Power Pools choice

[Razorcat]

I am leveling up an Electric / Radiation Dominator, but this problem is more or less the same for most Dominators: choose what power pools take.

 

1- SUPER SPEED

Is needed to have Hasten, and be able to continuosly use Domination

 

2- MEDICINE

Is needed to have a Self Healing.

Also it allows me to store 2 additiona special healing Enhancement, like miracle.

A dominator doesn't have many ways to heal himself, and this power pool increases a lot his survivability.

 

3- FIGHTING

Is needed for Tough and Weave, and allows me to slot a full set of gladiator armor and shield wall.

 

4- LEADERSHIP

The assault power gives me and my pets a +10% damage.

The maneuvers power can be slotted with the reactive defense enhancement

 

5- MU MASTERY

Gives me an additional pet, a very strong armor power that can be slotted with the Unbreakable Guard, and a power that boosts my resistance, and can be slotted with the Aegis special Ehancement.

(the epic powes of the heroes, for controllers and dominators are so bad...)

 

The problem of this list is that my dominator misses a movement power, and i can have only 5 power pools.

I wanted to choose fly, to have also levitation, and slot the Luck of the Gambler bonus of global recharge speed.

I don't like the running power of super speed, cause it doesn't increase my jump, and cause i can have the ninja run for free.

So... What do you think?

What are the power pools that a dominator absolutely needs?

Edited August 27, 2019 by Razorcat

[Deelon]

In my opinion, you should drop medicine for the flight pool you wanted. Grab hover for that free LotG slot and to help meet your defense softcaps. Speaking of which, you could drop Mu mastery for a set that has a defensive shield instead of a resistive. A lot of people go with the scorpion shield from what I’ve seen and softcap S/L/E defenses. You’ll get a lot more mileage out of defenses with a lower HP class.

[Razorcat]

1 hour ago, Deelon said:

In my opinion, you should drop medicine for the flight pool you wanted. Grab hover for that free LotG slot and to help meet your defense softcaps.

Why you are suggesting to drop medicine?

My dominator don't have other ways to heal.

I was expecting people suggesting me to drop fighting or leadership (that have not high bonuses for doms).

About the defense i understand what you mean, but i still prefer the Mu mastery,  since is an electric power like the basic one of my dom.

If my build will be fully equipped with the purples enh i want, should be able to softcap S/L/E and have an high resistance (for a dom) to all other damages ^_^

Edited August 27, 2019 by Razorcat

[Deelon]

Defense at 45% (at least) and recharge at 275% (for perma hasten with 100% recharge from enhancements included in that total) should be your top priority targets. If you can hit those numbers with Mu Mastery AND dropping Weave/Maneuvers, by all means go ahead.

 

With that much recharge, you should be able to somehow control the entire group most of the time, especially with domination. Those few moments of things actually attacking you are more than mitigated with softcap defenses, there shouldn’t be any need to heal. You could also take the healing destiny incarnate if it really is an issue.

[Razorcat]

Thanks for your advice

This way i will have healing at lvl 50, not at earlier levels when i do TF, but more or less is everything.

Just a question, how do you calculate that 275% recharge bonus?

Domination cannot be enhanced, and i don't think that a recharge bonus from the alpha can influence it.

Adding together all the recharge time bonuses from the purple sets i will use:

Both Dominator set

Ranged damage

Hold

Immobilize

Pet damage

Luck of the gambler

I don't think i will gain that much

 

[Deelon]

Let me take a step back for a sec. The general consensus of late game is to build your character to have more preventative survivability rather than reactive survivability. Let’s say you jump into a mob, your options of surviving are:

 

1. Healing: The reactive approach. You have to be fast to click, it takes time away from offensive abilities, has a cooldown timer, and you are hit with any debuff that comes with the attack.

 

2. Resistance: More of a preventative approach. Great for classes with high HP pools, not as useful for classes with lower HP by itself. You still take any debuff that is attached to the attack.

 

3. Defense: Most preventative approach. A positional or typed defense of 45% relates to you only taking roughly 1 out of every 20 attacks. That also means you are avoiding debuffs that come with those 19 dodged attacks. Classes with lower HP pools can effectively tank with high defenses because they just don’t take damage.

 

Of course, a mix of these is always good, but priority almost always goes to defense on all my characters.

 

The 275% recharge was specifically for hasten to be permanent. Excluding the 100% recharge from enhancements on Hasten itself, your other powers will effectively see a 175% recharge bonus. With hasten always on, you can apply its own 75% to the 275% total with no downtime math involved. This means you only need 100% recharge from set bonuses or other +recharge powers to get perma hasten.

 

Fortunately, perma Domination only needs something like 125% recharge, which you will have hit way before perma hasten.

 

 

[Onishiro]

3 hours ago, Deelon said:

 

Fortunately, perma Domination only needs something like 125% recharge, which you will have hit way before perma hasten.

 

 

If that is the case, then do we even need Hasten at all?

[Deelon]

13 minutes ago, chaossdragon said:

If that is the case, then do we even need Hasten at all?

I’m sure someone’s hit perma Dom without hasten. It’d be a bit tougher to do because you’d be forfeiting a free 70% recharge. 

 

I was going by memory earlier so some of my numbers a little off, here’s a link to some useful perma breakpoints:

 

https://paragonwiki.com/wiki/Perma

 

Unless you’re asking if we need to hit perma hasten at all?

 

The quick answer is mayhaps. Your single target attack chains won’t be as smooth, you’ll have downtimes that might require you to add another attack to the rotation, which will lower your dps if it has a worse dpa than your ideal ~3 attack rotation. This would also cost you an extra power slot that could have otherwise gone to something like control/survivability/utility power instead. Not to mention you’d get your AoE controls back that much sooner, in a way that improves your team’s pace and survivability.

 

Recharge arguably helps doms more than any other stat, but if you’re going for a budget build or want to focus on slotting for something else, you’ll still be viable for most of the game’s content.

[Onishiro]

Kewl, thanks for the swift response.  I was leaning towards  level with Hasten,  end-game build without, if you can achieve perma-dom without it...  but it does make sense to still use it just in-case and for DPA / CC.    

 

Now to decide for my own  DC/DA/IM  on hover/fly, tough/weave, leadership vs concealment, and Hasten (can't stand SS but I know it would probably fit the build better)

[Chirikiti]

Doms are my thing. I've never taken a self heal on any of 'em.  They don't need them. Even if you are leveling through the content like I do. I'm always surprised to see one with aid self or whatever.

 

Definitely can perma without hasten, hasten adds a nice buffer and way faster control/attacks. So obviously I take it and perma that too.

 

FIghting/Leaping/Speed/Leadership/Psionic Mastery  (I hate pets, don't need em, and the screw up my s**t)

[Cyrickain13]

Love Doms,

 

My main Character is a Dom Fire/Fire/Fire and is an AoE and Single Target god.

 

My goto Power Pools

 

Flight / Leadership / Speed / Concealment and then Fire (use whatever element you have Domination over)

 

Fighting's Tough and Weave - Get Replaced by Hover/Stealth and Fire Shield.

 

Go to the P2W vendor and Turn off all inspirations except for Healing and Energy---(Damage and Accuracy if you need those)

 

I have never build a Character without Hasten.

 

 

[Wintercat]

I wouldn't take medicine, other than to heal between groups when soloing.

 

Basically, a held mob does no damage, and doing unto them before they can do unto you, means you won't take damage and thus won't need a heal. This is also why I would generally not find a use for the fighting pool. Solo, I wouldn't need it much, in teams I would let others take the alpha and therefore not need the defense.

[Deelon]

1 hour ago, Wintercat said:

I wouldn't take medicine, other than to heal between groups when soloing.

 

Basically, a held mob does no damage, and doing unto them before they can do unto you, means you won't take damage and thus won't need a heal. This is also why I would generally not find a use for the fighting pool. Solo, I wouldn't need it much, in teams I would let others take the alpha and therefore not need the defense.

The fighting pool is extremely useful on any build in my opinion. Tough provides a resistance outlet for squishy classes to slot the two +defense IOs. Weave is a healthy defense boost that works no matter what defense type you’re going for and is another outlet for LotG +recharge IOs.

 

Even if you’re not taking alpha, you’re not going to be at your full potential if you don’t softcap your defenses. I’m not sure why you’d want to give up the ability to survive on your own if it’s easily available to you. A lot of endgame content involves running through a lot of baddies to get to some objective, especially on speed runs. If you’re dying every few minutes because you don’t have any defenses, you’ll be slowing your team down.

[mbre2006]

On 8/27/2019 at 9:18 PM, chaossdragon said:

If that is the case, then do we even need Hasten at all?

TBH no. But if you do take hasten you only need it to be one slotted. I would not waste slots on hasten. Instead enhance the recharge IO

 

Also for power pool choices I usually choose Concealment (Stealth, grant stealth), Jumping (Combat jump), Leadership (Maneuvers, tactics, veng). That's an easyway to get five lotg in. Plus who doesn't like getting invis to stealth through long missions? 

Edited November 1, 2019 by mbre2006

[The_Cheeseman]

The question isn’t “do I really need Hasten?” Hasten is one of the best powers in the entire game. The better question would be, “Is there any reason I shouldn’t take Hasten?” The answer to that is generally “no”.

 

Tough is mostly worthless on an AT without significant in-class resist buffs. The amount of resistance it provides in a vacuum isn’t significant, but if it’s your only choice for slotting the defense uniques, I suppose it’s worth it. I’d prefer an ancillary shield for that, though.

 

I don’t consider Fighting pool that good on Dom. You should be able to softcap one defense type and still get to perma-dom with only set bonuses. I’d use any extra power picks as mules for LotGs or whatever.

Edited November 2, 2019 by The_Cheeseman

[Mezmera]

The epic pools for doms are actually quite good, especially the villain side of things.  For the hero side, Primal Mastery you can get Energy Transfer, on a dom it's the best ST damage you'll get by far and compares to the best ST attack for any AT, it's up there with stalker attacks, just not godly critting ones.  In the villain epics always get the pets, they're all quite good and unique.  On some of my doms I go for Soul Mastery, the shield is sneaky good with resists to more damage types than other dom shields, you can take Soul Drain which is fantastic and then the Seer pet.  Mace Mastery has fantastic debuff capabilities. 

 

Lastly you can go with your Mu Mastery with the two high resists you can get out of that which'll allow you to focus building your defense and recharge.  Also if you didn't know that Mu pet heals you and he's quite good about it so you could likely drop the Medicine pool and slot a couple heal IO's into that pet.  

 

As for the regular pools Hasten is a must.  I love leadership, maneuvers along with vengeance are great LotG mules and tactics is really beneficial as well, just an altogether great pool teaming and otherwise.  I'd still go with Fighting pool for tough/weave, true tough will be a little redundant with all of your other resists but weave is a nice power to have toggled, I get a little over 6% defense out of it.  You could look into how another pool with defenses could help you like the stealth pool.  Personally I don't like the flight pool, hovering into a fight is not for me, there's a few defensive powers though you can get use out of.  

 

So you have Hasten/Speed, Leadership and Fighting which are all pools I go with.  The last one I'll go with is one of the new pools, Sorcery is real nice for 90 seconds you can get 40% resistance to all damage and with all the recharge you're aiming for it'll be recharged in about 135 seconds.  You can also use the ally buff as a mule for the absorb proc.  I'm really liking Force of Will as well, weaken resolve slotted with the achilles heel debuffs the target of 33% resist which is real noticeable, you'll get your leaping travel, and last Unleash Potential is a nice 20% additional defense plus recovery should you need that.  

 

I think you'd do quite well dropping medicine and taking Force of Will.  With all of these pools and my bonuses I get 60% ranged defense and 40-45-ish other typed defenses.  Build up those defenses and resists and go ham.  

Edited November 3, 2019 by Mezmera

[MTeague]

For my Plant / Psi dom, my pools are: 

• Speed:   Hasten, nothing else.
• Leaping:  Combat Jumping, nothing else (LotG mule, minor defense)
• Flight:   Hover (LotG mule, minor defense), Fly (travel)
• Leadership:  Manuvers (LotG mule, defense), Tactics, Assault
• Psi Mastery:  Link Minds (LotG mule, defense), Mind Over Body.

Psi mastery mostly just because my attacks are already all Psi, but also I really wanted to play around with Link Minds and see how close it comes vs not to the Widow version.  (Not nearly as close as I'd hoped, but still, it ain't bad).  I don't need indomitable will, because Permadom.  Scorpion Shield may be better for personal defense, but I still have quite a lot from set bonuses, and I prefer to contribute a decent chunk of defense to the entire team.  

 

Psi Assault brings in Drain Psyche to allow me to heal up and for -Regen for the biggie-wiggies.

Plant Control also brings in Spirit Tree, which is also nice maintenence healing, and lets me slot the entire preventative medicine set for the 8.75% recharge and the absorb proc. 

[Machariel]

I run:

Leaping: for combat jumping (defense, LoTG mule).  SJ is fine too I guess.  Combat Jumping is one of the best utility powers in the game - it's an OK amount of defense, it holds LoTG +7.5% recharge, and the extra jump control is really useful for moving around maps.

Speed: for Hasten & super speed.  Hasten makes getting permadom a LOT easier and it's one of the most useful powers in the game.  Not everyone needs it, probably, but you should definitely know what you're doing if you skip it.

Leadership: Maneuvers, Tactics, and Vengeance - 3 very useful powers, and 2 of them hold the critical LoTG +7.5% recharge IOs.  Tactics is also the only place I can slot the Gaussian's chance for build up proc, because my Dominator is /fiery assault, which means I can't put it into my "build up" power (Fiery Embrace) since it doesn't give +tohit.

Fighting: for Tough and Weave.  Tough is where I slot the 2 unique +3% defense IOs (because I don't take the epic / patron power shield) and Weave adds a good chunk of defense and also gives you another LoTG +7.5% recharge.

 

The Flying power pool is also pretty good for dominators if you have 3 power slots to spend on a travel power.  Hover and Afterburner can both slot the LoTG +7.5% defense IO.  You don't really need the Stealth pool, but if you don't like Leadership for some reason, Stealth is also a good source of pool powers to slot LoTG +7.5% defense recharge.

Edited November 3, 2019 by Machariel

[The_Cheeseman]

9 minutes ago, Machariel said:

The Flying power pool is also pretty good for dominators if you have 3 power slots to spend on a travel power.  Hover and Afterburner can both slot the LoTG +7.5% defense IO.  You don't really need the Stealth pool, but if you don't like Leadership for some reason, Stealth is also a good source of pool powers to slot LoTG +7.5% defense.

Most of us know what you meant, but for any newer players out there, he means LotG +7.5% recharge, which slots into defense powers. Though, I'd sell my soul for a +7.5% defense IO... 😉

[Machariel]

15 minutes ago, The_Cheeseman said:

Most of us know what you meant, but for any newer players out there, he means LotG +7.5% recharge, which slots into defense powers. Though, I'd sell my soul for a +7.5% defense IO... 😉

i have no idea what you're talking about >__________>

good catch

[Demon Shell]

I grabbed Force of Will for the debuff, travel power, and the psudo-T9. When I need a heal, Power Up+Unleash Potential works for that purpose (plus boosting all my Def to like 50%.

[Rokkeb]

hasten is t1 now, you don't need anything else out of speed to get it.