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If your team brings buffs/debuffs, the "gap" in secondary power is either not very noticable and devices is more often than not just as effective, or BU is so trivial you need to stop getting hung up on it.
Also, the boosts from secondaries do not alter the amount of damage you do to the point your party will suddenly notice that your secondary is "uber"
i say devices does well because I havent seen a single one be any less effective than someone using a different secondary yet i HAVE seen plenty of blasters who focus on an entire single-target attack chain that does less than a single AoE when you look at total damage, true, a fire/ who relies entirely on his AoE will have hell soloing or in groups of 3-4, but he will contribute heavily in large teams, they may not be grateful, but a fast team will not disband after 1 mission.
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I'm snipping her because I think what you said here is more or less a summary of what you said at the top.
Firstly, it depends on the buffs. Yes fulcrum shift can cap a blaster, but what else? Not AM or fortitude or siphon power for that matter. With those buffs BU is still going to help and you get a nice tohit buff during its duration (bigger than TD? I don't recall). With resistance debuff, BU is just that more useful. I've teamed with dark/ defenders and try to use aim and bu after they drop tar path for added bonus. Using one or the other (or both) I won't miss when it matters. When I'm on my dark/ I tell blasters to wait for tar patch before they go nuts. I keep hanging on BU because in /dev it's traded for targetting drone (which you get hung up on) which was once an okay trade. In short the damage boost from BU is very nice when combined with resistance debuffs of any kind.
As to the single target chain. It depend on what that chain is getting used on. If the blaster drops a boss in a single chain, the group is better off for it. If an AoE blaster toasts all the minions in a single chain, the team is better off for it. /elec and /nrg give blasters a choice as to how to build. /nrg has several really great buffs (well, conserve power is so so because of its recharge), /elec has melee powers which can be used as to kill things going at the blaster or for blapping. /devices give blasters a choices too. In the way of the chance to grab pool powers.
@Deadedge and @Dead Edge
Peace through power! Freedom is slavery!
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a yo-yo
Captainpants, I have respectfully stayed away from the nature of your posts because I was really hopeing that you would eventually "get it" so to speak. Obviously, several points are flying over your head.
You seem to indicate that the best thing that a blaster can add to a team is damage.
You also indicate in your post that targeting Drone allows an AoE blaster to deliver better AoE damage over time.
I will point out a couple of things to you that should, if you understand what I am saying, shatter this conception.
The secondary sets with Build-up, also have melee powers. I will talk about them after I have talked about Build-up. With Build-up, you can run through your AoE attack chain and hit mobs with so much force that depending on what set you are, you can kill almost all the minions (not everything may get hit).
Now, you may be able to point to a DPS chart and say that overtime the /Dev is actually doing more damage, it doesn't matter though in the game. I can point to the game and say that the blaster useing Build-up is killing more mobs. That is what is important.
Now, after the Blaster has delivered his AoE payload, there are still likely to be LTs, and Bosses standing. What does the /Dev user have in his arsenal? Trip Mine, too bad that takes forever to use. Taser, well that will stun one while you wait for powers to recharge. AT, lets not even joke at this point. Caltrops, well we could cause more scatter I guess.
Oh, but he still has single target ranged attacks while his AoE is rechargeing. Good point, too bad only 1 or 2 of them will likely bring down a target that survived his AoE barrage since he doesn't do the damage of the Build-up Blaster.
Then, looking at the Blaster with Build-up, you will also notice that even if he didn't have that great added damage from Build-up, he can fill his single target attack chain (while AoE rechargeing) with high damage melee attacks that are faster and do more damage than his ranged attacks.
Thus, killing more mobs faster. Which is what you say makes a good blaster. Which means, that /Dev is at the back of the pack when it comes to makeing a good blaster for teams and solo.
In regards to teaming, perhaps you haven't played blasters much, but we got an increased damage cap. Which means we can actually use a Fulcrum Shift AND a Build-up to hit our cap. Not to mention that to get that Fulcrum Shift boost, you would have to be next to the mobs, now the Build-up Blasters have Melee to use while they are there, what has /Dev got? Oh, cloaking device so they can hide, good job, that helps the team. *roll eyes*
No offense, but your examples all seem to come from your observations of poorly built blasters and poorly played blasters. I have a solo Blaster built for PvP. I have all of my AoEs AND my single target blasts (except flares) not to mention most of my heavy hitting melee attacks from my secondary. Exactly what am I missing that a team blaster would have? Recall Friend, aid other, stimulant, I mean what is it you think a Solo blaster will not have that a team blaster would?
You assume that a solo blaster would not take their AoEs, which is a mistake. A solo blaster will get their AoE that helps them kill faster, if it doesn't help them kill faster then they are likely to skip it. As far as endurance issues go, all blasters that attack fast, have endurance issues. I have /Dev blasters and /anything other than fire blasters. They all use up endurance at a frightening rate because I attack constantly with no pause. If a blaster has endurance left at the end of fight, they are either useing conserve power, Powersink, popped some blues, or let the rest of the team do the killing while they conserved their endurance.
Concern said what I think I was trying to say a bit better.
@Deadedge and @Dead Edge
Peace through power! Freedom is slavery!
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a yo-yo
OK. Naming boo-boo noted, reason for AT being changed noted. Great. Groovy.
/DEV's AT power is already different than the Malta version. Fixing this to allow it to work should not be TOO difficult. For the /DEV version ONLY:
1) Make it a pet-type of whatever type most pets are with 0 self-movement. No problem there, but this way it'll be teleportable like other pets are- and you can leave other objects unportable. Teleporting AT is not a Bad Thing, and breaking it to fix exploits elsewhere shouldn't happen. If you can 'port other pets, let AT ride the same boat.
2) Change the damage type to Energy. Add Knockback/down. Thing always reminded me of those turbolaser batteries from Star Wars anyway, and this will give the /Dev blaster a different damage type and AT will actually help keep bad guys off the Blaster a bit if their AT is slapping villians backwards with those dink shots. /Dev has plenty of S/L damage as is.
3) Buff the fire rate a bit. It's a friggin top-tier power, as pets go AT is fragile anyway and it's a slooooow recharge.
Bonus: Give mines sensors worth mentioning. Whiffbomb should be the real name.
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If you had actually comprehended what you read then you would understand that I don't have delicate sensibilities. 
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Sorry, mate, but as some guy who can't even bare to see a conversation which has absolutely nothing to do with him going on simply because he doesn't agree with the subject matter? Yeah, yer a veritable flower.
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That was sort of the point.
The one you missed.
Over there.
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Nah you just proved the opposite of what you thought you did. Lack of self-awareness for the lose, eh?
Gonna keep trolling the thread? Can't stand it? Look, people kept talking about gaming EVEN AFTER you tried to put a stop to it!
What oh what will your delicate self do now?
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If you had actually comprehended what you read then you would understand that I don't have delicate sensibilities.
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Sorry, mate, but as some guy who can't even bare to see a conversation which has absolutely nothing to do with him going on simply because he doesn't agree with the subject matter? Yeah, yer a veritable flower.
[ QUOTE ]
That was sort of the point.
The one you missed.
Over there.
[/ QUOTE ]
Nah you just proved the opposite of what you thought you did. Lack of self-awareness for the lose, eh?
Gonna keep trolling the thread? Can't stand it? Look, people kept talking about gaming EVEN AFTER you tried to put a stop to it!
What oh what will your delicate self do now?
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Ha. Besides one small comment on the first day of the thread which I felt to be appropriate I've been doing nothing but replying to people who reply to me.
Why people just like you. It's called having a conversation.
Troll? See your own posts if you want to see someone going over the line.
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If you had actually comprehended what you read then you would understand that I don't have delicate sensibilities.
[/ QUOTE ]
Sorry, mate, but as some guy who can't even bare to see a conversation which has absolutely nothing to do with him going on simply because he doesn't agree with the subject matter? Yeah, yer a veritable flower.
[ QUOTE ]
That was sort of the point.
The one you missed.
Over there.
[/ QUOTE ]
Nah you just proved the opposite of what you thought you did. Lack of self-awareness for the lose, eh?
Gonna keep trolling the thread? Can't stand it? Look, people kept talking about gaming EVEN AFTER you tried to put a stop to it!
What oh what will your delicate self do now?
[/ QUOTE ]
Ha. Besides one small comment on the first day of the thread which I felt to be appropriate I've been doing nothing but replying to people who reply to me.
Why people just like you. It's called having a conversation.
Troll? See your own posts if you want to see someone going over the line.
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I see that you were, indeed, too delicate. Shame.
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If you had actually comprehended what you read then you would understand that I don't have delicate sensibilities.
[/ QUOTE ]
Sorry, mate, but as some guy who can't even bare to see a conversation which has absolutely nothing to do with him going on simply because he doesn't agree with the subject matter? Yeah, yer a veritable flower.
[ QUOTE ]
That was sort of the point.
The one you missed.
Over there.
[/ QUOTE ]
Nah you just proved the opposite of what you thought you did. Lack of self-awareness for the lose, eh?
Gonna keep trolling the thread? Can't stand it? Look, people kept talking about gaming EVEN AFTER you tried to put a stop to it!
What oh what will your delicate self do now?
[/ QUOTE ]
Ha. Besides one small comment on the first day of the thread which I felt to be appropriate I've been doing nothing but replying to people who reply to me.
Why people just like you. It's called having a conversation.
Troll? See your own posts if you want to see someone going over the line.
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I see that you were, indeed, too delicate. Shame.
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Ah, but not too serious.
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Captainpants, I have respectfully stayed away from the nature of your posts because I was really hopeing that you would eventually "get it" so to speak. Obviously, several points are flying over your head.
You seem to indicate that the best thing that a blaster can add to a team is damage.
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because it is the least filled role in many teams, there are quite a few teams have 1 scrapper or 1 blaster, and just rely on buffs/debuffs to keep the damage high.
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You also indicate in your post that targeting Drone allows an AoE blaster to deliver better AoE damage over time.
I will point out a couple of things to you that should, if you understand what I am saying, shatter this conception.
The secondary sets with Build-up, also have melee powers. I will talk about them after I have talked about Build-up. With Build-up, you can run through your AoE attack chain and hit mobs with so much force that depending on what set you are, you can kill almost all the minions (not everything may get hit).
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people were comparing access to melee to the access to trip mines, and fire/ does that without aim or build up, and if the clump is tight enough, caltrops can replace things like snowstorm, rarely. rains are strong, and ... relatively.. safe if a troller isnt using immobilize/sleep.
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Now, you may be able to point to a DPS chart and say that overtime the /Dev is actually doing more damage, it doesn't matter though in the game. I can point to the game and say that the blaster useing Build-up is killing more mobs. That is what is important.
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a /dev can kill faster too if he plays right, and like i said, the idle times and the animations bork numbers beyond reliability.
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Now, after the Blaster has delivered his AoE payload, there are still likely to be LTs, and Bosses standing. What does the /Dev user have in his arsenal? Trip Mine, too bad that takes forever to use. Taser, well that will stun one while you wait for powers to recharge. AT, lets not even joke at this point. Caltrops, well we could cause more scatter I guess.
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..... get a troller? or a granite, or a dark/ defender, im sure theres a few other ways, you encounter bosses regularly in 7-8 man teams, who regularly have tankers and trollers, caltrops is great damage mitigation through fear, but your assuming that you must personally deal with every mob in every spawn.
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Oh, but he still has single target ranged attacks while his AoE is rechargeing. Good point, too bad only 1 or 2 of them will likely bring down a target that survived his AoE barrage since he doesn't do the damage of the Build-up Blaster.
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and this is assuming your the only AoE damage in the party.
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Then, looking at the Blaster with Build-up, you will also notice that even if he didn't have that great added damage from Build-up, he can fill his single target attack chain (while AoE rechargeing) with high damage melee attacks that are faster and do more damage than his ranged attacks.
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I really could care less whether the single target comes from range or melee, but many pick single target exclusively because they can chain it.
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Thus, killing more mobs faster. Which is what you say makes a good blaster. Which means, that /Dev is at the back of the pack when it comes to makeing a good blaster for teams and solo.
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I agree on the solo part, setting up is very slow, but in a party with too many controllers you could more than likely lay down the friggin time bomb mid-fight.
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In regards to teaming, perhaps you haven't played blasters much, but we got an increased damage cap. Which means we can actually use a Fulcrum Shift AND a Build-up to hit our cap. Not to mention that to get that Fulcrum Shift boost, you would have to be next to the mobs, now the Build-up Blasters have Melee to use while they are there, what has /Dev got? Oh, cloaking device so they can hide, good job, that helps the team. *roll eyes*
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double FS pbaoe = 80% for trollers, triple siphon power = something like 60-75%, +140-155%, that can be kept nearly perma. and if you did sit in melee, which many have no problem with (least on my teams) a single kin can perma stack FS, which can cap a blaster in large groups.
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No offense, but your examples all seem to come from your observations of poorly built blasters and poorly played blasters. I have a solo Blaster built for PvP. I have all of my AoEs AND my single target blasts (except flares) not to mention most of my heavy hitting melee attacks from my secondary. Exactly what am I missing that a team blaster would have? Recall Friend, aid other, stimulant, I mean what is it you think a Solo blaster will not have that a team blaster would?
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many either skip their AoE or slot them lightly
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You assume that a solo blaster would not take their AoEs, which is a mistake. A solo blaster will get their AoE that helps them kill faster, if it doesn't help them kill faster then they are likely to skip it. As far as endurance issues go, all blasters that attack fast, have endurance issues. I have /Dev blasters and /anything other than fire blasters. They all use up endurance at a frightening rate because I attack constantly with no pause. If a blaster has endurance left at the end of fight, they are either useing conserve power, Powersink, popped some blues, or let the rest of the team do the killing while they conserved their endurance.
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at higher levels there are a few fairly popular defender powersets that deal with this, lower levels there are probably only 2 powers available.
Im not saying that they shouldnt fix device powers like trip mines in hit detection, im saying this set isnt suffering as horribly as half of the people here make it out, bubblers are the top-dog, but its not like they cry for fixes that often (they gimped my MM, so they apparantly have once or twice, i want my repulsion bomb back!)
But this thread is like a compilation of people bashing a set to the point the people who CAN use it to full effect will never even TRY.
Err is this an issue of capabality at this point or an issue of speed?
If its an issue of speed then I think that devices slows progress down a little. The bonus being that solo becomes slightly safer.
My main Blaster is 42 Assualt/Devices, Currently 390 hours clocked on it. (more or less)
My second blaster is level 33 Archery/Electric, I beleive around 110 hours clock on it.
So far between the two... I think My Archer is actualy getting kills faster. Not as safe when solo but still.
I don't solo all the time with eather of them. The most noticable play diffrence I have between the two is this. On my main... when on a team, Devices most of the devices pool becomes completely useless to me. At the same time, on my archer, I still end up using everything.
This is of course, personal play experance.
Actually, it was my self-deprecating attempt at humor in TargetDummy's direction, as opposed to flaming back and forth over an issue I don't agree with him over.
Cyberfyre
How did any of that post of yours have anything to do with my post?
That said, on your proposed teams that fight +3 or less mobs, any of the AoE primaries paired with a non-devices secondary would be better than a devices blaster.
I mean, what's better, a /devices blaster hitting aim and their AoEs and doing good damage, but not finishing off all the minions. Or is it better for the secondaries with BU to hit that and aim, then use their attack chain to wipe out all the minions ... and then do it again 45 seconds or so later. (Also, I believe that blaster's Build Up provides 100% bonus damage, not 80%.)
For my money I'll take the latter.
I do find it odd however, that you're basically in this thread telling a bunch of folks who've played devices blasters and played alongside devices blasters that we don't know how to play the set well. You don't think folks haven't found as many ways as possible to eek out what effectiveness they can from the set by now?
MA Arcs: Yarmouth 1509 and 58812
lol
what a complete waste of time fixing this.
Pants, try and reply without doing a dissection or the quotes start to get incredibly long.
You made a couple of points that I will talk about here. One was that you may have more than one blaster per team and the other being that in large teams a kinetics defender can keep a blaster perma-fulcrum shifted.
In response, let me say this, in large teams I have personaly found that haveing the blaster up close to the mobs is dangerous in the upper level game to their health due to AoE and the more damageing attacks not to mention the mez.
Second, is that often in the upper level teams, there are one or two mobs that the team really wants dead first. Which means that the blaster is likely killing those mobs rather than rushing in to get a fulcrum shift.
This leaves the PbAoE buff and it leaves room for Build-up to easily cap the Blaster. Oh, and haveing a self buff is also usefull for when you get those annoying moments of having your enhancements suddenly get old, doesn't happen much in the late game but it does throughout the mid and early game. Build-up is golden then since you don't have any buffs that are equal to it when it comes to buffing damage.
So in these teams with kinetics defenders/controllers, the /Dev is usually just useing his primary. He doesn't have time to set-up mines, AT, or time bombs because the team is moveing too fast. If he is buffed by fort then the bonus from Targeting drone is pointless because fort is much better. So if there is an emp and a kinetic in the party the /Dev blaster has got jack from his secondary that is really usefull.
Other secondary sets still have their melee. Let me clue you in on another point you made. You stated that players usually choose a single target chain rather than a melee chain. Incorrect, players normally take both. They can use both too, they can hit with their hard hitting single target attacks AND hit with their hard hitting melee only haveing to resort to the low damage ranged attacks when the heavy attacks are rechargeing AND the AoE is rechargeing.
There is no loss to haveing more attacks that do more damage. Devices on the other hand just doesn't do anything necessary on large teams. If a blaster with just his primary got on a team and blasted next to a blaster with devices on such a team, you wouldn't see any difference from one battle to the next.
Now, if you have multiple blasters the advantage of haveing blasters with Build-up is amplified as they can now take out the LTs and almost kill the bosses with their AoE. The addition of more blasters with Build-up will allow them to take out the bosses as well. Especially if the blasters start to use their Nukes from battle to battle while the other blasters not Nukeing use their AoE. Again, Build-up comes out ahead of targeting drone.
No matter how you look at it, /dev is the worst primary except in certain rare cases where it gets to use the rest of it's powers. In the majority of game it doesn't get to use them while it is teamed. Solo, build makes the big difference but generally a blaster with Build-up will move faster if not safer through missions.
People can play with devices and have fun, but it is a weaker set. I want to say that the set isn't gimped, but from personal experience I know differently. Are you simply useing reasoning to come up with the concept that /Dev doesn't need fixing and is fine as is, or are you useing personal experience from your haveing played the set to determine your arguements.
Oh, and if you can get enough controllers that it becomes safe to use Time Bomb in a large team, you don't need a blaster anyway. The controllers will kill everything before the damn bomb goes off.
Your perception of a Solo blaster is very much off the mark if you assume they don't slot their AoE. Maybe you are thinking of specificaly Ice blasters or PvP blasters but solo blasters slot and use their AoE.
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But this thread is like a compilation of people bashing a set to the point the people who CAN use it to full effect will never even TRY.
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That is what it takes to get problems fixed by the players. You have to bash the issue so deep and into such a large hole that there is no way a developer cannot take note of it and try and do something about it.
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So in these teams with kinetics defenders/controllers, the /Dev is usually just useing his primary. He doesn't have time to set-up mines, AT, or time bombs because the team is moveing too fast. If he is buffed by fort then the bonus from Targeting drone is pointless because fort is much better. So if there is an emp and a kinetic in the party the /Dev blaster has got jack from his secondary that is really usefull.
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This is dead-on, you know. In the upper game, a /devices blaster getting use out of his secondary is reliant entirely upoin the team allowing him to do so.
Other builds make use of their secondaries as part and parcel fo teaming.
ED did this to /dev. But as we speak Castle is "looking at dev" to see if nerfing AT will have a negative impact on a set which is already impacted into the negative...
I don't hold out much hope for this secondary any more. Once they get it into their heads that "it's ok" it takes 7 issues of griping to get it reconsidered... and even then it may not see any changes.
Ah well. I guess I could just join the rest of the gamers and play /energy. What is diversity, really, but a word?
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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.
As a player with an actual historical reference to Ar/Dev -- My character Flack Freak was started in Issue 2 -- I have to agree with the majority of the players on the forums. The point everyone is trying to make is that this set has been hit hard and has been so underpowered compared to the other secondaries that you'll hardly ever see it on someone except for those with the masochistic streak.
Let's take some long-time Dev players like Fury Flechette (sorry to bring ya in this Fury 
) who were the utmost authority on the operation of Devices. Double Toe Bomb, Aggro Control, Using Caltrops Right, Dev Blasters could become engines of destruction if they were good.
Then ED hit and we lost our biggest advantage being able to slot maximum damage to even out our damage output loss of not having BU or Aim. With that, the set got progressively worse and became really a shadow of its former self. Fury Flechette retired as AR/Dev and a lot of us with old toons just let them shelve (Like my lvl 45 Ar/Dev Flack Freak).
Sure I can still do some damage, although nowhere near the speed that my other blasters can go. I also know how to play the set pretty well and I can live through the worst situations imaginable.
The point really to the complaints about Devices is that it hasn't been looked at in the slightest. We get the feeling that the Developers are trying to put the last nail in the coffin for this set and we aren't going to see it returned to some usuable point.
Stuff like Smoke Grenade not autohitting in PvE when everything else does. Stuff like Trip Mine not targetting and exploding right. Now, Auto Turret being extremely unreliable and costly to use and is no longer mobile.
The point is to get this stuff fixed so we can get back up to spec with the other secondaries. Because I can match my Sonic/Energy to my Ar/Dev and I know who would be faster at clearing groups.
if you were able to respec out secondaries, and a dev did a quick seacrh thereafter it would show not one person would have it at all, it has been constantly reduced (has it ever had even a slight increase in anything?), I have seen dozens of new blasters running about, not one has devices.
You may get one or two who will take it in the future yes, but largely for thematical reasons than usefulness.
If the good guy gets the girl, it's rated PG;
If the bad guy gets the girl, it's rated R;
And if everybody gets the girl, it's rated X
- Kirk Douglas
i guess i should jus reroll my lvl6 elec\devices now to something like elec\fire so i can get single hitters and AoE's instead of heavily planned out fighting
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Simple excerise using standard use powers: caveats - all attacks using 3 SOs, not including buildup, not standardizing BIs, assuming Sherk is right about the numbers
Katana - Energy Blast
Golden Dragonfly - 12.35 Power bolt - 5.4
Soaring Dragon - 9.75 Power blast - 8.9
Sting of the Wasp - 6.28 Power Burst - 10.2
Katana scrapper has 28.38, Energy has 24.5. Now all BIs are standardizes relative to blasters so the real difference is bigger. Of coure this also assumes a resist neutral mob
edit - If I screwed up correct me, like I said, I'm not a numbers guy.
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Dont't forget DPA. It takes the scrapper about 4-5 seconds to fire those off compared to the 12ish for the blaster. 
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Blasters don't shoot constantly, really.
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With the right build and selection of powers, they can, but I certainly agree with you it's a matter of burst DPS first.
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Code:[/color]
Katana - Energy Blast
Golden Dragonfly - 12.35 Power bolt - 5.4
Soaring Dragon - 9.75 Power blast - 8.9
Sting of the Wasp - 6.28 Power Burst - 10.2
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Dont't forget DPA. It takes the scrapper about 4-5 seconds to fire those off compared to the 12ish for the blaster.
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the activation times of those 2 sets of attacks are either identical or nearly identical
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Deep breaths now.
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*laughs* Nice... does that work in RL?
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I hear it does.
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You might want to head off to another thread that agrees more with your delicate sensibilities.
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If you had actually comprehended what you read then you would understand that I don't have delicate sensibilities.
That was sort of the point.
The one you missed.
Over there.