Dual Pistols?

Is it me or is this set lackluster in the damage department?

It's lackluster.

The set is designed around swap ammo and gives up far to much in exchange.

It's much better as a defender secondary (if you can stand the gunfu animations) than it is a blaster primary.

I like DP on my DP/EM Blaster. DP needs a buff though.

From the data I've seen, dual pistols actually has above average damage if you're using fire ammo. So it's not that it's lackluster in the damage department, it's that in order to deal damage comparable to an average set you have to give up your secondary effects.

It really shines later on when you've got all your tools set up. Hail of Bullets makes the set pull a complete 180 in terms of performance because it's up every other spawn and with a minor damage boost it can wipe out big spawns.

It's actually got some nice AoE effects but on their own it's not really enough.

I've got a DP/traps corruptor and I'll be honest it was kind of a pain leveling but now that I've built his defenses he can burn down spawns. One of my fav tricks to date has been to pop a purple to put me at the defense cap, dive into the middle of a spawn with soul drain and let off hail of bullets. Usually not much standing afterward.

I wouldn't mind a boost, certainly. It totally doesn't feel worthwhile using anything but fire ammo because the minor slows and minor -dmg don't mean a whole lot. -dmg is only really good if you can stack it with more -dmg or +resist, which very few ATs that use blast sets can do. And it's been proven on paper that even though fewer things in the game resist toxic damage, it still does more damage to use incendiary when its resisted.

Simple fix would be to either replace the -dmg with -Regen on toxic or tack on -regen as an additional effect. Couldn't tell you what to add to ice. Maybe -recharge? As I recall it only does -speed.

Before the mini-nuke, it's below average. If you maximize recharge in order to leverage the mini-nuke, it's above average after you get the mini-nuke. However, "above average" will never mean "Top Tier" in the case of DP.

I see it this way... I like Arrow Blasters cause Rain of Arrows recharges fast and has no crash. Same for dual pistols. Fire Blast is epic in the damage department, but it's T9 recharges slow and has a crash. This can be said for nearly all the blast sets.

My point? Trade a little damage for a fast recharging/non-crashing T9 power. It's worth it for my play style. And it's damage can't be too bad. My RAD/DP defender can solo AVs and has taken down a Paladin (yes lore pets helped).



Last

I agree that the non-crashing nuke is good but that's about all the set has to offer.

~ The set's two work horse AoEs are long animation DoTs which makes kiting difficult and exaggerates the effect of the alpha strike. It also gives the enemies more time to close range.

~ While the first two attacks are not bad with Incendiary, The third tier attack is particularly bad. It has both a glacial animation and a shorter range. The frustrating thing is that the animation has a long delay where you are not actually doing anything except standing there.

~ Redraw is present on all the gun sets and that's why they get crash-less nukes, but the fact that DP does a lot of its effects up close makes it particularly bad on this set. The play style of Archery and AR allow for a satisfying ranged strategy that lets you minimize redraw. The in your face style of DP, from the PBAoE nuke to the long damage over time nature of its AoEs that allows the spawn to close makes the set want to mix in melee and control attacks from the secondary as part of your chain and that exaggerates redraw.

~ The nuke is PBAoE so it roots it the middle of the spawn while you use it. While its good, this means you have to be more resilience to use it in large spawns without dying because you'll take melee damage. This largely negates the strategy of soft capping ranged defense.

The set doesn't need much, it just needs one advantage to make it fun when your nuke is down. If I was going to fix the set, I'd drastically reduce the animation on the third tier single target attack, or to Piercing Rounds. Actually, if they removed the stupid "throw my guns in the air" portion of Piercing Rounds entirely so it was fast enough to have good single target DPS with the "bonus" of being able to hit an extra enemy or two in a line I think I would really love set. Conceptually I like lining up that attack; I just skip it because of the animation.

I forgot one other thing; ammo dancing in a group to keep up the -Res from Piercing Rounds is really annoying. Make it work with all ammo.

I love Dual Pistols on my Blaster!

3 Fast rechargin AoE's
4 Single target attacks

You can shred mobs quickly with the AoE's, t9 every other mob!

4 single target attacks is better than any other set!

With FIRE primary all you end up using is the 3 single attacks and Fireball mostly, with DP all powers are in play!

Pair it with EM and your unstoppable!

I like my DP corrupter quite a bit.

I set Swap Ammo to 'fire' and don't look back.

Damage may not be uber amazing, but it gets the job done and as I happen to like the animations that's good enough for me.


But I would support another set of animations, as the whole 'gun fu' thing doesn't really jibe with a western theme- we've got the costume bits, we've got the pistol models, it'd be really cool if we got some old timey animations to go with 'em.