Psychic Blast any good?

[thegee]

Is psychic blast any good as a primary? 

[FUBARczar]

Not the best for PVE, but still decent.  It's good for ST damage, sucks for AoE.  And does slightly worse against some targets that have high resist to psi damage like robots.

 

For PVP it is top tier.

[FUBARczar]

On that note I think it is best to pair with TA, Martial or maybe even Devices.  For PVE that is.

[honoraryorange]

I've got a Psychic Blast/Devices that I really love. Taser is really great damage and gives you another non-Psy damage attack, just is short range. But you're usually near melee anyways because of the T9 and Device bombs. 

 

Psy gets a bad rap at end game, but honestly I've got a variety of fully IO'd blasters, stalkers, scrappers, etc. and my damage feels pretty nice. Not TW/Bio Scrapper levels, but very nice. Also you'll destroy those Unstoppable bosses in two hits while the rest of your team flails uselessly at them 🙂

[Llewellyn Blackwell]

Psi/ment advocate here. Psi primary is among the best prim sets for a blaster. Even the single highest psi res mobs in the game have much lower res then the vast majority of mobs have against the likes of fire dmg.

 

Psi primary can go with a lot fairly well, and can offer a good mix of dmg and soft cc. Psi tornado maybe even more then the nuke is imo the sets real key ability, few mobs can keep their feet against it and it can on a high rcharge build be endlessly spammed locking down huge swaths of foes when playing at a dif setting a team cant just nuke wipe room after room. it can make you the key protector of squishier character on teams. I cant even begin to count how many times Ive kept an over confident blaster, brute or even tank alive by just making every mob around bounce up and down endlessly.

 

Mental 2ndary is the natural partner but really any are viable for a fun build, maybe not a meta build but viable enough that if you optimize it, it should make you feel good even in end game content.

[oedipus_tex]

Psi has a bad rap but isn't that bad. 

 

I do like the set better on Sentinels though. On that class, they lose one of their single target blasts and pick up Psychic Scream (which for Blasters is in a secondary set) and since the nuke recharges twice as fast on Sentinels, its not bad as an off-brand Controller because of the Stun in Psychic Wail.

[Acrimon]

Something to consider for one really frequent piece of endgame content:

 

Psychic Blast is EXTREMELY valuable for ITF runs - you can punch through every Minotaur and Cyclops MOG at full power, speeding up all those otherwise drawn-out fights. Also, Cimerorans don't resist psionic damage.

[Display Name]

Does anyone have a good Psi/Mental build for a blaster?

[oxmox]

On 12/11/2019 at 10:22 AM, Bentley Berkeley said:

Psi/ment advocate here. Psi primary is among the best prim sets for a blaster. Even the single highest psi res mobs in the game have much lower res then the vast majority of mobs have against the likes of fire dmg.

I'm all about psi blast but this doesn't sound right at all.

[Display Name]

What about Scramble Thoughts in the Psychic Blast primary?  Is it any good?  How does Disorient work compared to other mez effects?

[Gentoo]

I just tried Psi/Energy and I'm enjoying the unique playstyle it is giving me. Boost range + psi is cool, because Psi for some reason has the furthest ranged blasts of any blast powerset (according to the help text anyway). Though I guess boost range plus any blast set would work pretty much the same way. Its fun standing out of range of their ranged powers and plinking away at them.

 

And then if up against heavy psi resist, its time to play blapper with the energy powers. 

 

Power Boost is also pretty fun, since Psi has a sleep and a stun and a knockback.

[Coyote]

Thing is, the Corruptor version of it has a much better version of Will Domination. And it has a 2nd AoE.

So unless you really don't care about AoE, and you're getting a secondary with a nice ranged Hold that you can proc up, I'd rather run Psychic Blast as a Corruptor.

You do get an equivalent of Aim, which is nice. But a Corruptor has 3 nice ranged attacks (TK Blast, Will Dom, and Psy Lance)... add in a damage-procced Hold, and you end up with a nice single-target chain, AND a 2nd AoE, and that may be better than having Aim.

[DZKFire]

Just shelved my Psi/Time. If was my fault though, one of time's melee skills inflicts pure psi so the only non psi damage I was doing was partly TK blast and the /time AoE. I didn't have the immob slotted so it was useless. I mostly play red side and there are A LOT of psi resistant enemies.

 

Finally got irritated on the last mission of Silver Mantis SF, where you have to destroy turrets. Being almost pure psi, it was a complete pain to watch a blaster struggling to kill things.

 

Gonna re-make him into psi/energy or psi/dev eventually, but remade him into Fire/Time for now (time shift is too cool to give up).

[Grave1]

I recently IO'd my Psi/Fire and he might be my favorite hero to date. Single Target is fantastic along with great AoE for PvE.

 

What's made the combo really fun is slotting Ragnarok: Chance for KD in Psi Tornado. I lead with it every time, sometimes even ahead of the group. Very rough estimate, but it feels like 80% of the group gets knocked down, including most bosses (Warhulks and DE bosses give trouble). If Psychic Wail is up, then I go Psy Tornado --> Psychic Wail and then just pick off the bosses.

 

Adding to the KD fun (plus survivability) is slotting Fire Sword Circle with Melee AoE Universal Set: Chance for Knockdown in FSC (the name is slipping me right now, Avalanche?). After popping Psy Tornado, run in and drop FSC to KD again and then drop Burn. Depending how tight the mob is I might use Psy Tornado for extra survivability, if not I just pick off the bosses.

 

ADDING TO EVEN more KD fun is slotting Hot Feet with Overwhelming Force's Chance for KB/KD. The fear component in addition to the KD pretty much gives me all the time I need to clear mobs.

 

Long story short, I'm having great fun with this toon. Highly survivable even at low levels due to KD and fantastic damage.

[Gentoo]

Went back and played by PSi/NRG again and its just so fun and such a unique playstyle. I kill things that not only can't reach me, but fade in and out of draw distance.

[arcane]

On 12/3/2019 at 8:57 PM, FUBARczar said:

Not the best for PVE, but still decent.  It's good for ST damage, sucks for AoE.  And does slightly worse against some targets that have high resist to psi damage like robots.

 

For PVP it is top tier.

Meh, if you have a single non-nuke non-cone AoE in your primary and a PBAoE in your secondary, you shouldn’t want for much on the AoE front to begin with. 

Edited August 20, 2021 by arcane

[FUBARczar]

On 8/20/2021 at 8:40 PM, arcane said:

Meh, if you have a single non-nuke non-cone AoE in your primary and a PBAoE in your secondary, you shouldn’t want for much on the AoE front to begin with. 

I have many toons with Psi Blast, I like it, but most don't like it much.  Plus Psi tornado is such a long animation.  Psi AoE compares poorly to other sets.