Question about /pain

I am intrigued by the /pain set, and am wondering if it's better on Corrs or MM. Also, are the buffs good enough (I rarely see them) that it would make me an asset to a team? Or are Emp/ff/kin/therm all better buffs? Lastly, which powersets go well with /pain? I was think of trying beam or beasts (one I havent tried/purchased yet) but maybe those don't provide much synergy. Thanks for any help/advice given!




@DrkFlz

Is it even on Corruptors? I thought it was solely for MMs.

Beast and pain do have a lot of synergy, though.

I like my Beast/Pain, alternating World of Pain and Fortify Pack to keep my pets survivable, or both when things get real messy. Painbringer is a nice buff for the Dire Wolf who gulps down endurance. Personally, I think Beast/Pain has as much synergy as any combo you'll find and makes a fun and effective character, but neither are top tier sets so that's to be considered if you're set on top end performance.

I don't think I'd pair Pain with Beam Rifle. While the pairing would work, Pain is a busy set and the constant redraw would be distracting. I do really like Beam Rifle though, with a Beam/Dev blaster that I love, and Beam/Traps corruptor that's become my main character.

Pain does have one difference between Corrs and MM's. For MM's Suppress Pain is a PBAoE +regen toggle, and for Corr's it becomes Soothing Aura, a PBAoE toggle with a periodic minor heal. I prefer the MM version, but opinions on that vary.

Great ty for the replies! I actually just made a beasts/pain and I like it so far. I totally agree on the suppress pain power, I think the MM version seems better. Gunna enjoy this one I think.

To answer the question, it works well for both, but it is better for a corruptor, because you get damage buffs out of it, and the toggle heal is only on corruptors that can wake sleeping teammates - the toggle on MM does regen instead.

Pain isn't fantastic. Its a more even spread over the team than Empathy - making everyone moderately good rather than the select few very good.

It performs better than it looks on paper. World of Pain gives everyone 18% resistance to everything, which doesn't sound like a lot, but pushes everyone up a tier. Resistance Scrappers/Brutes become resistance Tanks, Fire Tankers become Invulnerability tankers, and so on. Its like giving everyone an extra dose of Tough from the Fighting pool, but to all damage.
Between that and the constant pulse of Soothing Aura you need remarkably little spot healing. I found Empathy to be much more "health bar whack-a-mole" than Pain.

Come the snipe changes in I24, World of Pain gets a boost in providing +10% To Hit to the whole team. That will make the set more popular ( but still wont be a match for Time which will do the same).

I'm currently playing a level 50 Beam Rifle/Pain corrupter, and its a combo that doesn't give me much personal survival, but shores up any team quite adequately and subtly. I spend most of my time shooting, pausing for the odd spot-heal and application of PainBringer when its up (Pains very sub-par verison of Adrenalin Boost). I need to respec to take the snipe before I24.

It should be noted that Field Medic in the Medicine pool will help corruptors and not masterminds when it comes to the toggle aura also.

...but yeah, on top of everything else, Pain brings damage buffs for the caster, and it seems the majority of masterminds don't use damage powers much.

I always get the feeling that /Pain would be even better on a Controller. But alas, they do not have it yet.

Psi/Pain and Sonic/Pain corrs are quite popular.

I do enjoy /pain though, just feel it needs something slightly more to take it out of being in the middle.

I have a demon/pain and it works well - my pets never die but that's about it. It will never beat how much I enjoy thugs/traps.

Yea, I was talking about the Mastermind himself. I'm well aware of the absurd damage a Mastermind and his pets can put out.

So long as you have Provoke and a basic understanding of Bodyguard Mode soloing an AV isn't much of a challenge, generally. Now, there are some exceptions, of course. Some AVs with controller powers can be troublesome, and then there's Recluse and his infinite army of Bane Executioners.

The self-only damage buffs in Pain aren't much to write home about. The Absorb Pain clone gives you 25% ( a small red ) and rezzing someone gives you +30% with a crash later. You won't be spamming either of these powers.

A Mastermind will give all their pets the World of Pain buff (+16%) and can choose a pet to give PainBringer (+50%) when its up, which a solo Pain Corrupter cant do.

So I'd say its debatable that MM's really lose out on much at all over Corrupters in terms of how damage boost are applied.