oldskool

Totally fair points for your earlier paragraph, and I do recognize what you had stated earlier. However, the tone of that other reply comes across differently. That's my point. Furthermore, you really didn't need to restate any of that because your early commentary was already solid, in my opinion. Anyway... The final part of your commentary here. Are you sure that what you perceive is being argued is truly what is being stated? I've parsed over what Obitus wrote a few times. I do not see anything where it states Sentinels are better than Blasters. Instead, the last few pages are crafting an argument that Sentinels aren't as bad as the general consensus makes it. That is what I takeaway from this, but there is apparently a difference in perception.

Apologies on the wordsmithing I am about to do, but I think this entire argument could be reframed into something that doesn't read like a condescending jerk. I actually don't think that is your intent, but this is how it feels to read the above. Furthermore, it fully express the "talking past each other" @Obitus mentioned before. For the first point, I think it is a stronger argument to state that under certain conditions there comes a point where more defense is no longer necessary. I think that phrasing is rather important because the first point reads like absurdity to me. Outside of maybe 2 secondaries, Blaster's using the jury rig house-of-cards IO defense approach doesn't get anyway near Sentinel power sets. However, I do support an idea that within certain playstyles the level of defense that Sentinels have isn't needed while maintaining range. However, however, this kind of argument entirely glosses over that Sentinels can comfortably fight within melee range and this is allowable against a wide range of faction types. Indeed, I think that is what Obitus was pointing to before. Unlike some posters on the Sentinel side, I either run an AoE Immobilize or caltrops. Either option allows me to control enemy placement to a degree and this is something that not all of my Blasters have access to. It is an entirely different kind of gameplay experience between the two ATs. Let me just express my own experience here for a moment having played every one of these secondaries and having 7 incarnate Sentinels. I don't hover-blast on any one of them. I can fight close quarters and not worry so much about my health. This is readily apparent while soloing and often can be entirely unnecessary while grouping. If I do take some additional heat in a team, I can handle it myself. That's the point of the Sentinel, and it actually matches the description at character generation. My Blapper build on the other hand has to be a bit more tactical while solo, because I don't hover blast on that either, but in teams I can generally let loose without much issue. There are more enemy types that I need to be mindful of on any of my Blasters that I really don't think twice about with my Sentinels. If there is no value there for certain players or their playstyles, then the Sentinel is going to be disappointing. I get that, and I think Obitus does too from what I am reading. Hell, I think most of us that are more supportive of Sentinels, despite their weaknesses - which we are aware of, get this difference. It is often times those that want to browbeat about how Blasters are superior in all ways that just do not want to see any value in the Sentinel. This is where certain commentary like "training wheels AT" and "has no role" starts to manifest. For the last point, that's an argument I've seen done to death. I also don't think anyone has said the Sentinel's nuke is better than the Blaster. At least not those words. I think more to the point the Sentinel nuke is brought up as a reminder that the higher uptime is there to pad out its AoE weaknesses. In actual practice, the Sentinel nuke uptime combines with its other AoE powers in a fashion that are readily available per spawn. This isn't how all Blaster builds work, and it is equally intellectually dishonest to pretend it is. Furthermore, the Sentinel design allows it easier access to leverage PBAoE powers without much fear of reprisal. Again, In practice, the range limits are way overblown as are the damage ratios, but that doesn't seem to matter to folks that exploit maintaining range with hover (not accusing the poster of this but making general observation). Once again this is how the two player bases completely talk past each other than with each other. This thread, and all of them like it on this subforum, are one of the classic blunders. Never start a land war with Asia, never gamble with a Sicilian when death is on the line, and never, ever, try to convince Blaster lovers there is any value in the Sentinel. It is like trying to convert religion. Edit: I opted to go back and re-read some of what both Mac and Obi are saying previously. Ironically, Mac already touches on the point about enough defense vs not enough offense (Sent v. Blast). So, restating this really doesn't add anything other than to seem smug when the comment is viewed as a whole (again, I think it is unintended but still present in the tone). Obi notes a preference for a faster recharging nuke despite the Blaster version which is noted to do more damage. So, that poster already recognizes the potential of either path. Again, this just illustrates talking past each other. Can we group hug? 🙂

So back in 2004 or so, I think I started with a Blaster (because everyone did, seriously) and a Tanker. Holy crap... yuk on both. I swapped to Scrapper and tried a number of pairings. This is game launch so there wasn't the berth of ATs there are now. I'm also a glutton for punishment so I went with Dark Melee, before people realized how Soul Drain worked, and Dark Armor (when you could only run 1 resistance toggle at a time + Tough). Still, the Scrapper was the best experience I had had for years. I loved it. Then later down the road I started to grow as a person and try other ATs. Of course, I need to express that Controllers and Defenders had buffs by then so they didn't royally suck to play. That is when I discovered just how much I loved playing Dominators and Controllers before the game shut down. Illusion/Rad was one of my very last characters I made before the snap, and one of the very first characters I re-made when the game came back. Well, that and a Super Strength/Willpower Brute because that combo is amazing. Anyway, welcome to CoX, and enjoy your stay. There is a WIDE range of builds and AT combos to explore. Some are vastly better than others but the sheer scope of the game is what makes it so damn fun to me.

Clearly doing double the damage no doubt.

Plant/Poison is a good combo. Almost anything paired with Storm Summoning can be nuts. Dark Miasma, Radiation Emission, and Cold are also really powerful as they debuff the crap out of enemies. Illusion is a very single target oriented set but pushing high recharge can allow for permanent Phantom Army. That essentially means your indestructible goon squad gets to beat on some highly debuffed enemy. Illusion/Radiation is a classic combo that can take down almost anything. You can run any of the powerful secondaries with that and still come out really well. Illusion/Storm is chaos in a character and it can be glorious. People may hate you for that, but it is there. You still can't go wrong with any of the melee ATs. They are fantastic at surviving and are fairly easy to build. The squishy ATs can take a lot more work and time to really make them ridiculous. So there are two kinds of powerful performs. You have your direct damage unga bunga types like Scrappers, Blasters, etc. Then you have your weaken the enemy until they are cuddle kittens types like Controllers, Defenders, Corrupters, and Masterminds. Either path can get you to Godhood. 🙂

Something to think about, not that any of the other advice is bad, but there are degrees to which ATs compare with each other. Individual power sets, build preferences, and the like can really, really blur lines. The entire "out performs others" is so freaking nebulous here that you can get many different answers. Each one of them being correct on their own merits. You didn't even get responses yet about the Controller builds can out perform your idea, and they exist. That said, Titan Weapons is a strong performing primary on any of the melee ATs that can access it. Scrappers can certainly have the highest potential with it, but this isn't to say Brutes using it hit like wet noodles (they really don't, by a long shot). Hell, Tankers can also perform surprisingly well. You didn't mention Stalkers, but those too can do considerable damage. They are single target specialists but some combinations can do decently well in AoE too. TL;DR: This is something that can be overthought considerably. While you recognize people say "any class is good", I'm just here to say... we mean it.

Everyone of these threads. Every. F***ing. Time.

Radiation isn't dead but it does constantly experience half-life.

I sometimes consider the Blaster to be the Schrodinger's Cat of damage archetypes. It is the AT that is simultaneously able to survive really well while fighting with hover out of range and does the highest damage while being in melee range. The Blaster is also both alive and dead at the same time depending on how the Tanker is observing them.

If the build is fun for you in actual play, then no one's advice matters. That said, I think you are misunderstanding some fundamental mechanics and it is holding you back. 1) "Focused on damage", Unfortunately, no, no you aren't. You're focused on building % damage from sets, but this isn't as effective as it seems. You have 16% bonus damage globally. That's 16% base damage. That's like 12 pts of damage added to Hydro Blast. Whirlpool you have a full set of a slow set. It is obvious you're fishing for the defense, but let's consider what you've lost. That set modifies Whirlpool's damage by 21% (22-ish damage). Your global bonus another 16% (17-ish damage). If you actually enhanced that power with a damage set, then you'd have 90-100% boost. You've literally specced that power to do 1/3 of its potential from a damage set that could double its base effort. 2) When people talk about using Dominate for damage they are not talking about speccing it as a hold. What they mean is using singular %-based procs from a range of different sets to push it's damage artificially. By artificially, this means each proc is worth between 71 to 100+ damage for each slot. Other factors like recharge and base damage change this evaluation. Dominate's base damage isn't that high in the first place so each proc is likely going to be better than enhancing it. This really simplifying the topic, but what you have isn't effective for the goal. 3) You've enhanced regeneration rate with Luck of the Gambler's or you figured to add a +def slot. Either way, this is inefficient in powers like Hover which have pretty low base defense. Also, Regeneration the power set ironically works better off enhancing recharge. The whole mechanic of regeneration rate ticks isn't as powerful as it sounds. Those 10% boosts to regen rate in a set bonus are literally only giving you +0.5 hit points each second. That's not going to save you when enemies are hitting in the hundreds. 4) If you're going to slot Numina in Reconstruction, then be prepared to click that power every 120 seconds. You probably will anyway, but if you don't that proc will drop off. You could run that proc in a passive ability or a toggle and never ever have to worry about it. The Preventative Medicine proc doesn't rely on you at all since its condition to trigger is when you take damage. So you can have that set in a power like Reconstruction. 5) You don't need to soft-cap any defenses with Sentinel Regeneration and especially not if you're intending to hover out of range. You can ease off the defense if it will allow you to actually slot for damage vs chasing bonuses that aren't that effective. 32.5% is the defense number that makes any purple inspiration soft-cap that defense. A small purple inspiration is +12.5%. 6) If you're worried about alpha strikes, then Moment of Glory is better than it sounds. However, the Barrier Destiny Incarnate will also work real well. Speaking of Barrier, when you T4 that one you will have a minimum of 5% defense for the duration of that power.

If building for defense is your goal, then you're off to a reasonable good start. Here are some things to consider for what I would consider improvement. 1) Dump Power Blast. 2) Use the slotting of Power Blast into Power Burst if you like. 3) Get Power Push earlier, like when it unlocks at level 12, and use that Apocalypse set. This is your bread & butter damage attack. 4) Maybe replace Combat Jumping with Hover unless you just really like Combat Jumping. You don't need the immobilize resistance, but it doesn't hurt. 5) Non-tanks generally do not need 12 KB resistance. 4 is decent enough and Hover would also help mitigate that too (if you wanted). 6) That Nova slotting... Think carefully if you want that KB proc in a KB power. Maybe you do, but get ready to watch stuff go sailing out of range. (wheeeeeee!!!!) 7) If you use generic IOs, then seriously consider some boosters. Hasten with 2 level 50 IOs boosted to +4 each knocks another 5 seconds off the downtime. Up to you if that expense is worth it. 8 ) Consider boosting the Aim recharge to +5, when you can afford it, and using the Gaussian Build-Up proc as the second slot. So what if you wait 2 more seconds to line it up with Nova. It will boom so much bigger. 9) In Cloak of Darkness consider just going 5 slot Luck of Gambler for slightly better S/L resistance. 10) In Weave, move the resist global to Hover and put a LotG there. 11) If you have an open power pick up Maneuvers which will get you closer to 45% melee defense and can hold another LotG. 12) Maybe go with Obliteration in Lightning Field to get you to 145% recharge bonus with Hasten up. Why is this power even here with all the knockback? Just curious. You'll lose about 6% fire/cold resistance which really don't need that much of. You'll lose around 2% energy resistance which you weren't great at in the first place. Probably lost some toxic resistance but I never track it as that whole category is just BS. Dark Armor on Sentinels is not the universal tank that it is on melee, especially Tankers. This is a set that is a little bit weaker than the melee version as Obscure Sustenance just isn't a strong replacement to Dark Regeneration. Dark Regen is the key that lets Stalkers/Scrappers survive way longer than they should. I guess Cloak of Fear helps too. Sentinels can get really high regeneration rates which is still nice with high defenses. Anyway, what I am getting at is chasing a lot of resistance on Sentinel DA is barking up the wrong tree. The IO sets available to the AT just don't offer enough coverage to make it as powerful as the melee version. Its unfortunate, but it is true. All that said, I run Water/Dark that maintains about 32% to the 3 positions and less resistance than you have. That character does just fine. It isn't as tough as some of my other Sentinels, but it was never going to be due to limits in the AT. I also opted to proc out some attacks so I gave up defense for more offense. Moral of that story is if you're comfortable not playing at maximum difficulty, then you can ease off the mitigation stacking to diversify the build a bit. It can work.

Oh Hi! You're obviously new here. In other words, the Sentinel is literally unplayable.

If you're playing to exemp a lot, then the Sentinel can be a really solid AT. I do this pretty frequently myself and that is a big reason why I do not worry so much about the epic pools (which backload power post 41+). You also recognize that a Blaster will do more damage so that's good. The Sentinel damage "issue" is an often glossed over range of possibility. That range can include what appears to be Defender-quality damage but really the baseline should be higher. A min/maxed Sentinel will exceed that too, but it just won't be crushing Pylons on the same level as Scrappers/Stalkers/Blaster etc... All that said, it sounds like the Sentinel is going to do what you want it to do. When running Energy Aura, you do not need the second power in the Energy Blast kit (Power Blast). You don't need Defensive Opportunity in the long run. I would suggest you at least start with both Power Bolt and Power Blast with a plan to eventually drop P.Blast. Opportunity is pretty underwhelming the more you stack IO set bonuses and Energy Aura's Energize power will cut your endurance costs significantly. Between Energize and endurance procs you shouldn't be hurting on your blue bar unless you go out of your way to build for that. The other powers in Energy Blast; Power Burst, Push, and Focused Power Bolt are all pretty solid damage powers for what they are. Power Push is the most important of the three as it has the highest base damage-per-activation. The other two you can take both or leave one off depending on what you're doing.

None of the ammo powers disable procs.

"Effective" is highly subjective. What you're asking is the fundamental nature of how Energy Blast works. You knock enemies back and you do damage. That's going to translate into any other AT with access to this kit. You can build for ranged defense on any AT and so this doesn't make the Sentinel a unique choice. The only real question is if any of this matters to you when exemplaring down for low level Task Forces. That may be a key feature where the mez protection gives you an easy-mode perspective of the AT. I don't ever write this in the Sentinel forums, but why not just make a Blaster?

Sentinels are never good for teams, solo, logging into, looking at, cosplaying as, or recommending. The only good thing about the Sentinel, and apparently its entire purpose, is to create shitposts. That's the true power of the AT... its to troll everyone. 🤣

Thankfully, for the poor Sentinel it does not market itself around its inherent. It markets itself as a damage dealing AT that is more durable than a Blaster and can handle the aggro it gets. That's the paraphrase of the AT's description. At no point does it say that it assists its team to do more damage or any other fluff text like it. The entire concept of the Sentinel being some kind of warped support AT is born from forum posters. Now, as to whether or not it brings enough to a team that is debatable. It may not go as far as some like, and that is understandable.

Why would an inherent ability do anything for a team that is equal to an entire suite of powers?

Don't over think it. There are a number of directions you can take which can all be valid choices. Without knowing more, the best you can hope for is pretty generic advice. No reason you can't have these two pools. I'd highly recommend Fighting too for Tough and Weave, but you don't *need* them. Same goes for Speed to get Hasten. These are all just quality of life powers that can help support a goal, whatever yours is. Energy Aura and Energy Blast are both pretty straight forward sets. So here goes with some really general advice on both: Energy Aura; find some set you can afford that appeals to you. You really only need the Defense, Defense/End, and Defense/End/Recharge to get a good balance of cost reduction and coverage. You could also use a Defense/Recharge for a slightly higher defensive boost if the minor end benefit of the triple IO isn't worth it to you. Slot this way for all your defensive powers. Add 4+ slots only if you are going for specific set bonuses beyond that range. Some defensive sets have very good bonuses between 4-5 and very few are worth going all 6 slots. A key to managing endurance with Energy Aura is keeping Energize up as much as possible. Energize has a 30 second duration and a 90 second downtime. You can make this effect permanent with high enough global recharge. However, for the sake of simplicity, using 2 slots with 2 generic level 50 IOs is a good start. You could boost those IOs to +4 each and have 11 seconds of downtime. Power Drain can could then fill the gap. You may eventually feel that dumping Power Drain is comfortable, but I'd at least start a build with it. It can be a nice effect to leverage. On top of the use of Energize/Power Drain, endurance-related procs are also great. Panacea, Numina, Miracle, Performance Shifter, etc... Your Accolades will also help. You have to go out of your way to not be swimming in endurance with Energy Aura. Use 2 slots in your resistance passive or toggle (Kinetic Dampening or Power Armor) for the two +3% global defense IOs (Steadfast and Gladiator's Armor). That's a nice +6% to everything that stacks with all your other powers and bonuses. That's it for Energy Aura. You don't need to slot Entropy Shield and in general your slot use can be around 3 for everything else. Follow the advice above to get within mid 20% to low 30% to all damage types except for Psionic. Weave with at least 3 slots, like the above, and a generic level 50 IO in Hover will get you into the 30% to low 40% range. You can close the rest of the gaps with very specific build plans, but you're getting real close to near softcaps. Energy Blast; If you slot two of your attacks with both of the Sentinel archetype origin sets at the purple quality (Superior is the title) then you're going to hit upper 30% on Smashing, Lethal, and Negative defenses (your weak points). Turning on Stealth will push you just over 40%. Minimal slotting on Stealth should get you low 40's on nearly every type but Psionic. Easy peasy. Attack wise, you can skip Power Blast. You should keep Power Bolt due to its Opportunity effect. If you're still in a lower recharge build, then take everything else. If you skip Power Blast in Energy Blast, and Overload in Energy Aura you will still have room to take the following: - Stealth - Fly - Hover - The new Evasive Maneuvers - Boxing or Kick - Tough - Weave You'll have 1 free power pick left. Done.

Hooooooooooooowl Blaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh Raaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaawrgh Suddenly everyone in the community is using Sonic Blast. 😄

Edit note: I opted to reframe my thoughts. Would you not question the existence of the Sentinel if it were similar in some fashion to the VEAT? If so, then what is the point of the VEAT? What is the point of the Sentinel? These also feel like rhetorical questions given how homogeneous ATs can get within the IO system and the degree of overlap that exists in powersets. VEATs are great ATs in my opinion too. However, the VEAT is also very different. The VEAT can be a number of things depending on what it is you're looking to do. It isn't all that fair to compare the VEAT to the Sentinel as the Nightwidow/Fortunata/Bane/Crab experience is vastly different. The similarities that exists are the potential to do damage at range and have personal protections. Beyond that, the ATs are like comparing apples and tofu. Whether or not a VEAT brings more to a group is a matter of perspective. Certainly, they bring the capacity to provide team wide buffs due to their lower endurance cost Leadership options which also stack with the power pool version. However, what debuff effects is the Nightwidow providing? In some ways the use the term "debuff" seems to be looking solely at Venom Grenade. Venom Grenade is a very potent power, but it is just one effect out of many others. This pushes the Soldier side more towards a force multiplier but that isn't the only thing Soldiers (both Huntsman/Crab variants; even some Banes) bring to the table. Sentinels having less dps is also really ignoring how builds matter and what can be done with the AT. If you only look at the Sentinel through the lens of using full sets and only ranged attacks, then sure. However, the whole DPS argument is flimsy at best when using such generalized statements. Sentinels can be made to do enough damage, even solely at range, to overcome AV regeneration. That's a minimum of 150 dps. Is it the same level of other ATs capable of 400+ dps? Of course not, but it is still enough damage to participate, meaningfully, in all content of the game. The Sentinel may struggle for those trying to speed run specific objectives, but those are also self-imposed limitations. Back to Venom Grenade for a second. VG is a very big reason as to why the Huntsman is even a thing. The first two powers in the kit aren't that great without having negative resistance. The Crab's damage is also heavily linked to using its pets and even its melee attacks have better DPS than the ranged counterparts. So saying that all Soldiers are by default doing more dps than all Sentinels is factually inaccurate and also rather absurd. Nightwidows are predominately melee and they are exceptional at it. An expensive Nightwidow is a force to be reckoned with. These can do more damage than several other options within the ATs. So it isn't really fair to suggest that Sentinels should be compared to these. Not much actually compares with a well built NW. Fortunatas can play a similar role to a Psychic Blast/Super Reflexes Sentinel. I get the appeal to make the comparison. I did this during my write up of the Psychic Blast set in the sticky of this subforum. Sentinels can be designed using this combination to perform FAR better than you may think. However, the fundamental designs are also very different. Fortunatas can also dabble in melee while taking advantage of both Follow-up *and* Aim. A hybrid Fortunata plays a bit more like a Frankstein's Monster of a Dominator than it does in any sensible comparison of the Sentinel. VEATs are, by their very nature, capable of being jacks-of-all-trades. Sentinels aren't. Furthermore, the VEATs (and HEATs) have increased resistance caps which further enables their ability to play a number of roles. The Sentinel is just a damage AT with a poorly implemented mechanic. TL;DR: The Sentinel isn't that complicated. The Sentinel is a damage-oriented AT with some fundamental design flaws. Comparing it in its currently known flawed state to other ATs with very different roles is not a great method of argument. The purpose, which was the original question, can be answered rather simply. The purpose is to have fun and this is universal. The objective of the AT is to do damage. A perspective that criticizes this effectiveness is valid, but searching for some hidden meaning here is a path to disappointment.

This seems like a really narrow-minded way to look at the Sentinel and all other ATs in the game. Khelds in Nova are the only characters with innate hover to enable pew-pew at range without leveraging other abilities. By this logic all other ATs in the game are melee because enemies will try to rush into range. Even Controllers would be melee because they do not innately root on attack and require a power selection for such control as well as hover. You may be looking for deeper roles/design than CoH is going to provide and that won't exist in the Sentinel regardless of what the devs do.

This is more the crux of your original statement and the answer is probably the same. Though I think that defense really isn't an issue with Sentinels. In practice, Sentinels are actually quite durable. Furthermore, they have improvements to their secondary power sets that melee doesn't get. These changes can be really good in actual play. Sure, not all of the secondary sets are great, but several of them are considered superior versions of the original (e.g., Invulnerability, Super Reflexes, Regeneration). What is the purpose? Why is the damage low? Design flaws is the short answer. The dev team has already noted the lacking performance of Sentinels and mentioned that the AT will change at some point. The purpose was to make a damage-oriented AT like a Scrapper but one that uses ranged attacks instead. The issues with this design are documented in multiple places across this subforum, the suggestions forum, and other areas where this topic turns into a flame-war. Another aspect of threads like this devolves into Sentinel vs Blaster. This is an innately flawed comparison and will ultimately come down to individual preference. This horse has been beaten to the point of being a grease stain on a cement floor. Let's not rehash this again if we can help it.

Theft of Essence works wonders in Dark Regeneration. Most of the time I am endurance neutral when I use that power against multiple targets. Sometimes I am even endurance positive. There are some instances where Theft doesn't fuel the end enough, but it isn't the end of the world. I run minimal sets in Dark Regen and mostly have it proc mule. I do not suggest thinking of it as an extra AoE damage attack. Instead, look at it more like if you have to use the power you're going to retaliate a bit while gaining health back. Also, when hitting multiple targets Dark Regeneration can take you from near death to full health. The more healing % you have the fewer targets are required, but in a target rich environment the risk of death is pretty minimal.

The easy advice on Radiation Armor is this; don't set unrealistic expectations. What I mean there is don't go expecting to soft-cap your defenses working from zero on a budget. Even with a really expensive heavy Winter Set invested build you may not pull that off while also getting everything else one can imagine. Radiation Armor is actually really straight forward. It is resistance-based and allows for you to raise Smashing, Lethal, Energy, and Toxic to moderate levels *without Meltdown*. When Meltdown is active you'll likely cap your resistance on those 4 categories unless you're going out of your way to avoid it. There are multiple healing powers in the kit to help keep you running strong. So, keep it simple. Focus on the resistances first. If you can build up some defenses to about 15%-20%, then great because every bit can help. Rad's intimidating because it is new, but it isn't that complicated in actual practice.