Blasters surpurflous?

You may want to think that through a little more. Higher damage caps would be exceptionally useful to both solo blasters, and ones on teams with large amounts of buffs.

In the former case they would be able to achieve higher levels of self buffing, do deal with difficult spawns. Earlier in the thread you spoke of giving blasters a tier 9 or tier 10 power that would let blasters go completely nuts, well 40% more damage output for the cost of burning most of your insps or being able to peak much higher for fewer insps but in 10 second bursts is exactly that.

It also adds a nice element of skill in terms of good insp management and making a decision about when 10 second bursts are needed and when the max amount of time is needed.

In the case of teams with ginormous buffs the desirability of the blaster, and particularly the blapper is increased. They would be able to use those buffs instead of having them go to waste or having to waste their inherent buffs.

I would agree about preferring the increase in base damage. One way or another blasters are all about the preemptive strike.

The nonexistence of the highly optomized teams in the game is contradicted by both observation and actions the devs have taken. The 7 merit eden, shows pretty clearly that people put together core teams built to be well optimized and then filled with people so they could start the trial.

*Capitation might not be the word you want to use ? perhaps limit ?

Indeed.

Solo blasters can barely reach the 500% damage cap: you could increase the cap to a million percent and that wouldn't help solo blasters at all, unless they wanted to hunt around contacts while burning inspirations.

Which, by the way, is what Super Reflexes scrappers used to do back when their defenses were tissue paper.


I was thinking capped, but "capitated" seems to get transposed for capped a lot when I'm working on medical billing-related projects.

6 small insps away at the moment, 14 for the 700% limit. With remote auction house, there is a potential reservoir of 160+ insps available to everyone.

You aren't being serious, are you?

If we're going to argue that the blaster damage cap is feasible to reach solo, and therefore an increase in the blaster cap can reasonably benefit blasters, we have to assume the defensive soft cap is also feasible to reach for solo blasters, since it takes far less inspirations to reach it even with the current damage cap.

Mathematically I understand its reachable. But to actually say that increasing the blaster damage cap from being 6 damage insps away after using BU and Aim to being just 14 damage insps away and that's a credible buff to solo blasters is venturing far outside the realm of conventional game balance.

When Freedom launches, we'll be able to buy inspirations on the fly. That means we'll actually have an unlimited amount of inspirations at our disposal, all the time. We'll just have to pay for them. Anyone who therefore presumes blasters to be at the defensive soft floor, the resistance cap, the damage cap, and constantly mez-protected at all times for the purpose of balance discussions, or any discussions really, is free to do so, but they will be talking exclusively to a highly limited pool of like-minded individuals.

Given the problem is probably psychological more than real, I was specifically looking for a more psychological fix.

And I share your skepticism on the optimized force multiplier numbers. I am skeptical about a lot of numbers for highly optimal situations. For example, I've always thought Scourge's actual game effects were overstated due to the fact that it's firing is rarely optimal.

And again I agree, outside of the forums, I've never seen any anti-blaster prejudice but I can't claim omniscience, so I figure it has to exist, at least to some tiny degree, I just don't know where. But there are servers I like to play on, and some servers I largely avoid, too, so......

How many times do you fight melissa in a mission ? Operative whoever ? vanessa devore and her entourage ?

Its not that hard to keep the resources you need for the fight you know you will have to face.

I wasn't aware that inspirations were going to be available for RMT in freedom. Just one more reason not to like that I suppose.

So what you're saying is that Blasters perform as well as everybody else except for those specific cases, completely in contrast to what this entire thread has been saying?

Small insps last for 60 seconds. A solo Blaster going through a mission will take a lot longer than that... do you have any idea how many insps the Blaster would need to maintain the damage cap throughout an entire Carnie mission? That is seriously not the solution to the balance problem (not to mention that inspirations is never the solution to a balance problem).

No

What you are referring to is a discussion of weather or not raising the damage cap would be beneficial for a solo blaster. The answer is yes, of course its beneficial, the devil is in just how beneficial.

If you think blasters are performing poorly because they can't go 5 feet in a mission without faceplanting then raising the cap doesn't help much. If you think they perform well except for particularly difficult encounters then raising the cap lets them meet those challenges.

Uh. Why? My Blaster can die before killing a Boss on an Incarnate Trial (one on one with a Heavy Commander) whether he's at his Damage cap or not (Kins can do that). Having some additional defense or resistance would help dramatically more - my DM/EA Brute can solo ENTIRE MOBS on Lambda, whereas my blaster can get destroyed by the AoEs from a single Heavy.

Blasters have Stalker HP levels (And Caps, so stop casting Frostworks on me), but Stalkers get better single target damage while having infinitely better survivability (My Fire/Ice Blaster vs my KM/Nin Stalker - and my Stalker doesn't have all his level shifts yet).

Blasters don't need a higher damage cap. We need either a higher base to work with, or something to help with incoming controls/damage. Maybe give us ranged defense and status resistance/protection. I don't know, but I do know many Blasters require a lot more support, for what is debatably more damage.

Oh, and if I load up on insps for a tough fight (like mission 4 of Ramiel's arc), I grab oranges, Purples, Blues and Greens - not reds.

Originally Posted by Shubbie Im very good at taking a problem and making it worse.

Possibly. However, the current cap seems high enough for that purpose and I am doubtful that even 200% more cap room will actually have much impact. I am not opposed to a cap increase for the psychological benefit, but I can't see it having a lot of benefit even in your narrow case (granted, I generally stick to fighting +1s and +2s solo, perhaps if I engaged +3s more often I would think differently).

A blaster's kill speed is already high enough that they generally get more benefit from 2 to 4 purples than they will out of 6 to 12 reds (although I admit that assessment is based on Fire/Fire specifically, I am not sure I'd say the same about my Nrg/Devices and Sonic/Nrg (but they get gobs of control, it is possible they could really benefit from reds, since they need less purples), but my Ice/Electric is close enough to the Fire/Fires, IME).

And there is the problem

Blasters require support

Corruptors give it

Which is why I pack lucks not rages, and I don't have problems. Are we discussing my problems playing blasters, of which I have none, or the balance problems of blasters, which have been unambiguously datamined by the devs across the entire playerbase of players that play blasters?

That you need to explain this to A_F says alot about how folks ACTUALLY play blasters in game versus how he/she thinks folks play.

I'd argue her/his view is not close to the reality of how folks actually play blasters in game.

EDIT: And in THIS instance I don't mean that as an insult. I'm just baffled why anyone would recommend packing reds on a blaster vs all the other insp listed. Just doesn't make any logical sense.

I'd bet money if you took a poll in game of which insp blaster players pack reds would come in second to last or very realistically DEAD LAST.

Could have stopped here.

Seriously I'm eagerly waiting for A_F's response to this. Not to laugh or pick a fight, but I seriously would like to hear the reasoning on this one.

I think Aracnaville already laid out why a cap increase would be all but useless to blasters solo or on teams, or anyone who plays blasters regularly.

But maybe there's some unique slotting or strategy in relation to blasters that we're not aware of.

Hard to predict what a poll would say, but I would say if you're a blaster you should be *burning* reds as they fall. You should never even *be* in a position to wonder whether now is a good time to burn those six reds, because you're not supposed to ever have six reds.

I'm not one to tell people how to play, but my advice here for blasters has been pretty constant for years. Burn reds as they fall. Save defensive insps (lucks, breaks, respites especially) for when you will likely need them. Use lucks in bunches: if the situation is bad enough to need a luck, use at least two. Four is usually temporary immortality.

I manage insps automatically on my blaster. I accumulate lucks, and try to keep a couple greens and a break or two. I burn everything else. When I get full, I start burning the little ones to slowly upgrade to the bigger ones. Eventually my tray looks something like eight or nine large lucks plus some mediums, three or four large respites, and two medium or large breaks. So when it hits the fan and I start popping insps, sometimes I forget I'm supposed to be squishy and go a little nuts.

I think there is, but the situations are pretty rare to insignificant. Let's assume the following(because it's what my blaster has):

Musculature and reasonable enhancements: +126%
Damage bonuses from sets and Assault: +34%
Defiance: +50%
Build Up(assuming you alternate between it and Aim): +100%

That's a total of +310% damage which puts you 90% short of the damage cap. This means that a build up proc(which I personally have slotted because it's far cheaper than the PVP damage proc) will not give you its full benefits due to the damage cap. Losing out on a 10% damage buff during BU might seem insignificant, but that's before teammate buffs are taken into account.

So a damage cap increase wouldn't be useless, but it's not high on my priority list either.

Back to the original exchange

Just to restate the initial exchange, and to include the clarification

So now where does the higher cap help you ?

If a fight has sent you to the hospital and you are packing your insp tray to get past it

4 lucks, will cap your defense
4 sturdy may or may not put you near it
12 enrage will put you over the damage cap
__
20 insps = 1 tray

depending on the fight I would likely prefer breakfrees to orange

If you have eye of the magus you don't need the lucks or the oranges if you don't have it you should make the effort to get it

2 breakfree
2 respites
16 enrage
__
20 insps = 1 tray

For the sake of argument lets use 30 seconds for the duration of the original fight and that you had 4 lucks and 2 reds active but still died.

Setting the base dps as 1 before enhances and buffs and assuming the blaster leads with aim and buildup

in first first fight the blaster does 90 units of damage

30 base damage
30 enhances
15 from aim and build up 9 seconds active for aim 10 for buildup
15 2 enrage
__
90

If they down 12 reds while at the cap

30 base
30 enh
90 enrage
___
150 units

If the the cap is raised to 700% they do 165 units


30 base
30 enh
90 enrage
15 2 enrage
___
165 units

Edit: cases with musculature using t4 enhancement and 33% as the effective benefit

100 units initial case
150 units no raise in cap 12 reds
175 units for 700% cap

So in the case of tough battles the blaster would be able to put out roughly 16% more damage if you consider the period while aim and build up are active only its a nearly 40% increase in those first 10 seconds

If you don't feel being able to do an additional 40% damage while pumping out the initial aoes is significant, I am at a loss to try and explain further

Just what am I supposed to reply to ?

Just what is it you are saying I said ?

As to an increase in the damage cap on teams she isn't even remotely close to correct. If you want to argue that a 40% buff to potential damage output for blasters isn't big or great, I just hope you have prescription for the dope you are taking.

Its not something I have high on my list either, but if you asked me if a global damage bonus that ramped up as I attacked would be a good fix for an AT that lives and dies by burst damage, I would have laughed.

What you are ignoring here is fight duration. A lot of EBs (especially ones with a god mode power) can take longer than 1 minute to kill on a Blaster. From a comparison point of view doubling the number of purples/oranges you have (and maybe throwing in a few greens for when you do get hit) is more effective than taking more reds. Taking 4 reds increases your damage by about 50% of your uninspired damage which decreases a fight duration by one-third. However another 4 purples doubles how long you can remain soft-capped.

When I'm fighting EBs on a squishy character I always pack my inspirations around at least a 2 minute fight duration which normally means 8 purples, 8 greens and 2 breakfrees (I find greens more useful than oranges since the softcapping means I don't get hit that much).

Lets take your case that I am reading as 2 minutes ? you are using 8 purples.

12 reds cuts that down to 1 minute or less fight, usually considerably less because you have a greater effective dps that exceeds the rate the eb regenerates at. So you can have 12 red, 2 break free = status protection for the full time, 2 greens, and 4 lucks to cap.

Also if there is a spawn surrounding the eb, being at the damage cap means you can wipe them out in the first few seconds instead of having to deal with them while fighting the eb. The shorter they are in the fight the less harm they can do you

First place: awakens
Second place: They forget to use them.
Third place: Greens, but they do not usually have enough or can't click them fast enough.

But that is just my observation on how others play. I sure do see plenty of buff bars that lack any inspiration use, even when it should be screamingly obvious to drop them.