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Magentrix

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  1. Magentrix
    Not that much. The lion's share of the defense you're stacking will be from set bonuses, not powers.
  2. Magentrix
    Flux is basically right. While ranged might save some minor repositioning time compared to a melee character, the fact is that the marginal gain in lock time a ranged toon might enjoy over a melee toon is more than swamped by the melee toons being able to a) take the alpha strike b) do far more damage per activation and damage per endurance.

    Where ranged toons tend to really catch up in terms of damage done is higher target caps and areas of effect for their AOEs, but in my experience, that's really only relevant for knocking down minions slightly faster. There's also some merit to the notion that if you're on a team heavy with melee pets, you may have less trouble with collision, but in general I find this to be a rare occurrence.
  3. Magentrix
    Really, I think Gravity gets a bad rap, at least as far as Dominators are concerned. Does it have a lot of skippable powers? Yes, definitely. But the single target hold is as good as any controller's, the -fly and slows on almost everything are very handy, the lack of knockback protection on the immobilizes makes teaming with Earth/Ice controllers lots of fun, and the Singularity is the best pet in the game, bar none. And while I do wish Wormhole affected a larger area, it's still AWESOME. It fires around corners and lets you position mobs according to your will. With Energy as my secondary it stacks mags to let you stun bosses long before permadom.

    It's not the mammoth of control that Earth is, nor the damage powerhouse that fire is, but rather a finesse control set that rewards making good choices about your power use and slotting.
  4. Magentrix

    Fire/Energy

    POST-ACTION

    My advice: Roll a Mind/Fire/Fire or Grav/Fire/Fire Dominator and wonder whatever in the world you were wasting your time with a Blaster for.
  5. Magentrix
    I built the character for doing what I feel a Bane does best: Being a stalker with better team support abilities. If you'd rather have the pets than Web Cocoon, by all means, drop it, get Reinforcements and slot Expedient Reinforcement instead. I choose Cocoon because in addition to being a single target hold that's far better than any other non-controller/dominator hold, it's also a substantial recharge debuff, which makes fighting tough EBs/AVs a lot easier. By comparison, I find non-controlled pets to generally be more trouble than they're worth. YMMV.

    Anyway, my point isn't to tell you: Copy my build. It's to give you a jumping off point to see what you can do with a Bane. By all means, switch out powers, take the toolkit that's comfortable for you.

    PS: Unbreakable Constraint is a LOT cheaper than the hugely expensive Armageddon, Apocalypse and Hecatomb sets.
  6. Magentrix
    You can do a lot better, imo. You're not defense-capped melee or AOE out of stealth, and with only 2 slots in Summon Blaster, you're not getting anything really useful out of hasten. You didn't get TT:Assault or TT:Leadership, and trade it for a somewhat yawny Disruptor Blast.

    Use this as a starting point:

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    This build has more recharge, better recovery, better defense, better resistance, double assault and more than double the global damage buff, and really only gives up hasten (not important when your longest attack cooldown is 20 seconds), an underslotted pet and one of the worst AOE powers around.
  7. Magentrix
    Having played both AR and DP corruptors, I can say with confidence that DP is the superior set. DP has a complete single target attack chain, an excellent resistance debuff power in piercing shots in lieu of the snipe, and higher target caps for their high tier AOE powers than AR. The flexibility of swap ammo is also nice on teams, though when your'e soloing, you'll rarely if ever move off of incendiary.

    Also, DP just feels more engaging and thematically consistent. With my AR/Traps character, my highest DPS move vs. single targets was to immobilize my target and spray ignite at their feet. Effective, sure, but really kind of unsatisfying compared to the fast barrage of pistol fire you can chain together with DP.

    On the Traps/Devices front, I will definitely recommend a traps corruptor over a devices blaster. You'll spend a bit more time gunning stuff down, but /Traps is a monster set, able to solo with ease, offering fantastic buffs to your team and crippling debuffs to your enemies. Match it up with Mace Mastery and you'll have a character which can easily reach the Smashing/Lethal soft cap, immobilize entire spawns with Web Envelope and gun them down. A devices blaster has more raw offensive output, but not nearly as much survivability or team benefit.
  8. Magentrix
    If you want to do damage, Scrapper. If you want to be a hybrid damage dealer/tank, Brute. Where brutes really show their mettle is in terms of their higher base health and resist caps. Properly buffed, a Brute is just a hair softer than a pure Tanker, and nearly as damaging as a Scrapper.
  9. Magentrix
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by BigBoss Eyepatch View Post
    Yep I took tough.

    I just kinda figured the numbers would be bigger is all, which accounted for my earlier scepticism. Also I kinda thought the 20% applied to your overall totals, which made me think that with the 2/3 ED bypassed I could hope for a good bit more than 2.6% resistance to exotic damage types.

    True though that most energy attacks have a smashing element to them, and so do ice ones, but some dont and them that don't hurt an invul tanker when they hit but good, or can do
    Don't be deceived by the small numbers. If that 8% resistance to smashing/lethal pushes you from 82% to 90% resistance, it nearly doubles your effective health vs. smashing/lethal attacks. As you approach the defense and resist caps, your marginal gains from each percentage point of improvement grows.
  10. Magentrix
    Jikibao, I think you're mistaking the valence of Person34's statement. He's saying that his stalkers are jealous of his bane, not vice-versa.
  11. Magentrix
    Quote:
    Placate>Crowd Control
    For YOU. Not for your team. Placate makes a mob ignore you and start pounding your teammates.
  12. Magentrix
    I agree with EricHough. Global recharge and damage should be your slotting priorities as a Dominator, defense should make a distant third. Your best defense is your enemies being unable to retaliate, not passive defenses. Frequent and generous use of Synaptic Overload and Tesla Cage will keep you far safer than all that melee defense you're gunning for.

    Also, Neuronic Shutdown on Tesla Cage is horrible. Do yourself a favor and slot a Damage set into your single target hold, you'll be using it a lot, its damage is very respectable, and by and large recharge is more important than duration for purposes of stacking magnitude. I frankenslot mine with 4x Devastation and 2x Lockdown for a 6% global damage boost, plus nice solid enhancement numbers for the power itself.

    Overall, you seem to be very light on damaging powers. Don't sell your secondary short, dead enemies don't fight any harder than held ones, and your ancillary nukes don't have very good uptime. At least grab power push, it's got fantastic damage for its animation time, and the soft control is also not to be overlooked.
  13. Magentrix
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Steel_Shaman View Post
    Very nice. I must admit due to my Stalkers I'm a big fan of Placate. But that double Assault does sound sexy.... That's what I like about SoA's. There are lots of different ways to build them effectively.
    Definitely. I also really love the flexibility and power of the VEATs. And I'm not suggesting that Placate is a bad pick, it's just a much more solo-oriented power, and this build is very much about being a group-based shock-trooper.

    Quote:
    Originally Posted by EricHough View Post
    Mind you, I don't completely agree with Magentrix about the pets - the disruptor bots are some of the most durable and useful pets that soldiers get. Unlike the spiderlings in the crab tree they stay at range, so AoE attacks don't wipe them out and they have some nice controls to add. But a single target hold with a 50% recharge debuff is also a nice power and it will be up more reliably than the pets.
    Totally legit, again, I'm not trying to diss the pet powers, just stating my preference, and in particularly my feeling that Web Cocoon is quite underrated, combining a nice single target hold with a vicious debuff for those that are resisting the hold. They each have their trade offs, though. The pets will give you better damage when they're up, and you can definitely have them up for important fights, the hold will be more consistently available and offer a higher median of safety, but don't increase your rate of turning endurance into infamy/xp.

    Quote:
    Originally Posted by EricHough View Post
    I will throw out a thought about placate - since you don't have full crits on a bane it isn't a good damage enhancing power - due to the cast time you will end up cutting into your DPS even with the crits - basically, in order for placate to increase your DPS you need get full crits AND use it to crit on an attack that has a longer cast time than placate - otherwise you are better off just using the faster casting attack. Even on a stalker with full crits its only worth it on attacks like midnight grasp, soaring dragon or disembowel. It is a nice control/aggro shedding power though, so its still worth taking.
    Definitely true, however, in a group the control aspect isn't really there, and I build my toons with a focus on teaming. Placating a mob doesn't stop it from attacking, it just stops it from attacking ME. Placate definitely makes soloing tough Elite Bosses (and even AV's) much, much easier.
  14. Magentrix
    Brutes definitely wind up being tougher when you sink money/time into them. They have higher base hit points and a higher resistance cap. Scrappers solo more easily with less investment, since they're much more front-loaded, but with a Cardiac Alpha slot, a Willpower brute will never run out of endurance and will average much more damage. And properly buffed, you'll have tanker resists and the best damage output in the game.
  15. Magentrix
    My bane:

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    I slot resistance powers more heavily, cough up placate (DPS loss anyway), and Venom Grenade (screw redraw). No pets, no web envelope, this build really focuses on making the Bane into the best stalker I could make it. Note in particular the 27.5% buff to global damage, plus double assault, which has shatter doing over 1000 damage from hide.
  16. Magentrix
    Your taunt duration may increase, but I don't believe it will delay the explosion of the bomb, and once the bomb is destroyed, it moves off the AI's threat table.
  17. Magentrix
    Why does everyone put the throwaway Basilisk's Gaze into their single target hold? It's only the best and most flexible control power you get, why you'd want to gut it for a crummy 7.5% recharge boost when you're already over the perma-hasten threshold is beyond me. Franken-slot it for damage and hold duration. I use 4x Devastation/2x Lockdown for a nice 6% boost to global damage, plus solid numbers for virtually every aspect of the power.
  18. Magentrix
    FWIW, I think going with Spiritual is a mistake. First of all, you're already well over the permadom threshold with set bonuses alone, so the extra recharge isn't going to give you anything you don't enjoy already.

    Second, the only stun power you possess is Boxing, which is a whopping 10% chance for a 4 second stun, so all you're getting out of spiritual of any note at all is improved aid-self. Yawn.
  19. Magentrix
    I would drop the pets before I dropped Web Cocoon. This is a highly underrated power. Even against an opponent which can shrug off the hold, the 50% debuff to recharge is VERY strong. 2 applications of this will floor the recharge of most enemies, and being able to neutralize two enemies in quick succession at the outset of a fight is friggen awesome.

    The bots, on the other hand, underwhelm me. Sure, they're a lot of damage when they're up, but your low recharge makes their uptime pretty weak, and their AI makes them do retarded things: Suicide by melee, spamming holds on minions that will die in less time than it takes to animate their attack, aggroing other spaws, etc.
  20. Magentrix
    Total Domination, no question. Yes, all your claw-based powers have redraw, but TD won't come up but once every minute or so, even with the huge amounts of recharge you're standing on.
  21. Magentrix

    Most DPS?

    POST-ACTION

    How so? Fire's single-target attacks are better for DPA than Dark by a longshot, and its AOE is better to boot. And it has better be, it's got no secondary effects.
  22. Magentrix
    Vengeance gets 1 luck of the gambler +recharge. Do 4 days of tip missions and you can get one.
  23. Magentrix
    Definitely. 20 foot radius with a target cap of 16? Proc it up.

    Of course, I think it's a great candidate for 6 pieces of Obliteration, as well, depending on whether you want melee defense or not. But it's definitely a power that will do well slotted.
  24. Magentrix

    Most DPS?

    POST-ACTION

    The correct answer is Fire/Fire brute. They have the highest damage cap in the game, with the most damaging primary/secondary for the AT.
  25. Magentrix
    Gravity really only has one drawback, IMO: Bad radius of effect on Wormhole.