Spelltotem - the unwanted child ?

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ArkonHC wrote:

No, imho witout soulmantle, without the rare unique shield and without the much more rare crafted mod

That mod isn't that rare. It's a natural progression step. You don't "need" it until far late game, and when you reach that point, you have enough currency to buy/craft such a shield. Until then, you have the mantle. Hell, you can even progress without the mantle, nor the shield.

The "last steps" of a build shouldn't come without some sort of hurdle.

That said, totems aren't in a very good spot. Sure, everything's possible - and at the "high end" it's quite OK. But a little bit of love for the play style, especially after the Guardian node got removed, shouldn't be unheard of.

I think that the fact that you need a ~1-2 ex 6 link chest as a minimum to do t16 maps is a good thing..

The issue isn't that spell totems are too expensive to make work but that there are other things around that work for way less.

A 6 link soul mantle cost me 1.5 ex when I upgraded from a random bad 6 link. If you haven't been able to gather 1.5 ex by the time you reach red maps then there is something seriously wrong and even then I was running red maps on a generic 6-link just fine.

Spell totems are in a good place I think. I decided to play spell totem this league and went for an Arc build and it is in a much, much better place than you would think. I play semi casually ( maybe 20 hours a week ) and this build has managed to kill all the main bosses in the game ( that I have encountered ) as well as the maven's invitations ( those that I have tried at least, including the breach lords and the feared ) and 100% delirium maps.

Totems as a mechanic are kind of broken if you ask me. Just manually dodge everything and watch it die. It is a good thing that it requires some specific investment and isn't super high dps.

If it were up to me I think that every build in the game should require at least a few ex worth of investment to clear T16's.

GGG want to encourage self/hand casting, Totems make spell casting too easy so there has to be drawbacks to Spell Totems also some Spell Totem setups stress the servers which GGG dislike.

Spell Totem builds a niche playstyle and I guess there isn't a demand to improve them or make them easier to play. There are many skills GGG ignore or award slight buffs, such as Spectral Throw, their focus is on new skills. GGG can't afford to spend time and resources on Spell Totems.

While I loved totems back before my break after Betrayal league, it now seems like Totems got replaced by the Brands. They don't die, just expire and even though they are less flexible when it comes to spell variety, they overall seem better than totems. Admittedly it also seems extremely difficult to balance this kind of game with the amount of possible builds (Even though people seem to only play 'meta builds' for getting forward) and skill gems, so I understand why GGG would put totems under such tight requirements.

@Impiousbe

I got your points, but in In SSF or HCSSF my exalts are not going to buy me
anything. In trade-league it should be relativly easy.
You simply buy the soulmantle-armor or you buy the Tukohama's Fortress-shield, which are not too expensive and you have + 2 for very little currency investment.
And then your totems work. But without it you stall in early or mid-map-games.

Why not reduce the max totem limit and increase the sources of + 1 totem on items, so more new players or such with limited amount of free game time can use it?

In my opion it is actually a waste of potential with this gem - spelltotem -.

i play totem build this league with around 160m sirus DPS, if i take off my soul mantle my DPS will drop to 120m Sirus DPS but in exchange i will be a lot more tanky with other chest, so with 120M DPS i can't really agree with you that Totem is unplayable without soul mantle. And i don't even use self-curse.

Unless you called 120M DPS as Unplayable build.

@Ozxell

I assume, you dont play SSF or HCSSF and you have a lot of free time, means you are not working 8 to 10 hours for a living or you have a family.. I am right ?

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ArkonHC wrote:

@Ozxell

I assume, you dont play SSF or HCSSF and you have a lot of free time, means you are not working 8 to 10 hours for a living or you have a family.. I am right ?

Nice, personal attack instead of ague with logic. ok.

@Ozxell

was never meant to be an "attack", I am sorry, if it felt that way.

+ I checked your gear. Does not look SSF for me :).

If you have enough time at your disposal, you could get spelltotem
to work in SSF or HCSSF. But then you need very very good gear. And this takes a lot of time, a lot of grinding. With enough time spent, you could
get alomost every item. But a lot of people dont have so much free time at their disposal.
In trade league you can simply buy yourself two + 1 totem-items, and then spelltotem works.

But it think it´s a pity and a lot of lost potential in the early and mid
game with this skill. You could use it with so many spells, but it lacks the punching power, if one or two items are missing and you are a casual player with more or less limited game time.

In trade league it´s less a problem for sure. Since I only play SSF I did not give it that much thought, as it deserves. In SSF I find it quite difficult.

There are hundreds of builds that aren't exactly viable on SSF because they are gated behind specific uniques. Especially 6 linked uniques. I can't argue that spell totems are a lot harder to pull off on SSF.

The issue here isn't spell totems per se. I think they are fine and can be made to work rather cheaply in any trade league. The issue imo is that SSF as a game mode isn't very casual player friendly.

Don't get me wrong, mad respect for playing SSF, but I don't think it a game mode for a casual player and that is true for any build, not just spell totems.

For reference, I own a 6 linked perfect self found soul mantle that I found, divined and linked myself. When I get a corruption altar I will see If I can get a good corruption on it. It is possible but only if you play enough.

I agree that as a casual player you will have a hard time playing a spell totem build on SSF. I think however that that is true for most builds.