Ordius

1. Sorry, but that's -your- experience. I for one quite enjoyed my Psi/Mental Blaster all the way up to 50+3.

2. Ranged Defense is one of three ways to go with a typical IO Blaster build, the others being Smashing/Lethal Defense with Scorpion Shield or Ice Armor from the Patron/Epic Pools, and Damage/Recharge. I tend to go Ranged Defense, myself. If you look in the Blaster Guides section, on the last page I've got a link to my Psi/Mental guide that tells all about my build.

3. Avoid Robots and Carnies. Psychic Clockwork are a notable exception, because they have a strong weakness to Psi. Carnies... ugh. They still give me a tough time, but Ion Radial Final Judgement is a fun equalizer in the endgame for VIPs. And there are ways to take them down, it's just a LOT harder than point/click/win.

Thank you.

If you have any questions about it, I'd be glad to answer 'em. It was a fairly cheap build to assemble, but I had no patience with the market so I ended up paying more than I needed to pay. But with liberal use of Hero/Villain Merits and Reward Merits, I'm sure you could keep the costs down.

I mean... that's a huge undertaking, and Blaster aficionados tend to stick with one type of play style rather than attempt them all, so you could ask 100 different Blaster fans what they think is most effective and you'd probably get 99 different answers. (No one is answering that Electric Blast is the best. Ever.)

I can give you a very vague, quick rundown of all the Primaries.

Fire- high damage, high END usage, best AoE potential.

Ice- medium-high damage, medium-high END usage, single-target quasi-control set with slow and hold effects, targetable mega-nuke.

Elec- medium damage, medium-high END usage, secondary effect has a small chance of draining END from the target, as well as immobilizing. Only Blaster primary with a pet (quasi-pet, not controllable).

Psy- low-medium damage vs robots and other Psy-resistant foes like Carnies, high damage when not resisted, medium END usage, mostly single-target with a recharge debuff/slow secondary effect.

Assault Rifle- medium damage, medium-high END usage, most resisted damage types (Smash/Lethal), good crowd-control primary and a crashless nuke.

Dual Pistols- medium damage, high END usage, good AoE potential, switchable secondary damage type/debuff type which combos well with almost every secondary.

Energy- medium-high damage, medium-high END usage, high knockback secondary effects, weak AoE potential.

Radiation- medium damage, medium END usage, stackable defense debuff secondary effect, X-RAY EYES. Almost as good as Fire at AoE.

Sonic- medium TO high damage (due to the resistance debuff stacking), medium END usage, stackable resistance debuff effect, poor AoE potential, has disorient and sleep attacks.

Archery- medium-high damage, medium END usage, good versatility, added inherent accuracy bonus, crashless nuke considered one of the best damage powers in the game, damage type (Lethal) is fairly well-resisted.

Dark Blast is coming with Issue 21, but since I don't have specifics on it, I'll just assume it's similar to the Defender secondary and say it's medium damage, medium-high END usage, with a stackable to-hit debuff.

Couldn't tell you much about the secondaries except to look for symmetry. Fire primary goes well with every secondary since its own secondary effect is just more damage. Ice primary works well with Ice secondary for stacking slows and holds and having a higher-damage Controller type, or with Fire for the added damage, or with Mental for the slows/recharge slows. Mental secondary can add AoE damage to any single-target primary, and Drain Psyche can make your Blaster near-invulnerable. Energy secondary is the most unique, with 4 self-buffing powers (Boost Range, Build Up, Conserve Power and Power Boost) that can add a whole new dimension to your Blaster, plus some strong single-target melee attacks. And Devices... Devices is a relic of original CoH with a couple of powers that make no sense (Taser, Timed Mine). It needs to be remade, but would work well with a thematic superhero who has no actual powers. Like a James Bond-type.

I dunno, hopefully that helps.

It's cheap, no purples or PVP IOs, gets you over the cap in ranged defense before power boost, and could be further enhanced by the Nerve Alpha that enhances accuracy and defense. In fact, with Power Boost and Nerve Core Paragon, this build can reach 53% ranged defense. That should be more than enough.

I love layered damage mitigation on Blasters. Resistance alone is garbage; you want your Blaster to be able to survive long enough to hurl their tasty DPS, and on an AT with such low HP, anything that hits you is still gonna hurt. Better to give them the ability to dodge a lot of attacks so that they can take more people out of the damage equation. However, you should look at whether or not you're going to be teaming. Solo Blasters should look at 6-slotting Weave and slotting a set like Red Fortune, taking Tough -and- a pool Res shield, and focusing on slotting their single target attacks with Thunderstrike, to give themselves good accuracy bonuses and ranged defense without the use of costly toggles. More end for blasting is always good, right? Teaming Blasters can definitely leverage using those toggles to help the team with Leadership buffs 'cause every little bit helps (especially vs. end-game enemies), but your soloing will suffer somewhat. I dunno, just my thoughts from years of experience with Blasters all the way from the original game's beta.

Naturally. On my human-form only PB (which is a more viable way to play now with Destiny mez protection), I've gone this path. On my Tri-form I'm bringing up, I'll probably not even take the Fighting pool. Part of the reason I love PBs... lots o' flexibility in what to take.