What Would You Change About Dominators?

[Mezmera]

1 minute ago, modest said:

I would like Dominators to receive the same buff to their health pool that Blasters received: +200 health to their base and to their cap. Dominators and Blasters both play at both ranged and melee ranges. They both can use the additional health.

This x1000, I'm totally for this.  I see no reason why while the game was away that blasters got everything they got and as a topper got an hp boost where they were already advantaged in this and then doms got what? 

[oedipus_tex]

Some of the melee attacks do hit kinda hard, but like we talked about, Dominators more than most classes pay a big penalty when they die. This is actually worse for non permadoms than for permas. I always feel infuriated when I finally go into Domination mode and have it cut short by death.

 

When I play my Blaster I can go wild, and as long as I don't die more than once every minute and a half, count on coming back full strength with Rise of the Phoenix. As a Dominator, it's better to play safe and keep Domination going. Dominator armor consists pretty much entirely of the mezz protection in Domination and, with the exception of the Psi APP, a single standardized APP armor power shared with Controllers, Blasters, Defenders, Corruptors, and Masterminds.

 

Don't get me wrong. Psi Assault is very durable. It's the one set I can say I feel comfortable approaching melee in. The others the risk versus reward tips heavily toward playing in a style closer to a ranged Blaster. 

Edited July 31, 2020 by oedipus_tex

[Frosticus]

2 hours ago, Mezmera said:

Well I'm not in favor of dumbing down this AT to suit someone that won't keep up.  There's br00ts, blasters, VEATs, HEATs, scrappers, MMs and a bunch of other plug and play ATs available.  

 

The creation of IO's allowed for so much creativity and the Dominator archetype is a more thoughtful breed to play, there's just so much you can do with it, I was on board with them revamping the dominator assault sets to make them more attractive to play, which they accomplished.  There's already so many AT's that you can attain parity on, we can't have one that has the potential to get the best out of someone's creativity? 

I haven't seen any suggestions for dumbing it down, but maybe I missed them. I've seen suggestions for straight up buffs and a few to smooth out the bipolar nature of perma dom and 1 sec off perma dom. Why is +123% global magic, but +122% may as well have just stopped trying back at like +80% for all intents and purposes. But, maybe that is what you mean by dumbing down?

 

Who can't keep up? Keep up to what? 

 

I was being nice though. You said you were chaining 3 attacks that are impossible to chain even at the recharge cap unless by chain you meant "use 3 attacks and stop"

 

doms are cool, but let's be clear - the only things out there that should be outdamaging a Dom are Blasters and Stalkers. Instead they fall right in around rank 8 in single target damage and probably rank 9 in aoe out of 11 AT's (excluding epic AT's). 

 

You can like doms (I do and I think we all do in this thread) and still see the big picture.

[Mezmera]

46 minutes ago, Frosticus said:

I haven't seen any suggestions for dumbing it down, but maybe I missed them. I've seen suggestions for straight up buffs and a few to smooth out the bipolar nature of perma dom and 1 sec off perma dom. Why is +123% global magic, but +122% may as well have just stopped trying back at like +80% for all intents and purposes. But, maybe that is what you mean by dumbing down?

 

Who can't keep up? Keep up to what? 

 

I was being nice though. You said you were chaining 3 attacks that are impossible to chain even at the recharge cap unless by chain you meant "use 3 attacks and stop"

 

doms are cool, but let's be clear - the only things out there that should be outdamaging a Dom are Blasters and Stalkers. Instead they fall right in around rank 8 in single target damage and probably rank 9 in aoe out of 11 AT's (excluding epic AT's). 

 

You can like doms (I do and I think we all do in this thread) and still see the big picture.

Sure doms could take a tweak here and there if you'd like to desire that like this topic started because of, but nothing major like changing Domination though.  If you're one second off on recharge bonuses where does that fault lie?  I mean the same logic can apply to defense caps relevant to all ATs, if you are 1% less than the cap you're how much easier to hit?

 

I was just making a point that being efficient and eliminating redundancy in attack chains when I need do nothing but spam ST damage I can do that with my best chain and do it arguably better than a Fire blaster.   Stalkers outright ST dps better than my dom as they should other than that it really matters what powers you are.  Sure on a /psi dom you're just not going to be out dpsing a lot in ST but that powerset is more attuned for other things, just the same an /nrg dom can give about anything a run for their money in dps.  

 

Don't see anywhere in my conversation that I was accusing you of not being nice.  I was just pointing out the obvious that those complaining about Domination not being an easy mechanic are asking for it to be made easier in essence dumbing it down. 

 

You can make general statements about damage rankings and think they're correct but it doesn't mean it is so.  I'm on Excelsior come play with me some time if you like.  

[kiramon]

On 7/30/2020 at 11:10 PM, Mezmera said:

Sure doms could take a tweak here and there if you'd like to desire that like this topic started because of, but nothing major like changing Domination though.  If you're one second off on recharge bonuses where does that fault lie?  I mean the same logic can apply to defense caps relevant to all ATs, if you are 1% less than the cap you're how much easier to hit?

.  

This is actually straight up wrong and not at all the same. With 44% defense you’ll be hit 6% as opposed to 5% of the time - which means in 100 attacks you’ll get hit 6 times instead of 5 times— that’s a 20% increase in number of hits, but you’re still only being hit SIX times.

 

if you hit perma dom, you never have to build a bar again. If you’re beneath it, you have to rebuild the entire bar. Not nearly the same thing. Maybe if we had 100% ability to cap defense but even then Nope not nearly the same.

 

it is by far the most polarizing number to hit in game - except maybe having 3 protect vs 4 mez  protect. Which for most holds/etc is useless at 3 and invaluable at 4. 

Edited August 8, 2020 by kiramon

[oedipus_tex]

I'm enjoying this conversation. It's nice to hear from a wide variety of commenters. It's crazy that old game still generates such passionate feelings from players.

 

Here's where I am sitting right now. I am on the character creation screen looking at the various Assault set choices. On paper they look interesting. I want to want to try them. But with Martial, Thorny, Electric, Radioactive, Icy, I just can't make myself do it, because that type of play is not very effective. I have my good builds--variations of Psi Assault, Fire Assault, Dominators who lean heavily on Plant Control--but on the whole have to admit a lot of the combos feel fragile and fairly pointless. I find myself running out of endurance a lot, melee is dangerous, there's no hit point restoration, there's a mismatch between cone powers and PbAoEs, getting two-shot by Victorias, all of that.

 

The Dominators I love, I tend to love. I mained an Ice/Fire Dom on live (i wouldn't now because procs were nerfed in Arctic Air). I main an Elec/Psi Dom on here. But that's mainly the combo and not the archetype, either one powerset standing above the rest or the combo being very strong. And those combos always leaned very heavily on being permadoms who get much of their damage from the APPs, because the "Assault" set requires putting myself in danger unless I play as a kind of muted ranged Blaster. 

Edited July 31, 2020 by oedipus_tex

[Mezmera]

1 hour ago, kiramon said:

This is actually straight up wrong and not at all the same. With 44% defense you’ll be hit 6% as opposed to 5% of the time - which means in 1000 attacks you’ll get hit 6 times instead of 5 times— that’s a 20% increase in number of hits, but you’re still only being hit SIX times.

 

if you hit perma dom, you never have to build a bar again. If you’re beneath it, you have to rebuild the entire bar. Not nearly the same thing. Maybe if we had 100% ability to cap defense but even then Nope not nearly the same.

 

it is by far the most polarizing number to hit in game - except maybe having 3 protect vs 4 mez  protect. Which for most holds/etc is useless at 3 and invaluable at 4. 

Nothing straight up wrong about anything I've said, there's always that 5% chance enemies have to hit so you're telling me 1% less defense equates to 1% less of a roll for a chance to hit when the percentages range from 0-44% for the regular cap and 56% for incarnates?  Chance of an enemies hit landing can range from 0-100% while defense cap percentages range from 0-44%.  It doesn't work 1 to 1 between the two.  

 

https://archive.paragonwiki.com/wiki/Defense_Effectiveness

Edited July 31, 2020 by Mezmera

[Frosticus]

perma dom means dom every  90 sec with no drop. 

 

1% off perma dom means 90 sec+ time taken to refill (approx 30 sec of active playing?).

 

so 1% diff on rech means 30+ sec difference in the uptime of domination. No objective person would say that is designed well. 

 

They used a similarly arbitrary mechanic for fast snipe for awhile. You guys remember the tohit buff threshold that enabled fast snipe? Thankfully that was abandoned pretty quickly  

[kiramon]

5 hours ago, Mezmera said:

Nothing straight up wrong about anything I've said, there's always that 5% chance enemies have to hit so you're telling me 1% less defense equates to 1% less of a roll for a chance to hit when the percentages range from 0-44% for the regular cap and 56% for incarnates?  Chance of an enemies hit landing can range from 0-100% while defense cap percentages range from 0-44%.  It doesn't work 1 to 1 between the two.  

 

https://archive.paragonwiki.com/wiki/Defense_Effectiveness

What are you even saying here? 
 

you’re literally comparing something that it absolute vs something variable. Even the article you linked is arguing against you.

Edited July 31, 2020 by kiramon

[Hjarki]

15 hours ago, Mezmera said:

M'kay.  Based on purely visible values stated with slotting.  Not including real time application which I'd like to demonstrate some time.   

 

Energy Assault

Total Focus     438.69 dmg      2.53s animation

Power Burst    559.16 dmg      1.67s animation

Snipe              470.45 dmg      1.33s animation    (assuming auto snipe)

 

Fire Blast

Snipe              557.11 dmg      1.33s animation    (assuming auto snipe)

Blaze              336.52 dmg       1.0s animation

T2 Fire Blast   170.51 dmg       1.67s animation   (next best filler attack) or w/e secondary attack you'd like to pose, nothing will beat those top two though

 

Thanks to the longer recharge values associated to dominator assault attacks their chance to proc extra damage from any that you may have slotted in the attacks are a significantly higher chance to fire than what would conversely be slotted into blaster attacks.  You'd also like to use Snipe as a bridge in Fire blast, okay my best recharging attack is also my strongest one in Power Burst that I'll use as a bridge.  

The value you've listed for Power Burst is only in Energy Focus mode. The likelihood of this is hard to calculate since we don't know what the chance is for the various attacks, but you need to either set it up with low damage attacks or tie it to the longer recharge on Total Focus.

 

Also, the longer recharges aren't actually a plus. In the abstract sense, a power with a 5s recharge and a power with a 10s recharge with the same proc will create the same dps from that proc because the former will fire the proc twice as often with half the chance. However, when you have powers with a base recharge longer than ~16 sec, you've already capped 3.5 ppm procs (~12 sec for 4.5 ppm). So you need to lower the recharge to get them back below cap or you're wasting some of the potential of the proc. But doing so also diminishes the value of your global recharge.

 

Let's say we ignore activation time and we've got a 32 sec recharge power. We want to slot 100% internal recharge so we drop the recharge of the power down to 16 sec. Our power is approximately at cap now. If we add another 100% global recharge, this would mean that our power has near-cap proc rate with an effective recharge of ~10.5. If we had simply started with a 16 sec power and had 100% global recharge, we'd have a near-cap proc rate with an effective recharge of ~8 sec.

[Coyote]

Hm. A lot of viewpoints here.

 

I've seen my Doms as generally quite powerful and with good damage, leaving Nukes aside. Their DPA on attacks is good if you involve melee. Some don't have a big mismatch between cone and PBAoE attacks, whether because they have only PBAoEs or short-range AoEs (Energy, Martial & Earth), a short wide cone that makes travel relatively short (Thorns), fast change of distance (Savage), etc. Not all escape the problems, but I don't know if I would call it an AT-wide issue. They do seem strong when leveling before perma-Dom, and very strong after.

 

The only problems I have are, first, the low HPs for an AT with melee range attacks and mez protection... why mez protection? If the AT needs protection, then with no armor and very few options for healing, isn't pure damage as much of an issue as being mezzed? So if there is enough reason to give them mez protection, I think they could use some resistance to damage. And the easiest place to put that is via a HP boost. And, second, the difference in effectiveness between perma-Doms and non-permas... it seems too large to me. Either the base controls effects should be increased and the boost from Domination changed to a +1 Mag or +50% Duration or something useful but not as powerful as it is now, leaving Domination as more of a mez protection effect... or the "build up Domination bar by attacking" should be removed so that a gap is only a gap rather than a reset.

[Mezmera]

1 hour ago, Hjarki said:

The value you've listed for Power Burst is only in Energy Focus mode. The likelihood of this is hard to calculate since we don't know what the chance is for the various attacks, but you need to either set it up with low damage attacks or tie it to the longer recharge on Total Focus.

 

Also, the longer recharges aren't actually a plus. In the abstract sense, a power with a 5s recharge and a power with a 10s recharge with the same proc will create the same dps from that proc because the former will fire the proc twice as often with half the chance. However, when you have powers with a base recharge longer than ~16 sec, you've already capped 3.5 ppm procs (~12 sec for 4.5 ppm). So you need to lower the recharge to get them back below cap or you're wasting some of the potential of the proc. But doing so also diminishes the value of your global recharge.

 

Let's say we ignore activation time and we've got a 32 sec recharge power. We want to slot 100% internal recharge so we drop the recharge of the power down to 16 sec. Our power is approximately at cap now. If we add another 100% global recharge, this would mean that our power has near-cap proc rate with an effective recharge of ~10.5. If we had simply started with a 16 sec power and had 100% global recharge, we'd have a near-cap proc rate with an effective recharge of ~8 sec.

Power Burst does include Energy Focus mode which I have on the ready to fire so much more than not.  But for the Fire blasts I left in the 80% chance for extra fire dot.  So tit for tat I'd say.  And yes I do set it up exclusively with that beastly TF which I've also slotted a moderate and minor damage proc that fires highly but doesn't show in these base stats I listed, dominator TF is light years better than the blaster version.  

 

Yes in a long drawn out fight the proc chances of firing will balance out to where it's about even between a faster recharging attack that has more chances to fire and that of an attack that charges a little slower and has a better chance to proc.  BUT in a much shorter time like say skipping from mob to mob and AVs that get caught with their pants down the advantage is fully with the higher chance to proc extra damage.  

 

I should have prefaced when I originally said I have better ST damage than even the strongest blaster that I could argue that I do have the better damage potential.  I think I've shown that I have that argument.  

Edited July 31, 2020 by Mezmera

[Mezmera]

6 hours ago, kiramon said:

What are you even saying here? 
 

you’re literally comparing something that it absolute vs something variable. Even the article you linked is arguing against you.

You said that I was factually wrong that a 1% decrease to bring you below the defense cap had it's compounding consequences the same as having 1% less recharge slotted for permadom, which is easier to account for honestly because it is a more absolute value.  

 

You're the one who said defense and an enemy's chance to hit you are on a 1 to 1 scale.  Which you are horrendously wrong about.  

 

If you're saying that because this link says that having +40% defense but not enough to the full cap is still a good thing, well then yes it is.  But the odds of being hit by an attack are quite big between having 40% and 44% defense.  And yes there's tons of variables in defense and the type and level of your enemy which was exactly my point.  There's a finite number when you do reach that defense cap, but at 1% less defense than the cap it's definitely not what you were thinking it were to be.   

 

My point was to show that with numbers and stats there's these achievable goals set in place and that's a good thing to have to work to and not reaching those set values has their consequences no matter the power we are talking about be it defense, domination and any other benefit people try to achieve when building their character.  

Edited July 31, 2020 by Mezmera

[kiramon]

Quote

You said that I was factually wrong that a 1% decrease to bring you below the defense cap had it's compounding consequences the same as having 1% less recharge slotted for permadom, which is easier to account for honestly because it is a more absolute value.  

What? You are wrong. You are still wrong. You either have perma dom or you don't. You either are or are not. That's not how defense works. Polarizing. Yes/No, not a matter of degree.

 

Quote

You're the one who said defense and an enemy's chance to hit you are on a 1 to 1 scale.  Which you are horrendously wrong about.  

What? Where? Math? I showed you how 1% is 20% more attacks that you'd take than if you had 45% from 44%. What?

 

Quote

If you're saying that because this link says that having +40% defense but not enough to the full cap is still a good thing, well then yes it is.  But the odds of being hit by an attack are quite big between having 40% and 44% defense.  And yes there's tons of variables in defense and the type and level of your enemy which was exactly my point.  There's a finite number when you do reach that defense cap, but at 1% less defense than the cap it's definitely not what you were thinking it were to be.   

My reference with your link is that it clearly states that it may not be worth chasing the last 1-4% for soft cap vs what you have to give up. That is never the case with Perma Dom, because it is polarizing. You do know that if you have Perma dom, you can use it with the same bar you built up. When you don't have Perma Dom, you have to build the bar up. Yes/No; polarizing. Whether you're at 44% or 45% defense, you still have Defense. Whereas if you don't have perma-dom, you DON'T have perma dom. 

 

See the difference?

 

Edited July 31, 2020 by kiramon

[Mezmera]

5 minutes ago, kiramon said:

You are wrong, you're still wrong. Perma dom doesn't cascade or "compound." You are or you aren't. You have, or you don't. Polarizing. 44% defense or 45% defense you still have 44% defense. 

 

You're the one who said defense and an enemy's chance to hit you are on a 1 to 1 scale.  Which you are horrendously wrong about.  

 

If you're saying that because this link says that having +40% defense but not enough to the full cap is still a good thing, well then yes it is.  But the odds of being hit by an attack are quite big between having 40% and 44% defense.  And yes there's tons of variables in defense and the type and level of your enemy which was exactly my point.  There's a finite number when you do reach that defense cap, but at 1% less defense than the cap it's definitely not what you were thinking it were to be.   

 

My point was to show that with numbers and stats there's these achievable goals set in place and that's a good thing to have to work to and not reaching those set values has their consequences no matter the power we are talking about be it defense, domination and any other benefit people try to achieve when building their character

I think you are confused.  😛

 

I know Perma doesn't cascade or compound, the fact that it's an easily stated and attainable value makes it so much easier to build your character to than one where you're building in defenses.  Having 1% less recharge than the goal or 1% less defense than the goal both have their "consequences", much more so in the case for defense, like I've been saying.  

Edited July 31, 2020 by Mezmera

[kiramon]

2 minutes ago, Mezmera said:

I think you are confused.  😛

 

I know Perma doesn't cascade or compound, the fact that it's an easily attainable value makes it so much easier to build your character to than one where you're building in defenses.  Having 1% less recharge than the goal or 1% less defense than the goal both have their "consequences", much more so in the case for defense, like I've been saying.  

No, you're backwards. 1% off of perma dom is much worse than 1% off of Defense. It's kinda like being 1s off of Perma Hasten, except with Hasten you can see the bubble go BOOP back to 15 seconds. 

Edited July 31, 2020 by kiramon

[Mezmera]

1 minute ago, kiramon said:

No, you're backwards. 1% off of perma dom is much worse than 1% off of Defense. It's kinda like being 1s off of Perma Hasten, except with Hasten you can see the bubble go BOOP back to 15 seconds. 

Slot a LotG, you're fixed. 😀

[kiramon]

1 minute ago, Mezmera said:

Slot a LotG, you're fixed. 😀

And if you don't slot it, you're not at perma dom. Enjoy being on a totally different level of Dom than someone that slotted it.

Thanks,

[Mezmera]

1 minute ago, kiramon said:

And if you don't slot it, you're not at perma dom. Enjoy being on a totally different level of Dom than someone that slotted it.

Thanks,

But why wouldn't you slot it?  I mean are goals to have not a thing anymore?  

[kiramon]

Just now, Mezmera said:

But why wouldn't you slot it?  I mean are goals to have not a thing anymore?  

 

It's not the goal - it's the polarizing nature of it. 

 

The fact that at 122% recharge you are ... well, you do the math:

123% means 0 break in dom

122% means a break in dom + X seconds to build it back up

 

Maybe @Bopper can figure that out in terms of actuality with a 0 denominator for how much worse off it is math wise.

[Mezmera]

1 minute ago, kiramon said:

 

It's not the goal - it's the polarizing nature of it. 

 

The fact that at 122% recharge you are ... well, you do the math:

123% means 0 break in dom

122% means a break in dom + X seconds to build it back up

 

Maybe @Bopper can figure that out in terms of actuality with a 0 denominator for how much worse off it is math wise.

Take Hasten slot it with 2 50+5 IO's. Or 3 level 25 recharge IOs/SOs.

 

Build in bonus +recharge of +70%.  There's SOOOOOOO many sets and IO's that can get you to 70% +recharge.  Theoretically a dominator can have perma by level 22.  Easy to do by level 30.  

 

There's nothing polarizing about it. 

[Chrome]

i believe building a character for max recharge or any other goal is fun to me.  all my doms now have a goal of perma dom without hasten, i still of course slot hasten because i love it, but if this was a time before attuned enhancements were a thing than maybe you would have a point but getting such a low amount of recharge(123%) including hasten is easily achievable.  even at levels as low as 27.  most ATs are weak before hand.  changing domination in a meaningful way would drastically change the way this AT is played and id be against it, unless you want to make it MORE powerful.  if your argument is that Dominators "need" IOs to be competitive then i would argue from my perspective ALL ATs need IOs to be competitive.  personally i would be happier if all ATs had a fun mechanic like domination instead of boring passive boosts, especially if they could be buffed or enhanced via global recharge.

[kiramon]

26 minutes ago, Mezmera said:

Take Hasten slot it with 2 50+5 IO's. Or 3 level 25 recharge IOs/SOs.

 

Build in bonus +recharge of +70%.  There's SOOOOOOO many sets and IO's that can get you to 70% +recharge.  Theoretically a dominator can have perma by level 22.  Easy to do by level 30.  

 

There's nothing polarizing about it. 

 

I give up. You don't understand. 

 

It's not a matter of what's possible -- it's a matter of the difference between

 

0 Cooldown 

0.1 + (Time to Build Bar).

 

Do you know the percentage increase .1+(30s) is over 0? 
Hint: The formula would be (30.1-0/0)*100; guess what number you can't divide by, and for good reason?

[Bopper]

47 minutes ago, kiramon said:

 

It's not the goal - it's the polarizing nature of it. 

 

The fact that at 122% recharge you are ... well, you do the math:

123% means 0 break in dom

122% means a break in dom + X seconds to build it back up

 

Maybe @Bopper can figure that out in terms of actuality with a 0 denominator for how much worse off it is math wise.

Base: 200s

Dur: 90s

CastTime: 1.17s (1.32s arcana).

 

If you don't care about the cast time, the amount of recharge required to reach exactly "perma-dom" would be: 200/90 = 222.22% (+122.22% added recharge).

 

If you care about the cast time, the amount of recharge required becomes:

200/(90 - 1.32) = 225.53% (+125.53%).

 

My guess is, while casting the power you are not able to use a power to benefit from "Dom". If so, you would only care about the first number I gave. Otherwise, you would care about the 2nd.

 

The amount of downtime you would have for having +122% recharge is (assuming you don't care about cast time):

200/2.22 = 90.0900900900s. So your gap is 0.09s, basically.

Edited July 31, 2020 by Bopper

[kiramon]

6 minutes ago, Bopper said:

Base: 200s

Dur: 90s

CastTime: 1.17s (1.32s arcana).

 

If you don't care about the cast time, the amount of recharge required to reach exactly "perma-dom" would be: 200/90 = 222.22% (+122.22% added recharge).

 

If you care about the cast time, the amount of recharge required becomes:

200/(90 - 1.32) = 225.53% (+125.53%).

 

My guess is, while casting the power you are not able to use a power to benefit from "Dom". If so, you would only care about the first number I gave. Otherwise, you would care about the 2nd.

 

The amount of downtime you would have for having +122% recharge is (assuming you don't care about cast time):

200/2.22 = 90.0900900900s. So your gap is 0.09s, basically.

Yup - +~30s to build the bar. What's the % change/difference over 0? 🙂