DoTs have inconsistent on-hit behavior

2

Hi again. I've been experimenting with DoTs, Diversive Tactics, and the Hermiticon/Galvanic/Iron doctrine, and the behavior looks a bit off.

Up to this point, I've been assuming that DoT damage was not intended to "hit". I.E., it would not trigger on-hit effects like "shock on hit" or "bleed on hit" (however amusing DoTs-from-DoTs would be). Unfortunately, it seems that the Diversive Tactics perk is not behaving according to this assumption.

Setup:

  • Equip Needler Sniper Rifle. Let's use Needle Blast for simplicity, since we'll only deal with one "hit".
  • Equip a fair amount of "shock on hit" or "slow on hit" gear. (Note, I'm not using "X on Y skill hits" gear, since I'm assuming DoTs are excluded because they're not the skill hit itself.)
  • Select Diversive Tactics, equip a 3-socket Herm/Galv/Iron doctrine.

Expectations:

  • The 3-doctrine should convert our hit damage from physical to warp.
  • Since the enemy has been hit by warp damage, Diversive tactics should increase its warp resistance and add a physical and heat vulnerability stack.
  • Needle Blast should still apply a Poison DoT. Poison DoTs do physical damage.
  • The poison DoT should tick, and the enemy should have exactly one physical vulnerability and one heat vulnerability, assuming that none of the "shock on hit" or "slow on hit" procs went off from the initial Needle Blast hit.

Actual Behavior:

  • The 3-doctrine does convert our hit damage from physical to warp. Check.
  • The enemy does receive one physical and one heat vulnerability stack. (It will also resist warp damage from subsequent skill hits.) Check.
  • Needle Blast does apply a Poison DoT. The poison DoT does physical damage (you can tell by a combination of the resist messages and DoT tick numbers as vulnerability stacks change). Check.
  • Here's where it gets weird: as the poison DoT ticks, apparently Diversive Tactics treats this damage as "hits", applying extra heat and warp vulnerability stacks and increasing the mob's physical resistance. Unfortunately, this is the only effect that seems to treat DoT ticks as "hits". Any "shock on hit" or "slow on hit" or various psalm-code "buff-on-hit" effects do not trigger on DoT ticks (but obviously can still trigger on normal skill hits).

It's unclear to me what the expected behavior is here, but I'm assuming is one of the following:

  1. Diversive Tactics should not be triggering on DoT damage ticks, as they are not hits.
  2. DoT damage ticks are hits and should trigger all non-DoT on-hit effects.
  3. Diversive Tactics should be re-written as "Any damage increases the enemy's resistance against that damage type by 5%, but also adds Vulnerability to all other types." (emphasis mine)

Obviously, my preference would be for the first approach, as it enables a neat niche for Diversive Tactics (it seems intended, and god knows DoTs need the love). The second seems a bit odd (since this would be one of the only places where DoTs are treated differently than other debuffs in terms of application). The third is probably still not actually correct, since I don't believe environmental, NPC ally or turret damage causes Diversive Tactics, so there's some weird new category of damage which includes skills and DoTs but not other things.

Anyways, hopefully this helps debug this interaction. Thanks!

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DoTs have inconsistent on-hit behavior
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3 years 310 days ago
+1
Great. Thanks for the update, and I'm looking forward to hearing what is in store for DoTs.


I don't know if there will be a preview or beta program for the upcoming content, but I've signed my account up for the Gamer Testing Program. I hope you'll let the community know where we can help out. Thanks!

3 years 310 days ago
+1

This is known by our designers, they will try to get this handled in the short run.You can also expect major changes in the DoT mechanism with the upcoming Season patch (estimated arrival is June).