New to Sentinels

[Without_Pause]

1 hour ago, tidge said:

 

On Energy Aura, I always skip worrying about Positional defenses.. whatever "OH $#!+" defense boosts usually cover everything.

 

I also wouldn't build a Sentinel to be a "Hover Blaster", that seems like such (way) old school thinking. I think of Sentinels as Scrappers that happen to have ranged attacks, MMV.

Unfortunately, there's little reason for a Sent to be in melee depending on the powersets involved. 

[tidge]

1 hour ago, Without_Pause said:

Unfortunately, there's little reason for a Sent to be in melee depending on the powersets involved. 

 

 

El riesgo siempre vive.

[Psiphon]

3 hours ago, Without_Pause said:

I looked at my EA Sent build, and my Ranged Def is in the 20s. That's going to be a hell of an ask to get that to 45%. Can it be done? Sure, but I would wonder what other sacrifices would need to be made to get Positional Def to work on a Typed Def based set. I can get Positional Def capped on an SR and use the T9 as nothing more than a mule if needed be. 

Yes it can be done, mainly using Thunderstrike and Artilary. As it's a defence set, it's got DDR too which is useful.

[Psiphon]

2 hours ago, tidge said:

 

On Energy Aura, I always skip worrying about Positional defenses.. whatever "OH $#!+" defense boosts usually cover everything.

 

I also wouldn't build a Sentinel to be a "Hover Blaster", that seems like such (way) old school thinking. I think of Sentinels as Scrappers that happen to have ranged attacks, MMV.

I guess it depends on your playstyle. I've got some Sentinels that are ground based, depends on the powersets and concept, the hover blasters are more survivable though.

[Without_Pause]

4 minutes ago, Psiphon said:

Yes it can be done, mainly using Thunderstrike and Artilary. As it's a defence set, it's got DDR too which is useful.

FYI, I've literally taken it to 50 across the four ATs which have it. Much of that time was done solo. 

[Maelwys]

17 hours ago, Without_Pause said:

Unfortunately, there's little reason for a Sent to be in melee depending on the powersets involved. 

Psychic Shockwave and Mind Probe.
(I mean, you are picking at least one of those up already in the rush to get + procbomb Dominate, right?) 😉

Also stuff like Power Drain too I guess, since we're talking about /EA.


Personally I find jousting is fine for single target melee blapps, but PBAoEs like PSW become much easier to leverage if you don't have to orbit around your targets several times first like an overcaffinated sheepdog to "get them lined up just right". And phooey to taking Fold Space just for that purpose on a Sent'...

[Without_Pause]

3 hours ago, Maelwys said:

Psychic Shockwave and Mind Probe.
(I mean, you are picking at least one of those up already in the rush to get + procbomb Dominate, right?) 😉

Also stuff like Power Drain too I guess, since we're talking about /EA.


Personally I find jousting is fine for single target melee blapps, but PBAoEs like PSW become much easier to leverage if you don't have to orbit around your targets several times first like an overcaffinated sheepdog to "get them lined up just right". And phooey to taking Fold Space just for that purpose on a Sent'...

I didn't take Dominate on my EA. I don't really proc bomb on builds. Plus, I'm not really seeing slots for it. I 4-slotted Mind Probe as is. Granted, I just looked at my build and saw where I should add in a few procs. Note, I went Fire/ea. I skipped adding an Epic for my Ice/sr simply due to wanting RoP instead. Initial test on Beta made me roll that version onto an active server. 

[evetsleep]

On 11/7/2024 at 10:27 AM, tidge said:

 

On Energy Aura, I always skip worrying about Positional defenses.. whatever "OH $#!+" defense boosts usually cover everything.

 

I also wouldn't build a Sentinel to be a "Hover Blaster", that seems like such (way) old school thinking. I think of Sentinels as Scrappers that happen to have ranged attacks, MMV.

I've started building, where it makes sense, many of my sentinels to be close range (occasional melee range) and I've been pretty happy with it.  They are not blappers, but staying out of melee all the time seems to be leaving a ton of potential damage on the table (specifically later on when you get access to the ancillary melee attacks).

[Greyhame]

On 11/7/2024 at 8:27 AM, tidge said:

...

I also wouldn't build a Sentinel to be a "Hover Blaster", that seems like such (way) old school thinking. I think of Sentinels as Scrappers that happen to have ranged attacks, MMV.

 

I don't hoverblast any more either, but its purely playstyle preference.  On Live, every one of my ranged characters was a hoverblaster because it was just more effective and survivable.  I think that's still true for the most part, but in the intervening years I've just played too many action games to be content hovering around.  It's Combat Jumping all the way for me now, same as melee.

[Sovera]

I notice we're all skipping past Ninjutsu. It's a pretty sweet deal on a Sentinel. Heal, endurance, positional defense (hence ranged if wanting to focus on it). Downside would be no damage boost and having an anti-CC clickie instead of toggle.

[Erratic1]

On 11/6/2024 at 8:07 AM, tidge said:

Bio on a Sentinel looks to be somewhat set-and-forget (compared to other ATs) but I think it probably has more clicks (plus adaptation) than I'd recommend for a no-brainer armor.

 

That you can change stance doesn't mean you have to and a click heal and damage shield are pretty obviously better to have than not have and easy to determine when to use. I never take my Fire/Bio out of Offensive Stance.

 

While a properly built Bio can stand in melee pretty well, if you treat them like a ranged class with status protection the one remaining click power on Bio doesn't see much use. 

 

SR doesn't click anything? Well that also means no healing if it comes to that. You can play Bio as Invulnerability, just with an added damage shield.

[Erratic1]

10 minutes ago, Sovera said:

I notice we're all skipping past Ninjutsu. It's a pretty sweet deal on a Sentinel. Heal, endurance, positional defense (hence ranged if wanting to focus on it). Downside would be no damage boost and having an anti-CC clickie instead of toggle.

 

Well it has a very limited damage boost via crit from stealth, no?

 

I am currently working up an Energy/Ninjutsu Blaster and enjoying it. An Energy/Ninjitsu Sentinel would trade some damage but be a better protected. Might consider a Ninjitsu Sentinel (with some other primary than Energy) at some point.

[biostem]

32 minutes ago, Sovera said:

I notice we're all skipping past Ninjutsu. It's a pretty sweet deal on a Sentinel. Heal, endurance, positional defense (hence ranged if wanting to focus on it). Downside would be no damage boost and having an anti-CC clickie instead of toggle.

The status protection power is easy to make permanent, offers protection to fear, and because it's a clickie, cannot be detoggled mid-combat by, say, end drain.  You do get a damage boost from shinobi, and I rather enjoy having a stealth power in-set.  If I had to levy a complaint regarding ninjitsu, it's the lack of alternate animations for the status protection, heal, end, and T9 powers...

[Riverdusk]

For primary I prefer electric as it also gives the extra utility and defense of endurance drain as well as being a top tier dps set now (from the charts I remember seeing it is right up there with fire now or at least very close).  

 

Also almost worth it alone for the fact of never having to worry about MOG'ing paragon protectors ever again, or bubbling fake nems, etc.  They can't do that annoying stuff when they have no endurance.

[Heatstroke]

On 11/7/2024 at 11:33 AM, Without_Pause said:

Unfortunately, there's little reason for a Sent to be in melee depending on the powersets involved. 

 

Elec/Elec Sentintel Short Circuit/Power Sink/Lightning Field/Ball Lightning used in Melee will pretty much eliminate a foes End Bar, reducing their attacks and making them normally only able to use the weakest attacks 
 

Fire/Rad/Fire Sentinel Fire Sword Circle/ Ground Zero/Fireball/Inferno Nuke in melee range melts foes 

 

Psi/Regen/Psi Sentinel. Psychic Shockwave/Psychic Wail Melee range pretty good combo 

Like Clapton Said.. " It's in the way that you use it " 

 

Thats the beauty of CoH IMO.. people can have the same powerset and use them completely differently.. and equally as effectively.

 

[Wolfboy1]

On 11/6/2024 at 11:26 PM, tjknight said:

Dark Blast / Super Reflexes blooms rather early and stupid levels of survivable on just generic IO's or SO's. Especially, when solo. 

Can Confirm.  The damage may be a bit on the lower side but man is this set survivable.  Hardly anything hits me and if you take the heal power in dark...you pretty much golden.  Love this at 50. 😄