brophog02

No, and here's the problem I have with every one of your posts: you speak in generalities. You treat every situation the same.

Some fights are long. Some are short. Some have adds. Sometimes you have ambushes. The game is dynamic. Timing is not an argument, it is a condition, and it is a condition relevant to every player, whether they realize it or not.


Again, you speak in generalities. Sometimes you do need to pull. Sometimes you need to use terrain. There is not one strategy for every build in this game, against every enemy, on every map, with every team configuration. Sometimes we want them further apart, for mitigation purposes. A leveling tank will commonly pull around a corner or into a line simply to keep aggro without exposing itself to too much danger. Sometimes we want them even tighter together than they started, and knockback can be a tool to accomplish that.

There is not one overarching strategy to this game.

Knockback does not inherently scatter. Read that again. Knockback does not inherently scatter. To scatter would mean to move items away from each other. The force I am applying with knockback moves them all in a linear fashion away from me. Depending on the geometry, chance to hit, and other factors it may mean that those objects are further apart than they started. It also may mean they are closer than they started.

That depends entirely on who you are. If you are a squishy, knockback is often far more useful than knockdown or knockup. It does a lot more good to knock anything with a devastating melee attack away from me than it does to knock him down only to see him pop right back up and slash me anyhow.

No it isn't, as evidence in this thread has shown. It has the capability to be a benefit and a burden, just like any other power. I could say fireball was a terrible power because Blaster upon Blaster has died gaining too much aggro using it. Just because I twist the statement does not make it universally true. That's what happens with knockback statements.

There you go with more gross generalizations. Knockback does not inherently scatter. It's a linear positioning tool. It can be made to move things nearer another group just as it can be used to move all or parts of a group. You're again twisting things to fit an agenda.

This statement is the worst of all. Everything has a sequence in which it works better. If any Blaster fires off an AOE before aggro is contained, and he doesn't kill everything, there will be consequences. Why are we pretending there are only consequences in that situation if it were an AOE with knockback? If an AOE with knockback is used at the appropriate time, there are no consequences. Any Blaster has to time that to make things work. Controls work that way, taunts work that way.........just about anything in a team setting will affect something else if used at the wrong time. Similarly, the ways in which we do things that cater to knockback often help in using other powers. We aid each other by doing those things. The things being done to 'cater' to knockback also 'cater' to other powers. The fact you think they aren't 'needed' in situations is mostly due to the fact the game for full teams can be so ridiculously easy that mistakes can be overlooked, rather than the fact that such tactical moves lack overall benefit.

Some of these arguments by many posters are absolutely preposterous. Knockback can be used in a manner detrimental to a team, just as it can be used in a manner that aids a team. To suggest it is the only thing that can be used detrimentally or that it is always detrimental is absurd and not worth further discussion.

Until next time.......

The ST damage is absolutely average, and the only way you will reliably keep that Soldier on the floor is to add Power Push to your attack chain.

I didn't say percent chance determined the knock effect. They're two separate sentences because the are two separate statements.

Nothing is in jest. Knockback is everywhere, and at varying degrees. You simply work around it. You position with your knockback. You time your AOEs to work around the rest of the AOEs on the team. You grab another AOE out of an APP. You switch to your secondary. You have a lot more tools, including your brain, that are available.

Sometimes you just find another team. There are times for every AT that they feel they aren't of much use. Sometimes you just didn't need more damage. Sometimes you're playing a tank and the team has other aggro tools it prefers. Everything in the game can be this way in certain situations. You either work around things, or switch teams.

It does tend to happen when actual people are on the server. Tumbleweeds don't cause problems.

They require a single goto command. If that's consideriing micromanaging, then so is everything else in the game.

Yeah, you can't walk around with them on defend/follow and just do everything on autopilot.......welcome to playing CoX. Somehow every other AT manages to walk around and press buttons. I'm sure you'll one day get a handle on it, too.

Yeah, that's the way it is..........the less impact debt has had, the quicker players quit after a death. Not that it is cause and effect, just a very strange coincidence.

Exactly. It's mostly inaccurate threads like this one that make Energy Blast something it isn't, which is why we see this behavior FAR more on the forums than in the actual game.

Explosive Blast is one of the most singled out powers any Blaster sets gets, yet it is also one of the most cloned, but the clones don't suffer the stigma it does!

People still think Energy Blast is a great ST set, when it is just plain average. Nothing special about the ST damage, but it has a long standing rep to the contrary, in large part because many think it has insufficient AOE............which is also average for a Blaster.

Explosive Blast does not do radial knockback.

For much of its life, Power Bolt has insufficient magnitude to do knockback. At best, it is only a 20% chance. Power Blast only has a 30% chance.

In Blaster primaries alone, 7 of them have at least one knockback power, or the capability to do knockback. Even the most recent powersets in the game have knockback. Energy Blast does not hold a patent on knockback effects, yet the vast majority of the discussion pertaining to knockback effects is centered on Energy.

You need to re-check how much damage Energy Blasters are doing. The set produces average damage, both in ST and in AOE. There are not these loads of 'vastly superior' AOEs to be had and Energy Blasters do not do "subpar damage output on larger teams".

I don't know where you get your information, and I don't know who you team with, but your post is about as useful as you claim Energy Blast to be.

The solution is for people to realize how much knockback is in this game (and not in just certain sets) and learn to deal with it, rather than learn to avoid it.

There used to be a post a month on the Suggestions forum asking for some derivative of a -KB enhancement. This went on a good 2 years by my count..........it doesn't matter how many such threads are made, knockback is not going away from this game. People either need to find a new game, or realize this fact and work with it.

I deal with it very simply: I check every AT's powerset on invite and send tells as necessary. If I have a Willpower/Invuln tank, I let them know I'd appreciate then pulling to walls and into corners where I can saturate them. If I have a -kb controller, I let them know how appreciative I would be of them using said power, and in response I'll be quick to pull that aggro from them. I time my powers so that other AOEs are done before me.....so that I'm the killing blow.

It's easy, and I really don't have anything resembling an issue that can't be settled with a tell. My friends list on my Energy Blaster is filled with tanks, not other Energy Blasters. Knockback benefits everyone if everyone is willing to be benefited. We kill faster, we kill safer.

Case in point, a TF I was on recently with an Energy Blaster. The tank had been setting up near structure, I was doing most of the AOE, into said structure, and before everything was dead, the tank moved on to the next spawn. This went on for half a dozen missions, then a storm came through my area and knocked out the power. I hurried back, but I missed 3 or 4 missions. Before I left, we didn't have so much as a scratch (I died once by my own hand). I returned to a teamwipe with the leader asking the tank why he left the mobs.......his reply:

"I've been doing it the whole TF".

This was a good tank, mind you. We never got a scratch after I returned. I know exactly why they wiped........nobody changed their tactics to account for the fact I was keeping everything pinned and dead.

:d:d:d

I have to disagree with this advice as it uses an extra power (and perceivably, extra slots) to do things you're already capable of doing. You can move. You can command the pets to move. You can put recharge (and probably should) into twilight grasp.

Twilight Grasp is up about every 4 seconds with 3 SOs of recharge. That should be plenty often given Dark's numerous other tools to work with.

Anything less than a purple boss and I feel a little too unnecessary. I've seen the Oni give me the evil eye if I try to turn bosses off...........

Put a goto command on a mouse button and they are the easiest to use. They all want to be at the same range.........and that's right by the enemy. It's point and click.

The big difference in control of the ninjas is their speed. To me, that's a benefit. When I tell them to do something, they get there in a hurry. It's almost like having a ranged pet with melee damage.....because it doesn't matter where at, they're going to go where I tell them and kill nice and quick. They move quick. They animate quick. And, most of all, they don't say anything!

Yeah, they're melee and they kinda demand goto commands because of it. You don't want the Jounin shooting poison darts, for instance. But aside from simply not using goto commands, I don't understand the constant complaint that Ninjas are so much harder to use than anything else. Does everyone just play Bots on Follow/Defend and nothing else?

Put a goto command on a mouse button or use team teleport and Ninjas are no more difficult to play than anything this game has to offer.

I understand that. Even as good as storm is, it is the secondary, and will feel as such.

A Mastermind feels completely the opposite since all you actively do is manage the storm powers. It feels like a pure Stormy with pets.

If Blasters were meant as ranged toons, they'd have as many melee attacks as Scrappers have ranged attacks.

Blasters will conceivably contribute more, in general, but AOE damage contribution can be overestimated in a mature team setting. Once toons begin to get developed, everyone is usually going to bring some AOE damage, and often the difference in a Blaster's AOE damage contribution vs replacing that spot with something else isn't that big.

Plus, as mentioned, the Apps now can make up a big difference in that regard. Blasters would happily take an every spawn AOE power as good as the Fireball in the Dominator Apps.

Once you start adding in global recharge numbers for both ATs, I'm not sure there is enough difference in recharge either way to make a huge difference.

But Blasters also don't have Domination........tit for tat and all that.


Some Dominator Assault sets have something similar, just at a lower value, and not all Blaster sets have such damage buffs. True, Dominators won't have quite the burst that Aim+BU+(Blaster Melee) will have, but it also doesn't need to have quite that level of burst. It's still more than enough, and while Blasters get defiance, that damage increase doesn't go into effect until the powers start being cycled, whereas Domination could conceivably be on before a Dominator went into such a damage cycle.

This is a pretty good discussion, and we're only able to find rather small differences. I definitely agree that Dominators are more Blasters than Controllers. Having a buff/debuff set is a really big difference between a Controller/Dominator, whereas a Dominator Assualt set can effectively mash together a Blaster's primary/secondary by being able to eliminate things like controls and nukes.

A Dominator is much more a Blaster with more control than a Controller with more damage.

I think the same thing about Blasters......for both, the melee attacks are really incredible burst attacks that are absolutely worth taking. With a Dominator's control abilities, it makes even less sense to skip them.

My main is an energy/elec/elec and has thousands of hours post 50. I'm well aware of their benefits and limitations. While it may not be near the strongest post-50 toon I have, it is still my favorite, and by far the most played. I am not for a moment suggesting Blasters are not fun to play, but this is a relative statement.

And I'll repeat that Blasters lag behind almost everything else when you get it fully IO'ed out. They are squishy and that's part of the tradeoff for being high damage.

My controller solos mobs at +3/x8, as just one example of what another squishy AT is doing. You may think your duo is doing well, and it is relative to the game, but not respective to what most others can do. There is just only so far you can take a Blaster, even with IOs.

<sarcasm>
But castle, knockback and run away are scattering me mobs!!
</sarcasm>

The Cow-Monsters are three times as annoying as hearing that autoheal sound.

Not far enough. It's amazing how poor Blasters are in this game and how little anyone cares about it. That's what happens when the primary balancer is just to give everyone more damage when they seem to lag behind another AT.

I don't know the numbers either, but I agree with Strato on this.