Most of the people who say that Deathwish should only buff channeling skills, had already said that the damage buff for Deathwish should also be increased for the channeling skills as 325% isn’t enough. It’s already a known fact that the channeling skills don’t do enough damage by themselves, as such folks who want to play a pure channeling damage build aren’t able to because of the lack of damage.
Good thing no one ever suggested that. What’s been suggested is that Deathwish gets buffed and then changed to work for only channeling skills. Then buff all of the other skills that relied on Deathwish and Etched SIgil (For example meteor, arcane orb, explosive blast, etc.). This way not only would there be channeling builds where the channeling skills deal damage, but also arcane spender builds that don’t need to rely on channeling.
Again, no one’s asking for Blizzard to just nerf Deathwish and leave it at that. What’s being asked is that Blizzard buffs the channeling skills so that they can be used by themselves, and then buff the non-channeling skills so that they wouldn’t need channeling to buff them.
Of course, if Blizzard isn’t willing to do all of that, then sure it’d be better for them to not touch Deathwish. However on the off-chance that they are willing, then that’d be the best of both worlds.
I think there’s only a few one handed swords that I’d say fit mostly a Barbarian. But swords like skycutter look pretty good with Wizards imo.
Channel spells have largely been ignored since the game’s inception in lieu of other Arcane spenders. Firebird is a step in the right direction but honestly I’d like to see a set dedicated solely around channeling with the option to include other spells via items like Wizardspike, Etched Sigil or 2-piece Tal Rasha as supplemental damage rather than the primary source of damage like in the past.
@Clueso, @Lawson, @Obliviion:
I think this is worth repeating.
I can appreciate your desires to improve the class and improve the game for everyone. This means we are all striving for a similar goal.
Asking for a nerf to something that functional while attempting sprinkle said request with additional requests for buffs will not work with Blizzard. They will read the request see the nerf and will respond to that. Nerfing will take priority while buffing seems to have no priority.
Do not be swayed by the recent change to FireBird. Blizzard has a terrible track record of not responding quickly even when they had a full dedicated team (ex: see Wiz at RoS release and DH for good chuck of vanilla).
A 325% damage increase to all damage will not break Wiz or the game. It is insufficient by itself as a damage increase to just channeling skills. This means breaking DeathWish will not be a fix. You guys have basically agreed with this statement.
Since breaking DeathWish will not be a fix please stop asking for it to be broken and/or altered. Again, I don’t see any of you complaining and begging for Shadow Hook to be nerfed and it increases all damage. Its relatively simple to get over 300 max essence and Simulacrum-Reservoir doubles the Necro’s max essence so its not hard to get a 300+% damage increase to all damage.
There is a plethora of wands, sources, rings, amulets and other goodies that require immediate attention. So, if you believe the devs have to break some eggs and start somewhere, ask them to start with stuff that is currently in a broken/dead state first. Do not worry about getting stuff toned down because if they buff enough things within a class it will automatically trigger a nerf cycle. The only exception is Necro, which is tied to a DLC, and by all accounts looks like favoritism/priority toward DLC sales ($$$$).
With the end of Season-22 and removal of 4th slot so many builds will be left broken or under-performing with zero compensation. Some recent buffs, like buffs to hydra, require 4 slots to take advantage of, so the nerfs were built into the design. This means those aren’t real buffs, which means Wiz like the other classes are getting an implicit nerf. With Wizard, mobility is taking a big hit because we are forced into a major trade off between Aether Walker and a big damage increase (See Hydra, Twister, and Frozen Orb items).
Limiting DW to just channeling spells, even with a damage increase, will be boring as hell. The devs seem to know this just based on the recent FireBird redesign, and the introduction of DW and Sigil together.
Cratic suggested DW be sacrificed (nerfed) for buffs in other places.
Lexa said DW is cancerous, implying it needs nerfs/adjustments.
So many others are trying to tip-toe around asking for nerfs by sprinkling requests for buffs along with the nerfs, but I’m not buy it.
Constricting DW to just channeling spells is a nerf, and is not a fix.
The channeling spells are inherently anemic so are we going to expect an 800-4000% damage increase on a 1h weapon and call that balanced? Using D3planner, we can calculate where the damage will land just based on a LoD Disintegrate build with Taeguk ranks. FYI, an 800% increase aka 8x increase is rank 150.
Let me drop this here so no one gets to claim ignorance.
I know Tal’s 2-piece, Wizspike’s Orb and Sigil’s Twisters are underwhelming, hence why I said supplemental damage as opposed to being the primary source in a channel focused build. New Set Idea is something I came up with respect to Ray of Frost. Its a very raw/unpolished idea but something that puts an emphasis on a channel spell as the primary source of damage while giving players the option to supplement it with other Cold spells that proc while attacking/channeling.
No, what they asked for is Channeling to be buffed so that channeling skills can deal damage on their own, and our non-channeling abilities to be viable without needing to buffed by the act of channeling. This has already been explained.
It just turns a lot of builds into Channelling builds, something that Wizards are kinda oversaturated with since a long time, while also not having a dedicated Channelling build that uses a Channelling Skill as its main damage source.
Which is why basically everyone in this thread is asking for the damage multiplier to be buffed and/or to have another Channelling Skill focused item (I suggested Light of Grace to also buff the damage of all Channelling Skills).
It will fix that a lot of builds turn into Channelling builds and the “corrupting” potential that DW has on all kinds of builds (aka turning them into Channelling builds).
I probably would if Necro would be one of my main classes, which it isn’t.
But non of them have such a corrupting effect like Deathwish (and by that I mean that it turns too many builds into channelling builds).
I guess you could say that about almost all legendaries that buff a skills damage by xxx% and you would be right with that.
It is a nerf to certain builds, which will also fix them because they will no longer require a Channelling playstyle - and yes, that is an improvement for the Wizard - and when buffing Deathwish from 325% to e.g. 350-400% increased damage to Channelling Skills (or 400-600%) and then also letting Light of Grace increase the damage of all Channelling Skills by 350-400% or 400-600% (or whatever the fitting numbers are), …
Don’t forget Light of Grace causes Ray of Frost to pierce. Honestly I’d change Light of Grace to allow all channeled spells to pierce(not just Ray of Frost so this would apply to Arcane Torrent and Disintegrate) while simultaneously buffing the snot out of their damage to promote a build with a channeled skill as the focus(not the vehicle) for damage output.
Now that you mention it, few weeks or months ago I made this Mockup for Light of Grace where it both increases the damage of all Wizard’s Channelling Skills, as well as also giving each of them additional effects, where Ray of Frost would keep the piercing effect. You may like it:
That is honestly a superb Light of Grace update that gives a unique perk depending upon what channel spell you use. Unfortunately creativity is lacking at Activision since their focus is elsewhere heh.
Honestly, if I had to choose between either one, then yes a teleport rework/change would be more ideal imo. That said, a deathwish change certainly has it’s merits, but only if Blizzard goes the distance to actually to buff the other skills so that they wouldn’t need to rely on Deathwish, and not put in a half baked effort like they did with etched sigil.
Actually, I Don’t see a change/rework to teleport happening now, especially since teleport was (or will be) tied in with Firebird. As such, the only adjustments that I can see happening to Teleport now, would be via Aether Walker.
As we can see above he asked for DW to be sacrificed (nerfed) and then compensate with buffs to FB. He later attempted to defend/justify his nerf request by saying the devs could provide compensation by fixing the broken builds in the next balance patch. The next balance patch could be more than a year away or may never come. In the case of tap-channeled meteor shower the build is dead and has remained in that state since they broke Sigil, DW, and MoC.
Cratic later walked his request back partially across more than one thread. He left it as nerfing DW now wouldn’t make sense but should be tabled for a later patch. This leaves the emphasis on nerfing DW now or later. So to counter your argument that no one asked for it I listed just two. I didn’t copy Venilator who came out and said he’s been advocating for a DW nerf for 18 months. It doesn’t get more direct that than. Let’s not pretend that there aren’t calls for DW nerfs.
Once again, he wasn’t solely calling for a nerf to Deathwish. It was mostly a call for redestributing Deathwish’s power, so that the skills that relied on it would have the damage boost without deathwish, follow by potentially buffing the channeling skills so that they could deal damage by themselves. No one (that you’re referring to that is) called deathwish to be nerfed and left as is.
Even the post you linked, the request was more in line for a damage redestribution.
Since patch 2.4 release to be exact. Prior to 2.4 Wiz was still in recovery/catch up mode from RoS release. Its true some Wizards were asking for buffs to channeling. As depicted in the video I linked from patch 2.1.2, it would be slow and boring as hell unless they give channeling spells an insane damage increase. To stave of the impending boredom with a channeling only implementation, they made Sigil, but the triggered spells would need a damage increase so DW buffs all damage. This is a smart design choice that created huge build diversity.
DW does not corrupt or have a corrupting influence. Passive, AP free, triggered spells while channeling and buffing all damage is/was a smart design choice. Changing DW to channeling only will not fix something that is not broken.
What many are tip-toeing around is that the skills/runes themselves require fixing but the devs and management refuse to address that directly (at least not without the community donating another $40 US per RoS license for the work). So the devs will fiddle with damage numbers, up and down, and do some minor reworks on the items and sets.
Let’s say the devs made Slorak’s and Light of Grace buff all Wiz channeling spells including Electrocute.
1st - We know they are going to need to go well above the 325% on at least the weapon to make it viable for end game.
2nd - They need to buff each and every Wiz legendary and/or add additional legendaries (we’ll exclude sets, DW and Sigil for the moment).
3rd - They need to address AP recovery and I’m steering in the direction of how Critical Mass worked.
Why all of this?
If we are going back to paying full price for manual casting full time we need way better AP recovery. Delsere belt is generation not recovery. Once DW is nerfed, crippled, redesigned or removed we will be back at the pre-2.4, pre-DW, pre-legacy Sigil, pre-legacy Twisted Sword, RoS Wiz. Take a look at 2.3 Del-Rasha Meteor Shower: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6ToDXIpgUw
The alternative to not compensating AP recovery will be stutter stepping and generator weaving full time which slows down everything. It will be like playing a Cluster Arrow Demon Hunter with no set and no LoD/LoN. Slow Kill and not viable.
Compare the above Meteor Shower video to what CM provided in vanilla (2013): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-qdZl4nyTao
Jump ahead to the 2:03 mark and play. Pay attention to how Emperor was able to recover and maintain AP when nuking density without generator usage. Even this style of nuking, in the current game, would most likely be insufficient without massive buffs to legendary and set items, and/or major redesign of skills/runes/passives.
Removing channeling is a major step backwards. If removing channeling is an improvement to builds then why do we not have viable manual cast Meteor builds especially those that don’t depend on reverse archon? How come there are no non-channel non-reverse archon, twister builds doing GR125-150? Also, if a build requires 2500 - 4500 paragon to be playable, then its not viable.
Think of it this way. Remove DW (and possibly Sigil) and we are back to patch 2.3 since DW, Sigil, and Twisted Sword were patch 2.4. To move us beyond the patch 2.3 state in 2021, the devs have to replace the work of 2.4 with a full pass of all Wiz legendary/set items, and most likely all Wiz skills/runes/passives. The likelihood of a full pass of just Wiz at this point of the game is next to nil. If they break/remove DW and implement some new channeling only changes it will be patch 2.3 with the new channeling stuff. Nearly everyone will play the new channeling stuff, or TV/hydra, Vyr/Archon, FB, and maybe LoN/LoD. The viable builds will shrink dramatically. At that point queue the crying, complaining, hatred, resentment, and the mass exodus from Wiz or D3 completely.
I’m not pre-ordering or pinning my hopes on D4 or D2R.
thank you for these detailed posts. I’m under the impression that a lot of people who never/rarely played wizard are now trying to explain the wizard community how the wizard is supposed to work
I regard Clueso, Oblivion, Cratic, Lexa and so many others as quite knowledgeable of Wizard class mechanics and the game overall. I would say some of their knowledge/understanding eclipses my own. I draw from my experience through vanilla D3 and RoS. RoS release was quite painful because the Wiz class was gutted and left to rot on the operating table. The devs never finished the rework of the class by RoS release so we had to slog through so many patches just to get to 2.4 which changed/improved so many things for Wiz.
You mean like a legendary that sort of gives a more universally useful special affix by adjusting to the skill that is used with it.
Would be cool, but probably a lot more work as well.
Well, I don’t know why you would not want to have Deathwish changed (because you don’t say why), but I agree that Teleport needs some upgrades aside from the casting speed buff it gets this patch, so that it is also useful for builds that do not use Firebird’s.
I am just speculating here, but maybe he suggested this without changing DW to Channelling Skills-only because the primary topic in that context was Firebird being OP and yet another Channelling Build again, and not DW itself.
Yes, that is what I am suggesting here in this thread. Give Channelling Skills a big buff via DW and Light of Grace.
I agree that proced skills are really cool, but there are other ways to buff them than just with DW.
Like which ones?
I know that
the tick rate of Disintegrate is too high and therefore being the best Wizard Skill out there when not factoring in any legendaries,
the skill Blizzard is very underpowered on a base level and needs a larger buff,
and that Frozen Orb needs to be tuned down as it is significantly more powerful than any other Arcane Orb rune and also many other skills
Familiar, Magic Weapon, the Magic Armor Skills all could need an update as well…
But which ones were you thinking about?
You don’t need Deathwish for a modern day LoD Etched Twister Wizard. You use Valthek’s Rebuke in the cube and The Twisted Sword in your hand.
Valthek’s Rebuke gives you 400% Twister Damage while DW only gives you 325% after having used a Channelling Skill for 1 second.
I sometimes play a non-meta LoD build similar to that which manually casts Meteor Shower and has The Grand Vizier equipped as a 2handed weapon.
Very fun and enjoyable build. I can basically cast Meteor Shower with only little interruption due to the 50% resource cost reduction to Meteor on The Grand Vizier, though I personally have to say I like rotations like using a Generator to build up resource and then spend it on a Resource Spending Skill.
The individual who recorded the video - not sure if it was you, so don’t take offense - also did not activate Energy Armor and Magic Weapon, which would have provided additional defensive bonuses.
I personally like generating resource and then spending it on spenders. Most of the LoD builds I play are like that (and I play non-meta LoD builds most of the time).
However, I agree towrds the direction that at higher levels Generator Skills should generate more Resource (e.g. a Skill like Cleave could start out with generating 4 Fury per attack at level 1 and then generate e.g. 12-15 Fury at level 70.
The Wizard’s Primary skills could by default boost Arcane Power Regeneration for ~3 seconds, stacking up to x times, to be like a Generator with a twist.
It would be more viable if there would not be massive damage multipliers and massive multipliers for Cooldown and Resource Cost Reduction in the game that make resource costs and cooldowns obsolete.
However, I agree that Generators should generate much more resource, at elast on higher Character Levels.
Also, a lot of players want that the game slows down from the speed that it currently has. They don’t wanna have it slow either, but not as fast as it currently is.
You don’t need DW for these as there are other ways to buff these.
And we are not asking for changing the current version of Etched Sigil, so the Twister Wizard will remain as it is, because it uses Velthek’s Rebuke in the cube and not DW. It is just that in the previous season they had DW in the 4’th cube slot.
Currently, the only stronger Wizard build that is using Deathwish is the new Firebird Mirror Image build.
Hydra Wizard is not usind DW, they are using Serpent Sparker and Fragment of Destiny.
Twister Wizard, both the LoD and the DMO variant are using The Twisted Sword and Valthek’s Rebuke.
Vyr does not use DW. Maybe some reversed Archon build does, but I am not familar with reverse-Archon builds.
A lot of Wizard builds used DW during Season 22 in the 4rth Cube Slot, but that Season is over now.
However, this shows perfectly what I call “the corrupting influence” that Deathwish has on builds, as it now already has found its way again into a top Wizard build, aka the Firebird’s Mirrow Image build.
That build is the only one that would really suffer from letting DW only effect Channelling Skills, but it simply can get an x times damage boost to compensate for it.
Twister Wiz, Hydra Wiz, Vyr Wizard builds, etc, they already don’t need Deathwish anymore as they have other, better items that can go into the hand or the cube, however, chaning Deathwish to only effect Channelling Skills would finally get rid of its corrupting influence.
I wanted to stay out of this topic tbh but it is a bit rude I guess to just interject like that.
On topic, I have in the past criticized the old dw/es combo. Instead of asking for nerfs I asked for alternatives. The answer came last patch and the facepalms started raining.
One item that might have been a good solution to replace dw gave a buff to all generators but got specific to buffing hydra. Fragment of Destiny - Game Guide - Diablo III
If this gave a buff to all spenders it might had been another option.
I get the point you have, it is a powersource that is too attractive to pass on. On the other hand really think of all Boss dog has said I believe there is much in what he has laid out to consider.
One change without needing might be to rethink the whole delay and give it’s power while channeling and for 10 sec after.
If starpact was such as an issue why not put a roof on it’s benefit.
Sorry for the wall.
My main concern is the mobility rather than items at this point.
As far as items go there is a ton of interesting ideas on the wizard section.
Interestingly some items would need a rethink after the fourth cube slot went away. To have buffs on four items is just weird. I am sure there are more but I have give you all a rest from my ranting as always I appreciate your thoughts no matter if I agree or not!
as always I appreciate your thoughts no matter if I agree or not!