Corruptor vs Blaster

I've been playing on and off since about issue 5 and have mad many heroes and villains. Only a few at lvl 50, mainly heroes. But I have never touched the blaster AT pasted lvl 10. Mainly because they dont really have anything that helps to keep them alive (heals, resistance, defense ect). I know this works for a lot of people, but it doesn't work for me.I know I can dip into the power pools, but I've found heal self to not be that useful.

I dont know much about or really care for numbers that much, but from what I can tell, Corruptors have blaster primaries with defender primaries (or controllers secondary), while dominators have controller primary and blaster secondary.

I was wondering how corruptors play a role in teams and soloing. I'd most likely go the path of kinetics because its a lot of fun for me. I assume blasters do more damage, but do corruptors do more damage than defenders and dominators?

This feels like a silly thread to start, so sorry in advance, lol.

While they have similar sets, I personally do not place ATs in the same group with any other. They all play differently regardless even if corruptors sets look like reverse defenders. My Rad/Ice defender feels nothing like my AR/Rad corruptor. Corr damage at base mod do more damage than defenders and less damage than blasters. But you plan to go with kinetics so when you grab fs, you'll end up doing more damage than blasters.

Hope this helps

Oh and just an fyi, doms don't have blaster secondaries. They have Assault sets which are a mix of ranged and melee attacks. These assault sets are unique to dominators.

Blasters can be fun if you have enough green inspirations to make them work. I've only ever had one. According to my bro, mine is one of the hardier kinds (elec/fire), but I still miss the healing ablilities that the Corruptor has.

I see the Blaster AT as one that lives or dies by the words "the best defense is a good offense". Corruptors tend to be hardier than Blasters simply because they have other means of slowing the enemy's drain on their health bar. Since I primarily play ranged characters, Corruptors are ideal for me; I hardly ever get into melee range with my Blaster, and it helps to be able to heal/buff/debuff.

You asked if the Corruptor does more damage than a Defender or a Dominator. I can say for sure that Corruptors do more damage than Defenders, if only because Corruptors have the Scourge inherant (chance for double damage that increases as target's health decreases). I'd have to check the numbers regarding Corruptor damage vs. Dominator damage, but I personally prefer to play Corruptors over Dominators so that I can heal &/or buff myself &/or debuff the enemy.

You mentioned that you would probably go with the Kinetics secondary on a Corruptor, which would increase your damage output via the use of Siphon Power and Fulcrum Shift. In my experience, Kinetics can be aggravating on a Corruptor, especially when trying to keep an enemy out of melee range (since this practically renders Transfusion useless). That's probably just a matter of playstyle, though.

Corruptors tend to be welcome on teams, mostly for their heals/buffs/debuffs, but also for their ability to do damage at range and 'pull' an enemy if necessary. They also tend to do well solo as long as the difficulty isn't set too high. I've never had a problem with them, either solo or on teams, and I find them to be a thoroughly enjoyable AT.

I hope that this lengthy post helps answer your questions, and that you won't think that I'm being too much of a know-it-all. This is mostly my personal experience with the AT's mentioned (along with that bit from my brother), so it may not apply. Either way, I hope it helps.

Thanks everyone. This answers my question(s).

If you want to solo much on a /Kin corruptor, I'd recommend Sonic/. Or if you don't like that, Ice/. A /Kin corr tends to be lacking in solo survivability; a control/debuff heavy primary helps that.

As a veteran blaster player, let me say that blasters can play very differently from one another. Some are steady but safe soloers (AR/Dev) to pure glass cannon (Fire/Fire), while most fall somewhere in between.

My Ice/Ice blaster plays like a pocket debuffer with slows, holds. My AR/Mental plays a lot like a regen blaster with the ability to gain back health/endurance recovery and then launch AoE after AoE. The electric/electric I had back in the day blasted very little and mostly meleed stuff (wish I would've kept her since IOs would have added a lot of needed defense)

My advice is to try out a few different versions. They definitely don't play the same from one another.

One odd observation I've noticed about corruptors/blasters is that corruptors tend to be more team oriented in the beginning and become very strong solo later in their careers (it's that way with thermal for example with melt armor coming at 38). Blasters are strong soloists at the beginning of their careers, but later on become more team dependent (not that they can't solo, but they shine where other hero ATs can cover up weaknesses).

While Blaster damage is much higher than Corr damage, blasters bring nothing but damage to a team. Corrs bring much, much more.

I would rather have damage and buffs/debuffs which enable the entire team to do more damage than just more damage. That's personal preference though.

Given the choice between a team full of Blasters, a mixed team of Blasters and Corruptors, and a team full of Corruptors, I'd more than likely take the team of Corruptors. Blasters just bring damage, while Corruptors bring damage and extra defensive or offensive potential - on a team of buffing ATs (Defenders, Controllers, Corruptors, and even MMs), the whole will very often be greater than the sum of its parts.

I'm a fan of both ATs, personally (I'm a fan of any power set with ridiculous damage).

From personal experience, I believe Corruptors to be more "fun". When considering raw damage, Corruptors aren't nearly as powerful as Blasters (but much, much more powerful than Defenders). However, Corruptors tend to get cooler toys to play with. The buffs/debuffs from their secondary gives Corruptors added damage, which, in the long run, I believe makes them more powerful than Blasters. They do this by either out-living the Blaster, or by debuffing the crap out of the enemy, or by buffing themselves.

I actually have a Fire/Cold Corruptor that I've built for pure offense and survival. She doesn't have any of the Cold Domination Shields. With her, I can easily rival any generic Blasters out there, and she's just so much fun to play with!

The difference between Blasters, Corruptors and Dominators really boils down more to attack selection than damage modifier. Blasters and Dominators really seem to do more damage than you would think because of their ability to get "up close and personal" and slam a powerful melee attack into the foe. Corruptors, on the other hand, can buff their damage to get better results, and are much hardier. They take a lot more time and effort doing other things than blasting, but the bad guys still end up dead. (er, defeated)

Corruptors and Blasters do more AoE damage at range. (And Corruptors are more likely to survive doing that, solo ) Blasters and Dominators really become damage monsters when you get them in melee, although of course that's increasing the risk. If you take the three of them at range they're actually pretty similar (the Dominator's really the weakest there, although it can add its damaging holds to the mix) where they differ is what they do after they've "softened up" the foe at range.

And I will add that I don't really agree that Corruptors and Defenders are all that different. It depends on the build, of course, but outside of Scourge a good, offensive based Defender (meaning a Primary that boosts damage) will be very close to a Corruptor. The Corruptor will do more base damage, but the Defender will have a better boost, so the end result, as long as you've got that +Dam/-Res to start with, is the same. The advantage of Scourge is that it really helps the Corruptor finish off a foe when he needs it most, when he's close to running out of End and HP. If it's all about what you do after you "soften up" the foe, then the Defender is the one who doesn't really do anything but keep that up until the foe's dead.

Blasters dont do enough damage in my opinion to justify the squishieness they get. The lie that range is a blasters defense will just end up getting you killed since everything can out range you even with boost range. I been playing a few other MMOs and see how easily their range classes survive because the range as defense actually works in most cases. As for as corrupters go, the damage is just too poor for my tastes for solo play. For groups blizzard is the only reason to go as a corrupter since its the blaster version with scourge. The defensive capability corrupters and defenders get dont justify the piss poor damage either. Finally we get to doms. Prior to the recent changes I would have said they werent worth mentioning but post damage buff they are one of the most awsome ATs in the game to me. No matter what primary or secondary you choose you can now solo just about everything short of an AV scaled down to an elite boss. Unfortunately thats the real problem they have in the 40s and the drop a mission thing is every 3 days. Sigh... But outside of that doms are great if you want good damage for solo play with good survivability.

you know, i think blasters dont have enough cannon for the glass part..

i mean, scrappers/brutes/corrs/doms can *approach* their level of damage, while having much more disproportionate levels of defence, whether it be from a armor secondary, or just migitaion via debuffs/control

I mean, who cares if the blaster does 270 dps, while the scrapper does 250 and is 5x tougher?

This is true.

One could argue that Blasters can get high levels of mitigation through IOs (ranged softcap def etc) but that's largely moot as the same level of investment would make a tough scrapper even tougher while putting out competetive damage.

IMO, I agree with you. Blasters do have the highest raw damage, but many other ATs can come close while bringing more to the team/being easier to solo. Shame, really. Although it is worth noting that if you have the support to keep them on their feet (emp or therm or what have you), some blaster combinations can put out absolutely ludicrous amounts of raw damage.

My Fire/MM blaster is monstrous with a good emp.

It is worth noting that the Fire/Kin can only match Blaster damage once buffed and after 44 (or is Fireball 47 for Controllers? I forget)

As for buffing blaster damage being game-breaking, I don't know. I would have thought there's a certain point where you do so much damage there's essentially no risk to yourself (1shotting everything) but I've no idea where that point lies. This is the kind of problem inherent with designing such one-dimensional ATs, imo.

Boo hero ATs, yay villain ATs (and thus is my bias exposed!)