Played through Normal/Veteran so far.
On Normal it melts, pretty much just like any other skill.
On Veteran you can still feel the lack of single target, but it’s a very functional skill, imo.
The main issues I still found for leveling with it:
You have to go very deep and invest a lot of points into a class with no resistance reduction, which is felt vs Monsters that have some res. Even the difference between Warden Krieg phase 1 and Krieg phase two (he gains ~15% res and 50k HP) is noticeable. The RR on the skill helps a bunch obviously.
You can’t leech life without purple gear, but you have to stand still to attack. And Arcanist has no innate regen and very little health. This made me rush to Behemoth and I am glad I did.
There is no implement type for “elemental”, you have to hope you get good rolls on one of the lightning, fire (etc) implements. Makes them surprisingly hard to farm.
Energy usage is high for all Arcanist skills. I could have invested more into energy management, but it feels like Arcanist has to pay an extra tax. You don’t get stackable RR from your class and then you have to invest another 15-20 skill points to afford your skills. And the class’ innate energy leech doesn’t work with PRM, unless you have purple gear.
Single target damage bad, AoE great. I think that’s an okay place for a skill.
Overall, so far PRM feels like maybe the best skill to level Arcanist with, but frankly it’s seems just on par with Forcewave, Word of Pain and other low DPS/high AoE skills, but with higher energy tax.
Suggestions:
Adding some leech to one of the PRM MIs.
Reducing energy cost by a bit, maybe ~15%.
If some of the shotgunning behavior ought to be addressed: Suggestion to move some damage from Proliferation to the main missile, to improve damage vs true single targets while reducing the amount of mayhem vs clusters a bit.
Addendum:
It is, by the way, far better than Callidor’s Tempest now, which I still think needs some love.
and early game it doesn’t matter, because the the non MIs don’t have bias (as i understand atleast)
so you can either craft one or buy one from merchant, until reaching the “good” MIs
and for bonus bias you can just use one of the lightning/fire/cold daggers/sceptres (which again i’m not sure why we’re bothering with weapon type reduction?)
this suggests a vast build difference no? (between mentalist and warlock i mean)
ie we can “accurately” use the elementalist (double lightning mastery) as comparison for your elemental woes
when that is so close to the magehunter, it seems fine
and with similar build attentiveness as the warlock, one might surmise both the elementalist and magehunter can catch up to those numbers
i’m then also illustrating this, by directly showing you the difference you’re missing out on, the difference you’re putting a bounty on, but also attributing as to the “detrimental”/significant difference
and as the numbers on the items show; it’s not that huge a difference from non ele base, or non caster base… - you’re literally looking at a peak of 48% item dmg at lvl 55 that is what you’re raising as an “issue” or the lack of “non-existing” implements…
*ofc you could try to cherrypick and argue for dualwielding to raise that 48% stat discrepancy, buuut then we’re really trying to reach then right?
i’m not disagreeing, i’m saying you’re either not aware or the numbers; or blowing the numbers(differences) out of proportions/misattributing the significance it (currently) makes
i’m not arguing against getting an elemental MI (anywhere); i’m confused you’re raising it as this “detrimental” or “necessity”, not just because the numbers are that tiny, but elemental levelling was never an issue even before this patch ?
So PRM literally getting stronger, should make that singular 48% weapon stat discrepancy all the less significant
but i guess that’s too much nuance consideration to ask for when it’s all/the argument is only about wanting X and furthering that “buff”/bonus implementation
you state it as an issue
i ask where is the issue/am “confused about the issue”
(which you then try to underpin by X % dmg difference) my “whataboutism” and strawman, is showing your “issue” isn’t as big as you try to make it… - an issue you raised (not me), doubled down on; and proceeded(twice) to try highlight as significant
if you can’t handle someone showing your argument to either be not true or less trivial as you proclaim; maybe check your numbers first before making a mountain out of a molehill?
follow your own advice if you can’t handle dissenting pictures?/someone daring to poke at your rationale for buffs?
actually no, i’ll say it for what it is
perhaps actually double check items, and affixes/existing stuff, before being deceptive or outright lying about the numbers and impact
it’s bs here, from level 20-55 you’re talking about a 20%-48% stat difference; on a single exclusive slot (edit, goes up to 66% at level 70/“final” mi threshold)
yes, spin that as build defining or stat difference detrimental, or “try to invoke your elementalist-warlock stats as if relevant” to that picture
you got questioned/“poked at” and called out; because the original fn mention was indeed nonsense “as speculated”/“confusing as the mention seemed” - and the followup didn’t fix it…
- 
that is what you’re raising as an “issue” or the lack of “non-existing” implements…