Unfortunately I can’t test anything right now, because my graphics card gave out.
So I’ll just weigh in on my perceived status quo of ABB.
(I don’t know how much of an “increased damage scaling” it effectively is, numerically. I would like to know, if anyone got the numbers).
For levelling Nightblade, ABB always felt fine imo. Not the highest damage ever, but doesn’t have the energy issues of Phantasmal Blades.
For endgame, I think the skill was also just fine. The items are tricky tho.
The problem is that reducing the cooldown effectively is limited to Vileblade Set, which relegates all other builds to either using Amarastan Crusher (or the Fire ABB Conduit) - or using default attacks/Shard or Beronath for most of the DPS.
And that makes any actual investment into ABB hard to justify.
Attacking once every 1.5 seconds (or so) with your main skill just isn’t all that hot, unless you have sth worthwhile to do damage in between.
Maybe sprinkling the cooldown reduction over a wider variety of items could alleviate this.
If ABB was a little more “spammy” by nature, it also would be easier to build around.
Conduit of Night’s Whisper: Fire ABB affix
It doesn’t convert the Acid portion to Fire damage. This really eats into the damage, on an item that’s already forcing off-brand damage on NB and has -20% TDM.
Since the last change (increase CD and TDM to ABB) I’ve only seen and played that one build with the fire conduit and it’s really mediocre. Fun, but not of the highest tier.
Someone else might have more input on building with Enforcers for non-spam-ABB.
Was worse for me, than Mythical Venomlash.
The reason is the slow base attack speed.
The numbers on it are good, but it doesn’t matter if you attack at 180% speed instead of 200.
It’s also functionally identical to Venomlash, maybe one of them could just do sth else.
The CD reduction to ABB isn’t high enough to justify building around it.
Only really good for the conversion imo.
There is probably a good reason for this change that I am just completely unaware of?
Is the increase in damage to ABB this patch that high?
This is the best build I managed to make with the Crusher, and I haven’t seen anyone make anything better yet. (Looking forward to seeing some builds)
6:30 SR 30-31
Ravager of Flesh (the recording of the fastest kill I managed with this char)
This is a damn fine build, but hardly breaking the mold.
The best thing about spamming ABB is the consistent AoE.
Single target damage is lower than a build using RF or what-not.
And despite massive investment into physique and great gear, it’s still quite glassy.
Save file for anyone who wants to test it:
_AquaRegia.zip (407.3 KB)