Arctic Breath

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zharmad wrote:

That's interesting, in my tests I separate the ground ice from the head projectile via firing it through ice walls. The ground ice after the pierce definitely does damage. It seems to me that the ground ice is the bulk of the projectile and the skull just a visual ornament?

No, you're just somehow causing a bug where the projectile (the skull) appears to be destroyed on your client, but still exists on the server, and continues dropping ice. I will investigate when I have time. Are you doing anything special to cause this, other than Ice Wall?

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MagpieMcGraw wrote:

Have one more question. I just found out that fireball only does AOE when it expires, and doesn't do any when it pierces. Is it the same for Arctic Breath? What about with other supports like chain and fork?

Yes. Fireballa nd Arctic Breath both only do AoE when the projectile explodes, not when it passes through things.

Chain, Fork and Pierce all work identically for effects happening on the affected target. All three are ways for a projectile to move through a target without exploding.

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UnDeaD_CyBorG wrote:

So, would "Exploding" actually be a way for a projectile to continue, and thus a potential support gem?

No, a projectile which explodes no longer exists. It exploded. The explosion is the destruction of the projectile.

Exploding is the other thing that a projectile can do when it hits something, but by definition it is not "a way for a projectile to continue". Pierce, Fork and Chain are ways for a projectile to continue, exploding is the only other option, and is the way for it to not continue.

Projectiles already technically explode, but only some of them cause AoE damage when they do.

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UnDeaD_CyBorG wrote:

So if there was a support gem that added AOE to a projectile attack, it would automatically only work if it doesn't pierce or fork, etc?
Just interested in the mechanics.

It would depend entirely on how that support gem was implemented. There's just as much room for 'AoE on projectile hit' as 'AoE on Projectile Explosion'.

Leaving aside the huge problems with implementation that are present for both, of course :P

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Selanmer wrote:

The trail is also supposed to do damage to enemies who walk over it..

No it isn't. It's ground ice, and applies chill to enemies standing in it.\
Ground fire applies a burning damage debuff, which does damage, but that's a completely separate effect.

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Gorgomite wrote:

Arctic Breath tooltip.........

So last night I added the aoe node that adds 12% area damage and 8% size and my DPS on the tooltip didn't change.

Is the tooltip or the spell broken.

Neither.
Arctic breath will deal area damage (and be affected by those modifiers) if it explodes, but will deal non-area damage (not affected by those modifiers) for any other time it hits an enemy (chain/fork/pierce).

We can only show one set of values for the skill. Currently we show the lower value as the base of the skill, and the effect of 'this is area damage' is applied at the time it explodes.
We could equally treat area as the base of the skill, display that, and take away those bonuses on any hit that doesn't explode. Both have drawbacks.

There's a definite argument to be made for the second, since the base behaviour of the skill is not to pierce enemies, but there's also a strong argument for the first, in that people much prefer getting more damage in some situations than getting less damage than displayed in some situations. Given this, we go with the first, which is also simpler form an implementation point of view.

It is not and never has been two projectiles.

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