Crit Shockwave Totem or Crit Flame Totem?

Hey guys, as the title says I am trying to decide between the two. I was wondering if anyone could tell me which of the two is stronger and why?

thanks :)

Both are fairly strong dps-wise, the difference is in usage.

Flame totem has better range and doesn't try to knock targets out of it so you don't have to resummon it often for better positioning, on the other hand, it's more vulnerable to melee enemies than shockwave so it will most likely get destroyed more often.

They also have different focus, flame totem is stronger versus single targets and shockwave is stronger versus large groups. It's also worth noting for a crit build that physical to lightning gem gives SWT quite a shock potential so it will be able to shock stronger enemies than flame totem, freezing with just the hatred damage bonus will also be decently strong.

As for passive investment, my personal view is that shockwave totem user needs to chase AoE nodes much more aggresssively than a flame totem user needs projectile speed. Also, fire and projectile damage bonuses are much more abundant than physical and AoE.

I've played swt and flame totem on HC chars and they pretty much are on par with each other.

The reason i prefer flame totem is that when playing swt you are pretty much committed to using a carcass jack. It is bis for that build while flame totem leaves you more options. Especially when playing HC i prefer to have good defensive stats on my central gear piece like belly of the beast or a good rare (something with t1 life and very high armor/evasion for iron reflexes). You can have that with flame totem without cutting back on your offense (i guess this doesn't matter that much when playing SC).

Plus: The tree is a bit more straightforward for flame totem as good elemental damage nodes are on the same side of the tree as ancestral bond.

shock wave totems are far more annoying to level because they push everything out of their pitiful aoe.

2.0 swt will become the black holes of awesomeness with reverse knockback! And I prefer flame totem for solo play because it is better against bosses in general.

the revers knock back is on gloves right? man that is is gona be a hard sell between those (which will naturally be over priced) and the juicy multi from face breakers

Hah hey buddy! Keep in mind for all the people saying "Black Hole OP" that the knockback is now only 25%, so it isn't really that amazing.

Personally I will be leveling as Flame Totem (they are super fucking strong to level with) and transitioning into Crit SWT later on. I made this choice for a few reasons:

1) Flame Totems are really good for leveling. They are pretty tanky and by the time you hit dual totems on the passive tree they have decent AOE. Also it's easy to scale them through passives and all you need is a 3L. Shockwave is pretty mediocre until you have at least a 4L and some decent crit, they definitely require more investment to start getting good.

2) Shockwave Totem has better AOE and better map clear speed. Also since the changes to shotgunning Flame Totem isn't the obvious winner for single target anymore. Flame is still better single target as it has about 30% higher base damage but it isn't by such a large margin. Also with Projectile Speed the AOE on Flame is pretty decent, I but the 360 degrees on Shockwave is amazing.

3) Shockwave Totem is stronger defensively. Knockback is still good defensively, even at 25%. With Hatred you will be freezing everything except map bosses.

4) Scaling. It's Physical which is automatically better for scaling than elemental because of resists. I think with decent gear Shockwave has more potential through support gems. You can make use of both Conc Effect (you should hit most of the screen) and Hypothermia multipliers.