I have been having a lot of fun with this gametype, so I would love to see what anyone else out there thinks about it. I'll post a thread in the Halo 4 discussion about Invasion vs. Dominion, so let's not do it here. For now, I'll post some things I've learned from the little bit I've played.

Basics

Dominion is a lot like Land Grab on steroids. There are three bases. You gain 30 points every time a base you own resupplies, and the first team to 400 wins. If your team gains total control of all three bases, the game goes into a sudden death mode. The enemy team all gains overshields, and if you exterminate all of them before they gain control of a base, you win.

Strategy

I think there will be a lot of in-game decision-making involved with this gametype, but I think the standard approach should be to maintain total control of one base for the entirety of the game, and try to gain control of the neutral base early. If you can do that, you can get up on score early on and make the game mathematically impossible for the other team to recover. The other strategy I've liked is to take the primarcy bases (A and C) and confuse a team with its control of B. Then, force them out of B and exterminate them.

Resupplying and Fortifying

It seems that there are a lot of weapons in Dominion. Whenever a base resupplies, all of its weapons respawn. Also, because weapons have waypoints of their own, you can see how many power weapons there are around a base. Bases also fortify when you control them for about 30-40 seconds. You can then build turrets and take vehicles. The vehicles do not physically spawn, but a hologram of them appears, which you can activate to take control.


That's all I've got for now. I will comment more as I learn more.

Dominion is the new Invasion. Well, at least the red-headed stepchild of Invasion. I've been enjoying the gametype so far - though it can be confusing and chaotic.

We should document what spawns where on these Dominion games. I know the Gauss & Mantis spawn at one base or another on Meltdown.

While it's fun to dominate all the bases on a map and slaughter the other team (which is a nice option if you've completely outclassed the other team or they're shorthanded that way the game doesn't drag on and on) I think the optimum strategy might be to let the other team have just one base. Control the high points, and the bases with the desirable weapons/vehicles. Give the other team a place to spawn so we know where they are and will start.

this was always a good strategy for domination on COD... if you took all the points, you created unpredictable spawns. with your home base & the middle base, you can keep them spawning at their base and not have to worry about them spawning behind you.

I agree. Exile is very manageable when you control A or C, and B. I've used a Warthog to patrol the sides around B and our base to keep people from trying to steal A/C behind us, while everyone else pushes aggressively to control B.

A very fun and strategic gametype again reminiscent of invasion; my only concern is the frequency of power weapon spawns. This worries me as this type of setting will indefinitely attract stat padders, players whom will not play by the spirit of the game and unnecessarily grind randoms and potentially us. Within 5 minutes of elapsed time on longbow, my entire team (Crew) had a suite of rockets and various other power weaponry. I can understand the vehicles, but the plethora of lasers and snipers makes this feel like "Team fiesta" from halo 2 days. Not neccesarily a bad thing when taken at face value, but when looked at under a magnifying glass this can scream an incarnation of "heavies" outside of btb.

Hey everybody, Dominion seems to be the most commonly reoccurring playlist we enter in Wheelmen Parties. Time to figure some stuff out. Lets get started shall we?

THE AC MENTALITY



Now that we have gotten that out of the way, lets move into what WILL Work! (I hope)

THE RANGE OF MOTION MENTALITY

Time for Twisted's untested theory!

PART A: Fireteams
The team is split up into three squads of two. Offensive players, Defensive players, and utility players. IT IS CRITICAL to realize that this is not Invasion and these roles need to be subject to change rapidly in the middle of games. Communication is the key, we will get more in depth later. These roles should guide your game-play, not define it.

Time for informational graphics before I get into role specifics!







-In all examples, we start off holding alpha

DEFENDERS
Ideally these players are your most skilled ranged players in the game. Snipers should generally always be considered Defenders. Your role is simple: defend what we got, and when what we got is secure, support forward pushes with ranged weaponry. Bravo is generally the most important point to hold, and should be treated as thus. Just because you share a responsibility does not mean you need to be on top of each other. In fact, of the three roles, defenders may spend the least time interacting with each other. Realize where you need to be within your range of motion, and get there.

On Longbow:
-You will stay at Bravo. If we don't have Bravo, take Bravo. From here you will repel pushes from alpha and charlie, and use the tactical superiority of the position to fire down on enemy defenders as your team pushes onto alpha or charlie

On Exile:
You will move between your base, the banshee platform (in rare cases, such as sniping or when we do not control Bravo), and Bravo. Simple really, just know where you need to be.

On Vortex:
The range of motion image says all that needs to be said. Pay attention to your Bravo Ordnance drops, or your enemies will use them against you. FOCUS on Bravo, When/If you support A or C, do so in a noncommittal manner, always be ready to respond to pushes on Bravo

On Meltdown:
...

OFFENDERS
Offenders cannot be afraid to die. Players with aggressiveness play-styles or whom prefer CQC are best suited to be offenders. Your role is very very simple, to the point where I don't even need to specify individual map strategies ITT.

Take Objectives you do not control. Always focus on controlling Bravo. You are always pressuring the enemy team, push on whatever they control, and take it. It is important you communicate with your team, letting them know what Objective you want to push. If you are not a directorial-type, allow the utility players to co-ordinate the pushes. Just remember two things:
1. Take Bravo
2. Pressure the enemy team

UTILITY
The guys that tie it all together. Without a doubt the most important role of the three. These are the most map-aware players that you have. They must be able to constantly recognize where whey need to be and get there. Also, they should be able to communicate with both the offenders and defenders in a game to both support our pushes and help repel enemy pushes. The Warthog team will be stepping into the utility role while the hog is up. I don't know enough about this the way this role will play out or Dominion as a whole to write more at the moment. Just remember this: the whole map is your range of motion, it is up to you to be at the right places at the right times, the balance of the game hangs on it.

PART B:ROLE SWAPPING

Roles in my proposed strategy need to be volatile and subject to frequent change. Communication is key here. If your defender just re-spawned on the wrong side of the map, but he sees a utility player/offender at Bravo, he needs to tell them to take over defending until he can get there, or he can just out-right role-swap and begin an offensive push depending on where he spawned. Use common sense and communication in games, do not get so stuck on what role you are that you fail to do something that makes sense just because this guide didn't tell you it was your job.

PART C:VEHICLE ROLES
When you get in a vehicle, you can assume many different roles, depending on the vehicle. Communicate with your team if you are taking your vehicle into a different role. If you are an offender who is going to play defense with the wraith, tell your team that so a defender will begin pushing in your stead.

Tha Hog: Utility.
-cannot properly defend or offend because of it's inability to get inside of bases. Gauss hog can defend a bit better, but falls flat because of them same issue

Mongoose: Offense

Ghost: Offense, Defense, Utility
-The ghost is fast and responsive. It is also not very consequential to lose. Offenders are best suited to use this vehicle to push onto a base, then hop out and run inside.

Wraith: Defense, Utility

Mantis: Defense, Utility

Banshee: Utility


to be Cont.

Great write up twisted, i can't wait to see how your planned deviation from the "ac mentality" plays out over time in the playlist. Aside from that, how does one go about delegating role types at the start of a match; are they to be declared intially but at the same time be pliable depending on how the games situation changes overtime as you stated? Or will more time be needed before a game, i.e "pre game lobby" to gauge which playstyles personnel tend to gravitate towards and then change to on varying circumstances?

Sometimes it's where you spawn that will dictate your initial role but that's getting into the more advanced stuff. Good writeup Twisted.

This gametype is going to require a lot of smart decision-making. Beyond just holding ground, we need to consciously put our power weapons to good use and callout whenever you see enemies headed a certain way. We keep running into issues of poor communication and total non-use of our own power weapons.

When it comes to Dominion, I really want to simplify things down when we play. For now, here's what I want to do:

1. Spread out the defense
2. Pick up power weapons
3. Call out resupplies
4. Call out flankers

Spreading out the Defense

Instead of defending from our bases, which has thus proven necessary for control, I propose we start controlling the choke points of the map instead. We keep getting flanked around the sides of the map because we thrust up the middle constantly.

For Exile, I'd like to control the BTB Banshee spawn with a sniper, with a guy covering him and supporting Bravo from the junk pile. I'd like to keep two guys in Bravo. Lastly, I'd like a hog to patrol the tank side of the map to neutralize the guys who like to lift into Bravo. This way we can maintain control of the middle more effectively and consider a hog-and-sniper- supported push to take the last base from a team.

For Longbow, I'd like to make sure we control the lifts going up to Bravo, use a Wraith or Hog to patrol the beach pass, and play others low below Bravo. We also need to be aware of the teleporters and how quickly enemies can flip the map on us.

For Meltdown, we have to gain control of the caves. From what I've seen, there are three main chokepoints on the map. Two are on the outside near the base teleporters, and the other is around the middle near Bravo. What we keep running into with Meltdown is an over-commitment to Bravo which allows flankers to get behind us into our base. Our attention gets split, and we end up losing Bravo as well. We need to control these chokepoints and use them against enemies, neutralizing teleporter flanks, and sneaking into their base when they overload one side of the map.

Picking up Power Weapons

One of the biggest issues we're facing right now is five years of BTB mentality, and two years of Invasion. For years, we designated roles in BTB based on weapons. We had designated drivers, snipers, pilots, laser humpers, rocket users, etc. As a result, we don't often pick up our resupply weapons in Halo 4. In Invasion, we designated roles based on spawns, and as a result we don't actively seek out weapons when we spawn because we assume they're someone else's responsibility. I think we need to grow out of this mentality and put our weapons to work, whether we're the best with them or not.

Call Out Resupplies

This is mildly redundant with the last section, but I also want us to call out our own and enemy resupplies. We keep finding ourselves surprised by enemies attacking us with Rockets, new snipers shooting at us, lasers, etc. We need to make sure everyone is conscious of resupplies--our own and our enemies. We need to start putting our weapons to work, and we definitely need to be aware when they have more.

Communication

We need to communicate more effectively. If you see guys moving around the side of the map, call them out. If you see enemies moving toward a teammate, call them out. If you think you're about to get into a fight with someone, let your teammate you think is near you know. I made a post about the awareness problems created by Halo 4. We're going to need to communicate more effectively to slow this gametype down and give each other a greater sense of stability in the game.

Right now, many of us are getting frustrated in Dominion because of our own ignorance about what the other team has, what the other team is doing, and even what's going around near us. We need to communicate calmly and effectively. We're going to need to learn callouts or create our own for these maps.


Conclusion

I'm still having a lot of fun with Dominion. I love how tactical close games become in the end, when we start holding B intensely while sending rocket guys to disrupt late-game resupplies by the other team. However, many of the parties I've been in have been getting frustrated, and I think a lot of what we're combatting is a BTB and Invasion mindset that we'll have to change to play Dominion properly.

Is it possible to block the portals by ramming a mongoose in there or even using a redundant hog to block the enemies lift up to Bravo.

Black Knight wrote:

Is it possible to block the portals by ramming a mongoose in there or even using a redundant hog to block the enemies lift up to Bravo.

On Longbow, we derped a hog into the lift in Forge to see if we could get it stuck and failed. It cannot block the lift. As for the goose, if this game is like past Halos, then players will just be able to jump into the lift to get around it.

Using the maps Twisted posted we should be able to have some constructive call outs. And if people let themselves be a bit more "greedy" with power weapons then I think that'll go a long way towards some of the issues Sarge talked about.

I would add that don't be afraid to run a CQB loadout for Dominion, as when in doubt it is ALWAYS a good idea to camp a base. Base defense, especially the home base that might not get attacked often or at all, could be boring. But it's vital, not just for resupplies, but to make sure the enemy never forces us into a situation where we have to run around trying to capture ANY base to keep from getting killed off.

Also in a pinch, when you don't know what to do, a base can always use a bit of help defending until you've got a partner or team together to go after an objective.

As hard as it might be to implement/coordinate, has anyone tried breaking the team into a set of 3-2 man cells "Battle buddies"? If we pair up into double squads with the "hoarding power asset mentality" that oboe spoke of, there might be potential in having the partners equiped for any combat situation; Combine this with the role types/battefield awareness that sarge and twisted have been speaking of and we might just produce a more synergized unit.