I’m sure I’m missing something here as I’m guessing damage calculations are more complex than this, but looking at Whiteout:
Each additional hit you save 10% mana which is a net gain of .1 hits per hit (assuming 100% mana = 1 attack)
Each additional hit you lose 10% attack speed which is a net loss of .1 hits per hit (assuming 100% attack speed = 1 attack)
So in the end you spend 2 points for… 0 effective damage increase? Just faster damage since you now get 3 hits for 1, but with that significant slowed by needing to gain mana back more frequently and break from high dps as you lose it rapidly.
Can someone please explain to me why Whiteout would ever be worth taking / explain with my very basic math is actually wrong because of XYZ game mechanics? Thanks!
Shatterstrike generally has a very old and outdated skill tree.
It’s in dire need of an overhaul.
But overall i woudl say having fast damage delivery can be benefitical in alot of cases, even thogu your maximum dps does not increases significantly.
Especially in very high content you want to deliver damage as fast as possible, or some bosses only have limited windwos where you can savely attack them (msot notebly Shade Of Orobyss)
Interesting to hear that re: age of tree. I am new to the game (playing a couple of weeks) and this is my 4th build (shatterstrike spellblade) but feels great so far.
I think I understand what you’re saying re: “phases” of damage but the other issue I didn’t mention is you’re also giving up 2 points which can be used elsewhere so it can be a pretty significant dps loss overall and unless you’re able to just melt bosses in 1-2 expenditures of mana seems likely not worth it. I have managed to get some pretty decent gear and am running the level 90 monos right now. The boss fights so far have been pretty quick/easy. The shaman trio for example took me 3 total dps “phases” which maybe equated to around 3-5 complete expenditures of mana. Whiteout would have required significantly more expenditures of mana. Keep in mind also by attacking longer I am getting more attacks and even more mana via Icy Flow.
The Whiteout additional attacks are not instant either. Though I imagine it’s still quicker than just auto attacking it’s likely that the additional attack speed/damage I get from other nodes is making up for the loss.
Maybe I’ll try playing with it some, at this point it has just been theory but I can’t see it having real value.
Edit: One other benefit of NOT taking whiteout I forgot to mention which is huge for my build anyway - the whiteout strikes don’t generate ward! So I generate way more ward without it which increases survivability.
Two ideas come to my mind why the re-casts may be beneficial.
The bonuses of Firebrand (more damage per Firebrand stack consumed and guaranteed critical hit) count for the re-casts as well - so if you are using Firebrand to buff the damage of Shatterstrike, then Whiteout is pretty strong.
You can cast other skills while Shatterstrike is re-cast, you do not have to wait - so you can use other skills to (a) dish out more damage, (b) regenerate Mana (with Mana Strike - but there seems to be a bug at the moment), or (c) get more buffs from Firebrand.
However, I specced out of Whiteout just recently because of the broken Mana Strike interaction.
A third reason just came to mind: You can already run around to avoid hits while still dishing out some damage via the re-casts. So it can also be a defensive option for squishy characters.
Hmm I find my play style is more go in, unload a whole mana pool (or as much as I can) then move either to avoid a big ability or just because I’m on cooldown and need to play safer. Less of a “hit once and move” style, but yes I can see how whiteout could work for someone who likes to just hit 1-2x before moving.
Started experimenting with playing with Whiteout so I could get a less theoretical perspective. Some benefits I’m finding:
Health leech (which I wound up having to take some off for survivability in empowered monos) sees a MASSIVE improvement.
It makes packs of mobs way more trivial both because leech is amazing & because you can just swing once and keep moving. The packs will follow you and even those trailing behind will just die from the additional swings. So the huge benefit here is my runs are much quicker. This alone I think will make me decide to keep it.
I think I might have been wrong and the additional strikes do generate ward?
It may be – despite the tooltip agreeing with my math (sitting at ~82k shatterstrike dps vs I think it was 117k without whiteout or a massive difference of ~180k to more than 250k with buffs up) – the dps is actually higher? I’m guessing this is just because the downtime lost from manastriking is trivial compared to the “attack speed” gained. I wish it was easier to skip right to a boss to run more damage tests… or a dps meter would be nice at the dummy
Mana running dry faster is a major con - sometimes it takes me by surprise and I need a surge and get caught in an ability or I’m just sitting there not doing damage for 1-2 seconds before I realize, but I think these are things I can learn to play around.
Would love to solve once and for all what the best sustained dps is but I think the leech generation & added speed moving through timelines might make it useful enough even if it’s potentially a dps loss.
