Perhaps my thread title should have been “can we get basic build Drain Essence stronger?”
From what I read in your reply, you do not neither know or care about game mechanics and balance to be replying to this topic - yes you saw it coming. As I wrote, I have already gotten some good replies regarding the “identity” of the Drain Essence skill, but does that justify it having that low sheet dps as it have atm? Sure I get it that it should not have 130k sheet dps with g1-g2 gear as AAR, but how about getting 75k dps compared to 55k? Is that too much to ask for or should I just be content with “no they have different identities this thread is meaningless”?
Should I just accept that hexlauncher has 40% vitality to aether conversion? Letting it have 100% will not break anything since Urobooruk set already grants 100% conversions so giving hex launcher that conversion will not make Urobooruk DE builds “insane”.
It is discussions like these that brings the game forward. Replies like yours will just keep in the same place forever “no each skill have unique identities”…
I mean we got a drastic improvment in AAR now having piercing, could the other channeling skills (DE and FoI) get some love too or should I just accept things as “homogenous =/= balance”?
Now why didn’t you just say so and supplied some GT links to the builds you have been playing with? I am actually interested in that sort of things.
Pretty much this. AAR got drastically changed for the better and seems to be in a pretty good and fair state now. Retal DE was insane in the first two FG patches but seems to be more reasonable now (in the same ball park as Urobooruk DE builds) and Cold DE with Chillwhisper have some other problems than damage (armor, physical res)
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Good points!
I am trying to make a Spellbinder since I found a complete Diviner set, and you need a main damage skill next to Reap Spirit and Devastation which that set boosts and modifies. I at first thought of going with Panetti Missiles changed to Aether via Slathsarr’s Crest… but then I thought, all my other skills are Aether+Vitality, and Drain Essence does that, so I tried.
Big annoying thing with the skill is, mid-range only. And if I point and click my character will just stand there and channel the skill at nothing… with Aether Ray at least there is a beam you can see.
That said, the Drain works nicely with bunched enemies. I could not test on dummies how often the beam splits, oddly does not seem to do that only with very nearby enemies. But, it does nicely drain life. This was my first caster I could kill Gutworm with on first try without dying - he was 22, I was 16 or so. Took a while though. This is so far the only problem of the skill, low damage output compared to Aether Ray. Then again though, it is available right away while you need to get up to maybe Level 35-40 to finally get access to the other one. Anyway, since I will have the other two for heavy damage dealing, this will work fine as a crowd cleanup skill.
Btw, I was running a Chaos/Vitality Aether Ray Warlock (to use the Black Flame set) when the changes to the skill happened. And yeah… now that the ray penetrates it is far more easy to kill crowds with it, especially in narrow corridors. But even before that, it was a pretty good skill and you could sweep through charging enemies if they fanned out.