How would you Rank the Primaries overall?

Here's something I've wanted to see, but haven't actually been able to find on the forums. I know a lot of people want to build characters not just on concept, but effectiveness, and while everyone has an opinion on a specific set, I've never actually seen anyone rank the powersets. I think it would be useful to list them, but it's not only my opinion which matters but everyone who's had experience as a blaster.

Current Blaster Primaries are:
Archery
Assault Rifle
Dual Pistols
Electric
Energy
Fire
Ice
Psychic
Radiation
Sonic

For purposes of the primary set only, how would you rank them in damage output/effectiveness from highest to lowest. Yes, I know some sets are more suited to AE than others, but I'm curious to see the response when asked to list the set as a whole.

Oh, and some sets (such as Ice Blast) get powers that aren't high damage, but useful, so if you have a take on that, you can add that in too.

Let's see what everyone's opinions are.

And since it's my post, I'll put my choces here:

Fire (not a lot of utility, but oh, so much damage)
Energy (I LIKE the KB)
Electric (more damage than you realize, and end drain too)
Ice (blizzard is the gift that keeps on giving, and ice holds too)
Radiation (Nice AE's and decent recharge, but not ZOMG)
Psychic (seems very middle of the road to me, but I like the -Rech)
Dual Pistols (Bullet Rain looks cool, but the set as a whole doesn't seem to be high on damage)
Sonic (Love the Siren Song, Dreadful Wail is fun, but it just doesn't seem to have oomf)
Archery (Fast, but seems very low on damage)
Assault Rifle (0 experience with it, and from what I've seen, it doesn't have a lot of utility either)

My ranking

1. Fire
2. Radiation
3. Archery
4. Sonic
5. Ice
6. Energy
7. Electric
8. Dual Pistols
9. Psychic
10. Assault Rifle

Going to get a lot of different opinions on this if you let us be at all subjective. My personal ranking would be:

Fire (clearly the best if you can find other ways to defend yourself)
Ice (one of the best ST damage with decent AoE and great control)
AR (I think a lot of people hate on AR more due to pairing it with devices, AR is AoE death and not slow if you don't make the mistake of playing it as a devices trip mine blaster with no build up)
Archery (Archery may be better than AR statistically, but I like AR slightly better since it has more non-lethal damage)
Radiation (Good AoE, decent ST, big hitter comes with control, defense debuff is more useful than a lot of people think)
Energy (middle of the road)
Electric (another middle of the road set, just find it kind of boring, better set imho for corrupter/defender)
Psychic (Usual complaint, not enough AoE, also too many robots/zombies/etc. in the game that are super resistant)
Sonic (Poor AoE, slow animations, biggest hitter is the slowest of all and super annoying sound effect. Most over-rated attack set in the game imho)

Haven't tried pistols yet so can't comment.

Ooh ok, hmm..

Fire (duh)

Ice (safe and great damage, albeit single target)

Archery (hits harder than you think, great aoe once tier 9 is picked up, just got buffed)

Assault Rifle (this set gets WAY too much hate - it's got more aoes than any other set. It has more non-lethal damage potential than archery, as grenade, flamethrower, and ignite -omg ignite- hit more targets than explosive arrow and the fire arrow. AR also got an overhaul last year, changing nearly every power's recharge/activation speed to nerf ignite's insanity.)

Energy (ah.... sigh. Energy is pretty much THE best solo primary IMO, but hated in teams and high levels, and yeah, it's for good reason, but sigh...)

Radiation (awesome aoe potential, especially paired with /fire, but you need to be in close for all those yummy attacks - the cone isn't very good, and barely any mitigation although I like cosmic burst being the heavy hitter that also stuns)

Electric (really not a terrible set but not great - Voltaic Sentinel is required power to keep the set viable)

Psychic (Eh, I took one to 50, I rather enjoyed it but I have ONE request - make tornado's activation/animation/recharge much better - that should be decently balanced, no? Having ONE aoe that also has to suck doesn't seem right. Needs decent accuracy to make two medium damage attacks consistently hit for good damage.)

Sonic (ok, this set could be bumped up easily, but that Shout animation/activation/end use with zero mitigation is truly awful, and the kb power has nearly no damage for an aoe which is useless since you get a sleep and a stun later. I LIKE sonic, it has really good damage potential, but those two powers need a retooling for it to be bumped up to replace Energy in my list.)

--
Dual Pistols - eh.... kinda reserving my thoughts for now. It is a very FUN set to me. Lack of Aim doesn't seem right for the swap ammo trade off. I don't find toxic/cold bullets are very useful for BLASTERS but they are for defenders. People initially complained about activation times but no, the speed of the set is fine - it just SEEMS slow because the animations are so gorgeous. I really don't know where I would put this set. It isn't a far cry from Archery IMO. The cone is TERRIBLE. Even fully slotted at 50, you aren't killing anything with that cone. Normally most sets can hit build up, cone, then targetted aoe for killing a bunch of whites, but the cone is truly, truly awful in this set, at least to me. Slow the recharge and buff the damage a bit, please. I never took the stun so I can't comment on it. Hail of Bullets is fine for the range and recharge, I wouldn't change it at all. I only wish Full Auto was as useful as Hail of Bullets and Rain of Arrows, but AR gets so many AOEs that it might just balance out somewhat.

My rankings:

1) Fire. Yeah, sorry, it's hard to beat Fire. Fantastic AoE and ST damage too. Mine is a Fire/Energy.

2) Assault Rifle. Cone goodness, and the attacks just flow well. You've got your shotgun, your grenade launcher, and your sniper rifle. Those are a few of my favorite things. Mine is AR/Elec. Why the heck did they nerf Ignite (again), it was already something you had to finagle to make work.

3) Ice. Frankly I never really liked Ice until I paired it with Devices for a concept, and then it just clicked. Fine ST damage, and I dig holds. Makes some particularly annoying enemy groups a joke.

4) Archery. I'm not as enamored with this set as some, but will admit that RoA and Blazing Arrow are wonderful attacks. The rest of the set is pretty pedestrian to play, imho, although numbers wise it's fine. Archery/Energy here.

5) Pistols. Animations help a lot, especially Executioner's Shot, which I love. Otherwise the set's pretty middle of the road. Another /Energy pairing, sadly Blasters lack Martial Arts or she'd have that instead. Like JayboH says, that cone is just sad, guess every set needs something you can skip.

6) Radiation. Irradiate is great, Cosmic Burst too. Adore the nuke. Neutron Bomb makes me angry. Overall the set feels slow to me, whether it is or not. I like my Rad/Psi but don't love it.

7) Sonic. Sound just kills it for me. Yes I know it's a good set, with excellent secondary effect and a sleep, good damage, but my goodness the noise. I actually like it better on a Corruptor than a Blaster, but still have to turn the volume down.

8) Energy. Ugh. Sorry, I know it has its fans, and I too enjoy sweeping the room with the Torrent, but it's overall just not a fun set to me. Nova is great, but I think I'll just team with someone who has that instead.

9) Electric. Double ugh. A secondary effect I have to go way out of my way to leverage, meh damage overall, and yep, more nasty noise. If it was called Static Blast it'd be more apt, apologies to sound designers but I just don't like it. When I want thunder and lightning I get one of my Storms. Tesla Cage is useful, Thunderous Blast looks neat, but the rest is meh.

I've not played Psi enough to judge it. Honestly I haven't come up with a good concept for one.

Wait, Ignite got nerfed again? What did I miss?

Heh, not recently, LONG time ago. At one point things just stood in the fire and died. Fear added in like Issue 2. A joke.

Oh yeah I know - Ignite and Molotov Cocktail from Thugs now are the only burn patches with +fear. All versions of Burn and Oil Slick do not have fear.

1. Archery. RoA, EA, Fistfull all hit almost simultaneously to create unparalleled large area burst damage. Fair Single Target.
2. Fire. Great AoE and Single Target. Lacks mez power that makes other sets easier to solo.
3. Radiation. Good all-rounder.
4. Dual Pistol. All around decent. Lacks Aim. Very pretty.
5. Assault Rifle. Great AoE, poor Single Target. Lacks Aim.
6. Ice. Good Single Target, very good mitigation, weakish AoE, endurance heavy.
7. Energy. Knockbacks is good solo, but poor on teams. At worst, Energy Blasters detract more from team damage output than they generate. Weakish AoE.
8. Psychic. Good Single Target, fair mitigation, very weak AoE (why play a Blaster w/o notable AoE?).
9. Sonic. Neither here, nor there. Too slow, rooting animation on Shout, weak AoE. Annoying sound fx.
10. Electric. Unimpressive. All or nothing secondary fx. Weak Single Target.

1. Ice. Great single target damage, decent AoE and good controls. Easily my favourite.
2. Fire. Great damage and you get to experience the glass cannon feeling of playing a blaster!
3. Archery. Good single target damage and great AoE, some control.
4. Sonic. Good single target damage, quite weak AoE, but it multiplies your team's damage. Also has controls for easy soloing.
5. Rad blast. Good ST and AoE, secondary effect is a bit useless.
6. Psi blast. Great single target attacks, weak AoE. Also has the problem that enemies don't resist your attacks at all or they have very high resistances, making some enemies really frustrating (hello robots!).
7. Dual pistols. Decent ST, good AoE. Swap ammo does wonders, haven't tried the set personally.
8. AR. Weak ST, good AoE, lacks Aim. Never really like this set.
9. Energy Blast. I just don't like KB...
10. Elec Blast. Weak ST, weak AoE and a next to useless secondary effect to boot.

Just to defend Electric...

The secondary is quite potent, if you're intelligent and know how to leverage it correctly. In fact, there are two secondaries: Endurance Drain, and -Recovery. The first is strong enough, but leveraging the second is where the potency of the set comes into play. If players' only familiarity with Endurance Drain comes from Kinetics or Electric Melee, then it's no wonder they think it's "meh". Both Transfusion and Transference lack the -Recovery Debuff.

Allow me to explain. Tesla Cage, Short Circuit and Thunderous Blast each have a 100% chance of adding a 100% -Recovery Debuff effect to the foes they hit. This effect is actually enhanceable (though in PvE, that doesn't matter much except against foes higher level, and even then, not a whole lot). That means they won't gain any Endurance back while the -Recovery Debuff is in effect. Short Circuit also drains 35% Endurance (enhanceable out to about 68.78%), and Thunderous Blast drains 55% Endurance (enhanceable out to about 108.08%).

If you just use Tesla Cage on a foe--even if it's unholdable--your other blasts will still nickel and dime their Endurance by 7-15% while the -Recovery Debuff effect is going on. This adds up faster than you'd think, especially as they burn their own Endurance. I used the tactic against the Shivan Elite Boss in the Ouroboros missions, holding it to 0% Endurance with just Charged Bolts, Lightning Bolt, and Tesla Cage for the rest of the fight after I got it there. No Short Circuit, no Power Boost, and no Power Sink.

Furthermore, Electric's secondary effect of Endurance Drain / -Recovery is one of the only ones available to Blasters that can completely shut down a Boss, at least if you know what you're doing. You might take the Alpha strike, but every Blaster will--even Ice's -Recharge doesn't stop the Alpha strike, and in fact, it won't stop the Beta strike, either. Electric's -Endurance Drain / -Recovery can stop the Beta. It can stop the Gamma, too, and the Delta, etc. on through to the Omega.

Even further, regarding Electric's "single-target" damage, it's actually on par with Energy's. I ran those numbers years ago. Everyone else who's done it ignores Voltaic Sentinel. That's like saying you're going to look at Fire, but strip out Fire Breath from the equation. When you add it into the equation, Electric and Energy are roughly on par with one another in terms of single-target damage. With IOs, Defiance 2.0, and +Damage Buffs (outside the Pet Damage IO: Chance for Build-Up) not affecting Volty, the edge there probably goes to Energy, but not in any huge way.

In terms of AoE damage, both Electric and Energy surpass Ice by a country mile. I ran those numbers, too. When looking at AoE damage, most people only focus on the per-target damage. This is a mistake, because the point of AoE damage is to do more actual damage across as many foes as you possibly can so that it doesn't have to be done one-by-one. Ice kept up to Energy and Electric up to about 11 foes, but after that (i.e., a full 8 person group), it lagged significantly behind because it's up-front AoE only hits 10 targets and its other AoE takes a while to deliver its damage and it's on a much longer recharge timer. Electric actually has two 16-target AoEs (Ball Lightning and Short Circuit) outside its nuke, compared to Energy, which has one 16-target AoE and one 10-target AoE (and that's ignoring Energy's potential to knock its own foes out of its follow-up AoE path or time considered lining up the cone). While Energy Torrent delivers more damage to the foes it hits than Short Circuit does, it hits 6 fewer, which wound up putting them about on par with one another at about 12 foes, and meaning Electric does more actual AoE damage than Energy after that. If you consider knockback and lining up cones, I'd have to say Electric's AoEs are superior to Energy's, at least on a full team.

And before someone protests, "You have to pick Damage or Endurance Drain for Short Circuit!!! You can't claim it's both a drain power and an AoE power!!!!!!11!!!111!!!111!!!toyota prius!!!!11!!!1!!!!", I respectfully submit the following:

1 Nucleolus Exposure (Accuracy/Damage HO) / 1 Multi-Strike (Damage/Recharge IO) / 1 Scirrocco's Dervish (Damage/Recharge IO) / 1 Efficacy Adaptor (Endurance Modification / Recharge IO) / 1 Performance Shifter (Endurance Modifcation / Recharge IO ) / 1 Endurance Modification IO
=
+33.3% Accuracy / +84.7% Damage / +91.8% Endurance Modification / +95.9% Recharge
(Short Circuit has a 1.3 Accuracy Modifier inherent, so the +33.3% Accuracy leads to a 1.73 Accuracy Modifier, more than enough to hit +2s at 95%.)

(It goes without saying that Fire, Archery, and Assault Rifle are superior in the AoE dept. I'm not going to dispute that.)

A lot depends on what you want to do. Assuming you are teamed and therefore aren't too worried about survivability, I'd rank them as:

1) Fire
2) Archery
3) Assault Rifle
4) Radiation
5) Energy
6) Dual Pistols
7) Sonic
8) Ice
9) Psychic
10) Electric

(Note that I haven't played all these sets to high levels so I may be off a bit on some like Rad or Psychic).

For soloing, I'd change it to:

1) Archery
2) Ice
3) Sonic
4) Fire
5) Assault Rifle
6) Energy
7) Radiation
8) Dual Pistols
9) Psychic
10) Electric

(Again, I haven't played Rad or Psy high enough to be certain on them.)

I rank Radiation below Archery and AR because it requires getting closer to the action. If you go with a S/L softcap build Rad would be higher on the list.