Aside from getting Torchielle and Kazima up to 21 over the weekend (with some Friday and Saturday prep, and the Synapse TF wrapping it up), we also dinged Psi-clone and Amorpha to 36. W00T!
Actually considering a Respec on PC. While I like his power set, as I was tossing slots into him I realized that I have a hell of a lot of recharges on various powers (Group Invis, Phantom Army, Recovery Aura, with more to come). Enough that it might be worth sacrificing a power slot to Hasten and perma it, and in return free up another 5-6 slots.
Being able to heal faster could come in handy sometimes, too.
Of course, there is no power I want to give up. Dagnabbit.
Archetype: Controller
Primary Powers – Ranged : Illusion Control
Secondary Powers – Support : Empathy
01 : Healing Aura hel(01) endred(5) hel(13) hel(7) hel(33)
01 : Spectral Wounds dam(01) dam(3) acc(5) dam(11) dam(36)
02 : Deceive cnfdur(02) cnfdur(3) acc(7) rng(11)
04 : Heal Other hel(04) hel(13) hel(15) endred(17) hel(33)
06 : Hover fltspd(06)
08 : Blind hlddur(08) acc(9) endred(9) hlddur(17) acc(34)
10 : Air Superiority acc(10) dam(27)
12 : Group Invisibility recred(12) recred(15) recred(19) recred(19) recred(21) recred(21)
14 : Fly endred(14) endred(36)
16 : Hurdle jmp(16)
18 : Phantom Army recred(18) recred(25) recred(27) recred(31)
20 : Swift runspd(20)
22 : Stamina endrec(22) endrec(23) endrec(23) endrec(25) endrec(29) endrec(29)
24 : Fortitude defbuf(24)
26 : Maneuvers endred(26)
28 : Recovery Aura recred(28) recred(31) recred(34)
30 : Tactics thtbuf(30) endred(31) thtbuf(34)
32 : Phantasm acc(32) dam(33) dam(36)
35 : Resurrect endred(35)
The next two powers — Adrenaline Boost and Conserve Power — end up being recred-heavy as well. Power Boost at 47 is the same. So there’s some real value there.
Problem is, what to give up? PC is such a utility player that he’s got a wide variety of powers in his Primary and Secondary, plus Leadership. All of them are key parts of his strategy.
Rrg. The least important is Rez (already pushed back to this level a while back); I could take it (again) at 37, if I were willing to give up a future power — the ones I’ve mentioned above, plus TI and Vengeance. Again, doable, but then I need to shuffle things a bit (shove Rez off, take Hasten earlier so I can have it perma by now).
I also hate to add the Hasten glowy to myself. Just not me. But …
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***Dave Does the Game
Hrm.
Okay, have looked more at what I could give up. And the answer is … well, hrm.
I’d just as soon let go of the nerfed Maneuvers, but then I’d lose Tactics, which is a very nice TH buff — and I’d lose Vengeance, which is a very nice Jump On the AV buff on a team.
Still, that’s three power slots. (At the very least, I think I’m going to swap Maneuvers for Assault, but …)
TI is the power I’m lease interested in, but it’s part of the Power Mastery pool and a pre-req therefore for Power Boost — which sounds like da bomb for a Controller like me. Conserve Power is in there, too, and I think will be a very useful thing down the line (having started playing with it with Torchielle — and, of course, considering that I’ll now have Hasten …)
Then there’s four Empathy powers, all of which sound like too much fun. Rez is probably the least required, though it’s awfully nice to have, esp. where Inspirations are short. It is also very much a Public Service sort of power, of the kind that PC likes. Fortitude is too useful for buffing up Amorpha when we duo. Recovery Aura hasn’t seemed as necessary, though everyone assures me that it’s a great power (and it’s one of my few AoE boosts). Adrenaline Boost sounds like it’s going to make individual team members (including/especially A.) even more uber.
I hate to give up any of them.
(Note to self: These things have humongous recharge times. Am I really going to save that many slots? Am I going to put together something that uses up nearly as many recharge slots, in order to get these things into a regular per-battle rotation, even with Hasten?
(This begs the issue of the attention being paid here to the Empathy secondary. I’m not a Defender, but I’m sure playing one on TV … and IP, and FF, and TI, and …)
Hmmm. I could drop Hover. That’s … odd to contemplate, but I do have Air Superiority to enable Flight. Hmmmm. And I never actually battle using Hover, or Flight (well, almost never), and I could toss a few End Redux into it, and …
So, of things to drop, my tentative preferences are, in this order:
(Also thinking of changing Hurdle for Health, but that’s another minor detail.)
Thoughts?
More I’m thinking about it, the more I think that Hover has negligible utility in my present build. Next time I’ve got a spare minute with PC, that’s where Hasten will get respecced to. (Conveniently, it means minimal screwing around with power slots in CoH Planner, too.)
I would agree on Hover not being as important as some of the other things you mentioned. I would have done away with either that, or Deceive. I would -definitely- keep RA. It may not come into play much as you duo with Amorpha, but down the line, when you start getting AV arcs, it will help with those long battles. (I remember one battle against the Carnie AV taking around 20 minutes…I was watching the clock)
I’ve always thought PC had an….interesting (but very capable)…build. I guess mainly due to the lack of the AoE hold, but if he’s more of a utility man than a strict lockdown artist, I can see why you skipped on it.
I’m not a big one on Hasten, either, but some builds just really need it. I think the original, un-Hastened recharge on RA is something like eight minutes. With six-slotted Hasten and RA six slotted with rec redux, it’s about a 45 second wait from when RA wears off to when you can recast it. For a Defender that’s not bad but with an Emp secondary you might not need that quick of a return. I’ve also found that with six slotted Hasten and having Fortitude four slotted (rec redux) I can -usually- get it on three or four folks per battle….if they stand still long enough 🙂
While I hate powers that depend on a teamate dying (Resurrection, Vengence, Revive *Regen power*, etc.) sometimes they’re nice to have. Resurrection is one of them and, mainly, becuse you can do it mid battle and bring someone up to full. I’ve found it pretty useful in a lot of combat situations.
These are just some of my ramblings…FWIW 🙂
Oh, I could never drop Deceive. The entertainment value alone is worth the price of admission. Even if it’s becoming more problematic now that we’re running into Nemesis types, it’s still not a bad deal. And still fun.
Frankly, I like being able to run up to someone on the street who’s just died and Rez them, so they don’t have to run back from the hospital. I actually like being a Good Samaritan as I travel from here to there.
And, yes, he definitely lacks an AoE hold (which is one reason why I5 hurt him less than some other controllers). Like I said, I’m a general support person, with Fred the Phantasm hanging out behind my shoulder to assist with the damage dealing while I heal and target blinds and clean up the riff-raff.
Good thoughts. Thanks, LB.
Margie forwarded me (by e-mail, posted here for long-term retention and sharing) some Hasten calculators:
Online Enhancement Calculator, by Havok, also available as an Excel spreadsheet. Further info in this forum entry.
PH = Perma-Hasten
+n = +n Even-Level SOs
GROUP INVIS
Duration: 120
Base recharge: 240
PH: 140
*+6: 90
PH+6: 71
Safe perma: PH+2: 118
Safer perma: PH+3: 101
(*Current; change to 3; save 3)
PHANTOM ARMY
Duration: 60
Base recharge: 240
PH: 140
*+4: 102
PH+6: 71
Cannot perma with even-level SOs.
(*Current; change to 0; save 4)
RECOVERY AURA
Duration: 60
Base recharge: 480
PH: 280
*+4: 206
PH+2: 202
+6: 160
PH+6: 130
Cannot perma with even-level SOs
(*Current; could change to 2 to even out, or bump to 6 to maximize)
ADRENALINE BOOST
Duration: 90
Recharge: 300
PH: 176
*+6: 100
Perma: PH+5: 89
Perma: PH+6: 81
(*Current plan; change to 5, saving 1)
CONSERVE POWER
Duration: 90
Recharge: 600
PH: 353
*+5: 225
PH+3: 222
+6: 200
PH+6: 160
Cannot perma with even-level SOs
(*Current; could match at 3 to even out, saving 2, or bump to 6 to maximize, costing 1)
POWER BOOST
Duration: 15
Recharge: 120
PH: 70
*+6: 40
PH+4: 39
PH+6: 32
Cannot perma with even-level SOs
(*Current plan; could match at 4 to even out, saving 2, or leave at 6 to maximize)
Annoyingly, COH Planner does not calculate Hasten (or allow Hasten to calculate) into Recharge times. So I’ve used the web page above; note that you have to specify the actual level (not the relative -1/0/+1 level) of the SOs.
Based on the above stats, I did a respec on PC last night. I was a bit concerned — but then realized I had two respecs in the kitty, so I could burn one if need be. Current level 36 …
01 : Healing Aura hel(01) endred(5) hel(13) hel(19) hel(33) // hel(37)
01 : Spectral Wounds dam(01) dam(3) acc(5) dam(29) dam(39) dam(36)
02 : Deceive cnfdur(02) cnfdur(3) acc(25) // acc(43) cnfdur(45)
04 : Heal Other hel(04) hel(13) hel(15) endred(17) hel(33) // hel(37)
06 : Hasten recred(06) recred(7) recred(7) recred(9) recred(9) recred(11)
08 : Blind hlddur(08) acc(11) hlddur(17) acc(27) hlddur(31) hlddur(34)
10 : Air Superiority acc(10) dam(27) dam(29)
12 : Group Invisibility recred(12) recred(15) recred(19)
14 : Fly fltspd(14) fltspd(36) // fltspd(39)
16 : Hurdle jmp(16)
18 : Swift runspd(18)
20 : Stamina endrec(20) endrec(21) endrec(21) endrec(23) endrec(23) endrec(25)
22 : Phantom Army recred(22)
24 : Fortitude defbuf(24)
26 : Assault endred(26)
28 : Recovery Aura recred(28) recred(31)
30 : Tactics thtbuf(30) thtbuf(31) thtbuf(34) thtbuf(34) // thtbuf(40)
32 : Phantasm acc(32) dam(33) dam(36) // dam(37) acc(40) dam(40)
35 : Resurrect endred(35) // endred(39)
= = =
38 : Adrenaline Boost recred(38) recred(42) recred(42) recred(45) recred(45) recred(50)
41 : Conserve Power recred(41) recred(42) recred(43) recred(43) recred(46) recred(46)
44 : Temp Invulnerability damres(44) damres(46)
47 : Power Boost recred(47) recred(48) recred(48) recred(48) recred(50) recred(50)
49 : Vengeance hel(49)
Had a brief opportunity to play (after getting tied up in some RP with Healing Rayne), and — W007! Hasten is da bomb! Sure, I have to watch my Endurance a bit more carefully, but I was able to seriously wreak havoc while duoing with Amorpha.
A couple of other changes:
1. I kept the second Fly enhancement I’d gotten up to. A serious QoL improvement. I even allocated a third slot. A perceptible difference.
2. Dropping hover was not a big problem. Had to watch the End while doing some fly-in combat, but …
3. Since the Defense bonus of Maneuvers got so nerfed, I changed to Assault instead. The +Dmg can’t be enhanced, but it’s nice as is.
Played pretty well last night. I look forward to trying it some more, and on teams.