tips for Earth/Marine please?

[Xandyr]

Hey all

   Gonna delve back into Controllers, and want to make an Earth/Marine. Any tips/feedback on this pairing anyone would like to share? Is Vocanic Gasses worth procc'ing? What about the OF:Damage/KD and the Soulbound proc in Animate Stone? 

 

Appreciate anything and everything!

 

- X

[Maelwys]

12 hours ago, Xandyr said:

Hey all

   Gonna delve back into Controllers, and want to make an Earth/Marine. Any tips/feedback on this pairing anyone would like to share? Is Vocanic Gasses worth procc'ing? What about the OF:Damage/KD and the Soulbound proc in Animate Stone? 

 

Appreciate anything and everything!

 

- X

Earth is still a very solid set.
Stone Cages + Stalagmites and Earthquake + Quicksand give you a lot of AoE CC ability.
Adding Tidepool and Whitecap from Marine almost gets ridiculous.

Volcanic Gasses is one of the better AoE holds (IMO most are trash) because it's coded very strangely - instead of one long-duration effect or a single pseudopet; it spawns several pseudopets over a 50s duration, most of which apply a Hold effect rather than damage (the only one that deals direct damage or inherits damage enhancements is the initial Pets_Volcanicgas pseudopet). So it procs a little better than most pseudopet powers... especially with procs from Hold Sets... but I'd still not rely on it as a regular source of AoE damage output.

The Pet benefits greatly from Toroidal Bubble - throw the two +10% Pet Damage Resistance globals into the mix and they can reach the 90% hardcap to everything. Alongside the +MaxHP and healing they become very solid and can comfortably tank most tough single-targets (AVs/GMs/etc) in the game.
Don't bother with a KB>KD proc (its Hurl already inflicts KD). Soulbound is OK if you can spare the slots for it, but keeping Shifting Tides up will be more important.

Last I poked at an Earth/Marine (back in July from the looks of it) I came up with the below, although I've not personally played it except on Brainstorm. You could easily move a slot from Brine to Animate Stone for the Soulbound proc:
zController - Earth - Marine.mbd
Assuming you're keeping Barrier up it'll have Softcapped S/L Defense and hardcapped Fire/Cold Resistance; plus a <68s cycle on Power of the Depths.

It's also worth pointing out that /Marine is one of the few Controller builds that I'd try to take a patron pet on (and possibly veer towards Core instead of Radial Lore!) since both Shifting Tides and PoTD play so nicely with them; and you can shore up their mitigation drastically (Barrier Reef + Maneuvers + Aura IOs is ~27.7% Def to all; throw in Barrier Destiny and/or Support Hybrid and that's softcap territory. Toroidal Bubble + Aura IOs = ~40% Res to all; on top of Barrier and any inherent resistances like Stony's. Then there's the +MaxHP from PoTD and all the Healing/Regeneration...) 
 

Edited December 17 by Maelwys

[Meknomancer]

13 hours ago, Xandyr said:

Hey all

   Gonna delve back into Controllers, and want to make an Earth/Marine. Any tips/feedback on this pairing anyone would like to share? Is Vocanic Gasses worth procc'ing? What about the OF:Damage/KD and the Soulbound proc in Animate Stone? 

 

Appreciate anything and everything!

 

- X

 

I did make one of these, the only problem is i have an earth/dark and its a bit of a beast and fade let me skip the ugliest epic armr in the game (i went earth mastery on both) whereas with /marine i feel kind of forced to take and run it. I do like the look of @Maelwysbuild its a lot cleaner than mine, i'll throw it on and you'll be able to see where i was going. If it takes procs it got procs. I always proc out Volcanic , i didn't have slots for animate stone (or shifting tides/barrier reef) so they got minimal.

EARTH MARINE - Controller (Earth Control - Marine Affinity).mbd

[Maelwys]

FWIW, I found this summary by Carnifax from a few years ago regarding testing Damage Procs in Volcanic Gasses.

The TL;DR is that Hold Procs are worth it providing the spot you place VG contains a decent number of mobs for a good portion of the 60s duration.
(The fact that its effect keeps reapplying and can affect NEW mobs is another reason that I consider it to be one of the only AoE holds worth a spit!)
 

Also I prodded at my previous build a smidge to give better AoE damage output: zController - Earth - Marine.mbd
Swap Stalagmite slotting around depending on whether you lean towards damage or global recharge + disorient duration.


(although as before; the only things that see much benefit from containment will be Fossilize and Poisonous Ray unless you swap Epics to Earth or Ice for more damage but less -res)
 

Edited December 17 by Maelwys

[Meknomancer]

The problem with the troller aoe holds is they take so long to recharge so i tend to skip them. But if you can get enough force feedbacks into the build...thats a different story. On the earth/dark volcanic is pretty much available every mob rather than every 3 mobs.

[Onlyasandwich]

39 minutes ago, Meknomancer said:

troller aoe holds

I typically take them because:

• Hold sets are really nice (4 slot Basilisk if anything).
• They provide a really nice backup plan if your primary controls aren't cutting it. Good for big adds, or situations where the team is just moving super fast.

[Xandyr]

7 hours ago, Maelwys said:

Earth is still a very solid set.
Stone Cages + Stalagmites and Earthquake + Quicksand give you a lot of AoE CC ability.
Adding Tidepool and Whitecap from Marine almost gets ridiculous.

Volcanic Gasses is one of the better AoE holds (IMO most are trash) because it's coded very strangely - instead of one long-duration effect or a single pseudopet; it spawns several pseudopets over a 50s duration, most of which apply a Hold effect rather than damage (the only one that deals direct damage or inherits damage enhancements is the initial Pets_Volcanicgas pseudopet). So it procs a little better than most pseudopet powers... especially with procs from Hold Sets... but I'd still not rely on it as a regular source of AoE damage output.

The Pet benefits greatly from Toroidal Bubble - throw the two +10% Pet Damage Resistance globals into the mix and they can reach the 90% hardcap to everything. Alongside the +MaxHP and healing they become very solid and can comfortably tank most tough single-targets (AVs/GMs/etc) in the game.
Don't bother with a KB>KD proc (its Hurl already inflicts KD). Soulbound is OK if you can spare the slots for it, but keeping Shifting Tides up will be more important.

Last I poked at an Earth/Marine (back in July from the looks of it) I came up with the below, although I've not personally played it except on Brainstorm. You could easily move a slot from Brine to Animate Stone for the Soulbound proc:
zController - Earth - Marine.mbd
Assuming you're keeping Barrier up it'll have Softcapped S/L Defense and hardcapped Fire/Cold Resistance; plus a <68s cycle on Power of the Depths.

It's also worth pointing out that /Marine is one of the few Controller builds that I'd try to take a patron pet on (and possibly veer towards Core instead of Radial Lore!) since both Shifting Tides and PoTD play so nicely with them; and you can shore up their mitigation drastically (Barrier Reef + Maneuvers + Aura IOs is ~27.7% Def to all; throw in Barrier Destiny and/or Support Hybrid and that's softcap territory. Toroidal Bubble + Aura IOs = ~40% Res to all; on top of Barrier and any inherent resistances like Stony's. Then there's the +MaxHP from PoTD and all the Healing/Regeneration...) 
 

Excellent advice! Appreciate it!

[Meknomancer]

7 hours ago, Onlyasandwich said:

I typically take them because:

• Hold sets are really nice (4 slot Basilisk if anything).
• They provide a really nice backup plan if your primary controls aren't cutting it. Good for big adds, or situations where the team is just moving super fast.

 

My back up plan involves running away or dying and providing the team with veng bait. My primary control is to kill stuff before it kills me, doesn't always work but it is fun.