Spell Totem
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I agree that this was nerfed a bit too hard. The 50% less damage combined with 30% less cast speed means that your spell is doing 35% of the DPS that it normally would. Even if you get ancestral bond, you're only doing 70% of the damage you could do by casting the spell itself. Not only that, but you're giving up a link to do so. Totems can help with reflect most notably, but given the huge DPS loss here I don't really think it's worth it since with the extra damage you get a lot of flexibility elsewhere.
Flame totem and shockwave totem are actually both pretty decent now too, so if you're really into totems you have some other options instead of just using spell totem. I think this just needs some of its nerfs reverted in order to feel a lot better again. Totems can be very useful, but there's also a lot of significant downsides to doing this and the downsides just seem too extreme right now. @Moylin (Beyond) Last edited by Avelice#3926 on Aug 30, 2014, 4:23:10 AM
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" Couldn't have said it better. With such a hard nerf to spell totem it is impossible to "reasonably" compensate for the disadvantages it imposes. It should have been designed to provide marginal bonuses to characters that use it as a side grade. But if you choose to focus a whole build on it you should be able to. Currently it is just not competetive without very expensive unique setups (dual void battery for example) and since spell echo has been implemented the gap between self-cast and using spell totem just became horizons apart. Last edited by Segaia#7245 on Sep 19, 2014, 5:53:19 AM
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I agree that they overcompenstated. I found a Soul Mantle and got excite to theory craft a tri-totem build and even with three out it typically can't really match self cast DPS if using this support gem.
I kind of think the gem itself is fine, but there needs to be another cluster behind Ancestral Bond with multipilicative cast speend and damage binuses to tone down the negative effects of the gem for totem only builds. Although then you'd need to add multiplicative cast speed/damage to the standalone totems (shockwave/flame) as well or they'd be totally OP. |
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It would be nice to see the totem's HP somewhere--on the tooltip, or in a Minion tab of the character screen.
In the morning
Laughing happy fish heads In the evening Floating in the soup |
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" I'm all for stronger specialization. Really not a fan of the power difference of your curses when you spec for them versus not being all of TWELVE percent for example. Nerf totem skills accordingly, have totem nodes do more cast speed and damage. And you'd have a bigger power differential; and I suppose make totems actually feel like they're aligned to the red zone. Fire Ball versus Flame Totem versus Fireball With Soul Mantle's Free Spell Totem Support: Having 3 Flame Totems up has the base damage twice that of raw casting Fire Ball. Having 3 Fireball Totems up is about the same base damage as raw casting Fire Ball. That's not taking into account Spell Echo. Having 3 totems up should be in the neighborhood of 1.5 to 2 times the base damage of direct cast. |
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the problem with spell totem atm is the slow cast speed for summoning totems!
in the current crit 1 shot meta, during the time you place your totem other builds already killed the whole pack... this is why i think spell totem and other dmg totems in general need a significant totem summoning cast speed buff ! gameplaywise it would also feel so much smoother if you could almost instantly place the totem! ign: ALLRAUDER
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Questions:
1) Can a Spell Totem cast Immortal Call on itself or on the player (what happens if we link IC on it)? 2) Can a Spell Totem cast EnduringCry? Would this help it Agro mobs (as EC have that effect)? Would it generate charges for me? 3) If I link Cast on Crit + Spell Totem + IC + EC, would the coc cast the totem, then the totem would cas IC/EC AND/OR the IC/EC would get casted by the coc, ignoring the totem link? 4) If Spell Totem can cast those spells, how frequently will it cast then? If this combination works, I could become a nice new way to trigger my defenses (casting a physically defensed Totem when I open a group of mobs with Whirling Blades + CoC). |
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Linking a Spell Totem does not change what the linked Skill actually does. IC doesn't suddenly apply to a different entity, and EC still only grants Charges to the caster.
If you link CoC+Totem+IC+EC you won't get anything because there is no Skill to trigger IC/EC. If that setup is linked to an Attack, then that Attack will randomly summon Totems that cast IC, and Totems that cast EC. Whichever is summoned last gets to stay, as per usual. Totems simply hold the button down, casting as frequently as possible. Of course, since EC has a big ol' cooldown, that's not going to be terribly often (Rejuv is a far better decoy). |
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" I'm interested in a Spell Totem Casting Immortal call on the totem itself. Not me. I want the totem to cast EC (to agro mobs) and IC (to endure more). So, if Spell Totem does not change what the spell actually does, it should cast EC (agro mobs to the totem) and IC (on the totem) right? Spell totem will keep casting both (as much as the cool down allow) for what I understood. Unless, of course, IC and EC aren't considered spells that a spell totem could cast. The CoC question is completely diferent question: I wanted to know if CoC could trigger a Spell Totem (and then, the spell totem would spam EC/IC on itself). Last edited by junaum#4262 on Dec 11, 2014, 11:55:27 AM
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The Totem won't be casting both, as I already hinted at. You have EC linked to Spell Totem, and IC linked to Spell Totem; you don't have a Spell Totem linked to IC and EC. Each Skill summons its own Totem, which has the one Skill at its disposal. Skills linked to Spell Totem can be triggered via CoC.
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