Draconic Incarnation Dragon Breath Question

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Sympl

Well-known member
Ok, so I'm late to the party. I started using this on my first character that made sense to be in the Draconic Tree a few months back, prior to the update with all the "changes".

I know it's not the same as it was....I'm not jumping on here complaining about power level changes or anything else, I'm using what's there now and I'm faced with something that doesn't make much sense to me:

T4 Improve Dragon Breath....I was using Gaping Maw before because it flat out dealt more damage than the other two, albeit in the cone or straight line form (whichever it is) of the base Dragon Breath. I have a family member who always used Energy Burst because he hated things getting behind him, even though it dealt less damage than Gaping Maw.

Now it looks like both deal the same damage, which means there's never any reason to take Gaping Maw, right? Why Hit things in front of you for the same damage as you can hit everything around you for?

Am I missing something? Does the Baseform/Gaping Maw have a longer cast range/distance covered than the radius of Energy Burst? That would at least make the choice....a choice....otherwise, it looks like Energy Burst is just Gaping Maw except it hits everything around you 360 instead of just in front.......
 
SpartanKiller13

SpartanKiller13

Why do I have 411 .ddocp files
Sympl said:
T4 Improve Dragon Breath....I was using Gaping Maw before because it flat out dealt more damage than the other two, albeit in the cone or straight line form (whichever it is) of the base Dragon Breath. I have a family member who always used Energy Burst because he hated things getting behind him, even though it dealt less damage than Gaping Maw.

Am I missing something? Does the Baseform/Gaping Maw have a longer cast range/distance covered than the radius of Energy Burst? That would at least make the choice....a choice....otherwise, it looks like Energy Burst is just Gaping Maw except it hits everything around you 360 instead of just in front.......
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Gaping Maw did not do more damage than the other two lol. It doubled damage and kept the cone shape. Energy Burst doubled damage and changed to a blast centered on you. Energy Vortex did the most damage (tics every 3s for 15s) just over time.

Yeah, cones go farther in front of you than a blast centered on you.

Also the form lines up nicely with cone-shaped CC, like Greater Color Spray or Burst of Glacial Wrath.

There's certainly a playstyle for either, but using Energy Burst generally encourages you to be in the middle of the enemies vs base/Gaping Maw which encourage you to be on the edge of a pack. Being next to less mobs is usually a good thing XD
 
S

Sympl

Well-known member
SpartanKiller13 said:
Gaping Maw did not do more damage than the other two lol. It doubled damage and kept the cone shape. Energy Burst doubled damage and changed to a blast centered on you. Energy Vortex did the most damage (tics every 3s for 15s) just over time.

Yeah, cones go farther in front of you than a blast centered on you.

Also the form lines up nicely with cone-shaped CC, like Greater Color Spray or Burst of Glacial Wrath.

There's certainly a playstyle for either, but using Energy Burst generally encourages you to be in the middle of the enemies vs base/Gaping Maw which encourage you to be on the edge of a pack. Being next to less mobs is usually a good thing XD
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Thanks for the reply....like I said...kinda late to the dragonbreath stuff.......I'm easily wrong about the damage thing. I just remember it that way....but memory is fickle.

I'm using it on an Electric Multivial Alchemist who dual-crowd controls with Flash Freeze and Mass Flesh to Gold, so I'm trying out the Burst this time since Mass Flesh to Gold is self targeted as well. Honestly though, I'm pretty much not using it at all in favor of Storm Catcher out of Primal Avatar. I may try to respec my Draconic tree a little differently and just not take it (Dragon Breath). I do have/use Greater Color Spray.....so I'm kind of all over the board with cones and self targeted stuff and I used the Gaping Maw last ETR on the same build, so I get the synergy there.

I'm thinking swap the 4 points for DragonBreath+T4 modification for 2 levels of Dragonscales for the extra +2PRR and take my T4 Epic Improved Quicken from 1 level to 3 if I do end up giving it up entirely.
 
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S

Sympl

Well-known member
DBZ said:
Delete forget move on try macro strikes
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I've dipped into Macro enough to get Tonquin's Lightning Hammer, but I'm just getting too much out of Draconic and Primal Avatar to make climbing up the Macro tree higher worth it for this build. One of my cousins has an Electric spell casting Arti that takes full advantage of the tree and I'll likely do that whenever I'm on an Arti again, but.....I'm pretty happy with my Epic layout at present. :)
 
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DBZ

Well-known member
Im a fire bomber tail gunner i just aoe at max range di primal sd

I dont use any strikes now just greater color spray i have nightmare lance for raid bosses only

Reborn in fire still works just saw a 19k crit off it on r6 just need to stack enough amp

Ice gets you max crits fire gets you max heals survivability acid max dcs but lightning would be much better on a sorc

And going forward max spell timers and procs there is no good lightning dot proc that i know of
 
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erethizon1

Well-known member
Gaping Maw and Energy Burst were always the same damage. The question is whether you want a blast all around you or a longer distance in front of you. We used to get both abilities and what I discovered, when I started running high reaper for RXP, was that energy burst was too risky to use. You had to jump into a pack of monsters to use it and died all too frequently before jumping back out. A cone in front of you is much safer because you don't have to get as close.

The question now is, with the massive nerf to damage, is it better to just do energy vortex and hope that you hit most monsters at least twice instead of just once with a blast. I haven't decided what ability I am going with in the end (only played one life since the change and picked gaping maw again).
 
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DBZ

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You want ice acid or fire acid trying to maximize 4 elements is a nightmare

Max range and dont get hit thats the tanks job
 
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DBZ

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If you go lightning you need to maximize force lightning acid dots and magma dots

You could swap magma out for salt or freezing ice

Ruins still work
 
S

Sympl

Well-known member
DBZ said:
If you go lightning you need to maximize force lightning acid dots and magma dots

You could swap magma out for salt or freezing ice

Ruins still work
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I don't use dots. My Ruins work wonderfully. I don't think you and I are playing the same game. :)

Edit: While playing, I just realized my Storm Catcher is technically a DOT. I just don't tend to think of it that way.
 
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DBZ

Well-known member
Its alot more dps if u do and or free cc on all spell casts

2 mutlivials with max procs or fast cast meteors
 
S

Sympl

Well-known member
DBZ said:
Its alot more dps if u do and or free cc on all spell casts

2 mutlivials with max procs or fast cast meteors
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It's kind of hard to be a lightning based character if you aren't...you know....casting lightning spells.......

And this is all really off topic. My op was about Dragonbreath shape. I got my answer. This is all just....you trying to convince me that my build isn't as good as yours. And it's really just falling on deaf ears. Because I do quite well.

I will, as a concession, consider your advice should I ever decide to make a fire based alchemist, but it's not something I'm planning on at this time.
 
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