Dark/Dark. What AT?

[Snarky]

I am seriously alting madly trying to find the right fit.  Blaster was....too Blappery.  Brute was....okay, Brute is a monster.  I have the build full I/o'd and it still surprises me.  The thing is a farmer / tank / AoE monster.  But I wanted range.  Real spellcaster wizard stuff.  Started to level a Sentinel.  It is danged hard to build one of those to any particular direction.  Dark does not go to Def naturally, the armor is not heavy enough to mean much, looks nice, just not quite heavy enough and no health to sit on.  But there were some really good analyses on Sentinels.  About Darks minus to hit debuffs.  looked at MIDs.  Corruptor.  I haven't tried a corruptor in forever.   never ran them.  Blackstar has wtf -66.66% to hit.  ?  really.... hmmmm.  Looked at the powersets closely.  Okay.  That is a fine wizard indeed.  So, what else might my Brute-centric lifestyle be missing?

 

Seems like it is time o ask.  Okay what ATs really shine with Dark/Dark slapped on them?  Thanks.

Edited March 6, 2020 by Snarky

[Yomo Kimyata]

Defender or controller are both overpowered monsters.

[Gorgar]

I have tried dark/dark:

• scrapper
• brute
• tank
• blaster
• controller
• dominator
• sentinel
• stalker, kind of

Of the lot, I'd say the stars are tank, controller, dominator. 

 

I like the tank because dark/dark is pretty controllery.  Rather than trying to wring aoe damage out of it, I'd rather just lean on the controls, debuffing, and healing to make an unkillable tank.  Gloom and Darkest Night are *sort of* wizardy, I guess.  I do feel like this tank is magical more than physical, for sure, but it's pretty tough for a wizard.

 

I love /dark corruptors, but I don't think dark blast is all that great.  Looks cool, sounds cool, is just more -tohit on top of what dark miasma already excels at.  Plus a little heal, when you already have Twilight Grasp.  It's not *bad*, just not my choice.  On a corruptor I like ice/ and fire/, and on a defender I am positively in love with dark/sonic.  But dark miasma is so damn good that if you give it what I consider kind of a weak blast set, on either AT, you'll still have a great character.  I did have a dark/storm corruptor on live, but rerolled him at some point into a dark/dark controller.  <-- foreshadowing

 

I've got a rad/rad sentinel and a dark/dark sentinel, and the dark/dark looks amazing but just feels weak compared to the rad/rad.  Keeping the character but there's no question which is better, sadly.

 

The dominator is a lot of fun but the controller is more powerful, I think.  Dark Affinity has a couple great powers Dark Miasma doesn't have, and the powers it loses just show up in Dark Control anyway, so it's still the amazing debuff/control/healing set it was before, paired with a control set that gets extra pets.  Also the confuse looks cool and haunts are pretty wraithlike.  But either one would make a strong dark wizard.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[eknudson]

Dark/Dark blaster is oddly, IMO, not all that good a pairing. You get the dark blast powers that mostly want you at range for the AoE cones, and the dark armor powers that are mostly melee range.  

 

Dark/Dark defender doesn't do quite as much damage but it's an excellent pairing and brings a phenomenal amount of support to a team. Haven't tried the controller D/D but I hear good things.

[Coyote]

Controller D/D is not high damage but it's okay, and defensively it's amazingly strong.

 

Dominator D/D trades off a lot of the defense, but much of it was superfluous, for damage. It's a fair trade-off... you don't get as much offense as you gave up in defense, but offense is usually more useful. Also, getting a Power Up from the assault secondary really turns a Fearsome Stare/Living Shadows opening attack into a big -ToHit debuff in addition to the damage.

 

Sentinel should be a pretty strong pairing, Dark Blast works pretty well for them. I have a Dark/Nin build that's really strong, and while I haven't looked at /Dark for them, it should be fine... but if it has Oppressive Gloom, it's probably better paired with a primary that has a Stun power.

 

I remember running a D/D Defender, like the Controller the defense was very high (Dark Miasma/Affinity are very strong defensive powersets). Damage was on the low side for a Defender, but she soloed AVs before the damage bonus from Vigilance. Add that in plus using procs for extra damage, and it should be fine.

 

I really don't see a bad pairing for D/D. Heck, even Necro/Dark works ;). Dark Miasma/Affinity are very strong sets.

[Redlynne]

D³ Defender ... Dark/Dark/Dark

Although, to be honest with you, I'm thinking that a D²S Defender would be a superior combo ... Dark/Dark/Soul Defender ... because that gets you Power Boost(!) and Soul Storm(!) and Soul Drain(!).  Add Leadership toggles and make a difference to EVERY team you join (even if they don't know it).

 

Alternatively, you can go D²S Corruptor, but you'd want to make sure that the buff/debuff to damage tradeoff you'd be making by choosing Corruptor over Defender matches what you're trying to accomplish.

2 hours ago, Snarky said:

Real spellcaster wizard stuff.

Okay what ATs really shine with Dark/Dark slapped on them?

If you're wanting a spellcaster wizard vibe ... go either D²S Defender or D²S Corruptor ... and load up on Leadership toggles either way.  Of the two, I'd personally be more inclined towards the Defender with Leadership toggles due to the greater buff/debuff (Defender gets more +Damage buffing out of Build Up procs!) and leveraging Power Boost even more dramatically.  Put the Gaussian's Build Up proc into Tactics and 6-slot the Decimation set (with Build Up proc) into either Dark Blast or Gloom and start rockin' the Build Up procs that multiply the damage output of your AoEs in a repeating rotation.  See either my Ninja/Time/Mace Mastermind build or my Peacebringer or Warshade build posts to get a sense of how that might wind up being way more unfair to your $Targets than it might at first appear when doubling up on Build Up procs in fast recharging power(s) combined with Tactics that flow into attack chains loaded with quick animating AoE attacks (hint hint).

[Jimmy]

I adore my Dark/Dark Controller. It's just amazing, especially if you add Sorcery and Soul Mastery into the mix.

[Neiska]

I can +1 for dark/dark tank. A friend of mine runs dark/dark tank, and i don't think I've seen her die, ever. I can't comment on the other ATs, but the tank version is quite good. 

[Vea]

Dark/Dark Controller. Why? Darkness Affinity. It's unique to controllers and can't get it any other way. It's what I think Dark Miasma should have been.

 

I went for a Dark/Dark/Primal Forces for a power boosted fade. (Energy torrent is also nice with KB to KD and +rech procs) Power boost also increases every other -tohit power!

[Chris24601]

1 hour ago, Jimmy said:

I adore my Dark/Dark Controller. It's just amazing, especially if you add Sorcery and Soul Mastery into the mix.

I started one, but there’s this really off-putting reverb and volume mismatch on the associated sound-effect for the single-target hold that is completely out of sync with the rest of the set and I just had to drop and re-roll as something else.

 

The best way I can describe is, if you were listening to rest of the set from a speaker 10 feet away, the ST hold sounds like you moved to 5 feet from the speaker and turned the base up.

 

It’d be one thing of the whole set was like that; Grav is probably my favorite set and it is a noisy set... but it’s a consistent level of noisy.

 

Since this is a personal tick I don’t need it changed if everyone else likes it. What I could use help with though are finding the file names for sounds effects of the darkness control single target hold and immobilize so I can do a sound file swap in data folder (I want both the immobilize and hold to use the immobilize sound effect).

 

THAT would entirely take care of my problem (and I can roll up a toon for it because the play was nice other than that one sound). Thank you to whoever could help with that in advance. 😊

Edited March 6, 2020 by Chris24601