Frosticus

Dunno what you are trying to do with the build but in general you either can handle spawns or you can't, none of those options are going to consistently get you thru a mission unless you go very slowly. Now if you are just getting stuck on EBs or similar, then powerboosted unleash is pretty good if you are avoiding insp.

Honestly, the easiest way is to use flashfreeze cause sleep is autohit against normal mobs and it is a nice big aoe. Not a terrible attack either if you proc it out (damage is not autohit). If you are fighting easy stuff then iceslick is usually sufficient. Cold snap is ok, but the fear cone is much smaller than the slow cone and it is much harder to aim a cone while leaping into the middle of a spawn than it is the aoe of flash/iceslick. You are probably gonna eat some damage no matter what you do if you are in first cause AA only pulses every 2 sec and someone is going to break the sleep/fear in that time.

Fwiw you probably want to focus on one or two things to consistently use seismic forces on. You won't be able to empower everything. I ended up deciding to primarily burn the stacks on aim as it knocks a chunk off of the base recharge of meteor* Also do yourself a favor and get a knockback to knockdown converter in meteor asap. The knock on it is ridiculous and will scatter everything out of your marine debuffs. *think this mechanic is bugged and doesn't take as much recharge time off as it should.

I have a marine/seismic/soul that I find quite enjoyable. I did it for the pure power fantasy of tsunamis and meteors- an extinction event. So in before someone says "it's not as good as fire " ok... To address your points: Seismic waves will noticeably knock down enemies that get close, but once marine gets tidepool and whitecap you'll barely notice seismic waves, so don't worry about consuming them. Rock shards enhanced is a good attack, regular rock shards is ok in the low levels. The base rech is so low on the attack you probably won't use procs. Your final build probably won't have it at all because Marine pulls you into the centre of the spawn. High global rech is always good, but not at the cost of more efficient slotting. Plus whitecap and upthrust both trigger ffb proc a lot. It's super easy to hit ~perma Hasten onyhisbuild. I went soul cause soulstorm looks so cool and makes sense for the character. Soul drain is still pretty good too. Meteor is contentious. Cast it before doing other stuff. Cast it before putting down tidepool even, but definitely before upthrust and whitecap. You can land meteor, upthrust and whitecap at the same time which is fun.

Generally it is either or between Quicksand and stone Cages. They conflict with one another. If sand had a faster cast time I'd pick it over Cages, but sand is a very good power while leveling.

Pretty hard to pick anything other than /earth on most builds. Dramatically boosts st damage and you are already in melee for heart of darkness so it is an easy fit. Fissure stacks wonderfully with your aoe stun and is decent aoe damage. Earth's embrace for capped hp on top of /dark affinity is basically unkillable. Honorable mentions go to: Psi for mez protection, and ultra procable nado Scorp for poison ray, another pet, good energy def, and a nice taoe, plus focused acc to empower proc slotting across your build.

OP to cut thru the noise, permadom is well worth going for. I've done a lot of dominators and put up lots of videos for them because they are my favorite AT. My base recommendation at 50 (this can more or less apply universally to all the ATs) -85% global rech (more is ok, but not at the cost of other things) -Hasten -At least 50% slow/rech resistance -Proc out a few attacks like your epic aoe and a couple single target ones. It really makes a big difference. -Don't chase things that your build is bad at. Ie defense unless you have something with built in defense/tohit debuffs. It's not worth the investment from 0.

Procd whitecap, 5 damage proc flashbang, and damage slotted sleep nade makes spawns disappear. Tricannon isn't far below fire imps if you contain the target. Procd cryo, seismic + hurl will be satisfactory st later on.

Please take Hasten. You are giving up huge slotting opportunities if you don't. Use base empowerment and spend the money on the +rech amplifier while leveling. You don't necessarily "need" permadom while leveling but being able to chain it twice in a row will be a big improvement over letting it drop every time and you can get that at a very low level.

Axe looks like the easiest port to me. AS for swoop Placate for taunt

Earth and dark for personal damage Mace for personal+ pet damage and overall utility. Not exactly the same needs but i went mace on my ill/Marine. Disruptor blast hits much harder than fissure and you shouldn't need to cycle your aoe attack twice against the same spawn solo or teamed. Focused acc allows more proc opportunities. Poison ray passes seismic/midnight grasp very quickly if you have multiple damage sources, although not nearly as satisfying to use. Scorp shield is much better than rock armor and looks like waves

For def based t9s in the case of /ea that only matters if you are a masochist trying to never use inspirations to get through the crash. Otherwise you just hit a single blue and energy drain in the case of /nin (scrap/sent) they have a 0 end cost blue bar refill on a short timer, that set sails through the retsu crash like it is designed to handle it. Only /sr has issues easily handling the crash before 50, but it also gains the least from using it relative to the others. That said, 160% positional def on a tank is entirely, unnecessarily, enjoyable. everyone is free to petition for the type of gameplay they want, but imo /ea and /nin really underperform outside of their t9. So t9 changes would have to be accompanied by a major revamp of the entire set for me to get behind it.

I love overload and retsu (scrap and sentinel). I wouldn't play those sets without the t9s in their current (or very similar form). *I have 2 - /ea stalkers, a stone/nin scrap, an elec/nin sent and a sr/ss tank that all live in their t9s with the same formula of seamless t9>unleash>t9>unleash The full end crash is pretty trivial to power through and the builds reward chasing optimization as much or more than anything else in the game (which some really enjoy) I'm of the opinion that the defense based t9s give ample reward to justify their downsides. You just have a case of a community (discord included although they are coming around on /nins retsu) that is hesitant to try something because someone told them that it didn't work for them, when in most cases the crash is "barely an inconvenience" That said, unstoppable and powersurge either need to do a lot more to justify the increased risk that their crash carries, or the hp crash needs to be retooled. In the video @Americas Angel posted above at one point the mobs have 3x veng and a 54 rad/rad AV is on me. I dunno what to tell you, but even chain emailing super insp might balk at that situation. And as many survival insp one would take to replicate it, I can load up on huge reds instead if so inclined.

I think some behind the scenes changes have been happening with some of the power redirects/executes in the last couple months. I can't put my finger on exactly what though. It's my pet theory that redirects/executes will be what eventually paves the way for future proc changes.

It triggers interface damage regardless of successful knock. That isn't related to slotting, but it shows it can probably roll damage procs without meeting the condition required for the patch itself to deal damage (ie knockback resistant enemies) On my arsenal builds I haven't seen it do enough damage to warrant damage slotting and it doesn't proc well enough to dedicate the slots to it that are better spent elsewhere in the build. It is however the only control primary patch that has enhancable slow, which ime is very valuable. But ymmv.