DoTs builds, stacking flat damage or caster-oriented?

Let’s say you’re making a DoT build. Would you rather stack flat damage and use a skill with high % weapon damage (which do not stack with other % weapon damage skills, if I’m not mistaken, aplying only the highest %) or go for skills with base DoTs on them?

I ask this because I have a lvl 81 character that’s having some tough time, especially because he seems to lack damage enough to deal with heroes and bosses. After tacking a more in-depth look at him, I noticed that he has a significant amount of flat damage but no especially high % weapon damage skill and I find myself relying too much on skills with base DoT damage.

What do you guys think? :confused:

Depends on the build. Throw up a grimtools so we can take a look.

http://www.grimtools.com/calc/

You can even upload your save file to it directly to avoid the hassle of re-creating it on there.

Now that I think about it, I see that the question should be different: when playing your average dot build, let’s say bleeding, do you rely on one or two skills to get your damage going (which would mean you either a) have lots of flat bleeding or b) absurd amounts of + % bleeding damage, If your skills have base bleeding damage or your flat amount isn’t that big) or you see yourself relying on full skill rotations, devotions procing and etc (which would mean you c) either have low flat damage, making multiple skills with base bleeding necessary, seeing that % weapon damage do not stack, or d) your + % bleeding is low, making no use of your high amounts of flat bleeding and/or base bleeding on skills)?

I believe c) is the answer to me, considering that I have over + 1200-1300% damage, which is what I usually see here in the forum.

Typically the higher your base DoT damage is, the better. Optimally, you should be trying to maximize that base DoT damage in any form you can.

Again, giving us your build will help a lot. I have a Bleed Witch Hunter for example that uses several different sources of Bleed DoTs including maximized flat Bleed damage. So I guess to answer your question in the first post, the answer is C. All of the above :slight_smile:

There’s a sweet spot of balance somewhere, you need both high % and flat damage sources to scale (with enough resistance reduction, obviously)

For example, you have 500 bleed damage and 1000% bonus, consider the following:

  • Adding 100 flat bleed damage would add 1000 damage total
  • Adding 100% bonus would add 500 damage total

Of course the real calculation is much more complicated, but the general idea is that once you have enough %, flat damage is better, but if you only have damage, then adding % would be better.

Indeed, depends on build. Usually, DoT builds use several skills/procs, that provide DoT damage of correspoding type, to get enough DPS. They also tend to use crit (because if DoT crits, it will deal massive damage for all its duration). And they usually use many sources of resist reduction too. And they usually invest into DoT duration as well.

For example, my acid/poison WitchHunter has massive weapon poison damage, but he also uses constellation procs (Scorpion, Abomination, Manticore), item procs (Venomspine Greaves, Venomfang Grips, “of Blight” ring, Mark of Apostate, etc), Shadow Strike with NHH maxed (in addition to Amarasta’s Blade Burst as main attack), and he also converts 1/3 of Frostburn damage into Poison as well. He also has resistance reduction from weapon augment, Manticore, CoF and Veil of Shadow). He also has +470% to poison duration, so even “normal” 2-second poison will last more than 10 seconds (and 5-second will last 30+), so i often use “hit & run” tactics - poisoned enemy will die anyway, due to insane poison duration, so i can just run and hit other enemies.

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