Very stupid Decision to kill Frost blade of katabasis

The more interesting question here isn't whether the skill is still usable, ofc it is, though there is basically no reason to do so now.

The question is why it got this treatment. LS, FB, LSoA, FBoK all work rather similar and had very similar damage numbers up until now. Each has their quirks but in the grand scheme of things they are interchangable. Also, Fbok is barely even top 10 in terms of usage with 3%, compared to LS 14% and yet it got nerfed several times harder than LS. It just doesn't make sense at all. It's another one of those completely out of this world balance decisions that GGG makes sometimes that seem to lack any kind of logic or reason.

You wot? LS got its damage halved. How is FB nerf several times harder than LS?

"

Baharoth15#0429 wrote:

The question is why it got this treatment.

The reason is pretty clear: They want you to play this skill as 'intended'; a DoT skill. So the main question (IMO), is; do we have enough tools/paths to scale FBoK as a DoT skill? And I think the answer to that question is "no".

"

Aynix#7757 wrote:

You wot? LS got its damage halved. How is FB nerf several times harder than LS?

LS has two components. Melee and projectile. The projectile got hit by a 50% nerf. Given it's double hit mechanic that's more along the lines of 25%. Meanwhile FBoK got dumbed from 409 down to 240 which is roughtly 41%. I guess "several times harder" was an exaggeration but it got hit much harder than LS and all the others which is weird to say the least.

"

The reason is pretty clear: They want you to play this skill as 'intended'; a DoT skill. So the main question (IMO), is; do we have enough tools/paths to scale FBoK as a DoT skill? And I think the answer to that question is "no".

I dunno, would require more grey matter than i am willing to spend on it to really figure this out but even if we have, it's going to be weird as hell.

You'd basically have to scale gem levels with +2 from weapon, +1 or 2 from armor, empower, admirals arrogance for +3, and ashes/rare amu for another +1/+2. Tree probably would have to focus heavily around cluster jewels, likely to the point where you have to use 12 node large cold clusters because there is hardly any support for it on the bottom end of the tree. Cold dot multi has like 5 nodes on the entire skill tree. There are nodes that support cold damage with attack skills which would affect the dot as well like fangs of frost but that also has pen which is useless for dots. Can't even use perfect agony because that only applies to ailments and cold dot is not an ailment.

If forcing us to use it as a dot skill really is the intention then this honestly feels a bit like that "We nerf bleed weapons into the ground to free up design space" bullshit they pulled years ago followed by years of not doing jack shit about bleed until this league. And that was an entire archetype. Here it's literally just one single skill, i don't expect support for it to show up any time soon.

It might be possible to make it work somewhat if someone skilled put their mind to it but i doubt anyone is ever going to waste their time doing that. Why would they. There are plenty of other skills around that won't cause you as much of a headache to get off the ground.

"

Baharoth15#0429 wrote:

"

Aynix#7757 wrote:

LS has two components. Melee and projectile. The projectile got hit by a 50% nerf. Given it's double hit mechanic that's more along the lines of 25%. Meanwhile FBoK got dumbed from 409 down to 240 which is roughtly 41%. I guess "several times harder" was an exaggeration but it got hit much harder than LS and all the others which is weird to say the least.

Just like FBoK is two parts skill - hit and DoT, people just decided to completly ingore DoT part of it and pretend it doesnt exist.
Also when it comes to LS, during map clear melee part doesnt matter as you kill everything from range.
Both got simillar nerf. Thinking that Frost Bolt nerf is "several times harder" is just throwing a tantrum.

"

Baharoth15#0429 wrote:

LS has two components. Melee and projectile. The projectile got hit by a 50% nerf. Given it's double hit mechanic that's more along the lines of 25%. Meanwhile FBoK got dumbed from 409 down to 240 which is roughtly 41%. I guess "several times harder" was an exaggeration but it got hit much harder than LS and all the others which is weird to say the least.

Just like FBoK is two parts skill - hit and DoT, people just decided to completly ingore DoT part of it and pretend it doesnt exist.
Also when it comes to LS, during map clear melee part doesnt matter as you kill everything from range.
Both got simillar nerf. Thinking that Frost Bolt nerf is "several times harder" is just throwing a tantrum.

You are comparing apples and oranges. The difference here is that it's very much feasible to scale projectile damage and melee damage at the same time. It's a tried and true concept with plenty of support on the tree. Melee damage + cold dot is much less feasible because both require opposing scaling vectors. Crit damage, attack damage, weapon damage, all of that applies to both the melee and the projectile hit. None of those apply to dot's though. You are limited to generic cold damage and cold damage with attack skills to scale this, both of which are in short supply on the tree outside of clusters.

"

Baharoth15#0429 wrote:

Why would they.

For the same reason someone played other skills than LS last league; they wanted to, even if there are WAY better option(s) out there. That's why nerfing the outliers is so important, because it becomes easier to play what you want, instead of asking yourself "who would I?".

This time around, I think they missed the mark a little bit, and should've added some support for scaling the DoT portion of the skill in addition to nerfing the hit portion.

Sorry Phrazz but if you are seriously comparing the difference between LS and other tier 1 skills like MSoZ, FBoK, FB, MS, DSoA, GSoE, TSoC and ES to trying to make this abomination work then i simply can't take you seriously anymore and there is no point to talk any further. Even if you compare it to tier 2 skills it's not even close. This isn't even apples and oranges anymore, it's ants and elephants.

Those 2 things might look similar on a short first glance but are entirely different beasts if you take a proper look.

"

Baharoth15#0429 wrote:

You are comparing apples and oranges. The difference here is that it's very much feasible to scale projectile damage and melee damage at the same time. It's a tried and true concept with plenty of support on the tree. Melee damage + cold dot is much less feasible because both require opposing scaling vectors. Crit damage, attack damage, weapon damage, all of that applies to both the melee and the projectile hit. None of those apply to dot's though. You are limited to generic cold damage and cold damage with attack skills to scale this, both of which are in short supply on the tree outside of clusters.

You can easily scale both at once. Generic damage, elemental damage, cold damage. People just seen huge damage effectiveness and went for added damage instead, ignoring DoT part entirely. Skill want nerfed by 40%. The way people played it got nerfed by 40%. Now they will need to rethink how to build this skill. This nerf, just like to Hexblast, is meant to change how the skill is built, not just nerf its damage.