Water/Fire AOE god or false prophet?

[MIG]

I was messing around with builds and decided to level up a Water/Fire to 50, with the goal of seeing what type of AOE damage could be done.  Post 50, I haven't invested too much into the slots yet, but with the Epic Elec set (not optimal, but I liked the lightning field) I was kind of impressed farming the AE Dogs/Dawgs/ComicCon maps (sub 8 min maps with cheap IO sets, but survivability was sketchy at times without purples).  Out of curiosity, has anyone invested 1B influence into this type of build before?  Also, is there a magical hack/way to stick some sort of aggro-IO into this build (mocking beratement)?   Cheers!

[Sovera]

I preferred radiation or elec for AoE godlyness. Lightning Field does tie the knot nicely, but the mass immobilize, I find, only really works for farming. In regular teams it hardly ever finds use. For solo farming it serves to keep the mobs close though.

[oldskool]

Working on Water/Dark/Psi.  Mostly this is for groups vs farms (I have 4 Brutes capable of that already) but if I get her leveled up soon I'll let you know what she can do.  

There is always the test server too for experimenting with expensive builds. 

[earthaddy]

I just started a water/electric based entirely on this thread.

[WillParkinson]

On 9/15/2019 at 4:22 AM, earthaddy said:

I just started a water/electric based entirely on this thread.

Me too. Now just need to find a build.

[DrBasics]

False Prophet or Superstition?

[Ironscarlet]

I did a water fire. It is the most graphicly beautiful build I have ever done but it has major flaws that can only be addressed with incarnates..

 

What happens is  whirlpool scares off a lot of npc so it makes them run away from the burn which is  very bad.

On teams its hard to get burn set up right because everyone is on the tank or brute. Also sometimes its so fast by the time you set up your aoe's the team is already moving on.

 

On paper it looks great but in practice it is meh.  The only way I can see it being viable on a farm is with provoke and melee hybrid for taunt aura.

 

So can you make it work yes but it will take IO set investment and incarnates to make it work. If whirlpool did not have that fear in it and npc would not try to run out of it. It would be very different.

[Bossk_Hogg]

I have a 50 fire/fire sentinel. More or less fully IO'd with superior winter sets, PVP uniques and some other purples.  

 

She's a great concept character, but mechanically is more or less useless, and I feel this extends to any /Fire sentinel. With /Fire, a lot of your damage comes from Burn, which puts you in melee range, along with Inferno and the epic attacks. At which point, why not be a brute and have WAY more survivability not to mention team utility? Hell, now Tankers now deal VERY similar damage to sents, have bigger AE's and larger target caps. Plus Fiery Embrace is significantly better than Molten Embrace once you get some global recharge. Hell, Assault is better than ME as it also affects the team. 

 

While the AT as a whole is underperforming, Fire Armor in particular needs to be examined. IMO, the only thing Sentinels are gods of are being a great AT to play while drunk or high. They pay too much a damage premium for the tradeoff of not having to move into position. And given the short range of their attacks and, as you note, lack of aggro management, you still have to chase down runners. I'd really love a defensive mode with a small mag taunt on their attacks. 

[drbuzzard]

Odd, my fire/fire sentinel works fine IMO. I simply ignored burn since it really isn't practical (for many reasons). Given how tight my builds are, I'm generally have to have a skip over power in a set, and burn most certainly was one. If fire blast is ever good on a sentinel, then it certainly is fine on a fire/fire since /fire has a damage boosting power, so why not get a boost to arguably the highest damage primary. Yes, if you come in thinking you will be using burn, I can see disappointment in your future, but I run mine as a hover blaster who only swoops in to drop inferno and psychic shockwave, then move back out for the rest. Fiery aura on sentinels is actually more survivable than I had imagined since you can attain l/s cap if you work towards it, have decent other resists, (50ish), have a continuous pulsing heal in cauterize, and on top of that healing flames is a lot of healing on a fast recharge. I think it's just a matter of expectations. 

 

Sure, more damage would be better, but that is an AT wide issue, and burn certainly isn't going to be a solution. 

[carnalchaos]

No, no he's right please buff fire armor its bad.  Can I have more damage, and a better heal...maybe an absorbance shield.  Definitely fix the endurance recovery power, I need more endurance.  Ok I am not kidding on the last one, that needs to be fixed it's recharge is brutal.

 

Telling people not to take burn?  That's crazy talk if your not taking burn why even take fire armor its the entire trade off the set makes for lower numbers overall.  Burn on teams has a different function, its a get off me right now power and fight me at range.  It also can be used as a pseudo/control barrier between the melee and squishies since you will usually be in that area due to the reduced range anyways.  Burn is awesome just don't think of it from brute/tanker perspective where if he mobs don't stay in it till it expires its wasted, its not.  The damage is that good even a few seconds exposure to any mob is worth it and the fear is a valuable tool in your toolkit.

 

All kidding aside I found water/fire to be an odd fit trying to jump in and out of range.   If your familiar with how spines plays its got a similar feel, very active playstyle. 

[drbuzzard]

As I said, I play a flying sentinel, burn only works on the ground, and if you're flying, you don't really worry about people being on top of you. 

[Bossk_Hogg]

On 1/29/2020 at 8:08 PM, drbuzzard said:

As I said, I play a flying sentinel, burn only works on the ground, and if you're flying, you don't really worry about people being on top of you. 

They why bother with fire at all? Pick rad armor, bio, energy aura or any of the significantly better options. Fire armor gets Moten Embrace, which is ass compared to Fiery Embrace. Whee, my low damage sentinel gets a self only version of Assault!

 

All sentinels basically kind of suck, but fire really shows how meh the AT is for anything but concept. Mediocre damage and personal survivability but nothing to leverage the latter towards accomplishing. You can play a really blaster at range and deal way more damage. TBH, my water/atomic is about as safe as any of my sents. The AT as a whole for me is shelved until they rework it. It's fun to dink around with until 32 or so, then just drags.  This is what happens when you balance around SO's, as though blasters will die to a mild breeze in their direction, while ignoring the massive survivability that comes with tricking characters out. 

Edited January 31, 2020 by Bossk_Hogg

[drbuzzard]

Molten embrace basically costs a very close approximation of zero endurance. Assault is plenty endurance expensive. That's a pretty good distinction to me. Fire also gets cauterize plus a strong and fast recharging heal. I've never said fire was the best, as I recognize there are clearly better options (pretty much any of the defense based sets except ice). However it's not a complete loss. And yes, sentinels do too little damage. We all know it, have said it, and have complained about it. Maybe I'm not a twink enough at heart, but I still enjoy playing my sentinels even though <gasp> they are not the most powerful AT out there. 

[carnalchaos]

Also molten embrace has a chance to give a fire DOT to every attack.  

 

Not sure why you are arguing blasters do more damage, that's a big no duh.  If you have played blasters then you know having status protection, a heal, endurance management and shields is kind of fun.  I could never stick with blasters because of the lack of status protection and admire the heck out of anyone that leveled them to 50.