Energy/Mental with Sorcery Build

[H0PE]

Hello, I made a build with energy blast and mental manipulation /w the sorcery pool power and I'm having trouble with getting a good defense on it I attached the build below if anyone wants to take a look at it thanks in advance.  

Nexous - Blaster (Energy Blast).mxd Scarlet CHA0S - Blaster (Energy Blast).mxd

[Nemu]

Both builds lack focus, spreading out set bonuses across different types of defense and tiny bits of resistance here and there won't help your survival AT ALL. Not taking snipe is also questionable as well as the lack of slotting on your two area attacks.

 

But before we dig deeper, what's your game plan? Hover above and shoot, keeping yourself at range as much as possible or are you willing to go into melee range and mix it up?

[H0PE]

I definitely want survivability but I want to also have decent damage as a range dps…….and I know normally it would be wise to pick sniper powers as a blaster but this is also aesthetic purposes to so I was trying to have the best of both worlds 

[Nemu]

Let's define where survival comes from:

 

1 - Defense/resistance: If enemies miss more or do less damage you live longer

2 - Active mitigation: KB/KD/Holds/Stuns/Sleep etc. If an enemy is mezzed or knocked down, they can't hurt you. 

3 - Heal/Regen: If you can heal/regen back damage done to you faster than you take damage you live

4 - Kill it before it kills you: This is the blaster mantra,

 

Here are some more subtle elements that contribute to survival that you won't see in build posts:

 

5 - Movement/Using Line of Sight, if enemies keep chasing you they are not attacking you

6 - Mob AI: kill all the minions in a group in one or two shots and you can make even bosses run, if they are running, they are not attacking you. Area slows also do wacky things to mob AI, and the time they spend running out of the slow patch is time you can spend attacking them with relatively impunity.

 

From what I see you are focusing too much on #1. Energy/Mental has knock back and a fantastic AV killing sustain in drain psyche, and of course blasters have damage, There are opportunities to fit all 6 factors that contribute to survival into your blaster, some through builds, some through playstyle.

 

I've done these kind of build help before, if you care to take a look at these posts.

 

Build request: Dual Pistols / Dark Manipulation - Blaster - Homecoming (homecomingservers.com)

 

Help me fix this mess (Beam/Temp) - Blaster - Homecoming (homecomingservers.com)

 

On defense I'll reiterate that even if you plan on going into melee Range defense is still more important than melee defense or S/L defense. Why? Because smart blasters don't stay in melee. Melee defense also doesn't help against all the other mobs shooting at you, and a lot of those ranged attacks have debuffs.

 

Learn how to joust to minimize your exposure to melee, it'll change the way you play the game. I described the technique in the dual pistols/dark manipulation post.

 

I'll respect your decision not to take the snipe, and I'm also going to assume that arcane bolt and enflame are pet powers you want to keep and use. If that's not the case then we can further optimize

 

I'll start on the most glaring thing that you can fix - Slot energy torrent and explosive blast. Not only do they do area knockback which can be converted into knock down, they are also a means for you to kill fodder quickly. You are not a scrapper, if you focus on single target you are missing out on what makes blasters fun and exciting.

 

Secondly plan out your power pick progression. The Nexous build has only power blast, power burst and arcane bolt, all single target and 2 of which are fairly weak, as real attacks until level 30. And drain psyche is picked up at level 32, nova at 35. Do you want to be effective when you exemp down for TFs? If this is a 50 only build then yea slap the powers together in whatever order you wish but if you want something that be effective throughout the levels then mind your power pick progression.

 

Here are powers that I would take as early as possible: Energy torrent and Explosive blast for the reasons I stated above, Aim or Build up to give you extra on demand burst at lower levels, Drain Psyche because that's your sustain, and Nova because that's your nuke.

 

Most newbie builds suffer from the same mistakes - lack of focus and the belief that a full set is always the best way to slot something, and the penchant to slot any power that has a healing component for maximum healing.

 

I get that your are enamored with enflame and rune of protection, there's still room to fit them both in before or by level 30.

 

So build goals - Have decent defense, good enough recharge to keep drain psyche up as much as possible, fit enflame and rune of protection by level 30

 

Defense is the easy part, if you read the posts I linked above you'll see that it's just about stacking the same type of defense bonus from different sets in different powers over and over until you hit the number you want. The beam/temp thread lists all the sets that are good for range defense

 

This makes balancing the need for recharge a bit harder though. However, one thing that can help is that a lot of your attacks do knockback and some of those are perfect places to put a force feedback proc which provides a momentary boost to recharge. Area attacks are decent choices for this proc, as is any attack with a base recharge of 10 seconds or more.

 

You can still fit your pet powers in by 30 and have an effective blaster throughout all the levels, level progression can look something like this:

 

This Hero build was built using Mids Reborn 3.0.4.7
https://github.com/Reborn-Team/MidsReborn

Click this DataLink to open the build!

Level 49 Magic Blaster
Primary Power Set: Energy Blast
Secondary Power Set: Mental Manipulation
Power Pool: Sorcery
Power Pool: Leaping
Power Pool: Speed
Power Pool: Leadership

Hero Profile:
Level 1: Power Bolt -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Subdual -- Empty(A)
Level 2: Energy Torrent -- Empty(A)
Level 4: Mystic Flight -- Empty(A)
Level 6: Power Burst -- Empty(A)
Level 8: Combat Jumping -- Empty(A)
Level 10: Arcane Bolt -- Empty(A)
Level 12: Aim -- Empty(A)
Level 14: Hasten -- Empty(A)
Level 16: Concentration -- Empty(A)
Level 18: Enflame -- Empty(A)
Level 20: Drain Psyche -- Empty(A)
Level 22: Rune of Protection -- Empty(A)
Level 24: Maneuvers -- Empty(A)
Level 26: Explosive Blast -- Empty(A)
Level 28: Tactics -- Empty(A)
Level 30: Spirit Ward -- Empty(A)
Level 32: Nova -- Empty(A)
Level 35: [Empty] 
Level 38: [Empty] 
Level 41: [Empty] 
Level 44: [Empty] 
Level 47: [Empty] 
Level 49: [Empty] 
Level 1: Brawl -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Defiance 
Level 1: Sprint -- Empty(A)
Level 2: Rest -- Empty(A)
Level 2: Swift -- Empty(A)
Level 2: Health -- Empty(A)
Level 2: Hurdle -- Empty(A)
Level 2: Stamina -- Empty(A)
------------

 

I took combat jumping instead of hover because combat jumping is a better movement power overall. It's better for jousting and it provides immobilization protection which hover doesn't, and an immobile blaster is a dead blaster.

 

If you wish you can take a crack at using that progression and filling out the rest of the build while working towards the goal of getting 45% range defense. That exercise should help you understand the importance of focus when planning a build.

[Vulpoid]

On 10/7/2021 at 7:49 AM, Nemu said:

I took combat jumping instead of hover because combat jumping is a better movement power overall.

Do you know ( I have not tried) if Combat Jumping gives you the same "stop on a dime" maneuverability that having Hover does while having Mystic Flight or Flying running?
Without hover, the flight powers have you slow coast to a stop. Has anybody tried to run Combat Jumping?

-Thanks! 

[Nemu]

Not really. There's still inertia, the drift is manageable though. I'd only toggle on mystic flight in situations where I absolutely need to keep distance, like those +4/8 non-incarnate no insp no temp enemy buffed ITFs. For regular melee blasting I'd never use mystic flight, using it in combat is a net reduction to your combat mobility.

 

The only non-flight pool related power that does what hover does is inertial reduction from kinetics.

Edited October 9, 2021 by Nemu