Blaster Nukes

The "crash nukes" for blasters are a varied bunch. The electrical set has Thunderous Blast, which at its best is good for 312.8 unenhanced damage at level 50. Energy, Psychic, Radiation and Sonic top out at 375.4 damage apiece for Nova, Psychic Blast, Atomic Blast and Dreadful Wail, and Fire gets 544.3 from Inferno. Unfortunately, that's max unenhanced damage. Every one of these nukes also has the potential to hit for 187.7, unenhanced, and every one of them can also miss completely.

At level 50 you can't kill an irradiated gerbil with 188 points of damage, and I don't remember the last time I killed anything with a miss (myself not included.) Even slotted for damage and preceded by aim+buildup, Thunderous Blast vs Arachnos will leave half the minions standing. For powers that drain the blaster entirely of endurance and turn off recovery for 20 seconds, these powers should all be autohit, and the damage ticks should be automatic. If you need to, shave 10% off the max damage. But deliver it every time.

I strongly disagree; the Blaster nukes are actually UNBALANCEABLE without the random damage, no matter what you change the damage scale to.

If nuking killed *everything* it would be too good, but if you nuked and all of your targets stayed up, you would be in deep trouble indeed. It's only balanced if it wipes out most, but not all, of the opposition. So the damage has to be random; otherwise it would flip-flop from good to useless depending on the exact enemies you were fighting.

Accuracy isn't even really an issue; put one SO in and it's as close to autohit as makes no odds.

Every nuke except for Fire does serious offense debuffs or controls that should help you deal with the mop-up, and remember that some characters WANT enemies to survive. A /Fire or /Electric Blaster, as well as a Kin/ Defender, probably would rather kill all but 2 targets than kill all of them.

Altoholic,

Remember that while the Electric Nuke is weaker than others, it doesn't empty your END bar, just applies a -40 and then shut off recovery. That's significantly easier to work around.

Also note, the electric nuke is similar to Blizzard - it is a ranged nuke, the lesser damage balances out the fact that you don't have to close with the enemy, like most of the other nukes listed (fire, psi, sonic, and energy). A smart Electric Blaster can safely nuke around corners.

Well I don't have a Electrical Blast user of sufficient lvl to see what actually happens but both the ingame detailed info and Mids say you lose 40 endurance and have your recovery seriously debuffed:

smashing damage on target 72.29 energy damage on target 75.00%% chance for 36.15 energy damage on target 50.00%% chance for 36.15 energy damage on target -55.00% AttrEndurance on target 30.00%% chance for -25.00% AttrEndurance on target 30.00%% chance for -25.00% AttrEndurance on target -100.00% recovery rate for 20.00s on target -1000.00% recovery rate for 20.00s on self Ignores buffs and enhancements unresistable -40.00 AttrEndurance on self Ignores buffs and enhancements unresistable

cut and pasted from the detailed info ingame.

Is this incorrect?

Edit: The descriptive text, fyi, does seem to indicate you lose all your end, but ...

On my Electric blaster, using my nuke against only one enemy, preferably an AV, I only lose the 40 endurance. It's when I hit multiple foes that I am completely drained. Luckily, even if drained, I can pop a blue, run in, hit Power Sink and fill my blue bar immediately, if any enemies survived, that is.

If the nuke is modified to auto-hit and the random chance for damage becomes automatic, a nuke would kill all the minions with the exception of the stupidly resistant. You still won't kill resistant lt's, you still won't kill bosses, and you still won't kill more than 16 targets every N minutes, depending how much recharge you slot in it. It's ridiculous for these powers to have a six minute recharge, turn the blaster off for 20 seconds, and have that good a chance to leave minions standing.

Incidentally, this is not a result of t-blast's having a lower total damage output than the other nukes. All of them have this problem, because all of them can still deliver only the one pulse of 188 damage (extremely unlikely with fire, but it could happen) and all of them can miss. The psychic blaster faces ridiculous numbers of surviving targets against robots. I did factor in inferno's DoT. Without it, inferno would actually fall in the same damage pattern as everything other than T Blast.

While I'm not strictly comparing the electric nuke to the other nukes in terms of damage, electric doesn't gain damage for having a PBAOE instead of a cone, so I don't see why you would lower the damage on the nuke just because it has range.

Also, as has been correctly reported, you lose 40 endurance per target before your recovery is turned off. By the time you hit aim and buildup, then pay for t-blast, two targets leaves you out of the fight.

I missed someone's post. You cannot nuke around corners with T-Blast. I believe that's limited to Rain of Arrows and Blizzard. Full Auto and Thunderous Blast target enemies, not locations, so you need line of sight.

Boost Range, Power Boost, Aim+Build Up

I snipe with nuke nao?

Eat a couple blues, finish off the boss left standing that has no end to hit back.

*shakes fist* curse you and your quick typing Alpha!

Though I was more referring to Thunderous Blast

I believe you're exaggerating the situation a little bit.

Most tier 9's are situational powers (not all, but most), and should be regarded as such. Also, you're using unenhanced numbers for damage comparisons against mobs. Most blasters usually have their nuke 3 slotted with damage, at least 1 acc, and at least 1 recharge reduction, so you can double the damage there.

Add in aim and buildup to increase the damage, and a tight group is pretty well decimated except for the occasional lt, and most bosses. Pop a blue and use a end recovery/modification feature like conserve energy, hibernation, consume, etc., and the blaster is back in business endurance wise.

As far as accuracy is concerned, remember you have aim, and slot at least one accuracy. You normally get 2 hits average out of 3, so you do get good damage - while freak rolls can happen, it's not very often. The perception of missing a lot is just that a perception that fools the human brain.

Archery and Assault Rifle are the exceptions, but you need to consider that they actually do less damage, AR I believe only targets 10 because it is a cone, and they are both lethal damage, which is the most resisted damage in the game, and it's moderately well balanced. Is it perfectly balanced? No, but the variety is a good thing.

If you want "never miss" attacks, Champions Online has them. And look how popular they are!

... sorry, cheap shot at a target that's already down.

The original post distorts the situation in at least three different ways:
1) "Unenhanced damage" is half damage. Not counting BU/Aim.
2) Arachnos are tougher opponents than nearly anything else heroes face in the 32+ game. If I complained about the performance of my powers, and used Rularuu in example, wouldn't you laugh too?
3) "Can miss completely" is relevant, but fairly rare. Shooting 16 guys and missing 3+, assuming capped to-hit, is about a 3.5% chance if my math is right (and it sometimes is.)

I like having nukes that can erase one spawn every 3-5 fights. Some people prefer "nukes" that hit hard every fight or two, but aren't fightstoppers. Pick your powerset, pick your nuke.

I've used the fire nuke and the electric nuke extensively on teams. Both nukes are a lot of fun to use, but I find the electric nuke more useful than the fire nuke.

The fire nuke does more damage, on paper. But, both nukes kill minions and lieutenants, when teammates are contributing, and both nukes leave bosses injured and seriously angry at my blaster. And, there's no "extra dead" (or extra crispy) state for minions and lieutenants; they're dead or they're not, and "overkill" damage is wasted damage.

In my experience, the extra damage from inferno doesn't make much of a practical difference on teams, while the ability to use thunderous blast from range is sometimes helpful. Plus, the ability to frankenslot the electric nuke for endurance drain (which I do), when paired with a follow-up blue inspiration and short circuit or power sink, gives the electric blaster a better chance of surviving attempts at retribution by mobs not defeated by the nuke.