Is Superior Invisibility's endurance cost a bug?

Don't get me wrong, I love my Illusion Controller and maybe I didn't make myself clear in my meaning. I only have three controllers in my stable the other two being Gravity. These were created in the days of Issue 2 and 3, pre difficulty slider, XP debt to the max, no IOs, the Hollows opposite corner runs and Perez maze runs were standard, no vet powers, leveling was slow and characters were inf poor until level 35.

Compared to damage oriented ATs, controllers as an AT are slow. Yes SW does enormous damage but a significant chunk will get healed back unless you defeat your target within 10 seconds. Both SW and Blind have longer recharges then other Tier 1+2 controller attacks. Again SW and Blind are your only two attacks in the set. If you are use to damage attack chains from your primary this set can be troublesome.

Which is why I emphasis Deceive. Yes it eats a little bit of XP, unless you simply let them defeat each other rather than helping them along. Anecdote: Was on a team doing the trial/TF in the Hollows. Final room, the team leader was porting players to their alcoves and when it got to me he noticed my pillar was rather crowded by spectral everything. Two bosses, a handful of lieutenants and some minions. The leader went back to the front of the alcove and started to port the other players to mine to help the "poor controller" clear his pillar, he didn't ask if I needed help. By the time he was done there was one boss left, badly damaged and just to show off I went down and finished it off with brawl (I was still keeping it deceived). The team wondered aloud why the leader ported everyone there. A combination of SI, extended range SW, Blind, heavily recharged Deceive and one PA to hold initial aggro let me turn them against one another and let me finish most of them in under two minutes with little threat to myself. Deceive was key in this situation since it let me "recruit" lieutenants and bosses to wipe each other enough that a single SW and an occasional Blind was enough to finish them. The minions were mostly one punched by the bosses.

Sorry I misremembered what Flash did, hold not sleep. The only time I had it, I think I was in Steel by then, it was very disappointing. I clearly remember times setting it off in oh **** moments and nobody got held and I was quickly defeated. Long cast time didn't help matters. I was probably still using TOs at that point. Was not impressed and I respec out of it the first chance I got.

On the other hand, getting back on topic, Superior Invis was a Godsend. Getting to a mission door in Perez park maze with large mobs of clocks +3 to you or kitty-corner in the Hollows deep in CoT territory was a breeze. And endurance problems, we all get Stamina now at level 2 and what enhancement other than end reduct are you planning on slotting in it, defense? Since defense is Class B, 3 SOs could give you only 7% defense instead of 4.5%, half once discovered. Not a lot of bang for the buck.

I periodically duo with a D3. We are both mid to high 30s. When I have my Phantasm out its not even fair, we have to crank up the difficulty beyond what he can comfortably solo just to make it interesting. Since neither of us a melee specialists, the knockback from Phantasm isn't a concern.

I end up rarely use PA except on EBs, GMs and AVs. PA may be great for minion cleanup otherwise it's simply to draw aggro. And since I'm not an IO master with deep pockets, a market master or AE farmer, I don't have perma anything on anyone.

I find playing with characters that are limited, by endurance, by recharge, by defense by regen, a lot more interesting than characters that I can simply flail my attack chain from mob to mob without worry.

I will not lie: playing my Ill/Rad bores me to tears. I levelled it up in a great weekly team with fun people, so I got it all the way to 50, and IOed it out for perma-PA, and it *still* bores me to tears. The couple of other controllers I've tried have also not thrilled me (a Plant/Storm and...something I can't even remember that I must've deleted.)

However, if I look around I can see plenty of other people playing Ill/ and enjoying it. Also, people playing other controllers and enjoying them. So my conclusion is not 'the whole controller AT is broken' but 'controllers don't suit my play style, so I'll play ATs that do, instead'. Different people like different things, and it's great that the game caters to them all.

If you don't want to be bored make a Illusion/Kinetics. You can almost perma PA without IO and it lends you to steamrolling and being very active. I want to max my recharge as much as I can so I spam siphon speed all the time, it must me 3 stacked at all times. Yes you can't buff PA but you help yourself alot and others, oh and I don't have endurance issues. Best thing about PA they tank very well, unless you doing iTrials. I can solo stuff very very easily and chain mob after mob after mob into 1 giant line of death.

PS: I don't have any end issues with SI <.< >.> X.X man kinetics rocks

So someone asked me to look at this thread, saying someone was saying Illusion controllers were weak. And I said "wut?" I'm not even sure where to begin.

Does Superior Invisibility cost too much end? Maybe. But its also not a critical problem with Illusion Control. Does Spectral Wounds do too little damage because of the healback? No: it deals 1.0 DS net with the healback, and the healback doesn't obey damage enhancement meaning the base damage goes up with damage slotting but the healback stays the same. Even with DOs SW acts like a 1.2DS attack, and with SOs like a 1.3 DS attack. Assuming the healback happens which it won't if the target dies. But its a good attack even when the healback happens.

Does Illusion burn more end than the average controller? Not really: outside of SI, the slightly higher cost of SW relative to its damage is more than made up for by the free (in endurance) damage from the phantom army. And even if the PA can't be up permanently, Illusion controllers learn to use it as it recharges, speeding up and slowing down, averaging out to a higher kill rate than without it.

Can you give full XP for confused enemies? No: that's exploitable. I could just hang out with SI and spam deceive on a bunch of +7s and let them kill each other. In fact, I was on a task force a few months ago in Striga on my Ill/Rad, and I happened to find myself exiting a mission near some +6s. So I figured, eh, and started confusing them, every once in a while tossing in the occasional SW so I got some of the XP. The tank that was with me decided to jump in, and before I could stop him, splat. I lured them away with the PA and rezzed him, but the fool decided to jump in *again* and splat. So I decided to leave him there. I ended up killing about a dozen +5s and +6s that way, and got rewards for them by virtue of nicking each target at least once. Imagine if I was getting full rewards for that.

Illusion is a tricky set because it doesn't play like other control sets. Its probably more different than the average control set than even Mind Control. You need to manage the three pets and deal with the fact you don't have an AoE immobilize attack. The "chaotic control" that Illusion is famous for will make dealing with lots of targets more difficult, but when that control and offense is focused on just a few, or even one, Illusion shines.

I probably would tend to agree that SI's end costs are a bit high: they are probably a legacy from when Fly had similar high costs. But Illusion Control is way, way, way down on my list of sets that need attention.

I believe the 1.04 cost is a throwback to the "Cottage rule" for controllers. Fire control has 1 toggle at about the same level that is also 1.04 (i think it's called Hot Feet) and i think i saw some other Controller powers at the same level and cost. I never had any problem with running SI all the time with my Ill/Kin if it was my only active toggle or with Hover, but turn on Repel with it and i'd have lots of trouble. I think SI was put at a standard cost since not all secondaries have toggles and a lower cost may have been seen as unbalancing if you had one of those secondaries. I can't agree with that myself but i figure dealing with the issue is just part of the game. As for the slow attack rate with Illusion, imagine what your end would be if it was quicker.

While I don't think illusion needs any improvement, I do think SI is too end heavy for what it does. Which is okay, not every power has to be great, particularly in an awesome set.

I've been rethinking the worth of it as a power while planning my respec of my ill/kin. Seems to me, for PvE only character, the end cost of SI makes it less than the best choice (sad face)

Superior Invisibility is 1.04 end/sec
The stealth IO in super speed is 0.46 end/sec
The stealth IO in sprint + super speed is 0.75 end/sec
The stealth IO in sprint plus Stealth power pool is 0.62 end/sec & gives a possible extra LoTG mules or one shot wonder power.

Then there's Group Invisibility, it effects you, is fairly simple to perma, costs 10.4 end/120 secs (an tiny 0.08 end/secs) if cast whenever it drops, but gives less def, and lowers threat rating (would that annoy tanking types caught in it?), and helps others stealth. Still needs stealth IO in sprint for an extra .29 end/secs to be as effective as SI.