A Desperate Plea For Some Witch Doctor Love

PTR Feedback
1

Please I don’t want to skip playing WD for ANOTHER season, but lately things are just abysmal and depressing on the class

Any buff to Jade, Helltooth, Arachyr, Zuni, or Legacy of Dreams builds would be greatly appreciated

Additionally, WD is in desperate need of an across the board toughness boost / rework, as our requirements to reach any semi-decent level of mitigation is double or even triple that of other classes with how we’re hard locked into selecting 2 items + a skill just to get ONE max bonus

I’ve made these suggestions a few times before but it’s sadly appeared to have fallen on deaf ears, and honestly this PTR i was considering not even bothering posting anything because i just feel ignored, but ill give it one more try

For WD Toughness a couple ideas are as follows:

( 1 ). Just buff Lakumbas from 6% to 8% per stack, this is probably not the most appealing option as a common complaint with WD is our reliance on the Lakumba & Sacred Harvester combo, but it IS the easiest fix that could be applied relatively quickly

For a more satisfying(in my opinion) buff to Lakumbas, make it grant a flat 80% damage reduction while you have at least 1 stack of Soul Harvest, this would also eliminate the need to use sacred harvester in every build, which imo would be a massive improvement

( 2 ). Buff the soul harvest ability itself, perhaps doubling, or even tripling the amount of armour that it grants per stack

( 3 ). Add a 50% enemy damage reduction to the Hwoj Wrap or Belt of Transcendence

( 4 ). Buff the mitigation on the sets themselves, they’re quite lacking in comparison to some other sets (that’s not to say other classes couldn’t use some love on some sets as well)

Please just give WD something to look forward 2 as the last 2 PTRs have just been depressing

18 Likes
2

This is the best solution imo. Almost every class has a ring that does something similar. Anyone who plays WD knows how incredibly painful it is to die to a RG that doesn’t spawn adds and try to get 10 stacks of Soul Harvest before getting 1-shot.

3 Likes
3

Lakumbas suggestion is solid, would like to see it.

2 Likes
4

I pretty much gave up on it … wish they could at least revert the latest WD nerf.

5

I’m more pet based on WD, but these suggestions work. Are there any pet related buffs that need work?

6

we need more dmg redu for all wd build.

1 Like
7

80% DR from a single stack would be lovely.

Also, maybe buff the manajuma damage from 2000 to 2500% increase please? It’s difficult to play chicken at higher levels while everything else is just dominating, if the lakumba buff doesn’t cut it.

Or compromise: 60% DR, 2500% manajuma.

After all, Ring of Shadows gives ~60% DR from just using Vault.

8

This is really a good point.

I think I speak for more WD players than myself when I speak of having died on a boss and having to:
Go up one floor on the GR
Teleport out.
Then move to the waypoint to another map (preferably “The Old Ruins”)
Group up a few enemies near the waypoint or find a close by large enough mob.
Cast soul harvest so you can get 10 stacks in full in one shot for the 60 DR.
Then teleport back to town.
Into the GR.
And back down one level tot he GR boss.
Then pray to God you don’t die again, because you will have to repeat all of the above. before finally clearing the GR.

1 Like
9

Lakumba could work like that:
A direct 60% damage reduction plus 2% per stack, so 70% w/o SH or 80% with SH equipped.

3 Likes
10

I was wondering about this for some time. So the bracers are toughness stapels for builds, mainly Lakumba whit Sacred harvester, giveing 60% DR. Bracers of the first spider(or something like that) gives 30% and life per hit(or second?). But Jerams dosen’t give any. So lakumba is fine, maybe giveing DR up to 80%? The spider bracer should be buffed to 60%, and jerams could give 20% per wall of death up to 60 or 80% DR also. What do the experts think?

11

Man with no hope left, it’ve been years of suggestions… and still nothing

12

Well i was hoping when i saw there was another build that we’d be getting something, and technically we did with these improved versions of ethereals

But it doesn’t do anything to address the main issues WD has, and actually i would argue that ethereals are an even worse situation for WD than any other class as we’ll be unable to actually use one due to insufficient toughness until we get an ethereal that rolls with sacared harvester or our main build legendary

Every class is going to be fishing for that perfect ethereal, but we’ll be unable to play with an ethereal because out mitigation is directly tied to a weapon power, please… there’s still time

1 Like
13

While I see your point about difficulty finding the right Ethereal (it’s even harder now that each one has specific category +% dmg instead of overall WD dmg,) but I don’t see that as big of an issue as Lakumbas. Honestly, in the grand scale I think WD is one of the classes that benefits the most from Ethereals. I’m guessing it’s at least a +10 gr bump for almost every WD build.

14

Yeah it’s a large buff to the damage push potential of all WD builds

But what i meant with how we’re in a worse situation than any other class with ethereals, wasn’t to do with how powerful they were, but rather how soon we’ll be able to actually use them given our mitigation is tied to a weapon slot, which is the only slot ethereals can roll

if the suggested change to lakumbas was added, the ethereal issue would disappear

1 Like
15

The bigest problem is that many many items give buffs to dmg and there are so few that gives dr, which is just as important or maybe a little more important. Surviveability is key to dish out more dmg.

16

There a two things to do. Revert that last idiotic nerf and make WD a melee char as a quick fix.

17

Witch Doctor definitely needs attention.

Making Lakumba’s more like Band of Might is a great start as everyone is forced to use it, so it might as well be useful.

3 Likes
18

Add the soul harvester power directly to lakumba #FreeTheWeapon

1 Like
19

It’s either they listen and change some stuff for the better or it’s going to be another spirit barrage season for WD. Personally I would love to see pet builds get changes, specifically Zuni and Helltooth get some attention. I would love to do zombie bears again but they need to buff the mojo and increase the damage for zombie bears big time. Zuni needs some adjustments so we can get enough toughness out of certain items.

20

They won’t change anything after they first do a PTR. They make XYZ, have us test it, change it as needed, start season. They NEVER actually ADD to the PTR. Once they start it, it’s set in stone what they(actually us) are testing.