Spell Totem

I feel that Totem is a little too good for it's own sake.

Other day I was running Fellshrine Ruins with a party in Merciless difficulty. There were two witches, one of which was using not one, but two bluey totems which I am guessing were linked with Ice Spear (not very familiar with witch skills, but it was blue projectiles).

They were clearing everything in sight and my ranger and a marauder just picked up the goodies.

Isn't it unfair that some of the best damage skills you can link to Totems are INT based gems?

When I first came across this skill I thouht "wow, very cool idea". But I'm getting the impression that this makes the Witch too powerful, while ranged classes are usually already OP in most ARPGs I have played (and it seems to be the case here).

Essentially wouldn't you say that a Totem + Damage Skill is a powerful minion?

How about the Totems could dispense the auras or curses, in addition to being a weaker form of Decoy (less life or duration)? While retaining the direct damage on players? Perhaps this would balance things better. The idea here being that the Totem's advantage is you don't have to reserve the mana for the aura, but the downside is you have to (re)cast it and position it strategically. Whether that makes it a good alternative to wearing the auras on yourself has to be tested (this assumes that skills like Rejuvenation Totem would switch to a wearable aura, which can then be linked to "Totem").

Hard to say of course my impression is based on grouping with Witches and Rangers, not playing them. I know they're glass cannons, but they already have means to buffer the damage I think (minions, Decoy Totem), and they can also benefit from Totem + Curse.

It's just, if I summed up my feeling, that Totem seems to be doubling up on damage dealing minions, whereas the thematic background of the totem, in my imagination at least, was that it is a form of "empowerment" (through curses, auras and perhaps traps).

I also wish that the damage skills which are often associated with great visual effects would be more centered around the player character, as it is confusing enough already in multiplayer with the entire screen covered in fireworks...

Blood rage + totem support works wierdly: totem casts bloodrage on itself but doesnt give u the effect. pretty pointless make it casts to u, ur party or take it away :) doesnt even works as a tank because life goes down eventually

Skeletons summoned using Totem leave corpses behind and make quite a mess. As entertaining as it is, it surely isn't intended.

Screenshot

Has anybody tried Righteous Fire totem? If so, how does it work? Does it deal enough damage?

Totem dont work well with blood magic passive.When i use it with warlord curse skill,totem used own health to cast curse.After 4-5 cast totem stop becasu of low health.Also totem cant be used effective with mana reserve skills.Reserve too much health or mana.Totem dont work with leap strike.

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DarbeliMatkapTr wrote:

Totem dont work with leap strike.

LoL
What if it did?

"Totem" support gem is definitely OP, but the solution is making more strength-based totems that can provide support to melee players.

this totem gem has a weird bug, it can be linked to phase run gem and it cast on itself.

I dont think this is intended.

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Falcord wrote:

Has anybody tried Righteous Fire totem? If so, how does it work? Does it deal enough damage?

I saw it in action. It's really funny watching a Totem on 1 hp trying to reignite itself. Other than that it's useless and a waste of space.