Onlyasandwich

Sometimes sorcery for a build that could really benefit from rotating rune with another defensive steroid. Bonus points is flying is in theme. Force of will for much the same reason, though it requires more investment. Unleash potential is outstanding if you have some slot and power flexibility to give it love. If my concept involves flying, I'll definitely grab hover for in combat movement and extra defense. Extra bonus that the pool has another lotg mule if needed. I don't think the steroid in experimentation is worth it. This is better if you have a character that will benefit from the attacks as well, which won't be a stalker. Otherwise the power investment to get there is questionable.

White recipes and regular enhancements get vendored. Purples and high value ios depend on the market, but generally posted for quick sale at a reasonable price. Everything else I post for 5 inf to sell immediately and empty my bag. Better for the market if I get that salvage and mid/low tier recipes circulating instead of vendored! I make my money with other market processes unrelated to this. This takes five minutes once a week.

I don't look at tranq as an easy skip, but had a few reasons for skipping it on my arse/arse: With domination up, Sleep Grenade achieves a similar purpose, and is on a pretty low cooldown once the build is mature. As I'm going for Unleash, I was just a little squeezed for powers, and something had to go. Burst would be a pretty easy direct swap. However, it has better DPA, rounds out ranged rotations more completely, and is a good spot for Decimation BU proc and achilles since I can weave it in easily. Normally I have a tough time justifying the buildup proc, but the clamped 10% chance gives me a solid floor considering how much it will get spammed throughout battle. If I capitalize on the proc with an aoe or even just my higher DPA single target powers, it comes out to a really great return over time. I'll have to grab it on the way up at least to test it on AVs as you describe! Maybe I'll change my tune. I think it would be a slam dunk on a controller in place of an epic blast or something like arcane bolt. You're right in that there is very little synergy with the assault set. Like most folks I'm sure, I chose it for theme. Targeting Drone has synergy with a proc strategy on any primary of course. I've been very pleased with the power of the controls! The location aoe nature makes them very flexible for unique engagements and exploiting battlefield features to minimize damage taken. Sleep Grenade does a much better job of keeping things in one place than I thought it would. I don't know that this will hold true once I have ignite, though. That being said, I think I would probably do the same as you here if picking /elec, since its T1 has less proc opportunity. My own build makes some very similar choices otherwise. I especially enjoy the idea of making good use of Surge of Power! I wonder - does Power Up work with Unleash like cast buffs with a duration (FFields, Fort, etc), and give you the extra defense for the entire duration? I would think so. If so, I should be able to use it on every cast, giving me even incarnate cap ranged defense when up. Alternatively, I could reconsider my slotting for Unleash to focus on more basic recharge and regular softcap with PU enabled, freeing up some slots. I chose to proc out Flash Bang rather than Cryo. I'm usually a big proccy hold believer, but end up doing it less often on doms. The logic here is that I have pretty good ST damage in most assault sets, but aoe can be a bit lacking without epic support. Flash Bang puts out a nice chunk to intro most battles when procced. In your case, you picked up epic aoe, so fair enough for sure! Here's my build for comparison. Note that all but one power with FFback has procs disabled so as to not overexaggerate recharge potential, and decimation proc is toggled on. Wall of force is a proxy for Ignite, as mids won't let you slot it yet. Chunk: Dominator (Arsenal Control - Arsenal Assault) mk2.mbd

I have my own arse/arse up to 20, and it's a blast! Honestly the wealth of controls at this level feels really strong, and I feel more in control than most other doms at this level on the way up. Sleep Grenade especially is way more powerful than I anticipated. I'm perfectly happy having this in place of an aoe immob. Proccy, does a great job of silencing the alpha, and provides pretty solid ongoing mitigation as well. Obviously running in the 20's is no real test of a build, and I haven't tackled any challenging content. I always seem to have a really capable control at the ready though, and most of my controls contribute a solid chunk of damage themselves. Waiting for mids to update again so I can properly slot ignite and work out the rest of my build. Still interested in how this power works out in practice. Overall, it's fun to just spew random grenades and liquids out of my gun! My build has taken everything but tranquilizer in primary/secondary. I like tranq, but decided Burst was actually a pretty handy and efficient tool to have around for better overall ranged engagement. My defensive tools outside controls are: Ranged defense softcap with Unleash Potential up. Cycling Unleash with Surge of Power at high levels. I don't usually bother with crashy T9 type powers, but it's a good mule here, and doms can refill end with domination even when fully drained. I'm hoping this bit of AT synergy makes it worth using. The idea is rotating Unleash and Surge most of the time, but stacking when needed to become extra super tanky when needed. Ranged softcap with max resists to almost everything along with infinite end is nothing to sneeze at! I also like that I have plenty of efficient spots for FFback, which takes a little pressure off recharge set bonuses. Targeting drone has a similar effect, giving me more proc flexibility, as well as ramping quick snipe damage. Lots to like!

How are we liking Ignite here, anyone who's had a chance to get there either on beta or live? I'm rolling one up myself, but am afraid the fear effect may not mesh super well with the lack of immob, but maybe the other effects are good enough.

Ah, but you use the magical spoiler tags! In my book, that makes you a master indeed.

1. Plant/Fire Dom. An aggressive, spawn smashing powerhouse that lives and dies on their controls. 2. Grav/Energy Dom. TP other with a flaming singularity is pure joy, and popping the next spawn into that flaming pile with wormhole is even better. Energy is thematic here - secondary could be anything 😄 3. Rad/WM Tanker. Infinite endurance, nearly unkillable, outstanding aoe, and crunch for days. 4. Fire/Storm controller. Infinitely negative endurance (it's part of the fun!), and an absurd amount of damage for a controller. Visually chaotic, but controllable with the right approach. 5. Seismic/Earth blaster. Timing the meteor to wipe a spawn without worrying about the scatter is very satisfying. Every power is crunch smunch, and I can cram loads of wonderful FFback throughout. This is a hard list! I have at least 5 other characters that I still revisit just because they are such fun to play. The other 50 or so 50's do sit there gathering dust, and were fun to level and finalize, but don't give me the itch.

Anything electric armor I tend to prefer in a brute. Higher resist cap. Ela will be way over capped on several values, wasting some of its power budget. Taunt aura. Only certain armors retain their taunt aura in scrappers, and Ela is not one. Without it, runners are very annoying solo. Damage auras scale nicely with fury. Katana is off course outstanding on a scrapper, but great on a brute as well. Tanker is a worthy contender too of course.

I've found it useful, but am not on my final 50 build taking on 4x8. Is it literally just breaking almost immediately upon use, and have you found slotting it for heal to make a difference? I wasn't sure whether heal slotting would increase geode hp or only the Regen component.

It's hard for me to speak objectively here because I really love the trade-off that procs present, and the interesting optimizations you can do with some truly surprising builds. The vast majority of characters sacrifice huge defensive opportunities, recharge, accuracy, and end efficiency when focusing on procs. I find it fun to find the razor's edge of balance between just enough survival and leveraging procs to squeeze that extra juice. There are a handful of combos that break this limitation, as they can solve defense so easily with few slots and powers. Super reflex tankers and Pbu time characters are the main offenders. Even then, play one and I don't think you'll find it any better than a really well built primary with other strengths. Well - maybe time covers a too much territory as a set a little too well. Without procs as a very attractive alternative, I find it becomes a little too easy to come to a consensus on objectively superior "solved" builds. With procs in the picture, I can justify my super fun dominators who almost completely forego defense. They really lean on their control primaries to survive, and the reward for managing that risk with smart play is a meaningful chunk of damage. If not for procs, it would pretty much be defense softcap all day. I mean - it sort of is still, even though proc heavy builds are more popular than before.

I've been slowly leveling this guy and he's up to 40. Does not disappoint! Honestly staff is the most fun I've had on a stalker. The AOE is really quite excellent, especially with ffback support. Single target it feels a little slow with serpent's reach, but good. Now I just have to remember I have geode. It is quite capable of saving me, but I need to click it!

All of my inf goes pretty quickly into the next build, which runs 1 to 4 billion depending on exotic HO needs. I have a very lazy market process that involves low effort crafting of purples and waiting for a tight weekend to cash out above market listings. Anything that's not in a build is sitting in the auction block as a future sale or restock bid. That leaves me liquid with anywhere from 700 mill to a billion or so most of the time. If I don't have a new build for a while, 500 mill emails will start stacking up for the next go.

Welcome back @StriderIV! Concept is king as always. Some support sets I would just prefer as a Defender instead. What I feel would be really nice on a corruptor: TA, Dark, Cold, Kin, Rad, Storm Thematically, Water/Storm is great of course. Storm appreciates the minor self-heal present in Water, as does cold and TA. That is the only notable synergy. Anything will work fine!

I may have missed this element if buried within the thread somewhere. I see in the intro that the normalization is meant to allow a baseline to build on for introducing new pools, and to create fewer obvious "best choices," but nothing about a two pronged pass on powers affected by this sweep. In some of the cases highlighted here, this normalization is having the opposite effect, instead removing the one advantage an otherwise inferior power (Explosive blast in my recent example) had over other options.

Is there a specific reason for adding recharge to the armor powers? Is this to make it more punishing to be detoggled when you run out of end? As it stands, it wouldn't even detoggle if mezzed due to toggle suspension. I suppose it would also apply when you die and rez mid battle. Is the intention to punish this particular scenario? If so, why? Otherwise I don't understand why we are introducing a pointless, even if relatively meaningless inconvenience. I would pose the same question even for offensive toggles like Oppressive Gloom and Darkest Night. I can see some balancing logic here at least for Darkest Night, as it meaningfully limits how often you can change anchors, and how quickly you can cycle it to a new spawn. However, does Darkest Night deserve this treatment? Is its current 10s recharge time a balance issue for the classes with epic access? This is an example of an already under-picked power in an under-picked pool being made less desirable. You would be very hard pressed to find many dominator builds out there that use Primal Forces Mastery to begin with. Of those that do, Explosive blast isn't exactly a prime pick even then. This is what I was referring to in my earlier post about the formula adjustments not always taking into account the power budget of the pool as a whole, and how effective a given power is even in a vacuum. For thematic reasons, I actually went with this pool on a recent build! It was by no means optimal, but it seemed fun. This is less fun. Could we at least get a damage adjustment so it is more impactful when used? This is a power that does a whopping 47.55 unenhanced damage at 50. This is essentially tied with Psi tornado for lowest damage epic aoe on doms, and Psi tornado is in a superior pool, has a superior damage type, and doesn't require knockdown conversion. I suppose it will be more proccable, so may actually pull ahead when slotted with this focus! I actually love procs, and will benefit from this when adapting my build. However, my feeling (correct me if I'm wrong) is that you are not changing the recharge here to buff it through superior proccability. At least in its current form it offers some type of variety in the form of more heavily cycled mitigation, and better contribution over time to an aoe rotation based on leaner power choices.

The build as is would be fine for X1 to maybe X4 solo content. If you hate soloing, I'm not sure of the point here! It sounds like you won't like this character. To solo X8 content, you'll want aoes other than your Nuke and Force Bomb or it will be painfully slow. Energy Torrent is actually pretty good, and Explosive Blast is still a valuable addition to your aoe rotation, even if it isn't putting out as much damage as other aoes. If you just want the theme of big bubbles + blasts, you have achieved it. To @Frozen Burn's point, you just aren't really taking advantage of what either set can do. It's worth noting that you aren't softcapped to anything unless Power Build up is active, and it will only be active for 12 seconds on a relatively long cooldown. The real reason to take PBU is to use it before casting ally shields, as they retain the buffed values even after PBU wears off.

I've been struggling to articulate my response to why most of the significant recharge nerfs seem unjustified. I can appreciate why having a formula for translating powers into epics is useful from a balancing perspective. However, it ignores the power budget available in the pool itself, as well as how these powers fit into the playstyle of the overall build. Attributing set values to how "powerful" something like hoarfrost is compared to a soul drain is pretty tough, but the distinction is there whether we assign it perfectly or not. One solution is to homogenize them to the point where primary differences are in theme only. This is boring. Another would be too embrace the subjectivity and grapple with questions like: Is this power fun and useful in its current form? Do people even bother with it much in its current, pre-nerf state? Does having access to this power imbalance the class in some way? How popular and useful are the other powers in this pool compared to other pools? I'm sure these questions are indeed a part of your balancing process in some way, but the impression I get is that the formula is the primary tool in this pass.

Trolling back over the years of posts, I see very little talk of Rad assault, and it was the only secondary to not even get a single nod in the poll @honoroitshared earlier. It fits thematically for the illusion dom I'm brewing up, and I'd love to hear more from folks who've put it through its paces. Off hand I see a lot of long animation times, but also some pretty strong dpa powers mixed in. High procability, a seemingly useful secondary mechanic to help aoe, and a better than average healing option for doms. Do you use rad? Do you think it's trash, underappreciated, mediocre?

Okay, I think I got it! I lost a bit of recharge here and managed to: Maximize proc damage even further in seeds. Keep my global acc. Squeeze in a hold proc to Arcane Bolt (fun!). Max out Fly Trap Procs. That leaves Entangle as a pretty decent 1 slot wonder with the purple hold proc. I can chain this on AVs to hold them still, and will then have three powers in my ST rotation capable of piling on holds when drilling down a hard target. Any such targets will be constantly debuffed by nado/spout/FR, so hitting shouldn't be an issue. I could instead choose to mule a purple set in Entangle, or choose another power entirely with a purple mule. I think the extra damage and hold procs here are worth it, however. The runner up power from a utility perspective would be Snow Storm, which I've found useful for pulls in the past. Does anyone have any strong opinions on Snow Storm vs Entangle here? As a result, I'm a little lower on global recharge than I'd absolutely prefer. I think with FFback rolling from consistent Tornado spam it should still be really solid. I have so many fun cooldowns that it's okay to have a little room to be busy with something else at times. The build, for anyone interested: Controller (Plant Control - Storm Summoning).mbd It just makes me really happy inside to see Seeds doing 225 aoe damage, and I can't wait to watch Audrey tear it up fully loaded out. She seemed to do pretty well with just a lady grey on other Plants I've run in the past, and here she's loaded to bear.

@Argentae, do you revisit Verdicane often these days? I know you like to pop on new projects pretty often, as do I. It's one of the few combos where I've felt epic pets make a really big contribution. Leviathan mastery has been good to me - the little Coralax buddy is really great! I'd love some thoughts from others on what to choose as my final power. Ultimately it needs to be something that can take a purple set with +acc in order to complete my build goals. Right now I'm between: Spore Burst. Seems like it might be useful in certain content, but I can't imagine it would have a chance to work most of the time, as my pets are always waking things up. Thunder Clap. I can't see this ever being worth the animation time. There's always going to be a better cooldown to hit. Air Superiority. Not hyper optimized, but sort of fun and in theme with this character. Actually sort of useful when something gets in my face, and pretty competitive DPA. Overall a bit redundant from a ST attack chain perspective, as I'll be able to chain my hold and Arcane bolt almost seemlessly. Something else? I'm not sure. I want to keep that acc bonus. The ST immob would work. I guess it would actually have some utility in AV scenarios for more end-efficient application of containment than spamming my aoe immob. Maybe actually the option that would have the best use cases? Controller (Plant Control - Storm Summoning).mbd

Maybe have TK still have the hold effect on the primary target, but retain the reverse repel and immob on those who clump? If the immob were even just a little persistent after release (5-6 seconds?) and slottable for duration, that would allow you to use quick timing to combo it with other powers in an interesting way. It would also make the choice of when to release a bit more interesting instead of just "I ran out of end or they died." My use cases for the current TK include: Quick, guaranteed backup hold layer to get a boss out of commission when needed. Layering holds on AV's. "Get out of my face" button. Push mobs carefully back into a patch. Just being silly and doing fun things with mob positioning. It isn't an all-star, but it is a solid tool to have in my pocket, and usually pops out a couple times a mission solo. I need some more time with the new version to better understand my thoughts, but my initial impressions are: Get out of my face works okay. Hold layering obviously not happening. Patch positioning is superior. Faffing about with mobs has some new amusing scenarios, but it seems like the repel effect may be weaker. Am I imagining this bit? It still absolutely doesn't deserve to basically double my end/sec used while active. The recharge should be balanced against the idea that it is toggled for up to 30 seconds before it begins recharging. Other controls apply persistent effects and count down right away. I would at minimum knock 30 seconds off.

Nice! Sounds like a fun character. I've only gotten this guy to 28 (distracted by a new controller), but he's very solid. I haven't really pushed him through anything too challenging yet, though. Ran Peebles on +1X8 with bosses just fine, but that isn't exactly a high water mark. Still - not bad.

The build itself is moderately expensive, so your budget will be a factor. Being able to buy both ATO sets and the early Blistering cold will go a long way. You can catalyze them into superior at 50, and ride them all the way up. Other than that, there aren't any special considerations in terms of how I would expect it to drive as you level. On stalkers, I generally recommend focusing on slotting out your attacks first. Earth's embrace is a fairly low slotting priority, so can be filled out later in the build in favor of fleshing out end support and other parts of your secondary sooner. Especially in solo play, Ice Patch covers for poor defenses pretty well if you use it carefully, and only needs the base slot to get online. This can hold you over until you get the slots to boost up your secondary.

Regarding soul drain, I'm not sure I agree with why it would need to be standardized to the longer recharge if we kept the functionality as is. I always viewed Soul as the superior epic overall. The tradeoff with dark was that, by investing in at least one "tax" power in addition to the resist, I got a better version of soul drain. Soul on the other hand lets me cherry pick the res shield and pick up soul drain as a happy bonus if I have room. It also provides access to the sometimes build defining power boost. Even the summon in soul is one of the best available in APPs. It seems reasonable to consider the overall power budget in an entire pool rather than just balancing each power within only on its own merit.

I get the logic of this given similarities with Tornado, but it throws a solid wrench in many of my builds as a frequent enjoyer of Leviathan pool. The bonuses and procs available are significantly different. Is there any way we could consider preserving the Ranged aoe opportunity, and adding pet sets? The logic for set application on many powers is sometimes a bit squishy, and ranged aoe is by no means an unintuitive fit for the power.