Detonate Dead

leveling up with most gems are really unrewarding. Not only this one. I think its something they really need to work on. At certain levels the gems should gain something a bit more than 1% increases in dmg etc. If they worried about this skill being too OP with higher damage then give it a significant cooldown, that way instead of us spamming detonate dead and decimating everything we would instead have to strategically place that one big corpse explosion for massive damage and then finish the rest of with other skills. The higher the damage goes the higher the cooldown is.

I know there has been big discussions on cooldowns on these forums but for skills like this it would make more sense. Would make balancing these things so much easier and then we can say hello to the cooldown reduction support gem as well :)

I think one good utility would be to be able to blow your own summons up with it if you really wanted. kinda makes it so all your summons are mobile powder kegs... maybe make it 50% less effective if it is a active summon and normal amounts for a corpse on the ground.

also... there should be a incentive to leveling it up. maybe as you level it every 3-5 levels it gains a small percentage to chain if it kills another mob. like starts at 1% and gets up to 5-10%, probably wouldn't be effective though if you made the percentage to low... and if it was to high it would be op as shit. thats my two cents anyways.

From the start my character goal was a corpse bombing necromancer but I find myself using it only for the occasional laugh, to make an example out of a mob that annoys me. Other than that I find it totally underwhelming due to pitiful damage and it was a big disappointment when I finally got it.

To quote this site's description:
"At higher levels of skill, the detonation will damage and stun foes in a wide area"

However I see no noticeable gain in range by level 15 and in 70 hours of play I've not once noticed any stun (perhaps I don't know what to look for). Even with an aoe support gem its range is fairly useless because in most situations the living monsters are no longer in the area.

I use it only because blowing up corpses is good old fashioned messy fun. Perhaps with a damage support gem, the ability to target my own minions and if I could actually see its aoe in the spell effect (chunks splattering further) I'd grow to love it.

Character level 60
Skill level 15

Supports:
+39% chance to ignite
-19% reduced mana cost
+44% area of effect (now removed)

Passives:
+30% fire damage
+33% spell damage
+25% spell critical strike chance
+8% area effect

Gear:
+46% spell damage
+19% critical strike chance

I can see where a few of your problems may lie. First off, detonate dead is not technically a spell, so your spell damage won't help there.

A stun can occur from any damage if you do a large enough portion of the monsters' health. It is not a big flashy effect, just an interrupt and a short animation (usually the monster reeling backwards briefly).

As for getting monsters into position to explode, you can use minions (which you already mentioned), possibly box them in with frost wall, or lure them into position yourself.

But maybe you've moved on to other skills you like better. That's a good thing, you're finding what you like rather than trying to force something that doesn't seem useful to you. And that's also good feedback.

Some people should use this skill and give feedback on the new effect ;D

I saw Alira using it, briefly. I liked what I saw, but I'll have to dig out a gem for myself to get a little better view.

The visual effect seems different or maybe that's just a mistake.
The effect of the gem itself seems not to have changed in any way at all and is still horribly underpowered.

yeah the effect changed not that actually mechanics and balance sadly : /

I've already commented on the skill itself, but I do like the new effect. It looks like a small explosion is set off in the corpse and much more like a dex skill.