Is Flameblast viable in HLD?

Before everybody says: "no, it's too slow, you will never target anybody with it", first look into my build:

Main skill:

Flameblast - Increased AoE - Faster Casting - Fire Penetration - Block Chance reduction

Unique items:

Carcass Jack
Kaom's Roots
Doryani's Catalyst

Aura's:

Discipline - Clarity (Defensively I'm using a big life pool and some ES on top of it)

Passive tree:

http://www.pathofexile.com/passive-skill-tree/AAAAAgMAVysHY3NTwFR5Awj0MYjfsIIQB6UC40myLJxVrpf0l5VSUz1fj6YtH20ZwfOio3_GJ6labSQ8p1xJUS-dFvMmPBzcLUdQQow2c7PwaxXn1U_ed6Sx5Y5VSyaVkyfxdij6gsf56OvuuJMYPL0nkzoIZxW4yFuWMrUEXcZgbZ2AgzjvfEbXPAWf3xRNBLPwH6IAAnGOvhEtfIPN-n5Z3FcelKw_pwiPRtDQz2VVxhZv2t16qprgRZ3kIhps890ZhSSqNunjap2ubXuLjIt6pyvhc-0gV-H5ZSHDkNY=

Main result:

My Flameblast will have 115% INCREASED AOE (43% gem, 52% tree, 20% chest)
My Flameblast will have 120% FASTER CAST SPEED (49% gem, 51% tree, 20% items)

Main question => Wouldn't it be possible to target people with this Flameblast because it builds up so fast to such a huge area?

I was thinking of using TC curse for easier targeting and maybe shockwave totem to push them into the blast.
A CwdT lightning warp could be cool too.

Any other suggestions?

Faster Casting + Echo make flameblast ridiculously fast btw. In teams you'd be able to deal more damage by reaching a higher stage point. You could even carry an infernal mantle to gear check people with -60% chaos res.

I won't say much more because I know nothing of HLD :P

Aha, Echo works with Flameblast? Even better!
Shame my Carcass Jack is not 6-linked... .

The problem you will encounter are builds with block or dodge, if they dodge one or block you are pretty much screwed, some are even stacking both. . .

So I tested Flameblast with a buddy (Fightgarr) in pvp and the issue we observed was that Flameblast has a ridiculous amount of down scaling in pvp. IE We tried to boost it to the max tried it at different stages and it was almost as if stage 1 dealt more or same damage as stage 10... how that works or makes sense I have no idea. I also tried to scale out the burning damage and max chance to ignite and the burn should have in theory done a TON of damage but instead could barely overcome trivial life regen. Just wanted to let you know the result of our testing before you invest heavily into it.

This on top of the other issues of block and dodge as well as actually landing a hit with the skill.

"

So I tested Flameblast with a buddy (Fightgarr) in pvp and the issue we observed was that Flameblast has a ridiculous amount of down scaling in pvp. IE We tried to boost it to the max tried it at different stages and it was almost as if stage 1 dealt more or same damage as stage 10... how that works or makes sense I have no idea. I also tried to scale out the burning damage and max chance to ignite and the burn should have in theory done a TON of damage but instead could barely overcome trivial life regen. Just wanted to let you know the result of our testing before you invest heavily into it.

This on top of the other issues of block and dodge as well as actually landing a hit with the skill.

Thanks for this reply!

But what you say is very very worrying... do they scale down high damage in PvP? It would really kill any "big hit" build and only allow fast cast / attack speed build. Relying on that 1 big hit already has the disadvantage of not being able to do any damage against block/dodge without luck. Fast builds at least can always get some of their many hits through.

About the burn damage: it seems logical it didn't do much damage because the fire penetration doesn't apply to burn damage so the enemy was reducing it with his full fire resistance. Burn damage is therefor always very weak in PvP.

Block/dodge is indeed an issue, but mind that I linked Flameblast to a reduced block chance gem. The one I have gives -41% enemy block chance, so they'll go from 75% to 34%. Ofcourse, that coupled with a 46% spelldodge (PA + Atziri boots) only gives me a 35% chance to hit if I can actually target the enemy.

Has anyone else had the same impression as Lordsidro? With downscaling of huge burst damage Flameblast is really useless in PvP. It's already hard enough to target an enemy and overcome his block/dodge... .

Flameblast can only work in PvP if it's a 1-hit kill, that's its only advantage.

"

Soepkieken wrote:

But what you say is very very worrying... do they scale down high damage in PvP? It would really kill any "big hit" build and only allow fast cast / attack speed build. Relying on that 1 big hit already has the disadvantage of not being able to do any damage against block/dodge without luck. Fast builds at least can always get some of their many hits through.

My understanding is that different skills have different damage scaling in PvP. One of the reasons that whirling blades is so good in PvP is because of its comparatively better PvP damage scaling (despite its lower tooltip DPS). It seems like Flameblast may be a victim of this different damage scaling. It's hard to say for sure since we have no idea what the calculations behind the scalings are :/

If all skills have a different scaling in PvP, GGG should really inform us about that and give the exact numbers. How on earth are we supposed to plan and develop a build if we don't know what damage it can do?

"

Soepkieken wrote:

If all skills have a different scaling in PvP, GGG should really inform us about that and give the exact numbers. How on earth are we supposed to plan and develop a build if we don't know what damage it can do?

I don't have a good answer for you. It's something our community has requested multiple times.

There was a recent thread about it here: http://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/882911

Basically Rhys said it may not actually be plausible to show tooltip PvP DPS, but they would be able to share the scaling formula (although if they want to is a totally separate issue).

"

Rhys wrote:

Well, crap. After looking into this in more detail, there are some issues with doing it this way.

- It would require a large refactor of the stat display subsystem (since it would no longer be simply displaying stats, it would be modifying certain ones on the fly).
- Even in a PvP situation, you can deal both PvP and PvE damage (to players and minions respectively).
- It would be more inaccurate, because PvP damage scaling isn't applied to damage dealt, it's applied to damage received (after the defender's armor/resists/etc. are applied). While this is also true of PvE, players can have much wider ranges of values, unlike most monsters, which exacerbates the issue considerably. Not to mention players can use Granite Flasks and the like.

Perhaps sharing the scaling formula is possible, but it's complex and several skills have special cases. It's based on both damage and attack/cast time, so any DoT has special handling also. I'll see that the others think, though.

speaking of damage scaling...how nerfed was glacial hammer. I got some nice physical maces but I've been told that the skill was nerfed to the ground in an attempt to balance cuthroat races