oldskool

First thing to consider is this, don't stress too much about defenses with Electric Armor. Defenses are nice to have and you should try to add that to the mitigation strategy. However, trying to turn Electrical Armor into Super Reflexes may be a frustrating path. You could make a decision based on the direction of your powers. Are you going to take any of the melee options? If so, then building for Melee (which includes Smash/Lethal) is good choice. You'll be up close a good bit in order to use those close quarters powers so this makes sense. If you're looking to mostly hang back at range, then you want to maybe look at raising your ranged defense up. If your plan includes doing the whole "hover-pew-pew" you can get away with not completely softcapping defenses. Enemy attacks at range are far less dangerous than they are at melee range. Electric Armor has high resistance and high health regeneration. Even a little bit of defense goes a long way.

This thread is a bit dated. Necromancy is a Mastermind powerset.

Checked it too; you're right. Hmmm, I'm misremembering the other numbers from something. I'll blame boomer brain.

This isn't accurate, at all. This is less wrong as it is misleading. The proc chance on Annihilation's in Piercing Rounds isn't 100% and the numbers are slightly lower than 28%.

This isn't always true. It is probably less true more often than it is. Piercing Rounds takes a long time to animate. It gains a substantial amount of damage out of Incendiary Rounds but only has -9.6 resistance debuff (Edit notes: -13% as mentioned below, my mistake). The low quality debuff plus long animation isn't going to be a game changer on fast moving teams (Edit notes: The debuff is just under the Corruptor version, but I still question the value vs Incendiary Ammo or even the use of the power at all. I'm still not a fan of it.). The Annihilation proc can be OK in Piercing Rounds but you'd really want to run that power without recharge enhancement to make the most of it (Edit note: this proc is not guaranteed to trigger which was the original point). If that becomes the case, then you're not using it very frequently which ends up becoming a damage loss. Dual Pistols can squeeze out some consistent attacks with all of the other powers. They almost all animate at 1.848s Arcanatime which isn't terrible. The T9 then becomes the big slowdown attack. On my DP/MC I skipped Piercing Rounds and never missed it. I only use it on my Defender where the -20% resistance debuff is far more noticeable. The loss of personal damage in that case isn't a big deal.

The Sentinel is a damage AT. I really don't understand the confusion by that role. It literally offers nothing else in its powersets to the team. It is just as selfish as a Blaster, Scrapper, or Stalker. Now, the quality of its damage and success of filling that role is a problem. Just because the implementation of the role is poorly handled doesn't change what it was supposed to do. Also, I feel I need to say this, but Opportunity as a mechanic doesn't make the Sentinel a support unit. I can just hear the typing by someone wanting to argue that point (not you OP. 😄). As far as feedback goes, you've made a really expensive Sentinel. The defense stacking is always fun to see on Bio Armor Sentinels. I've never felt it was necessary, but it is a goal a lot of folks love to achieve. Maybe they are right, and I am wrong. Maybe not. Speaking of defense, I have a question. Do you die enough in team play that you feel it justifies this much investment into defense sets? If yes, then you're on the right path. If you're thinking "no", then I'm pretty sure you could back off some of these choices for more damage. You mentioned procs. As things currently exist, that is how Sentinels gain more damage. Specifically this works best in powers like Tesla Cage that can hold a high number of them. It can significantly improve the damage of that power. You don't *have* to do this. It is just an option. Without any goal stated on what you're trying to accomplish other than self sufficiency there is no real "this is what you should be doing" talk to have. By the way, Sentinels trivialize self sufficiency by existing and having a moderate investment in defense. They are fairly sturdy by default. Now on the other nitpicky feedback. This is just a discussion on power choices and slots as they are. I'm not looking to rebuild this from scratch. Lightning Bolt vs Charged Bolts - Charged Bolts is actually pretty good despite the low damage per hit. Just because something is in the T2 category doesn't make it superior. That said, Lightning Bolt is good. The big takeaway here is Charged Bolts is linked to Offensive Opportunity which can yield a bit more damage if you're interested. Plus the power weaves into your attack cycles easier due to its incredibly fast animation and recharge time. This gives more actions per minute. It looks like you're chasing some minor set bonuses without consideration on the consequences. Combat Jumping, for example, is a poor use of that +Defense IO. You'd get a lot more mileage out of that if you moved it to Environmental Adaption. The Numina proc will likely be on all of the time for you once you start clicking Rebuild DNA, but if you don't keep that proc buff up all the time it will eventually drop off. The 12% regeneration bonus sounds great on paper. However, do you see that 0.6 HP per second next to it? That's right. That is equal to less than 1 hit point per second. As our friend Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson used to say... Same could be said for that 2 slot of Panacea. That recovery is another drop in the ocean. You don't need the Acc/Rch in Parasitic Leech. The accuracy of that power is already really high. You could move a slot to Lightning Bolt to complete the set and gain 5% more defense to Fire/Cold if you wanted it. If you moved the slot from Combat Jumping to Environmental Adaptation you'd be in better shape when you're running Offensive Adaption. You skipped Aim which is a bit of a shame to see. That is your burst damage option and you could get the cooldown to line up with Thunderous Blast for big boom boom. Taking out enemies fasters speeds up team play. It also makes combat less of a battle of attrition which is welcome in either solo or group play. If you really wanted to add in procs, then Agility is counterproductive. You could run Musculature instead and gain damage even without procs. Psychic Shockwave isn't that great for damage in real play but it has its uses. Just FYI. Your overall set choices and slotting *are* good decisions. You're not an idiot. However, the return on this level of investment *is* questionable if you're not folding like a wet paper bag already.

If you're using procs, then it is the sequence I have found the most effective so far. If you're using full sets for defense bonuses, then Disorienting Shot is really good. Unfortunately, DS animates and recharges so fast it might muck up that routine. You could run it, but it might have a bit of a delay. Also, having both the T1 and T2 in the same sequence makes control over Offensive Opportunity a real chore. Edit: I happen to like SoW and have even on my Tanker. I look at it as a buff to all of the resistances that aren't Smashing/Lethal. SoW lets me raise my energy resist for those times where it feels necessary. I run Super Strength as the primary too and the attack chain is Haymaker, Knockout Blow, Footstomp, and Cross Punch. That eats a ton of end when the Force Feedbacks keep going off so the extra recovery of SoW is very welcome. A lot of opinions about it look at how WP can cap S/L and then just write off SoW as if that is all it brings to the table.

Arachnos Soldier has a disturbing lack of fire though. 😀

AR isn't a very popular set to talk about anywhere. I guess Blasters like it the most and "like" is used loosely. Sentinels aren't that popular and this subforum has quieted down considerably in the past few months. I know I responded in that AR/Dark thread. I don't want to completely rehash my thoughts here since you've likely already read it. My ideas really haven't changed since I wrote that. Anyway, if you can fit M30 into your build, then by all means go for it. I personally found that Full Auto into Flamethrower and Buckshot is enough for my tastes. I don't miss M30 in my build, at all. On Willpower, or any other low-ish defense set, the additional source of KB (or KD with the IO) can be welcome active control/mitigation. So it can have some value but the damage is lack luster. Actually the entire kit of Assault Rifle is lackluster for damage, but I don't play it to set Pylon records. I actually have grown to enjoy the character using the set and that is enough for me.

@warrock It is rare to see when someone comes around for advice, gets advice, and then follows up months later to pay it forward. That's awesome you're digging the character to the point of giving back!

The Sentinel hasn't had a review pass, yet.

Within this thread it would seem that the proposal is aimed at two functions. Damage dealing and group presence. Now, my own perspective on a problem statement is this; the feast or famine design of Opportunity doesn't work as intended. The conceptual design of the AT, as stated in September 2019 if I am remembering correctly, is that of a ranged Scrapper. The intent of Opportunity was that the Sentinel would have peaks and valleys in performance. During Opportunity the damage function of the AT would spike up which would, conceptually, exceed Scrappers. Then, during the downtime the Sentinel would do a bit less damage. That just isn't how the AT plays out in reality. This is exacerbated by the IO system and current power creeps. So the Sentinel, even during Opportunity, never excels against the Scrapper and just has generally lower overall damage at all times. The feast or famine aspect should have been an approximately 50/50 ratio, but this doesn't happen during the leveling process in my experience. I have a number of Sentinels, and it isn't until they have excessive amounts of global recharge that this uptime is even possible. This has a very real impact on the impression of the AT as people work through the leveling process. It comes across that their inherent isn't really doing anything and that is because it really isn't contributing much. The nature of this perception problem of the inherent also seems to create this hyper focus on "identity". Sure, folks would bring this up anyway. There is no shortage of navel gazing on "what is my purpose" across a few ATs right now. However, Opportunity doesn't function as it should which then spirals out into all of these other thought processes. The split nature of Offensive and Defensive modes has further problems. The first major issue for most players is the perceived lack of agency in their build design and loadout decisions. Offensive Opportunity is only possibly with the T1 and Defensive Opportunity is only possible with the T2. This leads some players to feel as if they have to have both which limits their build options. That is counter to the entire theme of how characters work in City of X. What's even worse is that Offensive and Defensive effects are proc-like effects and they aren't even that great. Offensive Opportunity creates a proc-like damage effect which is derived off the base damage rating of the power and it never scales with enhancement. Ranged power base damage has several struggles in relation to melee and the Sentinel's overall AT modifier doesn't make this better. In other words, this aspect of Opportunity is stagnant and appears to reduce in effectiveness over the course of the character's career. How utterly underwhelming. The healing and endurance return of Defensive Opportunity also reduce in effectiveness as the character matures. The IO system and the armor set variance of the AT allow for enough self-sustain that this feature isn't necessary even post-level 22 single origin availability. So neither Offensive or Defensive Opportunity bring much value to the Sentinel after a certain period within the leveling process. The major area of value is the resistance debuff but the availability on this isn't even 50% without significant investment. The kind of investment you can place into the Sentinel can done on any of the other ATs with a much more noticeable return on the investment. To add even more insult to injury, the high investment needs of the Sentinel just get the inherent to function on uptime as it is intended. That's the floor for the AT to function properly. It is also the ceiling on how it can go. I don't fault anyone for being disappointed with the Sentinel when viewed in this way. None of the above is to say the Sentinel isn't functional. It actually is. A lot of its overall perceived damage weakness is generally overstated in relation to a meta that is laser focused on overkill. However, the Sentinel does have a lot of area for improvement to smooth out its effectiveness from start to finish. This is what needs to be looked at primarily. There are other issues with the AT too, but Opportunity is the start of that corrective process.

No kink shaming here.

Yet, no other damage dealing AT (Scrapper, Blaster, Stalker) have anything other than a self-serving inherent. I feel I understand where you're going here. The Sentinel is new and there are already 3 other selfish DPS ATs. Why play a 4th unless it brings group utility or something else that is "interesting"? What I am getting at is that kind of idea can potentially hold the AT back. There is going to be a cost to its damage in order to have this faux group presence. So that won't do much to move the needle on "why play X vs Y" debates. It will then circle back to Sentinels are played for the novelty of their inherent and yet they fall off later. I feel the Sentinel is already pigeonholed here by design. It was conceptually supposed to function as a Scrapper at range with a feast or famine mechanic. That doesn't really scream team support, but like you note the inherent is lacking. I guess what I'm getting at is, I'm OK with it not being more engaging but being more functional. I actually like the idea of the ranged Scrapper. I couldn't care less that Opportunity gives it a group role or not. Damage is a role. I've been in a lot of these debates and it seems like that is where the split goes. Those wanting something more interesting, and those not really caring about that for the sake of basic functionality. I don't know where a happy medium exists that ever stops the "why play X vs Y" debate. Anyway, thanks for the clarity on your points.

I think my point is less about putting words in other's mouth (and I don't think that was the intent by any means) and more that this comes across as a double standard. The Blaster is sold to the prospective player as an AT that specializes in doing damage in any range. The AT *does* that. Defiance just facilitates more damage but also grants quality of life in mez protection (allowing the use of some attacks). Defiance has changed more than once. Never did it completely rewrite the core of the AT in my opinion. Sentinels are sold to the prospective player as an AT that specializes primarily in ranged combat while having a set of powers to facilitate their survival. The AT *does* that. Opportunity is additional flavor to facilitate damage in a failed concept of feast or famine. Sentinels aren't billed as ranged tanks, group support, crowd controllers, or any other subset of roles. So why is it that the Blaster can just exist as it is and it has an identity. However, the Sentinel has to have an inherent power that gives it an identity. This just makes no sense. Also, Sentinels don't need to appeal to every player. Folks should be OK taking a firm "NO" on the Sentinel if that is what suits them. So, @Wavicle, this is where I agree with one of your other points about why can't the Sentinel just do more damage? It isn't being billed as anything but a selfish DPS like a Scrapper or Stalker. Why make it do something different? This is especially true since the current state of Opportunity isn't that big of a team benefit as it currently sits. Opportunity is romanticized as something it really isn't.

I think there will always be an argument about identity even if this change were made. There will never be a point at which players say "Why play a Sentinel when I can play a Blaster" until one exceeds the performance of the other. That is what that logical loop causes and it won't go away regardless of whatever the dev team does. I'd argue the novelty of having range and armor *is* the identity of the AT. The debuff is a form of damage. Looking at it as group performance seems like rationalizing the mechanics as something greater than it is. Does Defiance really add a lot of identity to the Blaster? Why must Opportunity be that metric for the Sentinel? Just friendly question to have some friendly debate. I see a lot of room for this train of thought to completely hold the Sentinel back from ever having a "place" in the game.

There is one thing about this thread's title that no one has addressed yet.

I like the idea, but I don't think the 15% resistance debuff is going to happen. As it was mentioned by another poster, there seems to be this aversion from having innate resistance reduction being a part of an AT's kit.

I'm real late to this party, and I am bound to make some mistakes here that may have already been addressed. So in the original proposal of item #2 on Sentinel mark. This is 100% uptime? If T1, T2, or T3 apply a 10s non-stacking debuff that is overwritten whenever it is applied again, how is this not on all the time? I'm not opposed to that necessarily. What that would do is allow for Sentinels to switch targets and apply the debuff. However, against tough targets this is on all the time as it currently looks. One big problem about the Sentinel is that as you level one up Opportunity has a window of 15 seconds of feast gameplay. After that there is a downtime of variable length directly related to global recharge. If players wanted to build for reduced downtime, then improving global recharge is a key aspect to consider. Misses end up being the driver of longer downtime, but it is certainly possible to get 90% meter within 13 seconds on every single primary. Assault Rifle can do it in 11 seconds but the cost to overall DPS isn't worth the gains. Now, players that care about nothing but damage don't care about Opportunity at all. They care about Mind Probe and Dominate. Hell, your primary at that point really doesn't matter. Which version of Opportunity you leverage doesn't matter either. Offensive Opportunity in high end builds with extreme recharge and procs doesn't count for much total damage. If this feature were scrapped tomorrow my main would lose 3 DPS. The resistance debuff however, is a huge deal. Even if it is resisted somewhat by an enemy resistance debuffs increase damage noticeably. Having a 15% unresistable debuff with the possibility of constant application of the T1, T2, or T3 is an absolute YES PLEASE. You have no idea how much I'd abuse the F out this. One of my character's T1, with procs, still recharges almost every second. The T3 recharges within 2 seconds. Then, on top of this we can grant ourselves and our party a damage buff. That's on top of the damage derivative from Offensive Opportunity which can be compounded by -15% unresistable debuff plus Achilles' Heel, plus Fury of the Gladiator, plus powers? Sign me up. I want this yesterday.

@Galaxy Brainthanks for sharing here. I often miss discussions about the AT outside of this subforum.

You're welcome! Really happy I could guide a new comer towards the wonderful world of Blapping. You may experience a lot of defeats early on, but that is also part of a long standing joke tradition of Blasters earning debt badges. Dual Pistols is my favorite ranged attack set precisely due to its flexibility. Not ever power has the same level of value universally across all archetypes. For example, Piercing Rounds can kinda suck for damage on some builds. However, Defenders can really leverage the default resistance debuff it comes with (standard ammo is when you don't run any of the elemental types). This is because Piercing Rounds for Defenders grants the maximum -20% resistance shred that the power is capable of. For Corruptors that is -15%. For Blasters and Sentinels that is -9.6%. That -20% works with other powers that also reduce resistance like Tar Patch in Dark Miasma. Using Dual Wield for its knockback potential has a bit more value on Blasters than it might on a Sentinel. Suppressive Fire can be completely converted into a damage power on Defenders with relative ease. It is by default a better damage power on Sentinels. On Blasters that power can either be skipped, used as a hold, or used creatively like on Defenders and so on. Loads of potential for lots different types of gameplay to explore. Have fun!

I feel much the same way. I tend to prefer Dual Pistols on anything other than Blasters. Dual Pistols is an underrated attack set that can often be tossed into the discard bin. Blasters, in particular, are a hyper focused damage archetype. Blasters excel at leveraging burst damage and really just damage in many forms. Dual Pistols lacks a snipe power which is a large burst damage attack as it exists in other sets. Also, the T9 power for Dual Pistols (Hail of Bullets) has a long-ish animation time that puts you into melee range. That long animation can hinder the high burst damage concept some folks go for. None of that is to turn you off of playing with Dual Pistols on a Blaster. You do you. However, you may come to find that a lot of players like to make their Blasters as ranged-only specialists. If one goes down that path, then Dual Pistols can be a bit disappointing vs some other sets. This loops back into the lack of snipe and long animation of the T9. A T9 which happens to put you into a position you may not wish to be. So taking that opinion you can start to look at how other ATs function. Defenders can bring some damage but that isn't what their role is about. Their role is about making other players do moar damage. Yeah, there are exceptions, kinda, but this is the general idea. Dual Pistols has an entire mechanic designed around swapping ammo to grant various effects. Effects like lowered damage mitigation of your enemy (standard ammo on certain attacks) or lowering their damage output (chemical ammo on almost all attacks). Defenders happen to have the highest possible modifiers for this purpose which can potentially make this set really flexible if you want to explore that playstyle. Corruptors are very similar to the Defender as they both have access to supportive sets. The Corruptor just makes that a secondary effect vs a primary effect. Corruptors have the second highest modifiers for all of the alternative effects that Dual Pistols have. So this is a somewhat happy medium between doing damage and bringing some team support. Sentinels do not have access to the full range of damage dealing powers that Blasters do NOR does that AT have the same base modifiers. However, the Sentinel is conceptually the kind of AT that can sit back and pew pew with impunity. I personally feel that Dual Pistols is far more successful on the Sentinel for this kind of play than it is on the Blaster. I know that there will no shortage of folks willing to argue this, but I really do have my reasons for it. Now, back to Blasters. So since the Blaster version of Dual Pistols lacks a snipe and it has a melee final power, the Blaster version here can excel as a close quarters combatant. This is what is often known as the "Blapper". The Blapper is the kind of Blaster that isn't too afraid to mix it up into melee like a Scrapper might (Blaster + Scrapper, right?). Dual Pistols can be a highly effective Blapper. You can choose to skip certain long animation powers (e.g., Piercing Rounds) and substitute that with melee attacks. This can create a fairly fluid sequence of attacks built around the attack "Pistols" and "Executioner's Shot". You can then opt to skip almost everything else, except for your ranged area attacks like Bullet Rain, and leverage high damage melee instead. Note, Sentinels *can* do this eventually, but it isn't nearly as effective at the moment. Sentinels are just more comfortable at sitting back to pew pew. Pairing Dual Pistols with other Blaster secondaries known to be good Blapper sets is a worthwhile way to go. For me, this means I make a character where I don't feel like I am ignoring half the kit and try to find a balance between the two. Unfortunately, Blapping isn't really for the faint of heart. It isn't for everyone. I probably wouldn't recommend it to a new player, but once you get the hang of it the concept feels incredibly powerful. This playstyle can get a lot safer the later one gets in the build process AND with a significant level of investment into the Invention system. So it can be rather advanced. Synergistic sets for Corruptors and Defenders are any sets that bring resistance reduction. So there is a rather long list of that. Really, any of the top tier supportive sets (e.g., Radiation Emission, Dark Miasma, Time, Cold, etc...) have something in their kit that works well with the Swap Ammo system. For Sentinels, any of the more self-contained defensive secondaries (e.g., Invulnerability, Super Reflexes, Energy Aura, etc.) can allow for some damage exploration that other pairings just lack. For Blasters, there is a world is your oyster view, and you're going to find a lot of worthwhile recommendations here.

Well the Sentinel hasn't gone through a review pass, yet. So any of the older posts about how Water or Bio works are still valid. You could pick and choose whatever makes the most sense from any number of posts. Your most effective expenditures are going to be into the following quality of life procs: 1) Steadfast 3% defense to all 2) Gladiator PvP 3% defense to all 3) Shield Wall PvP 5% resistance to all 4) Reactive Defense 3% and scaling resistance to all 5) Numina Regen/Recovery 6) Miracle Recovery 7) Performance Shifter (not unique but still a good investment) 8) Panacea Health and End restore proc 9) Luck of the Gambler Recharge% as you can afford them -- not unique either but big bang for the slot and costs. That list will likely eat up a good bit of your budget. It is well worth the investment though. When it comes to fleshing out the rest of the build you could just as easily run with level 50 generic IOs until you get more funds to run something else. There isn't that big of a difference, at least in damage, between some generic options and lower tier sets. This is because the kinds of sets that the Sentinel has access to aren't that good to begin with. This is why the higher damage efforts come with much much higher investment. The Sentinel is playable with that but it absolutely requires heavy investment in order to even start to tread water in the extremes of "the meta". In other words, temper your expectations. Also, there is no one way to play your character. Since you have hit level 50 you have a build. It may not be finished, but you have had to have selected powers and distributed slots already. What does this build look like? Maybe some folks can offer pointers on where to put certain sets into slots you already have vs making you respec the character.

Psi Mastery is the strongest Sentinel Primary. 😉