Fierce Loyalty

[Thrakhath]

I've been playing around with the character planner, and managed this:

Thorns 9,415.00-13,840.00

This is before using any sockets; using gems it may be possible to hit 20K thorns damage - on you and all of your minions.

Is this a lot? Looks to me like his makes a summoner build pretty viable...

[yotajoule]

I was pretty excited about fierce loyalty as well but it looks like the tough stuff (champions, rares) are going to have close-to or even far above a million hitpoints.

http://media.diablofans.com/images/n...e/IMG_0101.jpg

[Zoltar]

Might run into trouble if bosses have thorns resistance.

[AurelianZ]

Only works for melee

[sacridoc]

It'll be good against fast attacking weak enemies. And not so good against slow attack strong enemies.

Also, I think thorns is probably best paired with life per sec since the other regen types won't work as well with summons.

Of course this is assuming that your pets simply get the benefit of the items, not the benefit of the actual life regen (which could be the case, and could make more sense).

In my opinion, you would use thorns as part of a tanking build in order to compensate for the damage you lose by taking defensive stats. Therefore, it'll be most useful in team games. But won't be as good when you're soloing. Because you rely on getting hit, you will have to stack defensive stats that will decrease your damage in a solo game.

Also, I'm under the impression that thorns works for any enemy that's in melee range. So if you're standing right next to an archer, they would take thorns damage.

[HardRock]

Also, I think thorns is probably best paired with life per sec since the other regen types won't work as well with summons.

Life per hit wouldn't be bad either, assuming that the dogs get the full bonus. Simple life regen is probably better though, especially since you can use the Templar's Loyalty aura for this purpose in solo games, which frees up affix slots on your gear for other things.

In my opinion, you would use thorns as part of a tanking build in order to compensate for the damage you lose by taking defensive stats. Therefore, it'll be most useful in team games. But won't be as good when you're soloing. Because you rely on getting hit, you will have to stack defensive stats that will decrease your damage in a solo game.

I don't think thorns will be effective in parties at all. It's best used when most enemies will focus on you, or in this case your dogs, which won't be the case if you play with a group. Even in solo games, monsters often ignore your dogs.

Also, I'm under the impression that thorns works for any enemy that's in melee range. So if you're standing right next to an archer, they would take thorns damage.

Damn, I should have tested this when I had the chance. I doubt thorns works like that though.

[Thrakhath]

Also, I'm under the impression that thorns works for any enemy that's in melee range. So if you're standing right next to an archer, they would take thorns damage.

This was the case in Diablo 2, as long as their projectiles dealt physical damage. Casters would never take thorns damage from casting spells - although many would switch to melee attacks when you were close up anyway. Since your pets will almost always be next to an enemy, they will almost always be dealing thorns damage, we just need other damage sources to hit ranged attackers our pets can't get to.

Might run into trouble if bosses have thorns resistance.

Thorns resistance was included in PvP in Diablo 2, and I am unsure whether it was also included for bosses. Since Thorns in D2 was based on a % of enemy damage, it scaled to ridiculous levels against bosses, and so Thorns resistance was a mechanic that made sense. Judging by the stats given for D3 enemies, there seems to be no reason for bosses to have Thorns resistance anymore.

I was pretty excited about fierce loyalty as well but it looks like the tough stuff (champions, rares) are going to have close-to or even far above a million hitpoints.

It looks to me like standard enemies, even in Inferno, will die from Thorns damage alone after hitting my minions 3 or 4 times. Not bad for a mana-free passive skill! Rares will be harder but with a ton of powerful summons, the WD is free to throw out damage from behind.

Here is an example of a build using Fierce Loyalty, relying on a lot of thorns and life regen items:

http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculato...TPU!gde!bbcZbY

[sacridoc]

I don't think thorns will be effective in parties at all. It's best used when most enemies will focus on you, or in this case your dogs, which won't be the case if you play with a group. Even in solo games, monsters often ignore your dogs.

I'm just saying that if you were able to get the enemies to focus on you exclusively, it would be better in a team game because your skill damage would be lower with a thorns build. I think you might be able to get enemies to focus on you if you simply run into them and the 3 other players you're with have ranged snares, etc.

It looks to me like standard enemies, even in Inferno, will die from Thorns damage alone after hitting my minions 3 or 4 times. Not bad for a mana-free passive skill! Rares will be harder but with a ton of powerful summons, the WD is free to throw out damage from behind.

I've always thought that with thorns builds the player would have to be taking more damage than each individual pet. Because otherwise you shouldn't get life regen items, and you're kind of losing a source of thorns damage. Also, it makes it easier to tank when you intend to be taking damage.

This is the build I was considering:

http://us.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/witch-doctor#aeYTgd!gdZ!bacZYZ

Where consuming spirit is your main attack most of the time but of course can only be used once against strong single targets, so you take phlebotomize for when you can't use consuming spirit.

Since the majority of your damage comes from thorns, I would expect that in the end you'll do less damage overall when playing solo because you'll need to stack life regen. But in team games (assuming you can effectively get enemies to focus on you and your team uses snares well) you may be able to move faster since your team would be less concerned with defense and more with offense while enemies focus on you.