DA Stacking and the Crucible

@ Chthon:
Ah, I see. OA it is.

Just thought about DA with this setup, who needs OA? :stuck_out_tongue:

Yeah, you can exasperate enemies to death.:slight_smile:

Something like that. 3k has to be enough. :wink:

I will never do that. Iā€™m 99% sure ABCbarbecue said they had doubts about posting their builds because of nerfs. Iā€™m not going to look for his post, but i found it funny and thatā€™s why i remember it. If he never said that and it was someone else, then itā€™s my bad.

I think a flat 66% PTH cap is a bit too strong a nerf. Something like what Dioarchet proposed sounds good to me.

I donā€™t really recall people saying legendaries were absolutely the strongest things in the game more than a year ago. Before skill modifiers made their debut in xpac things followed pretty general rules. You wanted +skill, certain slots lacked good blue/purple options so you just took greens.

Flash forward to now and some things look remarkably similar.

  • If a build doesnā€™t have rings that line up super well with its desired stats, it goes for MI rings.
  • If a build isnā€™t using shoulders for set piece thatā€™s an invitation for MI shoulders
  • Chausses of Barbaros is mostly the only non green thing you see in pants slot - because 95% of pants suck and the rest are questionable next to even a gimpy pair of solael sect packing four resistances. Minor exceptions exist for pumping specific skills but the trend holds.
  • Green boots arenā€™t quite as dominant due to the arrival of Runeguards, importance of armor making Golemborns more attractive, and Ill Omens packing a lot of easy to grab stunres. Still, greens are a bundle of stats here and sometimes the other legendaries arenā€™t the bundled stats youā€™d prefer.
  • Some builds have jack all for legendary weapons - or one MI just happens to have a modifier that beats out every other legendary. Greens a go.

Legendaries are guaranteed bundled stats and abilities. If that lines up with what you need, the unique stats available to one legendary can sometimes dominate a slot. If the legendaries donā€™t have this recipe of godly stats, or an MI has an S tier modifier, thatā€™s when greens slip in.

OK, so from my limited understanding, we have a few issues here:

  • Diversity can mean build, gear or devotion diversity. The consensus here is that DA meta while increasing build diversity, is killing gear and/or devotion diversity.
  • When DA meta is nerfed (and no other changes), the game returns to the state before those Chinese community posts appeared (aka worsening build diversity).
  • Nerfing DA meta and nerfing monster OA, or debuffs, etcā€¦, overall build diversity increases because it is easier now to breathe in W150-170. However, CDR, kiting casters, S&B are still kings => unfair competition.
  • Nerfing DA meta along with nerfing the effect of CDR on TD skills, as well as nerfing DoT, S&B builds. Everyone is happy, no builds is king, all can do W150-170, although with varying difficulty.

I agree with many people here that PTH lower than 10% at 5k DA and above is ridiculous. Mechanism should change in a way that DA 3k5 to 4k remains the same as of now to make it worthwhile, but DA 4k-6k should be a steeply diminishing return. At DA 6k, PTH should be around 15-20% so that W170 can still be a considerable challenge even for DA meta.

I have a few humble suggestions here:

  • If people want to nerf DA, may as well nerf CDR, DoT, S&B. DA formula can be changed to something resulting in diminishing return, and capped at around 15-20% PTH, or reduce half the effect of DA on AoE (we all know how bad AoE is W150-170).

  • With similar logic, nerf half the effect of CDR on TD skills so that no build can spam like how it is now. Need help to suggest a more proper nerf on CDR builds, mine is just an example.

  • For DoT kiting caster build, nerf its own OA, or lower cast range, or reduce projectile speed, or increase animation time. I opt for the 4th option because it puts DoT builds in a more vulnerable position than before because they canā€™t kite as much, or damage output will reduce significantly.

  • S&B: I have little understanding about those builds, someone please make some suggestions about this.

In conclusion, I think this kind of game should be about optimization of different factors. Optimization is needed because the extreme boundary conditions are supposed not to work out. For Grim Dawn, extreme damage scenario is already proven not to work out in Crucible (die too fast). However, extreme defense scenario is working well, which is unacceptable because to achieve this level of defense requires less than equivalent sacrifice on damage. A suitable nerf is to make the sacrifice on damage more impactful (aka canā€™t finish the wave before the time goes out).

This whole thread, to me, is like a reflect of society. Guys belonging to certain elite groups that enjoy special treatment (CDR TD skills, DoT, S&B) outperform others. However, the mass population discover that there is government subsidy for all (need to work hard for certain duration and some luck to get, available even to those elite). As a result, elite groups feel that life is too easy now and they donā€™t receive special attention like before, thus they demand and then influence the government to change the policy. However, even the government is confused how much to reduce the subsidy to satisfy both the elite and the commoner. The commoners are also aware that the elite groups are having too much power, thus they demand the government to reduce the influence of the elite group equally. In all society, the commoners always have the lowest demand in life. However, when even basic survival becomes an issue, sh*t happens. Again, when the commoners receive so much advantage to survive (the elite can also receive the same but they feel they are too elite to do that), conflicts happen. Solutions? Just enough subsidy to survive life and no more + remove elite class.

This is getting weirdly political, how fascinating! :smiley:

While I think the invulnerability + Time Dilation playstyle is incredibly powerful and may need a slight nudge when we incorporate the changes Iā€™ve already covered in my first response, the key difference is that this playstyle involves active defense, whereas DA stacking is very passive.

Pulling off nigh-immortality with timing cooldowns requires a decent amount of skill and should be appropriately rewarded.

I think thereā€™s a bit of misunderstanding about CDR and S&B here. Both CDR and s&b donā€™t solely rely on their namesakes for defense. They need two or three layers of defense to be reliable in cruci.

Spellbinder wants Mark, Mirror, Decay and maybe Giants blood. All the other CDR builds want at least one of Tree, Ishtak, Giantā€™s blood, Wayward soul, also Blast shield/blade barrier/seal/aspect of the guardian. And decent secondary resists in addition to TD/mirror or TD/mark

The earliest s&b builds that appeared after 170 had 4 defensive t3 devotions cause shields canā€™t carry them by itself anymore. The cruci nerfs on 1.0.5.0 alleviated this and some can now go a bit offensive with Oleron but will need either lifesteal or 4k DA.

DA abuse on the other hand, relies solely on that mechanic while ignoring all the other ones because it can carry them all by itself. Do note that CDR and shield builds can still die easily if one of their defenses falter, while DA has this very thick single defensive layer thatā€™s harder to break than all the defenses of the other builds combined.

We donā€™t need a cdr or shield nerf right now. We need a crucible nerf and a DA nerf. The Da nerf is because the current state of the game has shown that DA becomes ridiculously broken at higher levels and therefore needs adjustment. Crate just donā€™t want to dabble at the formulae right now so we have a DA cap incoming instead.

Agreed. What some donā€™t realize is that cdr builds have small margins of error that one small fuckup can lead to instant death. The first advice when playing a cdr build and failing is always practice.

This thread appears to be going places

Still, it shouldnt be allowed, even if it involves skill. I believe, that skills like Mirror or MoT have CD for a reason - they arent meant to be spammed indefinetely, even with CDR investments. I agree, that MoT doesnt grant complete invulnerability, but still, 50%+ damage reduction is way too powerful, and turns squishy caster into an unbreakable tank, while keeping his powerful spell DPSā€¦
If you think that skills like MoT should be spammed indefinetely, then rebalance MoT - reduce damage reduction to something like 30%, and increase duration to 8-10 secondsā€¦

Agreed on that. DA abuse is far greater problem, and should be fixed first. Along with nerfs to Crucible and some OP bosses.

but still, 50%+ damage reduction is way too powerful, and turns squishy caster into an unbreakable tank, while keeping his powerful spell DPSā€¦

MoT is not enough to facetank 150+ crucible waves. Even with MoT+Sphere+Decay Reaper can burst you in 2 seconds, that dosen`t sound unbreakable to me. At high levels of Crusy its only usefull as fail-back insurance when you run away waiting for Mirror couldown.

50% Damage Absorb turns you into an unbreakable tank. Lol, what?

It helps ease the pain, thatā€™s what it does. The hard hitters still shred you in no time

Iā€™d argue Arcanist is the root of all problems.

Nerf DA and bring back OAā€™s old glories, suicidal DW builds was the best thing ever, now they are only good at suiciding.

> select DW witchblade
> start in crucible 150+
> tactical suicide committed

The spoiled spellbinder is not the only cdr class you know. Nerfing MoT would kill some builds in crucilbe who rely on it.

They will nerf TD most likely, if anything

May the Gods hear your pleaā€¦I so miss the rush :frowning:

Itā€™s mainly about crucible. It wouldnā€™t affect players the way you are describing

I have a sneaking suspicion they might nerf the CDR on star pact if theyā€™re going this route.

Itā€™s still kinda unfair towards classes with single circuit breaker, say druid. Idk, tough cookie

Heh, my Devastation battlemage donā€™t use it and still capable to do 170.