Is there a video about WD skill runes? I've seen fire spiders and multi-poison dart, is there something else available?
I'm still sticking to my guns. Crimson firebomb, Acid Rain, crimson firebats (snipe!) Grasp of the dead for movement speed, zombie dogs to absorb damage (focuses enemies on them, does a bit of damage, holds for grasp of the dead & 2 aoe, & takes away 10% damage done to you = not a bad use of a skill slot, at all), & spirit walk for life.
Passives = bad medicine (20% less damage to dogs & 30% total less to you while under effects, even if it's for 3s)
Spir attunement (mana is still an issue, & this is still a great passive)
Blood ritual for more mana since you should not be getting hit AS MUCH with this build, or zombie handler or jungle fortitude depending on your gear or how you wanna play.
I will most likely be using blood ritual in groups & zombie handler in solo play.
Templar follower for heal over time & periodic heals + tank when solo.
Gem radiant amethyst in helm, rest of items get + intelligence gems for damage & resistances.
This, in my opinion, is THE BUILD for WD for solo & group PvE.
Acid rain for damage mitigation, firebombs for huge aoe, long-range firebats for enemies outside of your AoE circle or coming toward you. Grasp inside the circle. Spirit walk for ohnoez. Not the worst build imho.
Great for group play with almost any class, especially monk or taunting barbs.
WD is amazing.
This build is wonderful to sit back & cast aoe in a concentrated area on your dogs.
Is there a video about WD skill runes? I've seen fire spiders and multi-poison dart, is there something else available?
I'm still sticking to my guns. Crimson firebomb, Acid Rain, crimson firebats (snipe!) Grasp of the dead for movement speed, zombie dogs to absorb damage (focuses enemies on them, does a bit of damage, holds for grasp of the dead & 2 aoe, & takes away 10% damage done to you = not a bad use of a skill slot, at all), & spirit walk for life.
Passives = bad medicine (20% less damage to dogs & 30% total less to you while under effects, even if it's for 3s)
Spir attunement (mana is still an issue, & this is still a great passive)
Blood ritual for more mana since you should not be getting hit AS MUCH with this build, or zombie handler or jungle fortitude depending on your gear or how you wanna play.
I will most likely be using blood ritual in groups & zombie handler in solo play.
Templar follower for heal over time & periodic heals + tank when solo.
Gem radiant amethyst in helm, rest of items get + intelligence gems for damage & resistances.
This, in my opinion, is THE BUILD for WD for solo & group PvE.
Acid rain for damage mitigation, firebombs for huge aoe, long-range firebats for enemies outside of your AoE circle or coming toward you. Grasp inside the circle. Spirit walk for ohnoez. Not the worst build imho.
Great for group play with almost any class, especially monk or taunting barbs.
WD is amazing.
This build is wonderful to sit back & cast aoe in a concentrated area on your dogs.
acid rain costs too much. firebomb has a small AOE for shit dmg and your signature is fucking BAWS. i <3 you too
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"once the pretty hardcore gamers we had testing inferno found it fairly difficult, we then we doubled it" -trolololol jay wilson
Thanks for the information. The WD is going to be my first character and its nice to find a sensible crowd who at least take in other peoples opinions and not just break out the flames first. With the current opinions of dogs being poor damage (No beta) does that mean going for a massive pet build isnt as vialbe as it could be?
Is mana a problem or are you better stacking for regen? (with teh new patch changes)
Mana isn't a problem with the cheap skills. You get 10 ish mana per level and mana costs don't scale.
The templar regen is too op to pass up though.
Grasp of the dead does DoT, acid rain does damage & DoT, crimson firebomb a regular attack +damage to enemies within 28 yards. Plus zombie dogs.chipping away.
28 yards isn't that small, especially for the damage you get.
You only need to cast acid rain once or twice.
This is all theory, of course.
I hope you're not right about the mana issue, though.. Even with blood ritual & spiritual attunement.
Grasp of the dead does DoT, acid rain does damage & DoT, crimson firebomb a regular attack +damage to enemies within 28 yards. Plus zombie dogs.chipping away.
28 yards isn't that small, especially for the damage you get.
You only need to cast acid rain once or twice.
This is all theory, of course.
I hope you're not right about the mana issue, though.. Even with blood ritual & spiritual attunement.
acid rain still costs too much for the crap dmg it does unless they super nerfed the mana cost. theres so many better skills you could replace it with that would be better.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"once the pretty hardcore gamers we had testing inferno found it fairly difficult, we then we doubled it" -trolololol jay wilson
Grasp of the dead does DoT, acid rain does damage & DoT, crimson firebomb a regular attack +damage to enemies within 28 yards. Plus zombie dogs.chipping away.
28 yards isn't that small, especially for the damage you get.
You only need to cast acid rain once or twice.
This is all theory, of course.
I hope you're not right about the mana issue, though.. Even with blood ritual & spiritual attunement.
acid rain still costs too much for the crap dmg it does unless they super nerfed the mana cost. theres so many better skills you could replace it with that would be better.
It would take 3 Conflag Firebombs to even out the 28 yard damage of a straight Acid Cloud drop, the mana cost between those two given that isn't that different, and Acid Cloud still has its dot component to make it better.
Acid Cloud is good as long as you don't rely on it as a primary attack and instead plan to use it to open up a room with.
Thanks Ellixmaji for the recap, it's very much appreciated.
WD undergo some tweaking and I think if they made a so widespread nerfing maybe it was needed.
Also we lack info on items affixes/suffixes, if they affect skills (increasing damage, reducing cost, reducing CD, etc) they can change our approach to skills.
As things are right now I think some builds will be way less effective than before, but we'll find ways to make them work, as we did before.
On a side note: I've seen people compare non-targetable single target skills (Poison Dart) against targetable single target DoT skills (Haunt) or even non targetable AoE skills (Fire Bomb)....a little comparing may be worth doing but let's not stretch it too far, they are very different skills, each useful in different situations and, most important, each suits a different gamestyle.
What are people talking about?
Crimson Firebomb does 190% dmg as AoE.
Hungry bats hit for 200% wpn dmg, 240% w/ Vermin.
Posion dart still sucks ass. In fact with the huge nerf to Snake to the Face for PvP, i can't even think of a use for it now.
Edit: Dogs suck? LOL!
poison dart actually rules with the first rune. do u have the beta? its quite nice. 210% insta dmg
Its the beta...and runes drastically increase the potency of spells, generally. So of course it does good...but that doesnt meant its still going to be worth using in end game, just slightly more viable. Lots of abilities put up similar numbers and do actual aoe dmg.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
One is never hurt by being given additional choices, only by taking them away. A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
Thanks Ellixmaji for the recap, it's very much appreciated.
WD undergo some tweaking and I think if they made a so widespread nerfing maybe it was needed.
Also we lack info on items affixes/suffixes, if they affect skills (increasing damage, reducing cost, reducing CD, etc) they can change our approach to skills.
As things are right now I think some builds will be way less effective than before, but we'll find ways to make them work, as we did before.
On a side note: I've seen people compare non-targetable single target skills (Poison Dart) against targetable single target DoT skills (Haunt) or even non targetable AoE skills (Fire Bomb)....a little comparing may be worth doing but let's not stretch it too far, they are very different skills, each useful in different situations and, most important, each suits a different gamestyle.
Uhh w/o comparing skills, how do you choose which to pick? Flip coins? Sry, but the people who care about making good builds have to compare skills to theorycraft properly.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
One is never hurt by being given additional choices, only by taking them away. A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
What are people talking about?
Crimson Firebomb does 190% dmg as AoE.
Hungry bats hit for 200% wpn dmg, 240% w/ Vermin.
Posion dart still sucks ass. In fact with the huge nerf to Snake to the Face for PvP, i can't even think of a use for it now.
Edit: Dogs suck? LOL!
poison dart actually rules with the first rune. do u have the beta? its quite nice. 210% insta dmg
Its the beta...and runes drastically increase the potency of spells, generally. So of course it does good...but that doesnt meant its still going to be worth using in end game, just slightly more viable. Lots of abilities put up similar numbers and do actual aoe dmg.
As far as straight damage on demand the only abilities standing up to Poison Dart at the moment is a Vermin/Pierce Crimson Firebats, Zombie Charger, and Spirit Barrage. Two of those abilities cost significantly more than Poison Dart, as far as pure single target damage goes, Poison Dart is now the supreme king.
Thanks Ellixmaji for the recap, it's very much appreciated.
WD undergo some tweaking and I think if they made a so widespread nerfing maybe it was needed.
Also we lack info on items affixes/suffixes, if they affect skills (increasing damage, reducing cost, reducing CD, etc) they can change our approach to skills.
As things are right now I think some builds will be way less effective than before, but we'll find ways to make them work, as we did before.
On a side note: I've seen people compare non-targetable single target skills (Poison Dart) against targetable single target DoT skills (Haunt) or even non targetable AoE skills (Fire Bomb)....a little comparing may be worth doing but let's not stretch it too far, they are very different skills, each useful in different situations and, most important, each suits a different gamestyle.
I feel more like people are trying to find the baseline, the skills that are generally optimal. There will always be builds, especially PvP ones that will use abilities that are not the situational norms because they're looking for specific things, such as favoring Alabaster Haunt over Splinter Dart for the on target click rather than a projectile.
But the nature of the game is that there will be a "Best mana efficient AoE", "Best pure AoE", "Best support DPS", etc, etc. Its taking those elements and trying to make a competent build out of it. And I think that's where a lot of heads start to butt, when someone favors corpse spiders over firebats because their other skills cover up the inherit weaknesses of the skills and make their strengths shine.
What are people talking about?
Crimson Firebomb does 190% dmg as AoE.
Hungry bats hit for 200% wpn dmg, 240% w/ Vermin.
Posion dart still sucks ass. In fact with the huge nerf to Snake to the Face for PvP, i can't even think of a use for it now.
Edit: Dogs suck? LOL!
poison dart actually rules with the first rune. do u have the beta? its quite nice. 210% insta dmg
Its the beta...and runes drastically increase the potency of spells, generally. So of course it does good...but that doesnt meant its still going to be worth using in end game, just slightly more viable. Lots of abilities put up similar numbers and do actual aoe dmg.
As far as straight damage on demand the only abilities standing up to Poison Dart at the moment is a Vermin/Pierce Crimson Firebats, Zombie Charger, and Spirit Barrage. Two of those abilities cost significantly more than Poison Dart, as far as pure single target damage goes, Poison Dart is now the supreme king.
How is it the king again? So many competitors that do competitive or better dmg + AoE, and cost roughly the same..... Ohh and they have a much greater margin of erron in aiming as well.
They made poison dart viable, but its not king of shit.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
One is never hurt by being given additional choices, only by taking them away. A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
What are people talking about?
Crimson Firebomb does 190% dmg as AoE.
Hungry bats hit for 200% wpn dmg, 240% w/ Vermin.
Posion dart still sucks ass. In fact with the huge nerf to Snake to the Face for PvP, i can't even think of a use for it now.
Edit: Dogs suck? LOL!
poison dart actually rules with the first rune. do u have the beta? its quite nice. 210% insta dmg
Its the beta...and runes drastically increase the potency of spells, generally. So of course it does good...but that doesnt meant its still going to be worth using in end game, just slightly more viable. Lots of abilities put up similar numbers and do actual aoe dmg.
As far as straight damage on demand the only abilities standing up to Poison Dart at the moment is a Vermin/Pierce Crimson Firebats, Zombie Charger, and Spirit Barrage. Two of those abilities cost significantly more than Poison Dart, as far as pure single target damage goes, Poison Dart is now the supreme king.
How is it the king again? So many competitors that do competitive or better dmg + AoE, and cost roughly the same..... Ohh and they have a much greater margin of erron in aiming as well.
They made poison dart viable, but its not king of shit.
Take note of how I said "Pure Single Target Damage" which is really indisputable, I don't know what else to tell you bud. Nothing except for Spirit Barrage does more damage in a 1 second duration than Splinter Darts, and Spirit Barrage costs 3x the mana of Splinter Dart and outdamages it by 5%. I really don't see how this is debatable.
What are people talking about?
Crimson Firebomb does 190% dmg as AoE.
Hungry bats hit for 200% wpn dmg, 240% w/ Vermin.
Posion dart still sucks ass. In fact with the huge nerf to Snake to the Face for PvP, i can't even think of a use for it now.
Edit: Dogs suck? LOL!
poison dart actually rules with the first rune. do u have the beta? its quite nice. 210% insta dmg
Its the beta...and runes drastically increase the potency of spells, generally. So of course it does good...but that doesnt meant its still going to be worth using in end game, just slightly more viable. Lots of abilities put up similar numbers and do actual aoe dmg.
As far as straight damage on demand the only abilities standing up to Poison Dart at the moment is a Vermin/Pierce Crimson Firebats, Zombie Charger, and Spirit Barrage. Two of those abilities cost significantly more than Poison Dart, as far as pure single target damage goes, Poison Dart is now the supreme king.
How is it the king again? So many competitors that do competitive or better dmg + AoE, and cost roughly the same..... Ohh and they have a much greater margin of erron in aiming as well.
They made poison dart viable, but its not king of shit.
Take note of how I said "Pure Single Target Damage" which is really indisputable, I don't know what else to tell you bud. Nothing except for Spirit Barrage does more damage in a 1 second duration than Splinter Darts, and Spirit Barrage costs 3x the mana of Splinter Dart and outdamages it by 5%. I really don't see how this is debatable.
Splinter Darts is the Boss Killer spam of choice.
Well Idk what to tell you, but you are dead wrong....heck even you said so.
Zombie Charger, Hungry Bats(+Passive) both do more Pure Single Target Dmg than posion dart, and have significant advantages. Haunt is 500% wpn dmg for 1 GCD, though you cant spam it.
I could prob find more if I tried, but I dont have all the updated info either.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
One is never hurt by being given additional choices, only by taking them away. A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
What are people talking about?
Crimson Firebomb does 190% dmg as AoE.
Hungry bats hit for 200% wpn dmg, 240% w/ Vermin.
Posion dart still sucks ass. In fact with the huge nerf to Snake to the Face for PvP, i can't even think of a use for it now.
Edit: Dogs suck? LOL!
poison dart actually rules with the first rune. do u have the beta? its quite nice. 210% insta dmg
Its the beta...and runes drastically increase the potency of spells, generally. So of course it does good...but that doesnt meant its still going to be worth using in end game, just slightly more viable. Lots of abilities put up similar numbers and do actual aoe dmg.
As far as straight damage on demand the only abilities standing up to Poison Dart at the moment is a Vermin/Pierce Crimson Firebats, Zombie Charger, and Spirit Barrage. Two of those abilities cost significantly more than Poison Dart, as far as pure single target damage goes, Poison Dart is now the supreme king.
How is it the king again? So many competitors that do competitive or better dmg + AoE, and cost roughly the same..... Ohh and they have a much greater margin of erron in aiming as well.
They made poison dart viable, but its not king of shit.
Take note of how I said "Pure Single Target Damage" which is really indisputable, I don't know what else to tell you bud. Nothing except for Spirit Barrage does more damage in a 1 second duration than Splinter Darts, and Spirit Barrage costs 3x the mana of Splinter Dart and outdamages it by 5%. I really don't see how this is debatable.
Splinter Darts is the Boss Killer spam of choice.
Well Idk what to tell you, but you are dead wrong....heck even you said so.
Zombie Charger, Hungry Bats(+Passive) both do more Pure Single Target Dmg than posion dart, and have significant advantages. Haunt is 500% wpn dmg for 1 GCD, though you cant spam it.
I could prob find more if I tried, but I dont have all the updated info either.
Zombie Charger does less, Haunt does 350% now and its a supportive dps ability not a spam ability, under those circumstances many DoT abilities outdamage Splinter Darts, as they should.
Hungry Bats + Passive can counter Splinter Darts, but so could Splinter Darts + Passive put it back on top, so only Hungry Bats + Pierce + Vermin can actually full outdamage Splinter and you're giving up 2 passives to pull it off, nevermind the fact we don't know how it actually functions unfortunately.
I'm not sure why you're so adamant about Splinter Darts being bad, especially when you're using out-dated information in your arguements.
Uhh w/o comparing skills, how do you choose which to pick? Flip coins? Sry, but the people who care about making good builds have to compare skills to theorycraft properly.
Right, so tell me how comparing skills outside of a build is properly theorycrafting?
I wrote: "a little comparing may be worth doing but let's not stretch it too far, they are very different skills, each useful in different situations and, most important, each suits a different gamestyle."
I just wanted to point out that comparing single skills is useful to evaluate their efficiency but to understand how useful a skill will be in a build you have to do a more complete evaluation.
Sorry if my previous post was not clear, hope my position is more comprehensible now.
@Ellixmaji
Agree on what people is trying to figure, I just wanted to point out that there is not a "best solution" without a context nor a solution that suits each different gamestyle. Hope this time I expressed myself better
On one hand, it sounds like they are nerfing the free-spell build HARD. Personally, I think that the 'free spell' build (mainly stuff in the old Spirit tree and Gold-runed Poison Dart, etc) was really cool. It had clear strengths and weaknesses (the former being unlimited spells, but the latter being reduced damage and crowd-control compared to other builds).
Now it feels like they're nipping it in the bud by reducing the amount of mana returned from Golden Runes (or their new equivalent) and even changing the WD's masteries to be less effective at restoring mana.
And on the other hand, they do something as wacky as making Plague of Toads cost NO MANA with a particular rune? o_0 That has to be a typo - it seems so bizarre to restrict the 'free-cast' quality to just ONE spell in the WD's arsenal.
I'm really keen on playing a pet-less Witch Doctor. I know that I'll never compete with a Wizard in terms of raw damage output, but these nerfs are saddening as I'm wondering how viable a petless, vermin-based build is going to be now :S. I saw myself struggling with mana before, but with these nerfs to mana recovery, it looks like I'm going to need to wait for my mana to recharge every 8 seconds or something.
In any case, thanks for your work putting this list together! I was looking for something just like it!
I'm still sticking to my guns. Crimson firebomb, Acid Rain, crimson firebats (snipe!) Grasp of the dead for movement speed, zombie dogs to absorb damage (focuses enemies on them, does a bit of damage, holds for grasp of the dead & 2 aoe, & takes away 10% damage done to you = not a bad use of a skill slot, at all), & spirit walk for life.
Passives = bad medicine (20% less damage to dogs & 30% total less to you while under effects, even if it's for 3s)
Spir attunement (mana is still an issue, & this is still a great passive)
Blood ritual for more mana since you should not be getting hit AS MUCH with this build, or zombie handler or jungle fortitude depending on your gear or how you wanna play.
I will most likely be using blood ritual in groups & zombie handler in solo play.
Templar follower for heal over time & periodic heals + tank when solo.
Gem radiant amethyst in helm, rest of items get + intelligence gems for damage & resistances.
This, in my opinion, is THE BUILD for WD for solo & group PvE.
Acid rain for damage mitigation, firebombs for huge aoe, long-range firebats for enemies outside of your AoE circle or coming toward you. Grasp inside the circle. Spirit walk for ohnoez. Not the worst build imho.
Great for group play with almost any class, especially monk or taunting barbs.
WD is amazing.
This build is wonderful to sit back & cast aoe in a concentrated area on your dogs.
Yeah, & you're really bright.
acid rain costs too much. firebomb has a small AOE for shit dmg and your signature is fucking BAWS. i <3 you too
The templar regen is too op to pass up though.
28 yards isn't that small, especially for the damage you get.
You only need to cast acid rain once or twice.
This is all theory, of course.
I hope you're not right about the mana issue, though.. Even with blood ritual & spiritual attunement.
Yeah, & you're really bright.
acid rain still costs too much for the crap dmg it does unless they super nerfed the mana cost. theres so many better skills you could replace it with that would be better.
It would take 3 Conflag Firebombs to even out the 28 yard damage of a straight Acid Cloud drop, the mana cost between those two given that isn't that different, and Acid Cloud still has its dot component to make it better.
Acid Cloud is good as long as you don't rely on it as a primary attack and instead plan to use it to open up a room with.
THIS... This is very and I mean very very nice change !!!
WD undergo some tweaking and I think if they made a so widespread nerfing maybe it was needed.
Also we lack info on items affixes/suffixes, if they affect skills (increasing damage, reducing cost, reducing CD, etc) they can change our approach to skills.
As things are right now I think some builds will be way less effective than before, but we'll find ways to make them work, as we did before.
On a side note: I've seen people compare non-targetable single target skills (Poison Dart) against targetable single target DoT skills (Haunt) or even non targetable AoE skills (Fire Bomb)....a little comparing may be worth doing but let's not stretch it too far, they are very different skills, each useful in different situations and, most important, each suits a different gamestyle.
A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
Uhh w/o comparing skills, how do you choose which to pick? Flip coins? Sry, but the people who care about making good builds have to compare skills to theorycraft properly.
A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
As far as straight damage on demand the only abilities standing up to Poison Dart at the moment is a Vermin/Pierce Crimson Firebats, Zombie Charger, and Spirit Barrage. Two of those abilities cost significantly more than Poison Dart, as far as pure single target damage goes, Poison Dart is now the supreme king.
I feel more like people are trying to find the baseline, the skills that are generally optimal. There will always be builds, especially PvP ones that will use abilities that are not the situational norms because they're looking for specific things, such as favoring Alabaster Haunt over Splinter Dart for the on target click rather than a projectile.
But the nature of the game is that there will be a "Best mana efficient AoE", "Best pure AoE", "Best support DPS", etc, etc. Its taking those elements and trying to make a competent build out of it. And I think that's where a lot of heads start to butt, when someone favors corpse spiders over firebats because their other skills cover up the inherit weaknesses of the skills and make their strengths shine.
How is it the king again? So many competitors that do competitive or better dmg + AoE, and cost roughly the same..... Ohh and they have a much greater margin of erron in aiming as well.
They made poison dart viable, but its not king of shit.
A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
Take note of how I said "Pure Single Target Damage" which is really indisputable, I don't know what else to tell you bud. Nothing except for Spirit Barrage does more damage in a 1 second duration than Splinter Darts, and Spirit Barrage costs 3x the mana of Splinter Dart and outdamages it by 5%. I really don't see how this is debatable.
Splinter Darts is the Boss Killer spam of choice.
Well Idk what to tell you, but you are dead wrong....heck even you said so.
Zombie Charger, Hungry Bats(+Passive) both do more Pure Single Target Dmg than posion dart, and have significant advantages. Haunt is 500% wpn dmg for 1 GCD, though you cant spam it.
I could prob find more if I tried, but I dont have all the updated info either.
A QUADRILLION MAGIC FIND is worthless if you can't kill shit!
Zombie Charger does less, Haunt does 350% now and its a supportive dps ability not a spam ability, under those circumstances many DoT abilities outdamage Splinter Darts, as they should.
Hungry Bats + Passive can counter Splinter Darts, but so could Splinter Darts + Passive put it back on top, so only Hungry Bats + Pierce + Vermin can actually full outdamage Splinter and you're giving up 2 passives to pull it off, nevermind the fact we don't know how it actually functions unfortunately.
I'm not sure why you're so adamant about Splinter Darts being bad, especially when you're using out-dated information in your arguements.
Right, so tell me how comparing skills outside of a build is properly theorycrafting?
I wrote: "a little comparing may be worth doing but let's not stretch it too far, they are very different skills, each useful in different situations and, most important, each suits a different gamestyle."
I just wanted to point out that comparing single skills is useful to evaluate their efficiency but to understand how useful a skill will be in a build you have to do a more complete evaluation.
Sorry if my previous post was not clear, hope my position is more comprehensible now.
@Ellixmaji
Agree on what people is trying to figure, I just wanted to point out that there is not a "best solution" without a context nor a solution that suits each different gamestyle. Hope this time I expressed myself better
On one hand, it sounds like they are nerfing the free-spell build HARD. Personally, I think that the 'free spell' build (mainly stuff in the old Spirit tree and Gold-runed Poison Dart, etc) was really cool. It had clear strengths and weaknesses (the former being unlimited spells, but the latter being reduced damage and crowd-control compared to other builds).
Now it feels like they're nipping it in the bud by reducing the amount of mana returned from Golden Runes (or their new equivalent) and even changing the WD's masteries to be less effective at restoring mana.
And on the other hand, they do something as wacky as making Plague of Toads cost NO MANA with a particular rune? o_0 That has to be a typo - it seems so bizarre to restrict the 'free-cast' quality to just ONE spell in the WD's arsenal.
I'm really keen on playing a pet-less Witch Doctor. I know that I'll never compete with a Wizard in terms of raw damage output, but these nerfs are saddening as I'm wondering how viable a petless, vermin-based build is going to be now :S. I saw myself struggling with mana before, but with these nerfs to mana recovery, it looks like I'm going to need to wait for my mana to recharge every 8 seconds or something.
In any case, thanks for your work putting this list together! I was looking for something just like it!
169% exploding frogs for less mana than poison dart, lawl.