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5. (stolen idea) Give each single target attack a -10% res that lasts 5 seconds. This not only helps boost the blasters damage a minute amount but also allows the blaster to help a team. Thus encouraging teaming.
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This is exactly what these "Damage Kings" need. Please put it in to play. Sure as a bit of a debuff it steps on the feet of defenders, but I really don't think they'll mind too much. It helps them in the long run.
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I suspect that while it looks good on paper, the result will resemble what happened with a similar trick they tried for tankers - which is to say, it wouldn't get implemented past internal testing.
Elsegame: Champions Online: @BellaStrega ||| Battle.net: Ashleigh#1834 ||| Bioware Social Network: BellaStrega ||| EA Origin: Bella_Strega ||| Steam: BellaStrega ||| The first Guild Wars: Kali Magdalene ||| The Secret World: BelleStarr (Arcadia)
sorry, just that the whole "higher risk" bit alway smakes me laugh nervously....
The HP difference balances that out... THAT'S why they have more HP. They take a bit more in melee, so they have a bit more.
We supposedly (uhuh, right, because the 'high' part of our damage ISN'T melee-ranged) take less from range [true for a fair chunk of the game, at least in actual naked, before-mitigation numbers anyways] since we stay out of melee, and this more or less evens things out...
The higher cap we can balance out with the fact that its mostly lethal/smashing damage.
The "blasters can pick their targets at range" is rather misleading... ANYONE can pick their targets before firing.
As a matter of fact, there's this special command (we'll call it "The left mouse button") that when used in combination with a secret hacked-loot you get at 50 only (the legendary "cursor") allows ANYONE, not just blasters, to pick their targets, much in the same way that "cursor+leftclick" inherent ability of blasters lets them do this.
Those that 'don't have a choice' only don't have one because they ran in without looking (some don't need to after all) and just tab through everything as they slash. 'course they don't NEED to pick their targets... if they did, they'd do so.
But the defenses? the resistances? the immunity to status-effects (just as common fighting at range as in melee in MOST cases)? We're not in melee QUITE as often as they are, but we already have a penalty for our higher damage; its all done in that 'melee' range.
Can't wait to see what blasters get in exchange for lacking THAT
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Realize that boost range only now works with cones. People will need time to incorporate that into their attacks before we make any decisions on changeing the power to something else.
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Didn't take any time at all for me... Boost Range combined with Flamethrower and Full Auto rocks hugely.
"But in our enthusiasm, we could not resist a radical overhaul of the system, in which all of its major weaknesses have been exposed, analyzed, and replaced with new weaknesses."
-- Bruce Leverett, Register Allocation in Optimizing Compilers
A mini mez would be nice like a 1-2 second stagger when blasted (treated as knockdown and defended with acrobatics, integration, hover, etc). That'd allow blasters to be a bit more controllish, maybe have it as an inherent power at lvl 32 (kinda like the pet fun for controller damage at that level).
the thing i dislike about CoH is the one sidedness of all heros. Blasters do this, tankers do that, defenders do the other thing. No comic book hero is so one sided. They all have some way to mitigate damage, inflict damage and stop the badguys. All comic book heros are able to "solo" excellent, they team only to take on the real big bad guys (read Avs and monsters in our game.). A blaster shouldnt be a glass tank, totally un super. Anotehr thing I dont like while iam ranting, every Super should have their travel power at level 1, its decidedly uncool to walk across the street like the "normal " people. Another thing that seems dumb is that our supers powers dont affect normals, they walk across my tar patch like it wasnt there, even while i can barely move cause the dead earth thorns quicksand is still going. totally kills the mood.
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Another thing that seems dumb is that our supers powers dont affect normals, they walk across my tar patch like it wasnt there
[/ QUOTE ] And how the normals just push you out of the way. Hey Im a superhero darn it!! Go around!! 
[color=gold][b][size=5]♪ Sometimes you feel like a Tank, Sometimes you don't! ♪[/size][/color][/b]
[url=http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=114726][color=black][b][size=5]Moon [color=red]Hazard [color=black]Zone![/size][/color][/color][/color][/b][/url]
Not to mention people driving like maniacs.. 
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the thing i dislike about CoH is the one sidedness of all heros. Blasters do this, tankers do that, defenders do the other thing. No comic book hero is so one sided. They all have some way to mitigate damage, inflict damage and stop the badguys. All comic book heros are able to "solo" excellent, they team only to take on the real big bad guys (read Avs and monsters in our game.).
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Statesman has said repeatedly, that every AT should be able to solo their own missions.
CoH has THE MOST character-customization control of ANY MMO I have ever played or heard in depth about.
You CAN build a blapper or a blaptroller or a blastroller OR a damage-speced tanker or a damage speced defender, if you wanted too.
EVERY AT gets pool powers, healing powers, defenses, travel powers, concealment powers, these are all accessible to EVERYONE.
In WoW, character customization is in the form of "talent trees", but what that means is basically, there are 2 priest classes, shadow priests, that are mages with different skills, and healing priests. In CoH, there are 25 specifically different blaster classes (5 primaries x 5 secondaries). Each primary is different in playstyle and nuances, as is each secondary, whereas it doesn't effing matter what talents you take as a mage, you're going to be a ranged damage dealer, no alternatives.
So seriously, you might want to think creatively about character building before you suggest that there is a "one-sidedness" of each AT.
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the thing i dislike about CoH is the one sidedness of all heros. Blasters do this, tankers do that, defenders do the other thing. No comic book hero is so one sided. They all have some way to mitigate damage, inflict damage and stop the badguys. All comic book heros are able to "solo" excellent, they team only to take on the real big bad guys (read Avs and monsters in our game.).
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Statesman has said repeatedly, that every AT should be able to solo their own missions.
CoH has THE MOST character-customization control of ANY MMO I have ever played or heard in depth about.
You CAN build a blapper or a blaptroller or a blastroller OR a damage-speced tanker or a damage speced defender, if you wanted too.
EVERY AT gets pool powers, healing powers, defenses, travel powers, concealment powers, these are all accessible to EVERYONE.
In WoW, character customization is in the form of "talent trees", but what that means is basically, there are 2 priest classes, shadow priests, that are mages with different skills, and healing priests. In CoH, there are 25 specifically different blaster classes (5 primaries x 5 secondaries). Each primary is different in playstyle and nuances, as is each secondary, whereas it doesn't effing matter what talents you take as a mage, you're going to be a ranged damage dealer, no alternatives.
So seriously, you might want to think creatively about character building before you suggest that there is a "one-sidedness" of each AT.
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Couldn't said it any better.
Not in the high end game myself, but with characters at lev 32, there arent any I have found (over 6 ATs so far, 1 each flavor) I cant solo. I have found which powers I pick up at which time makes a huge difference in the early game.
Just as in every other game I have ever played, low HP = low survival of errors. A tank can screw up and typically still run. A blaster, defender, controller is already dead from being hit with one shot (or a stun then kaboom).
I think squishies should have status resistance, but tanks should be vulnerable to stuns, etc. Move their resistances over to passives so they survive being held, stunned, etc, and let blasters and defenders have ways to avoid or break free from being affected by status effects. I think that balances nicely, myself.
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Not in the high end game myself, but with characters at lev 32, there arent any I have found (over 6 ATs so far, 1 each flavor) I cant solo. I have found which powers I pick up at which time makes a huge difference in the early game.
Just as in every other game I have ever played, low HP = low survival of errors. A tank can screw up and typically still run. A blaster, defender, controller is already dead from being hit with one shot (or a stun then kaboom).
I think squishies should have status resistance, but tanks should be vulnerable to stuns, etc. Move their resistances over to passives so they survive being held, stunned, etc, and let blasters and defenders have ways to avoid or break free from being affected by status effects. I think that balances nicely, myself.
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Ah... now there is a good idea. Please forgive me... I just got done complaining of my squishiness on another Thread and thought I would check out what other Blasters talk about. I have not read much here so just pass me by if I sound like the NKotB. Anyway... since Hit Points are different based on AT, why not give a base resistance, as was mentioned before, to things based on AT. Run the scale the opposite way of the hit point spectrum.
I have one of every character except the Aliens since I have not reached 50 yet. (Just made 38 though last night!... ahem... with my Defender. ) I love all of the Types. I've tried so many alts, I think I'd give someone who's played twice as long as me a good run for their money in the search for a character I feel a warm fuzzy for. I even got a Dark/Regen Scrapper. I don't feel this would tilt the scales in any one direction at all.
Does it sound like too much? Do I just need to muddle through the Terrible 30's and look for the Rainbow?
I've noticed the melee orientation of Blasters these days.
I've seen Blasters designed (probably respec'd just for it) to be a Scrapper with "Force of Nature" (Epic power pool).
Why is it that, the only way Blasters are able to survive, is to force them into the role of a Scrapper?
Half of it is enemies mez less in melee than they do range.
The other is that melee does more damage than ranged and in PVP, drops toggles.
The other half is that the melee skill (Total Focus) mez the boss so that they don't 1 shot you back.
How many halves is that?
Actually the only time when I melee is when they are low level enemies or when I chuck a web grenade or when I run out of ammo so I can recharge.
Actually the only time when I melee is when they are low level enemies or when I chuck a web grenade or when I run out of ammo so I can recharge. 
In my opinion, the issue is a verrrrry simple one: Blasters don't do enough damage. Its that easy. In the early game (pre-1) it was called City of Blasters, and damage was king, and blasters were kings of damage. The Devs responded with a series of nerfs to blasters, culminating in an overwhelming number of status effects lobbed into the game, forcing blasters to be almost unplayable in non-team situations. While I believe a slight trimming of status effects should be in order, the real issue is..Damage. A blaster should be able to deal enough damage fast, to kill a foe before they kill or hold you (which equal sure death). As it stands now-this works for about about 15 levels, and after that the mezzers in the Lost, Tsoo, Family...kill any blaster who dares fight them (there are some builds that have tricks to get around this-but most dont).
What really rubbed blasters face in this shortcoming, was the buffs given to scrapper damage in this period. Nothing I ever read in early posts by Devs, the manual...ever said scrappers should even come close to a blasters damage, yet wtih crits and raised caps they were back-doored into the roel of damage king. They were supposed to be hybrids-sub blaster damage, sub-tank defense. As its stands now, they are kings of the game-herding and killing herd with impunity. Statesman, I believe its a great misstatement to say that scrappers need higher damage than blasters cause they are in melee. They are in melee, taking at most, say 50% higher than ranged damage, while running shields that prevent or mitigate more than 80% of that damage compared to a blaster. Even a rudimentary test that my 4 year old runs on my toons tells him which is the toon to have. You'd think the dev team could figure it out too!
I'd say blasters need an across the board dam increase of at least 10%, and that scrappers need about a 10% trim, but given that a trim will never fly, I'd say blasters are due for a 20% boost. If were gonna be far and away the squishiest AT, we need to be far and away the higest damage AT. It doesnt compensate for the greatest achilles heal- the lack of status protects, but it would give blasters some chance in the post-level 15 world. A few tweak to the secondaries and to the animations times are in order too as fine points-but they wont be enough unless the elephant standing in the room is dealt with first.
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I'd say blasters need an across the board dam increase of about 10%, and that scrappers need about a 10% trim, but given that a trim will never fly, I'd say blasters are due for a 20% boost. It doesnt compensate for the infuriating and unbalanced lack of status protects, but it would give them some chance in the post-level 15 world...
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I agree. In fact, I know that a 10% damage boost is needed for Blasters because I do the extra damage now.
I built a NRG/NRG Blaster to mess around with Blapping.
I was appalled to discover that my melee blaster was more survivable than my ranged one!
Especially when soloing, I discovered that mob death is the best damage mitigation.
My melee attacks could take out single targets faster and more efficiently than ranged blasts ever could.
So, yes, Blasters need either 10-20% more damage...or they need very short activation times.
Currently playing:
Infaerna Who knew Fire/Fire Brutes were fun to play?
Here's something REALLY funny.
I'm a lvl 50 Eng/Elec blaster, and an ok one if I say so myself.
I was fighting babbage today, and to my horrid disgust and surprise, I found out two things:
My Power Burst Dmg has just hit the cap.
Something is wrong with melee/ ranged attacks.
I would shoot the AV with Power Burst, and no matter what buffs I used (fortitude, Build Up, Aim, Enrages of various power) my dmg was capped at 200 smashing and 224 energy.
So what's wrong with that you might ask? Well, my power burst is 6 slotted with the following:
2 lvl 53 SO dmg, 3 lvl 50 HO dmg/range, 1 lvl 52 Acc
So I just figured I hit the 400% cap, which is fine, but then this discovery REALLY disturbed me. I used havoc punch against babbage, with Build up + aim, and it did 100 pts of smashing and 372 pts of energy dmg, and this is how it's slotted:
1 lvl 52 Recharge, 1 lvl 52 Acc, both SOs.
THAT'S IT. My Build Up and Aim both are slotted with recharge. Now, you don't even have to PLAY this game to know something is wrong with that picture.
Now I always knew that my toon was having more problems than when I started, but I never dreamed it was this bad with all the other combinations. And then to read that scrappers can do MORE dmg than us? It's just a freakin' slap in the face since we're supposed to be the kings of damage, and tempts me to cancel my account just for that reason.
So why not just make a scrapper, right? Well, I hate playing them. I like to shoot things.
Current Projects:
Arbiter Chaos-lvl 43 Bane Spider
DivineStorm-lvl 35 fire/storm Corr
TerrorGash- lvl 32 axe/elec brute
Elemental Distortion MAarc ID: 18525
Not really. More Risk (melee range) = More Reward (1.1 damage multiplier for melee attacks, AFAIK).
Blaster HTH attacks have always been awesome - all my "scrappers" since I3 have actually been Blasters.
I started doing this because the Blasters get cool melee attacks....I never suspected (until recently) that my "theme hero" was not gimp, but actually pretty effective...
Currently playing:
Infaerna Who knew Fire/Fire Brutes were fun to play?
Almost always awesome. 
The blaster melee attacks sucked in beta, and were given a bump towards the end of it because noone was taking them.
Personally, I think the fact that they were so unpopular should have been a hint that a squishy didn't really want to be in melee and maybe the secondaries shouldn't be cobbled together from tank/controller sets...hence devices, the only secondary designed from the ground up for blasters, but that's neither here nor there, now...they're looking at us now and hopefully they leave those massive melee attacks in, and drop the crapola powers.
Furio--Lvl 50+3 Fire/Fire/Fire Blaster, Virtue
Megadeth--Lvl 50+3 Necro/DM/Soul MM, Virtue
Veriandros--Lvl 50+3 Crab Soldier, Virtue
"So come and get me! I'll be waiting for ye, with a whiff of the old brimstone. I'm a grim bloody fable, with an unhappy bloody end!" Demoman, TF2
Man... City of Blasters...
It was really City of AR-Fire/Dev Blasters...
City of Blaster is a myth.
City of blasters was a myth? You either have no idea what you're talking about or that was supposed to be humour.
In Pre I2 days, blasters were king. No other AT even came close. Period. That's what they are refering to by saying city of blasters.
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City of blasters was a myth? You either have no idea what you're talking about or that was supposed to be humour.
In Pre I2 days, blasters were king. No other AT even came close. Period. That's what they are refering to by saying city of blasters.
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No...it's a misconception. As someone above me noted, it was City of /dev blasters, on the strength of *one* broken power. There were a lot of blasters, but those were the early days. On paper, (ie with no playing experience) blasters look like the most fun to play. So a lot of people roll blasters. Slotting a blaster is pretty simple to figure out, too...all the slots go to offense, so in the early going blasters really are offensive juggernauts, especially compared to the other classes that have to split slots between offense and defense. Nothing about blasters as a whole has really changed since then. The environment has, as there are more mobs with ranged attacks and mezzes are more prevalent, and mobs will scatter if they can't get into range of their attacker, but City of Blasters is a myth, one that died without any significant changes to blasters as a whole.
Now you wanna say "City of /Devices Blasters, before the smoke grenade fix" I doubt you'll get much argument. But my fire/fire (played since day one, so i'm well aware of any changes to them ) certainly wasn't what people had in mind when people said "blasters are too uber" back then.
Furio--Lvl 50+3 Fire/Fire/Fire Blaster, Virtue
Megadeth--Lvl 50+3 Necro/DM/Soul MM, Virtue
Veriandros--Lvl 50+3 Crab Soldier, Virtue
"So come and get me! I'll be waiting for ye, with a whiff of the old brimstone. I'm a grim bloody fable, with an unhappy bloody end!" Demoman, TF2
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5. (stolen idea) Give each single target attack a -10% res that lasts 5 seconds. This not only helps boost the blasters damage a minute amount but also allows the blaster to help a team. Thus encouraging teaming.
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This is exactly what these "Damage Kings" need. Please put it in to play. Sure as a bit of a debuff it steps on the feet of defenders, but I really don't think they'll mind too much. It helps them in the long run.
Debt is temporary, prestige is forever
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