Spells don't do any damage

[MadDemiurg]

With the introduction of multiclassing the damage potential of weapon classes generally went up.

 

Spell damage, due to the new per encounter system, was overall dropped. The number of spells you can use per fight was also decreased, but you don't have to rest to get them back now.

 

As a result, I find spell damage builds severely underwhelming compared to weapon damage builds.

 

E.g. I can do a nature godlike evoker with max might for maximized evocation damage and shoot a 100+ damage empowered fireball... 1/encounter, spending a per rest resource. Or a 60 damage one 2/enocunter.

 

Whereas a minmaxed weapon damage build can be putting out better numbers with an autoattack.

 

There are some exceptions like ascendant being able to spam powers and actually keep up in total damage at least.

 

But overall "damage" wizards and druids feel really underwhelming now. Druids still make a decent healer and wizard works as a "weapon summoner" in a multiclass, at least for now when the lack of scaling on conjured weapons doesn't matter.

 

But damage specs definitely need to be looked at. I'm not sure they are actually UP since they can do well enough on PotD so maybe it's weapons and weapon damage passives that need nerfing. But the current situation does not look balanced.

[dunehunter]

I think casters are best at doing AOE damage while meleers are best at single target dps right? That is still the same in DF.

[Dr. Hieronymous Alloy]

This is something they should be able to pull out of the telemetric data. I know they've talked about single class rogues doing poorly and multiclass doing well, so they should have similar data on casters.

[Wormerine]

Apparently so, yet in my personal experience casters tend to seriously out-DPS everyone else. Not to mention some super handy debuff/interupt spells. 

It might be me not really building properly melee DPSers, I dunno.

[MadDemiurg]

I think casters are best at doing AOE damage while meleers are best at single target dps right? That is still the same in DF.

 

 

To an extent, yes, but this balance is skewed atm.

 

a) The single target damage that weapon builds put out now is so much higher than the aoe caster damage that there's not much benefit to this aoe as single target allows you to focus targets faster

b) Casters are severely limited in resources and run out of steam very fast, 2/eocounter per spell level doesn't cut it

c) Even as far as aoe goes, a multiclass barb would put out a lot more aoe damage over the course of a fight. "Spell damage" wizard has better alpha but that's doesn't count for much.

 

They could probably track this with stats, but they'll have to compare to optimized dps builds. The damage of an optimized and non optimized weapon build differs dramatically. Whereas there's not much to optimizing a caster. Compared to casual builds that don't optimize much casters should still do pretty well.

Edited April 3, 2018 by MadDemiurg

[JerekKruger]

c) Even as far as aoe goes, a multiclass barb would put out a lot more aoe damage over the course of a fight.

 

Or any melee class that takes Fighter as part of their build and uses Cleave Stance.

[Dr. Hieronymous Alloy]

 

I think casters are best at doing AOE damage while meleers are best at single target dps right? That is still the same in DF.

 

 

To an extent, yes, but this balance is skewed atm.

 

a) The single target damage that weapon builds put out now is so much higher than the aoe caster damage that there's not much benefit to this aoe as single target allows you to focus targets faster

b) Casters are severely limited in resources and run out of steam very fast, 2/eocounter per spell level doesn't cut it

c) Even as far as aoe goes, a multiclass barb would put out a lot more aoe damage over the course of a fight. "Spell damage" wizard has better alpha but that's doesn't count for much.

 

They could probably track this with stats, but they'll have to compare to optimized dps builds. The damage of an optimized and non optimized weapon build differs dramatically. Whereas there's not much to optimizing a caster. Compared to casual builds that don't optimize much casters should still do pretty well.

 

 

 

Yeah, this is probably the difference: I suspect there are some optimized physical-weapon builds that are cleaning clocks, but I also suspect most people aren't using them, either because detailed build guides haven't been posted or because people don't want to make overbalanced characters.

Edited April 3, 2018 by Dr. Hieronymous Alloy

[Boeroer]

I guess it's the same as with PoE:

 

On release: "Wizards are pointless, rogues are so good".

 

Three years later: "Wizards are so good, rogues are pointless".

 

And that is despite the fact that spell mastery replaced whole-tier-on-encounter spells.

 

If you use Pull of Eora and then lob two Fireballs onto the gathered crowd that's some AoE damage that's difficult to achieve for any melee guy in the same time.

Edited April 3, 2018 by Boeroer

[MadDemiurg]

Idk, I'm a pretty experienced caster user in PoE1 and I liked them there from the beginning. I did TCS runs with a wizard and a priest.

 

Most casters feel much weaker than they were in PoE1 and weapon builds feel a lot stronger, I never managed to hit the damage numbers I pull off with weapon builds now in PoE1 this early.

 

Maybe the situation will change at higher levels with more spells available, but it could also get even worse if more passive damage multipliers for weapons become available.

 

Anyways I can only judge the lvl 1-9 range in current beta.

 

And I'm not saying that all caster builds suck, but most that try to dps with spells do.

 

I did note the higher aoe alpha potential, but you fall off after that alpha extremely fast. E.g. pull + 2 fireballs is a huge chunk of your higher level slots in the current level range. Not to mention that many weapon builds also have huge single target alpha which might be more useful for taking out dangerous targets fast (but once they're out of their alpha strikes they still do plenty of damage with autoattacks). E.g. you can hit 5 guys for 60 with a fireball for 300 total damage, or you can oneshot someone with 150+.

Edited April 3, 2018 by MadDemiurg

[Wormerine]

I fell in love with Thrust of Tattered Veils. Such a quick, long range, reliable interrupt.

[Boeroer]

Summoned weapons actually scale with level.

 

Damage mods are additive, not multiplicative (except MIG and lashes).

So more dmg mods on weapon base damage is not as effective as a dmg mod on spell damage. Usually spell base damage is higher than weapon damage.

 

A caster like wizard/druid/priest gains a lot of spells per encounter after some levels. Even with the somewhat reduced casting times it's kind of hard to spend all uses in one encounter with a full party. So the argument that you can only do alpha strikes loses its validity more and more with every level you gain.

 

Basically the same as in PoE where casters had very limited options and grew stronger and stronger with every level.

[MadDemiurg]

Do you think I don't know how damage calculation works?

 

The following bonuses are effectively multiplicative with each other:

 

+damage%, +lash%, -recovery (attack speed), +accuracy, +hit conversion, +crit dmg

 

All of these are a lot easier to come by for weapons than for spells.

 

Yes, weapon damage % mods are less effective than spell damage % mods but there are hardly any besides might. Thinking about it, they should add more damage passives for spells.

 

Full party is kinda ez mode even on PotD unfortunately, but yeah you'll probably clear most fights w/o running out of steam later on. With the pletora of mods that can boost your weapon attacks they would be matching if not surpassing spell dmg at that point tho.

Edited April 3, 2018 by MadDemiurg

[Frog Man]

Slightly on topic - but how do you guys feel about the effectiveness of a CC wizard so far? Focusing on things like TOTV, slicken, curse of blackened sight, etc.

 

Is a Cipher just much better in the debuffer role? Is the debuffer still an important role in a party?

[Boeroer]

How should I know what you know? I'm just interpreting what you wrote, and that may go wrong sometimes. Since you said summoned weapons don't scale I assumed you could be mistaken with the nature of dmg mods, too.

 

Anyway: the title "Spells don't do any damage" is highly exaggerated. I could agree with "don't do enough damage". Some could indeed be better.

[dunehunter]

Slightly on topic - but how do you guys feel about the effectiveness of a CC wizard so far? Focusing on things like TOTV, slicken, curse of blackened sight, etc.

 

Is a Cipher just much better in the debuffer role? Is the debuffer still an important role in a party?

I feel cipher lack hard CC at low level, and aoe range of cipher spell is pretty small.

[Dr. Hieronymous Alloy]

Slightly on topic - but how do you guys feel about the effectiveness of a CC wizard so far? Focusing on things like TOTV, slicken, curse of blackened sight, etc.

 

Is a Cipher just much better in the debuffer role? Is the debuffer still an important role in a party?

 

 

Hrm. They're pretty comparable.

 

A Beguiler cipher is VERY good at dropping affliction debuffs, but kinda has to specialize in that one role.

 

Wizards  have a lot of good debuffs, maybe not as ace as Ciphers, but also have a much wider range of available powers (especially given various grimoires etc). The main difference is that wizards get more powers, but they're mostly a little harder to use -- a lot more "aoe" powers with big areas of effect, instead of "foe aoe" powers, for example, so you have to worry about friendly fire and so forth. Cipher AoEs are smaller and more targeted but also generally "foe aoe". 

Edited April 3, 2018 by Dr. Hieronymous Alloy

[dunehunter]

I think the best CCer now is chanter specially skald and troudaur.

[Dr. Hieronymous Alloy]

I think the best CCer now is chanter specially skald and troudaur.

 

 

Try an Ascendant or Beguiler cipher out post-patch.  You can get some crazy stuff going. The downside is you have to wait a bit, but that's true with chanters too. 

Edited April 3, 2018 by Dr. Hieronymous Alloy

[dunehunter]

Well I know ascendant is pretty good for CC, but I think chanter is better since that paralyze invocation is too good compare to cipher ones

 

Instant cast and since it’s not a foe based aoe, it’s easier to cover more enemies.

Edited April 3, 2018 by dunehunter

[Dr. Hieronymous Alloy]

Well I know ascendant is pretty good for CC, but I think chanter is better since that paralyze invocation is too good compare to cipher ones

 

Instant cast and since it’s not a foe based aoe, it’s easier to cover more enemies.

 

That's a good point, Ciphers are kinda weak right now on Paralyzing since Mental Binding still has the "duration of six seconds, cast time and recovery of three seconds each" issue, and only Paralyzes a single target.

 

On the other hand, chaincasting Dominate while Ascended gets just jolly 

[Wormerine]

I am doing a run with an Ascended in the party. Loving it. I think I know what I will make my imported cipher into once the games comes out. 

[JerekKruger]

I am doing a run with an Ascended in the party. Loving it. I think I know what I will make my imported cipher into once the games comes out. 

 

I've been mulling over some Cipher builds myself. Both Ascended and Soul Blade look appealing.

[LampStaple]

Slightly on topic - but how do you guys feel about the effectiveness of a CC wizard so far? Focusing on things like TOTV, slicken, curse of blackened sight, etc.

 

Is a Cipher just much better in the debuffer role? Is the debuffer still an important role in a party?

 

the level 2 wizard web skill is super strong. Reasonably fast cast and lasts for a long time, makes halt completely redundant. I think I'm going to spec aloth to be a control/cc wizard so he can hold enemies down while my pc nukes them.

[Dr. Hieronymous Alloy]

Here's a question I haven't seen discussed much --

 

Which are the best Wizard spells to choose as your "core" powers on level up?

 

So far in the beta I've generally picked a few core utility powers that are always useful -- eldritch aim, thrust of tattered veils, pull of eora. What have other folks gone with?

[MadDemiurg]

The spell balance is honestly terrible but if you cherry pick the good ones (i.e. the ones with duration more than 3 seconds) ascendant or chanter are the best CC classes. Ascendant has 20 sec charm/dominate/aoe charm + dominate which is basically the strongest affliction. All the while paralyze is nerfed to 6 sec because "omg mental binding OP".

 

Wizard CC is better on average but has nothing to match 20 sec dominate and severely limited in resources. It's still decent, although confuse is nerfed into non entity.

Edited April 3, 2018 by MadDemiurg