dryad and heart of the wild doesn’t reduce dot dmg itself/directly, only how long the dot lasts - which becomes irrelevant if the DoT is constantly refreshed (or it has additional dmg types baked in)
*it should be working correctly last i checked (heart of wild used to be bugged/interacting with the wrong stat but is working correct now)
**as a side note, the way DoTs work dryad doesn’t work after the dot is applied. Since Dots do their status check on initial application dryad must be present before the DoT hits to count the reduction
***unsure about the enemies in the totems, but remember certain enemies still reduce resist, so it’s (potentially) simply possible you were dealing with an enemy that had 30 or 35 resist shred bringing you under softcap?
I’d like to thank you for, “the way DoTs work dryad doesn’t work after the dot is applied.” Also, I don’t know if any of the Heroic monsters from Totems deal more than 30 RR. This issue occurred not only with Totem monsters, but also with lower-level monsters in the general field.
Nevertheless, it should be noted that my other characters who do not have the Heart of the Wild skill, which reduces DOT duration, are fine.
It only happens with Wader, who has the Heart of the Wild skill, and it’s especially bad in the Painkiller Edition compared to the Final Edition.
Also, If monsters with poison RR above 30 are the problem, I can test by changing the resistance. However, all my other characters do not have a poison resistance of 30. They are usually only around 20.
I hope the developers will take a closer look at the Heart of the Wild skill.
try make a video when it happens? maybe something will stand out on replay
easy quick test; unskill heart of the wild on the warder
This issue has always been present, even with only 5 totem tries. I will test 50 times and let you know the results.
In 50 totem attempts with the Heart of the Wild skill removed, there were a total of 9 instances of rapid blood leakage from the DOT, with 6 resulting in death and 3 surviving. In this experiment, I can’t be sure if the Heart of the Wild skill is a program bug, but the three survive instances were surprising.
Dryad’s Blessing provides a 36% DOT duration reduction, while Heart of the Wild provides a 20% DOT duration reduction. Assuming Dryad triggered before the enemy DOT attack, would my painkiller Edition have a total of 56% DOT duration reduction or 36% DOT duration reduction?
they stack additively, so 56%
but gain, it only “works” if you’re not getting dots refreshed on you, otherwise dot duration below 100% does nothing
*reason is Dots deal dmg every second, so reducing a 3 second dot by 50% doesn’t prevent you taking tick dmg, and if you’re standing in a pool, or have a debuff on causing the dot, every second it will reset back to 3 seconds/original duration
It’s only when the source expires the final duration gets counted, that’s where the reduced duration would matter
Or, if you stand in a pool that lasts 6 seconds, but the poison it applies lasts 2 seconds, and keep standing in the pool; you will take 7 seconds poison dmg (since you only reduce the final application by 50%/from 2 to 1 sec and final application will be at the 6th tick)
if you stand in the pool, and move out, the dot will start expiring from the moment you left the pool -50% (so in this example you step out of pool poison lasts 1 second additionally)
But, since you’re already/still having deaths with Heart of the Wild removed, i’d guess it’s somewhat safe to say that’s not causing the issue/deaths directly then?
So perhaps it is a good idea to try film your totem runs, to see when/where the deaths happen exactly/in what combo. Will make it easier to see enemies and debuffs etc
Thank you for your detailed response. DOT duration time seems to be a relatively complicated behavior. From the previous experiment, I’m not sure if Heart of the Wild is a program bug, but I’m also not sure if it’s normal.
Just to be sure, I ran 30 totem experiments with my Witchblade with devotion turtle and crab removed, and Dreeg’s Blood removed. My witchblade has lower health and health regen than the wader, and does not have the Heart of the Wild skill.
In 30 totem experiments, my inferior witchblade suffered five noticeable blood leaks, but only two were serious, and I survived all five.
I can only assume that either the Heart of the Wild skill is a program bug or, if not, that monsters in this game deal different kind or different level of attacks depending on what your character is.
I’m outraged that my Warder, who takes down Superbosses, gets killed by the local mob. It’s like a boxer who beat Mike Tyson getting knocked out by an elementary school kid. 
it is not
again, it’s a super easy test
take your warder, go to spirit guide; remove heart of the wild points, go fights totems
i don’t know why you’re trying to use other chars, with completely different stats; when you can simply take out the points from Heart of the Wild and remove the variable you think exists, ez
and again, it would help your case super much; if you recorded the instances where your warder dies
thats just for this scenario/your char
another note would be; people have been using heart of the wild for years, still use heart of the wild, consider it mandatory, and have never reported any problems (except for me when it got fixed because it was not actually reducing bleed duration), you are the first one to speculate it’s causing poison deaths, no one has ever noticed it; so you should try your warder while removing the Wild points, and present the videos show casing it dying with Wild suffering from poison increase etc
Video 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1NRMIsHtoE
Video2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mz9wZrR7nGw
Regardless of whether or not I remove Heart of the Wild from my Warder, the rapid health drain occurs. If you look at the incoming damage in the DPYES utility overlaid in the top left of the video1 and video2, there is a very large amount of physical damage coming in consistently. This was completely different from my assumption that it was poison DOT damage. As you said, Heart of the Wild does not appear to be a program bug.
Is it Truma damage that is causing these deaths? I really don’t understand how someone with DA 2700/2800 and Armor Rating 3200 can die from that kind of Truma damage. Especially in video 1, where there are no enemies that can do that kind of damage. I also don’t understand why this death from Truma damage doesn’t happen on my other characters with similar DA and Armor Rating.
I don’t know what the hell is wrong with the Painkiller Edition Warder that he is being unfairly killed by Truma damage from a heroic monster.
Currently, I’m attributing this to the fact that Wader has about 10~15 less physical resist than my other characters (WitchBlade, Warlord, Death Knight)
Do you have an opinion on what the problem is?
cool, so now you know; it’s not because Heart of the Wild itself, simple, case solved
i’m guessing reflect - this is normal cause of death for phys builds with low reflect res (or low phys res after the phys res change)
DA doesn’t matter, the dmg/DoT lands it deals fixed dmg, trauma ignores armour so armour rating also doesn’t matter
like my initial suspicion was, reflected trauma dmg
You can straight up see in 1 of the videos you’re fighting a reflect hero
on the other totem i can’t spot the reflect hero, but it’s beetle spawns, and i know there is a beetle hero with reflect.
Reflect is “disabled” in Cruci and different SR (or rather not blanket enabled like campaign)
Campaign has regular reflective enemies, these then frequently occur from totems, so phys/trauma or Cadence builds generally always had to pay extra attention to totem farming vs cruci/sr
and Avenger always fit in that category that had to pay attention if they had low reflect resist (that’s why my own avengers have more than 25%, and ex my warlord had 98%),
and i think after the phys res patch lowering phys res values Avengers are even more in that category
Thank you for your detailed response.
- Is Truma damage reflected by Reflective Monster reduced by my Physical Resist?
The reason for this question is due to the following facts:
My Witchblade has Reflect resist and Physical resist of 18 and 48 respectively, my Warlord has 43 and 42, and my Death Knight has 18 and 39. My Painkiller Edition Warder is 25 and 29.
If low Reflect Resist is the culprit, my Death Knight(or Witchblade) should suffer more because it has a smaller Reflect resist than the Warder, but my Deathknight(or WitchBlade) is never killed by totem monsters. If the reflected Truma damage is reduced by the Death Knight’s higher physical resist, then the whole situation is well explained, but if not, then Warder’s unfortunate death remains a mystery.
yes,
reflected dmg goes through the regular defence interaction,
it’s just that mechanically trauma doesn’t get covered by armour (neither when you attack monsters - which is why it’s so strong)
So it goes through your same defence layers, resists, % absorb(Maiven) etc, phys res.
Reflect is then additionally checked by reflect resist too/an unique attribute only covering this special dmg interaction.
it’s not just a matter of your own defensive stats, but offence too.
An attack dealing 1million trauma, needs higher base defence than an attack dealing 500k trauma.
So even if there is a defence disparity between builds, a potential offence disparity can be enough to change the outcome.
*this is why my warlord had so high reflect resist/highest reflect resist of all; because it also had higher trauma output.
what i would do, re totem/campaign farm exclusively, is quick experiment with another reflect resist component (titan plating) see if it makes significant difference (or if you need more reflect res), but also more so if it makes a difference “instantly”,
since then you have double confirmed to yourself it’s purely reflected dmg causing it, and the solution then is more reflect res(ez?) or more phys res(harder probably?) - since likely dont’ want to lower dmg output 
last option, which is doable but also rough, is simply to start pay attention to reflective spawns when in campaign, don’t blindly attack/unleash all you have; if reflect heroes are present, and have their reflect aura up(wait for it to expire since it’s temporary/only lasts a few seconds)
Low reflect resist is the likely culprit. Of course, I’m going to equip the Titan Plate and test it out.
However, I don’t think I’ll be too happy if a Warder with the Titan Plate survives the totem monsters. With Titan Plate, It seems nearly impossible to adequately meet Warder’s resists while maintaining Devotion with the current aggressive deployment.
Perhaps, I should release a Narcotic Edition. Anyway, thanks for all the help.
Maybe this medal can help: Mythical Sigil of the Bear King - Items - Grim Dawn Item Database
Reflected trauma damage is a pain
try change matriach to combust band perhaps?
has huge pierce res, so that can then be “necessitated” swapped in on titan plate. While still getting some %dmg, RR, and speed.
overall similar resist, slightly less OA, slightly less trauma(weapon aug swap)
To: Gnomish_Inquisition & Bas
In about 50 Totem tests with the Titan Plate and Combust Band configuration, I only experienced three rapid health drains, and only one of those resulted in death. It is believed that the low reflection resistance is definitely the cause of the problem.
Titan Plate and Combust Band are somewhat of an alternative, but they reduce poison resist and vitality resist to 15 over 80 and 13 over 80 respectively. Zantharin, which is still a terrifying enemy to this day, will be even more terrifying.
The Bear King Ring has been used briefly before. This ring increases Reflect Resist by 18%, but lowers DPS and Life Steal, making it very difficult to beat Calagadra, and had to be accompanied by difficult kiting in the fight against Mogdrogen.
If the developers could put some physical resist into the Avenger 4 Set bonus, like they did before the big physical resist patch, this would be an easy fix.
that makes no sense,
on the GT i pulled poison res is identical (27 and 27), and vitality res is 25, and it’s 20 on painkiller (even tho painkiller does have 83max vit instead of 80)
painkiller GT as listed in OP Warder, Level 100 (GD 1.2.1.2) - Grim Dawn Build Calculator
fire 83+6, cold 80+11, lightning 83+6, poison 80+27, pierce 80+33
combust titan plate change Warder, Level 100 (GD 1.2.1.2) - Grim Dawn Build Calculator
fire 83+20, cold 80+25, lightning 83+20, poison 80+27, pierce 80+24
painkiller GT as listed in OP
bleed 84+61, vitality 83+20, aether 80+16, chaos 80+2
combust titan plate change
bleed 84+61, vitality 80+25, aether 80+16, chaos 80+3
there was 0 change to poison or aether or bleed resist affects,
elemental is up, pierce a bit down, chaos tiny bit up,
unsure how to weigh vitality change; since max res is greater against non debuffs, but 25 overcaps is greater against debuffs than 3max+20 over
Oh~ my mistake.
I tucked the Titan Plate into the headgear. Warder, Level 100 (GD 1.2.1.2) - Grim Dawn Build Calculator
If I put it in the torso like you suggested, it seems to work fine.
Thanks again.
Also, just out of curiosity, are you a game developer?
no, just a player/forum user
you can tell the Crate devs by their tag
and then it will usually say their title, Designer, Artist, Programmer etc
*also their name will be in orange colour
Thanks again. 
Without your help, I would not have found the cause of the problem nor the solution.
I would have been suffering through the development of Narcotic Edition with a bloody nose and would have spent days cursing the developers with the curse of weakness. 