Dom - wimpy until perma-dom?

[ninja surprise]

I haven't gotten a Dominator super high yet, and wonder if that's the problem.

I've played a lot of Controllers, melee toons of all types, Blasters, and the occasional Sentinel. I even got a Dark/Electric Defender to 50.

It just feels like my Doms defeat slowly and can't do enough simultaneous control and damage to make good headway.

 

My Dominator attempts are:

Dark / Martial Combat @ 32

Gravity / Earth Assault @ 32

Fire / Fire (Two of them because I got one to 16 then dropped it long enough to forget I had it before starting another and getting it to 22)

 

Am I choosing poor combos or are Dominators just kinda wimpy until perma-dom and everything fully slotted?

Or is it that even Blasters get more self-buffs?  Most Blasters get a self-heal and/or endurance recovery, whereas in Dom secondaries there's only 3: Consume in /Fire, Life Drain in /Dark, or Drain Psyche in /Psionic.

Do Controllers feel sturdier due to the buffs/debuffs helping survival during the weak-control levels?

 

How do you get your Dom rocking in the early levels?

 

[Mezmera]

Well in the early levels you're not meant to be the all being damage dealer.  Up to 32 your time should be spent fleshing out your controls along with building yourself with the pools.  For survive-ability I'd go with Force of Will or Sorcery for one of those shields.  Your damage cycle really doesn't get strong until almost 40.   Perma is more geared to helping with surviving since you can instantly control almost anything and have the best mez resistance in the game, your damage is your damage no matter if you have perma or not, you're just not getting knocked back or anything so your damage should stay consistent.  Typically your damage starts to build slowly from 16-38.  

 

Not sure about some of those assaults (/fire is good) but I'd assume they're not bad once you get them up to 38.  I've got a few energy assault doms and they crunch but their chain doesn't get built until 41 or so.  Really you're control early and a late bloomer into dps/survivability.  Team and keep your team upright with your controls, learn what can be done when in domination while you get familiar with the AT.   

Edited December 16, 2019 by Mezmera

[ninja surprise]

Ah, so late bloomer regardless of perma-dom?  I'll keep on chugging then 🙂

[Frosticus]

/fiery is a bit lackluster until blazing bolt and blaze. then it is crazy single target. 

/earth and /martial push you into melee range which can be tough until your controls are very solid and/or you have some epic shield and io bonuses. 

 

perma dom is of course very nice as it makes your controls rock solid all the time so you dont have to worry as much about being squishy. 

 

they tend to be very late bloomers.

 

 

[mbre2006]

End game for doms is perma dom. Unless you waste a lot of money on IO's early on. Well I guess it's not a waste if you get what you achieve.  Honestly you really should do fine whatever you roll early on.

[Coyote]

To be honest, one of my most powerful characters before perma-Dom is my Plant/Savage. He destroys missions solo, and because a lot of his damage scales with mob size, he has no problems with "clear all" on x3. Yes, defenses have big gaps, but when you only use one power to defend yourself from the majority of incoming damage, slotting it up isn't that hard. I only use 3 attacks from the Assault set, so it's not that hard to slot them up.

 

I said some time ago that even without perma-Dom, Dominators have an issue leveling up: all ATs need to slot up attack powers for Accuracy and Damage, and usually Recharge and End Red. But most other ATs get to slot up their defenses with only two IO... End Red and either Defense, Resist, Heal, or ToHit Debuff. Then there are some powers like Holds that need more, but usually get an Accuracy bonus so you don't need as much Accuracy slotting early. So Dominators need to slot up more effects on all of their powers, on the average, which makes the early-levels slot crunch hit them harder.

 

However, if you can bypass that issue by getting powers that are solid with few slots, and only concentrate on a few controls and a few attacks, I think they play better. Also, you need to worry about Accuracy early more than other ATs, because you have to hit with both your attacks and your defenses... the Kismet IO is necessary, as is looking for set bonuses like Positron that give Accuracy and Recharge. Also, assault sets with -Def shine early on when your attacks aren't that accurate and getting -Def debuffs really helps. Later on you fill out your Accuracy and don't need the -Def that much, but when making the slog to perma-Dom, getting -Def debuffs (or a self-buff with +ToHit) makes the leveling up much easier.

 

Lastly, Dominators really play better with a primary that blooms early and can defend you well before you're fully slotted out. To my mind, that's Electric (you can end-drain spawns completely pretty early on), Dark (-ToHit on everything really helps out with underslotted controls), and Plant (because Seeds). If you were to mix one of those with Rad, Savage, or Thorns, I'm sure that you'd see a much smoother leveling experience.

[Coyote]

16 hours ago, ninja surprise said:

in Dom secondaries there's only 3: Consume in /Fire, Life Drain in /Dark, or Drain Psyche in /Psionic

 

Rad Assault also has a melee-range self-heal... it's twice as strong as Life Drain, but it requires that the target is Contaminated. So it's not dependable, but it's there.

Savage has a pure self-heal, no enemies required. It's very strong, but also on a really long timer.

Also, Plant gets Tree of Life, though it's on a long timer and with a long activation time, so really only useful for AVs, EB, and maybe higher-level Bosses.

 

Another interesting idea is the Entropic Chaos set, which gives +Recharge as well as a lifetap effect. I think it's only about 2.5% equivalent, after "chance to proc", but if you put that in 3 attacks, it's like you're cycling a 7.5% heal regularly into your attack cycle, which is close to Life Drain. If you're building for Ranged Defense, it's hard to choose that over Thunderstrike (though getting +Recharge along with a defensive benefit is nice), but if you're going for S/L defense, then Entropic Chaos could be a solid choice to increase your effective in-combat regeneration rate.

[Frosticus]

 

 

4 hours ago, Coyote said:

 

Lastly, Dominators really play better with a primary that blooms early and can defend you well before you're fully slotted out. To my mind, that's Electric (you can end-drain spawns completely pretty early on), Dark (-ToHit on everything really helps out with underslotted controls), and Plant (because Seeds). If you were to mix one of those with Rad, Savage, or Thorns, I'm sure that you'd see a much smoother leveling experience.

This is absolutely true. 

As an example I have a fire/sav in the low 40s and it is still a struggle. I ended up taking aid self :p. Bonfire is great but you still get lots of pot shots coming at you.

 

I have a dark/sav also in the low 40s and it has been so much easier from the moment I unlocked fearsome stare. 

 

side note: why are dom fire imps still only sometimes summoning 2 imps? 

[oedipus_tex]

A make or break for any low level Dom is whether you have taken and slotted Hasten. Take it at the first opportunity that won't hurt your build (generally by level 18 or earlier).

 

You can't slot Domination for Recharge. However, its recharge time is affected by Hasten. Thus Hasten is essential for keeping Domination up as frequently as possible. By level 22 with an IO build, with no set bonuses, it should be possible for Domination to be active about 50% of the time.

 

[ninja surprise]

With all this in mind I plundered my Grav/Earth and respec'd my Dark/Martial. Removed the melee attacks, enhanced the controls for more control and the shurikens for damage/recharge. 

Started doing some solo missions at -1/+0 to see how it went... boy do I run out of endurance fast.  Trying to do better at pacing my attacks and not try to go as fast as my fire/fire blaster - maintain control, and do consistent damage. It'll take a little while, just be patient.

And it's working. Got through a bunch of missions solo and now I'm at +0/x2 while I wait for Wentworths to send me some more enhancements. Joined a pair of Posi TFs, Yin, and Citadel and did just fine.

Just hit level 39 and looking forward to getting stronger.

[MrSnottyPants]

Endurance is something you need to think about while slotting - that's for sure with a Dominator.

 

I've found them a struggle to solo in the teens, smoother in the mid twenties, and quite strong in the 30s.  For me, the important thing is having a good selection of the softer AoE controls - fear, sleep, disorient - it gives you layers of control when something goes wrong.  IOs and SOs help too.

 

Right now I'm working on an Electric/Martial.  Someone above pointed out Electric is particularly good at this sort of thing.  The chain confuse is great.  The location sleep that puts enemies back to sleep is great.  The toggle endurance drain is surprisingly good against harder targets.  Even the chain knockdown is useful once you get a recharge into it.

 

In the old days, I had a Fire/Fire I almost gave up on.  I took the immobilizes and it got better - constantly retreating while stringing out enemies 😁

 

Solo dominator is a mind set - not so great at rushing in both-guns-blazing until later.  Personally, I don't think perma-dom is needed just to solo well.

[MTeague]

My first dominator is Plant / Psi and... honestly I have trouble getting into another Dom (trying a Grav / Earth) because I can't help but compare them and he feels like he will never ever measure up to the godlike destruction of the Plant / Psi.

Kinda spoiled myself.

Edited December 19, 2019 by MTeague

[ninja surprise]

Quick update:

I put a Chance for KB into Trick Shot and it's hilarious.

 

Also I had forgotten that clicking Domination re-fills the Endurance bar, that's a great self-buff. I also didn't know Domination includes mez protection, that's great!

[MindOverMatter]

On 12/17/2019 at 10:38 AM, Frosticus said:

 

side note: why are dom fire imps still only sometimes summoning 2 imps? 

Apparently, this bug has been going on for some time. It seems to be linked to a zoning issue and may need more folks calling this out in the Bugs Thread to investigate further. 

[VV]

I have a couple Doms and I get where you are coming from. My Mind/Psi was hard to level and still feels a kind of wobbly. My Dark/Savage leveled pretty easily and is now a monster. In solo, I think the -ToHit of the Dark is more beneficial than the -Recharge of Mind. Also, the Savage melee attacks do ridiculous damage.

 

I also came across the feeling that my Controller was stronger at mid levels than my Dominators. Actually, with all of them tricked out at 50, I still feel that the Controller is stronger overall. That is probably just due to my playstyle since I am more familiar with the Controller AT than the Dominator.

[Frosticus]

2 hours ago, VV said:

I also came across the feeling that my Controller was stronger at mid levels than my Dominators. Actually, with all of them tricked out at 50, I still feel that the Controller is stronger overall. That is probably just due to my playstyle since I am more familiar with the Controller AT than the Dominator.

controllers are probably the strongest AT in the game. They get overshadowed in the rolling nuke format, but they are absolute powerhouses when it comes to tackling difficult content.

Doms are maybe the most dynamic AT in that they excel at control and do a mix of both melee and ranged damage, but when controls fail they have little to fall back on.

 

I surely would enjoy an illusion dom. 

[oedipus_tex]

I think it depends on the type of Controller. Dominators are scary-strong if built with min maxing in mind.

 

They also, almost unbelievably, have access to the power Sleet in their APP pool. The recharge for it is increased by 30 seconds and the duration of the summon is just 15 seconds (vs 30 on Controllers). But the debuff duration is still 30 seconds, so stuff stays debuffed even after the pet expires.

 

Also unbelievably, Sleet comes at the same level for Dominators as for /Cold Controllers.

 

The fact that you can access Sleet on any Dominator build is really impressive IMO.

 

[MTeague]

3 hours ago, Frosticus said:

controllers are probably the strongest AT in the game. They get overshadowed in the rolling nuke format, but they are absolute powerhouses when it comes to tackling difficult content.

Doms are maybe the most dynamic AT in that they excel at control and do a mix of both melee and ranged damage, but when controls fail they have little to fall back on.

 

I surely would enjoy an illusion dom. 

That may depend on the powersets in question.  I love my Mind/Kintroller.  He can march onto almost any map with 0 charges of bubblegum, and just kick ass.  Malta?  Sure.  Carnies? Bring it.  Nemesis?  Let's rock. Knives of Artemis?  Okey-Dokey.  Admittedly, it may be a slower slog if he's exemplared under lvl 33... Fulcrum Shift makes a gigantic difference.  But he's about half-way through the grand tour of Flashbacking it all, and no speedbumps of any kind. 

 

But if he's faced with a full Archvillian, it's not in the cards. EB's he can mop up. An AV... no. Transfusion isn't a big enough -Regen debuff.  If he has to fight an AV, he's teaming, or he's making a trip out to Bloody Bay for a Shivan Shard.  Probably not something a /Rad or /Dark or /Traps would need to do.

[Tater Todd]

Not all Dom combo are created equal and some Dom combos can down right spoil you and almost ruin the entire AT for you.  Plant/Fire and Elec/Earth is another.  Doms can be absolute monsters late mid ti late game with the proper slotting and procs but it does take a decent amount of skill to play one effectively.

 

 

[Hogunn]

So you are saying Elec/Earth is a strong build?

[Coyote]

4 hours ago, Hogunn said:

So you are saying Elec/Earth is a strong build?

 

I would say that it is. Electric can solo or team and provide a lot of defense early... I was at +1/x3 in the teens without problems... in the land of Praetoria, where the shadows lie.

Earth matches nicely with Electric's PBAoE aura since it does most of its damage at short range, so you fight inside the Static Field while draining mobs with Conductive Aura, and doing pretty good damage.

Elec/Martial would be pretty much the same idea, BTW... though Earth has a big advantage due to Power Up. Power Up allows you to build for a Defense build and shoot up the Defense stats for 10 seconds and the End Drain stats for 10 seconds, basically boosting your defense at the beginning of the fight, which is exactly when Elec is a bit weaker since hte mobs aren't yet drained. By the time Power Up ends and your Defense drops to normal, the mobs are generally drained. This works best if you take a S/L defense in your epic power pool, and Weave plus some other defense powers so that it has more base Defense to improve. But as a Dominator, you're trying to fit in 5 Defense powers anyhow if you can, so you can get 5 LotG, right?

[Chirikiti]

My experience is the opposite. Doms are strong right out of the gate.

 

Doms start out nicely and continue to be so, and get better and better, all the way to 50. And I'm talking SO era when there were no sets or IOs. Seriously you can solo the content on +3 no problem and do stuff that other ATs may find difficult. In this era their effectiveness is more pronounced especially when you can trick stuff out early (procs ATOs, cheap sets if you wish)

 

"I have a couple Doms and I get where you are coming from. My Mind/Psi was hard to level and still feels a kind of wobbly" - Why this should be I don't know, it's awesome at level 2 let alone leveling up. 

 

From a few conversations with people I think it's how people play them. I had one person describe their leveling experience and game-play in missions and was frankly shocked at how they were approaching things, the powers they used and how they used them. It was sort of embarrassing because it seems after 15+ levels they hadn't learned anything about the AT or powers or put any thought on how to better use their stuff.

 

While all power-set-combos may not be equal at a given level or block of levels, I just don't see how they can feel under-powered or difficult to run through the content.

Edited December 24, 2019 by Chirikiti

[Machariel]

Dominators are, in general, late bloomers.  You have a lot of powers and they all need to be pretty heavily slotted to be effective so leveling up in the early game can be challenging. as you'll have to frequently reapply your control powers in order to keep yourself safe while you DPS things down.  Additionally many of Dominators best attacks and abilities are late in their secondary pools or in their (very excellent) ancillary/patron power options.

 

Dominators shine with IOs and permadom, which generally lets them apply one or two big control powers to the entire mob and then go to town with their excellent single target damage.  Many doms wind up with excellent AoE as well.

[tjknight]

The key to creating a good leveling Dom is pairing a Primary that gets a solid AoE control early with a good damage dealing secondary. 

 

For example both Electric and Plant get early access to an AoE control (Seeds of Confusion / Static Field). So that's why you'll see those primaries suggested often for leveling. Combine with a good damage set (like Fire or Psi) and you're good to go. 

 

Also, being careful to lock things down first before moving in for attacks is vital. Mezzes are your defense held, stunned, sleeping and confused enemies can't damage you. And avoid opening with AoE immobilizers. Those just draw aggro your way.  

 

So if playing a Mind Dom, my preference is to sleep mobs with Mass Hypnosis. Then pick off enemies one by one.  You can also use Mesmerize & Confuse to keep enemies  out of the fight if Hypnosis isn't up.

 

Edited December 24, 2019 by tjknight

[Coyote]

19 minutes ago, tjknight said:

The key to creating a good leveling Dom is pairing a Primary that gets a solid AoE control early with a good damage dealing secondary. 

 

This is right. My top 3 choices would be Plant, Dark, and Electric, with Mind as another option. Controllers may be able to defend themselves from early on with their secondary, but my Fire Dominators just feel a bit naked.