Augury

I actually enjoy playing Augury because she's -not- misunderstood. She's just cold and selfish. And on the same hand she's still a human and has the human side that makes her far easier to relate to. This actually seems to be a common theme in CoV's "canon" and I like it very much.

Villains need not be either misunderstood or simply cackling mad evil with no human side. Most humans are perfectly capable of acting heinously towards some while acting like a compassionate caring being to others. Villains just take the divide and place it a little further down the line.

If there's one thing I've learned while playing MMORPGs it's that you RP aside from game mechanics, not around them. Trying to "explain" non RP things in an RP way tends to just lead to headaches.

For me, anything that doesn't specifically happen in an IC mode of operation with other IC people around didn't happen at all if I choose for it not to have happened. Therefore I have no problems accepting missions my villain wouldn't, my team doesn't RP in the heat of combat anyway. Why insist that it happened and then try and reason it out when just saying it didn't will save me so many headaches?

I know my healing will be somewhat inferior, but still reasonably solid as a backup healer, especially with spirit tree, so I'm willing to roll with that. I was under the mistaken impression only dark and radiation could heal, thanks for clearing that up.

Your second and third point actually somewhat tie in together. My two ice blasts will be actually very end light, which they need to be considering I can't fit stamina in anywhere. If I took more blasty powers I'd probably wind up overshooting on my end usage.

I'm not too concerned about the mez powers taking a lot of end, due to their long recharge they'll probably be less end heavy than my Aid Other/Self and my single target hold.

Domination was a little slow when I teamed last night, but I think it will be better, if a little slow, but definately bearable later on.

Thanks for your input!

Oh and before I forget, why exactly do you suggest switching chilling embrace out? Is it the aggro it generates or ... well, something else?

Not going to post my info here, since I have a mostly fixed team I go with. I will however say this since they're my pet AT:

Teams need doms! Doms come in lot of flavors from the uber controlly plants to the more blasty gravs. Doms can plug up control holes and blasting holes, they can tie up those pesky mezzing/deadly/etc bosses and lts so the rest of the team has an easier time of it.

Don't shun dominators, you won't regret it.

Please don't mind the slotting. I just added them for how many slots they will have at level 40, not for order. I'll figure that out as I go along.


Archetype: Dominator
Primary: Plant Control
Secondary: Icy Assault
---------------------------------------------
01) --> Strangler==> Acc(1) Acc(3) Acc(3) Hold(5) Hold(5) Hold(37)
01) --> Ice Bolt==> Acc(1) Acc(11) Slow(21) Slow(37) EndRdx(39)
02) --> Ice Sword==> Acc(2)
04) --> Roots==> Acc(4)
06) --> Aid Other==> Heal(6) Heal(7) Heal(7) Rechg(9) IntRdx(9) IntRdx(19)
08) --> Seeds of Confusion==> Acc(8) Acc(11) Rechg(13) EndRdx(13)
10) --> Spore Burst==> Acc(10) Acc(15) EndRdx(15)
12) --> Hasten==> Rechg(12) Rechg(17) Rechg(17)
14) --> Super Speed==> Run(14)
16) --> Power Boost==> Rechg(16)
18) --> Vines==> Acc(18) Acc(19) Acc(21) Rechg(23) Rechg(23) Rechg(25)
20) --> Aid Self==> Heal(20) Heal(25) Heal(27) Rechg(27) IntRdx(29) IntRdx(29)
22) --> Stimulant==> IntRdx(22)
24) --> Resuscitate==> Rechg(24) Rechg(31) Rechg(31)
26) --> Carrion Creepers==> Rechg(26) Rechg(33) Rechg(36) Acc(37)
28) --> Spirit Tree==> Rechg(28) Rechg(31) Rechg(33)
30) --> Whirlwind==> EndRdx(30) EndRdx(33) EndRdx(34)
32) --> Fly Trap==> Acc(32) Acc(34) Dmg(34) Dmg(36) Dmg(36)
35) --> Chilling Embrace==> EndRdx(35)
38) --> Bitter Ice Blast==> Acc(38) Acc(39) TH_DeBuf(39) Slow(40) Slow(40) EndRdx(40)
---------------------------------------------
01) --> Sprint==> Empty(1)
01) --> Brawl==> Empty(1)
01) --> Domination==> Empty(1)
02) --> Rest==> Empty(2)


So I decided to make a dominator that was far more team oriented, almost like a controller. Why? Because my girlfriend made a build that was sort of like that, and I was interested by it and further spurred on by the dominator popularity thread.

Primary areas of control/team usefulness:

Controlling <ul type="square">[*]Strangler (single hold)[*]Roots (AoE immob)[*]Seeds of Confusion (cone confuse)[*]Spore Burst (AoE sleep)[*]Vines (AoE hold)[/list]Healing <ul type="square">[*]Aid other &amp; self[*]Stimulant[*]Resuscitate[*]Spirit tree[/list]Slow/Debuff/Knockback <ul type="square">[*]Ice bolt (short duration slow/domination builder)[*]Bitter Ice Blast (slow/acc debuff/damage)[*]Carrion Creepers (slow, -speed, knockdown, immob, soft control)[*]Chilling Embrace (PBAoE slow toggle)[*]Whirlwind (PBAoE knockback)[/list]
I'll be slotting all recharge heavy powers for minimum 2, usually 3 recharge, and take hasten. I will be taking power boost for added control boost. I will be using ice bolt and holds to build domination.

The best thing about this build is that most of my powers for control will be available frequently (vines being the only one not available as often). Between haste and the recharge stuck into cone of confusion I will have confusion available a little bit after it wears off, or straight after. Same for sleep. Vines should be available once for most fights. Carrion creepers a little bit less unfortunately, but it can't be helped.

I'll be able to single target slow pretty solidly using ice bolt (bitter ice blast will make it better but this will be once my character is topped out in level). I'll be able to slow in a PBAoE effect if I feel brave enough. Between spirit tree and aid self and whirlwind for emergencies I feel confident I can stay alive despite the aggro chilling embrace might incur. Whirlwind and carrion creepers will knock things all over the place if needed.

My healing will be lacking until I get spirit tree and properly get it slotted for recharge. Once I get it between that and aid other/self I'll probably be reasonable at it, which considering its one of 3 or 4 areas of utility, is more than I expected. Resuscitate will help a lot too as very few villains seem to have a rez power. Stimulant can help in a pinch, but I'm not sure how useful it'll be.

Add on top of that that I have a pet, and domination, and I should think this build should be a whirling dervish of slows, heals, controls and knockbacks.

Any input? I'm pretty pleased with this planning so far but if I've made any blatant errors, I'd certainly like to know.

Just for the record, this character is not meant to solo. Ever. Although possibly at 40 she could.

Hmm, if I recall correctly the info on the power, says something like gaining pleasure from the damage she causes. Which would imply more damage == more domination. Kinda counter intuitive to the way it actually works.

I'm hoping there'll be more on Augury in following bits of writing too. ^^; I'd write about her myself but my writing pales in comparison to Er's. (Er is a she btw, both IC and OOC)

By the way, I found out something very interesting in terms of domination gain. Much like brutes it doesn't matter how much damage your attack does, or even if it lands: any attack you fire off will gain you domination, and from what I gathered the same amount.

Though someone please correct me if I'm wrong this seems entirely accurate from my experience yesterday where I did nothing but fire off ice bolts unenhanced, and gained domination as quick if not quicker than my grav/enr which uses fully slotted, big damage attacks.

Of course if you're simply attacking normally I doubt you'd notice the difference, since it's slow to build up anyway and slow to go, unlike brutes. But still, this means you could make an effective dominator by taking no attack other than your quick low damage starting secondary.

I'm thinking of slotting it with 3 recharge and 1 acc. I'd slot it further but my build currently requires the slots elsewhere (I've squeezed as many in as I could, really).

I figure one acc SO should be enough to make it "fairly" accurate, and 3 recharges because... well, what good is a power that isn't available? I have hasten as well so it should be fairly available.

Okay, my bad. This should show me to actually delete an unused char to doublecheck if my sources have the up-to-date description. (the one I got my hands on was apparantly older and didnt mention the live, or the speed thing, or anything)

This actually sounds really great. Thanks for the information.

So that's it? You pay 25 endurance for an AoE that immobilizes, does a tiny bit of damage, and has a chance of knockback on attack, all that IF something dies in it?

... I really don't see what's so good about it then.

EDIT: I just noticed that while the fluff text says its immob upon death and summoning of a vine with minor damage and knockdown chance, the mouse over mentions -Speed, -Fly and -Jump. Count me confused. This power needs better description, damnit.

Can someone please tell me how carrion creepers work? And please, don't regurgitate the in game description because it tells me nothing about how it functions exactly, and I'd rather not wait til 26 to plan my character out. &gt;&lt;

Anyway, from what I gather you dump an AoE somewhere, that takes 1/4th of your endurance, innately does nothing, and WHEN someone dies (and if its inside the patch) nearby mobs get immobilized and you get a vine thats much like the ones in the respec mission tree room?

Or am I totally getting it wrong here? Reading the description it seemed pretty useless to me and I did some research and found that apparantly its a staple power and draws people alone to plants dom set. I just can't find -why- it's so good and what it does, beyond the basic uninformative description from the game.

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Yep, it all evens out. Although technically they are as squishy as eachother, Corruptors could easily last longer.

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Evens out? You have got to be joking. The heals are nice, so are the buffs and debuffs. But lets face it, there's no balance between the two classes.

Did you check the class descriptions in CoV when creating a new char? It says that a corruptor has HIGH damage, and a secondary buff/debuff. Only... if it's high damage, why do some people expect me to be a SUPPORT class? I don't think anyone expects a blaster to act a supporting role.

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You might want to not balk so much at your buffing secondaries. From what I've seen some of them can make a corruptor way more powerful than your average blaster.

Plus why people expect you to do support? Because corruptors get the powersets to do so, unlike anyone else. Nobody expects corruptors (at least not unless they want to) to stand still with their eye focussed on the health bars like defenders, but when they're the only ones with the heals it might be a nice way to avert team wipes and xp debt, huh?

Well, I haven't bothered to time it myself but if CoH/CoV Character Builder has the right figures (which it's a distinct possibility it doesn't) then I think only dominators' AoE holds are shorter. (holds and such, not immobilization)

Personally I'd like to get a red to clear this up.

Ah, teaming slowing down domination gain could be it for me. I never really solo. I guess if I were I'd be using more damage and thus probably raising domination faster.

Power boost is a godsend. Shame that it's so required though, since not every secondary has it.

I'm actually thinking of making a controllerish dominator now. It'd be fun, if you ask me. But then again, in CoH I made a scraptroller, so I guess I like using ATs for things they're not meant for.

Domination up as soon as it recharges? I have a lot of pretty tough cookie blasty and melee powers and I've basically -never- managed that. At least not after 20 and certainly not after 30. O_o

How annoying. I heard in another thread (if I interpreted it correctly) that if you phase shift and toggle invisibility they'll lose you as their target.

Can anyone verify that?

My girlfriend surprised me yesterday. She made a plants controller. Sure, AT was dominator, but she didn't take any of the attacks from her energy pool!

It's actually kinda neat to think that you could reasonably focus on control at the cost of damage dealing abilities on a dominator. I wonder how close to a controller's control you could get one if you really tried.

In this case though, she did it because I made a stalker alt and told her I can crit held and slept critters.

So I'm starting a stalker. I have a question about hide, wether it's just my dumb luck, or working as intended. If you return to hidden while in combat, is it normal for mobs still to shoot at you or whack you in melee, causing you to get unhidden?

I really ought to make a secondary dom who focusses on melee over ranged (aug focusses on ranged with a pinch of melee). Any suggestions for a secondary?

And a primary, for that matter.

I'm thinking of getting acrobatics post 40. Like... I7. I just really can't find a place in my build for it without compromising the theme powers I really want for cool factor. I figure it can't be all -that- bad since I don't intend to tank very much and I'm getting protection to pretty much everything else.

Anyway, thanks for the advice. And yes blazing aura is an end hog. It also makes me an aggro hog, but its nice to one shot brawl a minion who was at low health because of it.

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I love sea nymph my Plant/fire domi but I agree they seem to be the least common AT much like controlers in COH.

IMO I think they are a great AT as you get to control the field and least you can defend yourself if need be not like a controler.

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It's great to be controlling and take a little break in your schedule to two hit that stray minion who comes up and beats on you with bonesmasher+total focus.

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Exported from Ver: 1.7.1.0 of the CoH_CoV Character Builder
---------------------------------------------
Name: Sun Viper
Level: 41
Archetype: Brute
Primary: Fiery Melee
Secondary: Fiery Aura
---------------------------------------------
01) --&gt; Fire Sword==&gt; Acc(1)Acc(3)Dmg(31)Dmg(40)
01) --&gt; Fire Shield==&gt; DmgRes(1)DmgRes(3)DmgRes(5)EndRdx(15)
02) --&gt; Blazing Aura==&gt; Acc(2)Dmg(5)Dmg(9)EndRdx(13)EndRdx(25)EndRdx(36)
04) --&gt; Scorch==&gt; Acc(4)Acc(7)Dmg(33)Dmg(40)
06) --&gt; Healing Flames==&gt; Heal(6)Heal(7)Heal(13)Rechg(15)Rechg(34)Rechg(40)
08) --&gt; Boxing==&gt; Acc(8)Acc(9)
10) --&gt; Cremate==&gt; Acc(10)Acc(11)Dmg(33)Dmg(39)
12) --&gt; Combat Jumping==&gt; DefBuf(12)
14) --&gt; Super Jump==&gt; EndRdx(14)
16) --&gt; Plasma Shield==&gt; DmgRes(16)DmgRes(17)DmgRes(17)
18) --&gt; Tough==&gt; DmgRes(18)DmgRes(19)DmgRes(19)EndRdx(37)
20) --&gt; Consume==&gt; Acc(20)Rechg(21)Rechg(21)Rechg(23)
22) --&gt; Build Up==&gt; Rechg(22)Rechg(23)Rechg(25)
24) --&gt; Swift==&gt; Run(24)
26) --&gt; Health==&gt; Heal(26)Heal(27)Heal(27)
28) --&gt; Stamina==&gt; EndMod(28)EndMod(29)EndMod(29)
30) --&gt; Fire Sword Circle==&gt; Acc(30)Acc(31)Dmg(31)Dmg(37)Dmg(37)
32) --&gt; Greater Fire Sword==&gt; Acc(32)Acc(33)EndRdx(34)Dmg(34)Dmg(39)Dmg(39)
35) --&gt; Fiery Embrace==&gt; Rechg(35)Rechg(36)Rechg(36)
38) --&gt; Rise of the Phoenix==&gt; EndMod(38)
---------------------------------------------
01) --&gt; Sprint==&gt; EndRdx(1)
01) --&gt; Brawl==&gt; Acc(1)Acc(11)
01) --&gt; Fury==&gt; Empty(1)
02) --&gt; Rest==&gt; Rechg(2)
---------------------------------------------


The closest I've ever gotten to playing a brute like AT was scrappers (not even tankers) and I'm a little confused about how they work, but I think I got a decent build for my F/F brute worked out.

Initially I'll be using dodge/boxing/scorch to build fury with some fire sword thrown in cause I like the visual and I already had to give up jump kick to make the build work, and refuse to budge further. ^_^

I'll be using cremate as a finisher. Won't be slotting for damage til late and even then I wont have 3 dam. I'll be relying on fury for most of my damage.

Toggles get a lot of end redux, blazing aura gets two because its the heaviest. I won't be taking acrobatics because I can live with knockback and can't fit it in. I won't be taking burn because I can live with immob and can't fit it in and was assured by the people I will be teaming with they'd handle it if it became a problem.

Healing flames and CJ/S.Leaping speak for themselves. So do fire shield, plasma shield, tough, consume, build up, swift, health, stamina.

I heavily slotted fire sword circle because I want to use it along with greater fire sword as my "big tricks". This fire/fire tanker will be a devestating, late blooming one two trick pony as far as I'm concerned.

I'm hoping I can stack build up and fiery embrace on a 100-200% increase from fury and I should have a 30ish BI AoE attack. That ought to nicely wipe out a densely packed group of minions, or at least soften them up enough for blazing aura to trickle away the last bits. If I don't have fury its still 22 BI, which is pretty damn spiffy still.

Similar on the greater fire sword though I also intend to use it as a normal finisher, hence the end redux. If I'm not wiping out minions with sword circle I can use this on a boss with build up and fiery embrace for a BI of at least 33, without fury.

Rise of the Phoenix I took because while many people hate res powers here's how I see it: I'm going to die at some point, you always do, pretending you don't is being overly optimistic. If I can use this power, come back, knock away mobs, stun them, get half my health and endurance back, gain more endurance gain on top of stamina, be invulnerable and safe against debt for a while, that means I can get up, do an AoE damage/knockback/stun effect, pop my toggles, pop healing flames, use consume and be utterly and completely back in action.

I know if I had such a power on my dominator I'd take it. That kinda thing can avert a team wipe and since this is a teamster, I kinda like the prospect of getting back up and whupping more [censored] to save the team after faceplanting.

So there's my build and why I made it the way it is. If I messed up or was misguided in my many many assumptions, please tell me! ^_^

Oh, sure, it can be really easy.

Say the person needing a respec is level 27.
You have 5 others who are 31 or 32.

You log off before every mission and have the level 27 enter the mission with one higher level PC who can run through the mission and ghost it.

Result? Mobs spawned for 2 players at level 29 and 30, 24 vines, and 5 players decked out with SOs who can mess up the core and defeat the ambush.

Of course if you do it with a bunch of 26s and 27s who all actually need the respec, it's really NOT that easy.

EDIT: I believe 34 is the minimum level to get another respec. I did it at 31 again and it wasn't an option.

I'm still not sure why people say the damage feels slow. It never does for me. Of course I haven't played a corruptor, couldn't deal with MMs and never played a blaster in CoH.

I hit 32 last night and got my singularity and I'm sitting here wondering how a loose cannon is supposed to really make me that much more powerful than normal. It'll probably be good soloing, but do sings do a damn thing for teams?

Also on another note. Levels 1-8 I felt pretty powerful on my dominator. Then it got a bit annoying 9-11. Then at 12 I got a few DOs but it didn't really help too much. I have to admit that the stretch from 12-27 is the worst. At 27 with tricks like respeccing out all your enhances (including DOs you picked up and slotted anywhere they could fit over TOs or empty slots to get full return value) you can - or I did - buy a full set of SOs for all the important stuff.

And then life gets a lot better.

I do agree doms need some love between around 10 and high twenties, because until you get into the high twenties your damage will probably be somewhat inferior and you'll possibly feel like a slightly gimped controller.

Having played my grav/enr dom to 32 though I have to say I would -never- play a controller over a dom again.