We'd like to hear from all of you what improvements we should make to a controller class that is primarily charged with control of enemies, and with debuffing enemies. If you think about it, it would be possible to build a game where all characters do debuff, and damage is a minor side-note effect relegated to one or two classes. But that would reverse the theory of every action movie ever made, as well as almost all games, so players expect damage to be king. This is why there is such an amazing focus on DPS for characters in many games. Many players automatically assume that maximizing DPS creates the strongest, most over-powered character. But controllers suggest that this idea is not true, and it is certainly not true in SoH. We think controllers are a special hi-skill class, most effective on teams but still able to solo, and that powerful debuff makes controllers incredibly OP in some situations. But we also want there to be some (not all) situations in which control powers, not debuff, turn out to be highly effective fighting tools that defeat enemies in swarms. In fact, we are speculating about making a short clip showing some of the unique features of SoH controllers. Would that be of interest?

kaminobaka said
I suppose I'd have to say the controller archetype in general speaks to my heart. As weak a role as it is in some games due to boss immunities and things like that, I love debuffing as a primary role for a class.

It is fun feeling, and CoH Illusion powerset was an excellent implementation of the concept.

There's a discussion around hard and soft power - hard (approximately) being the ability to just straight up murder your opponent, while soft power is directly weaker but used right means you win without having to fight at all.

CoH really nailed "soft" power in a game better than many others. It's difficult to do well, but having debuffs really mean something is still strangely rare in MMOs. There's nothing more fun than standing in the middle of a swarm of enemies who just can't seem to lay a finger on you 🙂

(also welcome aboard!)

The results of the poll so far are really interesting. When I first started playing CoH, my first character was a scrapper. Eventually, I played all the archetypes in that game, but scrappers and melee characters always had a special place in my heart. When CoH closed, like many in the community, I started playing SWOTR and my first character was a sorcerer. The sorcerer class is range damage and healing. That combination also speaks to my soul. The third class that speaks to me is the debuffing controller class. In CoH, that was a high skill class because the controllers did so little damage. In SoH, all those will be available, and more.