Mezmera

I take it that the Emerald Barrier has high mez protection/resist so that you're not just going to get that nice -regen from a blaster spamming an ice hold. Maximum efficiency would probably call for a Dom to be on that Emerald Barrier since they'll be able to maintain control the easiest. As for tanking Rom I found he snuggles nice and close by making a concerted effort to keep him in range of the taunt field. No one else on the team had a taunt field so that made things easier and I would just spam taunt just in case it actually did do something through that "Unaffected". For me it was really being able to survive through the moments solo when everyone else should leave my tank to kill those barriers. I would spare all of my tricks for when I was solo since once everyone got back to Rom I was getting team buffs again and he was well debuffed that I didn't really need my good stuff until I was alone. I don't mind that he is outright untauntable but if the tanker taunt field has an effect to keep Rom's priority on you especially if there's no one else all that close then I think that's fine if it takes a little extra effort than just spamming taunt.

This is the biggest barrier to pvp. The QoL improvements given to pvp is nice with the pvp only accolades and this new create a character system. Ultimately though the attraction to pvp will not be driven by these QoL improvements alone, it'll be a real rebalance of pvp from its current broken form that may attract more to these arenas. A full revert to the old system isn't going to fix anything and likely creates so many more problems. While these features are cool and all it still is window dressing.

Correct none of your arrows stack on themselves. You're only going to get one value of Disruption Arrow along with all of the others. But they do stack from another TA user.

This is how I play my doms since they gave us Unleash. Heck I take Unleash on my Shield tank for the fantastic regen and recovery. Force of Will pool is sneaky good.

First off Plant is OP as all get out so lets not act like Seeds and Creepers aren't broken. Seeds has a ridiculously fast recharge for such a supremely useful power ability. Creepers does fabulous damage AND those vines each hold their own aggro which keeps baddies from attracting to you. Plant is the all being control that should not be. Then the Fire Dominator takes advantage of yet another broken ability that has been allowed to linger far too long in Bonfire with that KB>KD proc. Take that away like they would have quickly fixed if this was the live crew and you'd find a dom with average control and good damage output. Dark Control is decent control but lags behind in aoe hard control for better damage particularly ST damage. Mind Control has far more the superior aoe control over all else and has paltry damage output. You're relying on Terrify and Mass Confused targets to do your damage. The benefit of Mind Control is that on Dominators all that control is accentuated so then you can rely on your assaults just as well to get your damage. I think someone should refrain from giving abstracts about a powerset they don't play. The bar should not be Plant nor Bonfire or even Stealth Confuses which are being exampled as 'good' powers and sets which have broken good abilities that are bad habit forming and lead players to ask why can't new control sets be as easy peasy. The devs have done a good job here of crafting their own unique powerset independent enough to play how they want it to play.

There's a lot of the same powers but it's a completely different playstyle. Mind Control's animations are fast and fluid. Symphony's are clunky in comparison but you are netting much better damage output for a bit less optimal control. Fair tradeoff. You can keep these animations away from my Mind dom tyvm. I can play Symphony if I like.

The confuse is fine as it is. This set is already quite powerful without that confuse and then you toss that in as an extra tool at your disposal you're quite well off with this control. How something should work does not need to be dependent on how Mind Control's powers work, or Dark Control or Plant, this is Symphony Control and should behave on its own separate terms. The sleep could use modified so that it feels like it would get more functional use but I don't think it's damage component is the problem. And yet it's still a good power to have in its current form you'll just have to adapt to how it plays rather than how it should play. They've been tuning this set for quite a while, we've seen it a few days. It feels quite good to me that I can really only pick out the sleep as less than ideal so I'm going to acquiesce to how they see that they want Symphony Control to play.

Plus spawning them out towards the sea implicates that you must stop them before they make way off the island and off to destruction. The twin fight is pretty epic but those extra ambushes feel like a bit much. Those twins are already a handful to deal with. As for the Romulus fight I actually kind of liked it. Once the team got the hang of seeing the barriers come back up they learned to leave my tank and kill those barriers and then back to Romulus. I don't mind the usual ambushes on this fight but I'd maybe trim down all the extra ads in the area to start. These two fights add a significant portion of time to the task force which I think trimming down a bunch of the ads in specific areas on these last two maps would do a great deal in not making it feel like such a slog. I like these additions but now it feels like there's just too much needless ad pruning that needs to happen which undermines these two new features. As for the hostless tech it's a real neat addition. They are a bit hard to identify in a crowd and it does feel like there may be a few too many that spawn but altogether I like it. The biggest thing I would do is to look into how if the hostless gets controlled to stop taking over your teammate that your teammate shouldn't die after bit now that they were freed and the time ran out on killing that hostless. But I think that is something you're looking into. We had a bunch of control on the team which it felt pretty strong compared to how it could have been with the old shout mez protection. I don't think control was left behind at all on this and feel like 2-3 control characters would be ideal to have. I'd say some ad pruning is in order other than that fun stuff!

Having just run my tank through the new relentless ITF I like this change and it feels warranted if all these wicked holds are going to be thrown around. Prior to this on the rare occasion that my Against All Odds got knocked off from some Widow hold or something I'd forget to look down to turn it back on when I'm usually in the heat of things. Sometimes it would be more than these 8 seconds so not having to worry about this now is great. But I do see how some need to be quick to get some of these toggles back up and running. I don't know about anyone running 4 offensive toggles but I can see 2 being on for a lot of characters. Put me down in the camp for a 6s suppression.

All in all I think this is a well thought out set. All of the usual powers are there and that it even has a confuse power sets it up as a cut above and I even like that it does damage, confuses are real strong regardless and I see the intent behind not wanting any extra stealth confusing tactics. Confounding Chant's soft control with that strong damage cone is the bread and butter of the set. Symphony does feel a little sluggish but that's probably for the best with how good of a set it is. The set has a great mix of soft control with some real nice damage potential and a little bit of hard control for fallback. I also like how the pet interacts in the fight. About the only thing I'd say that could use changed is Lullaby. It is a neat power with that -20% damage but that's all I'm really going to use it for since it's best to lead in with those cones and seeing how you're starting in the more ideal position to start engaging the sleep is one you'll want to include in your alpha. That it pauses the damage from your other control I find that less than ideal. I could see the sleep aspect of the power getting better functional use as a pbaoe even if it does still pause your damage and could keep that -20% damage debuff. It's not so OP that I will feel dirty playing it. Cool set I will have one of these.

Yeah I realized that today after playing symph again. Kinda neat but not sure how I feel about the damage pause.

Well any perma Mind dom that throws out a Mass Confusion is getting 3+3 mag confusing plus then if they have the Contagious proc based on the powers recharge they're likely getting a lot of targets layered with another 2 mag confuse. So pretty much any other aoe confuse power will carry you past the threshold along with all other ST confuses. And if we're getting rid of the shout mez protection altogether for a substitute 10 mag protection at all times this'll likely make things easier on most control. It'll likely lessen how easy breezy Seeds of Confusion can make things alone but it'll be just fine for control with others working in coordinated efforts.

Those are typically the primary powers I go with. Depending how I am playing on a particular build I'll have that Malaise and Contagious set flip flopped. In my team build which I substitute in Leadership powers for Stealth I like to put that Malaise into Mass Confusion for that added damage proc. On my Stealth build I go with Contagious in MC and I have the full Ascendancy set in the ST Confuse. As far as the pools I'll go with the ones you have but I don't go with Flight and instead go with Fighting. I like to 4 slot +5 Shield Walls in Unleash Potential with all of the recharge ones with the unique and then an extra slot for a lotg. I usually take UP in the 20s because I like having it at low levels and with a set that gets high enhancement values which I don't have to worry about it being attuned. Typically I like UP more on characters that can power boost it for a bunch more defense. Yeah I wouldn't rely on a FF proc for perma either. I do have one slotted in my snipe but that's just a bonus amount I don't need to rely on to still maintain perma.

I do agree that it feels like there's just one too many cones which makes this less conducive to Dominator playstyles which have a high mix of melee and pbaoe powers. I found I lead in with the Stun and the Sleep cones and pretty much the sleep aspect of that control is null due to wanting to use the other aoe controls and the dot of the stun cone. It is nice with that -20% damage but I'd rather see the sleep be a large area pbaoe power that way the control itself feels a bit more useful and lends itself to melee style doms a bit more to give this set a bit more variance. Edit: Of course that would change a lot of how the pet mimics that sleep which I ultimately have come to like this pet.

The thing about the ITF was that it was always understood that it neuters actual control characters since once they shout just about all control goes out the window. Now I don't mind them getting a high amount of mez protection but if it's something where I can't just focus on a particular EB to get them under control it does get irksome. For instance on the regular old tf those ambush spawns I will focus my aoe control surrounding that EB and then grind into them with more ST control but if any of its surrounding allies shouts there's nothing I can do to control that EB anymore. To me that takes things too far for control to enjoy playing this tf, which is fine so long as other tfs don't go kneecapping control like the ITF always has. As far as I can tell though the 10 mag shouldn't be a problem with how my Mass Confusion is set up with the Contagious proc since I'd likely be on target with the EB hitting their surrounding targets with Mass Confusion and then apply another ST confuse on that EB, but if they're getting the benefit of that shout to keep them uncontrollable then that just sounds as fun as it always has. It's a fine line trying to take away that cheese stealth confuse strategy through high protection. Ideally you want to have control characters to have to actually put skin in the game and have the control they can offer still be viable. I haven't played this yet but I can't wait to see what my Mind dom can do to your new creation.

Okay I was assuming as they were creating the new Sonic Assault that some of those powers they would allow to partake in the same festivities. I guess they will be shafting their new shiny the same way dominator Electric Assault was left kicking rocks.

Okay so the set is pretty strong. Not Plant levels of OP but some real nice aoe damage from Confounding Chant and proc'ing the aoe hold. Enfeebling Lullaby is actually quite good it is a nice cone of soft control on its own but it also debuffs targets of 20% damage so if they are awoken they are doing less damage. The pet is decent too. If you know how to play control and can get the most out of cones this is a nice set. It does feel a little sluggish but that's coming from a Mind Control main where those animations are super fast. Plus I paired it with the Sonic Assault and together they feel a bit slow but quite strong damage wise. This is an aoe machine for certain. I found Hymn, Lullaby, Chant, Despair and Reverberant to be the must take powers. I actually skipped the confuse which I don't do but being a ST control that will cause aggro I found better options in focusing towards aoe.

I was playing around with the Dom assault and saw the 7.5% -resistance but nowhere was it stated about the other portion which would be the 12% like the Defender value. Is there somewhere to find that out?

Couple questions: Is there no AT modifier and it's 12% and 8% across the board no matter the AT? The 12% for 8s can stack on itself from the same source but the other portion needs to be of a different category?

As someone with a fondness for a Shield tank don't worry too much about getting shields to rest on our backs. Any true warrir would feel ashamed that their arm is so puny that they feel they must rest the very essence of their survival anywhere but at the ready. Kidding aside I can see all kinds of complications arising from trying to incorporate Shields into the backpack option especially in conjunction with the regular weapons. Neat feature though for the weapons themselves, please don't go breaking my tank.

I was hoping for a bit more on the costume front. It looks like most of the effort was put into the weapons and their backpacks along with those costume overlays which is cool. Wish those redeemable rewards granted unique costume pieces that we could customize our characters with, not a fan of running around looking like an NPC. I like the Aeon Legacy gloves better, just the two colors it feels so saturated. I am glad to have these gloves though and hopefully we get a lot more costume pieces proliferated in the future.

Fair

Have to agree from first glance it looks like a strong damage set through a lot of cones. We'll have to see how the recharges are on the powers and the range of these cones and what the pet is all about. I was looking at was skippable and at first glance didn't notice the damage on the disorient and sleep cone. Seems like the fear cone and t1 would be the ones to designate to skip if I must. Unique idea though and with all of that psionic damage you would think it would seem to step on Mind Control's toes but it looks pretty different in execution.

Finally! For month I have had to make do with a broken "_" button. But now you all are conforming to ME! Who need to buy a new keyboard, time and patience my friend, time and patience. Next update can we do omething about that "y" button. Mine' a little upect.

Agree on everything being said. It really comes down to a bunch of factors. The base recharge of the power you're looking to slot is the major factor in proc vs sets. Then yes AT damage modifiers play a factor. I will usually slot 5 of a good set into powers which those usually carry a damage proc and then add another proc 6th if it seems beneficial. There's always one long recharging power you can find in your assault powers that you can look to play around with like Crushing Uppercut for my tank for instance, it can house melee, hold and stun procs at an optimal recharge so I look to slot that power just enough with 2 hecatombs to get it in the 90%'s for damage and then slot procs for a bunch of extra damage.