Give Radiation Blast Toxic Damage

[Naraka]

4 hours ago, Solarverse said:

I have tried playing Rad Blasters a few times, and this conversation has me trying one yet again. However, all the other times I have tried playing them just left me feeling "meh" about the whole thing. I always felt the damage was subpar at best and it was a major reason I wasn't impressed playing it. So I wouldn't be upset if it got a Dot added to the set. I might actually stick one out if it did have a DoT with it.

Maybe I'm biased because I just like the concept character I made (a character that uses power orbs to attack and protect so FF/rad has quite a few balls to toss around) but I disagree. All in all, it might not be the most bursty set but Irradiate is a solid PBAoE, pretty fast activating, utility debuff, the snipe is unique with a nifty animation, I don't like the quick tier 1 or x-ray beam eyes but cosmic burst is solid too. The nuke synergies with Irradiate but the cone is rather a mess. The only real travesty is def debuffs along with a list of other utility effects don't get much traction thus are ignored. 

 

I'd personally want some adjustment made to +/-ToHit, +/-def to emphasize the penatrating nature of radiation which could go on to help other sets and ATs to fulfill a better game balance. But if damage needs to be added, why not the powers that underperform like the cone and tier 1/2 (and maybe neutron bomb). Irradiate and Cosmic Burst certainly don't need help. 

[HelBlaiz]

I remember mention that rad blast has fairly long animations that get in the way of safe/high performance. A bit of extra dot toxic damage could help smooth it out.

[Golden Azrael]

On 10/9/2020 at 12:52 AM, Tyrannical said:

Pretty much what it says in the title. I think Radiation Blast could well use an overhaul to bring it in line with Radiation Melee, Radiation Armor, Atomic Manipulation and Radiation Assault.

 

The absence of Toxic Damage from Radiation Blast was always something that confused me, even from the start. Radiation is, after all, highly poisonous. I can understand why the original development team stayed away from it, since sources of Toxic Damage was intended to be 'rare' in the original production of the game, and was not intended to be used reliably. 

However, I think at this point that there should be a Toxic Damage element included in some, not all, of Radiation Blast's powers. I think the ones that aren't present in Radiation Assault would be good candidates, so we don't have to rebalance more than one powerset. So that leaves us with;

 

 - Irradiate

 - Cosmic Burst

 - Neutron Bomb

 - Atomic Blast

Of these four, I would say that Cosmic Burst is the weakest candidate, but could still be included. 

Each of these powers would have to have their damage values modified to compensate for the inclusion of a Toxic Damage element, adjusting them as necessary in order to ensure that they balance out. Toxic is a highly resisted damage type at this point, so I don't think there should be much of a damage tweak in order to ensure that the powerset doesn't overperform. 

 

This kind of change shouldn't affect overall game balance all too much, since way back the only Toxic Damage powerset was Spines, and now we have Radiation Melee, Radiation Armor, Atomic Manipulation, Radiation Assault, Thorny Assault, Dual Pistols, Widow Training, Bane Spider Training, Demon Summoning, Ninja Training, Bio Armor and Experimentation that allow us to very reliably put out Toxic Damage.

At this point, giving Radiation Blast a little Toxic Damage helps bring it in line both thematically and mechanically with all the other new Radiation powersets, and I think would aid the powerset in standing out a little more when compared to the abundance of pure energy based powersets we have already, especially Beam Rifle and Electrical Blast.

 

I always felt Rad blast on Def/Corr' was feeble.  Bar a few biggish hitters like the Snipe and Cosmic Burst?

 

So some toxic damage added into the mix?  Sure.  

 

Trying to stay alive as a Rad/Kinetics Defender is hard work on the Rad blasting part.

 

It's hard work to take down the mobs.  Even loaded with the -def in the blast powers.

 

A very clever couple of power sets.  In a game that gets munched by more direct powers.

 

If rad blast had the oomph of Rad melee...

 

Azrael.

[Golden Azrael]

On 10/11/2020 at 11:42 PM, HelBlaiz said:

I remember mention that rad blast has fairly long animations that get in the way of safe/high performance. A bit of extra dot toxic damage could help smooth it out.

And the long animations.  

 

So adding more dam via toxic would make sense.

 

Spraying liberal toxic DoT throughout the blast set may help.  Or upfront.

 

Azrael.