Leogunner

I see a lot of people shitting on AoE Immobilizes. You know, you won't die from casting them if you duck behind a box or utilize a corner so only a few of the spawn can see you. As for the prominence of "bad play", I say it depends on team make-up. If you don't have a guy that wants to heard everyone around a corner with their body, then that means don't get someone killed trying. If the Tanker/Brute themselves doesn't like to heard all the guys up because it wastes time to set up and there's enough AoE damage flooding out, things die anyway (the tank who thinks this way is the RIGHT kind of tank, IMO), kicking people or complaining about it is just wasted potential and wasted energy. I'd say, why don't you try going with the flow a bit more? I don't complain when the overbearing Tanker tells everyone to wait "Right. Here." while he heard and I also don't complain when a noob consistently uses AoE KB wrong. I just get my handy dandy high-powerd Assassin's Strike and boop each target in the nards and move on. If I'm a control AT and there's another control AT conflicting with what I'm doing, I just observe them and adapt my controls to handling hard targets or adds/ambushes. Perhaps the problem is people want to turn their brains off and play their characters the same way every time they log on and join a team? Never adapting, never compromising, always focusing on the prize without realizing the prizes we get are super easy to attain thus not really worth focusing on.

I've heard the reason was because it doesn't have much direct control to benefit from domination. I don't really care about that, personally. Some say swap some powers that would benefit from Domination but I'd be fine with just a straight port. You can pair it with a control heavy secondary that gets the domination bonus in its place. Granted, I've never actually played Illusion at all so I don't know how strong the set is first hand, I could presume Spectral Wounds is a flexible power that could be replaced.

I usually consider bread-n-butter stuff to be what you put around your meat. What powers do I use around the meat of my control sets? The ST hold and perhaps another or immob if the set doesn't have another. For my Grav/EA Dom, the bread and butter is Lift, ST Hold and Total Focus...Propel if you want to get in the Impact damage. For my Ice/TA Controller, it's the 2 ST Holds and procc'ed out immob. As for the AoE Hold, it's just unnecessary to buff them unless you also want to nerf the rest of the controls in the set to even things out? I mean, do you need a control AT to control even more? Or do you just feel that particular power (AoE Hold) should factor in more because it's a supposed control "nuke"? I'd also like to remind you that usually nukes are tier 9s. No control AT has a tier 9 AoE mass crowd control click except Mind control. If the AoE hold is skippable to you (not specifically you, just anyone in this thread), that is partly because a lot of powerset types have such skippable powers (confront, placate, repel, neurotoxic breath, a lot seem to really not like the tier 1 attacks, petrifying gaze, etc etc) but mainly that the way many players have min/maxed the game and get others to conform to a playstyle has created specialized builds that do not prioritize many other types of tactics and effects.

Or you can use some geometry and throw the grenade behind the guy in the back of the mob or the guy in the front of the mob. As for the prospect of a draw-in power, I believe it might have a chance to be implemented with the new tools they have. However, it will NOT be put in Hurricane. Hurricane is too good of a power to make it a face-roll for elitist people whose only concern is getting mobs as tightly packed to AoE them down. Maybe in a more situational and longer recharging power would you get that. EDIT: I think it might be time for us to start rolling up them Hurricane-using characters. Show him how its done.

It's a power curve. Of course you're going to feel the low levels are a drag and management of END is more difficult...but the enemies are easier in exchange. As you get stronger, you get more tools and thus better options for managing END. For a curve to exist, you have to have a low point to curve up to. This is just one of the dozens upon dozens of other suggestions that request to make that curve less to non-existent. Let us not forget those other gems like inherent "hasten", epic power pools lowered to lvl 4/14, selecting tier 1 and 2 from secondary at the start, SOs at level 1, and various other "remove this nerf" requests. Removing the END on the tier 1 doesn't help with managing END anyway, it's just something you can spam when you've failed to manage your END at all.

You're self-proclaiming the AoE holds are crown jewels. If you ask me what the crown jewel of Ice Control is, it's Ice Slick. The crown jewel of Gravity Control is Wormhole. The crown jewel of Plant Control is Seeds of Confusion.

Doh! But we're balancing around SOs! IOs don't matter! derp da derp da derp da derp! This just solidifies that the AoE holds SHOULD NOT be buffed.

Quit your bitchin'. You're whining like Controllers can't already incapacitate multiple spawns at once for extended periods of time already.

Maybe I'm nitpicking, but do you mean "cultural" rather than "ethnic"? Or perhaps I've got a warped definition of these two, cultural usually referring to a set of customs, traditions, art and achievements of a society while ethnically is referring to the actual population and their birth/origins/background. Unless you're saying we need to diversify the skin color and faces of the people walking around? I'm going by the context that you will hear those SJWs complain about cultural appropriation which is wearing the clothes or using the aesthetics of a subgroup of a non-white ethnicity. That being the culture belongs to that specific ethnicity.

So my spin on your Protector: And this is taking into account hitting the various "points" mentioned in the OP (such as the primary/secondary combo being an AT with similar ported over support sets and melee sets, utilizing the Placate effect, having an inherent that gives mez protection and absorb, etc) but modified. The Name Change it. Protector is nondescript since very little of the suggestion actually falls in line with it and it's just a synonym of Defender and thus boring. The new name is Vindicator and you will see why later. The Vindicator is a person of rules and procedures. Their judgement is swift and absolute and when their verdict is reached, they imbue one of their primary attacks with their power to put to rest their inquest. What does it do/not do? The Vindicator is a mid tier support (not main high tier) that carefully skims the outskirts of a battle, careful not to rush too deep in the fray as they rely on close-ranged melee attacks not only to dispatch foes but also to dish out support for the team. They rely on their team to engage and follow behind to support/attack. Solo, they rely on their inherent more for self-sustain. It's attack power isn't very high but it's still decent, beating out its peers in scale. This is not your stand-in main-line support. This AT, if played actively, must remain self aware of their inherent, their aggro and their support all at once. If enough support is available from the team, the Vindicator can keep up with the best of the other melees if needed. The inherent: Stalwart Boring. Change the name to Inquest. Inquest is a refashioned version of Domination. It is both a resource bar and a click button. The Inquest bar fills when your team or yourself are attacked. The bigger your team, the slower it fills form teammates being attacked but speeds up when you are attacked. Unlike the Domination bar, the Inquest bar is broken up into 2 levels (for UI, it could be 2 overlaying different colored bars or 1 bar with 2 segmented parts or 2 separate bars...I dunno). When the Inquest bar is at stage 1 or above, you can use the Inquest click. At any stage, you will break free of any mez you're afflicted with and gain mez protection and an absorb shield that refreshes slowly for the duration of the effect (lasts 20sec) and for that duration + 40sec, you get a moderate amount of resistance to all mez which stacks with other applications of Inquests up to 3 times. At stage 2, when you click Inquest, you get the same effects as stage 1 but your next attack from your primary will apply an OBJECTION! which is a moderate resistance buff to various types of debuffs for the next 30 seconds to all allies within 20ft. Objections can be stacked. Inquest can be clicked preemptively to gain mez protection so you're not mezzed but when used as a break free, it will apply a stronger +absorb effect. Inquest is a short duration, moderate recharge click. Because of its shorter duration and recharge, it's not wise to put it on auto-cast (but I know people will). Primary: Melee Having melee as a primary means your offense will mature more quickly than your support. This keeps you in-line with the other mid tier supports while also allowing you to keep up with the other melee ATs as well. As mentioned before, when you click Inquest at stage 2, for the next 15sec or the next tier 1-3 melee attack is executed, that attack will cast a debuff resistance effect on yourself and allies within 20ft. In place of the taunt power, the Vindicator gets an upgraded version of Placate. It is called Exonerate. Exonerate can be cast on allies which will erase all aggro from them and placate any foe around them. Placating at least 1 foe fills up your Inquest bar. You cannot erase aggro from a Tanker or Brute, however. When Exonerate is cast on a target foe, it placates the target and has a chance to apply a "placate over time" effect on the target (this doesn't fill your Inquest bar). Secondary: Support Pure and simple, you're about the same level of support as Controller, Corruptor and MM with the sophistication of offering good stackable resistance to debuffs for you and your team as well as some tactical application of aggro manipulation. To counterbalance the benefit of debuff vs buff, the area and target cap for debuffs is reduced slightly for Vindicator. Also, some powers would have to be re-purposed or changed to mesh with the style of the AT such as Repel/Repulsion Field and Force Bubble.

Well there's an idea. The OP and proponents offered suggestions to remove the old nerf to the AoE hold. What if, instead, if they aren't performing up to you guys' standards, you gain something (increased duration, cut recharge or both) but lose something as well (I suggested lowering the area and target cap) OR you can change them to do something else...like make those AoE holds superior damage attacks that also have hold effects (same duration, of course). I also wouldn't be against removing the accuracy penalty. Earth sets tend to be thematically defensive and very controlly. Stone Armor used to be the epitome of "you can't kill me" thanks to Granite, Stone Melee is all about the control with the stun, knockdown and holds, and Earth Control has good coverage for controls but also debuffs for defense (makes it easier to land controls) and ToHit.

I'm gonna have to go with a nope on all these. One with the Shield does have a DPS buff in the form of +recovery. You basically get an extra Stamina stacked ontop of your free Stamina. It also gives you an HP buff and a resistance buff to some damage types. The only similarity between it and Active Defense is the mez protection and you can view it as a means of covering for Active Defense if something happens like you're defeated right after using it and you get a rez, you can pop OwtS and rely on its mez protection until AD recharges. Or you can use it when your END is in a pinch. As for the taunt aura, most Scrappers likely just look for ways to bolster their armor more so they can withstand the aggro. If you can't work with that, there's the above suggestion of rolling a Stalker. Their AAO doesn't have a taunt. You'll be hard pressed to get a lot of Scrappers to give up their taunt in AAO.

Also, what happened to the OP? @sacredlunatic I have my own ideas to modify the suggestion but if he's not interested in discussing it anymore, I could save it for another thread.

Sorry, that wasn't aimed at you. More specifically, posters who have been arguing whether balance is looking specifically in one direction, the other or both to different degrees. To me, IOs have needed a nerf for a long time but that's neither here nor there.

And because they tend to centralize balance around SO levels, they also keep the level of capabilities mild so likely +1/x2 or x3. You DO NOT need AoE holds that recharge that fast and last that long against smaller-type near even-level spawns. So regardless of if you think SOs are the focus or if IOs get the spotlight, this idea, as presented, does not fit. It just doesn't. Or do you think, just because a SO level build can only keep up the proposed control less than half the time on high level teams that that is the target goal? Nope. SO level builds aren't for high level min/max'ed teams! Or at least they are damn well not meant to keep over 16 +5lvl foes at bay single-handedly for nearly a minute.

Don't think that's even possible to cast an effect without a specific range and radius. Even still, that kind of makes Confront a better Placate since Placate is just single target and this Confront is AoE except the target. Also kind of doesn't make sense that a Scrapper wants to lose aggro instead of hold it but mostly that foes would just forget about you just because you decided to challenge a single foe. I guess if this were an old kung-fu movie where foes would come in 1 at a time? If anything, I'd want to give my target a short term +movement buff so when I confront them, they rush at me quickly and I don't have to wait for them to saunter over to me after thinking about the insult I just threw at them and then running over.

I think they've always been persistent (control powerset pets) but they were nerfed at some point to not stack (having multiple sets of fire imps/multiple jack frosts/etc).

Most of my characters aren't min/maxed. With just some damage procs, some globals to help out recovery and basic IOs, most characters can comfortably solo at +1/x3 and depending on power set combo, +2/x5 (my only controller, ice/TA, sits at +2/x4 with only a boat load of procs, no set bonuses). At that point, you're already owning the game. Any higher than that and you're hitting hard limits like target and aggro caps. The main reason I'm contrary to a lot of blanket buffs is because I look at these changes through the lens of a mid level standard team. What use does a team have for a single controller to 100% lock down nearly every foe? Why would you need heals or defensive buffs? Why would you need aggro control? Why would you need a 2nd control AT on the team? Pure and simple: No one needs that much control! Same that no one needs their defense capped 100% of the time but people still do it lol. But that doesn't mean throw all limits out the door and remove all nerfs, remove all crashes, remove all caps. If the recharge and duration is to be reduced on AoE hold not because it's necessary but rather it be "nice", I would only agree if the area and target cap were also soundly limited (15ft, 8 targets). At least then, it's more a decent tool for solo but has limited capacity for teaming.

I thought that was close to how outdoor ambushes work. I think they do stop in their tracks once their target exits the zone. They don't despawn instantly but I assume they eventually do.

Do controllers need help? They're damn near the highest performing AT likely just below a high end dominator. They've been outstripping Defender, Tankers and even Scrappers in PvE.

Well to put a fork in this argument: CURRENTLY, you know the game isn't balanced so that IOs are required not to die repeatedly. Keeping the AoE holds like they are won't suddenly cause non-IOed lvl 50s to implode in high level content. BUT, changing the duration and recharge of the hold WILL have a drastic effect on high end builds.

You can bold and underline all you want, it still doesn't dismiss the point of the nerfs was so that every encounter didn't have teams beating on helpless statues. A 50% up time on AoE holds isn't just unnecessary but exacerbated by IOs. At best, I could see the duration for controllers buffed but keeping the recharges. AT. BEST.

I think my main problem is this: You know dang well the point doesn't merely lie with SO/HOs and taking into consideration IOs, you run into the problem that the nerfs were introduced to prevent: City of Statues.

Good job not answering my question.

But does that even matter? How often are lowbies street sweeping screaming to the heavens that they got pk'ed by some random high level ambush in Atlas/Talos?