Salt Crystals
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Salt Crystals
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It's sad but I would agree...I think it's sad because I really like the animation for the power (or the graphics for the power on the enemies 
).
Leader of The LEGION/Fallen LEGION on the Liberty server!
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agreed on Salt Crystals, it is however a nice power for a cheap purple recipe set if you have no other powers you want.
Oh.. and does stalagmites work like flashfire?
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Oh.. and does stalagmites work like flashfire?
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yeah, and it lowers defense.
Salt crystals can take some nice sets (purp or Call of sandman), but too many other good things to get..
perma jump is ---> /up 1
see and i was having issues if i wanted salt crystals since i have never seen the animations at all for it. I didnt take quicksand but i have a rad secondary and choking cloud,volcanic gasses and earthquake make for a killing field for my stoney
Take a look at my Earth/Rad guide for all the information you might need on the Earth set.
Skippable powers: Salt Crystals looks cool, but you generally won't need a PB AoE sleep power in a set of ranged controls.
Stone Prison: If you expect to solo (which I don't recommend), Stone Prison can be used as a damage power. Late in the game, it can be used to immobilize bosses and even AVs . . . but it is the second most skippable power in the set.
Stalagmites and Stone Cages can be used the same way as Flashfire-Fire Cages. It is one of your three AoE control options. The other two are Earthquake and Volcanic Gasses. Quicksand should be used underneath all three -- it has a massive (25%) defense debuff and acts as a back-up control for any foes who might not be caught by the other AoE controls.
Depending on the foe you are up against, it may be that Stalagmites-Stone Cages is the best opening move, or it may be that you should open with Earthquake or (after level 26) Volcanic Gasses. Remember that EQ and VG both take a few seconds to take effect on all the foes, so you need to take into account that you may get some return fire -- prepare to hide around a corner or wait until a tank teammate has the aggro. Some of this varies with your secondary.
LOCAL MAN! The most famous hero of all. There are more newspaper stories about me than anyone else. "Local Man wins Medal of Honor." "Local Man opens Animal Shelter." "Local Man Charged with..." (Um, forget about that one.)
Guide Links: Earth/Rad Guide, Illusion/Rad Guide, Electric Control
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see and i was having issues if i wanted salt crystals since i have never seen the animations at all for it. I didnt take quicksand but i have a rad secondary and choking cloud,volcanic gasses and earthquake make for a killing field for my stoney
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As I said, take a look at my guide. Quicksand is a great power for an Earth/Rad -- Choking Cloud isn't. You don't need to be in melee with a PB AoE Hold that hits only part of the time. (I love Choking Cloud on my Fire/Rad, but only because he has Hot Feet -- Earth doen't have the other powers to make Choking Cloud all that effective, and you have other, better AoE control options.)
As an Earth/Rad, you can be a very effective AoE controller starting at level 6. My guide has a lot of strategy discussions describing how.
LOCAL MAN! The most famous hero of all. There are more newspaper stories about me than anyone else. "Local Man wins Medal of Honor." "Local Man opens Animal Shelter." "Local Man Charged with..." (Um, forget about that one.)
Guide Links: Earth/Rad Guide, Illusion/Rad Guide, Electric Control
I agree with most everyone here. Salt Crystals is the dog of the set. Definately check out Local_Man's guide.
Oook! Incredible guide Local_Man! The best I've seen yet. I wish I had seen it waaaay earlier. It gave me alot of insight for my Earth/Kin & Fire/Rad. Especially with your explainations on each power & thier Status Effects. I might actually make an Earth/Rad now.
I agree with the Salt Crystals. The AOE Immob can also be skipped depending on your secondary and play style. Some secondaries the AOE immob is a great power and really helps contain people.
Now before people come after me, let me explain why it "MAY" be skippable.
First Earthquake. The -KB from the AOE kills the KD from earthquake. If your secondary has a similar power (Say Oil Slick) It messes with that as well. So that is 2 powers that will not mesh with the AOE Immob.
Now you could not skip it and just not cast it. However I find that most people who take their AOE immob spam it like mad. No matter what is going on or caring for the side effects.
Note, I'm not saying you should skip it. I am just saying you could and never miss it depending on your secondary power set.
I took it on my Earth/Therm but not my Earth/Trick arrow.
That being said, there are some neat tricks that I have learned and read about with the AOE immobs that can be pretty impressive. Like slotting Range, and Damage Procs. To hit mobs that are far enough away that they can not return fire.
Personally I do not think that any other power in Earth is really skippable.
I happen to like choking cloud on an ea/rad personally due to the 2 hold mag procs in the newer hold set.
Between gasses and cloud and all the hold proccing going on within them it's pretty easy to disable everything all the time. I also like being at melee range so I can keep popping AM without bugging everyone to assemble. (and I like using air sup a lot)
The only one I skip is Salt Crystals. I tend to solo a fair bit, and without Stone Prison that's much harder. Also Stone Prison lets you pick and choose who to set containment on while the mobs are flopping on your earthquake, where Stone Cages often won't be what you wanted.
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Oh.. and does stalagmites work like flashfire?
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One difference is that you have to be on the ground to use Stalagmites.
As for the original question; I'll agree that Salt Crystals and Stone Prison are skippable. Though the latter does have its uses.
Kosmos
Global: @Calorie
MA Arcs in 4-star purgatory: Four in a Row (#2198) - Hostile Takeover (#69714) - Red Harvest (#268305)
I also think the activation time for Stalagmites is much faster.
Salt crystals are skippable for sure.
You don't need the single-target immobilize. A pool melee attack is a better damage option if you need damage, and can also double as a travel starter if you want, although you probably want hasten anyway.
You don't need the AoE immobilize but it's useful as an immobilize or for containment sometimes. I think it still has -fly? It's always skippable, and definately should be skipped if your secondary is something like Storm. Stalagmites is up often enough to give AoE containment for epic pools.
For some secondaries you don't need quicksand -- quicksand gives movement slow and -def. Radiation, for example, has slow and -def already, as side effects of better powers, so quicksand would be totally redundant. Storm is another secondary where you don't want quicksand, because Snow Storm and Freezing Rain do the job and also have other effects. Anything else, you probably want it.
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I also think the activation time for Stalagmites is much faster.
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Flashfire 2.37s, Stalagmites 2.1s. So only a little faster (0.27s nominal, 0.264s ArcanaTime).
Interestingly, Stalagmites only costs 10.4 END versus Flashfire's 15.6 END.
Kosmos
Global: @Calorie
MA Arcs in 4-star purgatory: Four in a Row (#2198) - Hostile Takeover (#69714) - Red Harvest (#268305)
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Salt crystals are skippable for sure.
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Someone told me once that about the only thing this was good for was fighting the nictus' in the ITF. Never tried it, but i was told they are susceptible to sleeps.
We don' need no stinkin' signatures!
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I also think the activation time for Stalagmites is much faster.
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Flashfire 2.37s, Stalagmites 2.1s. So only a little faster (0.27s nominal, 0.264s ArcanaTime).
Interestingly, Stalagmites only costs 10.4 END versus Flashfire's 15.6 END.
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Wow, I'm surprised at that actually, it feels like it's a lot faster than that to me at least.
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Flashfire 2.37s, Stalagmites 2.1s. So only a little faster (0.27s nominal, 0.264s ArcanaTime).
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I think that Flashfire notifies of the attack prior to triggering the stun, while Stalagmites doesn't. I could be wrong about this but its what seems to happen with my Controllers. Could just be that my Earth/Storm always has Steamy Mists up, tho.
The only thing I'd agree with skipping is salt crystals. The rest are just far too useful.
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The only thing I'd agree with skipping is salt crystals. The rest are just far too useful.
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On a team-oriented Earth controller, Stone Prison is also skippable. It has its uses, but if you are AoE and team oriented, then the single target immobilize is the next most skippable power.
LOCAL MAN! The most famous hero of all. There are more newspaper stories about me than anyone else. "Local Man wins Medal of Honor." "Local Man opens Animal Shelter." "Local Man Charged with..." (Um, forget about that one.)
Guide Links: Earth/Rad Guide, Illusion/Rad Guide, Electric Control
I skip the immobilizes in earth mainly because of the graphics. They're just too crowded for me trying to be at melee range.
Gotta disagree on the Salt Crystals. Salt Crystals and Stalagmites are a one-two punch that gives you tons of time to beat mobs down at your own pace.
If you like teleport or invisibility then get into a mob and slam them with salt crystals. Learn how long the crystals last for your particular level and enhancements and start counting. Find a member of the mob the crystals missed and lock him down with stone cage and then immobilize. If you got the whole mob, lead with immobilize (double damage cause he's sleeping and you're a troller). You should have the first one or two down when you reach your number. Stalagmite now! Let the rest do the drunken stun dance while you finish off number three and four. Anybody left? It's a free-for-all now, Quicksand, Earthquake, Gas, or start using your secondary powers. Works even better if you take Boxing or Kick (since when you box sleeping, held, stunned, etc. you also do double damage). Don't fear taking a melee power with an earth controller squishy. Two reasons: 1) Stoney is very protective about bad guys poking you. 2) You can now take Tough and/or Weave (and/or get the Rock Armor epic) giving you a good chance of surviving in a high threat zone long enough to lock down your immediate area and get out of there. Salt crystals do suck on teams where a Tank or Scrapper has a damaging PBAOE attack toggled or on autofire - but then so do all Sleep powers.
Oh yeah, once you have Stoney, let him take the lead in which sleeping opponent to clobber first, he's very bad about following your lead.
Sorry, but the ability to take 3 or 4 punks out of a mob before the fight officially starts - you want that power. My answer is none - you want all nine. But if you need to make space for something, carefully look over your secondaries and pools - decide what they can cover for you, and take out that power. We can now have multiple builds on a character. In my team build the one power I can do without is Stoney - since I have teammates.
Just call me "The Pool Guy" - cause I believe that power pools are the ultimate in powerset proliferation. Fewer powers to develop and available to all.
"ADVERBS - we define action!"
"ADVERSE - we are action!"
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Salt crystals do suck on teams where a Tank or Scrapper has a damaging PBAOE attack toggled or on autofire - but then so do all Sleep powers.
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Salt Crystals is still better than other sleep powers even on teams because it applies another huge defense debuff that doesn't disappear when the spell effect is broken. Also, Salt Crystals does not have the same accuracy penalty that other AoE powers do, so it has a better chance of hitting opponents initially than the Stagmites/Stone Cages 'ghetto hold,' which is a necessary tactic on sets with fewer control options than Earth.
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Oh yeah, once you have Stoney, let him take the lead in which sleeping opponent to clobber first, he's very bad about following your lead.
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Another tactic I use on my Earth/Sonic is to target Stoney, Super Speed into a group, hit Salt Crystals, then use Fossilize on whatever Stoney attacks.
Once I got to higher levels, I got rid of Stone Cages and Stalagmites, and never took Stone Prison. Ghetto holds are for lesser controllers.
I am rolling my first earth troller and want to know if there are any dog powers I should avoid... thanks