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Yes, this. Electric does ok against small crowds, run up, let off a short circuit and follow it up with a ball lightning leaves most even conning critters zapped down enough to clean up with T1 and T2 blasts in short order. LTs can vary depending on the enemy faction, some don't melt as fast as others. |
Originally Posted by Biospark
Electric seems pretty decent to me from an AoE perspective, but requires you build and practice living in the middle of the spawn. Once you get over that hurdle, it is quite fun.
Where Electric falls on its face is Hard targets, especially solo. Voltaic can only focus on one target IF there is ONLY one target, so does not replace a hard-hitting single target attack in most situations. Plus, as many have pointed out, summoning him every 60 seconds is rather annoying (to me). hmmm... What if VS got the Haunt treatment. That could be workable. |
But hard targets are where Electric has the most trouble, easily. You have to either do something like a mine field with /devices (assuming they're not long range enemies, like carnie bosses that almost never move) or Sap them and hope you can drain them fast enough to stall most of their attacks and give you the time to take them down.
At least that's been my experience. I'm -really- looking forward to the changes for my elec/devices, having a 3rd blast will be quite nice.
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In my opinion, it's not. Short circuit's animation time and the DoT nature of its area attacks make it poor at quickly taking down targets before they can counter, which is an integral strategy for many blasters. Then again, the upcoming boost to blaster survivability will hopefully make blasters less reliant on the burst AoE strategy.
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Originally Posted by Biospark
Electric seems pretty decent to me from an AoE perspective
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Elec has decent AoE if you can survive to apply it. Hardly a new problem. As yet I can't see how the 'sustain' regen is supposed to address that issue. It's an increase in long term survivability on an AT that tends to die in a matter of seconds.
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Yes, I would like to emphasize my original comment mentioned "getting over the hurdle" of being in the middle of a spawn. Its not one of those "low" hurdles either. |
Originally Posted by Garent
In my opinion, it's not. Short circuit's animation time and the DoT nature of its area attacks make it poor at quickly taking down targets before they can counter, which is an integral strategy for many blasters. Then again, the upcoming boost to blaster survivability will hopefully make blasters less reliant on the burst AoE strategy.
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However, IF your intent is to drain a spawn, then you need to fire SC twice in succession, or one of two other ways to drain quickly. That doesn't present too much of a problem unless your difficulty is a bit higher than your defenses can handle, which also means you are not draining that mob anyway.
In the end though, I am with StratoNexus on this one. SC animation time should be shortened considerably. It is not really a "low-end" strategy to be a "sapper". It takes some work to make it happen. With the changes to survival and a tweak to short circuit, "sapping" could be usable much earlier in a characters' career, and even possible for non Electric secondaries. The tactic works. Just not as well "out-of-the-box".
BIOSPARK :: DARKTHORN :: SKYGUARD :: WILDMAGE
HEATSINK :: FASTHAND :: POWERCELL :: RUNESTAFF
I'm glad that VS finally seems to be getting its propers. For all the bashing that it and Electric gets; VS has always been potent in my view.
I've always counted it as part of my ST chain and given it its credit as a great Damage Per (A/E/S) power and as a great alternative to being mezzed and not attacking at all (so that's four attacks through mez you Blasters you).
It has the same drawback as Lightning Storm; random targeting (when multiple targets are present) but it does follow you, has more (base) up-time and it doesn't cause scatter. (and people seem to love LS)
That being said, I wouldn't mind it we could cast multiples and/or if it could chain its attack.
Apparently, I play "City of Shakespeare"
*Arc #95278-Gathering the Four Winds -3 step arc; challenging - 5 Ratings/3 Stars (still working out the kinks)
*Arc #177826-Lights, Camera, Scream! - 3 step arc, camp horror; try out in 1st person POV - 35 Ratings/4 Stars
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If VS gets the same small AoE treatment of LS, that would be cool!
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Originally Posted by Yogi_Bare
It has the same drawback as Lightning Storm; random targeting (when multiple targets are present) but it does follow you, has more (base) up-time and it doesn't cause scatter. (and people seem to love LS)
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Why Blasters? Empathy Sucks.
So, you want to be Mental?
What the hell? Let's buff defenders.
Tactics are for those who do not have a big enough hammer. Wisdom is knowing how big your hammer is.
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Yeeeaahhh. That "hopefully" in my previous post should have extreme emphasis on it.
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Originally Posted by Edana
Elec has decent AoE if you can survive to apply it. Hardly a new problem. As yet I can't see how the 'sustain' regen is supposed to address that issue. It's an increase in long term survivability on an AT that tends to die in a matter of seconds.
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We dont even know all the changes yet..
The hard things I can do--- The impossible just take a little bit longer.
If numbers are so much more important than a teammate who is fun to play with, forget about the game altogether and go play with a calculator instead. -Claws and Effect-
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I've known for years that the "math" has always been against Electric Blast as far as how it compares DPS-wise to other AT/Powersets. But after playing dozens of alts up to 50 I still find my original Ele/Ele/Ele to be one of my most entertaining alts. I realize that enjoying playing such a "gimp" combo probably seems completely insane to some, but if you don't like the way Electric Blast works no one is forcing you to play it either before or after I24. *shrugs*|
Originally Posted by Rakeeb
I'm genuinely (non-sarcastically) interested in how you got this. Where did you see that it was a Top 5 set, what led anyone to say that? It's a low damage set with bad cast times and no practical secondary ability... Endurance Drain on encounters that mean anything is essentially nonfunctional.
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Thanks (sarcastically) for suggesting massive changes to this one powerset just to make it "acceptable" to you. I would never argue that its perfect by any means, but likewise I find your single-minded hatred for it to be ironically laughable at the very least.
Loth 50 Fire/Rad Controller [1392 Badges] [300 non-AE Souvenirs]
Ryver 50 Ele� Blaster [1392 Badges]
Silandra 50 Peacebringer [1138 Badges] [No Redside Badges]
--{=====> Virtue ♀
I've been perfectly happy with my Elec/Elec/Elec since Beta (when he was just Elec/Elec....because that's all we had!). :-)
I know I'll never do as much damage as some of the other sets, and I can live with that, as long as he's still fun to play, both solo and on teams, and so far, he is.
I don't care for all of the powers offered, I have no interest in VS, so buffing that won't affect me. I don't have any interest in Lightning Clap, so the only thing I'm getting out of this "buff" is that my Snipe (which I do love) will be instant while BU and/or Aim are active, or while I'm "inspired" or when I have other buffs on me that add up to the magic number 22.
Since I was cool with my character before, I'm still cool with him now. In fact, as long as they don't nerf anything, or touch my nuke, I"m good.
In other words, I don't think I'm broke, so I'm not asking to be fixed. If anyone doesn't enjoy their Elec/*/* then I'm sorry for them, but there are plenty of other ATs and Powersets out there. Perhaps another would be more to that person's liking. Me, I'll keep blasting lightning, draining power, trapping foes in electric cages, and dropping entire spawns with Ball Lightning + Thunderous Blast, and grinning the entire time. :-)
-LR
Lightning Rod
<Guardians>
"I am certain that all CoX will be humbled by the might of the Lightning Rod." -Lady_Sadako
Lothic: It is possible for something to be fun and underperform. However, if you let underperforming sets STAY underperforming just because they're fun...you're asking people to choose between fun and performance. Those shouldn't be exclusive options.
Mini-guides: Force Field Defenders, Blasters, Market Self-Defense, Frankenslotting.
So you think you're a hero, huh.
@Boltcutter in game.
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This, a thousand times. A new player shouldn't be punished for picking a cool looking power set.
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Originally Posted by Fulmens
Lothic: It is possible for something to be fun and underperform. However, if you let underperforming sets STAY underperforming just because they're fun...you're asking people to choose between fun and performance. Those shouldn't be exclusive options.
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No, but analysis and discussion like this will help us get an idea of how those future changes will affect what's already in the game.
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Originally Posted by Airhammer
We dont even know all the changes yet..
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Fulmens, I do agree with this. However I think the point that Lothic is trying to make (similar to the point I made a few pages back) is that there are people who enjoy Electrical Blast as it is now and any changes to the set should attempt to avoid breaking how the set plays for them.|
Originally Posted by Fulmens
Lothic: It is possible for something to be fun and underperform. However, if you let underperforming sets STAY underperforming just because they're fun...you're asking people to choose between fun and performance. Those shouldn't be exclusive options.
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Some of the changes proposed in this thread for Short Circuit in particular would probably end up breaking set for those of us who enjoy it now.
In general I would say that any attempt to fix Electrical Blast should probably keep two features:
1. Short Circuit remains as a large area AoE with strong endurance drain and reasonably fast recharge (i.e. recharge shouldn't increase above the current 20 seconds)
2. Voltaic Sentinel should remain a pet of some sort.
I could be wrong but I suspect that most people who like the current iteration of Electrical like it for one of those two reasons. Yes, Short Circuit is a hard power to use, especially on a Blaster, but if you can use it effectively it is extremely powerful. It's got a much wider area than most AoEs and the Endurance Drain is (I think) more powerful than people give it credit for. Similarly VS is power that is unique in that it's a semi-pet in a Blast set. I'm sure some people took Electrical Blast solely for that.
On that note here is how I would change the set. First the small changes:
1. Decrease the cast time for Short Circuit and change it so that it deals about 50% of it's damage up front. This makes it easier and safer for Blasters to use.
2. Increase the damage on VS, possibly by adding a chain effect or just a straight damage boost, decrease the cast time (and maybe change it so it just appears next to you rather than needing a summon location declared)
Now the big one. Remove Aim and replace it with a new power called Charge Up (because I suck at naming things). Charge Up would provide a moderate To Hit Buff (enough to hit FastSnipe with little or no slotting) and a small damage buff (probably less than 20%). Duration would be 30 seconds and recharge 90 seconds. While Charge Up is active Charged Bolts, Lightning Bolt, Zapp and Ball Lighting all have a chance to Chain and hit additional targets. I'm thinking something like 30% for Charged Bolts, 50% for Lightning Bolt, 100% for Zapp and maybe 10% per target for Ball Lightning (the Ball Lightning chain effect would only hit one target for each chain proc, not a full AoE).
The general effect of this change would be two-fold. First Electrical Blast using SOs gets FastSnipe two-thirds of the time on it's own about 90% of the time if Charge Up is cycled with Build Up (you can probably hit 100% with IOs). This would help with the single target strength of the set by allowing it to use Zapp to make up for the lack of a third ST blast. By adding chaining to it's single target attacks and Ball Lightning it gets a bit more AoE strength at range. An IO build with decent recharge should find it possible to get Charge Up permanent giving more options for IO'ing. Finally it doesn't technically break the cottage rule (Charge Up still buffs To Hit and Damage).
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I like this.
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Originally Posted by Adeon Hawkwood
Fulmens, I do agree with this. However I think the point that Lothic is trying to make (similar to the point I made a few pages back) is that there are people who enjoy Electrical Blast as it is now and any changes to the set should attempt to avoid breaking how the set plays for them.
Some of the changes proposed in this thread for Short Circuit in particular would probably end up breaking set for those of us who enjoy it now. In general I would say that any attempt to fix Electrical Blast should probably keep two features: 1. Short Circuit remains as a large area AoE with strong endurance drain and reasonably fast recharge (i.e. recharge shouldn't increase above the current 20 seconds) 2. Voltaic Sentinel should remain a pet of some sort. I could be wrong but I suspect that most people who like the current iteration of Electrical like it for one of those two reasons. Yes, Short Circuit is a hard power to use, especially on a Blaster, but if you can use it effectively it is extremely powerful. It's got a much wider area than most AoEs and the Endurance Drain is (I think) more powerful than people give it credit for. Similarly VS is power that is unique in that it's a semi-pet in a Blast set. I'm sure some people took Electrical Blast solely for that. On that note here is how I would change the set. First the small changes: 1. Decrease the cast time for Short Circuit and change it so that it deals about 50% of it's damage up front. This makes it easier and safer for Blasters to use. 2. Increase the damage on VS, possibly by adding a chain effect or just a straight damage boost, decrease the cast time (and maybe change it so it just appears next to you rather than needing a summon location declared) Now the big one. Remove Aim and replace it with a new power called Charge Up (because I suck at naming things). Charge Up would provide a moderate To Hit Buff (enough to hit FastSnipe with little or no slotting) and a small damage buff (probably less than 20%). Duration would be 30 seconds and recharge 90 seconds. While Charge Up is active Charged Bolts, Lightning Bolt, Zapp and Ball Lighting all have a chance to Chain and hit additional targets. I'm thinking something like 30% for Charged Bolts, 50% for Lightning Bolt, 100% for Zapp and maybe 10% per target for Ball Lightning (the Ball Lightning chain effect would only hit one target for each chain proc, not a full AoE). The general effect of this change would be two-fold. First Electrical Blast using SOs gets FastSnipe two-thirds of the time on it's own about 90% of the time if Charge Up is cycled with Build Up (you can probably hit 100% with IOs). This would help with the single target strength of the set by allowing it to use Zapp to make up for the lack of a third ST blast. By adding chaining to it's single target attacks and Ball Lightning it gets a bit more AoE strength at range. An IO build with decent recharge should find it possible to get Charge Up permanent giving more options for IO'ing. Finally it doesn't technically break the cottage rule (Charge Up still buffs To Hit and Damage). |
Apparently, I play "City of Shakespeare"
*Arc #95278-Gathering the Four Winds -3 step arc; challenging - 5 Ratings/3 Stars (still working out the kinks)
*Arc #177826-Lights, Camera, Scream! - 3 step arc, camp horror; try out in 1st person POV - 35 Ratings/4 Stars
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Originally Posted by Fulmens
Lothic: It is possible for something to be fun and underperform. However, if you let underperforming sets STAY underperforming just because they're fun...you're asking people to choose between fun and performance. Those shouldn't be exclusive options.
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Originally Posted by Rakeeb
This, a thousand times. A new player shouldn't be punished for picking a cool looking power set.
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This game is a system that will naturally provide some powersets that are going to be qualitatively better than others. If they were all equally perfect then they would all be equally identical and boring. For what it's worth to you I have never had any problem soloing or teaming with my particular alt in this case. Once again I'll just say if you don't like Electric Blast and/or don't understand how to make it work then don't play it, but don't blindly believe it needs massive changes just because it doesn't suit YOUR playstyle.
Loth 50 Fire/Rad Controller [1392 Badges] [300 non-AE Souvenirs]
Ryver 50 Ele� Blaster [1392 Badges]
Silandra 50 Peacebringer [1138 Badges] [No Redside Badges]
--{=====> Virtue ♀
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Underperformance is an objective thing, not subjective.|
Originally Posted by Lothic
I would have to argue that your definition of "under-performance" or being "punished" for a selection is very subjective at best.
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Originally Posted by Lothic
This game is a system that will naturally provide some powersets that are going to be qualitatively better than others. If they were all equally perfect then they would all be equally identical and boring.
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And please stop insulting people. I don't know why you're so offended by people thinking that a powerset you like is numerically weak.
Lothic:
Endurance drain, from the if-I-were-a-Dev standpoint, is a bear because you're either cleaning up entire spawns in relative safety or you're getting nothing from it. I have had characters where it was very valuable and characters where it was worthless.
Elec is not necessarily qualitatively worse than other sets- it's very different. Ranged nuke, second AOE full of end drain, Voltaic Sentinel... it's not like the other kids. It can, as I mentioned, near-neuter an entire spawn in about five seconds. Or it can leave you stranded in a bad neighborhood getting beaten to death.
I have absolutely no problem with your suggested changes to Elec Blast- I wouldn't want Charge Up to do less damage boost than Aim and I have no problem with it being a power that, objectively, is better than Aim. I might lower the recharge on Short Circuit from 20 sec to 16, just because.
I have another idea that I suggested to Arbiter Hawk, but I don't even know if it's technically doable let alone attractive to him, so i'm not going to run my mouth about it.
Edited to say: Elec may objectively have lower DPS and more DOT so enemies shoot back more before dying. If those are your only measures, you can say that Elec is objectively worse. On the other hand, I can nuke people who don't know I'm there, take one step behind a corner, and be safe from return fire.
Mini-guides: Force Field Defenders, Blasters, Market Self-Defense, Frankenslotting.
So you think you're a hero, huh.
@Boltcutter in game.
A well slotted TB means there is no return fire. 
Apparently, I play "City of Shakespeare"
*Arc #95278-Gathering the Four Winds -3 step arc; challenging - 5 Ratings/3 Stars (still working out the kinks)
*Arc #177826-Lights, Camera, Scream! - 3 step arc, camp horror; try out in 1st person POV - 35 Ratings/4 Stars
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It's a toss up. My aim with Charge Up was to propose a power that has more total damage boost than Aim but doe sit in a different way. The actual damage boost is quite a bit lower but by stretching it out longer and making it give attacks a chance to chain the total damage increase over time from Charge Up would be higher than Aim.|
Originally Posted by Fulmens
I have absolutely no problem with your suggested changes to Elec Blast- I wouldn't want Charge Up to do less damage boost than Aim and I have no problem with it being a power that, objectively, is better than Aim. I might lower the recharge on Short Circuit from 20 sec to 16, just because.
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The upside is that this would fit well with the current DoT heavy nature of the set. Electrical Blast is not a set that front loads the damage but it's sustained output is pretty decent and my goal was to enhance that aspect.
I wouldn't want to see the recharge on Short Circuit lowered since that would mean also lowering the damage or the radius.
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There are numerous ways to make VS invulnerable, the problem is letting the taunt hit VS without letting the target waste time attacking it. The first solution that comes to mind is tagging a placate effect to VS' blasts so it is fundamentally incapable of holding aggro.
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Originally Posted by Adeon Hawkwood
The problem with this is that it would mean making VS vulnerable to attacks (at least I think it would). Currently VS has untouchable and is immune to all damage. In order for the Taunt to affect it this would need to be changed and it would become vulnerable to attacks.
I'm not sure if this is a worthwhile tradeoff or not. Maybe if it was done like Singularity where it's targetable but has very high resistances? |
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Right now, Short Circuit does the right amount of damage for its radius and recharge, but it does it as a long 4.1 second DoT, and usually DoT damage comes for "free" to one extant or another. I think the simple solution to the power is to change it from DoT to straight damage. It also needs to have the animation time reduced, but that's a bit harder to get from the Devs.
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Originally Posted by Adeon Hawkwood
I wouldn't want to see the recharge on Short Circuit lowered since that would mean also lowering the damage or the radius.
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Mids' Hero/Villain Designer Lead
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Or to reduce the recharge time/endurance cost and leave the damage as is for the DoT bonus.
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Originally Posted by Diellan_
Right now, Short Circuit does exactly the right amount of damage for its radius and recharge, but it does it as a long 4.1 second DoT, and usually DoT damage comes for "free" to one extant or another. I think the simple solution to the power is to change it from DoT to straight damage.
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That's less simple in that it requires them to decide how much of the DoT is normal and how much is bonus, which isn't something that's ever been standardized. Changing it to frontloaded damage also helps with the big problem the set has on blasters, which is that the aoe damage is sustained damage, not burst damage. Currently, from the time you hit the button until the time the last tick of damage is dealt, seven seconds have passed. That's an eternity when alpha strikes are considered.|
Originally Posted by Edana
Or to reduce the recharge time/endurance cost and leave the damage as is for the DoT bonus.
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Ball Lightning, for example, does scale 1.02 damage, whereas it should be 0.9, so it gets a bonus of 0.12 damage. It deals only scale 0.3 damage immediately, and the rest over a whopping 3.1 seconds. Short Circuit deals 0.9 damage, whereas it should be 0.89, so it gets a bonus of 0.01 damage. It deals all 0.9 damage over 4.1 seconds.
For comparison, Irradiate has the same 20 second recharge and 20 foot radius, has an animation time of 1.07 seconds, and deals scale 1 damage over 4.6 seconds (a bonus of 0.11).
Global @Diellan - 5M2M
Mids' Hero/Villain Designer Lead
Virtue Server
Redside: Lorenzo Mondavi
Blueside: Alex Rabinovich
Got a Mids suggestion? Want to report a Mids bug?
If electric lagged fire by only 20%, when Fire is given about 40% more damage than normal due to DoT, that would imply that intrinsically, Electric is actually the better offensive set unless you believe DoT is better than other secondary effects. If you do, then you should tend to pick Fire, no differently than if you think end drain is the best effect, you should pick electric, or if you think slows are the best effect you should pick Ice.
Where Electric falls on its face is Hard targets, especially solo. Voltaic can only focus on one target IF there is ONLY one target, so does not replace a hard-hitting single target attack in most situations. Plus, as many have pointed out, summoning him every 60 seconds is rather annoying (to me).
hmmm... What if VS got the Haunt treatment. That could be workable.
BIOSPARK :: DARKTHORN :: SKYGUARD :: WILDMAGE
HEATSINK :: FASTHAND :: POWERCELL :: RUNESTAFF