Highest DPS evoker skill in your opinion?

[Zumacrume]

since there is a lack of skill descriptions in game, i was wondering what everyone's opinions on highest dps evoker skill were.

[blood-doll]

mmm depends what you mean by dps
on single target
burst dps might be skullsplitter then hellfire
sustained dps might be tempest maybe arc legion
on multiple targets probably light field and swarm and spectral curse
also you'll get most damage out of your skills by stacking/rotating them so picking one skill because its high dmg isn't really as important as picking out skills that compliment each other..
also status effects are huge in determining dmg (like phase) though you can mod them into any skill pretty well

this (http://forums.hellgatelondon.com/showthread.php?t=78893) thread might have some more of the info you're looking for

you can check out the evoker section of the forum for more info on the skills and people's experiences with them... dmg and dps is always a hot topic

[gr00grams]

Common Blood-Doll you should know this :)

To answer the OP, Firestorm is the highest DPS skill bar none in the evokers arsenal.

It does more damage than any other evoker skill, bar none, no sfx etc need be taken into account.

There are hard hitting skills for sure, flameshards, hellfire, skullsplitter, etc, but the overall damage of firestorm is unmatched, even by tempest.

Nothing will bring an enemy down as fast.

-note, it is offset by its equally massive mana drain, and relatively close proximity of use.

EDIT* I would also like to add that there is a significant amount to disagree with in that link.

The OPs assesment of the fire tree is blatantly wrong. The fire tree overall has the evokers three most damaging spells. Hellfire is almost a one-shot to mobs. Yes, like that OP states, there is a delay, but it still pretty much one shots a mob. Flameshards in a closer proximity is equally as devastating. And firestorm, well read above :) The most powerful pure damage combo I have been able to pull off with any of my 6 evo's with any equipment, have all been in the fire line. HF to flameshards to firestorm the remaining (if any, there usually is not). I have not been able to beat this combo on a pure damage rating.

-note all this derived from NM elite.

Hellfire will/is also a very uber skill in 1.2 with the stacking of fields.

[Mars_Bar]

To answer the OP, Firestorm is the highest DPS skill bar none in the evokers arsenal.

It does more damage than any other evoker skill, bar none, no sfx etc need be taken into account.


only if you use increased use rate gear somewhere. It's very lackluster without it.

Skullsplitter will drop most things far faster when aimed correctly.

Evokers aren't a "dps" sort of class - monsters simply don't have enough health for it to be broken down that simply. Our rate of fire is relatively low, about on par with a sword/shield guardian but with relatively heavy hitting spells.

The thread called "Toilet Paper" that has a list of coefficients would be better to use to judge how much the skills do relative to each other. The coefficient is multiplied by the raw damage number determined by your focus items and mods to determine the spell's damage.

[Bliger]

Boneshards is 0 second time to cast.
This is the highest DPS skill coz it is "per 0".

[gr00grams]

Ok, Let me clarify Mars;

1. Use rate is NOT needed. Firestorm is simply the highest overall damage spell in the evokers arsenal.

-this is standalone. No other skills etc used. On its own.

Using a lv 10 firestorm (+45% damage) will out damage any other evoker skill.

Period.

again, if anyone would like to challenge this statement, I will easily back up my claims.

The character to /w ingame is named 'ph0b0s' or 'fath0m'

The test will use;

2 white same level 'locus' types. - No relics etc.

NO other gear on the evoker at all. - provides the best and cleanest results.
Test will be done on the TC, so that all people interested can freely test, and spec any skill to max that which they wish to compare.

Test will be on either me, or the other player in the pvp map, rating determined by from start to kill. Not on increments, hits, etc. From spell start, to kill.

I do not make claims without a defense, ample research and proven testing, and in no way mean this as a derogatory post. I am just trying to tell the absolute truth.

EDIT* to the above poster - bonshards also has a long cooldown which make it a non competitor. I will also accommodate this skill however, and any other than anyone wishes to compare.

[Mars_Bar]

it goes back to what I was saying about DPS not being a good gauge of Evoker skills.

You're not standing there wailing on something for 5 or 10 minutes like you would in EQ or WoW. Skullsplitter kills almost anything virtually instantaneously, and while Firestorm is very high damage in a short time, it can't compete with Skullsplitter for most things (because SS has a high propensity to single-shot things with sufficient and achievable gear.)

If the increased damage on Firestorm works into the "increased damage" portion of the standard equation, it's even worse for firestorm, as it wouldn't be modifying the coefficient, but instead would be changing the increased damage portion of the equation. This obviously only matters if the Evoker has existing increased damage and elemental damage, but that's in almost every "real world" context.

ex: let's say firestorm's coefficient is 1.
Evoker has 100% increased damage, 100% elemental damage.
combined dual focus Power is 132

if it modifies the coefficient:

(1.45)(132)(2)(2) = 765.6


if it modifies the increased damage portion:

(1)(132)(2.45)(2) = 646.8


the better question to ask (rather than for highest DPS) is:

what skills will allow me to kill things the fastest? - which is what I believe the OP was asking before I broke it down into a semantic argument :P

[gr00grams]

I am not going to go into math or anything. vs. Overall mobs firestorm wins over any skill, all the time.

-note firestorm is not my favorite skill, and I have no bias in this.

We can do it on a basis where skullsplitter would have an equal opportunity.

Basically, the test I illustrated would work.

You can kill me with skullsplitter, and I will record the time taken.
You can then kill me with firestorm, and I will record the time taken.

We can do it vs any particular enemy as well.

Say a gargauntua, as they are a decent amount of hp, or a vortex goliath.
No items but the 2 white foci.

I have tested pretty much everything with evokers on the TC.
I have tested a lvl 10 skullsplitter. I know, that vs mobs, skullsplitter can one shot 'lesser' and mid range enemies.

-I am not disputing its raw damage at all.

I am saying beyond a reasonable doubt, 1v1 to anything, firestorm wins.

If you wanted to say overall the strongest spell in practical use, that would actually be hellfire despite all the comments about it here on the forums.

-it has the highest single hit damage of all spells.

Pound for pound hellfire overall can take stuff down the fastest, followed by, you guessed it, tempest. Skullsplitter ranks in at third.

-the reason for this, is again skullsplitter vs EQUAL lvl mobs can wipeout rooms of lesser-mid range enemies, but lacks vs. the big guys, where as tempest and hellfire remain constant.

-note skull splitter IS one of my favorite skills.

Overall top DPS I could foresee (in practical use) would be hellfire, tempest, skull splitter and spectral curse. This would output the highest amount of sheer damage.

1v1 I will stand by my statement of firestorm.

Again, char names are in the previous post, if you want ingame evidence.
Can you fraps the one shot on shul too plz? -I realize you out lvl it by 18 lvls.

[blood-doll]

sorry groog for not including firestorm
my point i was trying to make (and that you guys made 1000% better)
is that highest dps isn't a simple question. as you guys said the mechanics of skill delivery (correct ranges cooldowns etc) get in the way of comparing their dmg directly and then there's things like what skills lend themselves best to cycling dmg or what skills have the least "waste" dmg (as mars is fond of..) and even if you could agree on a single answer there would still be builds or applications where it wasn't the highest

[gr00grams]

Yeah I know ::

btw was only j/k :P

I still stand by me argument though :D

[Mars_Bar]

okay YouTube kills the quality too much. Just uploading it to filefront, can DL it from there when it's done. Will post the link as soon as it's finished uploading.

http://files.filefront.com/Shulgoth30aavi/;9813152 (http://files.filefront.com/Shulgoth30aavi/;9813152;/fileinfo.html)

[Thor-Stryker]

If your using a valid copy of Windows XP/Vista, you can use movie maker to edit and compress it for free.

[Mars_Bar]

If your using a valid copy of Windows XP/Vista, you can use movie maker to edit and compress it for free.

it tosses an error code saying the codec isn't available on my comp, while media player plays it fine X_x

[Inflorescence]

You might have broken codecs. If you do, maybe you can fix them with "codec tweak tool" (google for a zillion download sites).

Alternatively, maybe you can just use vlc (http://www.videolan.org/).

[Mars_Bar]

about to add a video of me killing Errgoth from start to finish. Vid length is 17 seconds, Errgoth takes about 14-15s from him running into visual range, with nothing precast until he was already prety close.

http://files.filefront.com/Errgoth1avi/;9813532;/f (http://files.filefront.com/Errgoth1avi/;9813532;/fileinfo.html)

or as a DivX

http://files.filefront.com/Errgothdivx/;9813540;/f (http://files.filefront.com/Errgothdivx/;9813540;/fileinfo.html)

[Marshal]

about to add a video of me killing Errgoth from start to finish. Vid length is 17 seconds, Errgoth takes about 14-15s from him running into visual range, with nothing precast until he was already prety close.


I would almost swear that Ember got in the final shot just before your last
Skull Splitter. :D

[Mars_Bar]

I would almost swear that Ember got in the final shot just before your last
Skull Splitter. :D

hehe that ignite was all him ^_^

Ember is a rockin' little dude ^_-

at least MosquitoNoob was somewhat right - there are people that can drop errgoth from 3/4 to dead in 12 seconds or less!

[gr00grams]

I have tried this exact spec on TC in elite, to see if that is where the discrepancy is, and yes, you cannot kill them this fast in elite, using said skills.

I watched your shuld vid, and was indeed impressed, so I tried it, (mass phase+10 SS) and no, I could not pull this off using likewise equipment to what was posted elsewhere.

Same fore Errgoth, it was not possible to waste him in that little timeframe.

However, the MM buddy in me guild took him down in about 10 seconds with me grouped with him.... :/

Just notes on the diff btwn normal and elite. It would appear enemies are a lot stronger in elite than I give them credit for...

Not that I have troubles, but no I am not one shotting things.


EDIT* also Mars, while I am certainly no fan, you should really think about what 'mosquito-noob' thinks. He is NOT off the mark. It may not be OP, but its pretty close, and he is in elite... I can only imagine it in normal.

[Mars_Bar]

EDIT* also Mars, while I am certainly no fan, you should really think about what 'mosquito-noob' thinks. He is NOT off the mark. It may not be OP, but its pretty close, and he is in elite... I can only imagine it in normal.

he's completely off the mark. People load up on SFX mods and refrain from much +damage, and wonder why they do crappy damage.

In my current setup (farming, what I was wearing in the Errgoth video) I'm doing about 5.2 times what an Evoker with two 112 power focuses with 0 damage on them does. If you include phasing, I'm doing 5.2/1.5 - or about 3.5 times what they're doing. If you include the fact that I can phase stuff from my setup, you're looking at 7.8/1.5 or about 5 times the damage still (presuming phase is tagged on the end of the equation, which informally, it does appear to do.)

All he was doing was inflaming the masses about an already stated bugged with Tempest/AL (probably LF too) all proccing 10x as much as they're supposed to - the devs are already on top of that bug.

He really doesn't know what the heck he's talking about for the most part, and if we ever PvP'd, I could kill him with a non-crit, non-phase spectral lash in less than 3 seconds. He'd *have* to stun me and lock me, or die every single time.

[gr00grams]

Another note, in the errgoth vid... you used the skill I said was best :D

Anyway, been testing more errgoth, it takes significantly waaay more than shown in the video to down him in elite, yes, using %dmg relics, lvl 10/10 SS.

And if you do see his build, I gaurantee you would be impressed with the freaky deaky ability to proc status.

I realize you do great damage, and thats the proper way to go for the bone tree, if you really read in the lines of what he is doing, you will see.

He was right, tempest is a turret. He later noted that firestorm also can attain this, but what he is doing is similar to a MM, in rate of fire, procing ALL sfx at once. Trust me, he is not 'way off any mark' - I have seen it with my oen eyes, in elite.

I realize he presented his case poorly, however I am not so niave to refuse a method because of his presentation.

It seems we all have our methods of whats best, and are very resistant to new outlandish ideas.

Like, while you do massive damage, he can throw a SS that procs all 4 sfx at once, and sfx > dmg in elite at later lvls. -basically phase/ignite.

-I only have alot of damage on my firevoker and somewhat spectral, as they already have inherent abilities to proc the better sfx vs the game.

I have also PvP'd him, and he DOES ignite/stunlock/phase all at once -you may be surprised.

Again, I am no fan, but I can verify without bias things with my own eyes. I would very much like to see a fraps of you two pvp, that would have my undivided attention.

EDIT* It may be toned down when the lightning tree's sfx is toned down. I imagine it will. All errgoth kills were using a lvl 10/10 SS ONLY. -takes alot on elite, lost count over 20, as was having to kite like a mofo.

[Mars_Bar]

I used Firestorm because I have a use rate item and needed something to do inbetween. I didn't cast a lightning field twice - which i should have - and instead needlessly casted Demonspine twice.

What I'm arguing about is you're making a blanket statement on a "best DPS skill" when the reality is that what you should use is entirely situational.

You should note how little damage Firestorm did relative to Skullsplitter in the same time span, btw, not that I used it.

[macarius]

at least MosquitoNoob was somewhat right - there are people that can drop errgoth from 3/4 to dead in 12 seconds or less!

That was however for max level NME.

I'm unconvinced an Evoker can currently do this in 12 seconds, that is 75% Health to dead.

Perhaps when the Field stacking goes live, we might have a better chance with 2 slipnaughts fully modded for +damage/+damage to demons.

I'll try to find out what's in GIAFU's gun, but I'm pretty sure he's not using strictly +damage to demons



Same fore Errgoth, it was not possible to waste him in that little timeframe.

However, the MM buddy in me guild took him down in about 10 seconds with me grouped with him.... :/

And this is something I hope blood-doll can pry from the devs information wise.

I don't have a problem if this is the discrepancy they intended between the MM and the Evoker, but:


Mr. Hu asserts Evokers are currently the highest consistent DPS
MMs even on TC still take down bosses and mobs faster
MM uses power for mobile use beacon/multi-beacon - but still does amazing damage using no power and top-end guns, while Evoker still expends power for slower killing speed - which leaves me confused.


The only thing I can think of is that Evokers are doing more "DPS" being counted through AoEs.

That is to say my Guards fully nano'd Edge of Abaddon can technically do more DPS if he's fighting a pack of 20 mobs at once all taking splash damage vs. using his Hikida's.

This might be the difference between the two with the Evoker being the splash weapon and the MM being the direct weapon.

(Note: I tend to prefer the Hikida's as a mob that is dead is not hitting me, which is better than slowly whittling down the whole group at once, imo)



Edit: Wow, what can I say? I just saw the newest changes to 1.2 on TC, with massive reductions to the Beacon/Multi-Beacon skills.

It doesn't answer why certain statements were made prior, but things are going to look different after the upcoming patch. I'll leave the rest of the post unchanged from before seeing the info posted by RyanV however.





Just notes on the diff btwn normal and elite. It would appear enemies are a lot stronger in elite than I give them credit for...

Yeah significantly.




He was right, tempest is a turret. He later noted that firestorm also can attain this, but what he is doing is similar to a MM, in rate of fire, procing ALL sfx at once. Trust me, he is not 'way off any mark' - I have seen it with my oen eyes, in elite.

It's way off the mark because of the conclusions he arrived at:

Tempest is an immobile, med range turret that strikes at random (like when you get to the wurm and your Tempest is busy shooting maggots when you want it to shoot the Wurm).

It roots you to the spot.

It has a fairly long cooldown.

It has one of the weakest/least useful base elemental efects.

Firestorm is the closest approximation to MM high RoF guns (and I'd love to know how many shots per minute it actually has), however it's range is significantly shorter than guns like Hu's and sucks down an entire globe of power when you use it.

How does it compare? It's a tough call, on the one hand we can stack FS with other spells for more damage, on the other hand that costs us even more Power.




What I'm arguing about is you're making a blanket statement on a "best DPS skill" when the reality is that what you should use is entirely situational.


Our skills are situational, which limits them.

Because to achieve our highest DPS potential, you must be able to stack all of the skills in your arsenal at once.

So situations that prevent that, generally reduce our dps capabilities.

And that's why I've chosen the skills I have for my current Evoker, I wanted as many skills that I can use in most situations all at the same time.

And why I avoided skills that tend to be used on their own, or whose ranges and targetting/hit mechanics are not synnergistic with the rest of my build.

There are a few other skills I think would go great with my build, but they were impossible to fit in due to pre-reqs (skills that did not fit/I had no need for and would go unused - resulting in wasted skill points).

[Mars_Bar]

That was however for max level NME.

I'm unconvinced an Evoker can currently do this in 12 seconds, that is 75% Health to dead.


I watched the video. Errgoth looked like he was around 60-65% to me, but it's a bit hard to tell. If my elite evoker had even remotely close to the same gear as my normal, I'd try it out and see how long it takes. I could shave my kill time in normal-nm down to about 9-10 seconds if I didn't screw up the kill by casting demonspine twice and misaiming a skullsplitter. Not sure how much more health Errgoth has in NM-Elite than it does in NM-Normal, unfortunately.

[gr00grams]

I can tell you it must be significantly more.

I was using some of the best gear I have, and trust me is damned good.

Using SS alone, took a loooooong time. It was still a near insta gib for the surrounding creatures, but no way on Err.

[macarius]

I watched the video. Errgoth looked like he was around 60-65% to me, but it's a bit hard to tell.

Yeah it is hard to tell.



If my elite evoker had even remotely close to the same gear as my normal, I'd try it out and see how long it takes. I could shave my kill time in normal-nm down to about 9-10 seconds if I didn't screw up the kill by casting demonspine twice and misaiming a skullsplitter.

The best part about you doing that would be...

It wouldn't be Tempest the skill that was talked about, rather Skullsplitter.

At which point, no one capable of coherent thought would call Skullsplitter overpowered due to the way the targetting works.



Not sure how much more health Errgoth has in NM-Elite than it does in NM-Normal, unfortunately.

I don't know, I haven't played on normal in so long it's but a distant memory.

I'm going with the rough estimate of "massive truckload".


Sure wish we could convince you to come join us on elite one of these days ;)

I know you're thinking of going directly to HCE, and while that's the pinnacle of challenge in this game - Elite is a lot of fun without the fear of death looming over you. :p (It also puts skills and builds to the test, which will help for the translation to HCE if one were so inclined).

[Mars_Bar]

I know you're thinking of going directly to HCE, and while that's the pinnacle of challenge in this game - Elite is a lot of fun without the fear of death looming over you. :p (It also puts skills and builds to the test, which will help for the translation to HCE if one were so inclined).

nah, I still haven't been able to isolate a system lockup issue I've had, so no HC anything for me. My elite evoker is about 40 or so, but I hate her current skill setup with a mad passion so I might wait for the next skill retrainer set to play her again.

[macarius]

nah, I still haven't been able to isolate a system lockup issue I've had, so no HC anything for me. My elite evoker is about 40 or so, but I hate her current skill setup with a mad passion so I might wait for the next skill retrainer set to play her again.

Hey anytime you want to start up a new Evoker and get some powerlevelling, feel free to get a hold of me. ;)