BellaStrega

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Kali you are going to make me cry if you don't look at my arguements and at least acknowledge them. I mean are my arguements that off base?

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No, not at all. I've tried to make it clear that I'm only arguing from playing my scrappers and my peacebringer, and that I haven't played a blaster high enough to comment on how much they move.

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I don't what it will take to cinvince someone who has not played a blaster to the upperlevels that blasters move more than scrappers but I think I have layed out the arguements pretty well.

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From your descriptions, my DM/DA has moved at least that much in many fights, and sometimes for similar reasons (it's a lot of fun to try to drag a boss that has latched onto you over a tanker's invincibility aura while the boss hits you for half to two-thirds of your hit points per shot and your only saving grace is a tray full of respites).

My Regen scrapper has had to move around a lot to line up AoEs and to avoid damage because she's taking too much.

I'm not saying that blasters don't move. I mean, given how much my DA and Regen have had to move to both avoid damage and line up attacks, it's clear that a blaster has damage avoidance even more keenly in mind. I just feel that the idea that a scrapper can just stand in one spot or hit tab-follow and fight effectively is not accurate.

As for ignoring the blaster when he has a boss... I've seen defenders ask that people type "Zzz" or something when held/slept/whatever so the defender knows to wake them up. When I'm playing a tanker, I keep an eye on the health bars and try to watch what's happening to everyone else. If I see a teammate's health drop, I'll target them and hit taunt in the hopes that whatever is hitting them is their target... but it helps when blasters who are caught by a stray boss yells "help" because no one - and I mean no one - can pay attention to everything happening in a fight.

And also, my melee peacebringer moves around more than any character I've played when she's in human form. She moves more than she does in Nova.

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I can only extrapolate from playing my Kheldian in nova form.

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Nova Form is much better and easier to line up then a blaster AoE, speaking as a Fire Blaster that had a Nova for Kheld, my Fire Blaster had to be much closer, and had (especially in the early levels) less manuverability then the Kheld. The Kheld AoEs are generally wider and farther reaching then Blaster ones, which means, even though they have more manuverability, they don't need to use it.

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But novas are squishier than blasters, and have far fewer tools to handle attention directed at them. Sometimes they need to move quickly to escape damage. Shifting isn't always the best answer because human form without shields is even squishier than the nova, and I have been defeated trying to shapeshift and activate shields. I have a keybind that shifts to human, activates combat flight, shining shield, and quantum shield...and often, the bind doesn't even work properly. I've fallen out of the air (despite combat flight being the first toggle to activate) to get one-shotted because of falling damage. I've had shields turn themselves off. It's almost a lottery at times.

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I am not sure why we are still talking about this scrapper VS. blaster movement question. It is very clear to anyone that has played both a scrapper and a blaster that blasters move more in combat. They just move more. Why?

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Experience doesn't seem to bear this out, though. This is where the disagreement is. Or rather, experience varies, as it does not bear out for me, but does for hepheastus. Now, you can take his experiences with less salt than mine because I haven't played a blaster as far as a travel power - but I have used Energy Torrent (very easy to line up, but not so great on the damage), Frost Breath (great damage, great opener), and Fire Breath (similar). But... I have none of 14th level or higher, and hepheastus has played to 50. I can only extrapolate from playing my Kheldian in nova form.

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Both have to move about the same amount. However, blasters typically have to move *more immediately* than scrappers. The "penalty" for a scrapper jogging over to where they want to be is low; if a blaster has to move at all, the faster the better, and sometimes slow might as well be not at all.


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I agree with this.

If my Peacebringer is in human form, she's moving to get a better shot. She's really not at a lot of risk most of the time. In dwarf form, she really doesn't need to move at all, although she gets defeated in that form more than any other. In nova form, she needs to move to line up her cone, her aoe, and find cover. Admittedly, now that I have quantum flight, that's less of an issue (build up, shift, scatter, detonation, human form, quantum flight).

I'm not saying playing a Peacebringer is like playing a scrapper or a blaster, but it does touch upon both playstyles fairly easily.

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You are not supposed to able to do what scrappers are doing solo.

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Scrappers are not *supposed* to be doing what they currently can solo either. If you want to go by they way things are supposed to be, the gap between what scrappers and blasters is not supposed to be anywhere near as large as it is. There are two ways to fix it, give blasters a very large buff of give scrappers a very large nerf, which do you prefer?

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I'm not sure preference will help much, so I suspect we're likely to see a moderate nerf for scrappers, and a moderate buff for blasters.

I may be overly optimistic.

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whatever. a few missed mobs to a scrapper don't spell death.

nuff said.

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It can. I've had defenders and blasters scatter stuff I was fighting right before I hit dark regeneration, which had the consequence of me not getting healed with several angry Freaks/Rikti/whathaveyou still in the vicinity. This happened to me so many times in the 6-8 levels after I got the power that it was probably one of the top three reasons I hated energy, fire, and ice blasters, as well as storm/ and /energy defenders so much. It's definitely one of the big reasons I hated knockback well into the 30s.

Having randomly thrown energy torrents and explosive blasts break up a group of villains before I could use shadow maul, ripper, etc was just gravy on top of all that.

Now, I realize that the powers themselves aren't sucky and have uses, and I'm actually big on using knockback to tactical effect because of how much it did bother me, and since my current character is a Peacebringer and my next one is likely to be an energy/energy blaster.

I do realize that energy torrent and explosive blast can actually be a form of mitigation for blasters - they can use either to rapidly clear villains near them and keep them on their [censored] for a few moments and ease the pressure. It also has uses for "herding" them around.

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I didn't say I ONLY used him for solo purposes. read the post. and I never said I NEVER team with him. There's been PLENTY of times when I've herded for blasters.... and stood there killing while blasters help mow mobs down...

And I STILL don't agree with your assertion that scrappers have to move more. sorry.

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My peacebringer is almost entirely melee - my one ranged attack isn't somethign I usually position for. I am constantly moving around to use my pbaoe (Solar Flare), as well as selecting new targets as my old ones run out of hit points. Now, her style is not exactly scrapperlike, but it's not really blaster-like either. There are rarely situations where I can just sit in one spot and casually shift from target to target unless I've decided I don't really want to attack anything.

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there's that "good team" caveat again. and let me guess... it involves a tanker with mobs glued all over him.

I keep saying... An AT that can't even function unless mobs are autistic and can only concentrate on the tanker... or there's a full time controller locking everything down that moves.... is gimped.

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I haven't argued against that, but I have to say that the blasters on the teams I've been on (both tanking and playing a Kheldian) just haven't died that often. Yes, they do die more often than my Peacebringer, but my Peacebringer is noticeably less squishy than they are.

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Why? the tanker can function without the blaster. the controller can function without the blaster. Every AT can benefit from the powers of the others but they can also stand alone in almost any situation. kinda [censored] up if you ask me. Get right down to it blasters are the most replaceable AT in the game. For the most part all they provide is damage. Everyone deals damage. Blasters deal solid damage.... but when balanced against their fragility and lack of utility blasters need OBSCENE damage.

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I somehow doubt we'd get the missions done as quickly as we do if it weren't for having two-three blasters at any given time. I am not arguing that it's fair that blasters are the weakest AT. I do not think that things are as doomy and gloomy as some like to say.

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My spines scrapper does this.

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I knew I should have addressed this. The big difference I think is that you move to reposition for cone AoE. A blaster repositions for survival either his own or a teammates and also repositions for his cone attacks, AoE, single target attacks with knockback etc.

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Being as my damage resistance is something ridiculously low like 7.5% I can tell you that I occasionally reposition for survival. In fact, I relied on superspeed to get distance to heal up when things went south - which they did more often than I'm sure anyone believes.

But, eh, whatever. Scrappers stand in one spot and kill everything with their pinky fingers while blasters are running away from the fight praying they don't bleed out before they can turn the corner and break line of sight. More seriously, in a good team, the only real need for a blaster to position for survival is to avoid AoEs, and when blasters can fire with impunity (as happens on a good team) scrappers either attack the hardest targets or do nothing but chase corpses.

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I was just saying that while you are playing around in the game you usually never see an Ice Tank hanging around in the Portal Parking lot. I have seen maybe one at a time. I almost think that every Ice tank over 30 that exists in the game has posted on the forums.

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Probably very true.

All the ice tankers I listed are on Champion, though. I didn't mention the one that's nearly 20...

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Right there alone I believe is a good example of why a blaster moves more than a scrapper. A scrapper moves to engage and proceeds to beat their target. I have never seen a scrapper beat their target then back up, then go forward, then back up. It is a very simple matter of running up to the mob and beating it down.

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My spines scrapper does this.

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Few people have. How many Ice tanks do you see running around past the 20s? I can usually count them on a single finger most days. Invul tankers? If they were a pinatta a blind quadraplegic could hit one. Fire tankers are almost to those numbers as well.

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Hmm... On Champion, I can think of two 50s, my own 37, and a 24 that Doc Spielmann and I have been teaming with recently. There's a level 34 the player's told me about (but I haven't seen), and I know of one other that's probably into the 20s or higher.

Naturally, this doesn't include the 15 or so ice tankers who post regularly on the forums and have identified themselves in the Energy Absorption/Ice Tanker threads since issue 4 went to test.

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I love my Ice tank (although he is on hold due to melee classes being looked at) and I got an Ice Tank invited into the SG so that we may actually have some variety in the SG and don't get jaded but to be honest alot of times I would rather have an invul tanking.

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Ice can tank most situations fine. It does take more attention and effort to remain standing (holding aggro takes about the same - you need to pay attention to what's going on). I've been able to tank 8-person DE spawns without taking lethal amounts of damage (but I usually have to hibernate at least once per mission, sometimes more).

Sadly, the situations in which a tanker is really necessary are the same situations in which the deck is massively stacked against ice.

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I still say "tab, Follow-key" is not nearly the "repositioning" that the average blaster has to do just to stay alive AND kill mobs. Its one more key in the attack sequence that you tap on the way to the attack's numberkey. Its not "critical repositioning".

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Scrappers who "tab, Follow" in teams are more of a liability than an asset, to be honest. It completely avoids actually picking strategically useful targets and can have fun effects like just randomly killing anchors and thus causing squishydeath.

Not that this has ever happened when I was playing a defender...

Anyway, I never use "tab, follow" with my scrappers. Even if I did, and even if I didn't manage to screw things up by not assassinating the sapper that looks like he's about to aggro or ignore the boss that just decided to eat the blaster's head, most of the stuff that tab will get me will die before I can do more than give it a stern look.

Seriously.

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In reality, there was only one real problem that was Blaster-specific. The purple patch was added to make the whole game more difficult. It seems however, that while the game got more difficult for blasters, the tankers and scrappers were tweaked (and I'd say overly tweaked) to adjust to the new enemies. I've met and played with tons of tankers in the post level 35 world, and all of them at some point during our battles have cracked a joke about leaving the keyboard to go take a dump or make a sandwich.

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Never teamed with an ice tanker then? I don't think I'd feel safe leaving my keyboard as I need to be active to tank (remember to activate hoarfrost, taunt and hibernate if things get rough).

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I'm not evading jack.

I Just think you guys are nuts. know what my scrapper does in combat? wraps mobs around him like a security blanket and stands in one place going toe to toe with anything dumb enough to step up and get beat down.

My blaster is flitting about like he's on crack..... 2 attacks... fireball and fire breath... then it's time to make like someone put jumping beans in my pants to deal with the survivors. I'm I'm standing still it's on a bonfire patch that I layed before starting the attack. My scrapper isn't repositioning. he's standing there while I dole out pain. If he's jumping it's because something flew away. and what flew away had better be a sapper because otherwise it's not important enough to go after.

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Is this team or solo? Because my experience on teams is 180 degrees removed from this - the tanker is moving the villains around, the blasters are taking them out fast, and I'm trying to locate something that won't die in five seconds so I can punch it for an attack cycle or two.

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I think I need to make that a broadcast bind for my malta missions...

/bind numpad1 broadcast You Maltas are a bunch of evil cheater-heads!

Thanks for the line Kali!

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You're welcome. Glad to help in labeling the Malta Group for what they really are. Big fat evil cheater heads.

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Scrappers have no harder of a time positioning and repositioning than Blasters do.

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Actually...

If you have a blaster and a scrapper on the same team, the scrapper's need to move typically means wasting attacks on corpses because the blaster can and does rapidly shift targets and deal out a lot of high-damage fast-animation attacks. Yes, AR is an exception to that, but you guys are not the victims in every possible scenario that can be devised.

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Another thing that slows down scrapper DPS is executing an attack on a villain only to have it die before the damage is registered - something that happens to me all the time when I'm teamed with blasters.

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That is one that cuts both ways as well. The only one where this really does not happen is Elec blasters single target attacks that hit instantly. The animations on AR also end up making me go through an animation only to see the target die before I attack. Especially if I have to re-draw the gun.

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Back in the glory days of my Kheld's nova form (the teen levels), I was able to routinely cause the scrapper on my team to stab corpses. I was able to do the same with the Ice/Energy version of Maidenfrost (sadly no longer part of my character stable).

It naturally has more to do with fast activations vs slow activations, it's just that melee tends to have many more slow-activating attacks and ranged tends to have many more fast-activating attacks.

To be honest, I don't think there's a strong semblance of balance in terms of how long an attack takes to activate vs. the damage it does.

Another thing that slows down scrapper DPS is executing an attack on a villain only to have it die before the damage is registered - something that happens to me all the time when I'm teamed with blasters.

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Their range is just f'd right the hell up.

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And half their damn shots are cone attacks. Nothing like one of them fighting the tank across a room, and spamming you with bullets too.

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And even if you do dip into power pools to boost your defense, it doesn't apply to cones or AoEs.

But the Malta Group are just one giant conspiracy filled with evil cheater-heads.

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Now, the issue is more specifically - what does a Blaster do that a Scrapper can't already do? Or, even worse, is a Scrapper inherently "stronger" than a Blaster.

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Seems to me, in almost every group I'm in, that Blasters easily get 3 times the number of defeat messages that Scrappers do. The ability to change targets without moving adds so much more to Blasters offensive output than people seem to realize.

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Strangely, there was a lot of back and forth not too long ago in which several blasters insisted that scrappers can just stand in one spot and kill everything, while blasters have to constantly jockey for position.

It was surreal, but I think it demonstrated that neither scrappers nor blasters have the luxury of sitting in one place during a fight.

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I have a level 40 DM/regain and it is simply the easiest character I have ever played from 1-30. It isn’t quite as fast leveling after that due to the emphasis single target damage but all things considered it’s still easier to play in these levels even if it doesn’t level quite as fast as my tank or controller.

I know a BS/regain who says exactly the same thing about these early levels, and play nightly with someone who has a level 50 claws/regain and freely says that getting to 20 wasn’t hard at all.

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My second character after my DM/DA was a Spines/Regen scrapper, and I found the first twenty levels to be pretty easy...

...because I knew the game better after having already played through those levels and knew what to expect. My defenders have had it even easier.

I mean, think about it - before 16, Regen doesn't have any defenses. It has a self-heal that's about as good as a respite, and it has dull pain, which isn't usable very often. That's it. Nothing else. In effect, they're blasters with less range, more endurance, and free green inspirations. At 16 you get healing and status resistance, but I would argue that the latter makes a much larger difference than the former in terms of ease of play. I could solo +2 to +3 bosses with my Spines/Regen scrapper at 16th level without any healing in Integration at all - not because of any healing rate (that I did not have), but because not getting held, stunned, slept, or knocked down makes a big difference.

But the reason my spines/regen had it easier is pretty simple: I knew what to expect. I knew how to approach solo boss fights before DOs, and how the different factions worked. Even my Kheldians have a pretty easy time soloing missions.

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Statesman I applaud your efforts. I know you are crazy busy and I appreciate the fact that you will take a good hard look at blasters for the future.

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You do realize that everything States takes a good hard look at get's put on the nerf block, right? Be careful what you wish for.

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Well, it would be more accurate to say that everything States takes a good hard look at gets nerfed, buffed, or left alone.

Tanker damage? Super reflexes? Martial arts? Katana? Dark Miasma?

Probably.

Now extend that to "I am trapping you in a field of crushing gravity/shutting down your reflexes with my mind/overwhelming your senses/freezing you in a block of ice/entombing you in a block of stone..."