Barrage

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Manfred_von_Wolfstein wrote:

By itself as a standalone attack, there are probably better options, but I can see this skill being absolutely incredible with a CoC gem added.

I'm actually planning on trying out a crit-centric dual-wand Barrage Shadow as soon as the next set of leagues is up.

Barrage/Chain/Cast on Crit/Cold Snap/Power Charge on Crit/Increased Critical Strikes. Leave off the PCoC and ICS for earlier, non-6L builds. Critical Weakness to support. Combined with a few critical chance nodes and the wand's naturally high crit chance, I suspect this'll turn out to be a monster combination. Grab cold damage/freeze duration nodes in the Witch tree for even better results. Critical Cold Snaps are pretty respectable in the damage department and, as much as they'll be going off (Steady income of power charges ensures CS gets to bypass its cooldown a lot), I'll be able to lock down entire mobs while I nuke them with cold damage.

This combination's biggest shortfall, I predict, will be damage output against powerful single targets (i.e. bosses), so to fix that I'm going to have Ice Spear and Increased Critical Damage on-hand to swap with Cold Snap and Chain especially for those occasions.

I think it's going to work out just fine. ;)

Barrage by itself? Not so impressive. Barrage supported by the right gems? Potentially devastating.

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Aimeryan wrote:

@Manfred_von_Wolfstein, sidtherat

The issue here is the power charge on crit gem - it only gives a charge per attack/spell that crits (extra projectiles that crit do not count). On the other hand, the CoC gem will cast per crit (extra projectiles that crit do count).

With chain, a barrage that crits will throw out potentially six cold snaps per attack while only generating one power charge itself. The cold snaps can generate a power charge, but only if they crit - so, even if the majority of those crit, you will likely be at zero power charges afterwards (and some of the cold snaps might not be able to cast if the earlier ones did not crit).

You could solve this with Voll's Protector, which gives a charge per crit, rather than per attack (that crits).

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sidtherat wrote:

weakness of this is accuracy

you need enough accuracy to 'hit' and then 'roll crit'. evasion dips into your crit chance TWICE. it applies to mobs too.

my wander has around 85% crit power siphon chance and barrage with CoCS was not that impressive. ofc it all changes when you get crown of eyes (another broken unique)

also - eating power charges dips into crit chance (you cannot seriously play a crit wander without 6+ power charges up).

but, what stops me from checking this idea out..

EDIT: tested (briefly) with crit wand, ele, prolif, burn/shock wander tree

used tabula rasa. issue: you eat PCs faster than you generate them and 7PC make a huge part of my crit chance. cold snap dmg is probably ok (i used lvl12 just to see how it procs) but frequency is low due to no PCs->low crit

and barrage misses so many 'bolts' that effectiveness is not that great

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Aimeryan wrote:

@Manfred_von_Wolfstein, sidtherat

The issue here is the power charge on crit gem - it only gives a charge per attack/spell that crits (extra projectiles that crit do not count). On the other hand, the CoC gem will cast per crit (extra projectiles that crit do count).

With chain, a barrage that crits will throw out potentially six cold snaps per attack while only generating one power charge itself. The cold snaps can generate a power charge, but only if they crit - so, even if the majority of those crit, you will likely be at zero power charges afterwards (and some of the cold snaps might not be able to cast if the earlier ones did not crit).

You could solve this with Voll's Protector, which gives a charge per crit, rather than per attack (that crits).

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leighferon wrote:

in its current form it needs flat accuracy buff and 1 chain integrated into the skill. either that or they need to make accuracy version of tempest shield.

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leighferon wrote:

in its current form it needs flat accuracy buff and 1 chain integrated into the skill. either that or they need to make accuracy version of tempest shield.