dark/cold questions & catching up with changes

Heya,

I played this game for a minute a couple of years ago, and liked it reasonably well enough, but found almost no zone pvp at all (and I played on Freedom) after I actually got my dom to 50. I decided to reactivate a week or two ago because I had an urge to superspeed and fly around again. Anyways now supposedly there's actually a lot of people doing zone stuff, which is interesting! I just expected to mess around for 2-3 weeks, but maybe I'll stick around and check this out.

I'd play my old dom, but he was mind/ice and I understand the dps of ice is crap now. This new one is mind/fire, and I rolled a dark/cold corruptor as well. Both are low 20s, not sure which I want to really continue on with. I've been trying to catch up to speed with stuff, but there's still some things I don't know that would help me make a choice:

1. Last time I was really impressed at how much better/faster than my dom /colds were at controlling someone via massive snare/-recharge. I know snare is weakened, but I can still stack multiple recharge debuffs on someone and it's just as horrible as before right?

Also, while snare is weaker than before, can I still expect to not have people get away from me if I had infrigidate + snowstorm + sleet + heatloss stacked up on them (and possibly +webnades/cocoon too)?

2. Are dark blast, gloom, etc. each their own 7.5% to-hit debuff that stacks with each other, or are they all the same 7.5% debuff that stacks with itself (i.e. nuking someone 2x with darkblast for 15%), or is it all just one 7.5% debuff that doesn't stack up?

3. Would Black Scorpion be a good patron pool for dark/cold? My thinking was I'd have more -recharge debuffs to stack on top of people, focused accuracy to make up for lack of aim, and the defense shield would be good with my acc-debuffing darkblast spec.

The only thing is, I wanted to take hibernate since lifedrain is my only heal and I don't think I can take phase since I need tactics due to lack of aim in dark...or can I get away with just having focused accuracy and thus ditch leadership for stealth pool? (It seems sad tho to give up a 15% damage buff though when dark is already not the highest dps nuker.)

OTOH powerboost also seems incredibly uber if it boosts my -recharge and to-hit debuffs (is that how it works?). Tough call, thoughts?

Thanks in advance.

Ask Frost Elf D...she is the "expert" on dark/colds.....god i never though i would say those words.

dark/cold needs sharks to be viable as a duel toon.

if you plan on teaming, you might as well roll a different primary (sonic is my suggestion).

i like my dark/cold and enjoy it, but its a slow killer and sonic would be a good choice as barrier said.

I lost to a bad dark/cold on my elec/therm.


...I know.

I tied with you on mine.

I dont remember leaving in 5mins because i kno we tied. If you want to show the vid ill tell you if its my toon. Another possibility could be my bro was playing my toon because he's on my acc sometimes

As I'm tinkering with enhancements, I'm noticing it's really really expensive to get 41 KB protection. Last I played all you needed was Acro to be immune, qq.

Would I be better off switching from leaping to flying and using hover for knockback protection (hover is immune to -fly right?) until/if I can amass 41 KB protection?

Its ok. Just a tip, all my toons have Kool Virus in them.

I went AFK in a duel for 5 mins once.

>.>

Two followup questions:

1. Pace of the Turtle -recharge proc: does this only work on mobs and not players? I notice on the info is says "vs. critters" which leads me to think so, but I don't know offhand of anything else that's pve-only and it seems like it would work great with dark/cold that's already messing up your attack speed, so I have to know for sure.

2. I notice few people seem to build for a large amount of % damage boost from sets. Is there a reason for this (does it hit DRs or something in combination with aim/etc.?) I'm building on a budget, and it seems like I can get a pretty sizable amount of damage for relatively cheap, which might (somewhat) help offset my subpar dark damage and lack of aim.

Edit: I lied, 3rd question.

Is sleet worthwhile in pvp? Basically, is it anchored to the target or to the ground (and thus they'll just run out of it since ss trumps movement redux now)?

Thanks, I'm definitely going to take it, but I'm trying to prioritize the order of my powers, so I at least have the option of going into Siren's Call. I can't remember if this game counts IO set bonuses/+KB protection/etc. on powers you don't have access to when you're shrunken down to 35. Really THAT'S what I should have been asking.

So, is sleet anchored to an enemy you cast it on or is it a ground-target spell like teleport (in which case they'll run out of it and be back to normal)? The character creation screen says it's a friendly target spell which I'm assuming is a typo...

Do you know about when damage starts getting hit by DR? And is damage from sets it's own thing or does it all go into the same funnel with assault/aim/etc. getting hit by DR that much faster?

P.S. The two damage procs for ranged dds are expensive as hell, particularly the purple one. Are any of the other procs (i.e. change for build-up) decent for someone starting from scratch?