Blasters surpurflous?
By
Adeon Hawkwood,
Posted on: 2011-07-11 23:09 in Archetypes and Powers General Discussion
Quote:
See! TRUTH that blasters are not superfluous!!! They mastered time manipulation long before Corruptors, Controllers, Defenders, and Masterminds even knew they would have the option of taking such a set. |
Originally Posted by JayLeonHart_EU
Erm...
|
Words to the wise aren't necessary- it's the stupid ones that need them.
"You're right...I forgot...being constantly at or the near the damage cap is a big turn off. Definitely not worth it."
- Vitality
Quote:
Is that what you thought you were doing ? |
Originally Posted by William_Valence
Ah ha! I see where my mistake was. I was assuming you were contributing to the coversation of whether or not blasters were surpurlous on teams. You know, the point of the thread.
Instead you were going off on some terribly pointless tangent on the classification of Corruptors as damage dealers, and if their health should count as damage dealer's health. My bad, I shouldn't have assumed you were adding to the actual conversation. |
Then you needed to do the analysis with regard to whether adding a scrapper a brute a tank or other at represented a better choice than adding a blaster.
That would be just one more thing that you missed.
I see a lot of folks in here who just don't get it with blasters.
You can play them carefully and spend a fortune in IO's to build defense - or you can just decide to kill stuff and do it faster than anyone else.
If you can't keep a blaster alive - learn how aggro works. I usually start with ranged damage and work closer for the hard hitting melee attacks to finish the groups. I know even at level 8 I head over to Perez and defeat large groups of Hellions to fund my way up the ladder. Cashing in salvage I can always have 500k by level 12.
You fire an AoE, back up to string them in a line for cones, Jump forward to make single target finishes. If you get held pop a BF. If they hit hard pop a purple before you roll. I am sorry you are unable to play blasters - it happens - I hate PB's and Warshades. I just don't get the fun of them.
But my first 3 characters over 7 years ago were:
BS/SR scrapper (and they were so broken then)
Fire/Fire blaster (I had the first to level 40 level cap on Champion)
Fire/Fire tank.
If you stand in the open you die on a blaster - it is that simple. If you think adding a blaster doesn't help - you aren't paying attention.
Quote:
I prefer the nuke crash as is, though I do confine myself to builds that include "consume" type powers. Then I use my nuke as much as possible with minimal consequences.
|
Originally Posted by Arcanaville
meet-in-the-middle power would exist between the damage predicted by the endurance costs including the crash - 4.34 DS, slightly lower than what Nova actually does now - and the damage predicted by the recharge (12.2). It would then do more than its endurance costs and less than its recharge, and be roughly balanced in that sense. That would be about 8.25 DS in round numbers, which is about 68% more damage than Nova does now. That is plenty of damage to take out minions and LTs. You would have to be damage-capped to take out an even con boss with that, but you would be able to take out damaged bosses. And I think at that level of damage I would accept an unavoidable endurance crash (meaning: inspirations wouldn't work to restore end during the crash), at least for, say, the first half of the crash (the first 10 seconds).
|
Quote:
In a situation where the survivibility threashold has been reached, Damage > all. It isn't a given that a debuffer will provide more damage than a damage dealer, so adding a def/corr/cont isn't a given. In team makup situations where survivibility threashold is reached and the damage dealer is > the force multiplier, the blaster is -THE- best choice. My proof was that a Force multiplier isn't always the best choice, and it can be beat by pure damage. (BTW this -was- addressed in my other post)|
Originally Posted by Another_Fan
Is that what you thought you were doing ?
Then you needed to do the analysis with regard to weather adding a scrapper a brute a tank or other at represented a better choice than adding a blaster. That would be just one more thing that you missed. |
However when the ability to survive the challenge hasn't been met, that's the priority. Remembering that you need less survivibility when you have more damage. It's in these team combinations that Brutes/scrappers are a better choice, because they bring lesser ammounts of damage, but the survivibilty to deliver that damage. Combine that with enough supplementary damage, and their lesser mitigation becomes just enough to defeat a given challenge, with less concern toward gaining more survivibilty.
Adding a Tanker is usually enough to hit the survivibility threashold. Again, once the ability to survive incoming damage is reached, the priority is maximizing outgoing damage.
This is a delicate balance of numbers, that you've shown a complete inability to understand. However, the point is that blasters are not replacable by other ATs and, as expected from a game, some choices are better than others a certain times. The great thing about this game is, that better doesn't mean absolutly neccesary.
Murphys Military Law
#23. Teamwork is essential; it gives the enemy other people to shoot at.
#46. If you can't remember, the Claymore is pointed towards you.
#54. Killing for peace is like screwing for virginity.
Quote:
Good post!
|
Originally Posted by William_Valence
In a situation where the survivibility threashold has been reached, Damage > all. It isn't a given that a debuffer will provide more damage than a damage dealer, so adding a def/corr/cont isn't a given. In team makup situations where survivibility threashold is reached and the damage dealer is > the force multiplier, the blaster is -THE- best choice. My proof was that a Force multiplier isn't always the best choice, and it can be beat by pure damage. (BTW this -was- addressed in my other post)
However when the ability to survive the challenge hasn't been met, that's the priority. Remembering that you need less survivibility when you have more damage. It's in these team combinations that Brutes/scrappers are a better choice, because they bring lesser ammounts of damage, but the survivibilty to deliver that damage. Combine that with enough supplementary damage, and their lesser mitigation becomes just enough to defeat a given challenge, with less concern toward gaining more survivibilty. Adding a Tanker is usually enough to hit the survivibility threashold. Again, once the ability to survive incoming damage is reached, the priority is maximizing outgoing damage. This is a delicate balance of numbers, that you've shown a complete inability to understand. However, the point is that blasters are not replacable by other ATs and, as expected from a game, some choices are better than others a certain times. The great thing about this game is, that better doesn't mean absolutly neccesary. |
Quote:
Stun Aura on Stalkers instead of Repulse is kinda different... Or well the mez shield turning into a taunt aura that gives you +rech.
|
Originally Posted by ClawsandEffect
I didn't see any breaking of the cottage rule with EA.
|
Quote:
In before Cottage rule tangent!
|
Originally Posted by Kioshi
Stun Aura on Stalkers instead of Repulse is kinda different... Or well the mez shield turning into a taunt aura that gives you +rech.
|
Quote:
Yes because the ability to separate the team into multiple independent units is valueless, and the ability to complete tasks in parallel brings nothing. /sarcasm|
Originally Posted by William_Valence
In a situation where the survivibility threashold has been reached, Damage > all. It isn't a given that a debuffer will provide more damage than a damage dealer, so adding a def/corr/cont isn't a given. In team makup situations where survivibility threashold is reached and the damage dealer is > the force multiplier, the blaster is -THE- best choice. My proof was that a Force multiplier isn't always the best choice, and it can be beat by pure damage. (BTW this -was- addressed in my other post)
However when the ability to survive the challenge hasn't been met, that's the priority. Remembering that you need less survivibility when you have more damage. It's in these team combinations that Brutes/scrappers are a better choice, because they bring lesser ammounts of damage, but the survivibilty to deliver that damage. Combine that with enough supplementary damage, and their lesser mitigation becomes just enough to defeat a given challenge, with less concern toward gaining more survivibilty. Adding a Tanker is usually enough to hit the survivibility threashold. Again, once the ability to survive incoming damage is reached, the priority is maximizing outgoing damage. This is a delicate balance of numbers, that you've shown a complete inability to understand. However, the point is that blasters are not replacable by other ATs and, as expected from a game, some choices are better than others a certain times. The great thing about this game is, that better doesn't mean absolutly neccesary. |
Edit: Perhaps that was excessively confrontational, but the blaster is almost never the best choice. There are very very few blaster combinations that can actually outdamage scrappers, what blasters bring is AOE, which frankly everyone brings and it is hard to have a team that doesn't have more than enough even before judgement.
I think the game has evolved to a point where any AT can be useful in pretty much any situation, therefore no AT is superfluous.
Plus there's a whole 1-49 game where none of the incarnate stuff matters and most players aren't highly IO'd to superiority.
So I read like the first 2/3 of this thread, and i dont really have a side to pick. But, I have been playing since issue 2, and so I thought I would put my opinion on here....
I solo. I team, when I get random invites. I play on Liberty, and mostly on weeknights. Not so many invites. So I solo. As such, certain AT's just dont cut it for me. I have like one controller(ill/storm) at lvl 23 I think I play like once a year lol. I have no defenders, though I have played them into the 20's a few times. I have a couple corruptors on an alt server, and A dom at lvl 8 I just started to try the earth assault set. I play lots of Brutes, scrappers, and yes a pretty big pile of blasters. I have some older tanks, but powerset proliferation mostly made it so I just roll brutes instead. The big difference between blasters and scrapper/brute? Easy mode. It is possible to set difficulty on scrappers and brutes to "so easy I can watch tv while pushing 1-3-2-3-4-1 etc not even looking at the game" I find that, after the early levels, and sometimes even then, blasters dont function that way.
I find blasters to be great fun. Until somewhere in the mid 30's. Early on, they do stupid damage output, and have fun powers available. I mean stuff like, build up+fireball, TK thrust, power burst.... blasters get them early, and use them to great effect.
But then, somewhere in the "peak" of their development( I mean in regards to primary/secondary, not where people start investing in IO builds and app's etc) the play goes from "It's ok to blast the hell out of everything as fast as I can, I will get by on INspirations and stupid high damage" to something more like "dammit I have to snipe every spawn or pick targets really careful or kite enemies non stop because somehow I die really easy and cant seem to kill them off fast enough"
And really, I think thats what irks some players. I have this giant list of blasters, and like all but 4 of them havent seen lvl 32, and two of the 4 are at lvl 33. Some of the combos I have played are early power monsters, some take a little bit to get going, but all of them start feeling the squeeze as they progress.
Now, I dont mind difficulty ramping up, I dont mind AT's that have morphing playstyles as they level up. But the one thing with blasters is how much that difficulty and playstyle changes. I have an energy/fire at lvl 46. Made him years ago, before ED even i think like I3. I have tried different approaches to make him more survivable. I built him with IO's to max out acc, dmg, end and rech in the 30's, and did really well. That doesnt cut it in the 40's. So i tried to reinvent him, and his play style. I dont want to spend a fortune on him for a def build, and he just doesnt have enough tricks up his sleeve. So i snipe, I kite, I run away. And to me, I just dont like it. If I had made him as some kind of assasin droid or something, I wouldnt even notice really. But he wasnt like that, and it feels(yes I know really factual) like I am getting my playstyle of this character pigeon holed into a sniper. And I think, for most combos, blasters get that in the higher levels. the exception of course is IO's, and how much you mind picking as many pool powers as primary/secondary. I tend to like staying out of pool powers and using the unique character's powersets, and while I do enjoy crazy IO builds, I have so many characters I can not realistically expect to IO and purple them all. Heck I have deleted enough characters(level 30 and down) to fill up 3 other servers. Blasters are unique as an AT in how their power level alters over their career.
This is turning into a wall of text, so I will sum.... Blasters playstyle morphs as level increases. And some players do not like the way it morphs. And also, where some AT's gain MORE options as level increases in choice of playstyle, blasters appear to lose options, and get shoe horned into the snipe/kite/run or build for IO def style.
And again, this is from a solo players perspective. it is always amazing playing blasters on a well oiled team IMO. A team easily covers for the weak spots in the AT.
As for the "dont play the AT" thing, well, I like to play the blast sets. they are flashy and pew pew. If there was an AT that used blast sets, but had the difficulty range versatility of scrapper/brute, I would be all over that. In fact, I do not see why the blaster AT cant be that way. If brutes and scrappers were given some ranged aoe, but then forced to snipe/kite/run at high levels to survive there would be threads like this for those AT's too. Again, I am talking solo. group play is a whole different animal, and most of what I have put here doesnt apply, or at least is greatly diminished. And of course it's all IMO, for what it's worth as a long time player. Have a nice day!
- Elda
Liberty server
Eldagore lvl 50 Inv/ss, co-founder of The Legion of Smash
3.5 servers of alts....I need help.
May the rawk be with you.
Arc #'s
107020 Uberbots!
93496 A Pawn in Time
Quote:
The BAF escape phase is probably one of the purest situations that require the best possible *application* of damage, rather than contrived situations like pylon farming: targets that you can only stop by killing them with direct fire, from whatever range you can engage them in, that can't be easily herded. Blasters generally outperform everything else in that phase.|
Originally Posted by Another_Fan
Edit: Perhaps that was excessively confrontational, but the blaster is almost never the best choice. There are very very few blaster combinations that can actually outdamage scrappers, what blasters bring is AOE, which frankly everyone brings and it is hard to have a team that doesn't have more than enough even before judgement.
|
If that was the *only* place blasters outperformed everything else, then that would just be a curiosity. But it suggests, because that situation isn't really obviously contrived to somehow favor blaster offense over anything else directly, that because its so difficult to judge who is really delivering the most damage most effectively in team situations, that paper analyses of those situations might not be as trustworthy as we think they are. There's nothing about BAF that says those paper analyses would necessarily be totally inapplicable, but they clearly are.
I actually happen to think that the BAF escape phase probably says more about how blasters perform as damage dealers for most of their existence leveling up for the average player than most other things do. The one thing that the escape phase does is allow people to see the true ability for a blaster to deliver damage when they can focus entirely on that, and not have to focus on trying to stay alive while under extreme fire. If they aren't at risk of death, they actually do quite well at delivering damage.
Which suggests that in teams where there is enough support to eliminate the chance of death, blasters might also be excelling at damage dealing over other archetypes in many situations where the optimum on-paper circumstances don't occur frequently enough.
Its interesting to note that in the super-saturated optimal conditions most people talk about when comparing blaster damage to defender or corruptor damage, or any other archetype, the blaster shouldn't be at high risk of death. But we know in actuality, blasters die very often, and that is what causes much of the performance lag for them. But if they are dying that often, that suggests that perhaps those optimal situations that trivialize blaster damage don't occur often enough to negate blaster damage. There may be many situations where there are enough buffs to keep the blaster alive, but the optimal situations don't occur where blaster damage is trivialized. And conversely there many be lots of situations where there aren't enough buffs to keep the blaster alive but there are enough situations that occur that neutralize blaster offensive advantages. Its very difficult to say, because these are areas that the very people who debate these topics never seem to find themselves in: highly suboptimal and situationally inconsistent situations that apparently nearly everyone else but forum posters find themselves in almost all the time.
[Guide to Defense] [Scrapper Secondaries Comparison] [Archetype Popularity Analysis]
In one little corner of the universe, there's nothing more irritating than a misfile...
(Please support the best webcomic about a cosmic universal realignment by impaired angelic interference resulting in identity crisis angst. Or I release the pigmy water thieves.)
Well...being from the Repeat Offenders, nothing rolls quite like a team full of Defenders or Corrupters buffing each other to be tank mages, but...
Blasters still and will always have a larger damage cap, so even amongst a team of tank mages, Blasters can add something no other AT can, even more damage.
Member of:
Repeat Offenders Network - The Largest Coalition Network in the Game, across Virtue, Freedom, Justice and Exalted. Open to all, check us out.
Current Team Project: Pending
Since it's been brought up, I would love to see an improvement made to Snipes and Nukes. They're fun powers, but just not good enough at what they do. I find it sad that I'd rather use my Judgement than my nukes on my Energy and Electric Blaster.
Doesn't have much to do with the superfluous thing, but it's a good idea that should be followed through on.
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
Quote:
Meh, what you posted feels pretty much like current nukes. Kill all the minions and Lts., neutralize the bosses. No single spawn is worth a crash, ever. Rage, SoW, and Unstoppable all last for mutliple spawns (or in the case of SoW and Unstoppable allow one to last vs. a very strong opponent). I can see the benefit of your improved nuke with the real, unavoidable crash, but it seems only barely better than the current version and still not worth even the shorter crash. If nukes could somehow work on multiple spawns (or had a significant impact during a fight vs. a very strong opponent), then a crash would make sense to me (kind of like your Raging Lunatics idea might work). However, I don't really want to change what the nukes do or turn them into something else.|
Originally Posted by Arcanaville
I consider all of the crash to be all of the crash when I say that, and I do think -recovery would be less of a big deal if a) the nuke removed the immediate threat completely, and b) it lasted less long than the threat was removed for.
|
It is true, I often get to use my nukes on two spawns, but, of course, the 16 target cap means it is not really two spawns. I actually love the nukes, just like most every player I ever meet in game. My "main" blaster doesn't have it, because I am damn well not turning 7 (or 8) toggles back on all the time and she is a walking nuke every 12 seconds anyway. I have skipped it on a few defenders, mostly those that run lots of toggles or where it doesn't fit thematically. But generally I take it and use it (and on my Emp/Ice/Dark, I almost feel it is worth the crash, especially in places like on top of the towers in the ITF, but Blizzard is kind of unique, especially when Soul Drain is maxed).
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Its very difficult to say, because these are areas that the very people who debate these topics never seem to find themselves in: highly suboptimal and situationally inconsistent situations that apparently nearly everyone else but forum posters find themselves in almost all the time.
|
Indeed, on most teams it can be very easy for blasters to leverage the range advantage. I frequently kill stuff while armored ATs are still just trying to run over to them. I frequently have ranger teammates kill stuff while I am trying to run to it when I play an armored character. Even when teams go all splits and start tackling multiple spawns, a blaster may be able to keep up for a bit.
Why Blasters? Empathy Sucks.
So, you want to be Mental?
What the hell? Let's buff defenders.
Tactics are for those who do not have a big enough hammer. Wisdom is knowing how big your hammer is.
Quote:
Do they ? And how was that determined ? It would seem to be very dependent on strategy. In the stop everything at the doors and peel off strategy, dominators, and anything with damage auras and massive pbaoe seems to do very well. The chokepoint strategy favors, dominators controllers, anything with slows or persistent patches.|
Originally Posted by Arcanaville
The BAF escape phase is probably one of the purest situations that require the best possible *application* of damage, rather than contrived situations like pylon farming: targets that you can only stop by killing them with direct fire, from whatever range you can engage them in, that can't be easily herded. Blasters generally outperform everything else in that phase.
|
I can see them doing well in hybrid door chokepoint strategies where they are covering a door and a path simultaneously shifting their aimpoint accordingly I don't know that I would rate that an outperform.
Blasters lose out on several of there self buffs in the escape phase. The 2+ seconds it takes to hit aim and buildup is an eternity
Quote:
| If that was the *only* place blasters outperformed everything else, then that would just be a curiosity. But it suggests, because that situation isn't really obviously contrived to somehow favor blaster offense over anything else directly, that because its so difficult to judge who is really delivering the most damage most effectively in team situations, that paper analyses of those situations might not be as trustworthy as we think they are. There's nothing about BAF that says those paper analyses would necessarily be totally inapplicable, but they clearly are. |
As to not being obviously contrived ?? I am sorry you are talking about a situation that resembles ducks in a shooting gallery being moved on a pulley belt. The escapees don't fire back they are moving through the firing arc of the blaster. About the only other thing that comes close, would be a blaster blowing up objects on a mayhem mission.
Quote:
| I actually happen to think that the BAF escape phase probably says more about how blasters perform as damage dealers for most of their existence leveling up for the average player than most other things do. The one thing that the escape phase does is allow people to see the true ability for a blaster to deliver damage when they can focus entirely on that, and not have to focus on trying to stay alive while under extreme fire. If they aren't at risk of death, they actually do quite well at delivering damage. |
Quote:
| Which suggests that in teams where there is enough support to eliminate the chance of death, blasters might also be excelling at damage dealing over other archetypes in many situations where the optimum on-paper circumstances don't occur frequently enough. |
Either way, the amount of effort the team has to dedicate to keeping the blaster alive, is comparable to any other squishy, but the blaster is contributing less to the survival of the team.
Quote:
| Its interesting to note that in the super-saturated optimal conditions most people talk about when comparing blaster damage to defender or corruptor damage, or any other archetype, the blaster shouldn't be at high risk of death. But we know in actuality, blasters die very often, and that is what causes much of the performance lag for them. But if they are dying that often, that suggests that perhaps those optimal situations that trivialize blaster damage don't occur often enough to negate blaster damage. There may be many situations where there are enough buffs to keep the blaster alive, but the optimal situations don't occur where blaster damage is trivialized. And conversely there many be lots of situations where there aren't enough buffs to keep the blaster alive but there are enough situations that occur that neutralize blaster offensive advantages. Its very difficult to say, because these are areas that the very people who debate these topics never seem to find themselves in: highly suboptimal and situationally inconsistent situations that apparently nearly everyone else but forum posters find themselves in almost all the time. |
Once again I don't have the raw data, but the number of situations where blasters were performing poorly, was enough to get us defiance 2.0. If those numbers have shifted, I would hazard that it is because the makeup of the blaster population has changed.
We know that blasters start off as the most popular AT and at some point they have a severe drop off. Just as a possibility the people that keep playing blasters, are those with enough resources both in terms of inf and in game associations, and other well equipped characters that when they play their blasters its in circumstances where they will do well. If this is the case, you would see a steady performance curve, but taking its product with population curve would show a cliff like drop off. This doesn't say the blaster AT is doing well but quite the opposite
Quote:
Severe? I do not think that word means what you think it means. I have seen some stuff that indicates a mild drop, but nothing that indicates a severe one. What are you referencing when you say we know of a severe drop off in blaster popularity in the high levels?
|
Originally Posted by Another_Fan
We know that blasters start off as the most popular AT and at some point they have a severe drop off.
|
Why Blasters? Empathy Sucks.
So, you want to be Mental?
What the hell? Let's buff defenders.
Tactics are for those who do not have a big enough hammer. Wisdom is knowing how big your hammer is.
Quote:
Going from the number one archetype in the game to number three is, obviously, a Massively Huge decline in the number of Blasters. Having eleven other archetypes with a lesser population at level 50 is completely irrelevant because we are talking about Blasters. |
Originally Posted by StratoNexus
Severe? I do not think that word means what you think it means. I have seen some stuff that indicates a mild drop, but nothing that indicates a severe one. What are you referencing when you say we know of a severe drop off in blaster popularity in the high levels?
|
This is obviously every Blaster in the game when they go from L49 to L50, as played by Another_Fan.
-= idspispopd =-
[size=1]Arc ID: 3155 - Project Prometheus (Seeking Feedback, now with less invalidation)[/size]
The only thing I would want for blasters is a 2 second status protection increase when I pop aim or buildup.
There is nothing worse than zipping into range after a buildup + aim and getting hit with an AoE sleep - this happens so often I swear it is by design.
I am sorry Another_fan this is a silly statement:
"Personally I have never been on a team where the chance of death was eliminated. I have been on many teams where "No deaths occurred" but that is hardly the same thing.
Either way, the amount of effort the team has to dedicate to keeping the blaster alive, is comparable to any other squishy, but the blaster is contributing less to the survival of the team."
If they are dead - they are no threat. I once was running some missions on my fire/fire blaster and with a team of 6 we had 4 blasters and 2 scrappers - both scrappers were low level so my blaster was tanking.
One of the scrappers when he joined the team said how do we start? I said like this and ran in and opened up with 2 heavy AoE's and popped a green. The team just melted them down. I said death is the best mitigation.
After that mission he said - I see it but don't believe it - it is making me too nervous to see you go up and down in health like that. I was using corners, boxes, doorways and all the tricks to target edges of the foes and not be open for the entire alpha at once. I was gleaning spare greens/purples from other players as needed - but I never died.
Blasters are hard to play and simple at the same time. You tear things up and try to live long enough afterwards to enjoy your efforts. However, debt means nothing - there is no spoon.
Quote:
I've seen FA brutes burn down everything coming out of a door during that stage and be ready for every group that pops, but I have not seen blasters ready to do that with every spawn. Maybe a fire/reactive could have RoF ready for every one, but that would still just put them equal to what brutes and scrappers are able to also do.|
Originally Posted by Arcanaville
The BAF escape phase is probably one of the purest situations that require the best possible *application* of damage, rather than contrived situations like pylon farming: targets that you can only stop by killing them with direct fire, from whatever range you can engage them in, that can't be easily herded. Blasters generally outperform everything else in that phase.
|
That post above was made about damage being everything once you have enough survivability, but the BAF prisoner phase demonstrates quite well a situation where you also hit sufficient damage easily enough and more doesn't do anything.
Blasters may excel in their ability to kill runners that get away from multiple doors, but there is no reason to herd doors since they all pop out standing right where you expect them to. I don't even know why you mention herding when you don't need it at all for any AT during the stage. Maybe blasters excel when the league is doing choke points, but I see so few leagues doing choke points compared to doors, that it seems a moot point.
Quote:
There are the dev numbers and my own surveys. You can do your own informal checks, just check how many you see on your teams, and how many you see when you search for them.|
Originally Posted by StratoNexus
Severe? I do not think that word means what you think it means. I have seen some stuff that indicates a mild drop, but nothing that indicates a severe one. What are you referencing when you say we know of a severe drop off in blaster popularity in the high levels?
|
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Cyclone_Jack
Going from the number one archetype in the game to number three is, obviously, a Massively Huge decline in the number of Blasters. Having eleven other archetypes with a lesser population at level 50 is completely irrelevant because we are talking about Blasters.
This is obviously every Blaster in the game when they go from L49 to L50, as played by Another_Fan. |
Quote:
Which is why I said you can argue individual powersets: there are individual powersets that are specifically fairly well suited for that situation, like Fire tankers and Brutes. However, in terms of never seeing a blaster that could burn down every spawn that comes out of a door, I can do that.|
Originally Posted by rsclark
I've seen FA brutes burn down everything coming out of a door during that stage and be ready for every group that pops, but I have not seen blasters ready to do that with every spawn. Maybe a fire/reactive could have RoF ready for every one, but that would still just put them equal to what brutes and scrappers are able to also do.
|
Quote:
| That post above was made about damage being everything once you have enough survivability, but the BAF prisoner phase demonstrates quite well a situation where you also hit sufficient damage easily enough and more doesn't do anything. |
Quote:
| I don't even know why you mention herding when you don't need it at all for any AT during the stage. Maybe blasters excel when the league is doing choke points, but I see so few leagues doing choke points compared to doors, that it seems a moot point. |
I've seen leagues go both ways depending on the number of players involved. The choke points makes sense on smaller leagues and leagues with less damage dealers. Above a critical number of damage dealers, it makes more sense to go after the doors.
Above all else my blaster has far more flexibility than any melee character I could bring to that situation. I can shoot AoEs at a door constantly and still react to runners passing behind me if a leak develops. I can shift to being a floater far more easily and help different groups that might be having problems. I can cover far more area, and I can shoot at a larger number of targets overall, and I have plenty enough damage to kill them when I do before they pass me by. Nothing in my experience suggests anything other than in terms of shooting runners where ever they pop out from or where ever they are going, Blasters as a group will have the best overall performance.
[Guide to Defense] [Scrapper Secondaries Comparison] [Archetype Popularity Analysis]
In one little corner of the universe, there's nothing more irritating than a misfile...
(Please support the best webcomic about a cosmic universal realignment by impaired angelic interference resulting in identity crisis angst. Or I release the pigmy water thieves.)
Quote:
Apparently sarcasm and humor is lost on you. |
Originally Posted by Another_Fan
I am glad to see you had something significant to add. In the past I have seen you dispute that there was any drop off in blasters, I suppose having numbers you can't argue with must be upsetting for you.
|
Truth is, yes, Blasters go from the number 1 played AT to the number 3 AT in one level and only for 1 level. Why do you think that is? Because they suddenly have a huge drop in performance in that one level? I find that very hard to believe. From my observation, the reason is quite simple. Blasters do not farm as well as Scrappers or Controllers.
Now, I will admit, I would love to see Blaster Tier 9s get a work over, or perhaps create an alternative Tier 9 that players can choose between. As much as I love Blizzard, the crash is killer, especially since I almost have Blizzard down to a 90s recharge.
I do like Arcana's comment above about Lightning Rod. If Elec Blast had that as their Tier 9, that would be awesome.
-= idspispopd =-
[size=1]Arc ID: 3155 - Project Prometheus (Seeking Feedback, now with less invalidation)[/size]
I don't dislike that type of crash, as I am perfectly happy with Unstoppable, Rage, and SoW. But even if we made the nuke instantly obliterate even bosses or maybe even EBs, they still would not be worth the harsh crash, IMO. I cannot see a way to reconcile Nukes having a crash for blasters, outside of your Raging Lunatic concept. I love the idea behind Inferno and Nova. I even like the idea behind needing some moments to recover from that type of power. But what the nukes do gameplay wise, does not really match the way they work in a story environment and the crash is just inappropriate.
For example, if you give me EMP and I'm going to hold (or stun) everything in sight for 20 seconds, I wouldn't mind -recovery for 10. I do mind knocking something over for about six seconds of ragdoll and getting 20 seconds of -recovery. Its a question of balance there.
Incidentally, here's an interesting thought to consider. I've done the calculation many times in the past but I'll update it for the current situation. Powers normally obey a balance equation that determines their recharge and endurance cost by the amount of damage they do and the area of effect they affect. So lets take Nova (its the simplest to analyze) and just see what the equations say. Recognizing that the equations don't necessarily apply in extreme cases, this will at least provide some guidance when looking at the recharge, endurance costs, and crash of the power.
Nova does a maximum of 6.0 scale damage, but averages 4.875. It has an AoE factor of 4.75. It therefore does an effective damage of 23.16 DS. This translates into a recharge of 142.5 seconds and an endurance cost of 120.4.
Given that Nova's recharge is 360 seconds, its recharge is way too high for its damage output according to the recharge equation. But interestingly its endurance costs are way too low. Nova costs only 20.8 endurance to activate. However, it also crashes you to zero. You could argue that the *maximum* endurance cost of Nova is 100 endurance (for a player with unenhanced maximum endurance). Stopping recovery for 20 seconds is essentially another endurance cost of sorts: it robs the blaster of 20 seconds of endurance recovery. Prior to inherent stamina, that would have been at base about 33.3 end, and today assuming 3-slotted SO stamina (because by the time you have Nova you have access to SOs) that would be 49.6 endurance. So the absolute maximum endurance cost (assuming 100 max end) is about 149.6 The minimum cost is 70.4 endurance. The average is about 110 endurance. That's actually, coincidentally, just about what Nova should cost endurance-wise.
You could say, when describing the crash, that Nova is "borrowing" endurance to fuel its activation and the player has to pay it back after it fires through the crash. However, that line of thought only makes sense if Nova recharged three times faster: otherwise its obeying the endurance equation by applying a penalty to the blaster, but not obeying the recharge equation and allowing the blaster to use it as often as the equations would ordinarily allow. I think there is an opportunity to split the difference by keeping the crash and significantly increasing the damage of the power. A 360 recharge power intrinsically implies 57.96 DS, or at Nova's AoE factor 12.2 DS. That is 2.5 times higher than Nova's average damage and over twice its maximum damage. There's a lot of room to negotiate. If we didn't consider Nova to be anything special, strictly on the basis of its recharge it would deal about 763 points of damage *on average* at level 50. That's *base unenhanced damage*: more than enough with SOs to obliterate practically all minions and LTs at level 50. Its more than enough, with BU and Aim, to take out an even con Boss.
A meet-in-the-middle power would exist between the damage predicted by the endurance costs including the crash - 4.34 DS, slightly lower than what Nova actually does now - and the damage predicted by the recharge (12.2). It would then do more than its endurance costs and less than its recharge, and be roughly balanced in that sense. That would be about 8.25 DS in round numbers, which is about 68% more damage than Nova does now. That is plenty of damage to take out minions and LTs. You would have to be damage-capped to take out an even con boss with that, but you would be able to take out damaged bosses. And I think at that level of damage I would accept an unavoidable endurance crash (meaning: inspirations wouldn't work to restore end during the crash), at least for, say, the first half of the crash (the first 10 seconds).
[Guide to Defense] [Scrapper Secondaries Comparison] [Archetype Popularity Analysis]
In one little corner of the universe, there's nothing more irritating than a misfile...
(Please support the best webcomic about a cosmic universal realignment by impaired angelic interference resulting in identity crisis angst. Or I release the pigmy water thieves.)