Arc

hey guys did anyone noticed that after the new patch arc sometimes fail to cast?

Like when youre chasing a mob down, and he moves a bit further away from you. If you started to cast arc a moment before, it will fail to cast.

I think its somehow related to this:

"

Version 0.11.0 (Open Beta Phase Two)
Notes:

Skill Balance:

Fixed a bug where monsters that channel lightning could still hit targets that had moved out of line of sight or distance during the warmup period.

Well anyways arc and all its flaws, now can fail to cast.

!?

the eb(5 auras), summon witch is using arc - with conductivity, lighting penetration, + crit, fast cast. that and lightning spectres from the barracks make for a good shocking time. minion instability helps but she took it only in desperation.

with ~15% quality gems to make it work and minion damage and raise zombie taking to brunt this possibility of arc failing to cast is unsettling.

as it is arc feels more like a support gem than anything - a shock delivery system.

anyway - the 72 witch gets by. no serious end game mapping but if she can find an outdoor 60 something she does just fine.

just like all past post i do think they need to fix arc

1)the damage is far to low compare to other skill while gulping so many mana for cast and it become worse with 0.11 patch where it can fail to cast

2)it really need to chain more 3 hit at normal and 5 with chain attach it to meager + its low damage if link with chain the damage will suffer more and the mana cost will skyrocket

give this gem some love man it really need it. Freezing pulse and fire storm 1000 time better then this skill at current moment the only advantage it have is it auto targeting( not fully coz in some place with many breakable it will target those 1st then mob)

I agree with people that find Arc underwhelming.

As a solo player, I use Arc with dual totem but i have some troubles at Cruel Sarn.
Build : http://www.pathofexile.com/passive-skill-tree/AAAAAgUBAnEEswVbFE0WbxmFGjgdFB8CJKosnCynLR82xTbpOthEq0bXTdhVrlXGWfNaK13GYG1mnme9bRl2EX6vgW-DOIuMjHaPRo-mkFWboZ2AnjyiAKPypwinhMAawbTB889l0NDYJN3z4XPjauTs7DjtIO5v8B_60g==

Pretty much all I have to say has been covered already : lack of choice while linking it to a passive gem, lack of damage, the 3 hit chain being too low, high manacost.
Arc probably doesn't need to be buffed with every of its aspects, but the skill feels like it doesn't fulfill any particular role.
While playing solo, the shock chance becomes anecdotic against five white ennemies and more, because Arc will randomly attack and not focus on the shocked targets. You can focus one shocked ennemy manually but that's it.

When confronted to a large group of ennemies (like those in City of Sarn), even using dual totems, I can't clear them fast enough to avoid being in danger.
Against a single ennemy, especially a rare one, it's pretty slow to kill.
Arc chaining on pots and baskets is kind of annoying aswell :p

It's helpful against two or three targets because the chain will clear them pretty fast, but again, due to the large range of damage, if one target stays alive with high hp, it'll take some time to kill it.
Also I find it useful that it hit immediately after casting, and you can use it from a distance.

That's about it, I hope GGG will look forward to improve this skill !

the problem with arc is it costs too much to cast it yourself and it hits not enough targets in a game where everything is about aoe.
since lightning has shockstacks they wont up the damage.
it just sucks that a straight forward chainlightning cant be used effectively as a spamskill.

Even if it hit more targets it would still suck if damage was the same (unless maybe unlimited jumps - which will never happen). 3 targets would still be ok-ish if you could get DPS comparable to other spells = arc would have to kill those 3 faster than it takes idk FP to kill those same 3 targets because FP = unlimited targets(theoretically, if you could cram all the mobs in small nuff area :D ). And usually damage goes single target>few targets>AOEs.

its sad that they nerfed the range of this skill when the player is casting it. it was one of teh only spells that you could effectively use to kite in low level dueling, and anyone who knows LLD also knows that melee is currently much better than casters. i had a cold snap arc build that was pretty unique, but only worked because i could keep at range and cast coldsnap and arc in a combo with EE. now that the range is barely more than the range of flicker my build was basicly crushed...... and im not gonna just make a melee build like everyone else in LLD.

This skill definitely needs something more to be really viable. What if GGG focused on it's shock mechanic, something along the lines of:

"Arc deals an extra 60% damage per shock charge rather then the normal 40% bonus"

or maybe

"each time Arc hits a shocked enemy it has a 35% chance of chaining an extra time(possibly occuring multiple times)"


As it stands the slow cast speed and lack of support gems to efficiently increase how many targets it hits make it far worse at spreading Shock stacks as compared to spark. However this could very well be balanced by increasing the rewards for building shock charges.

Would also be a method that would create some real uniqueness in the ability rather then just adjusting it's numbers.

I like lightning magic, and I wish this skill be viable as a primary skill, animation is awesome, mechanics is great, but damage output is too low, mana cost is too high, and amount of chains is too low for the arpg, where mobs are tons. Even with +dmg support it's just not worth of taking it's instead of FP, Fireball, or basicly anything else. The shock chance? Just not worth space in sockets.

Some points:
- Arc needs better dps
- Decrease of mana cost
- More chains
- Some support gems to make it better (Projectile-type support gems are OP, but they don't apply to Arc)
- Or instead AoE, or same effect like LA.

Please, GGG, give some love to Arc gem. I'm sick and tired of watching endless brainless people make spork totem builds on HC instead of atleast playing smart. Put a totem and go get some coffee isn't a strategy I would've wanted to see in any kind of arpg.

I totally agree with VanguardUa. Really love lightning element, now playing lightning caster shadow (not spork totem). And at level 60 I have nearly 1.5k dps shown on Arc, and I think it even if it crits. It surely needs to be buffed, cause spell itself has great idea, and awesome animation.
For example, these are some good ideas imo.

"

bilun wrote:

This skill definitely needs something more to be really viable. What if GGG focused on it's shock mechanic, something along the lines of:
"Arc deals an extra 60% damage per shock charge rather then the normal 40% bonus"
or maybe
"each time Arc hits a shocked enemy it has a 35% chance of chaining an extra time(possibly occuring multiple times)"

Arc's way much better and more interesting then boring dual-spork-totems, but now it's not really viable as the main lightning spell.