Dominating Blow

Yes, I can confirm that strange yellow-black texture on the sentinels after 3.5
:(
I hope this bug will be fixed in future.

Enjoyed the rework done to it previous league. One more change I'd want possibly instead of replacing the summoned Sentinel that instead they be teleported to your current killed enemy and their durations refreshed similar to how Herald of Purity handles On-Hit with maintaining them.

Hi GGG i enjoyed the rework version of the skill and dumped a bunch of currency into a build to see how it handled end game, after already completing guardians/ shaper with two other builds i made, decided on this one next.

First off, leveling and maps was insanely smooth, alot of dps, and survivability, up until a certain point that is...

I hit a wall at shaper / guardians and also red elder / elder guardians (didn't attempt uber elder obviously)

The main problem is, you need momentum in this skill to feel good (e..g. have enough mobs around and time to rack up all your minions, aura of purity, or whatever else. I was using arakaalis fang and the scourge for even more minion good ness :)

So that means that for fights that start you at nothing, i got bodied hard, because all of my dps and survivability depends on having my summons out. Which requires i walk up to the boss and start smacking them in the face.

You had the right idea when you changed it so there is a "chance" to summon when you hit unique enemy, but the problem is, it's still not good enough. I have 8 aps and still don't get hardly any mobs out for these fights, and i die, because i have no dps and no mobs to tank for me.

So in the end, we have a really fun mapping skill, but in my opinion not viable for end game content.

It is viable for end game content for the simple reason that it depends on very few item types to reach really good damage on minions. That means that you can build really tanky without sacrificing much or any dps potential.

BUT a more reliable proc rate on bosses would indeed make the skill feel much better.

This skill is simply a lot worse than other skills

Problem 1:

You can either build for pure melee damage or minion damage
In the former case your minions don't deal enough damage and in the latter
your passive tree investment is unhealthy
Going for hybrid with The Scourge also means your dps is not going to be as high as with other skills such as Double Strike for example

Problem 2:

Unhealthy Mana cost
The skill is basically a default attack
There is no reason it should use that much mana
Mana Leech is a must have for any Dom Blow build
Its annoying and when you dont leech for a sec
Out of mana continue with default attack
This can happen on bosses because you don't leech enough
Therefore really bad bossing

Problem 3:

Significantly reduced amount of dom blow minions
Anger and Wrath aura don't add as much damage because you have 200 mobs with added damage vs 20 mobs with added damage

Problem 4:

Even though the amount of minions was reduced the skill still has a duration which is nonsensical at this point because you can't exceed the max limit
Investing into duration nodes on passive tree is just a huge loss therefore


Problem 5:

The rare minion can have an aura but you never have it very long because you are going to be killing more rares so the mods cycle through way too quickly to be reliable
Maybe it would be better if it worked more like headhunter (20 sec duration but they stack)

Problem 6:

The minions on their own suck
If you don't invest into minions that much the dom blow minions will suck because they dont have increased life or regen
So you are basically on your own using default attack

Suggestions:

Maybe your damage should increase with every minion you have and your minions damage should increase somehow as well

Will the changes in melee "aoe" apply to minions? Because if they don't, Dom Blow will still need melee splash to function properly.

With the upcoming nerf to multistrike attack speed, can we please get buffs to proc rates for this skill and for herald of purity? It's already very difficult to proc dominating blow against bosses, enough so that dominating blow is a very weak bossing skill. With the multistrike nerf it will become even more difficult.

I came here to recommend this same thing. Without any packs of enemies, ramp-up required to reach maximum normal sentinels is too much to ask for, regardless of the minion duration. In instanced fights it is especially an issue, such as the elder guardians and elder fights, because you are entirely dependent on using the 10% chance on hit to summon your sentinels.

I used to be able to get away with using this skill for everything with a t1 attack speed Imperial Claw and prioritizing minion attack speed on passives and jewels, but now even that isn't consistent enough with the Multistrike nerf. I can imagine what it would be like to try to use a +3 two-handed weapon with the same attack speed investment, and it's not pretty. If I was to suggest a specific change, the chance to summon a normal sentinel on hit would apply to both rare (because especially powerful beasts, essences, etc.) and unique enemies and be at least 20%, double what it is now.

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MercurialMaven wrote:

With the upcoming nerf to multistrike attack speed, can we please get buffs to proc rates for this skill and for herald of purity? It's already very difficult to proc dominating blow against bosses, enough so that dominating blow is a very weak bossing skill. With the multistrike nerf it will become even more difficult.

Dominating Blow has enough damage but not enough Area of Effect.

I would like to make a suggestion. For Dominating Blow, build in the Ancestral call support gem (and make the skill not supportable by Ancestral Call gems). Basically, when you use Dominating Blow, two golden spirit copies of you attack two nearby enemies (exactly like Ancestral Call, with a color change). These copies only happen when the player attacks with Dominating Blow, and does nothing for the minions.

Why?

Two key skill gem for Dominating blow is Ancestral Call and Melee Splash. These are both used by the player to spread the Domination debuff to create more purity warriors. Melee Splash is a good support for this skill and doubles as a buff for the minions. But the current support for Ancestral call doesn't do ANYTHING of the minions, unlike Melee Splash. Worst of all, its very, VERY necessary for the skill while feeling like a waste at the same time. Combined with Melee splash, Ancestral Call allows whole groups of foes can be Dominated, even at a slight range, but it just feels bad having to use it with no benefit to your minions (unlike almost every other gem you can support Dom Blow with). Since the Dominating Blow basically needs Ancestral Call to be really effective, this eliminates what is essentially a wasted support slot for the skill and gives a nice (and player protecting) buff to the skill (which it really needs for big bosses).

Also, PLEASE restore the old sound effect of Dominating a monster, I miss my eargasming 'BWAAA' when I crushed a pack into my new legion of light!