How could this have possibly happened?! Genuinly confused...<

[Xena1985]

How could this have possibly happened?! Genuinly confused...

I was playing a Frenzy Barb rune hunting and doing council runs. My juv's were low so I went to pindle to top up. I have 3000 life and I engage his group. A few of his minions hit me and my health drops down to approximately 85-90% judging by the orb. Then suddenly pindle charges me and it's KO?! Dead.

As I ran the mouse over my empty orb it said 1494 life so my initial thought was that while running through my initial warcry sequence I somehow missed the hotkey for BO and charged in with 1500 life. After S&E and getting my corpse back I went there to get killed on purpose to see if that was the case and it isn't. I made sure to have BO active after stepping out of the red portal got killed again, and again there was ~ 1500 life on my orb.

The question is how could Pindle possibly pack enough heat to remove ~ 2500 life in one hit with 15% damage reduction to boot. I wasn't amped either. The only thing I noticed was that he had a conviction aura. My resists were 20-40 (before factoring in the aura) I since I rely on fade from treachery. During this 1 hit KO I wasn't faded. This is the first time I've ever recieved a hit that insta killed 3k life. I've gotten insta killed by conviction gloams before, but that is when the whole pack fires a bolt at you at the same time so in reality you're killed by 7-8 hits and not 1. Any ideas about how this could have happened would be most welcome

 

[SunsetVista]

Re: How could this have possibly happened?! Genuinly confused...

Perhaps he was also lightning or cold enchanted? Both elements would add to his charge damage, and with conviction, that could be nasty. That does seem unusual, though. Can he get a critical hit?

 

[pharphis]

For some reason I'm pretty sure he can get critical hits. And I also think he might have crushing blow?

 

[Kimppi]

Re: How could this have possibly happened?! Genuinly confused...

Every (?) monster attack has a 5% chance to crit for double damage. Also the charge damage for those monsters is quite high and it's auto-hit, ITD or something similar IIRC. Pindle is also always FE for extra damage.

 

[zaphodbrx]

Re: How could this have possibly happened?! Genuinly confused...

Oh dear I hope it wasn't HC.

In my experience Pindle charge is the most devastating single target physical attack in the game- every one of them will knock you into hit recovery, and ( especially if you don't have FHR ), it sets up to get a big charge chain going - charged->knocked back->charge->knocked back etc and with each hit taking around 600 life you can be dead real easy, might/fana aura and amp also make it worse. The best solution is to not get into hit recovery by using an uninterruptible attack ( I recommend whirlwind, frenzy seems to me pretty useless in normal pvm ), and while whirling you will be close to the pack and leeching so it negates charging a lot.

Pindle's elemental damage output is pretty miniscule compared to his physical threat no matter what enchantment he has. So your resistances weren't the problem. Pindle charge can't be blocked and ignores defense as well IIRC, so the best bet is to just have a lot of life and use an uninterruptible attack.

 

[Xena1985]

Re: How could this have possibly happened?! Genuinly confused...

Oh dear I hope it wasn't HC.

In my experience Pindle charge is the most devastating single target physical attack in the game- every one of them will knock you into hit recovery, and ( especially if you don't have FHR ), it sets up to get a big charge chain going - charged->knocked back->charge->knocked back etc and with each hit taking around 600 life you can be dead real easy, might/fana aura and amp also make it worse. The best solution is to not get into hit recovery by using an uninterruptible attack ( I recommend whirlwind, frenzy seems to me pretty useless in normal pvm ), and while whirling you will be close to the pack and leeching so it negates charging a lot.

Pindle's elemental damage output is pretty miniscule compared to his physical threat no matter what enchantment he has. So your resistances weren't the problem. Pindle charge can't be blocked and ignores defense as well IIRC, so the best bet is to just have a lot of life and use an uninterruptible attack.

Fortunately the Barb wasn't hardcore I know what you mean when it comes to knockback and stun extra cherges and death. My assassin sometimes dies like that if I get really lazy mf'ing and neglect CoS or mind blast but in that case it's always like you said multiple 2-3 500-600 damage that strips away the 1200 life she has. I can see my health dropping to say 30-40% and then the final hit. Sometimes i don't hit the juv in time.

As for frenzy I'm dual wielding an etheral death CB and grief PB (Lo courtisy of pindleskin actually how ironic) I can assure you that frenzy is quite powerful in PvM :thumbup: not quite as safe as my fanatic zealot but the leech and the rate of movement are insane. I can literally get into fight with all the council members pounding on me with extra strong fanaticim might modifiers ect they'll quickly drop me to 500 life but I'll keep up the frenzy and leech my entire orb before they can kill me. My health oscilates between 90% and 20% I also have a lawbringer for undead heavy areas.

Anyway I've got a new respect for Mr Pindleskin but I'm curious has anybody else experienced such a KO? what's the highest amount of damage that guy can do?

 

[helvete1]

Re: How could this have possibly happened?! Genuinly confused...

Yes, he can critical hit you. Yes, his charge attack is auto-hit. Yes, it bypasses Energy Shield. Yes, Extra Strong makes him insta-kill some characters and most mercs if he gets a good charge in. No, you can't usually block it, Assassin Claw Block CAN block it in my expirience.

His elemental potential isn't very great unless he gets Cold and Lightning enchanted at the same time. Do NOT stand inside Frost Nova range and get hit by his bolts in that case. Beware of his Frost Nova when CE, it fires twice due to him being FE as well, and I suspect it can even crit you. Twice. CE+Conviction on this guy have killed some of my strongest characters.

Aside from Lister the Tormentor, he is my top candidate for "Extra Fast makes this guy dangerous, not just annoying"-award.

In previous patches, he could even kill you from the grave, as he'd try to resurrect like others of his kind, then Blizz had the wonderful solution of just insta-killing him when this happened, denying drops and death animations, but resulting in a very powerful, invisible Corpse Explosion...

 

[onderduiker]

Re: How could this have possibly happened?! Genuinly confused...

The base physical damage Pindleskin and his minions use for Charge is 58-117, increasing to 83-168 at /players 8. They use level 8 Charge, applying +275% Damage: this results in 217.5-438.75 physical damage at /players 1 and 311.25-630 physical damage at /players 8, which a critical hit (5% chance) doubles to 435-877.5 and 622.5-1,260 respectively.

Being Fire Enchanted, Pindleskin has 64-98 fire damage added to his attacks, while his minions have 32-49 fire damage added. Critical hits would double this to 128-196 and 64-98 respectively. Cold and Lightning enchantments would add identical amounts of cold and lightning damage respectively. If Aura Enchanted with Conviction it would be level 10 [86/8], applying Fire, Lightning and Cold Resist -75%: he could only have one other enchantment in this case, so a critical hit would apply maximum 256-392 elemental damage before Conviction. Assuming Resist 25%, this would be multiplied by 1.5 (25-75 = -50) and result in 384-588 elemental damage with a critical hit.

If Pindleskin were Extra Strong this would apply another +99% Damage to his attacks and +49% Damage to those of his minions, while being Aura Enchanted with level 14 [86/6] Might would apply another +170% Damage to all their attacks, and another +280% Damage to those of Pindleskin due to the synergy bonus (I have tested to confirm this actually happens).

Worst case scenario, an Extra Strong Aura Enchanted Pindleskin with level 14 Might applies +824% Damage to his Charge damage, so even at /players 1 that's ~536-1,081 physical damage (1,072-2,162 with a critical hit); at /players 8, it becomes ~767-1,552 (1,534-3,104 with a critical hit).

And I also think he might have crushing blow?

Only Blunderbores (of which Urdars are a subtype) apply Crushing Blow (15% chance in Nightmare and 25% in Hell), but Charge uses the same overlay (as do Bash and Leap Attack):

Yes, it bypasses Energy Shield.

I've read this and subsequently tested for it, but I haven't found it to be the case. Unfortunately I don't know the original source, so I could only speculate about the reason for the conclusion. I do know that all charges are not equal:

• Claw Vipers in Acts 2-3 use the Serpent Charge skill which applies no +% Damage, and their charges only apply 1-2 base physical damage regardless of player count throughout the game.
• Pit Vipers in the Glacial Trail and Icy Cellar, and Serpent Magi in the Worldstone Keep Level 2 and Throne of Destruction apply just 4.75-9.5 physical damage in Hell regardless of player count (+375% Damage from level 12 Charge in Hell), but Pit Vipers also apply 47-94 base magic damage and Serpent Magi apply 48-96, which increases with player count.

This variation between single- and four-figure damage may have led to the conclusion that there was a bug.

His elemental potential isn't very great unless he gets Cold and Lightning enchanted at the same time. Do NOT stand inside Frost Nova range and get hit by his bolts in that case. Beware of his Frost Nova when CE, it fires twice due to him being FE as well, and I suspect it can even crit you. Twice. CE+Conviction on this guy have killed some of my strongest characters.

Pindleskin is always Fire Enchanted, which leads to the following bugs:

• When Cold Enchanted, two FE explosions and two CE novae are triggered upon death. Fortunately, the CE novae have 3 frame next delay so only one should apply its cold damage and cold length.
• When Lightning Enchanted, an invisible FE explosion will be triggered whenever he is put into hit recovery, and upon death as usual.
• When CE and LE, an invisible FE explosion and an invisible CE nova will be triggered whenever he is put into hit recovery, and once again two FE explosions and two CE novae are triggered upon death.

All of these explosions and novae have an independent chance of a critical hit. Hell Pindleskin's FE explosion applies ~255-425 total damage (50% physical and 50% fire) in 1.13, his CE nova applies 308-310 cold damage with 45 second cold length, and his LE bolts apply 85 lightning damage each.