Martial Assault - What's the deal with Spinning Kick?

[BasiliskXVIII]

It's a bit of weird bird, if you're not familiar with it. Spinning Kick is a cone that doesn't require a target, simply hitting any targets in front of your character. It kind of feels like the devs were like "hey, I wonder if this will work?", and the result, while unique, feels to me like something that causes me to use the ability ineffectively more often than it provides benefits. 

 

Am I completely off the mark? It's kind of nice in Synapse, being able to kick gears before they're targetable, but is there some other great functionality that I'm missing, or is this just uniqueness for the sake of uniqueness?

[Psyonico]

It's not optimal... I've "wasted" the power too many times when I hit the activate but then remember it doesn't auto-rotate your character toward your target.

 

I'm pretty sure Vorpal Judgement existed before Martial Assault, so the devs already knew they could make a cone not have a target.

[BasiliskXVIII]

1 hour ago, Psyonico said:

I'm pretty sure Vorpal Judgement existed before Martial Assault, so the devs already knew they could make a cone not have a target.

I totally forgot about Vorpal Judgement. Maybe just "I wonder if we could make a Melee cone without a target and still have it work?"

I dunno. Even if it's not literally a test of a concept, it feels like it is one. I kind of wish they would change it to a targeted cone because I agree- I've had far more misfires and wasted uses of the power than I've been able to find use cases where the untargeted version justifies itself, which is why I was curious if there was a reason for it.

[lemming]

I find it nice when I have something targetted, but want to spread some damage about in a different direction

[Uun]

Takes a bit of getting used to, but it does decent damage and has a pretty short recharge. In addition to Vorpal, there are several heals that use non-targeted cones (Regrowth, Soothing Wave).

[Redletter]

The trick with Spinning Kick is to exploit the fact it's a Goldilocks recharge power for Force Feedback's proc you can execute without a target.

 

Like, sure, it's a decent power. There's some fun things you can do with it since it doesnt auto-rotate, especially with combat teleport, and Brilliant Barrage from pyrotechnic being able to essentially strike 2 places at once.

 

You *can* use it to maintain a multiple position battle. By being able to "attack" whenever you want, you dont need to STOP targeting whatever youre locked onto -- for instance, if youre dealing with destroyable objects but are ambushed, you can just lick Spinning Kick and kick anyone youre looking at, this is *ALSO* true of Dragon's Tail, so, you have 2 ways of keeping yourself safe while you're actually able to attack at range (Dominators, theoretically, can be doing ranged attacks, melee attacks, and controls, but its quite rare youre able to do all of that at *ANY* range, usually, you MUST be in melee AND have a target, meaning, youd be using your Ranged attacks and controls, in melee, if you were meleeing someone, since most of those ranged powers require a lock on. This isnt BAD that this is the case, but it does mean that if you want to do all three, you need to wade in.).

 

However, that's the nerd way of thinking. It's weird, and Im too busy eating glue to care. What we *REALLY* do with spinning kick, is take it, use its 1 slot for Force Feedback, and you mash that sucker until you get the proc. This means your Perma Dom is, in part, powered by Chuck Norris roundhouse kicks, and THAT'S the TRUE story the COWARD DEVS don't want YOU to know.

Edited July 16 by Redletter

[MonteCarla]

Martial Assault on Dominators is the ultimate "dancefloor emote" powerset, as you can do Spinning Kick and Dragons Tail without a target.

[BZRKR]

* adds martial assault dominator to the to do list *