Crowd Control Nukes; Are they useful?

[Jasimine]

So I am working on building myself into a versitile and effective nuking sorceress. I'm planning on having a few crowd control spells as they can come in handy in times when letting the melee wipe out the mobs is more effective and this has led me to look at two spells in particular that I refer to as Crowd Control Nukes. Greater Shout and Sunburst. I know that the damage on these will be rather poor compared to my traditional cold/fire and lightning/acid based nuking spells but they both carry with them a form of crowd control that can be rather effective depending on the party make up and what you are fighting.

Greater Shout carries it's stun based crowd control. Now is this stun the same as stunning blow/fist and allow for insta crits and sneak attacks? If so is it useful to work it as such and view it as a crowd control spell with a little added damage as a bonus?

Sunburst adds a blind componant to its rather poor damage, but blind can also help rogues deal out their sneak attacks much easier as well as giving some added defensive boost to the melee folks and a potential nuker. Is it useful in this regards?

I know they are not the most damaging spells and I'd not take them for that but rather as a form of crowd control that can do a little damage as well. Any thoughts?

[Rusty_Can]

Greater Shout carries it's stun based crowd control. Now is this stun the same as stunning blow/fist and allow for insta crits and sneak attacks?

No, it doesn't trigger critical hits and sneak-attacks.

Sunburst adds a blind componant to its rather poor damage, but blind can also help rogues deal out their sneak attacks much easier as well as giving some added defensive boost to the melee folks and a potential nuker. Is it useful in this regards?

I think that casting a heightened Glitterdust would be more effective, if your target is blinding foes.

[piggiecrdf2]

I think you should use cc specific spells if/when you want to do cc. Trying to dig into damage spells with effects to cc is what limits you. When you try to cc, find the best/easiest to land spell, forget about damage, use real damage spells if you want to do damage.

If you're going to penetrate through mob's fort save to stun them with greater shout, might as well cast wail of banshee and kill them instantly. Sunburst is ok if you want its blindness effect, but as rusty has suggested, glitterdust is an alternative choice. Sunburst is reflex save while glitterdust is will save. Sunburst is 1 time shot but glitterdust lasts.

Most high level character (since you're suggesting high lv spells anyway) should have empower and maxmized on all the time, the other downside for using partial damage spells to cc is that you're wasting a lot sp to deal poor damage but result in no better but in most cases worse cc result.

Try otto irresitible dance, it has no save and works great even in epic. Try symbol of stunning, it uses will save and doesn't subject to enchantment school save bonus a lot mobs have. Try mass hold monster, a held mob enables auto-crit and it's few cc that's still effective in epic. Try cloudkill, it's mass blur when fighting inside, with additional -con for mobs, which means less hp for them, easier for your wail of banshee to land, and it's the only cloud spell that has the consealment part works correctly at the moment. Even mass charm and suggestion are good cc spells if used wisely.

[Jasimine]

I think you should use cc specific spells if/when you want to do cc. Trying to dig into damage spells with effects to cc is what limits you. When you try to cc, find the best/easiest to land spell, forget about damage, use real damage spells if you want to do damage.

If you're going to penetrate through mob's fort save to stun them with greater shout, might as well cast wail of banshee and kill them instantly. Sunburst is ok if you want its blindness effect, but as rusty has suggested, glitterdust is an alternative choice. Sunburst is reflex save while glitterdust is will save. Sunburst is 1 time shot but glitterdust lasts.

Most high level character (since you're suggesting high lv spells anyway) should have empower and maxmized on all the time, the other downside for using partial damage spells to cc is that you're wasting a lot sp to deal poor damage but result in no better but in most cases worse cc result.

Try otto irresitible dance, it has no save and works great even in epic. Try symbol of stunning, it uses will save and doesn't subject to enchantment school save bonus a lot mobs have. Try mass hold monster, a held mob enables auto-crit and it's few cc that's still effective in epic. Try cloudkill, it's mass blur when fighting inside, with additional -con for mobs, which means less hp for them, easier for your wail of banshee to land, and it's the only cloud spell that has the consealment part works correctly at the moment. Even mass charm and suggestion are good cc spells if used wisely.

Never really thought about Glitterdust. Mainly because I always hated the graphical effect as a melee character and would scream murder when friendly casters started throwing it around. hehe... I do use cloudkill, wail, mass charm, and am getting mass hold next level. Just was pondering wether the crowd control nukes would be viable alternitives for times that insta kill is not an option (Fort save from Greater Shout) or when people just don't want glitter dust up and active because the graphical effect can be such an annoyance. Also for those times when reflex save is better put to use instead of will saves. Was a thought. I might tinker with them depending on how my spells play out these last two levels. Something to do for fun if nothing else.

[Talon_Moonshadow]

Not to sway you one way or another, but it should be noted that Greater Shout is one of the few CC type spells that can affect Frost Giants. Although they do have high saves.
Might also be useful in Epic, but I don't have a lvl 20 caster to try it out yet.

[Hjarki]

No, it doesn't trigger critical hits and sneak-attacks.

Greater Shout doesn't give auto-crits, but it does give auto sneak attacks. It also has the advantage of being a Fortitude rather than Reflex save.

In any case, normally you want to either deal damage or crowd control - not both. Hybrid spells like Greater Shout or Sunburst are pretty poor at either task.

[Jasimine]

Greater Shout doesn't give auto-crits, but it does give auto sneak attacks. It also has the advantage of being a Fortitude rather than Reflex save.

In any case, normally you want to either deal damage or crowd control - not both. Hybrid spells like Greater Shout or Sunburst are pretty poor at either task.

In otherwords, situational at best. Meh something to tinker with and see what I get out of it. I have lots of spells to finish swapping around still so it will be a week or two before I get to them.

[Shade]

Sunburst is rather useless, as blind is not a really desirable CC effect.. And it's high lvl and strange dmg type prevent it from being enhanced easily as other nukes, resulting in poort damage.

Greater shout similarly suffers the lower dmg isssue,
and while a short term stun that ignores spell resistance can have it's usless.. It's single shot fort save nature makes it weak as a primary CC spell useful vs high SR mobs.. Heightened web is almost always a superior choice, as it's a larger aoe, persistant and a save type that often lower (reflex).

So no.. Most CC "nukes" aren't particularly effective.

Most effective CC that deals dmg imo is probably acid fog.
It has been extreme nerfed recently, but still imposes a very small (~10%, used to be 50%) debuff in movement speed, and does decent damage. Combine it with waves of exhaustion and your enemies will move very slow.. Add in a wall of fire and they will cook quite nicely as they try in vain to reach you at there extremely slow movement speed.

[Tyrande]

Sunburst is rather useless, [... and Greater Shout...]

Most effective CC that deals dmg imo is probably acid fog.
It has been extreme nerfed recently, but still imposes a very small (~10%, used to be 50%) debuff in movement speed, and does decent damage. Combine it with waves of exhaustion and your enemies will move very slow.. Add in a wall of fire and they will cook quite nicely as they try in vain to reach you at there extremely slow movement speed.

Ask melees to use Sever: http://i153.photobucket.com/albums/s...pons/Sever.jpg in combination with Acid Fog and Waves of Exhaustion and you'll have some almost non-moving monster(s).

[Shade]

Ask melees to use Sever: http://i153.photobucket.com/albums/s...pons/Sever.jpg in combination with Acid Fog and Waves of Exhaustion and you'll have some almost non-moving monster(s).

Yea I have one of those.

Sucks it doesn't work on red named.