully this might calm some stuff down and not make it worse because that's not the intention.

Well, Darkstar pretty much summed it up, but I'll say a couple things. I would agree that recharge is probably more important than defense, but I wouldn't say ignore it (others might). You can get a little over 15% ranged defense from only using 5 slots, which to me is too good to pass up. Well almost anyway, I have 4 travel powers 2 slotted to get the defense and I get the same bonus from something else, maybe pets but I'm not sure. It's almost like the Universal Travel IOs were designed for khelds. There's at least 7 different ws powers that you can slot these in (not counting if you take a travel power from a pool), but I probably wouldn't use either of the forms for this slotting.

Dark extraction also can help this problem if you don't want to use a bind. I usually hit it first when I'm using unchain essense and works fine (though a bind would save 1 key press).

1. Yes it is an endurance hog.
2. No, you do not "need" to take hover. It makes it easier I guess, but I've never felt the need for it. (couldn't take it if I wanted to anyway since it's on a warshade)
3. Not sure. I have mine 2 slotted for the IO bonus, but I don't use it much and only have it because it's on a warshade.
4. It's not that bad, but it's easily my least liked travel power.

Myself, I really like having about 30% ranged defense (35% on my build) w/ nova as my main form, but until 47 I didn't have any def and really didn't have much trouble. As far as toggles go, I might would recommend the s/l resist shield since that's the most common dmg types, but after you get eclipse you can easily cap all your resists and with only 3 recharge reductions in it, it's only down for about a min.

There is a power available to you if you are afraid of the dmg you are going to take in human form when trying to get eclipse off that works really well. Nebulous form can let you jump into anything and take 0 dmg. If you pay attention to the animations, you can take the alpha, drop out of nebulous, fire off eclipse, and take pretty minimal dmg. Or even jumping in w/ dwarf first helps, but I prefer to take no dmg before eclipse than reduced dmg.

Here's a pretty quick triform build if you are interested.

Hero Plan by Mids' Hero Designer 1.401
http://www.cohplanner.com/

Click this DataLink to open the build!

Level 33 Science Warshade
Primary Power Set: Umbral Blast
Secondary Power Set: Umbral Aura
Power Pool: Speed

Hero Profile:
Level 1: Shadow Bolt -- Acc(A)
Level 1: Absorption -- ResDam(A)
Level 2: Ebon Eye -- Acc(A)
Level 4: Orbiting Death -- Acc(A)
Level 6: Dark Nova -- EndMod(A)
Level 8: Shadow Blast -- Acc(A)
Level 10: Hasten -- RechRdx(A)
Level 12: Sunless Mire -- RechRdx(A), RechRdx(21), RechRdx(21)
Level 14: Shadow Cloak -- DefBuff(A)
Level 16: Super Speed -- Run(A)
Level 18: Gravity Well -- Acc(A)
Level 20: Black Dwarf -- ResDam(A)
Level 22: Stygian Circle -- EndRdx(A)
Level 24: Nebulous Form -- EndRdx(A)
Level 26: Unchain Essence -- Dmg(A), Dmg(33), Dmg(33)
Level 28: Gravitic Emanation -- Acc(A)
Level 30: Dark Detonation -- Acc(A)
Level 32: Dark Extraction -- RechRdx(A)
------------
Level 1: Brawl -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Sprint -- Empty(A)
Level 2: Rest -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Dark Sustenance
Level 1: Shadow Step -- EndRdx(A)
Level 10: Shadow Recall -- EndRdx(A)
------------
Level 6: Dark Nova Bolt -- Acc(A), Dmg(3), Dmg(5)
Level 6: Dark Nova Blast -- Acc(A), Dmg(7), Dmg(7), Dmg(9)
Level 6: Dark Nova Emanation -- Acc(A), Dmg(11), Dmg(11), Dmg(13), RechRdx(13), EndRdx(15)
Level 6: Dark Nova Detonation -- Acc(A), Dmg(3), Dmg(15), Dmg(17), RechRdx(17), EndRdx(19)
Level 20: Black Dwarf Strike -- Acc(A), Dmg(23), Dmg(25)
Level 20: Black Dwarf Smite -- Acc(A), Dmg(25), Dmg(27), EndRdx(27)
Level 20: Black Dwarf Mire -- Acc(A), Dmg(29), Dmg(29), EndRdx(31), RechRdx(31), RechRdx(31)
Level 20: Black Dwarf Drain -- Acc(A), EndRdx(5), Dmg(19), Heal(23)
Level 20: Black Dwarf Step -- EndRdx(A)
Level 20: Black Dwarf Antagonize -- Acc(A)