Dominator PvP Tier List (9-4-19)

[M3z]

In light of the new changes I made a new dom pvp tier list, this list applies to zones/arena (PuGs/casual):

Primaries:

 

Broken Tier: Dark control

S Tier: Earth, Mind, Grav

A Tier: Plant, Ice, Elec

B Tier: Fire

 

Explanation:

Given current mez mechanics, the only thing that really matters about a primary is the hold. Hold duration, cast time and damage. Most of the secondary effects don't make much of a difference other than grav which can actually effect jump height significantly. I'd say all control sets are viable, it just has to do with your preference of what type of hold do you want, do you want a long cast time high damage hold? Or do you want a faster hold with lower procing ability?

 

• (Viable)Dark control has 6 second base duration hold, longer than all the other hold durations which are at 4. This is bugged and I would expect it to be fixed so I wouldn't make dark control for the broken hold duration. Also if you pick this set you are a cornball.
• (Viable)Earth gives doms 2 strong ranged attacks in fossilize and stone prison with decent ability to proc because of the cast times. Probably best primary right now for pvp(outside of dark).
• (Viable)Mind has dominate which although does not have great procing ability has the fastest cast time, is hitscan (meaning it hits the target the instant you cast) and ignores positional defense. As a dom in pvp you are very squishy so having fast cast times is important so you can leave combat when needed. Rest of the set is great for using as set mule. TK can also set up free kills on teams.
• (Viable)Grav has access to many utility powers that are useful in pvp including wormhole and dimensional shift. The secondary effect actually inhibits movements somewhat because it's -jump (most slows don't do anything). Dimensional shift means you have a phase shift every 16 seconds that does not put you in phase suppression.
• (Viable)Plant - Strangler is a great hold with good damage and fast projectile speed.
• (Viable)Ice - Block of ice has good damage and good proc ability due to its cast time.
• (Viable)Elec - Good range hold damage although the animation is a bit on the long side this will mean this set is easier to proc. Everything else in the set is mostly AOE and negligible. Gremlins are nothing more than a set mule for bonuses because you will never lock anyone down long enough for them to attack.
• (Viable)Fire - Char's fast animation and low cooldown means poor proc ability. Char also has a slow projectile speed but this can sometimes be used to your advantage by throwing char first and using another attack to have char+the additional attack hit at the same time for more burst damage. Imps are useless given current mez system (no real lockdown) so one of fire's greatest strengths are gone.

 

Secondaries:

Explanation:

There is one thing and one thing only that matters in pvp right now. Damage.

 

S Tier: Energy Assault, Fiery Assault

A Tier: Ice Assault, Elec Assault, Earth Assault

B Tier: Rad Assault

C Tier: Thorny Assault

D Tier: Dark Assault

F Tier: Martial Assault

Dumpster Tier 😞: Psi Assault, Savage Assault

 

Explanation:

• (Viable)Fiery Assault is the best dom assault set for pvp in the game. Blaze and blazing bolt are lightning fast and do massive amounts of damage. Embrace of fire is up roughly 40-50% of the time and last 30 seconds. It's easy to do 800-1000+ between hold->blaze->blazing bolt. Overall its the speed and damage of the attack chain, the low cooldown of your attack chain and embrace of fire essentially being a 30 second build up that puts this set far and beyond the others.
• (Viable)Energy Assault - After having its animation times reduced, being granted "power up" and the damage buff energy assault is in a good spot now. With a strong attack chain in total focus->power burst->sniper blast you'll have no problem doing massive amounts of damage with this set and you'll be a capable threat against blasters.
• (Viable)Ice Assault - Very strong ranged attack chain in bitter ice blast->ice blast->ice bolt and with power up can now be a capable threat. The melee attacks are very strong as well with the new buffs. This set is possibly S tier but i'll have to see more ice assault doms to get a better picture of what this set can do.
• (Viable)Electric Assault - Build up is always great and is the best "boost" power to have in the current meta. Thunderstrike, which has always done pretty massive damage has had not only its animation buffed but its damage buffed as well (to what degree I have no idea it's not listed in the notes). Very fast ranged attack chain with decent damage and a very strong melee attack chain. The only thing holding this set back is damage raw numbers (ranged attack chain is on the lower side but it's offset by having build up) and the short cooldowns this sets ability to proc as effectively as other sets. Normal you'd think short cooldowns is a good thing but lower base cooldowns often just means the attacks won't be able to proc effectively in the PPM system. If overall damage ever gets lowered in this game this set's viability will jump up dramatically as draining end will become more of an option with higher times to kill giving this set the utility it was designed to have.
• (Viable)Earth Assault - Earth's two biggest weaknesses to me before the buff were its ranged attack chain (slow cast and requires ground contact) and a lack of build up (power boost does not mesh with earth really in any way). Now both of those weaknesses have been addressed with a faster ranged attack chain (cast time almost cut in half between stone spears->hurl boulder) and power boost becoming power up means earth should be able to apply enough pressure to be viable. Earth has the strongest and fastest melee attack chain of all dom sets. Melee isn't necessarily bad on doms, the idea is you hold and during the hold duration you get off your high risk attacks off then finish with your ranged attack chain (stone spears->hurl boulder). With earth's extremely fast and high damage melee attack chain (stone mallet->heavy mallet->seismic smash) and now decent follow up ranged attack chain makes this set among one of the best assault sets.
• (Viable)Rad Assault - Build up->devastating blow is the hardest hitting move doms have access to. Rad has had its damage buffed and snipe animation speed increased but overall the long cast times and lack of smooth attack chains leaves too many opportunities for enemies to escape, evade or heal when trying to secure a kill. If siphon strike or devastating blow had an animation speed increase this set could become more viable. (Please give devastating blow the old energy transfer animation.
• (Viable)Thorn Assault - This set seems to have it all with build up, great base damage and strong ranged attack chain with strong melee attacks. The recent changes to the cooldown of its attacks also means better procability for attacks. But this set suffers from the same problem as rad, long cast times. Without any real lockdown in the game(because of the current mez system), it's hard to use sets that have long cast times. Thorny darts->impale->thorn barrage is around 5 seconds to cast (not even including your hold cast time) which not only leaves you very vulnerable as you root but often times means an opponent that will simply get away from you. Very close to being a top tier set if it weren't for the long animations.
• (Not Viable)Dark Assault - Might not be a bad 1v1 build with its -acc and self heal. In all other scenarios though the high damage environment of todays current pvp meta means you won't have time to wear down enemies with with DoTs and -acc. The current pvp system does not really lend itself well to attrition style sets like /dark. If dark had an increase on base damage or if overall damage in the game is lowered this set would become more viable.
• (Not Viable)Martial Assault - I really want this set to be good, but unfortunately this set does not have access to any good melee attacks (for pvp) as all the strong melee attacks are AOE (which suffers from AOE damage formula making them essentially useless). It's ranged attack base damage is also very very low. If this set had access to a stronger single target melee attack say eagles claw and higher base damage on its ranged attack chain this set would become more viable. That said this set IS good for PvE though.
• (Not Viable)Psi Assault - Back in the day (before i13) psi assault used to whoop ass because of its unresisted damage type and the strength of psychic shockwave. Now with damage type mattering less, no build up or power up and an incomplete melee attack chain (no greater psi blade or any extreme/superior damage attack)and a weak ranged attack chain (no will dom or power up/build up to boost dmg) and nerfed psychic shockwave this set is one of the worst for pvp. This set would either need higher base damage or to be reworked to include higher damage attacks such as greater psi blade or will dom to be viable.
• (Not Viable)Savage Assault - Extremely low base damage across the board.  But you do get to throw bees on people, so doesn't that really make you the winner at the end of the day?

 

APP/PPP:

 

Explanation:

Dom APP/PPPs are used for survivability, utility, or as slot mules to grant further bonuses.

 

S Tier: Leviathan

A Tier: Mace Mastery

B Tier: Primal Forces Mastery, Fire Mastery

C Tier: Mu Mastery, Psionic Mastery

D Tier: Ice Mastery

Dumpster Tier 😞: Soul Mastery

 

Explanation:

• (Viable)Leviathan Mastery - Offers the best slotting among all sets and a res shield. Res shields are extremely important because often times they are the only way for doms to get access to the unbreakable guard 7.5% HP IO. It is a must to be close to capped HP (1606) on doms to survive making this IO mandatory. Water spout is slotted for 2 lady greys for HP bonus meaning even the tier 1 powers for this power set still have utility for set bonuses. The pet while pretty useless in pvp is also great for slotting for further HP. If you don't have phase you can take hibernate, but hibernate more often than not gets you killed, I don't recommend it at all.
• (Viable)Mace Mastery - Mace is decent in 1v1 arena and 1v1 scenarios in zones primarily because of PFF. Dominator PFF grants the highest elusivity of any PFF shield with 60% elusivity meaning you're really not gonna get hit by anything outside of a BU+aim blaster. You also get access to poisonous ray which can be slotted for achilles -res proc which makes the -res value around 38.75% (this value gets DR'd) which can be very effective in helping you kill more quickly or set up kills for teammates. The weaknesses of this set is its lack of a resistance shield (no unbreakable guard proc unless you go tough (don't do that)) and poisonous ray's long animation cast time (2 seconds).
• (Viable)Primal Forces Mastery - You get energy transfer which just owns. You get conserve power which surprisingly helps a lot because dominators do tend to have endurance problems in pvp if you are attacking non stop. Temp invuln is a res shield so you get the unbreakable guard IO. Energy torrent and explosive blast are not really good though and should be ignored.
• (Viable)Fire Mastery - This set is not good because of the powers themselves but because they can be used as set mules. Fire ball, rain of fire can be slotted with jav volleys if you're looking to get more range in your build. Melt armor is also decent even though the recharge is really trash. You also get a res shield which as you know means +HP io.
• (Viable)Mu Mastery - Mu is only good in certain scenarios, mainly in end drain builds. Powerboost powersink can actually wreck someone's end bar and the guardian pet can continue to wreak havoc on someone's end bar. Although surge of power might seem great, because of DR it'll probably end up being much more useless than it looks because ranged characters are already often times soft DR capped on res so at most you'll get 5-10% more res from surge of power. May as well take it though right?
• (Viable)Psionic Mastery - Psionic mastery actually used to be pretty good in the old patch because you needed tohit to autocast snipes. But now that that's all over with the only real utility this build gets is having higher than normal res to psi (still a very common damage type in pvp).
• (Viable)Ice Mastery - Ice mastery might look really good and survivable but it really isn't. Luckily frozen armor can be slotted with unbreakable guard +HP but you're still stuck with a defense shield which drastically brings down your survivability. Hibernate is useless, if you hibernate in zones, you will be assassin striked the second you come out. If you hibernate in arena during a spike, chances are you will die in hibernate animation. Hibernate is actually not bad in 1v1s though so if you plan on doing strictly a 1v1 build it might not be a bad choice. You should already be close to HP cap so hoarfrost is really just equivalent to a 2 green insp pop every 3 mins (not worth it). Sleet is actually the best part of this set because it can be double slotted with -res procs (annihilation and achilles) bringing its non-DR'd -res to around -60% which is pretty strong. Overall though this set is not very survivable and if you're set on going hibernate go with leviathan instead for the res shield and pet.
• (Not Viable)Soul Mastery - This set is chalk full of PBAOE buffs that require acc checks, if you're spending your precious hold duration time walking up to your opponent to soul drain them for that 6.8% damage buff you're asking to get smacked around. Everything in this set is trash except for the pet (actually got the best pet of all dom APPs/PPPs) and the fact that you get a res shield. Now if people stop moving and group up together in groups of 8 then just maybe this set might become viable.

Edited September 4, 2019 by M3z

[Shoulung]

Thanks for the write up, will be useful if I ever see pvp on Indom.

[William Valence]

13 hours ago, M3z said:

(Viable)Dark control has 6 second base duration hold, longer than all the other hold durations which are at 4. This is bugged and I would expect it to be fixed so I wouldn't make dark control for the broken hold duration. Also if you pick this set you are a cornball.

Has it been confirmed that dark control can *actually* hold for more than 4s?

 

Not that it has a duration for more than 4s, but that a player affected by it is held for longer than 4s?

[CR Banana Man]

Yes

[William Valence]

8 hours ago, CR Banana Man said:

Yes

Is it all CC that is capable of exceeding 4s, or just this one specific hold?

 

Player CC should be hard-capped at 4s when in PvP. If all CC is capable of working past 4s then that whole chunk isn't working.

[M3z]

There really shouldn't be any auto mez system in pvp to begin with because it's impossible to balance. Also there are other holds/stuns that exceed 4 seconds, but value is lowered by hold resistance like acrobatics or mez res toggles.

 

The main issue with mez system is that there is no real counterplay to it like the old system (where breakfrees/mez protect toggles countered mezzes). You just get autoheld and hope you don't die from AS or blasters.

 

Another issue with the current mez system is it completely guts the primary purpose of dominators/controllers which is to hold/lockdown enemies. Sure they can hold a target but only marginally longer than other classes (doms/controllers hold for 4 second base, everyone else holds for 2 second base). This difference  in hold duration hardly makes a difference for these classes and makes these classes worse in zones/1v1s and broken in competitive team arena.

 

Here is a common scenario in pvp for dominators. You run into a blaster, you trade holds (they char you, you fossilize them), your hold lasts around 2.5 seconds, there's last probably around 1.6-1.8 seconds or something like that(everyone runs acrobatics so hold durations are diminished). That tiny insignificant difference in mez duration is all mez classes have right now to defend themselves and to create set ups (controllers need to set up debuffs and allow pets to come in etc) or damage differentials(doms need to dish out enough damage before the blaster comes out of the hold, which is usually only 1 attack). Blaster comes out of hold duration with 12 seconds of complete cc immunity, pops BU and crushes you.

 

Not saying this game should be balanced around 1v1 scenarios like that, but I feel these classes have no real purpose anymore and are merely blasters(controllers are only really viable as emps right now) with slightly longer holds. I won't even go into the other mezzes because they simply do not matter(they all have 2-4 second durations).

 

Old mez system had problems before but at least there was counterplay. Pvp right now for dominators is a damage race that you will most likely lose against, corrs, blasters, defenders, sentinels etc.

 

That said these much needed buffs definitely do help but do not fix the underlying mechanics issues in pvp right now.

[William Valence]

The reason I'm asking is there's supposed to be a hard-coded limit to mez in PvP to keep it from exceeding 4s.

 

That's why I'm asking if people see the mez actually apply longer than 4s or is it just people seeing the duration on the power being higher than 4s.

[M3z]

With defender powerboost+weaken you can get hold durations for 10-15 seconds I think.

 

But yeah for sure the dark hold lasts longer than 4 seconds.

 

Edit: also you have things like corruptor beam rifle that has lancer shot that has 4 second base stun (stuns are better in pvp than holds because there is less stun resistance in general) further nullifying any reason to play a dom or controller for mezzes.

Edited September 5, 2019 by M3z

[William Valence]

Bit of a strange request I know, but I don't have a character with dark control and the test server isn't set to allow me to just get one at the moment. Could someone make a video with them using the dark hold on someone who's just running? The person getting hit should just be holding the run forward button the whole time to show the first frame they regain control.

 

Extra credit if the target player is held for more than 6s.

 

If no one is able to I'll just wait until the test server is swapped back and dual box it.

[macskull]

3 hours ago, William Valence said:

Bit of a strange request I know, but I don't have a character with dark control and the test server isn't set to allow me to just get one at the moment. Could someone make a video with them using the dark hold on someone who's just running? The person getting hit should just be holding the run forward button the whole time to show the first frame they regain control.

 

Extra credit if the target player is held for more than 6s.

 

If no one is able to I'll just wait until the test server is swapped back and dual box it.

I can personally guarantee that it's possible to be held more than six seconds. I was helping a friend out on his stream using this exact method and was held for something like 13 seconds. It's not just the dark hold, it's any mez.

 

This hard-coded mez duration limit isn't a thing, AFAIK, and if it's supposed to be this is the first time I'm hearing about it.

Edited September 8, 2019 by macskull

[William Valence]

Like I said, strange request, but it would be helpful. Heck of you have a link to a vod of your friend's stream I may be able to see what I need there.

 

And if no one can/wants to, that's fine, I'm not the boss of anyone and I'll do it when the test server changes over.

[macskull]

2 hours ago, William Valence said:

Like I said, strange request, but it would be helpful. Heck of you have a link to a vod of your friend's stream I may be able to see what I need there.

 

And if no one can/wants to, that's fine, I'm not the boss of anyone and I'll do it when the test server changes over.

This was a couple weeks ago so the VoD isn't there anymore and he didn't clip it. Basically we were checking what the longest duration hold we could put together was (Clarion, Power Boost, Vanguard Medal, ED-capped Dark Grasp) and it was something like 13 seconds. The mez procs (i.e. Executioner's Contract) have also been verified to last longer than 4 seconds.