Viper Strike

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Thunderpeach wrote:

Suggestion:
At 4 charges, any additional applications of Viper Strike will refresh the duration on the current charges and also deal a flat amount of Chaos damage.

This change would make it very appealing to fast attack builds. The skill doesn't need AOE, it needs to be considered as a primary "spammable" skill like any other melee abilities.

Note: Puncture falls into the same category. It can't be used as a primary "spammable" skill.

A very old post, but I really like this idea. Something like increased damage against enemies with 4 charges specific to viper strike would be good. Puncture could have a similar boost vs bleeding enemies.

Either that or have DoTs like bleed and viper strike stack like burns and poison does, so that bleeds/viper charges from hits apply after the originals have expired dealing the damage calculated from those hits. This could potentially cause minutes-long DoTs, but the same is possible with fire attacks and that's not a gamebreaker.

longest burn currently possible (without enhance) is between 10 to 10.8 seconds (cloak flame, 20% qual chance to ignite and burning arrow, and two passive nodes), so yeah =p

Not sure of this has been discussed, can't be arsed to sift through previous pages, but is VS considered a "debuff"? While perusing through PoE wiki under debuffs, at the very bottom it has an "Incomplete list of things that are NOT buffs or debuffs" and it lists Viper Strike. This shocks me because the description of the gem itself is "Inflicts a debuff on foe..."

I'm hoping this is just a mistake by the wiki people, but can someone please double-check? I was theorycrafting a VS build and temporal chains + "increased buff/debuff duration" nodes were a focal point in the tree. If it is indeed not considered a debuff, GGG please fix the gem description, or make it considered a debuff so I can do more dmgs.

EDIT: The wiki is wrong, tested it with temporal chains. Also It lists Viper Strike as both a debuff and not a debuff, strange.

The viper charges applied by Viper Strike are debuffs.

GGG, cmon, buff this skill already

They're probably waiting for a time where it can be the spotlight of a patch, and thus the subsequent flavor of the month.

Quick suggestion for more interesting viper strike builds

1. Each attack no longer refreshes the duration of all viper strikes
2. Get rid of the 4 limit of viper charges

You can then scale your damage with attack speed as well chaos/DOT nodes. Also, builds that can tank better will be able to apply far more DPS, as the only limit will be how many viper charges you can apply before they start running out. The limit of 4 charges will permanently lock this skill into hit and run gameplay, I would like to see more versatility as well as a higher DPS ceiling. The draw of an ARPG is eventually becoming an overpowered god, and that's impossible to achieve with VS.

The problem with viper strike is damage scaling, in the start of the game viper strike is quite useful, hit an enemy once/twice and move on. the enemy will die.

later onwards towards end game, enemies are much tougher. attacking an enemy 4 times requires commitment to the assault. if i were to attack an enemy 4 times, i would be able to kill them using some other skill for 4 attacks.

it boils down to what is viper strikes purpose? how do you scale viper strike well?

heres some suggestions:

support:
- viper strike is used to HELP take down tough hard to kill enemies. application of viper strike reduces enemie's health regen/mana/evasion/dodge chance. armor is not affected. logically in the real world thats how diseases work. it cripples your health and fitness.
- also functions as a debuff without needing curses

main attack v1:
- every attack after the 4th stack deals a portion of phys attack damage as added poison damage
- or just make a portion of phys attack damage be added or converted to poison damage to begin with

main attack v2:
- easiest implementation would be removing stack limit. unlimited stack.

main attack v3:
- upon reaching 12 stacks, deals lethal chaos damage consuming all stacks. total damage is the damage that would have been dealt by viper strike over the total duration.

all in all, viper strike as it is, is kinda worthless. would be more useful as a support rather than an actual skill. if ggg removed viper strike entirely i think the community wouldnt even care

OK. I have thought about it. Just a little. Here are my current conclusions. On why Viper Strike is bad.

* 12k damage a hit (after monster resistance applies) is not impressive. You can do 12k a hit without having to wait ~30 seconds for it to land many other ways.

* You only have one or two 5 or 6 links. Utility damage like this, when the only fights that last long enough for it to do anything are act bosses and exiles, is simply not supported by the skill socket system. Especially when those gem sockets are being fought over for Auras, Curses, Trigger, Movement, Defense, Magic Find and who knows what other kinds of gems are coming.

* The bulk of the game is melting guys who die to a stiff wind. Being ranged saves on time moving around. That's why Cleave will never be better than Ground Slam.

What this means is that Viper Strike will have to be a good single target attack. That means either:

* The degen charges have to be unlimited or nearly unlimited. This will enable a "touch of death" type of cheese, classic Diablo 2 poison style, which still wouldn't matter much in a party setting.

* The degen charges have to count down very quickly. Like how Poison Nova in Diablo 2 lasted for only two seconds.

* Some kind of direct damage component. Poison Arrow has a 50% physical damage added as Chaos component to it for no completely discernible reason, but why doesn't this?

One thing that comes to mind is a combination of the first two, so that Viper Strike can be a primary, single target attack skill, but you still have to be around to do damage with it:

Charge duration at 3 seconds for all gem levels, 20 maximum charges, the duration is not reset when struck. Instead, when the duration for a charge runs out, that charge is removed.

What that accomplishes is a use case where you use it as a sustained attack. And legitimately spend 50% of your attack slots for. But I don't know if the engine could handle that..

The simpler alternative (from an implementation perspective), lots of people have already suggested a number of times I believe. #3 - Tack on a "Adds +X chaos damage on attacking a target with maximum Venom charges" clause.