Given the squishiness, it’s just another hugh risk factor in literally ALL WD builds:
You were pushing gr. You spent so many keys which took time to farm, and you finally got a good map and spawned the RG with 10 stacks of SH.
If the RG ended up killing you, it would be a DEFINITE GG.
Sure, plenty of other builds would call it gg once they die to the RG but I feel WD is the worst of the bunch because of the squishiness of the WD class, the ubiquity and cumbersomeness of the soul harvest + sacred harvester + lakomba combo, soul harvest’s long CD, and the fact that you can’t refresh the duration by simple recasting (there has to be enemy in close range, unlike Monk’s sweeping wind).
Nowadays soul harvest feels less and less like a fun mechanic but more a funless job you have to do because there’s nothing else to turn to.
======================
Some great suggestions proposed by forum members (will try adding links to original post when I’m on a computer instead of cellphone):
So far only included suggestions that are more straightforward/self-contained therefore relatively more realistic.
I totally agree with this, the mechanic works fine while being within the rift with lots of mobs but the moment you die at the rift guardian then you are screwed. A lot of witch doctor build suffer similar penalties like the LOD and Zuni DoD build where you will loose almost your entire defense with the zuni set and the entire damage with the LOD set unless you enforce the fetish army skill in the build. But also these builds depend on the sacred harvester for survivability. Many times before starting a high GR with friend I have to ask them to leave the mobs for me to gain stacks or else I will become oneshot with every mob I come across XD.
A very clunky mechanic involving 2 item slots , (one being weapon that you otherwise would never use), and a skill, all to get a measly 60% damage reduction.
Give us a ring or a bracer with a no-strings 80% DR , and that will help ALL the WD builds.
Lack of toughness in general, but particularly in regard to the unforgiving nature of the few options they do have. Sacred Harvester is in EVERY push build.
I would love to see Lakumbas decoupled from stacks. SH could still be a Jade weapon, and other builds could explore diversity, and maybe even live past GR 115 solo
I completely agree, While the new set(and honestly most WD sets) are fun for speed clears any pushing attempts where you lose the momentum and die, losing all stacks, especially when you only have one enemy to harvest is very defeating.
They could have easily fixed this by making coils of the first spider give more DR and also work when channeling SB and give a 10sec DR buff when casting a signature skill.
Sacred Harvester and Lakumbas is great for Jade but we need more flexible DR options for other builds that don’t use up two item slots and requires Soul Harvest.
I think they should allow more shielding options (mana or health shields) which can be renewed by attacks like the wizard has. That would solve alot of problems for WD when it comes to survivability. For example:
Lakumba’s: double the effects of Soul Harvest skill
Add a damage reduction ring like the wizzard has in the 80% range.
Adjust Soul Harvest - Syphon to health shield option which are stackable at attack rate
Adjust Soul Harvest - Swallow your Soul for mana shield option which are stackable with attack rate
Change the blood ritual passive to a new skill that acts like the Galvinizing Ward skill for wizard (heath shield)
Add a mana shield to the spiritual attunement passive.
Think that would also solve the problem not being able to not be able to use Squirt necklage properly and always be forced to use unity which only works solo…
You make SH sounds way better than it is, both utilitiwise ande experience-wise.
Firstly, don’t armor and AR suffer from diminishing return, greatly?
Also, plenty of skills/gears can be classifies as disgustingly op such as land of the dead, wizard’s es+dw+moc combo, but it makes no sense to say nothing can compare because you are comparing apples with oranges.
Finally, similar to wizards complaining about how they are stuck with aforementioned combo and their playstyles lack diversity, an op mechanic means an overwhelmingly favoured mechanic and the class performance ends up being adjusted (or “balanced”) by blizzard for the op mechanic, and that mechanic becomes a must have mechanic, i.e. pigeonholed!
It’s good that wizards have grabbed blizzard’s attention about the channelling playstyle (even though for non-top tier pushing e.g. speeds there are plenty other playstyle). I hope the same recognition could be given to WD’s soul harvest probelm.
Yep WD’s have next to no toughness items in comparison to other classes like barb and wizard, have to get into melee range to maintain toughness via soul harvest which usually requires burning spirit walk and do not have any form of CC immunity. They are due for a toughness overhaul.
Suggestion: tweak the legendary effects of Lakumba’s Ornament and the Sacred Harvester.
Lakumba’s Ornament Soul Harvest stacks up to 10 times. Gain 60-80% damage reduction while under the effect of Soul Harvest.
Now it’s on par with items like Halo of Karini and Band of Might. Also, hitting a single enemy is enough, so there’s less risk involved in achieving the DR, and dying is less of a setback. Seriously, Blizzard needs to abandon their “stacking for defense” design philosophy.
Sacred Harvester
“Soul Harvest is cast at the target location”
Now it’s more of a convenience item rather than a must-have. Why should Witch Doctors have to use TWO items to get LESS damage reduction than other classes can with only one?
Good idea. Though if these would ever be added I imagine it’ll be more likely that casting at target effect would be on lakomba and sacred harvester would stay the same. If it was the other way around, lakomba would be too good to not result in somthing else getting nurffed, and sacred harvester would almost become useless because we all know how precious a weapon slot is.
All defensive stacking items need to give max stacks when hitting an elite/boss. Necro has this same problem with it’s defensives.
Everyone has focused so much on damage balance that defensive balance has been put on the back burner.
I’m a wizard main and I completely understand that wizard is beyond broken in the defensive department compared to other classes. Why give wizard’s new set 80% DR and give witch doctor, whose lacking in defense, only 50% to start?
Soul harvest with the items needs to give 80% DR at 10 stacks plus everything else it gives and give max stacks when hitting a boss.
There’s a damage mitigation calculator. Just google:
d3resource mitigation
Not sure how up to date it is but it shows you how bad the diminishing return can be - I’m talking about when converting armor/AR to damage mitigation%
WD need to cast 10 times to gain 10 stacks; that will take like 60-90 seconds to attain. While Hydra Set Wiz can attain 80% DR within 2 seconds on a slow day.
And dont get me started on Karini ring… another 80% DR!
Dude what I’m saying is that doubling armour or AR won’t give you double DR from each stat respectively, not even multiplicatively.
For example, in the calculator, try making armour 5250 and the rest nil, you’ll get damage mitigation at 60%. Now double armour to 10500, it won’t give you 84% = 1- ( 1 - .6 ) * ( 1 - .6 ) overall mitigation but only 75% which multiplicatively is only a 37.5% = 1 - ( 1 - .75 ) / ( 1 - .6 ) additional mitigation.
What’s worse is that as you armour increases, this diminishing return effect gets worse.
The same goes for mitigation from AR.
And remember this whole time we are assuming a weapon slot is wasted on sacred harvester!
And mate we can further put that into perspective:
Assuming your char has 5250 armour and 1050 AR and equips the three-element combo. Without 10 stacks of Soul Harvest our char has 90% overall mitigation.
Now we get Soul Harvest to 10 stacks, which means double armour, 30% more AR and 60% DR from Lakumba. Entering them in the calculator we end up with 97.959% mitigation, that’s 79.59% additional mitigation comparing to no SH stacks.
Think about it. 1 skill slot + 1 weapon slot + 1 armour slot + strenuous/risky stack maintenance only net us just under 80% additional DR (with diminishing return!) plus 30% damage increase, whereas wizards with 1 skill slot + 1 ring slot + running away from monsters can get a reliable 80% addtional DR and can throw in whatever outrageous weapon they want.
The WD needs a DR ring like band of might, halo of karini. This has been said in too many places to count.
Blizzard will listen and action it, or they won’t.
If the first, it likely won;t be for a while but for now, nothing changes.
