oedipus_tex

Fire/Fire is probably safer than Ice/Ice because Bonfire is incredibly overpowered with a kb to kd proc. Ice Control at present is a fun set, but it significantly lags most of the other control sets in pretty much all categories: hard controls, damage, and safety. That said, I used to main an Ice/Fire/Fire Dominator. I enjoyed him a lot at the time, and the set hasn't technically gotten worse, Bonfire just became (significantly, hugely) better than one of its main powers. Icy Assault on the other hand is a set I can do without. Mediocre damage and nothing really stands out except Power Boost and the terrible, terrible PBAoE slow aura with a 10ft range no one uses.

The proc is very much worth it when you consider the base extremely high chance of knockback in Energy's AoEs and how fast they recharge. With a 50% chance in Energy Torrent and Explosive Blast to kb converted to kd, it's easy to keep things planted on the ground, making Energy Blast one of the safest sets to use. I would only bother to put the proc in the AoE powers though. Anyone complaining about single target knockback needs to just get over it. For the record, the unique kb to kd proc doesn't seem to work on Nova. I don't know why. The non-unique proc does seem to work.

If I remember right, any power that has a Resistance component, no matter how small, cannot be boosted with Power Boost. If I recall accurately, there's a technical reason for this buried in how damage Resistance interacts with Damage. The upshot is Power Boost won't work with the following powers: - Cold Domination Ice Shields (they have Fire/Cold resist) - Storm, Cold, or Dark Miasma auras - Sonic or Thermals shields (obviously) - Force Field's Personal Force Field Defense powers that do not include a Resistance component are boosted. These include: - Force Field's bubbles (in direct contrast to Cold) - Time Manipulation's Farsight power

Jolting Chain is usually the most skippable power. Might be ok if the animation was faster, but as is too much animation time for the effect.

Hi all, I'm looking for feedback on my Elec/Psi/Mu Dominator. He's built as a "super sapper"/perma Dom. This is a very expensive build. I'm still getting used to the newer rules for procs, so some of my slotting is different than how I would classically have built this character. In the older version of the game I'd have capped ranged Defense, but in this latest iteration I think procs are more important. That's because you can eat a Purple to hit the soft cap, but there is no inspiration to replace procs. So, I'm slightly under soft cap for Ranged. I also recently got schooled a bit about Dominator melee attacks. I dropped Mental Blast from my previous version of the build for Mind Probe. Hoping I don't run into too many issues with AVs. I am very unsure about the new rules for Snipes so for the moment just look the Snipe as a set mule. I do cast it occasionally after reactivating Domination since Domination provides 15 seconds of +ToHit. Incarnate abilities: Alpha: Spiritual (+Recharge, +Defense, +Endurance Mod) Destiny: Ageless while building the character for the extra Recharge to occasionally get perma dom, eventually probably Barrier Hero Plan by Mids' Hero Designer 1.962 http://www.cohplanner.com/ Click this DataLink to open the build! Social Medium: Level 50 Magic Dominator Primary Power Set: Electric Control Secondary Power Set: Psionic Assault Power Pool: Speed Power Pool: Leadership Power Pool: Leaping Power Pool: Fighting Ancillary Pool: Mu Mastery Hero Profile: Level 1: Tesla Cage (A) Basilisk's Gaze - Recharge/Hold (3) Basilisk's Gaze - Endurance/Recharge/Hold (3) Basilisk's Gaze - Accuracy/Endurance/Recharge/Hold (5) Basilisk's Gaze - Accuracy/Hold (5) Damage Increase IO (7) HamiO:Nucleolus Exposure Level 1: Psionic Dart (A) Thunderstrike - Accuracy/Damage Level 2: Chain Fences (A) Overwhelming Force - Damage/Chance for Knockdown/Knockback to Knockdown (7) Overwhelming Force - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance/Recharge (9) Overwhelming Force - Damage/Endurance/Recharge (9) Overwhelming Force - Accuracy/Damage (11) Overwhelming Force - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance (50) Annihilation - Chance for Res Debuff Level 4: Mind Probe (A) Hecatomb - Chance of Damage(Negative) (11) Hecatomb - Damage/Endurance (13) Hecatomb - Accuracy/Recharge (13) Hecatomb - Accuracy/Damage/Recharge (15) Hecatomb - Damage/Recharge Level 6: Hasten (A) Recharge Reduction IO (15) Recharge Reduction IO Level 8: Conductive Aura (A) Efficacy Adaptor - EndMod/Accuracy (17) Performance Shifter - EndMod/Accuracy Level 10: Maneuvers (A) Red Fortune - Defense/Endurance (17) Red Fortune - Defense (19) Red Fortune - Defense/Recharge (19) Red Fortune - Endurance/Recharge (21) Red Fortune - Endurance (21) Luck of the Gambler - Recharge Speed Level 12: Static Field (A) Accuracy IO Level 14: Combat Jumping (A) Luck of the Gambler - Recharge Speed Level 16: Boxing (A) Empty Level 18: Paralyzing Blast (A) Superior Ascendency of the Dominator - Accuracy/Confused/Hold/Immobilize/Sleep/Stun/Terrorized (23) Superior Ascendency of the Dominator - Confused/Hold/Immobilize/Sleep/Stun/Terrorized/Recharge (23) Superior Ascendency of the Dominator - Endurance/Recharge (25) Superior Ascendency of the Dominator - Accuracy/Confused/Hold/Immobilize/Sleep/Stun/Terrorized/Endurance (25) Superior Ascendency of the Dominator - Accuracy/Confused/Hold/Immobilize/Sleep/Stun/Terrorized/Endurance/Recharge (27) Superior Ascendency of the Dominator - Recharge/Chance for +Damage Level 20: Drain Psyche (A) Touch of the Nictus - Accuracy/Healing (27) Touch of the Nictus - Healing (29) Touch of the Nictus - Heal/HitPoints/Regeneration/Recharge (29) Touch of the Nictus - Accuracy/Endurance/Recharge Level 22: Tough (A) Steadfast Protection - Resistance/+Def 3% Level 24: Weave (A) Red Fortune - Defense (31) Luck of the Gambler - Recharge Speed (31) Red Fortune - Endurance (31) Red Fortune - Defense/Endurance (33) Red Fortune - Defense/Recharge (33) Red Fortune - Endurance/Recharge Level 26: Synaptic Overload (A) Coercive Persuasion - Confused (33) Coercive Persuasion - Confused/Recharge (34) Coercive Persuasion - Accuracy/Confused/Recharge (34) Coercive Persuasion - Accuracy/Recharge (34) Coercive Persuasion - Confused/Endurance (36) Coercive Persuasion - Contagious Confusion Level 28: Subdue (A) Thunderstrike - Accuracy/Damage (36) Thunderstrike - Damage/Endurance (36) Thunderstrike - Damage/Recharge (37) Thunderstrike - Accuracy/Damage/Recharge (37) Thunderstrike - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance (37) Thunderstrike - Damage/Endurance/Recharge Level 30: Super Speed (A) Blessing of the Zephyr - Knockback Reduction (4 points) Level 32: Gremlins (A) Expedient Reinforcement - Accuracy/Damage (39) Expedient Reinforcement - Accuracy/Recharge (39) Expedient Reinforcement - Damage/Endurance (39) Expedient Reinforcement - Accuracy/Damage/Recharge Level 35: Psionic Lance (A) Sting of the Manticore - Accuracy/Damage (40) Sting of the Manticore - Damage/Endurance (40) Sting of the Manticore - Chance of Damage(Toxic) (40) Sting of the Manticore - Damage/Endurance/Recharge (42) Sting of the Manticore - Accuracy/Interrupt/Range Level 38: Psychic Shockwave (A) Superior Avalanche - Accuracy/Damage (42) Superior Avalanche - Damage/Endurance (42) Superior Avalanche - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance (43) Superior Avalanche - Accuracy/Damage/Endurance/Recharge (43) Superior Avalanche - Recharge/Chance for Knockdown (43) Fury of the Gladiator - Chance for Res Debuff Level 41: Power Sink (A) Performance Shifter - EndMod/Recharge (45) Efficacy Adaptor - EndMod/Recharge Level 44: Ball Lightning (A) Ragnarok - Damage/Recharge (45) Ragnarok - Accuracy/Damage/Recharge (45) Ragnarok - Accuracy/Recharge (46) Ragnarok - Damage/Endurance (46) Ragnarok - Chance for Knockdown (46) Annihilation - Chance for Res Debuff Level 47: Summon Guardian (A) Expedient Reinforcement - Accuracy/Recharge (48) Expedient Reinforcement - Accuracy/Damage (48) Expedient Reinforcement - Damage/Endurance (48) Expedient Reinforcement - Accuracy/Damage/Recharge (50) Expedient Reinforcement - Endurance/Damage/Recharge (50) Expedient Reinforcement - Resist Bonus Aura for Pets Level 49: Charged Armor (A) Gladiator's Armor - TP Protection +3% Def (All) Level 1: Brawl (A) Empty Level 1: Domination Level 1: Prestige Power Dash (A) Empty Level 1: Prestige Power Slide (A) Empty Level 1: Prestige Power Quick (A) Empty Level 1: Prestige Power Rush (A) Empty Level 1: Prestige Power Surge (A) Empty Level 1: Sprint (A) Empty Level 2: Rest (A) Empty Level 4: Ninja Run Level 2: Swift (A) Empty Level 2: Health (A) Empty Level 2: Hurdle (A) Empty Level 2: Stamina (A) Endurance Modification IO Level 50: Agility Core Paragon ------------ ------------ Set Bonus Totals: 24% DamageBuff(Smashing) 24% DamageBuff(Lethal) 24% DamageBuff(Fire) 24% DamageBuff(Cold) 24% DamageBuff(Energy) 24% DamageBuff(Negative) 24% DamageBuff(Toxic) 24% DamageBuff(Psionic) 11% Defense(Melee) 8.5% Defense(Smashing) 8.5% Defense(Lethal) 6% Defense(Fire) 6% Defense(Cold) 22.56% Defense(Energy) 22.56% Defense(Negative) 6% Defense(Psionic) 27.88% Defense(Ranged) 6% Defense(AoE) 5% Enhancement(Heal) 4% Enhancement(Stunned) 4% Enhancement(Held) 4.4% Enhancement(Terrorized) 8% Enhancement(Sleep) 8% Enhancement(Immobilized) 8% Enhancement(Confused) 61% Enhancement(Accuracy) 100% Enhancement(RechargeTime) 6% SpeedFlying 34.34 HP (3.38%) HitPoints 6% JumpHeight 6% SpeedJumping Knockback (Mag -4) Knockup (Mag -4) MezResist(Confused) 45% MezResist(Held) 45% MezResist(Immobilized) 45% MezResist(Sleep) 45% MezResist(Stunned) 45% MezResist(Terrorized) 45% 20% (0.33 End/sec) Recovery 34% (1.44 HP/sec) Regeneration 15% ResEffect(SpeedFlying) 15% ResEffect(RechargeTime) 15% ResEffect(SpeedRunning) 13% Resistance(Smashing) 13% Resistance(Lethal) 31% Resistance(Fire) 31% Resistance(Cold) 13% Resistance(Energy) 13% Resistance(Negative) 10% Resistance(Toxic) 10% Resistance(Psionic) 6% SpeedRunning | Copy & Paste this data into Mids' Hero Designer to view the build | |-------------------------------------------------------------------| |MxDz;1480;669;1338;HEX;| |78DA65944B4F135114C7EF30532BA54F4B290F5B4A115AA8F621A81B136200DDD08| |484AD5A27EDA44C523A4DA724BA74AD1813135782E00770EDF333A891A80BE263E5| |4A41F0BD198F3D7F5A92B949F3EBFD9FC73DE7CC9DC95F9D713FBC707D4A48BEE98| |A6A9A85196349AFAA0DA3EEC8AB65BD286879168CA2AE566279ADA42F2F394989B7| |BC0AD346B551372AE9D98A566CD4F5E2BE30D47639679AEA72A5919E3775A34A1ED| |80BD7BC41810B354D2BF99A7FE734B5A4D5CD45BDE6DEDFD7F46AD9D3DC9CD7CB8B| |0DDAF5CDD6F462BA9D3DBF5CC8AB6643AB5FEBA5CA46E9B7EB17589643BCE91022A| |2888EB7E03BA6B20946C82DA7884367898A2C9C722B568855B6ED513E09F9A44F32| |FB7F641EFE006E315DEF99B9CFD0099CD252E45407FB8C33DD636092E94D30E3346| |247F3404B72A4B8062FF8836A71723EC9799BFDFD7799013274729CA3D325B1CDCB| |3CD205BA99DD3E30C4FC4979BBD077573F9FD543F93C9C4F78E02791E6839FCFA22| |57E516400D3093CE2AE7B1E834F98BD4FC167CCFEE74C372128FD3FC2928321D882| |CCA3DD609829D3C92154130A4BFCF4480BA3E3303A8DA2D2283A8C6212314C20860| |9FCA6BAFB10DB77912718BBC41CBA0C16C02BCC6195E9A19206D0F3006EC9F01A78| |9F796C1DDC001FC04E3547D047648BF3FDA15A06399F3CB8C3DAE836F80DDCC52DA| |1B3E3B851F1179C33F112DC045F33C75E317D1433827A47EE296C5B05D798E3EBE0| |0638C573BF414836EFBF2525EF700DC757982B644B216F6A02B649F014F3C469F00| |C8837E316218DD8347ACDA0F70C7ACEA0E7DC1EF89D799362B39861F6246D12744F| |94036F6EF366C6DB8A356EB3666D4ACEA64CD894499B326753E695D6F742484DA5D| |3DFFA0A585F5C64950E5AB76DCA579BB2735089F153FDDB4360CDFA07AE62FE73| |-------------------------------------------------------------------|

Thanks to all who participated in this thread. Based on the conversations I am going to revisit the single target blaps in some of my current builds to see if I can make them work. I may find that with all of the added Incarnate abilities and IOs that it is easier to incorporate slots for blaps that classically I wouldn't have.

Ice is in a bit of a weak spot currently. It has very low damage, and its signature Ice Slick is out performed by Fire Control's Bonfire with a kb to kd IO. Expect your Ice Control character to be very team dependent and to potentially even be a drag on teams that need high DPS to succeed, like in the final battle of the ITF. Overall you'll want a solid secondary set. Having a self heal is big plus for Ice Control, so Radiation or Time are attractive options. Thermal might be an interesting pick if you want a healer type. Storm has no self heal but adds some damage and control options to shore up your weaknesses, altho it hits your blue bar hard. The only secondary set I would for sure rule out is Sonic Resonance because the endurance costs would murder your blue bar. If you are determined to solo, an Ice Control Dominator may be more up your alley. Dominators get Assault sets that cover the holes in Ice's damage output, and mezz protection helps you keep Arctic Air running. It's probably not the "best" Dominator set choice, but it's probably not as difficult to run as Ice troller. (Signed, someone who has run 4 Ice trollers and 4 Ice Dominators to 50).

The thing that still irks me about Repulsion Field is its the same power as Whirlwind from the Speed pool. It does require two Speed powers to access it, but one of those is Hasten which is a given for most builds, and the other is Super Speed which is useful for its invisibility. I'd much rather have Whirlwind on a character with endurance management tools than a Force Fielder who has none. The only real benefit I can see for FF'ers is their Dispersion Bubble keeps them from getting mezzes (barring Sleeps), which is something, I suppose. I still don't see many/any characters taking Whirlwind, KB to KD proc or otherwise.

Hey Tex, Thought I would have to stand up for TA for just a sec. Not trying to start a fight. -remove crash from emp? I'm all for it in the days of crash-less nukes, but you can easily keep blasting anyway with a defender. -OSA is a bigger nuke than most defender tier 9s (not ice) so having it up about as often, slightly more is probably right... which it is. And don't forget it has an inherent k-down patch a la ice trollers as a bonus. -Disruption arrow up to 30%? that gives a 50% total for bosses which is hard for most any set to hit individually and with OSA it makes the damage potential there go w00. Don't think the devs would have gone for it. -PGA being non-notify... interesting idea. I kinda like it, but prefer having the tier 2 sleep because I can take out minions when solo and save em for last. -Flash Arrow increase in the debuff to 12.5%. Would be a severely overpowered treat like that. The key to FA for me was always the -tohit was un-resisted. So with your values, plus slotting and PBU you could throw a -tohit of 30% or more (sorry at work so not completely sure of numbers) that is unresisted and makes your entire team stealthed. Now make that two chars and no damage complaints anywhere. I ran a TA/sonic back in the day and am having fun growing a TA/dark currently. Last point, TA is a beast in an open pvp environment. These are fair criticisms. RE: Flash Arrow, on a Defender, the numbers as-is are actually more fair than I had imagined. The power reduces ToHit by around 9% as is, which brings it within the realm of a power like Dispersion Bubble (14% with 2 defense IOs). So it may be okay where it is or benefit from a tiny bump up to 7% base or so. Keep in mind that Buff powers don't diminish against higher level enemies; +14 Defense is always +14 Defense. That's why I'm okay with Flash Arrow having decent -ToHit even if it is unresistable. I hear your points on Oil Slick Arrow. I'm taking a second look at its damage now and it does considerably more than I had thought (albeit over a very long period of time). You may be right about the -Resistance at -50% being too high, but there is a Sonic Attack blast set with -30% in a cone blast. If TA had -Regen, I'd be more worried about it. I think compared to Dark, Cold, Radiation, and Kinetics TA would still be quite far behind even with the proposed changes. Most of those sets offer a mix of buffs and debuffs and don't seem to have made any tradeoffs for them. TA is a pure debuff set and doesn't appear to the best debuffer or anywhere close to that, which is unfortunate.

In pure power gamer terms I don't think there's an Assault set that touches /Psi. It benefited from the fact that the original developers didn't consider animation time in their damage calculations, and based damage on the recharge of powers instead. This leads to each power having wildly different DPS'es under various circumstances, with Psychic Scream being one of the fastest to animate by nearly a full second. Psi also has Drain Psyche, which is incredible on a Dominator, but especially incredible on a Dominator with a Confuse power, because Confuse makes enemies bunch up together. Earth is fun and cool looking and also very slow to animate. I don't know a thing about its actual DPS but I have to assume it is much less survivable than Psi. Then again, most sets are so it may not be a fair comparison.

I'm going to be upfront and say I am not a huge fan of Icy Assault. I took it to 5 years ago on a Mind/Ice Controller and was not super impressed with it. That said, it's not strictly bad, just not IMO on the same level as Fire or Psi Assault. Just be aware Icy is going to have some struggles with AoE in particular despite having two AoEs in the set. Yes. It was the final control set released when the game was live, and benefited from lessons learned in other sets. Confusion is probably the strongest control effect in the game. Not only does it not notify the mob, for some reason Confusion is also the longest lasting hard mezz. I would never recommend skipping a Confusion power on any Controller or Dominator build. (The one exception is the World of Confusion power available in the tertiary pools, which is terrible). Also, if you decide to IO this character out, the purple Confusion set is one of the best IO sets in the game, offering an eye popping +10% Recharge at T5 and +5 Ranged defense at T6, making it the strongest combo of Recharge and Ranged defense I'm aware of in the game, and a cornerstone of soft-caped perma-dom builds. The main argument for taking Ice Sword Circle is you don't have anything else to pick from, which is never a great place to be. Sadly most of the Dominator PBAoEs have long animation times that make them less than ideal (Psychic Scream in the Psi set is an exception and the reason it is well regarded). Dark Control relies on a cone Fear power but also a PBAoE Stun, meaning it already has its own conflict of powers. How you feel about Ice Sword Circle may come down to how you feel about the Fear cone and the Stun. Since you don't have access to anything else, it might be worth taking. With it's 2.9 second animation time though, this power takes a relative eternity to cast. Chilling Embrace is complete trash. It has a radius of 10ft and the slow lasts 5 seconds. It MIGHT (huge might) be worthwhile if the Slow lasted a long time or if the radius was 20ft or so. As is, this is one of the worst powers in the game, not even worth the endurance cost. If a dev is reading this, please put this power on a list to be fixed. Sadly it's partly because Chilling Embrace is so poor and takes up one of Ice's "unique" slots in the set that Ice lags behind other sets. Correct, Power Boost boosts Duration but not Magnitude in most cases. Note although the power says its boosts your Knockback I don't think it has done that in a long time. In the case of Knockback tho, it is Magnitude that would be boosted because Knockback is a special type of status effect. I'm 99% sure Power Boost boosts the -ToHit in your Dark Control powers so is very much worth taking, but it's been years since I looked at it so there's a chance I'm wrong.

While like you I lean towards staying at range, every single Epic powerset for Dominators comes with an armor power. No, we're not going to cap, but if we could then we would be complaining about why we had controls since we wouldn't need them. If you went with Ice Mastery, took Frozen Armor, Weave, and Combat Jumping, you might be able to cap Defense with IOs. For the record, every non-armored AT receives an armor power in its Tertiary pools. The shields Dominators get in their epics is shared with Controllers, and in many cases the same shield received by Defenders, Corruptors, Masterminds, and Blasters, where those tertiary sets share a theme. You are correct that the slash/lethal shields available in some tertiary powers can allow easy-ish soft-capping to slash/lethal, which could help your survival with some AVs, depending on their powers. Combat Jumping + Frozen Armor + Weave each with 2 ISO Defense IOs provides base 28.6 Slash/Lethal defense, which is a study foundation. You'll have very low Slash/Lethal resistance tho for hits that get through, and still be very vulnerable to other kinds of attacks.

They are. Sure they don't live in melee range but they don't really live at range either. They are a "Mixed" AT. And I know this varies by set, it varies by play style and other things. But the nice thing about a ranged attack is it doesn't require a minimum range to be used. Unlike a melee attack has to be within in a certain range. So like on my Earth/Fire I find I come into melee range a lot to make use of combustion, consume (if I need to), and I just use my ranged attacks from there. I am perma dom so you hit a mob with stalagmites and stone cages they are essentially held for long enough for rain of fire, combustion and a few single target attacks to take out. Same thing really with my mind/psi. My ice/ice is always in melee range to use arctic air and ice sword/circle. I am not disagreeing that they can be used by going into range to use controls that need it and then running back away out of the mob to kill them off, I am just saying IMO you don't have to. And as such the AT is mixed. And most Doms I know would say the spend time about equally split I think between melee and range. Again I think we have some disagreement about what "melee" means in my original post. I typed the original post in haste prior to darting out the door to a children's birthday party, so some of the confusion belongs to me, based on how I used the term/ The powers I specifically do not believe tend to make Dominators stronger in most cases are the single target melee blaps. These are powers such as: Incinerate Ice Sword Telekinetic Thrust Bone Smasher I'm far less familiar with the newer sets like Savage, Martial, and Radioactive, so they may have been designed with different parameters. The original single target blaps were simply carryovers from the Blaster secondary sets. They do marginally higher damage than single target blasts at the expense of range. Some of them animate quite quickly, which can be a plus. The issue is that for any single target attack to be worth its salt you typically are looking at 5 to 6 power slots. Dominators typically do not have these kinds of slots to spare, because the control set is usually slot hungry. THAT is the point I was really trying to make about "melee powers." If all we had to do was select the power and not any slots, the melee powers would be much more valuable. As is, they eat up 5-6 slots, and you just don't have that many to go around. Someone pointed out a few posts ago that Dominators have a slightly higher melee modifier than Stalkers. But unlike a Stalker, they cannot crit, so I am not sure how much that really matters. Where the blaps sometimes shine is accidentally, due to the developers not taking power animation time into account when they balanced power damage (instead, damage is based purely on recharge rate). In a few cases you have some fairly decent blaps. But again, the slot cost. The sets that don't have decent ranged attack chains (Earth, arguably Electric) are exceptions. As for powers like Drain Psyche, etc, I wasn't thinking of those when I said Dominators are not a "melee" class. My main is actually an Elec/Psi/Mu Dom who uses Power Sink and Drain Psyche with Conductive Aura. However, even if he does not have a lot of room for the melee attacks. As for powers like Total Focus and its absurd 3.4 second animation time, although it hits hard on paper, actually finding slots to do that kind of work on enemies is just not something I've ever been interested in investing in. I suppose it may be more valuable to people who solo a lot or for set muling. I don't spend a whole lot of time single target blasting bosses except for Elite Bosses or AVs and the power isn't well suited to that.

I just can't get into Trick Arrow. It needs adjustment to a few key powers before I would consider it. - Remove endurance crash from EMP Arrow - Change recharge of Oil Slick Arrow to 90 seconds (down from 180) - Disruption Arrow: Increase Resistance debuff from 20% to 30% (for Defenders, with cascading effects for other sets) - Poison Gas Arrow: Make this a non-notify power - Flash Arrow: Increase ToHit Debuff to 12.50 (up fro 6.25, Defender values) That would be a start. Still wouldn't be an amazing set, but it would be serviceable. Right now Tactical Arrow runs rings around Trick Arrow.

So I rolled a Dark/Savage Dominator, currently level 21. I'm not sold on Savage as a set yet but its still early. Don't think I've actually seen a Savage Dominator in game either. What are community thoughts?

Fire Control is currently absolutely ridiculously powerful thanks to the KB to KD proc that you can place in Bonfire combined with the fact that AoE immobilizes no longer cancel knockdown. Right now I'd say Fire Control is first in both overall control power and damage, with all the other sets lagging behind. Plant is probably second (Seeds of Confusion has always been great). Earth is high in control and the -Defense is useful for pick up teams, but damage is still very low. Dark is probably the third strongest set, to the degree that things can be measured that way. Ice isn't strictly bad but has one of the weakest pets and has been significantly robbed by the fact that its signature Ice Slick power is hugely outperformed by Bonfire for any character who bothers IO (and for sure the kb to kd proc should be the first investment of a Fire troller these days). Mind Control is not in a great place due to extremely long recharge times on some key powers. Mass Confusion has an absurd recharge time despite being nearly the same power as Synaptic Overload. Fix this and the set is pretty decent. Til then... meh.

This may be an area where I just need to be more open minded. I don't take the Dominator single target blaps pretty much ever. A few of them do pretty decent damage. But a Dominator is not a Stalker and does not have any kind of armor, nor is it in a position to easily cap itself for melee action in the one situation you actually need hardcore single target DPS: killing AVs, which happens to be the situation where your Domination effect mostly fails. Everything else is dispatchable with AoEs. For as tight as slots are on Dominators I've just never felt an investment in blaps was an effective choice, since it meant underslotting something else. It may be I am too hardline in this decision though. If Dominators could go toe to toe with an AV the way Stalkers, Scrappers, etc could I would probably change my opinion.

These are excellent points and probably require some clarification on my part. By "melee" what I mainly mean is the various single target blap powers that encourage you to get right in an enemies face. In theory, these powers are fine. But, for the most part, Dominators don't have the slots to devote to them. Most of the sets are actually balanced around the ranged attacks being the bread and butter. If the blap powers delivered significantly more damage than they do, they would be more critical to own and slot. FWIW I wouldn't be opposed to a significant increase in the melee modifier for Dominators. Earth Assault is an unusual set in that it is much more up close and personal without an option to go ranged. It's an exception to the general rule that the ranged blasts tend to make the character stronger. The various PBAoEs are melee-ish, and do encourage you to move in mobs. I don't consider most of those powers true melee powers though. They tend to work at a pole-range-ish distance, not quite on top of the mob but not quite truly ranged. In some ways they are similar to Blaster nukes, although usually shorter in range than that. As an Electric/Psi Dominator I do spend quite a bit of time near mobs though, just not a lot of time punching them in the face.

If you are open to playing a Controller instead of a Defender, you can get access to Indomitable Will from the Psi pool. That is one of the main avenues for gaining Mezz Protection as a Radiation Emission character. Otherwise, you'll need to wait to level 50 and go with an Incarnate Ability like Clarion.

Bonfire with a KB to KD proc is game changing. It should be an immediate priority because it will greatly increase your survivability.

Is there something specific you'd like me to expand on? I can't speak for all of the Dominator sets, but I've played around 12 Doms to 50 over the past decade (admittedly with a 7 year gap.)

Perhaps try Ice/Temporal or Energy/Temporal. It will take a little while to reach the AoE mezz power but its quite good. If you go with Energy Blast try to slot kb to kd procs. Lots of decent control there. (For the record I have a Energy/Temp at 50. The Ice is merely a guess, but it has lots of controls.)

I hear what you're saying. Maybe I'll respec into it once I have Sleet. I've been using Snow Storm to deal with groups because I've got nothing else that can do that at present. At the very least, it makes it more difficult for mobs to run away from Ice Storm. I'm not totally sure why people think so highly of /Cold. /Rad debuffs are nothing to sneeze at, and it's frontloaded because Radiation Infection is available at level 2. /Cold always seemed like a watered-down version of /Storm to me, the way /Poison was a watered-down /Rad. It sounds like I'm hating on the set. I'm not. But I'm noticing it's taking a while to come into its own. Hopefully the people who say that it will are right. I'm wondering if there's any logic in dropping bolt and just taking Blast/Breath/FR/BiB/BFR. I thought it would be useful to stack holds with FR/BFR, but I'm not using it that much. And there are definitely times that Frost Breath would be applicable. I think I have to drop BFR in order to get Frost Breath into the build and slotted. I don't see a better way to do it. There are all these minions running around and I have no way to attack most of them. Any other issues with the power choices or slotting? EDIT: edited for clarity Cold stands apart from Storm based on the shields, but also based on Benumb and Heat Loss. It's annoying that Cold has to wait so long to come into its own, but when it does, it truly brings it. Heat Loss is one of the best powers in the game. A Cold Domination character ith some IOing generally has a bottomless endurance bar, the dead opposite of Storm. Both good sets, but totally divergent except for sharing two very similar powers.

There are a lot of questions on these boards about various power sets. I wanted to just create a catch all response I can link to later. These statements reflect my opinion alone. I encourage discussion in the Comments section. 1. You didn't take Hasten as soon as feasible. You are a Dominator, a class that relies on a power called Domination that doubles the Magnitude of most of your key powers, restores your endurance to full, provides bonus +ToHit, and mezz protection. Domination cannot be slotted for Recharge. However, it benefits from global Recharge of the type provided by Hasten, and Hasten provides a ridiculous amount of it. By taking Hasten, you are essentially turning Domination into a power you can add Recharge to. As a side benefit, all of your key powers recharge faster as well. By "feasible" what I mean is the first opening you have where you don't need to pick up a key power. With some Dominators this is as early as level 4 or 6. With others it's a bit later. 2. You are holding back on activating Domination because you are waiting for a "key moment." Now, keep in mind you should use some strategy for when you pop Domination. You generally want to do it just before a big fight, at a moment you need to restore your endurance, or when you need to break out of a mezz. However, you should also be in the habit of using it often. With Hasten slotted with level 30 SOs, you can easily keep Domination up roughly 50% of the time. 3. You aren't using inspirations. This isn't a Dominator specific thing, but it's important enough to bring up. Too many players go entire missions without eating a single inspiration. There's no need for this. You should have a few you save for emergencies. The rest you should down with some regularity. 4. You don't know when to 'tank up' with inspirations. So, here I am contradicting myself a little. It turns out that certain inspirations are incredibly useful and should be saved for key moments. The main ones for this are greens (heal) and purples (defense). A key Defense value worth knowing is that if you hit 45% defense to a particular attack type, you are very well guarded against it, in most cases reducing the chance to be hit down to about 5%. Doing the math, assuming you have no other sources of Defense, that's eating 4 small Purples. Knowing when to down 4 purples is a huge power move that will make your character much, much stronger. Not sure how to track how many insps you should be eating? See next... 4. You aren't tracking important Combat Attributes. It is possible to track any stat in the game from the Combat Attributes window. Just open that window, go to the stat, right click, and select Monitor. Place the tracked stats window somewhere you can glance at it easily. The main stats I tend to track are: - Melee defense - Ranged defense - Recovery - Recharge time - Stealth radius Defense is incredibly important to monitor in part because there are so many defense debuff powers in the game. You might think you're soft capped to every position but actually be sitting there at -75 defense. Tracking stats is also how you tell how many purples or other insps you need to swallow to remain standing in tight situations. 5. You're too timid with your control powers, always waiting for the "perfect" time to use them. This is related to the comments above about Domination. In general, you want to be aggressive about using your powers. Some strategy is still required, but not using the powers actually leads to MORE emergencies happening. Remember, when you totally dominate the mobs, you don't get into as many emergencies in the first place. 6. You're overusing the immobilize power or using it too early. A common issue with new Dominators is a temptation to spam AoE immobilizes. There are some legit reasons to immobilize enemies, just try to do it at a time that is beneficial. 7. You believed the hype that Dominators are a mixed ranged/melee class. Here's one I am going to catch some flack for. While it is true that some Dominators play in a "blapper" kind of way, and melee attacks are available in each assault set, the class is overall still balanced around being a long to medium range blaster type. Yes, this is still true for Fire, Ice and Electric, with their PBAoE toggle based controls--for these sets, you're usually looking at keeping a short distance away. There are exceptions to every rule, of course. But in general, avoiding true melee is likely to make you live longer, especially as you approach the later game. You generally don't have the slots to devote to melee attacks and ranged blasts without short changing another asset, and your Control set demands a lot of slotting. 8. You felt like you're going to be the star of Incarnate Trials. Incarnate Trials overall are not a great place to evaluate Dominator strengths. You certainly aren't BAD at them... but your damage is mediocre compared to a true Blaster, you don't have the defenses of an armored type, and fights tend to go two ways: battles where the enemy mob drops instantly in a barrage of AoE attacks, and prolonged battles against AVs where DPS, buffs, and armors are what matter most. You have none of those things. But you are still a great AT! Get your rewards and remember you can shine elsewhere. 9. You assumed a PBAoE set like Electric, Fire, or Ice wouldn't benefit from Ranged defense IOs. In my experience, PBAOE sets benefit the MOST from Ranged defense, because they have control over the mobs they can keep at close-ish range. It's the stuff further away that causes the problems, and the reason I always go for Ranged defense on these builds. 10. You believed this guide too literally. You should apply your own experience to the game. Some characters are exceptions, and some players have different priorities. Have fun.:)

By the way, it seems completely reasonable to me that +Range would be a buff that Force Field could provide. This would lengthen/widen cones and allow the team to stand further away than normal, plus jive overall with the knockback in the set. There isn't any powerset in the game that provides this, and as far as I know only a single power (Boost Range in the Blaster secondary sets). If people feel this effect better matches to Sonic, the Clarity power would be a good power to attach it to.