[New skill idea] Mantra of Might

Core concept: turn Sweep into Flameblast.

Numbers subject to tweaking.

Mantra of Might
Red gem. Tags: Spell, AoE, Duration
Cast time: 0.2 sec (same as Flameblast)
Mana cost: 4-7 (+1 mana at glvls 5, 13 and 21)
AoE Radius: 20 (same as Cleave)
Quality bonus: 1% increased Cast Speed

Channels energy into you and nearby allies, temporarily reducing Damage taken. Using any other skill dispels this buff for that character, but grants Melee Skills more Damage and Area of Effect for a very short time. Each time you channel this, another stack of the buff is added and durations of previous defensive stacks are refreshed.

Base duration is 1.2 seconds
Base secondary duration is 0.2 sec
1% reduced Damage taken per stack
(40-60)% more Melee Damage per stack (glvl 1-21)
(10-15)% more Area of Effect with Melee Skills per stack (glvl 1-21)
Maximum 10 stacks

Cast-speed based attackers?
That's some pretty weird shit, but I kinda like it as a "spellblade" concept.
Crown of Eyes + Witch/Shadow tree super-synergy.

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The defensive qualities don't seem particularly abusive since it runs out quickly. More importantly, it requires the player to be stationary, which is way more deadly than nearly any amount of reduced damage it provides.

Offensively, to be interesting it would need to give you slightly more damage than spamming your main skill, otherwise what's the point? Since it's cast-speed based, this means that there's some relation where if aspd >> cspd, this is useless, and if cspd >> aspd, attacking without using this first is useless.

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Overall, my concerns about this are purely implementation. If it was an "Attack" that was "casted" using attack speed but did no damage, then it would mesh in a lot more cleanly.

As it stands, my first thought on seeing this is the aforementioned Witch/Shadow tree, getting a boatload of cast speed, linking it up as {MoM + FC + Echo + In.Duration}, and then using Leap Slam or possibly FlickerSplash.

Either would be a room clearer, either would let me get my damage up before actually needing to engage the enemy and put myself at risk.

The 4L seems like a no-brainer, which kinda sucks.

I certainly would never use this as a Sweeper. Those guys don't have to to fuck around and need to be sweeping immediately to stun nearby enemies and leech/life gain on hit or else they're toast.

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pneuma wrote:

Cast-speed based attackers?
That's some pretty weird shit, but I kinda like it as a "spellblade" concept.

Considering we've had Attack Speed casters for quite some time now, I thought it would be "different" but not "weird."

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pneuma wrote:

Offensively, to be interesting it would need to give you slightly more damage than spamming your main skill, otherwise what's the point?.

This here would be the main question - is the whole thing even worth the trouble. Unfortunately, fiddling around and making elaborate setups for your attacks is kinda hard to reward properly in a game where the main goal is destroying thousands of enemies per hour or killing hard bosses, which doesn't exactly have much room for messing around either.

That said, there would be a few interesting ways to use this. The obvious one is Vaal Skills, shepherd in a full screen of trash, do some channeling - instant megadeath, souls back up. The other one, which might not be as effective but could still be interesting are counter skills, channeling the spell for the defense bonus while your counters trigger might appeal to some players.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

Core concept: turn Sweep into Flameblast.

Mantra of Might
Red gem. Tags: Spell, AoE, Duration
Cast time: fast
Mana cost: low
AoE Radius: small
Quality bonus: x% increased Area of Effect

Channels energy into you and nearby allies, temporarily reducing Damage taken. Using any Melee skill dispels this buff for that character, but grants them more Melee Damage and Area of Effect for a short time. Each time you channel this, another stack of the buff is added and durations of previous defensive stacks are refreshed.

Base duration is short
Base secondary duration is very short
x% increased Cast Speed (increases with level)
1% reduced damage taken per stack
x% more Melee Damage per stack (may or may not increase with level)
x% more Area of Effect with Melee Skills per stack (may or may not increase with level)
Maximum x stacks (may or may not increase with level)

Well, the main problem here is that this buff grants reduced damage taken. You should remove it, cause it does nothing good for skill. I explain - if secondary duration will be long enough, caster will abuse it. If it will be quite short, then stacks will often fade before you'll be able to place (boosted) melee attack properly.

Also it might be too powerful for Vaal melee skills, so it will be nerfed to became worthwhile only for them (and being bad for "normal" skills. So, it should NOT work for Vaal skills i think..

If we need a melee skill akin to Flameblast, then it should be a dedicated active skill (just like Flameblast), that can be "channeled" for a certain time to inflict super-hard hit, just like those badass bosses (Vaal, Dominus, Malachai) have. And NOT a self-cast channeled buff.

Added sample durations to OP, because it's not really supposed to be an Inc Duration skill, nor a viable caster option.

I dont know about this- its like an eclectic mix of phase run and sweep lol
not sure howd this work in practice

I do agree with MK3 about reduced damage taken...I think its still abusable by casters. needs to have some way to exclude casters/bow users

Hmm, and how about a support gem instead of this? Let's call it Focus or something.

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Focus

Supported melee skills can be charged by holding the skill button. You can't move while charging but you take reduced damage. The charge will be interrupted by stuns and can also be cancelled by pressing some other skill button.

20% less damage taken
50% chance to ignore interruption
Gain a focus stack every 0,1s of charging, up to the limit of 10
20% more damage and 10% more AoE per focus stack

Eh, I think cast-speed based attackers would be interesting. :(

How short of a duration would we have to go to make it melee usable but not caster usable?

one word: summoner

id love to have such buff for my zombies as a summoner (they use melee attack and get hit pretty often). SRS? why not. heck even skeletons and animated weapons.


for melee.. not with current game pace, game is so hectic that forcing melee to channel and slow down might not be received well. as a party buff? well.. i do not party except for trade but from what i see on the streams/guides - melee players play solo as they slow groups down or barely keep up with all the bow guys

as for the damage and survivability - after today's flask reveal it is quite obvious what are the 2.2 tools for issues in these areas

note: GGG quite effectively removed most +%area quality effects and for a reason. I do not expect them to be back any time soon. +%area quality bonus is mandatory quality. and this is a bad design that GGG moved away from

as for my own take on 'melee only defensive buff' -> Fortify. Effect is dispelled after casting a spell (including CoCS). done