Frosticus

Trying out my ice/sav dom I like these changes. I mean it is a buff in many areas so what's not to like? Shivers+(faster) ice slick probably provide ok ranged control now for most ranged situations. The knockdown probably lets them retaliate from the fear a bit more often than one would like. Ice slick+AA (dominating) probably provide enough melee control now for most melee situations It's not total lockdown by any stretch, but it is definitely better. What to improve: Shivers could still use a little more punch Block of ice is still a bit slow Bug: Artic Air is still toggle dropping when mezzed

Looking at this a bit more I think it is fair to good for a lot of powers. ex Artic Air - even with a end game build it would take about as long to get back up and running ex Offensive toggles on armored characters - they might not even be paying attention to notice it went down as they aren't commonly mezzed It is a sizable downgrade for some powers that are often vital for other characters ex. Hurricane/venomous gas - when these powers drop you drop shortly after. On my stormy I can get it going way faster than this suppression I dunno, I really like my aggressive debuffers and in playing them aggressively I make sure that if I do get mezzed those powers are up way faster than this suppression period. For me the QoL improvement isn't worth the downgrade. 5-6 seconds is probably ideal.

This is a big nerf to my poison defender who lives and dies by venomous gas bolstering my offense and weakening enemies. When that toggle drops the scales tip immediately in favour of the enemy. It is priority one to get it back up, or die. roughly 4.7 vs 8 seconds post breakfree. This is a big quality of life improvement for playing semi-afk in easy content though I guess.

I'm not sure to be honest. I've never liked shred that much, but I don't like most melee cones. Savage leap could always crit, but it seemed exceptionally low. It still seems low to me. I'm not sure why savage melee has lower crit chance on aoe's than other sets (including rending flurry). It is still a great aoe set, but sometimes I think about those aoe's on a scrapper under critical strikes and how well they might perform.

In actual gameplay savage comes out pretty far ahead ime.

Definitely, but that particular AV is more challenging than many others. That said, storm doesn't give you much other than a nice dps boost (steamy mist is basically it). They are nearly immune to slow/rech debuffs, tohit debuffs and you won't be holding them unless the triangles are down. As mentioned above your best bet is to softcap ranged def, make sure you have mez protection in place and then hope they miss you enough.

The biggest favour you can do yourself on your sav/shield is to put as many procs as you can feasibly slot in to savage leap. In most powers giving up set bonuses for procs is a meaningful sacrifice, but in savage leap it is an easy choice. It does so well with procs.

Would the perception proc provide enough to see thru blind? I run +perception on everything so I'm not sure, but that could remove the need for inspirations.

Generally what you'd strive to do is build enough global tohit/acc that you don't need any in your powers. You still want to ED cap (or close) your damage enhancement in each power. So with musculature you'd still want to see around 110-120% damage enhancement. Then you layer on the procs. Only defenders and brutes have procs clearly superior to damage enhancements (corrs and trollers both critical which doubles damage enhancement effectiveness and muddies the water) That said, some builds benefit more from procs than others and in almost all cases proc performance is greatly overstated on the forums as the increase in performance is surpassed by the decrease in other metrics.

yes this certainly helps. If they are actively running though the delay after combat tp usually means they are out of range again before you can get a melee attack off. savage leaps is great. It sort of just is what it is for stalkers. You control the start of the engagement better than anyone, but once the fight is underway much of the pacing is determined by what your enemies want to do. If the Ogres want to flee into the hills, or an AV wants to try and flatline your dps - they will. Most other (non melee) ATs have to deal with runners too, but usually have a suite of tools to reduce the issue. off topic a bit, but I personally believe stalkers are the best balanced melee AT and definitely the most enjoyable (for me).

Everything will try to run from a sav/sd stalker. I dunno something about breaking the mobs morale? I remember a dev talked about that in the old days.

The other option is weapons mastery for webnade. Physical perfection is a nice power. Exploding shruiken is a small aoe but would roll procs well if you went that route. Giving up snipe is a big sacrifice though. Just depends how badly runners aggravate you.

savage/sd does oodles more aoe than elec/sd and probably has more st too. I know you like the ITF and I've done it at +4/8 no insp/temps/lore/amps on my sav/sd/mu. But you won't be afk'ing the mobs. Chasing the AV's around is fun at first, but gets old after awhile. Final romy jumping up into the mountains...sigh. I've tried it with enemies buffed, but I triggered the ambush at the summit and got whittled down. BU+ball lighting+savage leap+fast AS+(hidden) 15ft rending flurry is a lot of aoe over a pretty sizable area. You'll likely have double buildup for the rending flurry as the aoes trigger the proc constantly. you can throw shield charge in there too. But remember SC won't refresh buildup (psuedo pet). I imagine lightning rod doesn't work either, but savage leap does.

Poison/fire/psi has been my favorite defender. Keep in mind that frequent use of the defender ATO procs take away much of the shortcomings of lacking self healing capabilities.

Honestly it's something I'm struggling with right now. You need another attack besides maiming, AS and snipe if you want to run seamless chains. One could argue that stalkers rarely get to due to runners and such, but it is still probably important to be able to do. In most content those 3 atttacks, rending flurry and leap will be all you use in addition to always recharged buildup. You might want savage strike as a filler. At least it can add to assassin's focus, which savage melee really struggles to build ime. 100%. Savage leap is reason enough to play savage. People singing the praises of combat teleport should give savage a try. Definitely. It is a 14 sec attack so it will hit pretty hard and roll procs well. The issue is does it hit hard enough to justify draining your blood stacks and to warrant being a 5-6 second dot (one of the slowest available to melee sets. Maybe the slowest?). Compare it to incinerate (not available to stalkers of course) which most people dislike as well. Hemo is a slower dot and just barely does more damage despite recharging 4 seconds slower. All while being a consumer. Something isn't right with Hemo. I don't think anyone is gimping themselves to take it, but it really should be better.

I think Hemo is pretty skippable. Not because it is a bad attack, but because it is a consumer of blood stacks with no real benefit for the consumption. I think you are just better off plowing through spawns at full blood for the global recharge benefits toward AS and snipe.

Unless you took one of those pesky judgement's with a 2+ second cast and someone hits them with pyronic judgement first ha! I think if I was just contributing ageless every 2 min I'd personally feel pretty useless to the team, but to each their own. I don't personally team much in late game, but I have certainly felt my presence was next to nothing on many teams and I have some objectively strong builds in my stable. Nukes and judgement tend to do that in teams though.

Yes and then over corrected so now you need 3 stacks of blood for it to do the expected damage of a 14 second power. All in a slow dot. Sad.

Second vote for plant/poison/earth. Synergy is great

Powerboost will boost the -tohit of weaken very well for the full 30 seconds that weaken lasts. It will boost the -tohit of venemous gas well but only for the duration of PB. I don't think it will impact poison trap at all because other self buffs have no affect on it (like aim). I don't think the damage procs in rain of fire will produce the results one would hope for, but it just depends what you expect. I use the absorb (and heal) proc in my st chain. I usually have several hundred points of absorb refreshing while in combat. I have dominate with entomb as well. It works pretty well. It is a really fun combo. I have my take on the build in the poison guide of my sig.

I don't think there has ever been a better summation of how proc builds function. Almost none of my proc builds can realistically solo +4/8 outside of push over mobs. I'm looking at your build and seriously considering going the route you have because savage assault is super fun and satisfying to use. Savage leap is my second favorite power haha! Plant/sav is a good contender as well because seeds gets out so fast and creepers act pretty autonomously. I really like just charging in and having the auras do their thing though. It is a very different playstyle from any other dom I've used. Thanks for sharing this build.

Ive been levelling this exact combo with the same intent! Sort of a wendigo theme. I've done fire/sav, dark/sav, and plant/sav all into the mid 40s for perma dom and I think the ice/sav is the best for someone that just wants to fight (plant is good too). I was only able to get to 35% m/r def because procs are life for me haha. And I need call hawk! My only issue with the combo (which is common across many doms) is I have no recourse when my controls fail. Having to run missions with AVs off doesn't sit well with me in late game. Feral charge remains my favorite power in the game.

Next power(s) after the one it is slotted in is used. I dont think the 3.25sec starts perfectly at the end of power execution though. Or at least not perfectly in every power. Some powers have a weird pause after execution before you can start the next power. Powers like those likely eat into the 3.25 sec.

Keep in mind that the proc doesn't guarantee criticals. It adds a flat 50% increase. So in the end you get about 2/3rd chance to crit with TF if that is your goal. I prefer to jam several fast attacks in the window. It may/may not work out better but I like seeing the critical hits

And that's the sad part. It should be a really good attack considering it is a slow dot and a consumer. Stalker version "was" really good (too good) and it is now skippable too. But at least if you skip it you just plow along at full stacks until you decide to unleash the big version of rending flurry.