Adjust scaling of skeleton base damage.

Grim Dawn Ideas and Feedback
1

There has been some recent discussion among Praetorians about whether skeleton base damage would/should be reduced in the future. Based on my own build testing, I agree with those who say that a base damage reduction is appropriate. However, rather than a simple across-the-board adjustment, a more nuanced approach should be taken to address the underlying root causes of current skeleton base damage problems.

Problem 1: Skeletons scale far too aggressively at lower levels.

Root Cause A: Raise Skeletons ability contains too many bonuses.

Like other pet skills, investing into Raise Skeletons will increase base damage and stat bonuses (+% damage/health/energy). However, Raise Skeletons has yet another bonus of improving the mix of skeletons summoned as well, especially by reducing the frequency of low-value Skeleton Warriors. This makes points invested into Raise Skeletons (and +skill bonuses) far more valuable than points anywhere else for skeleton-using builds.

Root Cause B: Raise Skeletons ability is available at mastery level 1.

Since Raise Skeletons is available immediately at level 1 and grows so quickly and immensely with each additional skill point, it completely trivializes content in the first two acts even if the character is naked and spends no other skill points. Of course this is not the only skill with such early scaling problems, but it would still improve and greatly smooth out character progression if this could be fixed.

Problem 2: Skeletons scale far too aggressively at endgame.

Root Cause A: Raise Skeletons ability contains too many bonuses.

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Once again, the overloading of bonuses into the base Raise Skeletons skill continues with scaling at Ultimate ranks. Here, the passive bonuses and skeleton mix not only continue to improve with rank, but also their base damage increases far more at Ultimate ranks than other Necromancer pets do as well. Currently, a 26/16 skeleton wields 82% of the base damage of a 26/16 hellhound, which seems much too high considering 10 skeletons can be attained without using any skill modifiers.

Root Cause B: Not enough skill point sinks required to maximize skeleton damage at endgame.

Because skeleton base damage is current governed by a single skill, it becomes very easy at endgame to maximize base damage by overcapping that one skill. (The modifiers currently govern skeleton quantity and armor/conversion, not base damage.) This is unlike most other skill chains where one or more additional modifiers are usually required to maximize base damage, often using another damage type. To properly maximize base skeleton damage, players should be required to overlevel an additional skeleton modifier.

Proposal: Scale skeleton base damage using both Raise Skeletons and Will of the Crypt.

This proposal would remove vitality damage from skeleton base attacks, and replace the +% vitality bonus on Will of the Crypt with flat vitality damage bonus to all skeletons. Ultimate scaling for both skills would be reduced.

  • Raise Skeleton Ultimate scaling is reduced to +66%, consistent with Ultimate scaling for Blight Fiend.
  • WotC Ultimate scaling is reduced to +121%, consistent with Ultimate scaling for Soul Harvest.
  • Total skeleton base damage Ultimate scaling is still higher than both Blight Fiend and Sundered Wraith.

Impact at low levels: Low level characters would be delayed until mastery level 20 and 12 additional skill points into WotC before their skeletons reach current levels of base damage. Even so, skeletons would still be extremely strong at early game, especially with their AOE skills.

Impact at mid levels: For builds with 16/16 Raise Skeletons and 12/12 WotC, the only impact is the loss of the +% vitality damage on WotC. However, there are many other sources for +% to all or +% vitality from other skills (Soul Harvest, Call of the Grave, Master of Death).

Impact at endgame: Maximum skeleton base damage is reduced to 69% of hellhound (again, with up to 10 skeletons before modifiers). To reach max base damage, builds would be required to overlevel both Raise Skeletons and Will of the Crypt; current itemization makes it quite feasible to overcap both. (See example from Unimaginative Skelemancer Cabalist - Grimtools link.)

My hope is that the spreading of base damage onto a separate modifier and the adjustment of scaling at Ultimate ranks would make the impact of the changes much more targeted and effective than a blanket across-the-board reduction in base damage. Thanks for your consideration!

2

cries in Skelemancer :cry:

I sense heavy guide editing in my future… sigh :eek:

3

But, this actually seems like a much more thoughtful proposal to Skele scaling (say that three times fast) than the current approach.

Thanks for the work, DaShiv.

4

If DaSheet weren’t already an actuary (probably), I’d think he was gunning for a position with Crate balancing AoM content and future projects. =p

5

How would this proposal affect the hybrid viability of necro pet builds? Seems like the skill points would be much more severely restricted than in other hybrid masteries.

6

Skeletons should have imunity to bleeding and poison :eek:

7

I don’t mind skeleton power being smoothed, but the last thing I need is more SP to spend, I’m already massively short on a summoner in general. Gear might or might not fix that depending on the drops I pick up. Doubt it though, I’m seriously short.

It might work, but I’m really wary of need to spread myself even thinner.

8

As I had mentioned, the goal is “make the impact of the changes much more targeted and effective than a blanket across-the-board reduction in base damage”, and increasing skill point dependency is a key strategy to do so. For builds that are fully specialized in skeleton usage via investment/equipment, the nerf is minimal; for other builds that are less specialized, the impact would be greater. Keep in mind that builds that aren’t as heavily specialized in skeletons should have advantages elsewhere over builds that do specialize in skeleton usage.

This is a far more preferable approach than a larger direct reduction that equally impacts ALL builds using skeletons, regardless of the degree to which they’ve specialized.

9

I don’t know if I’d call an endgame %13 or greater reduction in DPS output minimal… but I understand what you mean. :stuck_out_tongue:

EDIT: DaShiv reminded me about external flat damage sources responding to a PM. Skeleton specialists wouldn’t suffer %13 DPS loss.

10

From another players perspective one who arguably has biast as a long time Necro player in multiple genre.

Quite frankly The class is as balanced as any other class considering Crate still does not have agro fixed and any damage ties naturally into agro.

Summoners must draw agro (I do not agree, but it’s what the current state is) so at the moment the balance in that equation must be that summons must do high damage instead of remain alive because they are not there to either soak or crowd control.

Now you have a class unlike anything bar it’s actual closest relative as far as a pet focus goes the shaman (note NOT the Occultist to which you reference whom is a debuffing sorceror that happens to dable in pets) that has supporting skills that have a prime focus on vitality with other damage type thrown in to mesh with other play styles.

It’s addition to any other class and what it ultimately has to stand on it’s own two legs by is in fact it’s summons.

It’s 4phys 2 cunning 4spirit per level as opposed to the occultists 3/3/5 or the shamans 4/3/3 proves this.

It has high phys because otherwise it would be an outright glass cannon because using anything other than straight summoning will garner Agro.

If you can accept that skeletons are not meant to be a simile of panetti’s replicating missile then you have to also accept that spamming them for 2 seconds worth of damage is not their issue.

Feasibly you can look at the numbers and say that’s high; or you can play the Necromancer and be grounded by the fact you can only summon back 3 at a time no matter how high the maximum cap on them is.

If you harm their first impact from what I am seeing in the new content with screen wide DoT AoE you will have a class whose primary strength is completely eroded to a level whereby it will no longer be considered competition for multi hit nova retaliate combat builds.

You may not think that’s an issue, but the reason you are having an issue in the first place with this build is because the reason why the class functions is making it function too well when people take it to it’s natural extreme; and quite frankly with the imbalances already signed off on in the system as presented above are far bigger issues because they are not overpowered just in the ‘extreme’ cases they are applied.
Damage in Grim Dawn is high; people are complaining that most of their builds have to center around countering that and guess what a summoner is all about (some of this can be attributed to lousy damage output)?
That’s right the art of not being hit.
That is how players like me play dedicated pet builds the ‘extreme’ end of the scale.
The problem is similar to the ranged issue with crate.
Crate has never liked ranged because a person with a gun doing equal damage at range to a person with a sword is doubtless going to win against the one with the sword and possibly take no damage.
This idea of ‘no threat’ is something that they are massively and categorically against.
If you lower pet builds damage you must make them more survivable otherwise people will not use them over healing retaliation novas focusing on multi hit and the game will become once again a one trick pony and completely boring.
The problem here is make them more survivable and you start having to give them what crate doesn’t want them to have; taking less threat and to a much lesser extent a longer clearance time because lets face it this is an ARPG the A standing for action (not attrition).
You want to remove vitality damage for instance; please enlighten me as to how you will balance that with healing circuit breakers and retaliation damage that far outweigh it on the damage curve while not specifically being attributable to DPS; or the fact that and especially more so now with skill modifiers how it is as big an issue as the bonuses supplied by correct itemization that initially is hampered by RNG, but because items can be traded or duped are essentially part and parcel of any build.
This in itself creates not just variance by it’s standardization like the integration of devotion exploitation into commonality but an insurmountable gulf to equalize.
Tell me how do you make a character that chooses not to use the devotion system equal to one which does?
You say specific single modifiers lead to the greatest damage and I beg to differ In my experience spreading the field of damage types has in fact done more harm than good to the game.
Now for decent DPS you spread instead of concentrate attack for DoT and then simply switch taking full advantage of %damage all to completely overwhelm any resistances of bosses.
Lets take an example a creature with 100% fire immunity.
A single damage type will either be fire or not and if it is it will be an insurmountable foe leading to a change of tactics perhaps having to go with whatever phys or backup skill you can manage.
with 2 types of damage of equal amounts the creature receives 50% damage on average.
with 10 types of damage this becomes 90% and now what should of been an issue ‘resistances’ is now a non-issue on large.
What also becomes an issue with ‘spreading the base’ is also a detraction from the fun of an ARPG when you must invest time and effort into a non-gaming activity (research) in order to maintain the established guideline on how much you are proposing in damage a character to do for the reason of… balance?!?
With who/what? this is primarily a single player game, so if everything is reduced to the same game play then there is no real diversity? Nothing to come back to, no other builds worth trying, no variance.
You say damage is too high I say it’s no where near high enough.
You wish to quote numbers how bout the exponential curve on experience that your damage output must follow else you are in fact weaker relatively speaking than your were a level or 10 ago? Think I’m crazy, let me tell you I’m anything but.
If you have to put in 10 times more effort for the same reward (an extra level) than you had to for the previous level and you arbitrarily cap damage output to a ceiling max; it is very easy to see where that trend is going.
The reward for progress will be stretched further and further out until what is being asked for is not worth what one is getting.
Hiding that trend is what keeps the human hamster running the wheel, and the way you hide it is to enable the player to engage with the system on an intellectual level to create their own win above the standard rate to a variable amount.
Nerf that variable, nerf the reward system that keeps the player base interested and at the moment having more than one decent build style is only a good thing.

If you want balance don’t look to ‘nerf’ things make others viable because it creates variation that will keep the game fresh; the opposite is niihilism.

11

Meanwhile Blademaster/Spellbreaker is on 3.7k OA 100k+ dps end game and no body mentions shit.

Theres a cancerious culture in gaming currently to percieve ANYTHING new as somehow OP and crying for nerfs, this has to stop. :mad:

Can Cablists solo mogdrogen? No
Can Cablists solo Ravager? No
Can Cablists reliably solo other super bosses? Expect lots of kiting and one shot death with your sub 2.4k DA. Also Beast Nemesis is a No.

So stop actually asking for nerfs.

12

I’m only nonchalant on the skele nerf because I’ve already discovered a funny trick that outputs almost half again the dps output of my latest build post. It’s… actually pretty hilarious. shhhh :rolleyes:

13

You mean like bugging out the boss pathing? :eek: thats definitely a bug.

14

Is every enemy in the game considered a Boss?

15

Any way on this thread, the cry on skeletons i dont understand. To get 10 you need BIS gears, and even then it is hard to max resistance to your skeletons, and they are so paper they die to anything thats remotely a boss on ultimate, not to mention a massive amount of resist reduction on expansion mobs.

I feel like the thread is simply hyperholing without practical considerations, especially in situations where you can easily lose your skeletons and therefore a huge chunk of your DPS. “But what about resummoning?” Yes what about re-summoning? You think your re-summoned little skeletal dudes is gonna stand to boss shotgunning you every 5 seconds? Even then, what if you lose half of your skeletons, you cant re-summon them back immediately, unlike hellhound/Briathorn etc.

Meanwhile all other builds are doing their damage fine until they die to boss because they don’t have to manage re-summons to sustain their DPS. As long as 3.7k OA 100k dps blademaster build exist, im not sure how can cablist possibly matching that ever. Not to mention blade barrier on blademaster for survibility, which you sadly dont have. Curse of fragility still makes bosses rush you ignoring pets, which yourself cannot tank in most situations.

Im not saying Cablist is under-powered or anything, it performs just fine and is possibly top tier, but definitely not the OP this thread is describing. :rolleyes:

16

I’ve been experimenting with skeletons and, even though I didn’t reached Ultimate yet, I have to disagree.

Yeah, they are very brutal at the early game, I picked Necromancer as my first mastery and they brutalized Gutworm, who usually gives me the most trouble at the start of the game. But at the same time, I think that without high damage, they would be nothing, because they actually fall really hard at the end game if you are not careful.

Here’s one detail that you overlooked, since the skeletons have less health than the other pets (I mean, they have roughly 7175 at 16 compared to a 16 Briarthorn that have roughly 36223 for example) and their advantage is based more on numbers, they have two major achilles heels: Area of Effect/Novas, and Damage over Time. And these get prevalent at the mid/end game, especially if you are facing the Aetherial Vanguard.

I’m not complaning about those, actually I’ve expected them to be like that, because that’s quite the “price” you pay for “raw power”, even by micromanaging them a lot with Pet Command I lose some and need to re-summon. And that also brings me to another point: I would have agreed if you only needed Raise the Dead for them to be effective, but due to their “zerg” nature, you absolutely NEED Undead Legion for them to be effective, and that’s roughly 12 SP. Like I’ve said, it’s not uncommon to find Heroes and Bosses that have AoE or any other way to deal damage to multiple targets, and due to the skeletons low health, good luck trying to re-summon them at 18 second cooldown rate to only have 3 and only 3.

Actually, in my honest opinion, I think instead of nerfing Raise the Dead for now we should focus on improving the other pets instead, because there’s not much reason to invest on their modifiers. Sure, Hellfire and Emboldening Presence are good, but that’s because they are auras. The other modifiers would be good IF the pets used their related skills more often.

I saw many complaints in the past that they don’t have aggro, but they actually have, it’s called Ember Claw and Ground Slam. But since these skills usage are not cooldown-based and instead are related to their dumb AI, they don’t use them that often and don’t generate enough aggro as a result. And also makes me question why the Briarthorn and the Hellhound even gain more Energy and Energy Regeneration per rank if they are extremely dumb to use it to begin with.

17

I know I’m new here, and I admit, tl;dr, but it seems to me from what I skimmed of the discussion, is that the real problem is that the Raise Skeletons ability contains too many bonuses.

18

You misspelled “not enough”.

19

Dude, just reporting on what I’m picking up. Personally, I’m all about some Raise Skeleton bonuses. Hell, I say add a duplicate skill tree so we can have twice as many and exponentially more powerful skeletons.

20

I think we should hold off on any nerfs till we see the builds actual performance.

Are Necro summon builds outperforming other summon builds?
Are Necro summon builds outperforming other types of builds?

You can’t take one skill in isolation and claim its OP. Skills are part of a mastery and you need to compare them as a whole.

Yes Hellhound is weaker on its own but it gets heals, RR, flat damage and non exclusive passive support.