Ringo

How is the new kid on the block - Illusion Control - working out for Dominators? Is PermaDom less impressive?

I already went ahead and grabbed the name Ill Natured for my new ill/nature. No idea how it'll play but I'm excited to roll a new Illusion controller

I'll pull up the build in Mids later, but I find your reasoning on the choices you make to be solid! My Homecoming main is a Plant/Storm controller which is focused on throwing out damage, so seeing your build is a big perspective shift. Things like Roots being essential to set Containment, keep mobs from scattering due to /Storm, and doing proc damage is simply unnecessary for your build and that's exciting

Spiders and Widows! Also some of these screenshots really make your costumes POP. Phoebe, Triton, and Sifon are my favorites! Also, I'm really curious what parts Spore King's costume is using

My first (and only) Defender on Live was a Dark/Elec with the concept of being a Blastroller. It had pets with Voltaic Sentinel and Dark Servant, multiple single target holds to lock down bosses, end drain to lock out minions, and actual blasts for damage. Unfortunately after Enhancement Diversification you couldn't end drain, your holds didn't last, your damage was pitiful, and they also changed pets so you couldn't summon multiples even with enough recharge. I didn't get him to 50 until after IO sets were a thing and it was still a slog becauce my guy never got to do what he was meant to do =(

I'm curious how Illusion/Nature would play?

Steamy Mist gives stealth, def, and resists. It's the backbone of Storm's ability to provide team support that's not just damage/knockdown, in my experience. Also remember that Phantasm summons its own invincible aggro-drawing duplicates. With a Kb>Kd IO it's another factor to your ability to control a spawn. Plus more damage while you hibernate!

I'm interested! I love Plant Control but have only run Thermal on an MM

Ridiculous and Amazing. Thank you for sharing!

Triple Snipe Build?

The R-Auras have a base recharge of over 8 minutes, Empathy's strength is in having teammates to buff/heal and nothing else. Luckily MMs bring their own!

Two thoughts: 1) Adrenaline Boost gives a 100% recharge boost for 90s to the target in addition to the +Regen +Recovery and +Debuff Resist. MM Pets don't benefit from anything that boosts their recharge. If you're soloing it's the best option to give one of your pets AB. But if you have anyone on a team, that buff should go to someone who gets the +recharge boost. 2) While I think Mercs would work fine with /Empathy, it occurs to me that Beast MMs can benefit specifically from /Empathy because Fortitude + heals can do everything Fortify Pack does while not wasting the 20% damage boost of stacked Pack Mentality. Saves you a power pick as well as the unfortunate Beast MM dilemma of ever using Fortify Pack

If you're going to mostly solo, why not Energy Blast? Hop in, Nova, hop out and hunt the survivors. Martial Combat has the movement powers, or Atomic/Fire/Energy can bring the pain

AR isn't a damage powerhouse but it does have quick cycling cone attacks for days (plus M30 grenade), and leveraging those cones for a screen full of orange numbers is one of the best parts of the set. IMO trying to use the melee in your secondary with AR is going to feel a bit clunky. I have a 50 AR/Pain Corr and jumping in and out of melee for the Pain Buff/Debuff targeting was only fun because my Corr was Resistance based and so getting hit (and not dying) was part of the excitement. So it can be done, and Martial has that teleport-like power to potentially make it easier, but it's going to be a more active playstyle than just blasting away

My suggestion would be to do what I did with my Dark Lord of the Sith Electric Blast/Ninjitsu Blaster: Use the individual arm and individual leg option to give your Pirate four peg-limbs. Maybe make him a Street Justice/Willpower melee to.. er.. boot

Yup there's the motel complex right next to the Hospital (and the Arena) in Peregrine Island. Super handy ToT spot!

I have an AR/Pain Corr built for Resistances and I love it

Here's the thread, the post by tomgreen has the build: Basically -recovery is what makes being a sapper work and Heat Exhaustion is the power you want for that Bonus points due to the Shocked mechanic making sappers hit harder Added: and it's -recovery that allows you to sap AVs and GMs. Taking away their end is hard, but keeping their end away is impossible without constant -end spam or decent -recovery

It's Elec Blast/Thermal for sapping #1 I'll try to find the thread when I'm off my phone

No Dark love here? Ridiculous! The set has -res, -acc, -dam, a group heal that does -regen, a pet that does all that too, plus the -regen of Howling Twilight (it rezzes people as a bonus). Increasing damage through buffs or -res means nothing if your hard target just regenerates its HP faster than you can dish it. No regen though? Doesn't matter if you're only doing -1hp per second, that target will go down (eventually)

I see you've already chosen the pairing for you but I do want to throw in my usual plug for Plant/Storm. Roots is an AoE immobilize that keeps mobs from scattering (which is helpful for getting the most out of Seeds of Confusion) but also lets them flop around from Sleet/Tornado/Lightning Storm. Plant/Storm's two shortcomings are 1)End Management (Pumping out Lightning Storm while running Steamy Mist and Hurricane adds up quick) and slow TTK on hard single targets. You'll never appreciate Confusion more than when you see how much damage is lost when the minions are dead and no longer wailing on that EB. While my playstyle of "controlled chaos" may still be too chaotic for your tastes, Plant is one of the best sets to mitigate /Storm's chaotic nature. I'll also second Illusion/Traps. Phantom Army allows you to do all of your trap setting in peace even in active combat and Traps has some massive debuffs plus everyone's favorite - force field generator - for mez protection. My live main was ill/ff and ill/traps beats it hands down. I've tanked AND debuffed Rommie in the ITF and had a dance party while doing it. Adding a KB to KD IO to Phantasm is just icing on an already stacked cake. I do miss the (very) old days of having 3 Phantasms though. So much KB! Again, might not be suited to your playstyle, but it's something different, fun, and viable

/Storm is such a fun controller secondary

People *happy* to see an Ice Controller? On Live?! Now you're just making stuff up!

I think trying to implement these things where they don't cause bugs in thousands of different missions and environments on a game running on 20 year old code is a bit of an undertaking

The Marvel hero "Gravity", does in fact have gravity powers. If you're going controller, I'd say Grav/Time has the look of a pure gravity powerset You could also do Grav/Trick Arrow and play up that you don't actually aim your arrows - you just alter their flight through increasing micro gravity/lensing effects