Arctic Air & Firey Orb

[Chelsea Rorec]

Anyone know whats happens with Arctic Air if you put in the firey Orb proc from Dominating Grasp ?

Does it keep spitting out Orbs ?

Is it per mob ?

 

[Onlyasandwich]

I would guess that it has chance to spawn an orb every 10 seconds for every mob in range.

 

Each mob should increase the chance to spawn, but only one will actually spawn. Would love to hear if this is true for anyone able to test!

 

[MoonSheep]

even if it procced a hundred fiery orbs it still wouldn’t be worth wasting a slot on - it’s truly dreadful lol

 

they should rename it “hot brawl”

[Onlyasandwich]

It's subtle, but they're not actually as bad as they seem.

 

They provide a useful distraction, and get two aura ticks off before they die. They add more aoe damage to your aoe immob than any damage proc by far.

 

It's best used in powers that are aoe, but suboptimal for regular damage procs. 

 

Even under ideal proc scenario for the aoe immob (no rech enhanced), a regular damage proc adds ~9 damage on average. Fiery Orb adds two ticks of ~11 damage - more than twice as effective, (it ticks much more often for an even higher total as @oedipus_tex corrected) and also still procs reliably for the whole aoe even if heavily recharge enhanced. The 30% chance for 3 sec Mag 2 stun is pretty useless of course. As a fun nod to your comparison, @MoonSheep, this is roughly the same as an ED capped brawl. 😄 It just so happens that a brawl on every target in an aoe for the cost of one slot isn't so bad.

Edited March 10, 2022 by Onlyasandwich

[oedipus_tex]

This post prompted me to look up what Fiery Orb actually does. It's power list appears to be here:

 

https://cod.uberguy.net/html/entity.html?entity=pets_dominating_grasp_pet

 

 

If this info is correct, the orbs summoned by this proc last 20 seconds. They don't actually have a direct attack, just an aura that ticks every 4 seconds (so it ticks 5 times over the orb's lifetime). The sphere has a 15ft radius and hits up to 16 enemies. Each tick deals 0.2 scale Fire damage, so an enemy hit by all 5 ticks takes Scale 1 damage. I believe that works out to around 46 damage total. That isn't terrible, necessarily, if you consider how excited players get about Hold damage procs--typically a 57% chance for 72 damage to a single enemy. If you can actually keep enough enemies in the 15ft sphere, Fiery Orb should work out pretty decently... if it triggers.

 

Two howevers to follow:

 

 

First however: the PPM for Fiery Orb is just 2PPM. That's low. This is certainly not the game changing proc that some other archetypes get in their ATO. 

 

Second however, the orb can be killed by enemies. It has 25% fewer HP than a standard pet and no defense or resist of its own. It's not a bad feature that enemies can attack them of course, it can pull a little heat of you, but it does mean the damage output is more theoretical than real. 

 

 

 

IMO the right place in Ice Control to put Fiery Orb is Frostbite, the AoE Immobilize. The only other AoE control thats suitable is Flash Freeze, the sleep, and a DoT is at total cross purposes of sleep. But even so I don't cast Frostbite very often, I'd usually rather allow enemies their movement, because Ice can slow it to a crawl and further mess with their AI.

[Onlyasandwich]

44 minutes ago, oedipus_tex said:

First however: the PPM for Fiery Orb is just 2PPM. That's low.

Excellent detail and analysis! I had a 10 sec tick rate in my head and,  like a fool, didn't bother to check.

 

As for the point above, I feel the low PPM is mitigated to a degree by the unique way this proc works compared to a damage proc. It's a bit more similar to a buff proc like FFback, where as long as one of them goes off in the aoe, you're good to go. My observed behavior thus far is that it will only ever summon one at a time no matter what, and they appear at the caster's position. If you are hitting a solid aoe, you're going to get an orb with most casts.

 

As for the squishiness, what better AT to leverage such a weak little creature than the lovely dominator, who can lock down those bosses and smash them to bits before they can retaliate? 😄 

Edited March 10, 2022 by Onlyasandwich

[oedipus_tex]

Yeah the Fiery Orb proc is always going to be a bit of a conversation starter. 🙂

 

I have to admit that when presented in terms of what it provides, a damage proc with the stats: 2 PPM, 5 x Scale 0.2 damage*, 15 foot radius, target cap 16 is pretty good. Probably the reason it doesn't "feel" good is the 20 seconds it takes to deliver that payload of damage. 

 

 

 

*Just realized I may be slightly underestimating how many ticks of damage the pet delivers. It lives for 20 seconds, its aura ticks every 4 seconds. So it's possible the pet delivers a final tick of damage on the same time it dies. Not sure which takes priority, the damage delivery or the pet dying first, but its at least possible it delivers 6 ticks of damage for a total of 1.2 Scale versus 5 ticks for 1 Scale.

Edited March 10, 2022 by oedipus_tex

[oedipus_tex]

Small update to my posts above, Bopper corrected me in a chat. 

 

Scale 0.2 damage on a level 50 pet is actually around 11.12 damage. If that ticks 5 times, you'd get around 55.5 damage (66.6 if it ticks 6 times) which is a bit better than the 46 I guessed at above.

[MoonSheep]

1 hour ago, oedipus_tex said:

Small update to my posts above, Bopper corrected me in a chat. 

 

Scale 0.2 damage on a level 50 pet is actually around 11.12 damage. If that ticks 5 times, you'd get around 55.5 damage (66.6 if it ticks 6 times) which is a bit better than the 46 I guessed at above.

 

is that less than brawl at 50?

[Chelsea Rorec]

On 3/10/2022 at 6:04 AM, MoonSheep said:

 

is that less than brawl at 50?

Interesting discussion 🙂

Edited March 11, 2022 by Chelsea Rorec

[Chelsea Rorec]

Question i have is if you have it in Arctic Air and are stood in a large mob dosn't that increase the chance to proc ?

[MoonSheep]

27 minutes ago, Chelsea Rorec said:

Interesting discussion 🙂

 

i looked in-game and at mids, looks like brawl at 50 on a dom is around 21 damage. therefore two ticks of fiery orb over 8 seconds = 1 brawl.

 

i tried it for a week or two on my mind/fire and promptly got rid of it, giving the enemies a wedgie would deal a more meaningful punishment

[MoonSheep]

24 minutes ago, Chelsea Rorec said:

Question i have is if you have it in Arctic Air and are stood in a large mob dosn't that increase the chance to proc ?

 

i have an ice/ice dom on test that i just logged into - i put the chance for +dmg in arctic air which reliably double stacks for +42% DMG, contagious confusion also works incredibly well in arctic air

 

i then put 4 dmg procs in it, along with 4 procs in chilling embrace for some good proccy fun. i don't think fiery orb is worth even considering in my opinion

[Onlyasandwich]

2 hours ago, MoonSheep said:

i don't think fiery orb is worth even considering in my opinion

It's definitely not amazing for an ATO, but I did some (hopefully correct) proc math to compare it to a damage proc in arctic air specifically.

 

At 3.5 PPM, a normal damage proc in Arctic air has below minimum chance to proc, so gets clamped to 5%. If facing the max 16 targets, this means you have ~56% chance for 74 damage to fire on one target for every 10 seconds.

 

If most other powers, Fiery's 2 PPM would produce a lower per mob chance to fire, but since both clamp to the minimum 5%, this will also have ~56% chance to summon a fiery orb every 10 seconds. Even if that orb only survives for one tick, that means ~176 damage over the entire mob area. If it lives to tick 5X, you have ~880 damage total.

 

Of course this is assuming a very optimal target saturation in both instances, but the total damage capacity is quite a stark contrast!

 

Assuming worst case scenario where Fiery only fires one tick, Fiery and a normal damage proc provide roughly equal damage value against 7 targets. This scales much higher for Fiery as you increase targets and account for more tics, up to 5 (maybe 6).

 

This is all ignoring the possible benefit of it taking a hit for you, or even the ~3 sec Mag 2 stun, which isn't actually as bad as I thought if it's hitting every 4 seconds.

 

In short, it's actually superior as a pseudo damage proc in toggle aoes or short cooldown, wide aoes. I'd prefer a normal damage proc in a longer cycling, more traditionally proc-optimized power, but it would be my first choice when adding damage to an aura or the aoe immobilize.

 

 

 

[MoonSheep]

22 hours ago, Onlyasandwich said:

It's definitely not amazing for an ATO, but I did some (hopefully correct) proc math to compare it to a damage proc in arctic air specifically.

 

At 3.5 PPM, a normal damage proc in Arctic air has below minimum chance to proc, so gets clamped to 5%. If facing the max 16 targets, this means you have ~56% chance for 74 damage to fire on one target for every 10 seconds.

 

If most other powers, Fiery's 2 PPM would produce a lower per mob chance to fire, but since both clamp to the minimum 5%, this will also have ~56% chance to summon a fiery orb every 10 seconds. Even if that orb only survives for one tick, that means ~176 damage over the entire mob area. If it lives to tick 5X, you have ~880 damage total.

 

Of course this is assuming a very optimal target saturation in both instances, but the total damage capacity is quite a stark contrast!

 

Assuming worst case scenario where Fiery only fires one tick, Fiery and a normal damage proc provide roughly equal damage value against 7 targets. This scales much higher for Fiery as you increase targets and account for more tics, up to 5 (maybe 6).

 

This is all ignoring the possible benefit of it taking a hit for you, or even the ~3 sec Mag 2 stun, which isn't actually as bad as I thought if it's hitting every 4 seconds.

 

In short, it's actually superior as a pseudo damage proc in toggle aoes or short cooldown, wide aoes. I'd prefer a normal damage proc in a longer cycling, more traditionally proc-optimized power, but it would be my first choice when adding damage to an aura or the aoe immobilize.

 

 

 

 

have you played a dom with the fiery orb proc in-game? it is genuinely underwhelming in real life and of limited use regardless of what numbers we can make up on the forum

 

the only caveat i can see to be balanced is that it might be useful for beginners who spend a lot of time in each mob and move slowly

 

edit: this reads hostile AF but is not meant to be lol. my hatred for the orb is though 

Edited March 12, 2022 by MoonSheep

[Onlyasandwich]

6 hours ago, MoonSheep said:

have you played a dom with the fiery orb proc in-game?

I do use it on all 4 of my doms, and many controllers (energy font is identical).

 

I agree that it's generally more useful on a controller, given that they are more likely to have mobs survive longer to take further ticks.

 

As I mentioned, it's certainly not super inspiring in and of itself! However, neither are damage procs in these sorts of powers. Sometimes builds have extra slots, or you just really want to eke every extra bit of damage possible, and if doing so in a toggle or fast cycling aoe, the orb is objectively superior to a damage proc, even under the worst possible scenario. On characters that have meaningful aoe damage, it's also quite helpful that the damage from orb is applied evenly throughout the spawn. One-off damage proc hits in an aoe often go to waste on minions that would have died to the normal aoe chain in a moment anyhow. 

 

If you've ever been in a really chaotic jumble of over-aggro where you're using all your controls to stay alive, the orbs can really start to stack up, and they even survive well enough if you're being proactive with your lockdown. That extra damage is quite subtle, but really adds up in these scenarios. 

 

All that being said, go with what feels best for you! I'm not criticizing you for not choosing to include it in your build, but do want to put out relevant information for someone who might be balancing whether it's worth using in some circumstances.

 

Looking at the optimal scenario (max target saturation and full ticks), I can see where it is a tricky thing to balance. For doms specifically, I think it would be impactful and thematic to double the tick damage and reduce it to half duration, or somewhere along that spectrum (50% more tick damage, 30% less duration ,etc).

 

 

Edited March 12, 2022 by Onlyasandwich

[MoonSheep]

31 minutes ago, Onlyasandwich said:

If you've ever been in a really chaotic jumble of over-aggro where you're using all your controls to stay alive, the orbs can really start to stack up

 

 

you say that like it’s not the default way to play 😛