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Ok, so after mulling it over I wanted to make some suggestions bout possible Dominator changes. First off, I think I understand why this may be problematic for the Devs now, as most of the thoughts I had involved significantly changing powers themselves, which at this stage of the game probably isn't that doable. So here are some other options I think might work ok...
Option 1:
Increase Dominator hp to Blaster levels
Remove the damage increase from Domination
Increase Dominator base damage
Add a defense buff to Domination
Option 2:
Increase Dominator hp to Blaster levels
Increase modifer for Dominators on all power pools so we can actually get worthwile amounts of defense or resistance out of things like maneuvers or tough.
Eliminate the recharge timer on Dominate, let the bar be the limiting factor.
Option 3: (the power alteration option)
Elminate the negligable buff/debuff power in most of our secondaries (chilling embrace, etc...)
Give all secondaries a resistance or defense toggle armor like the ones you put in our PPP's.
Overall, I don't think there is any one change that is going to fix Dominators unless they actually replace some of the powers in each of the primary or secondary sets. The current Domination change is an ok start, but it's just a start. Without some tweaking to hp, or base damage, or the presence of some protection, we're just meat when we're not in Domination mode.
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Hmm if they just eliminated the recharge timer on domination. and just allowed it to refill after use . . . I see that as a major change that alone would make the At considerably more powerful. I already see the drop in recharge as a good thing. Would change the play style though. Like others have pointed out, I hold domination because I fear turning the corner and seeing the boss and not having domination.
On Justice
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Let's not call a good thing bad. Domination is useful. I easily get it off twice in a mission, and with a reduced recharge time, I'm less nervous about using it more often.
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I spent almost all of my time in Recluse's Victory, as all of our changes are PvP only.
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One of these things is not like the others. The way I read it, our PvE fix to dominators was _nothing._ For those on test, is that right? Or does domination build more quickly in PvE too?
Domination's recharge time was reduce to 200 seconds for both PvE and PvP.
The increased buildup from secondary attacks is only for PvP.
dominator's ranged attacks already are 100% that of defenders afaik.
Its funny how we had to beg for this thread. Anyway...
Ice Sword Circle still has a delay (verified)
why would fire sword circle not have the delay but isc would? I hope we don't have to wait another 6 months for the fix (see psy drain).
I personally don't think I could fire off 12 attacks solo on a regular basis (from my secondary) and survive in the break free world of pvp, again because I can't drop toggles consistently anymore (maybe with blaze but not incinerate), and most HERO at's have mez resistance in their APP or otherwise. So I am stuck kiting with the ice slow powers. God forbid those every get changed.... I am trying to test but obviously no luck right now...
It seems to me that the Dominator changes are targetted purely for PvP. Reports from experienced Dominator PvPers are that these changes actually help Dominators in PvP (see Fishw0rk's post above). I won't discount that PvP in RV at the moment is a significantly different environment from regular PvP, so things may change with going live. For the record, I'm not a PvPer, so I can't really comment personally, although I will give it a try.
In PvE, I don't expect a reduced recharge on Domination will have a significant effect. My experience in teams is that I typically don't fill my Domination bar before it recharges, because I spend time carefully choosing high threat targets, rather than randomly spamming attacks. In solo PvE at low levels, the smaller number of attacks and lack of stamina means that it will be difficult to fill the bar in less time, while at high levels Domination is not really necessary.
I'm actually quite impressed with this change, and how precisely it addresses the PvP problems, without significantly affecting PvE. It's too bad about the toggle dropping, and I hope that these other buffs do overshadow that problem in the end.
I played my level 23 mind/ice dominator for three missions tonight. One was a story arc mission I did to clear room in my mission queue. The next was a newpaper mission to fill up my broker's awareness bar. The third was a Mayhem Mission from the broker. These were all done solo and the lowest difficult level. Therefore, the only I7 change that really pertains to this is the reduction in Domination's recharge time and the change to Confuse's animation lock-out.
The change to Confuse's animation is most welcome. I don't feel like I'm frozen for an eternity waiting to take my next action.
I found that I did use Domination more now than I do on live. I didn't use it everytime that it was available, but I wasn't as concerned with wasting it earlier in a mission. In these missions I always had it available when I "needed" it, and could even use it occassionally when I just wanted to. Before I would always save it for the end-of-mission encounter.
Where I noticed it helping most was in the Mayhem Mission. Mayhem Missions really don't seem to have been designed with low damage ATs like Dominators in mind. The primary way of increasing the timer is to destroy things, and Dominators as a general rule don't do a lot of damage outside of when Domination is active. Having it active more often did help with the goal of the Mayhem mission. I should note that Confuse was very useful here as well with the animation change. I couild confuse police or citizens to cause mayhem for me. As a matter of fact, if it had not been for the combination of the Domination recharge reduction and the Confuse animation change, I do not think I would have been successfully completed the mission. As it was, I did complete the main goal, and partially completed one secondary goal before I simply ran out of time.
The problem with the Dominator changes is that, while they may have helped the AT a bit in PvP (and that remains to be seen), they have done nothing really for PvE. Doms need help in PvE because, as they are, they bring less to a large team than any other AT. Doms are OK solo (if you don't mind having to take a long time to kill things, and if you don't mind having to team for most EBs), and they do well in duos and trios, but on a large team doing hard missions, they have several problems. Dom control acc and duration falls off rapidly as mob level increases, so on large teams doing hard missions, where levels will be +2 and +3, dom's already shortened controls (from controller durations) are even shorter -- when they hit. Domination is hard to build and maintain on a large team because of the afks between battles and the time MMs need to set up. A dom's entire secondary is pretty useless on a large team, because the dom's highest damage attacks are melee, and wading into melee with 15 or so mobs is death to the low HP dom.
Now, a couple of builds are OK for specific things. The Plant/ primary is pretty good at control because it has one power -- Seeds -- that is level 8 and can be perma'd pretty quick, and it has Carrion Creepers, which is a very effective control power. High level Fire/ doms with imps slotted out apparently do fairly well at damage. And that's it. One build that is decent at control, and one build that, post-32, is average at damage.
There is a reason why doms are consistently the least-played AT and why dom population falls off even more for higher levels -- it's because doms don't really contribute much to large teams and take forever to solo.
FivefifteenA
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The problem with the Dominator changes is that, while they may have helped the AT a bit in PvP (and that remains to be seen), they have done nothing really for PvE. Doms need help in PvE because, as they are, they bring less to a large team than any other AT. Doms are OK solo (if you don't mind having to take a long time to kill things, and if you don't mind having to team for most EBs), and they do well in duos and trios, but on a large team doing hard missions, they have several problems. Dom control acc and duration falls off rapidly as mob level increases, so on large teams doing hard missions, where levels will be +2 and +3, dom's already shortened controls (from controller durations) are even shorter -- when they hit. Domination is hard to build and maintain on a large team because of the afks between battles and the time MMs need to set up. A dom's entire secondary is pretty useless on a large team, because the dom's highest damage attacks are melee, and wading into melee with 15 or so mobs is death to the low HP dom.
Now, a couple of builds are OK for specific things. The Plant/ primary is pretty good at control because it has one power -- Seeds -- that is level 8 and can be perma'd pretty quick, and it has Carrion Creepers, which is a very effective control power. High level Fire/ doms with imps slotted out apparently do fairly well at damage. And that's it. One build that is decent at control, and one build that, post-32, is average at damage.
There is a reason why doms are consistently the least-played AT and why dom population falls off even more for higher levels -- it's because doms don't really contribute much to large teams and take forever to solo.
FivefifteenA
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Are you currently testing the changes or is this just your opinion of the changes? This thread is for testing the pve and pvp dominator changes. The above might be better suited in the General AT forum.
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Are you currently testing the changes or is this just your opinion of the changes? This thread is for testing the pve and pvp dominator changes. The above might be better suited in the General AT forum.
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Cricket said : "This thread is solely for discussions regarding the recent Dominator changes in Issue 7."
FivefifteenA
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Cricket said : "This thread is solely for discussions regarding the recent Dominator changes in Issue 7."
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I suspect that the Dominator changes in Issue 7 were targetted at the most obvious Dominator problem: PvP. Not everything can be addressed in every issue, and I expect that Dominator PvE was lower priority than many other things, possibly because of the lower customer impact. Dominator PvE will probably be addressed in a later issue, and I expect we will know it is happening. It would be nice if a developer could confirm or deny my suspicion.
I dont see enough benefit here.
Dominators were too weak when not under domination.
Just making it more common doesnt fix that.
Dom's need to be better when not doing domination.
Right now they just dont add enough.
Any of the dom sets can be good at control if you slot their holds heavily. I have a 30 ice/ice dom that deals almost no damage on large teams, but can put out some serious control. As long as dominators and debuff/control builds remain rare, control is a valuable asset to any large team, and cuts down on healing by a huge amount. You do, however, have to be skilled and be able to move, turn, and hit powers at the same time (which isn't very easy with the default control setup).
Also, from playing many aoe-type squishies (40 ice/rad corr, 40 dark/dark corr, 50 human/nova pb and warshade, 30 necro/dark mm) - timing and mobility (read: hiding) is everything when avoiding death on large teams.
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Any of the dom sets can be good at control if you slot their holds heavily. I have a 30 ice/ice dom that deals almost no damage on large teams, but can put out some serious control. As long as dominators and debuff/control builds remain rare, control is a valuable asset to any large team, and cuts down on healing by a huge amount. You do, however, have to be skilled and be able to move, turn, and hit powers at the same time (which isn't very easy with the default control setup).
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Well it's pretty obvious you don't PvP with your Dominator.
I'm saying this as a Level 40 Ice/Ice PvE/PvP mixed build without AA currently.
You'll die. Period. The end. You have no control in PvP no matter your slotting. Too many heroes. Your saving grace? Detoggles. You can keep the scrappers from hurting your team too badly, and keep the defenders from knocking your entire team into the wall for a week straight.
Now? Now you can't do that. Period. The end. Siren's? Forget it. Doms are now completely useless. We have two toggle droppers available; Block of Ice and Ice Sword. Ice Sword is 5% and my understanding is that BoI - which even three slotted for acc misses more than it hits in PvP - also is affected by the new detoggles. Regardless, BoI is not a damage dealer OR a control. Suppose you might try to count Flash Freeze with the mass-sleep, but that pretty much never works on PCs.
To call this a PvP 'buff' is utterly disingenous. It's a PvP nerf from hell. The already UNBELIEVABLY low population of Dominators in Siren's Call will be ZERO. Why? Because we now do nothing but leech. That's all we can do.
Thanks, FoTM whiners! Makes me glad there's mounting support for major nerfs to /Em.
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You have no control in PvP no matter your slotting. Too many heroes.
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This does not match my experience in I6, nor does it match the early I7 reports coming from Fishw0rk.
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This does not match my experience in I6, nor does it match the early I7 reports coming from Fishw0rk.
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It sure as hell matches mine. If I go on to the field as a Dom, I'm a target. I'm an EASY target. I can only hope to build up Domination if I am to stand a chance of not sucking for a few minutes; but the Domination bar drops to zero on death, so a simple two-shot from any of the plentiful scrapp0rz in RV is enough to scotch that.
Doms are the only AT to have a qualifying round in PvP. Survive long enough and attack often enough to build up Domination, and you might have a chance.
They are the only AT to have a mediocre primary and a mediocre secondary. Other ATs have inherent powers as a bonus; Dominators are the only AT to DEPEND on their Inherent power.
We need some serious fixing, and this was sadly not it.
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They are the only AT to have a mediocre primary and a mediocre secondary. Other ATs have inherent powers as a bonus; Dominators are the only AT to DEPEND on their Inherent power.
We need some serious fixing, and this was sadly not it.
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You're absolutely right. The heart of the problem, as I see it, is that the devs weakened the dom primary and secondary because they thought the inherent was very strong and would over-power any AT with normal-strength primaries and secondaries. They then gave doms 2 hurdles to jump before being able to use Domination -- the timer and the build up/decay bar.
It's obvious that very few people like this playstyle of having to wait/build up to use an inherent that makes us slightly better than average, when we are well below average otherwise.
Comparing this to my corr -- Scourge is fabulous when it hits a whole group, but my corr is not at all dependent on Scourge, and if I never had it, I would still be able to be very effective solo and team. And -- my Ice/ corr has Blizzard which, every few minutes, can unleash a huge amount of destruction -- but if I did not have Blizzard I could still have a very effective toon.
Other ATs get their "special" abilities in addition to primaries and secondaries that work well. Doms don't. That is the fundamental problem, imo. Personally, I would be willing to see Domination toned down some if it meant the primaries and secondaries could be brought up to par.
Domination is less problematic for people who solo all the time, because they can control when to build it up and use it. It is much less team-friendly, because the team isn't necessarily going to want to wait on the dom to be ready. That's one reason why so many doms are people who like to solo.
FivefifteenA
I love the increase in domination building speed. Love it.
But I want more.
I want to be granted scrapper level mez protection ONLY while domination is active.
That would be perfect.
Poifect!
And I want a pony.
Hi 
I have to admit, I've never noticed how evil I feel with domination up in PVP before. I held someone yesterday and the poor fool needed to use two breakfrees to break out of my grasp!
Unfortunately - after he managed to break free, he promptly killed me in three hits.
Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love this well-deserved change, but it doesn't prevent me from getting 2-3 shotted by several things. The most prevalent of which are Energy Melee (in all of its forms throughout any of the ATs, including tankers), but it's not limited to that; broadsword, spines, most of the blaster primaries, and any controller with damage can still kill me in less than what it'd take me to kill a single even-conned minion.
Part of me would slightly expect that our incredibly low health and difficult-to-use defenses would send our damage to be at least higher than Phineas Q. Everycontroller's, but as it is, most controllers' level 4 control power with containment is more damaging than a dominator's level 38 assault power with domination. Every time I see a 'low damage' AT, according to the character creation screen, constantly and consistantly outdamage me as a 'medium damage' AT. At least in the case of scrappers, their being 'high damage' slightly justifies their being able to 1-2-3 shot me!
However, the more I think about it, the more I feel that we're supposed to use a brute buddy to handle the incoming attacks for us, perhaps by use of taunt, and we help them build fury by holding their enemy in place. It still is frustrating to be killed so quickly and easily, though.
I am still unsure about how to use any of the new Patron Powers to further my survival in Recluse's Victory, though like most others I haven't been able to try them out yet. I have a difficult time imagining how anything could help more than hibernate, personal force field, temp invulernability, earth's embrace, indomitable will, or most of the other controller/blaster ancillary power pools. I hope that the 15 minute long recharge time and the 4 minute duration for the pets - the one thing that could be strong enough to save a dominator's life - means that it will be as powerful as an elite boss or archvillain.
Even though we've been graced by the devs with this helpful buff, my belief that the dominator should be considered as one of the most balanced PVP ATs still stands. PVPing as a dominator is very challenging, but it is always very rewarding. To further this point, as a controller I felt that the kills I have made in PVP weren't challenging at all and totally unrewarding, and I have a difficult time imagining that killing squishies so quickly as a scrapper or energy tank could be rewarding. Wouldn't it make sense that the devs wanted PVP to be challenging and rewarding?
I'm sure that my opinion will most likely change. i7, though totally awesome so far and well worth the wait, still has a month(ish?) left on the test server.
Sorry for jumping around a billion topics, I hope it didn't effect the readability of this post
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I love the changes to domination. I do find that damage is still too low even with domination running. In PvP I find that controls come a dime a dozen, and due to that, most come prepared. With our controlling abilities mostly negated, that leaves us with our damage. Yet we have subpar damage therefore even with domination running, I'm not much use for my team, against any decent team. Would we really be overpowered if we did more damage? I don't think we'd be.
I may be the only one that feels this way, so my opinion may not mean much.
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Are you being sarcastic? From your own explaination, what is there to love? I just don't get it. I didn't want to jump on the complaint train, but as far as changes go for Dom's I can sum it up in one word.
Whatever.
My Dom doesn't PvP. He might run some missions in the zone, but avoids everyone when it is at all possible. Why? Oh, because a Controller of the same level can rip right through me like a lawnmower on a Sunday. Give my Dom a little Containment instead of this temporary Domination stuff and maybe then I could show them a thing or two.
I do appreciate the removal of the pauses after animation on Confuse. Other than that I see no positives for my guy. Thanks.
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Frankly I think that the domination boost should be lowered by 50% and have the standard attacks boosted in damage to compensate. The domination bonus of increased duration, mag and endurance refill is enough without making it the sole way for a dominator to deal damage. Give it a minor damage boost rather than a major one and tip the scales for the more attacks.
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I'm sorry if I have repeat post after post but I am starting at the beginning and reading through. Comments will be the same.
Tal... no offense, but I'd just rather stay the way live is now. Why? At least these rules of play that we have now is something I am used to. I can hold the Big Bosses at the end of a mission and with a couple of reds I can take them out before Dom is over with. This is solo. I'd just rather keep it that way rather than having my damage cut and having to team because 1/2 my Acc and Dmg boost is gone.
It doesn't take forever for me to get Dom up but I sure as heck don't use it til I need it. Why? Because while it doesn't take forever now, it takes more than long enough. The only thing that I can say is that I'm ready to run with Brutes because I have to go-go-go to keep the bar from falling.
Now all this is based on me having a Mind/Thorn Dom level 29 and a Fire/Energy Dom only level 6. So maybe my thinking is just one-sided based on my AT. I do think an increase in damage would be nice, even if it was slight. I can solo fine, but all through my Dom's career, almost every mission is so long because the secondary attacks don't deliver on damage.
Survival is not my issue at all. Damage, however, is one of them. I just don't think anything needs to be traded to get it.
i want that protection while the dom bar is above 90%
No sarcasm intended. I do like the the fact that domination builds faster and is avaible more often. It's a tad better than it was before. Believe me though, I feel the pain.
It occurred to me that even if you gave dominators corruptor level damage, we would not be overpowered. I say this with PvP in mind. In pvp, people more often than not, people lead off with a hold/stun of some type. Some status effect that keeps you still should you not have a breakfree. From there they proceed to beat the snot out of you before the effect ends. To allow dominators to do the same, we could boost the hold duration, but with our current damage, any enemy passing through will kill us before we kill our target. The answer is to boost our base damage to a significant level.
Some have argued that we're meant to be a low damage AT, yet we see that other low damage ATs have something meaningfull that helps them to survive. Our controls aren't enough in PvP, and at times, in PvE. Only increased damage can balance this unbalanced AT. To be honest I feel that the damage I do when domination is running, is the damage that I should be doing without it.
The domination changes make me feel that I'm almost breaking even. So yes I'm happy for the change because I can feel a bit closer to where I think we should be, yet as stated, we need more than that.
Let me repeat Rigor_Immortus when it comes to dom damage boosting.
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I just don't think anything needs to be traded to get it.
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I'm not a PvPer so I'll leave that to them.
But domination coming back faster is a good thing. Thanks.
Princess Grace - MA/Inv scrapper
Solana - Mind/Energy dominator
Lyonette - Kat/SR scrapper
Well, the non-/energy's do anyway, lol.