Does anyone use Time Bomb/Trip Mine frequently?

So I'm thinking about rolling either a Traps/Sonic Defender or a /Traps Corr. Just playing around in Mids I've managed to make a few build(s) that I like (Softcap to M/R/AoE, ~60% SL Res).

I enjoy doing Speed TFs, and I plan on fully incarnating the toon, so lots of iTrials. I can't see myself ever really using Time Bomb and even Trip Mine seems to have limited uses though I can why it might be useful on something like a BAF, but is the damage that great?

So does anyone swear by either of these 2 powers? (Trip Mine I'm thinking mainly, since I gather the general consensus is that Time Bomb is useless)

Forum logout bug ate my post.

Trip mine: Hell yes I use this. All the bloody time. With softcapped defenses, the interrupt is not a problem to use in combat and it's the best attack my mastermind can drop. On top of that, I got some great set bonuses out of a four set of Eradications. Romulus? Put a bomb on his toe. Mass of fifth column? Drop a mine to blow out their kneecaps. It's even better when you know ambushes will be incoming from a certain direction. Excellent for a BAF. Can you say door six of blueside respec guarded by eleven mines? Freakshow vaporize at that kind of placement.

Time Bomb: It's not like my mastermind has access to it, but to hell if I'd ever use it anyway. The interrupt time is what... double Trip Mine? Then how long do you have to wait for it to go off? You can't guarantee damage with this power like you can with trip mine.

When soloing my Traps/Sonic I use it all the time, but not so much on teams.

Do mind in trials the softcap is quite higher then the base 45%. Though you have a larger group to get buffs from, just keep it in mind.

On trials i use my tripmine on my MM, specialy during escape missions, i just pop one down when i have the chance. Sadly due lag, 99% it explode but doesnt do damage.

Trip mine, hugely.

Time bomb? My dp/dev uses it when soloing hard stuff, but it's mostly unused on teams.

trip mine i use all the time

time bomb mostly unused-too unreliable for my tastes

I use trip mine all the time with my bots/traps MM. Solo and in teams. Just be careful when your in team due to the knockback.

Another vote for Trip Mine = good, Time Bomb = bad.

On my Fire/Traps I'll often toebomb with Trip Mine. As Beltor said though, be wary of the KB. The mines have a very tiny delay before they go off (even toebombing) so you can use that pause to throw a TAoE to make sure TM finishes them off.

Trip Mine -> Fireball -> Cackle

Soloing, on dp/dev, I have been known to place a trip mine, go around to the other side of a creature, and toebomb it. KB into another mine, instant death.

DIE FOR MY AMUSEMENT!

Note that I don't really care whether I'm playing efficiently a lot of the time, so my dp/dev tends to play at slightly higher levels, then spend 2 minutes setting up mines, drop a time bomb, then wait around a corner until the one surviving critter with two pixels of health bar comes around the corner so I can kill it with my T1 blast.

Just chiming in with pretty much what everyone else is saying.

With Traps its pretty much all the time for trip mine and I don't even pick up time bomb. I did have it on a my Sonic Traps corruptor at first but just got interrupted too much.

Oddly enough my fire/traps corruptor doesn't use trip mine as often as my archery/devices blaster - but he groups a lot more and in most groups you just don't have the time.

When I am soloing my preffered use on the blaster is to stealth in range of mobs, drop it at my feet along with a caltrop patch and then open up with RoA and my other AoE attacks. The result is that any mobs on killed in my initial attacks run toward me, hit the caltrops and slow down, then hit the trip mine and get blowed up.

That strategy doesn't work as well with my traps corruptor if only because I am at the S/L softcap and I am a lot more offensive on him - he jumps into the middle of the mobs, drops acid mortar + PGT and then unleashes RoF, fireball and firebreath (bouncing back out to aim that). I don't really have time for trip mine - usually I only use it when I am facing a couple of bosses or an EB and then I do a mine and pull strategy - dropping a couple of trip mines, PGT and caltrops then pull with fire blast.

On a traps/sonic defender you will probably get a lot more use out of trip mine than my fire/traps corruptor did if only because you don't have as much Aoe on sonic blast. Plus, you have the sleep in sonic which will give you more time to drop traps - just make sure you do them in the right order so you don't wake things up to soon. Stealth up to siren's song's range, sleep things, go in and plant PGT, Acid Mortar then trip mine and watch the fun. Alternatively you can do a trap and pull like my blaster did - stealth into sonic cone range, drop trip mine + acid and the open up.

I did once get a ton of use out of trip mine, did a Citadel TF with some people and somehow we ended up with the entire TF at +3. We were having a heck of a time killing stuff, and we actually started doing the thing where I set up mines and the tank brought things to them. Just because of the huge damage of well-slotted mines, it was actually worth it. (This may seem weird, but here's the thing: Mobs regenerate. Doing a bunch of damage all at once can cause them to stop regenerating.)

Even on a speed run, you can drop what I call a "safety mine" at your own feet before you start attacking. Anything that peels off and heads for you gets a nasty surprise, and even if it lives, the knockback may buy you time to react. Aggro management tends to get sloppier on speed runs and you may see more guys slip past the Tankers and Controllers than you are used to.

Like everyone else I see and use Trip Mines often.

Only time I've seen Time Bomb used at all, much less with any frequency, was with a group of friends. While 3 to 5 of us (all AR/Dev blasters) were setting Trip Mines, the only one of us to take Time Bomb (to see if it was really that bad ... heh) would set one among one mob, then all of us would open up on any mobs in sight as the Time Bomb went off. Survivors of the Time Bomb/Full Autos would get pulled down a hallway with enough mines to end pretty much everything in sight. Amazing sight and pretty much doable without a Time Bomb used, of course, as 30 to 50+ trips mines along a hall are pretty much the final word anyway.

I love trip mine. I love teleport foe onto my caltrops soaked mine field.

On fast moving teams I use it less, but its not useless.

Traps MM's don't have time bomb. Instead they have detonate, which blows up a pet or it tries to set a time bomb if it's human (thugs, mercs, ninja). This is almost as bad since you lose the pet, but them running into the front is better than you. I use Grant invisibility on one of my smaller bots, put him on "goto passive" (you can order just one pet with "petcom_name"), move him into the middle of the mob and hit the switch. Any survivors charge me and hit the trip mines. I suspect time bomb doesn't allow as much set up as detonate.

And yes. Teleport Foe into your trip mine is very fun.

I used to use trip mine a lot. I still do, but I used to too.

Time Bomb? Its a wonderfull power that opens up a power pick for something else.

Yep, YA "I use trip mine constantly" post.

I also like to use time bomb and time it with a trip mine for fun. Obviously not super time efficient but sometimes I'm playing for fun and tactics vs. pure efficiency.

Plenty of great suggestions out there for these powers so I probably shouldn't waste time on moar suggestions.

Thanks for all the feedback guys.

One last question, how much do you all use Seeker Drones? -Dmg - Acc (+Disorient) seems pretty good and potentially good for soaking alphas. Other thoughts?

On my Traps/Ice and Traps/Dual Pistols, I use Seeker Drones as a lead in on groups, and keep the debuff up on EBs and AVs at all times.

I never take Time Bomb, its a great gift to Traps players as it is a no questions asked skippable turd of a power.

I use Tripmine for a Purple set, and use it often for fun, and here and there its a wonderful damage/protection tool. Its a must take power on my builds.

Seekers can actually buy you enough time to drop trip mine toe bomb style. I, too, use seekers and trip mine as much as possible. Seekers absorb some of the spawn's most deadly attacks. After usage, the spawn does even less damage with remaining powers in its attack cycle.

Yes to both as a Blaster solo, no to both as a MM or as a corrupter/defender when it comes to frequently.