Domination has a duration. It is possible to get enough recharge so it recharges and can be activated again before the duration runs out. This is called Perma-Domination, or Perma-Dom for short. It will allow you to control bosses in one hit, making defence a moot point because a controlled enemy will not fight back and for EBs/AVs you can just use some purple inspirations until they are controlled.
Also, defence is a useless unless you're at the soft cap (45% Defence). However, in Incarnate content enemies have an extra 14% ToHit so you will need 59% Defence for that. You're still quite a way off from the Defence softcap.
Having said that, I personally do not build for defence at all. Instead I go for perma-Dom and perma-Hasten. Recharge is very much a priority for Dominators because it also allows control powers to be up more frequently, allowing you to control tougher enemies quicker as well as attack faster.
Quote:
/dark is a bit... strange when attached to plant. Plant tends to operate good at a distance, and /dark has a lot of close in features. Sure, you can make anything work, but they don't lend each other a lot of benefits. |
Originally Posted by Snowzone
Having said that, I personally do not build for defence at all. Instead I go for perma-Dom and perma-Hasten. Recharge is very much a priority for Dominators because it also allows control powers to be up more frequently, allowing you to control tougher enemies quicker as well as attack faster.
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With permadom levels of recharge, your pbaoe nuke comes up _a lot_, and is a steady layer of smackdown. But, it is pbaoe. You have 3 reliable ranged attacks (a heal, 1 cone, 1 blast) and the rest all close in work. If you want to work plant/dark, best solution is to lay control (seeds?) from a distance, and work point blank inside of melee range in a aoe immob patch. This means you can focus more on one type of defense (melee) until you are set and can work on ranged or ranged aoe.
If you can stand the dawg, dark/dark is much more forgiving a set combo, and only requires ranged defense, which slotting for instead of s/l/e/n or r/m, is much easier. The reason its more forgiving is the heavy layering of different control types you can drop on enemies from a distance before closing, without opening yourself to an alpha.
tl;dr: recharge first to permado. pick a defense and attack strategy and stick with it. dont have cake and eat it too, doesnt work.
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Hew in drag baby
Defense is not useless if your not at the softcap. 32.5% defense is a perfectly good value to have. Especially for a character who doesn't have to sit around in melee. However I do agree that getting perma-dom levels of recharge is more important. Generally I want 90-100% global recharge without hasten, then I work on some defense, then I push up recharge a bit more if I can get it. It's just a trade off. I actually rarely bother to push my dom's up to 45% defense, I designed a couple builds that could do it, but mostly I aim for something over 32.5% and then get as much recharge as I can otherwise.
Some defense is very useful for surviving the aggro you don't manage to control. Especially on teams, it's very easy to pick up extra aggro on a big team, and having some defense makes a big difference. I also tend to like to grab Hoarfrost from the Ice EPP for a heal.
Since your running a Plant/Dark/Ice and I have a build I put together for mine, I figured I would post it so you could see what I am for. I tend to slot a lot of my sets at level 30ish so that I keep the bonuses when I SK down that low. You can boost some of the enhancement values by slotting higher level IOs. With the Agility Alpha the build has perma hasten, without it's still close, around 5 seconds downtime.
Villain Plan by Mids' Villain Designer 1.958
http://www.cohplanner.com/
Click this DataLink to open the build!
Level 50 Magic Dominator
Primary Power Set: Plant Control
Secondary Power Set: Dark Assault
Power Pool: Speed
Power Pool: Leaping
Power Pool: Leadership
Power Pool: Concealment
Ancillary Pool: Ice Mastery
Villain Profile:
Level 1: Strangler -- BasGaze-Acc/Hold:30(A), BasGaze-Acc/Rchg:30(3), BasGaze-Rchg/Hold:30(3), BasGaze-EndRdx/Rchg/Hold:30(5)
Level 1: Dark Blast -- Cloud-ToHitDeb:30(A), Cloud-Acc/ToHitDeb:30(33), Cloud-Acc/Rchg:30(50), Cloud-ToHitDeb/EndRdx/Rchg:30(50)
Level 2: Smite -- KntkC'bat-Acc/Dmg:30(A), KntkC'bat-Dmg/EndRdx:30(5), KntkC'bat-Dmg/Rchg:30(7), KntkC'bat-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg:30(7), C'ngImp-Acc/Dmg/Rchg:50(9)
Level 4: Gloom -- Decim-Acc/Dmg:40(A), Decim-Dmg/EndRdx:40(13), Decim-Dmg/Rchg:40(15), Decim-Acc/EndRdx/Rchg:40(15), Decim-Acc/Dmg/Rchg:40(17)
Level 6: Roots -- AotDominator-Acc/Conf/Hold/Immob/Sleep/Stun/Fear:50(A), AotDominator-Conf/Hold/Immob/Sleep/Stun/Fear/Rchg:50(17), AotDominator-EndRdx/Rchg:50(19), AotDominator-Acc/Conf/Hold/Immob/Sleep/Stun/Fear/EndRdx:50(19), AotDominator-Acc/Conf/Hold/Immob/Sleep/Stun/Fear/EndRdx/Rchg:50(21)
Level 8: Seeds of Confusion -- CoPers-Conf%:50(A), CoPers-Conf/EndRdx:50(9), CoPers-Conf/Rchg:50(11), CoPers-Acc/Conf/Rchg:50(11), CoPers-Acc/Rchg:50(13)
Level 10: Hasten -- RechRdx-I:50(A), RechRdx-I:50(25)
Level 12: Combat Jumping -- LkGmblr-Rchg+:25(A), LkGmblr-Def:50(27)
Level 14: Maneuvers -- LkGmblr-Rchg+:50(A), LkGmblr-Def/EndRdx:50(39), LkGmblr-Def:50(39), RedFtn-Def/EndRdx:50(40)
Level 16: Tactics -- Rec'dRet-ToHit/Rchg:20(A), Rec'dRet-Pcptn:20(39)
Level 18: Vines -- BasGaze-Acc/Hold:30(A), BasGaze-Acc/Rchg:30(27), BasGaze-Rchg/Hold:30(29), BasGaze-EndRdx/Rchg/Hold:30(29)
Level 20: Engulfing Darkness -- Oblit-Dmg:30(A), Oblit-Acc/Rchg:30(21), Oblit-Dmg/Rchg:30(23), Oblit-Acc/Dmg/Rchg:30(23), Oblit-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg:30(25)
Level 22: Vengeance -- LkGmblr-Rchg+:25(A)
Level 24: Gather Shadows -- RechRdx-I:50(A)
Level 26: Carrion Creepers -- HO:Nucle(A), HO:Nucle(31), Dmg-I:50(31), ImpSwft-Dam%:30(31), Posi-Dam%:50(33)
Level 28: Life Drain -- Decim-Acc/Dmg:30(A), Decim-Dmg/EndRdx:30(33), Decim-Dmg/Rchg:30(34), Decim-Acc/EndRdx/Rchg:30(34), Decim-Acc/Dmg/Rchg:30(34)
Level 30: Stealth -- LkGmblr-Rchg+:30(A)
Level 32: Fly Trap -- C'Arms-Acc/Dmg:30(A), C'Arms-Dmg/EndRdx:30(37), C'Arms-Acc/Dmg/Rchg:30(37), C'Arms-EndRdx/Dmg/Rchg:30(37)
Level 35: Sleet -- AnWeak-Acc/Rchg/EndRdx:50(A), AnWeak-Acc/Rchg:50(36), RechRdx-I:50(36), Achilles-ResDeb%:20(36)
Level 38: Midnight Grasp -- KntkC'bat-Acc/Dmg:30(A), KntkC'bat-Dmg/EndRdx:30(40), KntkC'bat-Dmg/Rchg:30(40), KntkC'bat-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg:30(42), C'ngImp-Acc/Dmg/Rchg:50(42), AotDominator-Rchg/+Dmg%:50(42)
Level 41: Frozen Armor -- LkGmblr-Rchg+:50(A), LkGmblr-Def/EndRdx:50(43), RedFtn-Def/EndRdx:50(43), GftotA-Def/EndRdx:40(43)
Level 44: Ice Storm -- Posi-Acc/Dmg:50(A), Posi-Dmg/EndRdx:50(45), Posi-Dmg/Rchg:50(45), Posi-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx:50(45), Posi-Dam%:50(46)
Level 47: Hoarfrost -- Dct'dW-Rchg:30(A), Dct'dW-Heal:30(48), Dct'dW-EndRdx/Rchg:30(48), Dct'dW-Heal/Rchg:30(48), Dct'dW-Heal/EndRdx/Rchg:30(50)
Level 49: Super Jump -- Empty(A)
Level 2: Swift -- Empty(A)
Level 2: Health -- Numna-Regen/Rcvry+:30(A), Mrcl-Rcvry+:30(46)
Level 2: Hurdle -- Empty(A)
Level 2: Stamina -- P'Shift-EndMod:50(A), P'Shift-End%:50(46)
Level 1: Brawl -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Domination
Level 1: Prestige Power Dash -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Prestige Power Slide -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Prestige Power Quick -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Prestige Power Rush -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Prestige Power Surge -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Sprint -- Empty(A)
Level 2: Rest -- Empty(A)
Level 4: Ninja Run
Level 50: Agility Partial Core Revamp
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Code:
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Quote:
This is completely and utterly untrue. The nature of defense and Defense debuffs means that Defense gets more valuable the more you have of it but at the same time even non-softcapped defense is better than no defense. For non-incarnate content I find that even 20% defense makes a huge difference.|
Originally Posted by Snowzone
Also, defence is a useless unless you're at the soft cap (45% Defence). However, in Incarnate content enemies have an extra 14% ToHit so you will need 59% Defence for that. You're still quite a way off from the Defence softcap.
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To answer the OP's question I find that Domiantors are a very tactical AT. Power order becomes important in terms of selecting the order in which you use your powers. For Plant/Ice/Dark you've got a few interesting options. Seeds of Confusion is a popular opener for Plant since it tends to make enemies waste their alpha stroke on each other rather than you. At that point the question becomes whether to use Roots or not? On the one hand it will help keep enemies clustered up but on the other hand it grants them knockback protection which will negate the Knockdown effect in Sleet (which you should have if you're going Ice Mastery). Also, remember that you can double stack Strangler on a boss to hold him even without Domination.
Roughly speaking I would expect your opening on enemies to look something like this:
Seed of Confusion
Strangler on Boss
Sleet
Strangler on Boss again (to hold him)
Quote:
TrueÂ…that is until permadom. Then, fire roots every time. The damage is respectable and the ability to clump enemies and prevent runners is very useful. Knockdown from sleet becomes completely irrelevant once every enemy is mezzed. Sleet shines in its debuffs. Once you have permadom, I suggest seeds, roots, sleet, and then attacks.
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Originally Posted by Adeon Hawkwood
At that point the question becomes whether to use Roots or not? On the one hand it will help keep enemies clustered up but on the other hand it grants them knockback protection which will negate the Knockdown effect in Sleet (which you should have if you're going Ice Mastery). Also, remember that you can double stack Strangler on a boss to hold him even without Domination.
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Ok i dont know what im doing wrong On my dominator, but im new so, I have my s/l/e/ne/and ranged defense at about 32% and stuff eats me for breakfast. What are you suppost to do about bosses until domination is up?, I also have noticed when i do finally get it all the way up some times it drops back to nothing?. I have no clue what im doin lol. Im Plant/Dark/Ice