je_saist

First: the subscribers weren't driven away Nox.

The actual charts from NCSoft's financial reports are floating around on the forums somewhere. In terms of consistent subscribers, nothing changed.

Second:

... okay... I'm honestly not sure where to begin.

The game is deliberately designed so that some archtypes are intentionally weak to mez affects, and mez protection is almost next to non-existent in the available IO sets. IO sets, as a general rule, allow you to only decrease the duration of the amount of time a status effect is accurate. Outside of the Aegis and Impervious Skin enhancement procs, most of the IO set bonus's are in single digit small percentages.

There is, in effect, no way to use IO's to build up a meaningful amount of protection against effects other than Knockback.

The controllers Indomitable Will in the Psionic Mastery Set is essentially the only Mez protection Controllers can get. For reasons of balance the developers have also indicated that they are against changing Indomitable Will to act like a breakfree...

So, A, well, sorry, isn't really happening.

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B: can happen if you work some procs. There are procs within the pet damage set that allow you to increase your pets resistances.

Sovereign Right from the Pet Damage set offers a 10% resist to all damage but Psionics in a 40' radius.

Expedient Reinforcements from the Recharge Intensive Pet set offers a 10% resist to all damage but Psionics in a 20' radius.

Call to Arms from the Recharge intensive Pet set offers a 5% bonus to defense in a 20' radius.

However, once again, you'll run into game design issues.

Controller pets, such as Animate Stone from Stone Control and Singularity from gravity control have generally higher resistance levels to a wide range of attacks. Jack Frost from Ice Control lacks typical resistances, but instead offers a significant amount of mez protection against sleep, stuns, and slows. Phantasm from Illusion also lacks typical resistances, and even suffers from a weakness to negative energy, but can summon the Decoy Phantasm which can't be hurt. All of these pets also have multiple attacks.

Fire Imps really don't offer any of these advantages. They have a 40% base resist to fire which ignores buffs and enhancements, lack any mez protection, and have one attack each.

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This is where we get into the big problem with your chosen powers.

You do not have Increase Density.

ID is a Class Defining Power. Respec, and take it.

ID will allow you to give your pets around 27% resistance to smashing / energy damage when slotted for resistance. ID will also give your pets protection from stun, immobilize, hold, and knockback. Not much you can do about sleeps, but oh well.

If you want to increase your pets toughness, this is the way to go about it.

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Second, now for your overall build.

Speedboost? One Slot? Run?

... ... respec. put 6 slots in it. Efficacy Adapter, full set.

Also, drop the fighting pool. Here's a key fact about Kinetics that isn't really taught much these days.

it's not for you. It's for your team. One of my biggest problems with the fire control / kinetics combination is that they are both really busy sets. In order to be effective as a kin, you need to lay on the SB, ID, Transfusion, transference, Siphon Power, and Fulcrum Shift on a near constant basis. In order to be effective as a controller, you have to keep an eye on where enemies are, locking those enemies down (with holds or immobilizes), and watch your endurance. Throwing Fire Cages on Auto is just asking for your endurance to go bai bai.

One of the big misunderstandings about Fulcrum Shift is that the Caster does not actually have to be inside a mob for Fulcrum Shift to count. Fulcrum Shift is designed so that a kinetics can sit outside a mob while the tanks / scrappers / brutes run in, and then boost the melee('s) damage rates to maximum percentage.

The design is supposed to be such that if you, as a controller, defender, or corruptor, get into melee range to take advantage of your own fulcrum shift, you are supposed to go splat.

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This does raise the question then: why on earth do players use controllers to farm? Well, fire / kins, while they are lousy for teams, do have a couple of strong advantages. Fire has a strong -to-hit debuff in smoke, and a strong stun in Flashfire. Enough recharge, and flashfire can be up for pretty much everymob... giving a fire controller's imps enough time to get into melee range and go to town.

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Now, whether or not this helps how you play, I really can't answer. If you like to team, you just... well, no way around it, don't have a good teaming controller combination. I don't know what your overall intended IO goal is, be it recharge, defense, accuracy, or whatever...

I can tell you that you are going to have to get used to re-summoning your imps on a regular basis, and get used to the idea of earning the I've been mezzed badges very quickly.

what I don't get is this expectation from the player base that the developers are somehow going to implement a major change to the game without plastering it on www.cityofheroes.com or the CoH loading screen... you know... like they've done with every-single expansion / update to-date.

... and I thought Power_NA did bad suggestions. I'm not even sure if there's a logical place to start with why this is a bad idea.

... this joke reminds me a lot of that Epic Bard class for WoW a couple years back.

I'd play it!