Chromium_Man

You probably could have guessed from my forum name or sig that I support the idea of a powered armor power set or AT. A few years ago (probably seven-ish) I had an idea for a powered armor AT that had a mix of range/melee/armor. The trade off was that the AT would have 0% recovery and would have to manage the suits "energy" using just powers from the primary and secondary (not fitness). I had the idea of a power that would sap the users HP and turn it into END. It was very thematic but I'm sure the forums ate it a long time ago.

Back on topic: One power set I think is missing from the game and I haven't really ever seen mentioned before is a "Super Team" Mastermind. The character plays the role of the MM (Support) and the three levels of pet would represent a Blaster-ish Toon, a Tank-ish Toon, and a Controller-ish Toon. You'd only get four pets, but it would be a cool concept, like if your toon was running around with Fusionette (blaster), Frostfire (troller) and Faultline (tank). Then again, it might be lame if multiple people had the same set on a team and the pets were all identical but supposed to be different...

If you're misremembering, than I am too because I thought the synergy bonus was just for owning the power.

In regards to the OP's question, my personal preference is to always opt for a primary, secondary, or even epic power over a pool power. In a particularly loose build you might find room for five powers from the same pool, but even without seeing the exact stats on the new fighting powers I would think that the bare minimum to get tough and weave is enough.

That being said, I have two caveats:

1) I understand the temptation to take all the powers from a set. When the new sorcery power pool "leaked", I instantly started thinking of ways to incorporate all five powers into a build. When people started speculating that Sorcery would be one of five origin themed pool powers my head nearly exploded. Whether the new Fighting powers are worth the effort or not, I love the period of speculation that the OP, I, and I'm sure many others are experiencing.

2) I recently rolled an Time/Energy Defender and as I choose powers for him I find myself consciously choosing powers that I want for my concept despite the fact that I am usually a borderline min/maxer. It appears to me that with i24, the so-called "Fix Everything Issue", the devs are trying to make a lot of previously unpopular power decisions more desirable. My point is that my gut tells me that the line between power gamer and concept player is going to become more blurred soon, so if you want to take all 5 fighting powers and it's fun to play then do what you want and nuts to everything else.

I agree with Greyhame. I have three level 50 Dominators, all leveled from 1 to 50 completely PL free and the learning curve for all three is very different.

First up was Fire/Fire which is about as straight forward as it comes. He attained 50 before the Domination change, back when Dom used to give a damage bonus. He's been sitting and collecting dust more or less since he hit 50.

My second was Elec/Elec. A bit less straightforward and more strategy oriented. I liked (loved!) the toon enough to put a lot of work and effort into him and he has become my main toon. He has Perma-Dom and then some even though the time and energy I put into attaining Perma-Dom would probably have been better on my Fire/Fire. Dom does not affect Static Field, nor does it effect anything beyond the first target in Synaptic Overload, so the greatest benefit I get from it is in the free End refill every 90 seconds and the mez protection. While mez prot is a little less required in the Clarion-era, having mez protection from my inherent power has allowed me to go a different way and work on Barrier for my Destiny power.

I play DA missions at +4/x8 with him. The first mob gets nailed by Judgement, survivors run into the sleep patch and get dispatched. By that point, Dom has usually triggered. The next mob gets Held en masse by Paralytic Blast and summarily dispatched as well. For the third mob, I hit Barrier and enjoy enough invincible time to get the mob thoroughly locked down and quickly destroyed. Lather, rinse, repeat.

Compare that to my Blaster who has a very similar high recharge build. Without Domination, he has no mez protection, and so relies on Clarion to keep from getting chain-mezzed and murdered. Slotting Clarion means no Barrier, so already his survivability is much lower compared to my Dom. He has three holds, but needs a minimum of two applications to lockdown anything higher than a LT. I can use Judgement on a mob, but if there is more than one boss, there's no way I can juggle all the holding and still dish out enough damage to actually kill them. On the Elec Dom, Domination allows me to lockdown three bosses in perpetuity. My Blaster used to be my main, but with Perma-Dom my Dominator surpasses him in almost every conceivable way. And this is on a toon where I was fully aware going in that Perma-Dom is less effective due to the nature of Elec Control.

Speaking of less effective with Perma-Dom, I recently rolled and level-capped an Ice/Ice/Ice Dom. The Sleep power stinks, the Confuse is unaffacted AFAIK, and the hallmark power of the set, Ice Patch, gains no benefit from Domination at all. I rolled the toon when I was doing what I call "buff prospecting". I roll a toon using sets that are known to underperform hoping that someday I will reap the benefits of a buff. (P.S. It usually doesn't work, but it paid off in spades with my Gravity Controller.) Again, even knowing Perma-Dom is less necessary, I plan on making it a build goal just for the End refill (Ice/Ice is toggle heavy) and mez protection.

In my experience, not all Doms are created equally. The OP said his was Elec/Elec and the truth is that if the mez protection and end refill aren't enough for you, than Perma-Dom probably isn't necessary on that build. You might try to roll a Dominator who can take advantage of the full range of abilities given by Perma-Dom. Fire/, Dark/, and Plant/ come to mind.

Prospective Build:

I'll also double check to make sure those work.