Lightning Arrow

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adipy wrote:

(please don't nerf my baby!)

Well, it's extremely strong right now because of its very thorough coverage of the screen (much better than Split or Rain or Multi-ing anything else).

With loldiamond and the excess of DPS possible via stacking bunches of Crit Damage and Elemental Damage, its coverage allows it to one shot the whole screen half the time. However, if Diamond were removed and DPS were a bit less out of control, this wouldn't be an issue.

General comments, after playing one bow character through Chaos runs, and two more to their 40s and 50s.

For most of the time, I've been using lightning arrow fully leveled up, mostly for coverage - I've found that it's significantly better than split arrow or a multishot fire arrow when in enclosed area, primarily due to that coverage (part of it is just the visibility problems in enclosed spaced - lightning arrow frequently kills mobs that are next to me that I hadn't even seen).

The real issue with it is the cost/benefit of leveling the gem. I recently switched my Chaos running character from using a max level gem over to using a level 1 gem, and it's around a billion times more viable. Supported with Pierce and LMultiProj (which I'd be running anyway since it's my area clear skill) the targeting difference ends up being pretty irrelevant, whereas being able to fire off several more volleys before needing to flask is very, very relevant.

The main issue is that the only big ramp to the skill from levels is additional targeting capacity - which is a benefit that is only sometimes useful (and which is mitigated by a common support that you probably want to use with lightning arrow anyway) - whereas the mana cost increase is absolutely huge.

I think it needs a reduced base mana cost and reduced cost scaling, but with an added damage penalty that mitigates with gem levels (like multiProj). The lower base cost should keep it viable at low levels in spite of the damage penalty, and having some damage scaling through levels (even if it's just taking the penalty away) would encourage using a leveled version of the gem.

Overall it's a very strong skill, with some balance issues arising from the level scaling. I'd say that the level 1 version is more powerful than it ought to be in conjunction with good support gems in the later stages of the game right now. Conversely, a fully leveled version is a bit underpowered due to the high mana costs.

As a general effects comment, I'd just like to say that I'd probably keep using this skill no matter how powerful it was purely due to the audio/visual feedback. Hitting nearly everything on screen with it at once with pierce and multishot feels really good and creates one hell of a light show.

Edit: the missing of the skill is very unintuitive because it sounds exactly like a normal arrow when it misses a monster, but not when it hits a wall.

Though if you look closely, it's still possible to tell the skill went off because the arrow has a blue/white icy tint.

Does knockback work on secondary targets ?

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Silty wrote:

Edit: the missing of the skill is very unintuitive because it sounds exactly like a normal arrow when it misses a monster, but not when it hits a wall.

Though if you look closely, it's still possible to tell the skill went off because the arrow has a blue/white icy tint.

Ah, that's the explanation ?
I was wondering if the skill was bugged...

Didn't use this skill too much because of the high mana cost + low damage compared to fire arrow and / or the poison arrow of the same level... and I didn't have the time to test, but can you hit the ground with this? (primary target: ground & sec: 2-3 enemies in some designated area)

Instead of this skill I used poison with some split arrow gem for low mana + relative big area + hit anywere.

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DarkGreen wrote:

Didn't use this skill too much because of the high mana cost + low damage compared to fire arrow and / or the poison arrow of the same level... and I didn't have the time to test, but can you hit the ground with this? (primary target: ground & sec: 2-3 enemies in some designated area)

No, you can't aim at the floor with this skill, but you can aim at walls or trees etc etc.


In an unrelated issue to the one above me.

I'd suggest some kind of special effect of the person casting the lightning arrow, like a small flash of light before firing the arrow.

As previously stated their is simply no incentive in leveling this skill. Its lots of fun to use because of its animation and mechanics but it feels a bit under powered because its only viable as a level one skill.

Id suggest Adding 1-2% converted damage per gem level for incentive because chance to electrocute is simply not worth the mana cost of leveling this skill.

I suppose running a lightning arrow on a Templar with access to so many +Elemental Damages passive nodes would make it seem potent. But I'd have to build a seperate character to farm +Dex and +Hit Rating gears before he would be a viable character to play.

There needs to be better bonuses for leveling this skill and increasing it's mana cost, Perhaps some projectile damage?

Also the shock chance doesn't reflect properly in the tooltip if it is increased through passives.