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I think the set needs a bit more than these minor tweaks. It's not right that my Electric Controller is 10 times easier to play than my DP Blaster. Blasters shouldn't need this much help, frankly.|
Originally Posted by DarkMaster
Seeing as how DP isn't a damage monster...I really think that at least "three" changes should be made to the DP set to make it a little better:
1.) Add the fire DoT to the tier1 pistol attack 2.) Either slightly reduce the animation time of Executioner's Shot or increase it's range to either 60 or 80 ft. 3.) Allow the -res from Piercing Rounds to work even when "not" using standard rounds. If they did just these minor changes...I think the set would be pretty good... |
I just started my DP Blaster a few days ago and were I a new player I would be constantly and immensely frustrated. Not to mention in perma-debt. Debt doesn't bother me at all, but I know it does for new players. If I didn't have my Vet powers (Sands of Mu, Blackwand, Nemesis Staff and Power Drone), my trips to the hospital would be a lot more frequent.
Empty Clips being such a short range power has been really frustrating in particular. With the far more aggressive behavior of most of the mobs in GR, they close quickly and start wailing on you, so the only thing to do in lower levels is run-and-gun. It's too easy to run out of range of your abilities, but Empty Clips is by far the largest offender in this area. It also has such low damage that it's fairly close to useless in the early levels. Were I to roll a second DP Blaster (unlikely), I'd skip EC until I'd taken every other power I wanted first.
3 of my 4 50s are Blasters. My DP Blaster isn't likely to join them. It looks cool, but it's just not fun.
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Originally Posted by Umbral
That's also been something I've championed since we first saw the set. The fact that standard ammo is the only way to get the -res in Piercing Rounds (which is honestly one of the only reasons to use Piercing Rounds in the first place thanks to lackluster damage, effects, and AoE capability) always seemed kind of off to me, especially when I always got the feeling from the devs that they didn't want people Ammo dancing. Just doing that would go a similarly long way towards giving the set better ST performance.
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Did an interesting test this weekend. I actually made my second build without the swap ammo chosing to only use the lethal rounds, and slotted an achilles -20% res in my attacks. I actually felt I was killing just as fast (and faster in some cases) than using any of the special ammo, and the knockdown/back was keeping my much more survivable in solo and team situations.
I was actually quite surprised how well this option played, and quite disappointed that using the -res in my attacks was completely making the swap ammo kinda unimportant. While I only had 5 of the -res slotted in my powers (I know they dont stack, but this pretty much ensured everything had the debuff on them) I think the pvp -res IO stacked with the achilles would pretty much make swap ammo pointless. Since DP attacks are largely lethal (or all lethal depending), the -res should be applied regardless of the ammo used - that, or make the ammo type apply only that damage type. (i.e. 100% fire damage, 100% cold damage, 100% toxic damage).
Except that the proc works regardless of if you have Swap Ammo or not. So you can have your cake and eat it too, as it were. So take Swap Ammo, Load Fire, Slot Achilles' and enjoy.
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Really? I thought it only worked with the normal lethal shots and not with the other ammo.
I will hit a respec tonight to add back in swap ammo and give it another test. Wish there was a good way to get some more accurate/controlled DPS testing that does not involve a pylon shooting at me.
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Hire a friendly neighborhood Tanker to taunt whatever type of enemy you choose for your tests? He can just put taunt on autofire and alt-tab and surf the net while you go crazy. |
Originally Posted by Morbeux
Really? I thought it only worked with the normal lethal shots and not with the other ammo.
I will hit a respec tonight to add back in swap ammo and give it another test. Wish there was a good way to get some more accurate/controlled DPS testing that does not involve a pylon shooting at me. |
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I'm really taken aback by how weak DP is overall, at least as a Blaster powerset. No sniper attack and weak damage. If taken with what would be a "natural" pairing, Devices, the weak damage and truly horrible low level Device powers make soloing a nightmare.
If I didn't have the Nemesis Staff and the Demon-Slaying Axe from Veteran Rewards, I know I would've given up on the toon before reaching level 10. Empty Clips as an animation is meh, and even worse as a power, the cone effect is way too narrow and its damage is extremely weak. Bullet Rain is nice, and can save your butt every now and again, but overall, if not for the Gun Fu aesthetic, it's just not worth playing.
Lancelot Strong --
Level 50 Inv/SS Tanker on Triumph [Retired]
Tashkent Zen --
Level 25 Mind/Psi Dominator on Virtue
Hector Slade --
Level 34 SS/WP Brute on Virtue
The set is bad. If I didn't love my concept and costume I would have abandoned it. It really needs love. Just being a redraw set means it should be slightly better or have some advantage over other sets.
Have Ice and Acid bullets be entirely energy/toxic? Swap Ammo should shine on a player that has learned what enemies are weak to different types of attack types. Just this would mean that against highly lethal resistant opponents people could find a use for the other ammo types.
~ Rework Executioner's to be somewhat useful? Shorten the animation, make the damage worth the time of animation, give it a useful secondary effect; anything to make it not stink. This should be a go to single target attack.
~ Make the -Res of Piercing work with all ammo?
There are lots of things that could make the set competitive.
Moonlighter
50s include MA/SD, MA/SR, DP/Elec, Claw/Inv, Kat/Dark, Kat/Fire, Spine/Regen, Dark/SD
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eventhough the dmg on DP is low its not that bad.. i think the prob is most of the players are taking devices with the set..
I mean devices is great with everything else.. but the lack of build up really makes a difference..
So the best bet is go non devices.. i personally went with psi.. and love it..
And i use incin rounds 90% of the time slot two achielles in there and you will do some good dmg.. plus concentration/aim ect...
Plus i have Assualt.. and a build up proc in tactics..
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The lack of a snipe is, in all honesty, not something that the hurts the set. Sniper attacks have terrible DPA, are risky to use (i.e. if you get hit, you just wasted all that time for nothing), and are only really useful before you've actually started fighting (which means that they're only useful for a very slim percent of fights). If Blaster snipes were actually tweaked like Dominator snipes, the issue might be a bit different, but, as it stands, Blaster sniper attacks are less than useless|
Originally Posted by Lancelot_Strong
No sniper attack and weak damage.
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As I have been saying for a long time, the damage on the set is not weak. For most players, it's in the middle of the pack. With Incendiary Ammo, it's actually slightly ahead, especially if you value AoE damage capabilities higher (it's right up there with Archery, AR, and Fire where AoE damage is concerned). With Standard Ammo, it's slightly worse, but still viable. It's only when you switch to Chem and Cryo Ammo that the damage gets bad and that's because you're having to deal with a lack of +dam mechanisms combined with not getting the -res that makes Standard Ammo a viable competitor.
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Redraw is why the set has a 1.1 accmod rather than the standard 1.0. A higher accmod isn't its schtick, so it doesn't have a 1.155 accmod like Arch does, but it's definitely better than the standard 1.05 accmod for other sets with redraw.|
Originally Posted by Moonlighter
Just being a redraw set means it should be slightly better or have some advantage over other sets.
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| ~ Rework Executioner's to be somewhat useful? Shorten the animation, make the damage worth the time of animation, give it a useful secondary effect; anything to make it not stink. This should be a go to single target attack. |
My personal solution to it was to give it the dam/rech/end for the standard Blaster Sniper attacks (of course, I also want to buff the Blaster sniper attacks up to the same level as the Dominator sniper attacks so that they're actually viable). The higher damage would make the DPA substantially better, the recharge and endurance changes wouldn't be substantially different for attack string requirements, and it doesn't involve the apparent hell of shortening animation times. The higher-than-normal damage for Sniper attack dam/rech/end can, balance wise, be pardoned by noting the ridiculously long animation time and the lack of a true Sniper attack's incredible range.
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I figure that's probably the best approach for Executioner's Shot. It's a nice solid ST attack right now, but I do know the length of the animation holds it back a little bit. After all the animation discussion when it was in beta, increasing the damage, recharge, and endurance would probably be the best solution.|
Originally Posted by Umbral
While I agree with you (Executioner's Shot needs some loving), you're not getting it right. With Incendiary Ammo, Executioner's Shot is actually your best attack thanks to the stronger secondary effects it gets (which means that you also can't really say that it doesn't have a useful secondary effect because it's whatever secondary effect your other attacks have, only better). Executioner's Shot is a go-to-attack, it's just not as go-to as other tier 3 blasts.
My personal solution to it was to give it the dam/rech/end for the standard Blaster Sniper attacks (of course, I also want to buff the Blaster sniper attacks up to the same level as the Dominator sniper attacks so that they're actually viable). The higher damage would make the DPA substantially better, the recharge and endurance changes wouldn't be substantially different for attack string requirements, and it doesn't involve the apparent hell of shortening animation times. The higher-than-normal damage for Sniper attack dam/rech/end can, balance wise, be pardoned by noting the ridiculously long animation time and the lack of a true Sniper attack's incredible range. |
I also hope they make Snipes be worthwhile. I enjoy using them still, but they do have a fair amount stacked against them.
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. . a month later |
Originally Posted by Umbral
It was (and still is) on the first page of the Blaster forums under a similar enough heading that it should have been easy to find the thread, but here is the link to my post that definitively explains why, where damage is concerned, Incendiary Ammo is the only ammo that matters.
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There may be no reason to really burden anyone with an explanation but the above quote seems to have a "sigh, can't you newbs do anything for yourselves" tone. I thought I would explain my thought process.
I certainly saw the thread Umbral posted in and linked to and if that was the thread that the OP was referring to then cool. If it wasn't that thread (and I didn't/don't know if it is, Herojunkie has not returned to this thread) then I was curious (and still would be curious) about any other thread he may have read.
To be fair; a lot of the linked thread is about Aim and other off-topic issues. The pertinent post is the one directly linked by Umbral and there is no conversation about it, just one poster's opinion making it fairly isolated. While Mr. Umbral is a long time veteran (2004 registration), I myself am not a veteran, and I don't have experience in the community that would allow me to tell who is a long time knowledgeable player and who is just a long time player.
Chem rounds for the most part, switch to standard when Piercing Rounds is up, after debuffing switch to Incendiary to take advantage of the debuffed resistance, switch back to Chem to debuff the AV's damage some more. Maybe switch to Cryo when I get tired of green and yellow bullets and want to see blue ones for a few shots (can't think of any other reason I'd want to in that situation)
People, generally, do not like to be forced to play the "dancing game" like that just to make their powers somewhat effective and "comparable" to other Sets. The ONLY time this could possibly be acceptable is if the set you were forced to "dance" with would be just soooooo god awfully powerful that if you were able to run/use all powers/toggles at once that it would be borderline game-breaking if it didn't force you to dance between powers/toggles in order to utilize it's full potential. Being brokenly OP was not the case for Dark Armor, and so in light of QoL they changed the set. Well...Dual Pistols is and would be no where near OP if Piercing Rounds could keep it's -res effect even while using "non" standard ammo...so why make us power dance?!?
As far as I'm concerned...Dual Pistols is close to being the Blaster version of the "old" Dark Armor...only even weaker...