Oedipus_Tex

I don't believe in "top tier" sets. With the exception of Gravity, they are all very workable. I used to be more skeptical about Ice Control, but after seeing what alpha slots have done for slotting options, even that set has entered the top ranks.


Ok, but do you also feel compelled to inform Dark Armor Scrappers that they should play Tankers instead because the guy who soloed +4x8 Carnies proved that the set was "better" on them? The claim that any particular Controller or Dominator set is a poor choice because it's good on the other archetype hinges on a false notion: that Controllers and Dominators replace each other. They don't. Controllers are a buff/debuff AT. Some of them are good soloists. Most are just okay. The criteria you are using to reject Mind Control as a workable set would invalidate all but about 10 combos of Controllers.

I also disagree with you about the difference between Fire Control and Fire Domination. There is an absolutely huge difference. Same thing with Ice Control. And Plant. And all of the sets except maybe Gravity. Once you can leap into a group of enemies with no preparation whatsoever and reasonably expect to mezz all the bosses and survive their counter mezzes, the world completely changes. My Ice Dominator recently soloed the entire platform full of Rikti surrounding the Honoree during the LGTF in less than 10 minutes while the other 7 members of my team were off at the other end of the platform. Do you think this is something the average Ice Controller does with regularity?

Heck, here's a picture of why no one should ever play Ice Control on a Controller again for those who are inclined to such things:




Illusion Control would be mind bogglingly overpowered on Dominators. Even so, it wouldn't make Controllers irrelevant, because Dominators are not Controllers. To be blunt about it, most of the time when the team starts running out of space, the Controller gets the invite and the Dominator gets left out. Because as great as the Dominator is, they are not a support AT.

And Seeds of Confusion recharges faster than both and is twice as good as Flashfire. I guess all sets that aren't Plant suck, even if they aren't remotely comparable in any fashion, and have access to the strongest single target mezz in the game, and are the only Control set that breaks the rules about mezzing a boss in one shot.


This is true of ALL Dominators. Fire Dominators have mezz protection to keep Hot Feet running. OMG that means Fire Controllers
will never shine outside farms, what to do, what to do. :P

P.S. Can we please resurrect the "Mass Confusion sucks because Seeds of Confusion exists" threads? I've missed watching people fail that hard.

The characters I bring generally ARE IOed. Just not capped to slash/lethal specifically, because outside of this encounter and a few others, ranged defense is often more important to me. My Ice/Fire Dominator and Ice/Rad Controller usually survive due to a combination of Ice Slick, Glacier, Choking Cloud, Shiver, and other powers. Little of that helps them here. In fact, freezing enemies in place is often counterproductive during the BM fight (not so on the mission prior). Arctic Air and Ice Slick tend to obscure visibility of the halberds, so I keep them off even if they would help.

The Ice/Rad/Psi Controller is an interesting case study. In order to prevent BM from sunbathing in a damage patch, he has to avoid using holds and immobs. At this point, the character is basically using Psi Blast at half damage due to lack of Containment, Radiation Infection which is over 90% resisted, and the heal and buff aura on whoever I can manage to stand next to long enough to hit, while running away from any swords that take interest in him. Lingering Radiation can be used every 30 seconds or so to debuff regen (thankfully she resists most of the -run speed), and Enervating Field reduces her attack strength and debuffs her resistance by 2% more than a Tanker's Bruising ability. If he does get cornered by swords, he can survive approximately three strikes before dying.

My Ice/Fire/Fire Dominator meanwhile is more lucky. He has more attacks he can use. His best one has a 40ft range (48 ft or so alpha slotted and IOed as he is now). This means edging close to BM for much of the fight. Like the Ice/Rad he is capped to Ranged defense, but its not that useful here. Flying shortens the range on Blaze too much to really increase survivability; I'd basically have to fly right into a patch. The power that turns out to be the most important though is Rise of the Phoenix. That's because it lets me play a bit crazier. As long as RotP is recharged, I can take big risks. Sometimes the entire team wipes, including me, but I am the first one back because I can resurrect and move out of a patch before it can get me.



I think its obvious in itself that an IOed character would be more effective than one with identical power picks who is not IOed. If we are saying armored characters are made obsolete because squishy characters can use IOs, then we have to consider what IOs can do for the armored characters too. I think all of us are in agreement that a Corruptor with capped S/L defense is an end-state character. If we're going to say that he makes other characters ineffective, we have to consider the best other characters have to offer in their end states too. This is no different than why you can't compare an IOed Scrapper to an SOed Tanker and conclude Tankers are not useful.

Thanks, it helps to try to write things when I'm avoiding doing laundry. Thanks for the corrections. I actually never realized that the AoE immobs had a 50% overpower chance. There's actually a kind of pattern with that I never knew about til now: with the exception of Illusion, the Controller version of all Control sets features one AoE with a 50% overpower chance, and one single target that will nab a boss in one shot.

I didn't add the info about containment or psuedopets since people reading this thread can just read your note about it here. Thanks for clarifying that though. Overpower and Domination are actually weird across many of the sets; its not just psuedopets that don't get Overpower or Dominate procs, but auras (Arctic Air) or chain powers (Synaptic Overload, except on first target) as well.

One particular point I wanted to drive home is just because Mind Control gets the word "Domination" on the screen a lot doesn't mean it benefits from Domination mode that much more than other sets. Ice or Fire Control with built in mezz protection is pretty sick. And Plant Control with a cone confuse that nabs bosses instantly is pretty much cheat mode.

Depends on the blast set. For many/most of them, the Tier 3 blast has a base range of 40ft. I'm not sure what the radius of the halberd sphere is, but the graphic appears to put it at about 25ft (about the same as Dispersion Bubble). Assuming you're not hovering directly over Battle Maiden, and triangulating a distance based on an assumption that you're about 10-15ft away on the x,y grid after moving, you either end up with a vertical height z close enough to catch people on the ground (particularly jumpers) or taking the same penalty meleers have by being forced out of range for your best attacks. Not incidentally, this is the same penalty that "marginalizes" melees. If you could safely park yourself at a safe height and stay there it would be a bit different, but you will be forced to move around.

[EDIT: Meant to add the other advantage of avoiding hover: if you stay on the ground, the blast radius of any halberd attacks takes up 50% less room on the map, as half of the sphere is "absorbed" by the terrain.]

Not that "melee" is a necessarily a useful category. Blasters and Dominators lose a significant portion of damage whenever they are forced back out of melee range. Meanwhile a Scrapper's or Stalkers ranged blasts are extremely powerful. Compared to the Dominator version, Fire Blast on a Scrapper recharges 2 seconds faster and does 42 base damage more, with a chance to crit for double damage.

And of course all of this assumes blasting is even a good idea. Since this particular discussion focused on ways meleers are disadvantaged, we skipped over the discussion about Controller damage during this fight, which is cut in half whenever the enemy isn't contained. Meanwhile the swords are immune to stun, confuse, sleep, hold, fear, repel and knockback--immob works, but you have to use it far away from BM. I'd rather not rehash that if we don't have to, but if you are interested in reading about it, it's somewhere in the middle of the pile about how this encounter makes Masterminds, Dominators, Defenders, Tankers, Stalkers, Kheldians, and Blasters useless.

Before I reply I want to make it clear that even though I disagree with you, it's not personal. I enjoy debating these points. Thank you for keeping this discussion civil.

As to your point, you are basically still saying you are tanking without saying it. Statements like "the swords simply chase you around the map" dismiss the fact that its the swords chasing you around the map that makes being a squishy dangerous during this fight. The swords and minions are deadly to my squishy characters. You make it sound like no one should ever die to them, yet I do. And I cannot hover blast them because hover causes the halberds to spawn in mid air and take out teammates who are unable to see them.

You are presenting your case basically as if no squishy character has to worry about damage, because some small few of them might be soft capped to slash/lethal, and/or it's so easy to kite that you can do it and maintain 100% DPS on the AV. Or, you are presenting it as if because you have two characters with capped defenses, melee is no longer desirable because a squishy character can just do it all (otherwise known as "Controller syndrome": "OMG Fire Controllers can farm and Illusion Controllers can solo GMs, ALL Controllers are damage-monster-farmer-tankers!") Aracana's point about ranged characters applies here; if squishies are able to tank-except-not-using-the-word-tank the entire map, the problem isn't this encounter but that squishies are so overpowered that nothing can challenge them. That's a claim about the larger game that I find impossible to accept.

In any case I do not know where you get the idea that everyone should expect to fight at 100% capacity in every AV fight. I would sort of like my Controllers and Defenders mezzes and debuffs to be at 100% effectiveness. That doesn't happen, in this AV fight, or any AV fight.

So, you're back to saying you're tanking, but without saying it, but only as long as nobody attacks the stuff you pulled? How exactly do you defeat the required waves of Battle Maiden's allies doing this? That's a 100% reduction in DPS for squishies--let's get started about how they're marginalized.

The issue is not me "not getting it." The issue is you are overstating your case, and wavering on what it is you are overstating.

I think the argument is really that meleers are so used to their armor that they take survival for granted. Meleers for the most part have one target to worry about during the BM fight. Not so for anyone else. Even just trying to keep shields and buffs on people is difficult as they bounce around, die unexpectedly, and the swords/warriors chase you around. Three hits from a warrior will bring down any of my squishies and has a fair chance to stun them. And if I don't die, if the other squishies on my team do, that's a significant loss of DPS too. It is not the bed of rose petals its being portrayed as by some posters (not you). And that's why every single AT has had its turn to complain that it is uniquely difficult to contribute on this Task Force. My Ice/Rad can't even use more than 3 or 4 powers for fear of slowing BM, immobing her, holding her, or my slick/aura being mistaken for a blue patch.

But you know who isn't marginalized? People with a self rezz. Rise of the Phoenix rocks this fight.

I'm not trying to be rude either, but it seems to me that what you are going to great lengths to demonstrate is that "Sometimes enemies attack you." IMO this is not helping your argument. Unless what you are trying to argue is that "...and every one who gets attacked has armor equivalent toa melee." Because it is the fact that enemies do attack you that makes not having armor relevant. In essence, you are demonstrating the point you are trying to refute: without intervention via taunt, enemies will attack people who may not be built for it. You said yourself that you are not able to hold aggro. Unless you arguing everyone has the same armor you do, this weakens rather than strengthens your point.

BTW there is nothing special about Radiation debuff toggles that makes enemies come after you any more than other powers. What will cause this is if the toggle is running and enemies enter its range without being engaged by someone else. In any case, the fact that powers sometimes make enemies attack you is not surprising and in fact is the basis of Taunt existing to prevent it from happening.

I'm going to call your bluff. Unless your characters have a Taunt of some kind (maybe Fortunatas do and I don't know about it, but Corruptors surely don't) what you were doing is not "tanking." Nor is being soft capped comparable to the survivability an equally IOed melee. The facts of the Battle Maiden fight are that everyone is at a disadvantage in some way. But if you think s/l softcapped Corruptors somehow able to spit out so much DPS that no one can pull aggro off of them are the standard for squishy characters, I can see how you would be upset.

P.S. You also won't hear an argument from me that VEATs are a well balanced class.

Because every "melee AT" has a ranged blast available to them in their epics. If they chose not to take it because it "wasn't useful" I guess they turned out to be wrong. My Scrapper with the Fire APP has no problems whatsoever. And that useless Rise of the Phoenix power even if gives her a significant advantage.

Hilarious post. This part made me especially LOL.

Changed your statement slightly so everyone else can use it as a template. Don't mean to be rude, but can't help but notice that someone has now claimed every single type of character is marginalized by this encounter, from Controllers and Dominators ("I can't mezz the swords?") to Blasters ("I'm being chased by enemies with mezzes?") to melees, to, probably Gravity/Empathy/Ice Controllers with two travel powers, no Hasten, and their aura colored blue. It is quite the interesting encounter that manages to make everyone "marginalized."

I disagree. IMO the problem is that legacy content was not designed with every AT in mind. It was too predictable. And still is, somewhat, but only because we are still using the same template for AVs that was designed so many years ago.

Here is the historical problem in a nutshell: past AVs have been so uniform in their strengths and vulnerabilities that some powerset combos were able to rise above others, not because they were literally more powerful, but because they responded well to the very limited variety of situations the game had to offer. The fact that there is a "formula" for an "AV killer" should have raised alarms. It's ok for some sets to be generally better at it than others, but if this gets too extreme, and AVs are the only significant barrier to success in Task Forces, it puts a great amount of pressure on powersets to perform or be thrown into the "suck" pile. To rephrase this another way: what other video game do you know where every end boss is as predictable as they are in City of Heroes?*

The shorter version is: There is balance in variety. If there there is no variety, some sets rise to the top as "the best." Changing things around keeps powersets useful for two different but related reasons. 1) It allows some powers to be more useful or less useful in a given real encounter. 2) It stirs up doubt about any particular future encounter yet to be released, and doubt is almost as good as reality in creating need. Didn't need -Recharge this time? Well, maybe next time. But this doesn't happen if every boss is basically just immune to it, and yet never immune to some other debuffs.

Point 2 is the part that min/maxers don't like. They want to be on top all the time. They are missing the point. The point of having thousands of power combinations is none of them are the "best." If any of them do become that way, THAT is what needs to be fixed, not the restoration of the previously favored set to its higher than normal value status.

[*Side Note: Part of this stems from a necessary predictability of Defense values. This game does something that almost no other does: it varies the nature of armor across characters instead of relying almost entirely on either Resistance (as almost all competing MMOs do) or Defense (as table top games like D&D do). In addition it features the longstanding, and at this point more or less unfixable, design flaw that makes 45% defense twice as good as 40%. So the Defense stat as a whole is pretty well locked in.]

I agree with you about Doms still being good on teams. Both are fantastic on teams really, for somewhat different reasons.


Mind Controllers have "good enough" mezz to take care of most enemies. Unlike most Controllers, they get a Tier 2 damage blast in their primary set (Levitate). They are the only Controller primary that can sleep a boss in one shot with 100% odds (Mesmerize). They can also "juggle" bosses by using a mezz > Levitate > mezz pattern. They have less reliable ability to hit whole groups quickly, but they are the only Controller who can AoE discreetly, allowing them to set up the fight before it begins.

A Mind Controller is also a multiplier. Most of his or her buffs and debuffs affect the whole team. Put 8 Mind Dominators together and you have 8 Mind Dominators. Put 8 Mind Controllers together and you have 64, as each buffs the others, and the team eventually becomes indestructable from the powers stacking. The Controller's buff abilities also extend to him or herself; powers that provide personal defense and resistance have higher values on a Controller, so they are easier to soft cap and armor up. Plus, some of them have outright self heals that Dominators lack outside of one power set (Psi Assault).



Mind Dominators have incredibly powerful mezzes when in Domination mode. Like all Dominators, they have better base damage than Controllers. Most receive a very powerful Tier 3 single target attack that Controllers do not get. Domination provides them with bursts of endurance and mezz protection. Typically, they are much more able to charge into a battle without planning for it. Mind Dominators specifically can Hold or Confuse elite bosses and some AVs that Mind Controllers (more properly most Controllers) would not be able to. They can also sleep groups of AVs, which is a tactic sometimes used during one specific villain Strike Force. Mind Dominators are also freed from the worry of Containment, and able to blast more or less at will.

While Dominators typically do not stack as well as Controllers do, extra damage is never a problem. They can easily fill in for a Blaster on a team that lacks them (the real AT that ought to be concerned about Doms, IMO, not Trollers), but unlike a Controller, cannot fill in for Defenders or Corruptors. The Domination power itself varies in terms of which powers it affects, but make no mistake that ALL powersets benefit tremendously from it, not just Mind, even if they don't throw the word Domination on the screen to remind you. Ice, Fire, and Elec get mezz protection that is very useful to these sets. Earth, Fire, and Plant gets mag 6 mezz in their every-spawn Confusion and Stun powers that recharge much faster than any hard mezz available in Mind. Gravity, unfortunately, is neither a particular stand out for either Controllers or Dominators.

[EDIT: Corrections made based on user comments.]


Glad that was helpful. Here is a more specific breakdown. It may be information overload, but it may help you understand more about how these powers work.:



Containment is a Controller's ability to do double damage. You can do this with most attacks against an enemy that is Slept, Held, Stunned, or Immobilized. Without Containment, most Controller attacks are not very damaging (I think actually the lowest damage in the game). With it, you essentially get the equivalent of a Critical Hit every attack. Bonus damage, -Resistance, and anything else that increase your attack strength also increase this damage, but damage procs do not.

Note that even with Containment you are not necessarily doing huge amounts of damage (tho a small few Controller combos can). That's mainly because you don't usually get a whole lot of AoEs to throw at enemies. But the damage per attack is pretty decent. So you can buff, debuff, attack, buff, debuff, attack, and put out better numbers than you'd expect, because each attack is basically doing twice what it normally would, and even the buffs and debuffs are doubled.

Mind Control traditionally has some trouble establishing Containment, where Fire Control traditionally does not. That's because Mind lacks easy access to an immobilize power. Mind relies a lot on Sleep powers instead, which means Containment breaks on the second hit. (The second hit and not the first, because if you are in the know, you queue two attacks back to back, and get Containment for both, even tho the first one technically breaks the sleep). The two main places this will affect you are when using AoEs and when fighting AVs (who typically lack immobilize protection).

However, what you also need to know about Containment is that cage powers, of themselves, are not that great. They could be a lot worse, but essentially for most Control sets they take the place of what would be a very effective pet (in the case of Illusion) or an extra AoE control (in the case of Mind). So while Mind (and Illusion) both lack the immobilize powers, they pick up powers that shut enemies down. Which is "better" depends completely on the situation.

To make things even more complicated, you benefit from Containment even if you are not the one who sets it. If you're a Mind Controller on a team and someone throws out cages, you actually do more damage per available tier of attack than a Dominator. And, depending on what your secondary is, possibly even MUCH more damage, due to your ability to buff your damage, debuff enemy resistance. The only thing is that, again, you are unlikely to have that many attacks at your disposal like the Dominator does, and definitely will not have a heavy hitting Tier 3 single target blast that many Dom sets get at level 38. Hopefully you are starting to see why this topic is so complicated.



Overpower is a Controller's ability to get extra "free" magnitude on a power. Most standard mezzes are Mag 3. On most powers Controllers then get a 20% chance for an additional Mag 1 mezz to be layered on top of this. The reason you need to understand this is that bosses have Mag 3 protection. Mag 3 protection versus Mag 3 mezz means the mezz doesn't land (it doesn't vanish tho--it's still there, and can be stacked with other powers/a recast of the same power). If you roll the 20% chance, you mezz the boss on the first cast. If you've ever worked with a "Chance to Hold" proc, the idea is basically the same.

Most of the mezzes in Fire Control are Mag 3 with a 20% overpower chance. Exceptions are Ring of Fire (mag 4, 20% Overpower chance) and Fire Cages (mag 3, 50% Overpower chance).

In Mind Control, most mezzes are also Mag 3 with a 20% overpower chance. However, Mesmerize is Mag 3.5. This will sleep a standard boss in one shot, and even some Elite Bosses and AVs. Mass Hypnosis, meanwhile, is Mag 3 with a 50% Overpower chance. This will sleep bosses on the first shot 50% of the time. Moreover, it's also aggro-free, so if you have not yet attacked the group and need to do it, you can wait for the power to recharge and cast again. At high levels a basic build would have the power at about a 22 second recharge, power builds at around 12 or 13.

There is something very important about Overpower you should understand. The Overpower mezz has a shorter duration than the "main" mag 3 mezz. So if you throw an AoE at a group, and the boss gets Overpowered, if you watch and wait for them to break out of the mezz, you will see the boss break out first, followed by the others sometime later. That's because the Overpower mezz faded prior to the main one, and with them no longer stacking above Mag 3 protection, the boss is now protected.

Unlike Domination, Overpower is completely random. You have no control over when it happens.



Domination is a power available to Dominators that adds a 100% chance to proc a Mag 3 mezz to many (but not all) control powers. Unlike Overpower, Domination is an actual click power that you activate when ready to use it. However, before you can click it, you need to build up your "Domination bar" by using attacks. Domination lasts for 90 seconds each time it is clicked.

Domination also a few other perks. Activating it instantly refills your endurance bar, and gives you mezz protection for the duration its active.

Most Control sets can Dominate in their main powers, and 1 or 2 of their "mainline" control AoEs. In contrast Mind Control can Dominate in almost all of its powers. Whether this is as good as it sounds is debatable. All of the Dominator Control sets get huge advantages while in Dominator mode, even if they aren't immediately obvious. Fire, Electric, and Ice, for example, all get much needed mezz protection to run their PBAoE toggles unmolested. And any Dominator can one-shot hold a standard boss while in Domination mode.

In any case, Mind Dominators are able to use Domination to stack confusion and sleep on archvillains without drawing their aggro. This can be very effective, even if its also somewhat unnecessary outside of some very specific end game content. The technique also does not appear to be particularly valuable in the newer Task Forces and upcoming raids. But if soloing is your gig, it may be better for you.

Note that the in-game description of Domination claims it also "doubles the duration of most of your mezzes." This is not exactly correct. What it actually does is mimic Overpower, except with a 100% chance to proc a mag 3 mezz that is 50% longer than (rather than slightly shorter than) the main mezz. This basically means that like with Overpower, Dominated bosses will break out of the mezz faster than lieutenants and minions. The way it works out is that the bosses break out of the power at about the same time minions and lts would have if the cast had been made without Domination active.



A perma-dom is a Dominator with a lot of global recharge bonuses, which allow him or her to "stack" Domination on itself. When you have enough recharge to do this, it means you are able to more less permanently stay in Domination mode most of the time. Basically, what happens is your Domination icon becomes active again when you are still running the previous Domination cycle. You are able to click it and instantly refill your endurance bar and reset the timer on Domination. In other words, perma-doms do not have to refill their Domination bar by attacking, it just stays at full and you get the benefits long term.

However, perma-Dom is kind of a misnomer. You have to be vigilant enough to click the power every time it recharges. If you forget, and the previous cast expires, your bar crashes insantly to zero again and you have to rebuild it up again by attacking. You also lose your Dom bar if you die. You CAN maintain it outside of missions, but you have to remember to click the power constantly to keep resetting the cycle. At a minimum this is one click every minute and a half, but thats cutting it close. Remember: one missed click and it drops on you. (It has a special way of liking to do just after you aggro hordes of Rikti psi mages. ) This is also why enemies with -Recharge powers are the absolute bane of the Dominator AT.

If your Dom bar does crash, all of your mezzes are mezz 3, and you have no extra mezz protection until you rebuild the bar, the power recharges, and you click the power again. It rebuilds very fast on full teams (after about 10 attacks) and quite a bit more slowly solo. A perma-dom on a full team can usually pop 10 attacks and hit Domination immediately, where a non-perma or someone debuffed out of perma may find himself with a refilled bar but the power not yet being recharged enough to click.

As you level up, you will spend a good bit of time in the un-dom state, because perma-doms are very unusual prior to level 50. Even though Domination is a power, you cannot slot it directly. Only global bonuses from IOs or powers (e.g. Hasten) affect it. Characters who will never see IOs will never be perma-doms, so comparisons between Controllers and Dominators are that much more sticky. The good news that both ATs are awesome in their own right.