Blaster Issues - Increased Damage Modifier (Ranged and Melee)


Another_Fan

 

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Originally Posted by Void_Huntress View Post

Can you share with us a build that shows how to manage this that doesn't involve 'and I checked my combat monitor after hitting Barrier' ?
It does involve barrier, however that's with barrier providing 2.5%, which is the minimum amount it gives up until expiring- it will always give at least that much. I'll go take a screenshot for you guys.


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Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Chyll View Post
Doesn't the average defender have less mitigation against Mez (their powers, by and large, are not self targeting while the blaster gets freedom to use some abilities), and access to the same general blast set mitigation so little real appreciable difference there. I cannot see, or agree, that blasters are at the bottom of the mez and, consquently, (following your logic) DPS food chain.
Defender primaries grant all sorts of mitigation through buffs (some of which affect the user while providing mez resistance or outright protection, see Accelerated Metabolism, Dispersion Bubble, Force Field Generator, et cetera), debuffs (effective +Def and Res through reducing the inbound DPS of hostile mobs, or effective +To Hit and Damage by reducing hostile defense) and heals.

Some sets, notably Radiation Emission, are perennial favorites because they bring all of it together to create an extremely effective whole that allows the user to reach performance curves far outside the expected baseline for the AT with a fairly minimal amount of investment.

Even without that though, given the tools available to them, it isn't difficult to imagine a scenario where a Defender is able to outperform a Blaster through sheer survivability.


 

Posted

Is there a way to get my UI to show in screenshots? When I try to take one, the resulting screenshot has no UI.
I have to get to work now, I'll check back here tonight so I can take an upload a screenshot if there's a way to do so.


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Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Feather_Of_Sun View Post
Is there a way to get my UI to show in screenshots? When I try to take one, the resulting screenshot has no UI.
I have to get to work now, I'll check back here tonight so I can take an upload a screenshot if there's a way to do so.
Options => Keymapping => Other => Toggle Screenshot UI


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Posted

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Originally Posted by Radio_Silence View Post
Defender primaries grant all sorts of mitigation through buffs (some of which affect the user while providing mez resistance or outright protection, see Accelerated Metabolism, Dispersion Bubble, Force Field Generator, et cetera), debuffs (effective +Def and Res through reducing the inbound DPS of hostile mobs, or effective +To Hit and Damage by reducing hostile defense) and heals.
Granted, the AT as a whole has more survivability tools.

My point was - mez protection (as highlighted in the discussion) - is largely ally targeted (with some exceptions).

Quote:
Originally Posted by Radio_Silence View Post
Some sets, notably Radiation Emission, are perennial favorites because they bring all of it together to create an extremely effective whole that allows the user to reach performance curves far outside the expected baseline for the AT with a fairly minimal amount of investment.
Set specific high end performers are not a good basis for overall comparison. But, agreed, Rad is the shizzle.


Quote:
Originally Posted by Radio_Silence View Post
Even without that though, given the tools available to them, it isn't difficult to imagine a scenario where a Defender is able to outperform a Blaster through sheer survivability.
Solo, same difficulty settings.... I'd argue that Blasters are easier/more pleasant to solo for the average player. And that comes down to DPS, ultimately, so I stand by my opinion/experience.

That said, I'd probably slide Corrs ahead of Blasters, for the reasons you noted.
(edit: though, to be fair, that may not be true. I seem to remember a solo DPS comparison Defender vs. Corruptors post Vigilance changes that had Defs edging out Corrs by the numbers.)
(re-edit: which is an interesting point, I doubt edging out Corrs would equal passing blasters.)


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Posted



Here you go. As you can see, in combat with +4x8 Carnies, Barrier is at it's minimum (Which I assumed was 2.5, but it's actually 5%! Nice surprise there.), no inspirations or temporary buffs active.

47.78% Smashing
47.78% Lethal
50.60% Ranged
45.28% Energy
45.28% Negative Energy

And to answer the "post ur build nao!!!", I left my set bonus page open. I do not use Mids, nor do I ever intend to use a build planner.


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Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Feather_Of_Sun View Post

47.78% Smashing
47.78% Lethal
50.60% Ranged
45.28% Energy
45.28% Negative Energy

And to answer the "post ur build nao!!!", I left my set bonus page open. I do not use Mids, nor do I ever intend to use a build planner.
Well I gotta give it to you mang I was trying to find the cheat in the build but could not(you know like veng active or something similar) That's some build you have there even if you can't post it cause you didn't use mids.


 

Posted

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Originally Posted by Feather_Of_Sun View Post
Here you go. As you can see, in combat with +4x8 Carnies, Barrier is at it's minimum (Which I assumed was 2.5, but it's actually 5%! Nice surprise there.), no inspirations or temporary buffs active.

47.78% Smashing
47.78% Lethal
50.60% Ranged
45.28% Energy
45.28% Negative Energy

And to answer the "post ur build nao!!!", I left my set bonus page open. I do not use Mids, nor do I ever intend to use a build planner.
That's impressive. You approached that an interesting way, from what I can pull from this. I know I never would have considered six-slotting Gladiator's Armor a viable option. I assume that's in Fire Shield?

I'd love to see you in action for this. Are you able to record a video of one of your fights? Or if not video, a demorecord?


Quote:
Originally Posted by Arcanaville View Post
Softcapping an Invuln is fantastic. Softcapping a Willpower is amazing. Softcapping SR is kissing your sister.

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Lucky666 View Post
Well I gotta give it to you mang I was trying to find the cheat in the build but could not(you know like veng active or something similar) That's some build you have there even if you can't post it cause you didn't use mids.
I'd imagine he does even better when he can click veng. (you know WHEN another poorly played or built blaster on team faceplants. )

That's a damn good build.

*impressed*

What's even more impressive is that you did it without ever firing up a build planner. I can do that too NOW, but it took me literally years of using mids before i could. *even more impressed*


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Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Chyll View Post
Granted, the AT as a whole has more survivability tools.

My point was - mez protection (as highlighted in the discussion) - is largely ally targeted (with some exceptions).
Their best mez protection is offered to others, but the prevalence of powers which offer direct mez protection to the Defender itself is about the same, in particular to hard mez including Holds which would otherwise prevent the Defender from acting at all.

This places them in a broadly superior position over the course of the game. Blasters have limited actions they can take while mezzed, but Defenders can avoid or reduce significant mez altogether with no investment exterior to the AT itself.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Chyll View Post
Set specific high end performers are not a good basis for overall comparison. But, agreed, Rad is the shizzle.
It is worth noting, however, that the worst case scenario for Defenders on the Mez front is being in the same basic position as Blasters (lacking direct mez protection), while always carrying significantly better general mitigation.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Chyll View Post
Solo, same difficulty settings.... I'd argue that Blasters are easier/more pleasant to solo for the average player. And that comes down to DPS, ultimately, so I stand by my opinion/experience.

That said, I'd probably slide Corrs ahead of Blasters, for the reasons you noted.
Defenders are a quirky comparison here, since Vigilance grants them a 30% damage buff while solo. This puts them slightly ahead of Corruptor base DPS in solo play. Scourge helps Corruptors pull ahead, but only in a relatively small cross section of play is that by a significant margin.

Solo, at the same difficulty settings, Defenders are apt to outperform Blasters through sustainability. At lower difficulty levels the gap will be less obvious (even becoming effectively non-extent below a certain threshold) because mitigation means less when there is less to mitigate, and Blaster DPS will tend to be high enough to mitigate through murder anyway.

At higher difficulty levels, the gap will become increasingly apparent as Blasters lose the ability to survive against hostile mobs by destroying them first and start spending more time doing 0 DPS while chewing pavement or flying back from hospitals.

As far as subjective experience goes, in the end it boils down to how you want to play. I would not say it is impossible to have fun playing a Blaster, but I also wouldn't say that Blasters are performing well in their own right. This is the real crux of the various conversations about Blaster performance: Should Blasters be altered in some fashion to provide better overall performance compared to other ATs?

Available data suggests that, from an objective standpoint, they should.


 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Aura_Familia View Post
I'd imagine he does even better when he can click veng. (you know WHEN another poorly played or built blaster on team faceplants. )

That's a damn good build.

*impressed*

What's even more impressive is that you did it without ever firing up a build planner. I can do that too NOW, but it took me literally years of using mids before i could. *even more impressed*
It is pretty good, and I don't want to rain on any parade, but I find the lack of certain powers disturbing. Aim and Hasten seem pretty important to me, and I'd personally like to have RoF/Psychic Scream/Fire Breath on my build. Seeing a build would be nice, as I'm not convinced heavy sacrifices weren't made to reach that level of defense, but kudos still.


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Posted

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Originally Posted by Radio_Silence View Post
It is worth noting, however, that the worst case scenario for Defenders on the Mez front is being in the same basic position as Blasters (lacking direct mez protection), while always carrying significantly better general mitigation.
I continue to contend that worst case scenario for Defenders is worse than Blasters who always have partial mez protection. And anything other than worst case is power rather than AT specific.


Quote:
Originally Posted by Radio_Silence View Post
Defenders are a quirky comparison here, since Vigilance grants them a 30% damage buff while solo. This puts them slightly ahead of Corruptor base DPS in solo play. Scourge helps Corruptors pull ahead, but only in a relatively small cross section of play is that by a significant margin.
Yep, looks like you replied before I got some edits in. I had forgotten about the Vigilance buff. I do remember a numbers based thread that analyzed the results of that vis-a-vis Corrs and Defs edged them out for DPS as a result, even with scourge. I would hardly expect edging Corrs to beat blasters for DPS - but, that is going to be situational (foes, etc) anyway.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Radio_Silence View Post
Solo, at the same difficulty settings, Defenders are apt to outperform Blasters through sustainability. At lower difficulty levels the gap will be less obvious (even becoming effectively non-extent below a certain threshold) because mitigation means less when there is less to mitigate, and Blaster DPS will tend to be high enough to mitigate through murder anyway.

At higher difficulty levels, the gap will become increasingly apparent as Blasters lose the ability to survive against hostile mobs by destroying them first and start spending more time doing 0 DPS while chewing pavement or flying back from hospitals.
Blasters have mitigation beyond just out-damaging the oppponents, and that becomes more available at high levels too (i.e., KB, holds in ice, etc.) So I wouldn't be quick to say it gets worse as a player advances.

I will still contend far more complaints, threads, global requests for teams, etc. based on 'hard to solo this def' than any for Blasters. And I'd say that was telling. It is anecdotal vs. numbers, I admit, but I think it is pertinent to note.


Quote:
Originally Posted by Radio_Silence View Post
As far as subjective experience goes, in the end it boils down to how you want to play. I would not say it is impossible to have fun playing a Blaster, but I also wouldn't say that Blasters are performing well in their own right. This is the real crux of the various conversations about Blaster performance: Should Blasters be altered in some fashion to provide better overall performance compared to other ATs?

Available data suggests that, from an objective standpoint, they should.
*shrug* I haven't seen real "data" to that effect... and I think that any changse Blasters need are low on the priority list given that they perform fine.

But, I agree it seems unavoidably subjective/philosphical at this point, so I will pass on by the thread now.


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Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Auroxis View Post
It is pretty good, and I don't want to rain on any parade, but I find the lack of certain powers disturbing. Aim and Hasten seem pretty important to me, and I'd personally like to have RoF/Psychic Scream/Fire Breath on my build. Seeing a build would be nice, as I'm not convinced heavy sacrifices weren't made to reach that level of defense, but kudos still.
I don't like Hasten. Call it personal preference. I don't have it on any of my characters. I can't stand the glowing golden hands.

Aim's the only power I feel like I gave up, but I don't miss not having it. Concentration(if that's the right name? From the Mental tree) is better, since it's +100% rather than 68.75% damage boost. Sure, both would be best for dealing damage spikes, but tossing Aim out wasn't much of a loss.

I can't stand Rain of Fire. I played up to 50 with it, then dumped it. It makes enemies run away, which is a pain since I play in melee.

And there's no need for any other attacks than I already have, since I have a nonstop chain of my best DPS attacks already.


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Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Auroxis View Post
It is pretty good, and I don't want to rain on any parade, but I find the lack of certain powers disturbing. Aim and Hasten seem pretty important to me, and I'd personally like to have RoF/Psychic Scream/Fire Breath on my build. Seeing a build would be nice, as I'm not convinced heavy sacrifices weren't made to reach that level of defense, but kudos still.
By my math, that build has 62.5% global recharge plus Spiritual Alpha (I can't tell which from the information given). Which is pretty good, but some powers aren't going to be up nearly as often as a more recharge intensive build. For instance, Drain Psyche isn't perma.. but with the higher degree of resistance this build has than mine, it isn't going to be leaning on the regen as much.

Also, Fire has enough DPS available to it even at only moderate recharge that I don't think it'll be dangerously damage anemic, if the attacks have any substantial slotting.

Of course, theory crafting from a screenshot isn't the same thing as seeing it in action. I'd really like a video.




Quote:
Originally Posted by Chyll View Post
Blasters have mitigation beyond just out-damaging the oppponents, and that becomes more available at high levels too (i.e., KB, holds in ice, etc.) So I wouldn't be quick to say it gets worse as a player advances.
Defenders get all of these things and more.


Quote:
Originally Posted by Chyll View Post
I will still contend far more complaints, threads, global requests for teams, etc. based on 'hard to solo this def' than any for Blasters. And I'd say that was telling. It is anecdotal vs. numbers, I admit, but I think it is pertinent to note.
Those complaints about being 'hard to solo' are usually more along the lines of 'I feel like I'm not putting out damage at a rate I want'.

Some people want big numbers, and blasters have that. But big numbers sometimes and zeros others can easily average out to less than the non-damage ATs if there's enough 'zero' time.


Quote:
Originally Posted by Chyll View Post
*shrug* I haven't seen real "data" to that effect... and I think that any changse Blasters need are low on the priority list given that they perform fine.
The devs themselves told us circa I11 that blasters were the worst performing AT as a whole, amongst all powerset combinations for the AT. That the best blaster powerset combination was outperformed by the worst powerset combination for any other AT. Including defenders.

The adjustment we got was Defiance 2.0, which undoubtedly helped. The question is if it helped more than the buffs all the other ATs have received since helped them. It seems unlikely.

There's also the question of the new content (Praetoria, First Ward, incarnate, etc), and the increased threat level those enemies present, and how that threat weighs against the various ATs and playstyles.

Barring exceptional builds like feather_of_sun and myself deploy, blasters as a whole just don't have the tools to deal with large swaths of problems with any reliability.


Quote:
Originally Posted by Arcanaville View Post
Softcapping an Invuln is fantastic. Softcapping a Willpower is amazing. Softcapping SR is kissing your sister.

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Chyll View Post
Doesn't the average defender have less mitigation against Mez (their powers, by and large, are not self targeting while the blaster gets freedom to use some abilities), and access to the same general blast set mitigation so little real appreciable difference there. I cannot see, or agree, that blasters are at the bottom of the mez and, consquently, (following your logic) DPS food chain.
No, Some of the primary buff sets have self granted Mez protection (Forcefields, Sonic Resonance, Traps).

Primary Debuff sets (Dark Miasma, Radiation Emission, Storm) can floor the to hit of an entire spawn essentially soft capping themselves to mezzing attacks and damage on SOs alone.

Buffing defenders also do not HAVE to enter combat to fulfill their primary roll on a team.

The notable exception to this is Trick Arrow and it is the most under performing defender primary because of this very reason. (it lacks powerful to hit debuffs AND must enter combat to be useful)


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Posted

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Originally Posted by Void_Huntress View Post
The devs themselves told us circa I11 that blasters were the worst performing AT as a whole, amongst all powerset combinations for the AT. That the best blaster powerset combination was outperformed by the worst powerset combination for any other AT. Including defenders.

The adjustment we got was Defiance 2.0, which undoubtedly helped. The question is if it helped more than the buffs all the other ATs have received since helped them. It seems unlikely.

There's also the question of the new content (Praetoria, First Ward, incarnate, etc), and the increased threat level those enemies present, and how that threat weighs against the various ATs and playstyles.

Barring exceptional builds like feather_of_sun and myself deploy, blasters as a whole just don't have the tools to deal with large swaths of problems with any reliability.
My last, last post.

And as I recall there were dev comments about how Blasters were some of the highest made type of AT and the most taken from hero to villain. The latter in particular, at least, indicates some prevalence of play that would seem to balance against 'worst performing'.

In short, YMMV. And I am far from sold.


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Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Chyll View Post
My last, last post.

And as I recall there were dev comments about how Blasters were some of the highest made type of AT and the most taken from hero to villain. The latter in particular, at least, indicates some prevalence of play that would seem to balance against 'worst performing'.

In short, YMMV. And I am far from sold.
Blasters are the highest made AT. They are also the highest abandoned AT.

I have no doubt that blasters are the most taken villain side as I have done so myself. I didn't stay however. Scorpion shield is just barely worth the trip to and from. The only way to get it is to switch.

Since we can now switch through the Paragon Market I know I for one won't be making the trip ever again.


-Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. - Albert Einstein.
-I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use. - Galileo Galilei
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Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Chyll View Post
Blasters have mitigation beyond just out-damaging the oppponents, and that becomes more available at high levels too (i.e., KB, holds in ice, etc.) So I wouldn't be quick to say it gets worse as a player advances.
Not as character level advances, but as difficulty level increases. The comparison between Blaster and Defender at any arbitrary level during normal play, as difficulty settings increase.

ie: A Level 25 Blaster and a Level 25 Defender in solo play against the same mission instance with the same mobs. At -1/x1, we would tend to expect the Blaster to outperform because a Blaster's tools against lower level targets are vastly more powerful with vastly less effort than a Defender at the same time.

As you scale up to even con or higher, and across larger spawns, the Defender's improved ability to mitigate inbound damage will begin to mean more than the Blaster's high base damage, as more targets are able to survive the Blaster's initial assaults and retaliate.


 

Posted

I won't argue that a blaster isn't tough to play.
It's true, because they have no baseline defensive abilities inherent to the AT, a low-end and leveling blaster can be extremely difficult to play compared to just about any other archetype.

My only point is that at the extreme highest end, a blaster can reach the same superfluous survivability that a Scrapper can, has very closely comparable damage, and has access to some other benefits that a scrapper can't get, such as the powerful regeneration debuff in Drain Psyche.

A well built /mental Blaster is very good at soloing a wide variety of giant monsters for this reason.

Personally, I made a Blaster because I wanted three things: 1: An offensive archetype. 2: Drain Psyche. 3: Rise of the Phoenix.

I just love Rise of the Phoenix for the convenience factor. Death does happen now and then. No matter how high your defense is, you've still got a 5% chance of being hit. I run a lot of trials, and thus encounter a lot of mechanics that to some extent will ignore, bypass, or kill you regardless of your defenses. Thus, a powerful self-rez on a short timer is fantastic for the convenience factor, and it strongly contributes to the fun of playing my blaster, Twilight Sparkle.


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Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Lucky666 View Post
Well I gotta give it to you mang I was trying to find the cheat in the build but could not(you know like veng active or something similar) That's some build you have there even if you can't post it cause you didn't use mids.
It is an impressive build but its actually not softcapped to energy/negative in combat. The numbers shown are with unsuppressed stealth according to real numbers (two stealth buffs of 1.96% defense each are shown) which means that build actually has 43.32% defense to energy/negative on the back half of Barrier when stealth is suppressed in combat. Its also sitting at 45.82% defense to smash/lethal, which makes it particularly cascade vulnerable to defense debuffers.

For a blaster, its very strong (and expensive in multiple ways: tier 4 Destiny, both defense procs), but I still do not believe it is categorically stronger than a comparable scrapper build.


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Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Chyll View Post
My last, last post.

And as I recall there were dev comments about how Blasters were some of the highest made type of AT and the most taken from hero to villain. The latter in particular, at least, indicates some prevalence of play that would seem to balance against 'worst performing'.

In short, YMMV. And I am far from sold.
The same population numbers show that Blaster popularity drops with level, suggesting that with each level less and less people are playing Blasters, which can only happen if either the same number of people continue to play them but their leveling speed is very slow, or people are abandoning them at much higher rates than any other archetype.


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Quote:
Originally Posted by Chyll View Post
Solo, same difficulty settings.... I'd argue that Blasters are easier/more pleasant to solo for the average player. And that comes down to DPS, ultimately, so I stand by my opinion/experience.
You'd be wrong, because Blaster DPS is not radically higher now than preI13 and preI13 Blasters were harder to solo for the average player, as evidenced by the fact the average player died more often playing Blasters than any other archetype by a wide margin. That is likely to be improved now with D2.0, but highly unlikely to be reversed completely.

But then again, even before the I13 changes and especially during them lots of people were saying the same thing: that blasters were fine, that they were among the better soloers, I don't have any problems and neither does anyone else I know, etc. All of those anecdotes and judgments turned out to be 100% false, so their credibility today is entirely suspect.


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Quote:
Originally Posted by Arcanaville View Post
It is an impressive build but its actually not softcapped to energy/negative in combat. The numbers shown are with unsuppressed stealth according to real numbers (two stealth buffs of 1.96% defense each are shown) which means that build actually has 43.32% defense to energy/negative on the back half of Barrier when stealth is suppressed in combat. Its also sitting at 45.82% defense to smash/lethal, which makes it particularly cascade vulnerable to defense debuffers.

For a blaster, its very strong (and expensive in multiple ways: tier 4 Destiny, both defense procs), but I still do not believe it is categorically stronger than a comparable scrapper build.
I hate to correct you, Arcanaville, but that extra 1.96 stealth defense was not being applied.
I was in mid-combat.

Add up the ranged defense modifiers seen on my power screen there- you'll notice that the extra stealth showing up is not part of the 50.60% total ranged defense. It hits that with only adding one of the Stealths. It is also not part of the other defense totals.

The second stealth is just a display bug.

And yes, as there's no defense debuff resistance, it can be vulnerable to a cascade failure from melee attacks when Barrier is on the ebb. I love when bad things actually happen, because it means a chance to use Rise of the Phoenix. =D
I only rarely get to press that button, and it makes me sad that I don't get to use it more often.


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Posted

Blasters need the damage they have to not be terrible.

Remember when Ice Bolt, Ice Blast, and Fire Blast were fast animating powers that allowed blasters to build high DPS chains? Remember when those powers were reduced in DPA so that blasters wouldn't be unfair to one-another, yet no such concession was made in the other AT's, because it's not important if Dominators, Defenders, or Corruptors are unfair to blasters?

Yeah, that still leaves a sour taste in my mouth. The only AT who's ever had their damage performance curtailed to avoid stepping on blaster toes is BLASTERS.

And I think that THAT is the first stepping stone: All Blaster primary attack sets should be 'renormalized'. Right now they're normalized around "Be Awful". Let's normalize Blaster offense to "Be Awesome" instead. Why? We traded away our survivability for damage. It's a trade I make every time I load up my blasters. I hold up my end of the bargain. Now the damage needs to hold up it's end.

And until 20 Billion Influence and Drain Psyche get bundled into Defiance, I don't see either of those helping blasters in general.

So, what do we want, ultimately? We want an Electric/Devices blaster to join your team, and for you to think to yourself, without any prompting, "Yes! Finally some real damage!"

How do we get there? Recklessly.

Blaster Ranged attacks should not have animations longer than 1.5 seconds. I envision, in my pretty little head, a world where Tier 1, Tier 2, and Tier 3 attacks animate in 0.8, 1.1, and 1.4 seconds, or faster. Can't be nerfin Blaze (See above rant about nerfing blasters in the name of normalization. Esta Verboten Capiche?). Put the "And Run" back into "Hit and Run". And put the "King" back into "Damage King".

Blaster Ranged attacks should not have Ranges less than 80 feet. Power Burst is a Ranged attack. Every other "Ranged" attack follows the same Damage/Endurance/Recharge formula as Power Burst, so why is Power Burst short ranged? Scrapper "Heavy Hitters" don't suffer inherent penalties compared to other attacks in their sets. Tanker "Heavy Hitters" tend to come with Free Mez. So why not 80 foot range? 80 feet: Pretty Neat. It's my new motto.

Blaster Primary sets should have no less than 3 ranged single target attacks servicable as actual attacks. In other words, they meet/exceed the standards of the Damage/End/Recharge "Formula" that constrains all damage in the game. The sets that lack these third attacks? Assault Rifle and Electricity? Look at Tesla Cage. Now look at Cosmic Burst. Look back to Tesla Cage. It got scale 2 damage. How did this happen? It costs less endurance now. And it reaches 20 feet further. Anything is possible when you're buffing Electric Blast. Bean Bag should hit as hard as Total Focus. If we turn it into an attack as strong as Slug, we'd have to buff it's recharge speed, buff it's endurance cost, and everyone knows we can't have blasters getting fast recharging control effects after all. Better to just buff it's damage to be as good as Total Focus. Then we get to NERF it's endurance cost, in a proper trade-off fashion. Done and done.

Oh yeah, blaster damage MODIFIERS? We should at least Tie a Scrapper fighting a boss, because that boss is killing us while the scrapper makes elaborate arguments about why he couldn't fit Calling the Wolf into his build. My calculations indicate that takes a modifier of 1.23625 in both Ranged and Melee, so let's go with that.


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Posted

I have said before, and will again, do not go up against Arcanaville when numbers are on the line.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Arcanaville View Post
You'd be wrong, because Blaster DPS is not radically higher now than preI13 and preI13 Blasters were harder to solo for the average player, as evidenced by the fact the average player died more often playing Blasters than any other archetype by a wide margin. That is likely to be improved now with D2.0, but highly unlikely to be reversed completely..

But, maybe it is because I do not equate 'easy to solo' with frequency of death. And, yes, that seems backwards even to me.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Arcanaville View Post
But then again, even before the I13 changes and especially during them lots of people were saying the same thing: that blasters were fine, that they were among the better soloers, I don't have any problems and neither does anyone else I know, etc. All of those anecdotes and judgments turned out to be 100% false, so their credibility today is entirely suspect.
I probably shouldn't, but I take offense to that sidewise insult.

It is just a shame you can not add up fun...

I legitimately am concerned that there is an unfair judgement against blasters in multiple discussions atm. I do not speak for anyone else's experiences - I speak for my own. I have frequently seen complaints of defenders being hard to solo. I have rarely seen complaints about soloing blasters - to the contrary it is usually laughter and enjoyment of 'living on the edge'. Perception matters. I am sorry I cannot quantify my experience.

Blasters are fun, challenging, enjoyable, and easy to play.

But heck, this entire game is easy to play. I love defs, brutes, blasters, and all matter of ATs. My favorite ATs are corrs and tanks, so how I became the most vocal defender of blaster honor... I have no idea.


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