Get rid of her AR used to be good now its just about the most gimped blaster set out there. Long animation times power damage and way to long recharge times on powers the AR needs some love big time stlye and I hope it gets it in Issue 7 if they uped the damage of the powers it would be good agian.
AR at best seems horribly unsuited to being a Corrupter powerset. The animation times are very fast when the rifle is out which is all well and good until you find yourself needing to use the secondary. Buckshot and M30 are a total joke which doesn't quite seem fair. I'm not sure why they gave Corrupters this as a power set but not Electric Blast.
Really though for all AR is a bit crappy it's traps which needs some loving. If Web Grenade is supposed to be the equal of a heal then why do Corrupters only do 75% blaster damage? Surely if the Blaster secondaries are an equal to the Defender ones then Corrupters, Defenders and Blasters should all do the same damage. And how a small slow move is supposed to be the equal of Tar Patch or Lingering Radiation is something I'll never know. As for the traps themselves I thought that since they have the disadvantage that they have to be prepped in advance they would have an advantage to compensate but it really doesn't seem to be the case. If the devs are too busy nerfing to attempt to balance the pools then surely they should give out power pool respecs.
AR has always been a set with half the powers bad, the really useful ones are burst, slug, sniper, flamethrower and full auto, and maybe ignite and beanbag depending on your playstyle.
Only reason why I took AR/Traps is because there were hardly any of them about.
Both sets are kind of nerfed, as in there aren't that many decent powers early on, especially AR, up till level 18 I was only using Burst, Slug and Sniper Rifle.
The point here is that rather then wasting precious powers investing into silly powers, I put them into my power pools such as Leadership (Acc+Dmg) or Teleport (goes well with Traps).
It does become a fun character, but that depends on how you build your character up.
The long animation times aren't that bad, it's something you get use to (PvE strictly). Then at 35 you get mines, and that's when the real fun begins 
Its true I have had much fun watching soul trying to trip mine a group of monsters that see him. The mine explodes....sadly souls face is the thing nearest to it, course a microsecond later, its one of the things furthest away 
Is only funny cos its true!
I would have made 40 a very long time ago if I could resist doing that, but it's just funny when it happens.
Think I racked up 100k debt at one point!
Mental note: Must get CONCEALMENT in respec!
You know there's something wrong when a supposedly group oriented character (she sure as hell can't solo) gets booted from groups for being useless, while solo-oriented characters stay on. Traps desperately needs buffs but since the devs do nothing but nerf indiscriminately I can only hope that the next random nerf hammer falls less severely on her than other characters, and she'll be somewhat useful by comparison.
Sigh.
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Then at 35 you get mines, and that's when the real fun begins
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I hope you've tried a blaster in CoH and got to the mines before you say that. For me mines seemed great until I got them. Took forever to get some out and the damage wasn't that great. In team people tended not to be willing to wait for me to lay out 3 - 4 mines as it took too long time. Just my humble opinion... I know some people likes'em.
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Then at 35 you get mines, and that's when the real fun begins
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I hope you've tried a blaster in CoH and got to the mines before you say that. For me mines seemed great until I got them. Took forever to get some out and the damage wasn't that great. In team people tended not to be willing to wait for me to lay out 3 - 4 mines as it took too long time. Just my humble opinion... I know some people likes'em.
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Already tried and loved them mate. Really depends on the team, I set mines up in CoV all the time, I'll share some situations so hopefully people get inclined to try them.
Personally have two recharge reductions on trip mines which is why I can mine so fast. About 7-8 mines can take out one of those annoying Family "Consieuthngy" bosses through a good lure if going solo. So investing in a few minutes of laying mines to ensure a kill on a boss rather then running in and dying and wasting more time getting yourself back together.
On teams, lay mines wherever possible, may sound daft, but you never know when you might get chased and so you can run to a mine point for cover, if it doesn't go off, there's a small chance an ambush would run into it later on.
Teaming with a brute? Great! They run in and draw the aggro, you run in behind them and set the mine right next to their feet, doesn't apply with certain enemies (damn you CoTs -shakes fist-) but it works most of the time and you can deal a great deal of damage if you slot it properly.
My AR/Devices blaster is stuck at 18, need to get that poor sod's level up one day, but at level 30, concealment + trip mine + TP Foe = very annoyed villain.
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Get rid of her AR used to be good now its just about the most gimped blaster set out there. Long animation times power damage and way to long recharge times on powers the AR needs some love big time stlye and I hope it gets it in Issue 7 if they uped the damage of the powers it would be good agian.
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Acctually (funniest thing) AR gets a slight accuracy bonus to each power. Not that it really matters, right?
Also, according to the in-game description they get an Extreme Damaging cone by level 18. Now, I don't know really what measures it as extreme, 'cause to the damage listed SherkSilver's planner looks pretty lousy to me.
The recharge timers aren't that horrid. Again, Buckshot is (oddly enough) listed as a recharge 8. Now, that's the fastest recharging cone (although rather small) in the entire Corruptor primary as far a s I can tell.
On the whole, I do agree, it does need some attention. There's a lack of Aim, the set was more or less designed to work with /Devices. Back in the days, when Smoke Grenade was a 50% DeBuff, flooring the accuracy of an even-level minion, flamethrower + full-auto, all 6-slotted for damage (before EDs, when 6-slotting for Damage was a really thing). Next, please!
Oh, dang, now I got all nostalgic and [censored] 
. Anyhow, the set may need some love, but it's by far gimped, IMHO.
Mmmm, ooh yeah, something that I just want to lay out there. AR is one of the sets which can swing both ways, you can play it as a pretty solid single-power set. Or you can play it as an AoE set early on as well. Buckshot and M30 might not look that intimidating, and with the knockback on M30 an all, but consider the fact that if Buckshot or M30 hits more than one foe, it suddenly deals more damage than either Burst or Slug. I'm saying that the damage might not be great, but it pays off if you hit many foes at once.
Also, I believe most other level 32 powers give you a pretty nasty penalty. AR doesn't.
Actually no, Buckshot and M30 do about 40% of the damage of Slug so they need to hit 3 enemies to do comparable damage, and even then they cost far too much endurance, recharge far too slowly, and gain far too much aggro to be worth using, let alone taking. When you consider that Flame Breath does significantly MORE damage than Slug even when used on a single enemy you begin to realise that the devs are slack jawed idiots without the slightest clue about balance.
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Actually no, Buckshot and M30 do about 40% of the damage of Slug so they need to hit 3 enemies to do comparable damage, and even then they cost far too much endurance, recharge far too slowly, and gain far too much aggro to be worth using, let alone taking. When you consider that Flame Breath does significantly MORE damage than Slug even when used on a single enemy you begin to realise that the devs are slack jawed idiots without the slightest clue about balance.
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Dude, I just, I must have smoked a [censored]-load of pot because I was obviously right. Buckshot recharges as fast as Slug.
According to the BI, Buckshot is listed as 2.5333 Smashing Damage. 8 Sec Recharge. Range 40, and a 40 degree cone. 1.87 activation.
Compare to Fire Breath, 10 range, 40 degree cone. 4.875 BI. 16 Recharge. 2.67 recharge.
You can, efficiently fit in two buckshots. In the time it takes to execute and recharge one Fire Breath. Thus making the damage 5.0666 smashing. More than Fire Breath. Yey, for suckiness!
Of course then the endurance cost plays in. Where Buckshot costs roughly 10 endurance points, Fire Breath costs 15. So it's 20 to 15 instead, and for such a slight gain... oh, well, can't have it all...
Oh, wait, I'm not done. Slug deals 4.5556 damage (smashing and according to the BI). Has exactly the same activation and recharge as buckshot (but, a 95 range and lightly lower endurance cost that is). Again, two targets make Buckshot more efficient than slug.
M30 is listed as 2.5 damage, and again, two targets or more would make it higher damaging than Slug.
Of course, the damage on Buckshot and M30 is relatively low for playing it as an AoE set in the long haul but it's been proven over and over that playing it as an AoE set and respecing it out is more than possible and far from gimped.
Also, just as a note, just a "slack jawed idiot" would go about using a cone as a single target attack 
(hope you're not easily offended). Nothing personal, just that both Fire and AR has some single targets attacks, why not use them on a single target? As the devs surely intended? Considering the Endurance cost won't measure up with using a Cone or AoE as Single Target.
IMHO, AR does still look good on paper. It suffers a bit in-game, especially with M30 which (as you say) does relatively little damage for being a mob shatterer and aggro magnet.
You're poor theory does perhaps hint how the developers could have made such egregious miscalculations about the effectiveness of AR.
Firstly you should start every fight with all your powers charged. If you get to fire and reload Flamebreath then you would immediately fire it again. Buckshot would get get 3 attacks to Flamebreaths 2 giving it a rather derisory 7.5999 damage to Flamebreaths 9.75. In terms of endurance both would clock in at 30. In ideal circumstances and at those numbers Buckshot could occasionally level and with a lucky Scourge even slightly exceed Flamebreaths but far too rarely to make it useful. Don't forget in optimal circumstances where the enemy is defeated by the first wave of attacks Flamebreath does 4.875 to Buckshots 2.5333.
Also any slack jawed idiot knows it's better to do damage than not. Refusing to use Flamebreath on a single enemy because of inefficient recharge rates is a bit baffling, particularly if you aren't expecting to meet a group in the next 16 seconds.
Lastly the figures you've quoted seem to be wrong or out of date. Whenever I've used it, even unslotted Slug has always done significantly more than twice the damage of Buckshot, and has always recharged significantly faster. However since then I've neglected Buckshot so hard numbers would take some time and expense to work out.
Bah, I really should have made that post later in light of clear reason. The numbers you've provided do look in the ballpark. Also I noticed the argument you made against using cones as single target attacks is one based on endurance. That's down to a question of doing damage quickly vs conserving endurance. Against 1 enemy both Firebreath and Buckshot are an inefficient use of endurance, but it may be worth taking the loss in order to do damage more quickly especially with Flamebreath. Flamebreath is a fine use of endurance against 2 targets but Buckshot still looks very dodgy indeed. For Buckshot to be worthy as a power choice next to Slug you must continually hit 3 enemies with it which is very optimistic for a small cone.
But the real thing is Buckshots lousy damage rate which tends to require about 25-50% more time to kill enemies compared to Flamebreath. This is obviated a little in real circumstances that Flamethrower compares more favourably compared to Fireball but it doesn't save Buckshot from being an extremely sucky power.
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You're poor theory does perhaps hint how the developers could have made such egregious miscalculations about the effectiveness of AR.
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Say what? My numbers where based on comparing one attack to another.
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Firstly you should start every fight with all your powers charged. If you get to fire and reload Flamebreath then you would immediately fire it again. Buckshot would get get 3 attacks to Flamebreaths 2 giving it a rather derisory 7.5999 damage to Flamebreaths 9.75. In terms of endurance both would clock in at 30. In ideal circumstances and at those numbers Buckshot could occasionally level and with a lucky Scourge even slightly exceed Flamebreaths but far too rarely to make it useful. Don't forget in optimal circumstances where the enemy is defeated by the first wave of attacks Flamebreath does 4.875 to Buckshots 2.5333.
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Again, my calculations was to compare one attack with another.
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Also any slack jawed idiot knows it's better to do damage than not. Refusing to use Flamebreath on a single enemy because of inefficient recharge rates is a bit baffling, particularly if you aren't expecting to meet a group in the next 16 seconds.
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Of course, but as far as theory goes I'm not sure saying that Slug is a worse single target attack than Fire Breath is correct. Mainly because of endurance cost and recharge.
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Lastly the figures you've quoted seem to be wrong or out of date. Whenever I've used it, even unslotted Slug has always done significantly more than twice the damage of Buckshot, and has always recharged significantly faster. However since then I've neglected Buckshot so hard numbers would take some time and expense to work out.
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Well, to prove myself right, I just went in-game and tried out an even-level minion (well a few, acctually) (Level 2 Arachnos Wolf Spider)
Brawl: 3.65 Damage (Smashing)
Unslotted Slug vs. Even-level Minion.: 16.67 Damage
Unslotted Buckshot vs. Even-Level Minion: 9.25 Damage
Slug deals rougly 4.56 times the damage of Brawl (rounding down, as numbers are exact, they don't go up). Buckshot deals 2.53.
Whoops, those numbers were correct.
Recharge (timed and clocked): 8 Seconds, this kicks in after the ~2 second animation (as it should be, btw).
Seems I wasn't too far off then.
Edited in: Ah, I see you caught the whole post now. Well, I agree that Buckshot is indeed sub-par damage. But no matter how you see it, a cone is a cone. If you want a multiple target build even in the very early game, Buckshot and M30 is all you have.
You can toss them out in a Respec (you should, M30 clashes big time with Flamethrower). Since many corruptors carry their own Buffs and DeBuffs you can boost your own damage up quite nicely, of course it will still be a lot worse than (for instance) a Fire/* Corruptor with the same secondary and similiar build.
Firstly, sorry for going off on one I really need to wind down before I shoot my mouth off.
I was comparing the two powers directly but the problem lies in that area attacks don't tend to be needed more than a few times, and with Flamebreaths initial kicker it will always do better than the straight damage/recharge time would suggest.
The other issue comes in the backup from Traps. An AR/Traps Corrupter has to take at least 4 powers from Slug, Burst, Buckshot, M30 Grenade, Web Grenade, Caltrops and Triage Beacon. If you respec out of Buckshot and M30 you have to respec into two equally sucky powers.
There doesn't seem a good reason why Buckshot should compare so unfavourably with Flamebreath since it's a relatively simple comparison. It's just a shame no-one ant NC seems to have bothered to do the math.
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Firstly, sorry for going off on one I really need to wind down before I shoot my mouth off.
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No real need to apologize, I guess I wasn't going too easy myself. Also, my giant, inflatable ego doesn't go *pooof* that easily
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I was comparing the two powers directly but the problem lies in that area attacks don't tend to be needed more than a few times, and with Flamebreaths initial kicker it will always do better than the straight damage/recharge time would suggest.
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Very true indeed. I'm not saying my idea of measuring was in any way practical. I just compared the two power, trying to show that Buckshot in a way is more efficient than Fire Breath. However, the practical use differs. For instance, an AoE build attracts aggro. You want as much front-loaded damage as possible, not the most effective damage over time.
And, as far as power choice go, I can see why AR/Traps gets a little bit ripped off. Some powers in the Traps set just doesn't look attractive at all too me.
Oh, and regarding those four powers:
- Burst (Level 1)
- Slug (Level 2)
- Web Grenade (Level 1)
- Caltrops. (Level 4)
Caltrops is pretty nice acctually, and can be exploited for some extra DoT. After that it's just dipping into power pools for all it's worth then.
Fire and AR is so fundamentally different. The equivalent of Fire Breath comes by later, Flame Thrower. I'm not really fond of this thing we got started here; comparing individual powersets. Mainly because of the fact that you should pick a set out of Concept, Function and Fun. If you can fit in Fire, Think it's Fun and want some early, good AoEs and Cones it's what you should pick.
If you want an Assault Rifle, shine later on, and attack things with some solid cones from a distance it's what you pick.
Because it's part of my nature I can't stop doing comparisons like this. While conceptually I liked the idea of AR/Traps I can't help but be bothered when I find it was such a bad call, it's just part of my nature.
Fire and AR aren't really all that different. Both do damage, both have a lot of AoE attacks and neither have any great special abilities. But Fire does more damage, earlier, faster, over a greater area and requires less endurance to boot. I'd be better off if I didn't worry about these things, I took these powers because I liked the concept and thought they'd be fun. But whenever my group sends a request for a healer I realise it's my fault, whenever they are looking for a damage dealer I realise it's my fault. If I'd taken Fire/Kin I could have fulfilled both those roles and had a great buff to boot. As is I feel like an anchor.
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Fire and AR aren't really all that different. Both do damage, both have a lot of AoE attacks and neither have any great special abilities. But Fire does more damage, earlier, faster, over a greater area and requires less endurance to boot.
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Yeah, except that Burst and Slug are awesome Single Target Attacks, even while doing Lethal damage.
Buckshot and M30 is indeed skipable, but for the early game I would at least pick up M30.
Sniper at 10.
At 18 is when AR really comes into play. A medium ranged cone, and at level 32 a re-occuring usable attak. 60 second Recharge though, but compared to each and every other level 32 power in the corruptor line this is damn good.
I've mentioned all of this in this thread I think. AR really isn't that bad, it's just a late bloomer.
AR also has another upside, both Burst and Slug has relatively long range (90 and 95). It's been suggested by some to slot it by range enhancers. This will effectively get them very close to Sniper Rifle's range. As we all now, there aren't anything called safe range in this game, but AR comes close...
Fire gets all their main tools by level 8.
Also, there's whole lot tactics involved with using Traps I presume (just like with Devices in the Blaster line). Teleporting enemies into traps, etc, etc. Again, it's a different kind of game. AR/Traps obviously wasn't for you, that's it. None of the sets are totally gimped even though I don't like the look of Traps
By the time you've finished the game Assault Rifle does almost catch up with Fire. It still lacks a nuke and has some other issues but it has roughly comparable powers everywhere else and even a couple of nice bonuses. As a Corrupter though it does have major problems with activation times and as any class needs a good ability near the bottom of its secondary. Annoying, sub-par and in need of love but not totally gimped.
What is gimped is Traps. While this kind of powerset is harder to judge than straight up damage we have a pretty clear path going on.
Blasters have the same primary's as Corrupters, but do 33% more damage. If Corrupters are supposed to be balanced with Blasters the difference must be in their secondary.
Traps Corrupters share 4 abilities with Device Blasters. What's more they have to wait until later to get two of them, and one of them is classed as their ultimate. It's fairly common to recommend one of the Device abilities over the Traps specific one.
Assault Rifle/Devices is a pretty good Blaster powerset, not THE best but among the best. Assault Rifle/Traps is one of, if not the worst Corrupter powersets, and compared to any of the ones that feature neither of the two pools, by a very significant margin. It's not a question about preference, unless you are talking about preference to being a good soloer and/or a useful team member to being neither. I like everything about the powersets except being a total anchor.
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By the time you've finished the game Assault Rifle does almost catch up with Fire. It still lacks a nuke and has some other issues but it has roughly comparable powers everywhere else and even a couple of nice bonuses. As a Corrupter though it does have major problems with activation times and as any class needs a good ability near the bottom of its secondary. Annoying, sub-par and in need of love but not totally gimped.
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Acctually, activation timers for AR isn't that slow. We're talking 0.2 seconds here and there.
Also, lacking a Nuke is a good thing. Full Auto has a 60 second recharge, while all the nukes has a 360 second recharge. Full auto is still there a lot more often than a Nuke attack. Flame Thrower + Full Auto is the nuke.
Again, matter of preference. Attack neatly packed mobs from medium range or pull of a nuke in the midst of the fray.
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It's not a question about preference, unless you are talking about preference to being a good soloer and/or a useful team member to being neither. I like everything about the powersets except being a total anchor.
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Yes, it is. You don't go about saying that Ice is Gimped, when it's not just because it lacks AoE capability (which doesn't either, really) in comparison to Fire. Really, what set you choose, play and like is preference. All sets are different.
We've kind of been staring us blind on two sets in this discussion. There are more to Corruptors than just AR and Fire. And Definetly more to AR than AR/Traps.
Definately is about preference.
You've seen how many AR/Traps corruptors there are? Hardly any! That's probably one of the reasons why I chose this build, I've still yet to see an AR/Traps corruptor in all me 40 levels. The build may be gimped but I rather be that way then be one of many.
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Definately is about preference.
You've seen how many AR/Traps corruptors there are? Hardly any! That's probably one of the reasons why I chose this build, I've still yet to see an AR/Traps corruptor in all me 40 levels. The build may be gimped but I rather be that way then be one of many.
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The fact that you got to level 40 ought to be proof for everyone that it isn't gimped .
I suspect the reason for the weakness is that AR was designed to be a Blaster primary and Traps was designed to be a Mastermind secondary (where it fairs quite well).
I really should do something about this signature.
I've got one of these to level 14 and I'm becoming aware of the fact she's no good. Most of the early powers are total [censored] and while AR looks to get some interesting stuff later on to balance it out /Traps increasingly looks like taking Gimp Self. A good chunk of the powers come from a secondary I took a 25% damage hit to avoid while the others just don't seem to pull their weight to compensate. Acid Mortar is nice but it's no Enervating Field and I just can't see the other powers coming even close to compensating.
Can AR/Traps ever be a useable powerset or should I stop throwing good time after bad in levelling her up?