Looks like another Archon season for the wizard. Thought they would tweak typhoon set numbers. Oh well probably sit this season out
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Looking at the PTR notes I lost interest in testing. As I feared after the last PTR ended with a huge letdown… they don’t intend to fix Hydra set and items. Also channeling stuff, mainly Deathwish, still not limited to channel skills (and buffed accordingly), another sad season for wizards coming up.
Didn’t expect anything tbh, they’re going to wait for the big balance patch in S22. Welp hydra was cool, could have been should have been way better but bye wiz, it’s necro time!
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I think WDs are losing like ~10 GRs worth of power, maybe more, so maybe Wizards can only again be in the 4 man meta. That’s the hope. Have no idea how the meta is gonna shake out. Can Necromancers make the comeback? We’ll see.
And new DH set a possible Dark Horse to push into the 4 man as well.
Interesting weeks ahead.
Tbh, I figured that they weren’t going to directly touch on Typhon.
Pretty much this. We’ll need to wait a while longer.
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They might adjust some figures during PTR, but essentially, yes… I expect them to leave Typhoon and Hydra as-is until they go for the big one.
In the long term this might as well be better. Nothing would be more annoying than getting some legendaries buffed/changed for next season and then have them adjusted the season after that in a way that requires refarming. On that note, they could have adjusted (=buffed) the set since that would apply to existing items.
Regarding SoJ… this thing should be interesting for Tal Rasha builds. If you stack one element and gain the same buff for all, Tal Meteors will benefit from this greatly. It also makes using two or even three offensive skills more appealing, if combined with CoE cycles. Only issue I see is that Tal Rasha has pretty few options to stack Elemental damage. This is why I would have preferred SoJ to work slightly different:
Static elemental bonus on your gear, regardless of the element, is increased by 50-75% and applies to all elemental damage bonus to skill equally.
Soj could be a buff to lon hydra. Going all fire ? Rats actually looks stronger. As for typhon, a small buff wouldn’t be that hard to do.
I’ll need you to explain your logic on this. Because it doesn’t make sense.
I see you edited your post; Fine. Stone of Jordan’s new affix is basically useless. TR Wizards don’t exist, for good reason. Never tried 2x element Vyr; can’t really comment, but I believe that’s built around Absolute Zero which should be correctly classified as a non-static buff.
While you could do it with Absolute Zero, the timing would be annoying. You want the temporary buff to expire 4 sec into Archon, timed with CoE, to change your element.
So in theory you could do 20 Fire/19 Cold, cast Absolute Zero 6 sec before Archon starts (i.e. middle of Lightning) so it expires 4 sec into Archon (at the end of cold/start of fire).
All dual-elementists use 20 Lightning/19 Fire with Flame Blades though. Flame Blades buff is only 5 sec, so you just stop Flame Blading 1 sec before Archon. Then the buff lasts 4 sec into Archon for the fire cycle and drops off just in time for the lightning cycle.
If I’m understanding the SoJ change correctly, it actually wouldn’t work with dual element Archon no matter what though. Dual element build works by temporarily changing your highest element and then having that buff drop off timed with CoE.
SoJ sounds like it will make all your elemental damage equal to your highest element. That means they are all tied. In the case of a 4-way tie, Arcane takes priority. With SoJ, I think your Chantodo’s Wave would always be arcane, because arcane wins in the case of a tie. If SoJ does end up working with Flame Blades/Black Hole, you’d temporarily boost your fire/cold damage, which if it worked with SoJ, would also raise your Arcane damage and you’d still have a tie. Your Arcane damage would just raise accordingly with your Flame Blades/Absolute Zero buff.
And if Flame Blades/Absolute Zero don’t work with the new SoJ, then your Archon would be Arcane except for when you have those buffs up. E.g you’d have 40 Arcane / 40 Cold / 40 Fire / 40 Lightning, and then with Flame Blades up for example you could have 40 Arcane / 40 Cold / 70 Fire / 40 Lightning. So you’d have a baseline Arcane Archon/Chantodo’s, and a temporary fire one with Flame Blades up. But for dual-element, you need to temporarily change between two adjacent CoE elements. In order for dual-element to work with Arcane as your non-temporary element (which is what would happen with SoJ), you’d need lightning to be your temporary element. Except our temporary elemental buffs are only fire (Flame Blades) and cold (Absolute Zero). We don’t have one for lightning. You can’t make a dual-element Archon with Arcane. It can only be Fire/Lightning with Flame Blades or Cold/Fire with Absolute Zero.
So there’s two situations with the new SoJ: either your Archon is always Arcane no matter what and and you can’t switch it (assuming it works with Flame Blades/Absolute Zero, and they would just temporarily buff all your elements as SoJ boosts to compensate) or that your non-boosted element is always Arcane and you can boost to Fire/Cold (if it doesn’t work with Flame Blades/Absolute Zero, and you have baseline 40 for all 4 elements and can temporarily boost Cold or Fire). Either way though, it’d be useless for dual-element.
Note: Chantodo’s/Vyr2 resolves ties in the same order as CoE: Arcane > Cold > Fire > Lightning.
I think people are getting way too caught up in the new SoJ affix. If I’m reading it correctly, it’s super weak. It will have no application in most mainstream builds. It might have a bit of a niche application for dual-skill builds that alternate skills based on CoE cycles, e.g. a dual-generator build that uses one generator for one CoE cycle and a different element generator for the next CoE cycle. Outside of that it seems pretty useless, unless it is going to work differently than my interpretation.
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SoJ isn’t that strong, yet. But if Disintegrate, Ray of Frost or Arcane Torrent is buffed then you could profit through etched sigil. Cause it wouldn’t be to hard to combine let’s say Ray of Frost Sleet Storm with EB or Meteor Shower. But jewelery is really hard contested anyway.
I’d be doubting that the channeled damage from AT/Disintegrate could ever rival the AP spenders from ES. Disintegrate/AT would need a massive buff and ES a massive nerf. I lack the ability to calculate it exactly, but Meteor gets a 1500% multiplier from just Nilfur’s, so you’d likely have to have ES casting AP spenders for only 50% damage, and Deathwish would probably have to buff only Channeled spell damage, and not all AP spenders or something.
Something like this?
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Death Wish: Arcane Torrent, Ray of Frost, and Disintegrate deal their full damage on cast and no longer require ramping up. Arcane Torrent, Ray of Frost, Disintegrate, and Disintegration Wave all deal xxx% more damage.
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Etched Sigil: While channeling Arcane Torrent, Disintegrate, or Ray of Frost you cast one of your other damaging arcane power spenders every second. Arcane spenders cast this way deal only 30-50% of their damage. Hitting an enemy with an Arcane Power Spender increases the damage of Arcane Torrent, Disintegrate, or Ray of Frost by xxx% for 10 seconds .
You’d need at least 450-600% for the channeling skills - and also have Hergbrash do the same.
Also I would like to see Attack Speed being part of this, since that would improve the damage of channeling… maybe:
Deathwish:
Your Arcane Power consuming channeled skills attack 100% faster, have their ramp up time removed and deal 350-400% increased damage. Enemies hit by your channeled skills take XXX% increased damage from non channeled Arcane Power spenders for 5 seconds.
Hergbrash’s Bindings:
Arcane Power spending channeled skills have their cast cost reduced by 80% and deal 400-500% more damage. While channeling you have a 50% chance to dodge contol impairing effects cast on you.
Regarding Etched Sigil…
Under these circumstances I would not nerf it - it’s not necessary. In fact, the issue with channel stuff infesting everything is mainly caused by Deathwish being so strong. If that’s taken care of, then nerfing ES might be overdoing it.
I’d rather they increase the damage on Etched Sigil for the channeling skills and have it also increase all damage on top of that. Maybe like… hm:
Etched Sigil:
Arcane Power spending channeled skills deal 350-400% increased damage and channeling them automatically casts all channeling skills you have assigned to your skill bar at the same target. Switching between different channeled attacks no longer interrupts the channeling. Also, while channeling, you automatically cast your non channeled arcane power spenders at twice their normal damage every second.
… and now, as for why I refrained from directly adressing Arcane Torrent, Disintegrate and Ray of Frost in those legendary powers - while we are at it, let’s add something on top that has been neglected for a long time: Electrocute.
Myken’s Ball of Hate:
Electrocute attacks 100% faster, can chain to enemies that have already been hit and deals 400-500% increased damage.
Velvet Camaral
Doubles the number of targets your Electrocute can jump to and increases its damage dealt by 300-400%. Failing to chain to the next enemy immediately detonates the arc on the last target, releasing half the damage of all remaining jumps in a 10 yard radius.
…and finally:
Lightning Rod: [Legendary Wand]
Electrocute now consumes 15 Arcane Power per second but deals 1000-1500% more damage in return.
and while we are at it:
Slorak’s Madness:
Increases the damage dealt by Disintegrate, Ray of Frost and Explosive Blast by 500-600%. Enemies hit by either Ray of Frost or Disintegrate will be marked for five seconds and Explosive Blast now also detonates on marked targets.
Light of Grace:
Ray of Frost now pierces, deals 500-600% more damage and gains the Sleet Storm rune. Enemies hit by Ray of Frost take 100% increased damage from your other cold or fire skills for 5 seconds.
Okay, figures aren’t balanced at all, just as a draft to see the general picture.