spike trap under powered?

[JackalYYC]

I may not be at the level yet to have a valid opinion regarding how Inferno viable Spike Trap is, but in Act 3 Hell, at level 58 I'm still finding the traps very powerful. I used Bandolier for the majority of the playthrough, switching to Scatter for Act 1 and 2 Hell, now I'm back to Bandolier.

In situations where you can "fatal funnel" enemies in a narrow passage, doorway, stairs, etc., stacking 4-6 Spike Traps and then luring enemies back through them delivers massive, massive damage. I played around with stacking them on top of a Mark of Death (can't recall the AoE rune name) but didn't notice a significant increase.

I'm looking forward to Act 4, where the "ghost" of Leah mocks you and then turns into a unique. In Normal and Nightmare, stacking 6 traps while she gabs on allows for a one-shot of the boss as soon as it activates. I don't expect a one-shot in Hell, but it should still deliver some serious damage (at least 50%).

As far as using Spike Trap as a main skill, I just can't see it being efficient as it would require an immense amount of run-and-gun type tactics, especially in later difficulties. I find it to be too much of a support damage skill. A very good one at that.

[Karth]

As far as using Spike Trap as a main skill, I just can't see it being efficient as it would require an immense amount of run-and-gun type tactics, especially in later difficulties.

You're going to be doing that whether you want to or not if you're soloing.

[imthedan]

So, does anyone have a good build? I have a DH, and I am bored of the NT approach. I've wanted to make a trap build for awhile, but I just felt like it wasn't nearly as effective.

What do you guys think?

[Sky Tan]

Bandolier is nice when u can stack 6 in a pop (275 x 6) but in Hell n Inferno i feel it is too busy and hatred conusming.
So switch to scatter. Awesome for the mini bosses, act bosses, *cough*grom,izual,siege breaker, Azomdan,Diablo.

I use entangling(chain gang/JiS) + Scatter + NT , will be switching back to Chakram once i can get hold of a good chakram cloak.
(NT over Chakram is cos of the hit boxes, the trajectory will miss a few mobs, and the place to click matters alot if using Razor Disc)


Battle Scars, Tumble, Bats.

Moving away the dependency on Ball n Nether soon got a bad hunch coming.

THere sadly there is no passive for trap build. Numbing is ineffective as a lifesaver, Custom Engineering is for ROTFL.
(mentioned on another thread ... :( )
Still using the same 3 skills all the while Cull, ARchery, Steady Aim. Drop Cull for V when facing certain bosses.

[DaemonX]

Custom Engineering has "PvP skill" written all over it. You want to control space with your traps, and you can't do that if they run out when you walk away.

Anyway, Spike traps (with scatter) are amazing. In act 3 inferno I swapped out Vault for Spike and have no regrets. It allows you to just bomb melee attackers to death without needing to kite quite as often, and provides a way of killing elites that I had no chance of before.

The reason is larger enemies often take damage from all three traps' splash, and a large squad of enemy advancing will trigger all three traps. With sharpshooter or high crit chance stack (I have 52% crit buffed solo), you are likely or guaranteed to get 3 aoe crits. This can do a devastating 800k+ by the three overlapping damage splashes to all the monsters, while you spam tentacle in their face for even more damage. This burst can kill most elites in 2-cycles, all while hiding in smokescreen for those nasty affix mobs.

PROVISOR: This is with the Scatter rune. Before scatter, Spike is utterly useless unless you have stacked 200% IAS. With scatter, you get 3 traps in 1 cast animation for 30 hatred. It's ridiculously good. Without it, you get 1 trap for 30 hatred and casting animation. Scatter is the only viable rune - as in if they removed or nerf scatter, I'd never use Spike again. I'm just saying this to make you realise that it's scatter, not the innate power of spike trap, that makes this inferno-viable.

[imthedan]

Custom Engineering has "PvP skill" written all over it. You want to control space with your traps, and you can't do that if they run out when you walk away.

Anyway, Spike traps (with scatter) are amazing. In act 3 inferno I swapped out Vault for Spike and have no regrets. It allows you to just bomb melee attackers to death without needing to kite quite as often, and provides a way of killing elites that I had no chance of before.

The reason is larger enemies often take damage from all three traps' splash, and a large squad of enemy advancing will trigger all three traps. With sharpshooter or high crit chance stack (I have 52% crit buffed solo), you are likely or guaranteed to get 3 aoe crits. This can do a devastating 800k+ by the three overlapping damage splashes to all the monsters, while you spam tentacle in their face for even more damage. This burst can kill most elites in 2-cycles, all while hiding in smokescreen for those nasty affix mobs.

PROVISOR: This is with the Scatter rune. Before scatter, Spike is utterly useless unless you have stacked 200% IAS. With scatter, you get 3 traps in 1 cast animation for 30 hatred. It's ridiculously good. Without it, you get 1 trap for 30 hatred and casting animation. Scatter is the only viable rune - as in if they removed or nerf scatter, I'd never use Spike again. I'm just saying this to make you realise that it's scatter, not the innate power of spike trap, that makes this inferno-viable.

Will you post your full build? I noticed you are using NT as well, so I was curious as to your full build.

Thanks!

[Sky Tan]

Custom Engineering has "PvP skill" written all over it. You want to control space with your traps, and you can't do that if they run out when you walk away.


PROVISOR: This is with the Scatter rune. Before scatter, Spike is utterly useless unless you have stacked 200% IAS. With scatter, you get 3 traps in 1 cast animation for 30 hatred. It's ridiculously good. Without it, you get 1 trap for 30 hatred and casting animation. Scatter is the only viable rune - as in if they removed or nerf scatter, I'd never use Spike again. I'm just saying this to make you realise that it's scatter, not the innate power of spike trap, that makes this inferno-viable.

Probably for other skills, but Trap is already 30 secs. Dun think my trap need to be untouched for 1 minute.
Excellent for Mark > Sentry> Caltrops --> trap ??

I used Long Fuse and Lightning Rod before Scatter came.
LR is by far the closest for crowd control but the major downside is the Hatred cost.

[DaemonX]

In PvP there's a good chance you will want your traps guarding the health globes to last longer than 30 seconds. And scatter wins for groups and single target just due to hatred cost, let alone casting time.

Anyway, my build is as follows:http://eu.battle.net/d3/en/calculato...VXS!aYe!bcccZc

Extremely standard, but that's what it takes to beat Inferno without a trillion gold.
Only odd point is my Bait the Trap, I find this works well since I have stacked crit AND crit damage (39% crit, 260% crit damage), so getting myself to that 50% mark with the Bait lends my damage consistency and makes my traps deadly.

[swayzesghost]

Any skill that relies on a timer or mechanic other than you shooting the enemy is underpowered.

They gave us a higher difficulty and combined it with all these useless, roundabout skills.

[DaemonX]

Any skill that relies on a timer or mechanic other than you shooting the enemy is underpowered.

They gave us a higher difficulty and combined it with all these useless, roundabout skills.

I'd just like to point out this post is pretty ignorant, for the reasons I posted above.
A lot of our skills aren't useless, they're mostly pretty good actually - it's just that Elemental Arrow leaves them all for dead (if they nerfed NT everyone would use BL).