Single target needs some love

Some of you might not remember the days when people would use things like Dual Strike for single-target damage in a 4L. But I do. I enjoy builds with something beyond spam+movement. Stuff like Invalesco's 2012 Build of the Week, which demonstrates the idea quite well.

However, since the introducion of Melee Splash, such builds have been impossible, and with wanders and 1h casters they've been impossible for as long as I can remember. Any 6L with LMP, GMP or MSplash will always trump a 4L in single-target damage.

So naturally, the announcement regarding spell shotgunning's removal excited me. It turns out, however, that the changes put wanders (already gimped by a ridiculously small skill pool) even further from target. 2.0's lessening of the damage penalties for LMP and GMP makes it even harder for 1h to construct viable 4L options.

Although 1h is most effected, there is a 2h effect as well. ZiggyD noticed it leveling his beta bow build: single-target damage feels low even when multi-target damage feels fine.

Now, I know a good deal of people don't enjoy these nostalgic micro-intensive types of builds, and I am not trying to rain on their parade. If you run a single-skill-spam with LMP or whatever I do not want to nerf your build. I want to nerf the fuck out of LMP, but that just means means the appropriate active skills will need to be buffed enough that LMP spammers don't feel an ovrrall difference.

Thus the basic game plan would be:

• If an active skill gem is a single-target melee or a single-projectile skill, buff its damage. Heavily. 25% more minimum, 30% more preferred. Directly on the skill gem.
• The damage penalty on LMP should be severe enough that LMP plus a damage support has roughly the same impact on single-target damage as no supports whatsoever. It doesn't need to be less, because I get that LMP should fit the "I can't decide between single-target and GMP so I'm just going to spam LMP" niche, but DPS of a single-target 4L and a LMP 6L should be about the same. A 35% less penalty in endgame would be about right, 30% less would be minimum. (0.7*1.25=0.875>0.85)
• The damage penalty on GMP should be severe enough that GMP plus a damage support has noticeably less single-target damage than no supports whatsoever. At the same, it should be appealing compared to the less specialized LMP (from a multi-target perspective). A 45% less penalty in endgame would probably work well, 40% less would be minimal. (1.25*.6=0.75)
• Melee Splash's single target component would currently fit somewhere between the LMP and GMP models. Actually, giving Melee Splash the LMP/GMP treatment with both greater and lesser versions of the gem wound be pretty awesome. The splash portion might go from 40% penalty to 45% or 50%, but the 25-30% buff should more than cover that, buffing the area damage component overall.

Taken as a whole, these suggestions should not put a huge dent in the popular multi-target spam style, but would help enable a sometimes single-target style of play which GGG once fostered but has since lost sight of.

I still use a single target skill :(

Do tell. 1h or 2h?

^

I care a lot about this issue.

I think the ship has sailed on this one.

Of course it has. But it needs to return to port.

"

CliveHowlitzer wrote:

I think the ship has sailed on this one.

Yeah.

Nearly every boss spawns adds now.

Areas as early as Coast Normal (L2) have massive packs of 9-12 enemies that swarm you all at once.

A 6L single target is only minorly more damaging to a single target than a 6L aoe skill.

Every new skill added in the last year has an AoE component.

RIP.

"

pneuma wrote:

Nearly every boss spawns adds now.

Areas as early as Coast Normal (L2) have massive packs of 9-12 enemies that swarm you all at once.

A 6L single target is only minorly more damaging to a single target than a 6L aoe skill.

I don't view this as a bad thing. As long as there are enemies, there is always a chance one could remain after some combat, and thus a single-target skill could prove the best move at some point. It is actually good that bosses have adds so that it isn't purely a matter of taking LMP/GMP/MSplash out of your skill and replacing it with something else, which is just reducing tactical variety within builds from the other direction.

In essence, you're responding as if I was suggesting 6L single-target as a replacement for multi-target, and the OP should have made it clear that's not it at all. I want single-target skills to complement multi-target skills by giving the power of options to combat. As such, I'm not asking for a radical metagame shift (nor would my suggestion cause one), I just want some degree of tactical choice.

Nah, AOE should be dominant over single target. When the opponents are simple AIs, single combat isn't all that interesting. It boils down to which side is dealing more % life/sec to the other- just a comparison of stats, nothing else to it! With AOE, positioning matters, aiming matters, dodging matters... the "action" elements of ARPG come to the fore.