Storm Blast needs help, bad.

[DangerKitty]

I didn't decide this quickly, nor easily. And I bent over backwards to study the mechanics, and look for ways to make it work well. And I don't dislike underdog or off-meta sets at all. Almost every set has ways to shine. And I like to find it. And I have like 10,000 hours in official/homecoming combined, know mids like the back of my hand, in many versions. Actually I have several versions of it installed because there's a few features which are nicer on  some of the older iterations (for certain uses). And I love my character, conceptually and visually.

 

But I'm parking my Storm Blast corruptor character and respec'ing the IO's & money out of it.

 

Level 40, 250 million influence in IO's, all played in-game, no farming, trying hard to find it's hidden strengths ...they just aren't there.

 

Use only as a handicap for more difficult gaming. And if you do use it, don't take Blackwand & Nemesis Staff off your bar after running DFB, you'll find those continue to be useful for way, way too long.

 

Though I do want to express appreciation for those who worked on it. It is visually very pretty, and I can't overstate just how nice it was to try a powerset which I've never played before. 

 

edit: I realize I'm talking about a corruptor, in 'Blaster'. but it's the Blast-set which has fundamentally serious problems. and there are multiple AT's which have access to it.

 

Edited June 8, 2023 by DangerKitty

[UltraAlt]

2 hours ago, DangerKitty said:

I didn't decide this quickly, nor easily.

 

Plenty of threads recently dissing on Storm Blast.

An easy search could have found them.

 

I find it to be pretty OP in the game content (versus end-game) with advance tactics.

I know that isn't just me.

 

I know there are plenty of people that are posting distaste or plain hatred of it.

 

[laudwic]

I keep posting on these Storm Blast is terrible threads, I can understand why some people don't like it - you are constantly having to do one or two power preps for every fight - other than that, I don't get the hate.  Personally, I have a 50 TA/SB Defender and a 50 SB/Dev/Mun Blaster.  Both are in the middle of doing their incarnate powers.  I mainly soloed both with the occasional Team or TF.  Both have the Portal Jockey and Atlas Medal Accolades.  Both soloed all the EBs for Portal Jockey.  

 

Admittedly, I use the same main tactic for both, both primary and secondary have to hit debuff.  For my Defender Flash Arrow does one heck of a job to begin with and SB's powers add on so I'm routinely taking enemies below 10% chance to hit (I set up a channel to in my chat box to watch to hit rolls)  My Blaster does quite well in the to hit debuff department as well.  I have them both at +1/4 - I will do a little higher once I get level shifts and that meets my casual play idea and both do fine.  Admittedly, both are full with IO sets, but not purples.  

 

What secondary did you have for your Corruptor?  What about the set didn't you like?  The prep for fights?  Don't think it does enough damage as compared to other sets?  Category 5 taking too long for damage (I would think this would be a plus for a Corruptor since the damage is more towards the end)?  Hate that you have to put in a Kb->Kd proc in Cat 5?

 

 

[honoroit]

i wouldnt call power set feedback hate.  

 

regardless, and TLDR;

 

it is middling at best unless you can stand still.

 

it looks nice.

 

tempo could use an adjust, thats core to all complaint it seems.

[Sir Myshkin]

I'll say the same thing here as everywhere else: You're playing it wrong.

 

If you still have a temp power in your attack tray as a mainline power: You're playing it wrong.

 

If you think this is a Single Target exclusive set: You're playing it wrong.

 

If you aren't actively using Storm Cell, You're playing it wrong.

 

I will acknowledge there are a couple of powers in the set that are easily passable like Gust, Jet Stream, and Intensify, and really Jet Stream is just a bad power (in my opinion) with that repel kick, but every set has a couple of powers you can skip, and really Gust isn't bad, and Intensify just has a crap damage boost that (on a Kin at least) makes it absolutely wasted time. This set does so much AoE damage inside Storm Cell it's gross, and if you're not seeing it, you're not taking that time to set it up and get there. Just Storm Cell + Chain Lightning produces a metric ton of feedback. Add Cat5 into the mix even though it takes a second to build, once it goes it's melting things down, and the entire time everything still suffers from the -ToHit and Slows.

 

And ain't nobody can tell me Direct Strike lacks KAPOW because I use it to regularly snipe down Surgeons on ITF's

[Bionic_Flea]

1 hour ago, Sir Myshkin said:

And ain't nobody can tell me Direct Strike lacks KAPOW because I use it to regularly snipe down Surgeons on ITF's

Spoiler

 

[Captain Fabulous]

1 hour ago, Sir Myshkin said:

Intensify just has a crap damage boost that (on a Kin at least) makes it absolutely wasted time.

While I agree 10000% on everything you said I do have to point out the value of Intensify isn't just the damage and tohit buffs, it's the increased proc chance in Storm Cell and Cat 5.

 

I took Gust because of the -fly, which I find to be very useful. I took Jet Stream for no other reason than it's the only cone in the set as well as being a decent soft control. But neither are absolutely necessary if you have more useful picks for those slots.

Edited June 8, 2023 by Captain Fabulous

[MirrorDarkly]

1 hour ago, Sir Myshkin said:

This set does so much AoE damage inside Storm Cell it's gross, and if you're not seeing it, you're not taking that time to set it up and get there. Just Storm Cell + Chain Lightning produces a metric ton of feedback.

 

While I mostly agree with you, on my Sentinel at least I find just Storm Cell + Chain Lightning very anemic AoE damage, often failing to take out most minions before I get to them with my single target attacks.  Now Storm Cell + Cat 5 + Intensify (w/ Build Up Proc) is an beast and usually destroys most groups. 

 

No idea how much of that is a Sentinel issue as opposed to a set issue however. 

[Etched]

A friend and i ran up two storm/ blasters and Ill agree in most part that this set is fun and i definitly see how it is over powered. For me though it was visually painful to play. It was very painful to track where the mobs were scatterin off to.

Needless to say i had to scrap mine but I watched as my friends was out gunnin my brute.

Really wish they would work on some of the graphics.

 

@Etched

[Sir Myshkin]

4 hours ago, Captain Fabulous said:

"... it's the increased proc chance in Storm Cell and Cat 5."

 

I took Gust because of the -fly, which I find to be very useful. I took Jet Stream for no other reason than it's the only cone in the set as well as being a decent soft control. But neither are absolutely necessary if you have more useful picks for those slots.

 

The secondary effects on Intensify I'm still on the fence about from a value perspective, and that's all I can really say on that one.

 

For Jet Stream, my absolute biggest complaint is the Repel. Yes they implemented a tool within the set to convert it to KD, but if that cone catches something that's just outside, or happens to run at the wrong time, or whatever, suddenly you've got one (or worse more) mob just flying off up and awaaaaay! It happened far too often for me to accept keeping it in my tray, so out of the build it went. 🙁

 

4 hours ago, MirrorDarkly said:

 

While I mostly agree with you, on my Sentinel at least I find just Storm Cell + Chain Lightning very anemic AoE damage, often failing to take out most minions before I get to them with my single target attacks.  Now Storm Cell + Cat 5 + Intensify (w/ Build Up Proc) is an beast and usually destroys most groups. 

 

No idea how much of that is a Sentinel issue as opposed to a set issue however. 

 

Well, can't say I've every played any particular Sentinel and been amazed at their clearing force, but the entirety of my Storm Blast experience has been on a Corruptor at this point, and it fares perfectly fine. I'm not saying just Storm Cell + Chain Lightning is going to AoE the mob down, but it will do significant damage, and Chain recycles quickly, and the other half of your AoE is the use of your ST attacks, but the point is to focus on the bigguns like Bosses, let the Cell trickle out and take care of things for you. Storm Blast's effects work a lot like how Contamination does on Radiation Melee, give it a few minutes to start spreading and suddenly orange numbers are popping up all over the place.

 

3 hours ago, Etched said:

Really wish they would work on some of the graphics.

 

Other than Cat5 really being a boisterous effect, most of the attacks can be toned a little with things like darker gray's or dull tones, have you tried doing that to shift some of the impact in the visual graphics?

[Etched]

6 hours ago, Sir Myshkin said:

Other than Cat5 really being a boisterous effect, most of the attacks can be toned a little with things like darker gray's or dull tones, have you tried doing that to shift some of the impact in the visual graphics?

I fiddled with the effects for almost an hour, tryin to get it to  a point that I could bear it, which I was unsuccessful.

Cat5 is too dense and combinin it with the other AoEs I could only play the toon for 20 or 30 mins before my eyes felt like they were on fire.

 

However, there is only so much i can do when everyone else that i team with are tryin to make their attacks look cool to them. 

 

I understand completely that there are goin to be some sets that i have to keep away. It sucks but it is just the way of life.

 

@Etched

 

 

 

 

[JasperStone]

I have:

 50 SB/Sonic Corr T4s

 43 SB/Earth

 50 SB/Fire/Ice T4s

 

I only one I am meh about is the blaster, but she will get more attention next month.

 

The Corr was pretty good,  a bit of a delay in damage output. I started using SB more on teams as means to get those last pesty members of the mob out.

The Sent was by far the most fun and powerful. Paired with Fire secondary Burn and Consume, went through stuff fast.

Started working my way through Ouro stuff and that was when I saw the importance of Intensify as @Captain Fabulous has stated. I opened a combat log tab and watched what was actually happening. Definitely Proc'd more after hitting  Intensify.

 

sidenote: went APP /Ice for the holds and extra AoE. Did a LGTF ... bit tough without any holds 🙂

 

 

Edited June 9, 2023 by JasperStone
typos

[Sir Myshkin]

40 minutes ago, Etched said:

I fiddled with the effects for almost an hour, tryin to get it to  a point that I could bear it, which I was unsuccessful.

Cat5 is too dense and combinin it with the other AoEs I could only play the toon for 20 or 30 mins before my eyes felt like they were on fire.

 

However, there is only so much i can do when everyone else that i team with are tryin to make their attacks look cool to them.

That's unfortunate, but I get it. I've seen how aggressive it can be, especially when paired with Storm Summoning, when a player I'd PuG'd with had everything set to fluorescent pinks for every single ability on both sides of Storm Blast and Storm Summoning.

[Captain Fabulous]

3 hours ago, Etched said:

I fiddled with the effects for almost an hour, tryin to get it to  a point that I could bear it, which I was unsuccessful.

Cat5 is too dense and combinin it with the other AoEs I could only play the toon for 20 or 30 mins before my eyes felt like they were on fire.

 

However, there is only so much i can do when everyone else that i team with are tryin to make their attacks look cool to them. 

 

I understand completely that there are goin to be some sets that i have to keep away. It sucks but it is just the way of life.

 

@Etched

 

 

 

 

Can't you reduce particle effects? I know it will affect all the powers in the game, but it should greatly reduce the visual noise enough that you can play. 

[wjrasmussen]

On 6/8/2023 at 6:47 AM, laudwic said:

I keep posting on these Storm Blast is terrible threads, I can understand why some people don't like it - you are constantly having to do one or two power preps for every fight - other than that, I don't get the hate.  Personally, I have a 50 TA/SB Defender and a 50 SB/Dev/Mun Blaster.  Both are in the middle of doing their incarnate powers.  I mainly soloed both with the occasional Team or TF.  Both have the Portal Jockey and Atlas Medal Accolades.  Both soloed all the EBs for Portal Jockey.  

 

Admittedly, I use the same main tactic for both, both primary and secondary have to hit debuff.  For my Defender Flash Arrow does one heck of a job to begin with and SB's powers add on so I'm routinely taking enemies below 10% chance to hit (I set up a channel to in my chat box to watch to hit rolls)  My Blaster does quite well in the to hit debuff department as well.  I have them both at +1/4 - I will do a little higher once I get level shifts and that meets my casual play idea and both do fine.  Admittedly, both are full with IO sets, but not purples.  

 

What secondary did you have for your Corruptor?  What about the set didn't you like?  The prep for fights?  Don't think it does enough damage as compared to other sets?  Category 5 taking too long for damage (I would think this would be a plus for a Corruptor since the damage is more towards the end)?  Hate that you have to put in a Kb->Kd proc in Cat 5?

 

 

I seems pretty powerful at low level.  Only at level 20, so...

[Etched]

1 hour ago, Captain Fabulous said:

Can't you reduce particle effects? I know it will affect all the powers in the game, but it should greatly reduce the visual noise enough that you can play. 

I could and I'm sure it would help but i rather not play one type of powers if i have to chage around the particle effects. Call me lazy.

 

@Etched

[Ice Ember]

non IO, lvl 50 storm/atomic.  teams and TF's to lvl.

 

I am about to drop cat 5.  The only time I find it useful is on an ITf because of the ambush and the EB's dont drop fast.  I love rain powers on my ice and fire blast sets.  Cat 5... meh at best.

 

I was solo in the Black Scorpion arc to get to Dr Q and I dropped storm cell, intensify, and cat 5 in a 0/0 mission and still had mobs standing when cat 5 was done...

 

I always use storm cell.  I always use intensify before cat 5.

 

I like the visuals and graphics.  I like part of the set.  Jet stream is terrible.  cat 5 is the worst tier 9 there is. 

 

Looks 10, dance 3...

 

 

[VashNKnives]

Not every set is for everyone. After all these years I still haven't made a super-strength character. However I know SS matures to a powerful set especially with recharge. My experience with my storm/ninja blaster now incarnate is that it just needed a bit more debuff/control to really let that damage kick in. Once I got blinding dust, snow storm, extra defense, and some extra recharge  it went from a bit chaotic to play to a regularly awesome mob-plow. My difficulty slider jumped at around 35-40 and hasn't looked back.

 

As a reference, I have several blaster mains and have played them as mains since live, recreating them here years ago. This one, with a similarly expensive build, holds up nicely but plays differently. I think having that different experience is a big win for intra-archetype play.

 

BTW, regarding jet stream, I am currently running through the 1st Croatoa arc  via ouro and at +1×8 solo exemplared down to level 30 against hoards of roaming Tuantha... jet stream = safety + damage + force feedback proc. It's a 3-slot wonder power for me. Keeping those bosses on their bottoms is a big part of the build.

Edited June 10, 2023 by VashNKnives

[Bionic_Flea]

2 hours ago, VashNKnives said:

it just needed a bit more debuff/control to really let that damage kick in.

 

This might be the key.  I know that I lean on Freezing Rain to slow things down further and debuff their defense and resist so that they stay in the storms and take more damage.  I read someone else using the -tohit from Smoke with Storm Cell to become essentially untouchable. @VashNKnives is doing both with Blinding Dust and Snow Storm.

 

Another trick that some may not be aware of:  I always use Direct Strike after dropping Storm Cell - it has the bonus sniper damage, will stun and take a huge chunk of HP from bosses or  outright kill most other minions and Lts, AND has the highest chance to proc more lightning and wind.

[Snarky]

It almost always depends on your playstyle.  If you want all up front damage do not play Ice or Storm blasts.  m'kay?

[Ice Ember]

9 hours ago, Snarky said:

It almost always depends on your playstyle.  If you want all up front damage do not play Ice or Storm blasts.  m'kay?

I enjoy Ice blast.  Storm is not even close to it.

 

I am hoping my storm storm corruptor will be better. 

[Snarky]

1 hour ago, Ice Ember said:

I enjoy Ice blast.  Storm is not even close to it.

 

I am hoping my storm storm corruptor will be better. 

If you do not like it on a Blaster….  

[Biske]

That's actually the thing.

Different ATs play differently, and I think it makes perfect sense that Storm Blast would feel terrible as a Blaster but not that bad on the other ATs.

Blasters are all about up front damage, so a blast set that doesn't do that very well does in fact feel quite bad in comparison.

It's an AT that doesn't leverage Storm Blast's strengths nearly as well as the other ATs naturally do.  The most it can do is build for enough defenses so that the to hit debuffs might be meaningful, but that will rarely help the blaster do it's job better, especially on teams.  Combined with the burden of the very clunky Storm Cell, well....

Conversely, Storm's slow damage damage isn't felt as keenly on other ATs, and its debuffs complement their roles much better. 

 

And yea, obviously Storm can't hope to compete with Ice. 

In addition to much better ST, Blizzard is categorically better than C5.  😏

Dramatically stronger debuffs and only requires half as long to do its work.  I find C5 incredibly underwhelming on blasters.

[Seed22]

On 6/8/2023 at 4:29 PM, Sir Myshkin said:

I'll say the same thing here as everywhere else: You're playing it wrong.

 

If you still have a temp power in your attack tray as a mainline power: You're playing it wrong.

 

If you think this is a Single Target exclusive set: You're playing it wrong.

 

If you aren't actively using Storm Cell, You're playing it wrong.

 

I will acknowledge there are a couple of powers in the set that are easily passable like Gust, Jet Stream, and Intensify, and really Jet Stream is just a bad power (in my opinion) with that repel kick, but every set has a couple of powers you can skip, and really Gust isn't bad, and Intensify just has a crap damage boost that (on a Kin at least) makes it absolutely wasted time. This set does so much AoE damage inside Storm Cell it's gross, and if you're not seeing it, you're not taking that time to set it up and get there. Just Storm Cell + Chain Lightning produces a metric ton of feedback. Add Cat5 into the mix even though it takes a second to build, once it goes it's melting things down, and the entire time everything still suffers from the -ToHit and Slows.

 

And ain't nobody can tell me Direct Strike lacks KAPOW because I use it to regularly snipe down Surgeons on ITF's

The setup for SC is not really worth it considering you won't be doing any AoE damage on a semi competent team with even one top tier set in it. I've teamed with Storms, have one at 50 myself, and it's sad to watch. SC gets dropped. I drop inferno and delete the mob, they have to go and repeat elsewhere. They try to jump ahead, I judgement the next mob, then they repeat again, but this time someone else does what I did but with a diff powerset. It's rough for stormies out here.

 

Oh I guess yall are pretty helpful with AVs. SC really shines against AVs.

 

The problem is not the damage, whenever it's applied, it's the speed to me. Y'all cant keep up if you're on an even remotely decent team. You WILL be left in the dust as the other blasters speed demon the hell out of the map.

😛

Edited June 12, 2023 by Seed22

[Sir Myshkin]

39 minutes ago, Seed22 said:

You WILL be left in the dust as the other blasters speed demon the hell out of the map.

I have to disagree with you. You are taking perception against your personal method of play. Right now I’m running Storm Blast on a Corruptor with Kinetics backing, and even with me pumping the team I’m still at the front dropping Cells. I also don’t wait for the team to drop them either, if I know we’re going into a commonly pulled area like on an ITF, I’ll start dropping the Storm Cell in advance.

 

I might suggest stop running PI Council missions and try some more challenging enemy groups 😉