fire/rad

Theres a few key things to remember about Fire/Kins.

1) Not everyone can farm with one, it simply doesnt fit everyones playing style.

2) This Controller is rather fragile compaired to other controllers, and can only Solo certain missions and use them as farms.

3) Unless you have someone PLing you up, your more then likly going to hate this combonation, because it takes a long time to get any power.Not to mention its a Stamina Hog for a long time as well.

While these are commonly seen as issues with Fire/Kins, I can tell you from experiance, that Fulcrum Shift is the diffrent between the 2, as well as Fire/Rad having tons more survivability for a small lacking of damage, and slower movement speed.(Same Recharge buffer though)

Personally having a Fire/Rad allows me to tell you this from Experiance.If you wanted a solid, farmable Controller, and not want to worry about a single slip up face planting you like it can a Fire/Kin, thne this would be the controller for you.

Another perk, is that so far, I havnt been unable to solo anything yet.Where as a Fire/Kin has to be selective, or they are Epic Fails.

With AE in full swing for farms, im rather surprised to see people making Fire/Kins at all.Considering that you can farm with a massive list of things due to AE now days.

Wow. You even contradicted yourself. You really should proofread your posts, F_M.

Anyway, OP, a fire/rad can be quite an impressive build, especially when you have multiple fire/rads working together. Rad complements the damage in fire control by adding +dam from Accelerate Metabolism and -res in Enervating Field. Also, Accelerate Metabolism helps to offset the heavy endurance cost of Hotfeet and Fire Cages.

It's not as damage heavy as fire/kin, but fire/rad is definitely a more damage oriented build than most controllers. I also feel that it tends to be a bit more versatile than a fire/kin, offering more team safety. It's a very nice all-arounder.

This basically. Fire/Rad is far, far earlier blooming (Rad gets its decent powers very early) and safer overall. At level 38 though the Kin streaks ahead in the damage stakes.

But Fire/Rad is a super combo, good all-rounder and a really good Hazard Zone Spawn soloer (that's what I used mine for, deliberately. Even his Biography states that he was usally limited to operating in Hazard Zones only). A great Scraptroller (Hotfeet + Choking Cloud means you'll live to be in close to a spawn. Flashfire & Cages lets you do that. The masses of debuffs let you kill things quicker).

Fire/Rad is an excellent build that is more flexible than Fire/Kin. A Fire/Kin is a great build for limited things, like killing large numbers of lower level foes who don't have mez powers. Fire/Rad won't kill as fast as Fire/Kin, but has the tools to be more effective against single tough targets as well as being able to do some AoE damage. It will also survive longer than a Fire/Kin, and focuses more on control and not as much on damage.

One other aspect of Fire/Rad is that multiple Fire/Rads can make an unstoppable team. Stacked Accelerate Metabolism, Hot Feet+Choking Cloud and multiple uses of the debuffs and controls make a team of Fire/Rads too powerful for anything in the game. On the other hand, Fire/Kin's main buff, Fulcrum Shift, will cap everyone's damage with two or maybe 3 -- after that, additional uses will have no effect. In general, two Fire/Kins are all you need, and more would be a waste.

I personally prefer my Fire/Rad over my Fire/Kin -- I find it more fun. And I have played on teams of multiple Fire/Rads . . . once you get three or more, everything dies very, very quickly. A team of eight is just sickeningly fast.

Fire/Rad is the single build that can make best use of Rad's Choking Cloud. My Ill/Rad guide discusses the mechanics of Choking Cloud and some suggested slotting -- but does not recommend CC for an Ill/Rad. Once you get both fully slotted, Hot Feet+Choking Cloud is the key power combo for a Fire/Rad. Simply Flashfire+Fire Cages from range, then run in with HF+CC running and stand there, occasionally using Char on anything that moves. They all die.

As usual I agree with everything you said Local Man, but I have a minor quibble. IMO Ice/Rad is in about equal position or better position to leverage Choking Cloud. It's definitely a great power on both though.

I would say that Ice/Rad is the second best powerset to use Choking Cloud, and those two are probably the only controller builds I would use CC on. CC needs a second PB AoE toggle power to make it work effectively, and Arctic Air combines with it very, very well. However, I have to consider the damage in Hot Feet to be superior to the confuse in AA. Ice/Rad is great at controlling the foes, but isn't all that fast at taking them down.

I see your point. I think that if we take the direction that damage > control, though, we end up concluding that Fire Control is overall better than Ice Control as a powerset, which I'm not sure I agree with. I don't think most Ice Control players are in for it for the damage. What's great about Choking Cloud is it boosts Fire and Ice each in their best strengths, respectively, turning Fire into a cloud of death and Ice into a cloud of lockdown.

I agree with you for the most part. The two sets do substantially different things. Ice, especially paired with Rad, is a strong control set well made to team with melee characters. It will have to rely on teammates for most of its damage, but it provides a huge amount of mitigation to the front lines.

Fire/Rad, on the other hand, is a little more flexible. It can both support the front line, and actually BE the front line. It doesn't provide as much control to protect those front line characters, but it helps take down the foes faster. It can solo at a decent speed, which Ice can't do.