Physical Demo. We’ve already seen an amulet supporting phys Vindictive Flame and EoR which is great news for my scuffed home-baked EoR Shieldbreaker, but I hope there’s a lot more. Phys bomberman Adversary-style, possibly phys Mortars. Stun Jacks would probably be horrible considering how armor would eat them up, though it could be interesting if there was a mod reducing projectile amount in favour of a TDM or flat.
Pierce pets. Pets are currently supported in some form or fashion on every single damage type with the glaring exception of Pierce. They are also at least in some minor ways supported on every mastery except Inquisitor and Oathkeeper. Arcanist and Demo in particular have a surprising amount of pet support based entirely around IEE and Flame Touched respectively. Inquisitor is already in an excellent spot to support Pierce pets: Aura of Conviction is the single Exclusive Skill in the game that actually affects allies, making it a decent option for pierce pets. In addition, the pets can be buffed by Word of Renewal and they can benefit from Inquisitor Seal. That’s a way better pet support start than Arcanist or Demo have, were it not for a complete lack of ways to actually get your pet damage converted to pierce, or a lack of pet items that include Inquisitor somewhere in there (Glyph of Kelpat’Zoth is the only exception). There is an upcoming offhand that makes it possible for you to spec into Archer Skeletons (it makes it so that Archers are summoned more frequently than other skelly types) but it converts all the damage to Cold. That is welcome, as Cold pets do not have a ton of support outside of Winter King and Bysmiel’s Grasp, but I’m hoping perhaps pierce skelly archers could be a thing alongside that, with Inquisitor as the core secondary mastery to expand the range of pet classes.
Speaking of expanding pet classes, we don’t know how much pet support Berserker gear will be providing, but we do know where Oathkeeper stands pre-FoA. The only thing on Oathkeeper that benefits pets in any way outside of RR is Presence of Virtue, and tangentially Path of the Three if for whatever reason you really need the CDR. That puts Oathkeeper in an even worse pet support position than Inquisitor. However, we’ve seen in one of the previews an amulet/medal that turns the Wights from Reap Spirit into player scaled pets. I don’t know if the engine makes it possible, but boy would it be cool if the reverse (adding pet-based scaling) could be done for Guardians of Empyrion. With one item modifier Oathkeeper would become a core pet class.
Retal expansion. There are all sorts of items and skills with weird retal sources that are universally left unused. Nobody’s making an Elemental Retal build just because Turrion’s Reprisal has it, nobody makes Vitality retal just because Spectral War Shield has it, nor are there Chaos retal builds with Voidwalkers, Cold retal builds with Frostdread Cuirass and Crest of Winter Fortitude or Aether retal builds with Outcast’s Secret. Not only is the gear support/conversion not there, neither are there devotions for anything but Phys, Lightning, Fire and Acid retal. While it’s unlikely that retal will deviate from the core 4 damage types despite the smattering of items that give all sorts of odd retaliation (though IMO one or two extra wouldn’t go amiss), I’m hoping we get even more support on some of these non-traditional retal masteries, and that Berserker isn’t left out of the retal family. Mirror of Ereoctes, Arcane Empowerment, Reckless Power and Blade Barrier all feature retal support on them, but the skills themselves are rarely incentive enough to build retal around them, since there’s little other support. Retal Inquisitor Seals would be so cool! As would some kind of riposting Blade Barrier Nightblade.
But I think your point is maybe more confusing. Most sources of % Retaliation Damage are % All Retaliation Damage. This makes Retal more flexible than other approaches to building. In many ways, the exact flavor (damage type) of a Retal build matters less than it does for regular damage, as the items are more homogenized.
It sounds like more a question of asking for more RATA sources to more skills rather than a complaint about Retal damage types.
Well, it’s both. I wouldn’t mind making more types of retal available. Currently if you want to do anything other than Phys, Fire, Light, Acid, you have to get into conversions, and those rarely come bundled neatly on an item that also supports retal, so you’re getting your conversion but then missing out on % retal or flat along the way. You get your meme, but you’re worse off than if you just stuck to the base 4 retal damage types. So we have items like Turrion’s Reprisal that give flat Tri-Elemental retal damage that no build can actually make full use of. If you’re Fire retal, as a Demo often would be, you’re wasting 2/3s of the item’s flat retal unless you’re somehow bundling Lightning retal into your build as well. Then you’re still wasting the Cold. If you’re doing retal DE, you’re either ignoring the Vit retal on Spectral War Shield or you’re converting it with something like Gladiator’s Distinction to physical. So while all these retal damage types exist, they’re not used in their damage type.
At the same time, there are masteries like Arcanist or Nightblade with actual retal already present on their skills (Mirror, Reckless Power, Blade Barrier), but they only get used for something like retal CT or Dreegal’anore, cause making an actual retal Mirror or BB build is unattractive, despite things like Turrion’s existing (if a Turrion Sorcerer exists somewhere, I haven’t found it).
All it would take for something like Cold retal to suddenly exist beyond the boundaries of Frostdread Cuirass and Crest of Winter Fortitude is a dedicated retal item that also converts all Physical to Cold on top. Suddenly you can use all your cold retal items and your phys retal items and then just convert it without it costing you a valuable retal slot. We even have Cold retal components already (and Aether retal ones etc.) Same for Vit. All we need is one or two retal items with Fire to Vit or Phys to Vit conversion and we could actually use retal DE with Spectral War Shield in the item’s actual damage type. A few dedicated retal items for Nightblade and we can cook something up with BB, a few dedicated retal items for retal Arcanist and we could use the mastery as a centerpiece, rather than a joke side mastery with one retal build (CT). They don’t have to all be great, but it would be nice if it at least looked like these playstyles are there if you squint a bit. Currently if you’re doing Vit retal, you’re doing it cause you just really, really wanna try hard at something, cause the game certainly doesn’t help you much getting there.
That reminds me, I did a bit of research on available damage types on various masteries and bleed is the only damage type that is straight up unavailable for some masteries. Both Demo and Arcanist can do absolutely nothing with it. No conduits, no conversions, no nothing. The second closest is Pierce on Necro. It’s present on Bone Harvest but has zero support. So getting your idea working somehow would be neat. Bleed Demo should totally be a thing with all the shrapnel flying around XD
Before you get any ideas, I tried a concept of this using Alkamos' Scythe - Items - Grim Dawn Item Database, which has just about all the conversions you can ask for… and it was the most brutal, torturous thing I ever went through. Worse than beating Callagdra with Death Knight Skeletons. Some things are just not meant to see the light of day.
As for the OP, Pierce pets is unnecessary, but a pet set that involves a class that isn’t Occultist / Shaman / Necromancer is very high up that list. As part of my modding adventures, I made a Hellhound + Demolitionist pet set and I had a lot of fun making that. Hopefully we can have something like a Cold pet Druid set or some kind of Apostate set that focuses on pets.
If I don’t see gear that focuses on Wereraven + Occultist’s Raven pet, I riot.
I’d like to see a physical dmg auto attack to use it as alternative to cadence. I always liked WPS and having a DK with the 4 WPS working in all attacks it’s in certain mode a wish.
Cadence is good, of course, but as charged strike doesn’t triggers WPS, those skills always felt like “wasting” points.
yes, bornmist talisman exists, but is dissapointing. Perhaps we could get a “improved” version of it?
Support pets. Maybe a set that massively boosts their survivability but guts their damage.
Say, 50% damage absorption but total damage modified by -80% or similar.
So you could still use them for their passives/auras like Emboldening Presence or the Familiar heal on builds that still focus on player damage. Currently, trying to use them on a non-pet centric build, even with Defensive mode, they evaporate the instant you encounter any kind of AoE damage.
Ah yes, forgot to include that one in the OP. I did something similar, using Hellhound and Raven for auras and the heal, it worked ok-ish, but it was pretty obvious that I was trying to put together things the game does not want you to put together. It would be even worse now that Light of Empyrion no longer has any pet stats on it.
I also tried that at some point with the bird and abandoned it pretty quickly
Not sure it makes sense for the other pets, since most of them have aggro/taunt, but I’d really like it if the bird can be a support bird.
