anyone find a use for dot spells?

[fiadd]

I'm currently a 63 elemental mage and have been playing around with the acid dot spell. Here's what I've noticed about it so far:

the bad:
No damage on cast, you must form the link and then the first tick of damage is at the end of the tick, so it's about 4 seconds after you cast before the first damage shows up.
The time between ticks is longer than the time to cast a direct damage spell if you're using any type of staff and no cast rate credits on the spell.
The damage per tick for the dot is less than the damage per cast of a direct damage spell of the same level, and the dot damage does not increase when using a staff.
Dot spells cannot have area effects added into the stanzas. I'm not high enough to find out if you can add in the vampirism effect.

the good (?):
Having a creature meleeing you does not cause the link to break. The link can break from a resist and then the melee will make it hard to recast though.
If you are using a staff, the sap cost per tick is incredibly small (you pretty much heal that much sap per tick if you keep your stats at max for your level). If you wear heavy armor, that drain is doubled, but still essentially irrelevant. I've tried soloing in heavy armor using the dot, and it's viable for things not too much higher than you if you keep your fighter levels up as well (for extra hps), but while linked to the dot you never dodge/parry and the creature always hits for max damage (after armor). I usually can solo at a faster rate using fear kiting plus direct damage spells.

So, the only use I can find for it right now is if I'm in a group battle, drained of almost all hp and sap and still have one creature up, you can toss on the dot, hope it links, and do a small bit of extra damage rather than having to run up and beat on it with a stick.

The dot could be made much more useful, I would suggest adding an initial damage on cast (similar to how fear and stun give their effects for a small period even if the link is not formed), having the tick rate affected by the staff elemental cast speed stat, and the tick damage affected by the staff elemental damage stat. The area effects need to also be allowed to be put into stanzas, with the appropriate increase in drain rate while maintaining the link.

[ammokk]

Hmm,

I just love the DoT spells!
Most of the time they work (there are no "misses"), they are cheaper (sap) and faster! Yes faster!
Compare a DoT 2 spell with a normel lvl 2 spell! Even if ya compare them to a lvl 4 normal spell (´bout 120-150 damage) they are still better and faster.

I´m using DoT all of the time

Did you edit the spell?

[fiadd]

Hmm,

I just love the DoT spells!
Most of the time they work (there are no "misses"), they are cheaper (sap) and faster! Yes faster!
Compare a DoT 2 spell with a normel lvl 2 spell! Even if ya compare them to a lvl 4 normal spell (´bout 120-150 damage) they are still better and faster.

I´m using DoT all of the time

Did you edit the spell?

Currently I'm using the spells you get at level 70 elemental (forget the numbers offhand, but both the dd and dot are upgraded at that level), and all custom built stanzas without any cast time credits. My direct damage blasts using a 60% cast rate, 60% damage staff are doing 302 damage and taking a little over 2 seconds to cast. The dot does 256 damage every 4 seconds, in no way is it faster damage, and against group mobs (currently I'm mostly fighting level 120 torbaks) the link will break on average of once per fight.

The dot certainly uses less sap than chain casting dd spells, and seems to have a slower staff decay rate than the chain casting dd spells (which might simply be that you get fewer dot pulses in a given fight than you do dd casts).

I also noticed that at level 101 there is a new stanza which you can combine the dot with a dd spell, which might alleviate some of the problems.