The pull-in mechanic could be a real problem for non-season players, since both Ranslors Folly (energy twister bracers) and obsidian ring will be season only.
Only option left is in-geom with black hole. And I'm not entirely convinced in-geom is really worth wearing if you use only on CD based skill.
Plus in-geom is a sword, so has a bad ap/dmg ratio (too fast).
On the other hand i don't have any other idea of how soloplay could work now. Meteor is terrible on wide spread mobs.
It gives you extreme survivability. Wizzards does not lack the resistances due to high amount of int but they do lack armor. The Ice Armour is way better then Arcane one as bumping armor gives a lot more than bumping resistances.
Armor also reduces all damage, the ranged one as well. Having 6k armor and 10k armor makes huge difference. A lot more than having 1,7k ares and 2,2k ares.
I'm not talking about prismatic armor here. When doing GR's 47+ you're using Force Armor anyway, cause you just can't get enough toughness to mitigate the incoming damage by a decent amount and still have enough damage to clear the rift in time.
Force armor makes you take 3 hits, no matter how big they are.
And about the additional max. AP: you really don't need that. At all. A little ressource management assumed.
About Shoko's Argument: the tactics you describe work perfectly on lower GR's, which are currently still the Top ones in season.
As stated above: when fighting GR 47 or above even one spear or arrow hitting you might be enough to kill you without the support by Force Armor (or a good Eye of Ettlich).
Of course again this goes for softcore. I can't say much about hardcore since i don't play it myself at all.
I suppose i would, yes. But in this case it doesnt even really matter.
Still there's a little flaw in your calculation since CHC doesnt scale linear, but changes it's value depending on how much of it you already have and how much CHD you have. So you can't break it down to 1%CDC = X dps. Anyway the difference this makes is very small and shouldn't change your overall result.
What I'd recommend is: Use whichever you want and just keep farming more hellfires until you get a better one, or something better drops in the meantime (Eye of Ettlich, Immunity Amu, Haunt of Vaxo...)
Imo it may find it's place in HC Wiz setups but doesnt really have a purpose on softcore, since the damage you lose through the SoJ is just too good.
To give the ring some offensive potential you would have to take FN-Bone Chill, which makes you lose Magic Weapon. -20% +33% (non permanent), plus you have to stand in meleerange which makes you lose the Zei's bonus. Another huge downside.
Another problem: With HoA Ice Armor - Crystallize gives you 60% Meleereduction and 60% armor. Still no defense against any ranged attacks though, and ranged attacks are the wizards biggest problem anyhow (archers/speermen etc.). Since this damage is physical the esoteric alteration gem won't help here either.
TL;DR: Gain of toughness and utility vs. huge loss of damage. Nice for chilly farming of low GRifts, not suitable for highend progress in my opinion.
i made the calculation like this... but i don't know if i am right 100%
Based on my stats i have :
Fire Damage with my normal amulet: 4.333.211
Fire Damage with the Hellfire Amulet: 4.168.908 (without the Conflagration Bonus)
Then, i did like this:
1. I put my Hellfire on and i took out the 5%chc from the paragon... the fire damage is now: 3.912.756
2. So basically the 5%chc means: 4.168.908 - 3.912.756 = 256.152
256.152 / 5 = 51.230 per 1%chc
6%chc = 51.230 X 6 = 307.382 (this will be the Conflagration Bonus)
3. Now if i add the 307.382 to 4.168.908 it will be a total of: 4.476.280, this means a difference of 143.079 in the favour of Hellfire, when the Conflagration is on.
Now the question is: Will the Conflagration Bonus, be always on? (using only fire skills, offcourse)
No it's not, since the FB Bonus doesn't trigger Conflagration. Blizzard does, and afaik Hydra does too.
So you don't necissarily have a 100% uptime of it on all trashmobs. But there should be a Blizzard up on Elites at any time and at the RG too, so you got the conflag debuff up where it matters.
53% direct damage buff in class A yes. You're just leaving out everything else there right now.
In this class A there's also the WD's toxin gem, haunt and strongarm bracers. Also the DH's Steady Aim, Cull the Weak, Bane of the Powerful, CA Bonus and Sentry Bonus. Maybe I forget something here but you get the point.
Overall stacking more class A buffs becomes pretty terrible at some point, so yes 14%CC and 100% CD actually beat that extra 53% by far in reality.
Edit: It's 15% IAS on top by the Law.
And about Wizz vs WD? It's always WD. Because of the superior crowd control. Nothing comes close to horrify, when it comes to perma-cc.
Also two more points:
1: WD got the ZDog option, at least in non-season (I know this is a pure seasonal discussion at the moment, but in a few months it will be wizz vs. ZDog). You can't face up against infinite ressource generation and permanent RG stun.
2: Wizard just dies. To procc the HoA you have to get hit. And you don't survive being hit on level 55+. Easy as that. 60% Meleereduction and 60% Armor yay or nay, you just die.
Also you can't weave in blackthornes in the gear setup you posted. One molten pack and you bite the dust. Same goes for electrified exept you take the Xephirian amulet, which let's you lose some damage again.
WD is not mainly there for damage, but for control.
Crusader got: 20 CC, 100 CD, 15% IAS, 20%dmg through shield glare, 10% through toxin gem, 30% through strongarm bracers.
= way more than the wiz can offer.
About pulling: CD is almost the same yes, but Vacuum got a WAY bigger range. Also more important the crus got steed charge - draw and quarter to pull mobs in from further away. Really important for range mobs.
About the stun: stun is just not enough. Even stunned and frozen elites still trigger jailer/thunderstorm/mortar/frozen etc. The WD's fear is the only ability in the game that can prevent those affixes from triggering.
Another problem: Black hole cast breaks the WD's fear effect, making the wizard a danger to the DH's lives.
If you're wearing Rimeheart you should try Frost imo. SInce you have neither Mirrorball nor Frostburn yet I suppose just go with Blizzard - Frozen solid and maybe Magic Missile - Glacial Spike (simply because it has the highest procc coefficient).
I myself went for a fire specc with desintegrate right away and up until now i can farm T4 fluently. Here's my season mage: eu.battle.net/d3/en/profile/Cori-2996/hero/54718255
@soulzek: while your arguement definitely used to be ultimately true before 2.1.2 I wouldnt be so sure it still is. I'm not saying devastator is ahead of a furnace now, but it's definitely not as far behind as it used to be either.
There's a lot more trash in GR's now than there used to be, but only few if any more elites, which makes trash dps a lot more important than it used to be.
In my case on trash
Furnace: 330mio firebird DPS, 119mio hydra DPS
Devastator: 388mio firebird DPS, 148mio hydra DPS (even though i lose the 13% hydra damage from my chest)
So the devastator is 18% better here. Not enough to make it worth using over the superior elite DPS of the furnace of course, but you have to count in my furnace is as close to perfect as can be I suppose. So a perfect devastator is very likely to outperform a slightly worse one, especially if you count in the better ressource management over the rift.
Difference here is that you can easily force a perfect roll on a devastator just by crafting more and more until you have one. Furnace isn't that easy to get.
The reason for my unclear tests on 42-44 was the cindercoat. The lower the GR level is, the more important is RCR because you need to cast more blizzard because you're moving through the rift faster, if the mobs die faster.
The higher the level gets the more unimportant it becomes and the more the superior damage of the funace shows.
It's not bitching, it's just really hard for me to get the keys at all since hardly anyone who doesnt need them for themselves is willing to help. And on top to really have a good comparison you have to hit a good rift too.
I wish i could spend some more time testing but atm it's not possible for me to spend more time ingame than i already do. Stupid real life...
And I wouldnt have asked this question without doing at least some tests for myself beforehand. But there are just too many factors to this for me to overview (trash damage, elite damage, ressource management, toughness changes...)
Up until now I'm at a point where i can take a temporary resume though, which is as following:
Playing with devastator is a lot more relaxed due to the cindercoat. It's just not possible to spam blizzard without it enough to fully cover a stuffed rift room. When I got my shoulders i was really upset about the non-replacable rcr, now i'm kinda happy about it, because even these 8% make it a lot easier to keep my damage up.
Even though it's easier to play with a devastator the furnace is non-questionable stronger, depending a little bit on the rift though.
@phuzion: basically your arguement is correct, nevertheless there are situations where you have huge trashpacks that are just too good to skip, but too slow to kite them to the next elite pack. This goes especially for zombies and unburied, two of the best mob types available. In this case trash DPS is very relevant.
And @dezien: I know how lucky I was with that drop, don't worry.
As GlaDOS always says: continue testing. I will inform you about my results. Thanks for all the input and apologies for eventual butchering of the english grammar, it's not my native language.
0
The pull-in mechanic could be a real problem for non-season players, since both Ranslors Folly (energy twister bracers) and obsidian ring will be season only.
Only option left is in-geom with black hole. And I'm not entirely convinced in-geom is really worth wearing if you use only on CD based skill.
Plus in-geom is a sword, so has a bad ap/dmg ratio (too fast).
On the other hand i don't have any other idea of how soloplay could work now. Meteor is terrible on wide spread mobs.
0
So is it true, that the hydra doesn't benefit from Tal 6pc bonus right now?
Just read it on a forum and can't test it myself, since the PTR is always overloaded when i got time to play.
If this is correct, let's just hope it's a bug and will be fixed before it goes live. Missing Hydra in this Build is a huge loss.
0
Well to sum all this mess up:
HoA in HC: Maybe. Could turn out good.
HoA in SC: Probably not. Damage loss is too big, pure support mage doesnt work either.
0
Yah, sorry that I'm abusing your thread a little bit with further discussion, but this is relevant for softcore too.
0
I'm not talking about prismatic armor here. When doing GR's 47+ you're using Force Armor anyway, cause you just can't get enough toughness to mitigate the incoming damage by a decent amount and still have enough damage to clear the rift in time.
Force armor makes you take 3 hits, no matter how big they are.
And about the additional max. AP: you really don't need that. At all. A little ressource management assumed.
About Shoko's Argument: the tactics you describe work perfectly on lower GR's, which are currently still the Top ones in season.
As stated above: when fighting GR 47 or above even one spear or arrow hitting you might be enough to kill you without the support by Force Armor (or a good Eye of Ettlich).
Of course again this goes for softcore. I can't say much about hardcore since i don't play it myself at all.
0
I suppose i would, yes. But in this case it doesnt even really matter.
Still there's a little flaw in your calculation since CHC doesnt scale linear, but changes it's value depending on how much of it you already have and how much CHD you have. So you can't break it down to 1%CDC = X dps. Anyway the difference this makes is very small and shouldn't change your overall result.
What I'd recommend is: Use whichever you want and just keep farming more hellfires until you get a better one, or something better drops in the meantime (Eye of Ettlich, Immunity Amu, Haunt of Vaxo...)
0
Imo it may find it's place in HC Wiz setups but doesnt really have a purpose on softcore, since the damage you lose through the SoJ is just too good.
To give the ring some offensive potential you would have to take FN-Bone Chill, which makes you lose Magic Weapon. -20% +33% (non permanent), plus you have to stand in meleerange which makes you lose the Zei's bonus. Another huge downside.
Another problem: With HoA Ice Armor - Crystallize gives you 60% Meleereduction and 60% armor. Still no defense against any ranged attacks though, and ranged attacks are the wizards biggest problem anyhow (archers/speermen etc.). Since this damage is physical the esoteric alteration gem won't help here either.
TL;DR: Gain of toughness and utility vs. huge loss of damage. Nice for chilly farming of low GRifts, not suitable for highend progress in my opinion.
0
No it's not, since the FB Bonus doesn't trigger Conflagration. Blizzard does, and afaik Hydra does too.
So you don't necissarily have a 100% uptime of it on all trashmobs. But there should be a Blizzard up on Elites at any time and at the RG too, so you got the conflag debuff up where it matters.
0
53% direct damage buff in class A yes. You're just leaving out everything else there right now.
In this class A there's also the WD's toxin gem, haunt and strongarm bracers. Also the DH's Steady Aim, Cull the Weak, Bane of the Powerful, CA Bonus and Sentry Bonus. Maybe I forget something here but you get the point.
Overall stacking more class A buffs becomes pretty terrible at some point, so yes 14%CC and 100% CD actually beat that extra 53% by far in reality.
Edit: It's 15% IAS on top by the Law.
And about Wizz vs WD? It's always WD. Because of the superior crowd control. Nothing comes close to horrify, when it comes to perma-cc.
Also two more points:
1: WD got the ZDog option, at least in non-season (I know this is a pure seasonal discussion at the moment, but in a few months it will be wizz vs. ZDog). You can't face up against infinite ressource generation and permanent RG stun.
2: Wizard just dies. To procc the HoA you have to get hit. And you don't survive being hit on level 55+. Easy as that. 60% Meleereduction and 60% Armor yay or nay, you just die.
Also you can't weave in blackthornes in the gear setup you posted. One molten pack and you bite the dust. Same goes for electrified exept you take the Xephirian amulet, which let's you lose some damage again.
0
WD is not mainly there for damage, but for control.
Crusader got: 20 CC, 100 CD, 15% IAS, 20%dmg through shield glare, 10% through toxin gem, 30% through strongarm bracers.
= way more than the wiz can offer.
About pulling: CD is almost the same yes, but Vacuum got a WAY bigger range. Also more important the crus got steed charge - draw and quarter to pull mobs in from further away. Really important for range mobs.
About the stun: stun is just not enough. Even stunned and frozen elites still trigger jailer/thunderstorm/mortar/frozen etc. The WD's fear is the only ability in the game that can prevent those affixes from triggering.
Another problem: Black hole cast breaks the WD's fear effect, making the wizard a danger to the DH's lives.
0
Still not viable, because you can't perma CC Elites like the WD can, and you can't pull mobs in as efficiently as the crusader can.
Also the buffs are weaker than the crusader's.
Still no reason to take wizards in GR's. Sad but true.
0
If you're wearing Rimeheart you should try Frost imo. SInce you have neither Mirrorball nor Frostburn yet I suppose just go with Blizzard - Frozen solid and maybe Magic Missile - Glacial Spike (simply because it has the highest procc coefficient).
I myself went for a fire specc with desintegrate right away and up until now i can farm T4 fluently. Here's my season mage: eu.battle.net/d3/en/profile/Cori-2996/hero/54718255
0
@soulzek: while your arguement definitely used to be ultimately true before 2.1.2 I wouldnt be so sure it still is. I'm not saying devastator is ahead of a furnace now, but it's definitely not as far behind as it used to be either.
There's a lot more trash in GR's now than there used to be, but only few if any more elites, which makes trash dps a lot more important than it used to be.
In my case on trash
Furnace: 330mio firebird DPS, 119mio hydra DPS
Devastator: 388mio firebird DPS, 148mio hydra DPS (even though i lose the 13% hydra damage from my chest)
So the devastator is 18% better here. Not enough to make it worth using over the superior elite DPS of the furnace of course, but you have to count in my furnace is as close to perfect as can be I suppose. So a perfect devastator is very likely to outperform a slightly worse one, especially if you count in the better ressource management over the rift.
Difference here is that you can easily force a perfect roll on a devastator just by crafting more and more until you have one. Furnace isn't that easy to get.
0
Additional Information:
The reason for my unclear tests on 42-44 was the cindercoat. The lower the GR level is, the more important is RCR because you need to cast more blizzard because you're moving through the rift faster, if the mobs die faster.
The higher the level gets the more unimportant it becomes and the more the superior damage of the funace shows.
0
It's not bitching, it's just really hard for me to get the keys at all since hardly anyone who doesnt need them for themselves is willing to help. And on top to really have a good comparison you have to hit a good rift too.
I wish i could spend some more time testing but atm it's not possible for me to spend more time ingame than i already do. Stupid real life...
And I wouldnt have asked this question without doing at least some tests for myself beforehand. But there are just too many factors to this for me to overview (trash damage, elite damage, ressource management, toughness changes...)
Up until now I'm at a point where i can take a temporary resume though, which is as following:
Playing with devastator is a lot more relaxed due to the cindercoat. It's just not possible to spam blizzard without it enough to fully cover a stuffed rift room. When I got my shoulders i was really upset about the non-replacable rcr, now i'm kinda happy about it, because even these 8% make it a lot easier to keep my damage up.
Even though it's easier to play with a devastator the furnace is non-questionable stronger, depending a little bit on the rift though.
@phuzion: basically your arguement is correct, nevertheless there are situations where you have huge trashpacks that are just too good to skip, but too slow to kite them to the next elite pack. This goes especially for zombies and unburied, two of the best mob types available. In this case trash DPS is very relevant.
And @dezien: I know how lucky I was with that drop, don't worry.
As GlaDOS always says: continue testing. I will inform you about my results. Thanks for all the input and apologies for eventual butchering of the english grammar, it's not my native language.
Greets
Cori