Dr Causality

It's also a tough problem to solve, because there will always be a path of least resistance and it's rarely where the designer(s) imagined it would be.

In general build looks viable as is. Looks sturdy but I'd try to find a way to fit in more of the /Time powers. As for Clarion: Fighting Malta without Clarion is admittedly rough. But I don't usually want to use up Destiny on Clarion. Unless something can chain mezz you, I find I'm usually okay getting periodically mezzed on a well built MM. Sure you drop toggles, but as a Tankermind you don't drop your biggest damage mitation: Bodyguard mode's damage dispersion. When you're mezzed your pets are still attacking helping pull aggro from you, so with good Def and Resistance I find I rarely get chain stunned that I can solve by combining insps into a break free. Even soloing the ITF on a MM, an unexpected early Nictus kill that stuns me and my whole troop of minions hasn't killed me lately. But it's all about playstyle, so I get you wanting Clarion. Because we've all had the experience of sitting there unable move as a few critters slow carve you into pieces... And Clarion is a nice power to offer your teams. But back to your build: 1st Priority - Distortion Field - Find a way to fit it in your build. It doesn't look impressive in Mid's but its' surprisingly good in action in terms of mitigation. But slot it for Slow that way you can open with Distortion Field and things move so slowly they'll have trouble closing into melee range. The slow movement combined with Provoke's Taunt and strategic movement shuts down a lot of attacks. Once you've taunted, you can kite around jumping to opposite sides of the field punching things and mobs will slooooooly try to reach you. Keep applying Taunt and moving so they chase you back and forth across the Distortion Field. That way they end up not doing much besides moving slowly, and because of the -Rech they don't even get to use their ranged attacks often... If you're feeling starved for slots you only need a single +5 boosted Slow to take advantage of this playstyle mechanic. But Distortion Field is an usual power. With PPM changes most of these type powers like toggles are no longer worth slotting with Procs. But Distortion Field has a long duraction and relatively low cooldown. Combined with /Times 50% Rech buff, you can get high recharge builds capable of triple stacking Distortion Field! These kind of powers should get a chance to proc ever 10s. Distortion lasts long enough to get 4 proc chances. Even double stacked that starts to be a lot of proc chances for an aoe power you only have to cast once. It's an exception that's worth slotting for dmg procs if you can find the room. Using the SNBR Damage tracking meter, a single dmg proc in Distortion Field generated me around 5 DPS. For comparision Enforcers together usually get around 50 - 74 DPS and my tier1 Bots usually only get in the mid 30's. So 5 DPS is that's a great return on single IO slot... Stretch Goal - Time's Juncture - This is a skippable power on ranged builds. But since you're taking a lot of melee attacks you'd get good mileage out of this and it's definitely worth giving something up. If starved for slots you can slot it just for Endurance Reduction. Out of the box it's a slow that stacks with Distortion Field and a -15% Dmg, this will make it even easier to kite enemies around and you take less damage. The -Tohit is just a bonus. The other utility on a Tankermind is, especially when soloing auras like this helps your MM retain aggro. Last thought: Evaluate your playstyle strategy and the value of Procs in Low cooldown attacks - You've got a lot procs in Boxing and Kick. With a standard 3.5 PPM dmg proc Boxing has roughly a ~21% chance to proc and Kick with it's longer castime has a ~28% chance. That means for a standard 3.5 PPM dmg proc you get an estimated value (average) of around 15 Dmg per actiation in Boxing. Boxing is up almost instantly, and you can easily put 3 - 5 procs, so that's very respectable DPS for a MM. But a MM has lots to do besides repeatedly jabbing things in the face. It's a playstyle difference but I'd rather put those procs into long cooldown powers that gives higher proc chance, so I can use it less frequently for roughly the some overall damage. But either way since Boxing casts and recharges so fast you probably don't need to proc out both Boxing and Kick.... Boxing looks like it's slightly better Damage Per Animation, so better overall DPS than Kick. Kick knocks enemies away, which is handy for mitigation but annoying for when you want to keep hitting them with melee attacks. Crosspunch is a surprisingly good power for MM's. I would take everytime if I didn't also have to take Boxing and Kick to get the most from it. At zero recharge in Crosspunch, standard 3.5 PPM dmg procs have a 41% proc chance and 4.5 PPM purples have ~61% proc chance. My favorite slotting is 3 x Eradications for the massive 3.13% E/N Def set bonus: 1 x Dmg - boosted to +5 for for 43.5% dmg 1 x Acc/Dmg/End/Rech(+5) boosted to 19.03% 1 x Chance for Energy Dmg. The 19% recharge on a single boosted Acc/Dmg/End/Rech only drops your proc chances by roughly 6% (depending on the PPM value...), so usually seems worth it for the +Def bonus. That still leaves 3 slots for other procs like Armegeddon, FF, Fury of the Gladiator, etc. I build /Time very differently. /Time has so many good powers and it's +50% Recharge buff means you get a lot more mileage from proc builds. My strategy for standard game content is to just build for 33% Def...so one small purple insp away from softcap. You can easily fill in that missing 12.5% Def with a bind or macro button that combines inspirations. But there's not an Insp that will fill in all the powers you gave up and all the slots you used chasing that last 12.5% Def. Another bonus to using the Insp and set bonuses instead of toggles is you don't drop your defense numbers when mezzed.... With Farsight /Time can get to 33% Def so easily that you don't even need the Tough or Weave from the Fighting Pool. This means you can make weird novelty theme builds like fit in Spring Attack, slotted with FF and other procs, while taking almost all the /Time powers. Spring Attack makes for a very nice opener or follow up to dropping Distortion Field since it immediately gets you into range for Time's Juncture and has good chances to KD enemies... To further free up slots for Procs I take Musculature Radial Paragon. It's about 20% more dmg on your Thugs, and makes more creative slotting for procs possible. Additionally, it boosts the Endurance in ChonoShift and Stamina helping with Endurance issues you can end up with from having so many attack powers. But if you aren't comfortble fitzing with inspiration combing during combat, then this playstyile won't be very good or fun. That's one thing I love about this game, so many ways to play....

Your hunch was right, it's a bug in Mid's stats that hasn't yet been fixed. The Superior version of the Entomb proc actually only has a 23.875% Rech enhancement. But either way with KO Blow being a 40s cooldown single target power you have nothing to worry about in terms of recharge diminishing your proc chances. In fact it's a rare case where you have enough room to spare that it's better with Recharge, so you can use the power and proc more often.... The proc you're worried about is Force Feedback because it's a lowly 2 PPM. But given KO's 40s cooldown that means you go up to 61% Rech while still staying at your 90% proc chance cap. Here's a chart to help out: KO Blow PPM Calculations for Force Feedback Proc % Enh Rech Proc Chance in % 2 PPM (FF) 0.0% 141% capped to 90% 2 PPM (FF) 23.875% Rech 115% capped to 90% 2 PPM (FF) 53.00% Rech 95% capped to 90% 2 PPM (FF) 61.50% Rech 89.99% 2 PPM (FF) 99.13% Rech 74.39% So optimally even for proc builds you'd actually slot KO Blow for recharge as close to 61% recharge as you can get without passing it....

This is solid slotting. I couldn't spare the two additional slots slots for 4 x Basilisks otherwise I would have loved that sweet 7.5% Rech. Definitely one of the most value 4 slots bonuses in game. Entomb is good here if you don't have any other Hold power to drop it in.... But in my testing it doesn't reliably proc in Entangling Aura unless your in large spawns, and even then wasn't up anywhere near reliably or all the time. The uptime gets really bad when you need the Absorb most against single target AV fights. Because it's trying to proc an aoe toggle power on just a single target. My two cents is if you have any non toggle holds, especially single target long cooldown, then Entomb is much better there. For example I'm able to have the Absorb buff up almost every cast with the single target Holds from Leviathan (roughly every 10 - 15s...)

This is a different approach than I believe you've tested thus far. Extra Absorb comes from Entomb proc rather than your Powerboost (only impact the MM itself so not as good as Powerboost, but up every 10 -15s...). Recharge comes from Alpha Spiritual and Leviathan FF proc gimmick, rather than Ageless. That frees up Destiny for Barrier, which is great since Nature has no way to get Lore pets anywhere near softcap. I came to this combo because I was trying make a hand to hand combat theme MM build for a friend that would play more like a Tanker but with a small army.... I'd love for you to try it out. Build was slot starved. Much more mileage from procs in Leviathan powers since toggle powers like Entangle Aura don't seem to proc reliably enough. I tested the Entomb in Entangling Aura. It sometimes worked decently when surrounded by a massive mob, but against a solo target like an AV fight it was rarely ever up. Whereas, in Leviathan's KO Blow or Epic Hold it can very reliably proc every 10 - 15s. In my testing there's definitely no 90s cooldown on the Entomb Absorb proc. I never tested how stacking works or even if it will fully stack with Wild Bastion's Absorb. This is very interesting as it would be a big team buff. I would love to see some testing about this. But definitely not the way I expect it work based on other powers. In other powers procs from Performance Shifter, Panacea, Miracle, Numina's Theft of Essence etc, only target the caster. That said assuming it works, it actually not that great for the MM itself: (1) You'd have to leave Life Giving Spores running at your old location while traveling to keep benefiting from the Panacea and Performance Shifter procs. (2) I'm not sure how the mechanics would work. Health and Stamina are fairly unique, and the activation period for Life Giving seems to be worse than Health and Stamina, so this might mean a reduced number of procs for the MM. The PPM change seems to have mostly ruined procs in toggle powers. I think the only exceptions are procs like Lockdown Chance for Hold that have an immediate and extended mitigation impact by taking a target out of the fight. Otherwise, slots going to be better used elsewhere. Definitely interested in a Defender that's that sturdy. I saved your build and added to my list of things to play around with on Beta...

My first thought too. I only tested on Beta server, but it's working there.

Update on this example build: Validated to +2/+8 solo ITF. I've now tested this build on two solo ITF runs, set to Bosses and AVs, w/ no temp powers (other than Ninja Run and Steam Jump). It's cruised at +1/+8 and handled +2/+8 pretty well. On the 2nd run I triggered the Dark Ones ambush to see how it would go. I had to pull them back to a confined space to deal with the ranged attacks and it was a long fight, but got through them without much danger. I don't think it can handle more than +2/+8 though and would at minimum need more accuracy and/or +tohit to even try. I was nonetheless able to slog through a couple +4/+8 Timed Cimerora missions, but it was very slow rough going....not recommended. At +4/+8 with bosses I could not handle more a single Cimerora spawn at a time, so could easily die from accidental aggro or an ambush. The build destroyed both +4/+8 Council and Circle of Thorns Newspaper missions. But when I tried Malta I predictably couldn't get through the 1st spawn that had a Zeus Class Titan. Those might be the toughest thing I fight for MM's. Being able to perma hold you, while pounding you and the pets with aoe's is very tough to deal with. From the hardest fights I realized you often won't have time to spam both KO Blow and Spirit Shark, so for really hard content like +4/+8 you're best off moving the Entomb: +Absorb into KO Blow so you only have to spam that one power for both the Absorb and FF Recharge buffs. Also, comparing to a similar build using /Time instead of /Nature. /Time was easier to solo due to Distortion Field's slow letting you kite enemies... It also seems to have an easier time with the AVs. (Probably due to more -Res debuffs....) So for solo play /Time is probably the way I'd go for a Leviathan proc builds. Although when Cimerorian debuffs dropped defense /Time time struggled more than /Nature and had to run and regroup. And on a team I could see /Nature having more utility due to the uniqueness of aoe team +Absorb buff. Here's a Thugs/Nature build I've worked up as an example of how to take advantage of Leviathan Mastery PPM Gimmicks. I think /Time actually does Leviathan proc builds a bit better due to Farsight's Def and the 50% Recharge buff. But /Nature does very well too, so I wanted to use /Nature to add to @SmalltalkJava's testing, as I hadn't seen a Thugs version yet. I think Thugs were also the best option for this /Nature build. Even with Defense from Hybrid Support Thugs and Bots are the only pets that I could get to soft cap Def. Protector Bot's Bubbles have a 7% base Def versus Enforcer's 8% Maneuvers, which is made worse by Protector Bots not being able to buff themselves. So w/ Nature the Protector Bots themselves would not be softcapped. The thing Bots have going for them would be the 11% bubble one Protector bots puts on the MM, making it much easier to get good defense numbers for your character itself. But Thug's Gang War meant that I could use more procs meaning overall Thugs seem much better for this build. Build Goals and Theory Crafting: Overall: Play-style / Strategy The core powers and slotting compromises: The Example Build: Urban Ecology Club" Thugs/Nature MM build using Mid's Reborn v2.6.0.5 To Be added later: (Cleaned up) Shared Google Sheet with the PPM calculations I used

Most of the "Proc Monster" discussion seems to center on damage. I got interested in what other nifty things could be done in the new PPM world.... Powers that used to be questionably bad because of long cooldowns are now procilicous. And although it's technically percent based so not a PPM, having seen what Bonfire with 'Overwhelming Force: Chance KD' can do you, get the idea of what amazing non-damage impacts procs can potentially have... Leviathan Mastery FTW So what makes MM Leviathan special? Mainly a single power. All the MM Epic Hold's have a long 32s cooldown making them great for procing. But Knockout Blow from Leviathan Mastery stands out, in that it already does massive damage, plus it accepts Hold, Melee and KB IO sets, and has a massive 40s cooldown. If that wasn't enough it's also a Mag3 hold and has a base accuracy of 90 rather than the standard 75, so we can skimp on accuracy for more procs! And if all that wasn't enough Leviathan gets another hold power, plus an aoe cone Immobilize and decent resistance shield. How to exploit? What are the gimmicks I promised? Even with some recharge from Alpha or IO enhancements both 'ForceFeedback: Chance for 5s 100% Rech buff' and 'Super Entomb: Chance for +Absorb' can still have capped 90% chance to proc. With a moderately high global recharge and Hasten build that means you can reliably have both of those buffs up again every 10 - 15s. ForceFeedback --- 'Knockout Blow' being single target with a long 40s cooldown, means that a ForceFeedback proc even with it's low PPM of 2 still is above the 90% proc chance as long enhancement Recharge stays below 61% enhancement. All the other procs we'd care about have 2 or better PPM, so that magic 61.5% rech threshold will also give us capped 90% proc chance for all the other procs. This means you can slot for recharge, taking Alpha Spiritual or Agility and still have capped proc chances! That let's you easily get KO Blow cooldown into the 10s to 13s range, meaning you can reliably have FF's 100% buff up around 1/3 to 1/2 of the time if you're judicious about using KO whenever it's up in combat, so roughly equivalent to 33% to 50% global Recharge while holding enemies and doing very respectable damage. In my testing this let me make other long cooldown powers like Nature's Overgrowth Perma. Super Entomb: Chance for +Absorb --- Why care about this? Well how would you like an Absorb shield you can refresh roughly every 10s? (Taking into account the Rech buff from ForceFeedback...) This is my favorite gimmick, but it's arguably better in the Epic Range holds since you can more easily fire at will that way... In my use it's just a little under 150 HP Absorb on my MM. That may not seem like much, but I'm at 75% S/L res. Resistance reduces incoming damage before it hits the Absorb. So that means with that paltry 150 Absorb my MM can take an extra 600HP of S/L damage roughly every 10s or so. Not bad for a character that only has a 842 HP. If you can get off even 4 procs a minute it could protect you from 2400 HP of S/L damage. Another important is that's damage won't be transferred to pets in BodyGuard mode for instance when we all take a massive pboe hit.... Absorb is more effective when you have high Resistance, so will be best with 2ndaries like Resistance buffs like /Nature, /Thermal and Sonic can best leverage this. And it just so happens that Leviathan includes a decent shield 'Shark Skin' with base Resistance of 27.5% S/L/ and Cold. Combined with a 2ndary like /Nature this makes it easy to get to 75% cap on S/L even without Tough. Since Leviathan has two Holds it will also do well with 2ndaries like /Time, /Nature and /Radiation letting you stack multiple Holds. KO Blow Gimmick slotting: Relying on the 90% capped proc chances by keeping our Recharge enhancement at or below 61% for this power. ForceFeedback The usuals: 1 x Purple 'Enbreakable Constraint' [If you're poor non-purples will also have 90% proc chance it's just that they do less damage. But for instance you have other lower cooldown holds powers like Time Stop that you want to proc out you might be better off putting the purple there where the high PPM is actually needed to stay at proc cap. ...and 1 x Purple Hecatomb dmg But KO does a whopping (for MM) base damage of 109, so we also want to slot for Dmg. Optimal will be a two +5 boost Hecatomb's. 1 x Acc/Dmg/Rech and 1 x Dmg get you 94% Dmg 33% Rech. But I like 2 x Basilisk for Def bonus with 1 x Hecatomb Dmg which still gets you 66% Dmg. [2nd Hecacomb from choices above....] *Utility proc or another dmg proc seasoned to your build tastes. Interesting Utility options: Super Entomb: Chance for +Absorb is the main gimmick but I actually recommend taking ranged Spirit Shark too and putting Entomb in that. It's much easier to spam a ranged power, letting you more reliably keeping your Absorb up. Also, Spirit Shark has a lower 32s cooldown, but since Entomb is 3 PPM you can still easily keep it 90% proc chance cap... Mag5 Hold --- How about boosting the Mag3 hold up to Mag5 so you can instant hold Bosses? Superior Blistering Cold proc would let you do that but it's expensive and you don't need the high 4 PPM rate. Lockdown chance for hold's 2.5 PPM rate means you can reach 106% Recharge while still being at 90% cap Chance for -Res --- ?? Is this a bug. KO Blow accepts Targeted aoe sets?? Hmm how about 90% chance of procing an Annihilation chance for -Res? +Def bonuses --- We're often chasing Defense bonuses so my favorite slotting is actually 2 x Basiliks's and 1 x Hecatomb Dmg. That gets you 2.5% E/N, 1.25% Range Def and 66% Dmg and you can tune the Rech you get to keep it below 61% when combining with 45% from Alpha Spiritual.... Unless you have some other outside buffs you'll need some Accuracy anyway, so the Basilisks serve a purpose and also extend the hold mezz time. Other Leviathan Powers: Spirit Shark --- Single target mag3 Hold that does damage, so takes Ranged Damage and Hold Procs. Procs of interest: As mentioned previously, if you can fit it your build along with KO Blow, then this where I actually recommend putting Entomb here. At 3 PPM we can go as high as 98% Recharge while still keeping our 90% proc chance. And since this is 32s coldown power it will be up more often... Mag5 Hold -- Again adding a hold proc let's you reliable stack enough Mag hold to instant hold bosses. But don't use Lockdown as it's just a 2.5 PPM. This power takes Ranged Dmg sets and Devastation's Hold proc is a 3 PPM like Entomb. That small .5 PPM difference means Lockdown has to stay below 62% Rech to keep 90% Proc rate, whereas Devastation like Entomb can go to 98%.... Dmg procs -- Ideally the Purple Apocalypse Ranged Dmg proc. Not because we need the higher PPM rate, but because it does more Dmg... Honorable mention again with 2 x Baslisk Gaze, for the +Def set bonus and we do probably want some Accuracy and Recharge. School of Sharks: Nothing unique to see here that other Epics Immobs don't also have. The procs of interest will all be 3.5 PPM with the exception of Annihilation -Res which is 3 PPM. This means given the aoe cone and lower 20s cooldown, any recharge will greatly reduce or PPM chances in this power. For optimal procing you should go w/ no Alpha bonus and as close to zero IO Rech as possible. Procs of interest: Annihilation: chance for -Res (3 PPM) --- even with zero rech you'll still only have a ~54% chance of procing. ~45% chance to proc at 23.1875% enhancement Rech. And when you reach ED 96% Rech that goes further down to a 30.4%. Superior Frozen Blast: Chance for Immob --- This stacks ontop of the powers own Mag3 Immobilize letting you potentially mezz bosses and more easily hold AVs. While IO is 3.5 PPM which will help a bit, unfortunately it has a 23.1875% Rech Enhancement....so works against our proc plans. This will force you to 23.1875% Rech giving a proc chance of is ~52%, and worth yet also decreasing the proc chance other procs you want to use in School of Sharks. With Alpha Spiritual's 45% Rech tier that would total 68.1875% rech for a ~39.7% chance of procing. After the These might not seem that great, but for comparison remember that Controllers only get a 20% to add a +1 Mag to their powers. And since their powers are low cooldown that won't be able to use procs efficiently. Gravitational Anchor: Chance for Hold --- /Time and /Nature have chance for aoe Hold powers that accept the Lockdown chance for hold proc. If we add another aoe Chance for hold, we start to have decent odds of holding things. Gravitational is a 3.5 PPM, so the same numbers as Frozen Blast above, except if you opt to skip Frozen Blast, then you can actually be a zero recharge. Zero Rech means this a ~63% chance to proc a +2Mag Hold on targets in your Aoe cone. Debilitation Action: Chance for Stun --- It's only 3 PPM and it won't help us with Leviathan powers, but if you have other sources of Stun it might be better. Also it's dirt cheap. PPM chances will the same as Annihilation listed above. Dmg procs. Positron's, Javalin Volley, Trap of the Hunter all standard 3.5 PPM so same chances as Frozen Blast / Gravitational.... Dmg/Range or Pure Range --- This is cone power. Extending the range makes the cone's radius much wider at the end, but importantly doesn't reduce your PPM chances. You get a lot more mileage out of these powers when enhance for range because you can more easily target all enemies at once... (But sadly ranged cones have a target cap of 10 enemies....so there's only so much you can do with cone width...) Shark Skin --- Nothing much to say here. It's just like any of Epic Res Shields, but part of Res is for Cold which probab ly isn't as useful as Mu's Energy or Soul Mastery's Negative and Toxic. But I'm not here for the shield. The main point is that you want this power and you want it well slotted so you can best take advantage of the Absorb from Entomb. Bile Spray --- I'd say skip this. This power only takes Targeted Aoe sets so the proc options are limited. For proc builds you want to fully proc out powers for maximum benefit. Meaning you'll need all the 35+ slots you can spare for Knockout Blow and Spirit Shark etc..

This is an important consideration and it's also one advantage attacks from Epic pools like Leviathan have over your Inherent Crab powers. Having a longer cooldown means they aren't as heavily punished for taking Agility. Consider Suppression with a Positrons (3.5 PPM). Even with zero recharge it's only a 44% chance to proc, which drops to a 35% when you add the 33% rech from Agility. Arctic Breath w/ it's longer 32s cooldown has a near cap 87.5% proc chance at zero rech. And still has a 66.7% chance with Agility. Arctic air w/ the Agility penalty is 20% better proc chance than a Suppression that skips Agility and doesn't slot any recharge. Or consider Epic School of Sharks with 20sc ooodlown. Even with the penalty for 33% rech from Agility it's still 48.5% chance to proc. So 4% better than Suppression that didn't take Agility. If you really care about procing, the best powers to slot are Venom Grenade and the Epics. Suppression and Frag Grenade have low enough cooldowns their proc chances are also low, not leaving much of any headroom for slotting recharge or taking Agility. And Agility is great on a pet build since it boosts the defense of your leadership toggles and helps make the pets perma....

I agree with Bionic Flea that for Plant Control Control Radial wouldn't be of that much value since it does not damage and wouldn't benefit your opener Seeds. But I too would definitely like to know if the Control Hybrids are passed on to summons? And if so, do you have to have it toggled on when you summon? Or will it retroactively buff the pets? Do the pets get a copy of the toggle with the same expiration time as you have? Or will they keep it on until they die? I may eventually test myself, but I keep hoping someone else will do it and post the results. 🙂 Being able to stack mag5 Stuns seemed totally broken to me at first blush, so I did some very brief testing of Control Radial on the Beta server and found limitations that make it a more niche power choice. It should have been obvious, the Radial Mezzes only have a duration of 10s. You need to stack (1) for Immob, a (2nd) for Fear, then a (3rd) for the 1st Mag5 stun. So you need to get three powers off in under 10s, including cast times. A lot of aoe powers having 2 and even 3+ second cast times. I had been wanting to use this on my Crab with the insanely wide cones they get, but those are all 3s cast times. But it's even worse than that. The Immob and Fear are only Mag2, so you will need to stack two of them for Lieutenants and bosses. Meaning if you don't start off with an Immob or Fear, then you'll need 2 attacks for Immob, another 2 more for the Fear and before the 5th attack will stun. Five aoe attacks in under 10s, is a much higher bar and will require very specific builds. Now consider these are only 70% proc chances for the Immob and Fear, that means there's roughly a 76% chance one or more of those first four attack proc attempts will miss, meaning you actually most often need at least 6 attacks in under 10s.... The bar is starting to get pretty high and I can see why Bionic Flea might say not worth it.... Further possible limitations I wasn't able to test on the Crab. Sure you can stack the Radial power up to 5 times and the Stun is an impressive Mag5. But how does the stacking work? Can you only stack 5 total Control Radials? Or can you stack 5x each, so 5x the Immob, 5x the Fear and 5x the Stun mezzes? The difference could greatly complicate reliably using it as a source of crowd control....

I'd also like to know this and I too am guessing that aura won't get the proc chances. While were at it I'd also like to know if the toggles proc chance gets passed on to summons and psuedo pets etc? Posting here so I'll any replies that might eventually turn up....

Seems to me that some of these differences are just due to your /Time build seemingly not taking advantage of PPM changes, which on my take are what help make /Time really shine. With the PPM changes /Time can be built as probably the most Control/Domination oriented MM 2ndary. You get access to two Hold powers and you can add two more from the Epics for a total of 4 powers. Each of those are only Mag3, but all four accept chance for chance for Hold procs. After the PPM changes and because the MM powers are all high recharge, by keeping Recharge enhancement low, you can get proc chances that are very high giving you a way to easily and reliably stack Mag5 Holds in a single power.... What about immobilize? You say need to immobilize Boss's so they get stuck in Burn patch? Similarly, as long as you keep the power's recharge enhancement near zero (also meaning don't take an Alpha Spiritual or Agility) then any of the Epic/Patron Immobilizes slotted with a Superior Frozen Blast: Chance for Immobilize will reliably do that. But we're not thinking big enough here. Why bother immobilizing a boss when you can just hold them? An Epic's long 32s Rech Hold slotted with Devastation Chance for Hold should have a 90% chance to proc with up to around an astounding 96% Recharge Enhancement. Even /Time's 'Time Stop' lower rech and lesser 2 PPM's chance of Lockdown, is still decent since with zero Rech it has roughly 75% chance to proc the extra hold. For comparison an actual controller only gets an inhernet 20% chance to stack an additional Mag1 Hold and because their powers are low recharge, they won't be able to get as much mileage from IO procs... Putting that all together, How does /Time do you what you do with Caltrops and Web Grenade? Open with Distortion Field slotted for Slow and a Lockdown proc. Then follow up with an Epic Immobile power slotted with Superior Frozen Blast: Chance for Immobilize, Gravitation Anchor Chance for Hold. Enemies are heavily slowed, most likely immoblized and maybe even bosses held. But if a boss isn't held just follow up with one of the hold powers also slotted with chance for hold proc. But you say /Time is missing the damage from Caltrops? Well not to worry that what damage procs are for.... In sum no need to immoblize /Time can easily perma hold multiple Bosses. Immoblize/Taunt is reserved for enemies you can't perma hold like AVs.... /Time with it's 50% Rech buff makes some of the best use of Procs because Global Recharge doesn't count against proc chances, but still gets those powers up more often.

For people grappling with this question, which is going to be similar for Thug's Enforcers, Merc's etc. The min/max solution is carry lots of Enhancement Unslotter salvage. Against trash mobs, and especially if soloing you want the Dmg procs. But against hard AV/GM targets' especially if teaming then you want to swap out for Achilles -Res. Just be sure to dismiss and resummon after swapping, otherwise the new ehancement won't take effect. Taking advantage of the mechanics of the change not taking effect until you resummon.......a trick I use on fast moving teams is to swap the proc out on the way to the GM fight, then all I have to do is resummon, and rebuff instead of fumbling out around with enhancements....

Heh. I have a tough time imagining that's working as intended, especially when you consider we originally had to individually buff every pet. But cool trick and I hope left in the game.

Yeah sounds like different playstyles. I'm primarily using cones at range. I use a combo of the slow and KD chance in Arctic Breath, plus stacked Immobilize from 'Schools of Shark' with the Winter Immob Proc to keep things at range. This helps keep my pets safe, because enemies can't swarm them in melee, plus all the debuff and Immobilize sends most of the aggro at me. I was previously using Suppression alongside the Epic cones. I really didn't want to give it up since it has such a great width. But my most recent build and the one I think I'll stay with I gave up Suppression for Omega and Frag Grenade. It was a tough choice between Frag Grenade and Suppression, but I think I came to the same conclusion as you that yet another slow cone was redundant. The difference I guess being I'm not worried about Exemplaring, so Suppression's only advantage was cone width... For Exemplaring I plan to make a complete 2nd petless build, that will probably be more Bane playstyle. Yeah, I changed my tune. There are still things I don't like about it. Mainly the somewhat short range, long cast time and long recharge. (I guess I have an irrational dislike for powers that aren't up every spawn. Perhaps I like the "rinse repeat" play style more than I should...) But I found a way to move some of my IOs into Omega Maneuvers for better overall set bonuses. And also with the PPM chances Dmg procs make it into a nuke of sorts. It's also useful for bunching mobs. So my current build that I think I'll stay with has now added it. Glad you made me look at it again.

There's just no contest between how much Confuse a Controller and Dominator can stack. Domination is not just double the base magnitude, it's also a longer duration mez allowing for many more stacks. I'm actually not convinced that a Controller even can reliably perma Confuse an AV through the 'purple triangles." But the important difference is a perm Domination Mind Dom could stack so much Confuse that they have time to squeeze an attack chain in between when they need to stack their next Confuse. Controllers as far as I know cannot do that. An illusion Dominator would still have the same core aggro-less Confuse tool for dealing with AVs, but they'd now also have two sets of pets for a massive DPS boost, one of which is invulnerable adding safety to the AV fights to help cover any Confuse stacking timing slip ups. Basically Mind versus illusion, gives up nothing core to soloing AVs, but gains DPS and safety. But maybe Dominators already have most of that in Dark Control set, since it also has Confuse and two sets of pets. Dark Control's weakness compared to illusion is that Haunt Shades are not invulnerable, so die versus AVs without significant buffs, heals etc. But since a Dominator that can perma mezz an AV, they don't have to worry about their Haunt Shades being attacked. I'd like to see real numbers on this and I may go do some testing at point, but the problem I have with Dark Control's Haunt's is the two Shades don't feel to me like they have anywhere near the DPS of the three Decoy Phantom pets. But feelings are often wrong, when it comes to numbers. Maybe you can you can make up the difference since you put Dmg procs into Haunt. But you can put many procs in because you need recharge and recharge set bonuses. Also, I think Dark's Umbra Beast might have more DPS than Phantasm. So for mind versus illusion on a Dominator, yeah Illusion is borderline broken in terms of balance. But since Dominators already have Dark Control maybe Illusion is wouldn't be a significant difference.

Sounds like we're mostly on the same page. I prefer Positrons for the Crab Cones. Because: Positron's set includes a Dmg proc Positron's has only one enhancement with +Rech, which can be swapped out for the Dmg/Range IO. Important bc keeping your slotted Recharge low improves your PPM chances on Dmg Proc The Dmg/Range IO which when boosted to +5 adds a good range to cones, which in effect makes the cone wider (if you attack from farther away...) Even though it's not 10% like purple or ATOs, a set of (5) does at least get you +6.25 Rech and I desperately need rech bonuses to get all the pets cooldowns low enough to be perma. Only needing (5) leaves on slot open for another proc: like Achilles in Arctic Breath.

Got a chance to peek at this build during lunch. Interesting. So if I'm following, you're basically going all in on Absorb and Rech bonus slotting. Alpha Resilience buffs your Resistance and Absorb. Absorb is further buffed by Powerboost. Then you're getting your Def from Barrier and the Incarnate Melee. Is the idea that you can cycle between Barrier and then Wild Bastion's Absorb, so that one of the two mitigations should be up most of the time? So far I've shied away from Hybrid Melee because being based on how many enemies in your radius it doesn't off much help with lone AV's when you most need the buffs. Anyway, how is this build working out for you?

Yeah that's the struggle. The Tankermind Nature builds are hungry. I'd like to choose from 5 or maybe more powerpool. There are no Nature powers I want to drop. But I also like a bunch of Epic Powers. Demon's makes it more challenging because you get an extra pet power (Hell on Earth), and the attacks are actually good due to -Res.

Yeah any pet summoning build suffers in farms because each pet has their own aggro cap. So in huge spawns you will take far more damage than a normal character. This got me to....but Mid's shows incorrect values on the Hybrid Support Core Embodiment that doubles for pets. It's actually 6% Def that doubles to 12% for Pets. Mid's for some reason is showing the doubled version for your character. Makes sense if you think about it, since they should not give you more Def AND double it for pets... The 8% tier doesn't double... But we're on the page build wise. My final build Crab build on test settled on Hybrid Support and Destiny Rebirth, which together dramatically increase the sturdiness of the pets. The other pet survival strategy I briefly toyed with was Control Radial Embodiment with the idea being that Stunned targets can't kill your pets. That worked well for normal spawns, but hard targets like AVs and EBs still wiped out pets since you couldn't build up enough Mag for to stun them. So I switched to Hybrid Support. The other reason Hybrid Support is great is because your Lore Pets can do more damage than probably all the other pets combined. So making the Lore pets survivable with Support and the Pet IO's let's you take the Dmg side of the Lore Tree. I feel like the Lore pet sturdiness easily makes up for the loss of the DPS from not being able to have Assault. And the -Endurance from Support solved my recovery issues, letting me take Destiny Rebirth. Another thing I did was drop a travel power for Spirit Ward. With two Preventative Medicines it gives almost 20% Absorb to target on whatever pet is getting killed. With the Recharge needed for perma pets Spirit Ward is up roughly every 20s. My thinking with Support and Spirit Ward is that they also made me more team friendly. Spirit Ward may not do that much for your pets since they have low HP, but does a lot for a Tanker or Brute on your team...

I don't understand what you're gaining or doing here?? Are you just saying this is a workaround for upgrading all pets at once? If so, then towards the end of live, quality of life changes to MM's made the pet upgrades AOE. Long gone are the days of needing to individually buff each pet...

I'd love to have Illusion as an option. But I definitely think it would border on broken: Invincible Taunt pets, that need Recharge to make perma., where Doms need Rech for Perma Dom Mind/Fire is already a solo AV killer. Domination means Confuse would let you perma mezz AVs just like Mind, except you'd also have multiple pets for DPS and the PA Taunt for the oops I didn't keep enough Confuse spammed on that AV... Ice Mastery Epic gives you Sleet for -Res and soft control, HoarFrost Heal/Max HP, etc. Or you can go Mace Mastery for Poisonous Ray goodness and another pet. Mace Mastery Probably being the best since having three pet powers means you can easily fit all the four Pet Procs in.....and they matter because your Lore Pets benefit from them. Then if you want -Regen you have Psi's Drain Psyche which can reach up to close to -1000% Regen with full slotting and a bit over -1100% Regen with Incarnate Heal boost from Spiritual or Vigor. Psi also gives you the single target Subdue which is the Immoblize that Illusion is missing. Psi's DPS isn't that great, but the changes to Snipe Powers should help the single target attack damage significantly. Or you can go pure Dmg with Fire or Martial Assault. Hands down this would be a contender for the new solo Giant Killer. Sure you don't get the team support powers that a Controller has, but you get all the core tools you need for taking out hard targets.

This opening plan is something I've been toying with in builds. If you can fit in, then I think the optimal way to do it would actually be Spring Attack since not only do you port in you do aoe Dmg and KD. Makes a great Proc Monster for instance, with FF proc for some Rech etc. But the other important thing is Spring Attack has a range of only 60' which happens to also be the radius of Supremacy. This is important because Bodyguard mode doesnt work outside of that Supremacy radius. Now if the pets are trailing behind you even TPing 60' could cause you to be outside of Body Guard protection range. But if you can only TP a max of 60' with Spring Attack, then you'll have a very easy way to eyeball how far you can safely TP while still benefiting from Body Guard for the Alpha hit. Whereas, the Standard TP power has a base range of 300', so can vastly overshoot your safety radius. Also worth mentioning Sorcery's Mystic Flight includes a TP. It's endurance heavy, but you get basically Fly and TP in a single power. What I find annoying about Mystic Flight is it opens an extra power tray that you can't close or add powers to. Mystic Flight will probably be most useful for builds that want to take advantage of Rune of Protection. Spirit Ward is also very handy for keeping pets alive on builds that lack easily directed healing. From what I've been able to tell 'Rune of Protection' can be clicked when you're already mezzed acting as a break free.

Hey Frosticus here's a very subtle edit to your build that gets you Spring Attack with a FF proc. Was peaking at your build and thought if you aren't using Spore Burst and it's just a slot mule, then why not swap it out for Spring Attack? You already have the prereqs of two Leaping powers, Jump and Combat Jumping. So swap out Spore Burst for Spring Attack, swapping Fortunata Hypnosis (5) set for Armageddon (5) set meaning no set bonus change. But then if you're going to do the swap, might as well find a way to get the FF proc into Spring Attack. To free up slots I stole the Red Fortune (5) set from Maneuvers, replacing with two +5 boosted Reactive Defenses. Then moved the Reactive Defense proc to Maneuvers to make a set of (3). That gave me (3) slots, one for the FF proc in Spring Attack, then (2) went to Seeds of Confusion, letting me put Coercive Persuasion (5) set in to recover the rech lost from Red Fortune. I put a +5 boosted Ranged enhancement into the 6th slot of Seeds. Seeds becomes ridiculous when you boost the range of the cone. But you could of course swap a proc for the range since you say you like to play more aggressively. Likewise you could put a more generic dmg proc into Poison Trap, letting you move the Armageddon proc over to Spring Attack getting yet another dmg proc into the build. All said and done stats changes are very minor: Loss of 0.1% Def Gain of 1.9% HP (causing a tiny gain in Regen) Gain of 0.02/s overall Recovery (Increase of 0.06/s base Recovery, but also an increase of 0.04/s End use in Manuevers...) Gain of 5% global Rech Gain of 2% global Dmg Loss of 2% Random Status Resistances Probably a slight net gain in stats. But Spring Attack ought to be a good addition. A bit more aoe dmg, a bit of KD mitigation and a quick way to close the distance after you open with Seeds, Carrion Creepers, Poison Trap etc.... I haven't played Poison since a little after MasterMinds came out. You might have inspired me to poke around on the new test server. As we keep getting new Power Pool options, there will be increasing room for niche builds that don't take all powers from their Primary or 2ndaries, so Poison might have even more future utility... 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Nice find! Plant w/ Stone Mastery is so strong on it's own. The challenge is usually that both are slot hungry, so Stone Mastery gets starved of slots with most of the popular 2ndary sets. Poison only needing a couple key powers fixes that leaving room for Power Pools to build up defense...