Fire/Kinetics. Definitely. Please Devs, I beg you. Buff us. Please.
Hmm, I'm not sure, they're all pretty good. Would guess something like, I don't know, Illusion/Sonics? Not sure, all controllers pwn.
i had a bet with my bro that the 1st reply would be fire/kinetics
woot im now £5 richer
Lmao. Fire/kinetics is one of the really strong powerset combos, In my opinion the best at what I do with it, damage comparable or beyond alot of blasters I've played with, with my good control in there too.
Course, there are sets like Earth/Storm that are ALWAYS ready to stop a mob from doing things one way or another, and can probably keep several like that at the same time.
decided to try a mind empath for soloing for now
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Would guess something like, I don't know, Illusion/Sonics? Not sure, all controllers pwn.
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Ill/Sonic is quite good, because you have resist debuffs that your unbuffable pets can take advtange off. You can even put the big -res toggle on your Phantom Army. Quite end-heavy from what I've seen though (my boyfriend has one, so I've teamed with it a fair bit).
The weakest Controller I've played is probably my Grav/FF, but that's possibly just her build. She's quite good at soloing, and really irritating in PvP (hold, immob, slows, -fly, knockback, Detention Bubble, Force Bubble, Singularity, etc.), but I never feel like she's anywhere near as useful in a team as most Controllers are. When a team really needs control, I'd much rather be on my Earth/Storm, and when they need support or damage, I'd rather be on my Ill/Rad. Still, she can do enough fun things to make her worth playing and levelling, even if I never as powerful playing her as my other Controllers.
For soloing? Earth/TA
Synaesthetix:if your mum wasn't already dead I would go kill her for bringing
you into the world
Mind/Storm is pretty bad, the secondary makes the sleeps in the primary pretty useless.
Of all the combos I've played, grav/sonic was certainly the most underwhelming, especially when trying to solo, and mainly due to the secondary. The synergy between sets is not great since you can't really use Disruption Field on your Singularity (because of its inherent repel), and it doesn't need the sonic shields as much as other pets. It is a decent combo for teams (especially when there's a 2nd sonic) with some good powers (like Sonic Dispersion), but I found that Clarity came waaaay too late (35) and Liquefy is quite rubbish (at least for controllers). It does have some nifty tricks for PvP (like 2 phasing powers), but overall, a bit of a disappointment tbh. I guess Earth/ or Ice/ would have been even more frustrating with /sonic for soloing given their lack of single-target attacks.
CoX 50s: <ill/rad> <ice/ice> <fire/kin> <grav/sonic> <ice/storm> <earth/kin> <kin/elec> <cold/psy> <thugs/dark> <fire/dark> <dark/elec> <night widow> <EM/ninj> <mind/icy>
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Would guess something like, I don't know, Illusion/Sonics? Not sure, all controllers pwn.
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Ill/Sonic is quite good, because you have resist debuffs that your unbuffable pets can take advtange off. You can even put the big -res toggle on your Phantom Army. Quite end-heavy from what I've seen though (my boyfriend has one, so I've teamed with it a fair bit).
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Thats very true Cybercel, im playing a Ill/Sonic at the minute, my end is a lot better than controllers i played in the past, but its only lvl 27 at the minute. The Sonic controller shields are 80% what they are for a defender, very good combo IMO 
My Grav/Sonic plays pretty well solo and in teams at level 32. The main disadvantage is not putting sonic disruption feild thingy on the pet.
Dont know if anyone has tried it, but I wondered want the sonic repel buff would do on a sing? presumably a stacked repel which would make things pretty nasty in PvP and would be enough to repel a boss in PvE? If anyone has tried this, let me know!
As regards to original poster, its pretty hard to tell. I would have though Ill/Rad might be hard work, what with all that knockback dispersing your rad debuffs. Mind/Storm would loose out on mass sleeps. But these are all rather piddling problems really.
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I would have though Ill/Rad might be hard work, what with all that knockback dispersing your rad debuffs.
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Trust me, it's really not. One of the easiest combos to solo in the whole game.
CoX 50s: <ill/rad> <ice/ice> <fire/kin> <grav/sonic> <ice/storm> <earth/kin> <kin/elec> <cold/psy> <thugs/dark> <fire/dark> <dark/elec> <night widow> <EM/ninj> <mind/icy>
Grav / Trick Arrow is a very rare build (I've only ever seen one other and he was PLed guy who didn't take any Trick Arrow moves because they didn't do damage!). Pre-pet (I haven't got Mr Sing or Oil Slick yet) its pretty challenging, especially solo. Lots of running away to fan a group of annoyed enemies out so you can pick them off one by one, a nice tactical build.
Trying to solo Earth/TA would be even more challenging...
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I would have though Ill/Rad might be hard work, what with all that knockback dispersing your rad debuffs.
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Trust me, it's really not. One of the easiest combos to solo in the whole game.
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and one of the best in big groups too (if not the best )
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and one of the best in big groups too (if not the best )
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Pfft nub as if its best for groups, there is plenty more troller i can think of that id rather team with than an ill/rad 
That's just cos u gimp even fotm builds
Not sure about that. All controllers are generally fab in big groups due to the large amount of AoE powers they have at their disposal. /Rad comes off pretty well in number of AoE powers, but Ill/ is moderate. IIRC, Ill has spectral wounds, blind, confusion, superior invisibility all as single target powers, with spectral terror coming in as a near AoE power I guess. Earth for instance has only two single target powers, the rest all AoE. So its a fairly rich AoE set, but not the best.
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That's just cos u gimp even fotm builds
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Yeah of course....
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Not sure about that. All controllers are generally fab in big groups due to the large amount of AoE powers they have at their disposal. /Rad comes off pretty well in number of AoE powers, but Ill/ is moderate. IIRC, Ill has spectral wounds, blind, confusion, superior invisibility all as single target powers, with spectral terror coming in as a near AoE power I guess. Earth for instance has only two single target powers, the rest all AoE. So its a fairly rich AoE set, but not the best.
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Illusionists are pretty easy to play though. PAs & Deceive make for very safe ways to open combat, any of Earths AoEs mezzes might miss and suddenly you're in trouble. With PAs the only issues are if the buggers drop mid-combat or attract extra aggro. And Deceive is a wonderful way to make a fight a lot easier with little risk.
So even though Earth has much more AoE it doesn't mean it has much better "aggro management" tools compared to Illusion, especially for opening combat (which is often the diciest bit of combat).
Besides Ill/rad has two AoE holds (flashto make up and EM pulse) to control the odd extra aggro from PA (people keep saying they can attract unwanted aggro, although that has never happenned to me that I can recall) and Spectral Terror, an AoE fear (combined with Lingering Rad. it's like a 3rd AoE hold tho). Add to that Radiation Infection to keep yourself and your team safe in the middle of a mob, and you will find why I got my first debt badge at lv50.
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(people keep saying they can attract unwanted aggro, although that has never happenned to me that I can recall)...
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Playing em with Storm helps a fair bit alright, Room Of Death + PAs + Tornado = Death By A Thousand Mobs
The Phantasms Decoy is indeed worse at it due to the fact the bugger appears right beside a target and tends to vanish shortly afterwards...
Hehe when the baddie is dead. Nevertheless you got to love it when vs. an AV and decoys are recharging. He's just as good as the army to keep the aggro on him.
And yeah I guess storm makes aggro management much harder than with rad. Maybe the unwanted aggro comes from that 
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Not sure about that. All controllers are generally fab in big groups due to the large amount of AoE powers they have at their disposal. /Rad comes off pretty well in number of AoE powers, but Ill/ is moderate. IIRC, Ill has spectral wounds, blind, confusion, superior invisibility all as single target powers, with spectral terror coming in as a near AoE power I guess. Earth for instance has only two single target powers, the rest all AoE. So its a fairly rich AoE set, but not the best.
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AoEs really don't matter - my Ill/Rad doesn't have either of the AoE holds she could have, and she's easily the most powerful and easiest to play toon I have... to the point that I sometimes find her a bit boring, in fact.
What makes it so powerful is that you can do just about anything (as far as PvE goes) in complete safety - risk vs. reward goes out the window. You can operate from invis, you have powerful debuffs, and your pets do most of the work for you. Ill/Rad was the traditional AV soloer. You can also solo spawns meant for much larger teams. You're not going to do that on an Earth Controller.
Still AoEs make it soooooo much better, the three of them are a must for PvE imo
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Not sure about that. All controllers are generally fab in big groups due to the large amount of AoE powers they have at their disposal. /Rad comes off pretty well in number of AoE powers, but Ill/ is moderate. IIRC, Ill has spectral wounds, blind, confusion, superior invisibility all as single target powers, with spectral terror coming in as a near AoE power I guess. Earth for instance has only two single target powers, the rest all AoE. So its a fairly rich AoE set, but not the best.
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AoEs really don't matter - my Ill/Rad doesn't have either of the AoE holds she could have, and she's easily the most powerful and easiest to play toon I have... to the point that I sometimes find her a bit boring, in fact.
What makes it so powerful is that you can do just about anything (as far as PvE goes) in complete safety - risk vs. reward goes out the window. You can operate from invis, you have powerful debuffs, and your pets do most of the work for you. Ill/Rad was the traditional AV soloer. You can also solo spawns meant for much larger teams. You're not going to do that on an Earth Controller.
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Fair enough, but safety is only one aspect to "power". Mathematically, AoE effects will become progresivelly more powerful as teams/spawns become bigger. At least for PvE, however you cut the mustard, AoE > Single target. The only exception really is against AVs, when AoE buffs still rule, but single target damages/holds/debuffs are superior to AoE versions. THis is a very small, but probably most challenging, part of the game I suppose.
Bear in mind im not saying Ill/Rad has poor AoE potential. In the grand scale of Archetypes and no. AoE powers, and Ill/Rad will be way up to the top of the leauge. Just wont be at the top. Its quite hard to "knock" any controller (or indeed defender) from a big team perspective. I suppose something like a Grav/Empath would be the worst of the pack, but even that is streets ahead of most scrappers and a fair number of blasters or tanks (In terms of number of AoE effects).
To use your example, Earth/Rad would be pretty hard to solo. Mainly because of its huge number of AoE powers. However, mathematically, a large team (at least a reasonably balanced large team) would gain slightly more from an Earth/Rad than a Ill/Rad. That the nature of AoE.
as it says in the title, i want to know what the worst possible controller primary secondary combo could be, mainly cos i want to try it. any idea?