Updated: I tried Channeling Skills. Why they are bad & what can be done to make them enjoyable.

Coming back to PoE after a long hiatus, I decided to mess around with the mechanics of Channeling Skills and give them a try. In a word: underwhelming!

Incinerate, Lightning Tendrils, Scorching Ray, and Storm Burst are very poor Skills for clearing Maps, that and they have no chance in PvP except maybe Storm Surge whose Range can be scaled, and whose Projectiles can Crit, thereby benefiting from 'On Hit' effects. Okay, yea, so a small percentage of players actually PvP, yet that is beside the point.

Furthermore, the Cast while Channeling Support for Channeling Skills is not only one of the most confusingly worded Skill Gems I have ever seen (leading players to believe it is trying to take the place of Spell Echo), but the Cast while Channeling Support also affects every other Spell Skill that is not considered or categorized as a Channeling Skill, and that should not be happening!

For example, if a Staff rolls the mods '+2 to Level of Socketed Fire Gems' and 'Socketed Gems are Supported by Level 20 Cast While Channeling' (like one of my Shaped Staves did this League), and I place a Skill Gem like Firestorm into the Staff to gain the benefits from the first Fire mod only? Cast While Channeling should not have any affect whatsoever on any socketed Non-Channeling Skills. We should still be able to cast/use our Skills if/when linked to a Cast While Channeling mod on an item.


Cast while Channeling Support feedback:

The Cast while Channeling Support should ignore all Non-Channeling Skills, be it other Skill Gems are linked to the actual Cast while Channeling Support Gem, or other Skill Gems are linked to a Cast while Channeling Support mod through an item (like on a Staff).

The wording of the Cast while Channeling Support should also be revised so as to not lead players to believe it is trying to take the place of Spell Echo. Not only that, the animation of the Cast while Channeling Support does not show a Channeled Skill casting a second time while channeling...

The tooltip wording of the Cast while Channeling Support should be revised from, ""The channelling skill will trigger a spell periodically while channelling." to "The channelling skill will trigger a non-channeling spell periodically while channelling."

Incinerate feedback:

Incinerate used to be Projectile-based with the Keywords: Projectile, AoE, Spell, Lightning, Channeling, just like Storm Surge.

Now Incinerate is the equivalent of a fire version of Lightning Tendrils whose Range/AoE does not scale well at all! In fact, when I add or remove AoE from my character's gear or from the Skill Tree, I see no change in the AoE... It is only when I equip a Concentrated Effect Support that I see changes in AoE. In other words, Incinerates' animation does not visually show AoE scaling properly, and that should be addressed.

The only way Incinerate and Lightning Tendrils in their current game state can get away with their poor Range/AoE scaling is if players were allowed to move while Channeling those two Skills. But no, instead, players using those Skills are forced to be like sitting rocks, stopping and going and stopping and going...

That does not make for an enjoyable gameplay experience for players wanting to use those Skills as main skills. So, instead of Channeling Skills being improved to be more enjoyable (from what I have seen), they have either remained unchanged or they have been nerfed to oblivion so as to no longer be enjoyable anymore.

And then there are players in the community who say, "Oh, well, some Skills are meant to be swapped out for others; one Skill for clearing, and one Skill for Bosses." okay, but not when it comes to Channeling Skills the Devs spent so much time on to get their mechanics working properly.

That argument is flawed, because guess what? Players are going to swap out to their more powerful Skill(s) for Bosses, anyway, like they do so... why not improve Channeling Skills so they can perform on their own? instead of requiring players to switch to quicker Skills for Map clearing that, oh, by the way, may also be better overall for Map clearing and Boss killing!

With the aforementioned in mind, do you see the problem there?

Final thoughts on Incinerate: Incinerate can be made better if 1. players are permitted to use and Channel the Skill while moving or 2. Incinerate gets its own 'more Area of Effect for each stage' mod like Reave has to improve its Range/AoE in Mapping for more reach.

And while we are on the subject, if 2. is implemented to improve Incinerate, to make things fair, Reave itself should have a % Increased Damage mod that kicks in per stage ('Increased' Damage, not 'More' Damage, which would be multiplicative and possibly criticized for being overpowered).

Lighting Tendrils feedback:

Just like I suggested regarding Incinerate, Lightning Tendrils should be usable while moving, or, have its own 'more Area of Effect for each stage' mod like Reave has to improve its Range/AoE in Mapping for more reach.

Scorching Ray feedback:

Since Scorching Ray is considered a Spell and not a Projectile, its Range should be scaleable with any and all forms of Cast Speed, just like the Range on Projectiles scale with Increased Projectile Speed modifiers.

Let's make things fair game, eh? Projectiles get to scale with Increased Projectile Speed modifiers, therefore, Skills like Scorching Ray should also benefit from the same thing except from Cast Speed modifiers.

Storm Burst feedback:

Okay, so I do not know what to suggest to make Storm Burst better, except maybe to increase its 'More Area Damage' multiplier mod from 65% to 75%, but what I do not understand is Storm Burst gets to keep its 'Projectile' mechanics, yet Incinerate had its Projectile mechanics removed?

What makes you think Storm Burst cannot also be OP, too, in the right hands?

You know, maybe the decision to remove Incinerates' Projectile mechanics was because of its many 'More Damage' multipliers. If so, the better move would have been to simply adjust the values of those 'More Damage' multipliers while keeping Incinerates' Projectile mechanics intact! By removing Incinerates' Projectile mechanics, your Skills team made the Skill less fun.

The takeaway from this is you want players to enjoy the game, yet the way in which your Skills balance team nerfs or removes certain Skill mechanics is counterintuitive against the goal of getting players more interested and wanting to play. That seems to be the continuous pattern with Skill changes I would like to see changed.

Thank you for looking into this. Hopefully some things change for the better.
HeavyMetalGear

Good read, gj with feedback!

I think all channelings skill could be improved and buffed, as many other skills.

You completely misunderstood cast while channeling. It is intentionally there to cast a _non channeling_ spell while channeling. like curses during incinerate and the like. so of course socketing a normal spell in a staff with cast while channeling will prevent its usage, the same as all other Cast on X gems.

Otherwise, your complaint is not adding much new to the discussion. The sitting duck problem with Channeling Skills is the number 1 complaint.

It seems to me that you want channeling skills to behave like they are not supposed to.
Moving while channeling ? No thank you, no need to push for the clear speed and skills that can do everything and do it good.
It makes much more sense that the character stops and focuses to channel the spell imho.

"

HeavyMetalGear wrote:

Furthermore, the Cast while Channeling Support for Channeling Skills is not only one of the most confusingly worded Skill Gems I have ever seen (leading players to believe it is trying to take the place of Spell Echo), but the Cast while Channeling Support also affects every other Spell Skill that is not considered or categorized as a Channeling Skill, and that should not be happening!

Of course it does, you can only cast non channeling spells while channeling with this gem.
I have no idea how you could confuse it with spell echo, the name only suggests otherwise.

Now, the gem ( or mod ) supporting non channeling skill while not being linked to channeling skill, is a bit of a different matter.
It would be better imo, if when there is no channeling skill in the setup, the gem simply does nothing.

"

HeavyMetalGear wrote:

Not only that, the animation of the Cast while Channeling Support does not show a Channeled Skill casting a second time while channeling...

why would it ?
CwC casts a spell while channeling, obviously not a channeling spell but a normal one ( because otherwise it could potentially create an infinite loop ).
I really have troubles seeing how you got this confused honestly.


PS : if you want to include all channeling skills, you forgot blight.

This is good feedback and I do think channeling skills need some attention. Scorching ray can be good with certain setups - my understanding is it syncs well with RF or ignite builds - but it's definitely better as a single-target skill than for clearing. Lightning tendrils seems incredibly bad for clear; storm burst seems to be used for utility purposes but I'm not entirely sure.

Two quibbles:

1. I actually found incinerate to be a decent map-clear skill with no AoE investment, believe it or not. It clears pretty quick and its natural AoE seems adequate. That char uses firestorm for single-target, which is a far worse clear skill even with AoE setup, so maybe thats why incinerate felt good in comparison. This could just be me, though.

2. You're misunderstanding what cast while channeling does or why its useful. You cast non-channeled skills while channeling another - it has nothing to do with being some kind of spell echo for channeled skills. So, for example, you could channel lightning tendrils and ball lightning will be auto-cast at the same time. I've used it with a dark pact totem build to summon skeletons while channeling wither. But yes, the wording could use some work to clarify this.

I don't know where you're from, but spelling channelling with two Ls is perfectly correct. It might be different in American English (I know both spellings exist and I'm pretty sure two are used in British English, but not much about the use anywhere else).

Scorching Ray is actually popular in PvP precisely because it doesn't hit, since hits can be blocked or dodged.

The Cast while Channelling tooltip clearly says you can't cast supported skills directly. If you want to cast Firestorm in the item you mentioned, link it to a channelling spell and use that instead. Curiously, this will provide you with a considerably faster rate of Firestorms than Spell Echo with no damage penalty, although Spell Cascade won't apply to it.

The tooltip also states it doesn't support a second channelling spell if you were wondering if that didn't work. If you meant something else, I might have misunderstood you on that point.

You do realise that Incinerate has a bonus to AoE and damage with each stage, yes? And that the speed at which it is applied (and thus the time spent standing still) is affected by cast speed? Moreover with the 500% more modifier in the end, it seems much more like Blade Flurry than Lightning Tendrils. The point being that you have to stop to cast other spells as well.
According to a quick calculation, it should have slightly over 2900 dps without support gems on level 20. That seems like a lot to me. I'm starting to want to make a build already.
I also believe that clearing offscreen by stacking projectile speed was simply not the intended use of the skill.

Lightning Tendrils has less than half the unsupported base dps, so I can't argue that much on its behalf.

Projectile range doesn't necessarily scale with projectile speed; only for projectiles that have a lifetime. Cast speed increases the rate at which the DoT is applied, so range also profiting from it would be strange. In that way, it scales similarly to projectile spells whose frequency, not range, is influenced by cast speed. SR only gets 60% of the damage after the first stage, but applies a debuff reducing resistance by up to 24%.

It's imaginable to have the range increase with stages depending on the caster rather than the target (which is where the current stacking of SR applies), but I can't help but think that if that change was made, the zero stack range would be reduced, resulting in worse clear speed realistically.

And wow, a lot of people have replied since I started writing this. I'm so slow on my phone.

"

HeavyMetalGear wrote:

Incinerate, Lightning Tendrils, Scorching Ray, and Storm Burst are very poor Skills for clearing Maps

Cant tell about other skills, but from what I personally tried, incinerate with cwc bodyswap is probably one of the fastest clearing builds in the game. I used ll occultist. After you heat up, you just jump from pack to pack one-shotting everything, generally you dont even need to shield charge, flasks or anything. You just hold one button and clear the map in like 30 seconds? That was even faster then raiders I played (but not faster then poet's pen kinetic blast bodyswap deadeye), not to mention other classes. Cmon man.

"

UlfgardLeo wrote:

You completely misunderstood cast while channeling. It is intentionally there to cast a _non channeling_ spell while channeling. like curses during incinerate and the like. so of course socketing a normal spell in a staff with cast while channeling will prevent its usage, the same as all other Cast on X gems.

Fair enough. I did misunderstand the tooltip of Cast while Channeling. Thank you for pointing that out. I am still trying to catch up with roughly 2 yrs of changes made to the game.

I guess I got confused when I read from the Casting while Channeling tooltip, "The channelling skill will trigger a spell periodically while channelling."

To me I think it should be revised to, "The channelling skill will trigger a non-channeling spell periodically while channelling."

"

UlfgardLeo wrote:

Otherwise, your complaint is not adding much new to the discussion. The sitting duck problem with Channeling Skills is the number 1 complaint.

That is where I strongly disagree with you.

Some of the Channeling Skills, as I explained them in the OP, are underwhelming, and so what I am adding to the discussion regarding Channeling Skills, while it may not necessarily be new, is that Scorching Ray's 'reach' should be scaleable with Casting Speed (like Projectiles are with Projectile Speed), and Incinerate and Lighthning Tendrils, if not to allow players to move while Channeling them, should have its own 'more AoE effect per stage' mod like Reave has.

"

DER_PSYCHOPATH wrote:

And wow, a lot of people have replied since I started writing this. I'm so slow on my phone.

I would not want to type that much on a phone lol.

"

DER_PSYCHOPATH wrote:

I don't know where you're from, but spelling channelling with two Ls is perfectly correct. It might be different in American English (I know both spellings exist and I'm pretty sure two are used in British English, but not much about the use anywhere else).

Yea, I erased that part of my OP : ) It seems 'channelling' is the correct British spelling of the word after doing a little research.

"

DER_PSYCHOPATH wrote:

Scorching Ray is actually popular in PvP precisely because it doesn't hit, since hits can be blocked or dodged.

Yea, I can see where that can be useful in PvP, yet I believe we can all agree that Scorching Ray not being able to scale well (if even scaleable at all) is terrible. That is why I suggest Scorching Ray's 'reach' be scaleable with Casting Speed like Projectiles can scale with Projectile Speed modifiers. Source: https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Projectile#Speed_and_duration

"

DER_PSYCHOPATH wrote:

The Cast while Channelling tooltip clearly says you can't cast supported skills directly. If you want to cast Firestorm in the item you mentioned, link it to a channelling spell and use that instead. Curiously, this will provide you with a considerably faster rate of Firestorms than Spell Echo with no damage penalty, although Spell Cascade won't apply to it.

Yea, I was not catching on to the tooltips wording for some reason, but thank you for making things a bit clearer.

"

DER_PSYCHOPATH wrote:

The tooltip also states it doesn't support a second channelling spell if you were wondering if that didn't work. If you meant something else, I might have misunderstood you on that point.

I never got to wondering that, actually, but that is good to know.

"

DER_PSYCHOPATH wrote:

You do realise that Incinerate has a bonus to AoE and damage with each stage, yes?

I never said in the OP the mod for scaling AoE on Incinerate did not exist, just that Incinerates' AoE mod should be changed to something like Reaves' 'more AoE' mod that scales AoE better.

"

DER_PSYCHOPATH wrote:

And that the speed at which it is applied (and thus the time spent standing still) is affected by cast speed?

Yep, I know that part. I understand more Cast Speed with Incinerate = getting to 8 Stages quicker.

"

DER_PSYCHOPATH wrote:

Moreover with the 500% more modifier in the end, it seems much more like Blade Flurry than Lightning Tendrils. The point being that you have to stop to cast other spells as well.

Well, animation-wise, it looks like it spreads the same way Lightning Tendrils does, so that is more or less what I was referring to.

"

DER_PSYCHOPATH wrote:

According to a quick calculation, it should have slightly over 2900 dps without support gems on level 20. That seems like a lot to me. I'm starting to want to make a build already.
I also believe that clearing offscreen by stacking projectile speed was simply not the intended use of the skill.

I never said in the OP Incinerator did terrible damage, just that its Range/AoE scaling is bad (imho).

"

DER_PSYCHOPATH wrote:

Projectile range doesn't necessarily scale with projectile speed; only for projectiles that have a lifetime. Cast speed increases the rate at which the DoT is applied, so range also profiting from it would be strange. In that way, it scales similarly to projectile spells whose frequency, not range, is influenced by cast speed. SR only gets 60% of the damage after the first stage, but applies a debuff reducing resistance by up to 24%.

Projectile range does scale with projectile speed, meaning the faster a Projectile shoots, the more distance it travels. Source: https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Projectile#Speed_and_duration

"

DER_PSYCHOPATH wrote:

It's imaginable to have the range increase with stages depending on the caster rather than the target (which is where the current stacking of SR applies), but I can't help but think that if that change was made, the zero stack range would be reduced, resulting in worse clear speed realistically.

Since you did not specify, what Skill are you referring to? Scorching Ray, or Incinerate? I specifically stated in the OP that Incinerator's Range/AoE should be scaled through a 'more AoE effect per stage' mod like Reave has and that Scorching Ray's Range should be scaled through Casting Speed, with Casting Speed modifiers also affect Scorching Ray's Cast Time at the same time.