So, is energy/ really that bad...?

Or is it just not that good?

Opinions?

Energy/ doesn't have very good AoE and the big ST attacks take years to activate. On a team you'll find yourself corpse-blasting left and right. It does comparable and sometimes worse ST dps than other sets that also have vastly superior AoE and/or mitigation. You'll learn to hate it when you activate energy transfer and some Claws dude runs up and lays out 3 attacks in the time it takes you to use 1, kills your target and runs away, and you still take the penalty damage.

If you ever played it before the changes to TF and ET then yes it is that bad. It will always be a pale shadow of it's former self.

If you are the type that gets frustrated by an attack landing after the team has killed the target due to a long animation time then the set is not for you.

If you like AOE the set is not for you.

If you like upper middle of the pack ST dps that shines on hard targets then EM/ is an ok set.

The major issue is that KM does everything that EM does well and then betters it without the frustrations that EM brings. The animations are a touch faster. The damage is equal or better. Your Pbaoe is more useful by doing KD instead of stun and you get a nifty ranged attack

Joe summed it up pretty nicely. I personally find EM to be completely unbearable, and before I ever roll another EM character, I would stretch the concept to allow KM or DM to fill the void. Just because a set is ST oriented doesn't mean it has to just suck. And my opinion of EM is that it plain sucks. (You may not agree). Regular corpse blasting, crappy AoE, and a hard hitting attack that kills you places this set at the bottom of my barrel. I know it isn't that slow, but it feels like it is.

Well, that makes it a bunch easier for me...

thanks!

I've been really enjoying it on my PVP stalker. Hits like a truck since damage in PVP is based on animation times IIRC.

Still, I'll second the comments on it getting over-nerfed and being generally a bad choice. It is not useless but it is definately underperforming.

Isn't EM still king of single target burst?

WARNING: I bold names.

It's just not that good.

It's fair to middlin with no real reason to choose it over one of the other sets, imho.

To add to this thread:

If you want something like energy melee that doesn't feel like an absolute pig, try Kinetic. It's not slow, don't let anyone tell you that. I'm on the verge of writing a guide for it, with strategies that prove KM is NOT slow.

I liked energy transfer when it was a quick punch. Now its so slow i dont even see why it reduces your health.

R.I.P. Energy Melee. They might as well give it to scrappers, since they want everything.

It is. Sad part is that its STdps just isnt that great either.
As stated it was over-nerfed, its sad the devs seem to really suck at balance

If you miss it doesnt break the combo, btw. And you arent stuck HAVING to use a specific attack to build a specific combo.
SJ's combo system >>>>>>>>>>>>>> DB's combo system
But who knows, they might change that.

To echo the other people is this thread..yes, EM is really that bad. I also had an energy melee toon, em/da brute, that I loved to bits. It would easily have been my most played toon.

I went with EM in the first place for the damage, and cause it was good in pvp (this was before i13). Prior to the em changes..the set was good, and I didnt feel it was OP in the least. Frequently, I would duo with a friends SS brute, and while I could down a boss faster with an et, tf, et combo, his aoe was miles better. In fact, I respec'd out of whirling hands.

When they announced the changes (et was the 891320132 week animation, tf with a lower mag stun) it just killed the set for me. Nerfing the two best powers, while giving nothing back, is just retarded. Not to mention that the Total Focus change was not needed (since seismic smash from Stone also does a mag 4 mez, similar damage AND animations in a quarter of the time).

After the changes, I still played with the toon a fair bit, since I had enjoyed it so much. But like others here are saying..you end up spending most of a fight locked in your stupidly long animations, while your team mates kill everything with aoe and faster attacks. About the best thing I found was on Cysts during the ITF..since they wouldnt die so fast.

To answer your question..just consider that EM used to easily be the most popular set for brutes and tanks when I started playing, and now theres a good chance that any brute/tank you see, will be SS.

I do pvp on an EM stalker, and there I dont mind the slow attacks so much, but for pve, where aoe and fast powers are king (think fire blast) it sucks. All in all, take the idiots who thought up the changes, and Energy Transfer them in the nuts, the OLD way.