A powerleveler's guide to blasters (very long)

[RSRobinson]

Hi gang. I've been reading these forums quite a bit, but haven't
posted until now. I thought it time to give something back.

This guide will help you build the best blaster you possibly can.
By best, I mean most efficient, from a power-gaming perspective.
If you prefer building characters for role-playing reasons, that
is fine too but this guide is not for you. This guide is for the
person who wonders why he gets killed all the time while other
players steamroll through the levels.

I'll repeat, this is a pure powergamer's guide. You don't need a
guide to have fun, every bit of advice here is about building and
playing a character who will level as quickly as possible, die as
little as possible, etc. The one thing I do not do is suggest any
exploits. All the advice I give is advice I am reasonably
confident will never become obsolete due to nerfs. Of course, you
never can tell but I avoid any obvious exploits that will almost
certainly be fixed.

Just so you know I have some experience, my main is a level 40
energy/devices blaster. My current alt is a level 26 assault
rifle/devices blaster (yes I think devices is far better than the
other secondaries.) I have numerous low-level alts, both blasters
and other classes. And I have read there forums a lot, and
collected a lot of good advice and opinions, especially on powers
I have not used yet.


PICKING YOUR PRIMARY

The five primary powers are divided into two groups. Fire and
Assault rifle are AOE power sets. Energy, Ice, and Electricity
are single-target power sets. For leveling speed, AOE is simply
better than single-target. For doing door missions, single target
is better than AOE. Door missions are fun, but the higher you go,
the more AOE has the advantage in leveling.

For soloing, fire and assault rifle blasters will be focusing on
killing large packs of blues to yellows. Ice and energy blasters
will be going after small packs of two to four yellows to reds.
Frankly, electricity blasters should reroll. Electricity is by
far the weakest of the primaries. If powergaming is your thing,
don't take it. And for all you electricity blasters who want to
respond by relating some story to prove you are not weak, stop.
You are. Ok, you are still a blaster, so compared to other
archtypes, you are fine. But compared to Ice or Energy, you are
simply inferior. Sorry, I didn't design the power sets.


PICKING YOUR SECONDARY

Basically you have three choices. Devices has by far the best
powers. The other power sets get buildup. Energy gets buildup at
level four, so it is the best for a quick start. Fire has Fire
Sword Circle, an excellent AOE and therefore is your third
possibility. It works best with Energy or Ice to compensate for
your poor AOE capability.

Before the increase in the damage cap, I would have said pick
Devices, hands down. This was because Buildup is a waste when you
can cap your damage from enhancements. Now this is no longer the
case, so Devices is a tradeoff. No Buildup so you can't do as
much damage as can someone with Buildup. On the other hand, every
one of your shots will do consistently high damage due to
Targeting Drone and the ability to six-slot your attack powers
with all damage. When exping, you will have enough damage to kill
the mobs without needing Buildup to be available. And you get
lots of other good powers. I still think it is the best choice
overall.

Energy is a quick-starter, you'll definitely do better between
levels four and sixteen (i.e. between when you get buildup and
when Fire gets it). But, those levels are easy regardless. I
think it is not the best long-term decision but it is good for a
new player to whom the low levels aren't that easy.

For Fire, Fire Sword Circle is tempting as a single-target
blaster to get a decent AOE. Of course, Devices gives you Trip
Mine but that is at much higher level. And Trip Mine can be
tricky to use effectively (but fantastic when it is). And you do
get Buildup. Perhaps Fire is not the optimal choice but I think,
for powergaming, it can be a good one.

Electricty and Ice secondaries, in my opinion, just don't cut it.
They have nothing going for them.


PICKING YOUR POWER POOLS

Every blaster should take Stamina. Once again, someone will post
with his wonderful tale of his blaster who gets by without it.
Good for you. From a powergaming perspective, your character
would be better with it.

Next you need a travel power. My suggestion is go for Superspeed.
You should only take Flight if you are already taking Hover since
Flight is so slow that it barely qualifies as a travel power. In
my opinion, Hover is highly overrated as I'll discuss in the
section on melee. Overrated power plus bad travel power plus
extra used up power pool (of your four total) means probably not
the best choice. The keys to Superspeed are first I find it to be
the most useful power for travel and fighting. And second, you
will be taking Hasten eventually so you have the prerequisite and
don't have to use up a power pool. Leaping just doesn't cut it
for me, but that is a matter of preference. I like to do door
missions for fun, and I always regret not having Superspeed on my
current blaster. I tried out Superleap, it just isn't for me.

Let's talk about Hasten. Can you live without it? Yes. Should
you? No. You will get experience faster with Hasten then without.
More importantly, it will make a bigger boost than any other way
of spending one power slot and 4-5 enhancement slots. If you are
a powergamer, you will get Hasten. Depending on your build, you
can delay getting it but sooner or later you will. Getting it
early to unlock Superspeed kills two birds with one stone.

After these two choices, your power pools are for defense.
Defense? "What is this concept?", you say. Aren't we blasters?
Defensive choices are what separate the quick-leveling power
blaster from the people who keep telling us horror stories about
their exp debt. Especially for AOE blasters, you need some
defense. When you are attacking a pack of 10 minions with a boss
or two thrown in, there is a world of difference in how much
damage you take from just a couple of defensive powers. The
reason why blasters you read about are able to crush pack after
pack of whites/yellows for great exp and you die is because you
aren't using a few defensive powers and they are.

Devices is fantastic because it gives you both Cloaking Device
and Smoke Grenade for defense. If you don't take Devices, Stealth
from the concealment pool is hard to pass up. Superspeed negates
its speed penalty and combines with it to give basically full
invisibility. Invisibility is fantastic and you get a hefty
defensive boost in combat. What's not to like? Combat Jumping
costs almost no endurance, gives defense, and makes you resistant
to immobilize in addition to helping you get around. Manuevers
from the Leadership pool is a solid defense boost. Hover adds
defense. The Fighting pool has some defense in it, but it
requires too many power choices to unlock in my opinion. As good
as it is for a tank or scrapper, I'd advise blasters to steer
clear of it.

My suggested power pools choices are: Hurdle, Health, Stamina,
Combat Jumping, Manuevers, Hasten, and Superspeed. If you are not
going Devices secondary, I would suggest dropping either Combat
Jumping or Manuevers to get Stealth. You can drop Superspeed for
Super Leap. I prefer Superspeed because it is useful during
combat. If you go Leap, you will be switching it off for Combat
Jumping while fighting anyway (they can't be used at the same
time). Plus, cooking around door missions with Superspeed is just
incredibly handy.


PICKING YOUR PRIMARY POWERS

For Assault Rifle, at lower level you will function as a
single-target blaster using Slug, Burst, and Sniper Rifle. Once
you get Flamethrower 6-slotted and move to Dark Astoria, you are
an AOE blaster. At level 22, with six SO damage enhancements, one
flamethrower makes one dead pack of zombies. That can take you
all the way up to 30. Finally, at 32 you will get Full Auto which
once six-slotted means one dead pack of just about anything.
Buckshot and M30 grenade simply don't cut it at high level and
you don't have infinite enhancement slots to waste on them. It is
more efficient to just pass them by.

For Fire Blast, it is all about Fire Ball and Fire Breath. Fire
Blast is helpful mostly at low-level. At high level, you'll use
it for killing stragglers that survive your AOEs - out of a big
pack, you'll miss a few which you may want to finish off (or you
may just move on and ignore any survivors). Blaze and Blazing
Bolt give you, finally, the ability to deal efficiently with
bosses. There is nothing wrong with making your fire blaster more
well-rounded and you will have enhancement slots to spare.

For Energy blasters, Power Bolt, Power Blast, and Power Burst
along with Sniper Blast are it. The key to an effective
single-target blaster is having the three non-sniper attacks and
cycling them over and over. Power Burst is short-range, yes, but
melee is no problem as I explain below. With knockdown, it is
easy to safely get close enough to use Power Burst even on bosses
(if needed). Mostly I like it as a minion killer. Snipe a minion,
it is dead. Power Blast and Power Bolt another. Power Burst and
Power Bolt a third. One 'salvo' of all your powers plus a
recharge of Power Bolt (which is fast) means three dead minions.
This is your bread-and-butter exping method. Your AOEs are too
low-damage to be of any real consequence. The best use for them
is to do enough damage to a large group so that one Power Blast
or Power Burst can kill them. In this case, you can double-up a
Power Bolt to function as a third killing power (yes it does less
damage than the other two but it recycles very fast). So you
could kill a pack of 6 minions by Explosive Blast or Energy
Torrent then Bolt/Bolt, Blast, Burst twice.

Since it was hard for me to find this information as an Energy
blaster, I'll include it here. How much damage do our AOEs do?
Not much. six-slotted with damage, at level 40, they both top out
around 120 damage to an even con. Explosive Blast does slightly
less damage than Energy Torrent. Power Push does basically zero
damage. I was hoping 'minor' damage meant about what Power Bolt
does, 160ish damage six-slotted. Rather it does 20 damage with no
slots, or about 60 damage six-slotted. And that is with the
'increase' in damage in the last patch.

Ice Blast functions similarly to Energy just using Ice Bolt, Ice
Blast, and Bitter Ice Blast instead. Your disadvantage is you
have no snipe, so you don't get to start out a fight by instantly
dropping one opposing minion. The advantage is that Bitter Ice
Blast has better range than Power Burst (though it is still
somewhat short) and your activation times are faster. Hasten is
most critical with Ice Blast to get your three attacks cycling as
fast as possible. Frost Breath does acceptable damage and should
be used as your 'weakening' attack to drop mobs into single-shot
range of your heavy nukes, just like for energy.

For all the power sets, the rest of the powers are purely
optional. Aim is good, though not terribly impressive. Its best
use is as a boss-killer to give you the best chance to hit.
Inferno and Nova are both great for that tough fight (they are
really excellent for door missions with big groups which can be
quite fun.) Too bad they recycle so slowly, but adding recharge
enhancements reduces their massive damage, their best quality.
I've never used Blizzard but from what I've read, it
sounds... um... underwhelming. Ice Storm and Rain of Fire are
both endurance-intensive control powers. For Fire, I'd say skip
it. Ice is more a control power set and can make use of the power
better. To me, the key difference is that Ice Storm can be
slotted with Slow Enhancements and is therefore a useful power.
Fire Storm cannot be.

If you've taken electricity, I feel for you. You are a
single-target power set but you lack the third nuke that both Ice
and Energy get. You will need to use Ball Lightning more as a
nuke than as an AOE to get as much firepower as you can. Don't
get me wrong, its not that your damage is all that bad though it
will lag behind Energy a bit without a Power Burst equivelent.
No, its just that the knockback and slow effects of Energy and
Ice are both very good secondary effects. Endurance drain is
basically worthless. I laugh when I hear some Electricity blaster
detail a rare situation in which he neutralized some boss with
his endurance drain. My main is an energy blaster. I too
neutralize bosses, with knockback, as that boss spends his
last few seconds before I waste him on the ground. Plus, I get
that knockback consistently and often in every fight against
every mob I face. And I get a third heavy nuke, heavier than
either of Electricity's nukes to boot.


ENHANCING YOUR POWERS

Here is the most important lesson in enhancing your powers. If
you take a damage power, you will six-slot it. If you can not or do
not want to six-slot a damage power, you should not be taking that
power. The great thing about being a blaster is that the majority
of your slots go to your attack powers, allowing you the luxury
of six-slotting them all. This is why defenders fall much further
behind the damage curve than just the difference in base damage,
they don't have enough enhancement slots to fully slot their
attack powers.

Once you have Stamina and Hasten (and probably even before),
slotting attack powers is easy. Do you have Devices and therefore
Targeting Drone? If yes, slot six damage enhancements. If no,
slot five damage enhancements and one accuracy. If the power has
a big inherent bonus to accuracy, like Fire Breath, you can go
either way though personally I would favor damage. I would rather
miss one or two of a big pack and leave the rest dead rather than
leave them all with a sliver of life left.

Blasters are all about damage, and you will be the most efficient
blaster you can be by recognizing that. Nothing is worse than a
mob living with a pixel of life and needing to waste a whole
additional attack on it to kill it off. The more damage each
attack does, the less likely that is to happen. Are you running
low on endurance before Stamina and thinking endurance reduction
will help more than damage? Think again, having to use an entire
additional attack will use a lot more endurance than you save.
Think recycling your powers faster will help? Get Hasten. Before
that, you probably are waiting on the power to recycle because
your power did not do enough damage to kill the mob off on the
first shot.

Consider this. Imagine a person who slots each attack power with
3 damage, 1 accuracy, 1 endurance, and 1 recharge reduction for a
'balanced' approach. Now consider the device blaster slotting 6
damage instead. He is able to do that because Stamina takes care
of endurance, Hasten takes care of recharge, and Targeting Drone
takes care of accuracy. With SO damage enhancements adding 33% at
even level, the first person is doing two times base damage while
the second is doing three times base damage. Every shot is doing
50% more damage by slotting all damage. Basically, the second
person is doing the same damage on every shot that the first
person is doing with Buildup. A free Buildup on every shot? Sign
me up!

For travel powers, it takes two slots to max out Superspeed (with
SOs), three for Superleap, and four for Flight. You spend so much
time in this game moving around, if you can find the slots, you
might as well make your chosen travel power as good as it can be.

For Stamina, six-slots all the way. Hasten should have five or
six. The last one moves you from a trivial downtime on it to no
downtime. You are probably fine either way. If you have the
slots, go for six, but this is an area you can grab a slot from.

Defensive powers should just get their default one-slot. SOs
normally give a 33% boost, but defense buffs are one of the few
that only get a 20% boost. It just isn't worth it to waste your
slots for that little return until after you've fleshed
everything else out. Its not inherently bad to have more defense,
but it can be difficult finding the slots and I wouldn't weaken
my offense by doing so. Its better to use one more power slot to
pick up another defense skill than it is to spend five slots to
double the effectiveness of a defense skill in my opinion.

For Aim and Buildup, two to three slots is enough to always have
one up (with Hasten), though it is probably enough to leave them
at one slot. For quick exping, you hit Buildup then use your
attacks and by the time Buildup wears off, the fight should be
over. By the time you find your next pack to kill, it will be up
again even with one slot.

Note that once you get Stamina slotted up, endurance will not be
a problem. Before then you might want to slot your toggle powers
with endurance reduction.


WHEN TO TAKE POWERS

The first twenty levels are for getting your primary attacks,
getting your travel power, and getting Stamina. Leave powers that
are not critical for your twenties. You want Stamina by level 22
at the latest. It is that good.

If you are a fire blaster, you get your two primary AOEs (Fire
Vreath and Fire Ball) by level 8, so you want to prioritize your
defense powers. The sooner you have them, the sooner you can
start crushing packs of whites and yellows instead of greens and
blues.

For Assault Rifle, your good AOEs come late. Your early ones,
Buckshot and M30 grenade, are both pretty worthless. Your useful
AOEs are Flamethrower and Full Auto, so you have time before you
can turn into an AOE blaster.

For single-target blasters, defensive abilities are still useful
but not as critical. You really don't have the firepower to kill
more than whites or yellows efficiently for a number of levels,
and white or yellow minions are pretty harmless even without
defensive powers.


SOLOING

First of all, understand that door mission are bad exp. The
higher your level, the worse they become. They are a good change
of pace and can be fun, but when you want to get experience, you
don't want to be doing them.

AOE blasters grind best in hazard zones taking on big packs. Get
used to Perez Park, Boomtown, Dark Astoria, and Crey's Folly,
they will be your zones of choice.

Single-target blasters grind best in city zones taking on small
packs. Door missions are viable longer for you, especially if you
find a good one and keep resetting it. They have nice small
clumps of whites for you to kill. But eventually, your nukes will
be overkill on whites and you'll want to move to the street where
you can find more challenging prey. Get used to King's Row,
Skyway city, Independence port, Brickstown, and Founder's Falls,
you will be spending a lot of grind time in each.

A tip for fighting street mobs. Spawns are done on demand, when a
player gets near them. The mobs have a level range depending on
where they are. However, most often a mob will spawn in level
based on the player who spawned it. So, if the mobs range in
level from 26 to 29 and you are level 26, you'll see a mix. If
you are level 29, you will almost always see only level 29s. This
is good, street fighting less than whites is a waste of time.
But, it means you want to be as alone as you can be. If you have
lower-level players running around triggering the spawns, you
will find yourself frustrated with lots of greens and blues.

Also understand there is nothing wrong with fighting weaker mobs
at low levels. In your 20s and 30s, white mobs are very weak to
you. But low teens, they are tougher. Just because you will
eventually be killing packs of whites or small groups of reds
doesn't mean you can do it at early levels. As a general rule,
you will get better exp by slaughtering masses of mobs weak to
you as compared to taking a longer time to kill fewer weaker
mobs. This is why AOE is better leveling than single-target. If,
at your level, a certain pack of mobs does any appreciable damage
to you, you will get better exp by finding similar mobs a level
or two lower.

Stealth is your friend. With stealth, you can dictate exactly how
the fight starts and always get off the first shot. This is
especially important for AOE blasters. Fire Breath and
Flamethrower are devestating, short range attacks. You want to
move close to get their cone perfectly aligned before you open
the fight. Stealth lets you do that. For Energy blasters, getting
close enough to use Power Burst after your Snipe is helpful. Ice
Blasters generally engage and fight far enough away that the mobs
won't aggro until after you start the fight, so they can best
afford to not have stealth. Even so, it is still a fantastic
power. And both Stealth and Cloaking Device give a hefty defense
boost during the combat as well. Its tough to pass up one of the
stealth powers on a blaster.


GROUPING

Large groups, more than four, are purely for fun. If you want to
get good exp, stick to four or less. Ok, actually you should be
soloing. But when you group, you should be dominating the action.
The game is about damage, blasters are by far the highest damage
class. If you built your character well, grouping revolves around
you. In a small group, basically you pick fights just as you
would solo, just more difficult versions. Everyone who is not a
blaster has one job: make sure you live and make sure you can do
as much damage as possible.

This means if you are an AOE blaster and you do not have a tank
who can hold aggro and let you use your AOEs, the group is bad.
If you are a single-target blaster and you are not going for reds
(and purples when they readjust villian difficulty), the group is
bad. If the team's blasters are not putting out as much damage as
they can to their preferred target, the group is bad.

Don't get me wrong, sometimes you just want to have fun and then
grouping is great. But if you want exp, and want to group, you
will need to carefully monitor how the group unfolds or else your
exp bar is not going to be moving.


WHY MELEE IS NO BIG DEAL

Many blasters love Hover and claim that any melee is death, that
you will always be dead in a hit or two in melee. They are wrong.
Probably they don't have any defensive powers, and suboptimal
builds that do not kill quickly enough. I have a level 40, and I
can tell you that even at level 40 melee is no big deal most of
the time when soloing (grouping and fighting harder mobs is a
different story but a good tank will mean it still isn't much of
a problem). Only very specific mobs are threats in melee and you
will soon learn which. Basically, if it is a generic minion,
don't worry about it. Melee with minions is more of a threat low
level than high level. By level 20, minions are no threat to you.
The mobs you fight will die in seconds, you will have defensive
power choices, a few mobs swinging at you a couple times won't
make any noticeable drop in your health. Pop a health inspiration
whenever you get low on life, they drop like candy.

There are a few mobs that are a threat in melee. Any Boss and
some lieutenants (Freakshow comes to mind) are the ones you do
not want near you. You can use Hover to keep out of melee range,
but you have to waste an entire power pool slot on it, and more
importantly have to take the Flying pool which means one less
pool choice for better defensive powers. Plus you are stuck with
flying as a travel power, because it just is too darn tedious to
drop to the ground, use a travel power, then rehover up over and
over to set up each fight. Moving from pack to pack is constant
when grinding, and Superspeed is the best to do it. A few seconds
multiplied over thousands of packs over your character's career
is a lot of time.

Being afraid of melee, even a little bit, applies mostly to
single-target blasters. For AOE blasters, you are fighting packs
of white or at-most yellow minions and the battles last long
enough to cast one or two AOEs and then your foes are dead. They
will shoot one round of ranged attacks before they drop. You
ignore any bosses or lieutenants. Fire your two shots and move
on. Melee simply never comes up.

It is the single-target blaster who is fighting higher con (and
thus more dangerous) mobs and will be concerned about melee. If
you have Devices, just forget Hover. Throw Caltrops down in front
of you before you attack and melee is never an issue. If you have
Superspeed, just kite. Fire your attacks, and while waiting for
them to recycle, the few seconds, turn on Superspeed, back up to
maximum range again, and turn it off. If you have Hurdle plus
Combat Jumping, jump backwards to accomplish the same thing.
Heck, just turn on sprint and back up. Of course, more often than
not, the mobs are dead in seconds so you don't need to bother
kiting.

The point is, Hover is unnecessary. It works, it just isn't
needed. To me, it is a wasted power pick. At least it does have a
defense boost, so that is one plus for it. If you like Hover, go
for it, just don't assume other blasters need it to survive or
that we die a lot without it.


THE END

Well, that was quite long. I think the template here will help
new blaster powergamers understand how to build and play blasters
efficiently. I'm sure there are some differences of opinion, some
people prefer to play slightly differently than me, but you
certainly won't go wrong building a blaster according to my
guidelines. Feel free to post your own tips and comments!


Kelena, 40 energy/devices
Technobabble, 26 assault rifle/devices
both members of Knight in Tights on Virtue

(plus lots and lots of alts)

[TacRedline]

Nice. Read the whole thing. 5 Stars.

[The_Shield]

A lot of well thought out ideas.
Just my 2 cents...
Take flight, its fun.

[Ex_Libris]

Nice post. Very good info.

[Ex_Libris]

Good stuff! I took Hover/Fly based on what I read from the boards and find it nearly 95% useless. I guess maybe if you didn't have Caltrops/Web gren.. it might be nice to space yourself.

[Ex_Libris]

Thanks for the info, that was very good reading.

[dave_p]

Fly is incredibly useful... but not for power leveling. Within that scope, SS is best. Great post; 5 stars.

One disagreement: Energy is a viable AoE set. Even before 6-slotting, I was able to kill blues & below with Explosive Blast & Torrent in one salvo with Build Up/Aim. Not nearly as effective as Fire or high lvl AR, but still viable.

Any thought on how to best use the prestige powers, like Nova, to AE mobs? Use them alone or as a followup to an Energy Blast? Skip altogether? Slot as soon as you get it at 32?

[Ex_Libris]

Thanks for depressing me about my electricity blaster.
I've not tried any of the other Primaries seriously, but have always felt that it lacked an attack.
However Tesla Cage is great for taking Lts out, or giving you the chance to fight single targets/smal grps more on your terms.
The end-drain is pretty hopeless 99% of the time tho, like you say, personally I'd like to see it replaced with the stun-like effect you sometimes see (but not often enough) with Electricity attacks.

[Mythra]

Fly is great for getting out of a bad situation fast. So is jumping, but if you're getting hover, you might as well take fly as well, and save some skill points.

[_Naga_]

I'm a level 24 Ele/Devices casual power gamer (have the knowledge but not the time) who's read a lot and played a slew of throw-away alts.

Hasten, Stamina, Targeting Drone, Smoke Grenade, two six slotted ranged attacks. Instant blaster formula. After that, mix in secondary powers to round it out.

If you are a pure power game, elec is not ideal. Endurance drain is a non-factor in PvM 99% of the time. Elec lacks the third attack to make a great single target blaster, e.g. Power Burst. Instead of a cone attack like Frost Breath, they get Short Circuit which is PBAoE and puts you in the midst of a pack instead of its edge. They only get one hold instead of Ice's two, which makes Boss lockdown slower and harder.

On the upside - Charged Bolts, Lightning Bolt, and Zapp are all solid with typical damage, reasonable range, and good animation times - no knocks there really. Tesla Cage is a good power. Elec is geared to be a single target blaster so being able to lock down one monster in a pack is valuable - esp if you can lockdown the most annoying one, e.g. the Sorceror. Aim is a "round out the template" power not a defining one but it is still decent. Thunderous Blast is Ranged AoE rather than the more typical PBAoE which is an upside. Energy damage works just fine.

Elec also plays well in a team. No knockback to annoy the tanks or move targets out of the controller's AoE effects. Not AoE based so doesn't attract a lot of hate. Adds a hold that can be stacked with other's. Most of this doesn't matter, of course, since whatever a blaster is attacking soon dies. So knocking something away from a tank shoud be taken as "I'm killing this, attack something else" and attacking it means it no longer needs to be controlled since it will soon be dead. And power gaming AoE blasters should be in teams optimized around doing AoE damage - so hate doesn't matter since the landslide of AoE nukes will kill it all nearly instantly anyway.

All that said, if you don't need to be a pure power gamer munchkin than Elec works just fine as a single target blaster.

Just my humble opinion of course.

*edit* I think the ele stun is purely visual and not a real stun. It just seems like a damage anim the monster plays - landing another attack ends the anim. And it sure seems like the monster attacking will end the anim as well. Oh, and I think the anim is played when end recovery is halted, which is a small % chance effect on the bolts - I believe the guide called it 20% chance to stop end recovery for Charged Bolts.

[ElectricJester]

Electricity is by far the weakest of the primaries. If powergaming is your thing, don't take it. And for all you electricity blasters who want to respond by relating some story to prove you are not weak, stop. You are.

But, but, but.....

[Ex_Libris]

Very good post.

This explains a lot better than I could why my Fire Blaster doesn't avoid melee, I just don't start off with it (of course).

At 31, I was killed twice by orange Freak bosses. Yes, I killed them before, but it gets tough when they lob a grenade then run up and try to wack you and annoying when they get down to half HPs and start to run. My mistake was letting the boss get too close. I am avoiding them for the most part now, not worth the trouble.

At 32, I can kill a single red minion easily in 3 shots. (Build, Aim, Fire Bolt, then finishing with Fire Blast or Breath.) A bunch (3-10) of white, yellow and orange minions are np 2-shot killing assuming I have the right angle and position.

Crey's is a nice place to solo. Be careful of those darn packs of yellow bees. They wittled me down fast and are easy to underestimate, but they are tempting one shot kills of 100+ xp per mob. It's just hard to get more than 3 at once in an AOE because they move around too much.

My weakness is toggling targets using tab, I don't use it and it's probably gotten me in trouble a few more times than needed so I have to force myself to get used to tabbing it.

I disagree with skipping Hover and Fly, but at least you gave applicable reasons why. I like Hover myself. I was able to kill large packs of Wolves just by hovering and nuking. I have Fly 3 slotted with fly speed SOs and I can keep up with a friend who has superspeed. Gave him a head start as we went across town to the green tram, and as he was arriving there I was close behind. Before the SO's he'd always beat me and have to tp me, not anymore. Remember, with Superspeed you have to run around buildings and take streets, fly is more convenient for me. Your mileage may vary. I just like having the diversity when I want it and I'm not interested in even being slightly compared to a power gamer.

I like Aim because (like this guide indicated) coupled with Buildup I can solo orange bosses. Buildup, Aim, Blazing Bolt, Fire Blast, Fire Breath (or Blast) all can hit at max. After that it's just whittling it down. I only had to ask for help on a mission once when a purple vampire appeared at the end.

Overall though a good guide for many players because it seems that a lot of you want to race to 40 as fast as possible, then make an alt and race him to 40 too. Too much of a vicious cycle for me. But with the current fixes (and nerfs) it is harder to get in a group. 31 has got be be the ********* level ever because you are too high for TF groups and 2 low for higher groups. The patch forced me to solo. I can no longer group against purple mobs 5 levels above me because I can't hit (when I do) for higher than a whole 3 damage. But that's another story.

[Iceshrike]

[ QUOTE ]
I have Fly 3 slotted with fly speed SOs and I can keep up with a friend who has superspeed.

[/ QUOTE ]

Fly has an immensely lower cap than superspeed does, i can't imagine this ever happening. I'm an SSer and there is no way fly can keep up in raw speed regardless how many enhancers you have.

[Mythra]

Superspeed is like 83 mph cap, Fly is like 43 mph (I think or maybe 53). There's a dev post on it somewhere.

Last I timed flight, around level 27 or so, with 1 SO speed, I was going 32 mph.

In any case, superspeed is much faster.

[Ex_Libris]

In a city, superspeeders cannot run through building walls. Therefore they are forced to run around streets. Not to mention once in a while overshooting and running into stuff by mistake. I have the advantage here, and if they do get to one side first in a race I am a mere few seconds behind.

In a straightaway with no obstacles, sure they can beat fly. But how many times does your team end up going from one end of a city to another? A whole lot. I'm not talking miles per hour, I'm talking keeping up in the city limits. At 32 with 3 35 SO's it is no longer a hindrance for me, it is even too fast indoors.

With that in mind, fly is excellent for me and I don't regret not having Superspeed.

[PositronBot]

I am an electric blaster and find lvl'ing pretty easy with the way i work. I usually jump on for a few hours at a time and get about 5000-10000 xp each time i jump on. I can consistently take out a mob one lvl lower than me in about 10 sec. strategy: i turn on electric field, hit BuildUp, then jump in middle of mob (combat jump is on) throw out my electric blast, and before my buildup wears off i hit Short Circuit and by then most all the guys in the mob are dropped. But ur prolly right...fire/ice blasters are prolly doing the same thing to mobs 3 lvls higher than them so my guys is worthless......buy hey... my special effects look waaay cooler!!!! ;)

[Ex_Libris]

[ QUOTE ]
Electricty and Ice secondaries, in my opinion, just don't cut it.
They have nothing going for them.

[/ QUOTE ]
Can't argue with you there.

[ QUOTE ]
You should only take Flight if you are already taking Hover since
Flight is so slow that it barely qualifies as a travel power.

[/ QUOTE ]
4 - 40++ SO Fly enhs' in Fly make it as fast as or faster than an equally slotted superspeed. Tested last night :) There is a speed cap, but there are zones where flying will getcha killed :(. It's a trade off, the precision flying you can do allow for interesting tactics, as opposed to just running around on the ground. All said, when respec comes i'll probably take superspeed and keep fly, for when running is preffered.

You didn't even touch on ice primary's 2 hold powers. These give us a unique advantage to keep 3 villians held down throughout a fight, or 1 boss and 1 villian. Or, if you can survive the encounter, you can hold an archvillian/monster by yourself. No other blaster can do this as easily and I look forward to pvp ;). There are plenty of 'optimal' ice threads out there.

Other than that, solid post. Good way to tear it apart and make sense of it all. In the end tho, only do what makes ya happy. No point running around all the time when you always wished you could fly or jump.

[Jim_G]

Great comprehensive post! I strongly encourage you to at least post a link to it in the Forum on Guides and FAQs.

[Ex_Libris]

you didn't even point out the best thing about fly, which makes it hands down far above the rest


you can just put the thing on auto-pilot and alt-tab out and read the web, browse the forum, whatever you wanna do .... just point your nose up and towards the yellow dot... bingo... you dont have to do any work and you dont have to watch it just check back in a bit you'll probably be there... if not just alt-tab again... its so painless

fly is just too good to pass up

[SBeaudway]

[ QUOTE ]
you didn't even point out the best thing about fly, which makes it hands down far above the rest

you can just put the thing on auto-pilot and alt-tab out and read the web, browse the forum, whatever you wanna do .... just point your nose up and towards the yellow dot... bingo... you dont have to do any work and you dont have to watch it just check back in a bit you'll probably be there... if not just alt-tab again... its so painless

fly is just too good to pass up

[/ QUOTE ]

Agree with your post. I use the time to chat with the supergroup. But, the slow speed still drives me nuts now (lvl 27). I will probably switch to superspeed on a respec (if we ever get one). Plus Fly is useless indoors (I only run anyway). I agree with the original poster, in that, hovering out of melee range is a non-issue. Blasters do so much damage, no one gets close to me. Esp. with caltrops (which I rarely need to use).

[thador]

I have to disagree with this post a bit I'm an ELE/Cold Blaster and have been playing these types of game for years. I have been playing a week a few hours a day and my blaster is lvl 21 and im doing this grinding, door missions solo and grp and TF with friends only 1. Pick your char based on what you like, cause for the PL it about strat yes the other balster might have it a little easier then me, but I dont like things easy.

I chose the ele/cold baster cause thats what I wanted. I can solo or grp does not matter and lvl just as fast. Its all about strat and knowing your char abilities and weaknesses, for example lvl's 1 to 20 were pretty easy and the strat was easier for me. Hit lvl 20 got new contacts new missions harder mobs and before I new it bam 5k debt.

Thought about what I was doing and got a new strat down and less than a day no debt and lvl 21 here I am. So its about haveing fun and playing the char you want to play. Also I died take fly as well and no other special powers yet. So dont be discioureaged that you made an ele/anything blaster.

[45th_Parallel]

Great post. I agree with pretty much everything. Just a few points:

[ QUOTE ]
Electricty and Ice secondaries, in my opinion, just don't cut it.
They have nothing going for them.

[/ QUOTE ]

I mostly agree with this. However, I think you are highly over-rating Fire sword circle, and other than getting build-up early, energy is pretty much crap too. I think all the secondaries other than devices are equally crap (well, elec is still the worst of the worst).

The ice secondary does have one thing going for it – it has the best root by far. Chilblain provides a good attack slow as well as an immobilize, so it provides for some damage mitigation.

Also, you never make mention of Ice’s holds or slows. The damage mitigation provided by holds/slows is 100x better than the paltry 5-10% def bonuses you get from pool powers. Why even bother with super speed/stealth/kiting when I can hold several mobs and take zero damage? Not to mention that holds make several types of mobs practical to kill, that other sets would have to pass up on (tsoo sorcs come to mind). In fact, the only thing that saves the elec set (for me anyway) is that it gets a hold.

Also, I agree with you that hover/fly is not as great as many make it out to be. However, I still see it as being useful for Energy or Ice. As you pointed out, they have to pick small groups of mobs the proper level to get optimum xp. Fly is by far the best scouting power, so in real time spent looking for outdoor mobs, I think flight will help with level speed.

[arzenal22]

I have a lvl 32 Ice/Ice and you're pretty far off on your Ice comments

1) Ice Secondary has at least 3 good powers, maybe 4. Buildup, enough said. Chillblain can hold extremely well, Ice Patch is very useful for bosses. If they arent aggro'd on you, walk up and drop a patch on him. They wont attack again. Shiver is the best AoE slow in the game. Groups of mobs wont even move after landing it.

2) Ice doesnt do AoE? How about Ice Storm, Frost Breath, and Blizzard? All AoE attacks. Granted Ice Storm and Blizzard dont do massive AoE Damage but they Slow, Debuff, and panic. Frost Breath can take even lvl mobs down to half health in one shot.

3) Our attack animations are the fastest in the game. I can get Ice Bolt, Blast, and BiB all off before a fire blaster or energy blaster can get thru their 2nd attack. So in essence, I can deal damage faster. My animations have 1 second activation.

Oh and did I mention I can hold bosses by myself with 2 holds?

Granted, Ice has the worst ultimate of all..blizzard is godawful. Nova and Inferno flat out own it, but I hope the Devs will adjust it soon

Ice is underrated by you dramatically

[Kusanagi77]

Excellent post. You should put this in the Faq section, this I'm sure will be a great help to many.

[Ex_Libris]

Devices is excellent not only because of the drone, but the Smoke Grenade as well. With smoke grenade, it's like giving your group a great +DEF bonus! I could smoke grenade a group of lvl 35 werewolves (8-10 of them), and with combat jumping and cloaking device, I would get hit once before FA/FT would finish them off. I have no fear of death to melee, and if I die, I learn from my mistakes and I go back at it, this time smarter. With the new hasten DEF, it should be even nicer for those who take these defensive skills. We're not tanks, but it is nice to be able to stand there and take the heat when your tank's provoke hasn't recharged and you're laying down a massive AE on 20 pissed off mobs.

[RSRobinson]

Thanks for the feedback people, I went through and wrote up some
thoughts on the comments. Sorry that I don't have the patience to
quote everyone by name.

I knew fly and electricity would be controversial. I didn't
expect Ice Blasters to jump on my case, as I said nothing bad
about Ice. I didn't go into as much detail as Energy as I have a
level 40 Energy blaster not Ice Blaster, but Ice is still a good
single target power set. As for powers that I didn't mention,
like holds, I only did a guide for quick and efficient leveling.
Those powers are not used in that context and are thus
irrelevent. If you are having to shoot off a hold, you are
fighting mobs that are not the best you could be fighting
exp-wise. Even after picking up all the powers I suggest, any of
the sets is going to have a number of picks and enhancement slots
left to get the utility stuff and customize it for their needs. I
only addressed the stuff you want and need for quick leveling.

But to electricity blasters. You are still a blaster which
makes you better off then the other archtypes. Just compared to
the other power sets, you come up short. Its just that the
secondary effect is so bad. Ice has slow, Energy has knockback,
you get the terrible endurance drain. Lacking a third big nuke
hurts, but is livable. Giving up a strong secondary effect is
what makes Electricity inferior to both Ice and Energy.

As for flight, I took flight on my first character (a level 24
controller) and was crushed the first time I grouped in
Independence Port and the speeders/jumpers cooked me getting
across the zone. Its really noticeable in such a huge zone just
how much slower you are. Speed is just plain useful. And no way
will a flyer beat me across a zone regardless of enhancements. A
short hop 100 meters through city streets in which I have to go
around? Ok. Any real travelling across a zone? No way. You just
come to learn the zones and the fastest way to get places. And as
soon as there is any long stretch, superspeed just blitzes out
ahead. Also, superspeed plus cloaking device or stealth means no
worry about unwanted aggro and makes for easy scouting.

Alt-tabbing out while flying? Hah, that is exactly because it is
so slow. At superspeed, even crossing Independence Port won't
give me enough time to alt-tab out and really do anything.
Superspeed fully enhanced (which takes only 2 slots) is about
twice as fast as fly fully-enhanced, closer to 4 times as fast as
unenhanced fly. If you guys like fly, great for you, but I
honestly can't recommend it, speed just has too many benefits in
my opinion.

Hover. I don't like it. I do see why some like it. However, my
point was not that it is terrible, rather that it is not the
necessity I've seen some people treat it as. I was trying to
counteract the myth that a blaster must take Hover or become part
of the pavement due to mob melee. That just isn't the case.

As for Energy being viable AOE, it almost stacks up damage-wise,
but not quite. If you can't take out the pack with your first
salvo of AOEs then you can't efficiently exp with it. That's why
I like Fire Sword Circle. Its not the greatest, but it gives you
the AOE firepower necessary to kill off the group with your first
set of attacks for the weaker AOE powersets and is thus usable.
However, my general feeling is that if you want AOE, go Fire or
AR. Like a poster said, I too agree that Devices is just
better than the other secondaries, but energy and fire are both
viable for their reasons. It can be done and my guess is that an
efficient leveler can be made out of it. So I mentioned them.

In answer to a question, the final powers like Nova, once
slotted, do enough damage to basically kill any non-boss you are
fighting. I have Nova, my friend has Thunderous Blast (poor guy
chose Electricity). With these powers, all minions are dead. You
just use it and then back off or use a couple endurance
inspirations because you have no endurance or endurance regen for
a while and you are bound to have missed one or two, or if it is
Freakshow, some will stand back up. Its a fun power, it really
isn't an efficient leveling power though. But darn is it neat to
throw a bunch of corpses in all directions. And for electricity,
the victims stand there for a short time and shake before they
collapse, it looks pretty cool.

Someone mentioned swarms. Swarms are nerfed, but still soloable
depending on your build. Watch out, they move so fast that they
aren't where they appear to be, your client generally is not in
sync with the server. If you come on a pack and it spawns for
you, you can AOE it. If it is already spawned, what you want to
do is shoot one, the rest charge you and now you can AOE them
because they are all right on top of you. This is easier when
they are close to your level, they do a bit too much damage if
they are too high. I liked doing this with Trip Mines, fun fun
fun.

[Ex_Libris]

Well, I have taken 2 characters to lvl 18, not very high I know. Both Eng/Eng. First I rerolled because I wanted to take ET. The second I enjoyed so much more because of ET. But being Eng/Eng it was my only AOE if a cone could be called that early on. I have never played uber type characters in MMORPG's, but darnit, I want to this time. Love my blasters, but in the context of AOE blasters and power lvling to some degree which of these offers the most. Ice/fire, I figure you get good single target, a cone attack and then I would attempt to use fires secondary for additional AOE power. Fire/Fire, massive AOE's, even if I took the secondary melee AOE's would I find I never used them? Or should I merely go with what seems most min/maxy and get Fire/Device and just lay waste because with fires mass damage and devices utility, it really makes the control of Ice or the additional AOE's of fire secondary slightly less powerful?

Im not a kid, just a 42 year old who has a bit of time between work and kids who is not interesting in role playing, being innovative, playing a weaker class cuz no one else is or avoiding the the popular class on principle. This time I want to be the guy with the cookie cutter power class wreaking havoc upon the game. So experts, what do you think?


Ack, I didnt read your added thoughts, and it answered my questions mostly.

[BCanoe]

Could you post a Fire/Fire build? I am with phase2, I just want to go for the power to level, I have other characters for roleplaying.

[Doc_Phantom]

As someone who has played almost all blaster combos out there as alts, including a melee only elec/energy blaster, I have a few comments on ice also. I won't try to "jump on your case", but your assesment is incorrect.

My ice blaster does more DPS than my fire blaster.

Ironically, my energy melee blaster does more dmg per hit than any blaster I have seen, moreso after the recent patch (just get one to lvl 15 w/ melee slotting only and you'll see). My fire/energy does more dmg on a single target with an unenhanced Bone Smasher than my primary Fire Blast does with 5 dmg DOs... but I digress.

The point was to point out powerleveling discrepencies with ice/blah.

Fire breath hits for less dmg per tick over 3 ticks with the same cone as ice breath, which does 2 larger ticks at the same time. The dmg output seems to be almost identical. So, although ice does not have a followup ball-of-fire, power leveling (using your solo definition) is slower, but pretty close, and better than the remaining blasters... although energy can be fun also.

Yesterday I rerolled an old lvl 11 toon (ice/fire) as ice/dev. In about 8.5 hours of play I hit 12.5. I ran only 3 missions up to 12.5 (not including "kill x blahblahs"). Quite opposite of my main toons, but was a test to see his solo abilities.

So, to bore you a tad more, I went to PP at 7. I found smaller groups of 7s until I leveled. I lvled and came back. At this point, I was able to take out 15 -1 groups w/ 1 lt or boss per. The fight would be me lining up a cone, hitting the cone, throwing caltrops, picking off baddies who skirted them or the boss, then lining up and casting breath again as soon as it came up. Unless there was a runner, all dead. Total fight time, about 20 seconds. XP per group, usually 100, which was about 1/20th of level I think. Down time between groups was about 45 seconds as I found another and waited for endurance. Slots? Max possible in ice breath until I got 6, with ice blast trailing w/ a few less (5 in breath at 7, 4 in blast).

So, now that I have some DOs (more if I xfer some influence from my mains), I will have to reevaluate my tactics. I also have Ice Storm, which may turn this into a breath/caltrops/storm battle or some crazy alternative.

So what I am saying... is that my ice blaster can lvl just as quick as my fire (who used to pull buildup/breath/ball/rain combo to take out -1 groups). Same result. Almost identical fight duration. Only difference is lining up the cone 2 times (which fire only did once per battle), which can be a pain sometimes.

[BigT_TheFront]

[ QUOTE ]
Consider this. Imagine a person who slots each attack power with
3 damage, 1 accuracy, 1 endurance, and 1 recharge reduction for a
'balanced' approach. Now consider the device blaster slotting 6
damage instead. He is able to do that because Stamina takes care
of endurance, Hasten takes care of recharge, and Targeting Drone
takes care of accuracy. With SO damage enhancements adding 33% at
even level, the first person is doing two times base damage while
the second is doing three times base damage. Every shot is doing
50% more damage by slotting all damage. Basically, the second
person is doing the same damage on every shot that the first
person is doing with Buildup. A free Buildup on every shot? Sign
me up!

[/ QUOTE ]

WOW! I never thought of it this way! Great guide!!! Thanks.

[Iceshrike]

[ QUOTE ]
Those powers are not used in that context and are thus
irrelevent. If you are having to shoot off a hold, you are
fighting mobs that are not the best you could be fighting
exp-wise. Even after picking up all the powers I suggest, any of
the sets is going to have a number of picks and enhancement slots
left to get the utility stuff and customize it for their needs. I
only addressed the stuff you want and need for quick leveling.


[/ QUOTE ]

Play or watch an iceblaster and you'll find its a bit different, freeze can mean the difference between HP downtime or hospital trips and save you worry over disorients. Think the main issue was that you applied a leveling "assumption" on ice blasters without having any real experience with 'em.. and ignored two of the primary powers in the set.

[Ex_Libris]

Thanks for the info on swarms. I will use that tactic and will steer clear of higher swarms.

As for the other guy who says his ice blaster does more dps than his fire, that's pretty funny. I see you didn't get either too high, a shame because that's when fire really pulls ahead.

Nah, I'm not gonna continue to put fire on a "higher ground" but if any ice blaster gets higher DPS than I do I gotta see this! Check that, I probably wouldn't care even if it was true, fire blasters do too much damage as it is and I'm fine with what I got. No, really.

[Darkening_Flame]

Nice post, i certainly feel good about my Fire/Fire blaster, and have been feeling good about him for quite awhile. I will add one idea to all of your good ones; Solo is not the way to go, not at all. Why? Find yourself a good gravity controller who slots everything into accuracy and hold duration, then go powerlevel, make sure he has hasten as well, you'll notice that you can pull faster strikes on higher con mobs than ever before and never take a lick of damage, they will simply stand there and let you rain hell on them with aoe. Wanna kill em even faster? Get a tank too and have him tp right to the center of the biggest meanest mob you can find, the grav controller can follow up with crushing field for a serious hold on a tightly grouped mob of super aggro'd baddies, then you just lay down the fire and watch the HP melt away. I seriously spend all my time at almost full End and never take damage anymore, the mobs just fall fast, fast, fast. Grav controllers are a must and deserve alot of credit, I think any fire blaster that's grouped alot with a good one can testify to that.

[Ex_Libris]

[ QUOTE ]
So, to bore you a tad more, I went to PP at 7. I found smaller groups of 7s until I leveled. I lvled and came back. At this point, I was able to take out 15 -1 groups w/ 1 lt or boss per. The fight would be me lining up a cone, hitting the cone, throwing caltrops, picking off baddies who skirted them or the boss, then lining up and casting breath again as soon as it came up. Unless there was a runner, all dead. Total fight time, about 20 seconds. XP per group, usually 100, which was about 1/20th of level I think. Down time between groups was about 45 seconds as I found another and waited for endurance. Slots? Max possible in ice breath until I got 6, with ice blast trailing w/ a few less (5 in breath at 7, 4 in blast).

So, now that I have some DOs (more if I xfer some influence from my mains), I will have to reevaluate my tactics. I also have Ice Storm, which may turn this into a breath/caltrops/storm battle or some crazy alternative.

So what I am saying... is that my ice blaster can lvl just as quick as my fire (who used to pull buildup/breath/ball/rain combo to take out -1 groups). Same result. Almost identical fight duration. Only difference is lining up the cone 2 times (which fire only did once per battle), which can be a pain sometimes.

[/ QUOTE ]

No offense, but how exactly is this the same duration fight? You have to wait on the ice breath to refresh while the fire does fire breath followed by fireball and then moves on to the next group.

[Ex_Libris]

I didn't read the replies; just want to mention that RS Robinson knows 100% what he's talking about.

...except superspeed can be capped with your original enhancement slot if you choose swift instead of hurdle :)

[RSRobinson]

You ice blasters have to understand that I am talking about
leveling efficiently. Simply put, you are not fighting any mob
that can stun you or that represents any danger such that you
would need a hold. Having holds is irrelevent because you will
never use them. Yes it is a valueable power when just playing the
game but not when powerleveling. When powerleveling, you will not
have hit point downtime, you will take next to zero damage
factoring in the healing inspirations that will be constantly
dropping (and often they aren't even needed), and you won't be
dying.

Take the single-target power set Ice. You will spend the 20s in
Independence Port going after 5th column and family. Dark Astoria
is preferable, but the zombies are cold-resistant and Ice has no
snipe nor good AOEs so I am reasonably confident you won't get
good exp there. You will spend the 30s either in Crey's Folly
doing Swarms (a BIG plus for Devices that you get Trip Mine for
use on them) or in Founder's Falls killing Circle of Thorns or in
Brickstown killing werewolves and various other wimpy spawns.
These are the best places to get exp for a blaster from 20 until
40. Dark Astoria and Crey's Folly are the best for AOEing,
Independence Port and Founder's Falls are the best for small
groups for single target. In none of these places does a hold
ability matter. Once in a while in Dark Astoria a shaman will
hold you. Near 40 in Founder's Falls the Air Thorn casters
likewise will hold you, once in a while. These are rare
occurances, and who cares? You'll see that the situations you are
in, an occassional hold is an annoyance, nothing more. You won't
be in any danger of dying. That is one of the reasons these
places are where we grind, no danger, no need for any control
powers. Get a few defensive skills and mob DPS to you is low
enough that you'd have to actively try to get yourself killed.

I know holds are excellent powers in any situation in which you
are at risk. The whole point of powerleveling is to make a
situation with maximum experience and minimum risk. And although
I don't have a level 40 ice blaster, don't assume that doesn't
mean I haven't played one at all. Importantly, I've played a
single target energy blaster to 40. I know the difference between
playing the game for fun, fighting challenging enemies, and just
grinding for maximum exp. The former, holds or other control
powers are very useful. The later, they are dead weight.

Put it another way. Please tell me where you would grind exp solo
in the 20s and 30s that you would have any reason to use a hold.
I don't think you can name any place that wouldn't be much lower
exp than the places I mentioned above, where no holds are
required.

As for Frost Breath, the game is not the same low level as it is
high level. Really, I consider level 20-22 the breaking point. By
that time, you have all your key powers, have them slotted, you
have stamina, and at 22 you get SOs. While your Frost Breath may
seem comparable to a fire blaster's powers in Perez Park, it is a
far different story in Dark Astoria. Your Frost Breath and Ice
Storm simply cannot compare to the Fire Blaster's Fire Breath and
Fire Ball. Just the fact alone that the zombies take extra damage
from fire and reduced damage from Ice means even if your powers
were identical, you'd still earn exp much slower. And AOE killing
zombies in Dark Astoria is by far the best exp you can get for
the entire 20s, nowhere else even comes close.

Melee blasters just won't going to work. I said in my post that
melee is not a threat, but it will be if you are actively seeking
it out to be able to use your attacks. The damage melee attacks
now do is impressive, yes, but I don't think you will get a
viable leveler out of it. If you do, post the build and where you
fought. And once again, anyone can get 15 or 20 levels quick on
any blaster even picking the weakest powers. Tell me how to get
through the 20s much less the 30s efficiently with such a build
and I will be impressed. Heck, I'd be impressed if a melee
blaster soled his way to 40. Period. No matter how long it took.
And it will take a LONG time.

Understand that most of my comments judging the power sets are
geared to the later levels. Yes you can AOE kill as Ice for your
first 10 or 15 levels, maybe even 20. However, watch a good fire
blaster doing the same and you will have to admit they do a far
better job. Go to Dark Astoria and watch a fire blaster two-shot
packs of zombies, or an assault rifle blaster one-shot them. A
few seconds and a pack of 10-15 mobs is dead (you just ignore
the shaman), move on to find another.I would be just shocked to
see any Ice Blaster AOEing even 1/4th as effectively or getting
good exp in any AOE fashion from 20 on. Please, if you can, tell
me where, my Ice Blaster is fast approaching the 20s and would
love to get that kind of exp!

The truth is that the first 20 levels are really development time
on your character so you can do the last 20 levels at something
more than a snail's pace. The exp and time you need for each
level begins to grow quickly in the 20s and skyrockets in the
30s. Just about any blaster can level reasonably quickly the
first 20 levels, even with a melee build or a single-target power
set using AOE build, whatever. You won't see it not working until
it is too late to fix the problem on that character. That is the
point of this guide, to help you build a character early on that
won't be more and more unplayable as you climb in levels.

The point of powerleveling is to get to 40, not 10 or 20. As I
said in my opening, many people play for fun. Go ahead then and
make your melee blasters and your AOE Ice builds. But if you want
to efficiently make your way to 40, I stand by my guide.

[Ex_Libris]

wow whats this.. the manifestation of my thoughts? lol would you beleive it, I was thinking of writing this post 15 minutes ago, and now I found it, written almost exactly as i would. heh.. A couple of things however I dont agree on :). First, Fly is only slow as hell early on.. when you hit 30+ and gear up with SOs youre no longer a floating bathtub but a rocket :D. I just don't know what I'd do without my Fly. :). Second thing, why would you say that 'm30 simply doesnt cut it later on'? From what I've read, you havent had a chance to test out a 6x SO dmg m30, right? Well it's one of my main powers and I'm extremly happy with it. The best thing about it is it has an enormous splash radius. Pre-level 30 I was exping in Terra Volta on white-yellow minions (mostly freaks and sky raiders). Smoke, flamethrower, m30. All dead except for LTs. Snipe, slug, move on. You're right about the rest though :D and I just started a Fire/Dev today thats basically identical to what you described as a perfect build, except I'm using hover+flight (just a personal preference).

[Nazrek]

I must agree on not taking hover/fly. I just leveled an NRG/Dev to level 15 in a few days. Trops are doing me a better job than hover/fly. Wasted two powerslots and now it's back to reroll again for the umpteenth time.

I made an AR/Dev which I like and am following Memorex's advice which is working. I will be taking the SS and acrobatics approach (not hover/fly).

Trops are tricky to use now, I use the "dance around the trops" during a fight because mobs other than pukers don't stay caught up in them and you have to lure them back in (or get meleed from behind).

My NRG/Dev just would just get her [censored] shot up with hover in Skyway killing trolls, who liked to just stand back and take pot shots while she hovered.

I have noticed different mobs react to the trops differently.

[Ex_Libris]

Hows *this* for a challenge? Write a powerleveling guide for electricity/electricity :)

I dare yah! I double dog dare yah! :P

[Ex_Libris]

I TRIPLE dog dare ya! (Now he HAS to take the challenge!)

[Ex_Libris]

[ QUOTE ]
I have Nova, my friend has Thunderous Blast (poor guy chose Electricity).

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm the "poor guy" he's referring to. I have a level 16 Elec/Elec blaster that I abandoned when I changed servers. I now have a 36 Elec/Energy blaster. I certainly do some "power leveling" but I also do a lot of "missions for fun". I spend most of my door missions recruiting a young sidekick to tag along with me, just for the fun of it.

Charged Bolts, Lightning Bolt, Zapp are my 3 primary attacks. I pretty much use Ball lightning just for swarms, or a weak 4th attack. I have Power Thrust on auto fire. Not for the damage, but for the knockback effect if anything gets in melee range.

Thunderous Blast is literally a blast. Every time it refreshes I use it. It's got a *huge* area of effect, and will take out orange or red minions, or yellow LTs with out any worries. Losing all your endurance is not a worry. Anything that lives though the initial blast is also drained of endurance, and basically 1 bolt from defeat. Pop a couple inspirations and you're fine. The only real downside is losing any toggle powers.

[ QUOTE ]
Hows *this* for a challenge? Write a powerleveling guide for electricity/electricity

[/ QUOTE ]

Electric blasters level up just fine. That's not his point, his point was simply that the other blasters do it faster. Having had a lot of time spent as an elec blaster, I have to agree. Our secondary ability on electric attacks (endurance drain) is useless and the lack of a 3rd single target attack leaves us relying on zapp.

And rely on it I do. Coming across groups of mobs it's always zapp target 1, c-bolts and l-bolt target 2, zapp target 3. Zapp rarely gets interrupted anymore, but in cases where I am worried about that I'll pop off tesla cage, it fires reasonably quickly, especially compared to the cast time of zapp.

The biggest weakness electricity has vs Ice or Energy, the other single target blaster types, is vs bosses. With only 1 hold, don't expect to be holding bosses too often. Ice can cycle it's 2 holds, and Energy just knocks them on their backside. There's a couple bosses that just give me a hard time, Chief Soldiers for instance.

Taking out LT's are no problem though, Anything you can't kill in 2 shots you can cage first, then kill at will.

As for power leveling, in the 20's I went hunting for Totems and Mages in Dark Astoria, single pulling them (thanks super speed) and then kiting them around. Level 30 I just wrecked swarms. It was pretty ridiculous, 1 Ball Lightning, just cast it, then run on to the next pack, sometimes I'd get there after the spawn had already been activated by someone else and they'd started to move around, this is a pain, cause you want to blast them right when they're appearing and in a cluster.

About super speed: It hands down beats the other abilities, not just cause it's the fastest, or cause you can keep it always on, or cause it's just as effective indoors as out, but the big reason is cause it lets you single pull. Super speed includes a partial cloak ability that lets you run up to mobs without them engaging you. Used correctly, you can attack a mob and pull it out of a pack without the rest of the pack noticing. As long as the mob doesn't die next to them. I've also in a hurry completed entire "find x clues" missions without having to fire a shot.

I'd originally been of the opinion that hover was fantastic. But the fact is that after level 10 or so, you really don't care about melee damage as much, there's very few villains that can get into melee range with you, and even fewer that have a melee attack you worry about. A couple bosses come to mind, but they're few and far between. I have hover, I can't wait to respec and get rid of it. Stealth would have been a much better choice.

I also have to agree that hasten and stamina are a staple. I can't imagine being a blaster without them now. I 6 slotted hasten. I noticed that when they overlap, you don't take any endurance hit.

Here's what i have that i relly like:
charged bolts, lightning bolt, zapp, ball lightning, thunderous blast
tesla cage, power thrust
aim, build up
hasten, super speed, hurdle, health, stamina, combat jumping

By 30 I had all 4 power pools used and not much left, Short Circuit han't been beefed up, so I took Voltaic Sentinal. It's less than impressive. It fires so slow most fights will be over before it has a chance to run it's course. I think I'd rather have had Short Circuit or one of the melee attacks. Perhaps with Short Circuit 6-slotted that would give me the extra edge I need against some bosses. Who knows? I get total focus at 38, whch supposedly has a mod 4 disorient and knockdown. That might be what I'm looking for if true.

By the way, when doing missions with a sidekick I find Tesla Cage indespensible.

-Brae
-36 Elec Blaster
-leader Knights in Tights
-virtue server

[Ex_Libris]

[ QUOTE ]
Its just that the
secondary effect is so bad. Ice has slow, Energy has knockback,
you get the terrible endurance drain. Lacking a third big nuke
hurts, but is livable. Giving up a strong secondary effect is
what makes Electricity inferior to both Ice and Energy

[/ QUOTE ]

How are those secondary effects so strong and make you continually disrespect elec? Knockback and slow? Oh wow! My secondary powers can do both when I need them to. End drain isn't great (basically only useful against bosses), but knockback and slow aren't so great themselves as secondary effects. And, devices is quite overrated as a secondary. I have absolutely no need for cloaking device, smoke grenade, targeting drone, trip mines, etc. As an elec/ice blaster, I can start the fight from far or even run into a mob of reds, start the fight there, and not have to worry about dying. Oh yeah, ball lightning is quite nice as an aoe attack.

[Ex_Libris]

secondaries:
Knockback = not hitting you
Slow = not hitting you
end drain = still hitting you

devices:

cloaking device = not getting hit
smoke grenade = not getting hit
targetting drone = not missing
trip mine = nice aoe damage

[Outcasttaes]

Nice post, well thought out. I like that fact that you state if your building for fun or theme build what you want. To many powergamer seem to forget that many players are in it for the fun of it and berate those who aren't powerleveling. I really liked your backdown on the enhancement slots choices and why they make sense. Really nicely thought out post, thanks.

[Ex_Libris]

I'd like to see you guys skipping hover and then getting owned by Freak Tanks and speeded Ink Men. You can't hop around like a little bunny with those. The tank doesnt care about little tacs on the ground, he'll knock you down with his m30, run straight over caltrops and 1-hit you. Now please tell me an example where jumpin around would be more effective than hovering.

[NotDoc]

[ QUOTE ]
Do you have Devices and therefore
Targeting Drone? If yes, slot six damage enhancements.

[/ QUOTE ]
How do you recommend slotting Targeting Drone? Just leave it with 1 slot, moderate 3 slot, or all-out 5 slot? Thanks, gun guru, great thread!

[Ex_Libris]

Krikkit,

thanks alot for that post,
am also a elec/energy here, lvl 25 (who is considering superspeed).

Am intending to 6-slot tesla to boost the hold duration and reduce the recharge rate as much as possible so that it's more usable on bosses. Am tempted to 6-slot short circuit too, but will see how that plays out (havent got the skill yet) -may also take the power boost skill from the energy line to further augment this.

Let us know what you think of Total Focus!

[Ex_Libris]

"AOE Ice builds" - Now that's an oxymoron ;)

[Mezrah_FearGiver]

Hmmm

I am an Elec / En Blaster, even though I do enjoy my blaster and believe that my dps is good, I certainly notice that my AOE is not up to par.

At lvl 31 I started recording the amount of exp to next level and the amount of exp per even conning npc.

At lvl 31 I needed 314,405 exp and was gaining 143 exp per even con minion, so I needed 2199 (rounding up) minions.

At lvl 32 I needed 386,164 and get 161 per minion = 2399 minions.

At lvl 33 I need 470,416 and get 181 per minion = 2599 minions.

So if I continue to need an extra 200 minions per level up to 40 then my lack of good aoe is going to hurt me even more....

Regarding endurance drain.

In my 33 levels I have never had the endurance drain be effective (even against self resued freakshow that come back with 50% endurance), so as it currently stands the secondary effect of electricity is worthless and makes it by far and away the worst secondary effect of all the blaster lines.

Regarding Thunderous Blast (& possibly Nova?)
At lvl 33 I currently have thunderous blast slotted with 3 damage and 1 recharge, at lvl 34 I will be adding 2 further recharges, the reason for this is that with buildup and aim stacked I can take out a group of red minions, with ball lightning followed by thunderous blast I can take out red minions and orange LT's (my normal targets for these are the elite and field agents in brickstown which come in packs of up to 10). So for me I believe that a faster refresh on thunderous blast is preferable to the extra damage.

I am also unsure about going 5 damage & 1 accuracy on all my attacks, i believe that going 3 damage, 2 recharge and 1 accuracy is more effective (on my lightning bolt / charged bolts) as when stacked with hasten means that they are available most of the time. Given that misses occur against even con mobs even when using aim + with accuracy so's waiting for a power to recycle can and does effect your dps.

[Azzi]

So when is the latest guestimate of when they will let us respec our powers ??

I'd like to do Energy Torrent with Hover/Fly for now, and respec to Power Burst with Superspeed later.

[Mithrandir_]

I can feel the nerf-bat warming up...

[Ex_Libris]

How's this for a template? I already reached lvl 14, which is why I have Buckshot and why it's 3-slotted :(. The only thing I couldn't figure out is where to put in Maneuvers. I guess if I didn't take Buckshot I would've had room for it. Is it really that good? Or could I just 3 or 4-slot Combat Jumping with Def buffs and be ok? I don't really feel like re-rolling.

Archetype: Blaster
Primary Powers - Ranged : Assault Rifle
Secondary Powers - Support : Devices
Slot[01] Level 1 (Starting Primary) : Slug /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[02] Level 1 (Starting Secondary) : Web Grenade /Empty
Slot[03] Level 2 : Burst /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[04] Level 4 : Buckshot /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[05] Level 6 : Combat Jumping /Jump,DefBuf
Slot[06] Level 8 : Caltrops /Slow
Slot[07] Level 10 : Targeting Drone /HitBuf
Slot[08] Level 12 : Sniper Rifle /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[09] Level 14 : Super Jump /Jump,Jump,Jump
Slot[10] Level 16 : Hurdle /Jump
Slot[11] Level 18 : Flamethrower /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[12] Level 20 : Swift /Run
Slot[13] Level 22 : Stamina /EndRec,EndRec,EndRec,EndRec,EndRec,EndRec
Slot[14] Level 24 : Cloaking Device /DefBuf,Rchg
Slot[15] Level 26 : Hasten /Rchg,Rchg,Rchg,Rchg,Rchg,Rchg
Slot[16] Level 28 : Smoke Grenade /HitDeb
Slot[17] Level 30 : Trip Mine /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[18] Level 32 : Full Auto /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[19] Level 35 : Ignite /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[20] Level 38 : Time Bomb /Dmg

[Ex_Libris]

Lose time bomb.

[Doc_Phantom]

I am not going to discuss Ice anymore as the cult mentality is only going to argue anything I say with some unfounded statement. I team with a 34 fire/fire... I know the dmg ability. I play my own, albiet at a lower lvl (17 now).

Anyways, I never purported that an energy melee blaster would be a viable toon to hit lvl 40, much less solo to that level. I can do more dmg than any other blaster per hit, more than any scrapper per hit. Attacks are slow recharges. Risk is higher in melee. I was just letting you know that hit for hit, an energy melee blaster outdamages anything in the game.

Finally, for those who are still new to the whole blaster thing, the fire blasters being an "AOE build" just means that they have just one AOE, fire ball. Very nice attack and I use it all the time, but that is the extent of their AOE superiority. This ball is what defines an AOE blaster (elec/fire/AR) vs a single target blaster (ice/energy) in most people's mind. Personally, I think AR is the only real AOE blaster as they have 3 nice cones and a couple target AOE attacks. The rest all basically have the same thing +/- one AOE attack, as each other.

But hey, the original post was well written and if you wanted to play fire, it definately is fast lvling. I just want it known that there is not a huge difference in battle time per group (up to the lvl 34-36s I have fought at least).

[Gisa_]

beauty sheer beauty i read the whole damn thing its beautiful

[FieroFuego]

Thanks for taking some of your time to write this guide RSRobinson! Great post.

I am 1/2 roleplayer and 1/2 power gamer and what this guide does for me is helps me make sure the power gamer side of me stays happy. I took hover/flying to satisfy the RP side but I'm not going to argue the fact because the reason I took it was not to power level.

I'd also like to recommend to our other blaster brethren who have not taken one of the ideal paths to blaster pwnage to not worry about it. RSR is not saying that you are lame or that you have no place defending Paragon City...he is just showing the optimized way to create/play your blaster regardless of anything outside of pure exp gains. So keep playing your Elec/Elec blaster (I have one....and I like him because he looks kewl and has kewl looking powers) and don't worry about it. If you are kinda burnt that your blaster is not included in the "top performers" category...just make one to his specs and see if he is wrong. Something tells me he is not though.

Thanks again for the thread RSR! :D

[ran_liberty]

Ivan,

You'll need to get 2 lower level fitness powers before getting stamina. So you'll need to add health into your build after swift, but before stamina.

[Ex_Libris]

he has hurdle

[ran_liberty]

RSRobinson,

I've been watching this thread closely. Great stuff!

If you have a moment, I need some advice. Till now, I've been balancing my power choices between what I think would be fun and what would do the most damage.

What do you think my next power choices should be if my goal is damage output?

Notes:
<ul type="square">
I've made some bad choices already and won't be able to address those till respec. I speak of Tazer, Leadership:Assault, 2 slotting Hover, 4 slotting burst.
The powers I'm listing below are not in the order I took them.
I'm level 23 and have 7 more power choices in front of me.
[/list]

Current Powers:
<ul type="square"> Slug
Burst
Sniper Rifle
Flamethrower

Web Grenade
Tazer
Targetting Drone
Caltrops

Hover
Fly
Assault
Hurdle
[/list]

I'll need to get health and stamina, that brings me down to 5 more power choices till 40.

I'm starting to think of getting Hasten, SuperSpeed, Smoke Grenade, Cloaking Device and Full Auto. But that leaves out Trip Mine and Ignite. What do you think RSRobinson?!

I don't play enough to reroll - I'd never be able to catch up with my friends. I'm happy to stick with the choices I've made until respec.

[Anghell]

why skip Raiin of Fire, i find it usefull when i solo'd in Perez Park ( i'm only 16 )
could you tell me why to skip this power , and what to keep instead

[Ex_Libris]

Hmm. Following this guide, I pieced together an AR/Dev build, and I'm looking for thoughts on it.

Archetype: Blaster
Primary Powers - Ranged : Assault Rifle
Secondary Powers - Support : Devices
Slot[01] Level 1 (Starting Primary) : Burst /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[02] Level 1 (Starting Secondary) : Web Grenade /Acc
Slot[03] Level 2 : Slug /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[04] Level 4 : Caltrops /Slow,Slow
Slot[05] Level 6 : Swift /Run
Slot[06] Level 8 : Hasten /Rchg,Rchg,Rchg,Rchg,Rchg,Rchg
Slot[07] Level 10 : Targeting Drone /HitBuf,HitBuf,HitBuf,HitBuf,HitBuf,HitBuf
Slot[08] Level 12 : Sniper Rifle /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[09] Level 14 : Super Speed /Run,Run
Slot[10] Level 16 : Smoke Grenade /HitDeb,HitDeb,HitDeb
Slot[11] Level 18 : Flamethrower /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[12] Level 20 : Health /Heal
Slot[13] Level 22 : Stamina /EndRec,EndRec,EndRec,EndRec,EndRec,EndRec
Slot[14] Level 24 : Cloaking Device /DefBuf
Slot[15] Level 26 : Beanbag /Dsrnt
Slot[16] Level 28 : Trip Mine /Acc,Acc,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[17] Level 30 : Combat Jumping /DefBuf
Slot[18] Level 32 : Full Auto /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[19] Level 35 : Super Jump /Jump
Slot[20] Level 38 : Acrobatics /EndRdx

I'm not sold on the last two powers - SJ and Acrobatics. I think they'd be useful, I'm just not sure if they're optimal or not -- but from what I've heard of Auto Turret, it's awful. No firsthand experience with it, though.

Anyways, comments are more than welcome. :)

[Ex_Libris]

[ QUOTE ]
why skip Raiin of Fire, i find it usefull when i solo'd in Perez Park ( i'm only 16 )
could you tell me why to skip this power , and what to keep instead

[/ QUOTE ]

The damage on RoF scales very poorly. It also makes things scatter, which is typically not a good thing for a fire blaster.

[Ex_Libris]

[ QUOTE ]
I'm not sold on the last two powers - SJ and Acrobatics. I think they'd be useful, I'm just not sure if they're optimal or not -- but from what I've heard of Full Auto, it's awful. No firsthand experience with it, though.

[/ QUOTE ]

That's auto turret you've heard bad things about. :p

Going the CJ, SJ, Acro route at the end gives you resistance to immobilization, hold, knockback/down, and a better way to transverse messed up zones like Faultline (SS sucks in that zone). The only reason I would say not to go with these is if you were losing out on other key powers.

[Jim_G]

This thread is fascinating, and a great read. However, we're starting to branch out into unrelated areas about personal builds, and it's losing steam. I know that when I read a post with specific questions about a build, I just skip over them, and from the low response it looks as if most other people are too.

This is not to discourage people who have questions! But you will probably get more answers if you started a new thread with an appropriate subject, like "Which power to take at Level 24?" or whatever. Otherwise, you won't get many answers, and this thread will decay. Yes, it would be nice for the original poster, RSRobinson, to give you personal advice on your build, but if you review the thread you'll see he isn't doing that for anybody.

Thanks!

[Ex_Libris]

[ QUOTE ]
I'd like to see you guys skipping hover and then getting owned by Freak Tanks and speeded Ink Men. You can't hop around like a little bunny with those. The tank doesnt care about little tacs on the ground, he'll knock you down with his m30, run straight over caltrops and 1-hit you. Now please tell me an example where jumpin around would be more effective than hovering.

[/ QUOTE ]

Just kill them. The guys you mentioned can be 1-shotted. Speeded ink men have a tendancy to flee as well, so your worry there is catching them which you're not going to do with hover. You can also just keep them at range.

In any case, if you like hover, play with hover. It's not that bad a choice. It's just not the best choice from a strict powerleveling perspective. Mostly cause it ties up an entire power pool.

-Brae
-36 Elec Blaster
-leader Knights in Tights
-virtue server

[Ex_Libris]

I personally think they should ditch Short Circuit and give us [electricity] a 3rd nuke, even though "waaaa they have moderate/heavy as their first powers" the heavy [lightning bolt] takes 4 or so seconds to recharge even with a green SO and a DO, doing 60 damage with a damage SO... :( And the moderate does 40 or so damage with 2 DOs :eek: Hmmm... as I say wait until PvP and the end drains... muahahaha :)

--Enron
level 21 Elec/Fire Blaster, Pinnacle [Tesla Cage ownz!]

[TacRedline]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
why skip Raiin of Fire, i find it usefull when i solo'd in Perez Park ( i'm only 16 )
could you tell me why to skip this power , and what to keep instead

[/ QUOTE ]

The damage on RoF scales very poorly. It also makes things scatter, which is typically not a good thing for a fire blaster.

[/ QUOTE ]


To me Rain of Fire is a DEFENSIVE power, when things go wrong for your team, launch Rain of Fire and give everyone time to flee :p

[Ex_Libris]

Great guide! Thanks a lot :)

[LoneVandal]

I've been reading a LOT of threads since getting CoH and this kind of summerizes them and spells things out very clearly, so hats off to you for delivering on the topic title.

The only thing I have to kind of disagree about is endurance drain being worthless. Your example friend didn't take Short Circuit, our primary end drain skill. It has an inherent +20% acc according to the hero planner, and unslotted will drain a little under 1/2 enemy endurance and prevent regen. I've read from other topics as well that Super Speed + Stealth is an awesome combination. Use that, speed into a group and open with Thunderclap. Follow up with Short Circuit. Run back and use Thunderous Blast, everything has 0 endurance that is still standing. Endurance Drain has the potential to be the best defense, the only problem is that you need to get them to 0 and keep them at 0 or it really is as worthless as you describe it. As you said, Electric alone only has one hold. Shocking Grasp is the answer to having 2 holds (too bad we get it so late). You yourself described how using melee attacks isn't a big problem if you do it properly, and I agree totally. It will be fun whenever I get to 38 and start Tesla Grasping bosses that live through Thunderous Blast, which I hope will remain viable when they up the cap to 50. Anyways, can't wait for your friend to respec himself with Short Circuit, I think you'll re-evaluate your position. Electric is definately a late bloomer though because of all the other skills you need besides SC to be effective at reducing all the mobs to 0 QUICKLY, appearently. Your friend didn't take Power Sink either? Thats the other BIG endurance drain skill supposedly. What this shows me is that 1/3 of Electric / Electric's big endurance draining capability does not impress you. Just like Ice has very specific Hold skills, Electric has some specific skills that drain very large amounts of endurance, and you shouldn't discount the effect based on 1/3 of them (TB alone). Of those 3 you only need 2 to render an entire group unable to do more than Brawl you, and that beats Holding 2 Lts or a Boss if you want to compare secondaries effects directly. Run in and use Power Sink or Short Circuit again (it has a pretty short recharge with Hasten) when they start regen'ing and they are back to nothing and no regen.

I will not argue with you though about Elec being lacking for a power gamer. Late blooming means slow leveling early on, and even the combo I described above is probably slower xp than what you describe doing.

[Ex_Libris]

Er... right. Auto Turret. Not Full Auto. I blame lack of caffeine there. XD Thanks for the input either way.

[Zenobious]

So you don't think Tough and Weave are worth taking? I was planning to take them both (by 24) and end up three slotting them with SO's. Seems like it would really help keep a blaster alive.

I'm doing an AR/Elect blaster (roleplay reasons) that is going to end up being a mid range fighter (Flamethrower, Ignite, and Full Auto), so I thought getting those powers would really help. With the cap of damage and defence at 90% three so's would more than do the job in them.

I haven't gotten to the point of taking them yet so any advice would really help. I do plan on taking Health and Staming but they would be my last two powers - also three slotted (how many slots would you use?).

Anyway, yeah, in the end the first power from Fighting would be basically wasted, but Tough and Weave seem pretty awesome.

So, what do you think?

[Ex_Libris]

I agree completely that Electricity's secondary effect is inferior in its usefulness in PvM Vs the other blaster primaries.

But has anyone taken time to consider the potential juggernaut endurance draining/stunting it could be in PvP (especially group PvP)? Assuming there is a possibility that actual damage dealing might be reduced in pvp to make the battles longer and less DAOC-like, this secondary effect might all of a sudden become quite valuable to top level villain/hero fighting endeavors. I think this line holds its own nicely in PvM and any requests to change the line should be held until CoV is released and rolling for a few months.

[Ex_Libris]

[ QUOTE ]
The only thing I have to kind of disagree about is endurance drain being worthless. Your example friend didn't take Short Circuit, our primary end drain skill. It has an inherent +20% acc according to the hero planner, and unslotted will drain a little under 1/2 enemy endurance and prevent regen. I've read from other topics as well that Super Speed + Stealth is an awesome combination. Use that, speed into a group and open with Thunderclap. Follow up with Short Circuit. Run back and use Thunderous Blast, everything has 0 endurance that is still standing.


[/ QUOTE ]

Or you could just skip the first three steps and Thunderous Blast them to begin with.

There's almost no mobs you'll come across where draining their endurance is better than defeating them.

[ QUOTE ]
Endurance Drain has the potential to be the best defense, the only problem is that you need to get them to 0 and keep them at 0 or it really is as worthless as you describe it.

[/ QUOTE ]

But in that same amount of time you could just defeat him. Seems better.

Building an endurance drain blaster might be fun, or roleplay, or match your style, but it certainly is not for the powerleveler.

[ QUOTE ]
I will not argue with you though about Elec being lacking for a power gamer. Late blooming means slow leveling early on, and even the combo I described above is probably slower xp than what you describe doing.

[/ QUOTE ]

exactly.

[RSRobinson]

Here's a powerleveling guide for Electricty/Electricty - do
swarms. The 30s are the levels that really suck, but as long as
you have the option to do swarms during them, you are at least
ok. The sad fact is that the amount of exp needed to level in the
30s is sick. Only exploits or things that feel like exploits like
swarms hide how poorly balanced it is. Take away swarms and
everything but maybe Assault/Fire blasters and Fire Tankers are
severly screwed. I street hunted all of 37 to 38 in Founder's
Falls (I wanted to earn a large bank of Influence) and mindlessly
killing as fast as I could it took about 10 hours for the level.
I remember doing 39 to 40 on swarms in about four and a half
hours. I'm guessing it would have taken 12 to 14 hours street
hunting. The game is that far out of whack. If the new content
has no exploitable mobs, it will be plainly clear just how
unthought out the leveling system is.

Electricity is worse than other Blaster options, but heck you
still are a blaster so that makes you better off than anyone else
other than a fire tanker. And no I don't have a fire tanker, it
was clear to me that they were going to get nerfed. So I don't
really know how good they are currently, whether they are still
in the same league as a good blaster.

As for secondary effects, with Ice, Bosses swinging much slower
equals a good thing. For Energy and knockback, just use it or
watch someone using it. It works. The key to both effects is that
you don't need to be shooting off extra attacks that don't do
damage to get the effect, you do your damage and get the effect
for free. Note that I talk about bosses because lieutenants and
minions live 1-3 shots, a few seconds, so secondary effects
aren't really of any concern.

As for not needing Cloaking Device, Smoke Grenade, Targeting
Drone, Trip Mine - you can play without anything, but these are
efficient powers that make you level much faster, the point of
the guide.

As for the guy who claims I will get owned by Freak Tanks and
speeded ink men. First ink men are minions so they are no threat
whatever they are doing. Oh no, they stunned me. Um, wait, they
do so little damage, why again was it that I cared? As for Freak
Tanks, the fact that you cannot safely kill them without Hover
doesn't mean I cannot safely kill them without hover. Caltrops
works fine on them, you just have to know how to use it. Mobs
often run through a Caltrops most of the way before it 'catches
up' with them. If you are standing right at its edge, you get
crushed. If you are standing back a bit you don't. Besides with a
Tank, I'll just be kiting it on Superspeed, it never gets
anywhere near me. In fact, it generally will go into flee mode
long before it dies. Its an artifact of kiting and mob AI which
you will be unaware of if you use Hover all the time. Chasing
down a slow moving Tank and killing it while it tries to run away
is zero risk. Plus, with Cloaking Device, I can chase it in and
through packs of other mobs and they'll never even notice me.

Its simple really, I played the game to 40 and I hardly ever die.
And although I did power level at times, I did the vast majority
of missions from all my contacts including every one of them 30+.
I've fought and killed Purple Nemesis lieutenants five levels
higher than me, red tank smashers, the lot. I never used Hover
and I didn't die.

My Targeting Drone has 3 slots in it, seems fine for me. You
could probably get by with 1 slot, it really is a big boost, but
3 slots seems enough to hit consistently any mob I've ever
fought or am likely to fight.

Mezrah, just try slotting the powers the way I suggest. Recharge
sounds fine until you realize that first Hasten is easily enough
and anything past that goes into serious diminishing returns and
second, you will be 1-sniping and 2-shotting the minions you will
be exping on. By lowering the damage, now you need 2 or 3 shots
to kill those minions maybe even 4. Since you start the battle
with all of your powers charged and ready to go, making them do
as much damage as possible means faster kills. If you were always
fighting 20 or 30 mobs and had to use your powers over and over,
then recharge becomes tempting. But you get that free salvo,
damage is king. Just play it both ways and I'm confident you will
be slotting all damage very soon.

Lightning_Fast, what defines an AOE blaster is the ability to
kill a large pack of mobs in a single salvo. Fire has Fire Ball +
Fire Breath, which will kill a pack in one salvo. Assault Rifle
has Flamethrower and Full Auto which each can do the same. For
Energy, Energy Torrent plus Explosive Blast will not kill a pack.
For Electricity, Short Circuit plus Ball Lightning will not kill
a pack. For Ice, Frost Breath plus Ice Storm will not kill a
pack. Thus, Fire and Assault Rifle can level using AOE quickly
and effectively and the others cannot. That is why they are AOE
powers and the others are single-target powers. Using Fire and
Assault rifle, you will level fastest using your AOE powers on
large packs of close-to even cons. For the others, you will level
fastest by taking a few of the highest-conning minions you can
take down efficiently.

Of course, once you reach 30, everyone levels fastest if they can
find some efficient ways to take down swarms. Before the patch,
Explosive Blast 5-slotted could take down packs of swarms. I
don't know if that is still the case now that they are no longer
vulnerable to energy. This is one reason Devices is so good. Trip
Mine plus swarms means that the 30s go by quickly. There is
something immensely satisfying about standing on a trip mine,
shooting a swarm and having a pack of 10 or more of them decend
on you and get blown to pieces.

And notice I did not mention swarms in my guide. I wouldn't be
surprised if they get nerfed more. I think they are exploitive,
but the exp system is so out of whack they are exploitive
compared to everything else but not exploitive because everything
else is ridiculously undervalued exp wise.

Anghell, Rain of Fire is ok low level but as you level it gets
worse and worse. Since the higher levels are the harder levels, I
build for them. And trying to get Stamina as early as possible,
taking Rain of Fire just uses up a slot that could be used to get
a stepping stone to Stamina or a more critical power. Plus even
early on it is just so mana intensive that I find it slowed down
my leveling when I tried it, way too much downtime because of it.

As Jim_Gleaves mentioned, I am not looking at people's template
builds. There are a million threads for people asking about
particular templates, please take a look at the first few pages
of this forum and probably your exact build has been asked by
someone else. As long as you get Stamina by 20-24, get a travel
power, and have space for the bread and butter attacks for
primary, you are well on your way. The only problem you may
encounter is taking too much damage because you couldn't fit in a
defensive choice early on. That's another plus for Devices, Smoke
Grenade comes early and it alone can basically cover your
defensive needs.

Lone_Vandal, Thunderous Blast doesn't come until 32 and
generally, when you use it the only things standing are what you
missed :) You have this huge scenario to drain a bosses endurance
(as I said, minions no threat, bosses are). All I can tell you is
that as an Energy blaster I am just killing it, concerned only
with damage and I am also negating him with the constant
knockdowns putting him on his butt without having to worry about
using any powers that aren't severely damaging him. My friend
often comments while watching me play how unfair it is as I kill
bosses who just can't fight back. Why go through all the trouble
of trying to get endurance drain to do something when you can
just use knockdown and actually have a workable power? And before
Ice blasters jump on my case... Or you can slow the boss so he is
dead before any of his powers can recharge?

Zen_Lord, Tough is most effective when stacked with other
lethal/smashing resist. 15% base or 30% slotted resistance by
itself just doesn't make that big of a difference. Now Weave is
nice for defense but you have to take 2 powers that I don't want
to get it. You could take Manuevers, Combat Jumping, and Stealth
instead of Boxing, Tough, and Weave and be better protected. Once
you get high enough, you don't really need the defensive powers
to survive. You just need enough so that you don't get downtime.
With them, your health regen and health inspirations will offset
the damage you take. Without you take too much damage, especially
in spurts every so often and you get downtime waiting on health
(and maybe the occassional death too). For blasters, forget about
damage resistant and just go for +DEF powers. There are so many
of those available as the first power in their respective pools
that it just doesn't make sense to me to go for a 3rd tier power
that does basically the same thing. Once again, another reason
why I love Devices. You get both Cloaking Device and Smoke
Grenade, fantastic defensive powers, with no power pool choices
used up.

[LoneVandal]

Krikket, I guess my problem is that *right now* I have a hard time imagining being able to drop entire groups of things my level that quickly. The point of the post was that end drain isn't worthless though. The bosses / lts left standing after that combo will have nothing to fight back with while you pop an inspiration and finish them all off. I guess the end game is easier than the early if you are killing everything your level that quickly. I don't have Focus yet, but I can imagine how much faster things go with it.

[Mezrah_FearGiver]

Hmmm

Thanks for the response, given that influence is no longer an issue for me I have been able to try out your reccomendation regarding slotting all (but one) damage enhancers.

My thoughts after a few hours playing/trying still remain the same, the reason is that I have both buildup and aim slotted so that they are almost constantly available. This means that every time I start a new combat I am able use either of those to boost my damage (sometimes I will stack both depending on the con of the mobs (ie hunting small groups of orange or red mobs).

I can always 1 hit yellow minions with zapp, with buildup it is stil 2 hits on white or yellow minions even going 5 damage using Lightning Bolts &amp; Charged bolts...

It is still early days but i will continue to try this out for the rest of lvl 34, given the lack of logging / parsing options (or have I missed something that will help?), I am having to work purely on feel but again it is the recycle time when misses are accounted for that has me most concerned, and yes I have hasten 6 slotted (&amp; updated to ++'s when appropriate).

[Ex_Libris]

What do blasters do for defense against being held/disoriented/slept? I asked this question in a thread where I was looking for guidance with my Ice/Dev build but unfortunately got no response.

Soloing for me with the blaster has meant really loathing mobs that stun, and I just can't keep enough luck/discipline inspirations on hand to have them constantly going.

[Ex_Libris]

Thanks for a great post.
Very informative.

[Ex_Libris]

"I can feel the nerf bat winding up"

Yeah, I think they have been doing a fine job of rebalancing... but I also think they should not rebalance ANYTHING AT ALL before respec is put in. Doesn't matter if it is broken or not, if I build a character based on an ability that gets changed, I need to be able to change with it. This is by far the most common reason I have quit previous mmorpgs.

As far as the sleep/stun thing: I have combat jumping, which resists immob, and acrobatics, which resists hold/knockback...

BUT acrobatics costs endurance that I would rather spend defeating mobs, and you can't get protection from sleep at all. Not only that, but even popping iron wills before a fight, they still sleep me...

One of the biggest secrets to powerleveling is to CHOOSE YOUR FIGHTS. That's why superspeed is a must. Rewards are not balanced for the difficulty of an encounter. If I want to make exp, I don't fight bosses. I don't fight high level stuff. I don't fight anything that sleeps me. You run around with superspeed and choose the fights that offer the best rewards for the difficulty - you farm.

[Renjiro]

I'm really beginning to wonder whether or not the people who played in beta are just plain idiots or devious or both. Lots of beta blasters whined that they had too little HP or did too little damage and now post-release we have blasters publishing how-to guides on achieving 40 in 2 weeks.

I bet the developers looking at their data mining are shocked to see a huge discrepancy in levelling rates pre- and post-release. Either lots of beta blasters were fudging gimpness or simply never reported exploits or the developers didn't listen to the right people.

Blasters now are seriously overpowered compared to other archetypes its not even remotely funny. All of this exploit XPing and overpowered combos have got to be nipped at the bud. Its bad enough that a /whoall in any zone yields about 90% blasters, 10% everything else. Must they wait until every single player is playing a blaster?

I'm really worried about this game. The devs claim they are watching the datamining information carefully. And yet nothing has been done about fire/fire blasters getting a bub of XP at 35+ every 15 minutes. Something is wrong, the last time I earned a bub in 15 minutes as a scrapper was the low 20's. This is unacceptable, I hope they do something about this soon because the game is becoming rather silly.

[FieroFuego]

I feel for ya Ren. My highest alt is a scrapper. And I know the feeling Scrappers have. Hopefully the new crit percentage they are adding in will keep the scraps happy. I kind of doubt it because there main thing is survivability not so much damage output. I would just suggest not getting all worked up about blasters being too powerful and wanting to nerf them....I would be more inclined to keep giving feedback to the devs on how to make scrappers better. There are a couple of good threads in the scrapper forum with suggestions on how to help them out. If all else fails....make a blaster alt...and you can get some good general advice from this thread....and a ton of different builds to choose from in the blaster forum.

[Ex_Libris]

Mezrah_FearGiver and anyone else reading this for the guiding part, there has been several threads leveling guides like this before. Here is the thread I wrote for instance:

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showflat.php?Cat=&amp;Number=626003&amp;page=&amp;view=&amp;sb=5&amp;o =&amp;fpart=all&amp;vc=1

Also seen many on the general boards and various other class boards.

[Ex_Libris]

[ QUOTE ]
Finally, for those who are still new to the whole blaster thing, the fire blasters being an "AOE build" just means that they have just one AOE, fire ball. Very nice attack and I use it all the time, but that is the extent of their AOE superiority.

[/ QUOTE ]

All right I see bull [censored], let's set the record straight and include Fire Breath in there. You must be half asleep or not paying attention. Add Fire Sword Circle and Inferno for kicks.

[ QUOTE ]
But the fact is that after level 10 or so, you really don't care about melee damage as much, there's very few villains that can get into melee range with you, and even fewer that have a melee attack you worry about.

[/ QUOTE ]

You must be still fighting Hellions then. Higher level Capo Muscles, Freak Smashers &amp; Swipers will stun and kill you in 2 hits. I can think of more, but you obviously haven't seen higher mobs than that. Get a bit higher in level before you start making up incorrect generalizations.

Seriously, this thread should have been closed and saved at the top of the blaster forum as a guide before all this nonsense got put into it.

[Erratic]

[ QUOTE ]
I bet the developers looking at their data mining are shocked to see a huge discrepancy in levelling rates pre- and post-release. Either lots of beta blasters were fudging gimpness or simply never reported exploits or the developers didn't listen to the right people.

[/ QUOTE ]

Or Blasters really did suck during beta (I didn't play one) and at the end, with too little time to test, they were adjusted and improved a hair too much, with more pressing things doubtlessly coming up after release than rebalancing Blasters.

[Pulsewave_mark1]

[ QUOTE ]
I'm really beginning to wonder whether or not the people who played in beta are just plain idiots or devious or both. Lots of beta blasters whined that they had too little HP or did too little damage and now post-release we have blasters publishing how-to guides on achieving 40 in 2 weeks.

I bet the developers looking at their data mining are shocked to see a huge discrepancy in levelling rates pre- and post-release. Either lots of beta blasters were fudging gimpness or simply never reported exploits or the developers didn't listen to the right people.

[/ QUOTE ]
The developers raised Blaster hit points because Blasters were getting KO'd the most. It wasnt even close. The order went:

Tanker (defeated the least)
Scrapper
Controller
Defender
Blaster (defeated most often)

And they didnt really raise hit points that much. It was only 5-10%. Controllers got a bigger boost.

[ QUOTE ]
Blasters now are seriously overpowered compared to other archetypes its not even remotely funny. All of this exploit XPing and overpowered combos have got to be nipped at the bud.

[/ QUOTE ]
You mean like the burn tankers exploit that was addressed or the Caltrops hold that was fixed? Or maybe Ignite? Seems to me the devs are working on things.

[ QUOTE ]
Its bad enough that a /whoall in any zone yields about 90% blasters, 10% everything else. Must they wait until every single player is playing a blaster?

[/ QUOTE ]
Do you really think 90% of heros in the game are Blasters?

[ QUOTE ]
I'm really worried about this game. The devs claim they are watching the datamining information carefully. And yet nothing has been done about fire/fire blasters getting a bub of XP at 35+ every 15 minutes. Something is wrong, the last time I earned a bub in 15 minutes as a scrapper was the low 20's. This is unacceptable, I hope they do something about this soon because the game is becoming rather silly.

[/ QUOTE ]
Well frankly you can't do squatto about it. Why dont you just build a fire blaster if they are SO Uber? Why be such a whiney tool and stick it out with your crappy scrapper?

Either you are having fun with your scrapper or not. If he is so frustrating that the game is becoming silly, and you know all about the exploits that make fire blasters uber you should just restart and play one. That way everything can work your way for a little while, and rather than being frustrated by the devs poor management you can take advantage of it. What are you waiting for?

[Ex_Libris]

"Or Blasters really did suck during beta (I didn't play one) and at the end, with too little time to test, they were adjusted and improved a hair too much, with more pressing things doubtlessly coming up after release than rebalancing Blasters. "

One to one and half weeks before the end of Beta, the Devs increased hit points of blasters to be equal to defenders (same for controllers) because the Devs ran stats that Blasters died twice as often as any other Archetype.

And just a few days before going to pre-order live, they increased Blaster damage by a %. No where was it posted how much this % increase was except that it was close to 25%-30% damage increase. I can only assume the reasoning for this was to counteract the damage output a Radiation Defender with Accelerate Met. and Envenerating Field could dish out (pre-live nerfage) to targets.

Not to mention many AE damage powers had an increase as well (i.e. Ice Breath) just before pre-live as well.

Blasters per se never really sucked during Beta but when you were as fragile as you were (pre-changes) and didn't dish out any more damage than most optimized other Archetypes, Blasters were gimpy compared to some of the others who had damage + multiple utility powers.

[Ex_Libris]

How in the hell can you kill swarms for 4-5 hours? That sounds insanely boring....

[Wytch_NA]

[ QUOTE ]
How in the hell can you kill swarms for 4-5 hours? That sounds insanely boring....

[/ QUOTE ]

Staying focused. I could do it for maybe 2 hours before I would lose it but I know a person who did TV for 16 hours in one sitting. Not for me.

[Pulsewave_mark1]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I bet the developers looking at their data mining are shocked to see a huge discrepancy in levelling rates pre- and post-release. Either lots of beta blasters were fudging gimpness or simply never reported exploits or the developers didn't listen to the right people.

[/ QUOTE ]

Or Blasters really did suck during beta (I didn't play one) and at the end, with too little time to test, they were adjusted and improved a hair too much, with more pressing things doubtlessly coming up after release than rebalancing
Blasters.

[/ QUOTE ]
Blasters were pretty much the same. I played Defenders through most of beta but I went with a Blaster at the end once they got the HP boost. I can tell you that at the time AoE attacks were looked at as worthless by many testers since they drew so much aggro. I remember reading another post saying basically the opposite, that the whole point of being a blaster was to take advantage of big AoE affects. But my impression was that people didnt think to much of AoE. I played it out and totally disagreed.

Stuff like that happens. Stamina was once considered worthless. Geko had to defend it to the players. Now its considered a must have power. Hasten was at first considered awesome, then it was changed and it was considered useless. The power was still great, but players got it into their heads it worked one way and when that changed just cried about the difference. It didnt matter that the power was still awesome, it was different, and there were a lot of people complaining about it. So that colored a lot of players opinions on it before they even judged it on it's merits.

Honestly, a lot of what goes on these boards is colored by perception from other posts. Scrappers are crying now because they see other scrappers crying and together they all feel worthless. It's a spiral and there's really nothing the devs can do to fix it. Scrappers arent SO bad that they are unplayable. Fortunately the devs pay more attention to data mining than they do to personal opinions of the boards. The fact is that scrappers are viable right now. They may not have things as easy as Blasters, but they have it much easier than Controllers and Defenders overall. Scrappers can solo easier than either class, and soloing is better XP than grouping anyway. Scrappers just feel bad and think they arent wanted in groups. The devs can't change that. If you feel worthless there's not much that anyone can do to help.

[Nazrek]

My Blasters are leveling, but not as fast as peeps on this board. I think it has to do with enhancements. Saving and selling every enhancement in the game I get from kills/arrests, I still don't have enough to do the damage talked about in this forum (per/level meaning number of casts per mobs).
I don't have the means yet to transfer infl./money from char to char.
Alot of the fast leveling here is just smart play.
There's also some good discussion going on the tanker forum as well, peeps there too are trying to help each other out with what works and what doesn't in this game.
EQ went through the same process. A necro in that game can still out solo any other class despite numerous nerfs.
But I do hope this game doesn't turn out to be City of Gimps with all the nerfing going on.

[Erratic]

[ QUOTE ]
Blasters were pretty much the same. I played Defenders through most of beta but I went with a Blaster at the end once they got the HP boost.

[/ QUOTE ]

I thought they got:

1) Hp boost
2) Damage boost
3) Endurance cost cut

That's a lot of things coming together. Mind you, I'm not calling for a Blaster nerf or even remotely hinting at suggesting it, just exploring some of the reason for Blaster envy.

[Renjiro]

I think what people are looking for is City of Balance. Balance naturally includes a good mix of nerfs and buffs. As things stand now very few people could argue that Blasters by far outpace all the other archetypes in terms of levelling.

Its a combination of many things, first (in my opinion) and foremost that balanced teams do not yield the best XP as they should. But the second thing to consider is that blasters are simply so much better than scrappers.

And to the person above who asked the question why not just play a blaster? The answer is simple but probably beyond your FOTM mind to comprehend. It's because I want to play a scrapper but at the same time don't like to play an archetype that's gimped relative to Blasters. Wow, wasn't that simple!

I think the developers made a bit of mistake towards the end of beta when they added so many improvements to what was certainly already the most popular archetype with almost no beta testing. To me this seemed to be a bizzarre move and I had a feeling this may turn out to be a problem later. Lo and behold the first level 40 character came to reality in 2 weeks and he/she was a blaster. That was only the beginning, in the next few days more level 40's appeared and they were all blasters! As you can imagine this is not one of those times I enjoy getting a prediction right.

[dave_p]

[ QUOTE ]
How in the hell can you kill swarms for 4-5 hours? That sounds insanely boring....

[/ QUOTE ]

That is the essence of power leveling. It's certainly not everybody's thing. For the record, I can only keep it up for an hour or two, tops, before having to go on some missions or group to break the monotony.

[Pulsewave_mark1]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Blasters were pretty much the same. I played Defenders through most of beta but I went with a Blaster at the end once they got the HP boost.

[/ QUOTE ]

I thought they got:

1) Hp boost
2) Damage boost
3) Endurance cost cut

That's a lot of things coming together. Mind you, I'm not calling for a Blaster nerf or even remotely hinting at suggesting it, just exploring some of the reason for Blaster envy.

[/ QUOTE ]

Blasters always had the endurance break as far as I know. The developers never announced any reduction in Blaster endurance to my knowledge. I think it was always in their concept of the Blaster from the getgo, not an add on for balance. I noticed it right away when I made the switch from Defender to Blaster.

So the hit point boost was about 5-10% like I said. That really wasnt a big deal as it let you survive a single hit extra at the most by the time you hit the 20ish levels. The damage boost was also nothing special. Someone above posted it was 25% but it was more likely around 10% again. We didnt even notice it.

The whole point of the extra damage was to balance with DEFENDERS who were considered better in a lot of ways. You could build a defender that did comparable damage to a Blaster and had better peripheral abilities. This was what I was doing most of beta anyway and it was viable. The biggest advantage that Blasters have over Defenders (other than the unannounced endurance break) is they could put all their enhancements in attack powers while Defenders allocate to both powersets more. That and the fact that they get Build Up or Targetting Drone. So people were concerned that you could build a better Blaster using a Defender archetype. I didnt agree but try convincing Scrappers they arent gimped right now. It's like banging your head against the wall.

If someone could do a study now and see what a how lvl 20 heros hit for damage it would be interesting. Blasters use their primary set vs the Defender secondary set, so that should make for about 15% difference. Anything more than 15% would be the "extra" bonus that Blasters got. I'd be surprised it it was more than 25% total, indicating that Blaster "got" a 10% bonus at the end of beta. It should be right around 1 SO enhancement.

[Ex_Libris]

What a bunch of CRAP! Just cuz I am a elec/elec blaster, I am the crap of the barrell of Blasters? What a bunch of.........

HEHEHEHEHEHEHE, just kidding.

Hey man, very good post, it makes me feel like starting a hero all over again. I am a Elec/Elec blaster, and I am level 21 now. I have fun, and I do good damage, but your post makes some sense on how to do more. I am not into power leveling, just want to maximize my damage potential and this is a great guide. I am linking this on my site with your permission, as it is a great guide for any Blaster. If they take the time to read it, they will see all sorts of ways to improve thier hero.

Is it okay to link this? Just give me a reply here or PM me. Thanx.

Great post, 5 stars!!

[Ex_Libris]

First, should I be taking smoke grenade asap?

Second, what exactly are swarms? Is it a mob type, or just a way of saying a big group.

[Azzi]

[ QUOTE ]
If you don't take Devices, Stealth from the concealment pool is hard to pass up. Superspeed negates its speed penalty and combines with it to give basically full invisibility. Invisibility is fantastic and you get a hefty defensive boost in combat.

[/ QUOTE ]

Is Stealth alone enough? Or do you recommend also getting Invisibility? Is the Invisibility power just stealth with bigger % bonuses?

I'm trying to adjust my build to fit in super speed in addition to fly. Wanted to keep Stealth, Drop Invisibility for Super Speed.

[Pulsewave_mark1]

[ QUOTE ]
And to the person above who asked the question why not just play a blaster? The answer is simple but probably beyond your FOTM mind to comprehend. It's because I want to play a scrapper but at the same time don't like to play an archetype that's gimped relative to Blasters. Wow, wasn't that simple!

[/ QUOTE ]
The point is that no one is forcing you to play a scrapper. If they are SO bad, why are you playing one? Since its a choice whether to pick that archetype and continue developing it, IT CANT BE THAT BAD IF YOU KEEP PLAYING A SCRAPPER. Your actions dictate it. Are scrappers worse off than blasters? Maybe, but they arent so far off that you wont play one any more, so things arent that bad.

Get real and realize that you are just some schmoe who has very little to contribute to this game. If you think that blasters have it so easy just play one and be happy. It's like voting. If everyone would just play a blaster the devs would have to make the other archetypes better. It would be obvious in their data mining. But you keep playing a scrapper, and reinforcing with hard data that scrappers in fact arent so bad. They whine a lot on the boards because that's the scrapper mentality right now, but the data just doesnt support the kind of changes you want right now. Deal with it.

[ QUOTE ]
I think the developers made a bit of mistake towards the end of beta when they added so many improvements to what was certainly already the most popular archetype with almost no beta testing.

[/ QUOTE ]
Were you in beta? Blasters were not the most popular by any means. Axe tankers were a big issue for much of beta, followed by Reflex scrappers which were out of hand. Then Dark Melee scrappers, and after that Fire and Illision controllers. Blasters by comparison were relatively weak. The scrappers, tankers, and controllers were constantly at the top of the charts for levelling rates and kill acheivements. If you were in beta I dont know how we have such different recollections of things, unless its because you were only in the last few days or so.

[ QUOTE ]
To me this seemed to be a bizzarre move and I had a feeling this may turn out to be a problem later. Lo and behold the first level 40 character came to reality in 2 weeks and he/she was a blaster. That was only the beginning, in the next few days more level 40's appeared and they were all blasters! As you can imagine this is not one of those times I enjoy getting a prediction right.

[/ QUOTE ]

Just play a blaster and get over it. Seriously. I recommend this to all whiney scrappers out there. Come back to your scrapper when they "fix" everything for you.

[_Naga_]

Can we just skip the Blaster vs Scrapper talk for another thread and avoid polluting this one any further? Probably not, but worth asking.

And I love Smoke Grenade more than my Targeting Drone, which should tell you something.

[Ex_Libris]

Does your smoke grenade ever miss? Also, is there a point to getting both smoke grenade and cloaking device?

[Erratic]

[ QUOTE ]
So the hit point boost was about 5-10% like I said. That really wasnt a big deal as it let you survive a single hit extra at the most by the time you hit the 20ish levels. The damage boost was also nothing special. Someone above posted it was 25% but it was more likely around 10% again. We didnt even notice it.

[/ QUOTE ]

Not noticing a lot of small things individually doesn't mean that they don't combine for a noticable impact. Clearly Blasters in release have not had their beta woes. If the only thing that changed between then and now is what was done at the end of beta. . . .


[ QUOTE ]
The whole point of the extra damage was to balance with DEFENDERS who were considered better in a lot of ways.

[/ QUOTE ]

While the motivation for extra damage may have been relationally based, extra damage does have an absolute impact against things which didn't change in relation--mob hps.

[ QUOTE ]
You could build a defender that did comparable damage to a Blaster and had better peripheral abilities.

[/ QUOTE ]

Which is why Defender damage was capped at a lower value to my understanding.

[ QUOTE ]
The biggest advantage that Blasters have over Defenders (other than the unannounced endurance break) is they could put all their enhancements in attack powers while Defenders allocate to both powersets more. That and the fact that they get Build Up or Targetting Drone. So people were concerned that you could build a better Blaster using a Defender archetype. I didnt agree but try convincing Scrappers they arent gimped right now. It's like banging your head against the wall.


[/ QUOTE ]

I will agree that the marketplace of ideas feeds upon its own hype to a certain extent (check the history of views on Defenders on the Defender forum), but it seems to me there is a bit more at work here. I agree that a central advantage of Blasters over Defenders (and for that matter every other AT) through the low levels is the ability to focus on their attack powers. But it doesn't end there. Lowered endurance costs were predicated on the idea of a frail Blaster (you certainly don't see many discussions on other forums debating if Stamina is necessary or not--it basically goes without question). . .but Blasters are now no more frail than Controllers or Defenders. Operationally, this produces a profound difference between Defenders and Blasters. Sure a Defender has power that are supposed to make him more durable than a Blaster. . .but you have to apply those powers, which takes time and isn't free. As example, my Defender can decide to charge a group of mobs with Radiation Infection prepared to fire once in range, follow up with Lingering Radiation, and follow that with Enervating Field. Now able to stand in the midsts of the group she can Ball Lightning to her heart's content. But notice she had to apply 3 powers, 2 of which after the mobs have been angered and started to return fire. A blaster by comparison would Aim + Build Up out of range, prep an AE, and drop the entire group while the Defender is still softening the targets. And for all that Radiation Infection does to help you not get hit, you still do. . .so taking longer to kill because you deal less damage means risking status effects and overwhelming damage. (And I won't even touch upon the delirious notion the developers seem to have about Blasters not having any defenses. . .I should introduce them to my friend's Electrical/Devices Blaster.)

[ QUOTE ]
If someone could do a study now and see what a how lvl 20 heros hit for damage it would be interesting.

[/ QUOTE ]

It would be interesting. For the record though, 4 slotted for damage at level 28, pulling out all the stops I dealt capped damage (as the values were the same versus white and yellow mobs) of 301 with my Defender using Zapp. I rather suspect that a Blaster would deal considerably more. . .but maybe I'm wrong.

[Renjiro]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
And to the person above who asked the question why not just play a blaster? The answer is simple but probably beyond your FOTM mind to comprehend. It's because I want to play a scrapper but at the same time don't like to play an archetype that's gimped relative to Blasters. Wow, wasn't that simple!

[/ QUOTE ]
The point is that no one is forcing you to play a scrapper. If they are SO bad, why are you playing one? Since its a choice whether to pick that archetype and continue developing it, IT CANT BE THAT BAD IF YOU KEEP PLAYING A SCRAPPER. Your actions dictate it. Are scrappers worse off than blasters? Maybe, but they arent so far off that you wont play one any more, so things arent that bad.

Get real and realize that you are just some schmoe who has very little to contribute to this game. If you think that blasters have it so easy just play one and be happy. It's like voting. If everyone would just play a blaster the devs would have to make the other archetypes better. It would be obvious in their data mining. But you keep playing a scrapper, and reinforcing with hard data that scrappers in fact arent so bad. They whine a lot on the boards because that's the scrapper mentality right now, but the data just doesnt support the kind of changes you want right now. Deal with it.

[ QUOTE ]
I think the developers made a bit of mistake towards the end of beta when they added so many improvements to what was certainly already the most popular archetype with almost no beta testing.

[/ QUOTE ]
Were you in beta? Blasters were not the most popular by any means. Axe tankers were a big issue for much of beta, followed by Reflex scrappers which were out of hand. Then Dark Melee scrappers, and after that Fire and Illision controllers. Blasters by comparison were relatively weak. The scrappers, tankers, and controllers were constantly at the top of the charts for levelling rates and kill acheivements. If you were in beta I dont know how we have such different recollections of things, unless its because you were only in the last few days or so.

[ QUOTE ]
To me this seemed to be a bizzarre move and I had a feeling this may turn out to be a problem later. Lo and behold the first level 40 character came to reality in 2 weeks and he/she was a blaster. That was only the beginning, in the next few days more level 40's appeared and they were all blasters! As you can imagine this is not one of those times I enjoy getting a prediction right.

[/ QUOTE ]

Just play a blaster and get over it. Seriously. I recommend this to all whiney scrappers out there. Come back to your scrapper when they "fix" everything for you.

[/ QUOTE ]

You reinforce my belief that you are nothing but a FOTM player. Only a FOTM player would say something as ridiculous as "if you think X is powerful then just play it"

You really just don't get it. I don't like to play a class just because it is more powerful. Rather, I want ALL classes to be balanced and equal so that my choice of playing one archetype over the other will be based purely on style rather than on power. Its a simple concept but will forever be beyond your ability to understand because you don't care what archetype you play as long as they are the most powerful.

FOTM players don't care what archetype they play, heck they can have fun playing any archetype as long as they are powerful. Not all of us are FOTM nuts that's why we care about such things as balance because we really don't want to quit this game but would rather quit it rather than be forced to play a blaster just to be competitive. Stop being an idiot and start realizing that just because someone doesn't want to play the most powerful class it means he has no right to bemoan an imbalance!

Your recollection of the beta is different from mine probably because you have poor memory. Thats the only explanation i could come up with :p

Let's just leave it at that. You're right in at least one respect, the developers are datamining and it will become readily apparent that the last day boosts were far stronger in effects than they anticipated.

[_Naga_]

Yes, SG misses. But against even/yellow stuff it mostly hits. If you are just fighting that stuff, you don't need everything to have SG on it - the damage mitigation from having 80% of the mobs with it is enough to kill the pack, especially if you attack the non-smoked mobs first. If you need to be really stealthy, then you would have to apply it until everything was smoked. Really, SG is no different than most attacks now - against even level stuff you mainly hit and always have a chance to miss.

[Doc_Phantom]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Finally, for those who are still new to the whole blaster thing, the fire blasters being an "AOE build" just means that they have just one AOE, fire ball. Very nice attack and I use it all the time, but that is the extent of their AOE superiority.

[/ QUOTE ]

All right I see bull [censored], let's set the record straight and include Fire Breath in there. You must be half asleep or not paying attention. Add Fire Sword Circle and Inferno for kicks.


[/ QUOTE ]

I know reading is too much for most, but don't reply if you didn't take the time. First, fire breath is a cone and as I also said, other blasters have almost identical cones, so this is not a defining "AOE" attack for a fire blaster. Second, I was obviously talking about primaries only, as there is no mention of any secondaries relating to AOE.

Let me guess... your primary blaster is a fire/fire and you felt the need to defend it despite no argument against it? These aren't your kids people, calm down. Live a little. Play some other AT mixes so you aren't so freaked out when you see a post with your AT's type in the subject. "OMG, are they talking bad about my AT mix, should I post without reading? Why not, everyone else does".

[Moridin_]

Nice post. It’s really nice to see some posts that come from people who really understand how a blaster works, and what they can and can’t do. In particular the single target blaster advice nearly mirrors my own experience/technique exactly.

Just a reminder to some people complaining about specific issues. This is a pure power gaming build. Some, and perhaps even many, things will change if your gaming has a different focus. This includes things like elc blasters, and eng blasters AoE’s. While note as effective in a power gaming, solo/small group where your goal is to kill everything in one salvo the do in fact do just as much damage/second in longer fights since recharge and animation time are tied to damage.

From a strictly power gaming perspective how fast you can level is closely tied to short kill times which is of course where blasters excel. Having short kill times means that how fast you gain experience varies almost directly with how quickly you can find mobs to kill. (The latter of course is critical as well, but except for selecting super speed or perhaps super jump has little to do with your build.)

It’s this effect that makes blasters the best for power gaming builds. other then the now nerfed burn tanks which could kill higher level mobs and do it just as fast.

If you are not a power gamer there can be, and in fact there are almost certainly will be things you may want to do differently. Don’t confuse the two types of gaming. I am not a power leveler, and have a made a number of different choices to that end. But, for the times I am soloing my technique is almost identical to the single target technique outlined here, just not as fast since I don’t have super speed to get from mob to mob as quickly.

This does not mean there are not a lot of things you can take away from this excellent post/thread. The information on slotting is bang on for nearly everything, except for possibly travel powers. In larger groups I find that no one even bothers with their travel powers because the teleported can move them where they need to be far more quickly then they can move themselves.

[ QUOTE ]

But the second thing to consider is that blasters are simply so much better than scrappers.


[/ QUOTE ]

I disagree with this. It’s true that blasters are the best AT for power leveling thanks to their low kill times, but for power leveling some class will always be the absolute fastest and therefore the “only” choice. This is inevitable and unchangeable. It just so happens that blasters are the best for this style of play.

This doesn’t make them overpower or better from any other perspective, and it doesn’t even translate in saying “they are the best solo class” since solo does not have to be synonymous with power leveling. Scrappers can and do have the ability to solo a greater variety of different types of mobs then blasters. When you are power leveling, of course this isn’t relevant since you only want one type of mob, the type that provides the best xp/hour.


[ QUOTE ]

It's because I want to play a scrapper but at the same time don't like to play an archetype that's gimped relative to Blasters.


[/ QUOTE ]

This is totally and utterly irrelevant to what this thread is about. This thread is about power leveling and that is all choosing everything, let me repeat EVERYTHING, for the fasters possible leveling. It is simply not possible to create a situation where there isn’t one AT that is the absolute best for power leveling and the true power leveler will always choose that AT no matter what it is.

You simply cannot take the things in this thread out of the context of power leveling. Just because blasters happen to be the AT that power level the best does not mean they are superior or unbalanced in the normal, intended style of play.

If you want to power level as a scrapper you can in fact do so, in fact you can pretty much cut and paste the advice for single target blasters, and get nearly identical results. The only that may change is the target level of the mobs may be slightly higher. In this mode scrapper can power level better then any other AT in the game.

With this in mind, therefore, the way your statement reads to me is that you want changes made to your AT of preference so that it is the best for power leveling rather then the second best, which is frankly quite sad and something I hope the devs have no sympathy for. As has been pointed out most reasonable people will not enjoy a power leveling style of game for long, so you need to stop using it as ammunition to have your own preferred AT changed.

Power leveling is strictly a sideshow. It is not how the game is meant to be played nor is it (IMO) the most enjoyable way to play it. If there are issues with scrappers in the normal mode of play then you need to balance them against blasters in the normal mode of play, and this thread is simply not about that.

[Doc_Phantom]

[ QUOTE ]
Lightning_Fast, what defines an AOE blaster is the ability to kill a large pack of mobs in a single salvo. Fire has Fire Ball + Fire Breath, which will kill a pack in one salvo. Assault Rifle has Flamethrower and Full Auto which each can do the same. For Energy, Energy Torrent plus Explosive Blast will not kill a pack.
For Electricity, Short Circuit plus Ball Lightning will not kill a pack. For Ice, Frost Breath plus Ice Storm will not kill a pack. Thus, Fire and Assault Rifle can level using AOE quickly and effectively and the others cannot. That is why they are AOE powers and the others are single-target powers. Using Fire and Assault rifle, you will level fastest using your AOE powers on large packs of close-to even cons. For the others, you will level fastest by taking a few of the highest-conning minions you can take down efficiently.

[/ QUOTE ]

Untrue. With a build containing build-up as a secondary (despite losing a slot to acc), you can 2 shot equal minion groups with Ice. I would suspect energy can do the same but might have issues with knockback moving groups out of a tight bundle with no followup AOE or second cone (until late levels). Without buildup in my secondary, I can 2 shot -1 lvl groups of minions. I am still left with any lts/bosses, which also happens with my fire primary. Additionally, I could argue that the cone is instant, instead of DOT, and actually kills faster... but I would have to digress as rain then takes it's time to finish them off.

Also, you failed to mention one more tool to a solo powerleveler, in your original post. Find other like-built, but importantly... equal level, toons and group with them. Instead of grouping in the traditional fashion, just be in the same zone... working on your own groups. You will lose 1/2 xp per mob, but gain a grouping xp bonus. Provided you both do your jobs efficiently, both of you will gain xp 30-50% faster than you can solo. Add more toons in the group to increase this further... but it gets hard to find the right people and make sure they do their job (not go afk for 30 mins) when you are seperated and xp just keeps scrolling in the window. Again, they should be the same level (or +/- 1 lvl if you have to), and properly built for the same purpose.

[Moridin_]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

Just play a blaster and get over it. Seriously. I recommend this to all whiney scrappers out there. Come back to your scrapper when they "fix" everything for you.

[/ QUOTE ]

You reinforce my belief that you are nothing but a FOTM player. Only a FOTM player would say something as ridiculous as "if you think X is powerful then just play it"

You really just don't get it. I don't like to play a class just because it is more powerful. Rather, I want ALL classes to be balanced and equal so that my choice of playing one archetype over the other will be based purely on style rather than on power. Its a simple concept but will forever be beyond your ability to understand because you don't care what archetype you play as long as they are the most powerful.

FOTM players don't care what archetype they play, heck they can have fun playing any archetype as long as they are powerful. Not all of us are FOTM nuts that's why we care about such things as balance because we really don't want to quit this game but would rather quit it rather than be forced to play a blaster just to be competitive. Stop being an idiot and start realizing that just because someone doesn't want to play the most powerful class it means he has no right to bemoan an imbalance!



[/ QUOTE ]

I simply do not understand what you are trying to get at. If you are not a power leveler you can safely ignore this thread as it does not pertain to you. If you are a power leveler you will select whatever AT can be best tuned towards that end, it just so happens that AT is a blaster.

Given the dynamics of the game power leveling is linked to kill times and blasters are by design the AT that kills fastest. It seems unlikely then that you could ever change the fact that blasters are the best power leveling AT without redesigning the whole game or breaking the whole blaster AT. Either of these would simply make some other AT the power levels AT of choice and change nothing.

Since you seem to be saying you are not a power leveler my advice to you is to compare your scrapper to blasters who are similarly not power levelers. I think you will find they are much more comparable.

Put another way, what you seem to be doing is saying hey that guy is playing a blaster and made it to L40 in three weeks, while my scrapper is going to take three months. What you are missing is that that guy happens to be power leveling while you apparently are not.

He isn’t making it to 40 that fast because he is playing a blaster he’s making there that fast because he is power leveling, playing a blaster is just one step down that road. Blasters played the way you play your scrapper would take the same 3 months you do.

If you wanted, you could even build a power leveling scrapper. My guess would be that it would do about as well as the single target blasters and use much the same techniques. But from a true power levelers standpoint, tanking 3.5 weeks to reach 40 simply isn’t as good as taking 3 weeks.

[Moridin_]

[ QUOTE ]


Untrue. With a build containing build-up as a secondary (despite losing a slot to acc), you can 2 shot equal minion groups with Ice. I would suspect energy can do the same but might have issues with knockback moving groups out of a tight bundled with no followup AOE or second cone (until late levels). Without buildup in my secondary, I can 2 shot -1 lvl groups of minions. I am still left with any lts/bosses, which also happens with my fire primary. Additionally, I could argue that the cone is instant, instead of DOT, and actually kills faster... but I would have to digress as rain then takes it's time to finish them off.



[/ QUOTE ]

I can’t talk about ice, both energy torrent and explosive blast do less damage then their fire blaster counterparts. (IIRC, both are moderate for fire, minor for energy) The fire blaster will therefore always be able to kill higher level mobs with the 2 attack combo then eng blasters can. This will result in at least 30% more HP for the fire blaster, and therefore 30% faster leveling.

Presumably the eng attacks have shorter animations and recharge times to compensate for the lower damage, but if you are power leveling you do your combo and move on so the shorter recharge is irrelevant. If you are playing in a group with longer, tougher fights, then there is a substantial chance you will get to use torrent/blast one extra time making up for the difference but this is not a power leveling mode of operation.

[Jim_G]

A few comments:

I think two things are getting confused, and the result is that the uberness of blasters is getting exaggerated. Consider that 1) people who like to powerlevel choose to play blasters because of the advantages this class has in gaining experience, and 2) powerlevelers are willing to do things to maximize their experience that the average person would find incredibly boring, or against the spirit of the game. Look at the suggestions for how to play these blaster builds, including killing swarms for hours, deliberately replaying door missions, and ignoring Lt and bosses to move to the next group.

When you add the efficent builds to the powerleveler's "maximizing xp is the ONLY priority" mindset, you get characters that develop way more quickly. This is because powerlevelers do boring things very effectively, and we create characters that do exceptionally well at the boring stuff, and the game rewards that behavior with quick xp. That's one reason why people who play the game get annoyed with us and occasionally have to yell at us and say "Don't you guys care about FUN or PLAYING the game at all?"

[ QUOTE ]
I'm really beginning to wonder whether or not the people who played in beta are just plain idiots or devious or both.

[/ QUOTE ]
I work in the software industry. Here's what I've started to tell other people" "You really, really want to have a beta team before the software is released. Not because they will help you find bugs, although this is great. Not because they will help you improve the design, although they will. You want a beta team because a few weeks after release, other users are going to come to your public forums and say 'This is the most untested software in the history of the universe, and the people who did the QA are idiots, or blind, or both.' When that happens, you want to be able to point to the beta group, and point out that you had a few dozen, or a few hundred, or maybe even a few thousand people testing your software for weeks, and they didn't find the flaws that IN RETROSPECT seem obvious."

[Doc_Phantom]

[ QUOTE ]
I can?t talk about ice, both energy torrent and explosive blast do less damage then their fire blaster counterparts. (IIRC, both are moderate for fire, minor for energy) The fire blaster will therefore always be able to kill higher level mobs with the 2 attack combo then eng blasters can. This will result in at least 30% more HP for the fire blaster, and therefore 30% faster leveling.

[/ QUOTE ]

Good information. I have only played an energy blaster for a few lvls, up to 8 and am unsure about the exact statistics, especially since I did not slot specifically for AOE/cone.

Now, I do notice that energy gets energy/smash for torrent and it's labelled in Hero Planner as moderate. Actually, Explosive blast is the same. So, you "should" be doing identical dmg as ice for the cone for equally non-resistant mobs. I also noted that Torrent recycles in 8 seconds, as opposed to 16 for ice/fire cones. This means you can get 2 off in the same time. The problems with this are lack of immediate followup AOE/cone at low levels and knockback scattering them.

Of course, Hero Planner could be wrong with the numbers and my hypothesis is completely incorrect, since I don't have in-game experience with this build. I do know that other stats are off, like the end cost for the rain, which states 30, but can't be more than 12-15, based on the fact I can cast it with much less than 1/4 of the end bar left.

[Pulsewave_mark1]

[ QUOTE ]
... For the record though, 4 slotted for damage at level 28, pulling out all the stops I dealt capped damage (as the values were the same versus white and yellow mobs) of 301 with my Defender using Zapp. I rather suspect that a Blaster would deal considerably more. . .but maybe I'm wrong.

[/ QUOTE ]

Not sure what you mean by pulling out all the stops. Sounds like you buffed yourself all the way to your cap and it's 301. That sounds pretty good to me at lvl 28. Add 25% on to that and you'd have about 375 total damage for a Blaster.

I'd still rather calculate based on base damage since the caps are different for each archetype. Scrappers had a much higher cap than Blasters for example. This was recently changed too but I believe all archetypes have different caps, just like they have different damage multipliers.

[Azzi]

hi !

If you get stealth do you really also need invisibility?
How is it different, and how much improvement does it provide.

[Erratic]

[ QUOTE ]
Not sure what you mean by pulling out all the stops. Sounds like you buffed yourself all the way to your cap and it's 301. That sounds pretty good to me at lvl 28. Add 25% on to that and you'd have about 375 total damage for a Blaster.

[/ QUOTE ]

I meant by using character abilities only and NOT making use of outside buffs or inspirations. If a like level Blaster would only hit for 375 color me suprised as I would expect them to be on the order of 450 or so. In fact, if a like level Blaster would only hit for 375 I'd have to seriously consider if Defenders might be treading on Blaster territory too much.

[ QUOTE ]
I'd still rather calculate based on base damage since the caps are different for each archetype. Scrappers had a much higher cap than Blasters for example. This was recently changed too but I believe all archetypes have different caps, just like they have different damage multipliers.

[/ QUOTE ]

The problem with consideration on base damage is that if Defenders have a base of 50 and a cap of 300% that would translate into being able to belt out 150, which would seem superior to a Blaster having a base of 75 and a cap at 250% yielding a max of 187.5 even though in the end the Blaster is dealing more damage and hence kills things faster (and for less cost and setup).

[TacRedline]

energy torrent does MINOR damage, it hits the same as power bolt NOT evergy bolt.

that's a typo in the hero planner AND in the game text.

[Doc_Phantom]

BTW RSRobinson, despite my dispute over the abilities of ice, I agree with the rest of what you wrote... like you care...

Unless something new is contributed (instead of the off-topic sludge going on), I would like to close with this final piece of info:

AOE build primaries, from best to worse:
Assault Rifle
Fire
Ice
Energy
Electricity

While I did put Fire before Ice, simply because of the fire ball, I don't think there is a huge difference in killing speed based on Mr. Robinson's guide of decent sized blue -&gt; yellow minion packs. I do think, based on this latest info about energy (which I still admit to having almost no experience with), there is a huge fall off of AOE ability between Ice and Energy. I know Lightning Fast, elec/elec, was never anywhere near to a multi-target blaster.

[Ex_Libris]

For those wondering about the differences between now and beta:

In beta, defenders did 85% damage of a blaster, had equal endurance costs, and more HP... Basically, they were super blasters.

Consider the situation now, after the recent endurance cost improvements of other classes: Defender now hits for 65% damage of a blaster, powers cost 10% more, HP identical. Now for example add AM, JUST ONE BUFF THAT WORKS ON THE WHOLE GROUP. It gives 25% damage boost, 33% endurance recovery, some unknown amount of haste, run speed, and status effect resistance.

I think there can be no question that defenders are a much bigger boon to a group.

[Zigokubasi]

[ QUOTE ]
Unless something new is contributed (instead of the off-topic sludge going on)

[/ QUOTE ]

I've got a question for you. Looking at the Energy secondary, you only mention that it gets BU the earliest. But what about Power Boost? I haven't tried it yet, but given that Fire's secondary effect is more damage, wouldn't PB increase your total dmg output? The manual says it lasts "for your next couple of attacks" and since you are ideally only using two (Fire Breath and Fire Ball), it seems like the energy secondary would take the lead in total damage output.

Ziggy

[RSRobinson]

AfterShock, feel free to post/link it anywhere.

As for killing swarms for 5 hours, I didn't say it was 5 straight
hours, just 5 hours total. It happened to be split about in half.
Normally I have trouble powerleveling past 1 or 2 hours at a
time, but it was the home stretch to 40, so I toughed it out.

Swarms are a mob type found in great numbers in Crey's Folly. To
all you swarm hunters, put in the overtime now. Underlings on
test (swarms are underlings) are worth very little exp now.

Misc power question answers. On the question on Stealth,
Invisibility doesn't allow you to attack while using it, Stealth
is the power you want. Smoke grenade now misses (changed in the
last patch) but that isn't really a big deal. The whole point is
to reduce the overall damage you take from a pack and even
missing a few, it still does that. Smoke grenade and Cloaking
Device are both great, and while there is some overlap, you'll
want to pick them both up.

Scrappers are not bad soloers, though it takes perhaps a near-
perfect build to get a really good AOE soloer (by far better than
single target) while, for example, any Fire blaster build is going to be
a good soloer as long as the person is at all competent. The bigger
problem comes in groups, at higher levels. Let's not even talk
about scrappers taking more damage, pretend that isn't even an
issue (and it is), let's just talk dealing damage. The
scapper has to be really on his or her toes to not be complete
deadweight. A blaster just hits TAB and unloads his AOEs. A few
blasters do this and the mobs all melt. At worse, the blaster
hand clicks a mob in the center and unloads. With fast animation
time and no need to move close, the mobs die in seconds. The
scrapper, even if he is well-built and has powerful AOEs, has to
run up to the mob he wants to fight. If he wants to unload an
AOE, he has to carefully select the mob because his AOEs are much
lower radius than a blaster's plus the scrapper has to physically
get next to the mob before he can fire. With such low radius, the
mobs moving around as he charges is much more of an issue. And, a
scrapper usually has 1 circular AOE and the others will be a very
short range cone which is nearly impossible to use to the fullest
in a group, you need to be alone and use certain time-consuming
techniques to get the mobs properly lined up to use those
effectively. Of course, when you are playing with a couple of
blaster friends, anything that takes more than a couple seconds
is 'time consuming'. Its just a matter of game mechanics working
against scrappers and for blasters.

Lightning_Fast, you say you can 2-shot equal minion groups.
Fantastic. so you use one shot for Frost Breath, and the second
shot for... Ice does not have a second AOE. Ice Storm? It will
not do enough damage, its barely passable when you get it and it
declines a whole lot over time (relative to mob hit points). I
see from your sig that you are a level 16 ice blaster. Its just
not the same in the 20s and the 30s. Ice does not have a second
AOE to follow up with. Now, the reason I mentioned Fire as a
secondary in my guide was because getting Fire Sword Circle would
give you one. I haven't tried it myself, but Frost Breath and
Fire Sword Circle could well be the basis of a decent AOE
leveler. Maybe. However, it would still be hard because you have
two powers that need proper positioning instead of one. In other
words, its easy to line up a cone and follow it up by a big
circular AOE. Its not easy to line up a cone then use an AOE that
requires you to be right in the middle of the mobs, and has a
small radius to boot. It seems much more workable with energy
since you can stealth in and Fire Sword Circle then back out and
follow up by the circular Explosive Blast.

As for Energy, if you six-slot both Energy Torrent and Explosive
Blast plus always have buildup available and have all SOs you
could probably one-shot a -1 con pack, barely. Hopefully the mobs
are not at all resistant to smashing (the most common resistance
I believe) because a good portion of both AOE's damage is
smashing. Fortunately, energy resistance is rare. If they are
smashing resistant, you won't be 2-shotting a pack of anything
worth fighting. But even if you can, to do that you have to
underslot some of your single target powers to make the
enhancement slots, plus you can't do it until 31 because only by
then will you have Explosive Blast long enough to six-slot it. In
addition, you are dealing with some mobs being knocked back and
some not, meaning it is difficult to get both AOEs to hit the
whole pack. And while you can do it say at level 32 with all +3
level SOs, gain a few levels and your damage tapers off enough
that you'll be not quite doing enough damage to kill them. Ice
and Energy just are not cut out for AOEing. If you want AOEs, go
for the power sets that specialize in them.

Don't judge everything by the hero planner. Not all 'moderate'
damage is the same. Fire Breath plus Fireball does significantly
more damage than does Energy Torrent plus Explosive Blast
regardless of similar labeling. That's just the way it will be
with so few labels available. The weakest single-target attack,
Power Bolt, does about the same damage as Energy Torrent even
though Power Bolt is listed as minor and Energy Torrent is listed
as moderate. And Explosive Blast does a little less damage than
does Energy Torrent. The labels don't really help you, you need
to go out and use the powers or get advice from people who have.

[Rygel]

As an Electric/Fire blaster, I found this whole thread to be really informative. Yes, when I built my hero, I didnt choose the same powers simply because I wanted some variety. It may look funny, to see an electric blaster hocking fire, but its damn good fun :)

I'm not a power leveler. I do like to play in groups, but this thread does give you some fantistic information and considerations for perhaps starting an alternate hero.

Kudos to everyone for the information.

I'd also like to add that your shot at electric blasters is probably correct. It is much harder for me to (at level 24) solo mobs that con orange and red then my buddy who is a technology/devices blaster. Just the smoke grenade alone kicks butt. I do find that electric blasters are very good for teaming. If I tend to get more xp with one other teamate (usually my gravity controller friend or my tech/devices blaster), we go through mobs much faster then I could on my own simply because im always having to run things down or back off to avoid damage from large groups.

I don't see this as a bad thing for the way I like to play. But it is a bad thing for power levelers.

The main objective I guess of this thread to those who take it personally is that if your idea of playing CoH is to play and team and do missions, then nothing these folks have said here really applies to you. I read it as that, and others have too.

Thanks for taking the time to build this gude, and to all the constructive posters that built and commented on it too.

Cheers, and happy hunting.

[Doc_Phantom]

[ QUOTE ]
Lightning_Fast, you say you can 2-shot equal minion groups. Fantastic. so you use one shot for Frost Breath, and the second shot for... Ice does not have a second AOE. Ice Storm? It will not do enough damage, its barely passable when you get it and it declines a whole lot over time (relative to mob hit points). I see from your sig that you are a level 16 ice blaster. Its just not the same in the 20s and the 30s. Ice does not have a second AOE to follow up with.

[/ QUOTE ]

Actually, I stated that I could kill -1 groups with 2 casts (totalling about 3 seconds of animation, after lining up the cone). I also said a build containing build-up could do equals, simply extracting the fact that equals have 10-20% left without... so buildup should more than make that up. I know that if someone casts EV for me, I can 2 shot equals, and buildup is more dmg. Aim might be close in comparison and would allow the removal of a rad caster to tag along in this particular instance. Meanwhile, it's easier for me to just do -1's when solo.

[ QUOTE ]
Ice and Energy just are not cut out for AOEing. If you want AOEs, go for the power sets that specialize in them.

[/ QUOTE ]

Do you consider AR just as powerful as fire for powerleveling? If so, tell me what is the difference in killing your target groups in the 30s between AR and Ice. Please compare powers needed to complete an equal lvl group of minions.

[ QUOTE ]
Don't judge everything by the hero planner. Not all 'moderate' damage is the same. *snip* And Explosive Blast does a little less damage than does Energy Torrent. The labels don't really help you, you need to go out and use the powers or get advice from people who have.

[/ QUOTE ]

As I said, I have played all to a reasonable level, except energy... which I clearly stated I was basically unknown to me.

On a side note:
Do you think the toons listed below are my only toons? Do you think I don't have any at a higher levels that I just don't enjoy playing anymore? Why do you assume that I have not played at the 30s-40 level and therefore all my statements are uninformed/ignorant/without-merit?

Yes, there is a perfect build for solo powerleveling. There are also builds that are close in speed and may or may not be more enjoyable for a player. I am simply trying to show those other build's strengths relative to each other. I'm not trying to dismiss other builds, but offer other powerleveling options by showing that Ice is not disadvantaged in typical scenarios, contrary to your post.

[Anghell]

but but but .... how do you manage to solo with Fire Breath and Fire Ball??

what power do you start with ?

when i solo'd in perez park, i put catrops... then cast Fire Ball , after that i back off and cast rain of fire... and everything is dead, no need to cast another power.

now , explain to me how do you solo with fire ball and fire breath since that last power is short range and you'll get kicked in no time.

[Ex_Libris]

You can solo orange with just Fire Breath and Fire ball +aim and buildup. You open with Fire Breath and end the fight with Fireball a total of about 5sec and all mobs are down.

At best the mobs will get 1 round of attacks on you and most mobs will no kill you in that round. There will be no second round of attack when they are face down.

The "problem" with your view is that it´s low lvl. Fire rain is great at low lvl but at high lvl it don't have the dmg to kill anymore.
With your tactic an orange group would shoot 4-5 times before you even lay down Fire Rain. 4-5 Times from 10 orange is can be around 3000-5000dmg think you can take that?

[Renjiro]

[ QUOTE ]
I simply do not understand what you are trying to get at. If you are not a power leveler you can safely ignore this thread as it does not pertain to you. If you are a power leveler you will select whatever AT can be best tuned towards that end, it just so happens that AT is a blaster.

Given the dynamics of the game power leveling is linked to kill times and blasters are by design the AT that kills fastest. It seems unlikely then that you could ever change the fact that blasters are the best power leveling AT without redesigning the whole game or breaking the whole blaster AT. Either of these would simply make some other AT the power levels AT of choice and change nothing.

Since you seem to be saying you are not a power leveler my advice to you is to compare your scrapper to blasters who are similarly not power levelers. I think you will find they are much more comparable.

Put another way, what you seem to be doing is saying hey that guy is playing a blaster and made it to L40 in three weeks, while my scrapper is going to take three months. What you are missing is that that guy happens to be power leveling while you apparently are not.

He isn&amp;#8217;t making it to 40 that fast because he is playing a blaster he&amp;#8217;s making there that fast because he is power leveling, playing a blaster is just one step down that road. Blasters played the way you play your scrapper would take the same 3 months you do.

If you wanted, you could even build a power leveling scrapper. My guess would be that it would do about as well as the single target blasters and use much the same techniques. But from a true power levelers standpoint, tanking 3.5 weeks to reach 40 simply isn&amp;#8217;t as good as taking 3 weeks.

[/ QUOTE ]

Again this is a very very common mistaken assumption powerlevellers/FOTM players make about regular/roleplay players. When regular players demand balancing they always resort to the wierd accusatoin that we are just powerlevellers in denial. Like I said you probably will never "get it" because your mindset is so different from the rest of the gamers who aren't FOTM rollers.

I can however tell you that if you seriously think the developers will not care one way or the other that an archetype is attracting a large number of powerlevellers because it levels "so much faster" than the rest of the archetypes then you're either living in a dream world or simply naive and haven't played too many online games. If indeed what you say is true (that blasters just naturally make xp much, much faster) then you can bet that they will be nerfed.

What is the threshold for what is an acceptable discrepancy in XP rates? Of course the developers are willing to tolerate a slight discrepancy and they probably won't mind if the best blasters are levelling 5% faster than the rest. But you and I know that its far far more than that. Blasters can XP at rates 2-3x that of other archetypes, that's not an exaggeration and you know it. So again if you seriously think the devs are going to say, "Ooh, one archetype is levelling at 2-3x the rate of other archetypes. That's OK, let's keep the powerlevellers happy." you've got another thing coming!

Powerlevelling is all well and good, but if its because of some overpowering combination or an exploit or both then you're setting yourself up for a rude awakening a la burn tanker. An XP discrepancy of this magnitude will never escape the nerfbat's attention for long.

I also take offense to your insinuation that other archetypes aren't gimp relative to blasters because leveling rates are not a useful gauge for measuring archetype balance. There is nothing in this game but levels do you even realize that?? Again whats the threshold before it becomes plainly obvious that your position makes no sense? If an archetype levels at 1/100th the rate of a blaster will you finally concede that? Why? XP rate doesn't mater right?

Let's face it, something is very broken with the game mechanic currently in game. Its OK for people to want to level at the fastest rate possible but it cannot be at a pace that allows gamers to cap in the span of two weeks. That could only mean one of two possibilities: one that there are serious exploits undiscovered and two that there are extremely overpowered abilities in the game that trivialize all the rest.

[American_Pie]

Don't judge everything by the hero planner. Not all 'moderate' damage is the same. *snip* And Explosive Blast does a little less damage than does Energy Torrent. The labels don't really help you, you need to go out and use the powers or get advice from people who have.

Should probably talk to someone who HAS played an electric blaster to high levels. You electric information is misinformed.

[Ex_Libris]

[ QUOTE ]
You can solo orange with just Fire Breath and Fire ball +aim and buildup. You open with Fire Breath and end the fight with Fireball a total of about 5sec and all mobs are down.

[/ QUOTE ]

Try soloing reds for a little more excitement. Whip in a fire blast/flares/fire sword quickly to clean up the leftovers. Fun stuff. Simply Devastating.

[ QUOTE ]
I know reading is too much for most, but don't reply if you didn't take the time. First, fire breath is a cone and as I also said, other blasters have almost identical cones, so this is not a defining "AOE" attack for a fire blaster. Second, I was obviously talking about primaries only, as there is no mention of any secondaries relating to AOE.

[/ QUOTE ]

Gee, I can't read. Maybe you shouldn't have said anything about Fire not being AOE then. I don't see any other blaster with pure AOE in the primaries. Forget it, I lost all respect after I read your "no worries about melee mobs after level 10!" Did I read wrong here too? Gonna tell me to try hooked on phonics next? Too funny man. Get to level 40 and then tell me what you have learned. Too many players make assumptions on their low level heroes and then generalize that this is the way it is and the way it's gonna be.

[ QUOTE ]
Let me guess... your primary blaster is a fire/fire and you felt the need to defend it despite no argument against it? These aren't your kids people, calm down. Live a little. Play some other AT mixes so you aren't so freaked out when you see a post with your AT's type in the subject. "OMG, are they talking bad about my AT mix, should I post without reading? Why not, everyone else does".

--------------------
Doc Frost - 24 ice/rad cont - V
Doc Mental - 22 emp/psy def - V
Flagro - 17 fire/energy blast - V
Lord Spike - 15 spines/regen scrap - V
Techno Ice - 16 ice/dev blast - V

[/ QUOTE ]

A guy with this many alts tells me to calm down and live a little. LMAO. If I see an incorrect post, I correct it. Nothing gets me like people who don't know what they are talking about and then try to preach it to others. Point made, conversation over.

[RSRobinson]

Renjiro, the problem with your argument is that Blasters will
always solo faster than any other archtype, simply because they
are the archtype that does the most damage. What this game comes
down to is defeating mobs and that means doing as much damage to
them as they have hit points. Blasters will always do this faster
than anyone else. You can't make that not true without destroying
the basic design of archtypes in the game and that isn't going to
happen. The main reason I knew Burn Tankers would get nerfed hard
is because they destroyed the basic relationship between the
archtypes. Offensive tanker or not, if a tanker can deal damage
more efficiently (or even close to as efficiently) as the damage
class, its a problem, it will be stopped. However, that the
damage class is the best for damage is by design and will not be
changed. Other archtypes may get a boost (especially scrappers),
the gap may close somewhat, blasters may even take some nerfs but
in the end blasters will still be the fastest levelers, that's
just the way the game is and always will be.

Unfortunately, the game is in my opinion only a short-term game
because it lacks anything else other than killing. It has no
items to strive for, no crafting, little differentiation between
characters of the same powerset and level (at the higher levels),
and little variety in mob abilities and combat methodology (i.e.
95% of mobs just shoot at you and possibly charge you in order to
hit you in melee). Its also an inherent flaw that the more varied
in abilities a character is, the less efficient it is at just
killing stuff. Blasters have tons of killing abilities, that is
basically all. Completely boring and one dimensional, you kill
the same way over and over again. But you level by far the
fastest. Defenders are more interesting because they have a
defensive power set combined with an offensive one, but they pay
for it with noticeably less offense. Controllers are to me the
most interesting, because they have the most variety in
abilities. My first character was an illusion controller - you
get damage spells, holding spells, a charm, pets plus the defense
that the defenders get. By far the most interesting and by far
the least effective at what the game is all about, killing mobs.
And pity other controllers, as pathetic as an illusion controller
is soloing, he is much better off than the others.

To my mind, with so little to do in the game, the only way to
keep enjoying it is trying out new characters. The problem is
that characters other than blasters and some scrappers are
terrible levelers. Unless you have way too much time on your
hands (and even then), you can't get multiple characters into the
high 20s and 30s to try them out. Really, the game lacks anything
to do other than kill, the only way you can try something new is
to try a new character, it is inexcusable that you can't level at
a reasonable pace. In many ways, the game is more similar to
Diablo II than to a MMORPG. Imagine the failure D2 would have
been if it took a hundred hours or more to get to 70 or 80th
level.

Many people don't understand that the gap between an AOE blaster
and everyone else, including non-AOE blasters, is insane, several
times at least. People look just at the AOE blaster and say 'my
god, leveling is way too fast in the game'. Yeah, well go play
anything else. With swarms nerfed in the upcoming patch, people
will see just how stupidly slow leveling is now.

If I could make the next patch, I'd first look at controllers and
boost the damage their single-target status spells do to be in
the same ballpark as everyone else. I'm talking about their basic
attack spells like Blind, Fossilize, Char, etc. Throw controllers
a bone, its not like boosting their damage is going to suddenly
make them soloing gods or start being the character of choice in
groups. Basically treat those abilities just like attack spells
and give them damage appropriate for their recast delay in the
same way everyone else's damage spells are done. Controllers have
a lower damage multiplier than the other classes, so their damage
will still be less, but it will be something other than a
complete joke. At the same time, I'd change the endurance cost of
every single-target attack spell (for everyone) to be on the same
scale as that used by blasters, ignoring any secondary effects
the spell has. I can't think of any single-target attack spell in
which the secondary effect is so good that it absolutely demands
you pay additional endurance for it. Most importantly, the
archtypes who get a boost (i.e. everyone except for blasters) are
already the archtypes who I think most people agree need help.
When it comes to damage output, the class the furthest behind,
controllers, get two boosts. I don't honestly believe anyone
could claim that making their single-target status spells do some
decent damage at a lower cost are going to overbalance
controllers. They already are probably the weakest archtype,
chances are this still wouldn't catch them up but it'd be a good
start.

Reducing the endurance cost wouldn't increase combat power, it
would only reduce downtime between fights. Downtime is no fun for
anyone, its why everyone takes Stamina. Its not like any
non-blaster will suddenly become overpowered because of this. The
bottleneck to beating up mobs is still how fast you can kill
them, and that boils down to how many attack spells you have, how
fast they recycle, and how much damage they do. Blasters will
still be at the top. It only will get rid of the huge pauses
every few encounters that other classes must endure to regen
endurance and that blasters have to put up with much less often.

The second problem I'd address is that AOEs are just insanely
better than single-target attacks for exping. The truth is that
if we discount Fire and Assault Rifle Blasters (and Fire
Tankers), the difference between the soloing ability of the
classes is not really all that out of whack. Scrappers compare
reasonably well to blasters minus the AOE advantage. Defenders
can be passable soloers, if built for it, at least when you are
not forced to compare them to an AOE soloer. To address this
disparity, I would add a method of acquiring exp that
single-target power sets would be more suited for, namely
completing missions. The current reward for finishing missions at
higher levels is a joke, it might as well not even exist.
Increase the reward. Not a little bit, a lot. It should scale to
mission map size, and therefore mission completion time. A tiny
map should give about 1% of the level, an enormous map (like a
big COT base one) should give about 5% of the level. To prevent
abuse, I'd scale the reward based on what percentage of the mobs
you took out, down to a minimum of say 25% of the reward. In
other words, if you invis through and just find all the glowies,
you'd get the minimum 25% of the possible reward. If you killed
half the villians, you'd get half the reward. If you got them
all, you get the full reward.

The net result would be that the soloing exp earning ability of
the various archtypes will be made more similar. AOE blasters,
the current kings, will see no improvement. In fact, with the
nerfing of underlings, they will be reduced. At the same time,
all the other archtypes will be improved. No one will gain exp
any faster than the best currently possible, just the people who currently
gain it the slowest should see a marked improvement. At the same time,
people are encouraged to do their missions rather than skipping
them in favor of grinding.


One last comment: American_Pie, my housemate is a level 36
electric blaster. Name any comment I've made that is uninformed.
I've watched him play a whole lot, played beside him a whole lot,
and the simple fact is that electricity blasters are inferior to
other blasters for powerleveling purposes. I'm sorry that you
have a level 40 electric blaster and don't want to admit that you
aren't as good as the other primary power sets. Go complain to
the developers that endurance drain has to be improved, attacking
the messenger is pointless.

[American_Pie]

One last comment: American_Pie, my housemate is a level 36
electric blaster. Name any comment I've made that is uninformed.
I've watched him play a whole lot, played beside him a whole lot,
and the simple fact is that electricity blasters are inferior to
other blasters for powerleveling purposes. I'm sorry that you
have a level 40 electric blaster and don't want to admit that you
aren't as good as the other primary power sets. Go complain to
the developers that endurance drain has to be improved, attacking
the messenger is pointless.

Then your buddy dont know how to play. If Electric is so bad at Powerleveling, how come I was one of the first 40's?

[Moridin_]

[ QUOTE ]


Again this is a very very common mistaken assumption powerlevellers/FOTM players make about regular/roleplay players. When regular players demand balancing they always resort to the wierd accusatoin that we are just powerlevellers in denial. Like I said you probably will never "get it" because your mindset is so different from the rest of the gamers who aren't FOTM rollers.


[/ QUOTE ]

I’m not talking about role players in general; I’m talking about you in particular. YOU came into a thread about the best way to power level and started trying to complain about the fact that your AT didn’t have quite the same power leveling capabilities. There can be no other interpretation for this than that you want you’re preferred AT to be better at power leveling.

BTW, in case you missed it I am not a power leveler. I share some of their techniques when I solo, but decided against some of the most important ones be *gasp* they didn’t fit the character I envisioned.


[ QUOTE ]

I can however tell you that if you seriously think the developers will not care one way or the other that an archetype is attracting a large number of powerlevellers because it levels "so much faster" than the rest of the archetypes then you're either living in a dream world or simply naive and haven't played too many online games. If indeed what you say is true (that blasters just naturally make xp much, much faster) then you can bet that they will be nerfed.


[/ QUOTE ]


Did you even stop to think a little before you wrote that? Someone who is power leveling will easily advance 4X faster then someone who isn’t and the difference is potentially much more then that. This means that whatever AT the power levelers choose is going to advance significantly faster then the others overall. It’s an all or nothing proposition.

Secondly blasters in general do not power level signifincaly better then scrappers, this only applies to the AoE blasters. Scrappers can tackle the same mobs as single target blasters and do so nearly as quickly, so if blasters are nerfed so they are less effective for power leveling (again proably not even possible without completely destroying the AT) guess who is next up on the list. You guessed it scrappers because they are the second best power leveling class.

[ QUOTE ]


What is the threshold for what is an acceptable discrepancy in XP rates?


[/ QUOTE ]

I have to question whether you even read my post. Among people who are not power leveling I see no significant difference in who levels how fast nor do I believe a significant difference is even possible given that unless you are power leveling most of your time will be spent moving from place to place. Furthermore, if you are not power leveling there is a good chance you are working in a mixed group and therefore advancing at EXACTLY the same rate as someone else your level.

[ QUOTE ]


Blasters can XP at rates 2-3x that of other archetypes, that's not an exaggeration and you know it.



[/ QUOTE ]

Not an exaggeration so much as a deliberate bending of the truth on your part. Blasters power leveling advance at least that much faster then someone of another AT who is not power leveling. Blasters who are not power leveling enjoy no such advantage.

Blasters power leveling may enjoy that much of an advantage over defenders and controllers. For tanks the difference is much less and I defy you to point to something in the first post of this thread under the single target blaster category that cannot be done by a scrapper almost as quickly.


[ QUOTE ]

I also take offense to your insinuation that other archetypes aren't gimp relative to blasters because leveling rates are not a useful gauge for measuring archetype balance. There is nothing in this game but levels do you even realize that??

[/ QUOTE ]

That has to be the best characterization of the mindset of a power leveler I ever heard. If you think this way then I do not see how you can possibly be anything but a disgruntled power leveler at heart. Have you ever heard of a little thing called fun? If your only source of fun in these games is leveling then I assure you that despite what you claim, you are a power leveler.

[Doc_Phantom]

[ QUOTE ]
Gee, I can't read. Maybe you shouldn't have said anything about Fire not being AOE then. I don't see any other blaster with pure AOE in the primaries. Forget it, I lost all respect after I read your "no worries about melee mobs after level 10!" Did I read wrong here too? Gonna tell me to try hooked on phonics next? Too funny man. Get to level 40 and then tell me what you have learned. Too many players make assumptions on their low level heroes and then generalize that this is the way it is and the way it's gonna be.


[/ QUOTE ]

Actually, I never said fire wasn't AOE. I said fire breath is not a unique power to fire by saying it is not a defining power to call fire an AOE build over some others. Fire Ball would be that defining power. That is unique compared to something like Ice, which does not have this type of power.

Also, I never said "no worries about melee mobs after 10". So, yes, you did read wrong. Maybe your habit of quoting from multiple sources has confused who said what in your mind. No biggie, but as I said before... you aren't reading (at least not correctly).

[ QUOTE ]
A guy with this many alts tells me to calm down and live a little. LMAO. If I see an incorrect post, I correct it. Nothing gets me like people who don't know what they are talking about and then try to preach it to others. Point made, conversation over.

[/ QUOTE ]

Trust me, I have more alts, these are just my active ones. You also have no idea if I have had any toons reach 35+. I don't understand your negative point as to my number of toons. You obviously didn't understand that I am not married to any one of them in particular, where most people are and will defend it, regardless of the facts or circumstances. Nothing in my post has been incorrect. But I suspect you will continue to read what you want and twist whatever I say to argue your point.

If you care to contribute to the conversation by reading posts and discussing the points, please do.

[Ex_Libris]

How do you make do without Superjump/Fly in places like Faultline?

[Ex_Libris]

Avoid Faultline, it's a waste of time. :D

[Wytch_NA]

[ QUOTE ]
How do you make do without Superjump/Fly in places like Faultline?

[/ QUOTE ]

If in a group people will TP you normally. Honest I skipped Fautline. I leveled so quick it by passed it.

[Anghell]

how good is caltrops now ?? do i still need to 6 slot it to root foes ? or is it a suxing power now ?

[StemCell]

Very nice...thanks for this info-

[RSRobinson]

American_Pie, maybe if you'd actually read what I posted, you'd know the answer. Electricity blasters are still blasters and therefore still good at powerleveling. They are simply inferior to any other blaster. If you had chosen any other blaster primary you'd have gotten to 40 even faster.

Of course, you failed to mention any statement I made that you didn't agree much less the reasons for it. Here is a simple fact: for the single target fighting style, ice and energy both are better at it for the reasons I describe. Energy, for instance, is basically just an in-all-ways superior version of electricity. We have the same three basic attacks (the 4/8 second nuke and snipe) except Energy gets the useful knockback while you get the useless endurance drain. Plus, energy gets a 3rd heavy nuke for which electricity has no equivelent. It is insane to claim that electricity will somehow magically be able to kill as quickly when it has inferior tools to do so.

So, please, instead of insisting I don't know what I am talking about, explain exactly why you think that electricity will powerlevel as fast as energy or ice. (It is a given that all 3 are inferior to fire/assault rifle so we can just ignore them in the discussion).

[Wytch_NA]

[ QUOTE ]
American_Pie, maybe if you'd actually read what I posted, you'd know the answer. Electricity blasters are still blasters and therefore still good at powerleveling. They are simply inferior to any other blaster. If you had chosen any other blaster primary you'd have gotten to 40 even faster.


[/ QUOTE ]

Other then Fire (saw it first hand) I can imagine me getting to 32 as quick as I did (3 weeks noexploits). Fire put me to shame AE wise. Other then the seconday effect of Elec I find myself very happy with my choice I made.

[Darkstar]

[ QUOTE ]
how good is caltrops now ?? do i still need to 6 slot it to root foes ? or is it a suxing power now ?

[/ QUOTE ]

Well, I just started a blaster 8 hours ago, but to me caltrops is "teh win". :)

Round up a 2-3 groups of -1 or even cons, pop an enrage, hit Caltrops+ Rain of Fire + FireBall + FireBreath and clean up any remaining stragglers with FireBlast. Rinse and Repeat.

Don't group until they revoke the 6/9 patch. It's just not worth it if you are trying to level.

[American_Pie]

[ QUOTE ]
American_Pie, maybe if you'd actually read what I posted, you'd know the answer. Electricity blasters are still blasters and therefore still good at powerleveling. They are simply inferior to any other blaster. If you had chosen any other blaster primary you'd have gotten to 40 even faster.

Of course, you failed to mention any statement I made that you didn't agree much less the reasons for it. Here is a simple fact: for the single target fighting style, ice and energy both are better at it for the reasons I describe. Energy, for instance, is basically just an in-all-ways superior version of electricity. We have the same three basic attacks (the 4/8 second nuke and snipe) except Energy gets the useful knockback while you get the useless endurance drain. Plus, energy gets a 3rd heavy nuke for which electricity has no equivelent. It is insane to claim that electricity will somehow magically be able to kill as quickly when it has inferior tools to do so.

So, please, instead of insisting I don't know what I am talking about, explain exactly why you think that electricity will powerlevel as fast as energy or ice. (It is a given that all 3 are inferior to fire/assault rifle so we can just ignore them in the discussion).

[/ QUOTE ]

Think I made my point by saying that I was 40 before most others. exceptions were the caltrops/ignite exploiters. I was first to 40 in my supergroup too, beating the energy/energy and assault/device blasters.

There is no one AT that is faster, it depends on play style and tactics.

Saying one whole class sucks based on your buddies playing is misinformed. If you want to see how an electric blaster is played, roll a toon on Justice or on Test. I'll show you how worthless endurance drain is.

[RaptorCK]

I'm gonna try to log on tomorrow night (6/18) around maybe 10pm EST. Can you show me the ropes? I've got a lvl 13 elec/elec blaster on Justice who I don't think I've been using to her best potential.

[Doc_Phantom]

[ QUOTE ]
So, please, instead of insisting I don't know what I am talking about, explain exactly why you think that electricity will powerlevel as fast as energy or ice. (It is a given that all 3 are inferior to fire/assault rifle so we can just ignore them in the discussion).

[/ QUOTE ]

What was that? Did I just hear the creaking of a mind closing? Yup.

[bwbarbou]

[ QUOTE ]

Saying one whole class sucks based on your buddies playing is misinformed. If you want to see how an electric blaster is played, roll a toon on Justice or on Test. I'll show you how worthless endurance drain is.

[/ QUOTE ]

Amen to that!!! End drain has kept me from debt many many times. Nothing like stopping a boss dead in his tracks, and have him stand there like a practice dummy as you wail on him since he can't hit you back. Then again, i actually do the missions from my contacts.
Why powerlevel in a game with no PvP? I'm not trying to bash anyone who does, but I'm very curious as to the motive behind it. I personally love looking over my souvenirs and reading about the past missions I've been on. It helps to get immersed in the comic book aspect of the game. Not only that, it seems to be a slap in the face to Cryptic's content team, who have done a wonderful job on this game.
Please, enlighten me.

[p0isonb0x]

a post i actually ejoyed reading... hmm i guess there is a 1st for everything

[TacRedline]

[ QUOTE ]

Nothing like stopping a boss dead in his tracks, and have him stand there like a practice dummy as you wail on him since he can't hit you back.


[/ QUOTE ]

Well that's cute and all but if you were using fire he'd already be dead.

[Moridin_]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

Nothing like stopping a boss dead in his tracks, and have him stand there like a practice dummy as you wail on him since he can't hit you back.


[/ QUOTE ]

Well that's cute and all but if you were using fire he'd already be dead.

[/ QUOTE ]

I doubt it. Elec still kills single targets quickly, it just doesn’t have the immediately useful secondary effects of ice or eng, both of which can take to boss out of the fight on their very first offensive move. Elec does have fewer single target attacks, which is a problem, but If I’m not mistaken the ones it does have do more damage. Overall I think I would prefer elec over fire going one on one verses a boss, but eng or ice would be even better.

[Azzi]

:o

[BernieGoetz]

I read the guide, good stuff. I like the info and will use the advice. I mean no disrespect to my fellow CoH gamers when I say...

I was a little "saddened" by the post, although as a newbie to the game I expected it.

I think this game is immersive, lots of back-story. Killing baddies is just part of the fun, gets the blood pumping when you narrowly avoid death or run away with a sliver of life. The more immersed you get, the more actual time you spend reading the contacts information, looking at clues, trying to contribute to the society of Paragon City, the MORE you blood is going to pump from the sheer excitement of the action in the game. Yes, I believe the powergamer misses out on the true "action" in the game even though they think they're all about the action aspect, ironic.

Do you care when a character that hasn't been developed in a movie is killed? No. In RPGs your involvement in the development of your character isn't half as interesting, exciting or pulse pounding if you haven't let yourself become immersed in the world.

I believe the highs you feel running around burning foes with your blaster as a power gamer who has broken the statistics down to their lowest common denominator, built the 'best' on paper character who specifically avoids back-story or development as an inefficient waste of time (IE why bother creating a cool costume for your powergamer character, just take a default) I believe your highs aren't as high as my highs in the game. Sorry if that sounds arrogant or if you think I really can't "know" how someone feels in a game or how much enjoyment he derives, but I do know, and I know you're missing out by being a "powergamer". You're missing out most on the very aspects of the game you purport to specialize in.

This is nothing new. I see it in all computer games. I saw it in dice and pencil RPGs years ago. The DM and his pals who gave out ridiculous magic items and had millions of hit points didn't play D&amp;D very long. Me and my friends who played with a stingy DM and played in a fertile world that unfolded like a story before us would play the same campaign for years and years.

I really don't mean any offence to the powergamers. In fact, for all those of you who got your level 40 in one week of playing and have all your sockets in the mathematically most efficient slots for maximum NPC damage dealing here, I bestow upon you your rightful gift. A cookie. Enjoy.

Bernie Goetz, crime fighter extraordinaire

[Ex_Libris]

I think you'd be surprised at how many powergamers are roleplayers. Simply because you fall in one of those categories, does not mean you can't also fall in the other.

[bwbarbou]

Bernie.... very well said.

[Wytch_NA]

[ QUOTE ]
I think you'd be surprised at how many powergamers are roleplayers. Simply because you fall in one of those categories, does not mean you can't also fall in the other.

[/ QUOTE ]

I consider myself to be a powerPLAYER vs powergamer. Why? I play 4 to 5 hours a night and I maximize my exp vs play time. I level quick but I dont try to level just to level.

Now I know power gamers and they play 8 to 12 hours a day. I could be a power gamer and not know it, I only play 8 + hours on the weekend.

[TacRedline]

1) i didn't re-roll, my energy/devices guys f'n owns. Is it ok with you if I play my beta template a bit? (fire/devices)?.

2) heh, i don't 'power game', i see all my contacts, group, task force and what not.

[American_Pie]

[ QUOTE ]
I read the guide, good stuff. I like the info and will use the advice. I mean no disrespect to my fellow CoH gamers when I say...

I was a little "saddened" by the post, although as a newbie to the game I expected it.

I think this game is immersive, lots of back-story. Killing baddies is just part of the fun, gets the blood pumping when you narrowly avoid death or run away with a sliver of life. The more immersed you get, the more actual time you spend reading the contacts information, looking at clues, trying to contribute to the society of Paragon City, the MORE you blood is going to pump from the sheer excitement of the action in the game. Yes, I believe the powergamer misses out on the true "action" in the game even though they think they're all about the action aspect, ironic.

Do you care when a character that hasn't been developed in a movie is killed? No. In RPGs your involvement in the development of your character isn't half as interesting, exciting or pulse pounding if you haven't let yourself become immersed in the world.

I believe the highs you feel running around burning foes with your blaster as a power gamer who has broken the statistics down to their lowest common denominator, built the 'best' on paper character who specifically avoids back-story or development as an inefficient waste of time (IE why bother creating a cool costume for your powergamer character, just take a default) I believe your highs aren't as high as my highs in the game. Sorry if that sounds arrogant or if you think I really can't "know" how someone feels in a game or how much enjoyment he derives, but I do know, and I know you're missing out by being a "powergamer". You're missing out most on the very aspects of the game you purport to specialize in.

This is nothing new. I see it in all computer games. I saw it in dice and pencil RPGs years ago. The DM and his pals who gave out ridiculous magic items and had millions of hit points didn't play D&amp;D very long. Me and my friends who played with a stingy DM and played in a fertile world that unfolded like a story before us would play the same campaign for years and years.

I really don't mean any offence to the powergamers. In fact, for all those of you who got your level 40 in one week of playing and have all your sockets in the mathematically most efficient slots for maximum NPC damage dealing here, I bestow upon you your rightful gift. A cookie. Enjoy.

Bernie Goetz, crime fighter extraordinaire

[/ QUOTE ]

Thats a big misconception that everyone level 40 skipped the content. Levels dont really matter, time played does. I've done just about every mission and I hit 40 within a month of release. I also helped my SG level up, so I was rarely xping solo, mainly after 34.

I think people are more envyous of others ability to play alot rather than their level.

[Ex_Libris]

Oh yea, that must be it...they're "envious"... :p

[American_Pie]

[ QUOTE ]
Oh yea, that must be it...they're "envious"... :p

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes I believe so. Why does anyone care if someone is 40? Does it impact your game that someone else is 40?

So, why should someone who is say level 20 care that a level 40 has not enjoyed the game and skipped all the content, especially since its not true.

[Deathless]

I’m playing a non-AOE blaster and his specialty is wiping out large groups of orange. Yes, that’s right, he can take out a group of orange. Not only can he handle a group of orange, he can also destroy a combo of 2 purp lieutenants and 2 red minions. How do you suppose he could do this? No, it doesn’t involve any exploits, but rather the trick involves hovering and blasting from a distance. So here’s my suggestion to the person who wrote this guide – try the hover-blasting technique and once you reach level 22, you’ll see a big difference between flight and speed.

Jackdaw

[Ex_Libris]

[ QUOTE ]
I’m playing a non-AOE blaster and his specialty is wiping out large groups of orange. Yes, that’s right, he can take out a group of orange. Not only can he handle a group of orange, he can also destroy a combo of 2 purp lieutenants and 2 red minions. How do you suppose he could do this? No, it doesn’t involve any exploits, but rather the trick involves hovering and blasting from a distance. So here’s my suggestion to the person who wrote this guide – try the hover-blasting technique and once you reach level 22, you’ll see a big difference between flight and speed.

[/ QUOTE ]

The big difference between the two is speed. The superseed AE'er is finishing a group in about 5 seconds and moving to the next. You're spending much more time to kill one group.

Is it bad exp? No. You'll be generating more exp per hour than any other archtype.

Is it the most efficient exp gain, which is what this guide is about? No. AEing will generate the most exp per hour hands down.

[RSRobinson]

American_Pie, ignore the others in your supergroup. YOU would
have leveled faster to 40 using Ice or Energy than Electricity.
And I didn't say Electricity sucked, I said it was inferior to
the other choices. From a powerleveler's perspective (the whole
point of the guide), the idea is to choose the best choices, not
the second best choices. So I guess from a powerleveler's
perspective that does mean it sucks, but if you just want to have
fun, do missions, that sort of thing there is nothing wrong with
it.

Of course, you say you did very little soloing until 34, so I'm
not sure how you comments really apply. You are grouped with your
friends until 34 meaning regardless of what character they
played, you will all level the same. Heck, for all I know, you
were one of the first to 40 because one of your grouping buddies
was a fire tanker. After 34, when you said you did your soloing,
you are high enough level to do swarms. All blasters can squash
them quickly and efficiently, so during your soloing time it just
boiled down to more play time than your friends. Now I don't know
if you did do swarms or not, but you would have leveled faster if
you did. If you did not, it proves even more that the issue
wasn't your build or your primary power set, but just lots more
playtime or a willingness to grind that your friends lacked. With
the next patch, swarms will no longer allow all blasters
comparable leveling in the 30s. Underlings are nerfed on test.
The next crop of people coming to the 30s who want to level as
fast as possible will really see the difference between AOE
blasters and single-target blasters and between the various
single-target blasters. And they will see that Energy and Ice are
better than Electricity.

Just for the record, I did a bit over 4 levels in the 30s on
swarms and the rest on missions and street hunting in Brickstown
and Founders Falls. I hated doing swarms because they were so
dull but I just couldn't stand the insanely slow exp speeds as a
single target blaster, I could only stand so much once all my
missions were used up. These levels showed me that a build has
to have a powerleveling aspect to it to make any progress at all
at the high levels.

Admit it, endurance drain is far inferior to knockback and slow.
For powerleveling it is completely useless. You kill mobs that
pose no risk and can be massacred as fast as possible. No mob
will live long enough to be drained of mana. At least with
knockback and slow, you will take slightly less damage, though
all three will take little enough that it is hardly an issue. No,
for powerleveling, lacking a third big nuke is electricity's
problem. Versus bosses (which are kind of irrelevent for
powerleveling since when going solely for exp, you do not fight
bosses) I'll match my knockdown to your endurance drain any day
of the week. Especially before your character was fully
developed. Remember, knockback puts bosses on their back right
from level 1, and right from the opening shot of the battle.

By the way, I've copied Kelena, my 40 energy blaster, to test.
I'd be happy to meet you anytime to give you the chance to
impress me with your endurance drain. We can hit the COT and Crey
level 40 spawns around Agent Six, a typical single-target grind
spot for the high 30s (not that there is many alternatives), and
you can show me just how fantastic endurance drain is. And I'll
show you the difference the third heavy nuke makes.

Lightning_Fast, it isn't being closed minded to admit that fire
and assault rifle are simply better powerlevelers than are the
single-target power sets. Its really indisputable fact. Ice,
Electricity, and Energy all kill in a similar fashion so it is
best to compare them. My point was that we should avoid bringing
in Fire or Assault Rifle as a red hearing to make Electricity
look bad, to compare it to its peer power sets and show that it
still comes up short.

Bwbarbou, you are making a mistaken assumption that I do not do
missions. You don't list your level, but here is a tip. Do EVERY
mission at 30 and again at 35. When you are done with them,
you'll be left with about 3 levels in each 5-level block to go
that you'll have to grind somewhere. And there is something like
having a boss be a practice dummy after you managed to drain its
endurance. Having him spend the entire fight on his back, right
from the opening snipe, looking stupid as you beat him into
submission.

BernieGoetz, basically the same comment. At high levels the
missions give you only a fraction of the experience you will need
to level up. As in all your contacts will be drained, no more
missions, and you still have several levels to go before you get
more contacts. You will have to grind no matter what. The
difference is that a poor grinding built is likely to get
frustrated with the mindless killing and give up while a good
build is still frustrated but can get through in something less
than eternity to get to see the new contacts and the new
missions. Now that swarms are to be nerfed, it will take a player
even more willing to grind mindlessly to get past the 30s. We'll
just have to wait and see on the 40s.

Codename_hitman, what's your point? You just assume I would have
trouble taking out 2 purple lieutenants and 2 red minions. You
would be mistaken. The only mobs that give me any trouble are
those with status effects. You know, the ones that will knock
your hovering butt out of the sky right into the middle of the
pack. Nothing gets into melee range unless I want it to, or I am
held/slept/stunned (not counting immobolize, with Combat Jumping
I can't remember the last time anything successfully immobilized
me.) If that happens, with caltrops, I am much less likely to be
forced into melee than the you with your hover which just shut
off.

Single-target blasters avoid large packs because there is no
advantage in fighting them. You'll still have to pick them off
one at a time. What's the difference between picking off 5 guys
one at a time twice or 10 guys one at a time? Only that with 10,
more guys are shooting at you for a longer time, so you have more
downtime. Yes, a pack of oranges will do a noticeable amount of
damage shooting at you over the time it takes you to take them
out individually, especially if you are not a devices blaster
with Smoke Grenade. It just makes much more sense to find smaller
packs that you can drop quickly to minimize the shots you take.
It has zero to do with melee. I have no hover, yet no mob gets
into melee range with me unless I don't care if it does.

I'll add that if you rely on hover, wait until you get to high
level. I've been fooling around with the new content on test and
the developers' non-creative method of making the higher level
groups more difficult is to make a lots of them have status
effects. You will be slept/held/stunned constantly. You will be
completely drained of mana and have all your toggles turned off
contantly against one villian group. I don't mean just by the
bosses, by minions, minions at range. Hover will not even keep
you out of melee anymore because it will be constantly shut off.
Fortunately, my caltrops still work fine, and superspeed means if
I find the fight going badly, I only need a second or so of
unheld/stunned/slept time to turn it on and run away with my tail
between my legs. Flight is just slower, you will get much less
separation in the same given time, meaning much more chance that
you don't get away.

[BernieGoetz]

On power gamer and role player being one in the same. Yes I know they cross over.

The MMORPG is more Power Gamer territory, role players might feel out of place at times but still find a lot of excitement. As a veteran of "in character" RPG's (like Masquerade, played in real life with real people) I've seen many Power Gamer types come and feel out of place at real IC RPG sessions, perhaps as much as I do on this message board. Of course I always tried to make everyone feel welcome and that they had legitimate input.

But those who were overly concerned with numbers and powers would lose interest. They wanted to resolve the storyline and dispense with the "game" so they could get more powers. It's a tendency of human nature really so I don't mean to insult anyone. John Lennon said that life is what happens to us while we're busy making other plans. All I'm saying to the power gamer is to stop and take time to smell the Vahzilok (okay, not literally).

[ QUOTE ]
Thats a big misconception that everyone level 40 skipped the content.

[/ QUOTE ]

Huh? Did I say that someone lvl 40 skipped content? If the content is riveting eventually everybody will reach level 40. Unless of course there is some skill ceiling in the game which I have yet to encounter, which could be fun.

[ QUOTE ]
Levels dont really matter, time played does. I've done just about every mission and I hit 40 within a month of release. I also helped my SG level up, so I was rarely xping solo, mainly after 34.

So, why should someone who is say level 20 care that a level 40 has not enjoyed the game and skipped all the content, especially since its not true.

[/ QUOTE ]

In true "powergamer" fashion, even "immsersiveness" becomes a quantifiable value, proving that the power gamer just doesn't get the RPG.

[ QUOTE ]
I think people are more envyous of others ability to play alot rather than their level.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm just jealous of that cookie I don't get to snack on. :o

Bernie Goetz

[BernieGoetz]

BTW, RSRobinson. I completely respect your guide and your observations and in no way attempt to detract from the idea of "grinding" which I try only to do in bed. I completely understand that you stated what your guide was and was not and I respect that. I know it's an inevitable position.

I appreciated reading what someone feels is a good build as opposed to a not so good build. Believe me, I am more than a little interested in getting my characters as tough as possible for the tougher missions I expect to see later. And yes I spend a lot of time just taking out random baddies everywhere on the map.

[RSRobinson]

BernieGoetz, I know reading this guide you must think me purely a powergamer. That is not the case. I would rather be doing missions than street grinding any day of the week, even for slower exp. Heck, I play an energy blaster, a good mission runner but not the best grinder just because I like missions.

The problem with this game is that missions run out before you level up to the next level. You have to grind. To me, grinding is something I do not for more levels and powers (though I do like those), but to open up my next set of contacts and get more missions. Unfortunately, I was one of the people with 2 bugged story arcs from 25-30, so I have not been able to see any of story arcs from 30 on. Very frustrating to me. Fortunately, the devs have said that this is fixed so I should get to see 40 plus story arcs. I also read that there are a whole lot of missions 40 plus, I hope this is truly the case. The fact that one of the first missions I tried was a 'defeat all villians' mission with a level 40 archvillian in it was very upsetting. I am a soloer at heart, and before I was even a bub into 40, already I've got an unsoloable mission. Plus, I came across an unkillable boss for me in another mission, fortunately I didn't have to kill it. It hits for 300 damage at range, has a ranged hold, phases out during the battle so half the time your attacks have no effect, and summons lieutenants to help it that also have a ranged hold attack. Oh yeah, and it floats so knockback only pushes it back, it doesn't knock it down. It just is too powerful - the phase out that makes an attack just bounce off which it seems able to turn on while recharging its attacks and off while firing is the kicker. Add to that so many more minions having status effects and all of your toggles getting turned of and the content I played so far seems to have the general theme of difficulty via frustration which does not bode well for me to have fun with it.

[American_Pie]

Admit it, endurance drain is far inferior to knockback and slow.
For powerleveling it is completely useless. You kill mobs that
pose no risk and can be massacred as fast as possible

Your position that electricity is worse than the other AT's because mobs will die too fast to make endurance drain effective doesnt make sense.

If mobs die too fast, then none of the secondary effects really dont come into play in PL.

With Endurance drain, I dont have have bypass groups with bosses or multiple bosses or multiple LT's.

I'll add that character you have to my friends list on test, Im stuck in *outbreak* atm.

[Obitus]

[ QUOTE ]
Renjiro, the problem with your argument is that Blasters will
always solo faster than any other archtype, simply because they
are the archtype that does the most damage... [snipped for brevity's sake]

[/ QUOTE ]

That is probably the single most insightful post about this game that I have read. Kudos RSRobinson. Agree 100%.

(Just for emphasis, mission bonuses should be increased)

And my main is a scrapper. :)

[euVicious]

&lt;begin rant&gt;
wow. imean.. just wow.
rob puts up a PL guide and of course all the RPGers start complaining that PLing is dumb. If you don't like it, DONT DO IT!!!

and then all the elec/whatever people start talking about "im not inferior! i refuse to believe i chose wrong for PLing!". how can you even pretend that end drain is "just if not more" effective as knockback. when you knock a mob back, they're down for the 2-5 sec's they're alive whereas with end drain, they lose a miniscule % of their end and shoot at you 1-2 times... see how it matters pie?
&lt;end rant&gt;

[Ex_Libris]

I have a 27 Elec/Elec and 34 Fire/Device.

Fire Prim outdamage Elec Prim either single/pack target.

Why?
Elec have 2 single attack, 1 snipe, and 1 AE.
Fire have 3 single attack, which one of them is almost as strong as the snipe, 1 snipe, 1 AE and 1 Cone.

No hasten, Fire's attack allow them to attack most of the time. But the Elec are going to wait for his 2 singles attack to recycle.

[Pulsewave_mark1]

[ QUOTE ]
&lt;begin rant&gt;
wow. imean.. just wow.
rob puts up a PL guide and of course all the RPGers start complaining that PLing is dumb. If you don't like it, DONT DO IT!!!

and then all the elec/whatever people start talking about "im not inferior! i refuse to believe i chose wrong for PLing!". how can you even pretend that end drain is "just if not more" effective as knockback. when you knock a mob back, they're down for the 2-5 sec's they're alive whereas with end drain, they lose a miniscule % of their end and shoot at you 1-2 times... see how it matters pie?
&lt;end rant&gt;

[/ QUOTE ]

All I can say is I played with all the sets in Beta and the only reason I chose Elect in release is because I like the graphics and sound. No one in his right mind would opt for electric otherwise. Its far inferior to all other blaster sets. It works fine for someone who just wants to have fun, but realistically its not as effective as any other blaster powerset. Yeah, it does the job. ITS NOT BAD which is what the author has said several time. We have it easier than almost any other archetype. I have fun with my electric blaster. But to say its at the same level as the other powersets would be crazy.

[American_Pie]

[ QUOTE ]
&lt;begin rant&gt;
wow. imean.. just wow.
rob puts up a PL guide and of course all the RPGers start complaining that PLing is dumb. If you don't like it, DONT DO IT!!!

and then all the elec/whatever people start talking about "im not inferior! i refuse to believe i chose wrong for PLing!". how can you even pretend that end drain is "just if not more" effective as knockback. when you knock a mob back, they're down for the 2-5 sec's they're alive whereas with end drain, they lose a miniscule % of their end and shoot at you 1-2 times... see how it matters pie?
&lt;end rant&gt;

[/ QUOTE ]

Come see me on justice anytime.

[Ex_Libris]

so whats the big diff in an energy 1-2 shotting a mob and the elec doing the same? Drain or knockback...pfft wtf cares.

[American_Pie]

[ QUOTE ]
so whats the big diff in an energy 1-2 shotting a mob and the elec doing the same? Drain or knockback...pfft wtf cares.

[/ QUOTE ]

/agree

guess I was wrong to make an electric blaster, Ill never be 40!

[bwbarbou]

RSR, let me first say that, the guide that you created was very informative. Out of curiosity, I created a Fire/Devices blaster last night. HOLY CRAP!!!!!
Although I'm not completely convinced in inferiority of my Elec/Elec blaster, my god, what power. My Elec blaster is only 23 (only 23, heh), but I"ll continue to build him up.
My apologies to you and others that I might have offended with my comments. I don't mean to bash people who mainly power level. I'm only curious as to the mindset behind it since I've seen it in many of the other MMO's I've played. In other games, this has taken away from MY experience since I"ve been griefed so many times. I forget this game's not like that.
Have fun power leveling up. Just don't KS my hunting mission ;)
lol

[Ex_Libris]

Tell ya what why not leave this post alone and go make your own giude about Hover , Fly, Electricity or whatever.

This person posted a very nice guide that obviously took some time to write and it has turned into a flame war about nonsense. Why you want to hijack this thread with your dribble?

I could give a crap less if your electricity Blaster is lvl 40 or any of that stuff. If the title said Electricity Blaster debate than ok maybe I would be interested in what you have to say.

Quit hijaking this thread and go get one of your own.

yes i am!
no your not!
yes i am!
no your not!

My blaster can beat up your blaster!
no you cant!
yes I can!

give it a rest.

[RaptorCK]

The thing is, the so-called useful guide opened with a very poor tone towards electric blasters, claiming that they're inferior, and that anyone attempting to powerlevel with one is better off re-rolling.

It comes across as fairly immature, and as an Electric Blaster, I don't tend to see these problems. Of course, I'm also smart enough to add *range* enhancements to my build, so while you're all arguing about maximizing damage, I'm doing just enough from far away to wipe out mobs before they can touch me. Does it take a bit longer than AoE attacks? Maybe. I never said I was sufficiently well-versed in the art of powerleveling to know what the exact fastest method was for XP gain per hour, but you know, I'm pretty effective.

Maybe if the original post said something closer to "I don't know electric blasters well enough to provide any input," then this would have never blown out of proportion, as Pie might have just posted her tips, and we'd be done with this already.

(Besides, any thread that claims that a certain AT mix is going to have the easiest time powerlevelling is just *begging* for the nerfbat, which I'm sure we all want to avoid.) :)

[Doc_Phantom]

[ QUOTE ]
Lightning_Fast, it isn't being closed minded to admit that fire and assault rifle are simply better powerlevelers than are the single-target power sets. Its really indisputable fact. Ice, Electricity, and Energy all kill in a similar fashion so it is best to compare them. My point was that we should avoid ringing in Fire or Assault Rifle as a red hearing to make Electricity look bad, to compare it to its peer power sets and show that it still comes up short.


[/ QUOTE ]

Let me try and resolve this, although I doubt any single post will at this point.

You stipulated your ideal goal of powerleveling by identifing target groups of minions you should be killing at both low and high levels. You further state that the goal is to 2 shot them and move on. This would allow the quickest XP. Agreed so far?

I agree that AR is the best for this at later levels. Fire can do the same after lvl 11 or so, once you can 5/6 slot up both AOE attacks and fill them with dmg DOs. Still ok?

Now, my issue was that you claimed ice is a single-target blaster, along with energy and elec. My counter-point is that each blaster has a varying level of AOE ability and I had listed the descending order of those types: AR, Fire, Ice, Energy, Elec. As you go down the list, each type has less AOE ability and therefore has less chance of clearing out large groups and having to focus on smaller groups, therefore earning XP at a slower rate. So, in the grand scheme of things, choosing anything but ar/dev would be a waste... unless you put criteria on optimal target groups for grinding... which you did.

Based on your criteria, Ice is able to perform the needed 2-attack combo, in order to kill a group and move on within a sub-5 second time. If you want to increase your criteria, feel free. I would have no choice but to agree with you, but would definately make the point that as the criteria increases, you would be a fool not to play ar/dev... as it gives you the maximum possible AOE dmg for the maximum possible criteria. Luckily, people like different animations, sounds, etc and want to play different primaries. I am stating that Ice still is a valid powerleveling blaster with good AOE abilities, which can powerlevel at almost identical speed as AR/Fire, provided you do not diverge from the -1/equal criteria.

Quick note though... please don't repeat any statements regarding my levels or experience. You simply don't know. I remained completely quiet about the fact you are giving advice on fire/ar powerleveling but actually just have a 26 AR and 40 energy. I would suspect you don't also have 35-40 fire/ice/elec/ar blasters, but I didn't discount your post, telling you to actually play them. I ask you to afford me the same respect.

[Ex_Libris]

&gt;&gt; Electric Blaster, I don't tend to see these problems.

Denial is ugly. Bump for a great Blaster Guide.

[Ex_Libris]

Good grief he didnt say the other power sets were not effective, just not optimal for power leveling the way he described. I like my Eng guy best and might enjoy an Electric blaster as well, but its ridiculas to argue they level as fast. The simple mathematics dictate they dont. Does it mean they are gimp, uninteresting, poor levelers or inneffective, no. Just a bit slower. I dont understand the emotion behind people defending certain power sets. Blasters are kings of leveling and Fire or AR are the kings of those. Too many people just throw out the old................well come watch me on such and such server and you will see just how good x power set is. That offers no further insight or reason why your set is superior. If you are a high lvl, it does show that you are competant and understand the game mechanics well. I think my fire blaster is pretty boring, but nothing has lvld at the speed he has of the blaters I have. shruggs

[Cleen]

An excellent post, concisely demonstrating for the perusal of the Developers everything that is best about the best AT in the game.

Are you -sure- you wanted to do that?

[Cleen]

An excellent post, concisely demonstrating for the perusal of the Developers everything that is best about the best AT in the game.

Are you -sure- you wanted to do that?

[Erratic]

[ QUOTE ]
An excellent post, concisely demonstrating for the perusal of the Developers everything that is best about the best AT in the game.

[/ QUOTE ]

Why would a post about the best AT in the game be in the Blaster for. . .oh. . .you think Blaster is the best AT in the game?

*whistles*

Uh. . .nermind, go right ahead and think that. :)

[xerobulll]

Best blaster thread, and maybe best thread on the boards. 5 stars. Thanks, OP. Made me consider a few other powers down the line for my newly made blaster.

[Ex_Libris]

I didn't read any mention of flares. Should we skip it?

[Illumino]

[ QUOTE ]
I didn't read any mention of flares. Should we skip it?

[/ QUOTE ]

Unless you are taking devices as your secondary, you won't be able to avoid flares. At level 4, you can't take a power pool and most of the secondary sets don't offer anything reasonable.

[Ex_Libris]

Well if you go Fire Energy, you can skip it.
Level 4 is Uber level , get Buildup and start one shotting whole groups with a fireball heh.
I dont have Flares , sometimes I want another single attack but I have gotten by without it. I am going to hold out till the later Fire single target powers come available.

[RSRobinson]

American_Pie, I believe I explained that but I'll restate it to
be clear. For powerleveling, none of the secondary effects have
much of an effect although knockback and slow do give a slight
edge in damage taken: one less shot from a minion here and there,
and a few less shots if the pack is big enough to warrent using
explosive blast on it. But that isn't the issue. As I said, for
typical grinding, the fact that electricity lacks a third big
nuke is its problem. Ice and Energy can kill faster overall
because we have a third heavy nuke to drop into the mix. One more
nuke ready to go at the beginning of each fight and charging
through the fight means mobs die faster.

Jabbestryne wrote and you felt it good enough to agree:

"so whats the big diff in an energy 1-2 shotting a mob and the
elec doing the same? Drain or knockback...pfft wtf cares."

Exactly! The difference is I have an additional nuke to do it
with. We open a battle, snipe a minion is dead. Use our 1/2 nukes
a minion is dead. We both are identical. You are now waiting on
your 1/2 nukes to recharge. I instead use nuke #3. While you were
waiting for your 1/2 nukes to recharge, I was hitting the next
minion to die with 1 of the 2 nukes it will need to be defeated.
Consider a large pack of minions. The basic method to efficiently
kill them would be to use AOE (Ball Lightning/Explosive Blast) so
that now a single #2 nuke would kill them or two #1 nukes. Except
I also have a #3 nuke that will also kill them. For every 2
baddies you drop, I can drop 3. It is a noticeable difference,
and very noticeable when you need to go 4000 even con minions for
your next level.

Lieutenants are basically just as weak as minions, and good to
exp on because they typically drop in one more nuke than does a
minion, and give a sizeable exp increase for it. A pack with
multiple lieutenants is no problem, in fact its just more exp. Of
course, it depends on the lieutenant. Crey lieutenants, for
instance, have damage resistance and are no longer good to fight
simply because it takes more time to drop them than the increased
exp makes up for.

You don't fight bosses at all while grinding. Not because they
are dangerous. They could be, but that isn't the reason. Its
because they have a large chunk more hit points than a minion or
a lieutenant and do not give enough added experience to
compensate. For instance, in the time it takes me to kill off a
Death Mage in Founder's Falls, I could have taken out an entire
additional pack of a Behemoth lieutenant and 3-5 minions. If I
have them all in sight and don't have to go looking (not uncommon
once I got the hang of the spawns), probably I could take out two
such packs if they were small in the same time. But even one, say
a small one, of 3 minions plus one lieutenant gives more exp than
does one boss and takes far less time to kill.

Trust me, it has nothing to do with risk. With knockback, I can
take on the bosses with no risk. Bosses spend most or sometimes
all of the fight on their backs trying to stand up. It has
nothing to do with that, it has to do with how many hit points
they have, how long it takes to whittle away those hit points,
and how much exp they give.

And I'll repeat again American_Pie, even if by careful slotting
you've gotten endurance drain so that at level 40 you can negate
a boss, Ice and Energy have been doing it from level 1. Did you
weaken your attacks through the early levels by devoting slots to
Short Circuit that could have instead been used on your primary
attacks? Or to get hasten 6-slotted early? Or Stamina?

Raptor_CK, you'd be wrong. My housemate is a level 36 electricity
blaster, I have seen what endurance drain does (or doesn't do.)
American_Pie's major problem is that he doesn't understand that
it takes very specific build to get it do anything useful at all,
useful in only very specific circumstances (boss killing) that do
not come up while powerleveling. Ice and Energy both get a
secondary effect that starts working from level one, with no
specific build requirements, and that also work for boss killing
but also work against every single target you fight during the
entire game.

It is not immature in a guide on powerleveling to tell the truth.
Is it immature to say that a blaster is the way to go and that
anyone who is a powerleveler and is say a controller should
reroll? No. So it is not immature to say that Electricity, the
weakest blaster primary, should reroll.

Lightning_Fast, you are incorrect. Ice is NOT able to do a
2-attack combination to kill a group. At low level it can, but
the guide is a guide to 40, and more importantly it is the high
levels that really count. Ice cannot effectively AOE exp at the
higher levels and is therefore a single-target powerset. In fact,
energy is better at it than is ice at high level. You must
understand, Ice Storm is a control power, it does negligable
damage at higher level. Energy has two AOEs that do noticeable
damage, but it doesn't qualify as an AOE powerset because those
two will not allow you to consistently kill a group in your
opening salvo. They don't do enough damage, you'd need a third
AOE to finish off the pack and you don't have it. Just as Ice
gets Frost Breath which will not kill a pack and nothing else to
follow it up with.

If you believe Ice can and I quote, "can powerlevel at almost
identical speed as AR/Fire, provided you do not diverge from the
-1/equal criteria", then you are simply mistaken or talking about
low level.

As for not playing every blaster, I've played them all up to 20
and I've done my homework by reading other people's opinions,
those who are high level in the appropriate classes. More
importantly, I've played to 40, I know how powers scale and how
mob hit points scale. For instance, I can tell you after getting
to level 8 that Fire Blasters will always be able to AOE exp,
right up until 40 because mob hit point never take some drastic
jump that will make them not be able to. In fact, it will get
easier because once they get SOs, they will be able to handle
even higher con packs before having to use
Aim/BuildUp/Inspirations than at the lower levels.

Its simple, find any level high level Ice Blaster that can AOE
solo and get him to give you the skills he is using and what mobs
he is doing it on. And importantly, please explain why there
isn't a dozen 'Check out my new Ice AOE build' posts of people
wanting to make their own version on this board. If it was
doable, there would be, just like the million 'Please critique my
Fire/Assault Rifle' threads that actually are there.

Cleen, why not? I wouldn't mind seeing Blasters nerfed a bit.
Then everyone will see just how stupidly slow leveling is for any
sub-optimal build, hopefully it gets changed, and I can play a
different archtype without wanting to pull my teeth out. Sounds
good to me!

Red_Bane, I'd skip flares because Fire Blast is a 4 second
recharge time. Once you have hasten permanently running, casting
Flares then Fire Blast will do less damage over time than just
casting Fire Blast over and over. Plus, you need to 6 slot it
with enhancements if you are going to use it, and there are much
better skills at any given level for the fire blaster to slot
(like your AOEs, then hasten/stamina, fire blast, blaze, blazing
bolt, etc.) You might take it to make the early levels easier,
but once you get rolling, you'll never use it, so I'd advice
skipping it in order to make your build as optimal as possible.

[Damage_Inc]

I really appreciate this guide and would like some input on this build based on this.....

fire blast / devices
skills:
1. fire blast &amp; Web grenade
2. fire ball
4. caltrops
6. Hasten (power pool #1)
8. hurlde (power pool #2)
10. combat jump (power pool #3)
12 fire breath
14. super speed
16. target drone
18. smoke grenade
20. health
22. stamina
24. manuevers (power pool #4)
26. blaze
28. trip mine
30. blazing bolt
32. inferno
34.
36.
38.
40.

slot allotments:
3-11. slot ball &amp; blast
13. slot fire breath x2
15. slot super speed and fire breath
17. fire breath
19-21. hasten x2
23-27. stamina
29. blaze x2
31. blaze x2
33. blaze &amp; inferno
35.
37.
39.

fire ball, fire blast, fire breath, blaze and inferno are maxed
super speed gets 1 extra slot
hasten gets 4 extra slots

as you can see, I am not certain what to finish this build with...

any input appreciated.

[Riverdusk]

Great guide and I thought very well written. I prefer ice/devices just because I like to be a little more "controller-like" (controller is my actual favorite AT and my main is mind/force field, pity me if you wish :o ).

However, I'm choosing ice full-well knowing it isn't the "fastest." Still found lots of useful advice here, thanks for taking the time to write it.

[Ex_Libris]

To everyone who's preaching the greatness of fly over superspeed, you're all forgetting one things. His guide was not designed to create the best "all around" blasters. It was designed to create blasters with the most focused and economical builds for the highest possible damage output. Considering that the average character only takes one movement power, and that Super Speed's prereq is the invaluable Hasten, it's clearly qualifies as a better pick than Fly in that particular build, regardless of whether or not fly is practically superior. Super Leap is the only arguable alternative, since its prereq is Combat Jumping which he also suggests taking.

[euVicious]

heh, i forgot to tell you i liked your guide a lot rob(prolly cause it's almost exactly my fire/dev). i dont agree with you about nerfage tho, i think all the other ATs should just be brought up to pace as far as lvling goes. i can barely stand 2-18 as it is...

but im sure the devs will make it all better :)

[Ex_Libris]

RSRobinson:

Would you agree that if an energy or ice blaster takes DEVICES as their secondary, they can also become a very good AE blaster by adding trip mine to their repetoire?

Trip Mine + Energy Torrent + Nove

or

Trip Mine + Frost Breath

Either one of these will wipe out entire packs of white to yellow minions.

[Rakeeb]

Yes. Keep saying that Electricity is terribly weak and should be avoided.

Such protestations are useful.

[Damage_Inc]

I started building my fire/dev as I described above (FYRE STARR) currently I am only lvl-6 with limited playing time. My ice/ice was much more powerful at this lvl than this toon, probably because I didn't take flare, so I only have two attacks and I am always waiting on them to recharge... as soon as I get firebreath (gonna bump getting that up from #12 to #8) I think things will start rolling along better.
Right now, I don't care much for devices, again I know its the powers you get later that are beneficial rather than the ones you have now. I find web grenade useless and caltrops unnecessary since most of the gangs would rather stay huddles together and shoot me than rush me.
I currently have 3 slots on fire blast &amp; ball with 1 accuracy and 2 damage. I really had to put the accuracy's in, I was just missing too much. At lvl-16 (target drone) I will trash the accuracy and put in more damages.
I am gonna keep plugging away with this toon. Don't have much time to play on weekends, but will do what I can. :cool:

[RSRobinson]

Cambios, Trip Mine by itself is all you need, fully slotted it alone will blow up a pack of whites and some yellows. Depending on the pack, the survivors are often easier to mop up with single-target powers (i.e. you miss one or two and the rest are dead) making it work well with single-target power sets. Just remember to slot accuracy, trip mine is just like a pet, it doesn't inherit your buffs like targeting drone, buildup, or inspirations, so you need an accuracy on it.

But it is a power you cannot get until 28, can't have slotted up to usefulness to 31. You need perfect positioning because it takes a few seconds to set up and the radius is not the greatest, so you need packs that do not move. Plus you need superspeed to combine with cloaking device and give you full invisibility to get right in the middle of the pack to set it up. Smoke Grenade used to be great, but it misses now and it just takes one mob that you missed to notice you and mess you up. Finally, the recharge is a bit slow which can become an issue when trying to blow up a pack and superspeed to the next, you'll have to wait longer than a 'real' AOE blaster.

Overall, I'd say the negatives probably make the power a little too hard to use for AOE leveling. The setup time and the low radius will make you 'waste' a pack too often (i.e. get a low number of kills) and it is a bit slow on the recharge especially when you are waiting for it to do the next pack. Still my experience is limited. When I had it, I did AOE exping on swarms (and it was very useful on them). With them nerfed soon, maybe it turns out to be a viable option for the 30s and single-target device blasters. Its certainly worth a try. Even if it doesn't work for you as an AOE exping tool, it is still a great power and just one more reason to love Devices.

[Ex_Libris]

A question about AoE farming. Perez Park was great with finding large groups of minions. But now at lv12, they've all turned gray. The only gang that have any color in them are ones with multiple bosses or lts. I've been finding similar gang setups within the park itself. When I visited Boomtown, I found that each gang has at least 1-2 bosses and 1-2 lts. Now were the large gang of minions at Perez Park the end of the quick and easy gravy train?

[Damage_Inc]

try the water areas in perez park. (hydra runs) players love leveling on them. they are usually around lvl 13-15 i believe.

[Ex_Libris]

RSRobinson:

Thanks again for the feedback.

If you toss a smoke grenade into a pack of mobs, do the ones that is "misses" aggro on you? If so, that sucks. If they do aggro, will they aggro even if you have SS and CD on?

If that is the case, then it seems its better to just use SS + CD to drop trip mines and not even worry about smoke grenade. Is that an accurate assesment?

From my limited use of energy torrent compared to my use of fire breath + fireball on my fire blaster, it is definitely true that torrent isn't enough to make an energy blaster into a good AE blaster. However, when I group my energy/dev blaster with my wife's ice/dev blaster, torrent + frost breath generally takes out entire packs.

Would you say that any */dev blaster can be good at AE as soon as they hit level 31 (5 slots in trip mine)? The question then is how good at AE are they until then (fire/ar being the tops).

[RSRobinson]

Cambios,

No, Smoke Grenade is no aggro. But the ones you miss will not have their aggro range reduced, so if all you have is cloaking device, when you go right into the middle of the pack to try to set up a trip mine, then they will aggro. Depending on which ones you missed you can take damage, but worse they may mess up the pack's positioning which is key because trip mine has a low radius. Its probably just better to go with superspeed + cloaking device now.

I know how much damage energy torrent does, and I don't believe it and Frost Breath will let you AOE exp forever. but I could be wrong. What level are you? To the best of my recollection, Frost Breath hits reasonably hard when you first get it but settles in later to a mid-range AOE. To combine with Energy Torrent for 1-shot kills, it would need to do as much damage as a #2 nuke since energy torrent hits like a #1 nuke (beyond level 20 or so, a #1 plus a #2 is generally about how much hit points a mob has.) Maybe a high level ice blaster could give the numbers on his frost breath, but I bet it is going to be quite a bit less than a #2 nuke, at least beyond level 20 or so.

As to trip mine and AOE, it depends what you mean by 'good at AOE'. Trip Mine is certainly a good AOE, but for the reasons I detailed above, I don't think it would quite be up to the task of AOE leveling all by itself. Mostly because its radius is so darn small. Maybe you could hybrid it in hazard zones, blow up a good size chunk of a pack with trip mine then use your single-target nukes to kill the much smaller remainer, which also gives trip mine some time to recharge for the next pack. The major problem is that the hazard/trial zones that have suitable packs tend to have a boss or several in the pack. With AOE, you just blow away the minions and move on ignoring the bosses. If you only get a subset of the minions and need to gun down some more single-target to make it worth the time spent, now the bosses become an issue.

At high levels, say 30+, I'd say the best AOE is AR once you get Full Auto slotted up. Fire is very close, arguably better depending on the circumstances, and of course has been great since level 8. Energy is 3rd. Its two AOEs are decent but suffer from several drawbacks. The obvious one is that their damage is a little too low to blow away packs just with them. They can almost do it, but not quite and almost-dead mobs don't give any experience. Plus you don't get your second AOE until 26. Finally, the AOEs have knockback which often throws the mobs out of position after your first AOE so your second AOE doesn't hit all of them. Ice and Electricity are the worst. I guess it doesn't rally matter which order you go, they are both very far from being able to AOE exp. By the 30s, Ice Storm is completely a control power, its damage almost completely negligable. Ice has Frost Breath which does decent damage but it is a cone. Electricity has Ball Lightning which does ok damage, I guess it is about the same as the other ball AOEs (which is less than the cone AOEs), but a lot of it comes as a DOT. A quick DOT, but DOTs still mean the difference between a dead mob and one that gets to shoot you before it dies. Short Circuit got an upgrade, but from the number's I've seen, its still very low damage. Its like power push, considering how much damage it did before the upgrade, it can be doing 'much more damage' and still be doing not a lot :)

In the 20s, AR is worse than fire but it still has the awesome Flamethrower . Energy drops to the worst since you only have Energy Torrent. Before that, fire is the only consistent AOE exper, though I suppose Ice in the early teens when it has just gotten Ice Storm might be able to pull it off for a few levels. Heck, with damage upgrade to short circuit, maybe even Electricity can AOE exp a bit at the low levels, though even if it can, it'd be short lived.

[Rangael]

Thanks for the guide RSRobinson. It was very helpful. I made a prelim build based on your guide and was hoping you could critique it. Any advice would be appreciated. Unless of course it's perfect. ;)

Edit: I added a fire blaster build based on this guide as well.

Archetype: Blaster
Primary Powers - Ranged : Assault Rifle
Secondary Powers - Support : Devices
Slot[01] Level 1 (Starting Primary) : Slug /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[02] Level 1 (Starting Secondary) : Web Grenade /Immob
Slot[03] Level 2 : Burst /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[04] Level 4 : Caltrops /Slow
Slot[05] Level 6 : Hurdle /Jump
Slot[06] Level 8 : Hasten /Rchg,Rchg,Rchg,Rchg,Rchg
Slot[07] Level 10 : Targeting Drone /HitBuf,HitBuf,HitBuf,HitBuf,HitBuf,HitBuf
Slot[08] Level 12 : Sniper Rifle /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[09] Level 14 : Super Speed /Run,Run
Slot[10] Level 16 : Health /Heal
Slot[11] Level 18 : Flamethrower /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[12] Level 20 : Stamina /EndRec,EndRec,EndRec,EndRec,EndRec,EndRec
Slot[13] Level 22 : Smoke Grenade /HitDeb
Slot[14] Level 24 : Maneuvers /DefBuf
Slot[15] Level 26 : Combat Jumping /Jump
Slot[16] Level 28 : Cloaking Device /DefBuf
Slot[17] Level 30 : Ignite /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[18] Level 32 : Full Auto /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[19] Level 35 : Time Bomb /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[20] Level 38 : Assault /EndRdx

Archetype: Blaster
Primary Powers - Ranged : Fire Blast
Secondary Powers - Support : Devices
Slot[01] Level 1 (Starting Primary) : Fire Blast /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[02] Level 1 (Starting Secondary) : Web Grenade /Immob
Slot[03] Level 2 : Fire Ball /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[04] Level 4 : Caltrops /Slow
Slot[05] Level 6 : Hurdle /Jump
Slot[06] Level 8 : Fire Breath /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[07] Level 10 : Targeting Drone /HitBuf,HitBuf,HitBuf,HitBuf,HitBuf
Slot[08] Level 12 : Hasten /Rchg,Rchg,Rchg,Rchg,Rchg
Slot[09] Level 14 : Super Speed /Run,Run
Slot[10] Level 16 : Smoke Grenade /HitDeb
Slot[11] Level 18 : Health /Heal
Slot[12] Level 20 : Stamina /EndRec,EndRec,EndRec,EndRec,EndRec,EndRec
Slot[13] Level 22 : Blaze /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[14] Level 24 : Cloaking Device /DefBuf
Slot[15] Level 26 : Blazing Bolt /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[16] Level 28 : Trip Mine /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[17] Level 30 : Maneuvers /DefBuf
Slot[18] Level 32 : Inferno /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[19] Level 35 : Assault /Rchg
Slot[20] Level 38 : Combat Jumping /DefBuf

[Ex_Libris]

RSRobinson, I hope you can tell that I fully agree AE and Fire are the kings of AOE xping. I have done it with my fire blaster (and before that a fire/fire tanker). I don't deny that fact for a second. :)

I simply enjoy discussing and analyzing possibilities with people who know what they are talking about (and while I create and run RP-required RPGs for a living, there is still a bit of powergamer in me that has to be satisfied on occasion).


[ QUOTE ]
RSRobinson wrote:
I know how much damage energy torrent does, and I don't believe it and Frost Breath will let you AOE exp forever. but I could be wrong. What level are you?


[/ QUOTE ]

My fire/dev blaster is 15. My energy/dev blaster is 10. My wife's ice/dev blaster is 12. We actually haven't tried the torrent + ice breath combo yet (we also have a defender/tanker combo nearing level 30 that we play a lot).

I am just wondering if 6 slotted energy torrent + 6 slotted frost breath would be a legitimate AOE xping tool. If not, then hopefully the addition of Explosive Blast or trip mine would at least make AOE xping possible at higher levels when advancement as a whole slows down.


[ QUOTE ]
RSRobinson wrote:
At high levels, say 30+, I'd say the best AOE is AR once you get Full Auto slotted up. Fire is very close, arguably better depending on the circumstances, and of course has been great since level 8. Energy is 3rd. Its two AOEs are decent but suffer from several drawbacks. The obvious one is that their damage is a little too low to blow away packs just with them. almost do it, but not quite and almost-dead mobs don't give any experience.


[/ QUOTE ]

Perhaps if energy's 2 AEs are "almost enough", the addition of frost breath to that mix could make for good AOE xping at that point?


[ QUOTE ]
RSRobinson wrote:
Finally, the AOEs have knockback which often throws the mobs out of position after your first AOE so your second AOE doesn't hit all of them.


[/ QUOTE ]

This is definitely the kicker. The knockback does present a random X factor that could screw things up. The best scenario I could envision for an energy and ice blaster combo would be:

Round 1) Ice blaster uses frost breath and Energy blaster uses explosive blast.

Round 2) Ice blaster uses caltrops and then energy blaster uses energy torrent.

Or:

Round 1) Energy Blaster drops down a trip mine while Ice Blaster uses frost breath.

Round 2) Energy Blaster uses explosive blast while Ice Blaster uses caltrops.

Round 3) Energy Blaster uses energy torrent.

[supersoul]

Cambios, when doing AOE with torrent and explosive blast, you should use torrent first. The mobs get knocked backwards, whereas with blast they get knocked outwards. When you use torrent first, they stay grouped close enough together to be hit by the blast.

[Ex_Libris]

[ QUOTE ]
Cambios, when doing AOE with torrent and explosive blast, you should use torrent first. The mobs get knocked backwards, whereas with blast they get knocked outwards. When you use torrent first, they stay grouped close enough together to be hit by the blast.

[/ QUOTE ]

I've noticed that with torrent, but I've never used explosive blast (obviously). Thanks for the tip!

[euVicious]

last night was incredible.

my fire/dev blaster jumped from lvl 23 to lvl 26.4 in about... 7 hours. this was done in Dark Astoria at 2am(west coast). had to be the most insane xp i've ever seen.

the process consisted of:
1) run up to group w/ ss CD on, hit aim, smoke grenade middle guy.
2) fire breath middle guy(on average would hit 7-9 out of 10-12 of the banished pantheons)
3) fire ball same middle guy, run onto the next group

this left Lts and some randoms alive which often tried to chase me down. since the groups are all so close together, i could get 4-5 Lts and a bunch of minions following me at once.
when i decided there were enough, caltrops+smoke+fire breath+fire ball = even more xp. with stam 5-slotted until 25, then 6-slotted, i didnt really run out of end. my insp slots filled up with bounce backs and healths because i wasnt getting hit/dying. i also had an emp/rad defender and an ill/storm controller following in my wake, mopping up the leftovers. every once in a while i'd meet up w/ them again for recovery aura. :D

i'm relatively inexperienced(highest character is 26 and counting :eek:) and so my question for you guys, is this possible at later lvls or should i enjoy the easy xp now and get ready for slow lvling?

[arzenal22]

I wanted to finally dispel Robinsons notion that Ice cannot AoE at higher levels. Here is his quote "Just as Ice
gets Frost Breath which will not kill a pack and nothing else to
follow it up with."

Please dont try to come off as the end all blaster champion because clearly you dont know what you are talking about sometimes.

I just spent lvl 33-35 in Crey's folly fighting monkeys on rooftops. With a 5 slotted ice breath, and build up, I can drop groups of 15 lvl 34-36 monkeys in one shot. Thats right, one shot. Thats 230+xp per monkey or about 3500 per group. And there are TONS of groups Took me about 20 mins to gain a full pez.

And dont say "well thats not AoE" because it is. And I have seen packs of monkeys up to lvl 37. So Im pretty sure I can do this for a long time.

[Alaron]

I agree with alot of what the poster said... but

1st - Nova, Inferno, ie. anything with a long recharge. Would NEVER be suggested by a power gamer, the reason for the build of character is to gain xps faster than anyone else. These abilities do not do that. They are flashy cool abilities with tons of damage, but over all are worthless. If in fact this was a POWER GAMERS guide that is.

2nd - It's amazing how many people over look 6 slotting Smoke grenade. You do realize they are raising the cap right? This is one of the greatest group abilities that any blaster can get. Not only is it a great solo skill it's great when you are in groups.

To me Blasters are not all about 6 slotting damage on every damage skill you have, and leaving def. or aux powers in the wind. Personally I think it's best to pick 3 main attacks and 6 slot them, and use the rest of your slots how you want.

Just my 2 inf. and yes, my blaster is 40 , was under 2 weeks.

[euVicious]

holy crap... 2 weeks?
if that is true, i think YOU should be writing a PG thread.
meaning, write one plz!

[RSRobinson]

Arzenal22, any blaster can kill swarms/monkeys easily, in fact so can many classes. That does not mean you have an AOE character. It is simply a loophole which, by the way, is fixed on test. As I said right in the opening of my guide, I did not base any of the advice on exploits, things that I knew would get nerfed. Underlings are getting nerfed, as everyone knew they would. Now when the patch goes live, suddenly your 'AOE' blaster isn't anymore. But the AR/Fire blaster is still AOE-ing packs because they truly are AOE blasters.

Its no different than fire tankers. Everyone with half a brain knew that they were getting way too much experience through a loophole that the developers hadn't anticipated. Everyone knew they were going to get nerfed. And they did. Now we have a glut of fire tankers all complaining about how useless their characters are because they based them on an obvious exploit. You may try to claim you are an AOE class because of a loophole, but that doesn't make it so. As soon as the patch goes live, go back and AOE your monkeys for 20 exp a kill and tell me how well an Ice blaster is at AOE exping.

[RSRobinson]

Alaron, you did notice my mention of Nova and Inferno was not in the core powers for powerleveling but in the 'rest of the powers that are purely optional' section. In other words, those are the powers you DON'T need for powerleveling. After getting a powerlevel core, a blaster will still have a number of powers and slots left to choose. Nova and Inferno are just plain fun powers, and since by 32 you will have your powerleveling core intact and complete, there is nothing wrong with picking up the ultimate power in your set, its not like you have any powerleveling skills left to pick up at 32 (well not counting Assault Rifle, but their ultimate is a powerleveling skill.)

Nova and inferno are not worthless. If you powerlevel to 40 and then quit, what is the point? Do you do absolutely nothing else along the way? Try one of the task forces, for instance. The powers may not be available all that often, but they are fantastic every time they cycle. What's not to like about a one-shot kill on every minion you are fighting that also nearly kills all lts and heavily damages bosses? And the only penalty is that you have to turn your toggles back on after you pop down a couple of those endurance inspirations that hardly get used otherwise.

Defensive powers are necessary, I did mention that clearly in my guide, and smoke grenade is the best one you can pick up. And it is worth slotting. I advised against slotting the defensive pool powers because Defense Buff enhancements are only 20%. Smoke Grenade is a debuff, with 33% enhancements. Wow, it seems like often I end my posts with 'Just one more reason to love Devices'. Buildup is great and all, but I'd never give up devices unless I was playing a character just for fun.

[Ex_Libris]

I two shotted a group of 8 red minions in Dark Astoria, and killed the purple LT with the remains of my buildup/aim time.

Why exactly do you need a guide to leveling with a fire blaster again?

Let me sum it up for you:

Find big groups of things that are around your lvl. Walk up with stealth on if you have it, hit buildup/aim, then do firebreath/fireball and toss yer flame bolt and blaze at anything left alive.

If there's stuff still left alive, run like crazy.

Woo hard. I'm 24 in 2 weeks, playing like... every other night for a couple of hours and an hour in the mornings when I can.

Kind of a difference from my scrapper who's 28 after around a month and a half of the same kind of playing.

[SeeTen]

Electricity has very few attacks. Thats why its not as good as the others. If you have a scale where 1 is the hardest, and 10 is the easiest, and AR is 10, and Fire is 9, if Electricity is a 7 while Controller is a 2, does this mean Electricity blasters suck? I'd say 7/10 for levelling is pretty good.

But is a 7 a 10 as good as a 10? No.

For AoE, why not try Invisibility? Ought to be able to drop a trip mine wherever you like.

[Ex_Libris]

This is certainly one of the most helpful single threads i have found since Ive started playing a blaster. Everyone's comments give a great well rounded look at just about everything, though I skipped some of the 20+ pages I have to admit.

The build recommended for the Assult Rifle/ Devices blaster was frighteningly close to what Ive chosen as a CASUAL PLAYER. I power-gamed myself to utter boredom with EQ and refuse to do so in this game. Simply my choice. As a result I am in my high teens only after 3 weeks (~10 hours a week).

Already I would have to disagree with the usefulness of Buckshot and M30 grenade for multiple targets. The knockdown and knockback effects on both of these make them excellent for pushing mobs back into caltrops and keeping them from attacking. I just dont understand how these wouldnt be useful in the end-game...(if you can answer with specifics and first hand experience that would be helpful indeed). I also am curious about Ignite, and whether I should bother with Sniper Rifle.

I was a little apprehensive about having putting so many powers into defence as a blaster. I may have done it too early in the game, but the original post still makes me feel that these werent wasted powers. Stealth, Combat Jumping, Hasten (have it slotted once with defence..prolly a waste I know). Its good to know that this will be an advantage in the longrun. I also took superspeed. Clearly a skill that I would never regret taking. Again people: Stealth + SS = increased def+increased speed+great invis. out of just 2 powers. Im hoping to avoid taking any higher forms of invis.

Last note about power gaming and the "I'll be there sooner!" approach: Especially in a new game like this, there is still alot changing...which will effect characters of all levels. All of the mid-level content will be just as entertaining (im guessing) as the high level. Since you cannot pass gear down (what uber gear is there?) and enhancements can only be used at the appropriate levels anyway...There is absolutely no point. It was one thing where, in EQ, you could throw a fungi tunic (regen item) on a character and run around practically invincible for the first 30 levels, but in this game, even if you hand yourself down some influence (or whatever) you wont be able to give your "twink" much benefit at all. I'm not opposed to true PLing at all and it is not an ethics issue for me : simply that to get more bang for your buck you might consider pacing yourself.

The original poster did not mention what he did with his character for fun now that hes level 40 and the rest of us arent. Though I guess I appreciate that he did it for the info he has "shared with the unenlightened masses". You really did answer most of my questions about my build...Thanks

Less than L20 Blaster on Victory

[Alaron]

After level 40 you ask?

Well the new patch will make it lvl 50, but for now. With my 40 I love running around and helping lower level character by using smoke grenade. Also I've done the level 35+ TF about 10 times now, and killed Hamidon about 4 times.

There is stuff to do, but not a ton @ 40 for now.

[arzenal22]

[ QUOTE ]
Arzenal22, any blaster can kill swarms/monkeys easily, in fact so can many classes. That does not mean you have an AOE character. It is simply a loophole which, by the way, is fixed on test. As I said right in the opening of my guide, I did not base any of the advice on exploits, things that I knew would get nerfed. Underlings are getting nerfed, as everyone knew they would. Now when the patch goes live, suddenly your 'AOE' blaster isn't anymore. But the AR/Fire blaster is still AOE-ing packs because they truly are AOE blasters.

Its no different than fire tankers. Everyone with half a brain knew that they were getting way too much experience through a loophole that the developers hadn't anticipated. Everyone knew they were going to get nerfed. And they did. Now we have a glut of fire tankers all complaining about how useless their characters are because they based them on an obvious exploit. You may try to claim you are an AOE class because of a loophole, but that doesn't make it so. As soon as the patch goes live, go back and AOE your monkeys for 20 exp a kill and tell me how well an Ice blaster is at AOE exping.

[/ QUOTE ]


monkeys are a loophole? Since when? Its not like im using some obviously broken power like pre-patch burn or caltrops. Im using frost breath. I had to 5 slot it to do any decent damage

Are you saying monkeys are supposed to be harder?

[Ex_Libris]

[ QUOTE ]
monkeys are a loophole? Since when? Its not like im using some obviously broken power like pre-patch burn or caltrops. Im using frost breath. I had to 5 slot it to do any decent damage

Are you saying monkeys are supposed to be harder?

[/ QUOTE ]

Boy are you going to be in for a rude awakening.

Underlings were giving Minion exp with having much much less health and defenses. As a result, they were easily farmable exp by pretty much anybody with an AoE attack. So no, no obviously broken power, you're just killing obviously broken mobs.

Go copy your character to test and play with your precious monkeys. The exp is about 1/10th of what it used to be.

[arzenal22]

I wondered why they gave such high XP. hahah, I was exploiting and didnt even know it

[RSRobinson]

arzenal22, it depends what you mean by exploit. It'd consider it more a loophole. It isn't cheating, its just relying on something you know is going to be changed. Its hard to explain, I didn't feel exactly good about killing swarms, but I didn't feel like I was cheating either. I only did it because the amount of exp you can get in any other way is so insanely slow. So its an exploit but not an exploit. Err, or something. I guess we need multiple terms.

Compare that to these level 2 guys parked in train stations. I consider that just plain cheating. That is an exploit, with the full bad connotation of exploit. Its like in beta when you try all sorts of unexpected things trying to find bugs. Except here you find the bug so you can use it to cheat.

In the case of swarms, fixing the exp is fine. In the second case, if I was in charge, I'd run through the logs and find every character who did this, delete all those characters, and give the accounts a good long suspension. It'd be simple to write the script to scan the logs, unfortunately gaming companies have historically been stupid on this subject. Oh no, we can't ban a paying customer. They just fail to take in to account the people who quit in disgust in seeing cheaters being pandered to.

[Alaron]

[ QUOTE ]

In the case of swarms, fixing the exp is fine. In the second case, if I was in charge, I'd run through the logs and find every character who did this, delete all those characters, and give the accounts a good long suspension. It'd be simple to write the script to scan the logs, unfortunately gaming companies have historically been stupid on this subject. Oh no, we can't ban a paying customer. They just fail to take in to account the people who quit in disgust in seeing cheaters being pandered to.

[/ QUOTE ]

Sounds like someone is jealous he didn't know about the swarm sooner, LOL.

[Mashiara]

How many slots? Perhaps I don't fully understand "To Hit Buffs" because the descript is pretty nebulous. Fully slot it or is it good enough without adding more to it?

[Mashiara]

My alt is AR/Devices only because my hubby is already Ice/Ice as his primary. Ice is a fantastic power set, but it should be played like a controller who has serious damage output rather than the full on damage only blaster. When played this way, they are extremely powerful, but the techniques described in the original post don't fully apply.

My primary toon is a healer and frosties have serious agro buildup more than even power gamer speced aoe blasters. Just something to keep in mind.

I think the icy blaster is more fun to play and a bit more versatile, but they do lack some of the full-on damage potential for the power gamer method described (specifically a snipe, etc)

[Annihilatorr]

I took your advice and switched to an
AR/Dev build, previously played many
of the pure combos, taking ice/ice to 15.
At first, I was wishing I had hover again
until I started to just back up from a
fight (mostly) rather than the round-robin
kiting on the ground I was doing before
~had an aweful string of deaths in 11,
but figured I'd stick it out.

However, I'd like to know if I've lost
any of the added defense I got from
hover by going with this build?
That is, does it really matter if I
actually move around during the
fight to avoid projectiles (obviously
other than melee) such as when
I have a mob just standing and
shooting at me? (I mean, does the
game actually take into account
that it would be harder to hit a
moving target or is it that once
they're locked on, they hit you
regardless?) Do you leave sprint
on during fights, thereby deriving
additional defense with this build?
(I tried this before getting super
speed and it seems to suck endurance)

Or, do you have a bind that
you use which allows you to
switch to superspeed every time
you move during a fight, but
which then switches off sprint
once you stop moving? (if so, please post it)

Thanks,
PT

[Ex_Libris]

[ QUOTE ]
How many slots? Perhaps I don't fully understand "To Hit Buffs" because the descript is pretty nebulous. Fully slot it or is it good enough without adding more to it?

[/ QUOTE ]

Mashiara, it isn't necessary to write all your posts in bold.

Your posts are not any more special than anyone elses. Trying to make them stand out just makes you look arrogant and selfish.

[Ex_Libris]

This guide is top notch. All these people trying to flame Robinson for stating fact clearly just have trouble with reality. This guide was even handed, non biasied and very helpful.

Thanks.

[FieroFuego]

PT4me,

Unfortunately twitch skills are of no use here. I sure tried when I started. Shoot then run around a wall. But I'm sure you have seen it...the game determines whether it hits or not and then the projectile will turn a corner or go through a wall to get to you.

You want to turn sprint off during battles as a blaster. It just prevents you from regening as quickly as you could with it off.

I believe you are getting your defense in this build with stealth. I've also heard hasten has a def bonus too, and you can slot def buf's in it, though most people 6 slot it with recharge to get permahasten.

[American_Knight]

I for one want to thank you for putting your experiences down in words. I Just starting playing last night but have been reading the boards for awhile. Advice like yours helps both the "powergamers" and the "role-players." Please keep it up.

[Ex_Libris]

can u guys tell me how this build looks:
and any pointers u have plz.

How does this look?
Archetype: Blaster
Primary Powers - Ranged : Assault Rifle
Secondary Powers - Support : Devices
Slot[01] Level 1 (Starting Primary) : Burst /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[02] Level 1 (Starting Secondary) : Web Grenade /Immob
Slot[03] Level 2 : Slug /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[04] Level 4 : Caltrops /Slow
Slot[05] Level 6 : Combat Jumping /DefBuf
Slot[06] Level 8 : Hasten /Rchg,Rchg,Rchg,Rchg,Rchg
Slot[07] Level 10 : Targeting Drone /HitBuf,HitBuf,HitBuf
Slot[08] Level 12 : Sniper Rifle /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[09] Level 14 : Super Jump /Jump
Slot[10] Level 16 : Smoke Grenade /HitDeb,HitDeb
Slot[11] Level 18 : Flamethrower /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[12] Level 20 : Cloaking Device /DefBuf,DefBuf,DefBuf,DefBuf
Slot[13] Level 22 : Hurdle /Jump
Slot[14] Level 24 : Health /Heal
Slot[15] Level 26 : Stamina /EndRec,EndRec,EndRec,EndRec,EndRec,EndRec
Slot[16] Level 28 : Boxing /Dmg
Slot[17] Level 30 : Tough /DamRes,DamRes,DamRes,DamRes,DamRes,DamRes
Slot[18] Level 32 : Full Auto /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[19] Level 35 : Trip Mine /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[20] Level 38 : Weave /DefBuf

[RSRobinson]

It sounds like you figured it out. Just keep backing off. Most
fights against minions are so easy, you don't need to bother. But
if you do, turn sprint on and back up. Remember, you can turn
sprint on and off with the press of a button. Most of the time,
you don't need to kite, just turn it on when you do need it.
Once I got superspeed, I never used sprint again. Even if you
keep sprint for a while to max out superspeed with it before you
can get a couple SOs in it, you certainly would never use sprint
in combat. Just use superspeed like you used sprint at the
earlier levels, except its a whole lot better.

Sprint doesn't give any defense, nor does moving. The point of
moving is to stay out of melee combat, against the relatively few
mobs that can hurt you. Most minions can't. Basically, gang
slammer (i.e. Outcast Slammer, etc) and 5th Column Fist minions
are just about the only guys you want to avoid. Well, yeah,
lieutenents and bosses too, but the vast majority of guys you
fight are minions. AR/device has a lot of powers you want to take
at low level, making it hard to find room for defensive powers
early on. Fortunetely, you get Smoke Grenade at level 16 which
is so good, it the only defensive power you need. Don't let me
discourage you from taking more, more is always good, just trying
to say Smoke Grenade is really good.

Once you get Stamina decently slotted, you can keep superspeed on
all the time if you want or just turn it on and off as needed.
Just put it in an easily-accessible hotkey and hit it when you
need it.

And since you are devices, don't forget caltrops. Throw it down
in front of you before any fight that looks challenging and the
fight is a whole lot easier. Just back up a bit and fight, watch
the mob AI as they get to the caltrops, its easy to figure out.

[neurro1]

Robinson, check your private messages. I sent you a PM about my build.

[Annihilatorr]

Yeah I can't count how many times SS has saved my butt or allowed me to zoom away, rest, then return to finish it! I'm so so glad I went with SS now, it far surpasses fly on my ice build and it makes it very handy to zoom back and forth between zones for whatever reason.

I just got smoke grenade and I can already tell, like that other post is saying, the defense it offers is sick. Also, while I don't plan on doing it as much, I noticed in a couple fights against oranges that if I keep SS on and kite, they don't hit me as much and tend to forget about me even though I'm right in front of them. Can't prove this with numbers, but plan on trying it out as needed. Otherwise, yes, I always use caltrops.

[neurro1]

Here's my Fire/Devices build. Robinson please comment:

Slot[01] Level 1 (Starting Primary) : Fire Blast /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[02] Level 1 (Starting Secondary) : Web Grenade /Immob
Slot[03] Level 2 : Fire Ball /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[04] Level 4 : Caltrops /Slow,Slow
Slot[05] Level 6 : Maneuvers /DefBuf
Slot[06] Level 8 : Fire Breath /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[07] Level 10 : Targeting Drone /HitBuf
Slot[08] Level 12 : Hasten /Rchg,Rchg,Rchg,Rchg,Rchg,Rchg
Slot[09] Level 14 : Super Speed /Run
Slot[10] Level 16 : Smoke Grenade /HitDeb,HitDeb,HitDeb,HitDeb,HitDeb
Slot[11] Level 18 : Hurdle /Jump
Slot[12] Level 20 : Health /Heal
Slot[13] Level 22 : Stamina /EndRec,EndRec,EndRec,EndRec,EndRec,EndRec
Slot[14] Level 24 : Cloaking Device /DefBuf
Slot[15] Level 26 : Combat Jumping /DefBuf
Slot[16] Level 28 : Blazing Bolt /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[17] Level 30 : Rain Of Fire /Dmg
Slot[18] Level 32 : Blaze /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[19] Level 35 : Trip Mine /Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg
Slot[20] Level 38 : Auto Turret /Rchg,Rchg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg

[Zubey]

Nice guide.

[Halon]

[ QUOTE ]
I TRIPLE dog dare ya! (Now he HAS to take the challenge!)

[/ QUOTE ]

Now he created a slight breach of etiquette by skipping
the Triple Dare and going straight for the throat.

[mean_liar]

[ QUOTE ]
Defender now hits for 65% damage of a blaster, powers cost 10% more, HP identical. Now for example add AM, JUST ONE BUFF THAT WORKS ON THE WHOLE GROUP. It gives 25% damage boost, 33% endurance recovery, some unknown amount of haste, run speed, and status effect resistance.

I think there can be no question that defenders are a much bigger boon to a group.

[/ QUOTE ]

I saw this a few pages back and couldn't help but comment.

Adding a 25% damage boost, at best, in a group of 8 with 7 Blasters, adds 175% damage output + the Defender for 65%. Call it 240% Blaster damage in an optimal situation.

A single Blaster with his attacks 6-slotted with SOs does 300% damage.

The Defender increase from AM is good in that in an optimal situation is comparable to a Blaster, but I wouldn't say that its overwhelmingly obvious in the Defender's favor.

[Ex_Libris]

Excellent post. Very well thought out. Thank you.

[Erratic]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Defender now hits for 65% damage of a blaster, powers cost 10% more, HP identical. Now for example add AM, JUST ONE BUFF THAT WORKS ON THE WHOLE GROUP. It gives 25% damage boost, 33% endurance recovery, some unknown amount of haste, run speed, and status effect resistance.

I think there can be no question that defenders are a much bigger boon to a group.

[/ QUOTE ]

I saw this a few pages back and couldn't help but comment.

Adding a 25% damage boost, at best, in a group of 8 with 7 Blasters, adds 175% damage output + the Defender for 65%. Call it 240% Blaster damage in an optimal situation.

A single Blaster with his attacks 6-slotted with SOs does 300% damage.

The Defender increase from AM is good in that in an optimal situation is comparable to a Blaster, but I wouldn't say that its overwhelmingly obvious in the Defender's favor.

[/ QUOTE ]

Throw in Enervating Field, which the Defender should have if he has AM. Factor in too that the Defender can heal and blasts as well while debuffing the liklihood that the mobs can hit back.

[Ex_Libris]

RSRobinson I know it would be hard to speculate on a build for pvp since it's not even implemented yet and we dont know much about it but based on the powers available to us now what power sets and powers woul you pick?

[Alaron]

PvP - Fire Blasters will definatly be the way to go. It all comes down to faster animations and cast times, IMO that is. Of course all that could change by then.

[Ex_Libris]

[ QUOTE ]
PvP - Fire Blasters will definatly be the way to go. It all comes down to faster animations and cast times, IMO that is. Of course all that could change by then.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is far from accurate. Most fire blasters if not all ARE ae blasters, to be useful in PVP you need single target dominance....

If you concern animations to be of ANY value in PVP situations then ICE would be your choice for having the 2 fastest single target DD's a blaster can get.

The argument, is the person with the faster animations can get more attacks in... True ... but that negates the fact that the enemy(s) are still attacking you, and this logic ASSUMES that the faster animated character is going to win... which is completely false. You have to take into account the spells being cast, the damage being done etc etc..

In PVP the most advantageous opponent would value any sort of stun/knockback or ability which prevents your enemy from attacking back... even if for a short period....

For this reason alone Electricity would be the best, because every electricity attack has a stun component. Unlike knockdown which has a chance of occuring.... the stuns found on electricity always occur, and only sometimes do they miss on a boss.... Furthermore electricity Drains endurance, and has voltaic sentinel... a 'stationary pet' if you will which cannot be the target of spells or attacked. The endurance draining component will be the defining characteristic of any blaster in PVP

As far as the attack animation argument goes... Ice has 3 one second attack animations... something to note

Every other blaster has 2-3 second attack animations varying with the type of spell it is.

Ball Ae's are 1 second animations... But using AE's for pvp will be an efficient method of attack, not neccesarily the best option.

[Ex_Libris]

I favor AR for PvP. With other blaster primaries, you reveal your location every time you attack regardless of which attack you use. The long range AR attacks have little to no particle effects associated with them.

Electricity and Ice would tie for second for me, with energy at 3rd if PvP is largely occuring 1v1 or small group v small group. If it's large scale PvP then I'd go AR first, Fire second, Ice and electricity third.

Devices would still be the top secondary powerset wether it's small scale PvP or large scale PvP. Simply far to much versatility to pass up.

[RSRobinson]

Who knows how PVP will play out, it seems almost a certainty that many powers will get tweaked and outright nerfed before it goes live. As it stands now, any good controller will crush any blaster, except maybe Ice. There is just no way you can drop your opponent before he gets two holds off on you - I'm assuming that will be enough to overcome acrobatics' hold resistance. And any controller with sleep or disorient has a one-shot win because there is no way a blaster can get any defense other than inspirations. I can just see every blaster fighting for a couple minutes then running for cover back to buy a bunch more strength of will-type inspirations (do contacts even sell these? I never needed to buy them) because without them you are roadkill.

Of course, that just brings it right back to nerfing. People will complain that controllers are too powerful, so status effects will get nerfed. Then controllers will complain because without them, they are powerless, and blasters will be on top because of all the damage they can do, so we'll see a demand for reduced PVP damage. Then fights will drag on and blasters still will be on top because of their endurance discount, so some change here. Of course melee characters will be useless, so they'll demand some new abilities to get into melee and will probably waver between fodder and gods. Then, well, you get the picture - what finally goes live for PVP will probably be nothing like the game we play. More importantly, as was amply demonstrated in many other games, a class system based around fighting mobs almost never has anything resembling balance in PVP and about the only thing it does do is get a bunch of skills nerfed because they are too powerful in PVP. I hope the developers have a whole lot of beta time planned, and a whole bunch of good ideas to avoid this.

For blasters, as it stands now, Ice wins hands down. Ultra fast animations and two hold spells. I'd say AR is the worse. Only two single target attacks (I don't count snipe because no way can you get it off without interruption against a competent opponent) and those attacks have long animation times. Plus they are lethal damage. No way are you going to bring down a tank doing 10% damage a shot. Electricity not sure on. They have a hold, but just one so its not enough to overcome any hold resist effects. People talk about the stun, but is it real? I've heard that it is just a graphical effect and doesn't actually stop an opponent from using a skill, just most of the time they are recharging anyway so it seems that way. Endurance drain is useless. Both big endurance drain abilities are long activation and PBAOE. No way are you going to get someone to stay that close to you that long. Energy seems like most of its best qualities are lost in PVP. To hard to get near to use the close-range nuke and acrobatics basically negates the knockback (and what PVP build will not have acrobatics). Fire is probably the worse off in PVP. I mean what skills does it have? Snipe that will be interrupted, heavy hiting nuke that is to close range to land and two subpar nukes.

And of course, we don't know what new stuff will be introduced between now and then, nor what villians are like. Probably be new powers, new power sets, new pools. And who knows how PVP will be done. Maybe you just can't duel and can only have PVP missions of some kind that are designed to make everyone useful and prevent blaster raw ranged damage and controller ranged status effects from just dominating everything.

[RSRobinson]

Neuro1, and anyone else who sent me a private message. I'm not even going to try to answer them. As my replies here might give away, I am verbose. I just can't write a quick response to anything. Even when that is my intention, I just end up writing and writing. If I tried to answer all the PMs I've gotten, well I wouldn't be actually playing COH anytime soon.

If its a general question about blasters, a power, whatever ask it on the thread. A quick look tells me almost all are instead a 'critique my build' message. The whole point of the guide is to roll-up all the information you need to make a good build, and explain why particular choices are made. I thought reading the guide would be enough for a person to make a good build, but apparently not. How about a checklist then? Look at your build and ask these questions:

Do you have your chosen travel power at 14?
Do you have stamina at least by the mid 20s?
Do you have all of the key attack skills for your primary set, preferably the first level they become available?
Do you have adequate defense planned early, say one skill by the mid teens and a second by the mid 20s?
Did you 6-slot your primary offensive powers first and not waste any slots on other powers until your offense was maximized?

As long as you can answer yes to all, then don't worry about what other powers you went for, the exact order, which travel power is your favorite, if I or some other poster would have done the exact same thing. It doesn't matter. YOU HAVE A GOOD BUILD.

People, you just have to play. After you get the basics in place, there are so many choices that boil down to how YOU like to play. I hate Flight and would never give up my superspeed. Other people despise superspeed and are in love with Hover/Flight. Some people want stamina by 20 and will put off good powers until after while others are fine with waiting until 24 or even 26 in order to get the more 'flashy' powers to play with first. I could go on and on. Neither I nor anyone else can make these choices for you because we don't know how you like to play.

All builds have their plusses and minuses, and there is no 'perfect' build. Heck, everytime there is a patch some builds get better and some get worse. The guide will get you a solid base for a character that will be an efficient leveler. That's really all I, or anyone other than you, can do - give you the information you need to make informed choices, because in the end you are the one that is going to be running the toon.

[Ex_Libris]

very well said robinson! oh and this is an awesome guide!

[Ex_Libris]

Fifth_Element,

Electricity doesn't stun. The animations appear to stun them, but they can still interupt those animations and attack back. I had a level 12 electricity blaster so I experienced this first hand.

With regards to PvP, we don't know if it will be more individual based (AC, UO) or team based (DAoC). If most battles are large scale seiges, AE will still be king. If it's small wandering groups, single target blasters will have the advantage.

As for crowd control, I seriously doubt it will work like it does on minions. More like it does on bosses - which is not very well.

[Ex_Libris]

[ QUOTE ]
Fifth_Element,

Electricity doesn't stun. The animations appear to stun them, but they can still interupt those animations and attack back. I had a level 12 electricity blaster so I experienced this first hand.

With regards to PvP, we don't know if it will be more individual based (AC, UO) or team based (DAoC). If most battles are large scale seiges, AE will still be king. If it's small wandering groups, single target blasters will have the advantage.

As for crowd control, I seriously doubt it will work like it does on minions. More like it does on bosses - which is not very well.

[/ QUOTE ]


No the animations are a stun, and in fact whatever mob you see breaking that stun is usualy ONLY a boss Red_Bane. They also disrupt any current action the monster was taking. So when you see that riflemen shoot you and the glowing blob flies at you but neither reports a miss Nor a hit you know whats going on EVEN if he appears to be moving, which i might add is Rare to occur on non boss mobs.

They will hold a swordsmen swing in place, a damned hands in place etc etc... The stun has no possible chance of missing, and can only be shaken off by boss mobs....

If you have rolled an Elec blaster your most likely aware of this from levels 1-40.

RSRobinson, an Ice vs Elec match would be dependant on who gets the first shot off... Ice's ONLY option for succuess would be a freeze ray. If Ice attempts to blindly nuke an elec blaster, as the elec nukes back, he would interrupt and stun the ice blaster on the first shot meaning his demise (assuming battles would be based off a few spells concerning dmg output in pvp). Furthermore, Ball lightning has a range of 80, which is the max of any ice nuke accept the respective sniper attack, but ball lightning is a dot and its stun is the duration of its dmg or the Dot... meaning the elec blaster has that option from that range

More importantly, Simply naming a Primary and justifying it as dominating is ignorant. Secondaries must be taken into account ....

Kudos for those who are thinking about Boost Range right about now...

[Ex_Libris]

Also I'd like to point out that while i do have an end game elec blaster, I only play blasters and have many of them actually. I always find the need to justify the negativism present when Electricity is brought up.

Stating that endurance drain is useless, in fact is actually a useless comment. A blaster's entire offense comes from their endurance pool, the ability to deprive someone of their offensive capability outright is impressive. Again, understand that Short circut can completly rob any even con of its endurance if its 5 slotted with endurance drain, or leave the higher ranking opponents below 15%. Meaning 3 spells maximum might ensue.

Simply stating that its impossible getting near a target to cast a PBAOE is again absurd. You assume you have a supreme knowledge of all who are around you, negate all use of stealth (stealth, invis, phase shift, player buffs)skills, and assume you yourself are not held defenseless by means of a spell..... assumptions

[Illumino]

[ QUOTE ]
Who knows how PVP will play out, it seems almost a certainty that many powers will get tweaked and outright nerfed before it goes live. As it stands now, any good controller will crush any blaster, except maybe Ice. There is just no way you can drop your opponent before he gets two holds off on you - I'm assuming that will be enough to overcome acrobatics' hold resistance. And any controller with sleep or disorient has a one-shot win because there is no way a blaster can get any defense other than inspirations. I can just see every blaster fighting for a couple minutes then running for cover back to buy a bunch more strength of will-type inspirations (do contacts even sell these? I never needed to buy them) because without them you are roadkill.


[/ QUOTE ]

There is another skill that fire manipulation blasters get that could help out immensely in PvP. I am of course speculating, but a combination of burn + acrobatics could be very valuable in PvP. I am including both in my current Fire/Fire build. Acrobatics heavily protects you against knockdown and knockback effects. As you know, it also provides some resistance against immobilization effects. As a Fire/Fire blaster you can add to your immobilization resistance by laying down a burn patch. We all know about burn via the exploit used by fire tankers to damage purple con mobs. However, the side effect of burn that intrigues me fore PvP is the fact that it will burn through most immobilization,hold, and sleep effects. If you add an inspiration on top of these two powers, I think controllers will have a difficult time.

The high resistance from knockback should help keep you in the patch. I don't think you'll need much to defeat a controller if you can get off 2 or 3 attacks before they have a chance to immobilize you in some way.

I just thought I would add this to the conversation since there is a defense fire manipulation blasters have other than acrobatics and inspirations to defend against hold effects.

[blueXD]

[ QUOTE ]
I took your advice and switched to an
AR/Dev build, previously played many
of the pure combos, taking ice/ice to 15.
At first, I was wishing I had hover again
until I started to just back up from a
fight (mostly) rather than the round-robin
kiting on the ground I was doing before
~had an aweful string of deaths in 11,
but figured I'd stick it out.

However, I'd like to know if I've lost
any of the added defense I got from
hover by going with this build?
That is, does it really matter if I
actually move around during the
fight to avoid projectiles (obviously
other than melee) such as when
I have a mob just standing and
shooting at me? (I mean, does the
game actually take into account
that it would be harder to hit a
moving target or is it that once
they're locked on, they hit you
regardless?) Do you leave sprint
on during fights, thereby deriving
additional defense with this build?
(I tried this before getting super
speed and it seems to suck endurance)

Or, do you have a bind that
you use which allows you to
switch to superspeed every time
you move during a fight, but
which then switches off sprint
once you stop moving? (if so, please post it)

Thanks,
PT

[/ QUOTE ]

Note that once the content update will come out, fire will be alot more helpful than AR. Maltas mechs are resistance to lethal and the new nemesis bots too.

[Iceshrike]

[ QUOTE ]
RSRobinson, an Ice vs Elec match would be dependant on who gets the first shot off... Ice's ONLY option for succuess would be a freeze ray. If Ice attempts to blindly nuke an elec blaster, as the elec nukes back, he would interrupt and stun the ice blaster on the first shot meaning his demise (assuming battles would be based off a few spells concerning dmg output in pvp). Furthermore, Ball lightning has a range of 80, which is the max of any ice nuke accept the respective sniper attack, but ball lightning is a dot and its stun is the duration of its dmg or the Dot... meaning the elec blaster has that option from that range


[/ QUOTE ]

1: Ice animations have a whopping 1 second animation time
2: Ice doesn't have a snipe
3: You can't even interrupt them. You may claim elec has a stun all you wish, but if you initiate an attack that is not interruptable (I.E. any attack essentially, bar ones like snipe) they will finish it while they're "Held" or "stunned"

Now, i'm sure someone will fire back with a "But you aren't elec!"

No, i'm not. But i'm familiar with how holds don't interrupt any attacks except ones that are.. well, interruptable - corpse explosions and sky raider engineers while setting up their bubble bot. I can freeze a crey elite LT while in their attack animation and guess what.. they still fire before going into the "hands in the air, block o ice" pose.

Knock someone down while in their animation, and you still get hit by it. Freeze a crey eliminator during their full auto animation and you still get hit by it

The only exception to this is when you hit them and defeat them while their animation is going, then it will "miss" or "Hit you but do no damage"

Its just perception that you think its stopping uninterruptible powers.

[Ex_Libris]

I just wanted to say thanks, RSRobinson. I copied everything you've said in this thread and put it in a text file for later reference.

[RSRobinson]

Fifth_Element,

Why do electricity blasters get so defensive about endurance
drain? Its almost like saying it sucks is a personal attack on
the player. It isn't.

And it does suck. Must be done in melee means it is no threat to
a competent player. And even if it does land, you can still run,
can still pop an endurance inspiration. I've self-enduranced
drain completely many a time using Nova, and it is no big deal.
An annoyance, no more.

I wonder if you are a hover blaster? Used to standing still
during a fight? Because if you are a superspeed blaster, you will
quickly see that the game in PVP will play much like FPS. And any
FPS player will tell you rule #1: ALWAYS be moving. As in you
don't stop moving, ever, for any amount of time, for any reason.
Or you die. PVP in this game will be very similar. I expect
superspeed will gain popularity exactly because mobility benefits
are so critical. You will NOT get a PBAOE attack with a 3 second
animation time off on any competent player. Oh yeah, once in a
blue moon blind luck or lag will allow it, but that is like
playing the lottery, not building a consistent PVP character. It
is not absurd to say so, its absurd to claim it isn't true.

Might the skill be fun? Heck yeah, nailing a newbie with it would
be. But in any situation, a crowd control power would be a
million times better. Let's see, would we rather manage to get a
PBAOE endurance drain off on a crowd or a PBAOE Hold? Really a
no-brainer there. Plus some controllers have ranged AOE holds.
Heck, some controllers have a ranged AOE stun, which is even
tougher to defend against (no acrobatics). And the status effects
are absolutely core to controllers. Without them, they are
worthless. You think they may get nerfed but endurance drain will
not? Well, actually, probably you are right because endurance
drain is just not that good.

As for stun, I have to question your response. I know for a fact
that all but a handful of specific attacks can not be
interrupted. I myself have been held or stunned many a time and
still completed the attack I had started. I've done the same in
reverse to mobs many times. Just because a mob begins to shake
doesn't mean the attack isn't still going off. It is. Too many
people say the shake is just graphics, and the one example you
choose to use to show it is not, I know you are misinterpreting.
So unless more conclusive evidence is shown, it seems likely to
me it is just graphics and nothing more.

I'll stick by my assessment. Ice crushes any other blaster,
period. They have way faster animations so their attack will go
off first. Their attacks inherently slow your recharges, another
advantage but probably irrelevent since they will be holding you
with their freeze rays to begin the battle. And in raw firepower,
they have 3 uninterruptable attacks (i.e. not snipe) all at range
that are very quick to animate. So, given equal competence in
players of Ice and anything else. Ice wins.

RedHeat, forgot about that with the patch. Still, if you don't
have devices, you don't have targeting drone, you are in trouble.
Players have much better defenses than mobs. In PVP you basically
need a 6-slotted drone and probably tactics on top of that.
Otherwise, you are not going to be hitting consistently, and woe
if your opponents should include a forcefield defender. Or a
devices blaster that hits you with smoke grenade. It seems to me,
devices becomes almost mandatory in PVP, but we'll see.

[Illumino]

[ QUOTE ]
RedHeat, forgot about that with the patch. Still, if you don't
have devices, you don't have targeting drone, you are in trouble.
Players have much better defenses than mobs. In PVP you basically
need a 6-slotted drone and probably tactics on top of that.
Otherwise, you are not going to be hitting consistently, and woe
if your opponents should include a forcefield defender. Or a
devices blaster that hits you with smoke grenade. It seems to me,
devices becomes almost mandatory in PVP, but we'll see.

[/ QUOTE ]

I definetly agree that players will be much harder to hit. I also see how more slots will likely go into accuracy and less into damage if this is the case. Controllers will have to heavily slot accuracy as well as non-device blasters.

That being said, a targeting drone isn't going to do you much good if you have sleeps and holds chained back to back with no chance of using it. A burn patch + acrobatics may allow you enough time to pop your aim and/or buildup and unload a heavy volley of attacks.

I also agree that PvP will center around superspeed. PvP templates will also likely include superspeed + combat jump/superjump.

Once again, its all speculation at this point, but its fun to discuss.

[Erratic]

[ QUOTE ]
I wonder if you are a hover blaster? Used to standing still
during a fight? Because if you are a superspeed blaster, you will
quickly see that the game in PVP will play much like FPS. And any
FPS player will tell you rule #1: ALWAYS be moving. As in you
don't stop moving, ever, for any amount of time, for any reason.
Or you die. PVP in this game will be very similar. I expect
superspeed will gain popularity exactly because mobility benefits
are so critical. You will NOT get a PBAOE attack with a 3 second
animation time off on any competent player. Oh yeah, once in a
blue moon blind luck or lag will allow it, but that is like
playing the lottery, not building a consistent PVP character. It
is not absurd to say so, its absurd to claim it isn't true.

[/ QUOTE ]

As I think back to my DAoC days I recall that among the most powerful PvP groups were the PBAE groups that would make use of one person to lock an enemy group down, which would immediately be followed by the PBAE people running forth and blasting everyone in the victim group away.

Not to say that will apply here. I think people will be very suprised at what tactics this game will spawn because of the relation of the various powers to each other and that it is way to early to be predicting the nature of PvP.

[Ex_Libris]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
RSRobinson, an Ice vs Elec match would be dependant on who gets the first shot off... Ice's ONLY option for succuess would be a freeze ray. If Ice attempts to blindly nuke an elec blaster, as the elec nukes back, he would interrupt and stun the ice blaster on the first shot meaning his demise (assuming battles would be based off a few spells concerning dmg output in pvp). Furthermore, Ball lightning has a range of 80, which is the max of any ice nuke accept the respective sniper attack, but ball lightning is a dot and its stun is the duration of its dmg or the Dot... meaning the elec blaster has that option from that range


[/ QUOTE ]

1: Ice animations have a whopping 1 second animation time
2: Ice doesn't have a snipe
3: You can't even interrupt them. You may claim elec has a stun all you wish, but if you initiate an attack that is not interruptable (I.E. any attack essentially, bar ones like snipe) they will finish it while they're "Held" or "stunned"

Now, i'm sure someone will fire back with a "But you aren't elec!"

No, i'm not. But i'm familiar with how holds don't interrupt any attacks except ones that are.. well, interruptable - corpse explosions and sky raider engineers while setting up their bubble bot. I can freeze a crey elite LT while in their attack animation and guess what.. they still fire before going into the "hands in the air, block o ice" pose.

Knock someone down while in their animation, and you still get hit by it. Freeze a crey eliminator during their full auto animation and you still get hit by it

The only exception to this is when you hit them and defeat them while their animation is going, then it will "miss" or "Hit you but do no damage"

Its just perception that you think its stopping uninterruptible powers.

[/ QUOTE ]

1. Again I have to explain the importance of the stun, because it eludes you and so many others. What difference does it make what your attack animation is if you are stunned? Weather or not the animation is held, the attack came out, dmg was displayed is irrelevant... you WILL be shocked. So your attack MAY come out but the next one will NOT because you CANNOT move. He can CHAIN stun you

2. I actually wasn't reffering to ice having a snipe attack, and worded my post incorrectly, i was referring to all snipe attacks having a larger range than respective ice nukes.

3. Animations ARE interruptable, but ofcourse it is near improbable to interrupt a 1 second or even 2 second attack. Roll an elec blaster and find a Damned blaster type... just fight them and you will notice you can interrupt 3 second attacks like Combustion. Or fight a tsoo and see you can interrupt his teleport and he actually remains in the air, shocking, with the teleport graphic around his body

How can you conclude attack animations are not interruptable and then admit to others that are?

Obviously your chances of interrupting 1-2 second attacks are small, but they do happen. Its only more obvious on longer attacks : Combustion, Teleport, Embalmed etc etc...

You must be the Judge and the Jury Iceshrike

[Iceshrike]

[ QUOTE ]
How can you conclude attack animations are not interruptable and then admit to others that are?

Obviously your chances of interrupting 1-2 second attacks are small, but they do happen. Its only more obvious on longer attacks : Combustion, Teleport, Embalmed etc etc...

[/ QUOTE ]

Not all powers are interruptible

Corpse explosions (Embalmed.) are one of the very few that are. Check other powers' enhancer allowances; any that let you slot an interrupt reducer *are* interruptible, the rest are checked at the start of the animation and will hit or miss regardless of if the animation goes off. (Knockdowns, holds, sleeps, disorients on whoever is doing it)

Teleport is in your head, tsoo have a habit of teleporting from one spot they are in to the same very spot they currently occupy. They also don't follow LoS rules and frequently teleport even if they've been turned into an ice cube, just because they were cubed after they started their animation.

[Ex_Libris]

[ QUOTE ]
Fifth_Element,

Why do electricity blasters get so defensive about endurance
drain? Its almost like saying it sucks is a personal attack on
the player. It isn't.

And it does suck. Must be done in melee means it is no threat to
a competent player. And even if it does land, you can still run,
can still pop an endurance inspiration. I've self-enduranced
drain completely many a time using Nova, and it is no big deal.
An annoyance, no more.

I wonder if you are a hover blaster? Used to standing still
during a fight? Because if you are a superspeed blaster, you will
quickly see that the game in PVP will play much like FPS. And any
FPS player will tell you rule #1: ALWAYS be moving. As in you
don't stop moving, ever, for any amount of time, for any reason.
Or you die. PVP in this game will be very similar. I expect
superspeed will gain popularity exactly because mobility benefits
are so critical. You will NOT get a PBAOE attack with a 3 second
animation time off on any competent player. Oh yeah, once in a
blue moon blind luck or lag will allow it, but that is like
playing the lottery, not building a consistent PVP character. It
is not absurd to say so, its absurd to claim it isn't true.

Might the skill be fun? Heck yeah, nailing a newbie with it would
be. But in any situation, a crowd control power would be a
million times better. Let's see, would we rather manage to get a
PBAOE endurance drain off on a crowd or a PBAOE Hold? Really a
no-brainer there. Plus some controllers have ranged AOE holds.
Heck, some controllers have a ranged AOE stun, which is even
tougher to defend against (no acrobatics). And the status effects
are absolutely core to controllers. Without them, they are
worthless. You think they may get nerfed but endurance drain will
not? Well, actually, probably you are right because endurance
drain is just not that good.

As for stun, I have to question your response. I know for a fact
that all but a handful of specific attacks can not be
interrupted. I myself have been held or stunned many a time and
still completed the attack I had started. I've done the same in
reverse to mobs many times. Just because a mob begins to shake
doesn't mean the attack isn't still going off. It is. Too many
people say the shake is just graphics, and the one example you
choose to use to show it is not, I know you are misinterpreting.
So unless more conclusive evidence is shown, it seems likely to
me it is just graphics and nothing more.

I'll stick by my assessment. Ice crushes any other blaster,
period. They have way faster animations so their attack will go
off first. Their attacks inherently slow your recharges, another
advantage but probably irrelevent since they will be holding you
with their freeze rays to begin the battle. And in raw firepower,
they have 3 uninterruptable attacks (i.e. not snipe) all at range
that are very quick to animate. So, given equal competence in
players of Ice and anything else. Ice wins.

RedHeat, forgot about that with the patch. Still, if you don't
have devices, you don't have targeting drone, you are in trouble.
Players have much better defenses than mobs. In PVP you basically
need a 6-slotted drone and probably tactics on top of that.
Otherwise, you are not going to be hitting consistently, and woe
if your opponents should include a forcefield defender. Or a
devices blaster that hits you with smoke grenade. It seems to me,
devices becomes almost mandatory in PVP, but we'll see.

[/ QUOTE ]

Defensive is your interpretation of my post. Ignorant would be my description of your statements.

1. You Assume you have more control over your opponent than he does you. You assume that because you have super speed he A: Can't catch you B: Can't surprise you C: Your oppenent(s) haven't already held you in place. You make to many assumptions as to how YOU can get away, but do not grant your opponent ANY LUXURY as to how he might get near you.

2. If it does land, you CANNOT run because you will be shocked for 3 seconds. Again i have to reiterate that ALL elec attacks have some stun component within them... Some longer than others. If an elec blaster has super speed and decides to Ball Lightning you from a range of 80, the max of any nuke (non sniper, dd), you will be stunned for 3 seconds. Thats a 1 second attack. Regardless of how competant you think you are, all your elec opponent has to do is enter distance range for less than 1 second to begin the animation. You WILL be shocked, there is NO resistance toward it, and he CAN run up to you, and SHORT circut you. Or, he could just continue to combo you till you died, because EVERY attack is a shock!

3. "It is not absurd to say so, its absurd to claim it isn't true."
A truly narrow statement. You negate myriads of possible situations concerning PBAOE attacks, the enhancements which reduce these attack animations, player buffs etc....
It is apparent to me that whatever situation I propose to you isn't valid. As a matter of fact, cannot be valid because you cannot conceive it so. Odd, because your arguments concerning PBAOE have no premise and infact will actually be a way groups or pvp teams are structured. This FPS quake vision you have to me is absurd, and your predictions that players will not take advantage of superior AE's and PBAOE's is completely shallow.

Solo'ing systems are in place because of these spells. They will be similarly in place in PVP. Actually, I think the BEST groups or teams in PVP will be AE/PBAOE. Just as another poster pointed out about Daoc

Concerning endurance drain, Short Circut does not allow you to regen for some time. The fact that you have to carry endurance inspirations is an oppourtunity cost of other inspirations.

Furthermore, what relevance is there in slowing an enemy's attack when each of his attack stuns you? It matters not who gets the first shot off, only that the elec enemy gets his attack off, of which the rest of his must follow because yours cannot. (subject to holds and/or control spells)

Please stop denying that elec attacks do not stun, they do. Interruption or not (it does happen), you will be stunned, and then chain combo'd

For the record I have 2 40 blasters, 1 36, 2 low 30's

[Ex_Libris]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
How can you conclude attack animations are not interruptable and then admit to others that are?

Obviously your chances of interrupting 1-2 second attacks are small, but they do happen. Its only more obvious on longer attacks : Combustion, Teleport, Embalmed etc etc...

[/ QUOTE ]

Not all powers are interruptible

Corpse explosions (Embalmed.) are one of the very few that are. Check other powers' enhancer allowances; any that let you slot an interrupt reducer *are* interruptible, the rest are checked at the start of the animation and will hit or miss regardless of if the animation goes off. (Knockdowns, holds, sleeps, disorients on whoever is doing it)

Teleport is in your head, tsoo have a habit of teleporting from one spot they are in to the same very spot they currently occupy. They also don't follow LoS rules and frequently teleport even if they've been turned into an ice cube, just because they were cubed after they started their animation.

[/ QUOTE ]

1. You CANNOT assert not all powers are interruptable, even 1 second powers because IT IS a possibility. Because the DESCRIPTION merely makes it obvious or states the BENEFITS of using the said enhancement to REDUCE interuption does not mean EVERYTHING ELSE is not. Just not a likely possibility, nevertheless possible.

2. My reference to corpse explosion is for illustrative means. It is NOT just because corpse explosion is interruptable. NO incorrect. Rather, because it is a longer animation and CAN be interrupted

3. Tsoo DO teleport in place, but they DO teleport away as well. A reference to whats in my head or not is a lack of intelligent substance. "tsoo do not follow LOS rules"

A. you have NO idea what these rules are.
B. NOTHING has to follow LOS rules (under the map exploits? shooting then turning a corner so you could see the mob for a half second but it cant see you just so you could start the animation)
C. Attack Animations CAN go through walls, perhaps you have never experienced it, so naturally, you cannot understand this. But at the same time, you have to realize your not as intelligent as you think you are, and have to be sensitive to situations and possibilities that you had never thought of or experienced

In conclusion, Arguing the instances of interruption are irrelevant. Rather try to refute or propose situations that strip ANY elec vs generic blaster of being chain stunned

Please understand, interruption or not, animation flying or not.... what will you do once your shocked, and the elec blaster continues to blast you with his nukes. Most of which shock for 2 seconds or more

Again, I DO NOT favor elec blasters... Rather i find arguments against them silly and not being properly well structured. Often narrow minded and favaoring the subject of the argument. Basically, sophist arguments plaguing the AT.

First blaster was an AR/Dev... perhaps my favorite