What Is the **WORST** AT/PowerSet Combination?

[_NOPE_]

Now, I know that we now have data about which ATs/sets are the most popular thanks to @Cipher. That's NOT what I'm asking here.

 

While sets may become unpopular because they are less efficient, or harder to play, or too quirky, I don't really care about popularity. What I care about is pure performance. Which sets are the LOWEST DPS, the WORST to team with, that MOST annoying sets, the most PAINFUL to slog through solo. Now, some of this might be provable with numbers, but I suspect most of them won't be provable at all, since there's so much to be said for player preference and personal experience.

 

So that's what I'm looking for here, qualitative information on what sets you find the worst, the least "fun" to play. After people have provided their own experiences, I might then turn it into a poll so that everyone can vote on which sets are just.... just the worst.

 

Here's the format I'd like you to follow, so that we can have it in a bit of a standard format:

 

• AT/Primary/Secondary
• Number of levels of experience you have in it
• Why is it so bad?

 

Here's an example (not a REAL example, I've never played this combo before!):

 

• Controller/Illusion/Storm Summoning
• 35
• The pets do NOT play well with the Storm powers, stuff gets knocked all over the place, endurance drain is painful, and aggro goes right to me because of all the AoE and effects!

 

This is just a fun little thing I'd like to start to keep my mind occupied while I'm too busy to work on my Field Trainer (which requires WAY more concentration and solid blocks of time!).

[Darkneblade]

Controller/Mind/Force Field
42
Lowest Damage with worst survivibility, takes ages to defeat them, and you have to monitor your hp. In case your hp get really low you can use useless Personal Force Field to escape (usually you are too late). No Pets. I don't even know when I got to level 42 in first place. Really boring combo.

Edited June 6, 2020 by Darkneblade

[kiramon]

Necro/poison

38 

when you realize venomous cloud is not 100% uptime/toggle so your pets just continue to die every few seconds

 

😛 I realize necro/poison is thematic and has been around a long time; but I found it to be a horrible time — and I LIKE poison 

[Greycat]

I don't want to call them "worst," since they were (and are, for the one I remade as is) quite good at what they do (control.and team support,) but two controllers:

Ice/Emp

Earth/FF

Played both to 50. Neither are particularly *fast* to solo. (Wasn't expecting them to be, but the times I did, well...:)  )

 

Honorable mention to a 50 bot/ff for being boring enough, especially after the "AOE Team buff" change, that it nearly turned me off MMs completely on live.

[Redlynne]

Ninja/Trick Arrow Mastermind

50+3 on Virtue

Pre-folded origami rice paper pets that can't protect themselves combined with a secondary that does NOTHING to protect them from incoming damage.  Pathetic both coming and going.

[Yoru-hime]

I hated playing my Emp/Elec Defender.

20 levels of "nope" back on Live

People seemed to appreciate the heals and recovery, but I felt like dead weight on a team and soloing was nails on a chalkboard.

[Doomguide2005]

On Live I ran an Ice/Sonic Controller up to the low 20's.  Couldn't kill anything without running out endurance (at +0/×1).  Can't recall how much in the way IO's I put into it but ...

 

Controller Ice/Sonic 

Mid 20's, only Ice Controller, 50+ levels in Sonic Resonance on Live

Major endurance issues and low damage output solo.  I'll probably try it again see if getting to 40+, IO's sets, Jack and procs work 'wonders'

 

Edit 2: Should have added worked okay in teams, it's the solo experience that was painful and slow.  I think that caveat shows up in other posts as well, particularly in the controller pairings with Empathy.  Take a low damage controller (or one with unbuffable pets) and pair it with Empathy and running it solo is definitely a masochistic choice.

Edited June 9, 2020 by Doomguide2005
Afterthought

[Doomguide2005]

3 hours ago, Yoru-hime said:

I hated playing my Emp/Elec Defender.

20 levels of "nope" back on Live

People seemed to appreciate the heals and recovery, but I felt like dead weight on a team and soloing was nails on a chalkboard.

Probably would've been vastly better in a duo (ideally another Emp/Elec) or small team with at least one other end drain character.  Rapidly stack Short Circuit and it's all over and 2 IO'd Emp/Elec can lay down SC multiple times (4+) in under 10 seconds.  Nothing will have endurance or +recovery in very short order.

[EmmySky]

Defender-storm/energy

50 agonizing levels back on live

They have no synergy.  You manage to knock enemies out of your own range with both sets and therefore end up working against yourself.  This can be overcome with smart playstyle.

[Heraclea]

Fiery Aura/Energy Melee tanker.  Fire is not the strongest tanker armor set out of the box.  Its saving grace is its solid damage auras and Burn, but for survivability it depends on a self heal, which is reasonably fast to recharge, has a reasonable endurance cost, and does not need to hit mobs to work.   Most of the survivability of the set is due to the availability of that heal. 

 

Pair that with a weak single-target oriented attack set that was ruined on old Live by turning the hardest hitting attacks it had into sludgy things with three to four second animations, and it will end in tears.  Animation traps like that put your self heal out of reach, and that's a bad place to be if you are a fire tank. 

 

I rolled one of these in issue 1 or 2.  It was before power customization, I know, because the chief motivation of the selection was that the red pompoms of Energy Melee looked good with Fire.  Played to 50 , and once was one of my favorite tankers, the one I built for DPS.  I sent her to a seldom visited server after the energy melee nerf.  Slots on Victory were at a premium by then, and I didn't see this character getting played much any more.  She occasionally made appearances on Tanker Tuesdays, when she didn't have to take damage for a team all that much. 

 

 

Edited June 7, 2020 by Heraclea

[Coyote]

Wow. Necro/Poison and Ninja/TA. I bow down to your superior masochism 😛

 

The only combo that I tried that seemed poor (as opposed to merely that I ended up not liking how the character played) was TA/Archery on Live. Without serious investment in set bonuses (which was hard to do back then), it's really hard to get good personal defense on TA. The original version was worse than now, and it's still weak now. Archery is good for damage but not for self-protection, and Defenders didn't have Vigilance, so it was hard to use "damage as defense" by killing mobs fast. All in all, it was just fragile while not being nearly as effective on offense to make up for its defensive lackings. I may try Archery/Tactical Arrow as that set looks far better, and Blasters do enough damage to use it as damage mitigation (and IO sets are far easier to acquire on Homecoming), but TA/Archery was a bad, bad combination when it first came out.

[Without_Pause]

Since I played FF back before IOs it wasn't that bad back then, so I can't say it was the worst. More like it just aged itself into irrelevance. I think part of the answer for me is did the build ever have IOs in it? Some builds with common IOs are simply underwhelming. See Fire or Dark armor. I've done /fa twice to 50 although to be fair both were farmers. I did the arc to unlock Mu Mastery and holy hell, I've never felt more gimped and more so with a high level build slotted. The DA one is at 31. No default KB protection and end heavy as hell. I actively sought out two IOs as soon as I rolled it. More on the defender side, Sonic and TA are both in need of help. I think Traps is fine when soloing or facing an AV. I had all three in the 30s. 

[Call Me Awesome]

The worst I know of is Ice/Emp, I didn't play one but a friend of mine did, AND he tried to solo it.  No, I don't know what he was thinking either but it was his first character and he was determined, or possibly fixated.

 

The combo I personally played and hated the most (that I actually played to any extent) was an Illusion/Empathy controller.  The character was rolled up back in 2004 because I "Had to play an Emp" for some reason (ironic note, Safari autocorrected "Emp" to "Empty") and the character would get played on rare occasions when he was in the right level range.  Somewhere around issue 20 the character actually made level 50, making it the slowest 50 I ever played.

[cranebump]

I dunno which is the worst, but I’ve probably played it.:-)

[Strawberry]

Blaster: Sonic/Devices. Safe. I'll give it that, but damage ultimately much lower than other Blasters to the point where I don't even know why you would roll a Blaster instead of a Sentinel. Sonic for Blasters works best with a strong damage oriented secondary, which Devices lacks.

Controller: Mind/Pain Domination. Busy low damage primary that feels like it should be providing more lock-down than it actually does combined with an equally busy equally low damage secondary that can get you into danger if you aren't careful. Unlike other controller primaries, you have no pets to buff with your secondary. Okay in teams, but are you even pulling your weight there?

Corruptor: Electric/Traps. Outside of Short Circuit which is more for endurance drain, Electric works best at range. Traps wants to be in your face inside of the mobs. Electric doesn't have any sort of rain power to take advantage of Corruption.

Defender: Sonic/Electric. This was my main back on Live. I played one all the way to 50 and continued playing it for a good amount of major patches. I originally made one because I never saw one and I like playing weird unusual combinations. Sonic felt fine, but Electric was so unnecessary. I felt like I didn't even have a secondary and I was not one of those Defenders never to use their blast set. Damage was too low and endurance drain was too minimal. Not quite sure how this still holds up and haven't re-rolled one on Homecoming yet. I imagine it's at least slightly better with IO's, incarnate, etc...

Mastermind: As others have said, Ninja/TA. Your pets will die off in seconds and you have no way to keep them alive.

I don't have enough experience with the other AT's to answer for them, but from what I've played, those are my votes.
 

[Peacemoon]

A few mentions of Mind/ here but not sure I’d agree. It’s a very good damage set compared to other controllers, but falls off a bit when the others start getting pets. If you slot/proc Dominate/Mesmerise/Levitate/Terrify for damage you have a good attack chain and one of the biggest cone nukes in the game (which hits 16 not 10 targets). But yes, if you slot your attacks for +control duration and no procs, then your damage will suffer.

 

My vote for worst sets would be:

Sonic Emission buffing/debuffing set - not many good powers, and not much slotting opportunity. 
 

Weakest AT is easily MM.
As you level up your pets get weaker, not stronger. Your minions are 2 levels below you and struggle to keep up. If most of your damage is suppose to come from them, you’re in trouble. Pets are already pretty easy to kill and this means you spend a lot of time resummoning them.

 Your personal agency is very low both in attacks (very very low dmg) and your secondary powers are taxed to cost more endurance. MM’s are encouraged to do nothing. 
Their epic power sets aren’t very good either.
They’re difficult and fiddly to play, requiring lots of micromanagement of pets.
Pets will randomly fire off their abilities with no player control, so pets like Mercs Spec Ops often waste their good control powers and don’t use them when they should. They are often balanced around these control powers so are just really weak.

In the above example you have to try slot for everything the pet could do in 6 slots.

Some sets have an extra pet you can mule all the unique pet buffs into, but otherwise you struggle again with where to put what enhancements.

Pets are slow and every mission is like doing an escort mission with an annoying npc

No customisation of pets so they always look the same no matter what concept you choose. Even controller pets have customisation with different colours/variations.

I’m sure I could go on...

As you might guess, I don’t like this AT! 🤪

 

So the weakest MM, combine a weak MM primary (or any of them), with some random secondary that doesn’t do much for them. Or try play a MM /Storm with the extra end tax on their abilities! 
 

Anytime you try to focus on your secondary as a MM you realise you should have just rolled a Defender and unshackle yourself from all those pets and just blast the enemies yourself. It’s more fun and you’re not weighed down.

This is my highly personal opinion!

Edited June 7, 2020 by Peacemoon

[Strawberry]

5 minutes ago, Peacemoon said:

A few mentions of Mind/ here but not sure I’d agree. It’s a very good damage set compared to other controllers, but falls off a bit when the others start getting pets. If you slot/proc Dominate/Mesmerise/Levitate/Terrify for damage you have a good attack chain and one of the biggest cone nukes in the game (which hits 16 not 10 targets). But yes, if you slot your attacks for +control duration and no procs, then your damage will suffer.

Mind you (heh get it? 🐸) , I actually love Mind Control as a set. It's probably my personal favorite control set and I agree that once slotted out Dom/Lev/Mez/Terrify can be very solid for damage, but in terms of sets I have experience with, my Mind/Pain Domination Controller is not one I'd recommend. I attribute that more to the combination of Mind/Pain than anything else. Both are equally good sets in their own ways. Just maybe not together 💔

[Zeraphia]

Petless Robots/Empathy Mastermind...

 

Good luck! You my dear will absolutely need it! My friend attempted this as a solo-only experience and he made it to about level 21 before rage quitting the character completely even at the lowest settings possible. 

 

You have some of the weakest attacks with no inherent benefit at all to help you, and then you have a set that does nothing for you except healing which isn't great mitigation for a lot of situations and doesn't provide any benefit to downing an enemy whatsoever!

 

Very (un)honorable mention:

Assault Rifle / Ninja Blaster... This is just terrible. There is nothing redeemable, its damage is lackluster, the survivability is awful, enemies will run away from you due to ignite so you can't even properly use your Ninja capabilities... it's a monstrosity. 
 

Bon Voyage! 

Edited June 7, 2020 by Zeraphia

[Peacemoon]

13 minutes ago, Strawberry said:

Mind you (heh get it? 🐸) , I actually love Mind Control as a set. It's probably my personal favorite control set and I agree that once slotted out Dom/Lev/Mez/Terrify can be very solid for damage, but in terms of sets I have experience with, my Mind/Pain Domination Controller is not one I'd recommend. I attribute that more to the combination of Mind/Pain than anything else. Both are equally good sets in their own ways. Just maybe not together 💔

I think Mind works best with a less active set. And soloing with any of the more support focused sets is always a bit more challenging as so many powers are for allies.

I don’t think Mind/Pain would be too bad. Certainly better than Mind/Empathy as Pain has a nice self buff and a -res debuff. Sleep the group, run in and debuff them, jump out and terrify them. 
I suppose it’s getting your expectations right.

[Peacemoon]

5 minutes ago, Zeraphia said:

Petless Robots/Empathy Mastermind...

 

Good luck! You my dear will absolutely need it! My friend attempted this as a solo-only experience and he made it to about level 21 before rage quitting the character completely even at the lowest settings possible. 

 

You have some of the weakest attacks with no inherent benefit at all to help you, and then you have a set that does nothing for you except healing which isn't great mitigation for a lot of situations and doesn't provide any benefit to downing an enemy whatsoever!
 

Bon Voyage! 

As much as I dislike MMs, not much sympathy for petless ones. It’s like trying solo with a controller-less Controller and just focusing on the secondary. 

[Zeraphia]

2 minutes ago, Peacemoon said:

It’s like trying solo with a controller-less Controller and just focusing on the secondary. 

I believe you are speaking of... Illusion Control? heh

 

It really is as close to a control-less controller you get, you do spend most of the time on the secondary with it too is from what I've seen (you kind of dump PA off and then start the gravy train).

[Peacemoon]

18 minutes ago, Zeraphia said:

I believe you are speaking of... Illusion Control? heh

 

It really is as close to a control-less controller you get, you do spend most of the time on the secondary with it too is from what I've seen (you kind of dump PA off and then start the gravy train).

I always think MMs are suppose to play more like an illusion controller. Throw in it’s pets to distract the mobs and cause chaos while buffing/debuffing/supporting. But it never quite worked, at least for me. To much emphasis is placed in the pets (5 out of 9 powers). Another 3 out of 9 are wasted on personal attacks that are not allowed to function properly. I think the original devs got carried away with the pets and lost sight of the player.

I often think I’d prefer it if the pets just followed and attacked like controller pets, and you didn’t need to equip them. It’s such a gimmick. You could drop the equip powers and repurpose them, with the personal attacks, for some control-type powers or attacks that actually do damage. Oh well! I’m sure some people like MMs, but I’m not a fan.

Edited June 7, 2020 by Peacemoon

[Redlynne]

8 hours ago, Coyote said:

Ninja/TA. I bow down to your superior masochism 😛

 

1 hour ago, Strawberry said:

Mastermind: As others have said, Ninja/TA. Your pets will die off in seconds and you have no way to keep them alive.

 

I played Ninja/TA Mastermind before Time Manipulation was created.  I picked the combination because the personal attacks drew a bow and the secondary attacks would draw the same bow.  The way the combination played was ... very cowardly ... by which I mean, REALLY cowardly.  The only way to keep the Ninjas alive was to prevent them from drawing aggro.  If the Ninjas didn't get attacked, they wouldn't take (as much) damage, which meant full time Tankerminding.  The result felt more like babysitting unruly children who refused to stay clean, not jump into puddles (to splash themselves with mud), and so on.  It was just hella frustrating to play.

 

I even went so far as to use Flash Arrow and Teleport Foe in the early going as a way to not need to re-summon (and re-equip and re-upgrade) Ninjas who weren't (as badly) damaged, since neither the primary nor the secondary had any healing powers of any kind.  I eventually had to take the Presence and Medicine pools, in addition to Leadership, to overcome their shortcomings ... and even then I couldn't reach "par for the course" and would just "putt for bogey" in every encounter.

 

Absolutely, hands down, no questions asked, the absolute WORST combination I have ever played ... and I took that Mastermind on Mothership Raids, Hamidon Raids, ITF runs and even Incarnate Trials.  I had all the pet powers and spent at least half the time playing as a Petless Mastermind in endgame content.  With Ninja/TA your Ninjas can't even do the job of being a speed bump.

[Strawberry]

40 minutes ago, Peacemoon said:

I think Mind works best with a less active set. And soloing with any of the more support focused sets is always a bit more challenging as so many powers are for allies.

I don’t think Mind/Pain would be too bad. Certainly better than Mind/Empathy as Pain has a nice self buff and a -res debuff. Sleep the group, run in and debuff them, jump out and terrify them. 
I suppose it’s getting your expectations right.

Just giving my personal experiences in a thread that asked for personal experiences on set combos that didn't work well 🥴 

[ShardWarrior]

Ninja/Dark MM.  Far and away the most pitiful pets in the game.