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I'm saying that your focusing on single target a bit too much, the melee powers are good if your party is
a. missing scrappers
b. fighting AVs every mission, which is confined mostly to 40+
[/ QUOTE ] I guess I just don't understand where you're coming from here. I mean, why are the blaps only good if you're missing scrappers? Using /EM say, a blaster can meet or exceed a Scrapper's damage. That's good even if you DO have scrappers around.
Blapping's not bad solo no. It's also quite nice in teams. Heck, it's great in teams where there's a good controller, like your earth one. There's very little chance of getting hit with the various controll powers around, which means they can go wild with their high damage powers ... blaps. Higher damage means groups of mobs go down faster which means better XP.
Devices on the other hand is
not so good for big teams. For one, most big teams I've found are fighting +3s. That means you're probably going to be wanting to slot your powers with an acc SO in the first place for one. For another you're not getting as much extra damage from the secondary. There's a little bit more hitting with your blasts. I guess if you waste 3 slots on SG your group gets hit a little less. You could try to lay some mines down, but they're fairly easily interrupted in my experience. CD keeps you unseen untill you actually attack.
On the other hand, the other sets have build up. With the AoE sets, I've noticed that folks seem to be fond of saying that with BU and Aim their Archery blasters can take out a spawn of +3s in 3 attacks, and do it every time the powers recharge. Which is great, wouldn't be quite as fast without build up ya. And heck, when those powers are down, there's also a not inconsiderable amount of damage you can find with some of the blaps.
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and as you said fire/ and elec/ pull it off with AoE, ice can too if you use the rain and breath, AR does it fairly well, and ive SEEN archery do it consistantly. oh and nobody likes nrg/ apparantly so i actually havent gotten to see that one in action.
[/ QUOTE ] I could have sworn I said that /fire and /elec can both do AoE MELEE damage. The good AoE primaries are AR and Fire. They're good off the bat with AoE. Archery gets a lot better once it hits 32 for AoE. The rest of them don't quite come near the AoE damage of those sets. For the record, that's Electricity, Energy, Ice and Sonic. That's just a bit more than half the primary sets.
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this has been nagging at me, where on earth do you people get the idea trip mines define the powerset?
[/ QUOTE ] It didn't define the powerset. It was
part of it though. I mean, you'd throw the SG 'till the mobs were all covered, then run in and lay down a mine while stealthed with CD (or alternately skip the grenade and just take superspeed). Or you could lay down some mines in a caltrops field near the enemies (while stealthed), then put down a turret to aggro the mobs and draw them in to their doom. Then you could repeat the process with the next spawn and port your turret in instead of waiting for it to recharge.
To me the devices powerset was all about the ability to set up traps of one kind or another, a good number of the powers in the set mesh(ed) very well to allow traps to be set with ease. Traps are most easily used solo, and as such in teams all you really saw devices blasters do was use their drone and blast from range, which is what you seem to think the whole set's about. Sadly both the methods for setting traps when solo, and the use of the drone when in teams have been reduced in effectiveness over time.
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okay, before i reply to this one, someone said corruptors get less aggro, i made a fire/rad that for intensive purposes, is a tank mage. it takes aggro off 2 brutes and is the only one who ever died on its teams short of a full team whipe. think the self heals are great?
I have an entire spawn that would shoot me as soon as i popped my head out, granted it was my fault but my end was empty after a single attack chain so it might as well be one that kills all but the lts.
a team of 1 tanker 1 blaster and 1 defender would have been faster.
on the other note, earth/ has such horribly low damage that it is almost mandatory that I fight on 6-8 man teams, My secondary requires the ability to hit as well, when it comes to being sk'd I take the highest available.
as for blaps being your riskiest and most rewarding attacks, AoE generates more aggro across an entire mob, but unless I'm fighting on an 8 man team 2 control powers can pretty much makes it 100% safe for the blaster. a strong chain knocks it down to bosses and lts even as an opener.
8-man the bosses take a few seconds to lock down since theres 2, so i let the tanker distract them first.
Earth also has quicksand making accuracy slotting low priority, almost worthless up to +5s... especially when you can stack 2-3 of them. And i still go for the sk.
I avoid teams where I'm fighting over +3s, it keeps the team alive and lets me do my job to the point its fun.
Also, someone compared TD to both aim and BU .... and aim isnt in the secondary so its not really related to this. and if someone could give me numbers as to:
the actual recharge reduction effects, is 99% reduction the same as around 50% of normal recharge? its kinda been nagging at me, and would allow me to actually work out the damage increase from an extra recharge.
Oh and the recharge and duration times of BU would be helpful for that too
just curious to the actual gap, because if its up for 1/3rd of all the fighting and does 80% dmg increase... well, TD seems to be better from 1 extra recharge slot, and since its a toggle rather than a click it makes me think my numbers are off.
right now a blaster who is shooting constantly would be getting slightly more from TD, though the fact that you will usually have more than 1 power up at a time would probably balance that in favor of BU. and hasten would be better for non /devices as well.
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Blasters don't shoot constantly, really. We are good at burst damage. Our attacks take more end than melee equivalents, so we run out constantly. Also, you regularly kill the entire mob you are facing, the walk forward a little to the next mob, producing a break. Aim + BU tends to come up between fights. Course, I have haste, and 3 slot both for recharge. The only time accuracy really becomes a problem, is against mobs who are very powerful, and thus the ones you would pop BU for anyways-giving you an accuracy bonus.
Corruptors do draw less aggro than blasters-they do less damage. Damage + mezzes= aggro. Corruptors are made up for this by their buffs and heals. Corruptors draw less aggro and get to heal themselves. I'm not claiming that playing as a corruptor is God Mode, or all roses and sunshine. I'm saying that the set plays significantly different from a blaster set. You would gather less aggro per shot (as your doing less damage, and yes, that mean you need more shots to kill it.) and you would have better methods of dealing with teh damage directed at you. I don't claim corruptors live in heaven, merely that the experience is different enough that you can't claim you know one from playing the other. I don't claim to know much about corruptors, apart from the very basics. Please understand, that while blasters are not broken, some of our sets have become underpowered, and need some serious attention from the devs.
Some people prefer to live in a black-white universe. Either your class is working, or it is completely, totally, and utterly broken, and the AT needs to be wheeled through a level on a stretcher. There is a line between broken and working, where an AT is simply wanting. And the devs should place higher priority on helping wanting AT's then adding new material. Adding new material doesn't make the old material work any better. If the entire game normally took place in a jungle, and I had a broken character, and you added a mountain to the game, congrats- I would have a broken character on a mountain. And what we see is out AT, which is wanting, and has been largely ignored, continously ignored, along with a lot of other classes, in favor of programming new poses and costume pieces.
Simply put, we want the devs to create a more perfect balance for what exists NOW...rather than making more stuff for our wanting characters to use and wear. And that is not unreasonable. Some MMO's are free. Those that aren't inherently have an obligation to continously provide the service that justifies a monthly fee.
