Nemu

From a damage perspective, you are going to be disappointed with scrappers or any other melee AT when you compare them to your blaster. When you have survival figured out as you did with your fire/fire, blasters are just much more consistent in being able to deal ST and AoE damage from anywhere. There is no doubt that melee ATs are intrinsically tougher but as you noted, kill speed also creates safety and blasters do it well enough to trigger mob fear AI which is yet another under-appreciated form of mitigation. Battle Maiden in Apex is just one of many examples of where melee ATs will have challenges dealing consistent damage. If you want a more mundane example, then just the simple act of chasing runners. Once you learn to play a melee blaster there is nothing else that can compare to the havoc that a well built, well piloted melee blaster can wreak. You can PL any of these suggestions here and IO them out and give them a run and they'll be fun for sure, but will they stack up to your Fire/Fire? My bet is no.

I have a pretty standard approach to building my blasters - Scorpion Shield and softcapped S/L/R with a health dose of slow resist. But I've always been drawn to KO blow, and the thought of pairing that with any of the heavy hitter T9s makes me giddy. But scorpion shield have always stood in the way. I decided to try something different from my standard formula and do what I always wanted to do, and the result is super fun! Hero Plan by Mids' Reborn : Hero Designer 2.7.2.10 https://github.com/Crytilis/mids-reborn-hero-designer Click this DataLink to open the build! Moira Curie: Level 50 Magic Blaster Primary Power Set: Dark Blast Secondary Power Set: Atomic Manipulation Power Pool: Leaping Power Pool: Concealment Power Pool: Fighting Power Pool: Leadership Ancillary Pool: Leviathan Mastery Hero Profile: Level 1: Gloom -- SprDfnBrr-Acc/Dmg(A), SprDfnBrr-Dmg/Rchg(3), SprDfnBrr-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(3), SprDfnBrr-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(5), SprDfnBrr-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(5), SprDfnBrr-Rchg/+Status Protect(7) Level 1: Electron Shackles -- Acc-I(A) Level 2: Negatron Slam -- FrcFdb-Rechg%(A), SprBlsCol-Dmg/EndRdx(13), HO:Nucle(15), HO:Nucle(17) Level 4: Umbral Torrent -- FrcFdb-Rechg%(A), SuddAcc--KB/+KD(7), Ann-ResDeb%(9), HO:Nucle(15), SprFrzBls-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(17), SprFrzBls-Dmg/EndRdx(19) Level 6: Combat Jumping -- LucoftheG-Def/Rchg+(A), Ksm-ToHit+(19), WntGif-ResSlow(21) Level 8: Moonbeam -- StnoftheM-Acc/Dmg(A), StnoftheM-Dmg/EndRdx(9), StnoftheM-Acc/ActRdx/Rng(11), StnoftheM-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(11), StnoftheM-Dam%(13) Level 10: Aim -- GssSynFr--Build%(A) Level 12: Stealth -- LucoftheG-Def/Rchg+(A) Level 14: Ionize -- HO:Membr(A) Level 16: Boxing -- Empty(A) Level 18: Abyssal Gaze -- BslGaz-Acc/Hold(A), BslGaz-Acc/Rchg(23), BslGaz-EndRdx/Rchg/Hold(23), BslGaz-Acc/EndRdx/Rchg/Hold(27), Apc-Dmg(43), Apc-Dam%(45) Level 20: Metabolic Acceleration -- PreOptmz-Acc/Rech(A), PreOptmz-EndMod/End(21), PreOptmz-EndMod/Rech(46), PreOptmz-EndMod/Acc/End(48), PreOptmz-EndMod/Acc/Rech(50), PreOptmz-EndMod/End/Rech(50) Level 22: Tough -- GldArm-3defTpProc(A) Level 24: Weave -- LucoftheG-Def/Rchg+(A), ShlWal-Def/EndRdx(25), ShlWal-Def(25), ShlWal-ResDam/Re TP(27) Level 26: Life Drain -- SprWntBit-Acc/Dmg(A), SprWntBit-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(45), SprWntBit-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(45), SprWntBit-Dmg/EndRdx/Acc/Rchg(46), SprWntBit-Rchg/SlowProc(46) Level 28: Atom Smasher -- FuroftheG-ResDeb%(A), SprAvl-Acc/Dmg(29), SprAvl-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(29), SprAvl-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(34), SprAvl-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(37), SprAvl-Rchg/KDProc(40) Level 30: Maneuvers -- LucoftheG-Def/Rchg+(A), Rct-Def(31), Rct-Def/EndRdx(31), Rct-ResDam%(31) Level 32: Blackstar -- SprBlsWrt-Acc/Dmg(A), SprBlsWrt-Dmg/Rchg(33), SprBlsWrt-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(33), SprBlsWrt-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(33), SprBlsWrt-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(34), SprBlsWrt-Rchg/Dmg%(34) Level 35: Bile Spray -- Artl-Acc/Dam(A), Artl-Dam/End(36), Artl-Dam/Rech(36), Artl-Acc/Dam/Rech(36), Artl-Acc/Rech/Rng(37), Artl-End/Rech/Rng(37) Level 38: Positronic Fist -- Mk'Bit-Acc/Dmg(A), Mk'Bit-Dmg/EndRdx(39), Mk'Bit-Dmg/Rchg(39), Mk'Bit-Acc/EndRdx/Rchg(39), Mk'Bit-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(40), Mk'Bit-Dam%(40) Level 41: Knockout Blow -- FrcFdb-Rechg%(A), SprBlsCol-Acc/Dmg(42), SprBlsCol-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(42), SprBlsCol-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(42), SprBlsCol-Dmg/EndRdx/Acc/Rchg(43), SprBlsCol-Rchg/HoldProc(43) Level 44: Shark Skin -- StdPrt-ResDam/Def+(A), HO:Ribo(48), ResDam-I(48) Level 47: Beta Decay -- HO:Enzym(A) Level 49: Super Jump -- BlsoftheZ-Travel/EndRdx(A), BlsoftheZ-ResKB(50) Level 1: Brawl -- Empty(A) Level 1: Defiance Level 1: Quick Form Level 1: Prestige Power Dash -- Empty(A) Level 1: Prestige Power Slide -- Empty(A) Level 1: Prestige Power Quick -- Empty(A) Level 1: Prestige Power Rush -- Empty(A) Level 1: Prestige Power Surge -- Empty(A) Level 1: Sprint -- Empty(A) Level 2: Rest -- Empty(A) Level 4: Ninja Run Level 2: Swift -- Run-I(A) Level 2: Health -- Pnc-Heal/+End(A) Level 2: Hurdle -- Jump-I(A) Level 2: Stamina -- PrfShf-End%(A) Level 50: Musculature Radial Paragon ------------ Ranged defense > S/L or melee defense if you know what you are doing even for builds like this which has a fair emphasis on melee attacks. I was concerned about not hitting the S/L softcap as I normally do with Scorpion shield but when one's used to jousting in and out of combat it did not feel like a huge loss. Umbral torrent is very reliable KD and buys me breathing room, combined with a healthy amount of S/L resist, the -to hit effect, and life drain, this build is plenty survivable. Finally, using KO blow and then follow it up with a Posi Fist just feels awesome! The 80" cone on umbral torrent is the only thing that I wish could be different. I often find myself tagging the next group when I joust in and out of combat and use that power, so for tricky mob placement one has to be very strategic about where to position that power. Otherwise a very fun and satisfying build. And if you want to break your love affair with Scorpion Shield give this a shot!

The thing that grinds my gears is that the one unslotted attack empath approach has largely been voted off the island, same with the one attack tank taunt bot. You go onto those respective forums and start talking about being pure and you'll get a barrage of "this is not how you play this game." Take your secondaries, slot them, that's how you are really supposed to play those ATs. Blasters is the only AT left where secondary neglect is tolerated and based on more than a few voices here, even encouraged. And I am certain some of those same voices are quick to jump on the "take and use your secondary" bandwagon when it comes to defenders and tanks.

I just call it blasting. Why give a special term to a playstyle that is intended for the AT like it's an abnormal thing? I hate the word "blapping" I'd rather call the rangers "sentineling"

Because most people that play blasters should be playing sentinels instead. You've never lived as a blaster till you KO blow something and follow it up with a total focus or positronic fist.

The ideal treatment for FOT for me would be to make FOT a toggle sustain with the KB component as a click on a 30 second timer, similar to speed of sound/jaunt or mystic flight/translocation. But I can understand the argument that now you have to split slotting priorities in that power so it's not a game breaking change to have Dynamo in it's place as the new sustain. I'm very happy to see FOT reverted to it's former glory, even if it is a late game pick now. I would love to switch that with power sink in the order sequence, since most blaster builds won't really need an extra endurance recovery tool early game, but I'll take what I can get. Regarding the blaster AoE holds on the 180 second timer, I'm glad to see those recharge times tuned back down to 90 seconds. That will make them more appealing for players and not just as set mules. Thank you for taking in the feedback! 👍👍👍

No no, he has a point. blasters are so weak. Buff blasters and make them punch harder. I fully endorse this movement.

Think about LGTF, having a ranged hold is a good thing, and you can use ranged holds in melee too. A little less damage is a fair trade off for that bit of versatility. Get enough recharge on this so that it recharges fast enough into your attack rotation and then tell me if you feel the DOT takes too long. The DOT takes effect over 5 seconds and you can get the power to recharge well under 5.

But you have to admit, hovering at 80 feet is way more tactical than hovering at 50 feet and opens up more lines of TACTICAL play. For example

When you learn to play melee blasters you will want to play nothing else.

Ice Manipulation is really good now. I hesitated to make one on live because it had too many skippable powers and it was also too single target focused. The change to frozen aura is HUGE. This new AoE capacity and the 3 relatively fast animating single target attacks and the powerful mitigation tools in it's toolkit makes this secondary one of the premier melee blaster secondaries once it goes live.

I'd rather some of these control powers get the sonic deafening wave treatment. Chance for low mag mez, usable multiple times per fight instead of every or every other fight, and does damage. This applies especially to those secondaries that lean more towards melee. It's not like the ranged crowd will ever pick up a weak pbaoe mez or a short range cone mez based on the feedback I'm seeing on entangling arrow. Melee blasters certainly don't need or depend on those for survival either, but making these powers do damage with a chance for mez at least gives them some pause in the thought process to weigh in the opportunity cost of taking such a power in place of something else. Last time I checked, options are a good thing, but on the other hand, having options that no one takes is bad design.

Only one way to find out, give them a captcha test and have them point out all the traffic lights. If they fail - ROBOTS

I think they are just weak to energy damage if that's what you are hinting at.

No longer Irresistible isn't the same as missing. It just means mobs will resist the effect to a certain degree, so that the perception debuff is only 50% as effective, for example. I don't play /TA but isn't flash arrow autohit? And also why would you open up a fight with entangling arrow when you have more damaging and longer range options available?

That's how I feel about most of the T8s AoE CCs regardless of their mez effect, and I especially want to challenge this notion. I'd like to understand the rationale behind this that's not tied to spreadsheet numbers that cares only about damage/recharge formulas and the like. What makes a mag2 aoe hold so powerful compared to a mag 2 aoe stun/confuse on blasters that warrants bumping up their recharge to 180 seconds which is comparable to blaster nukes? Is the end result not the same that you prevent LTs and minions from attacking you for a few precious seconds? I get that you can stack holds easier because single target holds are more prevalent across blaster primaries and most of the secondaries with such AoE holds also have a single target hold to supplement that strategy but I don't see how that use case singularly propels AoE holds into the "broken" category to justify such treatment.

I posted that comment without doing any math but I can takesies backsies. Yes you are correct, 20% is around the ballpark. I think it's the visuals display of consecutive crit messages that made me feel like it was doing more. Time to stop feeling.

That part I completely get and I can get onboard that. I've expressed several opinions in this thread if you care to read through them. I don't want to keep repeating the same things over and over, I'm not that old... yet... 😄

I offer a team up so I can see where you are coming from and you can see where I am coming from. Offer's on the table, global @Nemu and I have Jezebel in my sig on torch, everlasting and excelsior. Same offer goes to @Placta and anyone else that dislikes TS and FOT.

Onto plant manipulation. The cast time reductions are good, Thorn burst still lags behind similar PBAoEs like combustion in both damage and recharge and it could use a slight tune up. For a T9 pick it feels even more lackluster than if it had been sitting in it's original slot. Am I reading it wrong or is ESD arrow the only T8 AoE hold that's still on a 90 second timer? I get the mathematical rationale of increasing the recharge on AoE holds seeing that controller holds such as cinders have a 4 min recharge. However controllers also have other control options and their CCs last longer. Rather than looking strictly at numbers and formulas, consider the human element and look at how people build blasters: I doubt many will find these 3 min cooldown AoE holds with their low duration (especially against higher cons) useful enough to invest in them. There is an opportunity cost associated with picking up non-damage powers for blasters and this treatment of AoE holds renders that cost too high.

Seems to be triggering off certain procs. I noticed the animation going off every time a FF proc triggered off golden dragonfly, as well as defiant barrage proc, guassian's proc and I bet any of the other procs that grant a passive buff. On the other hand /Nin feels very good now for melee blasters now that the damage is balanced against blaster formulas. The 20% chance for critical might be a bit overtuned when applied to all attacks, Might want to consider relegating it to /nin attacks or upping the crit rate on select sword attacks to add more incentive to go into melee.

Testing out sonic manipulation made me take a step back and look at /Elec as a whole and FOT's role in it on live. Ignoring the sustain part of it and focusing solely on the control aspect of FOT. What makes it so attractive on Live to melee blasters is due to the fact that /Elec is very single target focused. Therefore FOT in conjunction with Thunder Strike work well together to limit incoming damage from the adds surrounding the primary target. Dynamo can't do it alone, but if the splash damage on TS is increased by 300-400% it would surely increase kill speed and compensate for the loss of a consistent way to cycle KD. Even so, powers like ice patch from ice manipulation and even bonfire from the fire epic provides constant KD more efficiently and I see no reason that /Elec shouldn't be able to do the same with more effort and more risk.

Overall the set has a good feel speed wise, no animation is too clunky and the attacks flow well. Melee blasters like myself will enjoy this set. Here are some comments: Strident Echo's DOT takes too long. You can typically get Strident to under well under 5 seconds recharge and the overlap will waste the remaining dot. Recommend shortening the DOT and upping the front loaded damage. With the rest of the set thematically wrapped around hold as a secondary effect sound cannon seems out of place. I get that in RL thematically loud sounds disorient but this powers offers no synergy whatsoever with the rest of the set. I skipped it in my melee build because no synergy and ranged cone. Given the uproar over the range reduction on electrified net arrow with TA, I imagine having this tied to a 45 feet cone with no synergy with the rest of the set means that the ranged crowd will most likely skip this too. The absorb on sound barrier is negligible and makes no difference whatsoever for those versed in melee blasting. I don't know how the devs would feel about combining the effects of disruption aura into sound barrier. It's not like there is no precedence for combining blaster sustains with debuffs/damage auras...

I have a feeling most of the posters rooting for Dynamo replacing FOT are of the hover blasting crowd (don't get all triggered, read further below). I have absolute confidence the pure ranged crowd would skip FOT if it went to live regardless of whether it got modified in it's current beta state or not as long as the PBAoE tag sticks. Dynamo is a QoL improvement that both ranged and melee blasters can benefit from. FOT only benefits the melee crowd. Having said that I tested FOT with a few +4/8 PI radios. I had it down to about 30 seconds recharge so yes it's available every fight and it reliably triggers the FF proc. The stun on fodder lasts about 7 seconds, and I have not been able to stack stuns on bosses so far with thunder strike, as I have from time to time on live. The stun gives you enough time to take out a troublesome LT like a tarantula mistress but that's about it. Without the ability to cycle KDs like we can on live the incoming damage will be increased by magnitudes for melee blasters. The risk vs reward ratio is skewed towards mostly risk and negligible reward for those that make their home in melee range. While veteran players with softcapped builds and knowledge of how to play melee blasters can most likely get by with this change if it goes on live, those that don't build for softcap and there are plenty out there, and the more casual blasters will find little benefit to this power. I anticipate that they will most likely mark this as a skip just as the pure ranged crowd does. Radioactive Cloud is the closest comparison to FOT. In a vacuum they carry the same amount of risk with the PbAoE tag. However RC is a hold, and can stack with positron cell a lot more reliably than the FOT/TS interaction. In addition blaster primaries have quite a few damaging attacks with a hold component that can also stack with RC and PC. That secondary also feature beta decay which debuffs to hit, and metabolic acceleration provides more defensive benefits than Dynamo. /Elec has powersink but that in itself is not enough for an end drain strategy, and the end drain that dynamo does is not immediate and/or large enough to synergize with powersink. In short /Elec lacks the toolkit to back FOT up in its beta state. As I said before, if you can rotate energy torrent and explosive blast for the KD mitigation with less risk, there is no reason why we can't have the same interaction with TS and FOT with their current recharge timers on live. Change the recharge of the new FOT to 30 seconds, remove the stun, or keep a small chance to stun if you are feeling generous. That will make both the ranged crowd and the melee crowd happy with the changes to /Elec.

I get that, I'm way past the sustain part of FOT as it relates to any comparisons. I'm strictly focusing on the soft control/recharge time component of FOT. The whole bringing Blaster T8 AoE CC powers does have it's holes no? Where does that leave burn? I can accept having FOT at the T8 slot, but the new FOT doesn't NEED to be a clone of other T8s. Keep the 30 second recharge and the KB, remove the sustain and heck remove the stuns too, and I'll accept that. But the garbage of an auto-skip power on beta right now? NOPE.