Retaliation and CounterStrike Feedbacks

Grim Dawn Public Test Discussion
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Note: I’ll continue watching how retaliation goes and give my feedbacks by editting this topic, as the PTR changes version by version.

Before Version. Jan 24 goes into live:
Very glad to see there are plenty of retaliation changes referring to our suggestion. It’s a good start. Yet there are something I want to mention:

  1. About retal devotion routes.
    It’s good to see there begin to be strengths and weaknesses of t2 devotion maps and t3 devotion maps individually. Now we have a reason to use t3 retal devotions. However, it is in fact also a overall nerf to all retal builds even when you take one t3 retal devotion (except physical ones). One thing I want to mention is that except 3 retal builds that made it top20, there are only 3 retal builds made it top60 (43, 53, 60) and two of them were Hellborne. This means retaliation is, if not considering the 3 top20 ones, not something that needs an overall nerf. Level 100 (GD 1.2.1.6) - Grim Dawn Build Calculator shows a classic retal devotion map involving one t3 devotion and it also got the undeserved misfortune(-70% all retal). Other one-t3-devotion retal builds also got something similar. Thus I suggest a small buff to Obelisk. 40-60% all retal damage would do it well. At the same time, tune down Vire’s newly added 80% physical retal damage to 40% to prevent overbuffing. Won’t have any influence on the three top20 retal builds.

  2. About some other RtA skills not mentioned in my latest thread:
    Cadence(Agony): Lacks RR. Agony’s proc is a single-target one thus in most cases acid retal soldier lacks acid RR a lot. I would suggest a 20 RR to cadence modifier so that when you dualwielding it, you can have 40 RR, which is 12 more than Manticore devotion.
    Bramblevine: This is something I played back to v1.1.9.8 and have forgotten for a long time. The build is Elementalist, Level 100 (GD 1.2.1.6) - Grim Dawn Build Calculator. SR 30-31 is 4:45ish (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bllVfa-yJ0E, 5x SR30-31 [1.2.1.6] - 23:28 (4:42 average, one death)). It is another overnerfed thing, and its being nerf came from lots of aspects. Its damage nerf was mainly because of Dawnguard set adjustment, when most of the set’s power was moved to Champion of the Light. Yet the most serious thing is its sustainability. Its ADCtH was decresed by 1% along with monsters’ Life Leech Resist increased signally, but it didn’t benefit from the overall healing effect buff. Final life leech was dereased by a half. You can see in the video there are plenty of times when the HP went very low but I can’t draw it back. Luckily I have micro this time. I would say it needs maybe 1% RtA and plenty of ADCtH.

As for the three top20 retal builds, RtA Aegis, RtA DE, RtA Blitz, Brimstone and so on, I’ll keep watching them after Version. Jan 24 releases.

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the biggest hit will be to retal (dawnbreaker) counter strike though, right? going from 0.2s recharge to 0.4s?

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IDK. Have to try it after PTR goes live.

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Exactly. If Crate wants to nerf three top20 retal builds, they deserve individual approach, not this kneejerk blanket nerf.

I don’t think flat rr would stack this way. Rather increase RtA bonus to Cadence. Because 36% for every Cadence hit is very little.

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They already have. Let’s keep an eye after PTR goes live. :wink:

In that threat I mean, they could MOVE part of T2 retal devotions’ power to T3 devotions. They, however, didn’t move. They REMOVE it. :man_shrugging:

Tried with a mod and, right, it does not stack.

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This, as with fire/lighting retal builds reaching to the 2 T3 retal devotions is bloody difficult to get a max damage route. Menhir obviously is easier to get to, but yeah you’d loose a lot of retal flat damage and the all important +retal% :confused:

Also, we need a fire retal + a lightning retal T3 devotions if they’re going to go forward with this change.

Plus, it’s not like retal alone is the key to a retal build being successful, as without some form of sustain via an attack etc the build will die very quickly. Never mind it being slow to kill things from low attack damage. Which makes me think the key to reducing retal performance isn’t nerfing T2 devotions, but rather the amount of retal added to skills etc very slightly.

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Here I come! With a lot to say!

Before we get started, I want to define two factors:

a. Damage is “high”: means DPS is high, in theory or in fact.
b. Damage is “fast”: means you don’t have to stack your skills (for example Sigil) and can reach your DPS in the very beginning. Or your damage mainly comes from burst skills (for example grenade).

Now let’s start!

  1. About the three top20 retal builds.
    Dawnbreaker Warder: It is nerfed in a good way. Directly tuning down its sheet retal damage is right. It loses about 10% of all its damage (count other types of retal damage in and taking %res difference into consideration). It’s a bit more than I thought it should be (~6% because at the very beginning its not a super high-damage build), it is acceptable. Evident damage loss is observed. Besides, though this Warder used to have “high” damage, it was and is not “fast”. The SR changes encourage high-mobility and fast-damage build, neither of which is this warder very good at. SR time goes down from 4:05ish to 4:35ish. Very successful tuning so far.
    FOI Purifier: Nerfed in the way as expected. Damage was reduced by 8%-13%, depending on how you build it. Evident damage loss is easily observed, and it is probably overnerfed. Purifier is of very poor mobility. Its SR time goes down from 4:00ish to over 4:45ish. I would like to suggest dial its RtA back, fully or partly.
    Hellborne Shieldbreaker: Nerfed in the way as expected. Damage was reduced by about 15%. Damage loss is acceptable. The shieldbreaker is very good at both mobility and “fast” damage output, so it’s still the fastest SR farmer among all retal builds. SR time goes down from 3:30ish to 3:50ish. Sub 4 is still not hard. Considering it’s not very tanky, I assume there should be no more nerf.Moreover, its sustainability partly relys on super-fast killing, it may be not only slower but also more dangerous. Thus some health regen buff compensation is reasonable imo.

  2. About RtA Aegis and RtA DE.
    Aegis: It’s simple. It was just overnerfed over the last few patches and continues getting nerfed now by devotion nerfs. Different verions of the builds got % retal damage reduced more or less (This old slower version Archon, Level 100 (GD 1.2.0.3) - Grim Dawn Build Calculator got -70% and this new not-that-slow verion Archon, Level 100 (GD 1.2.1.6) - Grim Dawn Build Calculator got - 100%). It’s time we dial the Conduit’s nerf back a little.
    DE: Things are far more complicated of DE. If you don’t take Celestials kill time into consideration, in v1.2.1.6 RtA DE builds’ rank will be Physical≈Aether>Acid>Elemental (see them at A few retal builds and some thoughts on retaliation [1.2.1.6]).Let’s leave elemental one and Hellborne one alone and take deeper looks into the remaining three. In v1.2.1.6, Aether one deals more damage while Physical one was tankier. Acid one was neither high-damage nor tanky. In PTR. Feb 3, Aether one got -70% all retal damage along with Dawnbreaker 2-piece nerf. Having DE’s RtA buff, Aether one got its DE damage increased by 4% but sheet retal damage decreased by 9%. It’s in fact a tiny nerf. Physical one got +100% physical retal damage, which means a 5% raise in sheet physical retal. Along with DE’s RtA buff, its DE damage is increased by 20%. SR time does up from 4:45ish to 4:15ish. Good job. Acid one got -100% all retal damage. Its sheet retal damage is decreased by 5% and its DE damage is increased by 9%. Hardly any better in fact. It is still very poor. However, acid RtA DE’s issue is more complicated. It’s more like an acid retal issue that needs discussing. So let’s keep what’s done to RtA DE and go on tuning acid retal instead of RtA DE.

  3. About Infernal Brimstone and Dreegal’anore
    As for Infernal Brimstone , @Uncle_Mac has the same ideas as mine. (Infernal Brimstone feedback). In fact there’s no buff at all. I tried Grenade Shieldbreaker, RF Shieldbreaker, and DEE Pyromancer. RF Commando is the worst one. Though Grenade Commando is the best one, it’s still only a 4:45ish build which has nothing to do with good performance. Now Infernal Brimstone is still an inferior to Hellborne, unless it can have another or two more RtA skill modifiers. Blade Arc, Fire Strike, RF, EoR. Anything is ok. Dreegal’anore shares the same problem where its best style is DEE rather than Judgment. So just create new RtA skill modifiers.

  4. Systematically buff to acid retal is needed.
    Acid Retal DE is just an example. Acid Retal builds suffers a lot from the devotion tunning, and anti-acid bosses are always the hardest ones for retal builds. I prefer to buff acid retal items.

  5. About RtA RF.
    RF Warlord (Warlord, Level 100 (GD 1.2.1.6) - Grim Dawn Build Calculator) is now 4:10ish as it was in v1.2.1.6. Things seem to be fine but I found some issue after I tried different setups. Only those who use Final Stop shield can really deals effective damage. RtA smite is 35% times 2 = 70% per hit. If you take Okaloth’s Visage too, RtA smite will be (35+25)% times 2 = 120% per hit. This is the only thing for RtA RF warlord that deals good damage. This definately narrows the item choices of physical retal warlord. Considering physical RtA DE is doing very good, i’m afraid further hunreds of % physical damage buff won’t be proper. If you take Infernal Brimstone’s problem into consideration as well, you’ll find that RtA RF is outdated. RtA Savagery is now 20% RtA but it still can’t carry an build alone. RF’s 15% is too low. I would suggest to buff it to 20% and accordingly reduce hellborne’s RF RtA mods to 4% and reduce Final Stop’s smite RtA mods to 30%. Don’t have to worry about Dawnbreaker RF warlord or Dawnguard Archon because they are obviously worse than Dawnbreaker warder.

  6. About CounterStrike.
    To the Dawnbreaker Warder, CS damage remains similar (80% RtA per second in v1.2.1.6 and 75% RtA per second in PTR). If you don’t lower CS’s CD to a very low level, its buff is very tiny to a build. However, CounterStrike buffs did make some ideas feasible in theory. This 0.2s CD chaos CS Witchblade (Witchblade, Level 100 (GD 1.2.1.6) - Grim Dawn Build Calculator) is what I built and I said at that time it needed buffing. After the CS buff, it now has about 250k dps in theory, but in practice it’s much much lower. The first problem is, 4 meter radius is too short for a core AoE skill. As a contrast, Callidor’s Tempest is 5.8 or 6.8 and has higher DPS. RoS is 5.5 meter and is of super “high” and “fast” damage. The 2 meter radius mods on Dawnbreaker set is also an important factor that made it successful. Thus I think first it need some radius mods on the Conduit. 1.5-2 meters on the Chaos CS Conduit is very necessary. I would say let’s merge the Chaos and Aether CS Conduit. Keep the Chaos one as a result and redesign the Aether one, because the Aether one has a conflict with Blood Knight’s Visage. The second problem is, the 250k dps is only in theory but in practice it can’t even reach half of it. Triggering is an issue to be solved. A similar skill, Vindictive Flame, has 100% trigger rate and also can lower its CD to 0.2s, and has similar DPS (235k, Shieldbreaker, Level 100 (GD 1.2.0.3) - Grim Dawn Build Calculator ). It is playable but not OP as well. Imo CounterStrike should also be made 100% trigger rate to be playable as a core skill. If technically trigger rate can be added by the Chaos CS Conduit, then use a modifier. If technically it can’t (as far as I know about game mod, it can’t at present), making CounterStrike itself 100% proc on hit is also good and won’t make Dawnbreaker Warder or something else OP.

EDIT:
How can I forget RtA EoR!

  1. About RtA EoR
    The build is Dervish, Level 100 (GD 1.2.1.6) - Grim Dawn Build Calculator. Damage is very good now, but sustainability is very poor. DW RtA EoR does not have Obelisk or Anvil so it is not that tanky. Tried a few runs and died a lot of times. Life leech is a big problem. I would suggest a touch of ADCtH mods to EoR on Agony, so when you dualwield it, you can have better leech and sucessfully finish a run without death.

EDIT 2:
I forget Bramblevine…

  1. About RtA vines.
    Bramblevine is very very horrible. The build is Elementalist, Level 100 (GD 1.2.1.6) - Grim Dawn Build Calculator. SR goes down from 4:45ish to over 5:30. Its damage was nerfed again. Life Leech is far from enough. RtA vines build has very bad mobility and its damage has nothing to do with “fast”, these makes the build even worse. It needs more damage, and more ADCtH to get rid of being called trash.

EDIT 3:
One more thing…
0.2s CD chaos CS Witchblade is now still over 5:30ish…

EDIT 4:
Correction:
Infernal Brimstone: Grenade Commando, RF Commando→Grenade Shieldbreaker, RF Shieldbreaker
Just a mistake when typing…

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Hardly any substantial optimization of Retel and CS in version Feb.11.
Won’t have feedbacks on them this patch.

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I wanted to add feedback for Acid rta Vines. Coincidentally updated it right before the test patch and now with extra leech to Vines and some changes to Obelisk I am willing to test it again. Here is it currently looks:

Sustain is very sketchy on it, also need to change ring affix to cover resists (somehow resists are super tight on it despite Oak Skin and conduit.

Gonna experiment with different devos once new patch hits and report here.

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Should be buffed now considering the is more towards counterstrike’s based activation chance, meter radius and increased acid damage

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Yep, probably will have some test on them. Let’s see.

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And now that I think about it further, Mythical bramblevine, shouldn’t just has have attack heal, but a an increase to retaliation added to attack to grasping vines, I just find 5% is way too low, should be 15% but that’s just imo. Also, that acid retaliation seems too low

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8% is reasonable. 15% is not.
But ADCtH shouldn’t just be 5%.

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True for both, but I thought about Mythical Turrion’s reprisal giving 15% of retal to Blackwater Cocktail was one so that’s why I went with that damage wise. 8% seems reasonable, I probably think ADCth should be around 8-10%

I also think there should be an existing item that gives lightning to acid damage for retal considering that elementalist build is mainly geared towards lightning retal such as replacing the Conduit amulet from vitality to lightning or elemental conversion for acid since it looks like the elemental build is mainly surrounding lightning damage and you could go with mark of lethal intents since it also converts vitality to acid for grasping vines.

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I’m now on vacation during Chinese New Year and spending time with my family, but did some tests as well. A few feedbacks are coming, upon uploading my videos. :wink:

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Z made a comment somewhere he expected playtest lasting about 2 months i think, so you don’t have to rush it and can enjoy the lunar holidays :partying_face:

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This time I’ll post builds and videos at the beginning and analysis them in an integrated manner.

Builds, videos and performs:

1.Lightning RtA Vines Elementalist

SR30-31 - 4:57 (PTR Feb13): www.youtube.com/watch?v=eHeWtQhz8KE

SR clear time is around 5:30ish. 4:57 is already a very lucky run.

2.Chaos CounterStrike Witchblade

SR30-31 - 5:43 (PTR Feb13): www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZ3VRpVuaqE

SR clear time is definately beyond 5:30, and needs micro to achieve this speed.

3.Acid RtA ABB WitchHunter

Spec 1 (more retal damage):

SR30-31 - 5:05 (PTR Feb13): www.youtube.com/watch?v=RrfUaiatjk4

SR clear time is around 5:00. A little bit slow imo.

Spec 2 (more acid damage):

SR30-31 - 5:07 (PTR Feb13): www.youtube.com/watch?v=QZ3hd0eYLtA

SR clear time is around 5:00. A little bit slow imo.

4.Acid RtA DE Oppressor

SR30-31 - 4:14 (PTR Feb13): www.youtube.com/watch?v=CxH8KYZt5YM

Ravager of Minds- 1:17 (PTR Feb13): www.youtube.com/watch?v=2_vOBW94FhA

SR clear time is 4:30ish. Decent and Moderate.

5.Physical RtA DE Deathknight

SR30-31 - 4:30 (PTR Feb13): www.youtube.com/watch?v=JKsCNFya_yE

Ravager of Minds - 1:33 (PTR Feb13): www.youtube.com/watch?v=w4Zha0c6rFk

The Councils in SR30 - 0:17 (PTR Feb13): www.youtube.com/watch?v=lBBkDRlZoQo

SR clear time is 4:30ish. Decent and Moderate. Single target damage is a little bit low.

Analysis and Feedbacks:

1.Bramblevine

The 1% ADCtH buff does seem to help a little, but very limited. It did not solve its damage plight. The most serious problem is that it’s still too slow. Damage buff is an urgent need to this skill. As is talked above, I would suggest to increase its RtA mod to 8%, and probably there could be 1% more ADCtH. I believe it won’t be excessive.

2.RtA ABB

As is discussed somewhere else (New Dreegal'anore ABB mode is worhtless with this value), 18% RtA doesn’t seem to be decent. Both Specs lack damage. One farcical thing is, when fighting some specific bosses, RtA ABB is dealing even lower DPS than Dreeg Afflicted Spines (Relic proc). We know that Dreeg Afflicted Spines is only the icing on the cake but not a core skill in most cases. Yet here it plays a very important role. The reason is simply because RtA ABB itself is weak. Buffing it to something like 24-28% is appropriate, imo.

3.RtA DE

Dialing its RtA back from 23% to 22% is not bad. Along with global acid retal buffs, now both acid one and physical one is at a decent position. Its single target damage is not good though (especially the physical one). Maybe I should say physical RtA DE is still bad at single target damage. I would suggest to keep it here and if necessary, some tuning in another direction that I’m gonna put forward below.

4.Physical Retal

Tried a lot of setups but I didn’t have the energy to make them all videos. Vire’s % physical retal damage removal totally cancel out the buff to physical damage type (Assassin’s Mark buff and Monster Armor Reduction). Assassin’s Mark buff and Monster Armor Reduction increased physical retal damage by about 3% but Vire’s % physical retal damage removal reduced damage by about 4%. Another thing is it takes time to proc Assassin’s Mark but % damage is always there. Thus in practice most of physical retal builds get very slightly slower. Now that two major physical retal item, Final Stop of RtA RF and Spectral War Shield of RtA DE, are all nerfed this time, and other physical retal builds (except Stoneguard that seems to be good as well, whose SR time is 4:30ish) haven’t show their head, I think it’s unnecessary to remove the % physical retal damage from Vire. Bring it back also helps physical RtA DE on single target. If you worried about it being too good a SR farmer, then I think reducing its radius or target number makes more sense than punishing all physical retal builds or continuing reducing its single target damage.

5.CounterStrike

Thanks for the radius and activation chance buff. Radius looks and plays pretty good now. Activation chance, however, is still an issue. Sometimes I was thinking, not 100% activation chance at a low level makes sense, but when you construct a build around it and invest most of the build’s resource into it, it’s very frustrated to see it remaining silent. You can see in the video that, in shard, CounterStrike works, if not so fine, not too bad. However, in boss rooms, CounterStrike’s influence just disappeared. I’m fine with its activation chance not being 100% when it is an one-point skill, but when it was regarded as a core skill and hardcaped to lv.26 and invested a lot of modifiers, I’ll really appreciate it if its activation chance is 100%.

6.Hellborne

% RtA modifier for Grenado went from 40% to 33% to 28%, it’s finally not an easy sub-4 runner now.

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This is a good feedback overall but i have to mention that DE part is basically completely invalid. Both builds rely very heavily on impossible to farm shields. Even rolling a single rare retal affix is difficult on it. The shield has no retal bias at all.

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Overlord’s Spectral War Shield of Thorns also work fine on the physical one. Performance is almost the same. But yes, these shield is nearly impossible to farm, especially the one of acid retal builds.

If it took only one retal affix there, it would even go slower than 4:30ish and ravager time will be even worse. It still shows RtA DE’s performance near its theoretical limit though. So I assume the DE part is not completely invalid but what you say is a reminder that we can be more tolerant on how fast the builds i listed here are (though they are not super fast).

You put forward a good point of view. Retal bias may need to be added to the shield as well.

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I think you vastly underestimate just how non-retal this shield is for affixes.

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So even Overlord’s of Thorns is nearly impossible.

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