So I realize with Mosaic, most people are looking for the boosts to damage, bonus staff mods on the claw base like:
Claws of Thunder
Phoenix Strike
Claws of Ice
Dragon Tail (for the big booms)
However, you already do so much damage with Mosaic without these, why don’t people look for the utility skills to save points? I just found a Feral Claw with some huge skill point saving bonuses. Wouldn’t this be a nice bonus as opposed to some additional damage (that isn’t going to be noticed anyways)?
Feral Claws
+1 to Dragon Flight
+1 to Mind Blast
+1 to Weapon Block
It spawned with all three of those. I’m curious what other players think about this. In my opinion, I’d use this claw to save a huge chunk of passive points that can be dumped in other useful things, or more synergies. I am most likely going to save for myself and roll a Mosaic just to have on hand. Thoughts? Value?
The extra damage does still help in p8 games but yes if you aren’t p8, it is overkill just like fully built javazon/sorc/hdin/foh op p1 so yes utility would be better. I think one of my claws has MB and weapon block. DF is a little clunky to me. Otherwise if you don’t care to ever resell, this is the better path to take.
I realize there is much animosity towards this runeword, and I honestly don’t know how I feel about it still.
However, I think it’s cool to be able to build a really cool Dragon Tail Assassin as an alternative to the fireworks show. I’ve only made one Mosaic Assassin just to see what the fuss was about. Turns out the Assassin doesn’t need infinity or sunder charms without Mosaic anyways… The Assassin straight up destroys content without Mosaic.
Edit: Just to add though, there are other classes that feel this powerful, even without Infinity.
Examples:
Javazon
FoH/Hammers
Nova Sorc
Poison Necro (This build wipes screens mega fast)
Dragon Paladin
Trap Assassin
I just created one the season it came out, fully built her and got her in the 90s. After 20 years of never having a really fun MA sin, it was a nice changeup. But I have barely touched my mosaic sin since, it is just like my fully built hdin, both powerful but relatively boring to me. Much rather play my pdag/pnova full trangs nec with tele ammy, fury/rabies dru, bowazon or frenzy/double throw horker…
You seem to be very triggered. I don’t need to “learn basics”, I’ve played the game for 26 years. Also, I don’t play single player, so maybe that’s your problem? Your comparisons are very unrealistic, there’s no need for this “players 300+” talk, that’s not even possible.
Poison necro absolutely destroys content, much faster than a summon necro. I will be halfway through Chaos by the time you raise your army.
Because they haven’t fixed MA for assassins. They created an item that you build twice to “fix” the MA tree. Their amazing solution was to overload what MA skills do to a point that breaks the game, both mechanically and on most hardware. Anyone who played D3 looks at Mosaic and sees a textbook example of RoS item design, which is to say RoS build design. Mosaic isn’t an item that enhances the efficacy of existing skills, it is a full replacement for those skills.
The core appeal of D2 is that players select their build via the skill trees. Collecting gear from that point enhances that selected build. In D3, your choice of build is irrelevant and the items themselves serve as your build by fundamentally altering how skills function. That’s Mosaic. It doesn’t belong in the game. Frankly, neither does Metamorphosis, which does the same thing to wearwolf and wearbear for druids. What these items accomplish is to reduce an entire skill tree down to a single mandatory item to function. MA assassins don’t exist without 2x Mosaic. Shapeshifting druids do not exist without Metamorphosis. It’s tragically incompetent and lazy design. D2 has lived for over 2 decades because it avoided cornering entire skill trees in this way. It cannot be overstated how little the D2R team knows or cares about why D2 is successful.
Because I know someone will bring it up, introducing new items that completely alter how skills function in a lazy way to “fix” those skills isn’t in any way similar to items that offer oskills. Mosaic is not comparable to Chaos. Metamorphosis is not comparable to Beast or Fury. Giving a class access to a limited version of another class skill in terms of max rank and/or any associated synergy bonus is not the same as an item acting as a patch update for a class skill. Items with oskills expand the classes rather than further limiting them in the way that Mosaic and Metamorphosis do for MA and shapeshifting.
The disappointment is colossal, and yet at the same time even more unsurprising from Blizzard.
I would say they absolutely do, but elemental MA Assassins pretty much require Mosaic.
This is exceedingly wrong. This might be one of the craziest takes I’ve seen in a long time. In no way is Metamorphosis required for a shapeshifter. They’ve been extremely successful melee builds for decades, even after the IAS changes, fury druids are in a great spot without this helmet.
You missed the point. Metamorphosis adds so much to shapeshifting the the existing builds stop mattering, and any existing build would just start using metamorphosis because of how much it adds. When extreme power creep is added to a build, it overshadows everything else. What mosaic and metamorphosis both do is add completely unique power creep to existing skills. It creates such an extreme imbalance between competing items that there is no longer competition. It’s a pure, textbook example of adding something that demolishes the health of the game for the affected skills and builds.
