FFTMime

Yeah, I noticed that ICE is actually a single target ice sentinel pretending to be a an AOE blaster. Granted, again, all those hindering parts of it's AOE kit do really well for it. You really don't NEED damage. Unless you really want to forgo such tools and blast. Yet I feel there's better sets for that? Has to be.

..Noting I am very far from 50. But at this point there's nothing that's going to change this equation unless someone knows something I don't. Overall ICE ICE BABY is a strong blaster no matter what you pick. It feels really difficult to screw up. Just slot for mundane things like damage, accuracy, and recharge on longer CDs. All your powers are great. No real stinkers. You're always relevant in a group. Pretty easy to solo compared to some other nasty things I've tried. Still requires some care for being a blaster. Don't get silly out there.

But.. all that damage for comboing it! Shiver does no damage. It's purely a control power. That said, the cone on it is INSANE. I could at least see it in group play where quickly getting your slows out is hard. In solo it's often just not needed or helpful. Ice manip on the whole is odd. Not bad. Just odd? Something like fridgid protection is incredibly pro, and you have a lot of reasons to play in melee range because of your auras and something like ice patch. They also make it very safe to be here, or at least a lot safer than usual for blasters. At the same time, I would not call ice a power house blapper set. You're just going to use your primary attacks in melee range instead? Ice/Ice kills a bit slower (for a blaster), but it's also incredibly safe on the whole. Just don't get TOO cocky. Sometimes range is still your best defense.

I meant to ask specifically about ice/ice. but in my short time trying a few, melee seems largely not worth it to devote yourself to. It may be something you can't really do till the character is fully matured. Ice/Ice itself seems forgiving of doing.. anything it has available. Have an elec/elec I got to about 20 too? I felt I'd need to do a lot better leaning in to it's form of soft control to actually do well as a character. While Ice simply does it. Energy blaster, of course, was simple from the start. Knockback is knockback. It just works. Though blapping is a tricker option. Works better with super speed, I found. Though on that note, one might want to spec passive speed somehow for more consistent jousting. But regardless, Ice/Ice feels like I have multiple things I could lean in to. Though strong just taking everything and using them all too. The other blaster types felt like they needed to lean harder in to their proper methods of doing things. I can say I don't see the point in shiver on top of everything else, though. On the whole, just putting down rain and chaining my ranged blasts works fine to take down targets before they can do much. Maybe ice patch for safety. This is quite a high damage set for something so incredibly safe. I've been able to handle multiple groups at once with some care. Edit: I feel like I could drop frost breath and shiver and not really be missing anything. AOE doesn't seem especially helpful beyond the control element. Which is more simply provided for by other stuff.

While I do not require a full build yet, I am curious. What methodologies/playstyles are open to focus on? I'm sort of taking everything right now and saving respecs for later.

Sounds right to me. I remember now. How awful. And again, this is the guy who FAKED A RECORDING to pass by a nerf.

I think I am now a blaster main. Horrible, I know. But while I like the IDEA of other ATs, the issue comes to gameplay. Blasters requires the active participation in what's going on I need at this point. ...Ice/ice is fun.

If we're going in to classic cape comic lore... It works off thematic/symbology. The difference between the hero and the villain isn't really something like helpful versus not helpful to people. The hero typically has their powers as a gift in some form (you can even say this is a blessing from God). You didn't choose it. It chose YOU. The villain grasps power by their own will in some form out of their desire for it or it's potential usefulness. The hero exercises their capabilities with humility. The villain is prideful. This then filters down into simpler to understand results like helpful, law abiding, not a jerk, and so on. This may also explain why most classic capes get their power by 'happenstance'. Why inventors are usually villains or unstable heroes at best. Also why capes don't tend to train and upgrade themselves. It's a violation of theme. Desire for more than you have been granted as a boon is more on the villainous side of theming. The hero gets used to what they already have or happenstance strikes again if they need an upgrade. God sees fit to gift the hero more as they have not violated the silent covenant formed when they were gifted the powers in the first place. The hero is just.. better in some meta/spiritual sense. And by spiritual I don't mean metaphor. I mean a real manifested reality. That's kind of how classic stories work. Ever wonder why Batman Beyond can use the most high-tech suit on the planet while every single villain he fights pays a heavy price for trusting technology? It's kind of like that.

By the thread, it seems the REAL danger of radiation heroes is roasting your opponents alive in a way that's even nastier than being a fire blaster. That said, imagination and POWER RECOLORING can do a lot of lifting. ...But then I had a thought. RP Challenge: You have to play a combination of powers you can justify as nonlethal as possible. Maybe make yourself play something unusual because of it. Things with obvious high impact values are probably out too. No energy blasters causing people's organs to rupture when knockback triggers. Most melee AT options are right out too. For those that don't usually play them, controllers can possibly be a 'safe AT'. The low damage accounts for the care and alternate methodology behind the power use. You COULD incinerate your foe, but you're trying to be good here. ..Also depends on how nasty you want to be, I guess. People can live through lightning strikes, for instance. If you don't mind nerve damage.

Remember, that's the same man who faked evidence via faked replay to justify nerfs.

I'll be honest. I never liked scrapper criticals as a thing. They aren't that rare, but they are rare enough to not be something worth considering in how you build or approach. It's like.. getting an inspiration drop.

It's just, moments like this make me wonder why I worry about damage at all. The things I've done. The things I've seen. The controller main precontainment. The punished MA/Scrapper main who solo'd thanks to air superiority. It makes me want to laugh. Then cry cause I have consistent and strong proof that I have really shitty taste.

Let me look on my long forgotten wishlist. Seems everything on here has been done in some form. Though not all of it well, it seems. Still, there's one last thing. It says.. force field defense set for melee? Well, it would just be super reflexes with different flavor. Maybe just alternate FX options for something else. Still...

I wheeze uncontrollably as I play a controller around the time ED came out. I begin laughing. And wheezing. At the same time. I look at the scrappers and begin crying while laughing. I look at my own MA Regen scrapper nerfed three times in huge updates in less than a year. The world burns with me.

I'm torn between making a joke about how fast SS scrappers clear missions or saying something about kinetic melee.

Look, it's fine. It's not like your bones will explode from stamina loss. Or something. I promise.

Having seen some very nasty tanker builds in the old days, even pre CoV, I can confirm endurance issues are always fixable. If you are willing to throw enough at the problem. It tends to be worth the sacrifice in other areas too. Stamina was always the intended bottleneck for gameplay, and it's why they resisted giving everyone the stamina tree for free so much. I can't really flash numbers at people, but I knew an insane tanker back in the day. Pre COV even. No set ever seemed intended to be simply better, but some of those design points are weird things like 'easier to level than this other set' or 'a huge pain of end management holding back your raw power at bad times'. Yet results speak for themselves. Bottlenecks are often merely opportunities in disguise in COH. It's worth investigating the potential, at least.

Scrappers were always THE solo class. Which, yes, gives them a suspicious location in the game meta. Well, there's something to be said for a top shelf damage dealer that won't wilt if they get the attention of a single stray enemy. Reliability is a worthwhile trait itself. Evergreen. Always relevant. Tankers know they don't have to worry about you too much, and a melee free to nip at the trouble spots up and close is a tactical advantage. But if you can survive? Blasters simply do more damage. No arguing with it. I've been in situations I wished I was a blaster rather than a grav/kin controller or a MA/regen scrapper. Doing one thing VERY WELL speaks for itself. A dead man tells no tales, after all. Nor can he wub wub wub wub at you and make your brain hurt.

With great power comes great.. endurance use. Yes. As tends to be the case in COH. Always has been.

My honest advice to all RPers. Come up with one, one single on, really strong conceptual foundational trait. It can be a lot of things. A single personality trait. Some concept. Some specific event they were involved in. Or just a one-line concept of who they are. I built a CoC character around the simple idea of, "Schoolgirl who throws rocks as hard as she can at the evil fish men taking over the gulf coast." That was all I had. Then I built 'herself' up around that one part at a time as I used her and tested interactions. Yeah, kind of make it up as you go around what you have. This was one of my best characters, and all successes I have are similar. Which should make characters in COH all the easier. Since you can even do silly things like, "Was a family pet dog. Got soul transferred into the mind of a crime fighting humanoid robot." It kind of is that simple. You just need one VERY strong trait to think about. The rest can justify itself around it. It just works. This is how you make interesting characters worth interacting with. In my experience. I've never had luck doing anything else. Well thought out reasonable beings aren't interesting to chat with, turns out.

I confess, it took me some days to realize what was wrong with the city since I've been back. To be fair, the first few years of COH's life cycle was a LONG time ago.

So one of those low single target damage but high aoe sets. I could see why a lot don't like it as such. Something to be said for designating the toughest guy in the room for death RIGHT NOW. Particularly on a blaster.

I've been skimming the forum for a sense of how things work in Homecoming, and I've never seen something nice said about Dual Pistols. Just how bad is it?

I guess one can't bleed a stone. I've started a Fluff/Fluff controller, and I am in love all over again. The -ToHit really helps in the interm, but I know this is a temporary life. I still remember being on a TF where we simply did not have the damage to kill the AV, and at that moment I wished I had spent all those hours leveling a blaster instead. Any blaster. Maybe a defender at least. It's, sadly, one of my core original COH memories. At least it made me appreciate the role blasters played. You don't know to appreciate having a nice overtuned one till you need it. I mean you are there for catching runners or the occasional enemy making a run at the blaster. The blaster you do genuinely need more than you are needed. They'll be incredibly thankful you were on the look out for it. Since even great tankers need a moment to respond to that. Silly things can still happen. I don't know. I just wish there was another AT I enjoyed this much.

Really? Well I'm the criminal responsible for starting that mess. Hello. It me.