New efforts!

[LaughingAlex]

I'm not people. :P

Scrappers could do as much or more single-target damage as blasters. Blasters far outclassed them in AoE, though, and I did specify steamroller team. Not your ordinary pug, but one built for running non-farm content as quickly and effortlessly as possible.

With 2 defenders and 2 controllers on the team, the blasters are likely softcapped, and have either a decent chunk of resistance, regen or ticking HoTs at all times. They almost certainly have some sort of mez protection as well. And with 2 controllers most enemies are going to just be standing around not fighting back anyway. The blasters aren't going to be soaking up heals or otherwise diverting the attention of the defenders (who should be playing more like offenders in this setup) away from doing damage.

The key to a team like that is to stick together, move as a unit, and don't stop moving. All of the area buffs turn everyone into a tankmage. If a blaster strays too far away and gets flattened by a purple boss before the rest of the team gets there, no biggie. Fire off vengeance, have a good laugh, and maybe toss them a rez or a wakie while everyone else is mopping up.

A scrapper could certainly contribute to a team like that, but their waste of an entire powerset on personal defenses that are irrelevant due to already being capped, their lack of AoE with a decent radius, and their limited mobility makes them less than optimal.

Over the years I've run or participated in 27 static teams that leveled from 1-50 together, and at least that many that made it into the 30s or 40s before being shelved due to members being unavailable for RL reasons. That includes everything from all-AT teams to all-ranged, all-melee, various mixes, etc. I can say without hesitation that the ones in makeup similar to the above are the ones I had the most fun on, and felt the most powerful. It's the buff/debuff sets that make all the difference in the world.

I often associated steamroller teams in city of heroes with roman legions.  They moved as a team and could react to flanks.  They were a powerful "buzz saw" that could win most encounters under smart leadership because so long as they kept their formations, they'd win.  But they were not slowpokes like greek phalanxes were.  They were fast for the time.

Steam roller teams in city of heroes were far, far faster than trinity teams, could react to ambushes easily, and fight on multiple fronts.  They were far funner than trinity teams for those reasons alone and I often say they should have become a standard.  Because of their flexibility.  They were fun and awesome.

[pinballdave]

A good NAff/DP fender can keep a lot of damage from happening and then heal what's left all while propping up the team offense with ~100% +Dam... just saying.

I hadn't fleshed out the Nature's Affinity to sate my curiosity, but I did have a mid range Bots/Naff that seemed very powerful and the secondary fit the playstyle of my mastermind and the pets well. The heals over time, the regen rate, the +dmg are nice, but the -dmg in spore cloud is often forgotten and overlooked.

[worldweary]

We would Wormhole mobs into caltrops,Carrion Creeper+Vines+Roots or use Freezing Rain + Trip Mine.I really miss watching all the ways the different AT's could combine powers.

[Codewalker]

Steam roller teams in city of heroes were far, far faster than trinity teams, could react to ambushes easily, and fight on multiple fronts.  They were far funner than trinity teams for those reasons alone and I often say they should have become a standard.  Because of their flexibility.  They were fun and awesome.

Mmmm, ambushes. <3 ambushes.  Free XP, walking right into our trap.

Praetoria was quite fun on one of those teams.

[Arcana]

That was the one thing that bothered me most about the Defender inherent -- that it would benefit the Defender only if they weren't doing their job properly; if you were spreading your buffs and debuffs around correctly, your team wouldn't be getting into the state required to bring the end reduction up to a noticeable level.

That was actually intentional.  It takes some thought to realize why its designed that way.

[Arcana]

Defender cap is what, 400%? Same as controllers, tankers, dominators, khelds, and VEATs.

Assume 195% from base+enhancements, 18.75% from Assault, and oh... let's be generous and say 35% from a crapton of IO sets. Let's be extra generous and say you're running T4 Assault Core Hybrid with 3 stacks up for a total of +55%. That gets you to 303%.

I'm having a hard time imagining the +30% from Vigilance while solo would make a difference to anyone who isn't Kinetics. Certainly not while leveling, which is what the Vigilance change was targeted at improving. Yes, the cap is lower at lower levels, but so is everybody's (except Brutes, because Brutes need to be nerfed :P), and the Defender cap is within 10% of Scrappers at level 1.

Among the many, many weird oddities about Defiance 1.0, one of them was the fact that the maximum buff tier was +500% damage.  What exactly that was supposed to do was one of several mysteries about that thing.

[Arcana]

Illusion control had good single-target offense, but not so great at AoE. Fire is good AoE, and Plant reigns supreme at controller AoE damage, especially when dealing with large crowds beyond the target cap. Not as good as a blaster, but infinitely more survivable. Controllers mostly rely on pets and epics for single-target damage in any case.

The biggest advantage of Illusion is not the offense, but that with either a high-recharge build or a kineticist on the team, they became a completely invulnerable tank.

I think most of the focus on Illlusion was on the PA, but I think its biggest overall strength was that it had a unique mix of tools.  The PA, certainly.  SI was also a unique tool in that it was stealth that did not break (and had some defense in it).  The Spectral Terror was also an interesting terrorize.  And actually, focusing on the PA sometimes ignored the fact that the Phantasms also cast invulnerable decoys as well.

But yeah, its AoE wasn't all that good.  Just the AoEs in the Phantasm, with no containment.

[Arcana]

4 Blasters?It always seemed like people were asking for Scrappers not Blasters.They could do as much damage without having to be saved from being mezzed,sleeps or soaking up the heals. :P

Ranged AoE.

[Arcana]

Scrappers could do as much or more single-target damage as blasters. Blasters far outclassed them in AoE, though, and I did specify steamroller team. Not your ordinary pug, but one built for running non-farm content as quickly and effortlessly as possible.

Scrappers actually have more AoE than Blasters, something I used to harp about when people said that "AoE damage" was the blaster specialty.  But its not ranged AoE, and running at steamroller pace having range would be a significant advantage to those AoEs (as well as their generally larger area of effect).  Outside of high speed steamrollers though, I don't think Blasters actually dealt more AoE damage than Scrappers did.

Once you have enough buffs and debuffs, all steamrollers are pretty fun to be in, but if I had to compose one from scratch it would probably be something like two Ill/Rads, two Fire/Kins, and four archery/mental blasters.

[Azrael]

I'm not people. :P

Scrappers could do as much or more single-target damage as blasters. Blasters far outclassed them in AoE, though, and I did specify steamroller team. Not your ordinary pug, but one built for running non-farm content as quickly and effortlessly as possible.

With 2 defenders and 2 controllers on the team, the blasters are likely softcapped, and have either a decent chunk of resistance, regen or ticking HoTs at all times. They almost certainly have some sort of mez protection as well. And with 2 controllers most enemies are going to just be standing around not fighting back anyway. The blasters aren't going to be soaking up heals or otherwise diverting the attention of the defenders (who should be playing more like offenders in this setup) away from doing damage.

The key to a team like that is to stick together, move as a unit, and don't stop moving. All of the area buffs turn everyone into a tankmage. If a blaster strays too far away and gets flattened by a purple boss before the rest of the team gets there, no biggie. Fire off vengeance, have a good laugh, and maybe toss them a rez or a wakie while everyone else is mopping up.

A scrapper could certainly contribute to a team like that, but their waste of an entire powerset on personal defenses that are irrelevant due to already being capped, their lack of AoE with a decent radius, and their limited mobility makes them less than optimal.

Over the years I've run or participated in 27 static teams that leveled from 1-50 together, and at least that many that made it into the 30s or 40s before being shelved due to members being unavailable for RL reasons. That includes everything from all-AT teams to all-ranged, all-melee, various mixes, etc. I can say without hesitation that the ones in makeup similar to the above are the ones I had the most fun on, and felt the most powerful. It's the buff/debuff sets that make all the difference in the world.

Excellent post regarding a cosmopolitan steam roller team.  Buff tastic!

I remember being on and putting together non tank and non-scrapper teams.  Very rewarding and exciting dynamics.

Refreshing from the you need a tank or scrapper prevailing wisdom of some.

Azrael.

[LaughingAlex]

Among the many, many weird oddities about Defiance 1.0, one of them was the fact that the maximum buff tier was +500% damage.  What exactly that was supposed to do was one of several mysteries about that thing.

Simple, ensure damage was max for about 1/100th of a second before the blaster died :).  Awesome but impractical and is godly were the Dev motto then :).

Edit: Damn auto correct on Ipad.....

[Codewalker]

And actually, focusing on the PA sometimes ignored the fact that the Phantasms also cast invulnerable decoys as well.

That right that is what allowed a skilled Illusion player to tank AVs before they got enough recharge to perma PA.

I found that resummoning Phantasm a few seconds before PA expired, in a position where its only viable target is the one you want it to cast the decoy on had a high success rate of successfully transferring aggro.

[Codewalker]

(as well as their generally larger area of effect)

That as well as the target cap are the two reasons I generally consider Blasters to have "more" AoE. Not more powers or even more damage on those powers, but the ability to consistently hit more targets without having to waste time herding them around a corner.

There are of course always outliers. I remember titan weapon scrappers in particular being AoE monsters.

[Arcana]

Simple, ensure damage was max for about 1/100th of a second before the blaster died :).  Awesome but impractical and is godly were the Devi motto then :).

This is one of those cases where at first it seems stupid, then upon thinking about it for a while it starts to make sense, then after thinking about it some more it gets stupid again.

The stupid part is that since the damage cap is 500% its literally impossible, short of actually being under a tremendous damage debuff, to see +500% damage.  That's because base damage is 100%.  The most you can even see really is +400%, not +500%.

But maybe, you think, that's the whole point: the devs wanted to make absolutely certain that the blaster would be damage capped, so they set the max defiance tier to a value high enough that it was guaranteed to cap the blaster with plenty to spare.  Maybe that makes sense.

Nope: that tier was set to a very low level of health to trigger, and there wasn't a tier below it that buffed +400%, say, or +300%.  So the problem with making a +500% tier is really that they made you drop to ludicrously low levels of health to reach for something you could never even get the full value of anyway.  Had they made that tier +400% or +300% it would have justified increasing the health level that it triggered on.  Instead, they made blasters pay for a buff they could never achieve.  And that's the ultimately stupid part of that buff.

[Arcana]

That as well as the target cap are the two reasons I generally consider Blasters to have "more" AoE. Not more powers or even more damage on those powers, but the ability to consistently hit more targets without having to waste time herding them around a corner.

There are of course always outliers. I remember titan weapon scrappers in particular being AoE monsters.

Also, in steamrollers you typically are ignoring endurance costs altogether and presuming massive recharge, plus aggro means nothing and target densities are always presumed to be very high.  Whoever has the biggest splash wins there.  Outside of that, there are practical limits on AoEs that make the blaster AoEs less effective than their maximum numbers make them appear to be.

Heck, in steamroller teams Explosive Blast is a really good AoE because its big, recharges reasonably fast, and nobody cares about knockback all that much when things are dying in less time than it takes gravity to make something fall down.

[pinballdave]

We would Wormhole mobs into caltrops,Carrion Creeper+Vines+Roots or use Freezing Rain + Trip Mine.I really miss watching all the ways the different AT's could combine powers.

It's a really good hot mess to put a tar patch under :)

[pinballdave]

That as well as the target cap are the two reasons I generally consider Blasters to have "more" AoE. Not more powers or even more damage on those powers, but the ability to consistently hit more targets without having to waste time herding them around a corner.

There are of course always outliers. I remember titan weapon scrappers in particular being AoE monsters.

I loved my Titan weapon scrapper, TW/willpower. He was the guy I had solo the signature story arcs for merits. :)

[LaughingAlex]

Also, in steamrollers you typically are ignoring endurance costs altogether and presuming massive recharge, plus aggro means nothing and target densities are always presumed to be very high.  Whoever has the biggest splash wins there.  Outside of that, there are practical limits on AoEs that make the blaster AoEs less effective than their maximum numbers make them appear to be.

Heck, in steamroller teams Explosive Blast is a really good AoE because its big, recharges reasonably fast, and nobody cares about knockback all that much when things are dying in less time than it takes gravity to make something fall down.

I dunno bout that last comment.  I saw plenty of scrappers cry and whine bout knockback even when everything was dying super fast.  Just the mere presence of KB made some knockback phobics cry.

[Abraxus]

I dunno bout that last comment.  I saw plenty of scrappers cry and whine bout knockback even when everything was dying super fast.  Just the mere presence of KB made some knockback phobics cry.

Yeah, I ran into that a few times.  No matter how much I tried to keep it to a minimum with an Energy/Energy Blaster, there was always someone who complained or quit when it happened inadvertently.

[Sinistar]

Yeah, I ran into that a few times.  No matter how much I tried to keep it to a minimum with an Energy/Energy Blaster, there was always someone who complained or quit when it happened inadvertently.

Reminds me of playing my PB that had a build designed as a juggler build with KB enhanced.  I'd switch to that build and show the whiners about KB a few tricks.