Decoy Totem

I was surprised to read comments saying this is "too strong". Dual wielding duelist w/ 90 strength/26 int. I've leveled this gem to five and it is always taken out in one hit. Even the archers can take it out in a single hit. This does seem like it would be useful and based on earlier comments I assume it was nerfed. Somewhere in between the pre and post nerf stats would be nice. Right now it's not worth the time it takes to cast it. v.90e beta build.

My archer duelist has this totem. He's lv19. My decoy totem is only lv4 (almost 5), but so far it seems like it needs more HP. I have a +22% totem HP passive that I'm probably about to respec out of since my totem dies really fast anyway.

Edit: So far the only use I found for it is against those monsters that explode and leave fire on the ground when they die. I can get them 1 shot from death and then make them go out of deathsplosion range before finishing them off. Against anything else the totem seems almost entirely useless.

I use it more to save my butt and to group monsters up now more then for actually tanking mobs. Although in Merciless on my Templar without any totem passives it still survives a couple hits at least. Sometimes, depending on mods, a rare will 1 shot it but that is still long enough for me to get at a distance and light the mob(s) up from safety.

Could it use more health, sure. Is it completely worthless the way it is, not really. I just had to adapt my use of the skill to the new weaker version of it rather then just dropping it and mindlessly shooting rares as before.

Also good in MoC when you have Necros in the back rezzing the 30 mobs you just aoed down. Set it off to the side to clear the mobs over and group them up. AoE them down before they kill totem. Move to side and single target necro(s) as they re-ressurrect all the mobs I just killed.

Is it intended that necros are immune to the totem?

Used it on my ele bow templar a lot
Trying to use it on my bow ranger now as well, but can't seem to justify dumping extra Strength just to keep this totem level en par.
Other red gems I'm using need roughly 40 pts less Strength.
So I was thinking to level up a Rejuven Totem instead.
I hear it does roughly the same when used pre-emptively.
= taunting mobs until it's destroyed.
Or Shockwave totem maybe.

Strength can be a problem on bow Rangers when you start to make decisions about base item types, their item mods and also want MF stacked.

Question would be if Decoy has a superior taunt and more HP than the other totems.
If this won't be the case, I see little reason to go for Decoy over other, less stat-heavy totems.
Any thoughts on this?


edit
nvm other totems need even more Strength ...
they're next to useless when starting to min/max a bow ranger (high Dex, medium Int, low Strength)

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Mark_GGG wrote:

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Zayl056 wrote:

Is it intended that necros are immune to the totem?

They aren't. In the case they choose to do a melee attack, if taunted, they'll target the totem due to it being their aggro target. But in the case they're raising, that can't target the totem, so doesn't.

I couldn't help but notice the "if taunted" part of your answer. I assume it means that when the totem taunts ennemies it is not a 100% chance to taunt?

To summarize the ability, you place a totem on the ground, when an enemy is close enough the totem emits a shockwave animation that has a chance to taunt ennemies within said animation.

If so could we perhaps get numbers on that chance to taunt?

Here's the situation in which I had tested this: I used infernal slam to explode ALL monsters except
magical/champion/rare/unique monsters to see if the necros would raise them.(which they did not)

The reason I used the decoy totem was simply to lure the necros towards the corpses of said monsters. I placed a totem outside melee range of the necros, the totem activated its shockwave animation due to the necro being near enough. The necro was clearly inside the animation but would not move towards the totem. When I placed the totem within melee range of the necros, obviously they attacked it.(often the totem didnt even have time to cast its ability)

I hope this was clear enough :)

Does this not do anything extra when paired with other gems anymore? I tried putting heavy strike, cold snap, and some other non support gems with it and nothing happened.

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muccmaster wrote:

Does this not do anything extra when paired with other gems anymore? I tried putting heavy strike, cold snap, and some other non support gems with it and nothing happened.

You're thinking of the totem support gem