A comparison of of various ray/beam like skills

Grim Dawn Classes, Skills and Builds
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A while ago I made a spreadsheet to calculate the damage of various beam/ray like skills such as AAR and Drain Essence. As it was quite informative, and sometimes surprising, I thought that others would be interested in this as well.

Note: I did dare to include two ‘not a beam’ skills which do continuous damage in a beam-like shape but they both are, I repeat, not a beam.

I’ve calculated Damage Per Second (DPS) for the direct damage sources plus the damage of the Damage Over Time (DOT) that would occur in that second. I’ve given the DPS assuming 100% and 200% Casting Speed (CS), as in the latter case the DOT adds relatively less damage. I have also added DPS for ‘overleveled’ which assumes max level of all the skill nodes.
This does not consider that multiple damage types won’t have the same amount of +%damage, so keep that in mind when comparing the skills. I also did not consider the +%damage sources of skill nodes.

Conclusions:
In terms of AoE damage, FoI beats the other skills, but it does require a lot of skill points and energy. In terms of single target damage, Phantasmal Blades is a very clear winner, but its ‘beam like nature’ is contested. If you exclude PB, then AAR does the most single target damage. Storm Box (also “not a beam”) gets a honorary mention as it can act like a second beam in addition to one that you have to channel.

=== BEAM SKILLS ===

Albrecht’s Aether Ray
DPS (100% CS): 1554
DPS (200% CS): 3065
DPS (200% CS, max lvl): 5371
Targeting: Single Target
Other: +40% Crit Damage
Energy: 270.8 per second, increasing with 58.3 energy per second
Notes: High damage, but exclusively single target. Insane energy costs. Almost no DOT damage, so when you stop casting you lose all DPS.

Flames of Ignaffar
DPS (100% CS): 736 +25%WD
DPS (200% CS): 1236 +25%WD
DPS (200% CS, max lvl): 2872 +34%WD
Targeting: Short range cone
Other: +40% Crit Damage, -25 physical res, 25% chance to fumble
Energy: 162.6 energy per second
Notes: Low damage, low(ish) energy cost, hits all in a cone but short distance. Loads of DOT damage, so can alternate with other spells without losing much DPS. Don’t ignore the 25%WD as that can add a lot of damage. Overleveling adds a lot of damage.

Drain Essence
DPS (100% CS): 586 (703 with transmuter)
DPS (200% CS): 1072 (1287 with transmuter)
DPS (200% CS, max lvl): 2883 (3459 with transmuter)
Targeting: Single target, 20% to hit up to 3 more
Other: 15% (5%) ADCTH, +40% crit damage, -135 OA, 33% slow with transmuter
Energy: 150 energy per second
Notes: Low damage, with only some AoE damage. Has some nice added benefits in the form of ADCTH and -OA. Props for looking cool while casting this.

=== BEAM SKILLS FROM ITEMS ===

Conflagration (from the Conflagration Relic)
DPS (100% CS): 781
DPS (200% CS): 1440
Targeting: Single target
Other: +12% Crit damage
Energy: 229.2 energy per second
Notes: Works like AAR, has half the damage (but only costs a relic instead of 28 skill points) and a smaller crit bonus. Does the same damage as FoI but as a single target.

Acid Purge (from the Seal of Blight component)
DPS (100% CS): 1252 +28%WD
DPS (200% CS): 2313 +28%WD
Targeting: No idea?
Other: +25% Crit damage
Energy: 291.7 energy per second
Notes: I haven’t used this one yet, so I can’t comment on it’s playstyle. Requires lvl75, can be put in any main/off-hand, which is quite flexible. Compared to skills it seems to be doing very well in terms of damage.

Obliteration (from the Tome of the Arcane Wastes legendary)
DPS (100% CS): 817
DPS (200% CS): 1498
Targeting: Piercing beam
Other: +25% Crit damage
Energy: 300 energy per second
Notes: I haven’t used this one yet, so I can’t comment on it’s playstyle. Level 65 item. It pierces, but seems to have low damage with no added benefits.

Obliteration (from the Mythical Tome of the Arcane Wastes legendary)
DPS (100% CS): 883
DPS (200% CS): 1622
Targeting: Piercing beam
Other: +25% Crit damage
Energy: 316.7 energy per second
Notes: I haven’t used this one yet, so I can’t comment on it’s playstyle. Level 94 item. It pierces, but seems to have low damage with no added benefits. Barely does more damage than it’s non-mythical counterpart

=== “NOT A BEAM” ===

Storm Box of Elgoloth
DPS: 414
DPS (max lvl): 860
Targeting: Fire and forget. 4mtr AoE on target and a beam between you and it.
Other: -115 DA, 40% slow for 3 seconds
Energy: 75 energy per cast
Notes: Why is this one included? Because while it is a “fire and forget” skill it still functions like a beam. It does Ok’ish damage and has -DA, but it lacks a critical damage bonus. However, you can maintain its DPS with just a single cast, making it perfect to combine with another source of DPS.

Phantasmal Blades (transmuted)
DPS per blade (100% CS): 395 +12.5%WD
DPS per blade (200% CS): 705 +12.5%WD
DPS per blade (200% CS, max lvl): 1198 +17.5%WD
DPS if 5 blades hit (100% CS): 1635 +62.5%WD
DPS if 5 blades hit (200% CS): 3185 +62.5%WD
DPS if 6 blades hit (200% CS, max lvl): 6760 +105%WD
Targeting: Piercing line, 65% chance to pierce
Other: +40% Crit damage, 5 or 10% ADCTH (I’m not sure if this gets reduced by the ‘Total Damage modified by -50%’, but it used to at some point)
Energy: 80 energy per cast
Notes: Perhaps not traditionally considered a beam attack, but it does very much act like one. DPS depends heavily on how many blades hit. Shotgunning PB is pretty insane and can be done at medium-long distance. Has the highest (potential) weapon damage which further ups the damage and allows it to be self-sustainable through energy leech. Overall, it has the highest damage of all skills that are mentioned here.

Forcewave (transmuted)
DPS (100% CS): 265 +125%WD
DPS (200% CS): 531 +125%WD
DPS (200% CS, max lvl): 1050 +165%WD
Targeting: Piercing line, 100% chance to pierce
Other: +25% Crit damage, 20% slower enemy attack
Energy: 16 energy per cast
Notes: Very tricky to compare this one to the others, as most of its damage comes from weapon damage. At 200% CS it deals twice as much WD as PB but only 1/3 of the direct damage; it has shorter range, but pierces 100% instead of 65%. Not a beam.

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(Reserved for stuff because why not)

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I’m not really a fan of beam skills but data compilation is always welcome here. I think you left out the beam from Tome of the Arcane Wastes though (forgot the skill name)

4

Not sure what P.Blades are doing there. By your logic even Stun Jacks and Panetti’s Replicating Missiles should be there. If you are going to make a thread about “Ray” skills then keep it restricted to Ray skills. I don’t think anyone considers P.Blades similar to Ray skills

P.Blades doesn’t act like a ray skill. They are very different, the only commonality is that with the transmuter P.Blades scale with cast speed. But P.Blades aren’t only meant to be used like that. Phantasmal Blades are very good even w/o the transmuter and can be used as “Nukes”.
Ray skills have a fairly linear playstyle and buildstyle. P.Blades is much more diverse. They are literally two different type of skills

By your logic even Chillspikes should be here

Anyways, MToAW skill and Acid Purge have been overlooked by you

5

Phantasmal Blades is a shotgun skill, not a beam/ray skill. Don’t know why it’s there.

6

PB is a piercing beam (or technically a cone) which, in my experience, plays exactly AAR and FoI. The fact that it has a transmuter isn’t relevant–AAR won’t be suddenly not a beam if it would have been a transmuter.

Anyway, feel free to ignore PB and focus on the others.

I’ll look up MToAW and Acid Purge, thanks for the suggestions!

7

Obliteration. Moreover, this beam skill pierces through, unlike AAR and Conflagration.

I disagree about Conflagration costs only a relic slot - it costs a whole relic slot, and it’s the lower tier 2 to boot. It could be useful for grenado sorc/purifier but later on it must be replaced with Obliteration.

FoI and DE are cones rather than rays. I think Acid Surge is also a cone skill but haven’t tried it. PB is not even a channeling skill, otherwise PRM is also classified as ray.

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PB can “shotgun” enemies at a further distance than FoI can even hit them though. It’s only shotgun in the sense that it has multiple projectiles which travel in a cone (while FoI does equal damage in a cone).
Most rays deal damage every 0.3 seconds (without CS), PB does multiple hits per second.

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It’s still not a beam skill. Beam skills require you to stand still to start channeling, while PB doesn’t.

I guess procs that shotgun with several projectiles are now beam skills too.

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That’s just your head cannon. The skill is pretty different from what a beam actually is.

The thread itself is good, like including SBoE which is kinda similar to Ray skills but at the same time you have massively underplayed the potential of Drain Essence imo. The innate ADCtH makes it a very convenient to use channeling skill

11

Thanks, I’ll add Obliteration! I fully agree that Conflagration isn’t a viable option (in the late game), but I wanted to add it for comparison’s sake.

Note that the ‘channeled skill’ label in Grim Dawn seems to be quite arbitrary. The only characteristic seems to be that, without casting speed, they are cast in 0.3 seconds intervals instead of 1.0 seconds intervals.

I’m not saying that this is not one way to distinguish skills, but in my opinion it’s certainly not a demanding distinction. Would a 0.5 sec interval spell be a beam? Would PB be a beam if it would be cast in 0.3 sec intervals?

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You need to stand still for PB too. There is no practical difference between casting AAR for X seconds or casting transmuted PB for X seconds.

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Okay how about this, let’s compare 3 CS based skills - PBlades, Forcewave and AAR. The “first cast” would definitely fire off a single attack for Pblades and Forcewave, but in the case of AAR if you try something similar your character tries to do a dance move and no attack is fired.

Channeling skills require you to stand still and attack/fire. SBoE is a slight exception, while not exactly a channeling skill, it’s still similar to one in that the damage done by the skill is done in “ticks” similar to how ray builds deal damage. Of course that alone doesn’t make it a channeling skill but it is an honorable mention as a DPS source

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I understand what you mean, but then any spam skill could be considered a beam, including ranged Fire Strike and Cadence. To me beams are AAR, Obliteration and Conflagration.

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Those are attacks, not spells. In my opinion, that is a more meaningful distinction than whether it deals damage in 0.3 or 1.0 second ticks.

I don’t consider PRM a beam-like skill because it does damage all over the place and not just in a beam. DEE is more comparable to AAR in the sense that it is somewhat of a non-piercing beam, so I could add it for shits and giggles, but it’s too different (and it only deals like 1/10 of the damage of ARR).

Either way, I’ve collapses under peer pressure and added PB to a special “not a beam” category. I’ve added Storm Box there too, because if PB isn’t a beam than SB isn’t a beam either.

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Excuse me for asking.
How is storm box affected by cast speed? It has a cooldown.
I thought cast speed only affect skill with cooldown

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How often you can cast Storm Box is affected by cooldown reduction.
How often it damages enemies during its duration is affected by cast speed. It deals damage in 0.3 damage intervals, just like AAR.

IMO, this plays into why it seems to be a quite heavily underrated skill. It’s damage output is pretty absurd, and can be used to clear trash as well as being pretty great against bosses. You can either fully kite while maintaining your DPS, or double your DPS by attacking/casting with another skill. It deals half the damage of AAR, for a fraction of the energy cost and without requiring channeling.

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Let’s stick to the “beamlike skills” or the topic will become endless. :wink:

Obliteration has a skill cost not far from AAR but it deals around 1/4 and 1/3 of the damage. Ok, it pierces through enemies but it’s a very thin ray so unless they are in a line like at the postal office, it’s not a really important feature. I’ve tried it in various combinations (pure aether, cold converted to fire, pure physical with beronath, maybe i’ll try pure pierce) because i like the graphycs. In the end i’m convinced that the skill, even intended as a damage filler, needs a decisive buff to be really useful. Every build i ever tried with obliteration suffered in terms of single target dps, or else you go for a powerful nuke but then you realize that the time spent channeling obliteration is pretty much time wasted.

Acid purge is a skill i like a lot, tried it even converted to full vitality with Blood orb of ch’thon. Damage is good, as far as item skills goes i think is inferior only to chilled spikes, but the mana sustainance is heavy and the skill has very short range, and it’s slow to reach i’ts maximum distance.
As a damage filler in a build like this https://www.grimtools.com/calc/lNk3D74N it works decently well (180k dps with DO and HV procs active,which means all the time). Still it’s an example of a build that does a lot better in aoe and survivability than it does in single target dps

19

This is a really nice information. One of my planned build is using storm box as main skill. Though I have not pump the gearing for cast speed but the damage is already absurd.

Thanks for this :wink:

Then, based on your information, every skill that is not dealing DOT damage (for example: skill that has 5 seconds duration and deal 150 vitality damage) is all affected by cast speed?

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Anyone able to confirm this? Because as far as my knowledge of mechanics goes it’s wrong and cast speed has no effect on skills like Stormbox.