Totems and Elemental Equilibrium ?

How does Elemental Equilibrium and totems interacts?

Let’s take the example of a character with elemental equilibrium that deals all 3 types of elemental damages with its main attack. Normally, without the use of totems, he gets -25% resist to all elements when he hits a mob with the elemental equilibrium debuff.

This character also use a detonate dead totem that deal both fire and cold dmg. I see 3 possible ways for the detonate dead totem to interact with the player and elemental equilibrium :

1. The totem doesn’t interact with elemental equilibrium at all. It gets no resists penalty or bonus. It doesn’t affect the caster either.

2. The totem is considered like a separated entity that also has elemental equilibrium. In this case, it gets -50% lightning resist and 0% fire and cold resist when detonate dead is cast on a mob that was hit by the totem before. The caster elemental dmg isn’t affecting the totem and isn’t affected by the totem.

3. The totem and the caster are considered as one and only entity. In this case, that would mean that if the detonate dead is cast on a mob that was already hit by the caster, it get -25% fire resist and -25% cold resist. If the caster is hitting a mob that was already hit by the detonate dead totem, he gets -50% lightning resist and 0% fire and cold resist.

So, what is it ? 1, 2 or 3 ? I guess it could also be a 4th option that I didn’t think of.

Both you and your totem have EE. EE's resistance buff/debuff overwrites itself, so no matter whether it's you or your totem doing elemental damage, EE gets re-applied every time something gets hit.

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0nin wrote:

Both you and your totem have EE. EE's resistance buff/debuff overwrites itself, so no matter whether it's you or your totem doing elemental damage, EE gets re-applied every time something gets hit.

So, is it option 2 or 3 ?

Alright, let's do this step by step...

"

Let’s take the example of a character with elemental equilibrium that deals all 3 types of elemental damages with its main attack. Normally, without the use of totems, he gets -25% resist to all elements when he hits a mob with the elemental equilibrium debuff.

This character also use a detonate dead totem that deal both fire and cold dmg.

For one, if you do all 3 types of elemental damage, nothing happens. No EE debuff is applied at all.
For the sake of continuing the explanation, let's instead assume the character deals Lightning and Cold damage.

Now when the character hits a target, it gets debuffed with -50% Fire resistance. This buff stays on for 4 seconds (I think it was) and gets refreshed every time he hits it.
When the totem hits that same target with its detonate dead, the -50% Fire resistance will boost that damage, and then be overwritten by a -50% Lightning resistance debuff.
Finally, when the character hits that target again, he'll get boosted Lightning damage, and then apply a -50% Fire resistance debuff again.

"

0nin wrote:

Alright, let's do this step by step...

"

Let’s take the example of a character with elemental equilibrium that deals all 3 types of elemental damages with its main attack. Normally, without the use of totems, he gets -25% resist to all elements when he hits a mob with the elemental equilibrium debuff.

This character also use a detonate dead totem that deal both fire and cold dmg.

For one, if you do all 3 types of elemental damage, nothing happens. No EE debuff is applied at all.
For the sake of continuing the explanation, let's instead assume the character deals Lightning and Cold damage.

Now when the character hits a target, it gets debuffed with -50% Fire resistance. This buff stays on for 4 seconds (I think it was) and gets refreshed every time he hits it.
When the totem hits that same target with its detonate dead, the -50% Fire resistance will boost that damage, and then be overwritten by a -50% Lightning resistance debuff.
Finally, when the character hits that target again, he'll get boosted Lightning damage, and then apply a -50% Fire resistance debuff again.

So, its option 3, almost exactly like I described it.

Now that you mention it, I kind of remember reading that applying 3 types of elemental dmg does not trigger EE. But I don't understand why.

If you do fire dmg = +25% fire resist, -25% cold resist, -25% lightning resist
+ cold dmg = -25 fire resist, +25 cold resist, -25 lightning resist
+ lightning dmg = -25 fire resist, -25 cold resist, +25 lightning resist

The result is -25 fire resist, -25 cold resist and -25 lightning resist, no ?

So, what am I missing ?

Balance. Getting a free -25% resistance on everything would just be silly. It's intended for alternating attacks so that one element can boost another, not always getting a benefit on the same attack.

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0nin wrote:

Balance. Getting a free -25% resistance on everything would just be silly. It's intended for alternating attacks so that one element can boost another, not always getting a benefit on the same attack.

Hmm, I don't know if getting -25% resistance on all 2nd hits would be unbalanced.

First, there are other passives that are just as powerful if not more, without being called silly. For exemple, whisper of Doom let you cast a 2nd curse. That 2nd curse may as well be elemental weakness which reduce all resists by 50% without forcing you to deal 2 or 3 elemental dmg at once.

Second, EE only works the 2nd time you hit a monster. But normal mobs usually die from in 1 or 2 hit anyway, resists or not. So its only really helpful against champions, rare and bosses.

Third, you need to get all 3 elemental on the same spell or attack. For spell, its kinda hard to do and if you do, there's tradeoff for it. For attacks, its not very hard. But the benefit is also much lower since a big portion of attacks is usually physical dmg which doesn't get boosted by the -25% to resists.

Fourth : How are we suppose to know that doing all 3 elemental dmg does not trigger EE ? Are players suppose to read forum/fansites etc. before playing the game ?

Either the description of this Keystone should be modified to mention that EE isn't triggered on 3 elemental attacks/spell (I know it wouldn't be elegant at all) or better yet, the EE debuff should apply in all circumstances, without exceptions.

The other solution would be the change the Keystone entirely so we don't need so much explanations before understanding how it works.