[Guide] Zodiac Rend (Season 20)

Barbarian
259

It does apply very fast, but since the duration is so short, the gap can actually be a large percentage of your total DoT uptime. If Rend falls off rather than getting refreshed, for instance (I’ll use real numbers this time in case it matters):

At 2.17 aps (Paragon, IB, Dual Wielding, no as or ias on gear), WW is at 18 frames per tick (using the decimal for frames here, not hundredths of a second):
0.0 - Rend Applied
0.18, 0.36, 0.54 - more ticks that might apply lamentation, ignoring that and just focusing on one instance of rend now
1.00 - Rend falls off
1.12 - Rend applied again after a 1/5 second gap.

Getting 1 AS roll on gear gives 2.27 aps and 17 frame WW ticks
WW ticks at 0, 0.17, 0.34, 0.51
Rend re-applies at 0.08. for a 2/15 second gap.

This is a DoT uptime increase of (1/(1+8/60)) / (1/(1+12/60)) = 5.88% - that should translate to a pure damage increase of that much.
Adding a second roll leaves only a 4 frame gap and gives you a 12.5% increase over no Attack Speed.

So, this is why I think the distinction between whether Rend is refreshed by Ambo/WW procs or Ambo/WW just ignores a mob that already has Rend, allowing the DoT to fall off, might be important (again, wish I could test this. I don’t know how without recording and watching frame by frame).

I say might because that 5.8-12.5% increase you could potentially get is likely less than what you give up in other rolls (for my character it’s less than everything other than pure strength). It might be worth sacrificing Vit on gloves or something for one roll, though.

260

Well, keep in mind that DDs also are applying Rend (within 9 yards of your character), and spawn at different frequencies than your WW ticks. For instance, with the aforementioned 2.17 aps, you have an 18 frame WW tick, but a 13 frame DD spawn.

So I guess, using your notation, it would be something like:

0.0 - Rend applied
0.13, 0.18, 0.26, 0.36, 0.39, 0.52, 0.54 - more ticks that can apply Rend
1.00 - Rend falls off
1.05 - Rend reapplied (by DD) after a 5 frame gap (1/12 of a second)

at 2.27 aps, you’d have a 17 frame WW tick, but still a 13 frame DD tick, so your Rend refresh point would actually be identical (1.05)

at 2.31 aps, you’d have a 17 frame ww, and a 12 frame DD. This would give you

0.0 - Rend applied
0.12, 0.17, 0.24, 0.34, 0.36, 0.48, 0.51, 1.00- Rends applied
1.00 - Rend falls off
1.08- Rend reapplied (by WW)

So if this was the case, assuming that DD at 1.00 was unable to reapply Rend, you’d actually do less damage at 2.31 aps than at 2.27. Of course, if Rend could be reapplied at 1.00, then a 12 frame DD at 2.31 aps would be by far the best way to do this. To get to this point, as you mentioned, you need 10% AS in Paragon plus 2 7% rolls on gear. You essentially get one for “free” from Zodiac, the other would cost you some significant Str on gloves or a weapon, I think.

Assuming WW and/or DD can’t proc Rend on a 1.00 count, I think the best you can reasonably do would be to reapply Rend at 1.02, with a 31 frame WW, which would only be possible using a 2H weapon with 1.00 base aps (like the Furnace), with 7% IAS, 10% AS in paragon, and one 7% roll on your gear (probably Zodiac), giving you 1.26 aps.

Dual wielding, I think the best you could do would be to reapply Rend at 1.03, which would be possible if you had a 9 frame DD (3.01 aps), a 7 frame DD (3.76 aps), or a 21 frame WW (1.82 aps).

7 and 9 frame DD would be hard to reach, and a 21 frame WW is impossible if using either IB or BK. And the best any of these could do would be to give you a 2 frame increase over 2.17 aps, which would give you 3.33% additional damage, equivalent to 650 Str if you have about 19.5k Str.

There might be some crazy way to refresh Rend at 1.01 if you have IAS on one weapon, but not the other, so that your WW and DD speed oscillates as you cycle between hands, but that makes my brain hurt, so I’m not going to think about it.

I guess there are a few points where you could experience a relatively major gain/loss with a small change. For instance, using IB, fully stacked, with no AS elsewhere, including paragon, would have you at 2.03 aps, refreshing Rend via DD at 1.10, whereas adding 10% AS in Paragon would get you to 2.17 aps, refreshing Rend via DD at 1.05, saving you 5 frames and adding 8.33% damage.

I think the safest play is just to max out Paragon AS, and then don’t bother with it elsewhere.

It would be interesting to know if Rend is indeed falling off, but I think the actual dps gain/loss from adjusting your aps, in most likely scenarios, is going to be pretty slim.

3 Likes
262

You’re totally right - DD likely shortens that gap (it does for sure, but it gets fuzzy with travel time). I was for some reason (foolishly) looking at just WW and not DD ticks. So yes, it would have an effect, but an extremely small one that is difficult to take advantage of.

263

DizzyRend, The New Libra Zodiac

Libra because the Season launches on the 22nd which is still technically Libra (barely)

265

There are some unanswered questions when it comes to Rend in the new build, but I think it’s clear that WW is, at present, applying Rends about as quickly as they can be applied, and that jacking up attack speed isn’t going to do us any good.

The big fish left to fry revolve around whether X or Y Rend overwrites the other, or whether hard-cast Rends have different interactions in and out of density. I’m working on some tests and hope to have some video evidence later this week. In the meantime, I gotta write quizzes for my students and catch up on reading!

For the record: Anyone who plays non-Season is welcome to add me in game: Free#1746

I’ll be farming Bounties until the new patch drops.

4 Likes
266

So, I gave it some thought, and I think the best way to test for the “fall-off” effect is this:

You use a 2H mace with 1.00 base APS. Ambo’s in the cube, no Lamentation.
No AS anywhere, including paragon. This gives you a 30 frame DD and a 40 frame WW tick.

0.0-Rend applied… Though, now that I think of it, what point is this, exactly? I guess the DD is spawning before the actual WW hit, and it’s this that applies Rend. Which means that the WW tick at “0.4” is actually occurring at “0.1”…

So:
0.0 - Rend applied (by DD)
0.1 (WW), 0.3 (DD), 0.5 (WW), 1.0 (DD)* - hits that could apply Rend
1.0 - Rend drops. The trial here splits here into “Case A” where Rend is reapplied by the DD hit with the *, above, at 1.0, and “Case B” where it can’t reapply at 1.0, and instead is reapplied at 1.3, by WW or DD (both should take place at 1.3)

“A”: continues to refresh Rend exactly every 1.0 second

“B”:

1.3 - Rend reapplied (by WW or DD) 30 lost frames
2.0 (DD), 2.1 (WW), 2.3 (DD) - hits that could apply Rend
2.3- Rend drops. Note that the DD at 2.3 can’t reset Rend in this scenario, since if it could, we’d be in “Case A”, where Rend can be reset at an even count.
2.5 - Rend reapplied (by WW) 20 lost frames
3.0 (DD), 3.3 (WW), 3.3 (DD) - hits that could apply Rend
3.5 - Rend drops
4.0 - Rend reapplied (by DD) 10 lost frames
4.1 (WW), 4.3 (DD), 4.5 (WW), 5.0 (DD) -hits that could apply Rend
5.0- Rend drops
5.3- Rend reapplied (by WW or DD) 30 lost frames

I believe that the cycle of “B” is essentially repeating, with 60 lost frames every 4 seconds. This should cost you a full 25% of your damage.

“A”, in comparison, should lose no frames at all, and suffer no damage loss. Because Rend deals the same damage on every cast, you can calculate out how much damage it should be doing over a certain period of time, if fall-off is not a factor.

For instance, you might calculate, based on your weapon damage, crit chance, crit damage, and strength, that Rend should deal 1 Billion damage per minute. Then you Whirlwind an enemy (I always use Manglemaw for testing) for a minute, and see how much damage you’ve done. Assuming you’ve got no buffs to WW going, the vast majority of your damage should be coming from Rend (since it is getting a 15x multiplier from Ambo’s)

So, in this example, if “A” is true, you should do slightly more than 1 Billion damage in one minute (the Rend damage, plus some minor WW damage).

If, on the other hand, “B” is true, you should only deal a little over 750 Million damage in that minute.

If you get “B”, you know fall-off is real. If you get “A”, there’s still more testing to do, since Rend getting refreshed exactly every second, and being continually refreshed by WW (aka, “fall-off” doesn’t exist) should produce the same results.

So, for “Case C”, you repeat as in the first set of trials, except now you put 1 point in Attack Speed in your paragon. This will give you 1.0001 aps, dropping your WW from 40 frames to 39, and your DD from 30 frames to 29.

So:

0.0- Rend applied, by DD… the WW tick at “0.39” is actually occurring at “0.09”.
0.09 (WW), 0.29 (DD), 0.48 (WW), 0.58 (DD) - hits that could apply Rend
1.0 - Rend drops
1.27- Rend reapplied (by either WW or DD, both of which happen at 1.27) 27 lost frames
1.56 (DD), 2.06 (WW), 2.25 (DD) - hits that could apply Rend
2.27 - Rend drops
2.45 - Rend reapplied (by WW) 18 lost frames

etc, etc… the point is not the exact amount of damage lost in this case, but rather the fact that by increasing our attack speed, even by an incredibly small degree, we have de-synced WW and Rend, and, if “fall-off” is real, we will lose a non-trivial amount of damage (considering that in less than 3 seconds we have already lost 45 frames, I would look for at least 15% damage loss compared to the calculated maximum).

So, do another test on your chosen enemy, and note the damage after a particular length of time. If the damage you deal in this case, “C”, is less than was dealt in “A”, then you know that fall-off is real. If the damage is nearly identical to “A”, then WW is probably refreshing Rend stacks, resetting the duration of each instance of Rend to the maximum (1 second) each time it hits.

Simple, right?

Edit: I ran a much quicker and less painful version of this trial. Since in “Case B” we should be losing as much as 30 frames (half a second) at a time, and in “Case C”, as much as 27, this should be evident from a simple visual inspection. I WWed a skeleton with a 1.00 aps mace with no bonus to aps, and then with 1 point of paragon in AS, and in neither case did I see the Rend icon drop at any point.

So, that’s not 100% conclusive, but I’m guessing that the duration of Rend instances is actually being refreshed with each WW/DD hit.

Now, what that means, will involve further testing. For instance, hard-cast Rend can proc AD… so if you hard-cast Rend in density, then start WWing, is the AD-dealing ability of those Rend instances preserved, and refreshed repeatedly? (Edit: no, it’s not. When you start WWing, your HC Rend is overwritten).

1 Like
267

Free, now that a fan favourite build (and certainly yours) is about to be top shot again, pls don’t forget about others that needs further buffs. I feel that, although Remorless have put IK HotA in a good position, it still needs further buffs, maybe to IK6 directly. It’s a newbie friendly build and lots of fun, I’d like to see it in the top 3 barb builds. You’re our voice here, so keep the good work

1 Like
268

The problem with buffing IK6 is charger build. Top clear NS was 135, so I guess a 3 gr buff to around 6000% won’t disturb the intraclass balance and will only benefit IK among the three HotA builds.

2 Likes
269

Yeah, I would like to see HotA stronger, but I really dislike R6 HotA, TBH. It’s a freak build that relies on a broken mechanic (Wall charging) and to my eyes looks like an exploit that devs won’t fix because they don’t know what to do.

For me Raekor needs to be changed completely, to be all about Furious Charge, and IK needs to be all about HotA.

1 Like
270

Raekor at this point is only good for one thing. Push Zbarb build. I can’t stand Raekor HOTA. I am planning to try out IK HOTA this season to see what it can do. Plus IK set dungeon is the easiest to do.

1 Like
271

I love spin to win, but smash and exploding 'em with those fast hammer hits, feels satisfying, man

272

Wep Throw/ BT still need a lot of luv, along with Primaries in general.:wink:

273

Hadd: I replied to you here: 2.6.8+ Barb Buff Proposal II

Just wanted to keep this thread on topic. Looking forward to fresh, invigorating discussions and ideas in the new proposal thread!

2 Likes
274

Hello. Question on Passive Skills.
Why Brawler and not Berserker Rage? If you exchange Boon of Bul-Kathos with Weapons Master the rage bank will always be full, Berserker Rage will always work. Using Ancient Spear is more convenient.
Sorry if the answers have already been.

1 Like
275

You need Boon to maintain perma-Wrath. You could try to get rid of it in the Crimson’s variant, and it does work if you have enough CDR, but if you die, you might be stuck waiting for Wrath’s cooldown to wear off before you can respawn.

Brawler is guaranteed to be up for most of the rift, but if your Fury falls below 95%, you’ll lose the benefit of Berserker Rage. In my opinion, Brawler, which is not dependent on resources, is the more consistent DPS passive.

3 Likes
276

Yes, I mean the Crimson’s option, CDR is enough.

But if I put Weapons Master, then Fury will always be 100%, right?

277

If you’re running on heavy density all the time and have 55%+ CDR + Crimson + Orotz, you won’t need Boon. Since that will not always be the case, you may find a bad floor, or a long corridor with few enemies here and there, Boon you help you keep Wrath up. No Wrath = death when pushing.

That’s why Boon and Brawler. But you can certainly push Weapon Master and Berserker Rage though. Just look at your cooldowns carefully.

Another thing I forgot to mention: when in hairy situations, you may want to spam battle rage to heal you up (via Morticks’s all rune to Wrath - Thrive on Chaos one). That may drop Berserker Rage off, specially against the RG

1 Like
278

Ok, thanks for the explanation.

1 Like
279

should update gear priorities for rcr with crimson set, it’s bis on weapons, shoulders and gloves and for obsidian ring

1 Like
280

CDR stacks with diminishing effects, depending on how much you have it’s not worth sacrificing crit damage, chance or even average damage. As I said: it depends. I suggest 55% to 60%. More than that any cdr roll will provide 3 or 4% increased CDR (and therefore, damage)