Coyote

A few notes: 1: there are no more "low- damage" Controller sets for soloing, except if you also pair them with a low-damage secondary. With procs used to boost the damage of the single-target Hold and Arcane Bolt available, both of which end up as decent (though not really GOOD) single-target attacks, as long as you get a 3rd attack you can solo well enough. And you can get good damage for soloing out of Storm, Poison, Traps, Cold Domination, Time and Trick Arrow, at the least, if not others. You can use procs to get damage out of Infrigidate, Acid & Ice Arrow, Poison Gas Trap, Distortion Field, etc. 2: for the same reason, a lot of "low-damage" sets are higher than you would expect with regards to AoE. Dark Control has an AoE Immob that has a smaller area than most, which means that it takes procs better. It also has Heart of Darkness, which can be slotted as a mini-nuke for about 300 damage with Stun effects. Electric's Jolting Chain can be slotted for about 100 damage (which is fine for an 8 second AoE with excellent control effects), and it has the End recovery to also spam the AoE Immob to summon Energy Orbs for more AoE damage. So, if you get sneaky and know the proc calculations, you can turn several sets from low-AoE to medium-AoE. 3: as Hjarki has said, there is a huge difference between "rating while levelling" and "rating at level 50". General controls and debuffs are far more useful as the danger level increases, and there is a lot less danger on teams that are steamrolling mobs. So a set's rating on control and debuff matters a lot more at level 30 than at level 50. You have to be more specific when you're rating sets if you're mean from 1-50, or at 50+.

There are no unplayable powersets for Controllers, because even the weak ones have some synergy with some secondary powerset that make them usable. As an example, Ice Control is pretty weak. Ice/Rad shuts down enemy mobs, not in the usual "I control them" style, but in an unusual "Yeah, they can attack... but who cares? 25% attack rate, 50% of the time attacking their own team, hitting at 50% of their usual chance, doing 80% of their normal damage, falling down, and I can heal the rare hit that goes through" style. But Ice doesn't work as well with many other sets. Earth Control has low damage, so it doesn't solo well. But pair Earth with Cold and you have a solid attack cycle early, as well as great teaming ability. But if you pair Earth with Rad, then you don't really get any help offensively, and defensively you don't need it, so soloing remains painfully slow. Again, a powerset that can do something if paired in a particular way, but not in general. Fire Control is great for damage. Well, damage is king, especially when you have a defensive secondary... so Fire Control does great. But considered on its own, its defensive abilities are not really strong, so it seems better-balanced than it really is once you add in IO sets and defensive abilities from the secondary.

Fissure is great for Force Feedback... it's a good damage power, but it procs FF pretty much every time if used on a medium-sized spawn. Jolting Chain, fully slotted with damage Procs, does about 200 damage to the first target hit, and 100 to the subsequent targets. While 100 damage doesn't look like good damage for an AoE power, it's actually solid for something with an 8 second recharge. Add in the -End and random -Recovery, which help keep mobs drained, and the guaranteed knockdown, and I love it as a 6-slotted power. But its base damage is low enough, that I would put in like 4 damage procs into it first, and then Accuracy, before I slotted up the damage. Electric Fences is the place for the Dominator ATO, in my experience. One ATO, and one Accuracy/Endurance (or two if you can spare a 3rd slot), and it does solid work: helps with keeping mobs drained, puts out Orbs pretty regularly. Not almost guaranteed like the AoE Stuns and Holds, but at a good rate, and if you're fighting a large spawn you could have several Orbs out. You get way more Orbs out with this than by putting it in an AoE Hold, and Electric is a set that can generally handle the End drain of spamming an AoE Immob. Do the Panacea and Preventive Medicine IOs have a chance to proc per target when used in Conductive Aura, or are they just automatic powers that check every 10 seconds like they are in Health?

Resist-based Stalkers should do very well with Resist sets IF they have some options to add Defense, and ONCE you add in set bonuses for Defense. Staff is good since it has Parry, but you do need to add in some +RangedDef bonuses, and you can't really do that at level 15. Once you get to 25%+ in your Defenses and add the Resist behind them, they're tough. But until then, they're weaker than Defense-based Stalkers.

Once the changes go to Live, you do not need to do anything, in any build, for a snipe to be "instant-cast". If you are "in combat" (you were attacked, or made an attack, within the last 8 seconds), then the snipe will activate as a fast-cast version instead of the slow aimed-cast version, automatically. The fast-cast version will do less damage than the aimed-cast version, and Accuracy bonuses will increase the damage, up to +22%. At 22% or greater, the damage of the fast-cast will be equal to the damage of the aimed-cast version. So, if you build for +22% or greater, your fast-cast snipe will do as much damage as the slow aimed-cast version... but even if you do not, it will still have a fast animation, and do high damage.

Well, I think that's not necessarily the case. What is true is that now procs in toggle powers are... iffy. Hurricane with a single target in range and Force Feedback... averages about a 4.3% +Recharge. Considering that we slot powers for 6.25% set bonuses, getting a 4.3% wouldn't be bad... and it gets better with multiple targets in range. Siphon Insight is also good for this. World of Confusion with a -20% Res proc would average 6.14% -Res, and getting a 6% improvement to your melee-range damage for 1 slot seems worth it. Other PBAoE toggles with larger radii would still get 3-4% -Res, which sounds weak, but if you're running it for damage anyhow, then getting a 3% damage improvement for 1 slot isn't that bad. What it is, is possibly useful. Just not clearly must-have. Which, to me... seems like a reasonable balance.

That's interesting. They seem stronger on Homecoming, due to the ability to use procs to pick up better single-target damage, and the AoE damage that they usually lack. They're STRONGER as characters. The "problem" is that characters overall are generally stronger since IOs are much cheaper, and thus defense is less useful on teams. But that's not a Controller problem, that's a game balance post 50 problem. Any character not oriented primarily towards damage seems... far below optimal, once a team is capable of facerolling without worrying about danger.

Yup. But I think it's an AI issue... I beat Col Burkholder (with Nossie helping, but he wasn't a full AV), but he didn't run fully, just moved a bit. Nosferatu, however, broke completely... after running, he ran past me about 6 times, got attacked fully by me and the decoys... and didn't stop to throw a single attack. Maestro, Vandal, and Requiem also didn't run like little girls. So it's a serious problem with some AVs, but others will fight and die.

I believe only the powers that place a drop effect will stack: Disruption Arrow and Oil Slick Arrow.

Testing data on Freezing Rain: 1 damage proc Pre-testing planning: with no Recharge, a power with 20' radius and 60 second recharge should have a 90% chance to proc a 3.5 PPM IO. Damage procs (standard) are 3.5 PPM, so we should have a 90% chance to proc, if it's based on the power's recharge. However, if the power's activation is run like a toggle, then its chance should be PPM/Area Factor x 1/6 (because it checks once every 10 seconds, or 6 times per minute), capped at 90%. The Area Factor is 3.25, so in this case I expect a 18% chance to proc. Methodology: 1 damage proc, thrown over a spawn of level 5 mobs, and see how many die instantly and how many take a couple of FR ticks to kill. Result: 120 mobs killed, 20 instantly for a 16.7% rate. Conclusion: Freezing Rain (and I assume other Rain powers) activates like a toggle, every 10 seconds including 0. 6 slotted with standard damage procs at level 50, it would do about 77 points of damage up front, and another 77 after 10 seconds. Definitely less than overwhelming. Even damage-starved Controller builds can do better by slotting up the AoE Immob, at least that gets to benefit from global Recharge.

Another option that may fit thematically well with Gravity would be Traps. It solos well, also. And Gravity using Wormhole to pull mobs into prepared Killing Fields (tm) is a thing of beauty.

I think that you are having a slightly different discussion than the OP meant to have. You see, you are talking about a single attack... I agree that it's possible to have an attack loaded with procs, that greatly improves it. But the discussion is based on the "Proc Monsters" in the Defenders (and to a lesser extent in the Controllers) Forum, which are characters LOADED with procs, who basically depend on multiple procs in every attack in order to improve their damage. Defenders and Controllers can do this for several reasons. 1: Defense. My Dark/Dark Controller is soft-capped in defense BEFORE the -ToHit debuffs go out, and she has about 5 attacks slotted with procs. Blasters can't slot 5 attacks with procs AND soft-cap defenses. 2: Offense. Everywhere you stick a proc in a Controller's attacks, and almost everywhere in a Defender, you get more damage per slot, because their attacks are so low in damage. Blasters can only do this in a few attacks, OR if you ignore Recharge and Accuracy slotting, to basically try to get to use all 6 slots for improving damage. So they face a trade-off because their attacks do enough damage that you DO want to slot their damage up pretty high before looking at procs, while Controller attacks are far better with 4 Procs and 20% damage slotting, than with 95% damage slotting. So, in short, slotting a single Blaster attack with as many procs as you can, makes sense. Especially since if you do this, then you sacrifice only one set bonus in order to get 2-3 Purple damage IOs, which is totally worth it. The problems come in when you say to proc up EVERY attack, which is the concept of a "Proc Monster" character. One attack... fine. Every attack... problems with Defense, problems hitting (Defenders and Controllers who do this usually have a strong -Def power like Freezing Rain or Radiation Infection to help them hit... although, /Devices Blasters can get away with less Accuracy slotting).

What I'm curious about is Rain powers. I've read that "procs don't work well in Rains", but I wonder if the testing has been done on repeating proc activations. I'm not interested in repeated activations, but I do want to know if the initial cast of the power will trigger procs based on the power's Recharge, or if it's using the 10-second toggle rule even on the initial cast. I plan on testing in Perez Park if I have time this weekend, with a couple of damage procs in Freezing Rain.... without Recharge, they should have a 90% chance to go off, and each should 1-shot the low-level critters there. So a critter would have a 1% chance to survive both. By hitting spawns small enough to cover the entire spawn, it should be possible to get a good idea if it' has a 90% activation chance, or not.

Let me be the first to welcome our new Blapper overlords.

To echo some of the points made... Procs will help Blaster damage just like they help the lower-damage ATs, but because Blasters start off at higher damage, the procs won't help AS MUCH. Other ATs have more defensive options, and thus can more easily afford to proc out a ranged attack instead of going with 6xThunderstrike for the Ranged Defense, and still have good survivability. A Blaster who chases proc damage will lose a higher % of their defensive ability since they depend more on set bonuses, while at the same time getting a lower % increase of the damage that they deal. I have a few Blaster builds that use Procs... but I think they're all using procs on only one attack, that way I only give up one set bonus.

Yeah, I know, but sometimes when dealing with messy AI that is hard to decode... you just have to play around with attacks and see if something works. They could split up the single-target blast into two... or into 3 each with 3 second cooldowns so it's constantly active once it engages. Basically, there is probably a right solution based on coding... but there may be an EASY solution using attack cycles, and if the other pets are working fine and Phantasm can be fixed with a change to its attack options, why not go with the easy and safe option? It would be pretty easy to change and test, too, I think.

I always thought that they should split up Phantasm's blast into two blasts, both lighter and weaker so that its overall DPS isn't affected... but having two fast blasts will allow it to always have a ranged attack to use so that it doesn't have a reason to advance.

I like it with Electric and Ice... Martial Assault has 4 AoEs that it can use in melee range (5 if you count Caltrops), and only 2 at range (and one of them only does splash damage in an AoE). So to get the most of its high AoE damage, you want to be in melee range, and so I would put it with the two sets that benefit the most from being in melee range. Fire is not bad also, since it has Hot Feet, but I'm not sure if Fire can sustain Hot Feet and also throwing out constant AoE attacks. Of course, Ice has the same problem with Arctic Air costing a lot, but it still seems to be one of the few ways to make a solid Ice Control Dominator.

/Dark does have another attack against AVs... Twilight Grasp does about 140 "damage" to an even-level level 50 AV, without damage procs, due to its -Regen. Add in the 2 damage procs that it can take, and depending on Recharge slotting, it should get effectively about 220 damage to an AV. I'm not sure what the Pylon's regen rate is, but it's not far off from there. Definitely worth including in any attack chain, especially considering the -ToHit and -Dam debuffs. So, with that, Jolting Chain, and either Tesla or the Immob, it should be possible to get a full attack chain without looking at the Epics. And, to echo the Jolting Chain... my Elec/Earth Dom is using it as a single-target attack where necessary. It's not great as a single-target attack, but it's good enough, and adds greatly to End drain. It's definitely the set's hidden gem.

Thanks, that thread explains everything. Well, everything except for Nemesis. But I'm not sure that I'd believe any explanation that seemed to explicitly explain Nemesis.

Could you have been testing on lower-level mobs and thus getting the Knockback value increased from 0.67 to something high enough to cause knockback? Or using some other +Special power or Incarnate slot that increased Knockback? My recollection of Jolting Chain from Red Tomax's site is that the flag only lasted 2 seconds. However, speaking as a programmer, I have to wonder whether the flag might be unique to each power activation... for one thing, Gremlins use a copy of that power, and for another thing, you may have 8 Electric Control character in a team. It wouldn't make sense to have it be a global flag that blocks other Jolting Chains from working on the target. So, it would make sense that the RecentlyJolted flag is applicable to that power activation, rather than globally. So, if that was set up correctly, you shouldn't be able to self-block the Chains.

Fluffy is my pet cat. No, just kidding. Fluffy (also Fuzzy) is a usual nickname for the Dark Servant, which is the Tier 9 power for Dark Miasma and Dark Affinity. It is a temporary pet summons, but it starts off with a 4 minute duration and 4 minute recharge, so it's permanent by default. It debuffs ToHit (by a LOT) and Damage (by a good amount) in a circle around it, and uses Twilight Grasp, Petrifying Gaze, and Tenebrous Tentacles (2 of those add more -ToHit debuffing), so the best slotting for it is 4-6 Cloud Senses.

One other idea is to make a melee-centric MM. The MM attacks are weak, and had their Endurance costs increased... but the pool attacks haven't had that. So they do as well with the Fighting Pool as other ATs (which isn't great, but it's probably better than the Primary attacks from Ninjas, Robots, and Mercs). If you take a secondary that works well in melee (maybe Time), you could try a Ninja/Time or Necro/Time MM who fights in melee with them.

Surprisingly, /Dark puts out just about as much -Regen as /Rad, so it should be able to solo things as well as /Rad. The only advantage /Rad has is, specifically, with Illusion... because it helps get perma-PA more easily. For other Controllers, though, I'd rather try to solo a GM with /Dark than with /Rad. It gets stronger +Defense, stronger -Damage debuffing, stronger -ToHit debuffing, far better Healing, and far better Endurance management. Basically, the character can tank the GM without needing PA to be permanent... though PA also helps with damage.

Huh? Okay, I understand the situation and the effects, but why bother doing this? Any mob that is hit by a decoy is Taunted by that decoy, and for a few seconds it's "controlled" by being forced to attack a target that it can't affect. While it's cute to see multiple knockdowns, it doesn't seem to add any damage mitigation if, for a few seconds, a mob is busy getting up... rather than uselessly attacking the decoy. It's the Taunt effect that's the real damage mitigation, and that runs separately from any knockdowns. The only thing that you gain with a knockdown is that the mob can't hit the decoy with an AoE effect that may then hit you... but I don't think that happens enough times, to take up a valuable PA enhancing slot. I'd rather put in Soulbound's Build-Up, or go over the ED cap on Recharge.