Sonic Boom, yes or no

[roguedubb]

Sonic Boom tends to get written off by a lot of Engineers, on the basis that a 30 second cool-down makes it useless. What I have not seen is anyone explore the numbers and actually prove this idea. So I specced Sonic Boom, Wither and Leech all at rank 6 and started doing some solo runs while recording the numbers.

While Sonic Boom only did about 10 more damage per hit than Wither/Leech, I was able to reliably use it within a couple of seconds every time it came off cool-down on a pack of 6 or more trash mobs on Numa1. Wither NEVER ticked for full duration on Numa1, Leech did sometimes but only on the named mobs or the rifle mobs.

On the later Numa levels Wither and Leech were able to tick for full duration more often, but then I frequently ended up with situations where a second cast would not reach full duration. I also had issues with Sonic Boom, with the trash mobs hitting just hard enough that I could not reliably make packs of 6 or more mobs to use it on safely. Playing in a group would probably make Sonic Boom easier to use effectively on levels with tougher trash.

I suspect the efficiency of Sonic Boom VS Wither+Leech comes down to something like this;

- solo trash farming packs, use Sonic Boom
- grouping with people who like to AoE packs, Sonic Boom
- skipping trash to boss farm, use Wither+Leech
- ungeared and/or fighting mostly single mob pulls, GearUp+L2PackPull

[GigaBits]

It is an interesting point. In uncharted if you time it right you can use it once, maybe twice, per group of mobs. However, consider this: most of the commandos aoe abilities are on a 8 or 10 second cooldown. Gravity well, singularity, and graviton slam can pretty much be spammed in rotation much faster than you can lay out transference, sonic boom, and/or pain.
Engineers serve an important role: we buff, heal and occasionally cc.

I believe if you are having fun and the team isn't constantly dieing, then any extra you want to throw in is fine, but I have tried sonic boom at every rank and never found it to be a make or break skill in my engies line-up.

[Hullukko]

That's just it. The bar is set by the uncharted ruins and in there the sonic boom is unnecessary, leech and wither are more useful (many individual large monsters). In the other maps it doesn't matter that much, they can be plowed through with fewer skills anyway.

[kamikazees]

Thanks for doing these solo runs. As I found out doing my armor testing, the difference between Numa 1 and Numa 5 is quite significant. Numa 5 does not include a lot of pure trash mobs. Even those burrower guys can take 5 or 6 hits. As for me, I'd rather hit a vular 2x with Leech (8 ticks/30 sec) than hit him and his 3 burrower buddies 1x with Sonic Boom.

[roguedubb]

Sadly Sonic Boom in it's current design does seem to be limited by the levels available. An ability that works well on a single level is scarcely worth speccing into, unless one is looking to farm that level to the exclusiion of all others (and even then Leech will perform admirably and provide more versatility).

[Yangry]

Sadly Sonic Boom in it's current design does seem to be limited by the levels available. An ability that works well on a single level is scarcely worth speccing into, unless one is looking to farm that level to the exclusiion of all others (and even then Leech will perform admirably and provide more versatility).

After my own failed experiment with SB...this still holds true. Sonic Boon just fails to deliver.