None taken. I don’t mind the state of Savagery’s buff-embedded nodes myself, but to each their own.
It makes way more sense to nerf 10% of all builds instead of buffing the other 90%
I suspect losing FH is probably never worth it, but I’m not sure you would need the lifesteal from FH since Upheaval is the 2H version of Execution. With a decent amount of adcth from gear/devotions it should heal a lot; when it procs a total WD% of more than 600% occurs (assuming Blazerush or Avenger). It’s quite a lot more damage than FH.
So using this build, dropping Feral Hunger should result in a damage increase.
With a 35% crit chance, FH 27%; Upheaval has a 25.5% chance(0.73x0.35).
Regular Savagery hit = 152 x1.18 x1.15 = 206 WD%
FH + Upheaval: (0.27 x 206 x 1.7) + 0.255(206 + (206 x 2.11)) = Average WD% of 257.9
Upheaval by itself: 0.35(206 + (206 x 2.11)) + (0.175x206) = Average WD% of 260.2
Overall a tiny increase (flat damage was ignored but will be another small boost). I guess if you put those FH skill points into attack speed the gains could be greater, but that is much more complex to calculate.
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Main reason why i liked that the DA in Tenacity of the Boar went into Oak Skin, even if it caused some Shaman builds to lose some DA. Having to keep up Savagery just for stats is absolute cancer.
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In a world where literally every single update we’ve ever released has had a vastly higher number of buffs than nerfs, suggesting we are not buffing things that need help is just…
I mean, that literally goes back to my earlier point, if a few individuals in the community weren’t pushing for changes based on their own meter stick that nobody else is using, would the things that are “shit” even be an issue?
Talk about subverting what I said. 
A rather black and white way to describe it, don’t you think? Buffs and nerfs are both tools to be used judiciously in the pursuit of better balance.
And here is where we’re gonna need clarification, you know, so everybody’s on the same page. So by pursuing balance, we are apparently interested in homogeneity. But at the same time, if there are things in that game that are underpowered and they are not immediately addressed, we are doing a shit job.
But wait! We also shouldn’t nerf things that are overperforming because they are unique. Meanwhile what I said about the elite players pushing for power creep is apparently absurd and subverting what you said.
But do tell, what have we taken that’s unique (which apparently is the equivalent of overpowered in your book), and made it mediocre. Mediocre again being by some metric by which the rest of the world doesn’t function and was never intended to.
Frankly, caving to that mentality was another mistake on our part as endgame geared builds now steamroll the campaign content so hard that it lost all value as a challenging place to farm loot and being a “Cronley farmer” is used as an insult.
You’re right, we should pursue further uniqueness by just giving everything all the same strengths and no downsides.
Massive amounts of RR…all 5 of it. In before Thermite Mines, which were frequently featured in overperforming builds and historically had higher RR because of how difficult they were to use. Emphasis on were.
Yes, I am keenly aware of that specific instance.
Unfortunately we can’t disable a mutator based on a build you are playing and changing Olexra’s functionality would require significant tech changes and rebalancing, which would also throw its identity right out the window, but that is an entirely separate discussion on how we’ve unfortunately allowed damage to get so out of control that killing trash mobs is an afterthought and anything that doesn’t reliably destroy bosses is automatically trash for cutting edge endgame.
A fix that happened only a few months ago and resulted in maybe 30-60 seconds off of top clear times. A bit dramatic to suggest that it resulted in a 60% difference in Crucible times over 3 years considering it happened very recently.
Players will always find grievance with nerfs because it is easy to take such things personally. Some angry people in the community even went as far as suggesting that patches personally targeted their builds. Because that’s what we do, just sit in the builds section looking for things to snipe with changes, along with usernames to expedite the process!
A perfect balance would by definition be homogenous, because any variety means there is a range of results. That is, and never was, our goal.
There is a vast range of build factors that go under consideration and I feel like a broken record going over it when we have this same discussion on the forum every few months.
I’m not sure what is misleading about it. The skill states that crits on basic attacks trigger Upheaval. It would then be ascertained that a WPS proc is not a basic attack as those trigger off of basic attacks.
Is this an advanced mechanic? Yes. Does it require building differently than stacking a 100% WPS pool? Yes. Is that a bad thing? For some, no doubt, otherwise there would not be a thread suggesting a redesign.
Nobody’s denying that there are builds and items in the game that don’t perform as well as other options for cutting edge endgame. Although I would say there are some individuals that will happily cover their ears when something is on the other end of that spectrum.
In a perfect world, everything would be performing within a certain reasonable range based on player skill, gear support and stats. I’m not sure anybody’s ever gonna get there in a lifetime given the complex web that is balancing an ARPG.
But given how increasingly nitpicky complaints about balance have become, I would say we’re not far off from “good enough”.
17 Likes
A good part of those times falling could be attributed to the introduction of movement runes as well as passive damage becoming a much more prominent source of damage (Blade Spirits being permanent, Mines being easier to use, Wind Devils receiving multiple set support so that maximizing them is more beneficial, not to mention the omnipresent Cold Infiltrator with VoS + Aura of Censure). Oathkeeper support also contributes to the times declining as Vire’s Might is a very good movement skill that leaves a fiery trail that’s great for devotion proccing.
On the other hand, the aggro fix means that a player is taking much more incoming damage than before the patch, as there were very few players that stayed in the middle of the map and facetank everything Crucible threw at it. Even now, with all these buffs, fighting Reaper + Kaisan + potentially Korvaak on Wave 170 is no easy feat, and even a small damage nerf could be the difference between barely getting through the fight and dying. Every small damage nerf means that those stupid healers heal a Boss encounter to full before you can kill it and focus on the other 20+ Heroes you have in front of you.
It also doesn’t help that it took years before a good number of equipment + skills could be even seen as usable, much less good. It took years before I could make a functional Hellhound build that didn’t involve taking it at 1/16 and maximizing the Hellfire buff. I’m not talking about beating Crucible in 6 minutes - I’m talking about beating Crucible at all. I can understand that people get jaded when most of a patch buffs involve some numerical tweaking, but the one nerf was removing a conversion or dumping on a particular skill which made more builds unusable than functional.
1 Like
The end is coming, finally!
No more salty feedbacks and ungrateful comments after every new patch! Only technical support will remain. Will it?
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Maybe it’s not my place to say but if a character is so reliant on that small damage that they lost to a nerf, isn’t that a bigger problem in and of itself?
It is also worth mentioning that Crucible players have steadily developed a mindset over time of building glassier characters with the natural goal of pushing clear times down as far as they can in tandem with changes that have served to further enable this (like Cunning/Spirit providing health as a prime example) which is a problem as well. Especially as the aggro fix that they asked for means these largely offensive characters suddenly take more damage than they were previously accustomed to.
You know, I was about to write another big post about how finicky the wording is for proc skills and what can trigger them, but I took another look at Upheaval and it actually does use the same language that other WPS skills do, just with the caveat that it only has a chance to trigger on crits, so I’ll concede this point.
In case it’s not clear, I agree. If my most pressing issue with the game is about the advanced interactions between a half-dozen skills out of the, what, 250 that characters have access to? Then you’re doing pretty damn well compared to any other developers out there.
When it comes to a build that can readily beat Crucible in one patch and get destroyed in another patch, it’s not a factor of “oh, let’s just make it less glassy.” Skills typically need very specific gear combinations to get the bonus points necessary to hard-cap them and if you’re going so far out of your way to hardcap the ability, you really want to see nice returns out of them. You can try and get more sustain to offset the damage changes, but if you’re playing a particular skill + damage type, the devotion path just may not be there (no ADCTH nodes anyway near the T3 devotions you want to get), or you may use different gearing to get it, but then your resistances are way off and there’s no reasonable way to get past it without overhauling 3-4-5 pieces of gear you meticulously picked out for the occasion. The disappointment doubles if a particular MI slot you farmed 100+ hours to obtain is now practically worthless.
Now have that happen 2 or 3 times in the span of a year due to “balance” changes? That would make anyone want to uninstall and quit, at least until there’s a firm guarantee about “no more changes. Everything will stay as it is at this point.” Then people will come back and compete for speedrun glory again, knowing that even if they get a really good time, their builds will no longer be touched.
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Not a great comment on my part— I think I was reading something into your original post that wasn’t really there in retrospect. The intent there was to clarify that aggro fix (and more generally, mechanics changes) were a not entirely insignificant factor in getting from that 9-11 minutes to where we are now (something I thought was missing from an implied narrative that I no longer think you implied). I don’t think that I suggested that the aggro fix alone
but perhaps the brevity of my comment combined with my over-reading of yours created that impression along with the appearance of drama (the latter of which, to be fair, was present, though I hope not nearly in the quantity you may have perceived it to be.)
In any case, I hope we can get back to examining Upheaval and FH+Upheaval.
Having about 1650+ hours played in Grim Dawn, i never knew that Upheaval worked this way and didn’t proc off of other WPS. I much prefer it being another WPS at worse case or better yet, nerf it and make it able to proc off of other WPS. It doesnt make any sense to me right now.
Even if you disagree with me, one thing is undeniable. If i didn’t know the way skill didn’t work with other WPS skills by now then there is clearly something missing the way the game explains things.
EDIT : I like to mention that i always thought WPS as simply “empowered basic attacks”.
5 Likes
Or people have poor reading skills and comprehension to connect 2 + 2 = 4. The skill says: Whenever you land a critical strike with your basic weapon attacks + activates off default weapon attacks. It doesn’t mention anything else, so its safe to assume that it excludes all else.
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That’s why endgame content exists - to provide a challenge for full geared builds.
Oh, wait… You don’t balance SR above 60, my mistake
Lets call it a coincidence when nerfs happen if someone posted a 4:xx crucible run
Its kind a progress, you know. Planes fly higher, computers got smarter, cars got faster. The same is in GD
Damn, those Pyromancers, melee Shieldbreakers and Purifiers.
Purifiers someone? You know, those Demo+Inq? Dagallon, ehm?
It might be a revelation, but Mines are still the worst RR skill in the game
And we have it!
I can faceroll Cronley Gang in 30 minutes with Horn of Gandar or I can faceroll Callagadra in 30 seconds with retal WItchblade
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Pretty much boss nerfed mobs resistances in MC for 2 or 3 times. Ppl mostly complain about imbalances (eg Kuba healing pool or Grava dispel orbs…), we rarely flinch like omg this boss hit for 10k dmg and one shot me. Did we ever say Calla too hard? Nope. Dying is learning. Deal with it. We like creative, make something better, and thats how we love GD. End game gears mean strongest ones, they only get obstacle vs superbosses, and it happens to every RPG game. Thats why some games even has NG++++ or OP 10, for hardcore players.
About Crucible, as cunning/spirit gain hp as well, augments buffed, it allows glass canon builds can achieve the peak with strategy and carefully, not like before, a 7-8k hp char runs around and wish for luck a mob wont one shot him. Also 10 mins per run is a bit boring. Runs now smoother and shorter, it’s good, and everyone loves that.
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I love it when planes get balance patches. All my flights get shorter.
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If this thread descends into sniping at one another then yes, it will be closed. Keep it on topic if you want it to say open.
The fate of GD CCG hangs in the balance… Which mechanics shall the Shaman’s Upheaval Skill Card employ?! Only time will tell!
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