Heat Buster, or Frozen Blast?

• Malogg wrote on 2010-12-11 00:27
  Hello! :D
  I am a giant with relatively high skills/level. I have decided to learn alchemy, since I have gotten most of the melee CP dependent skills over with. My plan at the moment is to rank water cannon and alchemy mastery, but after that, I want to learn a more advanced alchemy skill.
  
  

  
  
  • Is ranking water cannon first a good idea?
    
  • After that, should I rank heat buster, or frozen blast?
    

  
  
  Please, only answer if you are high leveled and know what you are talking about.
• Zack wrote on 2010-12-11 00:51
  I think you should rank water cannon then finish off your melee tab, then move towards alchemy.
  
  But if you don't want to do that i'd personally do heat buster. Does a lot of damage and it doesn't take to much time to activate.
• radionoise wrote on 2010-12-11 00:52
  Water Cannon is the most basic offensive move for alchemy, it would certainly be a good start.
  
  As a giant, your range/magic options are a bit limited so you could use water cannon as a reliable ranged attack when it's not very safe to melee. As for other alchemy skills, it really depends on your playstyle... Frozen Blast is a good skill if you already have a high-damaging smash/water cannon, but its usability only really shows at the higher ranks. Other skills such as Heat Buster and Flame Burst require far more specialization into alchemy to achieve their full potential, but are also quite nice to have.
  
  Personally, if I had a main focus on melee I'd go for Water Cannon as a magic/ranged alternative, Life Drain for its wonderful damage/HP recovery, high-ranked Frozen Blast to spam smash gleefully and Alchemy Mastery as the backbone for it all.
• Fracture wrote on 2010-12-11 01:23
  Water Cannon is definitely the first alchemy you'll want to get to r5+ for offensive purposes. After that, I'd suggest Frozen Blast. High AP cost, but making Frozen crystals is the easiest/quickest way to rank alchemy mastery to 8+, at which point it become mostly golems/barriers and combat.
  
  Heat Buster is fun, and easy to use, but due to the high AP cost and lowering stam:damage ratio, I'd advise it being a later skill. Frozen is also easier to integrate with melee. Should you use it with a Tower Cylinder at r1, you easily have enough time to pull off a max fullswing with ease and no danger to yourself, or pretty much spam any move of your liking.
• Zid wrote on 2010-12-11 05:18
  Alchemy is not a true Ranged alternative though. Still activates Mana Deflector and, for the most part, hits the same "Magic" defensive properties.
  
  But... basic offensive Alchemy skills usually outdmg basic offensive Magic. Whatever your reason is, Water Cannon is the basic Alchemy attack. Chain Cylinder is your cheap dmg gambler, Alchemy Mastery is your buff, the rest are preferences.
• Archibald wrote on 2010-12-11 09:16
  If your level 600 like your signature says then you do not have most of your melee done. your actually about 1000 levels aways from truly having that done. But if your choosing to go alchemy the first thing is to decide on flame burst or watercannon. If you build for either you can get good enchants to make them strong.
  
  Edit: CP dependant skills, my bad. I'm not sure why you wouldn't want to finish your combat tab. Giants with full combat tab done are a force to be reckoned with.
• Xemnas wrote on 2010-12-11 11:27
  Heat buster for damage, frozen blast to be an annoying git in PvP.
• Nalgor wrote on 2010-12-11 13:27
  Keep in mind that you need Water Cannon r9+ to learn Frozen Blast.
• Username wrote on 2010-12-11 13:41
  Kay, Heatbuster is what you want. Honestly i ranked this early, and mastered it,and its beautiful. The problem is the 392 AP it takes to RANK it.
  You dont have to get it to R1, Acctually its a useable attack at Rank 4, if you choose to rank it to there then do some other Alchemy. I planned this out if i had 70ish AP Each RB, id get this in 6ish RB's (Lazy Nature) However Double Rainbow sped that up by alot.
  
  Its stamina at R1 Takes 23 Stamina, and aswell like Frozen Blast, if its interupted after it does damage, and just before the animation is done, you can fire again.
  
  However, Id advise ranking Frozen along with Heatbuster, as if you can freeze bosses, then start hitting them with heatbuster too. Make Heatbuster easier to crit and more damage it could do.
  
  Heat Buster is probally the best skill a Combat Alchemist can get.
• Bankai231 wrote on 2010-12-11 19:24
  If you like playing solo then I would say Heatbuster for great damage.
  If you play with a party alot freezing high prot stuff can help out a team ALOT. Friends were freezing hm Black ship rats last night<3
• Akemii wrote on 2010-12-11 19:26
  I'm wondering guys, is Heat Buster at high ranks even worth it? o -o I spam Water cannon ALOT.
  
  And also you got Water Cannon at R1? Mine is at R3 it's at it's fastest and it does very nice damage. Frozen Blast is based on CP, so unless you're not gonna be using Water Cannon like I do, you should go with Frozen Blast. Heat Buster if you're gonna be using it alot.
• Bankai231 wrote on 2010-12-11 19:27

  Quote from Blizaga;244310:

  I'm wondering guys, is Heat Buster at high ranks even worth it? o -o I spam Water cannon ALOT.

  
  
  Have you heard Username preach about it? Lol. Jk jk. Its a great skill Ive seen some amazing damage out of it.
  
  ESEPECIALLY if you spam wc.
• Shanghai wrote on 2010-12-11 19:27
  I say Heat Buster. It deals good damage when paired up with your WC spamming, and Frozen Blast needs to be at a minimum of rank 9 to freeze most enemies or so. You could say the same for Heat Buster, but the damage is still decent at a really low rank. Only problem are stamina costs and AP. If you want, you can also leave it at rank 8 since it gets a +60 damage boost to it's minimum + max.
• Akemii wrote on 2010-12-11 19:46
  Damage on Heat Buster at lets say... R9? Like a rough estimate?
  
  And also if you choose heat buster take into consideration the water cylinder vs fire cylinder. Will prob have to you Tower or normal cylinder.
• Mentosftw wrote on 2010-12-11 20:57
  Heat buster and frozen blast are on the opposite ends of use. Heat buster is purely offensive (it even requires the use of a couple other offensive alchemic skills prior to use) while frozen blast is purely supportive (it's more practical with a party because if you fail the freezing process, you're left open to attacks).