Fire/mental = open to suggestions.

[Ukase]

Below is the unfinished build of Zorba, a fire/mental blaster. Level 47 at present. Normally, I build a character, get the IOs, before I even create it. But, because I wasn't very familiar with the mental manipulation secondary, I've learned some things that lead me to believe I've picked some dog powers. Like confusion. It's a true turd for my style of play. Mental probe was useful up to about level 20, but haven't used it since. Subdual must be taken, but stopped using it at level 20 as well. Maybe earlier. 

It annoys me to no end to take fight and have boxing remain useles. The leadership pool has more utility, but there's no resistance layer of protection with it, and all those toggles...a blaster has to have endurance to dish out the punishment. Influence is no object. 

If some of you have some suggestions as to better ways to improve this build, I'd welcome the feedback. Sometimes, you get in the habit of doing things a certain way, and you lose out on different perspectives and ideas. 

The one thing is - I love Super Speed & Combat Jump. But it pains me to take Combat Jump and lose out on another power pool. If I had my way, I'd take Leaping, Fight, Leadership, Speed & Sorcery. But, the only reason to take Sorcery is to get Rune of Protection. It's an excellent power for preventing perma-hold/stun situations that would otherwise lead to defeat if you don't have a break free. But, we can only choose 4 pools. 

If I put an extra slot in hurdle, would it be about the same as having CJ when it comes to hopping up to the second floor? Guess I could toggle Ninja run...

http://www.cohplanner.com/mids/download.php?uc=1412&c=658&a=1316&f=HEX&dc=78DA6593594F135114C7CF74EE802D2D8BC80E02656FA150F54D13230818A10991C4075F9AB14CEA244DDB9492C8A3DF4020685496F8057C71FB16AE8FE2F6E686FA660CE27898FF694BEC4D667E77FE679973EE12BB7EDEFF60FAC659D20213297371313ECEEFBC95336266D24E100FE34A2677D5ACE4598BD8E297CC74D25A884CD9390BFE3D05CBFC52369BC9E523312B9D3753F19899B6B34B29336F67D2E49BCB645291F9AC652D04DCE9949DBC96B7D349BFFB356B99D9E2C77C2697B072CB2D93593B1129248F99098B5F07F3E566AEA79F9F7354188E417775A2A8A223F7841BA06F53B805FAB7C195522C512BB9DA3843937C1A2957F368420FA874A1022B0CB0871749D7904FF77A5C2DC89A817C9A11C63F2A84138C4AD854E543685D8FC0EEC7C227C2A7A0C6015EA9D9EBF0A0499E57C91FAA24F3885067EF002A528113E8BA7A14AC8D0A7F83C79BD8B143D13A7BD748BE9AFFF24D31EA6475EA761077F4ADF01D78ECBDF003D8F811BCC551F5EEDA3A46FD27B17D069BBF08BF4A2DBBC26FA0E23E1AD087D67030616DA8166C645B136C9EA619F877ED93DBCB80F84E1F9C5EA9BBE5397A697D217C0DB6BF14BE929D7806AEF511B5C97AB4BDC1AE8676C055B675C86E749C61289D2E303A65573B3770327A37C1FE2DE1B6F03EB8574B14440F46506AEEA916FA8455606F405803DEE1A83EE9AD6F0F750DFC11EE83437F850E384CB2271C388858CF6014F942BF600B85F1BDC6D6B0F413BE897A8757C0915570745DB8063A854163EEBB5D1DBA69AED2AD0A17CD71664245AB132AF31C2B79129DC61A47CBBC4E9629A7CA94D932654E156F3B69AEE2E59DD0A5965D1F5BE5CFDA084EC38F92E6D1BAE5465D64614051F43256ECFBE1B841C4FD2C699AB68A5DF0DF06FF01AC1CEC97

[Llewellyn Blackwell]

Alright Im not going to give you a build but I will throw some things at you for ya to ponder and you can PM me later here for more help or look me up in game on everlasting. Same name in game as here.

 

First this works with anything primary/mental 2ndary. First the big deal about mental is Drain Psyche. You can take it at like 16, and well slotted will keep your end recovery at max, and by end game at leas ta  100 hp a sec regen as well. Just have to get into the middle of big juicy mobs. That moves us on to stealth. Invisibility and phase shift are great powers for a blaster especially the route Mental takes us down. Invis into the cent of groups, drain psyche, psy scream, nuke, and then if things are not dead ad looking mad phase shift while if in team the tank regrabs aggro, or if solo while you ponder your next move.

 

Your on the right track with Sorcery. Personally Id accept mystic flight and its TP as your primary travel powers with sprint/ninja run or one of the shape shifts if your more a land runner thena  flyer. I usually just take the blast for the 2nd and either no slot it or 5 slot it for a decent set bonus depending on toon and build. Heres the thing by the by. If your building for heavy global recharge to make drain psyche always ready, your rune of pro will have a very low  cool down, low enough I find it pretty much all I need pre clarion to deal with most cc heavy mobs, but I also make heavy use of my defiance attacks. Your first 3 attacks including that subdual mod dot are attacks you can use while held, they also can easily be made good enough to be your single target dps chain for big bads they hit harder enough and fast enough.

 

You also mentioned Leadership another good instinctive choice, especially if you team a lot. Vengeance is a super buff to both dps and survival, if your using phase shift well it should not be you who goes down first in a team. Veng and go mage tank.

 

Speaking of mage tanking. I love Force of Nature from Force Mastery. Again with heavy recharge its going to be up often, drain psyches end recovery buff will work through its crash penalty, just have to be ready for the initial blue flatline messing with toggles, i usually pop a blue and phase right after to let things stabalize.

 

World of confusion I slot with a purple confuse set, the confuse proc in it is so strong it combined with the power itself will see a fair few mobs taking time o swing once or twice on allies, thats attacks not coming at you, see it as a mitigation power. Psy Scream I purple slot for its cc effect as well. A blaster with some decent CC is pretty scary.

 

Basically built well mental plus the right pools will turn into blaster into a high regen and recovery on top of high recharge in general, with numerous powers to help one react to excessive aggro, CC, and even face tank if its needed.

[Sovera]

You don't need to focus on defense if you float out of harm's way and plink at mobs. Fire is pretty good at it with the heaviest ranged attacks of the AT. You can sneak into the middle of enemies with Super-speed + stealth IO, unleash Drain Psyche, unleash Inferno (since both are PbAoEs), then just float out of the way and go ham with ranged attacks. Anything the mobs throw at you will be healed by Drain Psyche's regen. It will be weaker against solo enemies, but if you are in a team someone is grabbing the aggro.

 

Now if you really dislike flying and floating then you take a large portion of your indirect defense (simply not being in range of melee which is where the heavy damage comes from) and yes, you'll need to work on defense. Don't expect huge improvements, but I think about 33% to all is achievable without *too* much hassle, and then munch on a single purple inspiration if, if, you are in trouble or expecting to soak an alpha.

 

My Fire/Atomic managed 40% with tricky slotting and then ghetto added the last 5% defense by relying on the small 5% -ToHit aura. It did fine though, but it also relied on Hover and Tough and Weave. 33% would probably not require all of that, so you just need to decide what your goals are. Drain Psyche is so good you can almost ignore defense with it, but it's not nearly good enough if you stay in melee. Not even 100 HP regen (not always achievable in the first place) can keep up with incoming damage without defenses in place.

[Ukase]

Thanks to both of you. I did figure out that Drain Psyche has its benefits. The problem was finding large enough mobs. I am one to chase the merits from story arcs, so I was zipping through them at +1/1, so there were never many mobs to get much use out of it. But, on an MSR and a Market Crash, I saw I could max recovery without even slotting any end mod in it. So, the preventative medicine will stay. 

I think I'm going to forgo the leadership pool as I will most likely only be teaming for iTrials, and there are plenty of buffs in those. Clarion might be the choice for a lot of blasters, but I if my defense is softcapped, I much prefer Ageless. Not that I have to limit myself to one. 

[_Jesus]

I run fire / mental as my main and can send you my build if you want.

 

I would personally build for more recharge and HP instead of soft capping defense.

I went Force of Will  / Leadership / Leaping (for CJ) / Speed / Force Mastery. With enough recharge you can basically rotate between Unleash Potential / Force of Nature.

For destiny I went with both Ageless and Clarion and switch out depending on the enemy type.

 

Feel free to PM

[Ukase]

Thanks. I am afraid I'm a bit of an over-achiever. I've already t-4'd that character and it sits in Ouroboros while I'm playing an ice/atomic blaster. 

With this new one, I went for max hp and recharge - and honestly - defense is better. At least for me. I'd rather have 1700 hitpoints and soft-cap, then 1847.3 and 27% defense. Maybe it's all in my head. Who knows. Just seems like my ice/ice and fire/fire are simply ...more survivable and better than these other combos. 

I've never used Force of Will or Force Mastery, for that matter. Most of my blasters go with Ice Epic for hoarfrost or Scorpion Shield for s/l/e defense. There's just nothing in it Force Mastery that reads like it's worth taking compared to the t-8's and t-9's in the secondary in those later levels. That's probably just me, tho.