Dominator

Destroyer Dominator
Tier:	Supposedly 6
Tier:	Supposedly 6
Tank ID:	45
Tank ID:	45
Upgrades from:	Pressing H exactly once if at least one friendly Dominator is unclaimed
Upgrades from:	Pressing H exactly once if at least one friendly Dominator is unclaimed
Weapon(s):	1 Cannon
Weapon(s):	1 Cannon

Gunner Dominator
Tier:	Supposedly 6
Tier:	Supposedly 6
Tank ID:	46
Tank ID:	46
Upgrades from:	Pressing H exactly once if at least one friendly Dominator is unclaimed
Upgrades from:	Pressing H exactly once if at least one friendly Dominator is unclaimed
Weapon(s):	3 Cannons
Weapon(s):	3 Cannons

Trapper Dominator
Tier:	Supposedly 6
Tier:	Supposedly 6
Tank ID:	47
Tank ID:	47
Upgrades from:	Pressing H exactly once if at least one friendly Dominator is unclaimed
Upgrades from:	Pressing H exactly once if at least one friendly Dominator is unclaimed
Weapon(s):	8 Launchers
Weapon(s):	8 Launchers

A Dominator is a large tank in the Domination game mode. In Domination, if your team captures all of the Dominators, your team wins. Since the 25th of August update, the Dominator is a playable entity; if your team captures a Dominator, be the fastest to press the H key once without spamming to take control of the Dominator. The Dominators are also playable in the Sandbox game mode. There, the player is able to play as the smaller versions of the 3 types of Dominators. The Dominators are among the largest entities in the game besides the Arena Closers, the level 140 Mothership and the bosses.

Dominator Variants

What playing as a Dominator looks like.

As of the August 26th update, 2 new types of Dominators were added, bringing the total up to 3. See them below.

Design

A Level 1 dominator.

Universal

All Dominators feature a circle as their bodies and a hexagonal base, like the Smasher but the Dominators have weapons, and are much larger and much tougher. Their colors are dependent on which team captures it, but the base is always black.

Destroyer Dominator

The Destroyer Dominator is equipped with a short, wide cannon in front that has a small trapezoidal base, similar to the Ranger.

Gunner Dominator

The Gunner Dominator has three cannons in front. The cannon in the middle is longer and wider than the other cannons but shoots the same bullets, similar to the Triplet.

Trapper Dominator

The Trapper Dominator is surrounded by eight equal-sized launchers. Each launcher faces a different direction, but they are evenly spaced. Its circle of Traps defends it from all sides but such protection has a very limited range and is weaker against tanks with focused bullet fire. It is also called the Octo Trapper Dominator.

Technical

Stats

All Dominators

Dominators can’t move (except the now-removed Sandbox Versions) and have 6148 (6000-6088 in Sandbox) health points (per Dominator) with weak healing factors. Note that the health increases by 2 every level (including level 1), like other tanks. It does not have upgrades and has a base health of 5998. The regeneration rate is the same for all Dominators. Their field of vision is at least a bit larger than the Sniper. All Dominators, including the Sandbox versions, suffer no recoil.

Trapper Dominator

This Dominator’s FoV (Field of Vision) is about the same as the Hunter’s. It is surrounded by eight Launchers. Its trap speed is higher than a maxed Tri-Trapper’s, while its trap health and damage is about the same as a Trapper with 12 points in penetration and 5 points in damage. Also, its reload is the same as Trappers with 0 points invested in Reload. Auto-fire is always enabled with no exceptions.

Gunner Dominator

This Dominator’s FoV is about the same as the Hunter and its upgrades (not including the zoom out on the Predator). It has three cannons in front. Its reload is high and the bullet speed is normal. However, it has low bullet penetration and damage.

Destroyer Dominator

This Dominator’s field of vision is slightly greater than a Sniper’s. It has one Cannon in front and very high Penetration, being 5 times greater than a Mega Trap’s, and a Bullet Damage equivalent to a basic bullet with 21 points in damage. It has the bullet size of a Hybrid. Also, its bullets can be knocked by enemy bullets or drones. However, its Reload is about that one of Hybrid with 3 points in the respective stat and Bullet Speed is lower than a Hybrid or Destroyer.

Behavior

The Dominator, when AI-controlled, targets the closest enemy. Even if another player comes closer or the player himself or herself gets away, the Dominator will continue to target the player until the player goes out of its field of view. However, when a Dominator gets contested or changes the team, it will ignore its current target and attack the closest person to the Dominator. Also, if the current target has not harmed the Dominator for a certain amount of time, the Dominator will start attacking a new target, if there are any others around. Dominators’ AI was updated on August 22nd which enabled them to predict movements of players and shoot ahead, making it harder to dodge their attacks.

Dominators can harm shapes, but they cannot when neutral. They will also not target players out of their field of view unless provoked. Interestingly, they will not target back if you harm one when using a tank that has a higher range than the Assassin.

Dominators prioritize players but if there are no players, they will target Polygons, Bosses or Arena Closers.

If the game is over and you manage to decrease its health to 0, it will be contested. However, it won’t change the winner.

Gameplay

In Domination, these tanks are used as control points. They start neutral, but any team can capture it by lowering its health to 0 and being the last team to shoot it. Once the Dominator is under that team’s control, it can no longer damage that team. The team can shoot through the Dominator, but the enemy still can’t.

To capture a Dominator from the enemy team, you need to drop its health to 0 twice. When you do it for the first time, the Dominator will turn back to neutral mode. When you do that for the second time, the Dominator will be owned by your team. Whichever team lands the last blow on a contested Dominator will capture it.

As of August 25th update, if you press H before other players do, you will take control of a randomly selected (and uncontrolled) Dominator on your team, at the cost of losing the control of your tank, which will be destroyed slowly. A recent update added a Dominator in the center of the Tag Mode map but capturing it was not essential to win. However, it was removed soon after.

Strategy

All Dominators

• Strong against: Low DPS (Damage Per Second) tanks, melee builds.
• Weak against: High DPS tanks.

Destroyer Dominator

Similar to the Destroyer.

• Strong against: Slow tanks.
• Weak against: Fast tanks, long-range classes.

Gunner Dominator

Similar to the Gunner tank.

• Strong against: Low rate of fire tanks.
• Weak against: High penetration, high rate of fire tanks.

Trapper Dominator

• Strong against: Body build tanks.
• Weak against: Long range, high rate of fire, tanks with strong penetration, such as Destroyer, Annihilator, or Hybrid. Effectively all tanks excepting body build tanks due to its lack of attack.

Against the Dominator

The best strategy is to swarm the Dominators. Your team should attack with all single-point troops (such as the Triplet or the Destroyer) and guard with crowd control troops (such as the Octo Tank or the Spread Shot). The “point troops” will cause massive damage to the Dominator while the crowd controls will prevent the opposing team from recapturing it.

Also, try to avoid the Bullets from the Dominators, particularly Destroyer Dominator Bullets as they will do grievous damage to you, if not kill you outright. Assuming that the player has put some points into Movement Speed, they can simply distract the Dominator by avoiding the projectiles, as the projectiles fired are very slow (This does not work on a Trapper Dominator because the traps are omnidirectional). Try to not do this in front of teammates, as the projectile can accidentally hit them, most likely destroying them.

If you want to attack Dominators without risking yourself from being near to them, a Ranger with few points on Bullet Speed is a good choice. You can simply attack the Dominator without having to go near it, thanks to high FoV of your tank and decent Bullet Speed, although it would take time to do this by solo, especially against Trapper Dominators, as you have to change positions sometimes.

The Mega Trapper is very effective against a Trapper Dominator. This is because the Mega Trapper’s Traps are stronger than that of the Trapper Dominator.

As and/or Defending a Dominator

As an Octo Tank, an effective tactic is to stay in the middle of a Dominator and shoot enemies. Another strategy is to use Max HP, Health Regen, Reload and Bullet Damage. Get to the opposing side’s Dominator and use one side for the Dominator and the other for the other tanks.

Two tanks with high Reload and Penetration could move a Dominator’s Bullets and not get hit like Triplet and Gunner or any high Reload classes.

If you like to stay hidden, use the Manager or the Stalker. Just camp out at your base and protect a Dominator. A great tip for using the Manager is that you get a "glass" build (with maxed out Drone Speed, Penetration, and Damage) and hide your Drones in the middle of the Dominator, thus making the Dominator appear alone if no players are roaming around. However, enemy Dominators can see hidden tanks, so don’t think you can get away with it. Be extremely cautious when you’re camping near your Dominators, as most tanks that capture Dominators are usually Penta Shots, Sprayers or other spray-and-pray tanks. The massive amount of Bullets fired from these tanks can unintentionally hit you, forcing you to relocate your camping zone, otherwise, you will be destroyed.

If you are a Dominator, keep your mouse close to the center. That way you can rotate faster.

History

• In very old versions of Domination, there could be a rare message which says “The (Location) Dominator is now controlled by some mysterious group”. The notification would be gray.
• As of the 22nd of August update, the Dominator’s AI still prioritize players, but if there are none in range, they can target the Polygons, Bosses, or even Arena Closers.
• As of the August 25th update, players can control a taken Dominator of their team as if it was a controlled tank, but still can’t move.
• When the Arena Closers have finished killing regular tanks, they will start to target Dominator(s) with a player controlling it. That Dominator then becomes contested.
• As of the August 26th update, a Dominator was added to the center of the Tag Mode map, and could be captured by any of the four teams. It was removed the next day. The update also added the new Dominator types explained above.
• It used to be so that if a Dominator’s health reaches 0 when the Arena is closed, it will disappear. But the arena’s and Minimap’s tile color of the Dominator stays the same. On the 25th of August, this was changed; the Dominator now gets contested instead.

Trivia

• At the release of Domination, Neutral Dominators used to be the #A6A6A6 shade of gray. The color was soon changed to yellow in an update on July 3rd.
• If a neutral dominator gets destroyed by one of fallen bosses, it will refill its health back to full.
• If you use a Smasher, you can, with some difficulty, hide under a Dominator.
• A Dominator’s Death Screen is special. When they die, the death screen doesn’t show how long they were alive, how much score they have, etc.
• The Dominators' shells/bases, Traps, and the Smasher branch (including the defunct Mega Smasher) is the only hexagons (Polygons made up of 6 straight lines) in the game.
• The bullet of the Destroyer Dominator has the second-highest Penetration, after the Arena Closer’s, and third-highest Damage, only beaten by the Destroyer's Bullet and Arena Closer's bullet, of all bullets in the game.
• The Dominators are the second most resistant entities of the game.
• Along with bosses, Arena Closers, and Base Drones, Dominators (when neutral or Al-Controlled), are the only things in Diep.io that can detect invisible tanks.
• The Dominators are all level 75, which is unreachable by the tanks that players use.
  • However, according to the size of the tank, its level is 120, not 75.
• Back then, Dominators would turn to the enemy team's color when they are killed once. Currently, they become contested when the enemy team kills it, giving a chance for the other team to recapture it.
• Destroyer Dominators used to have a different design, although the only difference was that there was no trapezium on the front gun. It was changed with the addition of other Dominator variants.
• If the victory message appears in Domination and the lost team manages to capture a Dominator, the game will still proceed to close the arena.

Bug

This section contains bugs related to Dominator. Before adding a bug to this list, consider the following: Please screenshot, then reload. If the bug happens a second time, then get a second screenshot to verify that the bug is still happening. If the bug is still occurring, please post the bug report with the appropriate system template. Describe the bug in detail, but avoid having conversations in the description and/or using first-person-anecdotes: such discussions belong in either the comment section or on the appropriate forum board.

Click to Show Bug List
Patched or Removed Bugs Diep.io GLITCH ! FREE DOMINATORS ?!-3  PC  A bug that allow players to push the dominator around.

Gallery

A Destroyer Dominator in-game.

A Gunner Dominator in-game.

A Trapper Dominator in-game.

A Gunner Dominator in Sandbox mode.

A Trapper Dominator in Sandbox mode.

A Destroyer Dominator in Sandbox mode.

A neutral Dominator almost at full health.

A Trapper Dominator in Tag Mode.

Base of a Dominator after being ‘destroyed’ when the server is closed (Outdated).

Dominators can be player-controlled.

Differences in trap spacing.

A Trapper Dominator alongside a Tri-Trapper.

Purple Dominator in Tag Mode.

A Trapper Dominator in Sandbox.

Players on the red team shooting a Trapper Dominator.

The old design of a Dominator.

Fighting a Dominator in the mobile version of Diep.io.