Powerset killed by power _____

Yeah, that's probably what killed them for me, too, or at least half the reason. I just hate episodic power like that when I'm fighting things that are a bit too tough. I ESPECIALLY hate episodic power when my status protection is in it. On the one hand, a Dominator has better status protection than a Blaster. On the other hand, a Dominator even HAS status protection only sometimes. And since I don't build for perma-Dom, that's rather rare.

I actually do the same thing - I keep saving the power and saving it and saving it... Only to really need it literally the next fight after I break down and use it. It's kind of like Scrapper T9 God Mode powers... Only not. It's like them in that I shepherd the power, but it's not like that in that I can play a Scrapper without touching his T9, whereas playing a Dominator without Domination is... Harsh.

So, yeah, AT gimmick really kills me on the AT.

Speaking of which, Gauntlet ensures I will NEVER play a Tanker ever in my life. Will not. Vigilance used to be another turnoff, but ever since it started giving a damage buff, I've seen it much more favourably. Still won't try Defenders, though. My failure to play Kheldians and Dominators in the ways I preferred has soured me on trying anything new.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

Okay.

If you like that Blasters deal good ST and AOE damage via direct attacks,
and you like a playstyle that involves heavy use of active mitigation,
but you don't think that Blasters have enough in the latter department,
especially when going up against multiple enemies,
and you don't care about a hit to team damage contribution,
then Dominators are a good pick.

Most Blasters have a solo playstyle that is similar to Dominators, relying on taking enemies out of the fight before they can harm you. On teams, Blasters are more free to leverage their AoE and melee damage attacks to deal absurd amounts of DPS, but that's not really relevant for someone who only solos. Dominators can't ramp up the damage like Blasters can, but instead they have real crowd control that makes soloing many enemies at a time more feasible. I'd say it's a mistake to think of Dominators as Controller analogues; to be honest, and I know this is going to raise some eyebrows, I'd say the closest equivalent to a Controller is a Mastermind - they do it very differently, but they're both do-everything ATs that mix damage, mitigation, and force multiplication. Dominators are really much more like Blasters, especially after the revamp that kicked the damage boost out of Domination and into the AT mods.

The exception is /Dev Blasters, which are basically /Traps corrs - without all the good things about /Traps corrs. Yeah, I said it.

Ok, I'll admit I don't really factor in end costs when I'm playing a set that has an auto-hit end recovery power with a fast recharge. Powers that fire off fast = me not dead. Powers that fire off slowly but don't cost as much end = me dead with a full blue bar. End costs can be mitigated with inspirations, IOs, SO slotting, and recovery powers. Activation times are set.

Fire Sword Circle is also an AoE, which Fire Sword is not. Hence, why I compared it to another AoE.
Ok I get it. If you don't use it as mitigation it isn't mitigation.

I hereby propose we stop treating all the Blaster immobilizes as mitigation. After all, I don't use most of them as mitigation after level 20 or so, therefore they don't count as mitigation.
Then WHY THE HELL are you facing spawns of 8 minions and 2 lieutenants? Just because you CAN crank up your difficulty doesn't mean you HAVE TO.

Yeah, and I can tank Malta on +4x8 on my Scrapper. Therefore all Scrappers must be able to do so, even those with SOs and concept builds.

Oh, did I mention that I spent a lot of inf to get that Scrapper to that point? Yeah, I'm sure a lot of those Controllers and Defenders forget to mention that too. Just like those Blasters who make those videos.

Well, they do get higher base damage, and Defiance, and....um....ok you got me. /Traps just served to show those who still doubted how much /Dev needs a buff. If it wasn't for those sweet, sweet Tripmines...oh sweet little Tripmines, how I love thee....I would have dropped the set long ago. Now I have one at 50 though, so I can join the chorus: BUFF /DEVICES!

I'd actually take a SO'd D3 or Fire/Rad up against x8 Malta. Maybe not +4x8.

The Electric-Knight ______ Malfaz _____ Zox'Oculox

@Zethustra

"Now at midnight all the agents and the superhuman crew come out
and round up everyone that knows more than they do"-Dylan

www.pauldamonthomas.com - Original Music

A x8 mob of malta has a whole lot of teleporting bosses and Lts that just wanna hit you with a Liquid Nitrogen Round first chance they get.

I didn't say I'd win.

For the record I didn't say you'd lose

Two questions. One, if endurance can be mitigated with all that, then why can't health. Two, are we talking about the same set? Energy Manipulation does not have an auto-hit endurance recovery power. It has Conserve Power, yes, but that really doesn't do terribly much overall.

I'm not sure where I was going with that.


And you do? So you're saying that Thunder Strike, the power which has a low chance for AoE knockback and even lower for AoE stun, should blip on the radar of mitigation? If you count that, you might as well count the stun chance in Thunder Kick, and I simply wouldn't. It's not a question of what I use it as, it's a question of what it's useful for, and mitigation is really not something that it's useful for. Lightning Clap, yes. That I agree on. Reliable stun, large area of effect, reliable knockback. But Thunder Strike? You might as well call Power Bolt mitigation. And it really isn't.

Hmm... Emphasising words at random. I'm pretty good at this game.

I DIDN'T crank up my difficulty. I REDUCED it. I'm playing at -1, and already people are insulting me for being TOO WEAK. In fact, my difficulty is -1x3. What would you suggest I make it? -1x1? I'm not facing bosses, most of the stuff I face is one level below me and it makes for good use of AoE powers that usually went unused on the old Tenacious difficulty, which spawned much deadlier situations, by the way.

Please don't mix up enemy numbers with enemy level. I never said I increased enemy level. In fact, I'm pretty confident I spoke against increasing enemy level somewhere in this thread.

Actually, I'm serious here. What difficulty should I be playing at? Tell me so I can try it and we can avoid insulting my intelligence in the future.

Maybe we're operating on a different time scale here. How much time do you tend to devote to laying down trip mines? Or do you toe-bomb with them?

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

I have an Electric/Electric Blaster, myself. That sleep doesn't do anything for him, simply because if I don't wake them up, the Voltaic Sentinel will. Besides, what can you do in two seconds that doesn't involve hitting your enemies? And what power is it that has reliable AoE sleep?

Mind you, I'm not dising sleep as an effect. It has questionable merit, but it has merit nonetheless. I used to swear by Sleep Gas Grenade from Munitions Mastery before I swapped it out for Surveillance. Buuut... Sleep Gas Grenade is a 30-second 100% mag3 sleep (or was last I checked). This IS mitigation, and a pretty serious form. That's enough to pick off quite a few enemies one by one. A two-second interruptible sleep? What does that get you?

You can't always help it. The higher levels have a lot of highly resistant enemies that just don't go down easily, from simple things like Crey Tanks and Hercules Titans to Rikti Chiefs, the various Praetorians (Dominatrix's minions have 50% resistance to frikkin' EVERYTHING) and, of course, the Soldiers of Rularuu. They can be beaten, certainly, but when you're facing a Crey spawn of, say, 6-7 (-1!!!) minion Cryo and Voltaic tanks and a good couple of (-1!!!) Power Tanks... That drags on. No two ways about it.

I guess I could return to the old Tenacious by going from -1x3 to +0x2. I guess I could also drop my AoE powers for something else.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

I just wanna take a second and point out to /elec blasters around the world that you can use Power Sink on a slept mob and not wake them up. Now for you elec/elec blasters out there that means if you can sleep the mob(s) use Power Sink first, then Short Circuit to fully drain their end. If you go SC first and then PS you're gonna leave yourself open to a pretty big alpha. SC drains endurance pretty early in the animation, some of the mob will get off an attack but most won't have the endurance needed to attack you.

I apologize for bringing sapping into the conversation it's just that to be sapper can be a lot of work. Some people think it's impossible to be a blaster sapper without constantly faceplanting. IMO an important step to being a happy sapper is just getting into the habit of Power Sink then Short Circuit.

Having trouble keeping a straight face here. Energy Manipulation has always been the #1 all time acknowledged blapping set. In my opinion, it actually has does so to a slight discredit to Electric Manipulation, which is also a very good blapping set. But the notion that the intent, purpose, or usage of Total Focus is to get out of melee range is, as far as I can conceive, inconsistent with reality.

Which is another way of saying I almost spit my drink out when I read it. I'm not deliberately trying to be offensive: this is as irreconcilable to me as someone saying they primarily use invincibility for the tohit buff.


Sam:
Blasters can be built to stay out of melee range at the player's choice, but that's not how the archetype was designed or is currently maintained. The blaster archetype was originally conceived to be the Ranged Damage/Melee Damage archetype. It was intended to be the damage-focused (to the point of sacrificing protection or team utility) archetype, so it was conceived to have damage and more damage. The presumption was giving it two damage sets meant it would deal a ton more damage (because of course activation time didn't exist back then). It was changed to be Ranged Damage / Utility to soften the focus of the blaster secondary, and also (I believe) to expand the concept to include sets like Devices explicitly. At that point the Blaster became Ranged Damage / (Melee Damage/SelfSupport/Utility) in terms of the powersets it possessed.

But the blaster was never actually stated to be a ranged-focused archetype. It was said that the Blaster had ranged advantages but that's not the same thing. Anyway, that's history.

Word of God (or rather, the closest thing to it) comes from Castle, who I've had lots of discussions about this very topic. During the Defiance 2.0 buffs from circa I11 I specifically asked Castle for permission to relay the result of those discussions, and summarize his take on the blaster archetype, especially within the context of the question "what should blasters be able to do" which was relevant to Defiance 2.0.

I'm paraphrasing for simplicity, but the word from Castle is: Blasters are designed to deliver Damage. They are not explicitly designed to deal Ranged Damage. Its deal damage, period. To that end, some secondaries are designed to provide a very strong melee damage option (i.e. Energy Manipulation) while others are designed to provide very strong melee inhibitors to keep foes either at range or less effective in melee range (Ice). So to answer your other question:

I did answer this question lots of times during the Defiance 2.0 days. The answer is: no one thing. Since blasters are intended to be the damage archetype, not the ranged damage archetype or the melee damage archetype or anything more specific, secondaries are intended to provide the means to deal more damage in some fashion. Melee attacks do that. Damage buffs do that. PBAoE damage auras do that. Within the range of what's reasonable for blasters, just like blaster primaries run the range from almost 100% damage focused (Fire) to damage with soft controls (Energy) to damage with heavy control and debuff (Ice), secondaries run the range from heavy melee and buff (Energy Manipulation) to melee + PBAoE (Fire), to melee-defensive (Ice).

This isn't a unique situation for Blasters. Controllers have a similarly wide range of "control." Gravity control is not Illusion control is not Mind control. In fact, Illusion "control" has one single target hold and one AoE hold. Heck I have Ice blasters with more mez potential. But Illusion sits at the far end of a spectrum of control: Illusion has very novel powers: it has traditionally been called the "chaotic control" set due to having spooky (the Spectral Terror) and the phantom army (also known as the ADD brigade).

That's fine, because City of Heroes isn't about five pins pushed into the powers landscape: the absolute blaster, the absolute defender, the absolute controller, the absolute scrapper, and the absolute tanker. Each archetype has a continuum of possibilities within a range that sometimes strays very close to (or sometimes even slightly over) the boundaries between it and the other archetypes. Completely separate from whether or not /Devices needs to be improved from a performance perspective, its entirely valid for there to exist Blasters with gadgets like /Devices, or blapper tools like/Energy, or melee keep-away powers like in /Ice. That's entirely intentional.


Now, as to general comments about how long blasters can or should remain in melee range, and what is or is not mitigation, that's mostly a question of player preference and skill. But I will say that I spent a couple of hours testing some things yesterday and this morning by doing laps around the portal courtyard and my blapper instincts seem to still be intact. Taking on two level 50 death mages with an En/En blapper with offensive but not really defensive inventions is no big deal if you know what you are doing. I don't know if I'm "intended" to be able to stand toe to toe with a pair of DMs, but I do know it is well within the capabilities of the archetype, and its actually *easier* going blapper than doing it all from range. And as to whether sleep is actually strong mitigation for a blaster, ironically Siren Song works better for *blappers* because when targets are asleep, its better to be using hard-hitting single target attacks than AoEs. Sonic/Energy is actually almost cheating its so ludicrous. Its an ironic example of the ranged set being used as a "support" to the melee attacks rather than vice-versa. And also, I should add, perfectly consistent with the blaster archetype.

I shoulda recorded that morning session. I'll try to do another. My blaster might have like 3% defense due to some set bonuses, but I don't think that'll be critical. I do have the Cold epic at the moment on that character, though, so I do have Frozen Armor. I suppose I could run with it off, though.


Mystic_Cross:
That sounds less like any version of the manual, and more like the Issue 6 version of the Prima Guide. Those statements would not necessarily reflect the intentions of the archetype designers themselves.


Non-blaster stuff:

FunstuffofDoom:
Toggles can still be detoggled with endurance drain. And those powers are not all identical either. Active Defense has defense debuff resistance and also protects against fear, confuse, and repel. Kuji-in Rin has psionic resistance. The problem with Kuji-in Rin is, of course, the lack of KB protection.

Or it could be a great aggro magnet that will get you killed. I've seen it happen often enough to not take the power, and with Elec/Elec it's not like you're short on attacks.

You should. Love the Blaster, the Blaster is your friend.

You were talking about the high end cost of Shocking Grasp or something. Which comes in a set with Power Sink, which is awesome.

Health can be mitigated with inspirations and pool powers. You can't slot for "hurt me less." You can take the APP shields, which will help, you can get IOs for defense, but the only thing you can do once you are actually hurt is pop a green, or use Aid Self. You can use IOs to get +regen but on a Blaster that mostly serves to reduce downtime. Whereas you can slot to use less end, or recover it faster.
Thunderstrike has a low chance for AoE knockback now?

AoEs are balanced around three enemies, so you still get good use out of them on Tenacious, and increasing the number of enemies just increases incoming damage even if they are a level lower. You'd probably be better off going back to Tenacious. I found Rugged was often easier than Tenacious, even with my AoE Blasters, since the incoming damage was less.

I mostly use them to toe-bomb for giggles, or for EBs. If it's an EB, all the time in the world is worth watching them asplode My /dev also has Hasten, Trip mines slotted up for recharge and decent global recharge bonuses though (as did my /traps before her, who taught me the sweetness of watching EBs asplode), so I can get more mines down faster.

On a team they are completely useless and relying on them would be super slow, but dammit, they are FUN sometimes.

The last I checked Thunderstrike had a 50% chance to stun and a 100% chance to knockback the target, and an additional 80% chance to knockback surrounding targets.

I'd say I spend a good 80-90% of my time in melee on my blasters, doms, corrs and trollers... about the only time I leave melee range is to 1) set up a cone attack, or 2) things are getting too hot and I need to back off a bit.

The latter of those 2 things will happen to most every AT, including tanks, and will happen whether you're solo or on a team.



No, sorry, that may be your personal opinion, but it isn't a fact. Your words were that blaster secondaries don't get ANY melee attacks after the 3rd or 4th power pick. That is completely false. first off, Damage auras ARE Melee attacks, more or less... just because YOU choose not to make use of them, doesn't make them less of an attack, and what's the reason you don't use them? mainly because they're melee-use and you can't use them at range. Damage auras are also PBAoE, PBAoE's ARE melee attacks... they are best used in the middle of a spawn for maximum effect, and in the middle of a spawn you are in melee range.

Shocking grasp is both an attack AND a mitigation power. It's a mag 3 hold that can stack with other holds from primaries and APPs, and it also has a 1 second activation, as Eva said. It also does approx. 100 pts of damage unslotted, and you know what? as far as the "stupid-long" (as you put it) DoT is concerned, the enemy receiving it won't be attacking you because they're held for a longer duration than that DoT lasts. So, Its equal in damage to a tier 2 blast from the primary, it holds your target, and it activates in less time than said primary tier 2 blast.... yea, sounds like garbage, NEXT!

Again, this is you stating your opinions on how certain powers should be used. I personally stay in melee range for long periods of time, if not all the time, on most of my blasters. I did so before IO's were introduced, and I've continued to do so since. It's quite obvious that you can't, and I'm not sure if you're trying to figure out how, or if you're just saying people who blap are playing wrong... but it really seems like the latter.

So, you use Nova from 80ft? 40ft? 30ft?... if so then no wonder why you're dead. Since this is a Primary power, I have to wonder why you're bringing it up, because you've seemed to discard any mention of using primaries at all unless it suits your side of the argument, but i'll play along with you...

Nova has a 25' radius (radius means all around you) so if you're not in melee range, you're not getting the full effect of the power, which is not only extreme damage, but mitigation as well since it causes huge KB and scatters any remaining mobs, giving you time to pop some blues and get back to finishing them off, if there are any to finish off. (oh wait, you don't use inspirations either, thats taboo, right?) ok, lets move on to the other powers you listed....

Lightning Clap, PBAoE with a 15' radius (again, radius means all around you ) even if you chose not to use this power in the middle of a mob, those that aren't hit by it, or are immune to KB/Stun are going to be 1-2 steps away from pummeling you... you're right about this one though, it doesn't do damage, but it IS mitigation, and it's still melee.

Combustion, again, PBAoE with a 15' radius (do i need to explain radius again? nah) does more damage than you're tier 1 blast, but to multiple enemies, with approx double the cast time, and is actually tagged in the power description as Melee (AoE)...

World of Confusion, PBAoE toggle, does small amounts of damage, confuses foes allowing you to stay in melee range, hence it's mitigation. This power has an 8' radius, without question, it's a melee power. (oh and PS, I'm not going from memory, I'm going by the actual game descriptions on these )

Time Bomb/Trip Mine, I'll give these to you... in case you didn't see, I left little notes saying as much in my last post. Calling these melee is incorrect.

Blazing Aura, yep, you're right... it's a Melee PBAoE toggle with an 8' radius, coincidentally the same radius as World of Confusion, which you said is NOT a melee power.... BA also deals damage, though it has no mitigation... The damage ticks from it help to quickly kill spawns while you're in melee range unleashing the tempest of AoEs from the fire primary and secondary, which is, coincidently, the reason they generate huge amounts of aggro.

Frozen Aura, a PBAoE with a 10' radius, deals no damage, provides support through mitigation, should be used in melee or it's not going to affect anything due to its limited radius. However, I can go with you on this that it's not a damage power... it is melee, but it's not an attack... even though it does coincide with my description of blaster secondaries being a mix of damage and support through mitigation, which you don't seem to agree with.

Hot Feet, just for kix, PBAoE with a 20' radius... by far the largest area of effect, also pretty much the only mitigation power in use by Fire Manipulation. It does more damage than Blazing Aura per tick, has a slow effect AND an afraid effect... making your enemies run very slowly away from you (while not attacking for the most part)... is still best used in the middle of a mob where it affects all of them with it's larger than normal radius. Add burn to this to solidify the "afraid" effect and add to your damage, while your enemies slowly try to run and you pummel them with AoEs at close range.


Well then, thats just a difference in playstyle isn't it? Your obvious preference is to stay out of melee range, and you apparently feel that others are stupid for going into melee range on blasters, at the very least, that's how it's coming off to me. Either that, or you're trying to say that blasters are stupid for using their secondaries while staying in melee on the basis that you can't figure out how to use them that way... Surely you can use powers like Ice Patch in the way you describe, but it's not the only way to use it, yet you imply that it is.

Well, let's see... there's Charged Brawl, Havoc Punch, Thunder Strike, Shocking Grasp, Power Thrust, Energy Punch, Bone Smasher, Stun, Total Focus, Fire Sword, Combustion, Fire Sword circle, Burn, Hot Feet, Frozen Fists, Ice Sword, Freezing Touch, Frozen Aura, Mind Probe, Telekinetic Thrust, Drain Psyche, Psychic Shockwave.... Chain any of them together, even with ranged powers from your primary, and you're pretty much required to stay in melee to complete your chain, or waste time by dodging in and out.

Along with the powers you mentioned, that's nearly all secondary powers, or at the very least 60-70% of them... and not that each individual power requires you to stay in melee range, but the majority of them actually allow you to, while dealing higher mod melee damage (specifically on the punch attacks) without running in and out, wasting time.

Oh, and FYI... it IS possible to use Fireball and your other primary powers while you're standing in the middle of a mob, while also gaining the extra damage (and/or mitigation) from your secondary powers like Blazing Aura and Hot Feet, not to mention the other PBAoE attacks. your posts imply that blasters are incapable of using ranged powers in melee, or that blappers don't use their primaries at all, which is fairly ridiculous.

Again, here you are making a scenario that suits your argument, and of course it has validity in the scenario you're presenting, but it loses it's validity the moment you actually start spending the majority of your time in melee range... you're taking the main aspect of actually staying in melee and downgrading it to spending 10% of your time in melee... by that point, of course it's not going to make sense using your damage auras and the like, even while "jousting"... However, staying in near-constant to constant melee range and actually using the tools provided to minimize your damage taken increases the use and DPE/S of those powers to perfectly acceptable levels... and in the meantime, you would be doing more damage and on a larger scale, albeit with a chance of considerably more risk.

An average tier 2 blast does around 100 damage every 6-8 seconds, not including cast time... which would bring it to more around 8-10 seconds... Blazing Aura and Hot Feet together, deal 25 damage every 2 seconds with no cast time if they're already active (which you can activate out-of-combat)... so in the same 8-10 seconds, BA+HF deals 200-250 damage... and those are unslotted numbers. even with no damage slotting, only end... you're getting an extra 200 or so damage with no activation time WHILE you're attacking with your other powers. To me thats worth it, even vs a single target... and endurance isn't so much of a concern with proper slotting and Consume.

I didn't say it, the game manual did... if you have issue with what those writers say the secondary is intended for, or their source of information, which was most likely the developers, then by all means, take it up with them. and yes, FM has support in the form of it's slow and afraid effects in Hot Feet and Burn... enemies rarely attack when they're running away slowly... it also has superior AoE damage to take out large mobs rather quickly... much more so than any of the other secondaries do.

Soul Drain is actually a very nice damage AoE, and it has the bonus effect of -tohit and boosting your own damage and tohit. It's also not even a blaster power, and beanbag isn't a secondary power, so why you're bringing them up as enforcement to your argument is beyond me... and by the way, I never said they were designed to only deal damage, but they obviously, and for the most part, deal damage in good amounts as well as providing controls and mitigation.

So it's 3 is it? perhaps by your standards, since you don't bother with the toggles, and you only step in 10% of the time at most. The damage toggles, or at the very least, Hot Feet, can be one of the most powerful tools in a /fire blasters survival, so no wonder you can't hang in melee. Other powers you disregard as stupid are also the same type of powers, like Shocking Grasp, which is extremely helpful AND adds to your damage considerably, with little investment time.

You seem to disregard many of the key mitigational powers that blaster secondaries have to offer, and then you complain that you can't survive in melee, and actually have the gall to say that blasters as a whole, unless they're IO'd out to the max, can't do it either... your outlook is severely ignorant and narrow minded, and I'm sorry if that offends you, but you're extremely unwilling to listen to reason, or even acknowledge that other players are running melee blasters, with great success, and on SOs, while spending most, if not all, their time in melee.

Yea, I'll agree that Burn, by itself, sucks pretty bad as a damage power since the enemies all run out of melee when you drop it. Then again, Used in conjuncion with Hot Feet slotted with a few Slow SOs, it can do some pretty nasty damage while the mobs *try* to run away before they die... Its even better if you're on a team with a controller who can lock mobs down so they can't run, and it frees you from immobilize effects too... that's pretty handy.

Blaster secondaries ARE a mix of support, control and damage... as proof, the mitigation powers they use are the exact same powers, more or less, as Controllers and Defenders get in their primaries, with some additional attacks added in... one of the main mitigation tools for fire/kin trollers is Hot Feet, Fire/Kins have been stated repeatedly as one of the best, if not THE best toons for farming... which consists of constantly and quickly dispatching large mobs with little to no danger... Hot Feet is a key power in that role.

another power that's common between */fire blasters and fire/* controllers, is Ring of fire... and these are the only two mitigational powers */fire blasters get, the rest are mainly damage... Like Blazing Aura, Consume and Burn, Which Fire Aura scrappers have access to... and there are the obvious Combustion, Fire Sword Circle and Fire Sword... which are also pure attacks, two of which Fire Melee scrappers get in their primaries, and the other is in Dominators "Fiery Assault" set. ironically, Scrapper Primaries and Dominator secondaries pleasure is damage, So what's with them being in blaster secondaries? Damage, of course...

even more so, what is Burn doing in Fire Aura, the tanker primary and scrapper/brute secondaries? in a protection set? really? that must be because it's both a mitigation power and a damage power, in pretty much the only protective set that uses offense as a primary form of defense (which is mostly what blasters do too )... I can't believe that doesn't drop a hint for you... go figure.


You forgot the damage aura for Electric, Lightning Field, which is also a Damage power in Electric Armor... the only difference being, the blaster version does only slightly less damage than the scrappers, but more than tanker/brutes, and has more than double the radius of any of them.

Psychic Manipulation is a bit of an odd duck in the pond of blaster secondaries, however, every single power in it offers mitigation through -recharge, and then it has the buff/debuff power Drain Psyche, along with a PBAoE stun, PBAoE Confuse and a ST Fear power. Psychic scream, as you said... is an attack power (i.e. additional damage) and can be found in both the Defender "attack" secondary and the dominator "attack" secondary, which for one, further solidifies my point of blaster secondaries being both support and damage, thanks...

The other Psychic Manipulation powers are also gathered mainly from the Dominators "Psionic Assault" secondary, which includes Subdual (called "Subdue" on Dominators, but nonetheless the same power) Mind Probe, Telekinetic Thrust, Drain Psyche and Psychic Shockwave, on top of Psychic Scream.... so that leaves Concentration (a.k.a. Build Up), World of Confusion and Scare as the only 3 powers not found in an attack set... of which Concentration (or build up if you prefer) is common in blaster secondaries, World of Confusion is unique to this specific secondary, and Scare is basically a single target version of Terrify for Mind Controllers, or possibly Fearsome Stare from Defenders Dark Miasma. again, a large mix of damage along with control and mitigational "support" powers.

if you really want, I can go through all the blaster secondaries like this, because they all come out pretty much the same... with a modicum of powers from Defender and Controller sets coupled with other damage and/or survival powers from the other blast and melee sets.

A bit of over exaggeration there? I highly doubt you could blast a mob of 10 into dust, solo, from range, in 3 seconds... at the very least, not without severly IOing... which you're apparently against and don't do.... and even then it would be a stretch, unless you're Nuking after BU+AIM... which would still be difficult considering Nukes have cast times of 2-3 seconds alone.

Also, You're doing it wrong... first off, none of the powers you listed are mitigation... Blazing Aura is damage... Hot Feet on the other hand, has a larger radius than both the powers you stated, AND provides mitigation in the form of slows and "afraid"... you're not setting yourself up to be safe, or even using the mitigation available to you... you're just running in and trying to spam your AoEs which will obviously, as you've found, and as I said in my last post, get you killed quickly.

Second, You're activating too far away if you're worried about the range on Blazing Aura... which isn't even your main mitigation power. So to answer you're question.... Blazing Aura isn't going to do jack if you're activating Combustion and FSC at range... and since the radius on FSC is about 5ft shorter than Combustion... yet only 2ft larger than BA... chances are that by activating at range, rather than in the middle of the mob, you're probably not even hitting anything with FSC to begin with... and if you are, you're not hitting much, making it an even bigger waste of end consumption and damage potential than your toggle for Hot Feet would have been, if you even had it.

Its severely funny that you underplay the facts, while greatly exaggerating your own ideals... please try again, preferably with more fact and less personal opinion, thanks



Well of course they're not adding mitigation for you, You've completely disregarded all of the mitigational powers, like Hot Feet, Shocking Grasp, Chilling Embrace... and probably most, if not all the rest, too.


No, my argument is that *most* blasters can survive perfectly fine in melee, on SOs... their secondaries can be far more useful than you perpetuate them to be, and blaster secondaries are (for the most part) a good mix of Damage, Control, and Support through mitigation and control. They obviously aren't as capable as "specialist" defenders or controllers, but they are far more capable than you're making them out to be.

You're the only one who said anything about ONLY using SECONDARY attacks, I never said as much, and never would. I rely heavily on both my primary and secondary powers as a blaster, and both can be used for damage AND mitigation, depending on the set, of course.

You want an example of mitigation, fine... I'll use my Elec/Elec blaster, as he was specced with SOs, before I rebuilt him...

Bring up Voltaic Sentinel, Drop into a mob with Lightning Field active, Short Circuit/Power Sink... mobs are now end-less and can't attack, LF keeps them that way, while damaging at the same time... all the while, VS is hitting targets too... now I BU+AIM+Ball Lightning+Thunder Strike.... everything's dead, onto the next mob. In the off chance there's still someone standing, like a boss... well, ok... Shocking Grasp+Tesla Cage has them held, they're still taking damage from Lightning Field, and the DoT of Shocking Grasp, not to mention VS, if that doesn't have him dead... I smack him down with Charged Brawl, or Havoc Punch, or both depending on how much HP he has... he's dead... on to the next mob.

As far as Mentalists and other mezzers go, there are such things as break-frees, and at the very least, you can still attack with your T1/T2 primary and T1 secondary powers... not to mention, mezzers are ALL ranged, so no matter where you are, they can get you... it doesn't matter if you're in melee or at range, so your point regarding them is moot. blasters aren't tanks or scrappers... they don't have mez protection, but they certainly have the tools to handle Mezzers and other trouble enemies... like with Shocking Grasp+Tesla Cage... Freeze Ray/Freezing Touch, and plenty of other powers that produce KB/KD/Stuns/Sleeps/End Drain or what have you.

I use inspirations when I need them, regardless of the alt... and at one point or another, they all need them. You keep wanting to bring Invention builds into this for some reason and you keep pretending that's what I'm talking about... sorry, I'm talking about SO'd characters... you want to keep feeding the invention build fire, go right on ahead... you're just showing your ignorance on the matter.



It varies from set to set, but for the most part, I tend to try and stay away from Malta for the Gunslingers, Tac Ops and large robots... and Carnies if there are Master Illusionists, those are just a PITA... Nemesis I really don't find all that bad, and Rikti/Lost are pretty much Pushovers, Psychic Clockwork can be a small pain but are overall pretty easily doable, as well as Arachnos, Council/5th Column, and Cimerorans.

I can't say I've solo'd the Praetorian missions on my blaster, they were "double-boxed" with my Emp and my blaster because I wanted to do them as AV's and I'm fairly sure my E3 couldn't solo them as AV's without a bit more support... but yea, I did the Siege mission, and the rest, set to +1/x3 w/ bosses and AV's, of them all, pretty much the only really tough one was Tyrant... however, at this point I also had most of the IO's I wanted in place... by no means is my blaster softcapped, but he has about 20-25% melee defense, and the Electric APP shield for some resistance, along with Surge of Power... so this particular endeavor isn't going to meet your particular scrutiny of blaster survival on SOs. I mostly went with recharge and damage bonuses in my IOing, with a bit of melee defense for some added protection.

on a side note, since this will probably be my last post on this matter...

Some people simply don't find it fun to play blasters and other squishie types within melee range of mobs, and that's perfectly fine. If you're more comfortable playing at range, then do so. But applying a standard to how everyone should be playing their AT of choice is just wrong, even if they're not playing how you (and that's a general "you" not specifically you, sam), or even the developers, intended the AT to be played... that is, unless it's using some kind of exploit, which would be completely understandable when you say "hey, you're not supposed to do that!"

You are correct, of course, it was the Prima guide, my mistake. I haven't looked at the thing in years (basically since I started playing), but it was the first thing I thought of when I heard "manual", and I happened to have it on the book shelf.

Well, if you say so. Going off what players have said, however, a lot feel completely the opposite - that Blaster secondaries are supposed to provide support mostly and only, and that Devices was the only true Blaster secondary. I've also heard plenty of people claim that the point of Blaster secondaries is to keep you away from melee range. And while Castle is probably right, you can't deny that we were pretty much told back in the old days that Blasters were supposed to stay out of melee range. Wasn't it Jack who talked about range as defence?

Mind you, Blasters today are MUCH better suited for melee, with almost Scrapper health, whereas they used to have Controller health.

If you can do that, it would be very helpful. I honestly have a hard time seeing how that would happen, but if it happens, then I can't deny it, can I?

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

My bad. I misread that.

Be nice if I could get them sooner.

I will admit that I didn't actually check that, on account of there being no really good numbers for the power that I can check thanks to how it's set up. However, I was going from experience, and Thunder Strike simply didn't feel like it was reliably knocking my enemies back when I used it. At all. Could be a case of "they nerfed accuracy" perception, but I actually think it has to do with its cast time. I tend to be REALLY apprehensive of using slow melee attacks on Blasters, on account of me dying mid-way a lot of the time.

It comes down to two things: One is that cones are scaled to 2.5 enemies, but AoEs are scaled to around 3.5, which means four. That, and Tenacious seemed to spawn a single +1 lieutenant almost half the time, and two +1 lieutenants most of the rest of the time. Or a single boss by himself. I played an AR/Dev Blaster that way, and it SUUUCKED! Never going back to that, even if it means dying a lot.

I will admit, though, that it DOES seem to result in rather a lot more damage. I retested an old Regen Blaster who was basically unkillable back in the day, and found that he was... Pretty squishy in this day and age. Regeneration is the kind of effect which scales down VERY sharply with increased damage, going from "barely hurt" to "might as well not be there" pretty quickly, so it's a sensitive test for increased damage. It does indeed seem to be the case.

On the other hand, I know what's causing it. Before, difficulty settings used to spawn "large spawns" at even level and "small spawns" at +1. The new difficulties no longer respect that, causing "large spawns" to spawn at +1 and "small spawns" to spawn at mission level, making the difficulty vary wildly. The mission in question was a 41 mission set at -1, so 40, but it was a Malta mission, and Malta can't spawn below 41. So the whole mission was more like +0x3, rather than -1x3.

In fact, you know what the funny part is? I complained about this. I asked for an option to force enemies to spawn at mission level, so if I picked -1 they'd all be -1. You know what people told me? "If you can't play at -1x3, then you suck. lrn2ply. I can solo +12x10." So, yeah... I was given the impression -1x3 was embarrassingly easy for ANYTHING.

On EBs, I agree. That's the time when you kind of need them, plus EBs are pretty rare. For toe-bombing, though... I'd say Time Bomb is better.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

How can a power with an 8 second interrupt which takes 9 seconds to place and 15 to go off be good for toe-bombing?



Do I have a different definition of toe-bombing to everyone else?

There's a very simple solution here for you Sam.


STOP PLAYING BLASTERS IF YOU DON'T LIKE THEIR SECONDARIES.

They aren't going to change them to do what you think they should be just because you don't like them. So, either deal with what blaster secondaries ARE and stop *****ing about them, or stop playing blasters altogether.

I get that you seldom team, and I get that you flatly refuse to use IO sets. Given those 2 points, has it occurred to you that maybe blasters aren't the best AT for you?

Going by what a guide or an extremely outdated manual has to say about an archetype and holding it up as the holy grail of knowedge is just foolish.

The game has changed since then. Remember why the agro cap was implemented? It was capped at 17 because no tanker could handle more than that. That may have been true back in the day, but it's not even CLOSE to true now. I have seen tanks that could easily handle 2 or 3 times that number.

They also said you need to get a team to fight an AV because no single character can defeat one by itself. I'm sure you've read the scrapper boards enough to that isn't true anymore either. Hell, there are DEFENDERS that solo Giant Monsters.

Accept that the game has changed. You can still do just fine on SOs, but the game that is balanced around SOs is also balanced around teaming. In order to get the level of solo performance you seem to be expecting out of a blaster you pretty much need to use IOs. Did you notice what kept popping up in just about every one of the references you quoted in your own posts about what to do as a blaster when you get in trouble? In almost every one of them it made a mention about relying on your team to cover the holes in your abilities. The game was originally designed around SO level enhancements and it was expected that most people would be on a team most of the time.

So, instead of complaining that your blaster can't do the things that an IOed blaster can do (i.e. stay in melee range more or less indefinitely), accept that they aren't supposed to be doing that. Scrappers aren't supposed to be soloing AVs either, and Defenders sure as hell aren't supposed to be soloing Giant Monsters. The people that are doing crazy things with their characters are above and beyond what is expcted of them. The devs aren't going to listen to someone saying that blasters need to be fixed because they can't stay in melee all day without IOs anymore than they are going to listen to someone saying defenders need to be fixed because their Empathy/Psi can't solo Jurrasik.

Blaster melee abilities were intended in the first place to be used on teams where you have a tank to keep agro off you and a defender or controller to keep you alive.

Saying that you can't hang out in melee all the time on a blaster is like saying your Honda Civic can't run a 9 second quarter mile. Sure, some Civics CAN run a 9 second quarter mile.....but they are not factory parts running on pump gas either.

Originally Posted by Dechs Kaison See, it's gems like these that make me check Claws' post history every once in a while to make sure I haven't missed anything good lately.

What build are you using to do this?

Two points:

First of all, what I meant to say was "no melee attacks BESIDES damage auras," as the point was to explain how they were errant. And aren't damage auras actually something like the third power choice anyway?

Also, no. You can't count non-melee-range PBAoEs as melee. They're not melee attacks. If they were, then Nova, Inferno and Psychic Wail would count as melee attacks, and they're not.

Didn't I count Shocking Grasp as an attack?

Again, two points:

First, my argument was that all powers other than damage auras can be used without having to stay in melee. Would you disagree with that?

Secondly, all the people I've seen who say they "blap" and "stay in melee" have always ended up having a trick to pulling it off, such as Inventions, outside buffs, temporary powers, specific enemies or... Well, not actually staying in melee is described. I'd first like to actually SEE a person scrapping with a Blaster as described so I can make sure we're on the same page.

And believe me, I'd like to know what you're doing right that I'm doing wrong. I do. But every time people have told me about this, their advise has simply not worked. Like the person who told me to use Hot Feet and enemies would never melee me... Only for enemies to pretty much ignore the Hot Feet, run in and punch my face anyway. It was sold to me like this kind of "no go area" when it is, in fact, nothing of the sort.

I'm bringing it as an example of a power that's PBAoE but is not melee. Quite obviously not melee. Instead of insulting your intelligence like you insist on insulting mine, let me pose the question - how do you define "melee powers?" And I'll pre-empt your answer with my definition as I see it - powers which have a range of 7 feet. Do you disagree with that?

"In the middle of a mob" is not the same thing as "in melee range." If a power has a range of 15 feet around me, but enemies have a melee range of only 7 feet, then I can still use it, still catch everyone and STILL be outside of melee range. Can't really do that with damage auras.

Again, that was a mistype on my part, which I explained in a previous post it looks like you didn't read. I typed that, checked the facts, found out I was wrong, fixed it... And apparently missed one place where I said it. It's an error which I admitted to.

Again, you're not reading what I actually wrote. I don't NEED to use Ice Patch at the feet of my enemies, because it does not need enemy proximity to function. I CAN spawn it around a corner and pull enemies into it. Do you disagree with that? Because the ability to do so was the point.

Again, do you HAVE to use them like that? Are you FORCED to use them like that? Can you use them any other way? Because I assure you - you can. Ignoring the fact that I don't know what I'd have to play to even be able to chain Havoc Punch, Ice Sword, Mind Probe and Fire Sword, the fact remains that you don't have to use them like that if you don't want to. If I chose to not stay in melee much, I could easily do so by dashing into melee only for as long as the attack takes to fire and I get full use out of it. This is not true for damage auras.

That's assuming you waste time running in and out, which is not the case. Technically, you may waste something like .4 of a second both ways, but I'm not talking about staying 150 feet back and sniping. I'm talking about staying out of melee range, which is defined as 7 feet. So what I'm talking about is staying 10-15 feet back. In fact, you can shorten that even father because ranges are given horizontally, but they scale back the more vertical you go. That's why the Dispersion Bubble is saucer-shaped, rather than sphere-shaped. So if you use Hover, you can afford to be even closer while still out of range of claw and punch.

What my posts imply is that Blasters can use ranged attacks at ranged, so they don't have to use them in melee, and they can use melee attacks while staying out of melee "mostly." This is possible for everything EXCEPT damage auras.

Again, show me. I've heard tales of scrapping Blasters before and there's always a trick to them. Like stage magic, it sounds real impressive, but there's always a trick. And it's usually some trick that only works for the person using it. If you can show me your trick and I can use it, I'll convert to your way of doing things, because I actually WANT to play like you say you do.

Yeah, I never said damage auras themselves don't do a lot. They do. I said you need to spend a lot of time in melee to get that benefit. If you can, I'd be amazed. But on the other hand, if you can and you can teach me, I'd be willing to learn.

So you say. That doesn't stop enemies from attacking me just fine with both Hot Feet AND Burn going at my feet. Sure, they run for a bit... Then they turn around, come back in and hit me in the face. And besides, isn't that kind of contradictory to your modus operandi of staying in melee all the time? Just sayin'. When I play something designed to always stay in melee, like a Brute, powers that cause enemies to scatter piss me off like you wouldn't believe.

Fine... If you're going to be reducing everything to the trite argument of "it's not a Blaster secondary" even though that's immaterial to the comparison, let's simplify things - Stun does damage. Would you class that as an attack? Would you use that for damage? Would you slot that for damage? Because I wouldn't.

Please quote me where I said I only play a Fire Blaster. Be sure to include a link to the post you quoted.

Uh, no I didn't. But, hey. Feel free to quote where I said Shocking Grasp is a stupid power. And again, be sure to include a link to the post you took it from.

Again... You can't be reading my posts if you're saying this. I disregard only ONE set of powers - damage auras. Nowhere did I say I disregard mitigation as a whole, and if you really feel I did, quote me on it.

So you say, but that's not how it works. I'll admit I didn't try it with Hot Feet and Burn, but I've tried it with Caltrops and Ignite, which actually ought to work better. Caltrops floors enemy speed pretty easy and I can place Ignite at an enemy's centre, rather than sort of nearby. Doesn't do much of anything. Even under those circumstances, enemies still run away from the Burn patch almost immediately. Even at floor speed, they're still fast enough to cover four feet before they take much damage.

And, no, I'm not making this up here. I tried doing that, and I have up because it doesn't work. Much easier to just immobilize a single enemy. Of course, at that point the hassle becomes not really worth it.

You keep talking about Hot Feet, the one power Blasters get at what looks like full Strength. Why not talk about Ice Patch? Or the fact that Blaster control mods are nowhere near those of Controllers? Please, don't try to sell Blasters as Controllers because they share a few powers. By the same logic, you could sell them as Brutes because they have Energy Punch and Total Focus.

Actually, it must be because it sucks. And, yes, I'm speaking from experience. Fiery Aura is a gimmick set like Dark Armour, with its immobilization protection inexplicably shifted over to Burn as Dark Armour's is to Cloak of Darkness. The power's only use as mitigation is to hold your immobilize protection hostage. Its value as an attack is also highly questionable, partly because you can't slot it for accuracy, and partly because it's just not very good. It was good back in the old days of Fire/Fire Tanker farming, but the developers fixed that a LONG time ago. Right now, its use is that of a gimmick.

I will admit one thing, though - it looks cool to break an imobilization with it. I can't help but think that this kind of status protection would have been much cooler than just never being affected by anything, which is boring.

That I did not know. However, I checked, and you're right. That's quite capable of changing my mind on THAT ONE PARTICULAR POWER.

Yeah, that's the same kind of rhetoric that was given as an excuse for why Dual Pistols had such piss-poor balance in Beta. "But they have secondary effects!" Fat lot of good that does. And no, I'm not exaggerating. Blaster debuffs outside of Ice powers have never been a big deal.

Wait, what? Are you seriously counting the confuse in World of Confusion and the 25% chance to stun in Psychic Shockwave? Seriously? World of Confusion has a 1.5 second confuse duration to a 4 second tick (so not even 50% uptime) that additionally has to hit on each tick AND at 25% less base to-hit. I'm not quite sure what that comes to, but it's a low chance to hit for a crappy effect that's only there on paper. And you know what? I've seen World of Confusion used. A lot. Whenever it actually confuses someone, which is rare, the effect fades before that someone has a chance to do anything, so it's basically worthless. And, honestly, you can't count a 25% chance to inflict a stun, ESPECIALLY not a 2 second mag 2 (minions only) stun. You can't honestly expect any of that to make a reliable difference.

If you feel like it, it would be an interesting read. I'm not sure what it would accomplish in this thread, but - and I'm being perfectly honest here - if you wanted to start a new thread cataloguing those, I'd definitely read it. This sort of thing is interesting to me.

I don't recall saying "3 seconds" anywhere, and I went to look at the quote. Still didn't find it. Even if I did, three seconds is an exaggeration, yes, but the point was that plenty of Blasters can wipe out large spawns with AoEs before the spawns have time to get out more than their alpha. Fire Blast is the obvious contender, with Aim + Build Up + Fireball + Fire Breath, and yes, that was about the only way I was able to consistently beat Siege's minions. Rad Blast is also a contender, with its three AoEs, and I've done that A LOT with Ice/Ice via Aim + Build Up + Shiver + Frost Breath + Ice Rain. I assume I'll be able to swap Shiver for Ice Storm for a hopefully faster activation.

My AR/Dev Blaster used to do that a lot via toe Time Bomb + Full Auto, Long Range Missile + Full Auto or just basically Flamethrower + Full Auto + whatever is left. By the way, I finally spotted where I said "three seconds," and I will agree with you - I exaggerated. But the point remains - I can blindside my enemies and kill them in a couple of attacks from range outside of their most dangerous retaliation, whereas in melee... That's just not the case.

Actually, you couldn't be more wrong. AoE-ing a full spawn within two or three attacks is by FAR the safest way to handle enemies, and to be honest, it's not a cheat. Plenty of Blasters can do just that without resorting to nukes. Also, when did I say I'm not using mitigation? Could you possibly quote me on that?

Wait, what? What kind of a two-dimensional idiot do you take me for that I'd use Fire Sword Circle out of range, not hit anyone and go "THIS POWER SUCKS?" Seriously, did you honestly just suggest I would do that? Seriously?

All I said was that, by the time I get Fire Sword Circle AND Combustion out, I'm already pretty much dead, and there's no way I'd down a full spawn with just that. Trust me, I've tried.

What's funny is you keep putting words in my mouth and insulting my intelligence while failing to read what I've written. In other words, how's that straw man hunt coming along? Swimmingly, I assume?

You keep saying that, but... Where did I actually say any of that? I counted Shocking Grasp as an attack and never questioned its utility as control, I don't recall ever complaining about Chilling Embrace (as it's not a DAMAGE aura and doesn't require you to STAY in melee range as its effect doesn't build up) and while I might have dised Hot Feet's utility as a DAMAGE aura, I don't recall disregarding its utility as mitigation. It's not as good as you make it out to be, but it's not THAT bad. As for most of all... Yeah, check your browser. I think it's showing you someone else's post, because you keep reacting to things I never said.

Show, don't tell. People have been telling me that for years and it has always failed when it came down to the details. Again, I'd LIKE to be able to do that, but I just don't see it. If it were possible and I'm doing something wrong, then GREAT. I can fix it and I can survive like the mythical blasting Tankers you keep talking about. Everything I've been told to do to fix it in the past has failed, however.

By the way - Blasters were designed to be glass cannons. If you're trying to suggest that they're as durable as something like Scrappers or Stalkers in melee, that sounds like it'd be broken. And, really, that's kind of what I get from "survive perfectly fine in melee," since that's one of the things we keep being told Blasters shouldn't be able to do.

Wait, what? Ball Lightning + Thunder Strike kills everything? How does that even work? Thunder Strike's AoE damage component is barely 20 points. Plus Ball Lightning at around 63, are you counting on Lightning Field to do all that damage? Even with Aim and Build Up and slotting, that's pretty ambitious

Which drop with a frequency of one in never.
Which... Has nothing to do with the point I was actually making. The point was that Blasters don't have the kind of mitigation needed to stand toe-to-toe with enemies, and they don't get the kind of mitigation needed for it from their secondaries. You can stun-lock one mezzer. Just yesterday I fought a spawn that for some weird reason spawned THREE Malta TacOps. I don't know if it's bugged, but there you go.

Look, if you're gonna' keep repeating myself, then so will I - show, don't tell.

So... Basically your solution to dealing with mez-heavy enemy groups is "don't fight mez-heavy enemy groups?" Am I reading this right? Because it sounds... Like a really bad solution in my mind. Amma go fight some Rogue Vanguar vs. Malta missions while I ponder this.

That's kind of what I'm saying. Eventually it keeps coming to this. "I've done it, but..." If you want to give it a try, try a SO (or Commons) only Blaster of any kind you want to pick and try that mission on that difficulty solo. Grab a few videos and post them on you-tube. I don't really care about the Praetorians, themselves. Overdosing on purples makes them plenty beatable. I care about their minions. Siege's and Dominatrix's in particular, but Shadow Swan's should be interesting. Do that, show (don't tell) and I'm prepared to concede I'm an idiot.

But please understand that I won't concede I'm an idiot just because you keep implying it.

---

By the way, if you're interesting in replying, I'd advise against "quote tetris" in the future. It's far too cumbersome, so I'm not going to do it again, myself. I shouldn't have done it this time, either, but one of the few things that bugs me more than anything else is people putting words in my mouth.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

Probably. Between Smoke Grenade and Cloaking Device, you can place the bomb without being so much as hassled. If you watch the red light, you can time your follow-up blast to land just as it's exploding. It's really quite pretty. Kind of rare, though, as Time Bomb has such a long recharge.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

OK. What other AT can I play that has access to Blast sets at a 1.125 damage mod? Seriously. If there were one, I'd play that, instead. Unfortunately, the only other ATs that have Blast sets are support ATs with plenty of powers that are worthless solo. And with much fewer hit points, to boot.

I have no problem with Blasters not being able to hang out in melee all the time (aside from people browbeating me that I suck because ONLY mine can't). I can deal with it, it's AT design. What I have a problem with is powers that are designed with the assumption that you WILL spend most of your time in melee, or simply not get much use out of them.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

There are two entire ATs that are designed that way.

Look at how many powers in Defender primaries are completely useless while solo. 2/3rds of Empathy is useless to a soloer, large chunks of Cold, FF, and Sonic are as well.

Tanks have an inherent that is pointless while solo. If there's no one else on the map wth you, does it really MATTER if everything is on you or not?

Controller secondaries are the same as Defender primaries, only most of them get pets that their powers will work on. But a Mind/Emp has 6 powers in their secondary that are useless when they're alone.

Really, scrappers are the only hero AT that was designed from the beginning to be able to solo.

Blaster secondaries were (probably) designed to be used in a teaming situation to get the most mileage out of them. When you have a tank keeping things' attention you can spend as much time in melee as you like. Same when you have a defender buffing or healing you, or a controller locking stuff down.

The difference between blasters and defenders is that defenders have powers they CAN'T use while solo, while blasters just have powers that they don't get as much use out of.

(I apologize if my previous post came off as being a dick, that wasn't my intention)

Originally Posted by Dechs Kaison See, it's gems like these that make me check Claws' post history every once in a while to make sure I haven't missed anything good lately.