Dark/DAff Controller Journal

So, at long last I finally get a Dark controller: Shadow-Fallen.

An angel that couldn't deal with the no intervention policy and came down to earth to kick so bad guy butt. :-)

Big shout out to Zwill from all of us (myself and both kids)! He showed up on Triumph and started a flying disk party in the lawn in front of Ms Liberty. My son had spent some of his hard earned money to BUY the flying disk about 10 minutes before Zwill showed up, so: Awesome. Perfect end to an evening of family gaming and it was the kids favorite thing in the game so far. If the Flying disk showed up in the power tray's immediately it would be perfect. :-)

Did a couple missions with my kids (10 year old shell script writing IOS and Android app developing son, and 9 year old hysterically funny author/artist daughter, I'm the luckiest dad around :-) ) last night. Awesome. My daughter tried her first tank (she plays MM's mostly) and LOVED it, showed real promise on holding aggro and even a bit of herding! My son was on his Nrg/Poison corruptor, and also did a great job once he got over his soloing blaster type tactics. ;-)

Anyway, back to the point Dark/DAff:

Only got her up to lvl 9 as playing with the kids isn't optimal for xp gain though it was a LOT of fun. Towards the end of the evening gaming time I hit Perez at lvl 7 and it was hard taking down a large spawn, but doable with a tray of insps and Living Shadows 5 slotted with the GR pre-order enh. Got lvl 8 and picked up FS to pair with Darkest night.

OMG.

I was just mowing 'em down. Open with FS. Follow up with Darkest Night on a mob (boss by pref) in the middle and "possess" any LT's and just spam Living Shadows while beating on the boss (if there was one) with STH and vet attacks. It was a great fun watching the entire spawn being unable (floored acc) to hit me. Living Shadows with the Going Rogue pre-order enh 5 slotted (+ an acc TO) for the procs worked wonderfully for mass AOE dmg. Twilight Grasp was totally able to keep up with the incoming dmg.

Obviously that's a temp situation as the enh procs stop firing at lvl 20, but the Darkest Night + FS combo was AWESOME for opening a fight and was PERFECT as a alpha eliminating tool.

Love the new animation for Possess, best animation in the set.

I'll post more as I get deeper into the set, but the initial impressions were that it was a very fun, well balanced combo. Versatile, but not OP. Without the GR pre-order procs the dmg from Living Shadows was totally balanced, and the -acc effectively neuters a spawn much as an Elec/Elec controller can totally sap a spawn to end-lock.

Thumbs up to the Dev team!

Woo! yes this set is very much amazing, I got so into the set I couldnt stop playing untill about 4 hours ago to get to 38, let me be the first to tell you that the dark servant+umbra wolf+2x shades is awesome. Like playing a minimastermind. the wolf provides the damage while fluffy heals and neuters the mobs tohit, with the shades chasing down the stray minions I could likely get away with just sitting back and letting them have all the fun.

I gotta say, Dark Control looks SO GOOD, and customizes SO WELL, that it makes Dark Affinity (and Dark Melee and Dark Armor) all look and customize like crap. :-P

Didn't have too much time to play last night, but I got Shadow-Fallen up to 12 just running around Perez Park street sweeping.

FUN.

I LOVE Fearsome Stare as an opener followed by Darkest Night then Living Shadows. Confuse any outliers at the edge of the spawn either before or after that AOE control chain and they will run into the center so you can get them locked in place near the Darkest Night Anchor. At that point it's just a matter of lining yourself up right and spamming Living Shadows till they drop. Having all five of the GR Pre-Order enh slotted in Living Shadows is fantastic (+an Acc DO) . I'll have to think about what procs etc to slot it with once I hit 20 and the GR Pre-order enh stop procing.

I just can't say enough about how much I love the new animations in Dark Control, Possess totally rocks, can't wait to see Haunt etc.

So far I've taken no powers except Pri/Sec ones, using Ninja Run for a travel power. The -Tohit synergy between Dark/ and /DAff is just too tasty to skip any of the early powers. Still have to pick up HT.

Currently she's:

DARK Control:

Shadowy Binds
Dark Grasp
Living Shadows
Possess
Fearsome Stare

Dark Affinity:

Twilight Grasp
Tar Patch
Darkest Night

Shadowy Binds was one of the last that I picked up, totally worth it for locking bosses in place and as part of a decent ranged attack chain. I may respec out of it when I get to the late game and can pick up an APP/PPP ST blast, depends on how indispensible everything else is.

Arg

Sounds fun. I envy you, as it will take me at least through Friday night just to *make* all 12 of my characters. I have had playtime on some of them, but right now I am just working on getting names and concepts.

I have actually played my new Dominators more, just because they are less important to me, and so are easier to make and play. While occasionally typing /friend commands in missions.

Lewis

Ran through some missions and street sweeping last night with the kids and then some more solo and got Shadow-Fallen to 16, so she got her quasi-namesake power. There are a LOT of Outcasts in Skyway that are heartily sick of being nigh unable to hit anything while trembling in abject terror.

Continues to be a quite fun combo, though I'm feeling the lack of any -Def powers since I don't have access to SO equivalent enh yet. I'm thinking I'll probably plan to pickup Maneuvers (LotG mule) and Leadership for the +ToHit boost. Given that she's an Angel I felt like I needed to pickup Fly, but now I'm second guessing that. I'd probably be better off with Hover (LotG) and keep using Ninja Run. Maybe put a celerity +stealth IO in sprint to pair with Shadow Fall.

My kids are really enjoying the opening sequence of calling out "Tremble in fear!" before triggering FS, then Elizabeth loves the black porcupine of Darkest Night and the reaching hands of Living Shadows. Good times.

I find myself using Possess a LOT more as a positioning power than I ever did with Confuse on any of my stable of Mind/ Controllers and Doms.

Two more levels to Haunt!

Arg

Had a GREAT time playing (when I had time) this weekend. Played quite a bit with the kids (Nrg/Poison Corrupter and a Willpower/MA Tank), and really appreciate the hand Annie Wildfire lent the kids when I was already on a team and had to finish the mission before I could join them. :-)

Shadow-Fallen is up to 26 and with a lot more soloing and teaming time under my belt I have a few more comments regarding Dark/Dark.

So far the sweet spot for difficulty lvl is +0/5 equivalent so I get really large spawns of +0 or +1 mobs. FS (1 Acc, 3 -tohit debuff, 1 rech) + Darkest Night (1 endred) seems to be enough for dmg mitigation, and spammed Living shadows (with the 2 procs) takes care of the minions while the ST hold (1 Acc, 1 hold, 3 dmg) and judicious use of Posess takes care of LT's. I usually throw in Haunt part way in if there are no bosses so that they are still around to help take down the LT's at the end.

6-Slotted Living Shadows are now slotted with a 5 pack of Posi Blast + Trap of the Hunter Lethal Proc.

I've got 4 LotG +global rech in: Shadow Fall, Fade, Hover and Maneuvers. Between them and the +rech from the Posi Blast set, I'm getting close to 40% global rech which is enough to really start making itself felt.

I LOVE Haunt. I've currently got it slotted 1 Acc, 3 Dmg and 2 Rech SO's. Surprisingly flexible power… I Use it to totally occupy/kill a boss, I've used it to help clump up a spawn and/or eat the alpha from a secondary clump of a spawn. The ONLY time I don't like Haunt is after I've finished a spawn and I'm travelling to the next. The shades are MASSIVE aggro magnets, so it's actually a good thing that they don't stay around too long.

Fade: I'm going to buck the tide here and say that I really love it JUST the way it is. It may be short, but it's just about the right duration to get me through the initial setup time and it's up often enough that I can use it for almost each spawn when soloing (LARGE size spawns, but that's just so much FUN). I'm actually not looking forward to the update on Fade, though it'll still be quite useful. I'll miss the MASSIVE +def up at the start of just about every spawn.

Shadow Field: Meh. I've only played with it very briefly, but so far it's looking like it might be one of my very few /skip powers in Dark/Dark. So far I'm just not seeing when/why I would want it given it's uber long rech and lack of real power as a hold. I'll need to play with it slotted up, but it's not looking to favorable atm.

Now that I've got SO's I'm thinking I could probably drop Tactics, maybe trade it out for Combat jumping (5th LotG)? Dunno though, Tactics is super handy if I need to use vet attacks or if fighting Arachnos with those blasted blinding smoke grenades.

So far Haunt is one of the powers that's grown on me most with slotting. It's flat out awesome for single target dmg, and really reduces the need for more single target attacks (like the ST immob). It would be fantastic if their AI could get a tweak to get them to prefer higher ranking mobs when selecting their next target. If they would focus on LT's instead of wasting their time on minions it would make them even MORE amazing.

Arg

Haunt is definitely a good power. I am in a dark control duo with a friend off and on. We are both level 21. His secondary is Dark Affinity and mine is Poison. Those Haunts really help us.

Still loving the Dark/DAff combo. Didn't get too much time to play over the last few days, but I got Shadow-Fallen up to 27, got the final LotG (buying 5 from the market was soooo the way to go!) slotted as well as getting a 4 pack of Dark watcher in Darkest Night, a 5 pack of Exp Reinforcement in Haunt and a 4 pack of Clouded Senses in Fearsome Stare.

All told, she's up to 61.25% rech and it's making a BIG difference.

Haunt and Possess continue to shine. I'd love to take the ST Immob for the dmg and pinning A/V's to the ground, but with 3 slots going to LotG/Def powers I simply don't have the space yet.

Played a bit more with Shadow Field and it remains totally meh. I'll have to try it out on a test build with heavy slotting to see if it's worthwhile, but as I had to respec anyway, I swapped it out for Heart of Darkness, I'd rather put the slots into HoD anyway as a solution for mobs that resist the fear based alpha eliminator that is FS (yes, yes it IS a Nemesis plot, thank you for asking).

I just love the flexibility of the set, works equally solo and teaming. Hopefully I'll get her up to the late game before Beast Summoning comes out and I get the twitch to try yet another new alt.

Arg

Can you proc the bejeezus out of Shadow Field to make it worthwhile?

You can. It also does autohit -15% tohit. In my experience it's even a pretty reliable hold, which is impressive seeing as 75% up-time is not out of the question. I put six will of the controller in it and it's there when I need it and does what I expect of it. Let me put it this way: if I want my umbra beast to lay into a spawn I specifically do not use shadow field because it is too good at shutting things down.

What are the procs we're talking about?

Boy do i miss MIDS.

Shadow field can take the ghost widow's embrace proc as well as the unbreakable constraint proc. I view purple procs as approximately twice as valuable as normal procs so that's a pretty proccy slotting in my book. Well, it can also take the will of the controller proc, but I wouldn't advise not six slotting any set that provides a 5% ranged defense bonus. Oh, and I forgot that neuronic shutdown has a damage proc as well. Another option. And hell, I didn't even know gladiator's net did. You could put five procs in shadow field if you were so inclined.

So. Awesome weekend. :-)
Got to spend quite a bit of time in game this weekend, so I got Shadow-Fallen to Lvl 39.6.

So now I've seen/ played with the build with Mrs. O'Leary AND Fluffy in addition to my faithful Shades. HECK yes. Fluffy totally pulls his weight, and all four of them together ROCK. It'll be even better once the Umbra Beast AI is given a bit of aggression, but even now it's excellent indeed. The Haunts are like guided missiles, while Umbral and Fluffy have my back .

I made the mistake of chatting with Lewis on the Control channel for a bit about how I really missed having some -Def in the build. He dug around and pulled up the info that Waterspout in Leviathan Mastery is a -Def. Not mention I LOVED Waterspout on my Doms both for damage, and for the knockdown and fear. Water spout causes Fear and Disorient, with proper coloring it would fit perfectly with Dark/Dark. Add in the Coralax pet, and the fact that the Cone AOE in Leviathan would match nicely with Dark/'s cones... Bang, I've now committed to the trip to the Red side to pick up Leviathan Mastery. :: sigh ::

Good news is I helped my son do some of his Vigilante tip missions a few days ago, so I had like a 3 tip start and managed to get fully to Vigilante by the end of the evening. :-)

So one more alignment to go and I can respec into Waterspout!

Since I've got decent +rech already (+72.5 from IO sets IIRC) in the build, Waterspout and the Coralax should be up pretty frequently. Just think about it:

2 Shades.
1 Umbra Beast
1 Dark Servant
1 Waterspout
1 Coralax

That's SIX pets on a NON-Storm Controller! It's like a mini-MM but with a full group of powersets in addition to all the pets!

Yum.

(A steadily more villainous) Arg

That should be pretty nice! Tempting you into Evil was my pleasure!

I only regret that I have grown to resent the Umbral Beast. Not for the AI. Not directly for the constant yapping. But rather for being too much a reactive sapient/living/engaged creature. It kills almost any non-Magic origin for me. Fire Imps can be mere chaotic reflections of my Will on a mutant or a science controller. Heck, so can the Haunts from Darkness control. But Umbral Beast is too clearly an independent creature, which kills it for me, for non-Magic builds.

So as a result I will be deleting most of my dark control characters. I will probably keep Dark/Storm and my Dark/Fire dominator, but I am likely to delete at least 6 others, or else make totally new characters with magic concepts.

Lewis

It has got to be AWESOME to play a game you enjoy with your kids. Cheers.

B

Quote:

Originally Posted by Argentae So. Awesome weekend. :-) Got to spend quite a bit of time in game this weekend, so I got Shadow-Fallen to Lvl 39.6. So now I've seen/ played with the build with Mrs. O'Leary AND Fluffy in addition to my faithful Shades. HECK yes. Fluffy totally pulls his weight, and all four of them together ROCK. It'll be even better once the Umbra Beast AI is given a bit of aggression, but even now it's excellent indeed. The Haunts are like guided missiles, while Umbral and Fluffy have my back . I made the mistake of chatting with Lewis on the Control channel for a bit about how I really missed having some -Def in the build. He dug around and pulled up the info that Waterspout in Leviathan Mastery is a -Def. Not mention I LOVED Waterspout on my Doms both for damage, and for the knockdown and fear. Water spout causes Fear and Disorient, with proper coloring it would fit perfectly with Dark/Dark. Add in the Coralax pet, and the fact that the Cone AOE in Leviathan would match nicely with Dark/'s cones... Bang, I've now committed to the trip to the Red side to pick up Leviathan Mastery. :: sigh :: Good news is I helped my son do some of his Vigilante tip missions a few days ago, so I had like a 3 tip start and managed to get fully to Vigilante by the end of the evening. :-) So one more alignment to go and I can respec into Waterspout! Since I've got decent +rech already (+72.5 from IO sets IIRC) in the build, Waterspout and the Coralax should be up pretty frequently. Just think about it: 2 Shades. 1 Umbra Beast 1 Dark Servant 1 Waterspout 1 Coralax That's SIX pets on a NON-Storm Controller! It's like a mini-MM but with a full group of powersets in addition to all the pets! Yum. (A steadily more villainous) Arg

I been reading your exploits with a lot of interest particularly I am torn between controller and dominator. I am leaning towards controller mainly because of fluffy so would like your personal opinion of him? Also have you played a dark/dark dom? How they compare in terms of damage, soloability and playability?

Thanks for the great insight. I will keep on working on my dark/dark trolley.

My villainous odessy is complete! Last night I finished the alignment missions to switch to the red side so I could pick up Leviathan Mastery. By the time I finished all the tip missions and then the patron arc missions for Mako, I was at level 41.

In the Patron respec I picked up Water Spout at 35 (and 6 slotted it) and Bile Spray at 41.

I love, LOVE water spout on a Dark/Dark. With knockup/down instead of knockback it tends to just sit on targets, esp if you wait a bit so that only LT's and/or bosses are up for long. The damage it does is QUITE substantial when focusing on a single hard target, and the -def it brings to the table is especially valuable for a Dark/Dark as you have no other -def powers and being able to use Vet attacks vs single hard targets is quite handy. With it 6 slotted (3 Rech/3Dmg somewhat stale SO's so 88% of each), and 72% global rech it's up probably 50% of the time (out for 30 sec and recharging for 30 sec though I haven't timed it or done the math, that's about what it seems).

Bile Spray is only single slotted so far with a lvl 40 Acc SO, but it meshes very well indeed with the cones for FS and LS, and it looks like it should do quite good damage to supplement the procs in Living Shadows.

I don't really see a need for the Armor (res armor instead of +def ), and I *probably* will skip Hibernate, but I'll pickup the Coralax pet at 44, and it's ranged cone and multiple melee attacks should mesh perfectly with Umbra Beast and the haunts.

All-in-all I think it's a nigh perfect complement for a Dark/Dark controller. And it means that I'll have SIX pets. Same number as an MM, but with the full resources of a Dark/Dark controller behind them! Sweet.

Now I just need to figure out the slotting for the Leviathan Mastery powers. :: ponder ::

Arg

Sounds truly awesome. Congrats!

Meanwhile, I am in Stalker Hell, due to a friend goading me into making one. But I need to get back to some controller action.

Lewis

Been quite a while since I updated this journal.

Shadow Fallen is now up to about 49.5 (awesome for both teaming and soloing) or so, so I'm looking seriously at a final build. I've transfered some cash and enh to her, so I've got a bit over 1.2 billion (and 6 Hero Merits) so far to play with for outfitting her. This is the first character I'll be taking through the incarnate content (focusing on DA), so I'm trying to get a handle on the whole incarnate system as well. ;-)

I haven't really focused on building for def, though I've picked up the steadfast +3 def global and have Fade, Shadow Fall, Combat Jumping, Maneuvers and Hover (all five slotted with a LotG +rech). Fade isn't really slotted out, with all the -ToHit from Fearsome stare etc there really hasn't been a need to really focus on MORE +def.
YET.
I understand that will probably change in DA?

A few things I've found:

1. The two store bought (Paragon points) procs in LS (Posi and TotH) do *excellent* dmg indeed. I'm planning on adding in the Apoc Purple Neg Nrg proc and WotC proc and then probably two acc/end franken slots. That frees up a 5 pack of Posi Blast to go somewhere… Probably into Bile Spray.

2. I love having Fluffy slotted for healing, but I may need to look at slotting it for -ToHit when I hit DA and the incarnate content. I've currently got the Cloud Senses proc, 3 heal and one acc slotted. Any thoughts on slotting Fluffy would be appreciated, I'm already full up on 6.25% rech sets IIRC.

3. Kinda stumped on slotting Waterspout, on tornado I've occasionally gone with Kin Crash as it gives decent enh values, is SUPER cheap and has quite good set bonuses. MUCH tighter build here so I may have to franken slot it for the most bang for the slots, I also wouldn't want to add any KB and kill the knock up.

Sets I already have:

1. 2 full sets of Expd reinforcements (currently 5 in Haunt and full 6 in Umbra).
2. 4 pack of Dark Watcher in Darkest Night.
3. 5 LotG + rech global
4. 5 pack of Cloud Senses (currently 4 in Fearsome stare and the proc in Fluffy)
5. 5 pack of Doctored Wounds in Twilight Grasp with a +Acc

I'm tentatively planning on:

1. Putting a 5 pack of WotC in Dark Grasp with a +dmg IO. I know that misses the +ranged def, but I'm thinking the proc in Living Shadows will be a way more effective use for damage.

2. Full 6 Pack of the Purple Coercive Persuasion in Possess.

I've been away from my normal setup (house is still being cleaned up from the contractor caused asbestos disaster), but I'm working on getting Mids setup so I can post a potential build.

TIA for any thoughts/suggestions anyone has!

Arg

You might want to consider slotting Haunt the same way I like to slot Phantom Army: 4 Expediant Reinforcement, the Dam/Rech and Chance for Build Up from Soulbound. I leave out the Dam/End and the Resist proc from Expediant Reinforcement. Admittedly, the resist proc will do some good in Haunt while it is worthless to PA. But the nice thing about this slotting is that you get capped Damage and Rech, decent accuracy and the Chance for Build Up in a multi-pet power to increase its chances of getting that build up.

I currently have 4 damage procs in Living Shadows, the WotC, Posi Blast, Trap of the Hunter and Cloud Senses. I'm impressed with the amount of damage it does.

If you want to build defense, you might considering putting the full cloud sense pack in fluffy.
I wouldn't recommend the chance for buildup proc in haunt. Since it only cycles through 2 attacks, one that does low damage and one that does no damage, it's less effective than slotting a damage proc.