What happened to Fire Wall?

[Kyusaku]

What happened to Fire Wall?

Hi, I use to play in the old days, pre 1.09. I remember that Fire Wall was a very popular skill as maxed with max FM with items it could produce massive damage per second and didn't have any kind of delay. I haven't seen any builds really with this skill, so what happened to it? Did its damage get nerfed? I've recently decided to build a meteorb sorc but once I reached when Fire Wall becomes available I started using it very often and would combine it with a cold spell to maximize damage. I just reached when Meteor becomes available and I'm a bit puzzled on casting strategies with it. I keep feeling I'd do more damage with fire wall because of the landing delay in meteor. Some insight on this topic would be much appreciated.

 

[omgwtfbbqpwned]

Re: What happened to Fire Wall?

First off, welcome to the forums.

Secondly, I don't think Fire Wall got nerfed (someone correct me if I'm mistake). It was the introduction of synergies in 1.10 (pumping other skills boosts the damage of certain skills, such as Fire Ball for Meteor) that popularized once lesser damaging skills. Fire Wall did not get a synergy in this patch, which is why it is no longer a popular fire skill.

However, unlike Thunderstorm which simply died out after the patch, Fire Wall still has nice viable end game damage, which is why it's still a very potent skill.

 

[Kyusaku]

Re: What happened to Fire Wall?

Thanks for the welcome! And thank you for the quick response!

I see, I imagine Blizzard figured the damage was high enough that maybe adding synergies would probably be overkill.

I remember with minimal items Fire Wall could produce something like 4k damage per second.

So how does someone use Meteor exactly? Do you have to wait on the merc and then cast on top of him? I'm so use to Fire Wall strategies that I'm not so sure how to handle something that is cast in a small area and not instantaneous.

 

[omgwtfbbqpwned]

Re: What happened to Fire Wall?

You could do that, but most Meteorbs tend to spam Fire Ball/Frozen Orb when going through the game in general. In a big pack of monsters, wait for your mercenary to engage, then drop a Meteor if you would like, but FO/FB usually clears it just as fast. Meteor is usually used against act bosses (Andariel, Mephisto, Baal, Baal's Minions) and is very effective there.

 

[Kyusaku]

Re: What happened to Fire Wall?

Thanks for your help. I'll keep on with the Meteorb. Looking at a skill calculator Meteor and Fire Ball compliment each other to a point where you can cause more damage than a maxed fire wall.

 

[Ilumm]

Re: What happened to Fire Wall?

Yes,it is correct,what changed are the sinergies. As for firewall usage i have seen several dual tree builds where the 2nd element was fire through firewall.

For example max FO/ice bolt/As much CM as possible and use Firewall/Fire mastery as backup element.

Whilst in the meteorb build fire is the main element in all firewall builds,fire is there just to take care of the immunes and cold (or lightning but not recomended) is the main element.