Biospark

What Airhammer said ^^

Taking Stalkers as a model here, they could make the Snipes work off Defiance stacks.
Allow Blasters to fire off an un-interuptable Snipe if they have "X" number of stacks of defiance. "X" being determined however the devs feel is fair, but more than 3 would seem too much. Heck, make the damage of the snipe increase based on the number of stacks. So you could fire it with one stack, or wait till you have 5 and have a much larger blast.

LOVE the proposed changes so far ! But...

+22% ToHit ?! Really Devs ?

So lets force ranged toons to all take not one, but two, pool powers from leadership AND slot an IO proc, which will, skyrocket in price. Really bad plan.

Lower the number to 20% at least, that equates to a base of 95% to hit, right ?
15% would be even better, but probably dreaming now.

Here is an Idea too, increase the duration of both Aim and Buildup( 20-30 seconds).
More damage for all, less need to get tactics and Kismet. Blasters fixed !

Here are my thoughts on a Test method.

A) Pair all Primaries with the same secondary and make that secondary very vanilla in its assistance on the Primary. My choice would be Forcefields. No +dmg, just a generic Defense boost to help get the controller thru the test. Status protection to even out the curve of crippling mezz effecting run times.

B) Each build would be level 50 SO only and using no Incarnate powers slotted.

C) Create a custome AE mission with mobs that are not resistant to any damage types, and deal only smash/lethal to the player.

D) Have the AE test be in two parts. The first part would have large spawns and be designed to test how fast the controller can mow down large groups of standard level enemies. The second mission would contain multiple Hard targets and designed to test how fast the controller can burn down tougher opponents.

E) Compile times for each run and for each mission. Then post and review results.

** You could also restrict and define which pool powers are taken and that each build must have all primary and secondary powers. Even possibly restricting which ancillary is chosen to minimize variables beteen the test subjects **

Here are some fun Combos that I have tried and loved, but for different reasons;

Mind - Kinetics (This played like a Psychic Blaster, tons of damage, and great for teams)

Earth - Storm (This controller will one day get to a level to take Fire Mastery and become the Master of all elements. Really difficult on endurance, and WAY too many powers to choose from. Expect to be doing alot of respecs tuning this one)

If you want to avoid the typical Fire-Rad or Fire-Kin build, try Pairing a Primary of your choice with Forcefields. You get Status protection from the bubble as well as easy-to-use Team and Pet buffs that leave you free to focus on your primary. One of the biggest issues with controllers on a team is that they have TWO support sets, and often you will get controllers that play on teams and forget to use their primary to focus on their secondary, or focus on their primary and forget to use their secondary. Well, Forcefields is a set that lets you easily multi-task both sets.

Hehe

You know I will never change Arcana

What I really hope the devs will do one day is a 10th power to each powerset which is REALLY well thought out and focused on what the particular powerset lacks. In this way the Cottage rule can stand right where they left it.

WHAT IF:

The Aim power in Blasters primary set was changed to be both Aim and Buildup in strength and Cut the recharge in Half. I.E. +ToHit equal to Aim, +Dmg equal to Buildup.

THEN :

Change the Buildup power in the secondary to an appropriate Absorb/Dmg shield that worked as follows: Any attack that effects the Blaster has 'X' Hit Points absorbed by this toggle effect. If the attack is a melee attack, not only is the dmg absorbed by the shield, but deals the same amount of damage (of the appropriate type : Ex: Fire dmg for Fire Manipulation, Energy for Energy manipulation, etc...) to the attacker as was absorbed.

*The absorb amount would be enhanceable and since it is a toggle, would require the blaster to manage the cost of the shield*

I realize this is the same as, say, a resist toggle, but the absorb effect would be low enough to not turn a blaster into a Tank, because the % of protection would vary on the amount of damage. Example, if the shield Absorbed 10 points from each attack, a 50hp attack would deal 40, equating to a 20% resistance. OTOH a large melee attack which dealt 200 damage would still deal 190 damage, which equals only the equivalent of 5% resist.

Another thought is to do away with the absorb altogether and focus on the "backdraft" effect. What if, this toggle instead gave a small chance to deal full damage back to the attacker and block the blow. This would be un-enhanceable since you cannot deal more damage back to the source than was originally recieved. I would find it very enjoyable to watch a minion try to smack my Blaster, and see the "Backdraft" proc protect me from ANY damage from that hit, but instead "defeat" the enemy trying to attack me in a "fiery" burst. ...."That had to hurt. I guess I should have warned you about getting too close to my rocket boots.... Muahhuahhuah"

My suggestions for helping Blasters out are two-fold ;

"Crash-less" Nukes for all. After all, every swingin Incarnate now walks around with a Nuke usuable every other battle or so.
Why not make Blasters unique in that they get this at level 32 and have TWO crashless Nukes once they Incarnate.

Secondly, lets do away with pool defenses giving different values based on ATs. Make the resist of tough and the defense of every other pool power grant the same value to all ATs. This provides Blasters a decent option for durability which other ATs certainly take advantage of now.

These two changes would make my blasters very happy.

I am with Steele on this one regarding containment. At lower levels your rankings are very accurate, but once you factor in Ancillaries and Containment possibilities at level 50, some of the lower performers start to be more effective (elemental sets). Having played both Mind and Illusion into the higher levels, I would trade my left nut...er...eye for a reliable AoE containment power every fight.

I would like to chime in regarding the OPs search.

Go Tanker. You will not be disappointed in the end if you sink the effort and influence into the build. I really like Brutes and Scrappers too, but if the desire is to eventually crush +4/x8, Tankers have a tremendous head-start on everyone else.

Choice of Armor. Everyone is giving you good feedback here, so I will add my perspective of a player that has seen "awesome" tankers in action. If you want to go Defense based, choose Shields, if you want to go Resist, choose Electric. It really is that simple. I have seen these two sets do incredible things "in-game". You could also consider Dark Armor instead of Electric depending on your "tastes". I have not grouped with a fully tricked Dark tank, but we have a Forumite that has Videos about his exploits, so I know that it would work as well as Electric in a pinch.

Choice of melee set really comes down to personal choice, but you "should" consider the AoE capabilities of each set. My personal favorites are Martial Arts, Super Strength, Street Justice and Staff melee. I am kinda liking Kinetic Melee as well on my Stalker, but thats a surprising developement. If you are aiming for a "Farm-style" toon then the most capable are Fire and Super Strength. They have been for quite some time and for good reason --> Damage.

Good luck in your search

My Ill/Dark is only 33 (I dont level as fast as most folks), and this is the first 'troller that I have ever gone to x3 while solo before SOs. This toon can easily solo better than most of my level 50 toons could without an IO build. Me Likes

Can hardly wait until he has some solid IOs into his build.

I am actually going to depart from my previously held conceptions about solo-ability, which would inlcude Rad/... Dark/... and Time/... and say specifically Storm/Fire Blast.

Don't get me wrong, the first three definitely can solo, but I recently tried Storm/Fire with the Defender ATO proc in Fire Blast and OMG ! This combo can get all of the powerhouse effects at an early age. This is the first Non-melee combination that I have ever gone to X3 before SOs. Freezing Rain + Rain of Fire + Fireball , mop-up, rinse + repeat. Super fun.

Why do I not currently have one in my arsenal ? Too easy perhaps ?

Having played a few blasters, I am confused as to what the concern is here.

In most MMOs that I have played, there are 4 main divisions of team roles : Tanking, Support, Crowd Control and DPS. Blasters very clearly and easily fall into the DPS role, which they share with at least a couple other ATs. Their role is fairly start-forward and the only things that really bother me about Blasters have to do with, one, the decision to make pool powers give different amounts of protection based on AT. My defenders get much more mileage from powers like tough and weave than my Blasters, which is B*@@$#!T, in my opinion. And secondly, there are times when getting perma-mezzed is a real downside. I would like the Buildup powers to act like a break-free; 10-15 seconds of +Dmg/+ToHit and 30 seconds of Status protection.

But besides those two ideas, Blasters are fine and don't really need anything to define their role better.

Hello Strato,

Your post is well informed.

The defender primaries cannot be ranked well, which is why I tend to think of them as two sets of rankings; one list would be in team usefullness and the second would be in solo-ability.
I will not try and post how these should go because there are enough sets that I have not played past 30 that my view is skewed towards the early game, but here is the big problem with some sets (Empathy in particular). If a set scored high on team usefullness but low on solo-ability, it may be a very low priority to remedy, whereas the opposite ; low on team usefulness but higher on solo-ability, would command more attention from the devs. And in fact, what probably is the closest to the truth is that the devs would look for evidence that the set was under-performing in "both" categories before any chance of improvement were to occur.

So, rejoice all you TA, FF, and especially Sonic, because you have a much better chance of seeing improvements than Empathy. Although, not by much.