Why A Blaster?

I see this argument too often to continue to let it remain unopposed. First off, not all Blasters have access to Aim and Build Up or indeed either of the two. Secondly, it's not feasible to wait for BU/Aim to recharge every spawn. In practical gameplay, the realistic option is to alternate the powers each new spawn (if you have access). Furthermore, let me remind you that Ring of Fire is a slow DoT.

So you say. To the contrary overall AT performance should revolve around what an AT is able to achieve at any difficulty level. No one should have much difficulty with the default level with no bosses. Doing such missions all the way to 50 sounds like an inanely boring and lengthy process indeed.


Sorry, this just doesn't hold water with me. The developers promoted the game early on for being solo friendly and casual friendly. It was one of the main reasons I applied for and gained access to the US Beta way back when. The developers blessed Controllers with the bestest inherent by freaking far to help them with their soloing difficulties. Later they changed the Blaster inherent to help us solo, and finally changed the Defender inherent to help them solo at a better pace.

Even though Blasters are generally the first to faceplant on teams, I prefer the unpredictability that sometimes comes with multiple unknown factors. However, finding a proper team isn't all that easy on the EU servers at least and often I'm forced to solo hours on end. I'm sure most players have similar experience, so being evaluated purely on team performance when teams are available less than half of the time seems unjust.

That being said, do you honestly still think solo play has or should have little bearing on balance?

Okay, I give you that not all combinations have Aim and Buildup. On my AR/DEV blaster, I have neither, yet I have never had face planting problems soloing Malta on +2/1. In fact, I cant remember the last time he has even died.

Really, tactics – Blaster archetype only force you to do one thing - use tactics. Don’t have BU/Aim - fine, find another way with other combinations to defeat the mobs. There are so many potentials out there, especially with temp powers, IO set bonuses and Procs, environment tactics, etc. And if Malta are too much for you, lower the diff for that group, raise it for other groups that are easier.

My AR gets by with beanbag for the problem mob (like sapper or gunslinger), if its a boss, beanbag and taser and he is wandering around long enough for me to off him. If I see a double spawn (mind you I do use my stealth abilities to their fullest), nothing says meatloaf like a large minefield+caltrops - just aggro mob as you dive around a corner and watch them all die (sans bosses) on that minefield.

My SG mate love to melee the trouble guys by using Total Focus/Stun and stealth (with Stealth IO for invisibility). He hardly dies as well running +4/+1 on Eng/Eng.

Seraphael, if you are so upset about the powers you are going to have to build real numbers and formulas covering the full scope of issues to win this argument with the DEVs. Saying subjective statements like “…sounds like and inanely boring and lengthy process…” and “this just doesn’t hold water with me” is all fine and such but without any formula comparisons from controlled testing, you are not going to get a lot of support besides emotional quick responses.

Yet this is what the majority of PuG players that I encounter do. They are either teaming, or if running solo they are on default settings. It's easy to see another player's difficulty settings just by looking at the mission window.

There is such a wide performance gap between the low end and high end in this game, that any discussions of balance must be done based on default. The ability to handle higher difficulties will vary greatly depending on not just AT, but powersets within that AT, what powers are used, how those powers are slotted, what they are slotted with, etc.

And you completely skipped over my point about difficulty, which is that having bosses turned off does not necessarily equate to 0/0. +1/x6/no bosses is hardly default difficulty level, nor is it boring or slow.

I didn't mean to imply that solo play has no bearing on balance. It certainly does. But how AT's are balanced against each other is based on more than just their performance solo. I'll use Defender vs. Scrapper as an example. Solo, a Scrapper will do more damage while being more survivable in almost all situations and difficulty settings. When that Scrapper joins a team, his only contribution is a simple addition to team damage output. When that Defender joins a team, he acts as a force multiplier and increases the performance of the entire team.

A Blaster also performs differently depending on whether he is solo or teamed. Solo, there is more need to be cautious and worry about survivability. Teamed, when he has to worry less about assuring his own survivability, he is more free to contribute damage.

Outside of two specific combos, all Blasters will have access to Aim or Build-Up. Most combos will have both. And to address your point about these powers not being up for every spawn, not every spawn requires them either. Learn the enemy, and use them when needed.

And to further address the solo issue, when a player creates a character, they are presented with choices. Those choices have consequences. Some combinations of Blaster powersets will provide much more mitigation solo, some will provide less. Try an Ice/Electric blaster with 4 hold powers, and see just how much mitigation is possible through control.

In the end, these kind of debates are ultimately pointless. They are all based on our own perceptions, experiences, abilities and biases. Some players eagerly look at challenges from a tactical problem solving perspective, some get frustrated that they can't mindlessly mash buttons and 'win'. I know what I am capable of when playing a blaster. I know what the regular group of players I team with is capable of when playing blasters. That carries vastly more weight with me than what a minority of posters in this thread claim.

"If I am still alive", "I don't have 6 seconds" There is no way a solo SO'd blaster is going to survive to kill bosses in a spawn in 6 seconds. Just to point out the problem they need better than 400 dps to do that job and when you are firing off aoes you aren't even close to that neighborhood.

But keep spinning, heck fullmens and I don't exactly get along you can probably get him to come on thread and contradict himself once again.

I agree with most of what you are saying. In the controller case you have missed the pets and their buff/debuff capability. The ability to drop pets in a spawn and draw the alpha is very powerful and depending on the secondary they can drop more than one aoe control on the group.

On the default dificulty settings of 0/0 we should also be talking SO only builds and no IOs including the KB IOs. Even with that restriction blasters wouldn't solo much worse than any other AT. The differences become apparent when the difficulty is increased.

Wow, are you missing out. Powers like Chilblain and Electric Fence are spammable gems that help take down the toughest of targets.

When playing on my Blaster or a Kin I frequently bring up this exact phenomenon as the reason why the team should playing on +2x8 minimum. On +0 or +1 enemies just die so fast I feel like my damage out put is being wasted and I'm spending more time waiting for somebody to take the alpha than I am fighting. At least on +2 things take a couple hits before they go down, but on +3 or +4 we actually get a nice fight that still moves at a good pace.

Sorry, but this isn't a particularly good analysis. Melee AT's have mez protection regardless of their powerset selection. Corrs, Defs and Controllers have some access to incomplete mez protection if they choose one of three select powersets (FF, Sonic, Traps).

These are not equivalent states of being in the slightest.

Ok first, what part of keep a break free on hand was not understood yet? Also though here's Why this is wrong

#1 You aren't taking into account that the tier ones all recharge well before the dot stops, making it easy as anything to spam multiple dots on a mob.

Base recharge on all of them is around 4-6 seconds Before you slot anything. Three simple level 25 recharge IO's all but halves that, effectivily doubling your dots right there. That's without even taking hasten or IO sets in the mix.

#2 You left out the -50% recharge web grenade has which pretty much halves a boss's damage right there. That and both /ice and /psy slow recharge speed too.

#3 again we're only talking Malta? What about any boss that prefers high melee damage? Keep him at range with roots and you're limiting the incoming damage a blaster takes as well.

/facepalm . . . Hyperbole much? It's called using insps is PART OF THE GAME

#1 Any blaster popping greens is in over his head, purples serve him better because he already has all the damage he needs from range and higher aoe caps then scrappers as already pointed out eariler.

#2 How is the need for pruples and break frees any different for blasters then it is for every other squishy class in the game without mezz protection, more so as without defiance they are sitting ducks?

#3 You honestly think just because a scrapper has his magic makes all the difference mezz protection he somehow is just gonna use nothing but reds? Show me a scrapper that does, and I'll show you one hit by the L2P bat. How bout blues to keep his armors up, purples for that extra edge, greens for if he pulls too many mobs or takes a few too many melee hits to the face through them (something most blasters never worry about as the mobs are dead before they get near)

See above regarding DoT stacking, as for Aim and BU, my DP/EM's take on things.

"BU isn't up? Well that's what suppresive fire is for!" *Stuns mezzer, then proceeds to wipe the floor with them with blap attacks*

Stun resistant? *Power thrust into wall, blap, jump back, piercing rounds, executioner shot, dead*

And now that she has CJ and acrobatics, good luck KB'ing or holding me long enough to not do that. This is also the same blaster that is soloing +0 bosses and +0 4 minion 1 LT packs, without a SINGLE aoe to her name.

BU and Aim aren't needed for every spawn because a blaster has plenty of other tricks, see again the whole learning your AT problem some seem to have.

Again, totally wrong.

ST styles would have a much easier go at it with +2/x0 mob packs, as there's less all around to come after you.

AoE blasters would love lots of little mobs so a +0/2x would probably suit them more.

Either way 0/0 is the baseline for a reason, it's classic playing like we still have SO only CoX, and it's how the devs balance the game. They don't take high slider settings from "uber" builds or fully purpled out 50's for the simple reason of power creep. And as they have stated too many times to count the game is balanced so you can still play it and be effective without putting a single IO on your toon.

And for the record I play 0/0 solo because I'm getting ready for work around 1:30 PM and not getting home till around 12:00 AM EST which means I miss most of prime time for teaming even on the mostly west coast virtue. Also I don't give a flip about leveling fast, I take my time and keep it (GASP!) casual because I enjoying learning a powerset inside and out. And I care even less how I stack up against some +4/6x build because I'm enjoying playing my way, and isn't that the point of gaming? One man's inane and boring is another man's fun, hate to burst your bubble there.

In my experience the first to usually faceplant is the scrapper that thinks he's a tank, the blaster who foolishly fires off his aoe's before tanks get the aggro, or any AT dumb enough to wade into the AOE field from mass nemesis shots or things like COT behemoths. Either way though the blasters are the first to faceplant is inherntly false on too many levels to count. Unless they are the "The magic orange numbers will save me!" Kind

But that aside CoX still is solo friendly, if anything it's more solo friendly with all the buffs blasters have gotten over the issues. Try going back to play one just after ED for instance. Talk about playstyle readjustments for a ton of players. Or the great smoke grenade nerf that every device blaster screaming in rage. The more recent Total focus nerf that caused a minor ragestorm. Or the fact that the slider is still a pretty recent addition to the game, more so the new totally free highly detailed one.

As for the rest I'm gonna let my inner snark beast out for a moment, and say it sounds like you need to get over the controller envy. Accept the fact you have to solo at times, and some of us enjoy it that way. That and seriously look away from the XP bar a bit. Simply enjoy the ride to 50 rather then rush there. When I find myself obessing over leveling, merit earning, or my WW bids, that's when I know it's time for a new alt or time to take a break.

>.> <. well that and say if you can solo as a blaster even on then there certain acronym comes to mind again.>
and bonus quote!

And as again been stated, and as again seems to be constantly ignored, blasters have a higher aoe cap then scrappers, and a lot more aoe's at range to get the job done. That 100% difference means jack when the blaster is hitting anywhere between 2x to 4x more targets then the scrapper. And has defiance bonuses to reach is damage cap a whole heck of a lot easier even if it's an ST blaster alone. That and who even needs to hit the damage cap to begin with? On small teams or 0/0 gaming a couple attacks at that level of damage are going to drop everything regardless. Keep in mind that's where the balance game is played, not at the extreme ends your both arguing over, we don't need to put this into math exam territory.

Well, that shouldn't come as a suprise. Devices is pretty much made for soloing. In return for that privilege, Devices sacrifice damage and speed. In my view, such a Blaster is still a subpar soloist compared to many/most other ATs (in terms of safety, speed and what he can actually handle) as well as a subpar teamer (due to the damage lagging without BU and/or Aim). That doesn't stop AR/Dev from having it's own gimped charm of course.


This seems very much like the typical simplistic go-to argument for you guys; "I don't have any issues with how I play, therefore anyone with issues must be doing something wrong". I've teamed with loads of Blasters throughout and have extremely seldomly been outdone by any of them. For a semi-casual player (I'm more on/off), I'm pretty hot stuff. Adjusting the difficulty to the challenge at hand is something I learned years ago.


I'm not upset. I'm more fed up, which is pretty natural side-effect from having played a game that really hasn't changed significantly content-wise over the years. Nor am I a numbers-man, the metrics would be much too complex (generally unlike the few simplex numbers provided in rather feeble attempts to lend support to arguments in this thread) and only developers have access to data-mining which reveal the true state of affairs.

The specific statement I offered was a response to an attempt at limiting AT-balance towards default difficulty (+0/+1, no bosses). And that was a subjective comment after having refuted such a narrow scope. You do read me as the devil reads the bible, don't you?

Nice for you. Ice/Ice is ineed safe, but sacrifice AoE capability. On team, you'd be outdamaged and outclassed and by very common combinations of the solo-specialist class Scrapper. A Fire/Fire/Fire Dominator would have much better control, better single target damage, better AoE damage, better survivability (through controls), better endurance management, and better team utility. That's no reason to stop playing something you obviously take pride in however.

Here is the heart of the problem in this thread. The people that are posting that blasters are fine think +2/1 is doing fine. The people that are saying there is a deficiency are thinking +2/8 is good, +1/8 is the acceptable . If you go to the prior mentioned pylon results thread and actually read it, you will see the top times there done while fighting a pylon and being at the aggro cap surrounded by +2 Rikti.

Oh and those times weren't 6 second fights. Thats a scrapper staring down a pylon and a Rikti spawn for 4-5 minutes no insps.

Then your experience differ from mine. The PuG groups I join play at all levels from default straight up towards the hardest levels. Even mainly playing an AT that is often the first to pay the price for foolhardiness, I much prefer teams to set the difficulty to a point where the opposition truly challenges without becoming overpowering.


Yes and no. There's an extremely wide performance gap, but if balance is to be based purely on default difficulty, then Blasters would be overpowered to be honest.


It's hard to disagree with that.

These days I hardly see any Invulnerability (for Scrappers these have always been rare), Super Reflexes, Regeneration, Ice Armor, Stone Armor and even Willpower seems to be less played. The offensive defensive sets have gained a lot of popularity because everyone have seen the amount of damage they can dish out without really sacrificing survivability.

The advent of Shield Defense has further widened the gap. With Against All Odds, melee classes have gained a very powerful second damage boost power which is virtually permanent. They have gained a quick recharging mini-nuke in Shield Charge. Combined with Electric Melee (a very common combination for a reason), they can mini-nuke every spawn. A Spines Scrapper has always had better AoE capability than just about any Blaster combination with survivability far beyond. All ATs are capable of infringing on Blaster territory, the Blaster infringes on no one.


Fair enough, but such missions become somewhat repetetive mini-farms without the climactic opposition only bosses truly are able provide a skilled player.


A Scrapper can also act as an alpha-absorber and tank the hard targets. In nominal gameplay that is virutally the job of a supreme damage dealer as well as a tank.

In comparing Defenders with Scrappers, we are comparing apples with oranges. Blasters must be compared on the basis of role/function. These days, every AT is capable of dealing a respectable amount of damage though - but for me, any AT/combination that outdamage Blasters - any type of Blaster - is comparatively overpowered since damage is almost the only thing Blasters get.


Broad strokes, solo I tend to roll fast and furious. The living of the edge suspense only Blasters can provide has made me hooked. On teams, I'm often holding back waiting for alpha to be absorbed and aggro established.


Come now. You've argued raising difficulty without including bosses solo. If so, then either Aim or Build-Up, preferably both, is needed (to solo with any sort of speed).


I have. But such a creature sacrifice AoE damage for the privilege of 3 holds (not 4). The survivability the holds offer is still far less than any Scrapper. Besides beating on pillars isn't fun, if I wanted to do that - I'd "cheat" and roll a Fire/Kinetic Controller like everyone and their grandmother. Or a Dominator.


Agreed. Which is why I wanted the attention of the developers. Only they possess the data, but they're not really forthcoming with info that probably will force their hand any more.

Strawman arguments won't get you very far. After the developers boosted the AT, I have never said so and I don't think anyone here truly feels that is the case. Still anyone with any experience and integrity acknowledge the games is riddled with imbalance issues. I'm trying to make a case for some specific changes to address the issue with Blasters which would also make the AT more fun.


Ok first, what part of Blasters having to to keep not only break frees, but also purple defense and green heal inspirations on hand would translate into Scrappers being able to use their inspiration tray for purely offensive purposes was not understood yet? Abstract thinking too hard?

I'm not about to go into the anal-retentive mudslinging contest you've initiated when I can address adults.

You're right, a scrapper/brute can be built to be very survivable and very high damage, and like in every RPG ever the melee DPS classes win at soloing. Subsequently they'll beat any thing else on most solo metrics.

When you get into the teaming world that significant edge in survivability starts to lose importance and the small difference in damage starts to matter. This is because there is a point where a team has more mitigation than they need, but there's no such thing as a team having too much damage.

A well played blaster will benefit from their team and work with them to make the most of her outrageous damage potential. A well played scrapper does whatever she always does. In other words, what Fulmens said.

But there's a more important issue that I'd like to just touch on for all the people who remind me they can solo the world on +5/xOver9000:

I don't care

There's a place for talking about doing outrageous solo feats and we call it the scrapper forum. Beyond that it's pretty arbitrary to chose intermediate difficulties and call them good or acceptable. Why is it soloing +2/x8 the base line for good instead of it being +3/x8 or max difficulty? It's entirely arbitrary. Worst is that soloing is the strongest point of scrappers and brutes. If you want to base everything on the metrics that favor them it's a clear victory.

This is a lot like a skilled checkers player beating a chess grandmaster in a game of checkers and then proclaiming that he's the best at board gaming. It's meaningless to beat somebody at your own game of choice, you have to beat them at their own game.

Why the constant need to dumb down the discussion? This isn't purely about any one aspect of the AT. It's about over all performance. Besides, if you're able to solo the world you're also more than likely to put any of you teammates to shame unless they also are world beaters. Capiche?

Your reality (as much as the term can apply to a game world) may be simple. You're, in a way, very fortunate to live there. That doesn't mean people who didn't fall in undying love with the experience must forgo the capacity to stop, think, and comment regarding why we didn't.

Yes, I think so. It's my experience that Blaster damage is incredibly good and remains that way throughout the game. I did not notice a bump in difficulty after level 30 - if anything, the game got easier as I started to integrate IOs into my build.

No, Blasters can't solo as well as Scrappers and Brutes. Those classes can put out high damage and take a lot of punishment. But Blasters have more and better area damage, and most combinations have access to both Aim and Build Up. On a team with high survivability, when a Blaster's weak points are covered, they usually have the edge. These situations are not that rare.

I team a lot on my Blaster, and I often play with competent, intelligent players piloting well-built melee ATs. I always feel like the primary source of damage on the team. I've only ever felt like another AT was stepping on my toes when a friend of mine brings out his Fire/Kinetics Corr.

I think the 'problem' with Blasters lies with some of their sets and not with the AT itself. The Primaries seem decently balanced, but some of the secondary sets are just plain better than the others. Is there a reason besides concept to pick a secondary other than Energy or Mental?

I think that the gap between the top-tier combinations and the worst possible pairings is wider for Blasters than it is for other ATs. The difference between, say, Fire/EM and Elec/Devices is enormous. You can pick Blaster combinations that feel like they suck. By contrast, any Scrapper or Brute combo is okay.

Well for starters I actually read posts, rather then make snarky comments about the first part while not addressing the rest, as you said in your one post, I'll bold the part that matters.


Seraphael, with all due respect you haven't been offering suggestions to make the AT better, you've been offering a nonstop batch of unprovable blanket statements through the majority of your posts along the lines of "Blasters are the first to faceplant" "Blasters are subpar soloists" or "Scrappers outdo ST blasters" and so on so forth, I invite you one of these days to watch my all ST ice/dev in action and see how wrong that is.

Also if you want to just simply take the top of my post and call me a mudslinger or "childish" without addressing the reasoning and arguments that were below that, well it makes it hard to continue the discussion. That I find it just a touch ironic you want to complain about mudslinging, then go right into the name calling. Mr pot, Mr kettle on line 2 for you.

I could have boiled that post down to simply L2P newb! If I had felt like it, but I tried to show you why I think you're wrong (More so on this misguided mezz makes blasters useless theme of yours) using actual gameplay experiences and knowing a good chunk of how blasters work due to the fact that I've played virtually nothing but them since beta. Now if you want to talk gameplay, I'm all for it, but if you're gonna just keep rambling, it's /thread time for me. After all this thread's pretty much hit a point where it's going in circles anyway, can't please everyone right? =p

Oh and the lil smiley up there? He implies that you also really need to get a sense of humor about things too, oh or is that too childish of a thought to have?

And you are your 'camp' are telling everyone that is fine with how blasters are currently, that they are just happy being 'weaker' compared to others.

Also people keep bringing up specific powers or builds in order to state that Blasters are underpowered compared to others, but when people bring up specific blaster builds, its not allowed? Hypocritical much?

Stop bringing up things like IOed out fire/shield scrappers when I'm not allowed to bring up my softcapped Arch/MM blaster.

If you want specific power-sets improved/buffed, focus on those, not by stating that the entire AT is weak and underpowered.