Blazing Starfall

[Saeviomagy]

Hmm, here's something for the history buffs. But wasn't Scorching Burst well likes when 4th edition first came out?

Personally I think that scorching burst is just fine - it rivals striker damage if you can catch a few foes in it, just spread around, which is exactly what the controller is supposed to do. I'm totally confused how it comes out too weak. Some of the at-will area attacks in phb2 seem more like encounter-power level to me. Certainly none of the non-aoe at-wills seem to compare (with the exception of the druid, who seems balanced pretty much right).

 

[Runestar]

I think wotc is finally beginning to catch on that being a controller is more than simply being able to deal AoE damage. I sure hope to see "revisions" for fireball and meteor swarm in arcane power as well.

But wasn't Scorching Burst well likes when 4th edition first came out?

Was it? My guess is due to the dearth of wizard at-wills when PHB was first released, plus you wanted an AoE power for dealing with multiple minions anyways. So people took it not so much because it was great, but moreso because the other alternatives (like magic missile) stank.

 

[Doctor Proctor]

You have to look at the Sorcerer class as a whole to understand why Blazing Starfall makes sense. For example, on my Sorc I built for a one-off I have Arcane Spellfury (+1 to hit after landing an At-Will), and then Rimestorm and Poisonous Exhalation. Both of those attack FORT, and they give the targets a penalty to their FORT defense. In other words, it allows you to set up combos where you hit with an At-Will, then Rimestorm, then Poisonous Exhalation, then back to a FORT targeting At-Will.

Blazing Starfall is the same way. The idea is to drop it on some enemies, punish anyone that leaves the zone, but maily to keep them grouped for the followup attack. With Arcane Spellfury, you'll also get a +1 on that attack roll since you hit with an At-Will.

Does it outdamage Scorching Burst? Probably. Does it outcontrol Scorching Burst? Probably. But we're talking about an At-Will here, and you're comparing it to an At-Will (Scorching Burst) that the designers have flat out said was underpowered.

A better comparison would be to look at Grasping Shards (Invoker At-Will) versus Blazing Starfall. Grasping Shards is low damage in comparison to a Striker At-Will, but that's okay. I would also say it's the more "controller-like" power of the two. Sure they both try to keep you in the area, but Blazing Starfall does so just by doing a little bit of damage, whereas Grasping Shards actually slows them. A monster with a lot of HP can escape the Blazing Starfall zone easily and do whatever he was going to do on his turn, but you can't escape more than two squares because of the slow effect unless you burn extra actions. That's why Grasping Shards is the more "controller-like" of the two.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

I forsee this being a very popular Dilletante power, too.

as dilletante power its actually wealer than scorching burst...

but we speak of neclectable damage in both cases... so you rather look at the key ability and damage type... so it could really be popular on carisma using classes not beeing able to do radiant or area damage otherwise...