Looking for some general info on Mind Doms

[mistagoat]

Word on the street is that Mind Control is a really good control set, possibly ranking near the top of all control sets (according to friendly internet strangers) but It's never felt right to me and I've avoided it for decades now. A big part of that was the sleep powers and the long recharges on the good powers in the set. I've started Mind Doms/Trollers a few times but they were all abandoned relatively early and they didn't leave me feeling very positive about the set.

 

With the recent page 2 changes, I'm considering giving this control set another try. I think I've settled on going with a Mind Dom though I'm still unsure of the secondary, leaning towards Fire or Psi with a Fire or Psy epic (I know, I know, sooooo original!!). I can usually make a decent build but I'm having a very difficult time just selecting what powers to take. I want too many things and I know I won't have the slots to properly enhance those powers nor the time to use all those powers in combat. I've been looking at builds posted here for ideas but they are fairly old and I know Mind has gone through a couple updates and I don't know what build are still relevant.

 

From Mind, it looks like I can potentially skip either the single target sleep or the single target confuse. Leaning towards the confuse, both seem to be particularly good for dealing with EBs/AVs but I can't take everything. Would you skip one of these 2 powers? Are there other skippable powers in Mind? Is Mind better to play at range or in melee?

 

If I go Mind/Psy, I think I'd want the Fire epic just to vary the damage type since Psy is heavily resisted. Does this make sense or am I being overly cautious?

 

Any thoughts on Fire vs Psy in the secondary? 

Any thoughts on Fire vs Psy in the epics?

General Mind tips for a Mind noob?

 

General mistagoat info: I mostly live in the sub-level-50 world so I will not be relying on Incarnates/Purp/HOs/ect. I mostly duo with 1 buddy, team occasionally but I typically won't have team dynamics or buffs helping me out. 

[Fireburn]

Generally, i always select an epic pool with a -res power for dominators, or in the case of ice, both a res debuff and a defense shield. dark mastery works as well, you have tar patch and darkest night wich lowers enemies to hit. fire has melt armor and fireball so that's another good choice if you want area damage.

 

If you need to skip something in Mind Control, Telekinesis is probably the first power the drop. It has some uses, i like it and use it sometimes, but it's still very situational and not much needed, also the endurance cost is very high. Since you say you don't play at 50, you probably won't have permadomination, and so the single target sleep and confuse could be useful when you take extra aggro, you can quickly stack them on hard targets.  Mesmerize's magnitudo is 3.5, and so will stop a boss with a single application.

As a dominator i would also skip Levitate since you have an entire secondary set for doing damage. depending on how much recharge you have and if you sustain a good attack chain, you can also avoid the tier 1 attack and focus on the stronger powers, although that is usally done with a level 50 build.

 

Mind plays at range and would combine well with Fire, wich also deals bigger damage than psi. Psi, on the other hand, is more thematic and has Drain Psyche that is awesome  for your endurance and can also be used as a strong -regen debuff against AVs.   Psionic damage feels either fabolous when you encounter enemies that enter godmode, or weak if they are resistant to psionics. You can compensate for this by slotting damage procs.

Subdue is one of the few dominator attacks that accepts the Ascendancy proc, wich means it will give a steady damage boost by just rotating through your standard attack chain.

 

Mind's strength lies in its ability to completely lock down multiple groups with ease, especially now with the sleep improvements, and while they are under control, you and your friend can demolish them. So in the end, i wouldn't worry too much and just pick what you like most

[MoonSheep]

i’ve been playing my mind/fire main that i had on live for the last 6 years since homecoming returned and still really enjoy it

 

everything being at range (other than incinerate which i also picked up) is really helpful. being able to quick stack confuse helps to nullify AVs and similar as it can be applied enough to overwhelm purple triangles of doom

 

TK and the AoE sleep can be skippable if they’re not your cup of tea, i picked them up in the later levels

 

ice mastery is still quite good despite the nerf a while ago, -22.5% res is still handy

 

i built mine for enough +rech that domination is perma even if i haven’t clicked on hasten, no need to build for defense either 

 

it‘s a great combination, very powerful

[Championess]

Total Domination and Mass Confusion are a must.  I'd also take Terrify and TK for some unique aoe soft control.  Then I'd take Levitate for the extra combo and I'd also never want to skip a reliable ST confuse.  You're probably going to take the ST hold at least for a Basilisk mule.

 

The powers I skip are the sleeps.  They made sleeps better but that's more useful for the other control sets, Mind has oodles of control already.

[mistagoat]

I started a Mind/Fire a couple nights ago. My planned leveling build only skips the st confuse from mind.  I'm only lvl 20 but so far the aoe sleep has been the most valuable power. I'm running with a regen scrapper buddy and it's been keeping us both alive pretty well. I took TK too, and thats been a fun power to get a handle on! I'll sleep the group, then TK them into a nice tight ball and Fire Breath the hell outta them while my scrapper buddy goes full berserker rage!

 

That may change as we level up and the enemies become more challenging but it's been a wonderful low level leveling experience so far! 

At this point we've done street sweeping in Galaxy and then all the Hollows arcs and Rescue the Mystic. The only trouble we ran into was when I tried to TK Frostfire and made a mess of that room. Lesson learned!

 

I picked up TD last night but havent had a chance to use it yet. I'm really looking forward to playing with that and Mass Confusion!

[Uun]

Keep in mind that AV purple triangles don't protect against sleep. Mesmerize can incapacitate AVs in one shot (even without Domination).

[MoonSheep]

15 minutes ago, Uun said:

Keep in mind that AV purple triangles don't protect against sleep. Mesmerize can incapacitate AVs in one shot (even without Domination).

 

and you can stack enough confuse even with PTOD on AVs, with the recent changes to adaptive recharge this will be even easier on a mind dom