You said it … (IF) with a single hit you can kill multiple monsters… (If) you cannot you will have to deal with block/AR and now run because of knockback… Melee are already underplayed except for uber … we don’t need to make it worse but quite the opposite, I don’t mind a (Side effect) or straigh up less damage on the AoE/Cleave but knockback is really not good for melee.
100% this.
Not everyone that plays this game wants to stand in the corner of a room and have all the monsters melt.
I have a char with some AoE (zeal/dual-dream) for MF’n, and I have a zeal/fanta pally for enjoyment. Neither are good MF’r, and I’m ok with that, I play the game to enjoy the game. I think people that play the game with intent to find items have really lost sight of the actual game.
The dual dream guy is fast (for melee) and boring to be honest.
The zeal/fanta guy requires picking monsters out for first attach, retreat, gather mobs in patterns to attack again, use of obstacles for separating mobs etc etc… aka, you have to think to play melee well.
Making him yet another “walk into room and all monsters melt” build is a complete, and huge mistake.
If that were to happen, there would be no melee.
Adding splash/AoE to melee, is nothing but a means to remove melee from the game.
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To be honest Dual dream pally aren’t really melee … they can just run around and kill everything in P1, And sorc dual dream is better 
Agree, but to need clarify, running around and around waiting for pulses while taking damage is not only slower than stepping in and zealing, it’s also not as fun… and you can get trapped, and have to zeal you way out anyways… may as well step up to the plate 
and in Hell, acts 4 and 5, he’s extreamly slow if relying only on pulses… like mind numbingly slow… oh well, I don’t enjoy pure casters, so, that’s what I’ve got.
So, that is why I noted he has some AoE…
But, yes, you are right.
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I love all the suggestions for like cleave or splash…when talking about a werewolf druid…who already has Fury…lol
Melee is fine. No it’s generally not going to be the best for MF, though it can be (Pitzerker? Trav Horker?), but MF really isn’t the endgame of D2, killing enemies is. And melee does that just fine. Ditch the MF and focus on killing stuff, having fun, and maybe some HR’s drop.
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Physical damage weapons used to deal a higher percent of the enemy’s health in damage. And then they buffed all the monsters in the game and added synergies to boost damage output from the players–at the cost of build diversity.
They didn’t calculate it properly for physical damage abilities, however, as those got left in the dust while certain spells either got pushed into A and S tier, or stayed in A and S tier.
Instead, we ended up with effects such as crushing blow leading to Smite Paladins being the strongest boss killer, Grief becoming necessary to deal reasonable physical damage, and most melee abilities becoming obsolete at anything less than high end levels of gear. Physical damage bowazons fell off the map, physical damage zealots disappeared, and whirlwind barbs cried in a corner. There were exceptions, but as noted above they required significant investments.
There are three solutions that I could see working, and while I highly doubt they will pursue option 1, they might pursue options 2 or 3.
- Return to 1.09 values, removing synergies and restoring true build diversity and hybrid specs.
- Buff physical damage on the items.
- Buff synergies on physical damage skills.
On melee characters, physical damage synergies might be more difficult to scale properly because of the effects of Grief. On bowazon, it was no problem. Therefore, I believe that option 2 would be the best bet.
Alternatively, and as otherwise noted on this thread, splash damage could be a feasible solution. But I don’t think they’ll go with it, as it would probably require more work than they’re willing to put in. Options 1-3 above simply require number tweaks. And it feels like they want to do the absolute, bare minimum these days–and then only after a lot of negative feedback from the community, if they maybe feel like it, and usually way too late.
3 Likes
I feel Deadly Strike/Critical Strike should cleave on all weapons. Basically, deal double damage to primary target and AoE damage based on the weapon’s range.
Large weapons should always do AoE damage in their range, such as two handers and such. This would make the appeal of 2, 2 handed weapons on the barb extremely enticing.
Thanks for reading,
Floopay
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Lazy but effective would be x% of weapon dmg dealt by skill, like in D3. Which want’s a bad idea complety, but they overshot whit the values.
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A unique but efficient way to buff physical builds is indeed to give them AoE but it has to be thoughtfully added and the way I address it is via the Sorceress’ Enchant skill. Typically, players go with Act 1 for Fanaticism(via Faith), Act 2 for Blessed Aim(for Attack Rating), Might(for Damage) or Holy Freeze(Slow/CC) and equip either Pride(Concentration for Damage), Doom(Holy Freeze for CC/Slow and +2 Skills) or Reaper’s Toll(Decrepify for PI), or even Act 5 Frenzy since Grief + Lawbringer is stupidly broken strong(as is Grief + Plague).
Yet Act 3 is still bottom of the barrel in terms of usage(at least from my online experience). To help boost their usefulness, I think the Sorceress Enchant skill should not only add Fire Damage and a major boost to attack rating but that Fire damage from Enchant should be dealt in a 1 yard radius. Obviously against Fire Immunes this won’t help but its a unique and built-in way to give Act 3 Fire Mercenaries a really hard look, gives Enchant a really nice perk and buffs Physical builds with AoE via Elemental damage.
For 2-handed weapons, I would like to see two improvements.
-
Add a small amount of block chance (10%-15%) to make up for the fact that they can’t use a shield. Many RPGs do this.
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Bring down strength and dexterity pre-reqs. If anything 2-handers should require less strength since you are using two hands! I feel like whoever initially decided these values didn’t put much thought into it. He just saw Silver Edged Axe comes after Berserker axe on the list and bumped up the requirements.
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Can I know how you built that werewolf druid with those skills? And whether it is viable for playing solo online (not 8 players)? Also, if you know of a werebear build too that incorporates both Hurricane and Armageddon or either one of them?
I’ll try and log in tonight to give you a break down of skills…
But in essence
Armageddon/hurricane last 20 seconds
5fissure/5cyclone
20 Armageddon
20 Hurricane
5feral rage 5 fury 5 werewolf 5 lycanthropy
That’s 77 points or minus 12 level 65.
From there you can pump up what you feel like you are lacking, whether it’s your wolf form, feral rage, fury.
Armageddon/hurricane synergies.
I haven’t gotten past level 67 yet myself so it isn’t fully tested in hell but it’s a great change.
Build up feral rage stacks
Cast hurricane/Armageddon
And go to town.
I found for my specific level and gear I needed an insight merc for all the recasting every 20 seconds.
There’s tons of leftover skills for a spirit.
Come to think of it I forget which one he’s running.
Again without it in front of me it’s fairly vague.
Take this with a grain of salt though I haven’t pushed him far into hell yet but it feels promising.
Also a HC character so he is survivable and all play through has been solo to ensure talents were going into the right places.
I can’t see why you couldn’t just transfer the wolf skills over to bear skills but I haven’t tried it
The speed of wolf with feral rage is just really satisfying.
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Way to take the best druid build (wind) and make it effectively equivalent to the worse build (rabies)
I have fast clear speed and enjoy the build… what’s your problem?
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Ahhh ok. Thank you very much for the breakdown. I might try something similar with werebear since with the new patch they allowed werebears to be able to cast both of those skills in shapeshifted forms.
I think removing it altogether seems too much. Rather adjust it so leveling is not that impactful, but still has slight impact and being level 90 hits slightly more often than level 50 char. But yes there is problem of not hitting when leveling a melee.
Or…
Simply remove block chance of bosses and monsters without shield altogether. That would make tremendous increase.
I think problem lies in combination of chance to hit + monster block chance. Even if you have like 1 milion attack rating, monster has 40% block chance, then you cant hit more than 60% of time. Thats almost every second hit misses basically.
Its no fun seeing barb swinging swords at monster and not hitting, altho they have no shield to block with. I notice it the most against hell Baal with Frenzy barb.
Sure, in p1 NM. I know how much damage unsynergized Armageddon and Hurricane does
That’s great, just don’t pretend like your anemic build is any good.
This is case in point.
Not a single damage synergy and haven’t even attempted hell.
You could literally dump Armageddon or Hurricane and dump the points into on of the synergies and do more damage than the combination of the two skills.
You have 56 points in the elemental tree and you have 2 anemic level 30 skills…
For the same 56 points, you could have 20 in hurricane, 20 in tornado, 10 in twister, 5 in cyclone armor.
You came into a thread discussing weakness of melee builds and you proved a nonsensical “build” as a solution.
If you don’t like criticism, than maybe refrain from posting nonsense? You clearly have no understanding of game mechanics…
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You are very angry
Gl with that, I was only telling my experience so far and made a point to say take it with a grain of salt and gave the reasons why. In which you pointed out a second time after I already had but made a point to try and be as negative as possible.
I’m having fun with the build
It’s killing things fine for me on P1
I know it’s not fully tested.
Just because you’re having a bad day there’s no need to take it out on me.
I always spec into non meta to test it out then give my experience so far for it.
You’ve actually never done the spec I’m building as you’ve clearly stated so you don’t actually know it’s end game viability.
That’s why I’m testing it and said it’s done done yet so I’m not sure how it will fair in the end.
Ah… The typical projection…
Sorry, the real world doesn’t give out participation trophies…
Well, when your standards are low, the outcome really doesn’t matter
Yeah, you can test your build on d2planner and get a clear understanding of how unviable it is in hell real quick. I don’t even need to take this step to know your build is utter garbage.
The game is only 20 years old, thank you so much for testing out new and novel builds… 
Ignorance and hubris…
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You are still very angry, throwing passive aggressive insults etc.
Honestly you can disagree with me
You can think the build is bad
You can suggest what’s better
But damn
You have zero social skills and have no clue how to articulate your opinion without being a donkey
Grow up
But that’s typical for anonymity on the internet. It’s easy to be ignorant when you can hide behind your keyboard. Low self esteem will do this though.
People like you are a dime a dozen. I just feel sorry for you tbh.
I harbour no I’ll feelings towards you and genuinely hope you can move past it one day.
