The Mezmeron guide to the Mind/Psy dominator (1)
January 5, 2009 – 2:30 amPosted by: arosavi
This is a guide to playing a Mind Control/Psionic Assault dominator. Its purpose is to give anyone interested a better understanding of the powers and some ideas about how to play one.
Note: I will be adding more content later, such as power pools, and patron pools.
Contents:
1) About this guide
2) What is a Dominator?
2) Why choose a Mind/Psy dominator?
3) Dominator vs. Controller: What’s the difference?
4) Domination: what about it?
5) The scale for powers
6) About Slotting
7) Mind Control
Psionic Assault
9) -Coming Soon- Leveling: the early levels (1-19), the middle (20-31), the later levels (32-40), the Grandville levels (41-50)
About this Guide:
No matter how good a guide is, it is still a collection of opinions based upon the experiences of the person(s) who wrote it. Just as playstyles vary between people, so does the idea of what is the best build. What this guide is mean to accomplish is to not only give a better understanding of a mind/psy dominator, but get others interested in a build that I have enjoy.
What is a Dominator?
At first glance, a dominator looks like a controller that has attacks instead of buffs for secondaries. But unlike the controller, a dominator isn’t a defensive character; control isn’t used by the dominator to protect teammates. It is used to section off a portion of a spawn and dominate them. A dominator that tries to control every mob in a fight is going to find themselves making several trips back from the hospital, and frustrated as they discover that dominators lack any defensive powers to protect themselves with (except for */psi with drain psyche or when the patron shields which open up at lvl41).
Playing a dominator also requires alot of perserverence as they are the latest blooming AT in CoV. Control only becomes notably effective in the 20s as access to SOs and the later powers in the control sets open up. Attack chains don’t even become complete until the 30s when the big powers open up (psychic shockwave for */psi opens up at lvl38). But once everything is in place, dominators become an amazing AT to play. For those players that love a good challenge with a great payoff, dominators are you.
Why choose a Mind/Psy dominator?
Why choose mind control for your dominator primary? For straight-foward control, Mind is the best of all the sets. The set has 3 hard (once the power is applied, any affected mobs will not attack back) AoE controls in Telekinesis, Total Domination and Mass Confusion, and 2 more soft controls (once the control
is applied, the mobs will not attack back unless they are attacked) in Mass Hypnosis and Terrify. Mind also holds the crown for most non-aggro powers, which helps to minimize the aggro that a dominator will receive once the power has worn off.
note: Mind Control is the only dominator primary to not receive a pet at lvl32. If you are playing a dominator and want a pet, this is not the set for you.
Why choose Psionic Assault for a dominator secondary? Psi has the longest range of all the sets, and one of the better debuffs with -recharge. Although the debuff from a power cannot stack with the debuff applied by the same power (if applied by the same player), three debuffs stacked on a target will almost cancel out any recharge. Drain psyche also makes */psi the set that has the most survivability, and psychic shockwave is a fast recharging, high damaging, very large area of effect power which also has about a 33% chance of disorienting a target. Psi itself contains some compliments to the mind control set, and works very well for those who like to play characters based on roleplaying concepts along with dominators that love to live in melee range.
Dominator vs. Controller: What’s the difference?
What is it that makes a mind/* dominator different from a mind/* controller? Even though they both have access to the same primary, it is the types of secondaries that each class has that lends to the different playstyles.
Q: Thanks to my primary, I have locked down all the mobs. What do I do next?
A- Controller: I use my secondary to heal, buff, debuff, or apply further control as necessary.
A- Dominator: Use my secondary to defeat all the mobs.
Domination: What about it?
Description: +75% attack damage, double magnitude of all status effects, double duration of all status effects, and completely refills endurance bar.
Duration: 90 seconds
Recharge: 200seconds
Rating: 4
Strength(s): Domination will turn a mild-mannered dominator into a rampaging engine of destruction. Once clicked, mobs become like tissue paper and you’ll find yourself running into mobs faster than a suicidal blaster (which is okay since you’ll be able to handle it). Keep this power in reserve as an ‘Uh-Oh’
button or click it to fly through missions faster or to make a tough boss look like a minion with a couple more hit-points. With domination, you’ll deal damage like a blaster, stack magnitude like two controllers, enjoy power boosted like durations, and your endurance bar will completely refill so that you can start at full steam. Domination is arguably the best inherent in the game (and the only clickable one), and once clicked creates a peak that no other AT can match.
Group running, because they are about to be overwhelemed? Hold your ground, click on domination, and show the mobs that you have them exactly where you wanted them. Be careful though, you only have 90 seconds of glory before becoming returning to normal.
note: Currently on test, domination will also provide significant protection against all mez-type effects (sleep, hold, confuse, immobilize, repel, disorient, knockback, knockdown, stun). A further change that has been mentioned by a red name is that domination will also become a pseudo breakfree in that it can be fired off the same way that the inspiration can be used.
Weakness(es): Every peak has its valley(s). Domination wears off, and the dominator returns to being a mere mortal. Experiencing highs and lows of power are part of the flavor of dominators. It’s great to experience the moments of glory that domination can provide, but dominators pay a price for this.
to be continued
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