Is it me, or does everyone use Judgement Ion?

I'd say about 95% people of the people I have seen use this judgement. Is there a reason the majority doesn't go with anything else? While I also have Ion at tier 4, I am building up Void for that -50% damage debuff which looks very nice.

Just curious why everyone goes Ion? I went with it for concept.

I chose it for concept and because it looks cool.

I would imagine a lot of people pick it because there aren't a lot of ways to call down the lightning if you don't pick an electric based set, which for most people doesn't pack a lot of punch compared to some other choices.

I always pick Pyronic for the fast animation.

Ionic Used to double hit mobs, because it would chain and jump around. Perhaps people think it still does.

Ionic is both the flashiest, and the most easily leveraged AoE of all of them, which is why a lot take it. I have it on one character, but overall I've been much happier with Pyronic and more recently Vorpal. I've never taken the cold one, and probably never will. I had void on my Scrapper and am much happier with Vorpal (both for concept reasons and the way it "feels" more effective).

My experience is that Ion is the most popular with Pyronic being second. Void and Cryonic seem to be very unpopular and Vorpal hasn't been out long enough to really say.

As for why, I think Ion is popular for two reasons. First when the powers were originally released Ion had a bug that caused it to frequently hit enemies twice if it wasn't target saturated. Since it's very rare to target saturate the Judgement powers this made it a lot more powerful than the others. This was fixed but a lot of people still had Ion judgements. and no particular incentive to change (it's no longer OP but other else became FotM either). The second reason is that Ion is easier to use than the others. You don't have to worry to much about which target you select, the chaining effect will tend to cause it to hit everything anyway.

Yes, if they are all close enough together, I believe it will go down a chain like that. I wiped out all the Cimeroran Surgeons on a bridge the other day. They weren't in a straight line, but it was the same effect.

This also means that Ionic can essentially shoot around corners.

I do not find Ionic the most popular. I find it very popular along with Pyronic.

Void is not very popular - most people don't think it's pretty, and it's very long animating compared to the others. I think Cryonic is one of the best kept secrets in the game for characters that already hang back, and honestly, Radial-side Vorpal is even better, because it's a 120' long, 120 degree cone with a 40 target max - the only other Judgement with a 40-target max is Ionic. Of course, it's smashing damage, which sometimes is highly resisted, but less so than Lethal.

Ionic has one big downside. If too many people have it, using it can lead to "lost" uses of the power. The chains will not jump to something that's just been hit by another chain. So if two people fire Ion in quick succession, the first person will hit the nearby secondary targets, and that will block the second person's Ion from jumping to anything.

If you ALWAYS have all the mobs in a very tight bunch then Pyronic fires off faster and I think does slightly better damage. On the other hand Ion will hit a drastically larger area than any other AOE I've seen in the game.

Last night we ran an STF and in the Vine Room I tossed Ion on a vine in front of the tree... it cleared every single vine in that entire section of the room in one shot. Likewise on a Mothership Raid you can toss Ion on a mob at the top of the bowl and hit mobs all the way around the ring... it's great to see it chain from one end of the bowl all the way around the rim to it's starting point.

In my experience with both Ion and Pyronic I find that I almost always hit considerably more targets with Ion than with Pyronic. As long as a mob's within about 20' or so (has anyone measured that distance? I'm going on an off the cuff perception) Ion will jump to him provided it's still below it's massive target cap. The sole disadvantage of Ion is the somewhat lengthy animation while Pyronic uses the Fireball animation.

I know I went Pyro on my Blaster more for concept reasons (sets on it are Fire/Devices} and on my Tank I went void because it was the only Melee one atthe time, most of the others I've gone Ion.

I generally save my Judgement attack for emergencies, and I like Ion because of the huge AoE that can zap all the foes in a large and confused pull-gone-wrong. Unless there is some thematic reason to choose something else (like Void for my Warshade) I always choose Ion.
Based on my own experience on Justice, I think Pyronic and Ion are approximately equal in popularity, with Void running a distant third.

Edit: Screenshot taken while trick-or-treating at the Motel of the Damned on Peregrine Island. You can see that Ion is not one single chain. It can branch and fork.

I have Ion on my favorite stalker to match her Mu Mastery powers... I'll probably have it on my Elec dominator for the same reason. I find myself picking Pyro a lot more often though. 'Just love that big fireball.

I pick Pyronic for the fastest animation (as well as a solid DoT) on most toons. I took Void on a couple for the damage debuff. -50% dmg debuff for 30 seconds is really good.

Ion Judgement is really nice for when you just don't feel like herding a group together, but you will want to kill dudes in an AoE. Ion can even travel around corners, if the mobs are standing close enough. It's great for Oranbega missions.

Widow - Void made purple to look psi (may switch to Vorpal)
Plant/Earth/Fire Dom - Pyronic
DS/Pain MM - Pyronic
Necro/Dark/Soul MM - Void
Energy/Energy/Force Blaster - Ion

My DP/Time char, who is a natural speedster, will be Vorpal if I get her to 50. TW/EA will probably do Ion.

Quote:

Originally Posted by PRAF68_EU Dispari has more than enough credability, and certainly doesn't need to borrow any from you.

Started off with pyronic and it worked great, but recently switched to vorpal cause it fit better with my character's concept and have been very happy with it. Its not as flashy as the other powers, and is different in how you use it, but once you get it down, it works GREAT. Its basically a huge PBAOE but only in an arc in the direction you're facing. Playing around on the towers at the end of an ITF, it took out a whole line across one wall of the towers from the middle of it in one shot. Its quick, effective and I love it.

Ion is my default because of its large target cap and potentially huge area of effect. That's especially valuable on Praetorian content with Praetorian Clockwork, since they seem to have a very strong "prefer range" AI. It's just really hard to get them to clump up unless you have a Tanker doing traditional corner-pulling. You could hit a handful with a standard AoE, or you could hit all of them with Ion.

I'd say Ion is one of the most popular, not because of the old bug, but because it can cover a huge area due to the Jump effect. My FF defender uses it for fresh bowl-spawns on mothership raids and RARELY misses.

OTOH, my main tank took Pyronic. Why? Mainly looks. The fast animation is nice and having enemies refuse to grouping up tight to get to him is seldom a problem. But those are secondary and are the reason I haven't deprecated Pyronic and build myself a secondary for Ionic.

I think, for Tanks and Brutes, Pyronic is probably a better choice. But for everyone else, Ionic is the best bet.

Hell, even for Tanks and Brutes, Ionic isn't a bad choice. I've had my targeted enemy run away last second to try and reposition themselves for a better attack angle and take my Pyronic with them, saving their group...

Clicking on the linked image above will take you off the City of Heroes site. However, the guides will be linked back here.

Personally, I've been going Void on all of my Incarnates for the -DMG and slowly filtering in those Judgements that are more for a specific toon's concept/theme.

My Fire/Kin Controller has Pyronic.

My SS/Shld Brute has Ionic.

And my StJ/WP Brute has Void, Pyronic and Vorp.

Vorp... very disappointing. I was thinking it was something like Shield Charge or Lighting Rod where you can place the target of where you want to hit. But alas, no. It's just a cone in front of you that sometimes hits everything or sometimes hits like 2 NPCs.

Void, for my brute, I do like. But it didn't feel all that smashy to me. The "feel" of Pyronic is more intense than Void.

[ @Zombie Fryer ][ @Zombie Smasher ]
| Home Server: Virtue |

Twitter: @ZFLikesNachos Save City of Heroes (Titan Network) [Successful "The Really Hard Way" runs: 4] [Click ^]

I chose based on character concept, so of my 3 characters that have Judgment, two are Ionic and one is Cryonic. And an argument could have been made for going Ionic with her too, but Cryonic was the "more right" choice, in terms of concept, and it was different from the other two, for whom nothing else really worked.

Well of my 4 mains.

Ill/Storm/Fire Troller I took Void, 2 reasons 1 he is purely slotted with whatever the game gods dropped. So Void was the first I could make. I like this toon since it has a wide range of damage types; smashing, nrg, fire, negative, psi so Something for everyone.

On my Grav/Nrg/Psi Dom I went with Ion. It fit my range attack only build.

On my Fire/Electric/Fire I went Ion to continue theme.

On my Kin/Inv tank I plan on taking Vorpal for theme reasons.

Frankly All the Incarnate stuff is over powered so I think theme more than stats.