Dear Devs: Storm Blast powerset thoughts so far

[Dogooder]

I'm a returning player still new at the game. I'm currently playing a Storm Summoning /Storm Blast powerset Defender (lvl50+). I was excited about the new powerset and interested in playing a Defender. This post is a stream of consciousness post and I apologize for the disorganization. I broke up my paragraphs  with number to try to provide quick reference points. The purpose in writing this is to say: I think END issues need to be addressing in this powerset. With that said, some of my thoughts so far. 

 

1. Self-Heal needed.

 
I think Storm Blast, o2 in particular, should have a self-heal aspect. It's a shame having to rely on inspirations to heal oneself.  And it was frustrating and continues to be frustrating that I do not have a single power in a Storm/Strom set to heal myself so that I can continue to heal others. 
 

2. END costs for core power-building powers can be problematic.  

 

I generally slot one damage enhancement and one of the P2W Dam/Recharge enhancements (thanks for making those free) when I have the space on a power. I found the solo combat (using the default mission setting (1/0)) to be long and unsatisfying as I would sometimes run out of END in more protracted fights and lose by dropped defenses. I honesty found it pitiful.. And teamed with another friend using Storm Blast, I'm not sure if it was primary and secondary, could become comical as we would both fight until we ran out of END and then were defeated, The END costs of laying down Storm Cell, Cat 6, Freezing raining  and following up with support attack powers to try to do enough damage to remove an enemy set piece over and over again would drain my toon. And some individual powers like Gust are not powerful enough when not being used in the thematic Storm Cell build.    

 

3. Low damage can be a problem

 

And part of the reason the fights lasted so long was the lack of damage done by the powers. At first I was expecting my snipe power to be similar to the one on a blaster as a primary power and figured the lower class and different archetype led to different damage output which is my oversight and unfamiliarity with the archetype. The middling to seeming lower damage from the other powers was surprising, and with some confusing given the names of the powers.    

 

4. Team play difficulties. 

And when used in a team setting the manual placement (and inability for the system to register my selections/clicks sometimes) of some of the cornerstone powers becomes hard to deploy with the mobs of toons, technical problems of the system not accepting my clicks, shifting camera angles to deploy cornerstone powers, or the speeds at which some team events happen. And the blaster click and blast fall back options (when dealing with fast teams) of Gale, Direct Strike  (Hailstones Chain Lightning Cloudburst are good and have longer activation times which limit their availability)  are underpowered damage-wise in my opinion.  The small area of effect of the AOE powers and their longer cast times (Strom Cell and Cat. 5) can be an issue in fast moving team settings where the battlefield moves in seconds knocking out any damage multiplier for the low damage powers.  Perhaps increasing the AOE sizes (or reducing casting times) is a simpler solution. 

 

5. Set Design

 

I believe I understand the power set purpose: Build increasing attacks around a deployed Storm Cell. When deployed properly it is a somewhat decent set. Individual powers (Gust, Jet Stream, Chain Lightning, and Cat 5) working out side of  Storm Cell set came be less capable which I think can be an issue. I like the Storm Cell follows you as a pet does (centered on you I guess), can that be indicated in the game world or map? By a border or animation besides rain?  

 

6. Animations are wonderful, but the game play is not.

The animations are gorgeous and the description gave me the idea that I would be decimating foes via weather. And the reality has been a low damage de-buff set which leads to overly long battles when played as a secondary power. Quite underwhelming and frustrating.

 

7. Showing appreciation and frustration, as I want the set to be better, with the powerset

 

I appreciate the new set. Solo play is painful and long because of END issues and low damage. Play with the set has been frustrating in solo play and embarrassing (running out of END, cast times for core powers resulting in casting after a battle is over, small AOE sizes, being ko'ed because of no self-heal, and underwhelming damage) in group play. Concerning group play; this undercuts the basic goal of my archetype, to defend teammates. It has not been fun overall, I would not recommend this power set in combo with Storm Summoning on a Defender (And I'm not crazy about Defender's from this experience). 

 

8. Hailstones is a fun power.

The chuck of ice that falls if procced is very satisfying, and enjoyable! Thank you!

 

Thanks for taking the time to review this and for bringing CoH back. 

 

Edited May 9, 2023 by Dogooder

[biostem]

O2 isn't in storm blast, and very few blast sets actually have a self heal.  I don't find the damage to be bad - you just need to fully exploit the extra lightning strikes that storm cell and category 5 utilize;  It'd be like playing beam rifle and not utilizing disintegrate...

[Saiyajinzoningen]

also dont defenders do the least amount of damage of any ranged archetype?

[Zect]

I personally love the idea that storm blast is a set that trades a little bit of damage for powerful debuffs and soft control. There are plenty of sets focused primarily on dps, and especially burst dps, so this seems like a refreshing and fun change to me.

 

Reading your post, it's pretty clear you're inexperienced with both your powersets, and with defenders in general. If you have played storm summoning (not blast) - and before bystanders jump in to correct me, OP is playing a storm summoning/storm blast fender - you know it is famously endurance-hungry. Yet by your own admission your powers are slotted 1x dmg, 1x dam/rech. Of course you're going to run out of blue. Plenty of defenders have no self-heal, including classic sets such as TA and cold, and they solo and survive just fine. It's clear you're a blaster, bringing blaster preconceptions to a different AT. You need to improve your gameplay and build design skills to make effective use of your tools.

 

Personally, I've not witnessed any of the issues you see. Played and built competently, storm blast is exciting, powerful and fun. I wouldn't want to play it on a speed TF because I don't want to be resummoning storm cell at every shadow cyst, but that's about it.

[srmalloy]

22 hours ago, Dogooder said:

And when used in a team setting the manual placement (and inability for the system to register my selections/clicks sometimes) of some of the cornerstone powers becomes hard to deploy with the mobs of toons, technical problems of the system not accepting my clicks, shifting camera angles to deploy cornerstone powers, or the speeds at which some team events happen.

Popmenus are your friends for this. I created a menu file with popmenus for the location powers my characters have, and macro the one(s) a character has. Each popmenu ist set up with numbered options; '1' is the regular location power command placed by mouse click; '2' is placed down:max -- at the character's feet if they're on the ground, or straight down if they're flying (as in the monster mash of a Hami raid); '3' is targeted at the position of my current target. Dropping an AoE on my current target then becomes hitting the key for the macro's tray slot, then '3'. And because the pattern is the same for virtually every location AoE power, it quickly becomes automatic.

[Bionic_Flea]

Regarding Endurance Issues:  Look at your powers one by one in your enhancement screen.  Any powers with endurance costs in the double digits needs to have some endurance reduction slotted into it and you may want to use your lower endurance cost powers more than your high cost ones, at least until you have a complete or close to complete build.  You will also benefit by slotting the global bonus enhancements in Miracle, Performance Shifter, Numina's, and Panacea. 

 

Regarding healing:  The Panacea proc mentioned above along with the unique from Power Shifter will give you random periodic boosts of Hitpoints.  One of the Defender ATO sets also has a proc that has a small AoE heal that can go off when you use the attack it is slotted in.

 

I experienced some of the same issues you did while building my Storm/Storm corrupter.  But now that I am fully slotted and using incarnate powers I don't have any of those problems anymore.

[BrandX]

I have a Storm/Storm Corruptor.  I also have a Storm/DP Defender.  Hurricane 24/7 is going to eat your Endurance.  Not sure if you're trying to run it 24/7, but if so, you're going to drain yourself until you IO out and grab Cardiac (or that other Alpha with Endurance Reduction, but I believe it doesn't have the best other abilities to go with the combo).

 

For speed teams you may or may not want/need to lay down Storm Cell.  On higher +Difficulty teams, it becomes easier to lay those down, as the enemies are lasting longer.

 

[Captain Fabulous]

1 hour ago, BrandX said:

Hurricane 24/7 is going to eat your Endurance.

For the love of all that's holy DO NOT run Hurricane 24/7! 😂

[Rudra]

18 minutes ago, Captain Fabulous said:

For the love of all that's holy DO NOT run Hurricane 24/7! 😂

Especially if on a team.

[Wavicle]

3 hours ago, Captain Fabulous said:

For the love of all that's holy DO NOT run Hurricane 24/7! 😂

well, you can, but then you have to hang back and be really strategic about when you move forward.

[Rudra]

13 minutes ago, Wavicle said:

well, you can, but then you have to hang back and be really strategic about when you move forward.

You can slot it to do KD instead. It's the visual effects that some players find irritating.

[Wavicle]

1 hour ago, Rudra said:

You can slot it to do KD instead. It's the visual effects that some players find irritating.

Slotting it to change the knockback to knockdown does nothing to the Repel effect which is what most complaints are about. Not the visuals.

[srmalloy]

12 hours ago, Wavicle said:

Slotting it to change the knockback to knockdown does nothing to the Repel effect which is what most complaints are about. Not the visuals.

With a KB->KD IO slotted, it becomes a premiere herding tool. However, you really have to learn how to use it for herding, or you're just pushing mobs out of AoE clusters. Corners are your friends.

[Wavicle]

1 hour ago, srmalloy said:

With a KB->KD IO slotted, it becomes a premiere herding tool. However, you really have to learn how to use it for herding, or you're just pushing mobs out of AoE clusters. Corners are your friends.

The chance for knockback is very small. I really don’t think the kb2kd is necessary.

[Marbing]

Hurricane is a great area denial and fantastic at keeping melee off of you or other squishies if the team is aware of its benefits and doesn’t just tell you to turn it off. It is not a toggle meant to be run 24/7, but when used properly can absolutely be effective. I’ve also used it to save a team in an “oh shiz” situation where you get overrun. It can hold off a ton of adds and keep them with a substantial -Tohit and -range debuff in the process. 
 

Now with regards to Storm Blast, Hurricane can be used to great affect a keeping enemies positioned inside Storm Cell or C5. Takes some skill / practice to use properly but it does work.

 

 

[ClawsandEffect]

/macro Storm powexec_location target Storm Cell

 

That creates a clickable power in your tray that drops location based powers directly on top of whatever enemy you have targeted at the time. 

 

Since the combo you are running has at least 5 of those powers, that macro alone will make your life so much easier if you're like me and hate using the mouse to place powers. 

 

For different powers just change the first word after /macro to whatever you want the power button to say, and the last thing you type is the exact name of the power you want it to cast. 

 

Like this: 

/macro C5 powexec_location target Category Five