I heart Sentinels

[Heraclea]

Gold Side Mobs are made of exotic damage types and debuffs.  They were late created and as such designed to take advantage of the vulnerabilities in the defensive powersets - and badly devalue them.  Against the very last groups of villians designed, burst damage, hard control, or crippling debuffs are a better survival strategy than a defense/res powerset/AT, especially one that does less damage in service of that survivability - because goldside mobs (and later on, Dark Astoria groups) by design trivialize defense and res and stack slows and the like.  Better to just kill them quickly.  I noted on gold my tank was almost crippled by things my stalker and blaster simply tore through - the tank could not kill fast enough.

 

The only character I played through the revamped DA on was my Dark Melee/Reflexes scrapper.  This character was built to be as self sufficiently unhittable as possible.  She was AE-leveled, my only real AE baby, and built to have a chance against the overpowered AE mobs everybody liked to make.  Her purpose was to avoid the AH by buying rare salvage on demand with tickets.  She was the only character I had any interest in playing against those kinetic Tsoos. 

 

Goldside and the pervasiveness of these mobs with stacking debuffs in the new material was one reason why I was losing interest in the game before shutdown was announced.  The big problem with the material is that it is extremely team unfriendly.  Masses of those kind of mobs make it advisable to take them on one on one.  If you have to fight them, you don't want to spawn bosses, and full team spawns of them are just no fun at all.  This material suggested to me that the late-issue devs still didn't 'get' their game.  They did not understand all of the factors that made it uniquely fun.  They were adding generic MMO crap like don't-stand-here zones.  I regret to say that in the first half of 2012 I was not playing much CoH. 

[Sunsette]

That's a pretty good analysis, marcussmythe.

 

My point in bringing it up is that that's a design schema used for about a third of the game's life, and you can basically go straight 1 to 50 entirely doing content that's no earlier than the revamped RWZ (where Vanguard shows a lot of signs of later design). That is a significant chunk of content that the solo-friendly ranged AT is actively worse at both solo and party than the blaster.

[Tankshock]

I posted a couple of weeks ago that I would level an i25 blaster to compare the 2 AT's.  Did that, and here's my take:

 

Both AT's will melt mobs, but the Blaster is clearly doing more damage.

The Sentinel is a much smoother leveling experience.  Better thought out powers is both a pro and a con - easy to put the toon together, harder to min/max.

The Blaster really comes into it's own as an incarnate.  Once fully IO'd, it loses a lot of the squishiness.  But mez is always going to happen, though T3 Clarion largely removes the problem.

 

Sentinel clearly wins on leveling, Blaster gets the edge with a fully IO'd build.  That said, there is a bit of playstyle preference.  If damage/arrest rate is your primary fun, blaster.  If feeling like an invulnerable arresting machine is your preference, Sentinel.

 

<I used Fire/Rad for the Sentinel, Ice/Time for the Blaster.  Not one-to-one, but I'm playing for fun, not to further global science.  Sue me ;)  >

[Clave Dark 5]

A lot of people talking about this 'smooth leveling experience' with Sentinels, I'm gonna take a wild guess you do Blue or Red sides. Because I prefer Gold Side and the Wards (it's better written) and as painful as that is as a Blaster, it's even worse for the Sentinels I've done, though I haven't tried everyone's favorites of Fire/Bio, Beam/Anything, or Water/Anything (they appear to be the strongest sentinel combos). Frequent, frequent deaths just doing even hunt missions because you cannot kill fast enough and your defenses are too weak to do much worth talking about while you're alive.

 

I had spots (notably in the 30s) where I felt like Sentinel did better than Blaster and Corruptor but not many.

I'm sure that I have no place talking back to a Gold Side vet such as yourself, but I found every class was much more "dying all the time" there.  And in fact, just the past week I've been over there with a 50 Corr, one of those plot lines you can follow at 50, and died a heck of a lot more than that Corr normally does (I was teaming, yes).

[Sunsette]

...? Gold Side vet? Talk back???

 

If I've ever given the impression I think I'm better than someone because I've got a different opinion and experience, then I straight-up apologize for that right now.

 

Beyond that, though, my experience does not track with yours. By 50 I'll say that the Sentinel is unquestionably one the hardest characters to kill I've ever had in this game but struggles to bring much or clear much. I find that hard to kill status a lot more questionable below 50.

 

I do agree with assessment that gold is harder for everyone, yes. That's part of why I prefer it. But some perform better there than others.

[Jaynen]

Another in the Sentinel fan club here. I run an Energy/Invul and he is both incredible fun and incredibly strong, with soft capped types defences, hard capped S/L resist, and perma hasten.

 

Yes, we lose damage to blasters but we gain survivability. Yes, we lose damage to scrappers and brutes but we gain in versatility. And don’t let anyone tell you we don’t have damage as I’ve solo’d AV’s on mine without any -regen, and I’m not tickling them.

 

Plus, we get access to knockout blow in Patron Pool too, which immediately increases the awesome factor of any toon ten-fold. True story.

I am curious about slotting and powers to take from invuln would you mind sharing?

[CaptTastic]

Another in the Sentinel fan club here. I run an Energy/Invul and he is both incredible fun and incredibly strong, with soft capped types defences, hard capped S/L resist, and perma hasten.

 

Yes, we lose damage to blasters but we gain survivability. Yes, we lose damage to scrappers and brutes but we gain in versatility. And don’t let anyone tell you we don’t have damage as I’ve solo’d AV’s on mine without any -regen, and I’m not tickling them.

 

Plus, we get access to knockout blow in Patron Pool too, which immediately increases the awesome factor of any toon ten-fold. True story.

I am curious about slotting and powers to take from invuln would you mind sharing?

 

 

I took everything except unstoppable. It’s a great set. Invincibility is different on a Sentinel as it’s a flat defence boost rather than requiring you to be in a mob. Aegis and unbreakable guard great sets for slotting for the defence bonuses.

 

There is the Psi hole, of course, and I didn’t try to plug that. Firstly, I had quite a lot of residual positional defence from typed defence bonuses. But also, as a Sentinel you don’t take the same kind of aggro you do in melee, especially on a tank, so Psi foes don’t have the damage to cause major problems really. 

[Clave Dark 5]

If I've ever given the impression I think I'm better than someone because I've got a different opinion and experience, then I straight-up apologize for that right now.

No sweat on that, I just felt I needed to qualify my input because I haven't been gold in ages (except for those recent 50s runs).  You're good!

[Destlin]

This class is my favorite out of any in any game. That being said i have spent way too much time fine tuning my fire/rad/psi sent and it does way more dps than people think the class does. Also I cannot tell you how many times i end up being the one tanking half the mobs when they get away from the brute. they have respectable dps and in hover mode they are nigh unkillable. can easily farm x4x8 with them too.

[Midnight Blue Mage]

First 50 since relaunch is a Beam/Reflexes Sentinel, and it's the most fun I've ever had with the game <3

[Sovera]

I need to replace Whirlpool power button with a macro that casts it at a targeted mob.  This is going to require a refresher course.

 

/macro WP "powexec_location target Whirlpool"

 

That's #5 in  my Water/* toons' attack bar.  I put the Whirlpool power in the slot in the bar above it so I can see the countdown timer.

 

/macro RoA "powexec_location target Rain of Arrows"

 

That's for my Archery toons.

 

Macros suck due to not being able to see the countdown. I suggest binding the key you use to activate Whirlpool instead.

 

In my case I use control +3 to activate Rain of Fire, so I do /bind lctrl+3 "$$powexec_location target Rain of fire". Functionally nothing changed, you're going to press the button you always did, but now it will do the skill on your target and you will have the cooldown showing which would not happen with a macro.

 

Except if you decide to change the location of your Whirlpool on your tray and then you will have to rebind it, but in my case things stay where I place them so it's not a problem.

[Heraclea]

Macros suck due to not being able to see the countdown. I suggest binding the key you use to activate Whirlpool instead.

 

What I do is to add the original power directly above the slot the macro occupies, so I do see the cooldown.  I've also done the same thing with Ninja Caltrops, or whatever that thing is called;  this one just does target self.  The point being to surround yourself with the caltrops and keep overeager suitors at a safe distance. 

[Murcielago]

I like sentinels, they're more durable blasters. They're more balanced than the "kill everything before it kills you" playstyle of blasters.

[Rejolt]

My first character on live was an electric/energy blaster and it was thrilling and frustrating. It felt like I was playing an entirely different game from my brutes, controllers, dominators and corruptors. The chance to die or kill everything quickly with each mob is a rush. After you play a blaster anything else almost feels like varying speeds of cruise control.

 

I haven't really played a sentinel yet (created a few, but haven't taken them far) because I'm blasting without team buffs or control and yet things aren't dead as fast as they were on my blasters. It takes getting used to having 8 years of experience here.

 

Also, I hear people talking about how bad epic sentinel pools are but the only thing I'm disappointed in is the Electrical mastery's single-target mez is a Stun and the primary blast set has a hold. Yes, I know there's a Mu set but I preferred to try that chain heal.

 

[Chance Jackson]

Another in the Sentinel fan club here. I run an Energy/Invul and he is both incredible fun and incredibly strong, with soft capped types defences, hard capped S/L resist, and perma hasten.

 

Yes, we lose damage to blasters but we gain survivability. Yes, we lose damage to scrappers and brutes but we gain in versatility. And don’t let anyone tell you we don’t have damage as I’ve solo’d AV’s on mine without any -regen, and I’m not tickling them.

Which pets were you using?

 

Plus, we get access to knockout blow in Patron Pool too, which immediately increases the awesome factor of any toon ten-fold. True story.

Which pool gives you access to that?

[Warlawk]

 

Plus, we get access to knockout blow in Patron Pool too, which immediately increases the awesome factor of any toon ten-fold. True story.

Which pool gives you access to that?

 

That would be Leviathan mastery

[GritIron]

I've got 3 Sentinels with a 4th im mulling over...

 

lvl 50 rad/rad - Rhegulus

lvl 29 Archery/Ninjitsu - Zenn

lvl 10 elec/elec - Ivan Induction

 

I want to try a Beam rifle Sentinel, im just mulling over what to par with it at the moment...

[DocRadio]

I love sentinels because they have something blasters don't. The ability to relax a bit. Playing a blaster is playing on the razor's edge. One mistake can get you face planted in a nanosecond. My sentinel can screw up and just pop healing flames. Unless I get one shotted I at least have time to consider a retreat. And then of course... status protection. A ranged class with built in status protection... even if you eliminated every other benefit from sentinels, the status protection would make up for it.

[ParaBruce]

I love sentinels because they have something blasters don't. The ability to relax a bit. Playing a blaster is playing on the razor's edge. One mistake can get you face planted in a nanosecond. My sentinel can screw up and just pop healing flames. Unless I get one shotted I at least have time to consider a retreat. And then of course... status protection. A ranged class with built in status protection... even if you eliminated every other benefit from sentinels, the status protection would make up for it.

 

Yeah! That's a good way of putting it. And for me, knowing I've got that safety margin is stress-relieving enough that it genuinely helps my game play. Some people thrive on jittery tension when they game, but I'm not one of them. I do better when I can think and plan without worry.