Season 21 PTR - Organized DH Feedback Thread! 🏹

[DiEoxidE-1987]

@Iria-1342

For comparison, with 3000 paragon, I could barely do a GR130 with DH. However, with 2000 paragon I was able to barely do a GR132 with Barb. The difference between 2000 and 3000 paragon isn’t a lot for damage but it is for toughness.

That’s not a fair comparison due to seasons theme. That helped WW barbs a bit with flexibility and power. Your 132 in seasons would have been about 128 on NS at that same paragon.

I don’t disagree with the premise, hell I won’t argue with being able to do GR 140 under 4k paragon with the suggested buffs, just saying the comparison you used is a bit disingenuous.

[Iria-1342]

@DiEoxidE-1987

That’s not a fair comparison due to seasons theme.

Okay, true the season theme helped Barbs a little. I still don’t think DH is at the same level of Barb though, even without the season bonus. I can try to to GR128 with only 2k paragon but I think I would need to drop Convention of Elements or switch to Endless Walk (so I could use Elusive). The toughness of the GoD build is way behind WW Barb.

[bluebomber24-1504]

QoL: Strafe should display the 5 seconds of defense on its icon or have a green bar at top.

QoL: It would also be nice if Odyssey End gained the Chain Gang or Heavy Burden Rune.

[DiEoxidE-1987]

@bluebomber24-1504

QoL: Strafe should display the 5 seconds of defense on its icon or have a green bar at top.

QoL: It would also be nice if Odyssey End gained the Chain Gang or Heavy Burden Rune.

Much yes to both of these.

[Drakiock-1135]

Some new theme bug that is allowing 1 DH (1739 paragon) to do a GR150. Saw another player do a Wiz, WD, and a Necro do 150 GR. 2 Crusadors done 150 GR, and fifteen barbs.

All of these are seasonal GR’s.

I failed to see the thread about this. Season Theme Feedback - No Area Damage% 150 as zDPS still possible - #8 by MysticGlow-1734

[Zurtle-6510]

@Drakiock-1135

All of these are seasonal GR’s.

Seasonal theme is allowing this to happen. One chap showed area damage procced the effect massively while playing ZBarb. Then Rob2490210 or whatever did a 150 in 15:24 today with no area damage so it’s season 19 all over again.

Edit: Blizz have said they’re going to nerf the area damage thing.

[Iria-1342]

Big Update! New Section Added!

I added a section called “Iria’s List of Recommendations” and merged it with the other issues section. At the moment there are 9 items in that list but I can add more as I get more ideas.

This is my list of recommendations, not yours, so if you don’t like something on that list too bad! If you have a good idea with some explanations or reasoning behind it, I can add it to my list. I’m also adding to the bug list section as I see more bugs or read about them on the forum from multiple sources.

[Woogmoog-11780]

@FoxStarwind-11154

but since the design of the set is to constantly be strafing

This is so wrong, the design of the set clearly says… you have stacks and you can lose them. What can you do to not lose them? Shoot your primary yourself. So… no, by design the set is not intended to be constantly strafing period.
Also I’ve seen another misunderstanding of yours. If you go to any top tier barb video on youtube… you’re going to see that they do cast rend manually, and why is that? Because the rend applied by Ambo’s pride doesn’t proc area dmg, so in a way you think you’re already doing the highest dmg you can with the set… but because of a “bug” (I don’t know if it’s intended or not) your area dmg doesn’t worth anything for the rends applied by whirlwind from Ambo’s Pride.

[Knightmare65-1768]

Tried more variations of the set, anything to stay alive and kill at the same time, it was very difficult to do. [At almost paragon 1100] Actually pushed the set to do 105’s, but kept procking cheat death or dying or both. When S21 starts, I cannot see my self pushing to 100, the GoD set can’t handle it. It’s very weak offensively and doubly weak defensively. When I attempt to beef up the defense via gems or passives, the set can’t kill. I have no idea why all the hype on this set because it is no where near the high level the other sets that the other classes use. I don’t know, maybe I’m playing the set wrong ( I have watched a few YouTube videos on it and playing as instructed), but this set just can’t kill at high GR’s strafing or using the primary skills. Its like I am using the strafe skill and the bar never moves on the elite pack, same goes for using the primary. Forget about Bolas or Entangling Shot, those 2 skills suck worse. Blizzard needs to fix this set for us HC players because no one will use it unless to farm in T16 or do Bounties.

As for the Impale’s Holy Point Shot, the 75 to 100% for chance of damage is pathetic. I want this set to be the leading RGK, and this ain’t doing it. Very disappointed after looking forward to what were supposed to be drastic improvements. At least the Impale will get me to maybe 110 or higher in S21 in HC.

[Mersinary-11202]

@Iria-1342

1. Increase the GoD 4 piece set bonus to grant 80% damage reduction instead of 60%. This will help more casual players and lower paragon players enter the GR120-130 range. Due to asymmetric paragon scaling vs GRs high paragon players can almost fully max out their offense while lower paragon players must use multiple defensive tools (e.g. Elusive Ring, Unity, etc.) to survive unavoidable damage in dense environments. This toughness via paragon problem is also what walls out most players from certain Rapid Fire builds.
   Some players are instead asking for the Hunter’s Wrath belt to be built into the new set to enable the use of Captain Crimsons. However, since the new set doesn’t use Yang’s Recurve, Captain Crimsons won’t provide a large toughness bonus by itself.

It would be nice to be able to use Captain Crimson, or Aughilds with GoD. At the moment though, mostly considering the set is new and a “meta” isn’t quite settled upon, it’s nice to see the build itself has lots of variants at the moment. But Wraps of Clarity and Hunters Wrath and Depth Diggers are all too good and doesn’t allow access to the smaller sets.

Depending really however an individual decides to build their GoD6, be it super tanky or more glass cannon. Tanky aint really gonna grant you any trophies on the leaderboard minus the few people that don’t mind participation trophies. And if you follow DiE’s route of being mostly glass cannon and using Entangling Shot, I feel like it’s gonna eventually be another UE build where only top-tier players are able to push using unique mechanics like stutterstepping. Some more Damage Reduction would definitely help here.

2. Increase the GoD 6 piece set bonus to 20,000%. This isn’t an optimal fix but will put the damage more on par with other classes’ top builds. Instead of a straight buff to the 6 piece bonus, instead the 2 piece or 4 piece bonuses could be adjusted. For example, changing the momentum bonus to 20% per second or fixing the Strafe-generated primaries attack speed to a higher number.
   Some mechanic to spend momentum for some supercharged ability would also be interesting instead of a damage buff. For example, using Fan of Knives spends all your remaining momentum and fires a shot of your last used primary skill for every 2 seconds of momentum consumed.

Comparing GoD6 to Shadow Impale in PTR 2.0, I’m able to push up to Gr125 on both builds at p2800~. I think both builds how I have them set up are fairly similar in toughness. It’d be interesting to see what a seasonal character could do without this lame seasonal theme we’re gonna have, it doesn’t do the build any favors in terms of further testing. I’m assuming they’re gonna have atleast 1 more PTR patch, and hopefully it’ll put GoD6 more in line with other god-tier class/builds…

3. Increase the Holy Point Shot’s Impale multiplier from 100% to 300%. While the Impale buff was a step in the right direction, it isn’t quite enough to place Impale DH into the 4-person group setting as the boss killer yet.

I was able to clear Gr125 on PTR with the new Holy Point Shot while clearing Gr122 in Season 20. I don’t feel the added damage on HPS is that significant. Another problem that falls in line with being able to push higher Grifts is the increased incoming dmg as well. I had to use Elusive Ring instead of CoE to clear that Gr125 btw…=( It’s not like the Achieves Theme is transferring over to next season, or to nonseason. Impale has to go back to using Aquilas as well, that’s automatically a 10% dmg reduction loss if you choose to try to use CoE over Elusive Ring.

Honestly I still hate the Holy Point Shot buff. I know I’m mimicking a broken record here. But HPS was already hard as hell to find a good one, must less to find a good ancient, gawd forbid the disappointment of getting a primal. Someone said to make the buff equivalent if added more damage onto Karleis Point would have to be like 800% or something…? Why not do that instead.

Impale RGK still has major issues with RG’s that spawn adds

4. Bolas need a lot of help, consider doubling the numbers on Leonine Bow of Hashir and Emimei’s Duffel as well as granting a pierce or ricochet property to the bolas. Bolas need too many weapons to work due to competing equipment slots (Leonine, Emimei, Dawn, Buriza, etc.). Additionally, the Leonine pull-in effect should have a tighter vacuum radius like Ground Stomp - Wrenching Smash.

I don’t know if Bolas is supposed to be, or should be, used for solo pushing. Why theres an added dmg multipler on a utility based weapon is beyond me. I feel like it’s supposed to be used for ZDps DH, or utility based used in cohesion with Hungering Arrow.

5. Dune Dervish and Sand Dweller type monsters should reflect projectiles scaled to monster (not player) damage. This interaction has been in the game since its release. While it was okay in the early days of Diablo 3, after many damage buffs and relatively less toughness buffs, the reflected projectiles are now stronger than any attack in the game including molten explosions in GR150. Shadow Impale DH would also benefit from this quality of life fix.

Good lord, I hate these damned things…Moreso Sand Dwellers…Sand Dwellers half the time you can’t even see their ring activated to see if they’re reflecting attacks or not. But both for GoD6 and moreso Impale, you simply can’t fight these. For Impale, it doesn’t matter if it’s the primary hit or the secondary hit from Ricochet or Overpenetration, you’re still dead. How hard would it be just to make it reflect back 25% dmg or something…?

6. Allow Hungering Arrow to pierce walls with Ninth Cirri Satchel. This more readily makes Hungering Arrow less map-dependent and Waller-type enemies won’t be such a nuisance anymore (like Juggernauts still are).
   As a compromise, for Missile Dampening enemies, give Hungering Arrow a cap of 10 pierces per arrow. Missile dampening elites are almost as good as a conduit pylon if you can keep the main elite alive while everything else (including other elites) melts with stacked arrows (and heavy server lag at times). This would eliminate the need to fish for a perfect GR which includes rare Missile Dampening elites.

Until you explained it to me earlier today, I was so confused why some elites were dying almost instantly. While enjoyable, it’s clear it shouldn’t be happening…Maybe Hungering Arrow itself just needs to deal more dmg…? Cause killing elites or even RG just takes too damn long, even with Stricken. Stricken is basically required imo, if I use Gogok and fighting RG, it can take almost 2min to do 25% of it’s health.

7. Odyssey’s End should also add the Heavy Burden or Chain Gang rune to Entangling Shot. Using the Odyssey’s End into a solo build is very difficult without skilled “generator-weaving” with the added timing needed to make sure everything is constantly entangled and that you keep firing Hungering Arrows most of the time. Overall though, this new bow is a godsend for any DH trying to enter into group settings.

Basically what I was replying to #1. I feel like going this route is gonna end up required to be god/top tier and end up in the same position UE is currently in. Most people just won’t be able to do it. Example of Season 20 and only 5-6 UE have pushed from rank 10-70. Granted more people will likely play GoD6 next season and we’ll see more of the build in the higher ranks overall, or should, hopefully.

8. The new Stone of Jordan should double (or provide 1.5x) the player’s elemental damage bonus instead. At the moment, the new SoJ will only benefit multi-element players who use multiple skills for their main source of damage. Demon Hunters don’t have any such multi-element builds since it is better to stack attack options for a single skill rather than multiple.

I still feel like the new SoJ is aimed towards Shadow Impale to make it easier to itemize between neck, wrists, off-hand. But it has potential to be so much more. Even if its aimed more towards Impale theres really no place to fit it between Rose, CoE, Elusive Ring, and no Achieves theme.

Even if used for builds like GoD6 HA+ES/Bolas, it still has minimal effect when dealing dmg with the utility based abilities when you’re only using them every now and then.

9. Squirt’s Necklace has too many penalties for the bonus it provides. Squirt’s Necklace is regarded as one of the best amulets for Demon Hunters. However at the moment there are too many sources of unavoidable damage which make keeping the bonus active very difficult in higher GRs.
   Squirt’s Necklace has two major drawbacks: notably the damage taken penalty and the long ramp-up time after taking damage. One of these two penalties could be removed for the item to function more reliably while still retaining a drawback for fairness. See this thread for more information and discussion.

Huge agreement regarding Squirts. This again adds to the argument that this is/should be only used by god/top tier players that are actually capable of stutterstepping and avoiding most incoming dmg. The average joe will only see benefits from it when doing speed runs…And it’s doing more bad than good because of the huge 50% incoming dmg and minimal ineffective ways to absorb dmg to prevent it from happening. Theres the apparently flaw in the item when even the top tier players have trouble keeping the buff active.

[Mersinary-11202]

@Iria-1342

List of Known Bugs

Strafe-generated Evasive Fire does not have an attack animation.

• The on-hit animation sparks still show and the extra effects (e.g. Hardened, Parting Gift, etc.) still work. The backflip is disabled while Strafing (likely intentional so as not to cancel Strafe).

Strafe-generated Grenades do not aim towards the enemy.

• Strafe-generated Grenades fire in your direction of movement, not randomly towards a valid target like all other primary skills.

Strafe-generated primaries fire with inconsistent rate of fire.

• Attack speed seems to have no effect on controlling the number of primaries fired by Strafe. This might be intentional but it could be more clearly stated in the tooltip so as not give the idea that attack speed increases the number of projectiles.
• Some tests have shown the number of projectiles fired by Strafe seems to fluctuate randomly between 3 to 5 per second. We were unable to determine the cause; in one test, simply exiting and reentering the game changed the rate. Other possible ideas is that this could be due to server performance or a race condition between different game mechanics. A video showing different rates of fire with no equipment, skill, paragon, or other changes can be seen here.

Damage reduction from the GoD 4-piece bonus does not have an icon.

• The damage reduction property of the new set does not have any indicator to show the 5 second duration. Whirlwind has the same issue with Wrath of the Wastes.

Damage reduction from the GoD 4-piece bonus does not have an icon.

• The damage reduction property of the new set does not have any indicator to show the 5 second duration. Whirlwind has the same issue with Wrath of the Wastes.

Strafe does not fire primaries unless a valid target is in range.

“Damage reduction from the GoD 4-piece bonus does not have an icon.” is listed twice.

[Mersinary-11202]

I still feel like the new SoJ is aimed towards Shadow Impale to make it easier to itemize between neck, wrists, off-hand. But it has potential to be so much more. Even if its aimed more towards Impale theres really no place to fit it between Rose, CoE, Elusive Ring, and no Achieves theme.

Even if used for builds like GoD6 HA+ES/Bolas, it still has minimal effect when dealing dmg with the utility based abilities when you’re only using them every now and then.

What I meant really is that I think if you have 20% fire on neck, 20% cold on bracers, 20% physical on quiver. It should equal 60% to whatever element your skills are. Would be bit easier to itemize builds, but would SoJ even be used then for it? shrug It’s still lackluster except for UE Speed builds.

[Iria-1342]

@Mersinary-11202

“Damage reduction from the GoD 4-piece bonus does not have an icon.” is listed twice.

Fixed, and added a 10th recommendation regarding Taeguk.

[adjudication-1543]

@Altair, thanks for the reply. when i wrote that, the current builds on top weren’t on top. glad someone smarter than me came by and improved on what i was figuring out lol. i tried their builds, and find that i agree with your takeaway from the set. running both entangling and hungering makes for a potent damage build, and feels pretty fluid for maintaining momentum stacks.

with the hungering/entangling cold damage build, im kind of feeling that damage is about right. i would still contend that the damage should be increased slightly to promote variety in builds, but i am no longer sure that is necessary.

again, appreciate the feedback! im pretty set on playing DH this upcoming season now with the Nat/GoD hybrid for farm and cold GoD for ladder. should be fun.

[Gekerd-2216]

@Iria-1342

Squirt’s Necklace should have one penalty (damage taken +50% or 12-second stack generation) removed. This idea was provided by DiEoxidE. Squirt’s Necklace is regarded as one of the best amulets for Demon Hunters. However at the moment there are too many sources of unavoidable damage which make keeping the bonus active very difficult in higher GRs.
Squirt’s Necklace has two major drawbacks: notably the damage taken penalty and the long ramp-up time after taking damage. One of these two penalties could be removed for the item to function more reliably while still retaining a drawback for fairness. See this thread for more information and discussion.

I do think there could be a reduction in the time it needs to stack, but I do like the need to play around the fact that you take more damage. But then I like most damage bonuses that have a requirement to your play-style to actually work.

@Iria-1342

Taeguk should be a multiplicative damage multiplier and should apply to all channeling skills regardless of resource consumption. This idea was provided by DiEoxidE. Currently, the Taeguk legendary gem provides damage by adding to the “damage increased by skills” category. Unfortunately, there are many sources of damage that stack additively into that same category, most notably Odyssey’s End and Wojahnni Assaulter. This greatly diminishes the usefulness of the Taeguk gem for builds that use those items.
In the case of Rapid Fire, channeling doesn’t cost resource with Sin Seekers rendering the Taeguk gem useless. Furthermore, since the Wojahnni Assaulter provides a massive 3000% bonus to the same additive damage category, adding even a level 150 Taeguk with its +80% damage won’t even provide 3% total DPS increase!

Do you think that the gem should then also get a reduction to 60%? Because the armor buff of 20% is allready a pretty good buff, probably one of the reason Barbs can get away with taking less defensive options in higher GR’s (20% armor comes to about 15% added toughness for a strength or dexterity character), this would make it a logical thing to have other downsides.

[Pe3eWe3e-21492]

@Iria-1342

Dune Dervish and Sand Dweller type monsters should reflect projectiles scaled to monster (not player) damage. This interaction has been in the game since its release. While it was okay in the early days of Diablo 3, after many damage buffs and relatively less toughness buffs, the reflected projectiles are now stronger than any attack in the game including molten explosions in GR150. Shadow Impale DH would also benefit from this quality of life fix.

I don’t expect them to fix this and it could be a reason to not run DH speed groups.

Elites with spinner minions are spawning too often when you take pylon while wearing Nemesis bracers.

[Iria-1342]

@Pe3eWe3e-21492

it could be a reason to not run DH speed groups

That’s really unfortunate then, there shouldn’t be a single mob type that prevents an entire class from speed runs.

[Pe3eWe3e-21492]

@Iria-1342

That’s really unfortunate then, there shouldn’t be a single mob type that prevents an entire class from speed runs.

Agreed. If you are going to die often and make your party wait for you each time, until you get new pools… that is not going to work.

[s3p-21341]

I completely agree that bolas need some help, but even if they were on par, I don’t see anyone going that route to push their limits. Simply because fishing for missile dampening elites gives you free progress on a HA build. Which is pretty sad btw…

[ENIAC-11907]

@Iria-1342

Allow Hungering Arrow to pierce walls with Ninth Cirri Satchel. This more readily makes Hungering Arrow less map-dependent and Waller-type enemies won’t be such a nuisance anymore (like Juggernauts still are).
As a compromise, for Missile Dampening enemies, give Hungering Arrow a cap of 10 pierces per arrow. Missile dampening elites are almost as good as a conduit pylon if you can keep the main elite alive while everything else (including other elites) melts with stacked arrows (and heavy server lag at times). This would eliminate the need to fish for a perfect GR which includes rare Missile Dampening elites.

Man, I realized that too, I even saw a streamer wondering “how did I kill this elite”!

I would not like to fish for Missiles, I hope this is fixed.