Smoke Mine

Easily one of the worst new skills they've released since Searing Bond. Just absolutely underwhelming in every sense. Every other escape skill in the game is better like charmolipi alluded to above. This is pure, gimmicky garbage that's more for show "hey, look at this cool skill we released it makes you a ninja, Path of Exile is awesome" than for any sort of practical use.

The line of sight requirement is a pain in the a$$.
All other movement skills are used for just that, movement.

I've rarely seen them used offensively, as you can get more dps from something faster.
There was one time I have seen a lightning warp witch, was kind of interesting.

Lightning warp is used mainly to traverse gaps and go through bars, etc.
Same thing applies for leap slam.

Whirling blades is mostly used to "get out quick" and reposition yourself for the fight.

I've never seen people use Shield charge as a movement boost over any other movement gem.
I think the end delay animation is probably the cause of this.

And then there is smoke mine.
It's a great skill. You plan out beforehand where you want to go in terms of escaping. It has a very fast detonation time. I don't think there is a range requirement, which would be great except....... we run into the damn LOS requirement.

It kind of sucks when you expect to count on the skill to work, and die because you broke LOS.
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Now the only rational I can see for limiting the gem to LOS is because of people intentionally using it to "get back to places" faster. And what's wrong with that? You are limited by your run speed and the duration of the gem itself.

It's not like a trap where you can throw it, although it would be fairly interesting.
This limits players to use it beforehand, and plan out an escape.

They can balance this a little bit by adding a large range on the gem, but keep the same duration.
If you cannot traverse to the last placed mine because of long range, you are transported to the next available one; Or it just acts like it does now when you break LOS.

This removes the anxiety of players who are expecting the skill to work, and limits how abusive players can manipulate the mechanics.

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I would rather see the blind effect removed, or at least make it a chance to blind.
I would replace it with a similar effect of phase run, where the player becomes harder to hit for a short duration.

I just tried it out on my dagger/shield shadow and like it. I use double strike, wb, frenzy, endurance charges, tempest shield. I used to use a skeleton totem to provide some distractions on tougher groups. I replaced that with smoke mine with faster cast and increased aoe.

I don't use it as an escape, wb does that, its more a planned offensive move. I drop a mine, curse a group, get close, smoke mine teleport away, and wb back to the pack that is in smoke and attack. Before the smoke goes I drop a mine, wb out, smoke mine tele back in. It's easy to safely curse and enduring cry in between moves. Works better than a skeleton totem.

The LoS is annoying, and it seems like some monsters destroy mines but not sure. It just doesn't work sometimes.

I'd hope you'd do something about LoS in general on many skills. For instance when using leap attack, if the smallest bid of debris is located where you want to land, you just stand there. Similar with placing totems. Couldn't you make it so that the game puts you in a playable area close to where you pointed if debris or a wall is located exactly where you pointed?

Just picked up the gem and started messing around with it.

I might've kept it on my bar it if it weren't for the LOS requirement.


I can see it still being somewhat useful for characters that don't use whirling blades due to not meeting the weapon requirements, and as an alternative way to blind (I use cyclone + blind gem).

But, again, if it weren't for the LOS requirement, I might've used it since I do have an empty slot on my bar. Currently, I'd rather use the slot on my gear for leveling up some other support gem, tho.

Hi

Rory where art thou?

I ain't the only one that see's the LOS being a real issue with this gem. I still think smoke mine tries to fill some big shoes left by phase run. Instead of LOS this gem should've only worked in a set area radius(that way player has the remote mine symbol that mentions it can work), the LOS effect sort of acts like a set radius(yet it doesn't inform player that it is stopping them from remoting the mine properly) this is a horrible mechanic it completely defeats the purpose of remote, might as well have just made it a smoke trap instead.

Although since this is a ninja oriented skill maybe ninja just needs to be more aware of surroundings,sigh...

PS: Phase run I miss you

cheers

Make it usable with increased duration so i can atleast use it for blinding enemies for 7seconds xD

I kinda like it, adds some more creativity to gameplay beyond just clicking LMB and RMB (which most characters/skills boil down to). Although I think it'd be better if it were a thrown trap that exploded almost on impact, this would make it more like a smoke bomb. Hell, maybe create another skill, smoke bomb that did this (perhaps limit it to 1-3 smoke bombs max, rather than the 5 traps available now).

As others have sad, the LOS requirement is bad, the icon should at least grey out if the trap is unusable.

Currently using a ranger with a bow, lvl 32. I use split arrow, fire trap, rain of arrows, burning arrow, poison arrow, projectile weakness, and of course, smoke mine!

It has been great for me so far, it has allowed me to escape fast moving groups, leap attacks, ranged shots and more with a little bit of planning along the way. Nice to get some "free" kiting. I do wish that the LOS was removed and that the trap was given a radius in which it could work...a radius would limit people teleporting across entire maps while allowing for a bit more tactical movement with less "terrain error" along the way. Nontheless, very useful so far.

I think the idea of making this a mine instead of a trap is probably the biggest issue. As a trap you could use it to teleport into a group with an aoe blind, making it a great way to move around from group to group. As a mine, the only real use is retreating, which can be done with normal movement skills anyway without the clunkiness of having to drop it first and then detonate it(and the LoS but even without it'd be annoying to use imo). As a defensive melee range tool, I don't quite get the point over Freeze Mine either, it's redundant. Blind can be applied easily enough in an aoe too by either flametotem+blind or just blind on your main skill(or Bringer of Rain if melee), granted this is a guaranteed proc.

Another way to "fix" this would be to let use link Trap to mines, so you could throw it then detonate to it. That'd probably lead to people throwing freezing mines everywhere though, so I doubt that'd be a viable option.

I assume the intent was to be used as such, run into group of mobs, drop a smoke mine, activate to blind everything to buy time, drop damage mines, detonate them to kill mobs, move to next group with speed buff from smoke mine. Still doesn't add anything to using Freezing mine instead though, which I guess is the main design issue with the skill, it does the same thing but slightly different(and worse). Maybe if it created a static cloud for 7-8seconds that blinded everything in it, but without the move speed thing.

Casting time and detonating time is biggest issue for this skill. İts not fast enough. At higher levels you use it to kite fast mobs but becasu of slow casting, its not effective enough to do the job.