Death Magic Question

Death shield is defined as- Converts a portion of damage received from physical attacks to health...

Can someone help me to understand how this works? As you level this Skill a % goes up but I don't understand what's actually happening.

At first I thought it was the percentage of times that you will get life back when hit. There is no way that this can be as the spell hardly ever procs.

This week me to believe that I don't understand what the skill is actually doing, can someone help me understand how this skill works as it seems like one of the most useless skills in any tree.

 

I agree.. I think that spell sounds useless currently, but I plan to test it correctly - maybe this evening. Last release it's healing was really not worth it... to heal you need to take damage?? And a lot of it. Hopefully it works differently.. but I don't see why it would.

edit: though much can be said about leveling a skill up high enough to have it become useful, around 40 to 60 I'd suggest... what will this skill do at those levels? No way to tell until we try ourselves.. I hope it is working AS INTENDED, DEVS.

 

I was thinking it would be cool if while it was active the amount of damage that you took would increase the percentage of your life tap ability. So for instance if you took a ton of damage maybe you get a 50% increase of your life tap abilities.

I plan to test the ability more tonight, but I've played it with it for quite a while now and I'm really not sure what it's supposed to be doing, I can only assume that I'm using it in a incorrect application.

 

I also wonder if I'm using it correctly now, that is a good point. We do not know how skills work, or if they are working as intended, do we?

 

From what I've tested in prior iterations of the game is that it heals a percent of damage taken, which never seemed to be worth it, but that was pre-change. Now it may sound useless but actually is very attractive if it works properly. It is essentially adding direct mitigation in a non-traditional way.

For example if you take 100 damage and it heals for 10% damage taken that basically means you're only taking 90 damage, that would mean that's 10% direct damage mitigation. To get the same results in a more traditional way you would need to stack damage resist and calculate how much resist would net you 10% reduced damage.

 

Also, Not every skill is an offensive one. Imagine a tank type stacking defense armor, using this as well in his build. That would keep him alive longer, and help the healer keep up in burst times..

 

Search the forums for all things Death Magic. You will likely notice many people describing that the system needs a lot more love, in no lesser terms.

 

Death will tear me up right now. I can hold my own against archers and most melee guys, but that death is tough stuff. Saw it crit for like 148 yesterday. That's nearly a 300 point swing. I lose 148, he gains 148.

On the other hand one lucky crit and I can one shot him, even if he's over 500hp.

 

Is that good for magic? Im like, "level 26" (228 hp) and I crit for about 120-140 on the regular with bludgeon. At least once per fight. This is in addition to all the sun/knockback/knockdown/armor reducing abilities that bludgeon has. Im hardly trying to say one is better than the other, just saying an occasional crit for 148 (despite the lifetap) when youre at ~500hp total sounds disappointing.

 

Its good for a spell that does damage and heals at the same time. Searing Ray may hit harder at the same level but it doesn't heal ya.
Plus it crit'd like that while he was nearly full health, it would have done more damage (and healed for more), were he lower on health.
I cant heal thru it, he's death attuned, I'm life attuned. Every heal I cast he steals away, while hitting with bludgeon too.
Now if I could range him like an archer or mage, different story. If I don't need to get close to him I can win. That doesn't work tho, I'm wayyy too tanky!

Not saying it doesn't need work, just saying its pretty viable now, for 'end-game' level guys anyway.

 

SHHHHHHH
Oba Evesor

 

And, once again, we're talking purely PvP here - correct?

 

Yep! Purely PvP observations there. The people I know who use death swear by corpse explosion in PvE, but I have never played any Death so I cant confirm.

 

So back on topic. Does anyone know the percentage of damage that the shield returns as life?