Why is poison is so not poison at all? And very underwhelming.

[ahoboman]

Poison by its very mechanics feels so out of place and weak. Let me start off by pointing out all of the things that makes poison so messy and all over the place. Upon successful poison, a stacking debuff is applied. This stack can occur an infinite amount of time. The debuff inflicts per seconds, 20% percent of physical and chaos damage of the hit you dealt.The damage duration last two seconds, and can be increase or decrease. Only physical and chaos damage can inflict poison. Now with end game gears and dream items that currency can buy, I am sure you can a make deadly poison build just like any other effective build. But at last we know that this isn't a really scenario for the average up and coming up trying to build.

Anyways back to the point. Poison by its very nature in POE is supposed to be about stacking its debuff and letting the DOT take hold killing the target. Yet this all feels so incohesive. If you increase your physical damage output, what is the point? Even if your skill hit convert x amount into chaos damage, you might as well increase physical damage simply to increase the damage of the actual hit. The DOT portion doesn't even do much because the initial hit is what's going to be what killing the target. Most mobs usually dies in one big strong hit or fast 2 to 3 fast hit? I fail to see why stacking would matter? I tested Viper and Pestilent Strike, both kill the mob before the DOT can even take hold.

The duration is probably the worse part about poison. It only last two seconds? I fail to see why I would even wanna stack poison if it only last only two seconds, and does only little no extra damage. I might as well just focus on the initial hit as my main source of damage? Two second is also to short stack effectively.This means that I must have very fast attack speed or a skill that would guarantee fast hit in successions to stack effectively. Obviously that means give up some damage. Now even if I now hit very Fast. I am back to square one because it is still the melee hit or range throwing that kills the target. Be it just has to hit it a few more times. On boss the damage feels nonexistence, especially if they have shields.

If I stack duration, the poison debuff will now last longer ensuring better stacking. But I be back at square one. Because now I lose both damage and attack speed. And in order for poison to do some extra added damage, its needs damage. But in other for that damage to last longer, it need duration. But in order duration to stack, it needs attack speed for repeatly strike? And if you balance all of this, you still end up killing your target through hits instead and not your poison DOT? On bosses, the DOT is nonexistence because bosses are trying to one shot you and by the time you can really hit the boss again, the poison has runs its course and the DOT is gone? It all just feels so eh... lack luster and underwhelming.

[Astasia]

Like anything in the game you need to specialize in it for it to be effective. Poison is essentially a "more damage" layer that can be boosted quite high if you build around it. Duration can easily reach 6+ seconds and the multiplier can easily reach like 300% MORE damage spread out over that duration. You can hit for 10k and apply a 30k damage poison that lasts 6 seconds for example. That's entirely with normal passives and skill gems, no fancy gear or cluster jewels. Supports like Unbound Ailments boosts both poison damage and duration making it easier to stack while doing lots more damage.

[ahoboman]

Originally posted by Astasia:

Like anything in the game you need to specialize in it for it to be effective. Poison is essentially a "more damage" layer that can be boosted quite high if you build around it. Duration can easily reach 6+ seconds and the multiplier can easily reach like 300% MORE damage spread out over that duration. You can hit for 10k and apply a 30k damage poison that lasts 6 seconds for example. That's entirely with normal passives and skill gems, no fancy gear or cluster jewels. Supports like Unbound Ailments boosts both poison damage and duration making it easier to stack while doing lots more damage.

But compare to other build, poison just feels so underwhelming. It doesn't have the AOE of most other skills, and the one that do, can't really single target. I mean its doable but just not as effective as other skills. Take for example, a poison skill cobra lash vs a chaos spell soulrend. Both spread to near by targets. However Soul does more DOT on a single click where Cobra you have to throw a few times to catch up up. In a sense soulrend feels more like a poison to me but is of magic nature where cobro lash just feels I am tossing bouncing projectiles.

Melee skills like Viper Strike does insane damage if you can punch stack repeatily but so does and other weapon skills. Shadow also glass canon like so being up close and Viper striking is not safe. It gets out class by skill like cyclone which can move and hit, lacerate practically a range melee, frost blades feels better at clearing and somewhat safer single target due the range it has. there is just so much more skills that makes poison feels... not exciting to play.

[ahoboman]

Originally posted by Astasia:

Like anything in the game you need to specialize in it for it to be effective. Poison is essentially a "more damage" layer that can be boosted quite high if you build around it. Duration can easily reach 6+ seconds and the multiplier can easily reach like 300% MORE damage spread out over that duration. You can hit for 10k and apply a 30k damage poison that lasts 6 seconds for example. That's entirely with normal passives and skill gems, no fancy gear or cluster jewels. Supports like Unbound Ailments boosts both poison damage and duration making it easier to stack while doing lots more damage.

Also if I increase duration and specialized in all the poison nodes, poison damage and etc, it still feels really underwhelming. The poison simply does not kill fast enough. I see the health of enemy dropping, but I have to continue attacking to stack anyways thus killing them through my physical attack means. I might as well just increase the physical damage instead and outright kill the mob in one hit vs trying to stack three hit and then watch the poison kill them?

As for bosses, their not just gonna stand there let you stack. No amount specialize feels strong unless you end game gear and craft what not, but by that time anything you end game crafted and gear for should be absurdly strong.

[Astasia]

Originally posted by ahoboman:

It doesn't have the AOE of most other skills

I don't know what you are talking about. It's not a "skill" it's a damage layer, and it can be stacked onto any physical or chaos based skill. I've done poison builds with Tornado Shot and Toxic Rain, both were fine at AoE and single target.

The issue is you seem to have some sort of misconception that poison is supposed to be a long DoT where you hit an enemy once then watch it die. That's not what it is. It's a large damage multiplier that stacks up over time. You don't stop attacking, you don't hit something a few times and watch it die, you keep attacking and the poison keeps stacking, ramping up your DPS greatly over a few seconds. If you need to stop and avoid a boss attack, your poisons are still doing damage, you aren't losing anything. Think of it this way, if you are doing 10k damage per hit and applying a 30k poison, you are now doing 40k damage per hit. It doesn't matter if you are stacking it a lot (unless using certain supports or agony), you are still doing 40k damage per hit, that is a strong damage multplier, and that is the point of poison and all it does. It's the same reason people use impale, or shock, or ignite, these are damage layers/multipliers that work in combination with a damage base type to reach higher potential damage, they are not the main source of your damage though.

You can get enough poison damage and duration on something like Tornado Shot or Toxic Rain where you can hit most packs once and then move on while they all die as you are dashing away, some people play it this way but on a boss you are generally spamming attacks the same way any other build would, and just doing more damage.

If you want to play a "DoT build" you are better off with something like Bane, ED, or Creeping Frost. You want a skill actually designed to be a DoT for it to work like you seem to expect.

[Rogue]

You should not use poison or any dot based build while leveling prior to atlas.... They require specific mods on gear like +% more damage with poison, huge physical damage base, etc and leveled up gems to make them work.

Otherwise, poison are great. E.g Two full charge shots from my scourge arrow usually kill a T16 boss especially if I loaded up on max stacks of plague bearer beforehand. More tanky bosses like Shaper? Well, dot is running so you have mobility to avoid his attacks...

Viper strike can have poison stacks that last up to 20 seconds with certain builds. While other builds can build more than 40 stacks of poison in a second.

[ahoboman]

Originally posted by Astasia:

Originally posted by ahoboman:

It doesn't have the AOE of most other skills

I don't know what you are talking about. It's not a "skill" it's a damage layer, and it can be stacked onto any physical or chaos based skill. I've done poison builds with Tornado Shot and Toxic Rain, both were fine at AoE and single target.

The issue is you seem to have some sort of misconception that poison is supposed to be a long DoT where you hit an enemy once then watch it die. That's not what it is. It's a large damage multiplier that stacks up over time. You don't stop attacking, you don't hit something a few times and watch it die, you keep attacking and the poison keeps stacking, ramping up your DPS greatly over a few seconds. If you need to stop and avoid a boss attack, your poisons are still doing damage, you aren't losing anything. Think of it this way, if you are doing 10k damage per hit and applying a 30k poison, you are now doing 40k damage per hit. It doesn't matter if you are stacking it a lot (unless using certain supports or agony), you are still doing 40k damage per hit, that is a strong damage multplier, and that is the point of poison and all it does. It's the same reason people use impale, or shock, or ignite, these are damage layers/multipliers that work in combination with a damage base type to reach higher potential damage, they are not the main source of your damage though.

You can get enough poison damage and duration on something like Tornado Shot or Toxic Rain where you can hit most packs once and then move on while they all die as you are dashing away, some people play it this way but on a boss you are generally spamming attacks the same way any other build would, and just doing more damage.

If you want to play a "DoT build" you are better off with something like Bane, ED, or Creeping Frost. You want a skill actually designed to be a DoT for it to work like you seem to expect.

This is exactly my point. Why have poison work this way? If my goal is to ramp up the poison stack, then it should inherently last longer to begin with. It kind of defeats the purpose wanting to stack when the poison itself dissipate so fast. I am not saying it can not be done, but why would you want to do it? Why not just go with a better skill that is not poison or chaos related Like Barrage COC freezing pulse with another item coc ice skill frostbolt procing insane burst damage leveling entire waves and boss alike in one click. Or just mass an army of minions to pummel everything in your wave and protect them with a bunch of auras. What do poison have to offer in the meta?

Also you misunderstand what I meant when I spoke of skills. Poison is not a skill, but there is poison/chaos related skills. Viper strike, Causitc shot, cobra lash etc. These skills are obviously theme around the idea of poison. My point is yes my idea of poison is DOT. It should be. Or at least some form cc debuff. Like a slow or damage mitigation while afflicted. Otherwise, why even poison at all? If poison is just to serve as another form hitting my enemies to death then wouldn't I be better off building another form of damage. It just cannot compete.

For example, Viper strike can clear a bosses very well in my experiences. Due the bosses having very large health pool, getting a lot of hits in start to ramp of the damage. But it cannot clear waves no matter what. You must have ancestral call and melee splash to make this work. The problem now comes at the price of boss damage. i have to switch between the two back to back its gets annoying. The same problem occurs with range poison build. You have to give up multiple projectile. Now where you can just go a Cyclone build, and still kill bosses and waves alike without having to switch your links around. Or the like I mentioned above, COC barrage freezing pulse and frostbolts.

As for tornado shot, this skill inherently has good wave clear build into its core. It not only splits it projectile, but it proc a lot of hits in one go, so in theory can work practically any build. It doesn't even need having to use a support skill like multiple projectile to be good. Where Cobra Lash it is pretty much mandatory to have it to clear waves. Then you have to find a way to increasing more poison damage. But when a big target comes along the mobs, Cobra Lash becomes a joke at taking it down without switching to vicious projectile. And trying to switch on the fly not only kills the flow of combat, but can possibly get you kill if you ain't got god reflexes.

[ahoboman]

Originally posted by Rogue:

You should not use poison or any dot based build while leveling prior to atlas.... They require specific mods on gear like +% more damage with poison, huge physical damage base, etc and leveled up gems to make them work.

Otherwise, poison are great. E.g Two full charge shots from my scourge arrow usually kill a T16 boss especially if I loaded up on max stacks of plague bearer beforehand. More tanky bosses like Shaper? Well, dot is running so you have mobility to avoid his attacks...

Viper strike can have poison stacks that last up to 20 seconds with certain builds. While other builds can build more than 40 stacks of poison in a second.

You guys keep mentioning range poison archer build with skills that has some form of good aoe built into its core skill, what about melee or throwing weapons that can both wave clear and do bosses in one go. Specifically Viper and Pestilent Strike, or Cobra Lash and Venom Gyre? It doesn't exist.You have to switch gems between these skills to make them work. Melee for ancestral call and melee splash. Range throwing weapons for multiple projectile and projectile speed, or pierce(Venom Gyre). Then when a tough boss or even tough minions comes along, you have to switch back to single target, it just kills the flow of the build. Where cyclone you just spin to win. Or minions mass an army. Totem just ran around. Trap, well just throw them and dodge around. Bow as you guy have them, just shoot from a safe range. And none of these skills, you have temper with switching gems around to make them work. the skills I mention above, you have to switch your gems around.

[Lozamyth]

why can't skills and effects work differently? your examples are x does it better then poison which isn't true as poison is a very competitive damage source and out scales a lot of damage sources, or that you don't like that poison works in this way, which again, why can't skills and effects work differently? so yes, poison can compete, it does compete, but it isn't everyone's favourite playstyle. There are also multiple budget guides with multi-million dps with spells, attacks, mines, spell slinger, take your pick.

[ahoboman]

Originally posted by Lozamyth:

why can't skills and effects work differently? your examples are x does it better then poison which isn't true as poison is a very competitive damage source and out scales a lot of damage sources, or that you don't like that poison works in this way, which again, why can't skills and effects work differently? so yes, poison can compete, it does compete, but it isn't everyone's favourite playstyle. There are also multiple budget guides with multi-million dps with spells, attacks, mines, spell slinger, take your pick.

Okay, why don't you show me how to build an effective poison build that main cobra lash without having to give multiple projectiles and projectile speed, that can both kill end game bosses and mob in one go. It has to be able to kill both Shaper and Syrus as well.

[Lozamyth]

here you go, Esoro makes awesome builds, enjoy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4DyqmI5-RxU

[Astasia]

Originally posted by ahoboman:

why would you want to do it? Why not just go with a better skill

I feel like at this point this is the core of what you are getting at. This question can be asked of 90% of the skills in the game, and probably like 99.9% of builds. The answer is fun and variety. Yes the game doesn't have great balance, a lot of skills and builds are questionable in effectiveness compared to the meta builds, but they are still viable and can still be fun.

If you are in the Ranger area of the passive tree, there are a bunch of poison nodes that are easy to grab and are a solid DPS addition to any physical/chaos build. You could also go with cold conversion though, or pure phys, or travel somewhere else on the tree, there are options, different ways of adding damage to your build. Poison is not a bad option currently if it's nearby, how it works is fine and is different from Impale, or Shock, or Chill, or Bleed, etc.

Your issues seem to be more specific to certain skills rather than poison. Replace "Viper Strike" with "Double Hit" or "Dual Strike" or any other number of primarily single target skills and it would read out much the same. Do you want to swap gems? Do you want to find a balance between clear and bossing? That's up to you. Personally I just focus on clear and then spend a few extra seconds killing the boss. Ya bosses are too spongey and not at all dangerous, that's a different problem.

[Lozamyth]

Originally posted by ahoboman:

Originally posted by Lozamyth:

why can't skills and effects work differently? your examples are x does it better then poison which isn't true as poison is a very competitive damage source and out scales a lot of damage sources, or that you don't like that poison works in this way, which again, why can't skills and effects work differently? so yes, poison can compete, it does compete, but it isn't everyone's favourite playstyle. There are also multiple budget guides with multi-million dps with spells, attacks, mines, spell slinger, take your pick.

Okay, why don't you show me how to build an effective poison build that main cobra lash without having to give multiple projectiles and projectile speed, that can both kill end game bosses and mob in one go. It has to be able to kill both Shaper and Syrus as well.

so the main take away from the build i posted is the deadeye can fix the gem swap which is apparently an issue you have with the skill. you could also go with pathfinder to spread poisons so you don't need to swap. in all reality though, the skill benefits from the gem swap making it clear incredibly fast and also single target really well.
also, usually the only gem swap is gmp to slower proj for single target.

[ahoboman]

Originally posted by Astasia:

Originally posted by ahoboman:

why would you want to do it? Why not just go with a better skill

I feel like at this point this is the core of what you are getting at. This question can be asked of 90% of the skills in the game, and probably like 99.9% of builds. The answer is fun and variety. Yes the game doesn't have great balance, a lot of skills and builds are questionable in effectiveness compared to the meta builds, but they are still viable and can still be fun.

If you are in the Ranger area of the passive tree, there are a bunch of poison nodes that are easy to grab and are a solid DPS addition to any physical/chaos build. You could also go with cold conversion though, or pure phys, or travel somewhere else on the tree, there are options, different ways of adding damage to your build. Poison is not a bad option currently if it's nearby, how it works is fine and is different from Impale, or Shock, or Chill, or Bleed, etc.

Your issues seem to be more specific to certain skills rather than poison. Replace "Viper Strike" with "Double Hit" or "Dual Strike" or any other number of primarily single target skills and it would read out much the same. Do you want to swap gems? Do you want to find a balance between clear and bossing? That's up to you. Personally I just focus on clear and then spend a few extra seconds killing the boss. Ya bosses are too spongey and not at all dangerous, that's a different problem.

Actually if I switch to double strike, its more physical then it is now chaos/poison. Viper strike converse phys into chaos. Double strike is just straight physical. Sure its all numbers at the end of the day but surely a guy can have a bit of immersion can he not? Anyways, like I said, its not that Poison doesn't get the job done, it does. In my opinion I just feel like its underwhelming and needs refinement. The name POSION needs to feel more like poison. The stack should reset its timer if you manage to hit your target in quick succession and the 2 seconds should be 4 sec by default. Just maybe lower the damage so dip doesnt go absurd . And only chaos and physical can poison no matter what. No conversion of any sort from any other source of damage can poison no matter what? I think this fair so in sense it will feel more like the poison does the killing and actually bare the name POISON.

[ahoboman]

Originally posted by Lozamyth:

Originally posted by ahoboman:

Okay, why don't you show me how to build an effective poison build that main cobra lash without having to give multiple projectiles and projectile speed, that can both kill end game bosses and mob in one go. It has to be able to kill both Shaper and Syrus as well.

so the main take away from the build i posted is the deadeye can fix the gem swap which is apparently an issue you have with the skill. you could also go with pathfinder to spread poisons so you don't need to swap. in all reality though, the skill benefits from the gem swap making it clear incredibly fast and also single target really well.
also, usually the only gem swap is gmp to slower proj for single target.

That's a Deadeye. I am asking for an Assassin. Surely there isn't much difference in terms of final build damage output, but you are ignoring what I asked. In the video he clearly switch between multiple projectile and greater multiple projectile. I'm asking for greater multiple projectile and faster projectile to be on at all time never getting switch out all the way to end game and sustaining good damage. That is literally impossible. You simply will not have good damage unless you have already end game crafted the stuff of legends with poison damage on everything. If you are still coming up, you have to give up both those two skill gem when fighting tanky bosses. Otherwise the fight becomes a slug feast where you are throwing darts at em and seeing minimum damage. Plus there is the mana issue. I means I guess i can carry a mana flask? lol.

[Astasia]

Originally posted by ahoboman:

The stack should reset its timer if you manage to hit your target in quick succession and the 2 seconds should be 4 sec by default. Just maybe lower the damage so dip doesnt go absurd.

The damage would have to be nerfed into the ground to make that viable and it would be entirely useless outside of extremely long boss fights.

Just so we are clear, you understand poison already stacks infinitely right? If you hit a target once with a 30k poison debuff that lasts 3 seconds, and then one second later hit them with another, they now have a 20k poison debuff with 2 seconds remaining and a new 30k poison debuff with 3 seconds remaining. So if we alter that and say you are landing a 6 second poison on a 4 attacks per second skill, that's 24 independent poison debuffs with their own damages and durations counting down. The damage from poison procs are never wasted until the target dies, it doesn't matter how often you hit them or how long the duration is, there's no reason to refresh the poison or worry about building a lot of stacks because it's always equally effective. The exception of course being Vile Toxins and Herald of Agony, but those are both adding their own unique ways of playing with poisons.

If you are talking about refreshing durations, explain how that would ever work when a lot of builds could quickly ramp up to 1000s of stacks of poison against a boss? The calculations would get out of control, and the damage would have to be almost nothing to prevent instantly deleting the boss.

Edit: Also Viper Strike has a base poison duration of 4 seconds already, which you could easily get to 20 seconds if you wanted as Rogue pointed out in an earlier post.