Machariel

Yes, I know. Not all ATs get them whereas every single character gets a crashless nuke better than any Blaster T9 on a 90sec cooldown. Not to be rude but what was your point? Edit: I was incorrect, per galaxy brain, mb

I play pretty much everything with a 'high-tier' level of investment - any character that I care about at all I bring up to 50+1 and a full build before I really start to pass judgement on it it and when I think about game balance it's with that in mind. I share @oedipus_tex's view that the Judgement power in particular is responsible for flattening a lot of the difficulty curve in the game. A lot of the things you can do in the game kind of don't matter when enemies die that fast.

Roster: Plant/Fire Dominator (Blightfire) Demon/Dark Mastermind (Zahora) Titan/Bio Scrapper (Crusader's Heart) Fire/Devices Blaster (Speedtech) Arachnos Widow [Fortunata Hybrid] (Talavera) Arachnos Soldier [Huntsman] (Misgivings) Kinetic Melee/Energy Stalker (Synthwaves) Dual Blades/Energy Stalker (Synthblades) Honestly doesn't sound that scary, once you get past the stacked Arachnos leadership + Mastermind debuffs it's mostly just raw damage that folds pretty fast.

At low levels i think just keeping the P2W defense amplifiers running is a way better use of your time and inf.

Your problem is that Ninja Blade is one of the worst primaries on Stalkers whereas Katana is one of the best primaries on Scrappers. Ninja Blade AS is tied for the worst among stalkers so it has the least to gain from the Stalker ATOs. Conversely, the scrapper ATOs are nutty on Katana. Also obviously you lose Lotus Drops in the trade too. In fact I believe literally every Stalker primary gets more/better AoE than Ninja Blade does with the exception of maybe Broad Sword, aka Slow Ninja Blade™️. +4x8 Arachnos has a ton of defense debuffs and psi damage which will eventually overwhelm invuln especially if you are going out of your way to aggro multiple mobs that take forever to kill because you have zero AoE. So IMO the real question is what are you trying to gain by playing on x8 with a character that doesn't benefit from target density? The solution to your perception is to play a different Stalker or to turn the difficulty down to something more fun like +4x2, because if you have no AoE attacks then there's not much point in fighting big mobs since it doesn't result in more rewards/time. Some primaries have decent AoE (Elec, Staff, Dual Blades, Savage, Ice), some secondaries have decent AoE (bio, rad, shield, fire), some ancillary/patrons have decent AoE (fire, mu)... but Ninja Blade / Invuln / Body is none of those.

A corollary to this is that not only do you have to remember to use the power, but also, it should be slotted in a low-level power so that you don't get locked out of it if exemplared. (I made the mistake of putting it in Thousand Cuts once, took the build onto a Penelope Yin TF to try it out, and wondered why it seemed to be going so much slower than usual....)

Since it looks like most people say 'no' let me indulge myself a bit with my answer of "yes, definitively." Hopefully OP enjoys the detail: Meet Blightfire (Rebecca Rogers), a Mutation Plant/Fire/Fire dominator, the character I was playing when Live shut down and the first one I recreated on Homecoming. I initially created her because I heard that the power set combo was strong (spoilers: it is), but what made her grow on me was the way her character design and personality were, in my mind, precisely reflected in her powers, slotting, and playstyle. She is a misanthropic, hot-headed, stubborn, and violently aggressive super who struggles with the fact that her power is basically to shoot napalm. Long story short, Crey screwed over her family in legal proceedings back in the day and Rebecca inherited a dangerous power that required expensive equipment to contain, in a world of few legitimate napalm-based solutions. So she wound up in the wrong crowd and, eventually, in the Zig. She stayed pure redside until I got up to Westin Phipps. When I decided that those missions were her moral line in the sand, she became my main, and that's where the RP really took off. Mechanically, she's slotted very aggressively - almost all recharge and damage procs, moderate defense, almost no resists - and rips through most content (+4x8) at lightning speed because seeds of confusion makes almost every mob in the game fight itself instead of you. Solo performance is mostly binary - either everything is confused and she's stomping on everything, or she's on the floor - which I find engaging to play. It also generates a lot of inf and drops, which helps fund my other characters because most of my characters start out as, "this level 50 build looks fun, let's try it out." But the coolest part to me is that in-character, she doesn't get along well with people, and ingame, she sometimes frustrates tank players because confused enemies can't be taunted. She's independent and selfish and also, doesn't benefit as much from some support (+def, +res, heals) because those game mechanics are irrelevant if you aren't being attacked, and check this out - when she actually needs support she's almost completely incapable of keeping that support alive... so she kind of sucks at making friends. I also like that it's quite a flashy character as 12 foot spiked vines sprouting from the ground en masse is very dramatic. I like her costume, but it's not going to win any awards... but it would be out of character for her to win, anyway 😄

I would probably play it on a Scrapper, on a solid layered defense set with good resistances. Rad, Bio, or Dark come to mind but if I were looking to play Regen or Fire I think Katana would be a good pick there as well. Why those Sets? I think of Divine Avalanche as a power that lets you play your secondary more aggressively, because it gives you the option to quickly softcap your melee defense on demand. Now, you can and people do just build the character for softcapped defenses without IOs, and there's nothing wrong with that because softcapped defenses are awesome. But with powers like dark regeneration in the game I can't help but look at those builds and wonder if they couldn't afford to be getting hit more than they do - which implies that there may be a better way to invest those slots. Powers like DA and Parry are a cool compromise because you can build pretty readily for 30ish defense and throw in a parry once in while to effectively play softcapped. Get hit with a bunch of defense debuffs and now your secondary can't keep up? No problem, just keep parrying until they wear off. I feel like this way lets you get the most out of your secondary in that most of the time you just cruise along with your baseline level of mitigation/healing/whatever but then give yourself a free defense spike whenever desired. Also, it's a free Luck of the Gambler mule, which is more valuable to a resist based set. Why Scrapper? The Scrapper ATOs are also really good for Katana, I think because of its very fast attack chain. But the attitude above also feels more "scrappery" than Brute-y to me, because I imagine the character using Parry... to buy time to cut the mob down to a more reasonable level. In very long fights where I need to keep parry refreshed, I fully sympathize with the 'parry sucks' crowd. Ninja Blade on Stalkers loses The Lotus Drops for Assassin's Strike, and the Ninja Blade's AS animation is very slow. It's still a very high DPA attack but it's not that different from the rest of the set. Also, to the extent that you agree with the above reasoning about Parry, Stalkers are less likely to be attacked in melee because enemies don't cluster around them as well (lower threat + fewer AoEs + no damage or taunt auras). Tankers in theory might not mind reducing their damage to get cheap melee defense since they can confidently say that they are likely both to be in melee and to be attacked. I'm not inclined to play Tankers but I can certainly imagine that if I were leveling one up and was having trouble staying alive vs AVs - and that AV was subsequently messing up my teammates - I may be perfectly happy to focus on taunting and leaving a power like parry on autofire and be thankful for being able to softcap my own defense at level 16... even if I respec out of it. Come to think of it I had a Katana/Dark Stalker towards the end of live who I haven't yet re-created on homecoming. Maybe I'll remake her as a Dark Armor Scrapper.

I customize the power colors but usually draw the line there. Most of my characters have only one costume and I don't go hard on macros, keybinds, auras, etc. Back on live i was heavy into RP but even there didn't get too far into it beyond having multiple costumes, most of which were just casual wear. At this point most of my characters don't even have bios.

As far as I know there’s no reason to think it’s anything other than RNG.

On Plant, I 6 slot it into the AoE immob. If you want to max out on the damage bonus, the AoE immob recharges fast enough that you can fire it off 3 times quickly and with so many targets available at the start of the fight the proc goes off very reliably with each cast. There's also nothing else I'd rather really slot into the AoE immob since I'm not slotting it for damage. Mostly I'm just after the set bonuses and the AOE immob is the best place for me to put it. I guess if I were to slot Roots for damage I'd probably put the +damage proc in the ST hold with a bunch of damage procs and the other 5pcs in the AoE hold. Currently I have 4pc basilisk's gaze in both of those powers instead.

I'm not sure if all fast snipes have the same animation time but if not, Sniper Rifle's has to be one of the worst and I find it extremely janky to boot. It's especially weird if you're flying as - if I remember correctly - it basically brings you to a halt in a jarring way. Definitely something I hope gets fixed and shortening the animation time of the fast snipe would be a nice way to boost the underperforming ST damage of AR.

Not really relevant to what I said or to the topic, but whatever works for you.

pretty much every power in mind control gets boosted significantly by domination so i will echo that it's better on a dominator than a controller. as for secondaries, mind relies largely on sleeps and fears for it's 'up every spawn' control powers so i would pick something that has a controllable amount of aoe and preferably not a ton in the way of DoT, although it's not a huge deal. /energy, /dark, /fire, /earth are all strong

Two part answer: I certainly wouldn't say that I "never pay much attention to it", as a permadom with a lot of overlap on the power (recharges in ~70 sec). This overlap allows me to better control when I get the endurance refill, so it's worth managing. I'd imagine I'd have to pay even more attention to it if I didn't have a lot of overlap and therefore needed to be aware of when it's ending to make sure I'm not stuck in a long animation or something when the time comes. I don't find it onerous to keep up with, but it's something that I do actively manage, and enjoy using. That said, I like the idea of decoupling some of the effects of domination from the click power and tying them to the status of the bar. It seems that most people who don't enjoy the mechanic of permadom specifically don't like having mez protection tied to it. So with that in mind, here's an idea: - Domination keeps it's current effect of improving control magnitude & duration, refilling endurance, and giving mez and kb protection, but remove the "fury" requirement. Without the fury requirement, if you don't have enough recharge for perma, it's fine - you're at least not stuck having to rebuild the bar and you can disengage with your very powerful control powers until the power recharges if you're so inclined. - Give Dominators some passive bonus that scales with their "fury" including mez resistance or protection. I think it might be interesting to give them no protection but heavy resistance, so that a dominator could still be mezzed readily - or even quite a long time if it happens at the start of the fight - but that they would shrug off the effects quickly as you say. I like an end redux buff, but I also like a ToHit buff (maybe only for control powers, if possible), representing that the character gets more focused and their controls are harder to escape. This would be a big benefit to lower level doms as +tohit can relieve a lot of the pressure of accuracy slotting on an archetype where missing, I think, is more dangerous than any other. I think under these changes permadom would still be worth chasing but it would open up space for builds that don't slot as much recharge.

I am, but you raise a good point - the base 90sec recharge of something like Heart of Darkness or even the base 40 sec of Terrify is so long that you can probably slot the Ascendancy proc without its recharge component hurting the proc chances very much, if at all. So, maybe it's fine.

I would like to rescind my previous statement that I wouldn't make any changes to Dominators as I would definitely like to see improvements in one regard: Their ATO sets! Ascendancy of the Dominator is probably OK as is. On one hand it has insanely useful set bonuses when 6 slotted (10% rech and 5% ranged def!) and a lot of the sets that fit into control powers are pretty gross so it's nice to have a set that can fit anywhere. On the other hand, I've never been a big fan of the stacking +damage bonus, because I'm usually not spamming control powers that aren't slotted for damage, if at all. The +damage proc doesn't jive well when it's in control powers that only get used once or twice per fight (Seeds of Confusion, Wormhole etc). Some Assault powers can be slotted for mez (Stuns from /Energy, Midnight Grasp from /Dark, etc) and maybe the stacking +damage proc would be a good choice here. Maybe it would work better alongside damage procs in something like Terrify but then the /recharge component of the enhancement reduces the proc rates, and in any case I don't think the ATO set should be designed with damage procs in mind. So, I would be open to changing the set and curious what people would think. As is it has some good perks and some drawbacks and I normally slot it into my AoE Immobilize. The Dominating Grasp set on the other hand has all of the same issues with the Ascendancy Set - namely that it only goes into control powers which I don't want to spam - but the Fiery Orb pet is super weak and the set bonuses aren't as good. It's possible that one 'intended' way to slot the dominator ATOs is to 3 slot Ascendancy in 2 different powers and 2 slot Dominating Grasp in 3 different powers, which lets you maximize the bonuses to control duration and you'd wind up with 40% to immob and sleep and 20% to other types. I'm not sure what changes I'd make to them but an initial suggestion would be: 1) Change the Ascendancy +Damage proc from +20% damage for 10s, stacking up to 3 times to +30% damage for 15s, stacking up to 2 times. No hard math behind the numbers, I just think it'd work better. 2) Give the Dominating Grasp set a damage component to its enhancements and allow it to be slotted into damaging powers in Assault sets. Either buff the fiery orb pet or turn it into a damage proc on par with controller/corruptor ATOs.

There's really nothing TO take from "use your controls better" other than "get good". I might as well say "build your character better" and it would be equally helpful. 🙄

Personally I don't see a problem with permadom and with dominators being able to achieve it on their own. I think it would be idiotic to make it something that you need a team to be able to do because hey, if you've got a full team, who cares if you can lock down the entire mob by yourself? Your teammates don't care. In fact they probably would rather you not do that since it makes them not clump up as well. The problem with dominators is that the water level of the game has risen so much, thanks to the power of easy IOs etc, that their core competency - turning City of Heroes into City of Statues with a single or a few powers - simply isn't that useful when your team can just face tank them anyway. In fights against hard targets like AVs and GMs controls are basically useless thanks to purple triangles, barring corner cases like stacking confuse. It's the same situation with controllers and tanks, except that controllers can buff/debuff and tanks can sit in front of AVs/GMs - preventing enemies from attacking simply isn't that useful and it's animation time that could be spent reducing their HP closer to zero. That said, I think overall Dominators are a little underpowered but I don't think I'd make any changes to them. The Assault Sets are pretty good, their ancillary/epic pools are strong, and - as long as you're playing a game where control matters AT ALL - the control sets provide a number of useful and varied tools. Even WITH permadom, the binary nature of controls means that you have to stay on your toes because if a key control misses you don't always have a ton of time or other tools to be able to respond and Dominators are the squishiest AT in the game. If some massive meta shift happens (unlikely) where hard controls become more useful then obviously dominators will shine but I think that would require a rethinking of control in general. Please leave permadom alone. If you choose not to use it, fine, it's up often enough as it is and you can save it for key moments. People build for other things - perma-Eclipse, perma-Phantom Army, perma-Chrono Shift, perma-Hasten, perma-Soul Drain, etc, and "I don't want to have to remember to click something" isn't a good argument against any of those. It's super strong but obviously not required and its usefulness varies a LOT by set since not all controls are affected by it. It's also a valuable endurance management tool on an archetype that can really burn through End very fast.

Indeed. I was tired of tinkering with the build as it was 6 in the morning and had already made the important changes so I wound up with an extra slot. One easy change would be to put it into Soul Storm and change from 4pc Basilisk's Gaze to 5pc Unbreakable Constraint to max out on 10% recharge bonuses, but it could also go into the snipe, into the pet, into Build Up. . . wherever.

So I made a few changes to the build to prioritize damage and shuffled a few things around. The two biggest changes are to the slotting of Crushing Uppercut and Assassins' Strike. Crushing Uppercut: Changed to 5pc Hecatomb + Unbreakable Constraint proc. CU is your strongest attack and has a 90% proc rate for purple damage procs even when ED-capped for recharge, and you want this power on cooldown as often as possible and especially when the Stalker's Guile Hide proc goes off. Speaking of which, Assassin's Strike: Changed to 6pc Stalker's Guile. On a build without Tough I think you want to 6 slot this to get the S/L resistance bonus. If I were allowed to cut powers (looking at you, Summon Widow and a few others..) I might split up the Stalker's Guile set into 3 and 3 to double up on the defense bonus, and then you could get more damage out of AS by going 3pc + hecatomb + 2 damage procs. In any case, you definitely want the chance to hide proc in Assassin's Strike. Sweeping Cross: You can do a lot with this power slotting wise and it actually has great DPA and is a substitute for CU in the attack chain. With the 5pc Avalanche the build brushes up against the softcap for melee, or you can slot it with Armageddons for more damage. Overall I'm not a huge fan of the soul mastery pool on this setup and I'd look to make cuts there if you wanted to go for something like alternating Rune of Protection & One with the Shield, or to bring in Tough and Weave. But that is more of my preference and I didn't want to tinker in Mid's for that long, at least until I make my own 😅 Villain Plan by Mids' Reborn : Hero Designer 3.0.0.0 https://github.com/Reborn-Team/Hero-Designer Click this DataLink to open the build! Bitchwax: Level 49 Natural Stalker Primary Power Set: Street Justice Secondary Power Set: Shield Defense Power Pool: Leaping Power Pool: Teleportation Power Pool: Speed Ancillary Pool: Soul Mastery Villain Profile: Level 1: Heavy Blow -- SprAssMar-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(A), SprAssMar-Dmg/Rchg(3), SprAssMar-Acc/Dmg(3), SprAssMar-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(5), SprAssMar-Rchg/Rchg Build Up(5), SprAssMar-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(7) Level 1: Hide -- LucoftheG-Def/Rchg+(A), Ksm-ToHit+(7), ShlWal-ResDam/Re TP(9) Level 2: Sweeping Cross -- SprAvl-Rchg/KDProc(A), SprAvl-Acc/Dmg(9), SprAvl-Dmg/EndRdx(11), SprAvl-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(11), SprAvl-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(13), FuroftheG-ResDeb%(13) Level 4: Deflection -- LucoftheG-Def/Rchg+(A), UnbGrd-ResDam(19), UnbGrd-ResDam/EndRdx(19), UnbGrd-EndRdx/Rchg(21), UnbGrd-Rchg/ResDam(21), LucoftheG-Def(23) Level 6: Assassin's Strike -- SprStlGl-Acc/Dmg(A), SprStlGl-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(23), SprStlGl-Rchg/Hide%(25), SprStlGl-Dmg/Rchg(25), SprStlGl-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(27), Empty(27) Level 8: Build Up -- GssSynFr--Build%(A) Level 10: Battle Agility -- Rct-ResDam%(A), Rct-Def(29), Rct-Def/EndRdx(29), Rct-EndRdx/Rchg(31), Rct-Def/Rchg(31), Rct-Def/EndRdx/Rchg(31) Level 12: Combat Jumping -- LucoftheG-Def/Rchg+(A), LucoftheG-Def(33) Level 14: Teleport Target -- WntGif-ResSlow(A) Level 16: Active Defense -- RechRdx-I(A) Level 18: Spinning Strike -- PstBls-Acc/Dmg(A), PstBls-Dmg/EndRdx(33), PstBls-Dmg/Rchg(33), PstBls-Dmg/Rng(34), PstBls-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(34), PstBls-Dam%(34) Level 20: Against All Odds -- EndRdx-I(A) Level 22: True Grit -- UnbGrd-Max HP%(A), UnbGrd-ResDam(36), UnbGrd-ResDam/EndRdx(36), UnbGrd-Rchg/ResDam(36), Prv-Absorb%(37), Prv-Heal(37) Level 24: Hasten -- RechRdx-I(A), RechRdx-I(37) Level 26: Shin Breaker -- Mk'Bit-Dam%(A), Mk'Bit-Acc/Dmg(39), Mk'Bit-Dmg/EndRdx(39), Mk'Bit-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(39), Mk'Bit-Dmg/Rchg(40), AchHee-ResDeb%(40) Level 28: Grant Cover -- LucoftheG-Def/Rchg+(A) Level 30: Super Jump -- WntGif-RunSpd/Jump/Fly/Rng(A) Level 32: Crushing Uppercut -- Hct-Dam%(A), Hct-Dmg/EndRdx(40), Hct-Dmg/Rchg(42), Hct-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(42), Hct-Acc/Rchg(42), UnbCns-Dam%(43) Level 35: Shield Charge -- Obl-Acc/Rchg(A), Obl-Dmg/Rchg(43), Obl-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(43), Obl-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(45), Obl-%Dam(45), Obl-Dmg(45) Level 38: One with the Shield -- GldArm-3defTpProc(A), StdPrt-ResDam/Def+(46) Level 41: Moonbeam -- Apc-Dmg(A), Apc-Dmg/Rchg(46), Apc-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(46), Apc-Dmg/EndRdx(47), Apc-Dam%(47) Level 44: Soul Storm -- BslGaz-Acc/Hold(A), BslGaz-Acc/Rchg(48), BslGaz-Rchg/Hold(48), BslGaz-EndRdx/Rchg/Hold(48) Level 47: Shadow Meld -- LucoftheG-Def/Rchg+(A) Level 49: Summon Widow -- SlbAll-Build%(A) Level 1: Assassination Level 1: Brawl -- Empty(A) Level 1: Prestige Power Dash -- Empty(A) Level 1: Prestige Power Slide -- Empty(A) Level 1: Prestige Power Quick -- Empty(A) Level 1: Prestige Power Rush -- Empty(A) Level 1: Prestige Power Surge -- Empty(A) Level 1: Sprint -- Qck-EndRdx/RunSpd(A) Level 2: Rest -- Empty(A) Level 4: Ninja Run Level 2: Swift -- Run-I(A) Level 2: Health -- Mrc-Rcvry+(A), NmnCnv-Regen/Rcvry+(15), Pnc-Heal/+End(15) Level 2: Hurdle -- HO:Micro(A) Level 2: Stamina -- PrfShf-EndMod(A), PrfShf-EndMod/Rchg(17), PrfShf-End%(17) Level 1: Combo Level 1 Level 1: Combo Level 2 Level 1: Combo Level 3 Level 1: Quick Form ------------

Does Oppressive Gloom not suppress when hidden, though?

Yeah, Wormhole is pretty much the best power in Gravity. It is however in the same set as my actual favorite sub-optimal power, Dimension Shift 😮 I'm partial to Fire Breath too.

I would say either Magic or Mutation.

There are a lot of great things to say about a lot of Stalker secondary power sets but EA is my pick for overall best. while it’s not quite as defensively strong as /Invuln (especially on the resist side) it’s still quite durable and comes with a lot of other perks on top of its great Defense : -toggle mez protection, not a clicky like SR or SD - 20% recharge bonus to boost your offense - amazing endurance management - 2-3 skippable powers - decent heal (albeit on a long cooldown) - looks cool 😎 Very tough to go wrong with EA. The only thing it doesn’t have, which other stalker secondary sets bring to the table, is a source of AOE damage like /Fire, /Shield, or - my pick for best AOE from a secondary- /Radiation. Ice is similar to EA but more endurance heavy (no energize) and no recharge bonus, but with imo the best defensive T9, Icy Bastion.