What role does a dominator play on a team?

[RelativeQuanta]

TL; DR: What role does a dominator play on a team?  Maybe I'm ignorant, but they don't seem to fit all that well.

 

I recently soloed a dominator to level 50 for the first time.  I really enjoy the AT, but when I started thinking about how it’s built, things started to seem a little… odd.

 

They play a lot like blasters but with a lot more control (trading damage potential makes sense here).  So are they considered damage on a team?  Well… they’re in the 400% max damage buff group, so maybe not?  
(Momentary aside since I’m comparing to blasters: Oddly, despite dominator’s 1.05 scale melee modifier, blaster melee still hit harder on the same attacks according to Mids’s) 

 

The closest group role I can think a dominator would fill is that of a tanker.  A group hold is roughly equivalent to armor + taunt as far as a group is concerned.  Potentially riskier too as, in this analogy, the “armor” can miss.   Domination having mez protection also supports this analogy.  Stuff working against this analogy are target caps on AoE mez and the long recharges, though it can still work with skill and slotting.  This analogy falls apart when it comes to enemies with the PToD.  In this case, dominators are just mediocre DPS.  

 

So, how should we think of dominator balance? 

• Something like a scrapper (i.e. durable damage)?  In this case, do they need more damage?
• Or should it be closer to the tanker still?  In this case, maybe Dominator controls should taunt the AV and reduce its damage to just the Dominator for a duration matching what would otherwise be a hold?
   

Maybe I’m missing something?  Is there another way to think of this?  

…I admit I like the idea of dominators being an alternative Tanker now… 
 

[Ringo]

The original design of Dominators was from when you couldn't be a controller on Redside, Brutes were more fragile and had less aggro management than Tankers, and Stalkers were only critting from Hide.  So yes, they filled the role of keeping the Brute alive and supplemented the non-burst damage of Stalkers.  Definitely a support role first, damage AT second.

 

These days?  Domination still gives you the strongest controls in the game, mez protection, and a free endurance refill.  I'd agree that it's a similar support role to the team tank.

[EnjoyTheJourney]

Dominators could be seen as damage dealers, controllers, and debuffers. 

For damage dealing, dominators can do good to very good single target damage. Not at the level of a scrapper or stalker built to do damage, but even with and perhaps ahead of many blasters. AOE is not a strong point for dominators. But, it probably still lands even with or ahead of most scrappers / stalkers (crits are a key inflection point, here, so probably this is not always true) and below ATs with a nuke and other strong AOEs (blasters, sentinels, corruptors). 

 

For control, dominators are the strongest AT in the game because of the effects of domination.  

 

For debuffs dominators tend to come in ahead of blasters, sentinels, and melee ATs, perhaps with some exceptions, but noticeably behind many controllers, corruptors and defenders. This does vary a lot by powerset, though, as some powersets have very good debuffs, while others do not. 

For team buffs, the main ones that come to mind are mind link from Psi mastery and spirit tree from plant control. They are modestly helpful buffs, in general, and most dominators probably don't have them. Also, these two buffs are easily eclipsed in their value by the buffs available to ATs that specialize in buffing. So, while it could be said that (some) dominators have buffs, it's probably more accurate to say that buffs are not a noteworthy plus that dominators tend to bring to teams. 

[Luminara]

Kill shit.  Make shit not kill others.

 

Basically the same as every other archetype in the game, with different WAHWAHWOOSH and OOOOFLASHYLIGHTS.

[RelativeQuanta]

Thanks for the replies!  I hadn't realized that dominators could compete with a blaster in the single target case.  I figured the lack of a T3 blast, no defiance, and (according to Mids) slightly lower melee damage would put a dominator way behind. 

 

Though I do see that blasters being ahead in equivalent attacks is not consistent across powersets....  hmm..

[MoonSheep]

i play a mind/fire dom, one of the only two alts i play in my 4.5 years of HC (and a lot of Live)

 

the damage out of /fire is incredible - low animation times and meaty hits, about the same output as a blaster

 

i’ll switch between either using control or dealing damage depending on what the situation is. on teams where we’re steamrolling content, there’s little point using mez and i’ll just focus on damage instead

 

for something like a posi TF, i’ll focus on locking down the mages and spectrals before doing damage - makes a huge difference

 

doms are one of the best ATs available in my view (someone who mains a dom haha)

 

the ability to lock down an entire mob with 1 mez power and domination active is incredibly powerful and unmatched in its ability to turn the tide of battle

 

being able to the  dish out strong damage makes it even better

[Captain Fabulous]

14 hours ago, RelativeQuanta said:

They play a lot like blasters but with a lot more control

You answered your own question. Controllers are control+support. Dominators are control+damage. It's as simple as that.

[RelativeQuanta]

6 hours ago, Captain Fabulous said:

You answered your own question. Controllers are control+support. Dominators are control+damage. It's as simple as that.

 

Hardly.  The implied question in my post was do dominators meaningfully fill a role in the group.  Thankfully, the other replies seemed to understand that and answered the question in the affirmative.

[Captain Fabulous]

7 hours ago, RelativeQuanta said:

 

Hardly.  The implied question in my post was do dominators meaningfully fill a role in the group.  Thankfully, the other replies seemed to understand that and answered the question in the affirmative.

Meaningfully, they provide control + damage. Not sure why you're making it more complicated than it is.

[tidge]

I didn't see "Vengeance Bait" listed as an answer on the poll.

 

More seriously: When a Dominator is rolling (with Domination) they can be a whirlwind of insanity. I personally think the controls are what to lead with, but it would be a waste to not lean into their damage and debuffs. There are plenty of different directions to go in, but perma-Domination should be a goal.

[Clave Dark 5]

The way I play a Dom is really dependent on the circumstances of the team and who we're facing.  I see them as a Swiss army knife of a an AT.

• Squishier ones or low level ones tend to stand in back and mez everyone repeatedly to help keep the damage dealers safe; toss in a ranged attack or two.
• More protected ones and higher level ones (as that's usually the same thing) tend to open with a crowd-wide mez and then rush into melee, esp. if they have any PBAoE like Atom Smasher.

And then, while in melee, what else needs tending to?: more mezzing, another melee blow, or a ranged attack for that runner?  Melee toons just hit, maybe pop a heal or something, then hit again.  I think I abandon melee toons before 50 due to disinterest the most, unless I've given them a bit of extra via power pools or whatever.

[Ringo]

On 2/16/2024 at 5:00 PM, tidge said:

I didn't see "Vengeance Bait" listed as an answer on the poll.

Surely Blasters and Scrappers are higher in the list than Doms!  Doms only just recently got access to Illusion/Flash the biggest suicide button in the game

[MonteCarla]

I tend to lead the charge with my Dominators, leaning into the Tank-y style of play described above.

At the recharge levels required for perma-Dom, you can open on every group with a Mag 4 mez, taking down all bosses. No other archetype gets to do that.

If you're facing a big group of Carnies with two Master Illusionist, a Dominator is the only way to stop them popping pets.

A big group of Devouring Earth - if you get in first you don't have to deal with any emanators or Swarm summons.

 

Then I help clean up with beefy melee attacks and AoEs.

 

When I form a task force, I count and examine all the support sets first. I count Dom primaries as a support set, since having most enemies stunned or held all the time is a pretty potent defensive debuff 🙂

Edited February 18 by MonteCarla

[tidge]

On 2/16/2024 at 8:00 PM, tidge said:

I didn't see "Vengeance Bait" listed as an answer on the poll.

 

2 hours ago, Ringo said:

Surely Blasters and Scrappers are higher in the list than Doms!  Doms only just recently got access to Illusion/Flash the biggest suicide button in the game

 

This is my experience with Dominators: With Domination up they can usually pop into a large spawn and fire off enough controls (hard and soft) that they don't face any meaningful retaliation... and with perma-Domination, this sort of mad cycling happens really fast... but a few things happen to Dominators that don't quite happen to Blasters:

• A Dominator that gets slowed, or allows perma-Dom to slip gets clobbered fast
• Endurance burns faster with uber Recharge, so Dominators have to make sure they don't exhaust the blue bar before the Domination refill
• When a Dominator misses controlling certain boss-level enemies with mezzes, watch out!

This is a little different than with Blasters... yes Blasters can be hit with an enemy Mezzes and debuffs, but generally I find it easier to buff Blaster defenses AND have a couple of AoEs to wipe out spawns... so a Blaster that misses a nasty boss/LT has probably wiped the rest of the spawn (or set them up to be wiped with another AoE)... My Dominators don't tend to try to sweep out a spawn until after the first round of controls was applied.

 

Scrappers typically don't get ALL the aggro from a spawn like Dominators, Controllers or Blasters... and Scrappers have their secondaries. When Scrappers fail, usually they are just getting whittled down in a dogpile.

 

My Dominators constantly feel like they are on playing on the edge of a knife... I can play my Blasters in a kamikaze way but usually for me a full-kit Blaster gets into trouble when messing up an attack chain... Dominators fail in a wonderful variety of ways.

[Ringo]

Well reasoned and very true to my play experience as well.  I appreciate your insight, @tidge