Fire/MM build (what would be best of these two)?

Without actually seeing each build, I'd have to say option #2 is better. My Fire/Mental Blaster is one of my favorite characters, and I've spent countless hours fiddling with various builds for her -- and so I know how hard it is to shoe-horn soft-capped AOE DEF into that power-set combo.

I can say with almost complete certainty that you're sacrificing too much to get there. You'll end up with a very survivable Blaster, certainly, but given the amount of effort and influence you're spending on that project, you're gimping your offense unnecessarily. Might as well play a Scrapper, IMO.

Even leaving aside that bit of personal-preference reasoning, AoE DEF just isn't that important. The vast bulk of your survivability is coming from the ranged DEF, and you have the capacity to kill most spawns before they get off a third shot. Beyond that, yeah, you'll occasionally run into a brick wall -- but every build has weaknesses.

One of the things that strikes me about the high-level game is how varied the content is in that level range. Oddly enough, I actually tend to feel the every-build-has-a-weakness thing more often on my Tanker than on my Blaster. The former is used to surviving everything, and so it's a shock when I run into a struggle. On the Blaster, it isn't as much a shock.

(Probably the closest thing you'll get to a build with no weaknesses is a high-end Dominator or certain high-end Controller builds. Damage/attack types and buffs/debuffs are varied enough at the high end that passive mitigation will only get you so far. Proactive mitigation or control is more likely to carry the day when your defenses fail for whatever reason.)

Originally Posted by Iggy_Kamakaze Nice build

AoE defense is not really a big deal. AoEs are relatively rare and generally a lot less damaging than single target attacks. There are some nasty AoE debuffs or controls (like Longbow grenades and Malta stun grenades) but they're the exception and can be dealt with by popping an inspiration or two. As far as pure S/L attacks go, most guns (except Rikti blasters or the occasional oddball Council or Crey gun with cryo or heat rounds) are pure lethal. "Normal" melee weapons are generally pure lethal or smashing, and most non-powered hand to hand attacks (like Martial Arts or SS) are smashing. That means the AoEs you want to watch out for are things like cone attacks from guns and Foot Stomp or Fault / Tremor style PBAoEs. Grenades are also a danger since they tend to be Lethal/Fire and you probably don't have high Fire defense. But again, AoEs in general aren't that big a deal unless you plan to solo at x8 or something, and even then it depends on the type of enemy (and really no Blaster I know of solos everything well at x8).

For a pure AV soloist the first build looks interesting. But as soon as you add in general gameplay the lack of AoEs becomes a real problem... a Fire Blaster with no AoEs is half a Blaster. One suggestion would be to try to tweak build 2 to have Fire Breath and maybe Psychic Scream instead of Psychic Shockwave and Inferno. With a Ranged defense build you're probably better off using cones and Fire Balls than trying to move in to use PSW. Hover would be very handy for that build as well.