Wizard Active / Passive Skills (Originally by Zediono)

[:1]Taken from the original post by [user=338963]Zediono[/user], i copied out the wizard part, for us to take apart an discuss.

Many passive skills for 3 slots comes to my mind first. The active skills seem mostly familiar, apart form Archon and

Active Skills

• Frost nova


• Magic missile


• Ice armor


• Shock pulse (What's this?)


• Wave of force


• Spectral blade


• Electrocute


• Magic weapon


• Arcane orb


• Diamond skin


• Energy twister


• Disintegrate


• Storm armor


• Explosive blast


• Mirror image


• Slow time


• Teleport


• Hydra


• Ray of frost


• Energy armor


• Arcane torrent


• Meteor


• Blizzard


• Familiar


• Archon (Not Archon! "Super Saiyan"!)

Passive Skills

• Blur (level 10):
  
  Reduces melee damage taken by 20%.


• Drain power (level 10):
  
  All basic attacks (TL's note: not clear, melee attacks maybe?) provide 10 Arcane Power.


• Quickening (level 10):
  
  Increase casting speed by 10%.


• Flight before fight (level 13):
  
  Increases run speed by 5% when the Wizard is blocked in melee (TL's note: slowed? or actually blocking attacks?)


• Glass common (level 13):
  
  Increases damage dealt by 20%, but reduces armor by 20%. (Not Glass cannon? )


• Aggression (level 15):
  
  Increases attack by 20%.


• Superior skill (level 15):
  
  Increases precision by 20%.


• Expert defense (level 17):
  
  Increases defense by 20%.


• Astral presence (level 20):
  
  Increases maximum Arcane Power by 20%.


• Black ice (level 20):
  
  Damage dealt to frozen targets is increased by 20%.


• Temporal flux (level 21):
  
  When an enemy takes damage from an Arcane skill, its speed is reduced by 24% for 4 seconds. (TL's note: unsure if movement speed, attack speed, or both)


• Piercing attacks (level 25):
  
  Reduces the magical resistances of enemies by 20%.


• Temporal shift (level 26):
  
  Reduces cooldowns of skills by 10%.


• Unstable energy (level 28):
  
  When under 20% HP, the next skill (TL's note: loosely interpretated, may be wrong) knocks back all targets it hits. Can happen once every 90 seconds.


• Knowledge is power (level 30):
  
  Passive skill still being worked on. Used to provide 25% extra Willpower (a stat that is not included in the game anymore)

Black Ice, Temporal Flux and Piercing attacks?

What do you think, how it will be to extract 3 passive skills out of that many for your build?

Are there so many to complement the amount of combinations of active skills there are, also taking runes into account?

I am really wondering how this panes out.|||I actually suspect that Piercing Attacks will be ideal for mono-element builds, not dual element builds. Think about it - if you are using an Arcane Spell and come across a monster with high arcane resistance, why lower its resistances instead of just picking a flat +% damage passive that will allow you to kill it faster by alternating the spell damage type?

It has to be inferior for multiple element builds, otherwise it would be the single strongest damage booster, no?

But, yeah, if I was building a Wizard oriented around kiting/control, Black Ice and Temporal Flux sound like two primary choices. Casting speed sounds very useful for that play style as well.

Personally, though, my first Wizard will be a Lazer Wizard. With as much +% damage stacked as possible.|||IMO, Jay Wilson loves the idea of a melee-wiz, so we should probably watch out for amazing build diversity out there..

I'm probably done making theoretical skill builds, as they change everything every now and then.

That said, I might go with the defensive traits at first while the training wheels are still on... Max damage, later |||Real men build Glass Cannon first build, every game, every time.

Block all damage with the manly testosterone of your hairy chest!


Quote:




Shock pulse (What's this?)




I am guessing it's a damage oriented nova? If Frost Nova is disable and Repulsion is deflect/knock back.|||Looks cool. I see things breaking out into the following categories:

Armors/Buffs

* Energy armor

* Ice armor

* Storm armor

* Diamond skin

Defensive/Monster Evasion Skills

* Slow time

* Teleport

* Mirror image

* Wave of force

Single-Target Damage Spells [typically far range?]

* Magic missile

* Ray of frost

* Disintegrate

* Arcane orb

Near/Mid range Damage Spells

* Explosive blast

* Frost nova [could be more defensive if like d2]

* Shock pulse? (I am assuming this is like charge bolt)

Melee

* Spectral blade

* Magic weapon

Crowd Control

* Electrocute

* Energy twister

* Arcane torrent

* Meteor

* Blizzard

* Hydra

Godly abilities [probably have hefty cooldowns, like the barb skills recently revealed]

* Familiar (still no idea wtf this is)

* Archon

I imagine most of us will use a good mix of the above categories since we're restricted to just 6 skills. Here's how I'll probably make my first wizard:

* Arcane orb [assuming this will be my boss killer]

* Electrocute [i'm a sucker for lite sorcs from my D2 days]

* Arcane Torrent [in conjunction with Slow Time, Arcane Torrent should feel like casting a Blizzard]

* Archon [unless Familiar ends up being really cool]

* Slow time [best crowd control/defensive ability?]

* Teleport [every sorc will need it ofc]

* Ice/Energy/Storm Armor [whichever works best]

The 3 passives are kind of a no-brainer in my opinion. Just go for damage:

* Astral Presence

* Piercing Attacks

* Aggression or Glass Cannon [whichever gives greater damage]

*Quickening or Temporal Shift may actually end up giving more damage depending on cast time benefits

Also, where's the Passive love for Fire skills (meteor/hydra)? Ice skills get Black Ice, arcane skills get Astral Presence, fire gets nada?!? No fair!|||Arcane Orb and Disintegrate are AoE abilities.

Frost Nova is definitely defensive.

Fire seems like utility attack spells, believe it or not. Meteor is guaranteed to be our highest spike damage nuke. Hydra has the advantage of doing damage while you do other things (action economy).



And, see, there is a huge problem with classifying. Arcane Orb becomes a bloody armor spell with the right skill rune. Hydras change elements with every rune. Frost Nova is, at base, a defensive disable, but It has a Hurricane (D2 druid) skill morph.|||Quote:








I actually suspect that Piercing Attacks will be ideal for mono-element builds, not dual element builds. Think about it - if you are using an Arcane Spell and come across a monster with high arcane resistance, why lower its resistances instead of just picking a flat +% damage passive that will allow you to kill it faster by alternating the spell damage type?




Depends on how resistance works. If it is a percent based system and Piercing Attacks reduces resists on subtraction basis (I.e. a monster with 50% resist has 30% resist after Piercing Attacks) then Piercing attacks is superior to a flat 20% damage boost if resistance greater than 0, and equal if resistance is 0.|||Quote:








Real men build Glass Cannon first build, every game, every time.

Block all damage with the manly testosterone of your hairy chest!



I am guessing it's a damage oriented nova? If Frost Nova is disable and Repulsion is deflect/knock back.




LOL |||My biggets gripe with The Wizard is that there isn't any skill that's the equivalent of Firewall. This was THE damage spell, and once you got it in Normal (and to an extent, Nightmare too.) that was GG for the enemy. Not only was the damage frigging insane for anything standing in it, but while they were caught in it, roasting away, you were free to blast them with more stuff, like Glacial Spike/Lightning.

The closest combo I see now is to throw down Hydras and Ray of Frost them while they beat on you, and hope you out DPS them... I know Duriel/The council/Mephisto/Iswald/The Armorer/Diablo/Shenk/Nihaltak/The Ancients/Baal/Andariel(Nm)/Radamant(Nm)/Duriel(Nm) All could be out DPSed by a Firewall & Glacial Spike or Lightning combo.|||I think that's an argument against Firewall from Blizzard's perspective :P. Blizzard has made it very clear that they want all skills to be viable, and to encourage builds that make good use of all your skills. From that perspective, removing the 2 power win button that was Firewall + Glacial Spike seems like a necessity.

I do wish there was a spell or 2 with a wall type effect as I suspect battlefield control will be important to the Wizard (like channeling enemies into a line for easier disintegration). We'll have to hope that some of them become wall spells when given the proper rune.