Time Bomb - I don't get the Hate

use timebomb on a second spawn....to pull to the first spawn. Takes a bit of forethought and NOT always useful depending on circumstances.

Time bomb needs an upgrade. It and the rest of the nukes do too little for too much cost. Maybe you should get Arcannaville in here and see if she can balance Timebomb. The problems stem from Time to cast/explode, interruptible period, it doesnt technically break stealth you just alerted the spawn that you exploded all over and Trip mine works faster and has better dps...dpe? one of those two.

Time Bomb and, to a slightly lesser degree, Trip Mine sucks horribly on teams and even sometimes solo for obvious reasons, not the least of which is Cloaking Device just isnt good enough. Too much +Perc by everything, in other words, but mostly its the cast and interrupt times. Buncha peeps have already said this of course.

Time Bomb needs: A way to detonate it remotely when you wish OR be able to just throw it a short distance, coupled with much less cast time and much less interrupt.

Too bad we can't strap it onto the rather weak, unPortable and emminently skippable Gun Drone and send it in, or hang it on the Tank. Btw, God what I wouldnt give for the Omega Maneuver instead as other people mentioned.

Devices is marginalized and weak, period. It has a power that shows up in the Scrapper ancillary (Caltrops), another one or two that can be purchased for pennies in a pvp zone (Web Nade) and Smoke Flash (recipe) is similar to Smoke Grenade, only superior, and Plasmatic Taser (recipe) might as well be the power Taser.

I mean, wth?!

Not every power has to trump all others. It has utility, combine that with a clever player and thats all it needs to be useful.

I dont know if I count as even 0.1% but I don't want time bomb changed. I used to but then I found a way to use it that I hadn't thought of and it became a lot more fun for me. I go into a spawn and set a time bomb, count to 3 hit Aim then Inferno, pop a blue and pff (or phase or hibernate), wait for the boom as the survivors fail to hit me. I do use it on teams but when I do use it it is for soloing a spawn ahead of the group (never do this on master runs). Also if you have a lot of set-up time such as waiting on an AFKer and are on an ice/dev find a decent sized spawn, ring it with trip mines and then drop ice storm or blizzard or trip mine right in the middle. The first two will send em running into your trap. The third will send them flying.

Someone neg repped me with the question or words "How can you have 20 trip mines out" in this thread. I thought someone might ask. It's called +rechg. There is rechg slotting. There are rechg bonus enh. There is haste and an accolade called the Geas. There are perhaps +rechg buffing people with you. The most trips I am sure I've seen out is 22 with 2 kins with me.

I printscreened myself at 21 this morning totally self obtained with errors made (lost time). Do I really need to set up the screenshot?

Who was that btw?

Time Bomb could be a better power. I always wished it was a sticky bomb instead where you could attach to the back of an enemy or something. As it is, it is useful solo for very safe bombing, but on teams, the speed of the team (hopefully) makes it less useful. When I soloed my AR/DEV blaster back in the old days of CoH, I used to have the time worked out to set up a time bomb, and then plant a trip mine while stealthed at the feet of my enemies. It is called toe bombing (time bomb not required). A time bomb, plus a trip mine was one powerful supernuke if you will. I would jump back and full auto the mob usually for good riddance. This is fun at first, but after awhile, it becomes tedious, so in that sense, time bomb needs a lil attention. I don't hate the power, but I could think of 10 powers to pick that are better. It is all related to playstyle however, and if you like it, then go on with yo bad self!!!

The problem with Time Bomb is not necessarily the damage, but the fact that the power itself goes directly against the standard group mentality of " I want that group of mobs dead 10 seconds ago!"

Solo, this doesn't apply as you control the pace of the battles.

My problem with Time Bomb is that there is always something more effective I could be doing during the time it takes to set and detonate Time Bomb. Using powers and slots I already have. The opportunity cost of another power and 5 more slots is just too high for what you get. Since you have trip mine, if nothing else you can just plant a couple more trip mines and pull the mob too them. If I could set Time Bomb and then remotely detonate it when I want, I'd be interested, because that at least would give a useful, situational, functionality. But as is, no.

This is silly. Here is how you use Time Bomb on a team: Let your team engage a group. Hurry to the next group (or the group after that, if they're really quick), Smoke 'Nade 'em and plant a Time Bomb. If you time it perfectly, the bomb goes off when the team sees the group and you just clean up.*


* I have no idea if this actually works -- I've never had a high-level */Devices Blaster.

It can be done but the DPA is too long to make it unworthwhile. You could be doing more damage with other powers with the group however it can be a case of seeing a tough crowd, team not fancying their chances and using timebomb along with trips to cut the impending fight duration. The less time people have to spend fighting a tough group the more chance they would have but no one cares about debt or defeat unless its an Mo.