Posts: 621
Threads: 24
Joined: Feb 2003
I'm not asking for the ridiculous 10s of 1000s of damage due to the old bug. However, it seems odd to me, that for a skill which adds around 300-500 damage(the actual number escapes me, it's level 17 Venom), my 1.09 venom-sin(inventory full of various venom charms and 1 small cold charm) is doing MISERABLY in Nightmare. Hell, one quick look at the LCS™, and all I notice is that the damage she's doing with her 6 emerald Long War Bow, is CRAPPED(when Venom is on). According to the weapon itself, it's supposed to do 600 damage over 7 seconds. But due to Venom setting ALL poison durations to 0.4, I found the following calculation:
(600/7)*(4/10)=60/7*4=approximately? 34 damage. What the hell? Basically, the new Venom screws you over unless you have supremely high poison damage per second(frame, whatever).
So it seems to me, that all Venom does now, is compact your regular damage, into those 0.4 seconds(which is really sad, since 0.4 seconds is less than a 1/10th of the duration for even the crappiest charm), forcing you to fire more often, and making venom relatively useless for preventing regeneration(unless facing a singular monster) Someone please smack the idiot who decided to do that. The objective of playing with poison is so that you DON'T have to run around smacking the monsters every few seconds. What kind of idiotic poison hardly hurts the body, and is flushed in less than a second(I'll leave tobacco out of this)?
But I guess it could be summed up in one phrase.
If it ain't broke, don't fix it. The Venom skill itself was fine before 1.10. The only thing that needed fixing was how poison durations stacked instead of averaging.
Posts: 1,246
Threads: 1
Joined: Jun 2003
It's true that the .4 second thing means venom isn't useful as a fire-and-forget kill. However, the fix for the poison bow bug already eliminated that, more or less.
If you can repoison a monster every .4 seconds (10 frames), this short duration isn't a problem. So BF assassins and mêlée assassins don't really mind this restriction.
I think a significant change between 1.09 venom and 1.10 venom is that 1.09 was damage over 2 seconds, while 1.10 is damage over .4 seconds. That means that the damage/second is 5 times as much for the same damage. However, the total damage is also higher in 1.10 than in 1.09, so it's more than 5 times as fast.
The poison rate is equal to the sum of the rates of all your poison sources. So your damage/second while a monster is poisoned is unaffected by the .4 second limit thing.
Because venom has such a very high damage rate, it means that items don't add significantly to it. This means that venom is good, not bad. Also, because it has such a high damage rate, it'd be grossly overpowered if you could extend the duration with items. Venom at level 20 gives 425-445 damage over .4 seconds. If you had a single pestilent small charm of anthrax and the rates added and durations averaged, you'd have something like 6820-7130 damage over 6.2 seconds (rough calculations only). The damage per second is the same as with the .4 second duration, but this way, you can monsters damaged a lot longer, so you just have to make everything green.
Another big change is that venom now works together with fade or BoS. Even the single-point req point in these skills can be significant, so this is a significant boost.
I think the changes to venom are beneficial to most characters that use it, and because of the poison bow bug fix, you wouldn't be having much more success without the venom.
Posts: 114
Threads: 7
Joined: Dec 2003
The truth is in reality much more horrible.
When Venom is one all poison will be reduced to one single frame! All other poison damage from any source will be cropped likewise.
Posts: 1,246
Threads: 1
Joined: Jun 2003
I'd think that, if venom was only lasting 1/10th as long as it should be, and thus dealing only 1/10th its listed damage, that I would have heard about it before or noticed it myself...
Posts: 621
Threads: 24
Joined: Feb 2003
But isn't it the objective of using poison charms to BOOST poison damage? To me, it just sounds pretty ridiculous, that all my charms will now do only 1/12th(or even less!) of their listed damage, just because of Venom. As usual, Blizzard screws over the variants(and yes, a bow-using assassin is very much a variant) Not everybody carries a full inventory of arrows, and yes, I could always go to town for some, or pick up some, etc, but requiring me to stick 10 arrows into one monster just to kill it? That's a bit much. My point here, is that Venom+Poison charms=lugging around dead-weight, since the damage you'll be doing with Venom ON, is about the same, if not WORSE, than with Venom OFF. The damage RATE might be higher, but it makes me think that somebody's been diluting the assassin's poison stock.
Like I said, fix the bow bug, but spread out Venom's damage over the average duration. So instead of 400-500 over 0.4, say the average duration got raised to 4 seconds, it won't do 4000-5000 damage, but just 400-500 over 4 seconds, versus 400-500 over 0.4 seconds. Would this make the poison damage from Venom inconsequential? No. That's still pretty damn potent. It's just that you don't have to become a one-target bower, concentrating your fire over and over again into ONE target, while simultaneously getting pounded by another 30. And yes, I know about CoS, Mind Blast, et al. But just try Mind Blasting when your primary target is in the main crowd. Bye Bye Experience.
Posts: 1,298
Threads: 79
Joined: Feb 2003
03-02-2004, 01:18 PM
(This post was last modified: 03-02-2004, 02:00 PM by ShadowHM.)
AtomicKitKat,Mar 2 2004, 07:55 AM Wrote:Not everybody carries a full inventory of arrows, and yes, I could always go to town for some, or pick up some, etc, but requiring me to stick 10 arrows into one monster just to kill it? Hi
But, but, but.....
That't the way it is for variants ! Rogue Encampment to Worldstone Keep!
(Echoes of Ry Cooder's "That's the way the girls are in Texas" going through my head. B) )
Quote:It's just that you don't have to become a one-target bower, concentrating your fire over and over again into ONE target, while simultaneously getting pounded by another 30.
And that's the way it is for a Sniperâ¢. One target at a time until it goes down. Of course, there is this l'il thing called Pierce that a Sniper⢠tries to achieve, but that, again, is the way of variants. Gear dependency is part of making them work in Hell, in my experience. And yes, Cloak of Shadows is very much a part of the skill set that makes it work too. So is Mind Blast, just enough to make those other monsters NOT pound on fragile little you.
Yes, it is occasionally annoying to find that a play style that you like is no longer easy. But heck, prevailing anyway is such a triumph. :D
Edit: Query for adeyke
I have been assuming that Venom attaches to each Pierced target. Is this the case?
And you may call it righteousness
When civility survives,
But I've had dinner with the Devil and
I know nice from right.
From Dinner with the Devil, by Big Rude Jake
Posts: 1,246
Threads: 1
Joined: Jun 2003
Quote:I have been assuming that Venom attaches to each Pierced target. Is this the case?
Venom doesn't affect monsters. It affects your poison damage. But yes, if you hit several monsters in one shot because of pierce, poison damage does get applied to all of them.
Posts: 1,246
Threads: 1
Joined: Jun 2003
Quote:Like I said, fix the bow bug, but spread out Venom's damage over the average duration. So instead of 400-500 over 0.4, say the average duration got raised to 4 seconds, it won't do 4000-5000 damage, but just 400-500 over 4 seconds, versus 400-500 over 0.4 seconds.
The game internals have no concept of poison "total damage." There's just rate and duration. There's presently no way to scale down the rate as the total duration increases. I expect it would need heavy game code modification.
Posts: 621
Threads: 24
Joined: Feb 2003
Still, it essentially makes all my poison charms worthless. I'm only level 30+, I don't have access to those Blistering Blue Barnacle Charms of Thundering Typhoons dammit! Blizzard's really screwing with low level characters, IMO. Hell, even high levels are getting the shaft, from what I'm hearing.
No wonder I'm switching to Gunbound. At least the high-end stuff is available from the shops, if you have enough skill to get the gold to get them. :P
Posts: 165
Threads: 11
Joined: Nov 2003
the solution still lies in your equpiment
venom still makes you more powerfull... it'sthe charms that become less useful under it.
You need to look for High dammage LOW durration charms. Or just low durration.
The wind has no destination.
Posts: 1,246
Threads: 1
Joined: Jun 2003
The duration of poison items is irrelevant. All that matters is the rate. However, because the rate of venom is so high, other poison sources really don't do much.
Level 20 venom would add 425-445 poison damage over .4 seconds.
While under the influence of venom:
A perfect emerald would add 5.8 damage over .4 seconds.
A Tal rune would add 6.0 damage over .4 seconds.
An Envy jewel would add 4.0 damage over .4 seconds.
A poison Rainbow Facet would add 7.3 damage over .4 seconds (and has +% skill damage and -% enemy resistance, both of which are much more significant).
The poison damage of these are all single-digit, compared to the three digits the venom itself adds.
A pestilent small charm of anthrax would add 15.0 poison damage over .4 seconds. This can be significant, if you have a lot of them. However, considering the rarity of such charms, you don't.
Posts: 621
Threads: 24
Joined: Feb 2003
|
