Sentinel damage scales?

[aeb]

Does anyone know what the Sentinel damage scales are? They weren't added to the damage scales table on the wiki. 

 

Also when I started playing sentinels, it felt like they did just a bit more damage. Then a patch came, and the damage dropped... and I can't shake the feeling that they were better matched to the DPS archetypes before that patch. It wasn't a huge change - they still couldn't touch blasters for sheer damage - just a little more like they were  more like the DPS, instead of being there more to boost the team's damage than to do damage themselves.

 

[Bopper]

It's 52.83 for both melee and range. That is a 0.95 scale.

[Luminara]

17 minutes ago, aeb said:

Does anyone know what the Sentinel damage scales are? They weren't added to the damage scales table on the wiki.

[Bopper]

3 hours ago, Luminara said:

Looks like we need to fill in the rest. Luckily they're all available of City of Data

[aeb]

Okay. Thanks a lot. I didn't know the stats were in the ATs, too. I just looked up Damage Scale, and my second favorite AT was missing from the lists. 

 

I do remember the damage seeming to go down, but that looks pretty good. Interestingly, it's as good as Tanker, which isn't known for as great damage either, but they're 

both better than brutes, who are known for their damage? Okay... I have more to figure out, I see. 🙂

 

[Bill Z Bubba]

5 hours ago, aeb said:

Interestingly, it's as good as Tanker, which isn't known for as great damage either, but they're 

both better than brutes, who are known for their damage?

 

Brutes have a lower mod because of their inherent, Fury, which is a baked in 0-200% damage buff.

[drbuzzard]

Yeah, you have to consider the whole package before you decide on how much damage an AT does. For example stalkers do 1.0 damage scale, but owning to a whole lot of criticals which they can actually control, they arguable do the most damage for melee (single target). If they aren't kings, they are quite close. 

[DarknessEternal]

The biggest problem with Sentinel damage isn't their scalar, it's that Blast sets suck for damage.

[aeb]

The blast sets have poor damage? Then how are blasters known for such good damage? They don't look that much better than the rest otherwise...

 

[Snarky]

2 hours ago, aeb said:

The blast sets have poor damage? Then how are blasters known for such good damage? They don't look that much better than the rest otherwise...

 

THere are things that affect the damage that are 'hidden'.  1) Blasters almost always have TWO buildup powers.  2) Blasters have a ton more targets they can hit with an AoE (more damage by far) 3) Blasters are focused on one thing in their builds.  Damage first.  Sentinels have to at least take a small effort to enhance survivability.  4) The Sentinel damage scalar is less than a Blaster.  5) Sentinels range sucks.  (Yes, that limits the amount of damage they can do.)

 

These are just the reasons I can think of while sipping my 1st cup of coffee.  I do not do in depth DPS analysis.  Not for less that $30 an hour.  and I am rusty, you'd be paying for knocking rust off my calculus. 🙂

[oldskool]

3 hours ago, aeb said:

The blast sets have poor damage? Then how are blasters known for such good damage? They don't look that much better than the rest otherwise...

 

There is a lot to unpack in both of those questions.  

1) "Poor damage" is subjective and ill-defined.  There is truth that there is a historic issue with balancing ranged powers vs melee powers.  Melee powers often do more damage per hit than ranged ones do in the same tier.  However, that's just single target.  Also, ranged powers often have faster animation times which actually does help offset the disparity somewhat.  Still, the primary focus of the ranged power set has historically been area of effect and the historic strength of melee has been single target.  The lines here have gotten blurry over time.  

 

2) Blasters are known for "good damage" due to a combination of things.  One of those things is a tendency to overhype the AT on the verge of hyperbole.  Is the Blaster good at range damage?  Yes, if we're talking about AoE potential.  That AoE potential is often driven by access to a multitude of powers not being just the primary as well as both Aim and Build-Up.  The single-target melee powers in the Blaster's secondary more often than not do more damage than their primary alternative.  Blasters are pretty good at range.  They are better at it than other ATs due to higher base scalars, power accessibility, and even Defiance.  However, the Blaster is not optimal at range only.  It is viable, but not optimal.  

The Sentinel is an interesting case study in deconstructing power balance.  The AT was an experiment post shutdown as noted many times in other threads.  The changes it attempted to make had a certain spirit in mind but its execution falls apart due to a number of other factors.  

The Sentinel range sets had changes to single-target with what seems to be a spirit of improvement.  Damage within the ranged sets was smoothed out a bit across a snipe change (which was a power category often skipped by players) and adding damage to CC powers.  This actually would cause the Sentinel to do *more* single target damage at a baseline for any builds *not* using a snipe in the rotation.  The snipe availability that exists now completely breaks this dynamic.  Now, all blast sets or ATs with a snipe have access to a high damage-per-activation power with more reliability than they ever had.  The Sentinel's quality of life change here became a moot point.  

Now, the increase of single-target damage to smooth out Sentinel design came with it a restriction on AoE potential.  See how that original interplay between blast sets and melee sets had a design choice?  That seems to have been replicated in the Sentinel.  They were granted more single-target options and so they lost AoE potential.  Of course, this concept of AoE potential kinda goes out the window now with the Tanker changes.  

The design change to reduce range doesn't seem to be a punishment.  It was a design decision on compromise.  The single-target damage seems intended to be a bit higher and the AoE reduced.  In order to increase some risk the range was taken into consideration and reduced.  However, some of the AoE cones were changed to compensate this.  Not every single Sentinel cone was stepped on by this range change.  Some powers are the same.  Some of them have wider arcs by less engagement range.  There was some thought to balance here.  

Anyway, those are my thoughts on addressing those questions.  Be wary of hyperbolic statements casually flung around here.  It probably isn't an attempt to mislead, but that is going to be a common outcome.  

[DarknessEternal]

Listen to those smart and wordier guys.  Anything else I would add would just be shorter and less descriptive. 

[aeb]

Thanks. I never played on Live... actually, never played an MMO before Homecoming. The sentinel was the second AT I tried, so I didn't have a lot of pre-conceived notions about what it should be, and just learned what it could do...  I've been struggling with why folks complain about them so much. My toughest, strongest characters are my two highest sentinels (the two incarnates with all T4s), and I'm a little concerned about what that says about how good a player I am, with their reputation for just not being as good. If that's the best I can do... but range seems to come to me so much more easily than melee, and they're the least squishy ranged. 🙂

 

[DreadShinobi]

On 7/3/2021 at 3:56 AM, aeb said:

The blast sets have poor damage? Then how are blasters known for such good damage? They don't look that much better than the rest otherwise...

 

 

23 hours ago, Snarky said:

THere are things that affect the damage that are 'hidden'.  1) Blasters almost always have TWO buildup powers.  2) Blasters have a ton more targets they can hit with an AoE (more damage by far) 3) Blasters are focused on one thing in their builds.  Damage first.  Sentinels have to at least take a small effort to enhance survivability.  4) The Sentinel damage scalar is less than a Blaster.  5) Sentinels range sucks.  (Yes, that limits the amount of damage they can do.)

 

These are just the reasons I can think of while sipping my 1st cup of coffee.  I do not do in depth DPS analysis.  Not for less that $30 an hour.  and I am rusty, you'd be paying for knocking rust off my calculus. 🙂

To expand on this, 

-Blaster Aim+BU+Gaussian proc = 262.5% dmg buff

-Sentinel Aim+Gaussian proc = 130% dmg buff.

-Gaussians scales with AT modifers, 100% buff for blasters, 80% sentinels. Aim is 12.5% higher for blasters. So the internal dmg buff discrepancy here is actually 132.5%, not just 100% Build-Up.

-Blaster base damage makes damage buffs go even farther. 

-Blaster Blaze = base 170.5 dmg, enhanced to 131.33% dmg buff (enhancements, musculature core paragon) = 394.4 dmg, with Aim+Gaussi, BU = 841.9 dmg, at the dmg cap = 852.4 dmg

-Sentinel Blaze = base 135.5 dmg, enhanced to 131.33% dmg buff (enhancements, musculature core paragon) = 320.3 dmg, with Aim+Gaussians = 496.4 dmg, at the dmg cap = 677.6 dmg

-Same dmg cap lowers the discrepancy when a sentinel has access to red spam and/or team dmg buff, but the Blaster can hit their dmg cap by themselves, and do more damage at baseline. With Musculature Core Paragon, both ATs need ~268.67% dmg buff to hit dmg cap. During Aim/Gaus cycle a Sentinel still needs 138.67% dmg buff to cap (5 small red insps + assault + set bonuses), and a blaster falls just 6% short of it. Depending on your global recharge Aim/BU uptime and how much you want to damage buff yourself outside of your buff cycle, this generally means a blaster has more freedom in their insp tray to still hit damage cap and carry more defensive inspirations.

 

Blaster T-AoEs, PBAoEs = 16 target cap, Cones = 10 target cap

Sentinel T-AoEs, PBAoEs = 10 target cap, Cones = 6 target cap

-Blaster Fireball 74.6 dmg, 172.6 (enhanced, musculature), 368.5 (Aim, BU, Gaus) = 2761 enhanced target capped dmg spread, 5896 target capped dmg spread with Aim/BU/Gaus.

-Sentinel Fireball 63.02 dmg, 145.8 (enhanced, musculature), 227.7 (Aim, Gaussi) = 1458 enhanced target capped dmg spread, 2277 target capped dmg spread with Aim/Gaus.

-10 target Blaster Firebreath = worth considering in AoE attack chain

-6 target Sentinel Firebreath = not worth considering

 

Blaster access to real snipes is a big advantage to some sets, Fire blasting is obviously an outlier here in raw damage. However Sentinels cannot access the Sting of the Manticore set, and are often over-burdened with too many single target ranged attacks that reduces diversity in desirable IO sets that have good damage procs/set bonuses.

 

Blaster secondary powerset attacks have an enormous performance gap for attack chains compared to sentinels, even considering the great tertiary pools that they have access to. Blaster attack chains will be more full at earlier levels. Blasters exemp very well. Blasters have an easier time of chaining High-DPA only attack chains with less reliance on Low-DPA filler attacks.

 

@Snarky"3) Blasters are focused on one thing in their builds.  Damage first.  Sentinels have to at least take a small effort to enhance survivability"

 

This is a relatively moot point. Blasters can be built and played effectively without slotting for survivability, so can sentinels. Sentinels have better baseline survivability but rely on it more because targets live longer. A glass cannon sentinel will still be more survivable than a glass cannon blaster. Bio Armor does this approach very well in particular because it relies less on softcaps and more on regen/absorb clickies, and also happens to be a set that boosts offense. Blasters arguably get more mileage from defensive set bonus slotting. Hitting 20% or 32.5% positional def with a resist shield or 45% S/L def with ice/scorp are build goals that are neither challenging to reach and have minimal impact on dps potential. To bridge the damage potential gap, Sentinels must invest alot of their slotting towards proc loading attacks if they wish to address lower base damage and target cap issues. 

 

If I haven't alluded to this already, insp tax/effectiveness is a big deal in comparing performance. As I mentioned above I can have 5 red insps in my tray as a sentinel to make up the 130% dmg buff discrepancy for 60 seconds, but I will still be doing less damage than a blaster due to base damage. With 5 insps as a blaster and only 20% positional defense, I can softcap myself to all positions FOR DOUBLE the duration the sentinel is damage capped, still have a resist shield, still hit damage cap, and still have another insp slot floating. Blasters straight-up kill critters faster = more insp drops within a 60 second window to refresh them.

Edited July 4, 2021 by DreadShinobi

[oldskool]

5 hours ago, aeb said:

Thanks. I never played on Live... actually, never played an MMO before Homecoming. The sentinel was the second AT I tried, so I didn't have a lot of pre-conceived notions about what it should be, and just learned what it could do...  I've been struggling with why folks complain about them so much. My toughest, strongest characters are my two highest sentinels (the two incarnates with all T4s), and I'm a little concerned about what that says about how good a player I am, with their reputation for just not being as good. If that's the best I can do... but range seems to come to me so much more easily than melee, and they're the least squishy ranged. 🙂

 

 

I've been struggling with why folks complain about them in the manner they do for years.  There are valid criticisms of the Sentinel's design.  However, some of that does have a lot to do with current power creep.  There was an intent in the AT to resolve some quality of life and make a new playstyle out of it.  A lot of that work has been undone on HC for better and for worst.  It is unfortunate that the Sentinel has not had a review yet, but it is on the HC dev team radar.  They'll get to it when they get to it.  The fact there hasn't been a huge rush to fix it should also indicate it isn't as broken in their eyes as people make it seem.  

All that said, the Sentinel is still perfectly viable for content even in this version of HC.  Is it as strong as other DPS options?  No, but you're not bringing your team down either unless said team is trying for something very specific (i.e., speed runs).  I play Dual Pistols across the ATs that have it.  I can assure you my Sentinel does better single target damage than the Corruptor and Defender blast set vs blast set.  Both of those other ATs also have force multipliers in their support sets which help them out considerably.  However, it is not a fair comparison to make that my Defender is reducing enemy resist by an additional 30% and stripping off 40% defense therefore the Sentinel sucks.  [I should note that for Blasters, I prefer blapping with Dual Pistols vs full range.  It becomes a hard comparison when my build is leveraging melee to the degree it does. Still, AoE is better on the Blaster and single-target isn't so far above my Sentinel it bothers me much.]

This leads me to the last underlined comment there.  I'm sorry you feel as concerned about your characters, of whom I hope you have fun playing, because of reading the toxic drivel in forums.  Shame on us all for presenting something that should be a fun experience to outsiders looking in as some kind of "you're doing it wrong" try-hard approach.  Criticisms are fair game, but when they get to a point people ask if they did something wrong it goes a bit too far.  The reason for that is, you didn't do anything wrong picking a Sentinel and having fun with it.  If you didn't do that fully solo, then you're grouping to help gain that experience and Incarnate material cache.  It doesn't sound like anyone is kicking you out because of your choice.  You may find some other ATs perform stronger in the intended role, but don't let forum posters here stop you from enjoying yourself.  

Edited July 4, 2021 by oldskool

[Sunsette]

To add on to what oldskool said:

 

This game is very hard to optimize (that is part of what makes it fun to optimize.) There's a lot of fragmentary information that's hard to fully comprehend. Combine that with the fact that this game is very easy to succeed at. There's a huge gulf in player skill level as a result, none of which reflects poorly on anyone. However, the people that come onto forums or even general chat in-game to talk about builds are self-selecting heavily from the crowd that's spent a lot of effort and time to learn more. That's not a reflection on intelligence or worth.

 

This is game, games are meant to be fun; there is no obligation to anyone to be the most well-informed maximally powerful character, especially when you're new.

Edited July 6, 2021 by Sunsette

[Snarky]

11 hours ago, oldskool said:

 

Shame on us all for presenting something that should be a fun experience to outsiders looking in as some kind of "you're doing it wrong" try-hard approach.  

I got up and did the back pack dance when I read this!  Shame.  Bad person.  Shame.  True villainy does not always involve tying Nel to the railroad tracks.  It is the small things.  Like getting the dogs to howl all night.  Favorite vampire trick. Petty?  Maybe, but darned effective.

[Hardboiled Hero]

On 7/4/2021 at 7:15 AM, aeb said:

Thanks. I never played on Live... actually, never played an MMO before Homecoming. The sentinel was the second AT I tried, so I didn't have a lot of pre-conceived notions about what it should be, and just learned what it could do...  I've been struggling with why folks complain about them so much. My toughest, strongest characters are my two highest sentinels (the two incarnates with all T4s), and I'm a little concerned about what that says about how good a player I am, with their reputation for just not being as good. If that's the best I can do... but range seems to come to me so much more easily than melee, and they're the least squishy ranged. 🙂

 

 

I don't think I understand the thought process there.  Why would being good at an AT that is considered "bad" make you concerned about whether you're a good player or not?  Shouldn't being good at something that others have trouble with be a good thing for you?

 

  If you don't have a pre-conceived notion of what a sentinel should be, great, just try it and I hope you enjoy it.  The reason you see so much down-talk (IMO) is because most players DO have pre-conceived notions of what the sentinel is, and those pre-conceived notions usually involve the sentinel being Over-powered.  Because the sentinel isn't OP, any honest discussion of the sentinel's power-level is probably going to seem like "down-talk", at least at first. Furthermore, I wouldn't really say we have the sentinel "figured out" yet.. so when people come in complaining, we can't necessarily give them "positive" answers.

 

Finally, there's another issue that kind of dove-tails into this.  It seems like most of the talk on these forums (for most or all of the AT's) is about damage, followed by survivability.  There's an inescapable fact that only one AT can be the top damage at any given time.  Even though the sentinel is a pure damage AT, it doesn't top the damage charts.  Theoretically, the fact that other ranged classes also bring support and control puts the sentinel in a worse place. However, I believe that this game is actually so unbalanced toward damage that all of the non-blaster ranged classes are actually in the same boat.  In other words, if the sentinel is "bad", it's still no worse than a corruptor, defender, dominator, or controller. Then again, all of those classes can find their way into any content.. so you might as well just play what you find to be fun.

[Underfyre]

1 hour ago, Hardboiled Hero said:

I wouldn't really say we have the sentinel "figured out" yet.. so when people come in complaining, we can't necessarily give them "positive" answers.

 

In the aspect of what the planned intention of the AT is, you are absolutely correct. I mean, we have what Captain Powerhouse has said, but that vision and the actual execution of that vision don't exactly line up.

 

But mechanics wise? We have everything on that.

[aeb]

I think sentinels are more support than we realize; with that Vulnerability, they can really raise the DPS of the entire team. When it's a team of one, that's not nearly as much as when it's a team of eight, especially with other damage dealers on the team. For this reason, I actually think of them as more Damage-For-Team than Damage-Per-Second. (If you don't think vulnerability does enough, take them to the Summer Block Busters, and watch the AV hit points go down steadily with  vulnerability on, and not with it off. Something about four-member teams against AV's makes the difference striking. 😉 )

 

That said, my top two... okay, they can't solo an RWZ pylon or a giant monster, but enough others can't, we have regular Hamidon Raids, MotherShip Raids, and giant monster hunting pick up teams. They also can't handle most AE fire farms, and AE smashing/lethal farms are tough enough to feel stressful. I prefer street sweeping in RWZ's red zone in lieu of more traditional farming. As long as they steer clear of the pylons, they can even take those armored flying machines if they... well, the dual pistols/bioarmor has be distinctly careful with those, but she can usually get them if she is. The fireblast/super reflexes doesn't even have to be as careful with those, as long as she isn't careless. 🙂

[aeb]

12 hours ago, Hardboiled Hero said:

 

I don't think I understand the thought process there.  Why would being good at an AT that is considered "bad" make you concerned about whether you're a good player or not?  Shouldn't being good at something that others have trouble with be a good thing for you?

 

  If you don't have a pre-conceived notion of what a sentinel should be, great, just try it and I hope you enjoy it.  The reason you see so much down-talk (IMO) is because most players DO have pre-conceived notions of what the sentinel is, and those pre-conceived notions usually involve the sentinel being Over-powered.  Because the sentinel isn't OP, any honest discussion of the sentinel's power-level is probably going to seem like "down-talk", at least at first. Furthermore, I wouldn't really say we have the sentinel "figured out" yet.. so when people come in complaining, we can't necessarily give them "positive" answers.

 

Finally, there's another issue that kind of dove-tails into this.  It seems like most of the talk on these forums (for most or all of the AT's) is about damage, followed by survivability.  There's an inescapable fact that only one AT can be the top damage at any given time.  Even though the sentinel is a pure damage AT, it doesn't top the damage charts.  Theoretically, the fact that other ranged classes also bring support and control puts the sentinel in a worse place. However, I believe that this game is actually so unbalanced toward damage that all of the non-blaster ranged classes are actually in the same boat.  In other words, if the sentinel is "bad", it's still no worse than a corruptor, defender, dominator, or controller. Then again, all of those classes can find their way into any content.. so you might as well just play what you find to be fun.

The thing is, I don't know if I'm good in general, or if I'm just less bad... or even as bad, and... 

 

On Everlasting, which I usually play on, I even heard someone describe sentinels in some depth as "the new pity AT." How can that being my best fighters be a good thing?

 

[Sunsette]

4 hours ago, aeb said:

The thing is, I don't know if I'm good in general, or if I'm just less bad... or even as bad, and... 

 

On Everlasting, which I usually play on, I even heard someone describe sentinels in some depth as "the new pity AT." How can that being my best fighters be a good thing?

 

 

Because this game is absolutely ludicrously complex in abundance beyond what is actually necessary to succeed at it at standard difficulty, even before getting into the sheer amount of hidden information it possesses. I understand where you are coming from emotionally, but it does not reflect on you negatively in any way. 

 

Even if your goal is to be the best, which it doesn't have to be but if it is, that is a process which takes time. 

Edited July 6, 2021 by Sunsette

[PainX]

3 hours ago, aeb said:

The thing is, I don't know if I'm good in general, or if I'm just less bad... or even as bad, and... 

 

On Everlasting, which I usually play on, I even heard someone describe sentinels in some depth as "the new pity AT." How can that being my best fighters be a good thing?

 

 do you have fun think im getting too old to understand what "pity AT" means but i would suggest "good" means you had fun and "best" would be your most fun AT

[Myrmidon]

On 7/4/2021 at 5:22 PM, oldskool said:

This leads me to the last underlined comment there.  I'm sorry you feel as concerned about your characters, of whom I hope you have fun playing, because of reading the toxic drivel in forums.  Shame on us all for presenting something that should be a fun experience to outsiders looking in as some kind of "you're doing it wrong" try-hard approach.  Criticisms are fair game, but when they get to a point people ask if they did something wrong it goes a bit too far.  The reason for that is, you didn't do anything wrong picking a Sentinel and having fun with it.  If you didn't do that fully solo, then you're grouping to help gain that experience and Incarnate material cache.  It doesn't sound like anyone is kicking you out because of your choice.  You may find some other ATs perform stronger in the intended role, but don't let forum posters here stop you from enjoying yourself. 

This right here. If you enjoy Sentinels, by all means play Sentinels (I have four of them at 50 myself).

[Luminara]

6 hours ago, aeb said:

The thing is, I don't know if I'm good in general, or if I'm just less bad... or even as bad, and... 

 

On Everlasting, which I usually play on, I even heard someone describe sentinels in some depth as "the new pity AT." How can that being my best fighters be a good thing?

 

 

Are you playing for your own entertainment, or to impress others and meet their expectations?