LynxNordique

Gravity has very strong single target attacks, so the issue is /Time. Time is great in teams, but the debuffs are not as strong as other sets. However, I'm sure it is more than enough to defeat the CWK King as an EB. You probably need just a few inspirations, like couple of purples, blues and reds and he should be done for. My Gravity/Dark against the Cwk King as an AV was a very fun fight. The Cwk King hits like a truck, but so does some Gravity attacks.

For an Illusion controller, all is needed is perma pa, a good - regen power and a - resistance power. With that you can solo most lvl54 av (except robots and some others) and GM. All the rest, including proc, Lore, Judgement and interface is just gravy. You can solo, with such a minimal setup, with some additional spectral wounds attacks and some sacrificial Phantasms, Jack and Eochai at the same time. The only thing that is really useful is getting the end usage and the recharge down. So, a chance for build up in PA, a kb to kd in Phantasm (for qol against regular mobs) , as much Lotg +rech and +recover in health is all the proc that are needed. All the other proc are for your fun and to bring the defeat time down.

The problem is you invest on Damage proc, instead on investing on +recharge set bonuses,. For example, with 5 Unbreakable Constraint in Blind, you have +10% recharge. Even with my Illusion/rad with perma Hasten and perma AM, it was not easy to achieve perma Phantom Army. I achieved Perma PA only the moment I reached Tier 2 Agility and I did invest in 4 LoTG and as many +recharge set bonuses that I could get. You willl then have to rely heavily on Recharge reduction Tier 4 alphas and Ageless. Perma PA is the Key to make a GM/AV hunter Illusion controler. A 3 second gap in PA is more than enough for some AV and GM to crush down a controller.

My Dark/Dark and Earth/Dark can solo Eochai and Jack at the same time. Since my Dark Dark controller can output more damages with the Umbra Beast and perma Haunts combo and can stack up even more -tohit at once, she can solo most level 54 AV except very powerful exceptions like Ghost Widow and Lanaru the Mad. /Dark controllers are not fast killers, due to the Fact that Howling Twilight has a long recharge, but they are probably the safest AV/GM killers, with the strong mix of -tohit, Defense and damage resistance. It can even make a weaker primary, like Ice control, becoming an AV and GM killer. A lot of secondaries have stronger debuffs, but they are not as safe as /dark. That being said, Illusion with perma PA is unstoppable especially combined with those secondaries with stronger debuffs (like /Traps, /Rad and /Cold). One could argue that Illusion/dark is safer, which would be true, but it does not really matter as Perma PA is the definition of safe... So with an Illusion controller with Perma PA, the secondary is just a matter of preference and concept.

For Twilight Grasp, I agree that one accuracy is better and to go with 5 from a healing set since their bonuses are way better than accurate healing. I do have one of my level /dark controller that I haven't slotted for accuracy at all, in order to have all the set bonuses of a set. Instead, I rely on +Accuracy set bonuses. It seems to work fine as her Twilight grasp doesn't miss much. IMO there are 2 things that are important for a Fire/dark controller: 1) To make sure you have good end reductions in powers, maximum +recovery of set bonuses, best end modification as possible. I would suggest to go with Agility Alpha once 50. The reason is that Hot feet is super end heavy. 2) Try to fit -Tohit in as much powers as you can (Including smoke) and some defense and Damage resist in Shadow fall and Fade. It will help greatly the Imps survivability even against thougher foes, like AVs and GMs.

Yeah, I second Dark/Dark. It also very powerfull. It's very Tankish (great combo of -tohit, defense and damage resistance), lots of control, decent damages (for a controller set) if you make the haunts perma. It does make a great Sith.

Yeah, I suspected that, considering my Illusion/dark gave me one of my worst King defeat time at level 41 (despite providing a super safe fight). However, only my Illusion controllers were able to defeat Marauder as an AV at level 41 or 42 in the third to last Macintyre Arc, without kissing the ground. They can damage him pretty good, even when he hits unstoppable. At least, the Phantasm does compensate a bit against the CWK.

I didn't use Ice slick during the fight because of end management. I went back via the Ouro to try both Ice Slick and Artic Air. Ice slick has not effect on the King, other than the run speed. I tried also Artic Air. The CWK was never confused. I suspect that this power needs to be well slotted with confuse (like between 66% and 100%) to be able to confuse an AV. It is probably worth trying with a level 50 Ice controller fully IOed out.

Well. Surprise! Ice Control can Solo Archvillains (if paired with the right secondary). And its better than I expected. I soloed a bit with it at first, to see how it was doing. The damage was not great. It gave me the impression that earth is better, and it is far behind Darkness, Illusion and Gravity. But one thing I noticed: Jack Frost is more resilient than I anticipated. He is one of the few Controller pets I have seen survive the whole 30 minutes of a Rikti Mothership raid, (sidekick at level 49). Here’s the fight Summary: Ice/Dark This is, again, a mostly SO build, with 2 LotG proc and 1 miracle proc. Since lots of Ice control powers are not great, the toon was able to have 3 recharges in Howling twilight, Soul absorption (this power was 6 slotted) and fade (along with a defense SO). She has 3 recharges in Hasten and 3 end mod in Stamina. She defeated the King on the first try in 11 minutes 55 seconds. It’s, again, faster than I anticipated. She ate one purple at the start of the fight, for the opening, and 11 blues. The end was not better nor worst than other combos. The fight was super safe. Jack only took one hit that brought him down to half of his health bar and the Dark servant nearly died once. Jack was keeping the AV’s attention the whole fight. I was able to keep the AV’s immobilize half the fight, to set up containment. Funny fact: on the Ice control side, I only used 3 powers the whole fight. Jack Frost, Block of Ice and Frostbite. That’s it. The rest were Darkness affinity debuffs and buffs.

Interesting. Following that post, I tried again with my Dark/Dark/Psi that is now 50 and all IOed out (some purple sets too). In her case, I focused on Recovery, +recharge and various damage resistance (but doesn't have tough and weave). She is maxed out on Psi damage resistance, around 55% on S/L resistance and has at least 25% on the rest of the damage types (except Toxic, which is 15%). She does have some damage Proc, but not that many. Exemp to 45 and all Incarnate deactivated, the fight lasted 4 minutes 20 sec. She also used only one blue because Soul absorption missed once. I don't think any of the pet took any significant damages. So basically the same time as @Dungeoness, plus or less 10 seconds. These Dark/Dark are really great.

Yes, Tar Patch is -res, Howling Twilight is a strong -regen, and Twilight Grasp cast by the controller and the Dark Servant has some -regen as well.

Well, it does make a big difference. For example, my Earth/Rad managed to beat the King in 13 minutes at level 41, as previously mentioned and was mostly SOs. But, if she exempt down now (being all IOed out and with HOs) to 45 via Ouro and disable all Incarnate powers and buffs, she can take down the King in about 4 or 5 minutes. It would be interesting to see if mind control could beat the King once tricked out, especially considering that some players do usually put better enhancement (than SOs) in their build around level 35.

Yes, she did use Frostwork on the Umbra beast and it was reapplied everytime the Haunts were cast (if available at that time), along with the 2 ally shields (Glacial and Ice). Didn't make much difference, as the Umbra beast was going down in about 2 or 3 minutes everytime and the toon was following less than 30 seconds later if another Umbra Beast wasn't ready.. I guess Frostwork and the shields did work, because the Umbra Beast was lasting 2 or 3 minutes, considering that the King does have some pretty strong attacks. The workaround to make /Cold work was group inspirations (super expensive), in this case.

We have a New second place! Gravity/Dark This build is all Single origin, except for a +recharge LotG and a +recovery Miracle. Leveling it, I noticed that it was really good at single target damages (compared to other controller primaries) and it was obvious against this Archvillain. This controller ate about 8 blues and 2 oranges and 3 purple and defeated the King in 6 minutes 20 seconds. Less than a minute more than the current leader (the Dark/Rad) ant almost a minute and a half before the Dark/Cold. The fight was safe; the controller and her pets health bars never went below ¾ (not even the Dark servant), thanks to the Darkness affinity -tohits, defenses and damage resistance. The Singularity stayed at range the whole fight, so the controller was getting all the attention. Propel and lift do really good damages. She didn’t even try to set up containment, but the Dark servant and the singularity were able to keep the CWK immobilize most of the fight. It was one of the most straight forward fight yet. The Boomtown map was filled with even more litter after the fight. Since I did not enjoy that much Dark/Cold but came up with a great toon concept, the next one I will try will be Ice Control/Dark Affinity (so I can keep the same concept with a potentially more enjoyable build). I had a level 50 Ice controller on live. I remember that it was not the greatest, but it was still fun. I’m curious to see how it will perform in that AV soloing context.

Most of the /Dark Controllers can end up being efficient Tanktrollers, because of the -Tohit stacking, the stacking defenses and the good damage resistance (Shadow fall and Fade). Combined with the right epic shield, you can be close to the cap of Smashing and lethal and another type of damage. With Weave, the S/L resistance can be capped (I never took it on a /dark controller as I find it was not required). With Set bonuses and epic shields, these can be built to have a damage resistance between 30% to 75% on most damages type and incredibly high defenses, thanks to the -tohit debuffs. If one goes the Psi Epic Pool route, they can even have status effect protection nearly perma with Indomitable Will. Dark/Dark is hard to touch. Both Earth/Dark and Illusion/Dark both have pets that have taunting attacks and are very resilient or invincible. Plus they are all good at their controller job.