Tackling some unused secondaries

Prior to GR I finished up my goal of having one of each control primary at level 50. Now I've got an Electric controller under way to complete the set. With one goal nearing completion, my mind has turned to experiencing all that controller secondaries have to offer. Until this point, I have definitely played favorites with /radiation and /storm.

At the moment, I am considering an Earth/Sonic (for all around debuffing), an Ill/Cold (a nice means to stack defense on allies along with some very nice debuffs), and pairing any of mind, illusion, or plant with Trick Arrow. So, I ask, what pairings do you find enjoyable for the following secondaries (those that I haven't used yet): Cold, Thermal, Trick Arrow, and Sonic. Tell me about your experience with those combos or anything else that you think would be worth considering. I look forward to hearing your contributions.

There are many possibilities. I kind of lean this way though:

- Earth/Thermal
- Electric/Trick Arrow or Illusion/Trick Arrow
- Plant/Cold

Illusion/Cold is of course the darling set right now. I think its ok but not any better than any other Controller on most teams, and significantly worse than average when handling large, aggressive spawns (as Illusion tends to be). Plant/Cold IMO is a very powerful, and little seen, alternative. I have a lvl 50 Mind/Cold at 50 who is my favorite character, but that pairing is probably more an acquired taste.

I've done Thermal with both Ice and Earth. Ice/Therm is what I'd call "expert mode." There is a whole lot of noise on the boards about control always trumping healing but this is the combo that will make you question that. The character does do ok, but you have to accept that you and your team WILL get hit. I suspect Ice/Empathy might overpower Ice/Therm because of the endurance and regen aids to help you survive close range with Arctic Air. Earth/Therm in contrast is sort of terrifyingly powerful. The pet is close to invincible (90% resists to all) and you can heal it besides. Stuff also rarely gets to shoot you.

Trick Arrow is weird because it takes so long to set up. Paired with Electric it helps considerably to boost that set's anemic damage. Electric Cages will light an oilslick and still let mobs flop. Illusion/TA works well because TA fills in some of Illusion's bigger holes (that is, the whole "being a Controller" part).

I am hard pressed with Sonic. I guess Earth/Sonic is ok. I just think Earth/Thermal is a lot (LOT) better. I would stay away from Ice or Fire though due to endurance costs. I have a mothballed Fire/Sonic who hasn't seen his blue bar since level 25 or so.

For sonic, even though you're just finishing one I might go elec/. It seems like a quite synergistic pairing - elec would bring extra endurance to feed sonic's hungry toggles, while sonic offers mez protection to keep conductive aura going and a generally less busy style so you have plenty of time to spam chain fences and jolting chain to lock stuff down. I don't know how well this'd work out in practice yet, but it's my next planned controller.

I have an Illusion/Trick Arrow at 50. I specifically made it to experience the Trick Arrow set, and I think the two go together extremely well. Illusion is a ranged set, and TA works best from range. TA fills many of the control holes in Illusion. TA is all DEBUFFS, and Debuffs are needed to make Phantom Army better. TA adds the ranged AoE Hold that Illusion really should have. Illusion provides the distraction to keep foes busy while you fire off all your debuff arrows. While I prefer Rad and Storm, I have to admit that the Ill/TA is a really fun combo. Oil Slick Arrow really adds a lot to the set.

The only other sets I would consider using with TA are probably Earth and Gravity.

I'm working on an Illusion/Cold currently, who is level 46. Frankly, I'm not all that impressed with the Cold set. I love Storm, but Cold seems like an anemic version of Storm with the two Defense shields and two single target debuffs added (I skipped Frostworks). The only really interesting and unique power is Heat Loss.

I could see */Cold working with most primaries. It just is not as much fun as Storm.

I have both Earth/TA and Plant/TA.

Earth/TA is not that damaging but it is huge in control. Even with the Fire Epic it takes a long time to kill a spawn though doing so is extremely safe.

Plant/TA is one of my favorite controller Combos. Adding in the Fire Epic makes it huge. It's not as fast as a Fire/Kin but quite solid on damage.

I solo mine at +3/x8 and as long as I'm not trying to solo Malta or Nemesis I chew through things. My secret is to skip all the /TA debuffs that reduce mob recharge rate or reduce mob damage (Glue Arrow and PGA). You open with Flash Arrow, follow up with seeds, drop Disruption Arrow and Acid Arrow while the mobs self herd and then throw in Roots to keep the mobs in melee range of each other, season with Creepers, OSA, and Fireball until a light golden brown and repeat.

Of my lvl 50 controllers these seem to fall in with the OP.

Earth/TA- hands down best aoe control I've played. It's a fun combo, endurance friendly and one of the few sets you can turn off the team window and just play.

Illusion/ Thermal and Cold- both sets fun to play, very team friendly and the lack of clickiness of illusion makes up for the clickiness of the secondaries. Use therm for less than optimal teams or with teammates that tend to need healing even with shields on them. Cold is great for a well balanced team, that needs little more than shielding. Also good for when you are going for "big game".

Mind/Sonic- a surprisingly powerful combination, but uber clicky. Prepare to be worn out playing this one. But fun.

I have a lvl 50 Mind/Trick Arrow/Primal forces and I still don't know if I like her. Both sets synergize quite well: Glue Arrow prevents mobs from moving too much where Mind lacks an AoE immob (too bad Glue doesn't bring Containement for mooore damage :P), with EMP Arrow you get a strong AoE Hold to alternate with Total Domination and Mass Confusion, and an ignited Oil slick brings you AoE damage whereas Mind excels in ST damage (Dominate, Mesmerize, Levitate, rinse, repeat...). And everything is ranged.

But I often feel I have so many tools I can't think to all af them. With my other controllers (and dominators) there are powers that I always use, and others that are way more situational (e.g. the AoE hold that I almost never use, except as a Basilisk mule). Solo, my Plant/Empathy 'troller is very easy to play: I can forget most of the buffs of my secondary and just spam Seeds of confusion. My Mind/TA can use almost all her powers in every situation, but it's not that easy to pick the good one when needed.

In a team, I'm not always I'm useful. Maybe it's because Mind effects are very subtle (unlike Earth), maybe it's because I have so many debuffs to cast the mob has already vanished before I could use all the ones I wanted xP

Solo, I don't feel as "super" as with other toons but I feel I can handle more different mobs than I could with my Plant/ 'troller, because I have more tricks up my sleeves.

Maybe the awful truth is I'm not used enough to think to play this toon well and I still need to practice

I'm curious to hear a bit more about Mind/Sonic. On paper I don't see much synergy between the sets and it appears to be a very weak solo'er, though I may be overlooking something. Losing out on its best debuff when solo seems like a pretty significant blow against it. Bear in mind, I have played a mind/emp, which also loses out on a lot solo, but the powers that remain seem more useful than what you would find in mind/sonic. If nothing else, I do like the way the visual from mind and sonic mesh.

Fire/cold seems like a potential combo. With some tinkering in Mid's I made a build that could grant the Imps around 40% defense, enough to bottom out the enemies tohit after an application of Smoke. I agree Heat Loss would make running Hot Feet much less painful. It's also a nice thematic coupling, much better than any idea I could come up with to justify ill/cold.

At the moment, I'm favoring Earth/Sonic, Fire/Cold, and Plant/TA. They all seem potent with some nice conceptual pairings too. Thermal still has me stumped. I'm a bit curious about Mind/Thermal as low-aggro buffers, but I'm cautious about its solo performance. I often see talk of pairing Thermal with Elec, but I don't feel a single target -recovery debuff will do much to alter its performance as a sapper.

Oh, I IO'd the heck out of it. To the absolute most uber effect? No. But it's a rare build, so it's not going to be Ill/Rad. So what? Not everything has to be min/max synergistically super powered. It's a good solid combo, not the best but far far far from the worst. My measuring stick? If I leave the action, what happens to my teammates health bars? And with this combo, it becomes pretty apparent, that it's making a contribution to the team. It's not as sexy as some combos, it's not the most powerful, but like I said: solid.....but clicky.

No real end problems with the character really, as I said I IO'd her pretty heavily. I will be getting cardiac for her, not so much (but part of it) for the end reduction but for the addition to my resist buffs. As I said the combo is far from "dog" territory. While I'd admit, its a very rare breed, that doesn't necessarily make it a dog by any stretch. It's just different and not as flashy as some combos. There was a time when I wondered if the character was really making a contribution to teams. Something pulled my attention away and I had to go /afk. I came back to the screen to see many of my teammates bars were much less filled. I ran back to the action and as soon as I started using both primary and secondary things filled up and stayed that way.

I think you are missing some of the "good things" that /sonic has to offer while you keep mentioning the discrepency with thermal. Sonic dispersion- self protection (resist) and mezz protection (except for the bubble sleep hole of course). Also I think that liquify is a slightly underrated power (especially for the to-hit debuff) and can be used nicely with a controller and help offset the long recharge on the primaries aoe hold. The only petless argument and disruption field comes into play only when talking about soloing. Add a teammate problem solved.

The downside is obviously that it can be very clicky especially with a large team. And a large team is where I think the thermal argument wears thin (when discussing Mind as a primary) Talk about clicky!!! My fingers ache just thinking about Mind/Thermal in action on an eight person team.

My current build is fairly old and hasn't been respec'd after inherent fitness. Where /sonic will shine and where any potential end issues will come to play will be 4 slotting with Impervium armor for 2.25 extra end which will also increase recovery very nicely. This excites me as the current build thanks to slotting of my primaries already is recovery friendly, after this change it will be very sexxxeh! Also one of the nice things about sonic is you don't have to invest in a heavy number of slots and they can go towards primary and epics. It's pretty slot friendly. Just some thoughts.

Another vote here for Ill/TA as a fun, very effective combo.

If anyone had wondered, Ill/Sonic isn't too painful to run. Psionic + Res Debuffs + Containment work out well. If the rest of the /Sonic set were actually worth a darn, I'd highly recommend it.

I have a fire/sonic at 50 and an earth/sonic parked at 40. Both are primarily solo artists.

The fire/sonic is a lot of fun to play, but I wonder how much of that is due to fire rather than sonic. Like an earlier poster, I rarely bother to shield up my imps anymore. Sonic as a secondary is very set and forget, and there are a couple of powers that very few people will bother taking (Sonic Cage, Sonic Repulsion).

My earth/sonic is not nearly as much fun. I orginally liked the idea of having an essentially invulnerable pet, but the low damage of the earth set overall makes solo missions kind of a grind.

I recently respecced my Mind/TA to take Stealth (+ a stealth IO in Sprint) and... it helps a lot more than I had expected. Actually I don't feel like playing the same toon than before: now I can calmy choose the best angle to cast Total Domination / Mass Confusion / EMP Arrow or Confuse distant ennemies to make a tight pack. Practice since my last post helped too, but Stealth really was the missing piece ^^