How is it going? Is it as bad as the PTR testers and theorycrafters indicated? Have all the bugs been resolved?
The damage reduction with shields bug was fixed. I cleared a 117, with squirt’s staying up most of the time as well.
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The good: Shield bug is fixed, tankiness is nice can be immortal with OiD if you want (GL doing any damage though).
Animation delay upon summoning is fixed (helps like 2% damage boost, but hey it was something, thanks Cratic).
Also a nice unnoted addition is summoning hydra will actually take away the old hydra now so you don’t have to double cast them, this is very good wasn’t expecting that!
The bad: Nerfing SS/Magistrate without any compensation (yes 100% more isn’t doing jack all) has left it with no damage. I was running unity on PTR and the only limitation was the shield bug in a 115. Now struggling to do 111 dps, so forced to switch out for CoE which can run now, still 66% not looking near the clear of PTR.
The ugly: For any meaningful damage and possible meta group spots makes it extremely reliant on seasonal theme to fit reverse archon, once that’s over it will return to mediocrity.
It’s just very mediocre, most will just run either LoD Mammoth or boring Vyrs instead.
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Well jay with your par level its not to bad
I mean I can just throw on Vyr’s and do a 117, so I’d argue that’s pretty below my par and sure the gear isn’t optimal yet but I was at least half augmented as well where as PTR wasn’t augmented at all. The difference between 450% and 300% x2 gear pieces is a lot is what I’m trying to say. There was little reason for that nerf, LoD Mammoth was doing maybe idk 1-2 GR higher than expected at max? The 100% on 6pc does nothing.
But you don’t have to take my case, just look at the LB clear. Yes it’s only day one here but 3.7k para with both full 300% perfect mods on new gear, primal weapon and offhand and a 121 clear with only about a minute to spare kinda speaks volumes. Say with augments, fishing and better gear that would be 126-127ish?
That’s a sign of mediocrity.
So what’s the consensus now, is the set closer to LoD mammoth, or one should still aim for LoD for pushing / grouping? (not talking about ladder, but is nice to be able to do 100-110 in 4 player groups).
Because if LoD is flat out better, then no point to even get the set and spend mats on boosting it, just roll with Vyr’s and farm for LoD to get going IMHO - no?
Cheers!
There’s an almost 6k paragon LoD mammoth clear nearly fully 120 augged at 121 lol, 4 minutes or so to spare though so could probably be 125 if they really fished.
Telling you, they over-nerfed it. There was no reason for 450 > 300 if we’re basing power just on NS and 100% to 6pc doesn’t do anything to help that.
I mean some positives, definitely the most group friendly thing we got going on right now but the damage is so pultry it’s like hmm do I use this or DMO? lol
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I just put a very basic Typhoon together and it seems quite good tbh. With 10 hydras out you have same level of toughness as a LoD with full ancients (only the hydras, no karini or channeling etc), dmg is really good (no channeling or doing anything they murder stuff in T16 instantly - elites etc).
If you can do 110+ in 4P with it and be safe and have fun (and do meaningful dmg ofc) then I’ll be happy to settle for the set instead of going the length for LoD, and just make a necro for rats or smth for pushing etc.
But it really is fun. Just wish they would bump the dmg higher on set like for WD to 2000% per head and add a gimmick like when not channeling to open up even more options for gear / skills etc.
2000% per head would actually be really good, 1750% reasonable, 1600% minimum.
Nice, but what can you do with Vyr’s though? Just trying to access a mark of power here. If you do say 121 with Vyr’s is this still okay with you? Providing roughly same main stat.
I’m not asking for this to outperform Vyr’s, I think Vyr’s is our main stay solo, this is more group oriented, I’d be okay if it was maybe 1 or 2 GR below it. If it’s not, it needs to still be buffed.
Honestly I will say they did a fantastic job with all the bugs and features with this though, I’ve found none thus far, that is pretty impressive for basically an entire new feature of adding in extra heads to a hydra.
Serious hats off to that…now just give us 2k% per and make us all happy wizards 
I just did the math, apparently with all you can fit into LoD damage bonuses, Frost Hydra with ToV does approximately 34% more dps than LoD Mammoths currently.
Keep in mind LoD Mammoth can gear like 2-3 more DR pieces for a mere 34% less damage so it’s still verging that territory of LoD outdoing it.
Guess we’ll see on the boards in the coming days how that factors in.
Just tried a few GRs with the new set
- legendary gems around 105-110
- only 20K main stat (not allocating all my parangon, to emulate some mid-season progression)
- primal deathwish / good etched sigil
- no area damage on suff
- some useless affixes on new stuff
- using Hergbrash, probably WH is better (but magistrate in cube => no APoC so …)
- probably missing at least 1 IAS breakpoint on hydra (cannot import in d3planner right now to check)
- using BH:spellsteal (dynamic) instead of absolute zero (snapshotable) in order to lear to play the build in a little simpler configuration
=> managed to do a GR115, with some optimzation and fishing the set is probably capable of GR120
Need to do further tests and compare with chantodo. (not possible for me to compare with LOD mammoth)
There’s a 125 with LoD Mammoth Hydra in HC (Americas). 5500 paragon, level 100 augments, 13:40 time.
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Just fyi,
Leaderboards are currently bugged and not registering a lot of clears
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Yeah I did a 125 with Vyr’s last night and it didn’t post. Thought they were still just frozen after the patch, but it seems like the issue is still going on this morning?
As far as I can tell, yeah
It could be blizzard just doesn’t want to show how OP the new builds are lol
I simulated a low gems (25 + 25 + 60) 800 para no augs Typhoon’s (only weapon was ancient) and did 105 in ~8m.
Damage is there for such low para / gems / no augs, for ~100ish mark, DR is there as well but you have to play it cautious, because 1 death means you need to respawn at checkpoint, as you will insta die if you respawn in density (no time to get 10 hydras and shields up).
Still nowhere close to a meteor LoD DR levels where you can literally facetank while channeling multiple affixes in 120+ (so probably LoD Hydra will be similar if it goes full on channeling with iceclimbers & SG).
Damage is the more limiting factor for pushing higher GR’s, LoD Mammoth was doing so well because of the stacking DoT compared to the set who can’t use Mammoth for obvious reasons.
I guess the set will also have problems with packs that have various affixes like terror / frozen / teleporter / black hole because all those will interrupt channeling and force you to move (willingly or unwillingly) plus you will need to recast manually hydras a lot due to their short range (frost hydra). Arcane Hydra is way better for speeds, but not for pushing.
If they would increase the 6pc to 2000% per head (to be on par with WD 6pc bonus of 20.000%) then maybe set could peak into 130 range at 2k+ paragon.
PS: I did not use unity on follower in those tests, I want to have a solid feeling on my toon DR irrelevant of what activity I am doing in the game and how many other players are present or not.
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This set wasn’t designed to be the strongest for solo wizard, as we have Vyr for that.
We really should be testing this and LoD hydra in groups, since group play eliminates the weaknesses, and allows exponentially higher damage output via area damage, Arcane Dynamo, WoF- Arcane Attunement, Pain Enhancer, etc.
Something like this: https://ptr.d3planner.com/239443551
I’m not saying it will beat SB Doc, but If anyone bothers to actually push Typhon in 4p with Arcane Hydra you’ll see what I mean. Fully buffed Arcane hydras with 40+ stacks of AA & Spellsteal is serious damage even after the last nerf.
Edit: updated planner to add mobility, removed Taskers for now as I don’t see an effective way to fit them without losing too much value.
well i just played 2 pl with monk and 4 player with only monk support. i played lod mammoth hydra and i think im not bad geared. what a mess blizz made never been so dissapointed and im gonna switch right to wd. i was looking forward really did 120 2pl with monk had only 1.30 min left it was terrible i hjave 5.2 mill sheet dmg and 100 percent fire increase. bb hydra wizz
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Sure and that’s what I ran a 120 group with and ran that all on PTR (actually a much better version) but the point of this is it needs to perform well solo. And like I said I agree that it shouldn’t outdo Vyrs solo, but it still should be damn close and a good base of power here with the other hydra runes and not 100% reliant on arcane hydra for group and that’s exactly what I’m not seeing (however yah the whole leaderboard fiasco does need to be fixed first)
Btw your planner cannot reach 5 aps hydras without reliance on a dimensional speed and frenzy shrine 
If you gear all APS with Pain enhancer you’ll reach 3+ aps plenty for 4 pet aps BP with TnT. If a WD is around and a zbarb then possible to hit 3.9 aps BP for the 5.86 pet BP but yah you’d never want to drop TnT and you’d never want to touch stone gaunts even with immunity (which you also don’t have).
Btw when seasons comes that can also reverse archon, here’s a better planner: https ://ptr.d3planner.com/235370984
But again, that’s seasons and that’s groups. This is NS solo to establish a base of power, which IMO is lacking a couple GR’s.