Skills
Hell Brand Jlv.20Max Lv: 5
MP 3/3/5/5/8 & SP 3
Range: 6
Target: Circle around the spot
Cast time: 0
Duration: 8s / 10s / 12s / 14s / 16s
Total of set-able traps: 3/4/4/5/5
Hell Excruciation Jlv.20Max Lv: 5
MP 14/16/18/20/22
Range: 3x3 around the Hell Brand spot
Target: Circle around the spot
Cast time: 0.7 / 0.9 / 1.1 / 1.3 / 1.5
Power: 180% / 210% / 240% / 270% / 300% Matk
Dark Mages Hell Brand Jlv.40Max Lv: 3
MP 45/30/25 & SP 15
Range: 5
Target: Circle around 3x3 spot on the ground.
Amount of Hell Brands placed: 3, randomly placed on a 3x3 grid.
Cast time: 0.5s
What is Hell Brand?
Believe it or not, Hell Brand is the skill with the strongest damage a warlock can deal. Possibily the strongest in eco
Advantages
- Freakingly high damage when used right
- Immobilizes enemies no matter what they are
Disadvantages
- Without practice, really hard to use
- Cannot immobilize bosses
- Damage is divided between enemies
- Cannot be used for DAMAGE BRAGGING (because the numbers that pop out overlap on top of each other)
- Costy MP and SP
- Costy skill points
... More disadvantages than the advantages.
But believe me. It's worth it.
How does it work?
After the Hell Brand is placed, if a monster steps on it, it will be trapped and immobile for as long as the skill's duration. And this is absolute, without the need of INT or any other status, 100% for sure. Effective to trap any kinds of monsters except bosses. (Actually there's a percentage for trapping the target, but it is really high, and always recalculated, possibily everytime the target makes an action. So once a target steps on a trap, if it's not trapped then you can wait less then a second. It will definitely be trapped soon. Which means it's no different from 100% chance right?) And this is not an "Abnormal status effect" and not affected by the caster's MHit and the target's MAvoid. Unfortunately, this effect is absent in PvP. In other words, cannot be use to trap other players.
Hell Brand is spot-oriented, so as long as one hell brand is placed on the ground, other spot skills like Lava Lake, Icicle Tempest, Chaos Gate, etc. won't be able to be casted.
Hell brands that have been placed can be exploded with "Hell Excrutiation". Every hell brands will explode like the skill "Shadow Blast" (though weaker) in a 3x3 circle around the placed hell brands. Just like Shadow Blast, if there are more than 1 enemy in the 3x3 area of the skill, the damage will be divided between the amount of enemies. But this is where it becomes great. If we place 3 hell brands around an enemy, that means we'll be attacking the enemy with 3 x 300% matk = 900% matk.
After the hell brands explode, they will disappear and the previously trapped enemies will be able to move freely again.
But do not be fooled by the damage that pops out.
When Excrutiation is casted, every Hell Brands explode in the same time. And because of that, the damage numbers overlap with each other. So if you place 5 Hell brands, and 2k pops out, that means the damage is actually around 5 x 2k = 10k
How to use it?
This is the biggest reason why most warlocks think this skill is trash. Not knowing how to use it properly.
It's kind of complicated, so look at these numbers for spot positions:
7 8 9
4 5 6
1 2 3
Look at your numpad on the keyboard if you're still confused.
I'll be using these numbers to indicate where a spot is located, with the spot [2] being the spot where the player stands.
Method 1: With Hell Brand
Firstly, pull the enemy to you with something like chaos widow.
And then run away from the target a little. Why run? Because if you don't, the enemy will arrive at spot [4] [5] or [6] randomly. But if you run away just a little, it will 90% stop at [5]. It still can arrive at [4] or [6]. Possible, but rare. Remember, you have to run to the opposite direction from the direction the enemy is coming from.
Because we're sure that the enemy is going to stop at [5], put the hell brand on spot [5] before the enemy arrives. Hell brand cannot directly be placed under an enemy's feet, so it has to be set while the enemy is still in its way to [5].
After you set a brand on [5], even if the enemy hasn't arrived yet, quickly put other brands as many as you want around [5]. You musn't place it outside [1] to [9] because if it won't hit the enemy and it means a waste of mp and sp. If the cool Hell Brand symbol appears on the enemy's body, it means the enemy is successfully trapped, and you can place even more brands to your heart's contents. But remember, DO IT FAST. If the trap's duration wears off, you can't make it explode anymore. So finish the pattern before the first trap you placed wears off. Usually 3 Hell brands would be enough to OHKO a plati. After the pattern is beautifully set, before it wears off, cast Excrutiation right away (Hell brand has no cool down so you can immediately explode it). In the SS above, I put 5 traps (it's overkill for a plati actually) and the damage is 3059 for a trap. Remember, the damage pop outs are stacked together into one, so more or less the total damage is 3k x 5 = 15k. Cool isn't it?Method 2: With Dark Mages Hell Brand
Just like Hell Brand, pull the enemy with something, and then set Dark Mages exactly in the middle of spot [5] (or where the enemy's currently standing). Even though we don't know where the 3 traps are placed, because we set it around the enemy, it'll be a 100% 3 hit.
And then boom. If you don't have evil soul, the plati might not die from one dark mages. Then you can strengthen the damage even more with normal hell brands. For example putting one or two more. Remember, it still needs to be around [5]. Or else it won't hit the target.Advanced Use
Hellbrand can be easily combined with mystic freeze or medusa eyes. For example, Bandit will die immediately with freeze -> dark mages -> excrutiation. Make sure after you freeze/petrify the enemy, you place dark mages exactly in the middle of the target. And remember, freeze = 100 water and petrify = 100 earth. Meaning Hell Brand that is dark will get a 225% damage bonus.
I can ohko a DEM right away with Dark Mages.
Calculations:
1 Hell Brand => 300% matk
Evil Soul (+95%)
=> 300 + (300x95/100) = 585%
Zen (+200%)
=> 585% x 2 = 1170%
Freeze (100 Water, attacked by dark +225%)
=> 1170 + (1170x225/100) = 2632%
3 traps are set, so:
=> 2632% x 3 = 7896% matk. (Seriously.)
From the above SS, you can see how hax the damage is. It's about 10k x 3 = 30k. DEM dies in a blink of an eye.You don't believe me? Try looking at the first SS. There's another number you can hardly see below "11022". Yep. Actually, the skill hits it 3 times, but the numbers overlap like I said before.
The Dream Pattern
I call this "The Dream Pattern". Because the damage is like a dream.
Dream Pattern is a 3x3 Pattern fully containing a total of 9 traps. How to make this? It's actually very easy. You need to use normal Hell Brands 1 by 1 (not dark mages).
There's something you need to know. Hell Brand Lv5's limit may be 5 traps, but only for lv5. Meaning you can set 5 lv5 traps AND 5 lv4 traps together.
The trick is to use both lv5 and lv4. Put 5 lv5 traps (16s duration) and then 4 lv4 traps 914s duration) around spot [5]. Resulting in hellbrands inserted in all spots from [1] to [9]. You have to do this all less than 16 seconds, so you need to be quick.
If you successfully made it, it'll be like that. "Dream Pattern" =w=The above SS only uses Evil Soul. So the damage is around 3k x 9 = 27k
When full buffed, it'll be:
Evil Soul (+95%)
=> 300 + (300x95/100) = 585%
Zen (+200%)
=> 585% x 2 = 1170%
Freeze (100 Water, attacked by dark +225%)
=> 1170 + (1170x225/100) = 2632%
After Saga 10, there will be Soul Sacrifice:
Soul Sacrifice (+200%)
=>2632 x 2 = 5264%
9 Traps placed, so:
=> 5264% x 9 = 47376% matk.
For example, let's say you have 700 matk:
700 x 47376/100 = 331632 damage
And it's only 700. Usually full equipped and buffed high levels spellusers have about 900-1000 matk so...
What do you think? Is this still a crappy skill to you?
Looks tricky (as you've warned) but fun. And the damage is <3 too o3o
ReplyDeletelooks cool +_+
ReplyDeletecan you use it against mobs?
or it works only for 1 on 1 condition?
anyway, just a suggestion.
why not use Jump Break for a long post so it won't stretch the page too much? :D
can used for mobs, but it'll be divided, like Shadow Blast :<
ReplyDeleteand what is Jump Break? D:
ic.. but I guess it's harder to make many enemies to stop at desired spot, right?
ReplyDeletefor jump break.. if you ever see post like:
============
blablablabla prologorwhatever
Read More <-- this is jump break, click to read the rest of the post
============
there's "insert page break" button between "Insert Video" and "Alignment" when writing new post, or you can just use "< !--more-->" (without quotation and space before exclamation mark) between your post.
not a must, but it's better not to have a long post on home page (at least for me) XD
+200% means x3, not x2.
ReplyDeleteTherefore with Soul Sacrifice it'll be 2632 x 3 = 7896% → 71064% Matk with 9 traps → ~497k damage @700 average Matk.
Of course, that's just theory. In reality, monsters have Mdef to reduce that damage by percentages too, with Forcemaster being the only job who can completely ignore Mde- oh wait.
ReplyDeleteAnd since the traps hit multiple times, each hit will have its damage reduced by both enemy's left (percentage) and THEN right (value) Mdef, therefore the overall damage will be lower than as if the traps only hit 1 time.
ReplyDeletePrecisely, the damage of 9 traps hitting 9 times will be damage lower than as if those traps only hit 1 time.
Yes, I'm too Lazy to edit the comment, so I'm just posting new ones.
forcemaster.. if we talk about 3rd job, then soultaker's matk communion (matk+300) + Soul Taker (matk+300%) = ....powerful :9
ReplyDeleteUWAAAHHH How did I not realize +200% means x3 OTL
ReplyDeleteThanks for reminding me, Master... and yeah, it's too bad how the damage is calculated separately orz
And if we talk about Soul Taker,
Soul Taker (+300%) -> 71064 x 4 = 284256%
Matk Communion (matk + 300) -> 700+300 x 284256 / 100 = 2842560
And thanks Shu, I edited the post and added the jump break >3<
ReplyDelete