Return of Reckoning

This is a reflection on DoT abilities (specially stackable ones) across classes, and a suggestion.


One cannot help but notice that some classes have core abilities that are only used, if at all, as fillers or debuff masks for other abilities, while some other classes have very similar abilities and they are actually significant and ever-present in their rotations. This is specially noticeable with stackable DoT abilities.

WE’s envenomed blade, WH’s fervor, frequently don't even feature in many players' rotations. Mara’s rend (I might be mistaken though, I don't main mara) is used as debuff mask or only 1 stack in the rotation. If a KotBS spams blazing blade it’s probably because they have no better options to flesh out their damage rotation. Some of these abilities have been buffed at some point (WE/WH stackables having their DoT ticks deal non-physical damage, rend damage being buffed iirc), and yet, they are still very underwhelming and barely used abilities.

Why is that? The nature of melee fighting, where you need to apply your damage in a very short window of time before ranged fry you from afar or the zerg closes in on you, doesn’t really allow for building up 3 stacks of an unremarkable DoT. In the case of KotBs, again, they don’t have many other options, and tanks can afford to stay much longer in close combat.

On the other hand, battlefields are quickly filled with x3 broadhead arrow stacks, for example. One, because it now deals considerable damage (which is good, SW DoTs were not impressive), and two because, as a ranged class, you can afford to spam stackable (and normal) DoTs on multiple targets and keep them up for a long time from the relative safety of keep walls or the backlines of your army.

What I’m trying to say is that DoTs in general are more suited to a ranged playstyle, where they constitute the bread and butter of dps Ams, shamans, engies and magi, whereas for melee classes the productivity of this type of damage is more limited, and harder to take advantage of, especially in the case of DoTs that need to be stacked using up 3 gcds.

When it comes to melee, the most (perhaps the only) efficient DoTs damagewise are those that pack A LOT of punch in ONE application (see Burn Away Lies, for example). Stackable DoTs are in a sorry state for melee classes.

This is not the right subforum to make a suggestion, but first I'd like to get some feedback from people reading it before posting it in the proper forum.

So, my suggestion would be to change melee stackable DoTs to not need to be stacked (apply the full x3damage in one hit), or else make them 1-application soft-hitting DoTs with some debuff or additional effect on them to make up for the lack of damage, à la Wracking Pains or Wave of Mutilation.

The disparity of DOT abilities usage in ranged/melee is probably caused by the fact that ranged classes have more time/opportunity to apply dots, while in melee you most of the time (if not 1v1 duel) need to bring as much burst as possible. Different situation is in ranked when you first apply dots and then dmg abilities to have as much burst as possible, because most of the time kite and time are not considered limiting factors

*laughs in IB*

At one point Burn Away Lies was uncleansable, so it was reliable, now it can be cleansed. Similarly at one point Fervor/EB were cleansed 1 layer of DoT at a time - but now 1 cleanse removes the whole stack. So you end up getting more reliable dmg output from pure AW/Torment spam in case there is a healer using cleanse around.
They would have to buff the PSM of some of the "core" melee class DOTs a lot (like WL got their DOTs buffed, see Shattering Blow), to make them really worth using in normal combat rotations.
Though I still use Wracking Pains on WE, hoping I get the toughness debuff applied or that if target flees, the DOT might still finish them off. Similarly EB is still ok for masking the healdebuff from cleanse, or if I know I am not at rear (AW spam loses effectiveness) and the chance of target being cleansed from 20 debuffs is low.

Would not want them overbuffed, but 10-30% dmg increase from slightly increasing the PSM of various mdps/tank DOTs would help a lot.