the main thing that interests me about this char is the locking capability of volcano, as well as multiple sources of damage (physical from bear volcano, and fire)

how often does volcano cause fhr lock on most chars?

It depends on the char to be honest, sorces and pally are hard to catch, zons get cought in dodge lock until they die, its quite funny to be honest.

the key is that versatility from multiple attacks.

Volcano can be blocked. Hence, sometimes it will cause fbr lock on characters; it interrupts their teleport due to blocking, then, if it hits them, it has a % chance to put them into FHR.
FHR really works weird in d2- depending on what % of the maximum HP of a target an attack takes away, it has a % chance to put them into FHR. Theres no 100% fhr magic number like 1/12, rather its like if volcano takes away 1/16 of their hp, it has a small chance, 1/8 of their hp, a large chance, 1/4 of their hp, a 100% chance. Don't remember the exact numbers.

Volcano shoots a projectile every 2 frames. The projectile hits once at the location of the volcano itself, and hits whatevers on top of it, and then hits again when it 'lands' in a random aoe.
However, its hampered by nextdelay; each hit of volcano says you can't get hit again for X frames.

The initial explosion on volcano, getting hit by literally the volcano popping out of the ground, gives you 10 frame next delay
Further hits, after those 10 frames, have 5 frame next delay

So volcano will hit like this:

frame 0
frame 10
frame 16
frame 22
frame 28

since volcano only shoot on even frames, so even though the next delay is over on frame 15, the next projectile is at 16 (the one at 14 does not affect it).
Blocking, however, gets a free 10 frames since 1.10; after you block once, you don't need to use the animation again for 10 frames, on all characters
This is so that you can't get thrown in 'FBR lock'. So lets put together a thingy:


So lets say a sorc has 8 frame FHR & 6 frame FBR, and 8 frame FHR
Lets say she has a 50% chance to be thrown into FHR, and a 75% chance to be thrown into FBR

Frame 0 hits her, and she gets DOESN'T get put into FHR
She doesn't get interrupted, and now she has 10 frames to cast a teleport spell to escape. Since she teleports at 8 FCR, she can escape.

Now, if frame 0 hits her, and DOES throw her into FHR, she'll be in fhr till frame 8
at frame 8 she starts casting, but gets struck again at frame 10, etc etc
Same dice with her FBR



Long story short, it depends on a million factors; your opponents FCR, FBR, FHR, %block, the % of their HP you deal as damage, and more than anything, luck.
If you deal enough damage to throw her into FHR 100% of the time, she literally cannot escape via teleport; she'll keep getting thrown into FHR and this will interrupt her teleports
However, you'd need to deal like 1/4 of her hp to do this, so she'd die pretty fast anyway.


But the real key here is that volcano is so luckbased, that its fairly reliable to assume that it will interrupt an opponents casting as you use it; even with 25% FHR and against 75% blocking, thats still something like an 82%+ chance to interrupt someones teleport when you cast it on them. This is especially important, because it means that you can follow up your volcano with a namelocked teleport for a bear smack, which is the #1 shaman combo (volcbear). Since volcano naturally chainlocks for you, this is incredibly awesome.

Found the numbers for FHR. It differs from attack to attack (bone spear or something has 1/2 chances), but for the MOST of them, its like this:

(at least)
6.25%: 37.50% chance to 'FHR'
12.50%: 75.00% chance to 'FHR'
25.00%: 100% chance to FHR

so anything that takes more than 1/4 of your HP has a 100% chance to FHR you

So for a volcano that deals 1150 physical, 1350 fire, against a 50% dr, 75% fire resist char, it deals 152 hp. If they have over 2400 hp, it will never put them into FHR
If they had 8% dr and 75% fire resist, like a lot of casters, it will have a chance to FHR up to 3700 HP

This is why the opponents blocking can be so much more important than FHR: Irregardless of their hp, it will have a % chance to put them into FBR.
As you can see, most competent characters won't get thrown in FHR, just FBR. Only things like vita sorcs, es sorcs out of ES, zons, will get thrown into FHR
Yet *anyone* can get thrown into FHR. Unfortunately, while this can be badass against necros/sorcs/druids/sins, it means your volcano will never ever stun a bvc, and your volcano will do piddly against a paladin (holy shield makes pallys block at a ridiculous 2 frames, when a necro might take 7)


This post was edited by deathwinger on Aug 9 2009 04:09pm

totally agreed with the volcbear combo, it IS sexy

o and a grizzly strike will have either 75% or 100% chance to FHR just about anyone cuz it does such beastly high damage :3
its fun to watch a big long teleport race of shaman vs whatever, when I land on top of them and knock them out of teleport, 1-hit-kabooooom

damn, I've been a windy player for about three seasons now. I have always been fascinated by volcano and in the back of my head always wondered about a possibly hybrid.

a windy with volcano (for locks) but from what it sounds like, I'd need decent volcano damage to get them into fhr lock

wont work then? (was always just an idea anyways i suppose)

I've seen windy/fire hybrids tried and they simply don't work.
The advantage of a shaman isn't raw numbers, its the tactics; a grizzly strike instantly while teleporting, whereas tornados have a big delay, and fissures/geddon provide huge suppression.

Its not a build designed for being different or using odd attacks, those are merely perks- its a build designed to have the upper hand in PvP all the time.
If someone teleports/charges around like nuts, you lay down fissure fields. If someone tries to stomp on you, you lay fissure/volcano traps. If someone tries to defwhore, you volcano/bear them. If someone tries to play incautiously, you drop grizzly passes on their head to psyche them out (and outright kill them). Its sort of like a rock/paper/scissors where you get all three weapons and your opponents usually only have 1

A wind/fire hybrid simply does not have enough skill points to get meaningful damage, and even if it did with one skill, it would lack either offensively or defensively, giving it a big hole in its tactics

You need to ask yourself, which can occur faster;

a druid teleporting close to you with or without namelock
OR
an assassin mindblasting that druid in the 0.44 seconds that the druid is clickable.

Um probably the druid teleporting, if we're not allowing human reaction time for namelocking?
Thats why grizzly strikes so much faster than tornados; it occurs entirely on serverside.

When u attack with a tornado, YOU have to click the button (human reaction time) and the computer has to send the packet a thousand miles of internets.
So you get delay from human, & delay from computer. In the end, theres a fraction of a second delay between when you land on someone and when you cast the nado

with a grizzly, it will always start swinging *immediately* after landing on top of someone.