Ranged Auto Attack Build Discussion

Can you elaborate on this? Why do Ranged Attackers suffer from Fumble?

I played 2h Lightning Vindicator and against Grava noticed Fumble icon appearing. I never noticed before your ranged build can fumble, but apparently does?

Anyone can get the Fumble debuff, but whether it actually affects you is a different story and there is no “icon” for when you Fumble an attack. Impaired Aim just makes your projectiles shoot off-target (easy to see with Fire Strike as the projectile is so-well lit up)

AFAIK, Fumble shouldn’t do anything for Ranged play.

You might be right. Or maybe it’s impaired aim that is more common than Fumble. But ranged autoattackers fell off the meta for sure.

I’m surprised you don’t know by now that one of those is for melee attacks and the other for projectile attacks.

Ranged are not unfairly crippled by both.

I actually don’t know that much about mechanics, I often make threads with very simple questions in “Gameplay discussion”. On the other hand, some mechanics in this game work in a weird way, like order of RR or that meme mechanic on double Amarastan Crusher.

EDIT: @Zantai BTW, you can rename this thread to “What do ranged auto-attackers need”. It would be very relevant.

Ranged auto-attackers, been almost king of the hill in AoM, now are only mid-tier builds (especially dual-wielders).
What do we actually have?
The only good set-ups are Stronghold, builds with Erulan’s shield and also 2h puri with Desolator.

Pierce ranged has … Silverbolt. That got nerfed (that’s ridiculous, finally) because of being extremely op, I guess! Also, Valdun is crap.
Pistols? Haven’t seen any dw pierce auto-attackers. (maybe it’s also a problem of pierce in general)
Cold - Hagarradian Enforcer. That’s all.
Lightning … Dagallon is crap. No stats, poor defence. Raka’jax - no as/cs.
Aether - poor Dreadscorcher. Defiler on it is incredibly bad. And there’s nothing for aether besides it.
Acid&Vitality - also haven’t seen any build of that kind. And who would choose Venomlance instead of full Venomblade?
What else …
Corvan wyrm - also no as/cs. Useless because of it.

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Chaos - Rah’binger (Harbinger + Rah’zin). It’s not terrible, but it’s not going to be making any records.

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Yes, that’s it. But it’s also the problem of chaos in general - huge flat and average time. And overall lack of stats (defence mostly).
Also there’s darkblaze, but dunno how goes it performs now.

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I mentioned it in a suggestion thread before and I know it sounds like a lot however I still think valdun should get it’s own auto attack replacer for a completion bonus.

I look at that set and it just makes me think of belgothian in a way. A flurry of big pierce damage boosted by wps. Valdun can be its own bag and the masteries support it vs picking the mastery based on the attack replacer.

Once grimtools is up I’d like to throw together a purifier and tactician and try one out. Maybe it’s in a much better place with the recent addition of +skills from the previous patch? Anyone tinker around with it since then?

Ranged auto attackers are pretty underwhelming. In tough Crucible environment, especially. In SR and campaign are not that strong, but also not problematic.

Top tier ranged builds don’t exist. Second tier have Sparkthrower Vindicator, Stronghold build, probably Dagalon. With mines improved, classical fire Purifier should be decent. Chaos looks good on paper as RahZin, in reality is decent.

What’s the reason? I think the root of the problems @Zantai is that melee auto attackers were the meta for some time. Because of that lot of sources like Devotions gives less flat damage. So ranged weapons already have low damage values and that leads to further increase of difference in performance ranged vs casters. Also in today’s Crucible it’s hard to survive if you take massive damage and ranged builds should facetank too.

What to do to improve it? Tough to say, but maybe re-evaluation of base damage and speed of ranged weapons, as well of more physical resistance for completed sets or even guns. Maybe increase of damage values of Hydra. Idk let’s summon more players to help, that have experience to say their opinions. So please @mad_lee , @x1x1x1x2 , @thejabrixone , @ya1

===NOT A CRUCIBLE COMMENT===

I think the biggest issue with Ranged is a lack of AoE. What AoE does exist is mostly conical (Storm Spread, for instance) but every other archetype in the game has a means of applying damage on every side of the player. This is easiest for casters - circular AoEs like Sigil or Callidor’s, for instance - but melee can still get AoE procs that hit everything in a particular radius around the player. Pets also get good AoE (Blight Fiends, for instance, and they’re naturally afforded the ability to put the player wherever they like without sacrificing much DPS in the process).

Punch through was overpowered in vanilla (see, the glory days of Vortex of Souls) but nerfed before we ever even got tankier, speedier foes in Ashes of Malmouth. Those foes only got sturdier and faster with Forgotten Gods, and now it’s all but inevitable that things will jump on a player and totally surround them. Ranged characters can only handle one “direction” of enemies at a time, leaving them to be vastly overwhelmed. Lack of usable/reliable CC doesn’t help, and it’s all but impossible to line enemies up when not in enclosed areas (such as Tyrant’s Hold or Steps of Torment).

The solution, to me, would be most readily addressed via more creative gear procs. Melee only attacks in one direction, but it’s its procs that hit everywhere. Ranged, however, shoots Bursting Round, Chilling Rounds, Storm Spread, Valdun’s projectiles, etc. in the same direction as everything else. Fragmenting shots like Brimstone alleviate the problem somewhat but they are not a complete solution on their own and they are few and far between. Vortex of Souls Primal Strike was fantastic because PS and Torrent can hit virtually anywhere after the initial target. It’s that sort of damage application that’s missing from current-era Ranged gameplay.

Edit: Expanding off this to suggest that part of the AoE also needs to have % Weapon Damage, as comparatively Ranged cannot apply ADCTH as well as melee can given that melee can more reliably hit more targets.

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In my opinion ranged auto-attackers suck mostly because of very poor itemization. Valdun is crap as is Pierce outside of Belgothian or some builds that are supported by broken/overpowered skills and items (like Pierce BA Blademaster with Bloodrager and Naadan’s Reach). Justicar doesn’t have any specific bonuses to ranged skills. Dagallon is crap. What else? That aether gun what’s its name = crap.

One can’t forget that ranged meta was nerfed couple of times during Malmouth.

What can be done?

  • Reverse nerfs to stuff like Storm Spread or Chilling Rounds (was there a nerf to Chilling Rounds tho?)
  • Increase base damage of ranged weapons. I understand that remaking sets is too much work at this stage. However increasing base weapon damage of ranged might partly solve their problem.
  • Add +skills to Valdun set. It’s absolutely impossible to make anything decent out of it, really, because if you want Pierce Purifier you are likely run out of skill points
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Great analysis. The best ranged build I made for FG turned out to become a hybrid caster (lightning runebinder tactician with box) to address this problem. But I could afford it due to my AA being free. Other builds, especially FS can’t, tho they have better AoE due to brimstone. Still brimstone is still technically single target, same as storm spread. the only ways to deal your full damage on AOE are bursting rounds and seal of the void, which doesn’t hit your backside, unlike whirling death.

AoE is something I missed in my analysis. Yes great point, guys!

Ranged AA is a very different breed than melee. Ranged cannot get a big flat damage because for some reason, the base flat damage is always low. That also reinforce by the fact that all of flat source damage in Devo is nerfed because melee AA is so good.

So, ranged AA need to rely on mechanics tricks, cannot be build straightforward anymore. Thus why now the only viable option is fire strike and RF retal. The latter is also quite tricky to build, but I have 1 successful hellborne build here:

Both of that archetype rely on WPS interaction to their AA replacer mechanics. Brimstone+explosive/static strike+shotgun WPS, and retal+shotgun/barrage WPS. No other way around it as base flat damage is so low. That’s also why non retal ranged RF, cadence, savagery are so sucks right now. On a side note, using this mechanic makes you no different than melee, you need to shoot it point blankly to the enemies. “Ranged” benefit is not exist in this game.

My suggestion:

  • reverse the Nerf on storm spread, give it back that 5 projectiles
  • increase the base +% damage of 1H gun, this will strengthen that mechanic interaction and make it better as caster weapon.
  • if the base flat of all 1h and 2h ranged need to be increased, it need to be tested first. Idk if it can make it too strong or not.
  • ranged cadence and savagery and non retal RF need their own tricks. The simplest solution is a transmuter that gives +%total damage mod.
  • for the love of the god, please give 100% pass through projectiles to hagarradian enforcer so I can make a proper penetrating ABB build.
    Edit:
  • also give better base attack speed to 1H ranged

Need to update this. :slight_smile:

This either needs to happen at a lower rank (before it was 16/10) or don’t do it at all and instead increased flat damage or weapon damage. Only very few builds could afford going 16/10 as ranged is generally point heavy.

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Agreed. I tried to make a “Punisher” build with Valdun’s as a Commando (for thematic reasons only!) and it was a steaming pile of :poop:. In my opinion, Valdun’s needs a rework being a Cadence set that gives WPS?? Skill points are really lacking on that set.

Very good point. Unless you’re in the thick of it, which is counter intuitive to the idea of ranged builds, then you cannot kill large groups. There’s pretty limited AOE radius with range builds anyways, so range builds are at a disadvantage compared to melee.

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As mad_lee mentioned increasing flat damage on ranged weapons and on that note what about a much larger %damage bonus on 2h ranged for better returns on flat damage? Although I’m not sure if/when diminishing returns start to occur

wait a minute isnt Chaos Habringer one of the strongest build right now?

[1.1.4.1] Har'Zin's 2H Ranged/Doooom Bolt Deceiver - Crucible Farmer with 1.600k Crits (3Buffs;1Banner) this looks insanely good.

Weird how inquisitor gets chaos RR but not occulist, which makes anything not involving inquis for chaos build lacking RR…

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