Lazarillo

I often skip it, more 'cause the ambushes are annoying and time consuming, than anything. The EBs can be a little tough, but the Vanguard one is usually not a problem unless she gets you with Curse of Weariness (gotta bring the temp power!), but can be done without even using Inspirations for me, typically. Honoree is requires some skittle-popping, but beyond that, usually goes down okay too. And it's not hard to pull them separately, in my experience. But Rikti drones are up there on my list of "fun-killing" enemies, and having to wait for waves of them if I want to handle the EBs toe-to-toe is a pain. Doubly so when my goal is usually to unlock my Alpha quickly.

I feel like, given Dominators are the only AT with access to Assault sets, that's a fairly poor use of developer time. Doubly so since there are more "Assault"s than Control sets. So if more Dominator sets were made, it would make more sense to me to make new Control sets, since those could be used on multiple ATs. Though I'll admit I have a very love/hate relationship with the AT, so maybe that's narrow minded. After all, HC has provided a bunch of new Blaster secondaries, and those are also of somewhat limited use on the AT scale, and admittedly, Assault sets are probably much easier to make than Control sets (which will likely be much heavier in terms of VFX). But still, I feel like more Assaults aren't really needed right now.

I mean, the ghost only lasts for, what, 3 minutes? Seems like if you killed them, it didn't take anyway.

Decimation already gets quite close to the ED-cap anyway at the level-40 equivalent. You'd be looking at a best case scenario of 3% more damage (less, if you have any damage buffs at all thanks to bonuses in your build, or teammates) in maybe a couple of powers at most. Seems like it'd not be worth the effort.

Yes, they are. Same with several of the AVs in Mizz Libby heroside, too, just as an FYI. While you can generally smash through the LRSF these days with a heavily Incarnate-d team, bear in mind, it was originally designed to be the villain equivalent of a Hamidon raid. So crushing a team that's sub-level-50 is, for better or worse, entirely what that fight is designed to do.

I noticed, probably due to the changes they did to root times and such, that Vorpal Judgement now ends with an unskippable little crane stance animation that I wasn't always seeing before. However, I don't think it's actually lengthening the amount of time before I can act again. It's just, before, there was a delay in other powers, now, it's just still being "locked" in the Vorpal animation.

At the risk of stating the obvious, put it on auto? Ctrl+click it and you should see a little green ring. That means it will automatically activate as long as it's recharged and the bar is sufficiently high. For a Perma-Dom, this means it won't drop (unless you'd get slowed, or something, below the threshold, in which case it would drop anyway).

I have generally opposed this in the past because No Redraw didn't work right anyway, but i27.2 seems to have finally fixed this issue, so now I'm all for it! And for Mace Mastery epic stuff for other ATs. And for Spines! No Redraw ALL the stuff!

Given that Dominators have no way to heal/buff them like Controllers do, pets almost always feel too flimsy anyway. And similarly, given Dominators already crank out plenty of damage, I end up questioning how much difference the pets really make (especially if aforementioned flimsiness means they're dead half the time anyway). I think Mind/ honestly offers greater mileage for having wider utility instead.

Thanks for the commentary. Yeah, Leviathan is for theme, so I plan to stick with it despite knowing I could do better. And yeah, also, I'm mostly thinking "tank" only in the sense of "the character goes in first, instead of the pets going in first". And on teams it'll probably play more...traditionally like an MM than a "true" tankermind. It's nice to know that as long as I don't forget my secondary, or anything (unlikely, I think), it should still be able to work, more or less.

Just curious what people think of the practicality of this idea. It's nowhere near optimal, of that I am certain, but I really liked the idea of creating a Mastermind that leads from the front lines, rather than hiding behind minions, as it were (ironic, I suppose, given the latest changes that totally pull a "we have reserves" approach to MMs!). The idea is that debuffs from Time Juncture + the Lich (even at their most basic levels) plus various Defense buffs put my MM and all the pets at effectively the soft-cap, so long as the MM takes point, letting the t1 and t2 zombies follow in. The MM has melee attacks for flavor; I'm not sure how practical they'll be (though like I said, they're more about concept than anything). I also have no idea how the Lich is really "supposed" to be slotted, so I just went with a fairly MM-standard setup for enhancements that works in all the various aura buffs. Thoughts?

I know how the "best" use of it works, I just don't really feel like, given how much more "effort" it takes compared to other sets, with how closely the management works, that it's comparatively rewarding. Basically you have to do more, to get the same results. And Psi is similar, with the addition of a luck factor to make it even more annoying.

I have two main beefs with Psi Melee: First off, the animations are cool, but the SFX played when you miss sound like nails on a chalkboard to me. Second, insight is janky. Sometimes you get it, sometimes you don't. Sometimes you want it, but can't get it, sometimes it would be better to "save" it because what you need it for isn't ready, but it expires. And then you get locked out for an arbitrary amount of time. It's like all the worst parts of the Savage Melee mechanic (which I'm also not fond of), combined with the worst of the ones from Water Blast (probably not surprising that both Psi and Savage were half-baked, unfinished sets at the time the game originally ended). "Psi Melee" is a cool concept but I just can't see myself wanting to dedicate much time to a character with it.

If that's the crazy, then gimme my straightjacket, 'cause I'll maintain it. Then again, I won't play SS anyway because I hate the way Rage works, so probably my opinion doesn't matter? I will admit, I like the Punch animation on most the weapon sets, where the satisfying heft is, well, satisfying. But empty handed, it looks awkward, and is most certainly not a "punch" at all in the first place (the alternate animation does fix that, but I dislike that it and Haymaker have the same alternate animation, so I can only change one, and then I wanna get Air Superiority, too, and...yeah, we could go on all day). Gimme something outta your avatar, instead.

I just want to say I like every single one of these points. The badge ones, maybe could be "stop an invasion in every zone" (so Rikti, Zombies, Nemesis, or Banners, but not separate ones for each), but the idea of some sort of distinction for defending every zone is a neat one.

Jab is hypothetically unskippable because it has an awesome animation, while Punch, on the other hand...

I mean, the Leadership toggles, which are apparently the focus here, are already pretty "MinFX". I'm not sure how you'd make them any less graphically intensive without making them invisible entirely.

This. They had a fix for Rage, and they shelved it because of people whining that the changes weren't OP enough. I think it's unfortunate, but unlikely they're going to touch it now. Best we can hope for is that SS gets ported to Scrappers and a totally different power is put in its place.

I think there's a need, in some cases, to differentiate between annoyance factor, and "difficulty" factor. For example, like, Nemesis are a joke in terms of difficulty, but stacking Vengeance and PFFs mean they take forever to actually put down. But that's not really difficulty because it's not like they stand any chance of doing anything dangerous to the player, either. Knives of Vengeance, ironically, are kinda the same, since pretty much all of their LTs and above can pop "godmode" powers, it feels like. Tsoo, kinda similar. The Sorcerers are tough at low levels, but after that, they're mostly not a threat, just a "might as well afk for a minute because you've been slowed so much you can't move to the next mob anyway". On the other hand, you have Cimerorans, who you lowballed for being "brute force", but they have a lot of "brute force", to the point that they can and will ruin your day pretty much the moment you underestimate how big those damage numbers can roll. Arachnos and IDF are both pack a dangerous punch, just because of how bad they can debuff you, and how quickly those debuffs cascade with each other. Once the first one hits, you can be dead in 10 seconds flat.

Out of curiosity, anyone have a take on DP with /Plant? I'm planning to do the pairing regardless, but I'm curious if it's known to have any particularly good synergies or the like.

Can I just say, one little patch note, that I didn't even notice when it was on Beta, just completely makes this "Page" a game-changer for me? "No Redraw" customizations actually work now! Plant Manipulation, which I always wanted to try, but hated the janky animations for, is no longer janky! Mixing weapon and non-weapon attacks (or even different weapons) looks to be seamless! Between these, the MM changes, and the fact that I was making a new PB anyway, my Altitis is flaring up something fierce again, in all the best ways. ...oh, and on that note, can we get "No Redraw" options on Spines and Epic/Patron pools now? And really just completely crush my self control? I won't mind, I promise.😄

All the Judgement powers hit for more or less the same amount. That amount is just below what it would take to one-shot an even-level minion at level 50; when you factor in difficulty scaling up levels, and the like, that goes just a little lower, too. (though FWIW, the damage is buffed by a Musculature or certain Intuition Alphas, making it go above the necessary threshold). But the thing about adjectival damage descriptors, however, is that they don't correspond to anything specific. One AT's "moderate" might be another's "extreme". It's just kinda the nature of the beast. Now, that all said, you can right click on the powers for info, and then shift over to the "Detailed" tab, which will give you hard and specific numbers for most powers (Judgements included, AFAIK). That can perhaps help you make your decision. You'll see specific damage numbers, % chances for secondary effects, etc.

That's how they used to work, but I'm pretty sure they're outta the lineup these days. Although there are some missions (such as the aforementioned Tip, above) that still include them as a sort of independent, humanoid Nictus faction that's not stuck to the Council, Void Hunters and their ilk don't randomly show up alongside spawns of other factions. ...and part of me hates to say it because I love me some Nictus as an enemy faction in general, but that's probably for the best. "The Circle of Thorns hired a space mercenary!" never really sat right with me. Gimme more missions like that Tip, though, please! Gimme more Nictus in general!

I've got it on my Thugs/Traps "tankermind"-type character and I admit I don't use it a lot, or anything, but it's nice to have it as one tool in the arsenal. It's most useful for pulling stuff off an Acid Mortar, or for making the enemy AI question itself when it starts thinking about running for parts unknown. It's also handy for teams when at lower levels and/or if there's not a more "proper" tank for some of the harder targets (although when there is, I pretty much just give up tankermind-ing anyway and put the pets on aggressive). So overall, I'd say it's useful, on about the level you'd want/expect from a pool power, anyway, and what can I say, it's nice to have a few power slots saved for stuff that doesn't need much in terms of Enhancements, either.

A couple others have mentioned Demons/Storm. I gotta give props to that one, too. The theme feels very cool and sorcerer supreme-y, and the fact that it plays like a friggin' tidal wave only makes it more fun. The other that gives me a really good time, if in kind of the opposite direction, is my Thugs/Traps. It's absolutely glorious tankermind-ing, walking into a mob, giggling gleefully as their attacks deflect off my forcefield, and then having them realize a minute too late that there's a bunch of guys with guns right behind me...