r/DominaMains

i tried looking up guides on yt, but most of them are from season 1 and might be a bit outdated. which is why im asking this here

i want to play Domina better. right now i feel like my impact is non existent, any pressure i apply gets ignored and i get punsihed for it, i get run over by brawl tanks like Rein, Ram, Dmon and Queen.

Any Domina players willing to help me out with some tips, explinations or general knowlege?

I see a lot of people confusing Domina for a poke tank. How could they not, honestly? I mean, I did. Blizzard themselves said that was what they designed her to be! Unfortunately, Blizzard is not infallible, especially when it comes to their tank designs, like how they thought Ball would be an off tank. But I'm here to tell you: Domina is a brawl tank. She's not the throw pick people imagine her to be, you're just playing her wrong.

First of all, this isn't 2018. Brawl doesn't mean Reinhardt. Her primary fire is in line with what a lot of modern brawl tanks would have. Characters like Mauga and Ram have primary fires that's good in the neutral game. Range and neutral poke tools don't disqualify you.

Next, her shield. It's a stationary deployable ground targeted shield, which is most similar to, specifically, Ram shield. That's it. This part won't be long, just think of it like Ram shield.

Her push is a fully melee range ability. If it did full damage and stunned just pushing enemies away, sure, I might be inclined to agree it's a peel and disengage tool for a poke tank, but it isn't. You have to push enemies into something. The way I've found most successful using this ability is to just walk at someone, fight with them, and stun them either if you start winning (for kill pressure) or losing (for disengage or to buy time for your team to heal you).

Next, where it gets a bit difficult, her crystal. An infinite range aoe dot ability with a delayed explosion which even slows with major perk. Now, you can use that to control a choke, for sure. But between the travel time and the delay on the explosion, throwing it from far away gives enemies times to just push through or back off. Even if it does a little damage, you likely won't get the explosion on anyone. It's similar to a Ram E. Throwing it on top of yourself/at the floor while fighting someone, or into a wall and then pushing someone into it to stun them, does a lot more damage and has a much higher chance to get the explosion value off.

Her ult has a very similar problem to crystal. It's slow moving and easy to counter. Just walking at enemies so they have no reaction time will help it a lot. You can also use it defensively between the healing from its damage and the enemies not being able to shoot you through it. I like to use it on enemy tanks a lot more now that they buffed the shield health.

Finally, her passive. Abilities deal damage, you heal. It's like a less reliable JQ passive. The more enemies you're hitting with your abilities - which means, the closer range you play - the more healing it will do.

I'm just a masters player, so don't even take my word for it! Take it from top Korean and NA pro teams who played it in a Kiri Lucio rush comp at the recent midseason championship. I used to think she was a poke tank and really did suck at her, and I was taking the range and (now removed) push perks. Now, I take the heal on shield usage minor perk, and the slow on crystal detonation major perk. It's been my most played this season in ranked and one of my highest winrates. I really enjoy this character and her design, and hope even one person reading this also enjoys her and feels capable of playing her better now. Think of her abilities as similar to something like a mix of Ram and JQ. You're not a poke tank, you're not a disengage tank, you're not Sigma... you're a brawl tank that also has a good neutral.

So for the launch of Season 4, apparently there was a new stat added to the activity feed known as a "protect." Supposedly, you are notified of a protect when you mitigate a significant amount of damage near an ally. So far, I've never earned this stat as Domina. Have you guys ever earned a "protect" as her? Is it even possible as Domina? Not only that, but I've also never actually seen the protect stat notification nor have I ever seen the supposed "protected by" stat when playing non tanks.

I don't see many people talking about it. I feel like being acknowledged for protecting a teammate as a tank would give a sense of satisfaction much like the save stat for supports. Though I've yet to actually see it in game. Have you?

I see a lot of people confusing Domina for a poke tank. How could they not, honestly? I mean, I did. Blizzard themselves said that was what they designed her to be! Unfortunately, Blizzard is not infallible, especially when it comes to their tank designs, like how they thought Ball would be an off tank. But I'm here to tell you: Domina is a brawl tank. She's not the throw pick people imagine her to be, you're just playing her wrong.

First of all, this isn't 2018. Brawl doesn't mean Reinhardt. Her primary fire is in line with what a lot of modern brawl tanks would have. Characters like Mauga and Ram have primary fires that's good in the neutral game. Range and neutral poke tools don't disqualify you.

Next, her shield. It's a stationary deployable ground targeted shield, which is most similar to, specifically, Ram shield. That's it. This part won't be long, just think of it like Ram shield.

Her push is a fully melee range ability. If it did full damage and stunned just pushing enemies away, sure, I might be inclined to agree it's a peel and disengage tool for a poke tank, but it isn't. You have to push enemies into something. The way I've found most successful using this ability is to just walk at someone, fight with them, and stun them either if you start winning (for kill pressure) or losing (for disengage or to buy time for your team to heal you).

Next, where it gets a bit difficult, her crystal. An infinite range aoe dot ability with a delayed explosion which even slows with major perk. Now, you can use that to control a choke, for sure. But between the travel time and the delay on the explosion, throwing it from far away gives enemies times to just push through or back off. Even if it does a little damage, you likely won't get the explosion on anyone. It's similar to a Ram E. Throwing it on top of yourself/at the floor while fighting someone, or into a wall and then pushing someone into it to stun them, does a lot more damage and has a much higher chance to get the explosion value off.

Her ult has a very similar problem to crystal. It's slow moving and easy to counter. Just walking at enemies so they have no reaction time will help it a lot. You can also use it defensively between the healing from its damage and the enemies not being able to shoot you through it. I like to use it on enemy tanks a lot more now that they buffed the shield health.

Finally, her passive. Abilities deal damage, you heal. It's like a less reliable JQ passive. The more enemies you're hitting with your abilities - which means, the closer range you play - the more healing it will do.

I'm just a masters player, so don't even take my word for it! Take it from top Korean and NA pro teams who played it in a Kiri Lucio rush comp at the recent midseason championship. I used to think she was a poke tank and really did suck at her, and I was taking the range and (now removed) push perks. Now, I take the heal on shield usage minor perk, and the slow on crystal detonation major perk. It's been my most played this season in ranked and one of my highest winrates. I really enjoy this character and her design, and hope even one person reading this also enjoys her and feels capable of playing her better now. Think of her abilities as similar to something like a mix of Ram and JQ. You're not a poke tank, you're not a disengage tank, you're not Sigma... you're a brawl tank that also has a good neutral.

okay listen i love domina with a passion and she’s my favorite in the game but she is in need for a buff. almost every tank in the game has some type of movement ability or perk besides domina and to me she just feels horrendously slow. i also feel like she needs another buff of some sort but idk

Hello queens and queers and men, I am a masters 2 Moira one trick in 6v6 and I’m looking into other potential mains since pissing on teammates and fade super jumps get boring to a certain point. I’ve played 5 games on domina so far and here’s what I have gathered:

1: 70% of her gameplay is just trading cooldowns and brawling once they get close

2: she feels like a weaker sigma with more burst damage potential

3: her perks are kinda mid. Corporate retreat is nice if you use shield to push in and they fall back but can be situational. Also, her shield regen minor perk doesn’t feel all that good because your supports will probably be behind the shield anyways unless you’re going against like a brawly enemy team, which characters like rein, vendetta, and Orisa can just walk forward with cooldowns and out damage the regen.

Got any tips?

Hello fellow Domina players!  So I’ve had this idea for a second Domina passive in my head for a while and I wanted to hear if you think it’d be a welcome, but not OP, addition to her kit.

**New passive idea (will still exist alongside her “reconstruction” passive, not replace it) 
“Chain of command”- Domina gains 0.4% damage reduction for each active segment of barrier array (max 10.8% damage reduction if all 27 pieces are active) **

^ the idea behind this passive is for those moments all Domina’s players can relate to when your barrier gets its first broken segment, and for a brief second you just face-tank a bunch of spam.  
It’s that moment where the hole in your shield is in such a key spot that the cooldown as a whole loses a ton of value from just one 225 hp panel shattering.  

Unlike most shield heroes-- Domina doesn’t have the luxury of being able to see the individual health bars of her barrier-, nor the wiggle room the consistently dip at the first sign of cracks, so enemies often shoot Domina before she can even pivot.  

This proposed passive would lead to her feeding slightly less when a key center piece inevitably breaks. It’s not meant to be like Orisa fortify reduction or Nano, it’s just easing the amount of poke Domina receives before still needing to reposition, and also incentives breaking more pieces of her shield rather than just walking past it. 
Again, with this hypothetical passive, if someone pushes past the barrier without breaking much of it and shoots Domina outright, she’ll still keep the mitigation despite the barrier being completely sidestepped.  

When the duration of the barrier naturally depletes she loses the resistance.  How does this sound? Numbers for resistance can be tweaked of course.