Enantiodromos

BUILDS

First, I present two build checklists. My goal is not to build a specialized optimal Mind/* character, but to present a new or average player with a workable plan that doesn't necessarily miss any of the biggest deals. My goal is also not to criticize anyone personally for how they've built a character, nor is it to insist that anyone must do things my way.

MIND/EMPATHY BUILD CHECKLIST

The first thing to do is to make a series of initial choices. You have early build choices-- between Mesmerize and Levitate, between Heal Other and Absorb Pain, and between major movement powers.

I.
<font class="small">Code:[/color]<hr /><pre>
1 Choose: {Mesmerize or Levitate}1 Healing Aura
2 Dominate /Acc,Rchg,Hold,Rchg,Hold,Acc (2,3,5,7,9,11)
4 Choose: {Heal Other or Absorb Pain}
6
8
10
12 14 Choose: {Super Jump, Fly, Super speed, Teleport}
16
18 Total Dom /Acc,Rchg,Rchg,Rchg,Acc,Hold (18,19,19,23,23,25)
20 Stamina /EndMod,EndMod,EndMod (20,21,21)
22
24 Fortitude
26 Terrify /Acc,End,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,End (26,27,27,31,31,31)
28 Rec Aura /Rchg,Rchg,Rchg (28,29,29)
30
32 Mass Conf /Acc,Rchg,Rchg,Acc,Rchg,Conf (32,33,33,33,34,34)
35
38 Adren Boost /Rchg,Rchg,Rchg (38,40,40)
</pre><hr />



II. Next, we fill in the gaps for levels 6,8,10,12, and 16:

1. A movement precursor at 6,8,10, or 12 will be dictated by the movement power you took:
....a.Hasten, if Superspeed
....b.Combat Jumping, if Superleap
....c.Choose: Hover or Air Superiority, if Fly.
....d.Choose: Recall Friend or Teleport Foe, if Teleport

(Just say no to flurry and jump kick!)

2. Also, you'll have to choose 2 of the fitness pool powers that will go in the 6-16 range:

Choose 2: {Swift, Hurdle, Health} (If Movement power is Super speed, choose Hurdle)

3. Finally comes the deepest part of your character customization. You'll get to choose four, or if you took super speed, five, of the six powers on the following list, in more or less any order you want.

Choose 2:
Stealth
Confuse
Mass Hypnosis (Min L8)
Resurrect (Min L10)
Telekinesis (Min L12)
Clear Mind (Min L16)

III. Take Hasten at 22, unless you took it earlier because you run super speed:

1. If not Super speed, L22 = Hasten
2. If Super speed, L22 = Choose One: {Stealth, Confuse, Mass Hypnosis, Telekinesis, Clear Mind, Resurrect}


IV. Pick two other powers to go in L30 and L35 slots:

Choose 2: {Stealth, Confuse, Mass Hypnosis, Telekinesis, Clear Mind, Resurrect}

Note: The order I'd consider the "optional six" powers are: Confuse, Clear Mind, Mass Hypnosis, Telekinesis, Resurrect, Stealth. For $Deity's sake, don't take everything EXCEPT confuse and clear mind. 9_6

V.Finally, you slot things. Remember: once you're using SOs, don't slot more than 3 of a given enhancement type.

Place Slots: 3,5,7,9,11,13,13,15,15,17,17,25,34,36,36,36,37,37, 37,39,40,40,40


MIND/RADIATION BUILD CHECKLIST

I. Start with the following list, initially choosing between Mesmerize and Levitate at L1, and a major movement power at L14.


<font class="small">Code:[/color]<hr /><pre>

1 Radiant Aura /Heal (1)
1 Choose: {Mesmerize or Levitate}
2 Dominate /Acc,Rchg,Hld,Rchg,Hld,Rchg (2,3,3,9,11,13)
4 Accel Metabolism /Rchg,Rchg,Rchg (4,5,5)
6 Rad Infect /End,DefDbf,DefDbf,DefDbf (6,7,7,9)
8
10
12
14 Choose: {Fly, Super Jump, Teleportation, Super Speed}
16
18 Total Domination /Acc,Rchg,Rchg,Rchg,Acc,Hold (18,19,19,23,25,29)
20 Stamina /EndMod,EndMod,EndMod (20,21,21)
22 Enervataing Field /End,End,End (22,23,25)
24
26 Terrify /Acc,End,Dmg,Dmg,Dmg,End (26,27,27,29,31,31)
28
30
32 Mass Confusion /Acc,Rchg,Conf,Acc,Rchg,Conf (32,33,33,33,34,34)
35
38
</pre><hr />

II. Next, we fill in the gaps for levels 8,10,12, and 16:

1. A movement precursor at 8, 10, or 12 will be dictated by the movement power you took:
....a.Hasten, if Superspeed
....b.Combat Jumping, if Superleap
....c.Choose: Hover or Air Superiority, if Fly.
....d.Choose: Recall Friend or Teleport Foe, if Teleport

(Just say no to flurry and jump kick!)


2. Choose 2 of the fitness pool powers that will go in the 6-16 range:
{Swift, Hurdle, Health} (If Movement power is Super speed, choose Hurdle)


3. Pick one other power to fit into the 8-16 range:
Choose One: {Confuse, Mass Hypnosis, Telekinesis (12), Mutation (16)}


III. Take Hasten at 24, unless you took it earlier because you run super speed:

1. If not Super speed, L24 = Hasten
2. If Super speed, L24 =

Choose:
Stealth
Confuse
Mass Hypnosis
Mutation
Lingering Radiation


IV. Pick four more powers to go in L28,L30,L35, and L38 slots:
Choose 2:
Stealth
Confuse
Mass Hypnosis
Telekinesis
Mutation
Lingering Radiation
Choking Cloud
EM Pulse (Min 38)

Note: The order I'd consider these optional powers, is: Confuse, Mass Hypnosis, Telekinesis, Lingering Radiation, Mutation, EM Pulse, Stealth, Choking Cloud. Don't stake your build on Choking Cloud and Stealth, for cryin' out loud!


V. Finally, you slot things. Remember: once you're using SOs, never use more than 3 of a given enhancement type.
Place Slots: 9,11,13,15,15,17,17,31,34,36,36,36,37,37,37,39,39, 39,40,40,40


SOLO VS TEAM BUILD CONSIDERATIONS

Mind/Empathy and Mind/Radiation alike are great team contributors. Confusions, radiation debuffs, and empathy buffs are great magnifiers, and all the controls, and heals are great mitigation tools. As a rule, my remarks have reflected teaming, as a rule.

There're a few key considerations for builds that want to solo:

Solo Mind Mods:
<ul type="square">[*]Must take Levitate, Dominate, and Mesmerize.[*]3xDmg in Mesmerize[*]Always take Confuse[*]Strongly consider Mass Hypnosis[*]Strongly Consider Air Superiority[*]Omit Total Domination[*]Always take Terrify[*]Strongly consider stealth.[/list]
Solo Empathy Mods:
<ul type="square">[*]Omit Heal Other AND Absorb Pain[*]Consider slotting Healing Aura heavily.[*]Always take Regen Aura[*]Have existential crisis. You really should be teaming.[*]First respec trial at 24. And there's always rerollling.[/list]
Solo Radiation Mods:
<ul type="square">[*]Omit Mutation[*]Consider slotting Radiant Aura significantly.[*]Take Enervating Field early[*]Omit Lingering Radiation[*]Omit Fallout[*]Relish nobody but you killing your anchors![/list]
Tactics while solo will include a fair amount of juggling between mobs that are confused. Keep one of the lower-class (minion, lieut, vs lieut, boss, respectively), preferrably something that deals good damage, confused at all times. When you're down to 2 remaining mobs, start holding and damaging your confusee, and let the hurt guy wake up, confuse him, and let him go after your former 'ally.' Remember also that your confused guy will wake up sleeping bosses, which tends to be suboptimal, and usually argues for either double dominating a boss, and sucking up the damage.

Once you have Terrify slotted out as a damage tool (1xAcc, 2xEnd, 1xRchg, 2xDmg), keep your eyes open for herding opportunities. Adjacent spawns will become your friend. If you're Rad, learn to pull with Rad Infection.



APPENDIX A: UNDERSTANDING STATUS EFFECTS

There are a number of distinct status effects in CoH, and Mind Controllers are masters of some of the strongest, whereas Radiation also runs its fair share. Also, Empathy-&gt;Clear Mind immunizes against them all. Understanding them as a Mind/Green controller is crucial.

STATUS EFFECTS
<ul type="square">[*]Hold: Affected target cannot use any power, and cannot move. Drops toggles. The most common status effect controllers use.
[*]Disorient/Stun: Affected target cannot use any power. Drops toggles. Also, moves slowly and randomly.
[*]Sleep: Affected target cannot use any power, and cannot move. Drops toggles. Effect automatically ends when target takes any damage from a hero.
[*]Immobilize: Affected target cannot move.
[*]Fear: Affected target cannot use any power, and cannot move. Effect momentarily stops (long enough for target to make one attack), every time a damaging power is applied to the MOb. Often includes an accuracy debuff.
[*]Phase/Detain/Intangible: Affected target is intangible and cannot be affected or affect others.
[*]Knockdown/up: Affected target is knocked to the ground, or into the air, then has to get to their feet, during which time, they cannot take any other action. Some controller forms of knockdown have repetitive, pulsing, AoE knockdown.
[*]Knock back: Like knockdown but displaces the target horizontally.
[*]Slow: Not really a status effect, rather, a movement debuff, and, usually, recharge debuff.
[*]Smoke, etc: Not really a status effect, rather, a debuff on aggro range/perception, and an accuracy debuff.
[*]Confusion: Does quite a few related but distinct things. Affected targets:
stop attacking heroes completely,
stop buffing villains completely,
buff heroes as though they were villains.
attack and debuff villains as though they were heroes-- BUT! 75% the damage done by confused mobs is excluded from the calculation of credit for XP, whenever a mob is defeated. [/list]
Most ATs have at least a few powers in a couple power sets that at least occasionally do status effects. Disorients and stuns are frequently a possible side effect of melee attacks, as are knockup and knockback. Dark and Ice (non-controller) sets notoriously wield a variety of controls, including holds, fears, and slows. Controller primaries are a collection of 3-9 (usually 8) powers whose primary purpose is a status effect (or pseudopet that immediately produces a status effect, including most placed AoE powers).



STACKING, MINIONS, BOSSES, AVs

Every control has something that gurus call "magnitude." Bosses and Arch-Villains are progressively harder to control than lieutenants and minions. To successfully get them controlled, you may need more than one application of the status effect.

Putting the same status effect on a MOb twice or more is called "stacking." Status effects can only be stacked with other status effects of the SAME TYPE. You cannot stack confusion and sleep, fear and hold, etc. A boss with a single application of sleep, hold, and confuse each is a boss who's still fully active and hurting you (ordinarily). As a rule of thumb: it takes one application of a control (sleeps, holds, etc), to affect a minion or lieutenant, and two to affect anything classed higher than that (bosses and up).

But there're a LOT of exceptions:

Certain types of mobs have resistance to certain kinds of controls. Some are just a little tougher, and require a second application as though they were a boss. Others may actually be absolutely immune to certain kinds of controls.

Most control powers that do not ordinarily affect a boss in a single hit will, occasionally, score a "critical" hit, and get enough magnitude to control a boss in a single application.

Immobilizations and Mind Control/Mesmerize are slightly higher magnitude from the get-go, and affect bosses in a single application.

Nearly all Elite Bosses and Arch-Villains have a special power that gives them very, very high resistance to holds, sleeps, confuses, and fears, for (I'm guessing here) about 65% of the duration of the fight. This resistance can be overcome by stacking one kind of control very high, but it takes typically 2-3 controllers spamming that control nonstop in order to do so. The other ~35% of the time, when the resistance is down, the Elite Boss or AV is just like an ordinary boss. You can tell whether resistance is up or down, by looking at the purple triangles circling the MOb's head. If they point up, the MOb is resistant. If they point down, he's vulnerable!

Giant Monsters of various sorts have the same kind of high resistance AVs have, except it's up 100% of the time. It is possible to control them, but again takes typically 3 even-level controllers nonstop spamming the same kind of control.

Phases/Detains/Intangibilities cannot be slotted for duration. Some can be slotted for *magnitude*, others (the single-targets) have a very high magnitude to start with, which can't be improved. With a single intangibility enhancement in an enhanceable power, you can affect even-level bosses. Bear in mind this is also affected by relative level.

Slows do not have the same sort of magnitude-- they always have some effect, the effect is simply scaled back against tougher opponents (but not a lot-- slows can be great versus AVs).

Bear in mind also that controls nearly all have finite durations, so you're limited in how "high" you can stack an effect by how fast you can apply it repeatedly.


HARD AND TOTAL
Total/Partial Control: A term I like to use to distinguish between two classes of controls. Total Controls are controls that fully stop the attacks of an effected enemy that would otherwise be aggroing, for a significant duration. They include hold, disorient, sleep, fear, confuse, and phase. Technically Knock* is a total control with an extremely short duration.


Hard/Soft Control: Another term I use to distinguish between kinds of controls. Soft controls are controls that you can't benefit from and attack the controlled mob at the same time. They include sleeps, fear, smoke, and phase. (The other controls could be called "hard" controls.)

Hard Total Controls: hold, confuse, disorient
Hard Partial Controls: Knockdown/up, Slow, Immob
Soft Total Controls: sleeps, fear, smoke, and phase

Some people include what I call "hard partial" controls under "soft" control. Some also fit confuses and even disorients into that category.


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APPENDIX B: CONFUSING SPECIFIC MOBS

There are a few noteworthy mobs in CoH to deal with, as a Mind Controller. As has been noted, confused enemies will buff and debuff to *your* advantage, and this is something you'll very much want to take advantage of. Any time a mob is primarily or note worthily a buffer, debuffer, or controller, you should consider it your solemn duty to confuse them.

An incomplete list of confuse-worthy targets:

<ul type="square">[*]Vazhilok Embalmed of all kinds, will blow up their own allies rather than your team, if you confuse them. Not always a high priority for confusion, since holding them is just as good, but frankly, everyone loves you when you set off Zombie fireworks safely, and frankly some of the earlier Vazhilok missions are really dangerous because of the unresistable and front-loaded damage exploding zombies do. So I say-- blow them up on each-other! Super funny!
[*]Certain Lead Outcast, who summon pets, such as Lead Scorchers, as well as Frostfire himself.
[*]Some of the Circle of Thorns Mages-- especially madness mages (who virtually are Mind/Emp themselves), Life Mages (who heal now, some), Ice Thorn casters, and worst, those pesky Earth Thorn casters-- all of whom will put their powers to work for YOU. (But get the earth thorns confused *before* they start firing powers.)
[*]CoT Portals, which summon Behemoths that yield no XP (yuk!), but are good XP themselves, can be kept from EVER summoning by confusing them before they aggro to anything. Just make sure to approach cautiously (it's hard to gague aggro distance from portals) and make SURE to keep the confusion up.
[*]Council vampires of all sorts (they use various sleeps and holds).
[*]Banished Pantheon Shamen (they others use myriad status effects and debuffs, including snow storm, earthquake, and hurricane, and Death Shamen summon pet zombies).
[*]Sky raider Force field Generators (yes, they bubble *you*!).
[*]All devouring earth 'shrooms. They mez like crazy, and also summon mez-resistance emanators. (See below for more on Emanators).
[*]Crey Medics and Radiologists (Medics heal and Radiologists do rad infection).
[*]Lost Aberrants and Pariahs, especially the Eremites and Anchorites.
[*]Rikti Mentalists, Mesmerists, and Guardians. Also, Rikti portals, opened by communications officers, will port in *confused* conscripts if you confuse the portal!
[*]Tsoo Yellow Ink Men, who use sleeps and holds, and Sorcerers, whose heals are legendarily annoying, and who have a hold of their own. Also, Dragonfly, Herald, and Skyfall type bosses. Finally, anytime a Tsoo throws caltrops that are getting on your nerves, confuse him. As long as he's alive and confused, the caltrops will affect him, not you. (After he dies, the caltrops revert to hurting you.)
[*]False Nemeses. These guys *can* be confused with the normal difficulty of a boss, and they often have dispersion bubble up.
[*]Malta. Sappers, which are, hands down, the best target for confusions in the entire game. They do negligible damage, but even stalwart tanks and epic scrappers fear their end drain. You needn't. Have them drain your enemies instead! Also, if you have a Malta Engineer who's already dropped an auto-turret that is annoying you, confuse him. So long as he's alive and confused, the turret will attack villains. It reverts when he dies though.
[*]Carnie Illusionists and Master Illusionists-- they'll summon hordes of pets-- other illusionists, Dark Servants, Phantasms... and they'll all fight each other, so long as you keep the original summoner alive and confused. Great fun.
[*]Knives of Artemis-- All the Knives throw caltrops, it seems like, and a single mass confusion can turn an inferno of caltrop micro damage against the people who created it.
[*]ODDITY: Devouring Earth villains drop a wide variety of emanators that buff other DE ONLY. Confusing the person who summoned the emanator OR the emanator itself will make the emanator STOP buffing the DE, but it will NOT buff your team. (This is an unusual exception.)
[*]CAUTION: DE Fungoids (deathcaps, etc) require special attention, as well. If one that you confuse plants a fungus (which normally provide nearby DE with resistance to status effects), and then you proceed to put holds on other DE, and the fight gets going, and somehow your fungoid dies, suddenly you'll have a fungus that nobody was worrying about breaking all your holds. So watch funguses. Keep them separately confused if for whatever reason your team isn't killing them automatically.
[*]CAUTION: Nemesis are a pain in the rear. They all require two applications to confuse, so rarely will there be much point in using confusions against them. Of course, as noted above, False Nemeses and Warhulks, as bosses, only take the usual 2x confuse to affect. You'll often come across a pair, and if you don't have anything else, it can be useful to pop mass confusion and then a pair of confuses to get the two of them.
[*]CAUTION: Explosives, a relatively recent introduction into the game, blow up good guys and bad guys alike. Don't be tricked into thinking you can confuse them into not blowing you up. A confused explosive puts the smackdown intended for you, on the enemy, but also puts the smackdown intended for the enemy on YOU! [/list]


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APPENDIX C: MISCELLANEOUS ADVICE

<ul type="square">[*]Always be courteous. Discourtesy is always a waste of time.
[*]Start teams yourself, rather than waiting to be chosen. Develop your leadership and communication skills. (The author is sorely lacking in this department.)
[*]There are only four good ways to approach a dangerous fight.
1) You lead into each fight with area control-- preferably aggroless-- from sufficient distance, or
2) a blaster or defender pulls ones and twos with an especially lightweight or long-range blast,
3) tanks closely followed by scrappers rush in, followed by everyone else keeping their distance.
4) tanks attract aggro then leave the enemy's line of sight around a corner, making enemies cluster at the corner.

TAKE THE RESPONSIBILITY for making sure your team knows and agrees on ONE AND ONLY ONE of these, especially if you're leading.
[*]If your team is composed of 40%+ melee and the group isn't in way over its head, help blasters, defenders, and other controllers understand that pulling with blasts is NOT THE ONLY way to play.
[*]If you're on a team with 40%+ blasters and few team-defense oriented builds, help any twitchy scrappers present understand that being kiting debt magnets is NOT THE ONLY way to play.
[*]If you're on a team with a good tank who is herding, don't fire off control until he's in position. Ask him to fire off an F7 "Ready!" when you should mez. But also watch out for other teammates who get dangerous aggro away from him. Herding can be dangerous, and you're not vital to it, so use your alertness to the max.
[*]If you're on a team with a good blaster or defender who's pulling, if there are *any* melee people on the team, DO NOT MEZ ANYTHING until it's WELL OUTSIDE THE AGGRO RANGE of whatever group it's been pulled from. And for $Deity's sake do NOT confuse it!
[*]If you are on a team with people who do anything AoE to foes-- particularly claw/*, spine/*, and */dark scrappers and fire/* and */fire blasters, radiation, dark, and sonic controllers and defenders, watch positioning CAREFULLY, because once you lock down a group, obviously they won't move into position for cones and AoEs of their own accord. It's ok, especially with the scrappers and tanks, to wait a minute to lock mobs down, and not lockdown before they cluster up. You've got heals, so if need be, let the scrapper go into the red, then heal, mez, and heal again. It may also be useful in this regard to run ahead of the team a bit and immediately mez clusters of MObs as soon as they spawn and before they start to meander. You can in theory use Telekinesis selectively to correct problems applying AoE to a scattered mob you've just held, but don't waste too much time; area mezzes aren't going to last forever. The goal here is clustering of MoBs for AoEs. Investigate this further.
[*]Some attacks will make mobs scatter-- it seems to me most notoriously, everything with the word "rain" in the power description. If you have a teammate running this kind of effect but not locking down mobs first, work something out with them.
[*]Accept that there are bad teams to be on, and that you can only do two things about them: talk, leave.
If the team can't be improved with talk, you should leave it. For the good of the game, leave it!
[*]If you're LEADING a team, it means you accept responsibility for recruiting, communicating, and most of all, addressing misconduct if it's ruining play for the others. Addressing misconduct in a team is your job because you have the sole power to kick people. If you don't want to exercise it, hand off leadership to somebody who does, preferably BEFORE anything becomes an issue. And always say you've done so in the team channel.
[*]Always keep a seperate tab visible, while teaming, for ONLY chat and private tells. There's an audible report for everything that comes in over either channel, and teammates should be able to expect you to promptly respond in those channels, and not miss anything said there. The entire chat window opens and closes with a single keystroke (c), so if need be, flip the window open just long enough to glance at what people are saying.[/list]


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APPENDIX D: CONFUSION AND XP/TIME

INTRO

A confused mob will actively do damage to the other mobs you're fighting. Normally, anything except a teammate doing damage to mobs you're fighting claims a portion of the XP for themself.

However, MOST of a CONFUSED MOb's DAMAGE DOES NOT COUNT in this regard. 75% of the damage a confused mob does to your other enemies magically disappears from BOTH sides of the equation. In other words, for example, if you do half the damage to a mob killed by confused mobs, you get 80% of the XP.

Equations for real XP yield over time require looking at the duration of a normal fight, an unknown standard downtime between fights, and the way confuse buffs XP/dmg. The following section looks at these things in detail. Fortunately, there is one fairly simple rule to follow regarding keeping XP up:

If you're using confusion, it will not worsen XP per time unless you spend more than a certain amount of time between fights. That amount of time is: three times the amount of time the fight itself WOULD have normally taken, times the fraction of damage you did.

As a practical matter, groups that are pursuing XP in any remotely reasonable fashion will be well within this range, so that confusion NEVER, as a practical matter, hurt XP/time. Some people will never believe you re: this. If somebody disrupts team play telling you not to use confuses, I strongly recommend you cite their disruptive ignorance and leave the team.

The following is a kind of proof, regarding XP and time. If you're math-phobic, turn back now. If you have a herostats-esque program, just go verify this stuff for yourself.

Also, please note: this was meant to address only the binary: confusions vs holds or similar, and its effect on experience. That's based on the assumptions that either you don't have to play with confusion-spamming mind controllers at all, or if you do, the mind controllers can be well built without doing much with confusions. (Either is true.) So this attempts only to show: does it get worse if somebody's using confusions instead of holds (also, I ignore bad guy buffs to your team, and the minor scatter or cluster you get confusion, depending on your skill level and luck.)

HOW EXPERIENCE WORKS GENERALLY
Spawn: A group of MObs (mobile objects; bad guys. XP on legs.)

Where:


X = Experience value of (average) spawn
D = fraction of the spawn's HPs done by you, where 1 = 100%.


Under normal circumstances, everybody who damages a mob "takes" a share of that mob's experience yield (X), proportional to the fraction of damage they do (D). That means if you and an unteamed stranger each do half the damage to a mob, and it's defeated, you each get half the experience value. Earned experience (Xp) is equal to the mob's experience value times the fraction of damage you do to it.


Xp = DX


If you do all the damage (D=1), then you get the full experience of the spawn (XP=X).

HOW EXPERIENCE OVER TIME WORKS GENERALLY

Where:


F = ("Fight") time each spawn takes to fully defeat
S = ("Search") time it takes after each fight to find the next fight
T = ("Time") fight plus search time = F+S


Experience per time (Xppt) is equal to experience value of the spawn (X) divided by total time (T). Total time is a function of how long it normally takes to defeat a spawn (F) plus time between fights (S):


Xppt = X/T = X/(F+S)


HOW CONFUSION EXPERIENCE WORKS

Where:

Cmd = fraction of spawn's damage done by confused mobs (where 1=100%) = 1-D


The experience value of mobs damaged by other confused mobs (Cx) is equal to the mob's base experience value times the fraction of the mob's damage once you EXCLUDE three quarters of the damage confused mobs did (Cmd) from the mob's base damage.


Cx = DX / ( D + (Cmd/4))Cx = DX / ( D + ((1-D)/4))Cx = 4DX / (3D + 1)




HOW CONFUSION FIGHT DURATION WORKS

Fight durations depend directly on how much damage has to be dealt to finish the enemy. The amount of time fights last (Cf) where damage from confused mobs is in play, is the normal fight time (F) times the fraction of the damage you yourself have to do (D).


Cf = time a spawn takes to defeat, if it's been damaged by confused mobs = FD.

***Note: F here is the duration of a NORMAL fight, that is, without confusion in play.


HOW CONFUSION EXPERIENCE OVER TIME WORKS

Total time with confusions in play (Ct) is a function of how long it takes to defeat a spawn with confusions in play (Cf), plus downtime between fights (S).


Ct = confused fight plus search time Cf+S = FD+S


Experience per time with confused mobs doing some damage (Cxppt) is equal to experience value of the spawn damaged by confused mobs (Cx) divided by total time with confusions in play (Ct).

Just as

Xppt = X /T


Likewise

Cxppt = Cx/Ct
Cxppt = 4DX / ((FD+S)*(3D + 1))



DOING AT LEAST AS WELL

What we really want to do is compare normal experience per time (Xppt) to experience per time when confusions are in play (Cxppt). We can find a "break even" point by setting the two figures equal to each other. The break-even point is should be a statement about when your experience over time WITH confusions (Cxppt) is the SAME as your experience per time WITHOUT confusions (Xppt).

Break-even point rule:

Xppt = Cxppt


<font class="small">Code:[/color]<hr /><pre>
Xppt = Cxppt
__________________________________________________ ___________
X/(F + S) = 4DX / ((DF+S)*(3D + 1)) |divide by X
1/(F + S) = 4D / ((DF+S)*(3D + 1)) |invert
(F + S) = ((DF+S)*(3D + 1)) / 4D |multiply out
(F + S) = (3DDF+3DS+DF+S) / 4D |multiply by 4D
4DF+4DS = 3DDF+3DS+DF+S |subtract (DF +4DS +3DDF)
3DF-3DDF = S-DS |divide by (1-D)
__________________________________________________ ___________
3DF = S
</pre><hr />

WHAT DOES S=3DF MEAN?

So, here's our statement about when your experience over time (Cxppt) WITH confusions is the SAME as your experience per time WITHOUT them

S = 3DF


In English:

Time it takes after each fight to find the next fight is equal to three times the fraction of the spawn's damage done by you, times the time each spawn takes to fully defeat (normally).

If you start the next fight faster than that, your XPS is better with confuse than without. If you find them slower, experience over time gets worse when you use confusions in place of (some) holds.


WHAT DOES THAT PROVE?

Nothing, directly, since we have to be able to judge for ourselves whether we can meet the rule above. But we CAN safely say that if our downtime between fights is short enough, confusion is really helping with XP, to say nothing of being a hold with lots of fringe benefits.

In my experience, groups with any real interest in decent XP over time will EASILY be doing better than the S=3DF rule above. If the group can't manage S=3DF on the average, it's probably because they're doing something IN PREFERENCE to decent XP/time.

And as anyone can see, such a group has no business complaining: "Confusion is hurting our XP!" Because of course, if the group wasn't doing other things that hurt XP/time more, the confusion itself would be *helping* XP/time. If you're not trying to get decent XP, you ought to have no complaints about not getting the best possible XP.



HOW MUCH BETTER?

Remember, none of this speaks to *how much* better the XP would be if you were getting in more than your 2.7%.

To generalize, ((Cxppt/Xppt) -1) is the % bonus to XP you get (Cb) when using confusions.


Cb= Cxppt/CXppt = (4D(F+S) / ((FD+S)*(3D + 1)))-1


Among the things that can be seen is that as D goes down, (Cb) goes up.

WARNING: Do not adjust your D!

It's wrong to conclude from this that we should hold back doing damage to increase XP gain from confusion; holding back damage is an assumption that stretches the "normal" fight length, and generally just doesn't apply. It's throwing out damage and getting nothing in return.

D is the fraction of damage *you* do. You can quite effectively tweak it downward by fighting mobs with more hitpoints, against whom your damage is scaled down, and that, when confused, hit harder. IOW, D can be scaled back by fighting higher level mobs. The only caveat I have to offer is: you need to make sure you have the accuracy to be doing this. The ubarness of confuses versus higher level mobs is narrowed by accuracy scaling back against much higher mobs.

Mind, Radiation, Empathy...or, Colorless Green Ideas Sleep Furiously
PvE Team &amp; Solo Mind/Empathy and Mind/Radiation
For I8, by Enantiodromos v2.3

__________________________________________

1. Introduction
2. Mind Control
........a. Overview
........b. Mind Control Features in Depth
........c. Individual Powers
........d. Using Mind Control
3. Slotting
4. Empathy
........a. Overview
........b. Individual Powers
........c. Using Empathy
........d. Mind/Empathy Synergy
5. Radiation
........a. Overview
........b. Individual powers
........c. Using Radiation
........d. Mind/Radiation Synergy
6. Pool Powers
........a. Recommended Pool Powers
........b. Other Pool Powers
........c. Pool Powers to Avoid
7. Per Origin (RP)
........a. Mind controllers and Origins
........b. Empathy and Origins
........c. Radiation and Origins
8. Builds
........a. Mind/Empathy Build Checklist
........b. Mind/Radiation Build Checklist
........c. Solo vs Team build considerations
9. Note on Ancillary (aka "Epic") Power Pools
10. Things that suck

APPENDIX A: Understanding Status Effects

APPENDIX B: Confusing Specific MObs

APPENDIX C: Miscellaneous Advice

APPENDIX D: Confusion and XP/Time
.......a. Intro
.......b. How experience works generally
.......c. How experience over time works generally
.......d. How confusion experience works.
.......e. How confusion fight duration works.
.......f. How confusion XP/Time works.
.......g. Doing at least as well.
.......h. What does S=3DF mean?
.......i. What does that prove?
.......k. How much better?
.......l. Warning: Do not adjust your D!

_________________________________________


INTRODUCTION

In this FAQ, I'll be talking about Mind control with Empathy and Radiation sets. I hope to provide fairly thorough insight into all three. I've spent over 1400 hours (for a variety of reasons) playing my L50 Mind/Empathy controller, and I run a Mind/Rad L37 controller, and a Rad/Psi L43 Defender, so I've played the great majority of these powers fairly heavily. I don't play player-versus-player at all, and will only have cursory comments regarding this.

In v2.3, I tidied up some descriptions of powers, elaborated a bit on slotting strategy, omitted a few things that seem pretty irrelevant (my builds, some fancy math speculation about confusion XP, comparisons of other Mind/* builds which can be found in the Guide to Choosing the Controller that's Right for You), killed a couple typos, and doubtless introduced several more.


__________________________________________

MIND CONTROL

Mind Control is the premier set for hard &amp; total control, aggro-free control, and confusions. It does fair damage that's typed Psi for good penetration, has enormous surgical control potential, no pets, and no immobilizations. It has sometimes been remarked that Mind Control has good or great area control. Mind does have good area control, but is not, contrary to popular wisdom, the best (see Ice and Earth control).

(If you're unfamiliar with status effects and terms, or end up not understanding anything said here, please refer to appendix A, understanding status effects. There's no standard meaning for some of these terms either, and I use them in what I think are precise, but not totally norm, ways. Again, consult the appendix if the following doesn't make sense.)

Here are the highlights of Mind Control:

<ul type="square">[*]Hard Controls
Mind has five great hard controls: a ranged single-target and *two* Ranged AoE holds-- Dominate, Telekinesis (AoE Toggle), and Total Domination (AoE). It also has two confusions, which are among the hardest controls in the PvE game: Confuse (ranged single-target) and Mass Confusion (ranged AoE).
[*]Single Target Controls
Mind has three great controls for dealing with one target at a time-- an aspect of controlling often overlooked, because many sets have half their single-target control in the form of an immobilization (which are of limited control value). Mesmerize, Confuse, and Dominate easily let you juggle 3-8 mobs at a time (depending on your skill and slotting) without resorting to any sort of area control.
[*]Soft Controls
Mind also has three soft controls-- Mesmerize (ranged single-target sleep) Mass Hypnosis (ranged AoE), and Terrify, (large cone fear).
[*]Aggro Free Controls
Three of Mind's controls, Confuse, Mass Hypnosis, and Mass Confusion, never cause aggro-- which is three more than any other set except Illusion (which has one, or more if you count invisibility.) And since they're all ranged, you're able to actually apply them at zero risk of aggro. There are all sorts of tactical advantages to be had from this.
[*]Damage dealing
Controllers now do meaningful damage (see containment), and most of Mind's damage is typed Psi, which is rarely resisted. Dominate and Mesmerize are standard damage-dealing controls, and a great damage/control one-two in a fight. Mind also has Levitate, a great high damage power that does prevent knockback-nonresistant enemies from attacking while they're on the ground, and which is smashing damage, a handy alternative to the psi you do, especially when facing robots. Finally, Mind has Terrify, one of only two options in controller primaries for doing area damage.
[*]Containment setup
Containment is now the name of the game for damage with controllers-- any mob that is immobilized, held, disoriented, or slept takes double damage from any attack by a controller (except brawl). Mind has two single-target (Dominate, Mesmerize) and three AoE controls (Total Dom, Mass Hypnosis, Telekinesis) that set up containment, all ranged. This can mean decent damage output with unusual safety, in the hands of a well-built mind controller.
[*]Confusions
Mind specializes in confusion, one of the most controversial kinds of powers in the game, because of the question often raised regarding XP and confusions. Confusions are like a hold in that they completely stop a foe from taking any action against your team. However, they also (among other things) cause the foe to attack *other foes*-- and most (75%) of the damage they do when confused, is not "counted" when mobs are defeated, so you wind up getting more experience that normal for the damage you do.

Read that again: the net effect of confusions is to improve XP.

Confusions are widely misunderstood for three reasons:

1) At one point in the early release of City of Heroes, damage from confused mobs was not discounted by 75% when XP was distributed, so that it typically made XP worse, when used. This has been fixed for a LONG time, but attitudes persist.

2) People improperly compare confused villains to pets because the L32 Mind Controller power is Mass Confusion, not a pet.

3) People sometimes become interested in how much experience they're getting per defeated MOb. Confusion can cut down modestly on your experience gained per mob, but it always compensates-- or overcompensates-- by speeding up fights, which mean more experience per time.

Because of these things, there is a persistent belief that confusions cause teams to 'lose XP.' They absolutely do not, but you can expect to team with people who think they do.
[*]Trickiness
Mind Controls can be some of the hardest control effects for teammates to recognize. None of them have dramatic animations like, say, Earth or Ice, and teammates attacking/killing controlled mobs first can cut down on your effectiveness, if they can't/won't learn to work with you. Confusions, indeed, leave mobs actually moving and attacking, which can be even more confusing for teammates. Communication is a must.
[*]Stackability
Mind provides two (technically, three) pair of stackable total controls-- Confuse and Mass Confusion (both are confusions), Dominate and Total Domination (both are holds). It also can, technically, double up sleep magnitude, by using Mesmerize and then Mass Hypnosis.[/list]

INDIVIDUAL POWERS

NOTE: Again, read the appendix on status effects first, if any terms used here are not familiar.

<ul type="square">[*]Mesmerize
Available: L1
Slotting: 1 Accuracy. If you want damage, you could add 1-3 damage. A second accuracy later, if you decide you need it.
Importance: Consider

A single target sleep with enormous duration and enough magnitude to sleep a boss in one application. It does OK damage, and is great for keeping fringe mobs, especially bosses, out of the fight. If there are guys on the fringe on the opposite side from your team who aggro, put them to sleep, and deal with them later! Like any sleep, the downside is that all the lovely control duration you invested in the mesmerized mob goes away when he takes the first point of damage from you or a teammate. Note, Mesmerize CANNOT be slotted for recharge. This is not a bug, AFAIK.
[*]Levitate
Available: L1
Slotting: 1 Accuracy, 3 damage. When you have spare slots, +0-1 Dmg, +0-1 End, +0-2 Recharge.
Importance: Consider

Levitate is the best low-level damage power in the set. It does knock-up, which at least momentarily interrupts your enemies, too. A strong choice in a scraptroller or a build with very few powers to offer early in its secondary (including an empathy build with no single-target heals, if that interests you.)
[*]Dominate
Available: L2
Slotting: 1 accuracy, 1 hold, 2 recharge immediately. Depending on what help you have in other powers, +0-1 accuracy, +0-2 hold, +0-1 recharge, +0-2 damage, +0-1 End Redux, as soon as possible.

Importance: Mandatory

Dominate is a good fast single target hold, with decent damage. Dominate is a bread-and-butter power. You should ALWAYS take it at level 2, or latest at 4, and slot early and heavy.
[*]Confuse
Available: L6
Slotting: 1 accuracy. When you can, +1-3 recharge, +0-2 duration. If you really have slots to spare and lots of native +recharge, consider +0-2 range.
Importance: Important

Confuse completely stops an enemy from attacking you or your teammates, and additionally forces them attack and debuff other villains, and buff the good guys! As if that weren't enough, it DRAWS NO AGGRO! You can spam confuses all day long, if you just want to clear out an area. It requires two applications to affect a boss-- much like holds, and has a longer recharge and activation time, BUT, it also has a significantly longer duration.

Another way confuses differ from holds is that, confused mobs will still move around under their own power. Potentially, in very dispersed, adjacent groupings, they'll go where you don't want them to go. On the other hand, confusion can also be used to get an outlying mob to cluster up with the rest of a group, since he'll move to attack them. If you're really clever, it's a herding tool. If you're really unlucky, it causes a bit of scatter. Fair tradeoff.

Confuse should be SERIOUSLY considered by L16 or so, if not straight away at L6. Using it on any enemy is good, and using it on enemy defender types is fantastic.

For PvPers, however, Confuse will be a nonstarter-- its effects are at best a nuisance in PvP, and it can't detoggle or set containment.
[*]Mass Hypnosis
Available: L8
Slotting: 1 Accuracy. A second accuracy when you have slots to spare. Consider +1-3 recharge, if you find you can make frequent use of the power, and +0-2 range when you really have slots to spare,
Importance: Consider

Mass Hypnosis is your first, and one of two, aggro FREE area controls! It is a large Area of Effect that centers on an enemy you target while at range, putting minions and lieutenants to sleep, with a small chance to sleep bosses. It does no damage. Very good for mitigating damage when you're facing overwhelmingly large spawns, as when two large spawns are back-to-back, or some gruesome summoning power is at work. It also initiates containment damage doubling. Rarely should this power be used, however, in the middle of a fight.
[*]Telekinesis
Available: L12
Slotting: 1 End Redux. +2 End redux soon, depending on whether you're using the power regularly.
Importance: Consider

Telekinesis is an auto-hit TOGGLE ranged area hold, meaning, you select a target, toggle on TK, and the target and everyone else around them has a hold applied. Additionally, affected targets steadily move in a direct line away from you- this is what makes Telekinesis tricky; you have to find physical obstacles to bunch your TK'd opponents up into, because otherwise, they'll not only drift away from you, but they'll all drift apart, including away from the original target of the effect, and most will come un-held. Also, can cause the target to drift far away into areas where the effect will draw aggro to you, like any other anchored AoE toggle.

Telekinesis is also one of the biggest end hogs in the entire game. To use this power as a staple, you'll need to take it and slot it fairly heavily for end reduction, which given all other considerations, you'll have to do either ASAP, or pretty late.

Telekinesis has adequate magnitude to hold lieutenants and minions, but also stacks with total domination or dominate. Unheld bosses will readily move to counter the pushback effect of TK.

Finally, telekinesis, ifyou missed this, takes no hit check. It can be used with 100% confidence on significantly higher spawns.
[*]Total Domination
Available: L18
Slotting: Three-slot immediately. 2 accuracy, 1 recharge. When possible, +1-2 recharge, +1-2 hold. If you always run rad infection and/or tactics, consider dropping an accuracy for a recharge.
Importance: Important

Total domination is an Area of Effect Hold applied to everyone within a fairly large radius from an enemy you target at range. It does no damage, but does draw aggro. Like most area controls it has a long recharge time. It's a great tool to provide teams with safety in combination with other powers, but will require full slotting. Take it as soon as available, at 18.
[*]Terrify
Available: L26
Slotting: 1 Accuracy. When you reasonably can, +0-1 accuracy +1-2 end redux. If you decide you need damage, +3 damage.
Importance: Important

Terrify is a fear effect with an accuracy debuff that does psi damage equal to dominate and mesmerize, in a VERY large cone. Though it's a soft control, as damage mitigation goes it can still be useful when you team with single-target hitters, particularly if you stand any chance of surviving one volley from the enemy. Terrify also has a good recharge rate for such a big, broad damage/control attack. Endurance is what tends to keep Terrify in check. With slotting, Stamina and Recovery Aura or AM, you'll be able, eventually, to sidestep this limitation.
[*]Mass Confusion
Available: L32
Slotting: 4 slots immediately-- 1 accuracy, 3 recharge. When you have slots to spare, +0-1 Accuracy, +0-1 End Redux, +0-2 Confuse duration.
Importance: Mandatory

Here's the zenith of Mind Control! Mass confusion is everything that the single target confuse is, except as an AoE. It's long-duration, slow recharge, draws no aggro, and is fantastic for clearing out an area (say, the bodyguards of an AV). It can be readily stacked with confuse, and second to none for versatility and power, among area controls. It's also hysterically entertaining.

Refer to the section on Confuse, and think AoE.[/list]

USING MIND CONTROL POWERS

<ul type="square">[*]Dominate, Levitate, Mesmerize, Confuse
Basic single-target controlling is important as a mind controller. You have a LOT of options to take one guy out at a time. ALWAYS know which mobs are the mezzers/buffers/debuffers, among the enemy, and fire confusions off FIRST on those mobs (the long activation but aggro-free nature of confusions make them ideal initials in chains).Hit crucially dangerous bosses with dominate (typically twice), until they stop moving. Look for lieutenants and non-crucial bosses on the edge of fights to mesmerize (mesmerize does a good job of getting enough mag to sleep a boss). And use levitate as a stopgap control between real controls, or on anything that's held, for a dose of damage. These are key, too when soloing, since they do the most damage and since it's scarcely efficient to use an area control on just 3 mobs, since you can almost certainly lock those down well before they take more health from you than your native health recovery will return before the next fight. If you really feel you need a fifth power in your arsenal for soloing, consider picking up air superiority. With a control/containment/damage set like Dominate, Levitate, Mesmerize, Confuse, Air Superiority, you'll have respectable damage and, if you use it right, iron-clad safety.

[*]Mass Hypnosis, Dominate, Mesmerize (Very Safe)
This is a basic combo you can be doing by L8. Lead with Mass Hypnosis from a good distance, then immediately Dominate to get the most important target under control-- either the guy your buddies are gunning for, or the boss you dread most. Now mesmerize the mob furthest from the attack zone of your teammates. Cycle your Dominates through the battlefront, and your Mesmerizes through the rear of the enemy. You'll be doing noteworthy damage with every hit, and mitigate nearly all of the enemy's damage.

This combo is particularly important, because there's a strong current of well-deserved disdain for lowbie controllers who're full of useless powers because they're building toward their ubar stamina/hasten/movement power/pet build in the 30s.

So if you really wanna be a hardcore *controller* early, here's your chance. Get this build up and running, trouble yourself to explain it to teammates, and avoid teaming with people who have large area damage before you turn 21, and can consistently sling total domination for them.

<font class="small">Code:[/color]<hr /><pre>
1 Mesmerize /Acc,Acc (1,3)
1 Healing Aura /End (1)
2 Dominate /Acc,Acc,Rchg,End,Rchg,Rchg (2,3,5,5,7,7)
4 Absorb Pain /Heal (4)
6 Confuse /Acc (6)
8 Mass Hypnosis /Acc,End,Rchg (8,9,9)
</pre><hr />

Extensive control for single-target hitters, with heavy healing to back it up. And you can always spec slots out of Mesmerize and Mass Hypnosis when you turn 24. And bear in mind-- with containment, you're going to do fair damage this way, too. Pair this with an Energy Blaster, Martial Arts Scrapper, or other single-target fighter, and you're golden in your fledgling hero days.
[*]Confuse, Mass Confusion (Aggro FREE!)
For going after large groups with very high safety, or for leading into groups that you want to subsequently Hold, but want to be quite sure never attack you or your team. Apply mass confusion, then, lay a single confusion on each boss. This ensures every mob is completely controlled WITHOUT ANY AGGRO, and doesn't even involve bosses reducing the XP value of individual mobs before you send your team in. This might be hard to pull off perfectly if there are many bosses or you don't run hasten yet. Also, if you have large groups you just want to clear off, especially if they lack bosses, you can just apply mass confusion and keep spamming confuse until you have one mob left.
[*]Telekinesis, Confuse (You're so clever!)
Here's a great way to bring your stragglers back into the fold of TK. Suppose you have four MObs gathered in a corner, but one got away, and you just REALLY want them all in one place. Wait for the right moment, and confuse the straggler. They'll run right over to the bad guys that are bobbing in the corner, and get stuck in the hold themself.
[*]Confusion, confusion, patience! (Aggro FREE!)
For dealing with pesky spawns of bad guys surrounding an Arch Villain-- confuse the AV a few times, and wait. When his mez resistance drops, he will promptly decimate his own allies, leaving your team free to focus on him. This is particularly beneficial fighting certain AVs who spawn in the presence of large status-effect groups or other dangers, such as Infernal. Better still, those pesky AV alpha strikes won't be used on your team, which can save a lot of grief up against guys like the latter-game clockwork king.
[*]Mass Hypnosis, Total Domination (Extremely Safe)
Total Domination does after all draw aggro. And sometimes you'll want or need to lead into fights, as a controller. Especially if you don't have a handy tank or are dealing with a horde of psi blasters (Gordon Trench and The Clockwork King's dimension come to mind). Especially if your accuracy with Total Domination isn't Iron Clad, the Mass Hypnosis is a nice cushion. The guys you miss with Total Domination will stay asleep, and you can target Dom them to your heart's content. If you're really hardcore and have an especially enormous cluster of MObs, you can always try doing partial overlap placement with the two-- get Mass Hypnosis further back, and Total Dom nearer; you'll still be buffering in the overlap, get more total coverage, and your team will presumably be dealing with anybody in the front row that Total Dom missed. Also, this technique allows you to keep proximity aggro off your team until scrappers are charging in, and gauge when to lay down hard control once they're (liable to be) woken back up.

[*]Total Domination, Dominate (Low-risk)
This is elementary total lockdown, and should be in every Mind Controller's playbook. Apply Total Domination to a spawn (preferably a boss closest to the center of the group so you get everyone, and don't have to re-target to go after the boss), then keep your eyes open and spam dominate through the group on a cycling basis (usually, bosses first). Unless your Dominate is slow, you're up against huge spawns, or you're fighting things 3+ over your head, you ought to be able to keep a spawn locked down at least until your endurance runs out. But if you're doing this, you're going to need to survive whatever ranged alpha strike any bosses present will use-- so don't do it against mezzers like Rikti Chief Mentalists. Obviously, in a scenario with bosses, pop Total Dom and then get Dominate on the boss as fast as possible.
[*]Telekinesis, Total Domination, Dominate (Draws some aggro)
One of the nice things about telekinesis is that it's an auto hit. Suppose you were dealing with numerous +3 bosses, and your tank was going down. Maneuver into the right position, apply telekinesis, then total dom, then start domming bosses that're still moving. This will cost you some endurance, but you *should* be able to get several of them under control pretty darn quickly this way. Once you know you've got a couple doms on each, turn off TK to save the endurance.
[*]Mass Hypnosis, Mass Confusion and Terrify (Low-risk)
Here's the Promised Land of soloing. If you have both of the top powers in Mind Control as well as either Mass Hypnosis, and especially if you have Hasten and Stamina and/or Endurance Buff to support it, this trick becomes possible. Lead in with Mass Hypnosis. Follow up with Mass Confusion. They're still sleeping though, and ready to take 2x damage from your next attack! Now hit them with Terrify. They'll take damage, wake up, smack each other once, and cower. If you have teammates, they can finish them off. Or, you can keep terrifying them, with Mass Hypnosis beforehand when available to get 2x containment damage.
[*]Telekinesis, Terrify (Tricky!)
One other screwy thing you can do, if you have Telekinesis, Terrify, and Stamina, is use Telekinesis both to buffer you against alpha strike, and as a containment setter, to send off a shot of terrify. Since telekinesis is guaranteed to hit, if you can toggle it up, quickly fire terrify, then toggle it back down, you stand a good chance of getting terrify's soft control in on the entire group *and* its contained damage, without really moving the group much, and only having to take fire from bosses present. I know that sounds scary, but it's usually very survivable.[/list]

______________________________________________

SLOTTING

As a breif intro to slotting powers, a few remarks. My comments in power descriptions on how to slot refer to slotting single-origin (SO) enhancements, which are expensive and unavailable (for the most part) until level 22, when you can buy level 25 SO enhances.

Level 1-11
Most of your powers from your primary will have hit-checks. Early in the game, especially with things that are AoE, this is an issue. Mind's in fairly good shape since there aren't many mobs with +defense to mental typed attacks, which is nearly everything in /mind. But you really want controls to hit, so while you're still using training-origin enhancements, I recommend slotting a couple of accuracies in every hit-check power. (Many regard slotting anything before DOs a waste of time. At least as far as accuracy goes, I don't agree.)


Level 12-21
At levels 12-21, start slotting dual-origin enhancements (DOs) the way you would SOs, with the understanding you're not getting quite the same performance that you might expect at 22+. If you don't have any help with influence, you should hold off on DOs other than accuracy until 17. You may also want to consider some other tricks:

<ul type="square">[*]Especially once you have a travel power, make sure to stop and sell enhancements. Make sure to sell DOs and SOs at the appropriate stores, where you'll get more influence for them.[*]Take risks with your life for greater XP gain unless you're on a team that's playing very conservatively, especially if you have a res in your tray-- so long as you have debt, you're earning extra influence.[*]If you play in a SG that insists on you running in SG mode but doesn't pay influence at LEAST 3 to one on prestige earned, consider finding a less stingy SG, or if post-25, soloing and PuGing.[*]Let your enhancements go to yellow at 16,21,26,31,36.[*]Try to avoid overlaying DOs or SOs. Plus up where possible. This can be easier if you choose to put even numbers of enhancements of a given type in a power. E.g., if you're choosing between 1 acc, 1 hold, 1 rchg, and 1 acc 2 rchg, weigh in the ease of plussing up paired recharges into your decision.[/list]
Level 22+
At this point, slot SOs per my advice. If you have trouble with influence, see above, and bear in mind that running in SG mode after 25 is going to start costing you influence.

Most importantly: Never slot more than 3 SOs of a given *type* in a given power. The fourth recharge in Dominate, for example, gets you very nearly nothing. If you feel the need to do this, investigate "Enhancement Diversification" on the forums first.

Finally: Beware putting extra enhancement slots in a power early to put extra TOs or DOs in, where you won't be able to use the slots once you're using SOs. It's always best to know precisely how you plan to build a character. There are character builders out there, and most of the AT forums are happy to review your build, especially if you use a relatively catchy subject line. (You can be cutesy, provocative, or desperate to equal effect.)


__________________________________________

EMPATHY

Play Empathy if you want to be popular in the early game with people who don't understand defenders, or tactics, well.

Empathy, has lots of healing, yes. But it's more about reducing downtime between fights, and later on, about buffing an ally or two, and less about team defense, than most people think. Personally I think it's fantastic as a team-oriented SECONDARY-- a controller can use it to the max for it's supporting role without extravagant expense in powers and slots, especially a late-game troller.

The downside is of course you do need a team to make Empathy useful. Even that has a silver lining, though, because you really should team anyway, as a controller, and being a "Healer" has got to be one of the best (if not best-justified) selling points you can broadcast when you're looking for a team.

Though it's got a lot of heal, the high range of Empathy has some great buff powers OTHER than the heals. People will love you all over again for a dozen levels when you pick up Fortitude and Recovery Aura at levels 20 and 28. Under the right circumstances, you can also ingratiate yourself immensely in the 20s and up with clear mind. And Adrenaline Boost, the final power of the set, is a phenomenal single-teammate booster.

Empathy is certainly the least directly offensive set, and along with FF one of the most team-oriented. It has more click and teammate-target effects than any other set. And half (44%) of the set is effects that are (or can be) last-ditch, emergency efforts to keep teammates from being dead in combat. It is, after all, a weird set.


INDIVIDUAL POWERS

<ul type="square">[*]Healing Aura
Available: L1
Slotting: 1 Heal. +0-2 Heals and +0-2 End Redux when you have spare slots.
Importance: Forced
The only low level power you'll get out of Empathy that helps you, and you'll be forced to take it. It's a good self/PBAoE heal. And hey-- if you're working with a bunch of blasters who're all sucking up aggro standing next to you, it's great.
[*]Heal Other &amp; Absorb Pain
Available: L2, L4 respectively
Slotting: 2 Heal. When you have spare slots: +0-1 Heal, +0-2 Endurance, +0-2 Recharge, .
Importance: Choose ONE.

My position is, these two are redundant on a controller. Absorb pain makes you wait another 2 levels to take it, heals more for less endurance, and is a little trickier to manage since it hurts you a little and makes you un-healable for a short period. The more popular of the two is Heal Other, but especially on a low-aggro Mind controller, Absorb Pain should be seriously considered, since it heals more than twice as much for negligable endurance.
[*]Resurrect
Available: L10
Slotting: 1 Recharge
Importance: Consider

This power brings a teammate back to full health from defeat. The End cost is big, and the recharge is very slow. Primarily, this power is good for saving your teammates the trouble of walking back from the hospital.

But there are situations where an in-combat Resurrect can be fantastic. A group depending on a Tank can really benefit from that tank making a very fast full-recovery. A group in a tedious fight with a fast-regenerating boss or AV will likely be very happy with a spot-resurrect when it's key blaster falls. Also bear in mind that Ressurect gives the recipient a short respite from debt if they die immediately again; so if you don't have anything to lose, neither does somebody you Ressurect in combat.
[*]Clear Mind
Available: L16
Slotting: 1 Recharge
Importance: Important

Gives the target large +magnitude against immob, sleep, hold, terrify, and disorient. Crucial against some kinds of foes, this sometimes overlooked power makes you the anti-controller. It cycles fast, lasts a fight, and is otherwise pretty much effortless-- EXCEPT-- that you have to train teammates to call out quickly when held or otherwise watch them on the screen like a hawk, if you're not spamming this power before every fight. Either way, this power is great if you're not *lazy*.
[*]Fortitude
Available: L16
Slotting: 1 recharge. +0-2 Acc Buff +0-2 Def Buff +0-2 Recharge when you can spare the slots.
Importance: Important

A nice damage, defense, and accuracy boost. A little more everything! (Including, BTW, defense against psi!) Fairly slow recycle, but if you work at it you can have 2-3 teammates forted once you have hasten and couple recharges in it. Plus, if you're going to be worth nothing else in a fight, say against an AV, you can still fort teammates.
[*]Recovery Aura
Available: L28
Slotting: 3 Recharge immediately. +0-3 EndMod if you have nothing else to slot.
Importance: Crucial

A PBAoE endurance recovery buff extraordinaire. It is, itself, an End Hog, so you're best to pop it at the start of a fight, unless you think you'll be mostly watching the scrappers wear themselves out beating bad guys silly, in which case, wait a bit. Obviously, you benefit from it too. It doesn't last forever-- you need a couple folks to keep it perma, but it certainly lasts the lenghts of most fights, which means everybody pouring everything on without hesitation.
[*]Regeneration Aura
Available: L35
Slotting: 1 Recharge. +0-2 Recharge, +0-3 Heal if you have nothing else to slot.
Importance: Maybe

Regeneration aura is a powerful boost to native health recovery. As one more purely defensive power, while this power is good, I think its usually better to get most of your controls in first. Take it late if you want it.
[*]Adrenaline Boost
Available: L38
Slotting: 3 Recharge immediately.
Importance: Important

This power is huge. Huger than people know-- its only drawback being that it's single-target. You won't quite be able to make it perma on anyone without outside help, but whomever it's on will have ENORMOUS health and endurance recovery, MUCH faster recharge (= 2x speedboost), and some resistance to slows. This power alone defines the entire empathy set as the best late-game duoing set there is.[/list]

EMPATHY USAGE

Like defenders, be ready to do some buffing at the start of combat, and pay attention to when the buffs are back up again-- ordinarily, you should be able to put them up once a fight.Giving somebody Fortitude + Adrenaline Boost is a very real and noticeable improvement, to any character I've ever seen. Even just spamming heals on a scrapper can easily make the difference between a defeated AV and a defeated scrapper. If you're pulling off a hazardous resurrect, be ready to hit your target with a heal if he starts to go down before he gets away or turns on toggle defenses. Rezzing somebody to die again just sucks.

My recommendation on buffs (this is a no-brainer, but it's easy to let intelligent buffing choices slide) is, give fortitude and adrenaline boost to the lowest level damage dealer (scrapper, blaster) in the group-- or, if all else seems equal, give fortitude to the blaster with the most trouble hitting, and adrenaline boost to the scrapper with the biggest endurance issues. If you're fighting large groups with numerous mezzers (Tsoo, Lost, devouring earth, and Rikti come to mind) spam clear mind through the team's controllers, defenders, and blasters, especially of nobody's running dispersion bubbles. If your 20+ scrapper or ($deity forbid) tank lacks mez protection, you'll notice, and can yell at them later.

Empathy is not your primary as a controller. I recommend against taking more than two healing powers with the set (you're forced to take one), and I recommend against trying to routinely use heals to defend your team. The exception is: when you're aiding a retreat or fighting an AV.

MIND CONTROL/EMPATHY SYNERGY

MC/Empath is really a build for multitaksers-- people who think it's fun to try and keep their finger on the pulse of everything going on, especially in a pickup team, where it approaches impossible, even if folks stay together. MC/Emp is one of the least susceptible of all builds, to the "What is there to do but stand here and hit things" syndrome. You will have to become very accustomed to your preferred method of selecting both teammates and enemies. Tab (in the default keyboard configuration) cycles you through enemies. And you can select teammates with mouse clicks on the team list. I recommend mapping the "~" key to cycle through teammates. You can also select targets of either sort with a click directly on the target. Only you can come up with the target-selection scheme that works best for you, but choose wisely. Also, strongly recommended you turn the health and status display bar for other heroes to to "always on."

Mind control has a lot of aggro-free attacks, and Empathy has no aggroing debuffs. You could live your life virtually aggro-free under this build. You will be the last man standing, more than almost anybody. If you are prone to survival guilt, you may want to consider another build.

Mind is pretty much a grouping-oriented set, and Empathy the most grouping-oriented of the controller secondaries. MC/Emp is therefore an extreme group build. That's how to think about playing Mind/Empathy IMO.

Mind control is not surprisingly an End Hog with its advanced stunts, nor are heals or resurrection light on the end. Fortunately, Empathy has one major power that works directly with you-- Recovery Aura. You can readily eat your entire native + stamina endurance recovery doing Mind Controller Tricks, so having Recovery Aura ready to go can be a real boon.

Mind/Empathy can be fantastic if you're working with a modest number of damage dealers who're squishy or would prefer not to rely only their own defenses. Duoing or trioing with blasters or Super Reflexes scrappers particularly, can be quite lucrative, especially if you're at a stage where you can boost their accuracy a little, you have missions set on invincible, and your allies are a couple levels below you. The ideal sidekick for a Mind/Empathy is a Blapper!

On big teams on high difficulty with a tank, you will want to think about giving full heal attention to the tank, and be sensitive to whether there's herding/cornering going on.
__________________________________________

RADIATION

Radiation is an effective and aggressive set. It's got three fantastic buffing/debuffing tools very early in the set, and two or three other powers that are worth a serious look. It adds a lot of offensive punch to teams or to its user solo, as well as substantial control at the higher levels, a PBAoE heal, and a resurrect. Powerful, aggressive, versatile-- this is Radiation.

<ul type="square">[*]Radiant Aura
Available: L1
Slotting: 1 Heal. If you really find yourself using it a lot, could be slotted +0-2 Heal and +0-2 Endurance reduction.
Importance: Forced

Radiant Aura is a tidy PBAoE heal. You'll be forced to take it. But hey-- you can heal yourself with it.
[*]Radiation Infection (RI)
Available: L2
Slotting: At least four slots as soon as possible. 1 Endurance reduction +0-3 DefDebuffs +0-3 AccDebuffs. Add the last two slots when you have nothing else crucial to slot.
Importance: Crucial

Radiation Infection is a toggle AoE debuff-- you pick an enemy, toggle the power on, and the enemy and any villain nearby has reduced accuracy and defense. You can slot this for offensive (DefDebuff) or defensive (AccDebuff) purposes. Most folks recommend slotting for accuracy debuff to further protect the team. My philosophy differs-- particularly with a Mind controller, it may be a strong contribution to slot for defense debuff.

Remember that Radiation Infection stays up until the bad guy dies, or is very far away, and that in the meantime, if he runs, anybody he's near is aggroed to you. Extremely effective, and a must-have sometime before your teens.

When running RI with mass confusion, there's this to consider: if you slotted exclusively for defense debuff, you'd be increasing the net rate at which confused mobs hit each other. Slotted for accuracy debuff, of course, you'd be decreasing it. But the closer to balanced these debuffs get, the more RI tends to have no effect on the damage output of a group that's all confused. In other words, you have to decide whether you want to maximize or minimize the rate at which confused mobs attack each other.
[*]Accelerate Metabolism (AM)
Available: L4
Slotting: 3 recharges immediately, and eventually, when you have slots to spare, add three End Mods.
Importance: Crucial

This PBAoE buff lets you endow your whole team with a modest amount of extra damage, recharge, movement speed, and resistance to mez and endurance drains. The net effect: a very impressive buff. AM should be taken and slotted as soon as possible. Even when you solo, you'll want AM as often as possible.
[*]Enervating Field (EF)
Available: L10
Slotting: 1 endurance reduction. Followed by 1-2 more once you start using it regularly.
Importance: Crucial

A toggle AoE debuff like Radiation infection, Enervating field reduces your opponent's resistance and damage. It's quite an endurance hog, so you'll almost certianly want to wait until L22 to take it, but you certainly *won't* want to skip it.

Since resistance debuffs work a little better on those who have a high resistance to a given type of damage, and because often mobs are resistant to the same type of damage that they themselves wield, EF, like defense debuff slotted Radiation infection, tends to enhance the rate at which confused mobs kill themselves off.
[*]Mutation
Available: L16
Slotting: 1 recharge
Importance: Consider

Returns a downed hero to full health and endurance and gives him a short-lived damage &amp; endurance &amp; recovery boost, that drops after the length of a fight or so, leaving the target breifly sensitive to damage before going back to normal. The End cost is enormous, and the recharge is very slow. Primarily, this power is good for saving your teammates the trouble of walking back from the hospital.

But there are situations where an in-combat Mutation can be fantastic. A group depending on a Tank can really benefit from that tank making a very fast full-recovery and gaining miscellaneous buffs. A group in a tedious fight with a fast-regenerating boss or AV will likely be very happy with a spot-resurrect when it's key blaster falls. Also bear in mind that mutation gives the recipient a short respite from debt if they die immediately again; so if you don't have anything to lose, neither does somebody you use Mutation on in combat.
[*]Lingering Radiation
Available: L20
Slotting: 1 accuracy. +1 Accuracy, +1-2 End redux when you start using it regularly. Top it off with recharges when you really have slots to spare and have fallen in love with it.
Importance: Consider

A ranged AoE slow and regeneration debuff. The first significant control power in the radiation set, and though Mind scarcely needs other controls, you may want to consider this one eventually. It is particularly valuable against Archvillains, who can't be affected full-time by holds and so on, but *can* be slowed slightly with LR, and also have enormous regeneration that normally makes it hard to beat them. You may find this power extremely useful in the end game.
[*]Choking Cloud
Available: L28
Slotting: 3 Hold, 2-3 End Reduction.
Importance: Maybe

The second of three control-oriented powers in radiation. This one is a PBAoE toggle pulsing hold. That is, it applies a very short duration pulsing hold, to villains standing near you, once every several seconds. Fully slotted, it's an interesting form of control, but as a controller, you'll probably find it redundant with your primary. If you want it, you really need to have 3 hold slots, and some end reduction, before you really get a sense of what it can do.
[*]Fallout
Available: L35
Slotting: 0-1 Accuracy, 3 dmg.
Importance: Dubious

A power one rarely sees, and situational to instances where you have a dead teammate on hand. I have mixed feelings about this-- moreso than a defender, if you can't keep teammates from dying in the first place, there's some doubt about whether you're doing your job (or, are on the right team). What it is, is a hefty dose of AoE damage centered on a fallen teammate. And you can, in principle, tote a teammate's corpse around if you have recall friend, and blow it up for damage. Very cool, if that's your style.
[*]EM Pulse
Available: L38
Slotting:
Importance: Consider

EMP is an exceptionally large PBAoE attack, long-duration hold, that hurts robots a bit, makes it hard for you to recover endurance for a while, and has a long recharge time. As another control, this power isn't really a priority, but it's good enough out of the box, and cool enough that you might want to take it anyhow. The power also drains some endurance from targets, and stops you from recovering endurance for a very breif period.[/list]


RADIATION USAGE

Slinging radiation, as a controller, is a matter of constantly waffling about whether to debuff with RI before or after you apply area control. If you think you can survive alpha strikes, or if you have a handy tank who's absorbing alpha, by all means, debuff first, then control. If you have an aggro-free control handy, Mass Confusion or Mass Hypnosis, use that, then debuff. Otherwise, you'd better know how much alpha strike you can handle.

Because toggles go down when the target for the toggle, or "anchor," dies, you're going to find it annoying when people kill your anchors prematurely. You need to approach this problem from both angles: 1) Get used to it! 2) Educate your teammates.

When buffing with Accelerate Metabolism, don't be shy about calling for the team to gather to get the buff. Usually shouting "Gather!" or "AM!" in the team channel is sufficient. Don't be rude or obsessive, but try and make people understand that they really want the boost, because it's net effect is great, even though an individual can sometimes not notice it.

Radiation is great for helping out with killing bosses and AVs, especially with RI, EF, and Lingering Radiation in play together.


MIND/RADIATION SYNERGY

When it comes to the Mind/Radiation combo, there's really nothing that doesn't work together, and most of it is phenomenal. So much so that the main thing to talk about (once you realize how UBAR mind/rad is) is pitfalls:

The first big pitfall is that Radiation, like Mind, has a lot of powers your teammates can work with, or screw up, depending on their actions. Hence, more that possibly any other set, Mind/Rad requires you to talk to your teammates and explain yourself if they don't already know Mind and Rad. It will also be worth your while to develop some macros (there are FAQs on this), to announce whom you're targeting with your mezzes, toggles, and mez toggles. Also, experience as a blaster helps a lot with this-- you'll notice quickly that the guy your tab-select first hits is the SAME guy everybody else's tab-select hits first! I recommend you learn to tab 80% of the way through a spawn to select your target, if that's the method you're going to use for target selection.

The second big pitfall of Mind/Radiation is that Mind and Radiation both have overwhelming numbers of great or necessary powers in the early build. Which forces you to make tough choices about power selection until you're nearly in the endgame. You have a lot of viable alternatives in a Mind/Rad build, but you should *really* plan your entire build ahead, looking at what you want to be able to provide, and when you'll be able to support the endurance cost on which powers.

Another awkward thing about Mind/Rad is that both sets are control heavy. For example, supposing you decided to stick to holds. A L38 Mind/Rad could easily be built who had: Dominate, Telekinesis, Total Domination, Choking Cloud, and EMP. The holds would ALL STACK. That's more area hold power than $Deity. Not that that kind of redundancy is terrible, but it does respresent overkill in most situations, outside of stacking hold mag on an AV.

Fourth to note about the combination is the endurance cost. With 3-slotted stamina, it's possible to run Telekinesis, Enervating Field, and Radiation Infection, each with 2 end reduction slots, indefinitely, if you're not running anything else. With AM up, things are a little better. Both sets can, potentially, make enormous endurance demands on you. This can actually make decisions about your pre-21 build easier, since you can choose to pick up end-light powers, and/or slot for end redux, in the first 20 levels.

Finally, radiation debuffs with Mass Confusion can be completely fight altering. Particularly if you focus on defense debuffs without accuracy debuffs in Radiation Infection, running it and EF on a mass-confused spawn ensures a sickeningly fast rate of spawn self-destruction. On the other hand, using an accuracy debuff heavy Rad infection and Lingering Radiation without Enervating Field, will tend to slow down the rate at which a mass confused spawn will kill itself. This is an arcane point about confusions, but getting the right ratio of confused mob-to-team damage is the key to getting the best XP/time buff out of confusion use, and radiation debuffs enhance your control over this.

__________________________________________

POOL POWERS
Recommended Pool Powers

<ul type="square">[*]Speed/Hasten
Available: L6
Slotting: 3 Recharge
Importance: Crucial

Hasten is worth it on most Mind builds, especially Mind/Empathy. Three-slot it for recharge, and it's like having an extra couple recharge enhances, most of the time, in every power that recharges. Now, consider some of your best powers-- Total Dom, Terrify, Mass Confusion, Rec Aura, Adrenaline Boost, Accelerate Metabolism. These could *always* use more recharge speed. Get hasten and 3-slot it as soon as you have your endurance issues clear. With Radiation, it has bonus synergy with Accelerate Metabolism, and helps with powers such as Lingering Rad, Mutation, and EMP.

Can you survive without it? Yes. More so on a */rad build. But IMO you'll still be happier with it than with a variety of other powers you may eventually build into your Mind/Green troller. So take it, eventually. FWIW, I think a lot of people are giving up on the utility of Hasten because it's not what it was before enhancement diversification. As a Mind/Green, you're going to have to be doing a great deal of clicking anyhow.
[*]Fitness/Stamina
Available: L20, after 2 other fitness powers
Slotting: 3 EndMod
Importance: Crucial

It is conceivable to avoid stamina on Mind/Empathy characters, if you're willing to wait around until you get Recovery Aura, and be forever pinned down between uses of it. Even with both, though, you can find ways to tax yourself end-wise as a Mind/Green, especially if you're running telekinesis. With Mind/Rad, Accelerate Metabolism doesn't fill this gap in quite as well, and Radiation itself can demand more endurance for things you might want to do routinely. In either build, I think Stamina is well worth the 3 powers and 2 slots.
[*]Concealment/Stealth
Available: L6
Slotting: 1 Def or End
Importance: Consider

Stealth is a quality of life enhancer. It's nice to scout an area before you back off to start controlling. Mind's wealth of aggro-free control, with stealth added, can make for an entirely different playstyle. Also, stealth opens up a lot of opportunities soloing missions for objectives without making most arrests, if you want to see game content but can't find a team. [/list]

Other Pool Powers


<ul type="square">[*]Fitness/Hurdle
Available: L6
Slotting: 1 Jump
Importance: Optional

Most people have noticed that if you're building Hasten + Stamina into your character, you have a handy opening on super speed as a movement power. If you're doing that make sure to pick up the sequence HURDLE, Health, Stamina. If you're not going to take a major movement power at all, hurdle is also nice for mobility.
[*]Inherent/Sprint
Available: L2
Slotting: 1 Run No move power planned? +2 run.
Importance: Optional

It's not the end of the world if you don't take a major movement power at all. (Incidentally, people who make a big deal about 30 seconds more or less between missions are very likely to be impossible to control for anyhow.) If you're going with swift and hurdle for movement, remember to slot SPRINT, NOT SWIFT, for optimum speed. With swift and 3 runs in sprint, you're not much slower than the average flier. And you get to see more of the game. Plus, nowadays, with shortcuts through bases and Pocket D, you really aren't at that much of a disadvantage.
[*]Teleport/Recall Friend
Available: L6
Slotting: 1 End or Recharge
Importance: Consider

Most defenders who routinely resurrect/mutate people (which shouldn't be happening, but that's another story) like recall friend so they can pull out of harm's way then resurrect you safely. Plus, it's just nice to be able to offer teammates who're selling on the other side of the map a direct port to the door, gate, or train.
[*]Teleport/Teleport Foe
Available: L6
Slotting: 1 End or Recharge
Importance: Optional

Teleport Foe is fun. Also, however, confused mobs have the same short aggro range you've come to otherwise love, and if you're using confuse, you're going to sometimes end up with a solitary confused mob with a good 20 seconds of confusion left on him to no good purpose. Teleporting him into the next group of enemies is a nice touch for the anal-retentive mind controller. Even better, if you've got a particularly great buffer/debuffer/mezzer bad guy confused-- sappers, carnies, tsoo sorcerers, rikti guardians, Sky Raider force field generators all come to mind-- you can tote them around! (This is nothing overwhelmingly useful, but it's not a complete waste of time, plus it's fun.) Regardless, don't put something more important off just for TP Foe.
[*]Teleport/Teleportation
Available: L6
Slotting: 1 End. Maybe 1-3 Range and 1 End when you have slots to spare.
Importance: Consider

Teleport-- Teleport is potentially the fastest, but the hardest to control, of all the major movement powers. Best but hardest to control? Sounds like a Mind Controller to me. Don't get it if you have serious lag issues.
[*]Superspeed
Available: L14
Slotting: 1 Run
Importance: Considder

Superspeed is a great movement power on a mind/green controller. Builds are always tight, superspeed is a nice fast form of movement with decent precision and a great stealth bonus, and you almost certainly will have its precursor anyway. If you can reconcile yourself to having a fire perpetually lit beneath your feet, and not having much in the way of vertical movement, Superspeed is the way to go.
[*]Leadership/Assault
Available: L6
Slotting: 1 Endurance
Importance: Optional

A modest damage buff for your whole team. Useful mainly as a precursor to Tactics. Also helps resist taunts.
[*]Leadership/Maneuvers
Available: L6
Slotting: 1 Endurance
Importance: Dubious.

A small defense buff for your whole team. Useful mainly as a precursor to Tactics. Prefer Assault under most circumstnaces.
[*]Leadership/Tactics
Available: L14, with Maneuvers or Assault
Slotting: 1 Endurance, 3 Accuracy Buff
Importance: Consider

Tactics can be a meaningful buff to accuracy on every power used by you or any teammate. This is worth considering, though the total cost to your character's build (2 powers and 3 slots) can be daunting. Gets even better for hitting very-hard-to-hit opponents. Also increases the range at which you can spot stealthy folks and resists confusions and terrorizes a bit, making it more exciting for PvP.
[*]Leaping/Combat Jumping
Available: L6
Slotting: 1 End
Importance: Optional

Marginal defensive bonus plus some nice resistance to immobilize, and a higher jump. A precursor to Super Jump.
[*]Leaping/Super Jump
Available: L14, with jump-kick or combat jumping
Slotting: 1 Jump, +0-2 jump when you have spare slots.
Importance: Optional

Super jump is a bit counter-intuitive, as a combination with Mind, Empathy, and Radiation. I associate it with sets like kinetics, gravity, and super strength. Anyhow, if you think it fits your character, more power to you-- it's a great movement power, with decent control and great speed.
[*]Flight/Hover
Available: L6
Slotting: 1 End, possibly 3 fly.
Importance: Optional

A slow form of flight with a small defense bonus. If you just want a relatively low-endurance way of staying out of melee range, it's OK, but leaves you fairly stationary. Movement becomes more tolerable with 3 fly enhances, if you have slots to burn, or with other movement enhances, such as putting flight speeds in sprint, swift, or quickness, getting speed-boosted, etc.
[*]Flight/Air Superiority
Available: L6
Slotting: 1 Acc
Importance: Optional

A nice attack with a great knockdown element. No flying solo controller would be without it!
[*]Flight/Fly
Available: L14, with Air Superiority or Hover
Slotting: 1 Fly, +0-2 Fly when you have spare slots.
Importance: Optional

The slowest of the major movement powers, but the best precision vertical movement, and most heroic seeming. I'm a fan, most people aren't. [/list]


Pool Powers to Avoid

<ul type="square">[*]Leaping-/Jump Kick
Available: L6
Importance: Avoid

An attack with a long animation time that doesn't quite get full containment. It's vaguely entertaining, though. If you're trying to build a mind controller who's one of the three stooges or a gorilla, I say, take this power! Otherwise, skip it.
[*]Fighting/Any
Importance: Avoid

At some point, it will become tempting to add boxing or kick to fill out an attack chain, and maybe try to add tough and weave to be able to hang in there with the tough guys, later on. Just don't. Besides which, if you really must take a pool attack, it should be Air superiority.
[*]Medicine/Any
Importance: Avoid

Unless you were playing Mind/Rad and were desperate for a mez-breaking power, there's no reason in the world to take the Medicine pool.
[*]Presence/Any
Importance: Avoid

If you were dead set on a concept character who ran multiple fear attacks, then MAYBE you should consider this. Otherwise, controllers have no business taunting![/list]

__________________________________________

PER ORIGIN

Mind Controllers Generally

[*]Natural
Much of Mind Control could be explained as persuasion, charisma, intimidation, and the like. The two telekinetic elements in Mind Control are hard to explain for a natural, unless you think it's a completely ordinary human ability, or unless you retcon them as some form of martial art, using them when standing near badguys. None of the super-movement powers fit terribly well, strictly speaking, though you can always claim superspeed's a motorcycle, flight is a flight backpack, or teleport is the result of your having hacked the city-wide teleportation grid.
[*]Technology
Controlling minds with technology can be done wackily-- ala some sort of "cerebro" device that amplifies brainwaves, or perhaps more interestingly, as a side effect of using psychoactive chemical agents sprayed in the air. Sorta creepy, but a lot of the mind powers *do* look like some kind of aerosol. Flight is the most plausible Technology major movement power, and teleportation works well too.
[*]Science &amp; Mutant
What one does with these origins is notoriously open. I mean, what *can't* the right sort of scientific experiment unlock? What *can't* be a mutant power? For the Science side, see the Anime classic Akira. For the Mutant side, what makes more sense that a mutant psychic? With the telekinetic component of Mind, Flight is probably the best, conceptually.
[*]Magic
Holds and sleeps in Mind could easily be "soft" forms of magic, whereas confusions could be forms of possession or will domination, and telekinetic elements could be more physically-oriented "spells." Teleport is probably the best magical movement power, though flight fits well also.




Empathy

<ul type="square">[*]Natural
With a little suspension of disbelief, the low heals in Empathy could be emergency medical attention. Many of the higher-up buffs could be attributed to encouragement or tactical advice.
[*]Technology
The various healing/buffing effects of Empathy could easily be super-advanced medical technology.
[*]Science &amp; Mutant
It's plausible, if not typical, to imagine someone transformed by science or born with mutation to be able to heal others.
[*]Magic
Magic healing and blessings easily cover the empathy set.[/list]


Radiation

<ul type="square">[*]Natural
It's difficult to interpret radiation powers as natural, without going into comedy, or reinventing the meaning of the term.
[*]Technology &amp; Science &amp; Mutant
Discovery of (technology), or bodily control over (science &amp; mutant) some sort of secret energy form or energy source could easily explain radiation powers.
[*]Magic
Wispy green clouds of light are the most common way magical power is represented in the game. All the radiation powers could be forms of magical energy, curses, and blessings.[/list]

Nicely done! I was always a little alarmed to think that people were going to my build guide for comprehensive advice on Fire/storm. I've played mine to 41 now, just got fireball the other day. Still love the build.

Glad to see somebody recommending Cinders. Much as you said, it has its limitations, but is still quite worthwhile. Among things to remember: on a team, you're likely back-to-back with somebody who's got a nuke, their own long-recharge AoE hold, or something wacky like EMP. If everybody stopped taking long-recharge powers that are radically better vs larger groups of enemies... I mean, there'd be a lot of potential going to waste.

Also, I'm usually going a million miles a minute and paying attention to lots of stuff at once, when I'm on a team big enough to generate bosses, and go careening into a group, but it's fairly stock for me to pop flashfire + thunderclap in clusters of baddies, and I'm pretty confident I see bosses take the stacked disorient all the time.

Let me also just say, after playing it, I'm still convinced there isn't really a better match for fire than storm, and vice versa. Sure, I know, yadda yadda, fire/rad and fire/kin controllers seem to get all the attention, and Ice/Storm is the conceptual preference (despite some redundancy IMO). But when you consider Freezing Rain, Thunderclap, Hotfeet, Flashfire, Cinders, Steamy Mist, all in tandem, I think it constitutes the strongest single synergy argument there is in any controller build.

Again, nice guide!

[ QUOTE ]
One caveat I'd apply here, some players moment-to-moment fun may come *more* from improving the functioning of the team then purely from faster XPs. They enjoy the "middle M" part of the MMO. This probably comes more from players of defenders and controllers then, say, scrappers, but it does exist, and it provides some reason to take an "explain first" approach rather than just a quit.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm not sure I understand the first part of your caveat; moment-to-moment fun does derive from team magnification for many, including me-- it's what I like best, matter-o-fact.

Also, I'm not sure if you're arguing in favor of explain-and-stay, or explain-and-quit. I assume the latter, since that's what the rest is discussing.

Preferring it to quitting without explanation, as my guide describes, is a gamble; it's a game of skilled gambling, not of chance, to be sure. If we must, I'm sure we can agree to disagree about the odds on that particular gamble, but if somebody's doing something egregiously stupid on your team already, and nobody else's doing anything about it, I'm saying, I think the odds are poor, and for the majority of players, who have somewhat less experience with PuGs than I, it's certainly a losing gamble.

[ QUOTE ]
Oh, and if you're wondering, [my list of objections that are always unreasonable] is what triggers the bloviation detector.

[/ QUOTE ]

The proposal you call absurd and unreasonable is, in short: Use your powers the way you think it's best to use them.

And you really just don't have many alternatives to offer to my "absurd unreasonable" approach: I mean, I *could* ask Brillig every time before I use a power, or I could just not use any powers at all... Or, I could exercise my own judgement about how my powers are best used. My proposal, the latter, clearly wins by a wide margin.

[ QUOTE ]
Wanted to disagree in part to this... Rational Self Interest did lead to putting a man on the moon.

[/ QUOTE ]

The easiest way to say this is to point out that, rather obviously, neither American flags on the moon, nor stunning funerary monuments in the desert, are in the direct, rational self interest of, pretty much, anyone. Except in extraordinarily indirect ways that involve psychological and sociological factors rendering Rand's insight a touch simple-minded.

But like I say, it certainly applies to teaming in CoH, where for the most part (in a very small way, Hammy raids and TFs are exceptions) there aren't any grandiose schemes in play except individual players' moment-to-moment fun, which is why that kind of self-interest rules.


[ QUOTE ]
Unless they bought their account, are using their room mates account, ect ect ect. They could also have coasted by being PL'd by SG mates.

[/ QUOTE ]

Sorry, I thought I addressed this in the section following what you quoted. There aren't legitimate newbies playing L50 toons. They're illegitimate newbies; which I termed "menaces."

Oh well, yeah. If you want to say: "Hey guys, I'm quitting because Leeeroy and Micromanager here are bugging me; rest of you are great, send me a tell if you want an invite to a team without them," I'm all for that, and would qualify it as 4a, because, yanno, you're not giving anybody the lecture.

Guide to How To Cope With Teams Where
Somebody's Doin' Sompin' Egregiously Bad


As a service to the community, I want to share my research and wisdom regarding membership in teams and options available to players who find themselves in teams they don't like.

There are four distinct options you have, when you find yourself on a team that's doing things very badly. These options are not all created equal!

1a. Put up with it, and stay on the team.
2a. Complain about it, and stay on the team.
3a. Complain about it, and quit.
4a. Quit. &lt;--Right answer


Option 1a
This is known colloquially as the "doormat" option.

Pros: Few. If you're not duoing with your spouse, and you're not playing on a ghost server at 3 am, there's no reason not to go find a different team.

Cons: Not only are you hurting yourself, but also you're degrading the entire game experience, for everyone.

Pardon? I'm being hyperbolic? Not at all! Yes, people can solo, but the game's geared around teaming. It's dynamically self-adjusting, to state-of-the-art teaming. Communities are like that. What it means is, the more you support people acting like clowns, the more clownism will flourish.

Don't be part of the problem. Do not be a doormat.


Option 2a

A respectable option, especially for those who like to argue, rather than play the game. Part of the rationale is to help other players understand the game better (in cases where it's hard to tell whether people legitimately don't know what they're doing), part of the rationale is, the team leader may decide that both your complaints and the behavior of the person you're complaining about are way too annoying, so that they kick the person you're complaining about. If that happens, it's great. If you get kicked (too), that's only the risk you run on any team where you're not the leader.

The problem with option #2 is that what usually happens is this:
[ QUOTE ]

You: "Hey guys? Doing things that way is pointless. Let's do it this way instead."

Leader: "You just don't like my team's playstyle, is what you mean."

You: "No, I mean, in general, this is just slow, risky and annoying to most players, for the following reasons: [reasons]"

Leader: "ZOMG! I play this game for fun, not to be lectured! If you don't like my team, get off it!" ... sometimes followed by a kick.


[/ QUOTE ]

Two ugly truths are involved:

<ul type="square">[*]The first is (and I'm pretty sure there' are numerous folk sayings that back me up here) people rarely take good advice.[*]For many, the very idea of disagreement is terrifying, so even if you're disagreeing with somebody who just said 2+2=5, you're the badguy.[/list]
But there's an even bigger problem with option #2. That is, complaints have no real teeth. (I know there are times when teams really need to talk a little more, and I'm all for that, but this is the guide to egregious stupidity, not the guide to communication or dealing with newbies.)

What I meant by "no real teeth," is that, unless you're the team leader (and to a lesser extent even if you are) talk carries no weight. People complain about the weather, the tightness of their socks, the color of electric melee animations, and everything else under the sun, all the time. Complaining doesn't amount to much.

And I do NOT advocate griefing a stupid team. (So many of these options boil down, like this one, to: that's a complete waste of your time, and I assume you value your time.)


Option 3a

This option, obviously, has a lot in common with both 2 and 4. The advantage it has over option #2 is that it has "teeth." By quitting the team, you're depriving them of the only thing you really have the right to deprive them of-- your complicity in their stupidity.

Plus, people tend to notice it when teammates quit, because quitting puts your money where your mouth is. All the rest is just talk.

The gamble of option #3 is that, as mentioned above, people who disagree are usually automatically wrong. The net effect of explaining why you're quitting before you quit may help a few people understand your decision and agree with it, but more often, it will be their rationale for dismissing your decision as unreasonable.

I'm not a fan of Ayn Rand, but to be fair, those folks have a point. Rational self-interest may not build societies capable of constructing the pyramids or putting a man on the moon, but rational self-interest does speak loud and clear to motive. Sad but true: it appears more honest, to most people, than any effort you may make to explain the situation as you see it.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. Option #3 is a gamble; sometimes it leads to people understanding your point, which has a small payoff for the time you invest in explaining yourself, which is: the community improves infinitesimally from the transaction.


Option 4a

As I've been saying, there's not a lot of reason to believe explaining yourself will get you anywhere (assuming you're not dealing with newbies, which is a seperate subject, and normally quite visible), and explaining yourself puts you at risk of being perceived as "just some guy who wants to argue about everything."

That's why I strongly advocate option #4-- quit without explaining yourself.

First off, the payoff is normally quite large; as I discussed under option #1, you can nearly always find a different team-- assuming you don't team with your significant other or play on a dead server during dead hours.

Secondly, it's by *far* the best way to get people capable of thinking things through at all, to actually do so.

Yes, there're always those in a crowd who'll never think anything through. How can we hope to address that problem? Only by making sure we're the team leader every time-- but that's the subject of a separate guide.

For people capable of thinking, the fact that a teammate just quit (it's pretty easy to see "so-and-so quit" on the right screen) without explanation, is the best way to get them to really reach any kind of conclusion about *why* they quit.

It's not a given that they'll care, but people who just don't care are, like people who never think, not a problem that your behavior can ever solve.


Corollary-- how to Cope With Teams Where
You're Doing Sompin' Good That Others Don't Like

The same kind of thinking can be applied to situations where teammates don't like the way you're doing things. It might be that you're really just doing something stupid yourself-- in which case, by all means, quit it!

(Also, by the way, questions about tactics and power use should always be given careful, civil responses. People do have the right to expect you to discuss how best to work together-- if you can't do that, do us all a favor and start soloing more. And keep an open mind to the possibility that you really may be doing something that's not optimal-- people who use Gale nonstop, I'm looking at you! O.O)

OTOH, there're often times where you're going to be reviled on a team, at least by a few vocal teammates, for doing something that is a good idea. In particular:

<ul type="square">[*]Speed-boosting people ("I don't need superspeed!")[*]Sonic Resonance powers ("It gives me headaches!")[*]Confusions ("It steals our XP!")[*]Intangibilities-- when properly slotted &amp; deployed ("I can't hit anything!")[/list]
That's just off the top of my head. Needless to say I don't regard objections to any of these powers as legitimate, but this is not the place to argue that. The point is, what should you do when somebody asks you to behave in ways that are counterproductive?

The options here are:

1b. Stay on the team, quit doing what they don't like.
2b. Quit the team.
3b. Stay on the team, keep doing what they don't like. &lt;--Right answer

Option 1b

This is also the "doormat" solution to the problem. The sole advantage is that it gets somebody being unreasonable to shut up. The disadvantage is, they team's playing less effectively than it could be. Since, as discussed above, you surely can find another team, this is a terrible option to exercise.

Option 2b

This option is respectable, but it's critically unlike its cousin option #4a, because ultimately you're justified in thinkinng your approach is right, whereas teammate(s) under 4a are not. (Which is the premise on which making these two guides distinct, is based.) Quitting the team because somebody complains is a gamble, because there's always a chance that the team is clueful enough to know the complaints are unreasonable, and you may be taking on the burden of finding a new team more often than is really necessary. (I'm aware this sounds unduly optimistic, but at present it seems to me a close thing. There *are* clueful people playing the game.)

Option 3b

This option is the strongest of the three. The worst that can happen is that people will continue to voice unreasonable complaints.

The leader may kick you under this option, but that's really only the risk you assume any time you're on a team that you're not leading (and to a lesser extent, even if you are, since people you lead can always quit and reform). You can be kicked at any time from any team, for bad reasons, if you're not the leader.

This is not to say there's no drawback to people complaining in the team channel. While they're doing so, odds are they're not contributing fully to the fight. What that means is: you have teammates that want to do something other than contribute productively. If you find that that's the case, you're on a team where somebody is doing something egregiously bad, and you should exercise option 3a or 4a above.



Note: It will be clever and amusing when someone points out that this guide is an example of 1a. Except it's not. Chattable team channels are incidental to the game, whereas, reading what is written here is the only reason to come here.

Bonus-- Guide to Spotting Newbies
and when to explain things more

There're two reasons you should spend more time explaining things to teammates. One is, if they're a newbie. The other is, if you're using a really exotic power.

There aren't many exotic powers in the game, but I've already mentioned two of them: confuses and intangibilities. Rarely played sets, too, like Trick Arrow and Dark Miasma, may increase your expectation that people don't know what your power is doing. There's no iron-clad way to know if your powers are exotic-- you kind of have to have played the game a while to know that sort of thing. If in doubt, try asking somebody you know who's been around a while, or perhaps ask on the forums, if anything in your powerset tends to be hard for teammates to understand.

Spotting newbies isn't effortless either. Look for clues-- do they ask about where such-and-such is a lot? (Personally, I still can't remember where all the difficulty-setting agents in Paragon are, so this isn't iron-clad either.)

One thing that can definitely help you rule *out* whether they're a newbie is the level of the character they're playing. There's a good chance somebody on a L5 character is a newbie. There's NO chance that somebody on a L50 toon is a newbie.

I know, I know-- what about people who're playing toons they didn't level themselves? Well, call it a word game if you will, but I don't regard those folks as legitimate newbies, I regard them as menaces. And at any rate, for our purposes here, they're not the kind of people you ought to invest time in explaining things to.

And newbie-ness is a spectrum, too, remember. L40s stepping into the shard for the first time are a kind of newbie. People playing their first controller or mastermind are newbies to pet-wrangling.

The point is, there're people whose ignorance is innocent, but that doesn't mean we can't hold anybody responsible for anything. It's not hard to tell the difference; let your intuition and experience guide you.



Note: For anybody who wonders, this guide has been on my mind a long time. It reflects not 2 weeks, but more like 2 years, of specific experiences. And yes, I'm a notoriously cranky guy.

[ QUOTE ]
Curious lables you so dismissively throw out without any form of actual backing. You build your pont on assumption and supposition, yet you feel the need to accuse people of being trolls?

[/ QUOTE ]

I think what you meant to say was:

1) I didn't back up what I said.
2) It's mean to call people trolls!

So:

1) I did.
2) Trolling is meaner than most things I do.


[ QUOTE ]
Redefiniton of reality and attributing intent and context to statements that often have neither is the easiest thing in the world, but it just never leads to anything good. You, yourself, seem to be talking in absolutes, as well, which is also quite striking. You define what people mean, what they are asking, what they want to know, what they do not want to no and so forth. Well, you can't know that. Not only can you not know it, not everyone acts the same way.

[/ QUOTE ]

You're cutting a great example of "communication is impossible!"

For obvious reasons, that's scarcely ever a very useful position to take.


[ QUOTE ]
I agree that answers that carry no information rarely serve much value. However, how much value they do serve depends on the question asked and the context in which it is being asked. You started out so well noting those, and then you seem to have completely abandoned them further down.

[/ QUOTE ]

I didn't. I carry on with the assumption that everyone agrees, when communicating, to say: 1) the relevant, 2) Not too much, 3) not too little.

That's an understood standard that any linguist can tell you about, without which communication is flat out impossible, and with which the rest of my position on why people answering questions about what's necessary in a build with babble about their private aesthetic idiosyncracies or facts known to everyone who's played to level 3 already know, are trolls, follows.


[ QUOTE ]
It is a fact that some people who ask if a power is necessery, actually want to know if the build they have in mind could function about as well without it. It is also a fact that some people ask if a power is necessary, simply because they hate the power and want to take another in its place if its possible to function without it.

[/ QUOTE ]

Those are both in the scope of "necessary" as it's being used when that question is asked.

[ QUOTE ]
The person who said this was an invalid comparison was completey correct.

[/ QUOTE ]

Nope. If it weren't a valid comparison, you, or they, could and would have been able to find fault with it as it applies here. You haven't. Snipes are not, at all, subjective, they're every bit as objective as the shape of the earth. Snipes are an objective measureable fact of the game, the fun and effectiveness of which, for general purposes, are just as suitable for discussion and scrutiny as the question whether the earth is flat.

No reasonable person would ever discuss "what idiosyncratic traumas from my childhood snipes alleviate." Which is a major point of my criticism of the class of trolls this guide addresses.

They're not subjective, no matter how popular it has become to declare everything subjective as a way of copping out on giving good advice for fear (or, annoyance) of being trolled.

[ QUOTE ]
I'm going to give this a shot, and see if there isn't already a word or phrase without a contradictory meaning which could be used.

[/ QUOTE ]

For this to be relevant it really has to be you tryng to get *everyone* to change how they communciate. That is an audacious thing to attempt. And doomed.

My guide, on the other hand, points out that a small (but vocal) minority of people are operating contrary to standard communciation habits, (for the same reasons some kids like to make farting noises during moments-of-silence) and that nobody's fooled.

My guide: practical.

Yours: A Perpetual Revolution!

[ QUOTE ]
Here's a simple point, if you need to write an FAQ to explain what you mean when you say a word, odds are you're using the word wrong.

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't; it's not really a guide to the word (behold: irony), it's a guide to context (on this particular topic).

Moreover, I don't ever ask "what's necessary."

Nor do I nor most people have trouble understanding what's being asked when people *do* put it this way.

[ QUOTE ]
I have the language you're using on my side.

[/ QUOTE ]

Norms of communication are on my side. What you have on your side is the piquant game of "let's ignore context."


[ QUOTE ]
Words have meanings, and you can't expect people to understand what you meant when you didn't actually say what you meant.

[/ QUOTE ]

Words have meaning and context. It's commonplace for people to get the right meaning despite some misused words thanks to context, so yeah, actually, you can expect as much, from everyone who isn't a troll. OTOH, get the context wrong-- and that's what the trolls this guide addresses are trying to obfuscate-- and you can mess up communication at least as easily.

1. Frost is a guy, despite being part of the Jug band.
2. I didn't say frost was *obviously* annoyed. The ways of Frost are subtle.

Thanks Otter, and everybody. ^_^

The irony is, after brazenly stealing sections from other people's guides without asking (credited them, but didn't ask), the only person I managed to annoy at all, I think, was Frost.

It was really very much a community effort. I need to go back and solicit write-ups on the remaining combos... maybe add some thoughts to some of them.

[ QUOTE ]
More specifically, the most common powers about which the question is asked, by your own admission, are Hasten and Stamina. I would assume that you believe those to fit into the category of those for whom the answer should be "yes". There may be exceptions in the case of certain specific builds...

[/ QUOTE ]

For the third time, including the time I said it to begin with:

We're already talking about particular builds. The remarks in this guide obviously, and explicitly, don't apply to a question without the context of a specific build. People aren't often asking that question, and there's no shortage of promptly asking them what build they have in mind (compared to the grinding lack of common sense it takes to assume anyone is seriously asking the question "is it theoretically possible to build a character without hasten?") on the occasions when they do.

[ QUOTE ]
I should also add that it is NOT always irrelevant and obvious to point out "You can do whatever you want", as in many cases doing whatever you want may not lead to the results you want.

[/ QUOTE ]

Not sure if I'm following. I think I said it's at *best* irrelevant. Or I should have.

But you're right, this effluvial idea that "You can do whatever you want," is sometimes worse than irrelevant-- it's downright bad advice. I'm against advice like that.

[ QUOTE ]
To use your own example, it is a totally different thing to say that "some people find the world to be flat", compared to "some people find that snipes are not effective". That is an invalid comparison. If you actually go and measure the world, you will actually find it is not flat. On the other hand, if you are terrible with sniper attacks, and cannot master subtle strategies such as timing the build up to correspond to the space between foes' shots, then measuring the number of times you are successful with a sniper shot will support your subjective belief that snipes are not effective for you.

[/ QUOTE ]

And if you're terrible at measuring the world, you may incorrectly deduce the world is flat. In fact, even if you're amazingly good at it, you may come to the wrong conclusion. But us crazies who care about good information still force the truth on people, fascists that we are-- and somehow adapting to a world shape that really is rather counter-intuitive just isn't that painful for most people.

Snipes are X amount effective, and have a learning curve that simply doesn't vary so wildly from the learning curves of other powers in realistic combat contexts to make this objection to my comparison valid, especially considering that very little in the game is *painfully* hard to learn to do except maybe herd with Telekinesis and mitigate with Dimension Shift (which are not overwhelmingly effective things anyway), so with a tiny number of exceptions people just won't have any trouble rising to the challenge of a the kind of *slightly* steeper learning curve you get in CoH.

There are certainly lots of powers that are better than snipe in certain builds, and I can readily imagine not having the power in some builds that could have it. Snipe, just FYI, does not make my list of powers that are actually likely to come into question this way.

[ QUOTE ]

I hope you were just bored at work or something when you wrote this...

[/ QUOTE ]

Dang, I'm so transparent.


[ QUOTE ]
He is quite the cunning linguist... I think that he was metagaming the forum when he wrote this--writing a guide designed to generate a thread that could serve as a testament to the hypothesis that for each and every possible position on any topic whatsoever, there are multiple forum posters who will take up arms in opposition to that position.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm almost that clever. Which is braggable.

[ QUOTE ]
Fun can't really be measured, so it shouldn't really be brought up in any guide specifically one that is talking about getting rid of useless information in answers.

[/ QUOTE ]

That's just not true; your objection is 'really' only that it can't be measured to an arbitrary degree of precision, and/or that it's not *identical* with respect to particular powers, from person to person. But neither ultraprecision nor universality are required for a gague of a power's fun to be useful in this situation.

[ QUOTE ]
As far as effectiveness, it also varies. Some people don't find snipes effective, other people do.

[/ QUOTE ]

People can also 'find' the world to be flat, but this does not make the degree to which the world is actually flat 'vary.'

Neither fun nor effectiveness of a particular power in a particular build are the wildly subjective matters that people like to make them out to be.

[ QUOTE ]
Whether or not something is needed as measured by your efficiency and fun scale more or less varies completely from player to player.

[/ QUOTE ]

No.

First of all, again, I'm not talking about [efficiency x fun] across all powers, in general, with no other assumptions. I'm talking about within a specific build. Even across all powers in general, [eff x fun] definitely does not "vary completely from player to player."

But once you're talking about a precise build, which is what's in question here, as it usually is in the kind of thread this guide addresses, it becomes exactly a question of whether the power fits above or below a cut-off point in a list of powers ranked highest to lowest in [E x F] (with adjustments sometimes needing to be made based on power synergy gained or lost from things that drop off the bottom of the list), a predetermined % of which absolutely cannot be fit into the build. That's a question on which there is, practically speaking, NO wiggle room, assuming everyone understands the power clearly-- which is why of course there's often legitimate debate over what powers do, when someone asks a question like this.

Whether players are interested in ExF varies a *bit* from player to player, generally least of all among people new to the game-- the people most likely to be asking such questions in the first place. (It really only drops in importance in a minority of severe alt-itis sufferers.) So the assumption that that's the interest is extremely useful and proper; anyone interested in something else will, and should, have to ask a more specific question.

[ QUOTE ]
The only problem I have with this post is that you have essentially explained why the answer to the question "Is power X necessary?" should be "Yes" for the most common powers used in that question as X.

This effectively nullifies the point of the post as there is then no need to ask the question in the first place. The answer is always "Yes",

[/ QUOTE ]

Er, sorry, I can't figure out how you got that out of what I wrote. On the contrary, I said quite explicitly that it's legitimate to answer "No," or disagree with other posters' "yes" responses.

Also, in case you missed it, I talked about such questions in the context of particular builds. Not at all something to which the answer is always "yes."


[ QUOTE ]
It's my understanding that usually the reason readers of the board post that particular question is that they wish to discuss whether or not the answer may NOT be "Yes", and under what conditions that may be.

[/ QUOTE ]

Perhaps I should have lavished more criticism on folks for not asking what they meant to ask. But my remarks already do go to the group who has a genuine interest in whether or not best builds include a given power.

Of course, if somebody is intentionally posing such a question as a way of objecting to the idea that certain powers are-- fact of life-- needed or necessary (a small group, but yes this kind of poster exists), those folks deserve a double helping of scorn. They're both asking the question clumsily, *and* misdirecting discussion into the vapid area of: "is it theoretically possible for somebody to build/enjoy a character without power X."

[ QUOTE ]
that the proper answer to the question is "Yes... and no." Yes, power X does provide the greatest amount of effectiveness and "fun", however if you are considering not taking it, you may, with the understanding that it will be less effective and "fun".

[/ QUOTE ]

That kind of remark can be had without the circumlocution of "yes... and no," and without pointing out the irrelevant and obvious: "You can do anything you want, but..." It's alot like starting every statement with "This is just my opinion, but..." It's at best confusing, at worst, intentional misinformation. (As when I say: "It's only my opinion that you can drown in water." ... so, you know, do whatever your first impluse is, when it comes to water safety.)

Everyone's considering taking and not taking every power (except the four I mention). That's already a given, or if it's not, we expect a poster to say "I intend to have gale and bonfire six slotted as soon as possible, regardless. Aside from that... do I need X?"

What I object to is the misinformation front that pushes nonsense on people to the effect that they 'can' be just as happy with whatever build they like. I 'can' be happy with a kick in the rear, if I set my mind to it, but that doesn't mean there's suddenly no meaningful way to answer a question about whether one should seek out rear-kickings. What's the best way to fix my car? The answer "Whichever way you think you'll enjoy fixing your car," is worse than useless.

If somebody wants to come to a forum and ask a question: "What controller is the noisiest?" I can answer that question-- in fact, I have. (I can't remember what I decided-- earth/kinetics, I think.)

Until they ask a more specific question, though, questions about whether certain powers are "needed" or "necessary," have only one proper response; a discussion of how [effective x fun] (usually with the emphasis on effective) the power actually is. Nor is this is an especially subjective matter. People need to stop giving out bad information about whether certain powers are effective under cover of the flimsy excuse that they were pointing out that other things are theoretically possible-- because that's not what any sincere poster is asking.

[ QUOTE ]
I don't think that anyone who insists on misinterpreting 'necessary' will (a) read or (b) be swayed by this.

[/ QUOTE ]

The majority of the people who post on the forums about things for which there's a guide never look at the guide, certainly not before they post. It may be true that for this reason, guides have diminished value. It doesn't apply specially, here.

However, unlike most guides, this guide's purpose is not so much one of preemptive information as it is, to have something ready-to-hand to beat people over the head with when they persist in addressing nonissues in threads.



[ QUOTE ]
You seem to believe that "more effective" = "more fun". Consider the case of Speed Boost. It's obviously "more effective" to keep the entire team boosted. However, many a /kin will not obsessively keep everyone boosted, because it's not as fun.

[/ QUOTE ]

No I said they were closely related, not that they're identical. Since this isn't a guide about how, precisely, to measure standard player satisfaction with a power-- a I thing that is, by the way, remarkably standard from person to person, in practice-- I didn't go into that in detail, but indeed it's a system of those two tests: effective and fun.

[ QUOTE ]
Some folks refuse SB. Apparently, being more effective is not fun for them.

[/ QUOTE ]

Ignorance and incompetence are barriers to both progress and fun, it's true. This also isn't a guide about why you should always accept SB. ^_^


[ QUOTE ]
Ditto the idea that there is no "fun cap".

[/ QUOTE ]

This also isn't a guide to hedonism. ^_^

But more seriously, the assumptions I make that you call "serious flaws in the basic premises," are not meant to establish a procrustean bed into which every poster fits. They are, however, well-founded guidelines to default assumptions about what kind of info posters are looking for. When posters are looking for something besides the kind of thing I suggest they are, it behooves them to say so.


[ QUOTE ]
Finally, a guide for a single word is extravagant. What's next?

[/ QUOTE ]

I wrote a guide to walking, once, so that's already out there.

I'm considering a guide to why the term "nerf-herder" is inherently absurd.

Obviously, too, a guide to how to indicate what kind of answer you want when you ask a question might be useful. ^_^

[ QUOTE ]
This guide is unnecessary.

[/ QUOTE ]

ZING!

"Necessary" Powers

In this FAQ I discuss the words "Necessary" and "Need" with respect to City of Heroes character builds.


Why this FAQ?

The most commonly asked kind of question on the forums is of the form: "Do I need..." such-and-such a power, or is such-and-such power "... necessary?"

Communication always requires interpretation and context to convey meaning. This is not a reminder to explain yourself carefully-- it's an absolute observation about communication. Context and interpretation are critical for anyone to communicate even the simplest idea.

Bad faith posters frequently jump on such questions with misinformation-- they take it as an opportunity to brag about how much they enjoy (for whatever idiosyncratic reason) a build without such-and-such a power.

This guide is for the rectification of such posters' attitudes, because they're not being useful.


"Necessary" not meaning "Only Possible"

When somebody asks "Is such-and-such power necessary," or "Do I need such-and-such a power," they are not asking:

• Is it possible to build a character without this power?
• Is it possible to enjoy a character without this power?

How do I know this?

Consider that there are only four powers on any given character that cannot be excluded from the build:

• Brawl
• Sprint
• Origin 'temporary' power. (Tranq dart, Taser, etc.)
• 1st-tier power from secondary powerset.

And nobody ever starts threads to ask if it's necessary to take one of these four powers. (75% of all such questions pertain to Hasten and Stamina).

People asking these kinds of questions are not confused as to whether they can in theory avoid choosing certain powers. They recognize that it's possible to put together even TERRIBLE builds-- which is something they're trying to AVOID, which is why they asked.

People sane enough to seek advice from others are also not confused about the fact that different people are prone to liking different things. They recognize it's possible for somebody to call fun a TERRIBLY un-fun build-- something trying to AVOID building, which is why they asked.

This is all rudimentary context that must be used when interpreting questions about what powers are necessary or needed.

Anyone who answers a question about whether such-and-such a power is necessary, as though they were answering the question "Is it theoretically possible to build a character without this power," is a Troll.

Anyone who answers the question as though they were answering "Does anyone out there have fun in the game without such-and-such a power," is a Troll.


What "Necessary" means in-context

People asking whether certain powers are necessary are asking their question in a community of relative experts because they're interested in an informed consensus opinion on how useful a power as far as two closely related goals go: making progress (experience-wise), and having fun.

Since "make progress and have fun" is the default assumed goal of every player-- you know, unless they say something otherwise, this is how all "necessary" and "needed" questions should be answered by anyone who is *not* a troll.

Simple rule: With re: to builds, "necessary" means "most effective/fun."


Build Choices: Not all powers are created equal

Across a to-40 build, there are far more powers to choose from than you can fit in a character's build. You can't take more than 20 out of the 52 possible (after primary, secondary not including inherent or prestige powers).

Not all powers are created equal for fun/progress; indeed some powers facilitate FAR more fun/progress than others.

Viewing the possibilities of a build from this PoV, at *least* 32 possible powers have to be excluded from the to-40 build.

At least a few of those exclusions can be made purely on the basis of style, and 20 will be excluded by the limitation of 4 power pools. But the better part of 12 powers will remain to be excluded by the player. Picking those 12, as well as the exclusion of the other 5-8 power pools, is where the "what's most fun/useful" comes in.

Under these circumstances, there *are* right and wrong answers to which of these powers and pools are at the top or bottom of a list in ranked on effectiveness/fun.

Hence, there are right and wrong answers to the question "Is such-and-such a power necessary," including many powers re: which the answer will be "yes."

Relative vs. Absolute

If you're still struggling with this concept, it may also be useful to remember this rule of thumb: People who like to have fun, like to have *more* fun.

IOW, people don't have an enjoyment cap. If a build choice will make their character more effective/fun, they *should* make that choice.


Traditional Form of Argument

The traditional form of this argument from good faith posters has always been:

"Well, you don't *need* anything, but you're going to be a lot happier with your character if you take such-and-such a power in this build."

That's what people asking the question wanted to know.

It is also sometimes legitimate to say:

"No, you can be as effective and have as much fun as you could hope to be, under this build, without that power, or so nearly so, the difference is negligible."

It's also legitimate to have a genuine difference of opinion with somebody in a thread:

"Pilcrow is a nutcase-- you should never take deceive; it steals XP, does no damage, and gets you killed instantly. Don't take it!"

It is NOT legitimate (at least, not without extensive explanation) to answer this question with remarks like:

"I have fun without the power."

"I can still do something, without the power."

"I can get 'the job' done without the power."

"You're stupid if you don't take that power."

"I would kick you if you didn't have that power."

Contemporary Form of Argument

From now on, feel free to Substitute:

"Yes, such-and-such a power is necessary in this build. (See also 'Guide to the word Necessary.')"

for the deprecated:

"Well, you don't *need* anything, but you're going to be a lot happier with your character if you take such-and-such a power in this build."

Nice guide. I've recently played an arch/dev blaster up to 37, and am loving it!

Something I've never known because I've never taken any foe-targeted -per powers; do they stack with stealths or not? That is, can I toe bomb smoke-grenaded badguys while running cloaking device? Not that I'd want to, but I'm curious.

I'm not sure I agree with you re: working on teams, at least on one point. It's probably not the maturity and "willingness to work with you," that will prevent teammates from letting you set the pace. I've honestly quit more teams over people who insist on wasting time doing things that are effective solo but ineffective on teams, than for any other reason, and mine-laying qualifies in about 80% of all team situations. I think as an arch/dev on a team, your job should be to deal maximum AoE damage, and eat up as little of your defenders' attention span as possible.

I'd be curious to hear if you have any opinions about leadership on arch/dev. I myself already took assault, and I'm actually considering tactics; I don't normally blast OR PvP, but I think among other things, it would be interesting to try out all that +per at once. Plus I'm at the point of being not *quite* happy with my accuracy overall, against +2s, w/ targeting drone + 1 Acc SO.

Thx again for the guide!

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If the devs ever put in say store bought jetpacks with a usage limitation rather than a timed limitation. Would that crossover too much into tech origin to utilize.

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Again, it's not so much a question of what's available per the game, but of what appears to be the norm. If there were any significant fraction of regular paragon residents evident on the streets operating jetpacks and flying cars, that's the point at which jetpacks would become off-the-shelf-ish for the purpose of knowing what fits a natural concept well.

ICF_Zombra

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I'd suggest rethinking the term "natural concept". If you could rewrite it without using the words "natural" or "origin" at all, a lot of idiocy could be avoided. ...disclaimer at the bottom, too, saying something like: "NOTE: While many Exceptional Human (or whatever) concepts work well with Co*'s Natural Origin, there is no direct relationship between the two...."

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Lord_Magnuss

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I disagree with the title of a "natural" concept character. ... it's really a natural HUMAN concept character. ...Superman is the obvious example.[1]

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I appreciate the desire to see confusion avoided, but the job I set for myself is to clarify a concept that belongs very properly to CoH. Avoiding what's passed for 'confusion' here (which is actually, ranting about paranoia-conjured criticisms that were never made, and clinging to a patently meaningless concept when there's a meaningful one at hand), is *at best* a distraction from that job.

The situation was already confused-- by the change in the definition of the origin. I can't take the blame for it being confusing, but I can present naturals clearly, which is what I've done here. There really aren't two ideas of reference, "natural origin [current definition]," and "natural concept [my definition]," because the former is devoid of menaing, to the point that objecting that it's an idea worthy of even a footnote is nonsense. It's completely flimsy and beneath discussion, except as a distraction.

Meanwhile, the term 'natural' applies quite well to natural concept characters as I've outlined them, and is extremely relevant (witness CoH's inception w/ an explicit natural concept definition for the natural origin). I simply emphasize its relevance by talking about the concept directly, since it's what the origin was and should be.

[1] And natural concepts are oriented to familiar modern humans, and never aliens or anything else, and this isn't something you can disagree with me about since it's not an invention of mine, it's just a highly intuitive component of the superhero genre (although you're certainly free to sneer at the tendency of authors to create characers we can identify with on certain levels.) This doesn't mean people who're from other planets can't be natural concept characters-- only that their exotic alien-ness can't be the explanation of their powers if we're calling them natural concept characters (another good example of this is the defunct but fantastic comic "Alien Legion."). Characters with exotic powers derived from their alienness are *obviously* alien concept characters, which is what Superman is. Superman in fact is one of the best possible examples of what a natural is *not*-- he has utterly transhuman powers in such abundance that it's hard to imagine what it would be like to be him or identify with him at all-- which is exactly what natural concepts are about. This bit has been discussed previously in the thread, but I didn't want you to think I'd missed points you were making in the post I quoted.

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Enantiodromos was not doing that, but also was noticably less polite about his phrasing.

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Your sense of 'polite' eludes me. I've certainly not threatened, used crass langauge, or argued ad hominem. I've very mildly expressed my irritation with people willfully and grossly misrepresenting what I said, and have refused to compromise with flat wrong views, but if either of those is where I fall short on politeness in your view, I fault your views re: politeness.


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Just for curiosity, where would you fit psionics in such a case?

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Psionic powers are a genre element that has all the usual hallmarks of non-ordinariness that magical abilities and mutant powers have. They fit most closely somewhere in that family of concepts. They're also widely recognized not to exist, and even where claims of their existence are made, the implication is always that one is dealing with someone of extra-ordinary gifts. It is *certainly* an exotic speculative fiction claim to suppose that everyone has them in any strong sense. Hence they're definitely inappropriate to a natural concept character. (Which is, again, not to say that characters with some of the appeal of a natural concept character can't have them, and not to say that there aren't ordinary human abilities that resemble them.)

NemoUtopia,

What's under discussion here is definitely not natural origins, though you persist in addressing them. As you point out, whether something is appropriate to that origin all depends on "how you see it." Which is why it can't mean anything at all, to say something is or isn't natural origin. Which is why this isn't a guide on that topic.


BTW, my heartfelt thanks to those of you who posted on page 7 and seemed to "get it." I don't mind being perpetually assailed by willful misunderstanding, but it's nice to know somebody understood.

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Of note: Daredevil could be a great Natural Concept character(depending on how the writers treat him). He has no fancy gadgets that can't be designed by any average mechanic, and his abilities are olympic level but not beyond human reach. If not for his radar sense(heightened senses similar to a radar sense would be /SR or /Ninjitsu) he would merely be a highly trained and determined human.

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Yeah, daredevil is a perplexing case. I'm sure the writers must be aware of the mileage they can get out of him by making him a highly sympathetic guy: blind guy with no superpowers who basically is just incredibly trained, and is "without fear."

And sometimes they seem to be playing to that-- indeed I get the impression, though I've never been a Daredevil afficionado, that there's often some question about the real nature of his senses. Of course, other times his senses are clearly portrayed as way superhuman, and he loses a touch of that appeal.

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He is actually *less* powerful than he would be on his home plane as a number of his inherent abilities don't function here.

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Interesting twist on the genre, that.

I had trouble following the initial statement of your view. I'm going to paraphrase it. If I'm wrong, sue me.

"The core of your misunderstanding, Enant, is that someone else interpreting your words in context as different from your intended meaning somehow invalidates it."

Now if you can explain what "it," is, I'll probably get your point. IOW, did you mean to say: interpretation can't invalidate meaning, or that meaning can't invalidate interpretation?

Not to get ahead of you, but in the mean time I note there's something you left out, besides meaning and interpretation. That is, what was actually said. What was said can absolutely invalidate interpretation.

This is true, BTW, even where we substitute art for words, and the issue becomes: are there some experiences of an artistic work that are flat out invalid? Yes, there absolutely are. Rolling up Magritte's "Ceci n'est pas une pipe" and trying to smoke it would be hilariously funny. It would even be funny and clever to contend that the the painting is a revelation that artistic representations *are* what they represent. But if what you got from that painting was a sober message: treat artistic representations as the things they are, you would NOT have a valid personal interpretation of the art painting. It would just mean you didn't get it (and let's defenestrate some po-mo art critics while we're at it).