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Let your experiences guide this choice...


Sir Myshkin

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I'm currently torn on starting the next project, and I'd like to try and give Dominators another chance. I've never been a hardy fan of them and getting my Grav/Fire to 50 was a struggle (found it personally tedious and unenjoyable) and only saved by Fold Space, I also haven't logged it since unlocking Alpha. There's a concept in my head that I'd like to warp around a powerset/AT, it's malleable so knowledge of the concept does not impact the choice of the sets. What I'm looking for, what I'm asking for, is experiences; moments of game play, memories that stick out the most while strolling around the wide city of Paragon to help me waiver towards one direction or another.

 

I don't want builds, I don't want (direct) power suggestions/advice (beyond how it influenced the experience), just y'alls moments in time playing your Dominators.

 

Right now I'm actively considering exploring:

Primary

  • Illusion
  • Fire
  • Plant

Secondary

  • Dark Assault
  • Martial Assault
  • Savage Assault
  • Psionic Assault

Epic will be Psionic Mastery with most certainty, but this is not in relation to the concept, I'm chasing this down for Link Minds and Mind Over Body.

 

So fellow players, what're your experiences that can help sway me towards another Dominator?

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The only Dominator that has kept my attention all the way to 50+ was Ill/Sav. I've found that Dom Ill Control complements a melee mindset well. Mixing it up in melee with your PA is really fun and I like TPing around and tearing stuff up with Sav. And you get a bird.

 

I chose Ice Mastery for the AoE debuff (only way to buff PA dmg), Hoarfrost to replace the meh heal in Sav, and Hibernate for those "oh fudge" moments.

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Mainly on Excelsior. Find me in game @Spaghetti Betty.

AE Arcs:  Big Magic Blowout! 41612 | The Meta-Human Wrestling Association 44683 | MHWA Part 2 48577

Click to look at my pets!

 

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I made a Plant/Martial Dominator for thematic giggles and ended up enjoying it a lot more than I originally thought it would be. Plant/ overall is a very strong set in itself for it's Seeds of Confusion and the Carrion Creepers. You can easily wrack up a lot of damage and diffuse a lot of tension from your team with these abilities. Plus the creepers just look really cool.

 

/Martial is incredibly gimmicky in terms of utility compared to other sets. I personally wouldn't recommend using it unless you were okay with a secondary that is inferior for the tradeoff of being something different and refreshing. Admittedly, I found it more difficult to build a Dominator using /Martial since the abilities don't have many secondary effects besides damage to qualify for other set bonus stuff. On any note, Trick Shot is a disgusting tool that just shreds enemies with a chaining mechanic. Masterful Shot feels really powerful and impactful with an interesting zipping sound animation. Since we're able to skip the secondary tier1 now, I haven't had much of a chance to try out the final Exploding Shuriken much. It was rather underwhelming to use in the past but I'm just happy to continue having a 3-part Shuriken chain for my character's silly theme - a Beyblade Master. Altogether, my shurikens slowly slice enemies apart like I'm some fancy butcher.

 

I also have a Mind/Dark Dominator - this pairing has been my favorite so far that synergies extremely well. /Darkness secondary offers Gather Shadows, which is desirable by all Dominators, a really good mix of abilities that have an additional bonus access to -ToHit sets. You have plenty of options to work with to help reach your +Recharge goals. Smite, Gloom, Moon Beam, Gather Shadows, and Midnight Grasp are the only tools I ever use from Darkness Assault. Thematically, Dark serves as an excellent canvas for themes like Ink, Water, Sand, and Snow. Again, I would like to highlight that Darkness is a very strong choice as a Dominator secondary set due to it's broad selection of abilities and access to set bonuses.

 

As for Psychic Mastery Epic - go for it. I have used this line twice now since having Link Minds and Indomitable Will grants you 2 easy Luck of the Gambler mules. Mind Over Body is just an additional plus.

Edited by Nayeh
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I've been waiting for Illusions to be ported to doms for a while now. And since it did, I rolled an Illusions/Marital and is hands down one of my top ten favourite toons. Illusions' Superior Invisibility gives him stalker level stealth. So he goes around like a true ninja assassin. He's only level 27 atm, and with his handful of powers (2 utility and 3 damaging attacks) he's got no problem getting through any mission -- hardcore rules. He's opened up a new dimension in the otherwise formulaic steam rolling gameplay, which I find a great change of pace. A fairly tough boss resistant to holds and immobilise? deceive his minions to kill him for you. a foe notices your presence and comes racing to you? a flash of light and a kick to the gut to quiet his anxieties. things suddenly go sideways? pop your phantom army and a handful of floor spikes and silently slip out of the confusion then attack from left field. Highly enjoyable.

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I have a Martial that was, I think Psy too?  He was OK, but never really felt like he was "singing" to me.  For some reason I've run a lot of Sav toons lately, so I've got a pretty good feel for it and obviously I wouldn't be playing it if I didn't care for it, so I'd say go that way, of the two.  The Savage Leap combat TP power is indeed a lot of fun, and being a Dom with, presumably, perma-Dom, you get to use it an awful lot.

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I have Plant/Martial, Dark/Dark and Mind/Psi doms and have Illusion and Fire controllers. Plant/ is really good and a lot of fun. With Domination up, Seeds of Confusion will completely neuter an entire spawn. Because SoC is a cone, I would pair it with a secondary that allows you to stay at range. Fire/ can be played at range, but I prefer playing it in melee, stacking Hot Feet on top of Bonfire. Illusion/ is almost entirely ranged but I haven't played the dom version yet. 

 

/Dark is really good. It has 4 ranged attacks including a cone and a self heal, solid melee, and a Power Boost clone. /Martial has 4 ranged attacks and solid melee, but Caltrops doesn't really belong in an assault set and Envenomed Blades is a real dud. /Psi has 5 ranged attacks (but you only need 3-4), more limited melee, and Drain Psyche (+regen/+recovery) instead of a Power Boost clone. I haven't played /Savage, but I would rank /Dark ahead of the other two.

 

 

Uunderdog - Rad/Rad Scrapper | Uundertaker - Rad/Dark Corruptor | Uun - MA/Inv Scrapper | Uunison - Grav/Storm Controller | Uuncola - Ice/Temp Blaster | Uundergrowth - Plant/Martial Dominator | Uunstable - SR/Staff Tank

Uunreal - Fire/Time Corruptor | Uunrest - Dark/TA Blaster | Uunseen - Ill/Poison Controller | Uuncool - Cold/Beam Defender | Uunderground - Earth/Earth Dominator | Uunknown - Mind/Psi Dominator | Uunplugged - Stone/Elec Brute

Uunfair - Archery/TA Corruptor | Uunsung - DP/Ninja Blaster | Uunflammable - Fire/Nature Controller | Uunflappable - WM/WP Brute | Uundead - Dark/Dark Tank | Uunfit - Water/Martial Blaster  | Uunwrapped - Dark/Dark Dominator

Uunchill - Ice/Kinetics Corruptor | Uunpleasant - En/En Stalker | Uunbrella - Rad/Rad Sentinel | Uunsafari - Beasts/Traps MM | Uungnome - Nature/Seismic Defender | Uunsavory - Poson/Sonic Defender | Uunicycle - BS/Shield Scrapper

Uuntouchable - Ill/Time Controller | Uunferno - Fire/Fire Tank | Uunthinkable - Psi/SR Scrapper | Uuncivil - Thugs/Elec MM | Uunnatural - Ice/Savage Dominator | Uunshockable - Elec/Bio Sentinel | Uunfathomable - Elec/Dark Controller

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10 hours ago, Sir Myshkin said:

So fellow players, what're your experiences that can help sway me towards another Dominator?

 

Hi there! I have many dominators but in regards your question about experience i must say that if i have to choose between Illusion, Fire and Plant... ill go with Plant. The reason is because offers the best AoE control with a good dps. Carrion Creepers is an amazing AoE attack that you can proc and Fly Trap is a very nice ranged pet. Seeds of confusion is the best cone AoE confusion in game with fast animation and also good recharge.  Illusion is great from DPS stand point with it lacks of control in my opinion. However (even you didnt put it like a choice) Dark Control is for me the most fun and best primary for a Dominator. The pets, the control tools and the -to hit inherent is just perfect.

 

Regarding Secondaries i really enjoyed /Dark. Got decent damage a good heal and the best:  gather shadows that boost everything. Martial is great for AoE and ST damage. Trick Shot is chain AoE attack that you will love in big groups and also animation for the whole set is really great. I would pick Martial because it offers more variations if you want to go solo or in teams. 

 

I hope you find a good combo that this time makes you enjoy Dominators and gives you an smooth ride to Lvl 50.

 

 

 

 

 

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4 hours ago, serxiom said:

Illusion is great from DPS stand point with it lacks of control in my opinion.

True with respect to the controller version, but the dominator version replaces Group Invisibility with Gleam (25 foot radius AoE stun). 

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Uunderdog - Rad/Rad Scrapper | Uundertaker - Rad/Dark Corruptor | Uun - MA/Inv Scrapper | Uunison - Grav/Storm Controller | Uuncola - Ice/Temp Blaster | Uundergrowth - Plant/Martial Dominator | Uunstable - SR/Staff Tank

Uunreal - Fire/Time Corruptor | Uunrest - Dark/TA Blaster | Uunseen - Ill/Poison Controller | Uuncool - Cold/Beam Defender | Uunderground - Earth/Earth Dominator | Uunknown - Mind/Psi Dominator | Uunplugged - Stone/Elec Brute

Uunfair - Archery/TA Corruptor | Uunsung - DP/Ninja Blaster | Uunflammable - Fire/Nature Controller | Uunflappable - WM/WP Brute | Uundead - Dark/Dark Tank | Uunfit - Water/Martial Blaster  | Uunwrapped - Dark/Dark Dominator

Uunchill - Ice/Kinetics Corruptor | Uunpleasant - En/En Stalker | Uunbrella - Rad/Rad Sentinel | Uunsafari - Beasts/Traps MM | Uungnome - Nature/Seismic Defender | Uunsavory - Poson/Sonic Defender | Uunicycle - BS/Shield Scrapper

Uuntouchable - Ill/Time Controller | Uunferno - Fire/Fire Tank | Uunthinkable - Psi/SR Scrapper | Uuncivil - Thugs/Elec MM | Uunnatural - Ice/Savage Dominator | Uunshockable - Elec/Bio Sentinel | Uunfathomable - Elec/Dark Controller

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i main a mind/fire/ice dom since 2019 and have played it as pretty much my only alt in that time

 

i’m surprised you were frustrated with a grav/fire, fire assault is incredibly damaging, easy to fire off and delivered all at range

 

if you were to make another dom i’d recommend mind/fire, mind/energy or replace mind with plant. mind/fire is near enough the most potent dom combo, on the same level as plant/energy for lockdown ability and incredible ST damage

 

ice mastery is nearly the only sensible choice for dominators, with soul also a great and equally good choice for those who want extra damage. the others aren’t worth choosing

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On 12/16/2022 at 5:56 AM, Sir Myshkin said:

I'm currently torn on starting the next project, and I'd like to try and give Dominators another chance. I've never been a hardy fan of them and getting my Grav/Fire to 50 was a struggle (found it personally tedious and unenjoyable) and only saved by Fold Space, I also haven't logged it since unlocking Alpha. There's a concept in my head that I'd like to warp around a powerset/AT, it's malleable so knowledge of the concept does not impact the choice of the sets. What I'm looking for, what I'm asking for, is experiences; moments of game play, memories that stick out the most while strolling around the wide city of Paragon to help me waiver towards one direction or another.

 


I tried so many Doms on Live. I could never make it work. From memory: a fire/ice, a fire/psi, a plant/thorns, a fire/thorns, gravity/energy, fire/energy... None stuck. I've tried a couple of doms here: plant/fire, fire/energy again, elec/stone, and I like the idea of a gravity/psi but can never get the build right. Side note: I teamed with @Dahkness' Grav/Psi, with both Fold Space and Wormhole, and it was great. Strong combo in the right hands.

Of my two 'mains' on HC, one is a Dom: Plant/Psi/Ice.
I didn't get Doms cos I used to run controllers on live. Once you forget you don't need to buff, once you have domination up you don't need to worry about being overwhelmed or mez'd, you don't really need to care about your teammates tbh... Your job is to dominate those enemies.

 

Everyone has had that +2 Yin where the ambush is coming and someone clicked the computers and like 4 of the team die cos it is a crush. I remember being on the Dom as that happened. Only me and the other Dom survived the wave. Just lots of confusing, creepers, holds, everyone was held/dead/dying, immob'd Clamor out of the way so she couldn't see us. Neither of us was 50, we had some sets, but it was just really fun. As the mobs died, the team revived.
Every TF I do someone will say "Seeds with Domination is so broken". It is. Roll with it. You'll never need a tank again. Who needs taunt when they're fighting each other.

I've tried quite a few masteries on my Planter, both on the game and the test server: scorpion shield, soul, psi (psi was my second favourite, partly for theme) and fire.  @MoonSheep is right: Ice is brilliant. Sleet is a mob killer and a debuffer, you get at least 1 defence buff and maybe a survivability buff. I can see why you might want Psi. It didn't work for me though as robots already resist one of my sets and cold helped that. If its about gameplay then go whatever and enjoy it, but that was my thinking 🙂

@Xiddo on Excel. Alts: Agent Betel - V_archetypeicon_dominator.png.5633ed21aff3ea441cdd024895843d4a.png  Athosin - Archetypeicon_peacebringer.png.9e329a8a509066a020fd4635ccbb4385.png  Nisotha - image.png.c44c4b37be8839626cedeee9a8966397.png  Anapos - V_archetypeicon_corruptor.png.f105930c83b316a39d147c7de8c7e017.png  Atomic Chilli - V_archetypeicon_brute.png.b1e0b25149b74ff24ce1fd3603064e6e.png  Bainbridge - image.png.fc49fb2cec0488ed5cd6d82f5ea9260a.png

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Illusion/Savage no question. It is so fun to teleport into large packs and vicious slash, call hawk, and feral charge all slotted with the FF recharge proc you should have a permanent phantom army. I love my ice/Sav it is the only dominator I have. If you like fold space, you'll love feral charge.

Edited by Darkir
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I really like dark assault - I feel it adds a bit more self-sufficiency that other assault sets lack.  I don't really have any high-level experience with plants, so I can't comment on that.  While I like illusion, I feel like dominators lack some necessary tools to really take advantage of PA like controllers can, (barring maybe sonic assault).  While savage assault does offer some nice +recharge and -end cost, the set just doesn't "gel" for me like the full-fledged savage melee one does.  Fire control definitely has some great tools at its disposal, (especially if you put a kb->kd IO in bonfire), and I think dark assault can complement it nicely.

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I have a couple of Doms

1) Fire/Fire:  Dominatrix Jace -- my first Dom

2) Ice/Ice: Kryzmas Jones-- i think this was my second Dom

3) Symphony/ Sonic -- Flashtrance

4) Illusion/Ice -- Spookville and Spook Central -- i've slowly been soloing these two on off hours

 

These four are my favourite doms

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I have a Plant/Sav/Psi and while it is quite strong... boy it's kind of a chore to play. A lot of clicks*, which I've 'automated' via crossbinds to movement keys but still.  Not bad, just really busy and that automation can que up powers and interupt a deliberate attack chain. Feels lose/lose.

 

I have a Fire/Fire/Fire that's built like a

hoverblaster and is a lot more fun. I don't think it's as effective at control as the above, but the simplicity allows for more fluid play in a high tempo environment. 


*:

  1. Dom
  2. Hasten
  3. Creepers
  4. Indom Will
  5. Link Minds

And that's just the stuff you want up off CD.

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Having read everyone's thoughts up to this point and put some time and consideration into playing around with a couple of builds I have what may be a plan in action. My initial thought started around something using Illusion/Dark Assault since Gather Shadows has that nice little Specials kick and I can already get the recharge down ridiculously low; plus Dark has a series of pretty impressive ST hitters (always has). However, like someone mentioned above, Savage gets you a Hawk! I really like the overall concepts for each of those summons attacks (I aggressively abused them on a MM), but I didn't feel settled with a primary.

 

I had a stroke of madness about everything a couple of nights ago though. Martial is what I had originally started looking at, Illusion/Martial actually, it leads back to an idea that I tried to meld into another character as an Illusion/Pain Controller that was never 100%. In Guild Wars 2 there is the Mesmer Profession that uses Illusions to manipulate combat while it fights. I haven't played that game in several years now, but I remember it blinking in and out of combat and casting clones of itself and being pretty fun.

 

Illusion/Martial sounds about pretty much exactly that. So I rolled one. Lets see where it goes...

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My personal experience is that Martial is very poor on Dominators. Also, with Ill, since for whatever reason the powers that be decided to remove the taunt in PA, you want a ranged domi to pair with it and ranged attacks in MA are very poor. Personally, Plant/Dark or Plant/Savage would have been a much better choice tbh. Just my 2 cents.

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Update: I'm definitely looking to push this thing quickly when I'm up to it. Got it PL'd up to 16 from a short sit-in and then spent some time on various teams (WL, Tips, PI) getting a variety of exposure to different enemy groups and getting to revisit the common theme that I had with the previous Dominator: Eating Floor. A lot. Their HP pool is just so laughable that a stiff wind nearly kills them so surviving any content beyond +1 without any kind of enhancement is just dumbly difficult regardless of team dynamic. I died an average of twice a mission, but ended the night at level 28 which gives me a good portion of the core Dominator powers.

 

Right now I feel like I have too much going on. My planned build followed a pretty typical 4 ST, 2-3 AoE focus with a couple of the tack-on Dom abilities as my "armor", but Blind is flowing much smoother with the attack chain then I expected it to; it doesn't feel misplaced visually or anything so I'm willing to work with it over Trick Shot or Spinning Kick depending on which I feel is more replaceable.

 

And Gleam... Gleam! I have to go back and check (I forgot to do so early) what its in-game data says, it just doesn't feel right that Mids has it input correctly for range/effect area as a Cone with it being listed as TAoE and the radius it has been effecting being so huge. I'm finding a bit more enjoyment out of the power than I anticipated and am likely going to try turning directions and shift this into a proc-bomb main-AoE.

 

23 hours ago, Nightmarer said:

My personal experience is that Martial is very poor on Dominators.

 

I don't think there's anything wrong with the set, but it definitely has a lot going on and that factor forces conflict with any Dom Primary that's going to pair with it. I seeing that I really have to find the best tools in the Martial kit box to pair with Illusion for flow and reliability to make them work well together because so far I went off just basic theory and it doesn't quite work right, too many bumps between the two that need ironed out (remove power, add power kind of things).

 

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3 hours ago, Sir Myshkin said:

And Gleam... Gleam! I have to go back and check (I forgot to do so early) what its in-game data says, it just doesn't feel right that Mids has it input correctly for range/effect area as a Cone with it being listed as TAoE and the radius it has been effecting being so huge. I'm finding a bit more enjoyment out of the power than I anticipated and am likely going to try turning directions and shift this into a proc-bomb main-AoE.

CoD lists it as a TAoE with a 70-foot range and 25-foot radius.

https://cod.uberguy.net/html/power.html?power=dominator_control.illusion_control.gleam&at=dominator

Uunderdog - Rad/Rad Scrapper | Uundertaker - Rad/Dark Corruptor | Uun - MA/Inv Scrapper | Uunison - Grav/Storm Controller | Uuncola - Ice/Temp Blaster | Uundergrowth - Plant/Martial Dominator | Uunstable - SR/Staff Tank

Uunreal - Fire/Time Corruptor | Uunrest - Dark/TA Blaster | Uunseen - Ill/Poison Controller | Uuncool - Cold/Beam Defender | Uunderground - Earth/Earth Dominator | Uunknown - Mind/Psi Dominator | Uunplugged - Stone/Elec Brute

Uunfair - Archery/TA Corruptor | Uunsung - DP/Ninja Blaster | Uunflammable - Fire/Nature Controller | Uunflappable - WM/WP Brute | Uundead - Dark/Dark Tank | Uunfit - Water/Martial Blaster  | Uunwrapped - Dark/Dark Dominator

Uunchill - Ice/Kinetics Corruptor | Uunpleasant - En/En Stalker | Uunbrella - Rad/Rad Sentinel | Uunsafari - Beasts/Traps MM | Uungnome - Nature/Seismic Defender | Uunsavory - Poson/Sonic Defender | Uunicycle - BS/Shield Scrapper

Uuntouchable - Ill/Time Controller | Uunferno - Fire/Fire Tank | Uunthinkable - Psi/SR Scrapper | Uuncivil - Thugs/Elec MM | Uunnatural - Ice/Savage Dominator | Uunshockable - Elec/Bio Sentinel | Uunfathomable - Elec/Dark Controller

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  • 2 weeks later

Following up on my experiences so far: I think I've given up on the idea of leveling up a Dominator myself. If it doesn't get PL'd to the late 40's I just can't stomach their lack of slots/ability to enhance. I worked the Illusion/Martial into 30ish range and had gone off on a couple of missions and found it still felt too tedious and took it back to the farm again until it hit 44. Tonight it got to go through a real test (without enhancements even), and execute the Dr Quarterfield TF (03:14 w/7). I definitely died, a lot, but I expected that (I also wasn't alone!) without having any set bonuses or any slotting in defense, but this forced me to play differently and by far more cautious about my actions.

 

Right now I think I may have one or two too many abilities that I'll be looking at trimming down. I could easily let Phantom Army open and take the brunt of most assaults, but I lacked the endurance to support with AoE that I know this should be able to work out, and I definitely ended up feeling like I had too many AoE's to consider choosing from that weren't getting used cause I wasn't able to actually engage in Melee successfully.

 

I'm going to Market some enhancements up for the build from its wee-lil seed stash and try and get its defenses stable enough to feel comfortable testing melee better before I completely pull the cord on this being a viable Martial pairing. Made it to 48 during the Quarterfield, so I can drop pretty much everything/anything I want enhancement wise into the build once I obtain them. I'll give it until Alpha Unlock before I decided if it's going to get fully slotted or just parked in the garage like the last Dom.

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I love ill on domi's (and trolls) and i tried really really hard to love /martial on domi's. I ended up with a mind/martial and elec/martial but after 2 attempts i realised it just wasn't happening and if it didn't work with my 2 fav primaries it wasn't going to. Don't give up on the AT just yet, theres some seriously good combo's out there, quite a few that never get boring. Elec/psi/ice, plant/dark/primal, mind/fire/anything, ill/energy is a hoot. 

 

Once you hit 50, fully slot, get your incarnates in its a whole different experience. Assuming you build for recharge. If not it'll be the same toon you played at lvl 10. Whatever you do not take spinning kick. Awesome animation, 1 of the best in game. Quite a feat to also be the worst/most useless power in game at the same time. And its up against some serious competition there. I don't think i've ever seen it hit anything. Fortunately you get dragons tail and thats good for a force feedback and has a decent radius so recharge isn't an issue.

 

Illusion rocks, its as good on a domi as a troll. Gleam is fantatsic, flash is the  usual, spectral takes some good sets, PA is PA i never noticed a lot of difference between it and the troll version as domi's secondary is all damage and if they aren't taunting how can you tell when everythings mezzed 😛

 

And Phanty is just as annoying as he's always been. Whats not to love.

 

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A Tinpex and a Katie Hannon down alongside some time traveling around Paragon on different level 50 teams doing odd jobs and business has gotten me a chance to ride the wave of infinite endurance and recharge to see what the build can do in a fully slotted sense and I definitely see where the short comings are. My PTSD from Quarterfield hasn't quite settled yet, but the 280+ Merits have served me well in flipping all my earned recipes into viable enhancements. So far I haven't pulled a dime of my outside resources to fuel this and I've got quite a collection of stuff slotted which is giving faith to this lil' Dom's future since I'm not really investing in it thus far.

 

I've gotten my cycles down and I've figure out where I want to trim. This is the build I'm coming from:

 

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		|49AE0AFE03A80BEECF|
		|-------------------------------------------------------------------|

 

And this is where we're going:

Spoiler

| Copy & Paste this data into Mids Reborn : Hero Designer to view the build |
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		|B|
		|-------------------------------------------------------------------|

 

I know originally I really wanted to work in Psi for the Epic, but on a testing platform it was easy to toss in Scorpion shield and focus on the powers themselves and I came to the conclusion that Psi was just going to add another step of busy work to my survival I didn't want to focus on; automation is better. From there I do like having Caltrops, but it doesn't add enough value for me to remember to keep cycling it in and I wanted to scale up the PA a bit so Sleet was a reasonable call to get the slows and add some major -Res. Ice absolutely does not make sense for the concept, but at this point I'm saving the build over the character.

 

Trick Shot is my last potential power on the chopping block. It hasn't impressed me thus far and I think I can get at least 40% Ranged with just a few alterations if I sacrifice that power. That would also get Hibernate into the build for some kind of self-Heal/untouchable for Hard Mode style content.

 

56 minutes ago, Meknomancer said:

Whatever you do not take spinning kick. Awesome animation, 1 of the best in game. Quite a feat to also be the worst/most useless power in game at the same time.

 

It is a forward-direction 9' cone on activation, it doesn't utilize/require a target making it incredibly easy for it to miss absolutely everything you intend to hit with it. Mid's doesn't have this clarified or I'd have probably passed on it from the get-go, but you're right its animation is pretty great. I dropped it out of my build. After hitting the button and watching it continue to spatial puke on itself too many times I gave up on the power and removed it from my tray and stuck to Dragon's Tail and found I was just generally happier with it.

 

I really want Martial to work out here, the more I use Masterful Throw and Explosive Shuriken, the more I enjoy watching those little stars arc around (even when they miss they go crazy all over!) and hit things. If it starts holding up better in this next round, there's hope, otherwise I'll be off to playing the Psi/Martial Blaster I rolled as a backup.

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Final Update:

I have all of the Incarnate abilities unlocked, on the verge of Vet Level 10 with a pile of threads and several Tinpex's down to close up T3'ing everything but the Lore on this build. Only enhancements I'm primarily missing are purple sets; for the speed at which I pushed the build to 50+9 it hasn't had a lot of time to invest in its own drops (and I'm actually surprised in how few IO recipes I'm actually getting). I decided to pull Winter-O's out of storage to fill those in to make things more bearable. After all that, the build is still surprisingly endurance heavy. Phantasm is dying a lot more often than anticipated in team scenarios adding to the woes. I've been spending most of my time with my toggles turned off besides SS and Invis.

 

This aggression of endurance has pushed me to making alterations to the planned Hybrid/Destiny scheme and I now have Support and Ageless made to see which (or both) may be required to float the build.

 

Beyond all that, seeing the build function at soft cap is pretty good. It is insanely busy and so long as I keep feeding Dragon's Tail to keep up the extra 100% Rech it has a break-neck speed.

 

Thunder > Blind > Thunder > Masterful > Explosive is possible pretty safely, and if I throw Ageless in there I know I'll probably be taking out a Thunder from that mix. With Dragon's Tail I definitely have the feel I was looking/hoping for in this combo, but at the same time there's this strangeness about Illusion and the soft controls in the KD's, Gleam being my only real mass control as a Stun, and the heavy slows in Sleet/Ice, oh and the indirect Fear from Snarf, er--I mean Spectral Terror. There's definitely pieces of crowd control going on, but I never really feel like I'm stopping the flow of combat like, say, Seeds of Confusion might, or Bonfire truly would. I feel like I'm lulling things just enough to kill them which is creating this fuzzy misconception about being a Dominator when really it just feels like being a slightly more trolly Blaster.

 

I think I ended up building myself out of the Dom box and into a Blaster box with Dom powers.

 

Yolo, I guess.

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2 hours ago, Sir Myshkin said:

After all that, the build is still surprisingly endurance heavy. I've been spending most of my time with my toggles turned off besides SS and Invis.

 

This aggression of endurance has pushed me to making alterations to the planned Hybrid/Destiny scheme and I now have Support and Ageless made to see which (or both) may be required to float the build.

Yup. Mine runs extremely end heavy as well. I have Ageless for when Domination doesn't come back fast enough to keep my blue bar healthy. All Illu powers have huge end cost. All of my toggles up and yeah sometimes I have to hit Ageless.

 

2 hours ago, Sir Myshkin said:

Phantasm is dying a lot more often than anticipated in team scenarios adding to the woes.

Phanty I've found to be wholly useless outside of adding DMG to big targets. He does a really good job of getting himself killed otherwise. Still worth keeping unless you have a really specific build goal in mind IMO.

 

2 hours ago, Sir Myshkin said:

I feel like I'm lulling things just enough to kill them which is creating this fuzzy misconception about being a Dominator when really it just feels like being a slightly more trolly Blaster.

Now that you mention it, yeah, it does feel like that. There is very little control going on (but more than an Illu Controller, funny enough). I even went a step further and just removed Spectral Terror from my build. In my eyes it's just not reliable enough to be worth spending a slot on. My gameplan with my Dom is drop PA, let the mob gather up, hit Gleam, and clean house. I have Flash for emergency cases but I find I benefit most from keeping fights compact and speedy. The longer the fight drags on, the more danger I'm in.

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Mainly on Excelsior. Find me in game @Spaghetti Betty.

AE Arcs:  Big Magic Blowout! 41612 | The Meta-Human Wrestling Association 44683 | MHWA Part 2 48577

Click to look at my pets!

 

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On 1/9/2023 at 11:25 PM, Spaghetti Betty said:

Yup. Mine runs extremely end heavy as well. I have Ageless for when Domination doesn't come back fast enough to keep my blue bar healthy. All Illu powers have huge end cost. All of my toggles up and yeah sometimes I have to hit Ageless.

I like ageless regardless because the CD reduction helps KEEP domination ready to use to help my stamina problems.

On 1/9/2023 at 11:25 PM, Spaghetti Betty said:

Phanty I've found to be wholly useless outside of adding DMG to big targets. He does a really good job of getting himself killed otherwise. Still worth keeping unless you have a really specific build goal in mind IMO.

I like Phanty slotted with KB>KD. He's a reliable source for it, but it does feel like groups I *DON'T* need KD'd, are the ones getting KD'd. Like, more often than not, he'll target the groups I've mez'd already, or, his mini phanty will pull agro from groups i didnt want to mess with yet. It's a 50/50, but on teams he's great! But yeah, I don't take him for the deeps, I'm Ill/Psi and his damage doesnt outstrip mine since Im proc'd out of my fucking gourd (orange number make me heppy)

On 1/9/2023 at 11:25 PM, Spaghetti Betty said:

 

Now that you mention it, yeah, it does feel like that. There is very little control going on (but more than an Illu Controller, funny enough). I even went a step further and just removed Spectral Terror from my build. In my eyes it's just not reliable enough to be worth spending a slot on.

I dunno. Spectral Terror is good for how early you get it, but I do agree, by level 30 or so he's just not the kinda friend you wanna have around? Again, if there's something from set bonuses a person wants I can say that -15% to hit is pretty fucking delish on a Dominator, who tends to have at least 5 powers that'll buff their DEF, so that 15% can go a long way.

 

But yeah, he kinda smelly.

On 1/9/2023 at 11:25 PM, Spaghetti Betty said:

My gameplan with my Dom is drop PA, let the mob gather up, hit Gleam, and clean house. I have Flash for emergency cases but I find I benefit most from keeping fights compact and speedy. The longer the fight drags on, the more danger I'm in.

 

Me too! I call this way of life;

                                                                The Razzle Dazzle

 

 

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On 12/15/2022 at 9:56 PM, Sir Myshkin said:

So fellow players, what're your experiences that can help sway me towards another Dominator?

 

I've made it no secret I love Symphony Control. I will say, it's a LOT better on a controller, as it synergizes PHENOMNALLY well with them moreso than the dominator.

 

However. Domination is, as I'm sure most will say, a game changer.

 

Symphony Control by no means NEEDS Domination. Nor does a Symph dom NEED it. However, with it, the mez stacking becomes truly absurd -- once you get the positioning down. Symph/Earth comes to mind as one of the truly heinous control monster's I've had the pleasure to play. It's a close range dom, closer than I'd like, but with the incarnate power that lets you stun any creature that is both immobilized and feared, in combimation with mud pots, and the Reverberant (with how I've slotted it) pet (along with the many tools Earth has at its disposal) mean that when Im in position, that's the end of a mob group. Even AVs are like "Ah, damn, I guess I can't play the game :/. Man, why do the devs let dominators play, theyre so toxic :/". They don't get to play the game either, because everything is either held, feared, sleeping, or stunned...

 

THEN YOU HIT THEM WITH A FUCKING ROCK

Take that level 4 Skulls Slugger!

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