The Dominator Approach

As a longtime player, I've spent most of my time blueside. This weekend, I got my dom to level 40 and something doesn't feel quite right when I solo.

My question is about the dominator approach. Should I be playing the character as a controller who blasts, or a blaster who controls? I have a fire/rad troller and a fire/dev blaster blueside who seem very capable. Even considering that my both are level 50 and well IO'd, my dom seems underpowered somehow. I'm pretty sure that dom's are not, so I'm wondering if it's my approach.

When on my troller, I waltz in, hit em with fire cages/flashfire and then just stand in the pack with hotfeet and choking cloud running and wait for the mobs to fall over. It seems I gotta work a lot harder to get a similar level of pwnage on my dom.

My dom is mostly IO'd (hard to keep up on dbl xp weekend), with at least one acc and one rech on most lockdown powers. Attacks in her secondary are standard 1 acc/3 dam.

Any suggestions?

BTW, my dom is fire/fire

Depends on the build and what you're fighting... but most likely you'll need to mez the mobs first then hit your attack chain... and apply further mez as needed.

Without knowing which powersets you're playing its impossible to give advice or suggestions. Much like controllers each combination plays very differently. There is not a singular approach that going to work across the board.

Flashfire > Fire Cages > Fiery Embrace > Fire Breath > jump in with Hotfeet and blast away

A lot of people play their dominators in different ways, personally I like to save my ST hold to lockdown dangerous targets such as liuts and above and then scrap it out with any unmezzed minions.

I play both Controllers and Dominators. I've come to see them a bit like this:

Controller= Being crushed to death by a large snake.

Dominator= Being crushed to death by a large IMPATIENT snake that keeps biting you to get the job over quickly.

You can see the Dom as either a controlling Blaster or a blasting Controller. Either way works. In both cases you'll lock down your targets then tear them up with direct strikes.

For my Mind/Psi Dom, the usual order of events is Confuse target one, Dominate target two, Mez target three, TK targets four five and six as needed. Liberally spread psi darts and mind blasts around usually starting with the Mezzed opponent. Reapply all as needed.

I never leveled a Fire/Fire past 12 but from what I've seen they are amazing on dmg...not much on control though.

I agree with the spirit of DarkCurrent's message. I have had the most fun on Controllers and Doms in this game, with Doms taking the lead in the fun category. Fun to me is challenge in the game, and no other AT to me spells challenge like Doms. Knowing how many to control (= aggro), when to run into melee, retreat, blast from a distance, run around a corner, control again... Doms are the greatest utility player, and easily move from controller to blaster and even to bleeding edge scrapper continuously based on battlefield conditions and team makeup. My first 50 in the game was a Fire/Fire Dom. There was never any "waltzing in" per your OP. It was a quick combination of firing off controls and then dishing out damage, damage, and more damage quicker than they damage you. And even though your flaming crackmonkeys are a big source of this damage, they become another source of aggro that just adds to the stress....errr...."fun."

I think all villains are designed this way to a point - more utility, less ease, more considerations, more to do in the late game than their uber hero counterparts late game. Other than most blasters, I find most heroes too "easy" late game. Doms remain a fun challenge from 1 to 50.

All that being said, I've often told people that because of the utility and secondary effect of "more damage," I found my Fire/Fire Dom to be the Easy button in the game so far. So much control and so much damage... Things move fast and furious, and it felt like a sprint to 50 instead of a jog.

You want a challenge? Take on my current project - a melee-focused Ice/Electric Dom. People usually scratch their heads on that one...

It's worth noting that Radiation Emission is an unusually powerful set, for which there is no equivalent for Dominators. You simply won't find anything anywhere that is as fire-and-forget as a Fire/Rad controller; had you started with, say, an Earth/FF 'troller I think your estimation of Dominator damage capacity would be much more favorable.

I thought Poo-man was the most damaging Troller pet.

True, but that's still 31 levels of killing enemies with immob + force bolt.

Also, I'm actually not sure whether the 3 imps together outdamage the golem. It's true that he's gotten a lot stronger now that he uses all his attacks, but he still only hits one thing at a time. FWIW, I'd go with Earth/Son as the best golem-exploitation combo: the shields and -res aura on him basically turns him into your own little pet tank. But now we're waaaaay off topic...

Thank you for all the advice so far. I have 50s of every hero AT (close in villains), so I will adapt a more blastery(?) approach. This will (I think) mean combining my holds with more running and gunning, staying on the move more instead of rooted.

For what it's worth, on the challenge comments, I see my superheroes (and villains) much like the old school comic book ones. When fighting mere minions, whether the hero is at a power level like Batman or Spiderman or the Thing, I want to see my hero in a pack of ten to twenty mobs and shrug them off like the lowly minions they are. That feels comic-booky to me.

I'm not implying in anyway that the suggested dominator approaches here could not do that, I just was inexperienced enough with doms that felt I was doing something wrong (I was) and needed advice.

The best way to play a Dominator is not as a controllery Blaster or a blastery Controller, but as a controllery Blapper or a blastery Scraptroller. You've GOT to get in and mix it up in melee, unless you're /Fire, and even then getting close to the foe can help.

Both Controllers and Blasters have the strategy of standing back out of the melee, Controllers to wait for the foe to die, and Blasters to wait for a chance to run in. With the Dominator first you want to divide up your foes, hold down as many at a time as you can, and then run in and take them out. Hesitation is not good to a Dominator.

And trying to take on large groups isn't really a lot of fun either. A Dominator is more of a stealthy subtype, only without the actual stealth. Using your holds or even soft controls to divide up the foes and throw them into disarray, though, will help you single them out. You're not really a heroic type, you're a sneaky, take advantage of any opportunity type.

You really had to play that way back in the old days of Domination, but even with almost Blaster-level damage with new Domination, you still can't play strictly like a Blaster. It's not about overpowering your foes with damage, it's about overpowering them with controls, and then taking them out while they're helpless.

I still think the comparison to a Controller/Blaster is apt, since Blasters also do more damage if they add in the melee attacks. They just dont survive as well.

Anyway, I'm in the minority, but I usually de-emphasize the melee range playstyle. Oh, I still take and use most of my melee powers, but I have always (on both controllers and dominators) preferred playing mid-range, at about 15 feet away. That leaves me set up well for moving in or out as I prefer. I use melee when I happen to be adjacent to a foe, or when I decide to move up a bit.

So, yeah, you do more damage in melee range since you have all your attacks available there, but you CAN play at range. Contrary to what most people prefer, I usually dont even take my Electric Melee punches until the 30s. I'm fine relying on CB, LB, and Static Discharge. Then again, I was a controller first, so I'm tolerant of a slower approach. The damage definitely is lower at range, not only because the ranged attacks do less damage generally, but because half your attack chain is unavailable.

Lewis