Understanding Onslaught, Onslaught Stacks and +X charges

Grim Dawn Classes, Skills and Builds
1

Hi everyone,

I have been discussing the skill Onslaught with @Gnomish_Inquisition, and I found some weird wording in Grimtools.

Let’s sum up facts first:

  • Onslaught is DAR (Default Attack Replacer)
  • When used, it generates Stacks, those stacks don’t “vanish” by themselves, they “patiently wait” to be released
  • You can’t release Onslaught Stacks by using Onslaught, you need to use another skill as a “finisher” or “releaser”

In Grim Tools, there are some skills, which add an extra number of Onslaught Stacks, so when used as “releaser” / “finisher”, an extra portion of Onslaught Stacks are added:
Aether Assault +3 [Onslaught like skill, granted by item] ;
Albrecht’s Aether Ray +3 ;
Beronath’s Fury +2 [charging DAR, granted by item] ;
Cadence +3 ;
Deathweave +1 [item skill proc] ; Deathweave +2 [item skill proc] ;
Drain Essence +3 ; Drain Essence +8 ;
Eye of Reckoning +3 ;
Feral Claws +3 [Werewolf attack] ;Feral Claws +4 [Werewolf attack] ;
Fire Strike +3 ;
Flames of Ignaffar +3 ;
Ice Talons +3 [Wereraven attack] ;
Onslaught +1 ; Onslaught +2 ; Onslaught +3 ; Onslaught +4 ;
Righteous Fervor +4 ;
Savagery +3 ;
Winds of Asterkarn +3 ;
Zakull’s Anima +5 [complete set proc] ;

But in Grim Tools, with some skills, there are also some “Charges” worded specifically with them… Let’s have a look, which skills have the “+X charges” bonus, or better said modifier to them.
+1 charge
Amarasta’s Blade Burst ;
Blackwater Cocktail ;
Blade Arc ;
Blitz ;
Callidor’s Tempest ;
Canister Bomb ;
Doom Bolt ;
Evade [general movement, not a mastery skill] ;
Forcewave ;
Grasping Vines ;
Grenado ;
Leap ;
Reap Spirit ;
Ring of Steel ;
Rune of Hagarrad ;
Rune of Kalastor ;
Shadow Strike ;
Sigil of Consumption ;
Siphon Souls ;
Trozan’s Sky Shard ;
Vire’s Might ;
Word of Renewal ;

+2 charges
Trozan’s Sky Shard

@Gnomish_Inquisition understands that those “charges” are “transferred Onslaught mechanics” to those skills. But how they are released? They can’t be released by themselves, e.g. Blitz +2 charges means it generates 2 charges, but I can’t release those by Blitz itself anymore, I need to use another skill.

My understanding is different: Imagine you have the Onslaught skill and you generate, let’s say 8 Onslaught Stacks. You use Shadow Strike to release them, and if Shadow strike has +2 charges, the Shadow Strike effectively unleashes 10 Onslaught Stacks. 8 provided by stacking them by Onslaught, and other 2 as an extra “added” by Shadow Strike to them.

So? Are +X Onslaught Stacks and +X Charges the same and the devs forgot to unify the wording, or the situation is much more complicated?

2

Charges are unrelated to Onslaught Stacks.

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3

Can you show a concrete Grim Tools example, or several, that you are confused about?

4

I think charges mean that you can use the skill again with no recharge time. And onslaught stacks will make each release more powerful.

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6

Examples:
Item with “Charge” - Covenant of the Three - Items - Grim Dawn Item Database
Item with additional “Onslaught Stacks” - Garmir’s Horn - Items - Grim Dawn Item Database
Item with both Onslaught Stacks and Charges - Awakened Tainted Swampgrips - Items - Grim Dawn Item Database

7

I am sure in a few days there will be plenty of Big Bonks And You: Understanding Onslaught and Onslaught Stacks in Modern Grim Dawn pamphlets and video on demand courses.

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8

“Charge” means you can use the skill again without waiting for cooldown

“Onslaught stacks” means that the skill can generate onslaugth stacks for you which can be spent on another skill with cooldown.

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9

Those are cooldown charges.

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10

Why so sarcastic?

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11

And, if I think hard, since you need a skill on cooldown to spend your onslaught stacks on it, the +charges thing is a way to “balance” and make it a bit harder to spend your onslaught stacks.

like you generate 7 onslaugth stacks and BOOM you cast blitz insane dmg but wait blitz has with that item a +1Charge meaning you have to use it again to put it on cooldown before you can spend onslaught stacks on it again

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12

No sarcasm, builders and content creators always come out with helpful guides around the release of new mechanics.

An explanation:

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13

And some of those guides will be wrong in one way or another :slight_smile: as always

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14

The Way of the World

15

that’s why i’ll be waiting for Ceno or Mi0 to make the deep mechanic breakdown, with frame times etc bug/conflict interactions :sweat_smile:

doesn’t seem hard at a glance
get stacks,
use blitz; but hold it down, game auto spams for you since no cd(i’d assume),
cd sets in, commence stack building skill/“now switch button”

would seem like/if interaction wise it’s like the current reset mechanics, it merely changes how long you hold down the support skill button, ala clairvoyant doom bolt or gildam memes :thinking:

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16

yeah, should be easy to workaround

17

For me, the situation is little bit harder, because I’ve played Titan Quest a lot back then, and in the game, there is Onslaught skill, but in TQ, it works like Savagery in GD… :smiley:

And you are right, guys. When FoA is out, wait a bit unless the game is balanced, hotfixes are released and then it’s perfect time to “disassembly” Onslaught to the core.

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18

In Path of Exile “Onslaught” is a global attack, cast and run speed buff that you can get via flasks etc.

19

I get there are some not always super clear term overloads (not that Overload either), because Savagery and Cadence use “Charges” which are different than +X Charges, and the Onslaught skill “charges” up but grants Onslaught Stacks, which are just a mechanic that is not exclusively tied to the Onslaught mastery skill etc…

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20

looking at modifiers
spam skills can get get onslaught stack generation Search - Grim Dawn Item Database, cd skills can get charges
Charges don’t have to have any relation to stacks, seem more like a way to buff general CD skill use contra turning everything into cdr modifier stacking (current meta)
OSstacks just something that can then compliment inbetween, kinda giving you 2½ build options, build for charges, or mix OSstack focus + charges, or build “solely” for OSstacks boost

Wonder if it will make spam/“pure” cdr stacking meta obsolete, so spamming 0.1 sec cd DB/Boneharvest will be less worth than just just a bunch of charges +combo skill/“piano superiority” :thinking:
Or something crazy like cdr stacking one skill and OSstack/charge stacking the combo skill, so 0.1sec BH spam + default cd DB with +4charges :stuck_out_tongue:

*curious enough despite Charges addition, it did not swap out chance CDR resets/replace that mechanic, The Clairvoyant's Focus - Item sets - Grim Dawn Item Database, so that’s also a thing to contend with too - wonder what Roman will think about that cd rng still :scorv:

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21

Onslaught is a Berserker ability that generates Onslaught Stacks. These are generated each time the ability is cast, not per target hit.

Onslaught Stacks are expended when you use a cooldown ability that is not a debuff and is not a summon (the brief cooldowns on abilities such as Albrecht’s Aether Ray are exempt and count as non-cooldown skills). For each stack you have at the time of casting, the ability deals +15% absolute damage (calculated After other bonuses are applied).

Modifiers that give +X Onslaught Stacks increase the maximum stacks the skill can generate and store. If a skill previously did not generate Onslaught Stacks, this enables it to generate them.

Charges are additional uses of the ability. By default, every skill has 1 charge. When a charge is spent, the skill’s cooldown begins. If the skill still has charges left, you can cast it again. Each time the cooldown finishes, a charge of a skill is regained. They are not regained all at once.

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