Sounds interestin - could be one of the variants to make the relic more useful and populer. Maybe also grant +1 to one of masteries?
Yeah. As far as I heard this nuke is not considered by some builders because of lack of bonus to mastery skills, as one of the reasons.
I think what you meant to say is ‘Yes, Zantai should do that but i fear it would be pretty underpowered’
Yes most CR players prefer offensive +1 relics and I prefer serenity, eg in cold reaper serenity provides +1 to LA and SH among other skills which compensates the loss of %damage from any relic so using Scourge as DW definitely doesn’t worth it.
same as SR players and this relic feels meh with its cd and bonuses
Good day to everyone. I was glad to see some Uroboruuk’s relic rework, thanks to @Zantai and devs. Recently I saw a thread, where several players agreed upon nerfing the Reaping Arc. Actively began to building and test this skill, I will say that the results for the existing types of damage, were very different, but about this a little later. I would like to note that I am familiar and have repeatedly communicated with these players, the results of which are presented here, they are some of the fastest players of the crucible, especially banana_peel, who does many runs, then chooses the most lucky one, but sometimes, can’t even repeat it in the same builds. Also, I’m very glad that Zantai noticed the fantasy and fabulousness of the assembly presented here on penetrating damage, consisting of a lot of double green, which should not be considered in the context of the nerf Reaping Arc, because legally, the average player would need so much time, which is difficult to describe in numbers and it’s more theory than practice. My point is, one shouldn’t rely on deciding nerfs, based on purely lucky run with a green build, since your casual player wouldn’t be able to repeat the process. I also want to point out that many such builds have at least 3 or 4 double green items within them, vastly improving the output. The number of deaths during these runs were not announced too. I can believe that Spellbinder’s pretty sturdy, but others. Not so much.
Now that the first part is done, let’s move on to the next part, namely my tests and the tests of another builder from the ru-community, Mikhail Knyazhitsyn. I would like to note right away that we aren’t fast crucible pilots, so please compare our results with ordinary players who decided to test this revork. I would like to formulate a question that I was wondering about. Would Reaping Arc be imbalanced in the hands of average, rank-and-file Grim Dawn players who have 3-4 years+ experience, on different damage types? (The answer is below).
Aether was the first to test. Pretty straightforward Spellbinder in Krieg Set with Lucius sword. I was impressed with the results, so I made two versions - with the sword and without it. Turned out, it was pretty fast, with the result of 4:46 and good survivability too. This is good towards the time limit Zantai mentioned earlier. So, no OP here - just good build. (95% success, 5% death)
https://www.grimtools.com/calc/YZeEMKvZ
Next, my friend Michael did a physical variation of RA. It’s strong, but not that fast. 150-170 with 4:56 and 6:29 without buffs. (95% success, 5% death)
https://www.grimtools.com/calc/gZwaqLj2
I then took upon the chaos variant. Classic, with Ra’hzin and Harbinger, got result 5:13 on Deceiver. Again, not something that powerful, survivability is okay. Anything else is significantly worse in survivablility, as well as damage. (85% success, 15% death)
https://www.grimtools.com/calc/D2pPW6y2
Things were worse from there. Since the survivability of builds on other types of damage was many times lower, similarly they had slightly less damage.
Vitality one got 150-170 in 5:38 (70% success rate).
https://www.grimtools.com/calc/aZqMb39Z
Lightning is 5:30, with only 50% success rate.
https://www.grimtools.com/calc/w26rkqb2
Pierce one, unlike the build above, without a ton of greens, has gigantic timer, as you can see - 6:42, with amazing 30% success only.
https://www.grimtools.com/calc/mN49B3m2
Acid is 5:57 with 80% death rate, incredibly low survivability.
https://www.grimtools.com/calc/m239039Z
RA on fire, cold and elemental damage types simply didn’t make it due non-existent sustain.
So, above demonstrated almost all types of damage, except fire, elemental and cold (Bleed excluded), tests of ordinary players, not speedrunners of the crucible, on the new Reaping Arc. Now, answering myself to the question posed above, “Will the Reaping Arc be imba in the hands of ordinary, ordinary Grim Dawn players who have 3-4 years+ experience playing different types of damage?”, I can safely say that no, there is no super imba, based on the tests above. Going back to the videos provided by the author of feedback, we can see that almost all the results were tested in the crucible one of the best pilots crucible banana_peel, if you go to his youtube channel, you get the feeling that in this game, 90% of everything needs to nerfs, but it is not. Such fast and handy pilots in the game can be counted on the fingers, but do not put their results, with the agenda to nerf, while having a huge boost from a large number of double green. Leave these builds to me or my friend, I’m 100% likely not even close to repeat these results, if at all close 150-170. What I’m saying is that when evaluating a skill’s nerf, you should think about some sort of average result and parameter, rather than one lucky run in the hands of a super fast game pilot who put on a fantastic doublerare piece of gear. Frankly, it looked like some kind of joke and mockery towards the game devs.
I really urge the developers and @Zantai to analyze the whole situation in its entirety. Do not make hasty decisions based on the results of one of the fastest pilots of the crucible, characters, hung with doublerare gear, because as practice has shown, the average pilot, it is far from imba and any miscalculation on the part of the devs and the game tester team, in all and was not necessary at all some nerf?
If the development team has already decided that the nerf will be in any case, I ask to listen to one of the testers @Strannik, which expressed a very good idea here above, namely: “I would say if it will be decided to low %WD on RA I would suggest to keep it 220-225% since BA with gloves can reach 225% WD.” Thank you for your attention.
P.S from Alk0zAuruS (Russian translator). Perfect length, perfect thickness, hardness and elasticity. What is this? It’s a male substitute from a sex shop. Doesn’t it remind you of the double rarity stuff drawn in a stasher? Maybe we shouldn’t have a demonstration with the dildo waving over our heads?
Special thanks for the translation @Alk0zAuruS and @Autentist
Special thanks for your help with these tests Michael
11 Likes
Have to agree with x1x1x1x2. Even before now, it’s been proposed/asked that Blade Arc hits with both hands to buff 1-handed variants and it’s never happened, so wouldn’t get my hopes up for Reaping Arc doing it.
that’s sorta true - having double conversion is certainly over the top, yet moving the conversion will cause this belt to be the same as this one - https://www.grimtools.com/db/items/9076. On the topic, i agree with banana’s proposal to introduce more sources of ele --> pierce conversion across the board. I guess something can be done with Nadaan as well, as it’s conversion is nothing but useless now.
support entierly
while i agree on this one, i can see a lot of people being upset about it. however, one must keep in mind that Uroborruk is a Necro relic on in the first place, so it shoudn’t support fire/lightning/acid variants to begin with.
and even if it means loosing variety having other bonuses to 2H melee archetypes added across the board is certainly better.
don’t take my words back though. it’s understandable that Crate has an upcoming project and it’s a miracle that GD is still being supported after so many years. However, the testing two previous patches received were rather poor, imo. it bothers me because community still looks relatively active, but apparently the number s of testers are shrinking.
I can only assume that some of the meaning was lost in translation because a lot of the stuff doesn’t make any sense, and it was very hard to go through the text.
First of all
Players can’t agree to nerf or buff smth, that’s what devs do.
I have to ask to not speak on my behalf, especially in such fashion which honestly look almost like a slander. I didn’t grind for the best runs with any of the RA builds, with a sole purpose to avoid skewing the presented data. For example, it’s possible to achieve all time Crucible record with the pierce variant considering all the time loss during the recorded run. I didn’t grind it either. Also the most green build of the bunch, the pierce one, is marked as fantasy in the title.
I come from academia and i’m always very careful with my tests. I will not tolerate such accusations.
Slander once again. Also amusing to see an accusation of agenda from someone who:
- asked me to provide a realistic pierce arc build
- was immediately presented with one (pretty much the same as the fantasy build, with MIs downgraded to singlerares and marginal loss of dmg) and promised to assemble it for the test
- went on to build a completely different build, featuring random items and dreadful stats like 2900 OA and 180% AS
- had a nerve to present it as “realistic” result
edit: corrected the stats in the Aleks’s pierce build, gt didn’t display the buffs
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Ah, classic mistake.
You assume the testers test anything!
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That is my general sentiment on this change…it is an Aether/Vitality Necromancer relic and other archetypes emerging from it feels a bit off.
That said, I suppose I can see going in the other direction and embracing the wider use of it and replacing the % Aether bonus with a % All damage modifier. Uroboruuk was such a smart fella, maybe he dabbled in other magics.
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Can confirm, this patch made me two feet shorter!
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Woot!
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I mean…that can be said for any build. There will be min-maxers that will squeeze every last bit out of a build, and there will be everybody else. It is important to consider performance in all forms, but it is also fair to say that some builds will be harder to play than others and that difficulty should, ideally, be rewarded with a few %'s better performance.
When that gap is too wide, then adjustments need to be considered of course, but every build is realistically going to show a difference between the average player and the elite builder.
Or you disagreed with something we changed I guess? Not even sure what you’re referring to from last patch that was so outrageous.
Even Reaping Arc, as shown by this very thread, is not some wild outlier that’s destroyed the game’s balance. Sure, there are a couple exceptions that require further scrutiny, but I don’t see it as an all hands on deck alert some are making it out to be.
We’ve certainly made mistakes with tuning before, but I wouldn’t say this was one of them. I enjoy productive discourse with the community. While this topic started out a bit rocky, it ultimately yielded great results and the skill can be nudged next update while remaining a great new gear choice for several new builds.
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i dont?.. at least i don’t remember anything at the moment. there were some minor things, but they are too minor in a great scheme of things (if there’s one)
i was more referring to all the fuss around DEE (especially fire one), imo it could had been solved much earlier if necessary data had been gathered. and it’s not that data harvesting is something complex in this case (still not sure that fire/chaos DEE became viable though, yet to test). same goes for retal i guess. it’s being balanced since the very first FG patch or am i wrong? there’re also examples of some concepts being pushed (bleed Vire) with every patch, but still strugling to be viable. i unironically believe that the reason is lack of testing.
guess it has something to do with “The myth of sisyphus” reference, right?
This does go for players as well not just Praetorians. Common reminder here that Praetorians are exactly the same as you and me when it comes to voicing feedback with the exception that they see patch notes before we do and that patch notes are always subject to change over time.
In this case, you don’t just mention but imply that some concepts like Bleed VM are being pushed with multiple patches (multiple being the keyword here rather than just a singular patch), so if you think data needs to be collected to show that these concepts are underperforming or in extreme cases fundamentally won’t work, then you are always free to collect and present the data yourself in exactly the same way as the first thread’s post. If Zantai over here agrees then changes do happen.
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This.
There’s more of “you” than “us”. We are also entirely voluntary. We also all have different playstyles and what we do in-game. Some of us like early game. Some end-game and Crucible/SR etc. We just get the build and play it like how we play it. Noone is going down Zantai’s gargantuan changelog tick-for-tick testing every single thing in it.
Plus, as is readily apparent “testing” continues via you all here on the forum after release and you guys have just as much of an impact on any subsequent changes Zantai enacts as any Praet.
For my part I would say to consider the Praets as merely a “buffer”, ensuring there are no (or few) serious technical issues affecting the player base at large after an update.
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Also no matter how extensive testing is, and how big testing stuff is, you can never outtest a millions user doing their best to break your game. You can test all day, then someone comes in, put pineapples on pizza and congrats - new meta
As for Reaping arc itself - I personally agree that it does not need converter. In my opinion vit is already extremely well supported damage type and no need to give it one more exclusive toy to play with. %WD nerf - sure, higher energy cost - sure, maybe even slightly less affected targets, but no inbuild converters
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Both understand but a bit bummed since we have bonemonger, shadow queen, and the MI mace or Arcanor that all provide considerable elemental support for necro. Necro actually started getting all the most interesting elemental tools outside of scion!
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To anyone that starts complaining and will start to complain about double rares used in the testing: Be reminded that almost every build has double rare versions, and thus if double rare build A is stronger than double rare build B, then non double rare build A should also be stronger than non double rare build B except when build B has a non MI defining item.
Again, I don’t think a game should be balanced around underoptimizations. That doesn’t mean casuals are ignored, unless you’re the type of casual who wants all buffs and no nerfs.
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