Plant/Storm Journal

I'm not sure if anyone else has commented on the leadership pool so far, I don't have much time this morning to read the whole thread. Here's my thoughts on it:

1. Freezing Rain pretty much completely negates any need for tactics.
2. Plant/Storm later on, when you are using everything, will run you out end pretty quickly even if the only toggle you're running is Steaming Mists. This is with three slots in Stamina, and lots of sets giving 1.5, 2, and 2.5 recovery bonuses.
3. Vines is your ONLY reliable control versus things that are resistant to charm. Not taking it will severely limit what situations you can handle comfortably. I tend to use Vines heavily vs both Rikti and Nemesis, and often vs Carnies too. Also Vines is a great panic button if you end up agroing a second or third group and other controls haven't recharged yet.

Conclusion: By taking leadership and not taking Vines, you will be looking to run yourself out of end before you get the job done, and really hamstring yourself versus several villain types.

Plus Vines really only needs three slots to e pretty effective if you give it 3x Acc/Hold/Recharge it's not bad at all for really low slotting requirements. (I ended up 6 slotting with Lockdown for the ranged defense bonus and the extra hold proc)

Honestly your way will work because Plant/Storm is very resilient but the endurance issues will probably make this build seem to bog down a bit later and, in for me, you would have to pry Vines from my cold dead fingers - it's that useful to the character as a whole.

Ohh just wanted to add my thoughts on the APP. I went with Ice, because Hibernate = Win. Like I said earlier, you will find yourself running out of end, and sometimes you will find yourself taking more damage than you can regenerate. Hibernate is awesome for both problems. It can quickly refill your end bar in the middle of a tough fight, and it can keep you from having to run or face plant in a different kind of tough fight.

Also Frostbreath packs a serious punch to a large group that's already been debuffed by Freezing Rain and contained by Roots. I find that using it as my 4th power in the opener, half the minions dies at that point. The rest of the spawn follows quickly after a couple more roots applications.

I definitely don't ever go into melee with this character unless it's to use Sands of Mu on a held boss so the Stone APP is much less appealing to me than on some other Storm toons.

*chuckle*

I may be a bit odd- I'm barely bothering with any of the APPs. I've got everything from both sets except for Spores... which, quite frankly, is kind of useless with all the AoE flying around. Took Conserve Power because, well, yeh, this is kind of an endurance-hungry beast, but beyond that, just kind of shrugged and forgot about it. Thus far it's working alright for me :3

Hover is good because it allows you to place your Lightning Storm over the top of the mob, giving Knockdown instead of knock back from it. On the other hand, since you will be spamming Roots every time it comes up, you probably don't need it for that(unless you're fighting werewolves, who pretty well ignore your roots).

I would look at O2 Boost. I know there is a lot of disagreement about the usefulness of O2 Boost, but for plant I think it's almost a must. The flytrap pet is the squishiest pet in the game, and it tends to pull a lot of agro if you yourself are playing at range. I ended up going with the recharge pet set for it because of the resistance IO to make him tougher, and because he dies so often as well. It's nice to be able to top him between fights and to keep him in the fight, taking agro that would otherwise be hitting you. Especially if you end up soloing on 6+heroes at +1-ish, there will be things that don't get controlled immediately, and they will be causing some damage before you get them locked down and arrested.

This way you have O2 boost for your pet, and Hibernate for you, to take care of any fights that start to go poorly.

So anything new going on with your Plant/Storm? Mine has been 50 and complete for about a week now. It's pretty powerful and fun to play. I play the concept of a Druid.

Ok, So Viri's up to 34 now and 1 piece away from having a 5 pack of Posi in Roots, DID get the Posi Energy Proc, so now I just need the Acc/Dmg or Dmg/End! Have a bunch of bids out on the TotH Proc as well so hopefully that'll come in soonish.

Having a LOT of fun in Croatoa doing Kelly's missions, made most of the last level just doing the "Rescue" 4 Tuatha mission. The one with a HUGE map full of Cabal spawns? With it set to +1/+8 it's a huge pile of flying mobs that I fully expected to be early impossible for me to handle. Guess what?

No real problem. I have to keep on my toes, but even with all those Lightning throwing T-Storm Summoning Hurricaning Mavens, I was able to take on those spawns time after time with only like 1 faceplant(which was just 'cause I wasn't paying attention).

Anyway, I've got Spirit Tree 4 slotted (3 heal, 1 rech) now so I should be able to get a feel for how useful it is as far as potential is concerned. I'm either going to 5 slot it with Doctored Wounds or Drop it in a respec and pick up O2 boost for Twitchy.

Twitchy: Mixed feelings. Helpful, but seems almost as much of an aggro-mad psycho as an imp sometimes. I swear, I've watched him hesitate after taking down a mob on the edge of a spawn I'm working on, and then go CHARGING off to single handedly assault another 8 hero spawn all by his lonesome. NOT. TOO. Bright.

Ok, ok, he's in a persistent vegetative state, granted. But shouldn't that make him CALM at least? I mean, when I'm dealing with Imps I KNOW how far they will range out and they tend to keep reasonably close to me. :: sigh :: Ah well, I prob just need more practice at Twitchy Trailing...

Carrion Crawlers totally rock (as we all know). I'm still trying to noodle out how I want to IO them, the Posi Proc is out as it's Targetted AOE would only trip on the initial cast, but the TotH and Impeded Swiftness Procs should still be good, yes? I need to really sit down and look at this one. Crawlers slotted for dmg are awesome, and obviously you want them maxed for rech as well. I really need 2-3 more slots for Crawlers! ;-).

Ran some team missions vs. Nemesis the other night... They did a great job reminding me WHY I HATE NEMS (Mind/ is my spiritual home as a Controller ), but Carrion Crawlers and Snow Storm were both super useful, as was Hurricane. Really need to try some Nem missions solo so I get a feel for how best to handle them without affecting teammates. I figure I'll get stuck with more NEM missions than I could ever want soon enough though, so why go begging for aggravation? .

Last Level till Tornado! [edited to change 'cane to 'nado Oops!] :: rubbing hands gleefully :: Can't wait to add it to the carnage!

Anyone have some good examples of Crawler and/or Tornado slotting? One cheap option (inf wise, not slots) for Tornado is Kin Crash, got +rech and the -kb is handy. IIRC it's got so-so dmg slotting like 60%ish? Can't remember how it stacks up -n the endred though, which is going to be important when Tornado and Lightning Storm are both coming into play.

*evilgrin*

If you think Twitchy (or OmNom, as I dubbed everybody's favourite walking appetite) is an aggro monkey, wait 'til you see the Tornado :3

Explosive Strike also has a smashing damage proc; the way I've got Creepers slotted right now has three damage procs (Impeded Swiftness, Explosive Strike, and Trap of the Hunter), two generic Recharge IOs, and the Force Feedback chance for +Recharge. Looking at it, I could get more damage out of it with a generic damage IO rather than the Force Feedback Proc, but I'm not sure how accurate the numbers in Mid's are- that looks like it would put out slightly more (average) damage than even slotting the power with Ragnaroks :/

Hurricane I'm planning on slotting with Kinetic Crash- more for the set bonuses than the actual enhancement bonuses. Your totals for that set are 68.9% for damage, 47.7% for accuracy and End Discount, and 53% for recharge (oh, and 173.95% for Knockback, hehehe)- nothing spectacular, but respectable. And Mag 34.1 Knockback is just fun

Awesome write up, been a great read. I should of done something like this as I leveled up mine.

I already had several controllers, none of them (still) are 50 but one or two were close, I decide to make a kind of nature spirit so in keeping with a theme I went Plant/Storm. To echo everyone else, by level 8, you're pretty much set, seeds/roots then damage. Then later, Seeds/Roots/Freezing rain . It was a VERY fun ride, and as such, became my next 50. I ended up with Earth Mastery as my epic, and here's why.

Rock Armor, this, combined with Combat Jumping, steamy mist and set bonuses, one could easily softcap. As it is, I am just outside the softcap. Its awesome to see those Roman Generals take swipes at you and miss time after time.

Earths Embrace. The +heal +hp is too perfect, that power right there completes the sets as far as I am concerned

Fissure. a very short targetted AoE attack that disorentates, doubly useful if you have Thunder Clap

Siesmic Smash! A lot of folks will say that the only downside to the combo is the single target damage, this is one way to make up for it, great damage (omg especially once contained!) and its a mag 4 hold !

Ice Mastery would work wonders too. Frozen armor/Hibernate for survival and of course Ice Storm! . I went with Earth purely for theme, and again, (by pure coincidence) I was rewarded with wonderful Symmetry.

The character is blazingly fast, and has so much utility I can usually get a team out of anything they may of stumbled in too. I built it as a controller first, with team support, despite earths embrace, i also took 02 boost and spirit tree. they still very much have their uses. When I am solo, I can actually farm at a decent rate, but i much prefer to taskforce!

oh, and yes as others have stated, careful with tornado (roots is fantastic for this power), I don't think there is a single power in the game that can throw as many objects as far or as fast as this one can. Use with care, take your time, you'll figure it out, its also great damage! (and can be hilarious)

Looking forward to more of your writing! Keep up the good work!

Far as I've been able to figure, the Achilles' Heel Proc has two chances to fire in Freezing Rain (once on firing, once at the 10 second mark). Honestly, my feeling is that a chance for an extra 20% resistance debuff is nothing to sneeze at, and finding the space for it isn't a big deal.

Also, Tornado is only lasting one spawn for you?

...

Maybe I just move a little faster. I tend to find that it lasts about two and a half spawns for me (granted, that's partially because it'll occasionally decide, apparently at random, that I'm not fighting enough guys, and wander off on its own to bring me some new friends >.O).

Well, how big are the spawns and what lvl are you?

As I just GOT Tornado about an hour or two ago (rare morning playtime ) It's hard to say exactly. Without the AOE from an APP available (or Lightning Storm for that matter), I'm guessing it'll probably take most of a tornado's spawn time to work through a +1/+8 spawn when soloing. So maybe a spawn and a half depending on positioning and whether a nearby spawn jumps/is dragged in.

When teaming, it's totally different obviously.

One of the things that takes awhile between spawns is positioning for Seeds... I'm strongly considering picking up Hover and switching to Swift vs Hurdle as highspeed Hover was always the best combat movement for my Grav/Storm and I imagine it would work even better with Seeds.

VERY impressed with the durability of Plant/Storm!

I had a spawn trigger (BAD Twitchy! No Compost Tea for you!) in about the worst posible sequence for me, almost nothing ready to go, spawn was spread ALL over the place making Seeds largely ineffective. After Twitchy made a total hash of things, it decided to go fling some thorns at a whole other +1/+8 spawn around the corner making it infinitely worse (VERY BAD TWITCHY! :: threatens with weedwacker :: ). I popped a green, a purple, brought Hurricane up, dropped Spirit Tree and started working the spawn. That was the closest I've come to a faceplant without ever dropping in quite some time. Luckily Crawlers came up shortly, so once those lovely tentacles started waving, things started getting better.

I DID take great pleasure in dismissing Twitchy with extreme prejudice once it was all over.

I tend to have better luck with Flytrap. Though sometimes if he decides to go off on his own and gets pummelled for it, I usually mumble something about 'see thats what you get' then proceed to lock down mob.

As my first 50 controller I learnt on that controller first that there is a time to put pets away.

One easy example is the first mission on the ITF. When everyone leaps up to the altar instead of walking around, agro'ing the nictus. Dismiss him before you make that leap, or he'll decide to go the long way and agro everything.

So we have Twitchy, OmNom (cute btw ), any others? I'll put mine down, I just call him 'Trappy'

Heh. Trappy -> Trapper Color him Red and olive drab and Put a big Red Cross 4077 Symbol on him.

Yeah, I suppose I figured Twitchy would be more like Jack or Singy than like an Imp. I don't have any problem with dismissing him and re-summoning when needed, just haven't quite gotten it drilled into my head yet that he's more of a big green Imp with a ranged weapon.

And just who thought giving ranged weapons to an Imp was a good idea? Haven't they ever heard of the "Personal Pointy Projectile improper Piercing Prevention Program"?!

Egads

:: shakes head ::

The Devs these days. No sense of Superhero safety... Srsly Sad.

Hmm... okay, didn't realize that the Force Feedback proc didn't feed back to the player. Going to have to ditch that, then, since it's not nearly as useful as I thought. Generic Damage IO, here we come. Also, I meant that it put out more average damage than a full set of Ragnaroks. Although not by enough to lose the Posi's Blast set bonuses. Pity, could've saved a bit there.

Also, looking at my saved Mid's build, I apparently decided to go with Expedient Reinforcement on Tornado, rather than Kinetic Crash. *blinks* Bit of a surprise there, but alright- looking at the various set bonuses, it's not too bad; I just skipped the 10% resistance bonus, which is kind of useless for Tornado anyways, and stuck the slot in Hover and gave it the Blessing of the Zephyr KB protection for an extra mag of Knockback protection. Although part of me is a bit sad to lose the 34.1 Mag Knockback >.>

Oh, and as to movement speed, looks like I was getting mixed between my teaming and my soloing (+0/+8)- solo, Tornado lasts me about one, maybe one and a half spawns (assuming I've got everything ready to go). Gotta say, though... at level forty-ish (level 45 now), Plant/Storm is like tossing mobs into a blender. If you have a decent grouping to start with, Creepers-Seeds-Roots-Hurricane-Lightning Storm-spam Roots as needed, and my inspiration box fills up so fast that the little 'bing' noise can't keep up.