Ethereal Knives

too slow (cast and projectile speed)
too short of a range for projectiles
cost way too much mana

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Darkfyre wrote:

too slow (cast and projectile speed)
too short of a range for projectiles
cost way too much mana

Exactly my thoughts.

I took this skill cuz I thought it would be a good AOE cleanup, but its too slow and if I try a comby by first cast a firetrap, there is a slow glitchy graphic before the EK take effect. and it barely does any damage.

I tried to kill a group of 4 mobs with it and i ran out of mana twice before I could kill them and I had to continually maneuveur to get a shot off. The range is too short to just spray, and if you go get a group only one proj can hit each mob anyway.

So I figured, maybe I just had to level it up... well it stays behind the curve of all the other spells. So then I thought what if I add some spt gems. I tried:

1) lesser projectiles - This made me lol, adding 2 projectiles to my current 10 gave me 12, BUT it also made all of them do 30% less damage AND cost me 50% more mana to cast. (This was just funny, and me start thinking about how lesser projectiles could be reworked. instead of adding 2, it could triple the current skill. Since almost all skills start with 1 proj, (except split arrow) this wouldnt be much of a design change and still give the same results) It would boost split arrow, so maybe that could be looked at but anyway, off the subject)

2) Pierce - This actually did improve it, but not enough, and you still had to work hard to get the mobs lined up for the shot. (range too short)

3) Added dam - helped a tiny bit, not enough to use

I stopped there, as I could tell there was no fixing this skill.

If I have to get that close to the mobs to use a skill im just gonna dual stike them with my claws/dagger and kill most of them in one hit.

To make EK work, you are going to have to up the damage or add some special effects, stun/poison/bleed/slow something. and no matter what else you do you have to speed it up and increase the range. OR make it Shotgun again.

nobody is going to pick this skill over any other skill and its a shame, cuz it seems like it could have potential.

My current suggestion if you dont want to make it Shotgun, cuz I can see how that would get out of hand balance wise, or end up just being a boss killer. Give it 100% pierce and increase the range. This seems to go with what the name implies, then add some special ability, maybe a vulnerbility. Then you actually have a useful comboable skill.

I agree on this, this skill is quite crappy as it is. Only use I have for it, with my dagger/trap shadow, is after I throw a fire trap to a cluster of mobs, to finish em of. And I probably could use several other skills with an overall better effect.

Mana cost is prohibitive. Cast speed is terrible. If those values changed then I could understand the short range, but with the actual behaviour it doesn't make sense.

I wonder what is the thought process behind this skill. It just falls short in every possible way. I really don't get GGG's point in this one.

Cast speed is very slow

Presumably GGG have an intended use for this skill, or possible uses for it that make it viable.

Could we hear what those are?

I am struggling to work out a way to make this skill not terrible :/

I like the idea of a short-medium range cone-shaped power but this skill is way too slow.

For people who can't figure out a use, try increased projectile speed along with something like added chaos damage and added lightning damage, along with projectile damage passives.

I'm not saying it's be strong, but it might at least be useful.

It really does seem to encroach on existing skill territory though such as spark or ground slam or freezing pulse.

Using this on my duelist atm as my primary skill @ level 25. Dual weild wands (lol). Hoping to get a pair of nice wands with faster cast & faster projectiles.

The damage output seems nice. The mana cost and cast rate are horrific. I need about 20 more levels to cope with it atm.

It works with hatred aura. It works with Added Fire damage.
Rustic belt works too.

Using faster projectiles + added fire damage. Cant afford the mana cost with anything else, nor do I have a support to use it with.

I have a feeling it will scale nicely as I level the build, as hatred and added fire are % bonuses, however It feels like firestorm when that was first introduced, taking ideal conditions/passives/supports to make it functional.

I'm in desperate need of faster cast and mana management, which I have neither.

Until I got my hands on a Faster Projectile Speed support gem, this skill was useless except for breaking pot clusters.

It still wasn't good enough to use until I picked up Hatred, then it's something decent once in a while.

All in all though, this spell and Whirling Blades are both pretty crappy.

When the latest patch was released my buddy and I rolled both shadows, he went dual wand and I went dual claw. As we both dinged lvl 10 I rushed back to town to get my new claw skills - whirling blades and ethereal knives. I was really excited because I needed AoE and I assumed that both, or at least one, of these skills would serve that purpose.

After about 10 minutes of usage I realized that ethereal knives was near useless. It's range was near-melee, and its arc might as well be non-aoe. I had problems taking out groups of barrels in one hit for christ's sake! I joked that it looked more like a radar ping than an actual attack skill; or a skill used to find secret doors in walls.

Whirling blades is a bit lackluster as an attack but at least its a good GTFO skill when you're surrounded by mobs and your AoE skill, ethereal knives, is crap.

As a INT/AGL character I've resorted to using frost or shock nova as my AoE since ethereal knives is terribly useless.

My suggestions on how to make it viable:
1.) Area of effect - either increased range and/or arc or make it a 360 move like sweep or frost nova.
2.) Cast time - its presently too slow for comfort
3.) Mana cost - its way too much cost for what it does (or doesn't do)
4.) Damage type - Clarify how this skill can benefit from other nodes. Either make it affected by one handed skill nodes or by elemental skill nodes - or something else. I know its affected by projectile nodes but a melee character shouldn't have to invest into ranged nodes just to boost this skill. It needs to synergize better with melee builds.