Blackfeather

It's definitely true that locking down Giant Monsters outright with the current scaling would be fairly rare...I did want the Controller to be able to temporarily lock them down, but I wasn't certain about how often they ought to be able to do that, especially since I don't believe even perma-dom Dominators have enough magnitude to breach the level of protections they have. Something I also considered was that Giant Monsters are supposed to be tackled in large groups - it assumes the presence of a lot of characters, along with status effect inducing players, such as Controllers/Dominators. As it stands, two Archvillain level Overpowers would be sufficient to lock a Giant Monster down...though at this point, I really ought to try running the numbers to see how likely that'd be in a given timeframe and so on...math is not my strong point, but I'll see if I can run some scenarios down in a subsequent post soon. 😂

Hahah! Oh for sure - providing some way of indicating that impact I definitely wanted to do. Hence the whole Overpower!! with extra exclamation marks on the end to denote it being stronger than usual in that table. Status effects are certainly quite potent things, and I wanted to capture the feeling of the Controller putting all of their effort into one big lockdown power with this proposal...getting the nuts and bolts of it, figuring out a nice balance of numbers, etc. is the hard part, sadly! 😅

Well...I suppose that's true - something I found a little difficult was trying to avoid stepping on the Dominator's toes while thinking about changes to the Controller's inherent. Perma-Domination's big draws are its reliable, powerful controls, but it does take some work to achieve in the form of some IO bonus slotting. So I wanted to find something that could match both perma and non-perma Domination for the Controller: unfortunately I'm not sufficiently experienced with math to say whether or not upping the chances of and Overwhelming Overpower would make it more/less effective compared to a Dominator that's either perma/non-perma. But I suppose if that's the case, I can't very well say that +Chance to Overpower is any better in that regard: having an outright higher chance across the board might work out quite well in practice, true!

First of all, thank you very much for your response! I did indeed create this proposal with fun as a large part of it - personally it doesn't make much sense that a Controller needs the AV to "let" them get locked down via the whole Purple Triangles mechanic, so I thought Overwhelming Overpower would help fill in the gaps a little. I wanted to create a proposal that increased the Controller's potency with status effect powers, but also provide them with a separate niche to Dominators. I figured the difference there was "potentially more powerful, but higher variance" (Controller) and "consistently strong, but lower peak" (Dominator), especially considering that Controllers already have a chance based mechanic attached to them. The "speed" of the game was definitely a point brought up by some other users in this thread. I believe @Doomrider has said such things, as has @Sovera and @Uun. I do wonder a little if that's more of a balance issue than something to be dealt with on the archetype level, but that's neither here nor there. I'm glad to hear that you like where this proposal is going! Dominators are indeed currently the clear better choice when it comes to actually locking down the battlefield, and I wanted to even this out somewhat, in the Controller's own, unique way. Out of curiosity, what do you think of the whole +Chance to Overpower proposal that came along with the original post? I envisioned it as a more dynamic way of increasing the chance of an Overpower as compared to just upping the chances of it occurring across the board (e.g. the more magnitude stacked on an enemy, the higher the chance of triggering an Overpower). Did any of them strike your fancy/thought of a potential alternative way of increasing the Chance to Overpower dynamically?

Hello @honoroit! I noticed you mentioning that you primarily play Controllers and Dominators a little while back. As such, I'd definitely be interested in hearing your thoughts on this proposal to modify the Controller's inherent somewhat, allowing their powers to affect AVs/GMs more easily, even without the adequate magnitude to outright override the protection levels they possess. What do you think: would this be something of interest to you, is it overpowered/underpowered, would you do something else entirely? Looking forward to your response! 😄

Also going to ping @Steampunkette about this - hello there! I've seen you around the forums talking about the binary nature of control powers against enemies and the like. While this proposal of mine isn't quite designed to change it completely, I do think this proposal does help to alleviate it somewhat against enemies with higher amounts of protection that a Controller can dish out, allowing their powers to work on them, if not all the time, then sometimes. As such, I'd definitely be interested in hearing your thoughts on Overwhelming Overpower, and whether or not it'd be something you'd be interested in seeing with the archetype. From the looks of it, it sounds like you've a fair amount of experience with Controllers/Dominators, so would love to hear your response!

There's an option in the Launcher Settings window to reset the graphics on the next run - have you made sure nothing like that was toggled?

Oh, thank you! That was a lot of notifications I woke up to, was a pleasant surprise. 😄

From what I recall from one of the Blueside story arcs, medi-porters have only just started being distributed to actual civilians, and only then, for the elderly/handicapped.

Going to be pinging @SaddestGhost for their thoughts on this proposal - hey there again! I recall your feedback on some of my previous suggestions, and they definitely were quite well thought out and reasoned; I get the feeling that you've got a fair amount of experience with both Controllers and Dominators under your belt. As such, I'd love to hear any opinions you might have on this new proposal, which is meant to help provide Controllers with the ability to lock down AVs/GMs, somewhat circumventing the binary nature of status effects (which you've mentioned in the past). Any thoughts on this proposal - too powerful, too weak, would do something different, something else entirely? Looking forward to your opinions!

I'd argue that "character customisation" is part of "playing the game", and therefore shouldn't be partially locked away through combat/grinding, which is a different aspect of play. There's that joke about the real challenge of CoH being picking out a costume, and I'm kind of inclined to agree. Some people enjoy the customisation aspect of CoH more than the combat, and I'm sure that's valid...I've a friend who pretty much uses CoH for roleplaying, since they can't really handle the combat, as it's disorienting for them. Any things that are locked out initially ought to make sense: the stat boosting accolades work, since you're enhancing combat (+HP, +END) with more combat (defeating enemies to earn badges). I don't see character customisation as something that ought to be locked away, as such.

I feel like @Doomrider and @Sovera have somewhat mistaken my proposal's intent as "making Controllers more relevant" or something along those lines - I personally think Controllers are in a fairly decent spot at the moment. Per my original post, the main intent of this proposal was to allow the Controller to lock down AVs/GMs even if they didn't have the adequate magnitude to do so, like they would if they came in a team: hence partial lockdown in Overwhelming Overpower. While there's certainly discussion to be had about endgame balance and whatnot, and the place of status effects, etc. this wasn't quite what I was aiming for in this proposal, you know? But if there's indeed an issue with "enemies being defeated too quickly/game being too easy for status effects to matter" like @Uun has suggested in the past, frankly any change to Controllers won't really do the trick. Personally speaking, that sounds like a game balance issue, not a Controller issue, and should be addressed accordingly if that's the case.

Building on that, I wonder how immense the kind of work would be to create a native Linux port of the actual game client.

Both Jolting Chain and Repulsion Bomb work very well with procs. The former provides a chance on every 'jump', due to the way that it functions behind the scenes, and the latter has a small-ish radius and a relatively high recharge. Here's how they both stack up in Mids: Jolting Chain can take three damage procs: Explosive Strike, Gladiator's Javelin, and Apocalypse. Repulsion Bomb can take four: Bombardment, Javelin Volley, Positron's Blast, and Explosive Strike. Repulsion Bomb works well with Force Feedback too, easy way of building up some recharge. In general, most Controllers start off slow, you'll want to take the P2W prestige powers to get you through the lower levels. From there, once you build up some proper attacks and so on, you should be fine. Once you hit level 20 and get Dispersion Bubble, you should get a boost to survivability. If you solo often, you might even like Detention Field for the lower levels - take out a boss for 30 seconds without too much hassle and deal with them later.

You'll want to proc out Jolting Chain and Repulsion Bomb to add some damage - does a fair amount that way.

Oh! I'm pretty sure @skoryy mentioned something along those lines a little while back here. @FoulVileTerror also mentioned something similar, but different, with having controls provide a 'resolve' metre themselves, that could allow for defeating enemies in a different way than reducing health, I believe. It'd be a neat way of defeating enemies for low-damage powersets as well, I imagine! I think @DougGraves also brought up Guild Wars 2 a little while back as well, as seen here. While it's not something I can easily envision replacing the magnitude system any time soon, it's definitely an interesting way of going about it! But it's something that could be sort of emulated in the current system - I believe @Replacement made a suggestion here about providing a long duration Mag 1 status effect on a Controller's Overpower for instance, which would effectively lower the "health" of the target enemy's "break bar" (magnitude protection). (Will get to the other part of your post in a bit!)

Hmmm...is that really a "Controller" issue in that case? If "enemies die too quickly for effects other than damage to matter" is the issue you've got with the archetype, it sounds like you're talking about an overall game issue that needs to be addressed, rather than a Controller problem - I for one quite enjoy how they play for instance. Status effects are fun! I think @BitCook has said similar things, such as in this post, and @Sovera has said the same here.

The game's been crashing on startup for me on the latest versions of Wine, not sure why though.

Well, that's the thing: I'm not talking about whether or not status effects matter to a fight. The situation at hand that I want to resolve is having them work in the first place, without the need of the Purple Triangles. The intent of Overwhelming Overpower is to enable that. I...don't really see how that's flawed? I'm not trying to solve whatever problem of "feeling impactful", because I think Controllers already feel impactful to me. I just would like to be able to lock down AVs/GMs with their powers in some way, and this was the suggestion that I came up with as a result of that.

For Controllers, it'd either be the Numina or Sister Psyche package, I think: Mind Control/Empathy or Mind Control/Force Field respectively.

To be fair the main premise of the this proposal was that (per the OP) much of the Controller's main arsenal is rendered ineffective against AVs/GMs, due to the high amounts of magnitude protection that they have. While it's true that I pinged @Sovera because of their interest in improving Controllers, and thought it might have aligned with their desire to see them better, my main intent here was always to just make the Controller more able to lock down stronger targets. So unless the premise of "the Controller's primary powerset just doesn't work when fighting against AVs/GMs" is incorrect, I can't really agree with the idea that my suggestion is based on shaky reasoning. I never made a judgement call on whether or not they were over or undervalued...just that the Controller's primary was rendered ineffective against them due to their high protection levels. And that's what my suggestion was aimed at resolving. For the most part, I actually think Controllers are in a fine spot - but it does seem quite clear that that's not the case for some people. I believe @BitCook for example has stated similar things in the past, such as here. Personally, the only annoyance I really have is the fact that they can't really lock down tougher targets alone. Overwhelming Overpower was designed to 'scale' the binary nature of status effects to one or two Controllers: when there isn't enough magnitude on the team to break down a tougher target's protection. I.e. affect AVs/GMs to some degree, but not completely lock them down. The reason I play a Controller is because I like the way their status effects work. If I wanted stronger buffs/debuffs, I'd roll a Defender. While I won't object to improving this side of Controllers (Ice Control's secondary effects of recharge debuffs are a nice touch for instance), it isn't personally a priority to me. Sure, taking an AV/GM out of the fight for a little while mightn't be as effective as actually debuffing them or something like that...but personally, I don't really see an issue there. The game's easy enough that I don't need to play 'optimally' - I just wish I could actually use my powers and feel like they have an impact: and for a Controller IMO, that's in personally being able to lock down the battlefield, including AVs/GMs from time to time. Hence again, Overwhelming Overpower.

It's been the official stance for ages that something like this would happen sooner or later.

Actually, I do believe @aethereal suggested something along those lines! It might be an interesting way of implementing things, though I'll admit there's an appeal to being able to lock down AVs/GMs for a long (albeit not permanent) time. Along with that, I do believe Dominators with perma-Domination are able to permanently control such enemies - Confuse for instance is something they can build up to quite easily, to my knowledge. I wouldn't want to take that sort of thing away from them by changing the way that controls work on these types of enemies, you know? On a slightly different tangent...I do kind of like Containment on Controllers - got to deal damage in some sort of way. And the difference between Overpower and Domination for me is of 'reliability'; both are strong, but Overpower varies more. Hence the route I went with Overwhelming Overpower.

Rise, riiiiiiiise! Mwaaaaahahahah! 😈 First of all, thank you for both of your responses, they're very comprehensive and in depth - I'll get through the second soon enough, but I thought your first was interesting too, so I'll be looking through it first! I do admit that on some of my Controllers, soloing can be a little slow, though this is mostly an issue at the lower levels, and Prestige Powers do wonders to help shore this up. While I didn't play the game on Live, I've heard that Containment was introduced in the first place to help speed soloing up for them. I'm fine with this for the most part, as I figure that that's mostly in line with them being a support oriented archetype. I figure that if one wants to have ways to lock down the enemy and deal damage, Dominators are the better choice, you know? Not to say that Controllers can't do a respectable amount of damage - I know my Plant Controller is quite monstrous with Stone Mastery's attacks and a procced out Carrion Creepers. But not all combinations work that way, and I think that's mostly fine. That being said, I wouldn't object to some additional damage while soloing; I believe Defenders actually have something along those lines in their own Inherent ability, Vigilance - they have a flat damage increase while not in a team, or in a small one, to my knowledge. So stacking damage according to the amount of status effects/magnitude, I wouldn't mind alone, or in a small team. Though again, I do see this as more of an issue at the lower levels. Maybe scaling said damage increase depending on how large the team is would work as well, in this case. Additionally, I can't help but draw parallels to your idea and my +Chance for Overpower thought in the original post. It looks like we both came to similar conclusions about stacking status effects/magnitude to cause a greater result! We just came to different conclusions about what said greater effect might be: increasing the chance for an Overpower to occur, and dealing more damage respectively. I do like the idea of having separate status effects having higher potencies than the others too...I might borrow that for my own suggestion in fact! I.e. having a higher chance of an Overpower depending on the kind of status effect applied on an enemy. I've written up a suggestion thread on Mind Control in the past, actually! Though in retrospect, I would have changed some things about it...I'll get to making a version 2 one day. For instance, I do think adding a long lasting Immobilize to Mesmerize and Mass Hypnosis would do a lot for it - not only does it provide a way of inflicting Containment on enemies at a lower level, but it'd provide something unique to the powerset: an Immobilize that doesn't aggro. Even if those enemies wake up, they still won't be able to move (which I'd flavour as the fact that the Mind Controller's managed to make their limbs partially fall asleep), providing the standard AoE Immobilize that other Controllers get on a team, while also preserving the utility that the Sleep status effect provides in some edge cases. And of course, a numbers pass through the other powers would be nice - no reason for Mass Confusion to be on that long of a cooldown, or have accuracy penalties in some of its abilities, especially not when the powerset is described as being more accurate in the first place! Thanks again for your two responses - I'll get one up for your second post soon!

*Grins in Knockback.*