Hurricane tactics solo?
First thing i can think of is try getting the ST immob (crush?) for damage instead of air supe. This may cause power slot issues if air supe is a travel prereq though i guess. I actually think crush comes out above propel for dps as it's so fast.
That way you can keep hurricane up for protection (try just "tappping" the nme with the edge of the hurricane to debuff them) and use ranged attacks for damage. As a controller though things like red totems and other bosses will always be a problem damage wise until epics.
I miss him in the weeping of the rain;
I want him at the shrinking of the tide;
The old snows melt from every mountain-side,
And last year's leaves are smoke in every lane;
But last year's bitter loving must remain
~Edna St. Vincent Millay
I took Air Supp as the pre-requisite for Flight. Have found it incredibly useful pre-Hurricane.
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As a controller though things like red totems and other bosses will always be a problem damage wise until epics.
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Not quite that late, but after you get and slot Tornado, add Freezing rain and an Immob to stop the KB and it takes down res quite fast.
Ok so Jack did add a bit of damage to speed things up.
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I know the tactic is to just pin as many as you can into a corner and then use Freezing Rain, but this means that each group I face I have to be careful where I'm putting them. Is there no other viable melee tactic with Hurricane?
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Kind of, use Snow Storm and Freezing Rain and then run around them just brushing them with your Hurricane so they stay in the AoEs.
On the other hand you could get in a corner and use WormHole to put them in the corner, instead of pushing them into it.
Shame you took it out for now
I'll get it at 28 again cos I loved the power itself, just thought I needed more damage.
Herding with hurricaine!
Anchor an enemy in the middle of the group with snow storm, gale all the groups into a corner, keep hurricaine on and lightly brush them into a tight group. Hit your group control powers. (Wormhole then AoE immobilze) or group hold.
Done!
What I like to do is land the Freezing Rain just behind the mob then push them into it with Hurricane.
One thing to note with using Hurricane, the Accuracy debuff is a pretty wide area. So you only need to "scrape" them with the Hurricane to debuff them. So you don't need to go into knockback range, just tip the 'cane off them every few seconds. Combined with Disco_Freaks tactic you shouldn't be knocking them too far back.
Thanks for all the advice. I did manage to take down that red Totem boss solo with some of the tips here.
Just gonna take a bit of getting used to, I think
With Hurricane 3 slotted for tohit debuff, you're pretty much untouchable tbh...
Use all your AoEs, eg Rain, then run in for the attacks with hurricane going.
It's much, much easier to herdicane things about on a controller with AoE root as they don't struggle at all.
Teleport is also your best friend with hurricane. You can teleport into a bunch of mobs and they get debuffed before they do their alpha strike. Then just immediately AoE root and push them into the nearest corner and commence ownage I couldn't live without teleport on my defender. It's less chaotic to put up a lightning storm above your team and then teleport behind the mobs and push them towards the team and the storm.
Herdicaning is much more difficult with my defender. I have snow storm 3 slotted with slows just to keep them locked down as much as possible so I can push them about.
Hmm, using an Immob or Hold with Hurrcaine is tricky, some times the repel filps and they come towards you and away from where you want them. So instead of bunching a mob up, you scattter them out.
Although, it doesn't happen all the time.
Hm, I am going to look more into herdicaning myself, sounds pretty good. In my experience, freezing rain just dont do enough damage to be really effective, but I guess I have slotted wrong.
I have not used hurricane much because I am mostly a melee char (Ice/Storm), went with boxing to add a little punch (sorry about pun). But i guess you get the same problem with Air Superiority - that is indeed a melee attack too, isnt it? That must make effective hurricaning very difficult.
I tend to use arctic air and steamy mist a whole lot instead, and only flip on Hurricane to get peeps back on the slippery stuff when teammates with knockback pushes them off, or to knock things off buildings just for the fun of it. Oh and in pvp to make stalkers go insane.
What I need is ranged damage, and outside of the epics that is a huge problem. I found the nemesis staff to be exeptionally good for damage, but then you get knockback again which is not so great.
I also tried using the temp lightning attack power you can buy in buy in the pvp zones if your side is winning.... the downside is that it expires very fast, becomes fairly expensive in the long run, is not always available and theres all the traveling time ot get it. Worth getting for special occations tho. Also, I forget - but I dont think it does the bonus damage on moobs (double damage), only on players? But never mind.
Here is the thing: The very best power I have found to boost my damage as a controller, is "Old Iron", which is a reward from the Croatoa arc. A big old sword, special damage bonus to fey creatures, but decent on everything else too. Cant be slotted, of course, and no bonus for control unfortunately. On the plus side, the duration on it is bugged. It is supposed to last for 3 days, but my sword says it will expire in a bit over 5000 days. Hopefully, that will last me until I can dig into the epics.
My strategy then is to put on ice patch first, snowstorm the highest mob, run in with steamy mist and arctic air, block a minion and start wailing on him with the sword and boxing, get him out pronto. Naybe do two minions or one LT like this, then hit with Freezing rain. Normally, they wont have much chance of getting away, especially with ice and rain overlapping.
It is worth noting that aoe immobs like chilblain counters the effect (the "knock-up") of ice slick and freezing rain. So it is best to save that for later. I AOE immobing mobs and either fuching them around corners or off edges so that I only have line of sight with the bobs I am actively fighting.
I have slotted ice block for recharge speed and hold duration, it is my main powwer. I can more or less chain-hold 3 same-level lt's with it. Only real obstacle is running out of steam, so stamina is a must for this. Old Iron helps a lot for speeding up the rate at which I am able to take the poor guys out. Speed-slotting full holds means that AoE debuffs become a lot less important, as held mobs just don't need ot be debuffed really.
I am probably doing something wrong, but I figured I'd share anyway. So the main points are:
* Get Old Iron in Croatoa as soon as you can (insist on doing your mishes, you're in the range)
* don't mix immobs atacks with freezing rain, as it counters the knockup effect of the slippery ice.
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* don't mix immobs atacks with freezing rain, as it counters the knockup effect of the slippery ice.
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Depends on the immob. Dark Blasts tentacles & Gravs immobs doesn't do -knockdown/back so Storm / Dark & Grav / Storm are safe enough here.
My Illusion / Storm is a ranged char anyway with Blind, Spectral Wounds and Deceive for added chaos so I don't have the issue but yep Hurricane isn't the greatest for pb aura & melee attack strong controllers.
Wormhole is basically an AOE TP foe with Disorientate in it isn't it? Do you need LOS? You don't with TP Foe but I've never played Grav so I'm unsure. But Blackholing them somewhere uncomfortablem, group immob and then pin them with Hurricane and use Lift may be an option. I'd actually drop Air Sup for a Grav / Storm as you don't have PB auras which complement it as Ice, Fire and the Rad secondary have (off the top of my head, there might be more) and take another single target ranged attack maybe. Or Haste / SS to cycle your current attacks more quickly
At the moment my endurance is dropping like a stone - I'd hate to see it with Hasten up and recharging powers quicker!
Yep, true enough. Thats partially a sympthom of i7 too though despite the lack of comment from any devs over it bar "prove it to us"
But for a Grav / Storm I would maybe focus on being a nasty ranged single target killer... erm, "arrester" rather than using Air Sup. But then you do have a bit of a tighter power squeeze to get your travel power fitted in.
The Endurance issue is definitely an i7 thing.
Fly is my favourite travel power - I have it (or an equivilent) on my two main characters and the characters I have taken SJ or TP with tend to get shelved soon after as they're so much work.
Initially, Air Supp and then Fly provided me with a nice melee move and a travel power. I can still use it if I get enemies pinnd up against things, so I'm not really looking to change it at the moment.
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Hmm, using an Immob or Hold with Hurrcaine is tricky, some times the repel filps and they come towards you and away from where you want them. So instead of bunching a mob up, you scattter them out.
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It used to be that if someone else other than the hurricane user, immobilised or held something then the hurricane would push that mob away from whoever held/immobilised that mob but they fixed that bug.
I haven't seen hurricane pushing held/immobed things towards me since I came back to CoH with I7.
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It is worth noting that aoe immobs like chilblain counters the effect (the "knock-up") of ice slick and freezing rain. So it is best to save that for later. I AOE immobing mobs and either fuching them around corners or off edges so that I only have line of sight with the bobs I am actively fighting.
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Since it sounds like you are soloing a lot, have you tried messing around with artic air with 3 confuse duration SOs in it? It sounds like a bit of a faf but you can ice slick and snow storm, herdicane everything into the middle of your slick and then switch off hurricane and move in with arctic air and hit them all with an aoe immobilise and watch them kill each other. I find that with even level mobs, once you've got them all locked into position and within melee range of each other, you can get them all confused and attacking each other. It really is a good aoe confuse if they are immobed and therefore don't move to run away from your air. It makes chewing through spawns a lot faster and as long as you aren't soloing much higher level mobs the collateral damage you take from the ones that do target you is minimal.
I've been using hurricaine more and more now, mainly as a herding tool, as with fortitude I can herd lots of mobs, mainly use it to PL SG and close friends. A really useful trick with hurricane is to use your AoE immobilze, if the group is immobilzed its much easier to control them when grouping them up with hurricaine. This is very useful when dealing with dispersed mobs who aren't nicely grouped up together.
With the World Cup on and the advent of the fantastic "Don't want to team, leave me alone" option, I have decided that if I pop on CoH during breaks between World Cup matches, I will try soloing my level 27 Gravity/Storm controller.
Now previously, my tactics solo have been:
Open with mass AoE hold, put down Freezing Rain, use AoE immob and then use single target hold to lock down any stragglers.
From that point on, get stuck in with Air Supp and Lift.
However, I don't get quite enough damage output (certainly not against red-con Totem bosses, for example. I need more damage and less chance of getting hit.
To this end, I respeced her, taking out O2 Boost and Wormhole (for the moment, will take it again at 28) and adding in Propel (for more damage) and Hurricane.
However, both of these seem to negate my previous tactics. Hurricane pushes people out of the Freezing Rain, and I can't get near enough to anyone to use Air Supp. Propel just knocks them out of it if they are immob'd rather than held.
I know the tactic is to just pin as many as you can into a corner and then use Freezing Rain, but this means that each group I face I have to be careful where I'm putting them. Is there no other viable melee tactic with Hurricane?
At the moment I can see its usefulness, but it's really disrupting the playstyle I've had for all this time.