Levitate vs Lift

I didn't really want to be drawn into a Mind vs Plant argument that is why, both sets are very good and both are capable of single handedly controlling for a team.

Plant has the advantage of being the new kid, it was designed much later then other control sets and this gives it an advantage. The devs were much more clued up when they created it. These days new powersets are created with so many jewels in the rough its more like rough in the jewels, but I digress. This is not to say Mind is bad, just its a minor miracle that its so good compared to what it could have turned out like (Gravity..)


Plant is a good set, no one is debating that. But saying what you said there to me strikes as someone deliberately trying to make a point and perhaps even an argument. You are obviously a Mind/ player who played a lot of Plant/ and prefer it, but let me tell you a little about me. I have played many Controllers, Earth, Ice, Plant(Dom), Gravity and Mind. For me, Mind Control was the last one I chose but also the one I fell in love with the most - it became my first and only level 50.

Why? Because it has powerful solo capabilities and powerful team capabilities. Mesmerize, Dominate and Levitate all slotted as attacks will make you one of the best soloing Controllers you can make, right from level 4. Gravity should be at this level or even better, since it has 4 not 3 attacks.

Mind's powers are not so straightforward though and to some extent must be used with finesse and elegance, but to great effect. It requires a certain amount of stratergy but when it works well there is a whole lot of satisfaction. This is the kind of challenge I enjoy, I like sets that make me think.

In comparison I find Plant to be very boring once the novelty of Seeds being overpowered wears off. Yes it has other tools in the box, but they are rarely needed and completely surplus. Its one power for almost every situation and requires no skill or stratergy which to me, is a huge turn off.

Remember, before Plant Control there was only one set in the whole game which had AoE Confuse - Mind. That is what made it unique. Some people used it as justification for lack of a pet (I remember the threads). Personally I prefer not having a pet, especially with Mind's strong attack chain. Also I fell in love with Mind far after Plant had already been released, so its not an issue I'm worried about but its one worth remembering.

The devs gave AoE confuse to Plant in a manner which to me, shows a complete lack of clever design. It strikes me that they wanted to make the set very good, and not necessarily very balanced. They didn't alter the already VERY long duration of confuse at all (37.3s base). A duration which is fine for a single target attack or a long recharge Mass Confuse but on a short recharge, excessively wide cone? If you consider that its effectively an even better version of a hold, the duration really seems out of line for all confuse powers.

As for more about Mind vs Plant, I disagree with your assessment that AoE is always better then ST for control. I mean, it has huge advantages but ST controls are good for taking out the big threats to your team. They rehcarge fast and have long durations.

Mind offers a team no aggro sleeps and confuses. Plant even though it mirrors Mind's powers, does not have access to this. Mind has access to 2 powerful AoE's for full lockdown, Mass Confusion and Total Domination. Mind can back this up with 4 very strong ST attacks, confuse, 100% knockup, Mag 3.5 Sleep (1 shotting bosses and AV's) and of course the hold.

A mind controller can easily control 3 bosses at once, 4+ if you have oppertunity to sleep them, in comparison a Plant Controller has to rely on immobalizes for bosses it can't hold using its single target hold, or chance it with an overpower.

A mind controller also brings AoE damage to the table with Terrify. A wide AoE fear which is pretty much Seeds of Confusion but fear instead of confusion and excellent damage.

Both sets can get the job done easily, but to me, Mind is more interesting, more challenging and more rewarding. Its variety of ST attacks in combination with its AoE's make it for me, the set with the most tools for when things go wrong.

The only drawback to Mind is its reliance on Mass Hypnosis at early levels. Now, you can either fight against it or you can embrace it. Personally I found many ways you can use it to very good effect, I've written enough without going into that here though.

Getting back on topic:

I completely agre Ketch.

I don't disagree with anything you said, but I'll just point out that I'm currently running (solo) a +2 boss map and I engage 15-17 bosses at the same time. If I felt my plant troller was limited to 4 bosses at once I would have never rolled it, I would have just done some kind of perma dom. I generally only die once every 4-5 runs of the map.

Granted IO's are doing some of the leg work here (3% def unique, 1kb protection, 2 full sets enfeebling), but my mind/kin is very similar to my plant/kin in terms of survivability numbers and maybe it is just me, but can't do squat in such a demanding scenario.

Once you can quickly control such a situation virtually everything the normal vanilla pve game throws your way is... pretty easy because it can all be one shot controlled (for the most part).

Are we talking Seeds of Confusion slotted with Coercive Pursuasion? Numbers such as 20s Recharge, 1min 20s duration, chance for overpower and chance for contagious confusion?

If anything you are just proving what I said before about A) Seeds being overpowered and B) Plant being the 'newest' kid on the block so the devs were not clever in how they designed it and just "lets make it cool!"

For the record my statement regarding Mind I was talking more with just single target abilities and not counting the AoE ones. I was thinking of a lower level range also, more like 12.

My Mass Confusion is slotted with Coercive Pursuasion as well and with Overpower and Contagious Confusion it can take out most bosses by itself. It does have a long recharge to go with it (93s), but I consider that more balanced then Seeds recharge, which is just silly and ultimately, boring.

No I listed the IO's on my build that make a difference. Seeds is slotted with mostly befuddling's. Other than the kb IO and the 3% def IO my build really doesn't cost much more than a SO'd version. It made me enough inf over 2x xp weekend to slot a bunch of purples and what not, but it is already so strong.

My mind/kin has a very similar cheap 44% s/l build, but it has been disappointing. I can't create consistent aoe containment to leverage fissure. I can't handle huge spawns well enough to dispatch them on my own, when I use mass confusion my xp plummets because I don't have very good aoe damage and can't stop them from using a lot of melee on each other. Unlike seeds backed by CC and roots and fissure where I usually net 85-90% of the total xp, but way faster.

Back when troller epics were OP'd and doing ~double damage I loved my mind/kin. I could two shot entire spawns with masshyp+fulcrum+fireball+terrify, but now no matter what I do and what epic I use I just get a bunch of uncontrolled and very angry mobs on me.

I think I'm switching my plant/kin over to ice app in i16. At which point the aoe comparison won't even be in the same stratosphere, not that it is right now. Like I said though, maybe I'm just using mind wrong because the damage is subpar as is the control imo.

If you don't mind me asking because I hear this a lot about mind, but what are all these options?

My mind/kin which is arguably much better set up to spam mind controls than most other combos is governed by recharge entirely. My options come down to what is recharged, not some neverending stream of choices.

If MC is up then that is my only good aoe control. If TD is up then that is my only good aoe control. In quick teams I'm often left with only mass hyp as any kind of aoe control. I like terrify, but it sure lets a lot of return fire on aoe centric teams ime. I mean even under high recharge MC and TD take 80 seconds to come back, so if the team is moving faster than 40 seconds per spawn I end up spamming very subpar stuff (imo).

Like I said though, maybe mind just isn't for me. It was fun leveling the toon, but I never felt very strong in teams, not compared to my earth dom, plant or fire troller. Better than my grav troller though

...

Mind Kin?

And you slotted for DEFENSE?!

No no no no!

Slot for Accuracy and RECHARGE, my friend! When Total Dome is up twice a fight you don't NEED defense! You're not a defender! You're a controller! You have control options for mitigation! They just take a while to recharge...

When steamrolling, first you use Total Dom for your containment. FS, back up, use AoEs, you're done (if not, hit hasten then unleash another AoE). Next mob, hit the sleep, mass confusion, hit siphon speed, hasten (if you didn't use it before), siphon power, fulcrum shift (transference if you need it), reposition, hit terrify and as SOON as it hits, hit mass hypnosis again and then use your Ancillary AoE. Next mob, Total Dom should be up again. Repeat. Keep your recharge and damage up and just keep runnin. Hell, if you wanna be clever, hit TK then follow up immediately with Terrify, then turn it off. If at any time you miss someone, you have three ST attacks. Use them.

Heck, you say you don't do good aoe damage and you can't stop your foes from hitting each other... uhm hello? Terrify only lets enemies attack each other ONCE until they take damage. And Terrify does the same damage as all your other ST attacks! It's not Mind that's bad, it sounds more like the Player behind it.

Mind/Storm is an amazing combo and I have shared your experience. It is no suprise to me that you have had a great experience, it mimics mine

Well I have to agree with this.

Terrify minimizes the damage confused targets deal to each other and actually a very good AoE attack, doing 130 damage with containment to all foes that are hit, more if you put in a Positron's Blast proc, more if you factor in something like Freezing Rain.

Combine that with your EPP AoE attack and you have a set which offers great AoE damage, more then most sets I would argue.

Mind's weakness is lack of containment, granted, however as a Mind/Storm, you can use Thunderclap to fill any holes you encounter. When your mass hypnosis and thunderclap have a recharge of less than 20 seconds, its something you exploit to the maximum.

Umm you don't need to be rude as I've already REPEATEDLY said it is probably the way I'm playing mind.

I have enough tohit+acc to reliably hit +4's and I'm usually around perma hasten recharge due to /kin and the ff proc in fissure. I really don't see that needing to be improved.

The problem if you check again is that the control options of mind don't work well enough for me.

I use high defense because I fight +2 boss spawns. They hit you twice and you die, simple as that.

I stopped measuring a toons performance in normal pve some time ago, it just doesn't compare to what is in AE.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but what you described wouldn't work on anything higher than luts and you kill so slowly that Total DOm ( a base 4 min power) is up twice a fight?

The other scenario you go on to describe is exactly what I already said was the problem, having to wait to cycle between TD>MC>TD, if the team moves faster - and lets be honest I'm a /kin, if it can't kill spawns in less than 40 seconds something is very very wrong.

Your suggested use of terrify in conjunction with MC works in the exact way I don't want. I want the confused mob to tear itself apart, but I want to do enough damage where I still retain 90%+of the xp and just gain a heap of speed (like I do with plant). Terrify does nothing but slow that encounter down. I'm not interested in a "time out" I'm interested in killing quickly.

We just seem to have a disconnect here. I'm talking about two specific cases where I find my mind/kin to be very subpar.
1. Boss teams - it just doesn't have enough control or damage
2. Normal mission teams - we move too quickly and I end up doing nothing (well what I consider nothing, ie st controls and masshyp) because td and mc cycle too slowly even with perma hasten.

I can tell we are playing on two different levels because you are talking about clicking hasten like it isn't up all the time. If I'm running perma hasten and find everything too slow I'm not sure what I'd do if it was even slower like what you are describing.

I've heard people use TK for every- spawn aoe containment, but I rarely seem to get more than ~5 with it, it there some way to make it hit 15-17 like I need?

Ya but what do you do once you've used a contained terrify? wait for it to cycle again?

The problem I've found it that you either choose between a contained terrify or a contained epic aoe. You can't get both unless TD was up...Well that isn't entirely true at least for fireball if you go right to the range limit of terrify you can get both contained on one masshyp.

At any rate, lets pretend both terrify and epic aoe (fissure) are contained for a troller with a 30% -res that is:
(27.55+30.6) x 1.95 x 2 = x 1.3 = 294.8 dam vs even con
For my /kin at dam cap that is:
(27.55+30.6) x 4 x 2 = 465.2 dam vs even con

That doesn't even kill even con minions and you've got no way to keep aoe containment going so fissure is cut in half after that and terrify has a pretty slow recharge. wtf should I do?

PS. I'm familiar with thunderclap, I have a fire/storm that can aoe stuns every boss spawn. I had a mind/storm for awhile, but ended up ditching it in favor of fire/storm for a lot more damage and imo better control synergy (flashfire+thunderclap+fissure = whole lot of stunning going on). In fact my fire/storm which everyone always says fire is way weaker than mind for control is capable of running boss maps as well in near perfect safety. Much faster than my mind/kin, but not as fast as my plant/kin.

I dunno what to do, the mind/kin is one of my older toons and I've tried so many times to make it perform well with each differeent ancillary, flight, leaping, high res build, high def build, high recharge build..none of them feel very powerful to me. Maybe I'm just expecting the wrong thing.

AGAIN. Really, Enantio, Really?

QUIT THE DRAMA. Ruined yet another thread. I'm sick of you.