Quote (FnK @ 13 Jul 2010 01:50)

you can wsg walk and still do timed teleports out

Quote (Conviction @ Sep 21 2010 06:33pm)

can poison kill a paladin with cleansing?

Quote (markilbaldacchino @ Sep 21 2010 05:51pm)

Fucking right.

Quote (thecrazykiller @ Sep 21 2010 06:41pm)

Poison stack bug? What dat?

Also poison kills barbs if you have nat set trangs and facets. Your poison will last longer allowing hit and runs. ESP good for hybrids.

Quote (thecrazykiller @ Sep 21 2010 10:13pm)

yes. poison java that has some survivability owns a pal with cleansing. or if the pally doesn't have good rezz and uses cleansing.

Quote (drt1245 @ 11 Jul 2010 21:21)

Venom Sucks

http://classic.battle.net/images/battle/diablo2exp/images/ass/skillz/venom-bt.gif


Slight exaggeration. Venom is a useful skill, giving a good source of poison damage that works with all attacks. However, it's also one of the most overrated skills in Diablo II.

It is a widespread myth that the majority Whirlwind Assassin's damage comes from Venom and that physical damage is lesser and secondary. In fact, the opposite is true.

I'm going to compare 1-point Venom to 20-point Venom to show that maxing it is generally a waste of 19 skill points.
For the purpose of this comparison, I'm going to assume several things:

• +25 skills from gear that raise Venom
  
• Trang Oul's gloves are the only source of +% poison skill damage, proving +25% total
  
• We are using an Assassin competent at tri-whirling
  
• Our opponent has 75% poison resist
  
• Our opponent has 0% poison length reduction. Since poison length reduction suffers a -100 penalty in hell, poison duration will be doubled

With 1 point in Venom, we will have level 26 Venom to cast.
Level 26 Venom: 595 - 615 poison damage
The +25% poison skill damage bonus is applied twice: 929.7 - 960.9
Take into account 17% PvP penalty: 158.0 - 163.4
Opponent has 75% poison resist: 39.5 - 40.8
Double duration in hell: 79.0 - 81.7
Average damage: 80.4 poison damage

With 20 points in Venom we will have level 45 Venom to cast.
Level 45 Venom: 1250 - 1270 poison damage
The +25% poison skill damage bonus is applied twice: 1953.1 - 1984.4
Take into account 17% PvP penalty: 332.0 - 337.3
Opponent has 75% poison resist: 83.0 - 84.3
Double duration in hell: 166.0 - 168.7
Average damage: 167.3



Average damage at Venom level 26: 80.4
Average damage at Venom level 45: 167.3
Difference: 86.9

So, for 19 skill points, you gain 86.9 damage per hit. That's 4.6 additional damage per skill point.


However, it's worse than that.

First, if your opponent has more than 75% poison resist, the poison damage will (of course) be further reduced. If, for example, someone uses 85% poison resist, the additional 19 points in Venom will yield a 52.1 damage increase (down from 86.9).

Second, your opponent might use poison length reduction. Many GM rule-sets don't put any cap on poison length reduction, and, as such, someone might use up to 175%, reducing your poison damage to an eighth of what it was. Even less extreme amounts of poison length reduction can significantly reduce Venom's damage.

Third and most significantly, if you do good tri-whirls, you will hit hit most characters far more frequently than once every 0.8 seconds (which is Venom's duration). Whirlwind has the potential to hit with both claws every 4 frames (0.16 seconds). This has several implications. If both claws hit on the same frame, Venom still does the same damage, so effectively, you're dealing half the damage per hit that you could potentially do. However, even if both claws do not hit on the same frame, it is completely possible (likely in many circumstances) that you will hit again within the next 0.8 seconds, thus re-applying Venom before it can deal all it's damage.


Conclusion:
Build your Assassin around fucking physical damage. Venom sucks.

Quote (TwentyOneGuns @ Sep 21 2010 11:38am)

Venom owns. Get some prebuff and it's dmg is like 3,5k..

Quote (Bryant @ 21 Sep 2010 23:10)

Woo, go LCS damage!