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So not only has their ranged mod been increased but their snipe damage been drastically bumped.
So.... Are snipes worth taking now or are they still not worth the set up time?
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IMO they are still not worth it. The part that screws them is the fact that they are so sensitive to you having been moving 3 seconds ago. If you could just stop and then use them, it'd be no big, but thanks to lag making the server think you're still moving, they're not worth it.
Still skippable, or IO mule.
Few doms would ever open with a snipe (outside of solo) and they aren't part of a regular attack chain.
They can have some use solo, but a dom already stomps solo content so why bother with an awkward and finicky power when you can just pwn faces instead?
Nice for building domination in pvp.
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Nice for building domination in pvp.
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What exactly does domination do in pvp now?
(I know the answer, but I'm curious what others think)
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Nice for building domination in pvp.
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What exactly does domination do in pvp now?
(I know the answer, but I'm curious what others think)
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It triggers PvP related nerdrage and ragequitting.
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Trust the computer. The computer knows all.
They're worth taking if you find a way to use them often. All or mostly ranged Doms come to mind. I'm almost certain we'll see more of these builds with the I15 changes.
I know I've been very impressed with the attack chains of my all-ranged builds on Test so far...
"Situational power? Sure. Although in a sense... all powers are situational. It's just that some situations occur more than others." Understand the situation needed in order for the power to be most effective... and make that situation happen.
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Nice for building domination in pvp.
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Except that they also cost higher endurance now, and will bottom you out faster.
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I know I've been very impressed with the attack chains of my all-ranged builds on Test so far...
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What kind of Dom do you have on test? I've made several Doms and it seems that their melee powers do more damage than the ranged ones. Has this changed or is my perception distorted? 
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I know I've been very impressed with the attack chains of my all-ranged builds on Test so far...
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What kind of Dom do you have on test? I've made several Doms and it seems that their melee powers do more damage than the ranged ones. Has this changed or is my perception distorted?
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You may be corect in terms of powers, but I was speaking more of the builds themselves, not the individual powers.
I've made many doms as well. Enough to be creative with different ways of building them. On test, I was speaking of a Grav/Psy, a Mind/Psy, and a Grav/Nrg. The primaries are slotted for damage as much as the secondaries with a great emphasis on range, and Grav/ and Mind/ offer additional ST attacks which help to stretch out the attack chain. The secondaries also focus on damage and range (ie Damage/Range HOs) and offer more ST ranged attacks than others creating a pretty seemless attack chain when used with mitigating and control powers from primary. I wouldn't say this is a common thing to do, but with the testing I've done, I can say it's been made a lot easier to do and will likely cause some newer dom users to approach it this way and be as comforatable as those who don't.
You can almost breeze thru the early teens of a doms life with 2 ranges in the AoE immobile and a few ranged attacks to match. I have effective doms that do lots of melee and those that hop in and out, but my grav/Psy (as an example)... who doesn't have PSW or Singy is still quite capable of any challenge I can master with my others... only it rarely if ever takes so much as a scratch in doing so.
Nothing is ever urgent when you're 115 ft away, with a full bar of endurance at the push of a buton, and complete control of every mob in a group. You find yourself in a situation like that and you'd be silly not to have a snipe fully slotted for attack.
(Edited to show relevance to OP)
"Situational power? Sure. Although in a sense... all powers are situational. It's just that some situations occur more than others." Understand the situation needed in order for the power to be most effective... and make that situation happen.
Thanks for responding. I like the sounds of this. I have 3 doms in the 30s. Which do you think would be best suited for the play style you're talking about (ranged powers)? I have a fire/electric, ice/psi, earth/fire. So far, I like ice controls the most.
And I agree, Doms are very easy to level thru the early teens. I've taken on more with my doms thru these lvls than my brutes. 
Solo it seems like it could be a decent power to use, especially Blazing Bolt. Under FE it's gonna be doing massive damage. Hold a guy and smoke his [censored].
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Thanks for responding. I like the sounds of this. I have 3 doms in the 30s. Which do you think would be best suited for the play style you're talking about (ranged powers)? I have a fire/electric, ice/psi, earth/fire. So far, I like ice controls the most.
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Some people like to build ranged Doms, but the approach is just suboptimal compared to a conventional build of range and melee. Make one of your Doms ranged if you want, it's your 15, but keep in mind you are in fact gimping yourself in so doing.
And keep a respec handy just in case.
Remember kids, a Dom that kills slowly dies quickly!
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WARNING: I bold names.
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Thanks for responding. I like the sounds of this. I have 3 doms in the 30s. Which do you think would be best suited for the play style you're talking about (ranged powers)? I have a fire/electric, ice/psi, earth/fire. So far, I like ice controls the most.
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Some people like to build ranged Doms, but the approach is just suboptimal compared to a conventional build of range and melee. Make one of your Doms ranged if you want, it's your 15, but keep in mind you are in fact gimping yourself in so doing.
And keep a respec handy just in case.
Remember kids, a Dom that kills slowly dies quickly!
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I'm not sure it's that cut and dry. If you only take (or slot) ranged attacks, that leaves you with extra powers (or slots) that can help you in other ways. I think there are some doms (e.g., /fire as of now at least, not sure how I15 will affect things) that can very comfortably be pure ranged if they want to.
For example. if your goal is to create a dom that can solo Ouroboros missions quickly, a ranged dom might be just the thing since spawns will be small and the range might help you clear things quicker.
(I still probably wouldn't take a snipe though unless it was for set bonus purposes.)
"Hi, my name is Ail. I make people sick."
A partial selection from my 50's on Freedom: Ail = Ice/Traps, Luck = Street Justice/Super Reflexes Stalker, Mist = Bane, Pixy = Trick Arrow/Archery, Pure = Gravity/Energy, Smoke = Fire/Fire Dominator
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Thanks for responding. I like the sounds of this. I have 3 doms in the 30s. Which do you think would be best suited for the play style you're talking about (ranged powers)? I have a fire/electric, ice/psi, earth/fire. So far, I like ice controls the most.
And I agree, Doms are very easy to level thru the early teens. I've taken on more with my doms thru these lvls than my brutes.
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I liked /Psy for a few reasons: 1. Each ranged power is already sitting at 100ft base range, 2. the power subdue, which acts as a decent attack as well as extra mitgation for keeping foes in place. 3. The secondary effect of Psionic powers. Most mobs are easily outranged... the very few who aren't will only have one to two attacks to reach you and those will be greatly reduced in attack speed, making them quite easy to overcome.
For a primary, I wouldn't say Ice stands out to me as primary heavy on ST damage, but the slows could definately help to mitigate foes who break free of an immobile or hold. You may also find yourself picking up and using the ranged AOE sleep more than the PBAoE Hold. Proc slotting helps a bunch too heh.
Wth several powers than can be laid down to miitigate damage in Earth control, and well just a lot of extra damage in Fire control... I'd say Ice is right in the middle, dealing a bit more damage than you'd get from Earth/, while keeping things at bay easier than you would with Fire/.
"Situational power? Sure. Although in a sense... all powers are situational. It's just that some situations occur more than others." Understand the situation needed in order for the power to be most effective... and make that situation happen.
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Some people like to build ranged Doms, but the approach is just suboptimal compared to a conventional build of range and melee. Make one of your Doms ranged if you want, it's your 15, but keep in mind you are in fact gimping yourself in so doing.
And keep a respec handy just in case.
Remember kids, a Dom that kills slowly dies quickly!
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I'm almost certain that comparision is on paper, and I'd strongly advise someone to do a new comparision with I15 changes installed. There's big difference between killing slow, and killing slower. My doms have never had much trouble killing things at a fast pace before, and on test atm... there's no such thing as a dom that kills slow.
I don't disagree that the optimal of optimal builds (farming and such) is a mixture of both range and melee, but just as one can make an all melee build work by finding a way to deal wtih the increased risk of debt... one can make an all ranged dom work by finding a way to eliminate such risk.
"Situational power? Sure. Although in a sense... all powers are situational. It's just that some situations occur more than others." Understand the situation needed in order for the power to be most effective... and make that situation happen.
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I'm not sure it's that cut and dry.
[/ QUOTE ]Never mind him.
Seriously.
Just based on the primaries I think Earth would be the best one for that kind of ranged playstyle. Ice and Fire both lose out on their really good PBAoE toggles if you're 100 feet away from the enemies for most of the battle. Ice wouldn't be a total loss due to shiver stacking with psychic scream, but you'd have to get a bit closer to enemies to stack them.
Active (Freedom): Setna (Ice/Psi Dom), Arram (WP/KM Tank), Tesmiel (Elec/SS Tank), Astredax (Robot/Dark Mastermind), Operative Vidali (melee fortunata)
Retired (Virtue): Gaav (Inv/EM Tank), Baqra (Fire/SS Tank)
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Just based on the primaries I think Earth would be the best one for that kind of ranged playstyle. Ice and Fire both lose out on their really good PBAoE toggles if you're 100 feet away from the enemies for most of the battle. Ice wouldn't be a total loss due to shiver stacking with psychic scream, but you'd have to get a bit closer to enemies to stack them.
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Ooo...good point. I hadn't thought about that one. But I would have eventually. Most likely right in the middle of a fight. I think I'll head on over to test. How does earth/psi sound? I'll let you know how it plays out. Thx all!
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Some people like to build ranged Doms, but the approach is just suboptimal compared to a conventional build of range and melee. Make one of your Doms ranged if you want, it's your 15, but keep in mind you are in fact gimping yourself in so doing.
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It's true that removing the melee attacks reduces your sustained damage. /Fiery is the least affected, and is absolutely fine without Incinerate. /Electricity is the most affected, and probably will regret skipping the melee attacks.
In I15 gimped is too strong of a word, but it certainly applied to ranged only /Energy and /Electricity in i14.
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Thanks for responding. I like the sounds of this. I have 3 doms in the 30s. Which do you think would be best suited for the play style you're talking about (ranged powers)? I have a fire/electric, ice/psi, earth/fire. So far, I like ice controls the most.
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Some people like to build ranged Doms, but the approach is just suboptimal compared to a conventional build of range and melee. Make one of your Doms ranged if you want, it's your 15, but keep in mind you are in fact gimping yourself in so doing.
And keep a respec handy just in case.
Remember kids, a Dom that kills slowly dies quickly!
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I am one of those who dislike seeing an all-ranged Dominator. It's timid and used to be very low damage.
But I took my lvl 50 /thorn to Test and the damage from the 3 ranged thorn attacks are pretty good now. It's not impressive but much better than before.
I think an all ranged-dom is going to gimp himself much less than before. You are still gimping your damage potential but I guess it is safer not to go in for melee.
The dom can slot some +damage in control powers as well to make up the lack of melee damage. Gravity is a good choice I think. It has -slow and two attack powers (Propel and Lift). Is Gravity's Lift the same damage as Mind control's now? I haven't tested it.
What's left is to normalize all Assassin Strikes and improve Stalker's old sets (Claw, MA and EM)! You don't need to bring back the missing PbAoE attack. You just need to make the existing ones better! For example, make Slice a WIDER and LONGER cone.
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I am one of those who dislike seeing an all-ranged Dominator. It's timid and used to be very low damage.
But I took my lvl 50 /thorn to Test and the damage from the 3 ranged thorn attacks are pretty good now. It's not impressive but much better than before.
I think an all ranged-dom is going to gimp himself much less than before. You are still gimping your damage potential but I guess it is safer not to go in for melee.
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I only have one lvl 50 dom but I want at least one more. I never "play mine safe". I was on a team once where the brute dropped and I ended up tanking. It was more fun than playing an actual brute.
But I'm beginning to think I agree with those who don't think an all ranged dom is that great of an idea. I guess if I wanna play all range I can just log onto a corr.
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Just based on the primaries I think Earth would be the best one for that kind of ranged playstyle.
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I would agree. Earth or Gravity, really. Quicksand alone makes Earth an excellent choice, while Grav has your personal melee guardian.
I think an all-ranged Earth/ Dom would be the stereotyped gimp dom that some are unsure about. A dom who appears to be playing controller. From my experience, the trick about building an all ranged isn't just about taking just ranged powers from the secondary... but turning your primary into damage. (not just adding procs) I don't see Earth/ as having enough damage to pull it off.
A better comparison for melee vs ranged would be a standard dom with controls slotted for control and assault mixed with range and melee... to an all ranged dom with full damage slotting in primary and secondary (ranged) attack powers. Then again however, I'm never one for paper comparisons and numbers... I'm a playstlye/tatics/gameplay kinda guy. I can share a bit of my experience and speak on what I have found to work but as always YMMV.
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The dom can slot some +damage in control powers as well to make up the lack of melee damage. Gravity is a good choice I think. It has -slow and two attack powers (Propel and Lift). Is Gravity's Lift the same damage as Mind control's now? I haven't tested it.
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Not some damage... lots of damage. The hard part is to sacrafice the control completely for damage... and have all the CC effects act as a beneficial side effect. Grav makes a great choice for it's 2 extra ST attacks (adding four additional "attacks" to the attack chain) as well as having a wonderful way to put mobs at range via wormhole. Mind comes in a distant second having the extra ST attack and TK, which is also useful for keeping/putting foes at a distance... but no immobilizes.
P.S. Before anyone says it... Propel from 90ft away completely loses it's slow activating feel. I promise.
"Situational power? Sure. Although in a sense... all powers are situational. It's just that some situations occur more than others." Understand the situation needed in order for the power to be most effective... and make that situation happen.
I am planning a Grav/Energy for after i15 comes out that is going to be primarily ranged. I will likely pick up Total Focus cause it's just that good. But with lift, and the new power push plus all the energy ranged attacks you can get a pretty nice ranged chain rather early. Propel is still just too slow so I'm skipping that.
So not only has their ranged mod been increased but their snipe damage been drastically bumped.
So.... Are snipes worth taking now or are they still not worth the set up time?
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