Ranged Attack Totem

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Vipermagi wrote:

RAT doesn't have Conduit, so it can't share Charges with you.

But it does! Or at least it should, if my research is correct.

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Mark_GGG wrote:

"The totem is linked to you - it's casting your spells, not it's own. The totem always casts the spell exactly as you would if you cast it at that point."

(http://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/30777/page/10/#p566830)

Than there is this information found on the wiki - I know, I know, the wiki can be out of date or inaccurate, blah blah blah. Getting a definitive answer for this would be nice cause then we can update the wiki and make it that much better!

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Skills used by totems are affected by the player's passive skills, equipment, and linked support gems.

(http://en.pathofexilewiki.com/wiki/Totems)

So again, I ask:

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Zoo_Smell wrote:

Can we please, pretty please, make RAT work with Conduit? If not can we at least hear the thinking behind not allowing this?

Awwww maaaan...

Well, I am very happy with getting a reply from the man himself, thanks Mark!

Is it enough to have a bow or wand equiped or do they need to be the active weapon set to let Ranged Attack Totem work correctly?

I tried it a bit for fun on RoA, it wasn't as good as expected
Tooltips = ~ 8, 487 dps per totem before point blank

Supported with thunderfist, point blank (keystone) and decent dps gear.
I was able to shock a few high life targets but there's a few different things that makes it less viable than a spellcaster.
Cast time is 1 sec, on a character with low to non existant cast speed increase. Combine that with the slowed attack speed and the little delay, it feels quite sluggish to play with it.
Rain of arrows really seemed like a good idea for totems, but it targets the closest mob, so half the aoe is usually wasted. The hypothetic gain in dps is wasted since a player will usually aim betweens mobs. The totem, while castable at range, doesn't have great range on its own, it's probably below the point blank threshold for reduced damage. Getting stunned while the animation will cancel the attack, that's nothing new but it's worse for totems with their low life.
40% less dmg on bows: impossible to play with physical. It's already hard to obtain a decent physical value, you can only dream of it on totems.
The advantage to avoid reflect issues isn't really worth it since you can't really spec crit/crit dmg (on a life build anyway and even for bows), and I really missed the life regen from life leech compared.

The general feeling is that it seems hard to make totems work without a fork/chain direct attack (such as spark, ek, split arrow or lightning arrow) due to the limited range. The constant need to recast really hurts on a ranged character, no wonder no one's using it. I haven't tried split arrows/lightning arrows though !
As a gimmick to use ice shot it's quite powerful though.

Suggestion: 50% of attack speed is converted/added as cast speed for ranged attack totem.
Forgot something crucial: when you're targeting out of line of sight or on a obstacle (chest, debris), you're firing an arrows instead of summoning the totem, that's really really bad

It would be very nice if RAT totem summoning worked off of your attack speed rather than your cast speed. The Spell totem and RAT have the same stats and look to be meant to be copies of each other. However, in temp chains maps the RAT totem cast speed is abysmal.


It shouldn't be that hard to implement -- there are already attacks that trigger spells. Explosive arrow and poison arrow for example. Make the skill "totemic shot" or something like that. Fires a projectile into the ground that summons a totem from the depths of the earth to fire the shot that summoned it.

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DeltruS wrote:

It would be very nice if RAT totem summoning worked off of your attack speed rather than your cast speed. The Spell totem and RAT have the same stats and look to be meant to be copies of each other. However, in temp chains maps the RAT totem cast speed is abysmal.

QFT. RAT feels very clunky and slow compared to spell totem due to the natural synergy of spell totem and cast speed and the lack thereof with RAT. The logic objection ("summoning is a spell") can be addressed with an artful mechanic like the one suggested by DeltruS or a similar approach.

Please allow totems to have as many power/frenzy/endurance charges as player can.

Maybe nerf charge effectiveness for totems if it is required for balance issues.

It will open some new possibilites for gem combinations which is always interesting and fun to explore and try.