You can’t throw countless bodies toward Ravager, because from Elite forward he will heal his entire health pool if you die. I don’t doubt you killed him, on the other hand, for missing that out.
I believe Superfluff can even confirm that you can glitch the Ravager and get him stuck between the houses so it’s not like ppl haven’t taken advantage of his poor A.I. and beat him through less…honorable means. As Ch’thon put it, DoTs are an entirely legitimately strategy and if people want the helm they can might as well obtain it through GD stash if they don’t play legitimately. I do and I don’t play multiplayer either so it’s not like I could obtain the helm through some other means. The only reason to actually kill him - and, btw, he drops his helm also in Elite - is to test your patience, not the strength of your build. The fight is entirely one dimensional…like MQ.
I can think of one ranged build that can do it (although AoD seems to be using a different build)
Assuming AoD isn’t using illusions he is most likely using a DoT based Ranged build (like Superfluff’s Terminator but using Poison Damage)
Judging by what he has said about Cadence and DoTs it is most likely a Venomlance Cadence build
I really don’t think it’d be hard for Venomlance to beat Ravager
@Ceno: you are right about the fact that if more than 50% of your damage output comes from procs and non-weapon-component skills than it is wrong to call it “ranged”. Superfluff however posted a “ranged” Ulzuin build a couple of patches ago - more precisely, when you could trigger Meteor Showers independently through each Hellfire mine - and called it a “ranged” build.
If “ranged” refers simply to cadence and things that shoot out of your rifle and pistols, then ranged builds are at the bottom of the barrel, because you can’t get much out of them except for Havok Cadence and (maybe) pierce Tactician/Infiltrator.
The point I mentioned was simply to underline the fact that even though, as a whole, ranged builds are worse than melee and casters, they do, however, have some advantage in some particular circumstances. Those circumstances are MQ - which was specifically designed in a time when dw Blademaster was king in order to address the melee/ranged disparity - and, in my opinion, at least, the Ravager. Maybe calling them “ranged” builds is wrong, but if that’s the case, then every ranged purifier posted on this forum that uses BWC is actually a ranged/caster hybrid.
Good topic. I did not know about the deflection chance being so much higher then the doge chance. I wonder why they did that? This along with ranged weapons generally having a lower dps compared to melee weapons seem bit large too large of a disadvantage considering that ranged is not that much of a advantage in this game against anything that is not trash mob(with a few exceptions).
The bit about the lack of WD% nuke skills was something it noticed too and is IMO the worst issue as besides as a way to stack DoT(and thus further lowering the dps for ranged) they are also great for healing large amount of health in one go with ADCtH and increasing you mobility due needing to stand still far less to deal the same dps compared to auto attack and wps, further worsening the mobility ranged builds have.
I wonder why so many WD% nuke skills need to melee only(And why they did not add a good ranged WD% to the inquisitor), most of the mastery skill and relic skills (not that there are all that many in the first place) are melee only. In reverse there are no ranged only skills for some reason.
Some of the more simple solutions to these problems would be:
Buffing ABB. While it is good for normal/elite ABB lack dps against single target
in ultimate and needs heavy gear support to be half way decent. Comparing it to cadence it deals around 1/3 the single target dps(assuming a WS% of 170+) even with a large amount of CR and skill damage mods. Sure it has more AoE damage but cadence adds pierce to ranged. While cadence is still inferior in AoE damage it should not warrant such a large difference in dps.
Removing the melee requirement of the scourge and Uroboruuk’s Reaping relic. Other then for flavor I don’t see why this should be melee only.
Adding a Elemental ranged nuke skill to the Bane relic. The current proc sucks and this would be a good way to indirectly add a ranged WD% skill to the
inquisitor and boost ranged mage hunter builds.
Changing the skill of the Amulet of the Darkblaze set to a ranged nuke skill.
As for the slow problem adding slow res to Vigor in addition a number of non boot gear slots and more constellations could solve that.
For a complete solution I think the only way really to solve it and make sure a ranged build always plays as a ranged build and not as a gimped melee build with the occasional ranged advantage would be to make every mob and boss vulnerable to CC and balance it so that you can’t permanently CC a boss.
A ground targeted movement skill would help a lot to.
Removing the melee requirement of the scourge and Uroboruuk’s Reaping relic. Other then for flavor I don’t see why this should be melee only.
Surprised they did this really. I would’ve thought they would go the Necrotic Edge route where it works with ranged but has no AoE (because bullets can’t cleave).
Everyone knows range is inferior to melee in GD. We’re not arguing that right? lol…
There are melee builds that can FT nearly anything in the game and still retain insane DPS. They don’t have to worry about spacing, or charging mobs, and with the right build even ground AOE becomes a joke.
Ranged builds are MORE difficult in this game than any other ARPG i’ve played (POE, DS2, DS3, Torchlight 2, DS1-3 etc) mainly because so many mobs can charge at you, or have ground target and AOE, and your build tends to be auto-squishy because ranged.
Now I’m not saying ranged builds are nerfed or anything, I just think the majority of players prefer lower stress builds (melee). I think pistol damage is FINE, it’s quite huge, but on almost every gladiator run i host the gun ppl are the ones who die semi-frequently, and I’ve had many a run where I’m left to tank 3 nemesis on 150… which is slow but my toon is designed for exactly that- 40k dps is not ideal but for near immortality its a good trade.
I don’t think range needs a buff either, I think if anything Crate should add MORE auto attack options- rather than shoving everyone into cadence; or add a bubble to savagery/primal strike etc that changes them into different damage types so we have more variety.
Show us a ranged build then which can reliably farm gladiator crucible.
Not that it changes anything, but I think Sacred Strike is a decent single target nuke skill for ranged elemental builds.
I think one of the main issues is the lack of ranged only skills, which could be even movement, kiting abilities. So ranged playstyle should not be about facetanking with a ranged weapon instead of melee, rather about some kiting and dodging and moving around and such. But this is extremely hard because we have some kind opponents who charge into our face with insane damages, so a ranged build needs to have the same defenses as a melee build because of this, and deals less damage, so it makes no sense to play a ranged build at all, it has no advantages. The main issue is actually Fabius and Iron Maiden in the Crucible. Everything else could be solved with a little buff here and there, changing some skills, components, relics etc., adding some AoE for some WPS other than Inquisitor, for example Zolhan’s, Markovian’s, Necrotic Edge, which in itself would already increase the number of somewhat decent ranged builds and class combinations. I don’t get it why they aren’t designed as an AoE for ranged as well. Or we need some sets or items that change them to AoE for ranged builds as well. But the main issue is currently that a ranged build has to facetank just as much as a melee build, because of the design of some enemies. Can’t be evaded with any player skill, only raw defense numbers and adcth matters in this case. And in raw defenses and damage output melee should be always better than ranged.
For example we have this item: http://www.grimtools.com/db/items/9380
Clearly designed for a ranged Death Knight. I can imagine that it has good single target damage, but how will this build have enough AoE? It has Cadence pierce and thats all.
Depends on the mob. Some like Grava are insanely difficult to kite, where Mad Queen is a total joke for ranged dot builds and very tough on melee. Melee still wins out imo because if you build reasonably tough or have a shield/lifetap/high DA there are a lot fewer WTF I’m dead?! moments.
I still think auto attack options are far too limited. If it was me every mastery would have an auto attack option (why does shammy get 2 and soldier 3?)
If you factor how many impaired aim skills from bosses/heroes, which are mostly AoE that force you to move around, this with deflect chance they have, really put ranged into bad spot from losing so many DPS by kiting and hitting nothing… so much annoying anti-ranged this game have.
I think it is pretty illustrating that the only two ranged gladiator farm builds that I know of on this forum are build more tanky then many of the melee builds, never mind caster builds.
Oh boi, let me do some shameless self promotion: http://www.grimdawn.com/forums/showthread.php?t=64162,
Also this: http://www.grimdawn.com/forums/showthread.php?t=63371
At this point I’ve known at least 4 ranged setup that can farm Gladiator reliably, Jov’s Tactician, Fluff’s 2H Purifier, my own G&B Purifier (may count as two setups) and Korsar’s Darkblaze Pyromancer (not sure how reliable this one is though, since Korsar doesn’t seem to be a Crucible guy himself :rolleyes:)
I’d post more but one can’t do 10x builds per months:D just because you can’t see it here doesn’t mean it’s not possible.
And about the tankiness, that is where a lot of player make the mistake of thinking that ranged build means you always have to run 'n gun, doing excess kiting and losing dps. There is no big difference between a 2h melee builds and 2h ranged build at it’s core. The only difference is that ranged has slightly less damage and can kill trash/mobs in geneeral before getting swarmed.
But for bosses there WILL come a point where you’ll have to face-off. So you need to build your guy/girl wtih melee mindset. Just get good DA and life steal and use all your survival skills like FB, seal, blast shield and whatever else there is.
I intend to make a venomlance build for example that is objectively less tanky than purifier but i’m 100% sure it’s doable.
Well that’s exactly what AoD is saying and I don’t think at this stage of the game they can do much about it. Regardless of playstyle you have to build your character to be tanky.
Also there more ranged builds that can beat glad they just don’t get posted SPOILER[/spoiler]
I’ve done it, so I know for sure it’s 100% doable.
@Stupid Dragon: you can’t make an acid/poison WH around ABB, because ABB is a skill that scales enormously poor. It is not a single target dps skill, nor an AoE one…it is actually a combination of CC, AoE and DoT available to you from lvl. 1. WH ranged builds work very well, but not focusing on ABB, despite the enormous (and erroneous, IMO) support the skill has received in AoM.
@somnium: you are expected to be tanky, at least if you plan to farm the Crucible and kill all the nemeses. The only situations where “ranged” characters can avoid taking damage completely are Mad Queen and Ravager and in the last case, you will still get a DoT from time to time if you are not careful.
The point was not to adjust armour or DA values on medium armour or put deflect/dodge on every ranged legendary in the game, nor to amplify the damage of rifles and pistols to the roof. “Glass cannon” as a general archetype can’t work in this game and this is generally for the better. The point was to make the life of a ranged character less miserable by allowing them access to things they don’t generally benefit from (e.g. more single-target nukes, slow resistance, mobility, some sort of way of overcoming impaired aim/deflect).
