Focused Feedback: Controller - Archetype Inherent Changes

[ScarySai]

Focus! Don't let this weird cat monologue distract you from controllable dom pets!

[Championess]

9 hours ago, Faultline said:

 

Controller started as heroes, and their pets are dogs - they see you as part of the pack, and will gladly help you. They just learned to follow new commands, just to please you!

 

Dominator started as villains, and their pets are cats - they will do whatever the heck they want, if that inconveniences you, deal with it, that's why you have a cat.

 

No points for guessing if I'm a cat or a dog person.

 

Makes total sense to me love it!

[Championess]

As a dom exclusive player to the control AT I love that controllers get to control their pets and doms dont.  Having it baked into their inherent is great.

 

I will though offer that maybe dommies can have some damage modifiers adjusted in lieu of the incessant ask to control pets as well.  They are more a cross between blasters and trollers anyways so maybe upping some melee damage modifiers would suffice since they may be the most unarmored riskiest class.  Thats for another topic some other time though.

 

Glad to see this for controllers.

[ScarySai]

Yeah, as a dom player I hate having basic pet control of the things I summon. Very cringe.

[Championess]

3 minutes ago, ScarySai said:

Yeah, as a dom player I hate having basic pet control of the things I summon. Very cringe.

 

[noogens2]

Was it an oversight or was the Arsenal set specifically excluded in the containment damage buffs?

[Ridiculous Girl]

9 minutes ago, noogens2 said:

Was it an oversight or was the Arsenal set specifically excluded in the containment damage buffs?

no, but i think that is why they tweaked the sleep grenade. that the set was performing well enough that it needed just a minor adjustments to the set along with the controller tweaks, that it was good enough already. 🙂

[Player-1]

20 minutes ago, noogens2 said:

Was it an oversight or was the Arsenal set specifically excluded in the containment damage buffs?

 

The Tri-Cannon already had containment damage before this page if this is what you are referring to.

[Uun]

Fear establishing containment now gives Illusion (and Mind) another means of setting up AoE containment. Granted Illusion doesn't rely much on containment for damage once you get Phantom Army, but it's nice to pull out Spooky and get containment messages on all your personal attacks (and some of Phantasm's).

[ZamuelNow]

6 hours ago, Player-1 said:

 

The Tri-Cannon already had containment damage before this page if this is what you are referring to.

 

Might be worth a small note in the Patch Notes so a ton of questions don't pop up when it hits Live.

[Uun]

Definitely noticing the containment messages from Bonfire (and the Imps).

[High_Beam]

Man, I just ran a few street hunt mobs with my various controllers.  What a difference it makes with my Phantasm and Singularity and especially Fire Imps (OMG those little bastards are finally on a leash!).  A world of difference.  Haven't tested it on Reverb but then again, reverb really did a good job of seeming to know who I wanted regulated (with the power of music).  Also haven't tested with Jack yet.

 

But man, this is straight up a top notch improvement to game play and enjoyment.  The ability for me to focus their attacks gives lets me catch up a little to Dom damage.  It is why I play a lot of doms because of that shortfall so now controllers get something unique to them, and doesn't displace Doms from their place as better damage dealing trollers.  Please don't change it

 

[warlyx]

On 5/28/2025 at 9:22 AM, Faultline said:

 

Controller started as heroes, and their pets are dogs - they see you as part of the pack, and will gladly help you. They just learned to follow new commands, just to please you!

 

Dominator started as villains, and their pets are cats - they will do whatever the heck they want, if that inconveniences you, deal with it, that's why you have a cat.

 

No points for guessing if I'm a cat or a dog person.

Masterminds started as villians and can controls tons of cats 

 

[Doc_Scorpion]

Took my Earth and Electric out for a spin last night...  Took a bit to get into a more Mastermind-ish mindest, but definitely ramped up the fun and ability to solo.  (No more kiting a pet into range and hoping I don't get aggroed on! Yay!)  I appreciated that my Gremlins have individual controls, though I didn't find much of a use for them.  (Since, unlike MMs, there's no differentiation between types of pets.)  Based on Mastermind play, didn't note any oddities or anything unexpected in how my 'troller pets responded to commands.

I do not like the new floating text in the least bit.  In fact, I loathe it.  There's getting to be entirely too much visual spam in this game.

[ryuplaneswalker]

16 minutes ago, Doc_Scorpion said:

I do not like the new floating text in the least bit. 

Is floating text something that can be turned on and off? Visual Clutter is getting bad sometimes but I would like having the floating text on so while leveling so that I can get some feedback to If and how certain mechanics are functioning.

 

[StarkWhite]

IIRC they are looking at (or at least thinking about the topic) making combat float text more customizable in options; the topic comes up a lot in closed beta.

[Clave Dark 5]

On 5/28/2025 at 1:22 AM, Faultline said:

 

Controller started as heroes, and their pets are dogs - they see you as part of the pack, and will gladly help you. They just learned to follow new commands, just to please you!

 

Dominator started as villains, and their pets are cats - they will do whatever the heck they want, if that inconveniences you, deal with it, that's why you have a cat.

 

No points for guessing if I'm a cat or a dog person.

But since Doms are now playable as heroes and controllers villains, this doesn't really make any sense. 

 

I mean, y'all can just go ahead and say "because we wanted it this way, tough," we can't stop you.

[dukedukes]

It's cool for flavour to have controllers command their pets but personally I would primarily use commands to deal with buggy pet behaviour like flying pets going off in random directions for no good reason. It's for dealing with AI bugs for me basically, so from this perspective it's a bit goofy to only give controllers the tools needed to avoid bugs.

 

I understand there is additional utility in giving pet commands, like the earth pet commanded to attack and taunt bosses or damage dealing priority targets and I agree it's interesting to only give controllers this option but the AI issues are my biggest gripe personally. If the AI bugs were fixed separately then limiting to controllers would be good with me.

[MTeague]

I could do without additional sources of floaty text.  There's a point where I just understand the 2nd damage number if my containment damage, I don't need to see any text accompanying it. That said, overall, these changes are all great.  My Mind/Kin Controller has no pets to control, but he still feels like he's in a very good spot now with the Deep Sleep changes and the reduced cooldowns if Total Dom / Mass Confuse are used on smaller spawns.

 

And my Ice Controller Mr. Kelvin will be glad he can finally order Hobbes around. (yes, Kelvin & Hobbes...)

[Renatos1023]

I want to start off by saying that I love the idea of finally being able to command Controller pets, definitely a needed change that was long in the making. As someone who mostly mained Controllers back on live, that was always something I wished I'd been able to do. So yay for this change!

 

I also like the idea of the adaptive recharge based on the # of enemies hit for the big control AoEs. That will definitely help in smaller teams, or to use in other situations. However, I still think the top line, fully saturated recharge rate should be less than 240 seconds. Even if you do hold the max number of mobs, the 4-minute recharge is a little ridiculous. Blaster nukes (not counting Arch or AR) seem to range between 2m5s or 2m50s -- and they generally wipe out most of a mob, not just hold them. I think that 4-minute top line recharge should be no more than 3-minutes. 

 

Now, I don't play on beta, so I'm not able to test these changes, so please take my following question with a grain of salt: How does extra containment damage help Controllers be better controllers?

 

As I said, I used to mostly main Controllers on live, but since coming back to Homecoming have found them relatively lacking at upper levels due to increased mez resistance/protection of mobs - maybe its just my perception, but controls either seem to not have an effect or last such a short time that it feels like a waste of endurance to use. This, along with the reduced secondary buff/debuff numbers, is why I pretty much just main Defenders now.

 

I feel like the current iteration of Containment's bonus damage and sporadic chance for the extra +1 mag does not overcome the issue of being able to lock down mobs at upper levels. My hope was that a fix to Containment would address this issue, rather than adding more damage (I get it, more damage is the current meta, but a Controller should control first and foremost, no?). One thought I had was a fixed chance for control effects to ignore an enemy's status protection (i.e., a 20% chance that your control powers will ignore status resistance/protection). A Dominator can overcome an opponent's protection by stacking higher mag and duration controls due to Domination (and for many, this is perma, making them more effective at lockdowns than most, if not all, Controllers) - maybe Controllers should be able to get around that protection in a different way. The chance for +1 mag should still stay, but it is currently useless on say an ITF due to Cim mez resistance -- just one example of why a chance to ignore mez resistance could help Controllers be more effective at higher levels. 

 

Just a thought I had while looking at the patch notes and my current perceptions playing Controllers on Homecoming. Not sure what the % chance should be for ignoring status resistance/protection, but I feel as though it should be relatively moderate due to a Dom's ability to dramatically increase their mag/duration with their inherent power. 

Edited Tuesday at 12:37 AM by Renatos1023

[Awilix]

A question and a suggestion,

Is it possible to use the pet command goto in any way with the new(ish) /Powexec location command?
'Goto' technically has no 'power' to link since its a more insubstantial pet command, so unlike Tar Patch (or a similar location based power), I cannot reference it to force my pets to go to a specific location. It'd be nice to have a slash command so that I could tell Singularity to stay on top of me without having to do several separate clicks and find my feet on the screen (if I'm even on the ground). Or force one of my pets with multiple powers straight into melee with an enemy.

If that currently is not possible... Could that command be made? Turn goto into an explicit power or something more clever? I don't think that was the expected feedback on this change, as it'd affect more than controllers, but it came to mind while trying to use Singy and seems relevant.

[BZRKR]

42 minutes ago, Awilix said:

A question and a suggestion,

Is it possible to use the pet command goto in any way with the new(ish) /Powexec location command?
'Goto' technically has no 'power' to link since its a more insubstantial pet command, so unlike Tar Patch (or a similar location based power), I cannot reference it to force my pets to go to a specific location. It'd be nice to have a slash command so that I could tell Singularity to stay on top of me without having to do several separate clicks and find my feet on the screen (if I'm even on the ground). Or force one of my pets with multiple powers straight into melee with an enemy.

If that currently is not possible... Could that command be made? Turn goto into an explicit power or something more clever? I don't think that was the expected feedback on this change, as it'd affect more than controllers, but it came to mind while trying to use Singy and seems relevant.

 

you would use the "petcom" commands

https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/List_of_Slash_Commands

 

A bind I use a lot on my mastermind is:

 

"/bind ` petcom_all Aggressive Goto"

 

The tilde (`) key is easily within reach of my left pinkie. When ` is pressed, it creates the targeting circle wherever the mouse pointer is. Then you click and the pets go to that spot, and when they get there, they will be ready to fight. Just sub defensive or passive if you want them to go and be ... defensive or passive.

 

Good luck!

 

[Awilix]

I understand the following things:

Quote

How petcom commands work: If I follow that suggestion, I would have to petcom_name singularity goto and select my character once every couple of seconds (or faster!) to constantly reorient my singularity on top of me as I move.
Suggesting that I pinpoint goto command on my character's feet upward of 60 times a minute seems like an unreasonable suggestion.

Recall friend: Teleporting an entity takes a length of time, requires endurance, requires a cast time and does not allow you to use other moves, and -also- requires me to constantly click at the intended target.
It has the same issue as above and also prevents me from using any other power. That also seems like an unreasonable suggestion.

Summoning Pet with the powexec_location command: Powers have recharge times, cast time and endurance costs. So if I use '/Powexec location' on the Singularity power itself, it not only clears all buffs from the pet, it is also limited by the recharge and other costs of the pet.
This also seems like an unreasonable suggestion.

Back to the suggestion at hand,
Allowing the powexec_location command to work on the goto pet function seems like it would have a lot of uses. You could use it to force controller pets like Animated Stone or mastermind melee pets like The Bruiser into melee.
Or in my case, I could use something to the effect of '/powexec_location me [goto command]' and place my singularity on top of my character whenever I move, making use of its lack of hitbox in a fun and effective way.

[BZRKR]

2 hours ago, Awilix said:

Allowing the powexec_location command to work on the goto pet function seems like it would have a lot of uses. You could use it to force controller pets like Animated Stone or mastermind melee pets like The Bruiser into melee.
Or in my case, I could use something to the effect of '/powexec_location me [goto command]' and place my singularity on top of my character whenever I move, making use of its lack of hitbox in a fun and effective way.

Aha!

You're right, that would be cool! I just got off test, and even using the goto command with the circle at your feet, the pet will stay back a little.