QuiJon

And yet for the most part i can do this now by just being selective off which radio mission i take. The travel time would probably be a wash being radios are all in one zone. And with stealth+SS or many other mixtures of powers in the game its pretty easily to stealth a blinky mission. Yet we dont nerf rewards for standard mission now do we? God can you just imagine the outcry from all those that complained to get AE changed if bonuses and rewards in the real game were based off effort and risk also?

Dominator controls are not that far off of controllers, all the end costs and recharges are EXACTLY the same, only the durations differ and not by much.

For instance since you example a fire dom

Dominator Controller
Char
17.9s duration 22.4s duration
Flash Fire
11.9s 14.9s
Cinders
11.9s 14.9s

Your talking at most a 4-5 second reduction, which when dominator are running domination they totally out duration a controller, and even in those lower levels you claim is such a problem, a dominator would be totally killing faster then any controller would solo. So im not to worried about losing 5 seconds on my Single target hold when it still has a base recharge of 8 seconds and i can easily stack it 3-4 times once its slotted up. Not when i am killing a mob way faster then using brawl or vet attacks which for the most part is a controllers only options for even decently fast killing at low levels.

Also in one post you claimed that when you used flashfire on your dom, you then for the next mob had to use cinders, and then for the next mob you didnt have a AOE control availible. Flashfire has a 90 second recharge. Once slotted that is even lower, and by 22 when you should have hasten 3 slotted with SOs that again is even faster. And your seriously telling me your complaining about losing DPS by bunny hopping but your working through 3 mobs solo at +1/x4 as you said fast enough that your AOE control with a 60 or so second recharge by that time isnt ready? Thats bad play? Thats substainal slow down to your playing style to fight 3 mobs within 90 seconds?

They compare more closely to a blaster, then they do a controller. I guess we could argue the point, but controllers were not intended to be damage dealers. Yes they have powers that do damage, namely pets, but most controllers dont get strait damage attacks until the epic power pools. Where as a dom, gets a mixture of control sets and damage sets from the begining. And and since the revamp dominator, the damage sets are close to being on par with a blaster. They do perfectly fine damage to slot early on at maybe one SO acc and 2 damage and be able to use those slots for controls. Especially with a set that is so -def like earth control is.

The bunny hopping playstyle you speak of is actually exactly how IMO a blaster survives. He attacks from range, picks a moment to move in and slap down some melee and backs off again etc. This playstyle works well for doms also, with the acception that IMO you need to concentrate on attacking the entire mob, not just a single strong enemy within it.

The same two attacks you complain about for a dominator are availible also on a fire blaster. They are different attacks, with different targeting mechanisms, yes you have to move to accomodate the targeting. But blasters have this same problem. Take my energy blaster, if i set off my explosive blast before energy torrent what do you think happens? I scatter a nice mob to hell and back and energy torrent wont pick them all up in its cone for a follow up attack. The difference is play knowledge, knowing what powers to pick up and use when. For instance on my fire/fire dom, i found the attack chain worked just fine when i used flashfire, firecages, and then moved in and set off combustion, and backed off again and used fire breath. But again the active defense, and activity in combat is what i like about dominators. I could play a brute sure, and just move into melee expect my defenses to keep me alive and just stand toe to toe soaking up damage and dishing it out. I find having to think, and place my character, use my attacks wisely to be much more fun.
And most dominator sets have more tools then JUST their AOE controls. However, again why i suggested that the OPer should have concentrated more on his primary set then only his secondary. If he had 5-6 slots on fossilize, and stalagmites and had Earth quake he would probably be just fine. He could hit stalagmites, fire off a fossilize on a boss, hit and AOE for damage while fossilize recharges, then hit the second hold on the boss, and drop and earthquake to keep minions bouncy. Then go back to using damage to take out minions.

The thing is many times, i fight the boss last. I can hold a boss even with only SOs pretty much indefinately so long as i keep track of him, and lets face it the minions and LTs are not exactly tough to deal with with soft controls like earthquake. If you operate under the impression that you should singly handedly be working on the boss and only let splash damage deal with the rest of the mob, ya your probably going to have issues.

And yet its the main reason many of us like doms and role multiples of them. Hey i guess its just a different strokes for different folks. However when taken time to learn, there is nothing wrong with how doms play. They dont play exactly like blasters or scrapper or brutes, or controllers or kheldians etc. They play like dominators. If thats not your thing, thats fine. I just dont understand coming then to the dom forums and offering advice to a new player trying to get his feet wet as to why you think he shouldnt try them or why you think they are borked. I dont like Villian Epic ATs, i dont go to their forums and be all like, "They suck they dont do what i want them to do." I made one and tried it, i dont like it, i moved on.

the problem is everyone compares them to controllers. They are much more suited to compare to a blaster. And i find them atleast as easy to level to 32 as a blaster and getting pets to be a much better reward then an action stopping nova.

Though that is true, a dominator for the most part dishes out much more damage then a controller in that level range (pre pets). So though for this discussion he is using stalagmites, earthquake, and fossilize for the most part. Stalagmites has enough of a duration that if his fossilize was fully being realized with 6 slots he could have the majority of a solo mob controlled by other means by the time it wears off. And in a couple levels he gets Volcanic Gases, which again will help stack up mez IMO much more effeciently then any of the other AOE holds because its duration is 1 minute, and the way it ticks helps keep mez stacked even on bosses.

You cant fight single mindedly as a dom. It just isnt effeicent. Even with the higher damage, you have an active defense by way of holds, stuns, etc. A typical dom fight solo, is much different then say a blaster or scrapper or brute. Where they might pick a hard target and hammer away until that target is dead, and then move on to the next, a dominator should be probably slapping down an AOE control, then hitting that harder target with a single target control, then attacking others in the mob and switching between applying controls around the mob and inflicting damage as he goes inbetween times. Focusing on one target alone solo, especially as this particular level, is going to be problematic on any dominator.

For a dominator my best suggestion is to movie bar fight. Dont go in and just pick the tough dude and ignore his buddies at the bar, you have to fight them all at once, cycle between enemies, apply a hold, attack the next target, then hold him, then move to the next target attack him, then hold him, then go back to the original target etc etc.

I personally found no problem maintaining an attack chain with /fire. I did a fire/fire and a earth/fire and found it acceptable. Keep in mind your level 24. You just barely hit SO levels, and still probably havent earned half the slots you will end up with by the level cap. Slot are hard to come by for all toons at this level, but you are earth. Almost all the powers in earth debuff defense in some way, even just QS which is almost always up, will help you until you get the ability to slot that second accuracy.

But if your attacks at level 24 are all 4 slotted already how is that leaving your controls? By level 24 i would personally have been making sure i had hasten and 3 slots on it, stamina 3 slots in it, and atleast my Single target hold 5 slotted, and for earth i would say some recharge atleast in earth quake and stalagmites decently slotted.

The thing to remember is that with a controller you said you would be able to debuff them into nothingness. You would do that by slotting your radiation powers or your debuffs in any set. If your have concentrated more on the assualt powers on a domiantor and lightly slotted controls, this might be a problem. Keep in mind you can take your time killing something, if its controlled. Your controls are your defense iwth a dominator.
Psi isnt highly resisted, but this is also reflected in the damage the powers do. And i agree with you that Psi took some getting used to. I probably made 3-4 psi toons before i really started enjoying one, and finally took a mind/psi to 50. If you havent tried it since they balanced the set you might give it another try. I think also now that i can color it other then pink, it moved up a bit on my scale also.

Thorny and ice assualt i havent cared for.

Earth i have one, but its not wowing me, but its fun since i like having matching sets for theme.

If your going to start a new one, i say try earth/fire. Earth has IMO one of the best aoe holds in the game, and there is nothing like dropping down a QS, leading a mob into it and dropping volcanic gases all from the saftey of a corner, then just running into a held group and hitting some decent AOEs on them. You also get consume earlier then waiting for a patron end regen tool, which allows you perhaps to save off on using domination as much and allows you to use it when you really need the control, status protection etc.

The only toons i have used purplels in are my 2 perma doms. My earth/fire has a set in his ST hold, with the proc in volcanic gases, and a set in his AOE Imbl, my mind/psi has 2 sets also in confuse and sleep.

They are effctive and worth it to me for perma dom, holding a boss in one shot is nice, and 90 seconds to a full end bar, and perma end free status protection. Otherwise no i havent seen a character yet i am willing to drop the money into for damage or such purple sets.

In doms they might not make you an AV killer, but they definately help for team or solo play.

I liked gravity, but some consider it a bad set due to a lack of early control. It might very well be better for concept, but now that you can color the powers, i can see using mind and be able to imagine that you are casting controls from energy and not dominating the mind. But for more of a challenge, ya grav/psi could work. I guess a dark dark defender or corruptor could also.

I actually agree with this on the same plane of thinking where i would argue not all movies are art either. But unfortunately its a subjective process.

Like i can watch Transformers and i dont care how much thought or design were put into it, i cant see a flaming turd like that movie as art. However a movie like star wars or a tv show like star trek, i could totally see justifiable as being art. They changed how people saw scifi, they changed the way movies were made, and even if they borrowed from other sources, IMO they are art.

Games are the same way, i can see something like "The Force Unleashed" or KOTOR and say its art, its intended to pull in the player and inspire choices, and consequences and to imerse someone in an experience. Where i see something like Halo where its basicly linear and shoot and duck and say as nice and well polished as the games are, they really dont qualify to me as art. They are just a shooter and do nothing new, and invoke no emotional response in me what so ever.

My thought, make him a dominator. THen in 6 months change him to a hero.

You want Dr. Strange you can go Mind/psi, you will have good control, you get confusion powers instead of pets, and your secondary will provide enough damage that you wont face plant trying to solo.

Though they do use blaster powers mostly, dominators IMO are much more survivable due to the defense that your control offers. I say give it whril, even if your not looking to be a villian, when you know you can change his sides later on, i say go ahead and try it, and just ignore the "evilness" of being a villian for a while.

I cant understand why this opprotunity isnt being taken to just combine the markets into one system to take atleast on inequity away from being a villian? Hell even for theme there is a black market truck parked in back of WW in talos, so its pretty obvious that the idea is the BM is leeching off WW anyway.

I was just meaning that for a natural/weapon based assualt set, it wouldnt really require you to create new powers, everything that needs to be sliced together is really in the game already.


This makes me feel better. But though i was sleepy, i dont recall hearing this in anything i have seen from hero-con yet. It just seemed to all be about playing the rogue or vigilante Archtypes (for lack of a better term i could think of). It made it sound, atleast to me, that a hero could fall to be a vigilante, but not truely a villian. But if what your saying is that i can infact say make my mastermind a true hero, then that makes me happier.


I guess now my only real concern is what this means for the zones. I could see a villian almost being forced to go rogue just to find the best teams and gain access to the more highly populated hero zones. I just wonder is there going to be any benefit at all for still really concentrating on being heroic, or villianous?

Sorry so far im dissappinted also.

First off, we have known of atleast these two new power sets for sometime. I am seriously hoping these are not the only two new sets. And why the heck do we not have a Dual Pistols for Dominators. It would be easy enough to use the DPs from the new set, mix in a couple martial arts attacks and make an assualt set it would seem to me. But over all i would expect that they would take the opportunity of the hero-con to introduce more new sets if they were going to exist.

Secondly, graphics... ok fine, i understand wanting to update the system, but honestly just to add things that many players wont probably use, or dont care about, seems like a waste of time. If they truely wanted to see major graphic updates, then why not be working on COH2 instead of an expansion?

Third, IMO the whole Going Rogue system is NOT what they sold to us. I know not alot of info was released, and players start to read things into comments. But IMO the devs have for months now let the players live, comment, and post on these forums with the idea that we were looking at true side switching in GR. Not this half ***** system of basicly becoming an outcast.

All this new system will do is make everyone choose to be nothing. No more heroes, no more villians, everyone will choose to be a rogue or a vigilante because that would be the only way to play both sides. It basicly is just making the game one big co-op zone. I should be able to CHANGE my alliances, not just break my old ones.

Not just that, but this would be the best time in the world to finally just incorperate combining all the markets into one big pool acrossed all the servers. An opprotunity that is being wasted by again having the new origins still have to pay alleigences to either wentworths or the Optimus Prime trucks.

It just seems all this expansion is doing is... well basicly nothing. From what has been announced, we are getting a couple new sets, we are getting a graphical bump, but nothing more. 6 months before villians launced we already knew way more about the game then we do this, and suposedly this was to be as big of a content update as villains was?

I just know at the moment, i would seriously consider NOT purchasing this update if its not manditory, and would consider canceling atleast one of my accounts if it is. I dont want to be a darkish-domintor, i want to be a heroic dominator. I want to fall to the dark side, i dont want to trip into a grey zone.

Right now my money is in question, by this time this comes out i am likely going to be having to choose. Buying two updates for this, play DCUO, or Star Trek Online, or perhaps be close enough to Star Wars TOR that i dont need to be spending more money on this game to get benefits that we have been getting in free content updates for years.

Its not just the long wait, i really really wish the devs had given thought to the idea of scaling the event to the zone populations.

Its bad enough waiting it seems like forever to get a villian side banner raid on Liberty, but then the event gets ruined by there not being enough people on or taking part to complete it.

It kinda makes it feel like the old Rikti raids where you had like 6 team members taking part but the elite bosses would never spawn and that was the only badge you still needed. The rate of spawns and the ability to attack the banners and the banners difficulty would have been nice to have been scaled to the amount of heroes/villians that were in range of the banner during the event. Tonight we had one team pounding on a banner for 5 minutes and never even was able to take down that one banner. Granted you could chaulk that up to team make up and buffing etc. But it took forever just to get enough badies killed to open up the banners with the amount of people taking part.

Not everyone can play during rush hours to get good results, and not everyone plays on virtue and triumph.It would be nice to see that taken into account.

So essentially your best chances are to farm your *** off. We were having this argument in another thread. Soon the responses will turn to "you dont need them unless you want to be super uber like us."

The team drop rate for these things needs to be reworked. Even with team multipliers its insane to think that your hopes are that every 30 thousand enemies killed on a team you get a random chance it will drop to you.

The devs have created a game that doesnt need to be played anylonger from 1-49. Its basicly a waste of money to slot anything less then IOs at level 32, most of the time spent playing pre-20 is basicly spent waiting for health and end to regenerate. And then you figure with Flash Back and now the SSK system you can do anything, and perform better doing it after you pass the level range, rather then doing it in your level range.

So frankly im wit Eric, i can totally understand people saying screw playing that they want to PL to 50 and then do what they want to do from there. Infact I think i kinda predicted it to become more common in a thread on the SSK system when you figured that you got 2-3 extra powers on exempt then you do normally.

BS. See me registration date? I have been playing and paying since the game launched. Or shortly after. I have not taken breaks, or let either of my accounts lapse. And i farmed my *** off when the AE was cranking. For no other reason then it was fun to do. It was fun to advance a character quickly through the game i have played for 5 years and more now.

A blanket statement like "...difference between a player staying..." is utter BS. MMOs live and survive for years on the hardcore dedicated fan base that doesnt go anyway. Though new players might drift in and drift out, having a basic base that is there no matter what is what keeps any MMO going. Its when that base starts moving away that the game really starts to falter.

If a player comes in and buys a box and sticks around for 2-3 months while they see everything and then leaves, but in order to keep that 2-3 months the devs have made a game that someone that has paid, and would be willing to keep paying after 5 years, and they leave, who is the bigger loss to the company?

And this is any different then having a fire tank or brute farming infernal demons from a story contact how? Sure they might have attacks but seriously you can easily and cheaply max out fire damage and get close to 30 percent defense to fire with out really trying. Then figure in a nice IMBL or quicksand to the mix and burn suddenly works again, and between the heal and end recovery in the set, you basicly have a character now that can run that mission on +3/8 anytime they want, and not die doing it.

The AE atleast allowed me to have some variety to the missions and to make something new to look at.

I have no problem with the current system accept the total gutting of having one or two rank groups. If your previous statements were true, then so long as my groups have the attacks the devs require them to have, i should fully be able to make an all Lt group if i choose, or an all boss group. Since the increased rewards for those groups would coincide with the increased risk of having higher ranked villians to fight.
BS. If anything prices on more rare items like Miracles or LOTG uniques dropped during the MA farming. Because people had a better chance of getting them then running TFs etc to get merits. I love how people seem to think that the cost of say salvage skyrocketing was terrible when the cost of something that was 160 million was cut in half. Lets see, the 5 peices of salvage i needed went from totally 1 million to 2 million, but the cost of the recipie went from 160 million to 80 million. What one saves me more money? The only possible way it was a problem was for purple drops which became more rare cause the AE didnt offer them. Simply solution there, allow the AE to have them be a reward.
I dont consider earning less xp for harder enemies to be a reward. Fixing exploits and changing the basic nature of the reward structure are two totally different things. Remove the Mitos, no problem i understand, but taking 25 percent xp off the top for standard.standard foes that are most times more capable then dev created content? Ya that makes sense.

And yet if the majority of the player base was more intrested in having the MA used for farming and leveling and earning rewards (not exploitively earning but earning) then isnt it selfish of the devs or other players to scream about having it changed to their wants or desires no matter what he original intentions were? One thing the OPer is very correct on, the MA is dead, maybe not arena dead, but if i see one other person in the loby thats a busy night.