The Blaster has three things going for it, burst damage, strong melee attacks that don't take much time to animate, and a large selection of very powerful AoEs. Scrappers I believe are justified in their challenge to Blasters as the primary damage dealer, but Corruptors and Dominators really can't compete. When it comes to range, the Blaster is definately the damage dealer, although it often has to get in melee to deal it.
If you can deal with the hit and run style of play, and that the odds can change on you in a second, then it's great. Of course, that makes your performance very erratic and inconsistent, and I think that's what a lot of people don't like.
I can run blaze/blast/flares seamlessly, so no need for melee attacks (even though i could get a higher dps chain with fire/elec or something). Not sure how much higher dps it is adding melee attacks (can do around 280 dps with buildup/aim, think around 200 without). I know shield scrappers can do 270 or so with their aura saturated. Even if im held or stunned i can chain flares/blast for good dps. Also I am /mental so i can give hard targets -500 regen permanently (have to joust for that tho). I still have to do the pylon test, but i believe i will give the highest dark/shiled scrappers a run for the money. On top of that I have fireball and rain of fire, so AOE output is hard to match by other AT's (except elec/shield which have pretty low st dps). Performance is not erratic in my experience, I rarely die.
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The Blaster version of Fire Blast is a relatively low-DPA attack. Mind Probe is a better filler between Flares and Blaze if all you're interested in the highest possible single-target DPS.|
Originally Posted by Adaptionist
I can run blaze/blast/flares seamlessly, so no need for melee attacks (even though i could get a higher dps chain with fire/elec or something). Not sure how much higher dps it is adding melee attacks (can do around 280 dps with buildup/aim, think around 200 without). I know shield scrappers can do 270 or so with their aura saturated. Even if im held or stunned i can chain flares/blast for good dps. Also I am /mental so i can give hard targets -500 regen permanently (have to joust for that tho). I still have to do the pylon test, but i believe i will give the highest dark/shiled scrappers a run for the money. On top of that I have fireball and rain of fire, so AOE output is hard to match by other AT's (except elec/shield which have pretty low st dps). Performance is not erratic in my experience, I rarely die.
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Blasters are still pretty squishy, even with soft-capped DEF -- given that you'll never cap to all positions, and given that you're still short on mez protection, which is available to almost every other AT in one form or another. Considering that you apparently finalized your current build only a handful of days ago, it's hard to take your claims vis-a-vis survivability with anything more than a grain of salt; obviously the matter is largely subjective, but my rather large body of experience with Fire/Mental builds (both ranged and S/L capped) is that you will occasionally run up against something that hands you your backside.
And especially if you're going to run at +2/x8. YMMV.
For what it's worth, running a very similar-to-yours Fire/Mental build against a Pylon, I ended up with (virtual) DPS in the 260 range. I probably could have improved that a little bit just through practice (tightening up the rhythm of attack chain and Aim/BU usage), but that was a good enough ballpark figure for me.
That included Mind Probe, though it was a little under the ED-cap for damage (using a set of Kinetic Combat and nothing else).
I say it was virtual DPS because Drain Psyche's regen debuff is obviously a large factor, as is the Pylon's lack of psionic resistance. Pylons resist all other types by 20%, so in a sense using any psi attacks in a one-for-one comparison with other characters' DPS scores is cheating.
You might be able to match 260ish DPS with your build given a tight rhythm, but I doubt you'll exceed it by very much. We can argue back and forth about whether herding mobs to saturate Against All Odds is a fair tactic, but it's worth noting that the highest Scrappers on the Pylon list get to 300+ DPS without regen debuffs or psionic damage.
You're also missing out severely on AoE damage by not taking Fire Breath. [Edit] Oh, and you don't have permanent Drain Psyche. You're 5 seconds short when Hasten's up, and you're going to have a good ~15 seconds of downtime on Hasten every cycle, assuming you're using the build in this thread.
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Originally Posted by Iggy_Kamakaze
Nice build
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While technically true, this does not accurately represent the reality of blasters and mez protection.|
Originally Posted by Obitus
Blasters are still pretty squishy, . . . given that you're still short on mez protection, which is available to almost every other AT in one form or another.
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In one sense, blasters have the best mez protection in the game: Defiance. With this you can never be prevented from using your Tier 1 and 2 primary powers and your Tier 1 Secondary power. Depending on what those are, you can continue to do serious damage no matter happens to you until you're dead.
There have been (rare) occasions playing tankers that I've gotten held or stunned due to several mobs hitting at once: dual Master Illusionists and their summoned Illusionists, or a big bunch of Tsoo Ink Men. Blasters can still attack under such circumstances. They can't flee or heal, or use their AoE powers, but they can still do damage. And sometimes that alone is enough to let them pull through.
Blasters can get Acrobatics, which provides minor protection against holds, and Combat Jumping, which provides good protection against immobilization. Blasters can also get Aid Self, which provides stun resistance for a time each time it's used (not as good as real protection, but given Defiance the reduction in stun durations can often be enough to let you keep attacking at full strength until the stun wears off). Finally, Health provides Sleep resistance (though everyone gets this now automatically, so it applies to all characters except ones that haven't been respecced).
If you carry a 3-4 break frees and replenish them as you use them by combining other inspirations status effects become almost irrelevant, especially on teams where someone else is drawing aggro while you're mezzed.
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Another nice point is that few Blasters depend on droppable toggles (although I guess Hot feet is one), so the moment you hit the breakfree you're able to plunge back into your attack chain. And powers continued recharging even when you were mezzed, so the disruption will be minimal.
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Originally Posted by Rodion
If you carry a 3-4 break frees and replenish them as you use them by combining other inspirations status effects become almost irrelevant, especially on teams where someone else is drawing aggro while you're mezzed.
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If we are to die, let us die like men. -- Patrick Cleburne
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The rule is that they must be loved. --Jayne Fynes-Clinton, Death of an Abandoned Dog
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Technically true is technically true. The rest is subjective. If you don't feel that the technical truth is relevant to your gameplay, then that's great, but it doesn't mean that it's irrelevant to everyone else.|
Originally Posted by Rodion
While technically true, this does not accurately represent the reality of blasters and mez protection.
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If we want to talk about technical truths that aren't truly relevant, then I'd have to say that your point on Defiance struck me as terribly over-optimistic. Yes, Defiance can't be turned off, even by ludicrously well-stacked mez effects. In that sense, it is technically true that Defiance has an advantage over other forms of mez protection. But it's a pointless observation; in practice, most any other form of bona-fide mez protection is better than Defiance.
The ability to fire off first-tier attacks is nice when you're facing a single target or two, but those aren't, in my experience, the situations in which I care about being mezzed (or even the situations where I'm most likely to be mezzed). I care about mez protection when I'm getting 30-second stuns spammed at me by a full spawn of Malta, for instance. I ain't gonna kill my opponents with Flares before they kill me in that situation.
Blaster mez protection (or the lack thereof) is particularly of interest to high-end soft-capped builds, and especially those that lean on Ancillary/Patron armors. If you're soft-capped, then you're probably taking on more opponents than you would otherwise, which means that you're less likely to be saved by Defiance's little perk. It also means that those opponents will see a significant chunk of your DEF drop when you're mezzed. Even if you pop a break free a split second later, there's a chance that your DEF will have started a cascade failure.
So in an odd way, the lack of mez protection is both more relevant and more annoying for Blasters with more defenses.
Now is being mezzed an acceptable disadvantage for Blasters? Sure. Can you work around it through managing inspirations? Most of the time, sure. I never argued otherwise. The only point is that I believe the OP is painting a bit too rosy a picture of Blaster survivability relative to other ATs (specificially Scrappers). I probably wouldn't have blinked at his argument if I hadn't seen him post yesterday about his build, which (in combination with another thread about a week ago featuring a different Fire/Mental build) leads me to believe that he hasn't a firm basis on which to say that Blasters are awesome survivalists.
Even at the high end, Blasters are still probably the squishiest AT, and often by a lot. That's worth mentioning even if the trade offs are acceptable to the OP, to you, or even to me.
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Originally Posted by Iggy_Kamakaze
Nice build
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Scorpion Shield, Weave, Combat Jumping, and Hover all qualify.
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Originally Posted by Sailboat
Another nice point is that few Blasters depend on droppable toggles (although I guess Hot feet is one), so the moment you hit the breakfree you're able to plunge back into your attack chain. And powers continued recharging even when you were mezzed, so the disruption will be minimal.
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Originally Posted by Iggy_Kamakaze
Nice build
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Uh...those drop when you're mezzed? I haven't tried them on a Blaster, but I don't recall Tough or Weave dropping (not sure about CJ, frankly) on my Shield Scrappers and Tankers when I'm tardy recycling their click status protection and get mezzed...and I do notice AAO dropping and having to retoggle it. This is since the change to toggle dropping, of course.
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Originally Posted by Obitus
Scorpion Shield, Weave, Combat Jumping, and Hover all qualify.
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If we are to die, let us die like men. -- Patrick Cleburne
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The rule is that they must be loved. --Jayne Fynes-Clinton, Death of an Abandoned Dog
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Ah, my fault. I read you wrong.|
Originally Posted by Sailboat
Uh...those drop when you're mezzed? I haven't tried them on a Blaster, but I don't recall Tough or Weave dropping (not sure about CJ, frankly) on my Shield Scrappers and Tankers when I'm tardy recycling their click status protection and get mezzed...and I do notice AAO dropping and having to retoggle it. This is since the change to toggle dropping, of course.
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They don't detoggle on mez, but their DEF does go away for the duration. Thus, certain builds do rely on their being up, but they aren't droppable.
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Originally Posted by Iggy_Kamakaze
Nice build
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Ah. Yeah, the defense is suppressed. Frankly I wouldn't expect Weave or CJ to keep me alive in a large spawn even if unsuppressed. I believe Blasters who softcap get the vast majority of it from set bonuses, which don't suppress.
I was just getting at the fact that you can generally tap a breakfree and just start hammering your attacks again without rebuilding your defenses.
If we are to die, let us die like men. -- Patrick Cleburne
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The rule is that they must be loved. --Jayne Fynes-Clinton, Death of an Abandoned Dog
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Ranged DEF Blasters get a bulk of their DEF from set bonuses, though having their toggles go down can cost them as much 10% DEF depending on the build.|
Originally Posted by Sailboat
Ah. Yeah, the defense is suppressed. Frankly I wouldn't expect Weave or CJ to keep me alive in a large spawn even if unsuppressed. I believe Blasters who softcap get the vast majority of it from set bonuses, which don't suppress.
I was just getting at the fact that you can generally tap a breakfree and just start hammering your attacks again without rebuilding your defenses. |
The OP's build (as linked above) loses the better part of 25% DEF on mez. Scorpion Shield is the heavy lifter there. Even a split-second mez on that build can mean you lose your DEF for the remainder of the fight to cascading debuff failure.
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Originally Posted by Iggy_Kamakaze
Nice build
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I changed the build a little, now have fireball, firebreath, psy scream, shockwave for aoe (as well as inferno, but dont us it much). Recharge is 150, downtime is 5 secs on DP, so as you say it is not perma, but pretty close. I can build for capped range and energy toggleless, but then will have to skip the cone attacks. This will make jousting DP a little more hazardous tho, and I will have to use blaze/blast/flares (instead of probe) for ST. Against an AV that is timable but in big groups solo not so good (in a team with a tank it is no problem). I am still debating if s/l/e togglebased (10 s/l res) is better than ranged toggleless (also have just under 50 s/l res). I prefer using as few attacks as possible so I can focus more on tactical positioning.
I have tried the following builds: capped range and AOE, only fireball as AOE(120 recharge)), capped range/energy (150 recharge), capped s/l/e (150 recharge) so I do have some experience. Have done ITF's, Hamidon etc with the different builds. I soloed at +3/5 comfortably (except arachnos and carnies) with the range build.
Actually the build i feel most comfortable playing is the toggleless ranged/energy capped one. It is probably better suited for fire/energy as Obitus has previously said, but I do like having the ability to debuff regen. Hoverblasting is a lot more laidback than blapping and The cone attacks (while doing more damage to >3 targets) are situationally and positionally dependant. This is not the case with spamming fireball/blaze/blast.
The best fire/sr scrapper builds do not reach 200 (190 is the highest chain if i remember correctly) dps and only have firesword cirle for example, so reaching 260+ dps (most shield scrappers don't get higher than that) is very competetive in my opinion. Using drain psyche is no more cheating than saturating AAO (which is very situational in general gameplay). Even if /Mental is really good for AOE chaining cones, it is also good for building ranged defence (confuse purple set for example), so the secondary is not a total waste for a ranged build. Energy may be better, but boost range is not critical imo.
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Glad you got a chance to fit in those extra AoEs. They really are very good. To be clear, I wasn't saying that ranged DEF is better on Fire/Energy in the other thread; I was saying that a single-target ranged build is better for Fire/Energy or (especially) Fire/Fire (because Ring of Fire is just that good).|
Originally Posted by Adaptionist
I changed the build a little, now have fireball, firebreath, psy scream, shockwave for aoe (as well as inferno, but dont us it much). Recharge is 150, downtime is 5 secs on DP, so as you say it is not perma, but pretty close. I can build for capped range and energy toggleless, but then will have to skip the cone attacks. This will make jousting DP a little more hazardous tho, and I will have to use blaze/blast/flares (instead of probe) for ST. Against an AV that is timable but in big groups solo not so good (in a team with a tank it is no problem). I am still debating if s/l/e togglebased (10 s/l res) is better than ranged toggleless (also have just under 50 s/l res). I prefer using as few attacks as possible so I can focus more on tactical positioning.
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If you take Psy Scream, then a Fire/Mental build can become a ranged AoE monster. It won't win any single-target ranged DPS awards, but it'll be competitive in that area, and will have Drain Psyche in its backpocket for a little extra virtual DPS.
I think you'll find that the ranged DEF build (with Hover and a +resist APP shield) is more survivable through most content than the melee/ranged hybrid S/L (and energy) DEF build, but it does limit your options somewhat, or at least make them a little less attractive. It's a difficult decision to make, so much so that I ended up using the (painfully extravagant) dual-build option for the first time on my Fire/Mental Blaster.
If I came off as rather too strident in this thread, I apologize. It wasn't my intention to say that you had no experience with the power sets in question; it just seemed to me like you were largely unsatisfied with previous iterations of your build until you hit upon your most recent one a few days ago, and that you were perhaps a little too enthused about its capabilities. If so, then that's understandable. It's always nice when an IO build comes together.
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| The best fire/sr scrapper builds do not reach 200 (190 is the highest chain if i remember correctly) dps and only have firesword cirle for example, so reaching 260+ dps (most shield scrappers don't get higher than that) is very competetive in my opinion. Using drain psyche is no more cheating than saturating AAO (which is very situational in general gameplay). Even if /Mental is really good for AOE chaining cones, it is also good for building ranged defence (confuse purple set for example), so the secondary is not a total waste for a ranged build. Energy may be better, but boost range is not critical imo. |
If, for instance, that same Fire/SR Scrapper were running a Drain Psyche analogue (as I had it slotted, which is about where yours is in terms of uptime), then you could add probably another 75-85 DPS to his total. If he were using an attack chain that was let's say 20% psi damage, then his (virtual) DPS would go up by another 10 or so. (All rough approximations.)
If you were to add the same conditions to one of the absurd 300ish DPS Scrappers using Soul Drain and/or AAO, then you'd be looking at something close to 400 (virtual) DPS.
None of which is to say that Blasters are incapable of matching Scrapper ST DPS on average. If I went pure offensive on my Fire/Mental (and practiced a few runs to find the best rhythm) I could probably get a good deal higher than 260, but then I wouldn't be able to survive the Pylon either.
I guess the bottom line is that the Pylon test doesn't really prove anything. The best times on that list last I checked belong to Cold Defenders/Controllers, and no one is going to argue that those are the best general-purpose damage dealers. Regen debuffs are only equivalent to DPS when you're soloing a single hard target, after all. (They are equivalent to DPS when you're teaming too, but only up to the point where the target's regen is turned off. In other words, they don't stack like DPS, and they're virtually useless against anything less than an Elite Boss.)
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Originally Posted by Iggy_Kamakaze
Nice build
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Without any intent of lauding over other ATs and whatnot, it is true that the advantage of being able to fire our attacks at range in any and all directions, as soon as we wish, is an oft overlooked advantage that is not reflected on paper well at all.
Firing and hitting Tab and/or quickly spinning the camera around allows us to cover a pretty wide area.
And it is pretty evident when you see my lightning blasting every which way and anything that is remaining.
Not looking for a place on the top of the awards ceremony platform... but this aspect is a lovely element of being a Blaster.
@Zethustra
"Now at midnight all the agents and the superhuman crew come out
and round up everyone that knows more than they do"-Dylan
and round up everyone that knows more than they do"-Dylan
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It is something that seems nicer than it is. The problem is it doesn't scale well and is one the things most likely to get you killed. Firing a ranged attack first into an X8 spawn means you 10-16 attacks coming right back at you. |
Originally Posted by Electric-Knight
Without any intent of lauding over other ATs and whatnot, it is true that the advantage of being able to fire our attacks at range in any and all directions, as soon as we wish, is an oft overlooked advantage that is not reflected on paper well at all.
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Second @the O.P. wonderful build, but the cost was what 7 billion ? 8 billion ?
You also have the gladiators armor unique in there which is at best difficult to obtain even when paying insane amounts.
You really need to compare to similar priced and hard to put together builds for other ats.
I redid My Arch/ment blaster for I19 then I got very sad when I saw that for the cost of the arch/ment I could redo both my elec/shield scrapper and my fire/shield scrapper to be Elec/shield/fire and fire/shield/fire and both would have superior performance in every meaningful way.
Note: Fire blast is in both their attack chains now and it actually does more damage and more dpa than the fire blaster equivalent. This is nice for the toons but somehow makes me a little ill.
Edit as points of comparison
Arch/ment
180% rech
S/L def 45.6
1600 hp
Regen 15.9 hp/S
Fire/shield
141% Rech
Melee def 47.8
Ranged def 45.9
AoE 48.7
Resistance
SL 28.3 without One with the shield
53.8 with it
HP: 1992
Regen 22.4
The fire Shield also does its burst AoE damage faster than the arch/mental. The Elec/Shield just totally eclipses the arch/ment.
The arch/ment has 4 purple sets, 3 of 5 one of 6 and a bunch of horrendously expensive IOs that you used to have a hard time giving away.
The scrappers don't have a single purple set between them and their most expensive pieces are the recovery/regen uniques and the lotg globals.
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For me, it is as nice as it is. |
Originally Posted by Another_Fan
It is something that seems nicer than it is. The problem is it doesn't scale well and is one the things most likely to get you killed. Firing a ranged attack first into an X8 spawn means you 10-16 attacks coming right back at you.
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Two very different aspects come into play that prevent utter failure for me...
First, obviously, if I am teamed with someone good at taking aggro, I really don't need to worry about firing away at everyone. And I also meant switching targets as they drop. If I can get one or two AoEs on them, I'll likely be one-shotting the rest, if no one has gotten to them before I do.
The second is something that I most enjoy, but also think many have a problem with accepting and/or enjoying (Not that that's a problem in itself... if you don't enjoy it, you don't enjoy it! Nothing wrong with that). I don't mind my Health going into the yellow and the red.
It doesn't make me panic and sometimes it is part of the process (When I feel like diving into the middle solo or leading the team).
As an Elec/Elec/Elec, I can jump in the middle, suck their endurance, while damaging them, throw down another AoE and hold any remaining potential trouble-makers before I drop.
Obviously the order of those steps depend on who I am fighting or what kind of mood I am in.
Usually, lock down the boss(es), sap endurance... at this point, my health might have taken a hit, but now I am free to take them all out.
The threat of ultimate failure is not as bad as it seems.
Still, I am also someone who is not entirely positive that our degree of fragility is a fair trade for the amount of our damage.
It might be... but I can see strong cases that the damage of others combined with their defenses could suggest Blasters could either be a bit more hardy or a bit heftier in damage.
I'm not convinced, either way....
Regardless, I do enjoy it the way it is.
@Zethustra
"Now at midnight all the agents and the superhuman crew come out
and round up everyone that knows more than they do"-Dylan
and round up everyone that knows more than they do"-Dylan
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I don't recall anyone, on the forums or ingame, ever saying Blasters are worthless. |
Originally Posted by Adaptionist
Until i deleted my AR/En blaster at lv 41 (just SO's), played a fire/sr scrapper to 44, a shield/ss tank to 46, a dark/ss tank to 50, a traps/sonic def to 50 and a cold/ice def to 50, and lastly played a fire/mental blaster to 50.
After this roundtrip taking some years, my main is now the fire/mental blaster (capped to s/l/e, with 153 recharge). The thing is scrapper dmg looks equal or better on paper, but this does not take into account the fact that as a blaster with range, damage is applied faster (range) in most situations. All the time a scrapper spends running up to an opponent, the blaster spends blasting... I think many do not grasp this simple fact. Also I thought my traps/sonic would do equal DPS to a blaster, that is partly true (after a long time ramping up damage) but damage is not instant, and that seems to me to be the true strength of the blaster...Instant damage delivery without delay. Also AOE dmg is far better (with elec/shield scrapper being the exception). Slotting for defence and global recharge makes it all even better. A blaster capped for range or s/l/e is plenty survivable for +2/8 for example. |
To use this thread to now say a Blaster can outlive a Scrapper, Brute or Tank in any/all situations outside of AE...........
on top of that we have Rodion saying Defiance may be or is the best mez protection in the game?.........
it sometimes amazes me how some folks can be so shameless.
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Well, there have been a few grousing threads out there about Blasters (for some reason). So I think that this was in response to those, even if some of the claims are rather over the top here (but there were some over the top claims in other threads going the other direction, too).|
Originally Posted by milehigh77
I don't recall anyone, on the forums or ingame, ever saying Blasters are worthless.
To use this thread to now say a Blaster can outlive a Scrapper, Brute or Tank in any/all situations outside of AE........... on top of that we have Rodion saying Defiance may be or is the best mez protection in the game?......... it sometimes amazes me how some folks can be so shameless. |
Electric, for what it's worth, I think ranged damage really is a big bonus, and love that aspect of Blasters. Their surging, pedal to the metal aspect is also quite fun for me (and I know a lot of other people). There are pros and cons to every AT out there: and that's the way they need to be.
Guide: Tanking, Wall of Fire Style (Updated for I19!), and the Four Rules of Tanking
Story Arc: Belated Justice, #88003
Synopsis: Explore the fine line between justice and vengeance as you help a hero of Talos Island bring his friend's murderer to justice.
Grey Pilgrim: Fire/Fire Tanker (50), Victory
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Originally Posted by milehigh77
I don't recall anyone, on the forums or ingame, ever saying Blasters are worthless.
To use this thread to now say a Blaster can outlive a Scrapper, Brute or Tank in any/all situations outside of AE........... on top of that we have Rodion saying Defiance may be or is the best mez protection in the game?......... it sometimes amazes me how some folks can be so shameless. |
Oh this is definitely a response to the "why a blaster thread". It was pretty obvious from the first post. The problem is that the OP just reinforced the arguments made there.
I19 with inherent fitness and the incarnate slots aren't helping either. Blasters at least used to own the low level game and really didn't slip behind till the 20s.
Coming from the scrapper side and just recently adding IOs to two end game blasters I found the following:
~ For such a stark lack of mitigation and mez protection blasters ranged single target damage is really kind of meh.
~ A lot of the sets really only have a cone and a targeted 360 degree radius as their primary AoE. Every secondary should probably have a meaningful supplementary AoE like /Mental.
~ I expected the primaries of blasters to be balanced better. I am used to scrappers where the primaries are fairly well balanced, each with it's own advantages and disadvantages. Blasters have clear winners (Fire, Archery) and sets that are somewhat lackluster. (Elec, Dual Pistols)
(Note before DP and Elec lovers jump in defending their sets: I know they are playable, but you have to admit they don't have the oomph or advantage over the top blaster sets.)
~ Blasters are *way* too dependent on Scorpion Shield or Frozen Armor to hit end game mitigation. The reason this is so annoying is it either means a purple glow and a trip villain side or the dreaded ice cube armor which fits very few concepts.
~ Targeted AoE IO sets really really suck. They really need to add two more good sets to support the combinations that rely on cones and ranged AoEs.
Moonlighter
50s include MA/SD, MA/SR, DP/Elec, Claw/Inv, Kat/Dark, Kat/Fire, Spine/Regen, Dark/SD
First Arc: Tequila Sunrise, #168563
While I know this is supposed to be a kinda "hip-hip horray blasters!" thread, it's hard to get excited when one of the primary arguments is:
"All the time a scrapper spends running up to an opponent, the blaster spends blasting... I think many do not grasp this simple fact."
Having played both sides of the coin, the time spent face down on the pavement probably exceeds the amount of time my scrapper has to acquire and pounce on a target.
What's that? Go easy and die less? Well, then not only am I not doing my job right (raaaarrh) - but I'm not out damaging my scrapper. The ammount of times the words "Man if I was on my scrapper I'd be alive.." vs. "Man if I was on my blaster I'd be owning this fight.." ? 12312424 to 2 (BM, Architect)
For the present, if I want a ranged character with some muscle, I usually play my corrupter... so I have a decent secondary to fall back on if I feel my damage is sub-par or too risky. My Cor's face-plant quite abit too, but for some reason it bothers me much less.
I've tried to find the motivation and reason to finish leveling my blasters but it's really hard when the grass is greener on the other side and you're (me) a big cow. =p
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To be constructive: I'd love to see some balancing done to the Blaster primaries, you'd think something named BLASTER, being as squishy as they can be, would out-damage most everything by a fair margin. I'm not going to champion for higher defenses and mez protection, but I want some more "cannon" in my "glass cannon" - With the dmg most other AT's are capable of now (properly built) - even a poor blaster should be able to keep up. Just an opinion.
I love blasters, I just find that after level 15-20ish you just have to play smart. Running at a mob with a fireball is going to get you dead. Unleashing your full wrath against a herded mob or 3 that's been taunted by a tank is where blasters shine. Or when they can't do anything because of a controller or the like.
Some one sets em up, and the blaster knocks em down!
So many times I'm playing a tank and I'm thinking to myself, I wish there was a blaster on my team!
But I don't think anyone has mentioned, unless I missed it (which I probably did)
Dead things don't hurt you.
I'm actually playing my Sonic/Energy Blapper (That's right; a melee blaster!) a lot and I'm finding I can take down a +1 boss before they can make 2 attacks on me. Not drawing any attention with AoE attacks, I can wade through a distracted group faster then I could with any of my scrappers at the same level. I've been thanked for the extra damage I brought in, it is really noticable.
my blaster is fully IO'd out and has no survival or end issues.
also with the new alphas does hella more damage. My main however is a fortunata, I like being a brick wall of defense.
still, I love blasters, but then again it's my playstyle
Magisterum- 50+3 Fortunata--Virtue
Lukerion- 33 Emp/Rad Defender--Virtue
Noah Heartily- 34 SS/SD brute- Virtue
Mika Heartily- 50+1 Fire/MM blaster-Virtue
Quote:
At what difficulty? And doing what missions? Are you running +1/x8 like most of the other IO'd ATs do? Running Vanguard? Freakshow maps?|
Originally Posted by Rintera
my blaster is fully IO'd out and has no survival or end issues.
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One problem with subjective discussions of power is that varying people have wildly variant difficulty settings. People play doms, masterminds and corruptors at x8 and say blasters are weak. Others like to play vanilla default settings (or x2) and say blasters don't have issues.
Personally I can comfortably play at x4 with bosses turned on with normal difficulty, a little higher against easy groups like Freaks and Council (so long as I kill the vamps first) and less for tip missions (Carnies, Arachnos, $%#& 12 waves of sappers) and harder content like Vanguard.
Moonlighter
50s include MA/SD, MA/SR, DP/Elec, Claw/Inv, Kat/Dark, Kat/Fire, Spine/Regen, Dark/SD
First Arc: Tequila Sunrise, #168563
Until i deleted my AR/En blaster at lv 41 (just SO's), played a fire/sr scrapper to 44, a shield/ss tank to 46, a dark/ss tank to 50, a traps/sonic def to 50 and a cold/ice def to 50, and lastly played a fire/mental blaster to 50.
After this roundtrip taking some years, my main is now the fire/mental blaster (capped to s/l/e, with 153 recharge).
The thing is scrapper dmg looks equal or better on paper, but this does not take into account the fact that as a blaster with range, damage is applied faster (range) in most situations. All the time a scrapper spends running up to an opponent, the blaster spends blasting... I think many do not grasp this simple fact. Also I thought my traps/sonic would do equal DPS to a blaster, that is partly true (after a long time ramping up damage) but damage is not instant, and that seems to me to be the true strength of the blaster...Instant damage delivery without delay. Also AOE dmg is far better (with elec/shield scrapper being the exception).
Slotting for defence and global recharge makes it all even better. A blaster capped for range or s/l/e is plenty survivable for +2/8 for example.