Riverdusk

Close to the same idea, Bot/FF mastermind is another classic for that. Some will say MM's actually require a lot of micromanagement, but that's really only if you crank up the difficulty very high and against a few certain enemies or maps. Keep things 'reasonable' and you can completely chill with them and pretty much just watch the show.

Soothing aura on a MM does give +regen (+200% base) even in PvE. For some reason they changed it from healing tics to regen for MM's specifically. Edit: And they renamed it to suppress pain, forgot that part.

Also have to realize some will just find it dumb and juvenile? I'm more of that camp, but not enough to really care all that much about it.

Yep, as mentioned, F key. It can be used on enemies or friends actually. Can quickly reset camera by pressing PageDown key (changeable in keymapping options) or scrolling into first person view and back out. That should fix the 'side profile' issue.

Was my first reaction as well. Forced to choose between two sleeps as your only level 1 power choices? One with a 45 second recharge? Like, what? At the least swap the regular ST hold so that it is a level 1 option (like almost all other control sets). It is almost like they knew a lot of people would want to skip the sleeps (as usual) and are trying to force us to take one. 😁 Edit: Just double checked. The longest recharge of any other level 1 control power choices is 9 seconds (blind). Throwing a 45 second recharge power in as a level 1 power choice option is a definite newb trap. I can just see a new controller player coming in, choosing that (and not realizing about P2W attack options) and having only brawl and a heal and this power they can only use once every 45 seconds. I think I'd quit and never look back.

Unless you are using it in say a farm. Considering farmers don't move much, if at all, they'd have to cast it twice as often for the same end result. And the cast time is a pretty harsh 3 seconds or so. They'd probably consider it a nerf. If more concessions were needed, I'd also be perfectly fine with making it not stackable from the same caster, period. That'd also actually be a nerf according to a lot of people in this thread. Anyway, all depends on some of the finer details on how it is done. All I can say as it stands now I end up skipping it most of the time. If I have room I'll try to fit spirit tree in specifically just because I think it looks cool. Once in a long while I'll actually bother casting it, but usually to little effect beyond looking pretty. Maybe they could just work on making triage beacon also look cooler. 😄

With an equally shorter duration. But whatever you say. If that is a 'buff' then yes, I'd like to see it.

It does, just scroll down, at least for each primary/secondary individually. You can combine the least of each and be pretty safe. For instance sonic/ninja was probably the least played blaster combo. As mentioned though, it is very old at this point, and some things have gotten buffed or gotten more or less popular since.

Also might look at illusion/empathy controller. You get the best invisibility power in the game so if you really want you can heal from the shadows. Also allows you to tank (with your phantom army pets) in a pinch. Was actually my first 50 on live.

Just calculated it for myself and actually even with max recharge slotted and enough global recharge for perma hasten it is about 53 second recharge. A more 'average' build and you're probably looking at more like 75 seconds. A team doesn't need to be 'devouring' anything to go through one group of mobs in a lot less than those times. I think I could roll up a 1st level controller solo to take out a group a lot faster than that. Anyway, as stated by someone near the beginning of this thread, their farmer was the one most benefiting from the way it currently is. I'd say that isn't ideal for a power either. Technically I'm not even asking for a 'boost' as I'd say keep the uptime and downtime ratio the same, just shorten both so it is a bit faster to 'reposition it' basically, nothing more.

People always talk about double stacking with these and have to say I don't get it. Maybe outside of farming or the rare AV fight when are you staying put for the 40+ seconds to double stack it? To me those are edge cases, not common. Even by mid levels mobs are disintegrated a lot faster than 40 seconds usually and the team is moving on and it is left behind. Regardless, solution to me has always been to half the recharge AND half the duration. Makes it more likely to be available every fight and if the fight drags on long enough you'd still be able to double stack for a bit. Biggest downside of that would probably be the cast time would become more of an issue, so speed that up a bit too.

I had someone in game email me for this exact thing a while back. I wasn't really using the name anymore and gave it up for him. Definitely worth a try.

Yes, I found illusion/dark kind of overkill defensively honestly. Not that it is bad and I had fun with it, but I realized I like other illusion combos better that are still plenty safe and have a wider array of buffs/debuffs. Still think the classic illusion/rad is my favorite. Despite what I said above, if you want to be a 'tank' as a controller, illusion/dark is probably the closest you can get. Super safe along with decent damage (at least once you get phantom army and decent recharge bonuses). Ice/Dark should also be very safe, but damage might feel low, especially after fire/TA. Of course that isn't so much an issue if you mostly team. If you do solo I'd suggest picking up sorcery pool for arcane bolt and load up on some temp attacks, at least until you get your pet Jack. Of course I actually suggest that for any controller. I never start any controller without at least blackwand, nemesis staff, and constant max charges of plasmatic taser from the P2W vendor.

Play a mastermind and bring your own team. Honestly though you can solo with pretty much anything in this game if you put the effort into it (and don't go crazy cranking up the difficulty).

Yes, several stealth powers don't suppress when attacking (arctic fog, steamy mist, shadowfall, superior invisibility and a few others I think). What in means in practical terms is that members of the same 'group' will still all see you if you attack any one of them, but if there is another separate group close by, they will not unless you hit them as well or get close enough. Superior invisibility is the most impressive as it's stealth is powerful enough that you can literally stand in one group and attack a different group at range and the group you are standing in won't react. Note that clicking a glowie will still suppress all of them completely though. You can see this for yourself if you go to combat attributes and monitor "stealth radius pve". Yes, you retain all of Arctic fog's defense even while attacking. Arctic fog + a celerity stealth IO is the way to go imo (as they do stack). Stealth has a better stealth radius, but arctic fog's defense is better, it has several damage resistance values, slow resistance, and it is aoe.

That maybe true in the earlier levels or if you don't IO them out, but once you invest into them I rarely have to resummon mine and honestly rarely have to direct them much (especially if you go with a ranged MM set). There are a few tricky mobs or maps though where it does become necessary. Overall however, I think you are close to it when you mention plant control. I'd probably suggest plant/traps as closest to fitting your criteria. A build that has also definitely benefited now that you can skip web grenade which was always a waste of a pick with plant in the past. Honestly a lot of sets can fit what you seem to want though, if you are willing to fill the 'holes' with incarnate powers or P2W buffs/temps.

Not sure on that. Bought a steam controller in their discontinued sale for like $5, but still have yet to actually ever try it out. 😁

Yes, you can and I've done so. Only thing it won't do is track hours played (that I've seen anyway). Handy for taking screenshots and easily sharing them though. Can also add it in through GoG galaxy and there it will track time played (or time you have the launcher open technically). Personally I think it would be cool for it to have an actual Steam page though.

Just logged in. That's some amazing big news! Grats.

Agreed. Only characters I have that'd really miss it are my masterminds. In level 54 content without that level shift the tier 1 pets are fighting +6's, which means they are basically worthless. Other than that, really not needed.

And yet I don't think it is what CoH was ever about (and am happy for it). I remember even the first years on live having a ton of alts. IMO, CoH has always been more about the journey and less about 'end game' than any other MMO I've every played, especially back during live. And that is a big reason why I stuck around. As to the game being too easy, my biggest pet peeve isn't IO's, it's nukes. Removing the crash was good, lowering the recharge on them so much I think was a mistake. Too late now of course. Incarnate nukes also I think are too much. Insult on top is that controller/dom's aoe holds are still stuck at 4 minute base recharge.

My build ended up similar. I'd love to fit more procs into them, but also ended up with just the achilles heel and the overwhelming force kd. Can't find a way to do more without giving up stats I feel they need while also fitting in all the pet IO's, and getting the recharge bonuses I would want from splitting up Mark of Supremacies. I did fit 4 SCotM's into spec ops too though. One quick change you might want to look at is swapping out temp invuln for charged armor since that is the only power you are taking in the pool anyway. Basically in exchange for giving up about 4% s/l resistance you get an extra 42% or so energy resistance (assuming near max resistance slotting). Well worth the trade off imo considering energy is one of the more common damage types. You could also go with dark embrace if you wanted to stay more on theme and pick up some extra negative and toxic instead. The 'split' resistance armors I always find more worthwhile than temp invuln basically unless there is something else in the pool you are going for.

You know the best thing about endurance draining that I discovered by leveling up an electric/energy sentinel? That paragon protectors without endurance can't MOG. Mezzing also works, but that I found harder to do if you have several of them at once. I never had such an easy time fighting what often otherwise is a really annoying mob to fight. Anyway, electric blast on a sent is top tier regardless so the endurance drain is just a nice bonus.

Definitely good choice. Beast/cold was exactly my favorite beast combo (the level 50+ one I still play sometimes). Beast/time also worked well (/time pretty much always works well). Being all melee pets I find having a secondary with slows or extra controls helped a lot (runners being more of an issue to melee pets). So /pain wouldn't be a choice I would recommend, to get back to the original question.