Is Proton Sweep Worth It?

[Rylas]

20 minutes ago, Erratic1 said:

 

Oh...I wasn't trying to do that. There are definitely trade-offs. But it has been working (or at least not not working) for me. Please let me know how it works out for you.

 

I didn't mean to imply that was your goal, but you made me reevaluate my approach all the same. It'll be a bit before I can implement both, but I'll keep you posted on how it does.

[Lazarus]

Proton Sweep is absolutely worth it.

 

It has a really good cone width,. And its one of the few attack that can slot 2 -res procs in the game.

 

I always 4 slot Eradication with 2 -res procs. then fallow it with DEVASTATING BLOW.

[Hjarki]

Yes and no.

 

As an area effect attack it is, like most Cones, of somewhat limited value due to the need to line up the spawn. While Tankers have the benefit of taunt auras (to compress packs) and wider arcs, they have the disadvantage of normally not wanting to re-position to optimize cones because their movement disrupts that nicely packed spawn.

 

As a single target attack,Tanker cones of this sort are often a decent choice due to their low area factors (1.24 for Proton Sweep). Such attacks can slot Fury of the Gladiator and Armageddon - neither of which would be available in a conventional single target rotation. Cones also tend to have the right levels of recharge for inclusion into single target rotations and, if their activation is amenable (1.848 is decent but not ideal for Radiation Melee), can form a part of a strong rotation.

 

If you run:

• Contaminated Strike (Gladiator's Strike A/D, proc; Damage Enhancement; proc, proc, proc)
• Radioactive Smash (Gladiator's Strike A/D, proc; Hecatomb D, proc; proc, proc)
• Proton Sweep (Fury of the Gladiator A/D, proc; Armageddon D, proc; proc, proc)

Then you'll be dealing about 185 dps against a single target @ +125% damage. With a 65% uptime on FotG, that would rise to 209 dps. It would rise further if you replaced a proc in one of the single target powers with Achilles Heel.

 

Unfortunately, there are two problems you'll encounter with Radiation Melee:

• Lack of an opportunistic attack. This sort of rotation is fantastic for Tankers because it arrives very early in the level progression so you can retain even when exemplar'd to low levels (and it's a lot easier to level). However, the best such rotations have some longer recharge attack down in the tree that will be thrown on recharge to boost your dps. Radiation does have Devastating Blow, but it would constitute a dps loss in this sort of rotation.
• Lack of set mechanics to offset the costs. Sets like Savage and Staff work with this methodology because they have innate mechanics that ameliorate the problem of not slotting your offensive powers for set bonuses. If you're just slotting Scrapper-style with 5-set Hecatomb, 5-set Armegeddon, etc., you're getting a significant amount of recharge/accuracy that this sort of proc slotting doesn't provide. Since Radiation Melee itself doesn't provide it either, it's a struggle to make this sort of build work.