How should a DS/DM slot?

Im new to the MM AT and am used to building farmers.. its fun to me. but I liked the idea of having a large group of helpers with me while I hin a x8 spawn so I made a MM... I love the /dark pools for the CC and -toHit..

I think I picked out all the abilities I want, but when I started setting up sets in Mids.. I realized I didnt know what I should be slotting for.. I normally go for S/L defense cap.. but wasnt sure if I should be going for ranged cap, or none at all... Im also trying to go for regen to perma hasten.. not sure if that was needed.. and if im not going for S/L cap, then I need to rethink my build as I went with combat jumping,fighting pool, and mace mastery for the scorpion shell... ohh and I took Maneuvers and assault.

Ive tried reading the forums a bit and decided I liked the sound of the DS/DM build.. but I didnt see any specifics on the playstyle/build combos.. it was either "here is my build, what do you think" or.. "I love my DS/DM, I open with x and then y and let my minions do z" .. I cant really say what my playstyle is as of yet, my MM is still too low a level to say but I wanted to get some ideas on what to shoot for in a build and the whys, I hate slotting while leveling only to find out that you need to respec at 50 because a few slots are totally useless in whatever power.

Edit: Just thought of this too... can you proc Vengeance off a fallen Minion?

Veng won't work on a henchmen unfortunately.

As for what to build for...

Well you want your pets to be a survivable as possible. So first thing you wanna do is make sure you take maneuvers and shadow fall and slot them for as much defense as possible. You should also get all of the defensive and resist uniques from the Pet Damage IO sets. By combing your extremely good to-hit debuffing with some defense, you can get your pets to be very, very survivable.

You also want to be tough as nails, and you can accomplish that by taking Scorpion Shield and Weave on top of everything else. Those two shields with the 3% Steadfast and some easy slotting can get you to the S/L soft-cap really easy, and not far off from the E soft-cap. Fearsome Stare and Darkest Night will make up the difference for everything else.

Regen is no good for a MM. Your HP is so low that the regen rate would be terrible.

Finally, you want a lot of recharge. As a DM, you are gonna rely on keeping the enemies debuffed all of the time. Additionally, Dark Servent has double the normal recharge for MMs. With enough recharge you can stack Tar Patch and keep Fearsome Stare and Twilight Grasp firing off constantly.

Howling Twilight: This power is more than just a rez. It is an AUTO-HIT AoE stun and big -regen debuff. You wanna use this the same way a Fire Control user would use Flashfire. Taking out every minion in a group is a pretty big deal. Also, there's nothing quite as satisfying as rezzing your whole team with 1 power.

Fearsome Stare: Slot this for to-hit debuff. The debuff in this power is as strong as Darkest Night and you can toss it out with complete safety. Fear Duration isn't very useful because you only need it to last long enough to cast Tar Patch and Darkest Night, which only takes a few seconds.

Twilight Grasp: This is your big heal. It also has a small -regen debuff. You may notice the healing radius is pathetically small. That is true, but in issue 20 it's being increased to a 20ft radius to make it even with other ATs.

Blackhole: Crap. Skip it.

Petrifying Gaze: This power isn't that great, but you can slot it with a set of Basilisk's Gaze, which for 4 slots will give you 7.5% recharge and good defense to E/NE and Ranged.

I don't really have a full DS/DM build to post but I'll just say to keep an eye out for sets that give you extra defense and recharge. Dark Watcher's Despair, Siphon Insight, Basilisk's Gaze, Blood Mandate, Call to Arms, Trap of the Hunter to name a few. Also, don't be afraid to slot cheap purple sets. Absolute Amazement can be slotted into Howling Twilight and Gravitational Anchor could go into a Patron AoE Immob like Web Envelope. With 3 Blood Mandates and all of those Basilisk's Gaze sets you will have really good Ranged, AoE, Energy and Negative Energy defense.


Finally, if power gaming is your thing, Demons are great at it, but Thugs are too. Better, actually. Thugs tier 2 henchmen get a version of Leadership that provides something like 20% defense (when slotted) to all of your henchmen. That makes it A LOT easier to soft-cap them.

Not saying demons aren't good. They are. If you wanna roll Demons then you won't be disappointed. Just throwing out suggestions/ideas for ya.

wow.. tyvm for that post.. very informative and thorough.. Imma try to work something up and post here.. so perma haste is a good thing to shoot for Im guessing then.. defense, holds/fears, and im supposed to skip all my whip attacks? =(

I picked up the whip attacks on my demon summoners. I would suggest you try to fit in lash and crack the whip. Crack the Whip especially has a nice AoE with a -resist component.