I've been refining a fire build that will be mainly relying on, no surprise, Conflagration, and was wondering what folks thought about the right pick for slot #2. Basically, the build begins like this:

L1: Throw Fire
L1: Heat Wave (Engulfing Flames), Fire Strike (Crippling Challenge), or Immolation
L5: Thermal Reverberation
L8: Fiery Form
L11: Conflagration
L14: Force Shield
L17: Fireball

And so on.

I'm pretty comfortable with everything except that second L1 power. Here's how I see it:

Heat Wave: Seems damaging -- and I haven't tried Engulfing Flames yet -- but not sure it really accomplishes much above and beyond Conflagration. And the hold seems to kick in late. Plus, it's got a 20 second cooldown.

Fire Strike: Obviously, not terribly damaging. But it offers 100' reach, which can occasionally have merit. It does offer the Crippling Challenge advantage. And it offers the "Fiery Escalation" buff, but I'm not sure this lasts long enough to benefit any power other than Fire Strike while you're using it.

Immolation: Long cool down, and it only lasts 12 seconds. And the damage bonus doesn't seem that significant beyond what Fiery Form offers. However, the energy discount (around 30%) is pretty darned good. And it's a hold breaker. Could be the best option of the lot, even if it's only used occasionally.

Thoughts? Please help me choose wisely.

Thanks so much.

- ELB

heatwave is a very good power.

Well, that's what I did. I took Fire Breath to begin, and then once I acquired Conflagration, I retcon'd Fire Breath to Heatwave.

Heatwave impresses me okay, but, honestly, it doesn't seem like I'm seeing much difference between it and Conflag in terms of the amount of time it takes to put down a foe. That's why I queried about whether to keep it or move to one of the others for their unique advantages. For what it's worth, I have yet to take the advantage with Heatwave, which looks promising.

- ELB

Conflag does more dps than Heatwave, so unless your target is moving around (pvp mostly) it's not all that useful.

Crippling Challenge has no use (or at least very very very little use) for a non-tank build unless you PvP.

Immolation is good because it breaks Holds. The damage boost and cost reduction is just a nice bonus. Life sucks without a Hold breaker, even in PvE.


So in short, Heatwave or Crippling Challenge if you PvP a bit, and this will also allow you to get a different hold breaker if you like (Ascension or Resurgence perhaps). Otherwise, Immolation is probably the way to go.

Excellent, thank you. I shall retcon out Heatwave for Immolation. Heatwave's seeming redundancy makes Immolation the smarter choice.

If anyone else thinks differently, I'm all ears.

- ELB

Heatwave trivializes master villian opponents, just fyi. Survive long enough for the hold to kick in and Mr. (TOUGH) Power Armor goes down like cake. Against anything less or more Conflag is probably way more damage.

Until you get a TRUE AoE, Firebreath is the way to go, then retcon into Heatwave.
Heatwave does "trivialize" MV's i agree.

I went with Fiery Form +:

• Fireball (+ Adv. for the Debuff and ST aspects)
• Heatwave (+ Adv. for the Hold and ST aspects)
• Flashfire (for Thermal Reverberation and AoE aspects)
• Pyre (for Thermal Reverberation and AoE aspects)

(Yeah, yeah, i know "Conflaguration" is a better AoE )
(But it's "animation" bored the shyte out of me )
(I added Conflag. at the end of the build anyway :o )

PS: What's with the use of the word "FIRE" and no red text!?

It's a RULE man!
A RULE i tell you!

EDIT: *digs out a POST on fire that has links to other fire posts out of mothballs just so he can say fire in red a few more times*

Well, I can still take Heatwave at some point, should I find myself struggling with Master Villains. However, given my other powers, it seems nonessential and of especially limited use. I will admit that I thought it was cool, both the animation and the sound.

Thanks for the responses.

- ELB