Normal Thresher vs Eth CA vs Eth CV for Insight or Infinity

Which of these is best for Infinity and/or Insight for Act II Merc? I know in general

Eth is better than normal, but on the other hand I've also heard that Threshers and Giant Threshers are amazing and that CA and CV are complete garbage.

Rest of merc setup will either be

Eth Treachery +

Tal crest, or,

Eth Fortitude +

Tal crest

Eth

Thresher. has faster base attack speed which works well in conjunction with andys and Treachery

Thanks, but I think I already knew that

Eth

Thresher would be better than

Eth CV or

Eth CA.

My question is in regards to:

NORMAL

Thresher vs

Eth CV or

Eth CA.

Maybe the question is so obvious it was easy to miss, but I was/am genuinely asking.

EDIT: I don't yet have the runes for Infinity, but will definitely wait for an

Eth

Thresher or

Eth

Giant Thresher when/if I do.

But for now, I'm trying to decide between NORMAL

Thresher Insight vs

Eth CV Insight vs

Eth CA Insight.

Insight is so cheap, craft it in all the weapons and try them for yourself, then you can decide what is better for you

So you're losing 50% ED by not having

Eth. I'd say that by itself is enough to rule out any polearm when comparing to others of a similar tier. If you have some on-hit procs like

Enchant/curses/crushing, etc, then it's a different story potentially...

For polearms (and all weapons generally), the faster they hit, the lower their average damage per hit is and the lower their native damage per second is.

The

Eth CA does double minimum damage and maybe 70-75 % more maximum damage than the normal

Thresher.

But the normal

Thresher is "fast attack speed" and the

Eth CA is "normal attack speed". Problem is I don't know any exact numbers on how their attack speeds actually compare.

My gut tells me that the

Eth CV Insight has got to be better than any non

Eth Insight, surely.

Insight has procs like 5-30 poison damage (flat damage), but I think that's minimal. Insight also has critical strikes, but I think that doubles damage, so scales fine with higher damage per hit at slower attack speeds.

Snape75 wrote: 2 years ago

The

Eth CA does double minimum damage and maybe 70-75 % more maximum damage than the normal

Thresher.

But the normal

Thresher is "fast attack speed" and the

Eth CA is "normal attack speed". Problem is I don't know any exact numbers on how their attack speeds actually compare.

My gut tells me that the

Eth CV Insight has got to be better than any non

Eth Insight, surely.

Insight has procs like 5-30 poison damage (flat damage), but I think that's minimal. Insight also has critical strikes, but I think that doubles damage, so scales fine with higher damage per hit at slower attack speeds.

If you remember how algebra works from school, you can calculate your merc's effective IAS and then look up the appropriate frames on the amazon basin.

Otherwise there's this tool, which should be accurate for the act 2 mercenary in 2.3/2.4.

If both of these options look like chinese to you, searching for "attack speed diablo 2" on youtube should help.

Edit: In case you speak Chinese, insert another language above.

This breaks it all down

https://www.purediablo.com/forums/threa ... eriod.853/

you can use whatever fits for Insight, for Infinity you want the best possible base becuase its bloody expensive

I don't know who told you that CA and CV were complete garbage. Their DPS is pretty much the same as T and GT. The only polearm that stands out is the

Great Poleaxe. It trumps them all in terms of DPS.

There are narrow differences in case of characters wielding Beast (for

Fanaticism aura) and zealots, but otherwise it's pretty much all the same.

TL;DR: Any ethereal elite polearm with 15%ED will be a great choice. Mind the str req though.

The whole ethereal mechanic is stupid, I wish they had never implemented it in the game. The idea was to have items that were good but time limited, but in practice it's just a must-have for mercs because for unrelated reasons mercs don't deplete durability.

Miroslav wrote: 2 years ago

The whole ethereal mechanic is stupid, I wish they had never implemented it in the game. The idea was to have items that were good but time limited, but in practice it's just a must-have for mercs because for unrelated reasons mercs don't deplete durability.

It's a fantastic addition to the game, because it makes itemization deeper and item-hunting more exciting. Are you also suggesting removing

Zod Rune from the game?

iamergo wrote: 2 years ago

I don't know who told you that CA and CV were complete garbage. Their DPS is pretty much the same as T and GT. The only polearm that stands out is the

Great Poleaxe. It trumps them all in terms of DPS.

There are narrow differences in case of characters wielding Beast (for

Fanaticism aura) and zealots, but otherwise it's pretty much all the same.

TL;DR: Any ethereal elite polearm with 15%ED will be a great choice. Mind the str req though.

Heya,

15%ED, is that a typo? 15 % enhanced damage seems low? Mine 234%ED. I rerolled this one (hell countess runs) until I could get to lvl 17

Meditation aura, despite what the other stats would end up being.

Also, good to know that CV and CA are not garbage. I tend to always see "just use T/GT no matter what". Didn't even know the great pole

Axe was in the running!

Anyway, I've attached the two Insights I was comparing below. Non-

Eth

Thresher and

Eth CA. Surely the

Eth CA has got to be better! I'll check out those calculations/tools/breakdown links.

Katonda wrote: 2 years ago

Snape75 wrote: 2 years ago

The

Eth CA does double minimum damage and maybe 70-75 % more maximum damage than the normal

Thresher.

But the normal

Thresher is "fast attack speed" and the

Eth CA is "normal attack speed". Problem is I don't know any exact numbers on how their attack speeds actually compare.

My gut tells me that the

Eth CV Insight has got to be better than any non

Eth Insight, surely.

Insight has procs like 5-30 poison damage (flat damage), but I think that's minimal. Insight also has critical strikes, but I think that doubles damage, so scales fine with higher damage per hit at slower attack speeds.

If you remember how algebra works from school, you can calculate your merc's effective IAS and then look up the appropriate frames on the amazon basin.

Otherwise there's this tool, which should be accurate for the act 2 mercenary in 2.3/2.4.

If both of these options look like chinese to you, searching for "attack speed diablo 2" on youtube should help.

Edit: In case you speak Chinese, insert another language above.

Thanks for this! I tried using the tool (not entirely sure I did it right). I did it for the "town guard" (assuming that is the same as the Act II Merc). I plugged in '45' for IAS, on account of using Treachery. And I got 4.16 attacks per sec for the

Thresher and 3.57 attacks per sec for the CA. So that's 16.5 % faster attack speed for the

Thresher (5 frames vs 6 frames).

However, the

Eth CA is doing 792-2592 vs

Thresher doing 413 to 1695.

So that's 1692 avg for

Eth CA vs 1054 avg for

Thresher. Ie, 60.5 % more damage per attack for the

Eth Ca.

So overall, I think the DPS for the

Eth CA clearly dwarfs that of the

Thresher, right? Unless I'm missing something. Insight doesn't seem to have much in the ways of on-hit flat proccing effects (ie, critical strikes scales with damage per attack just ifne).

Snape75 wrote: 2 years ago

15%ED, is that a typo? 15 % enhanced damage seems low?

I meant a superior base.
Also, I forgot that

Ogre Axe was an elite polearm too. You shouldn't NOT use it, because it's the runt of the litter.

Snape75 wrote: 2 years ago

Thanks for this! I tried using the tool (not entirely sure I did it right). I did it for the "town guard" (assuming that is the same as the Act II Merc). I plugged in '45' for IAS, on account of using Treachery. And I got 4.16 attacks per sec for the

Thresher and 3.57 attacks per sec for the CA. So that's 16.5 % faster attack speed for the

Thresher (5 frames vs 6 frames).

However, the

Eth CA is doing 792-2592 vs

Thresher doing 413 to 1695.

So that's 1692 avg for

Eth CA vs 1054 avg for

Thresher. Ie, 60.5 % more damage per attack for the

Eth Ca.

So overall, I think the DPS for the

Eth CA clearly dwarfs that of the

Thresher, right? Unless I'm missing something. Insight doesn't seem to have much in the ways of on-hit flat proccing effects (ie, critical strikes scales with damage per attack just ifne).

Katonda wrote: 2 years ago

So you're losing 50% ED by not having

Eth. I'd say that by itself is enough to rule out any polearm when comparing to others of a similar tier. If you have some on-hit procs like

Enchant/curses/crushing, etc, then it's a different story potentially...

For polearms (and all weapons generally), the faster they hit, the lower their average damage per hit is and the lower their native damage per second is.

At the risk of looking silly for quoting myself, I already as much. Of the 60.5% damage discrepancy you observed, 50% is due to ethereal characteristic and the remainder due to the weapon class (base speed). I would look at average weapon damage as well as the spread. Some people prefer high spread weapons like the

Colossus Voulge for those really big crits, where others prefer a more consistent approach to help with mercenary survival since every hit leads to decent life leech with a weapon like

Cryptic Axe. Personally, I'm in the latter camp. In the same line of arguing for consistency, I'm usually happy to

Sacrifice average damage per second for attack speed. More frequent hits means more chances to leech life and apply weapon effects.

Also, with the calculator, have a look at the table stats, to see how far you are way from breakpoints. The further you are away from them, either above or below, the more potential for overall improvement there is by equipping alternative gear.

Katonda wrote: 2 years ago

Snape75 wrote: 2 years ago

Thanks for this! I tried using the tool (not entirely sure I did it right). I did it for the "town guard" (assuming that is the same as the Act II Merc). I plugged in '45' for IAS, on account of using Treachery. And I got 4.16 attacks per sec for the

Thresher and 3.57 attacks per sec for the CA. So that's 16.5 % faster attack speed for the

Thresher (5 frames vs 6 frames).

However, the

Eth CA is doing 792-2592 vs

Thresher doing 413 to 1695.

So that's 1692 avg for

Eth CA vs 1054 avg for

Thresher. Ie, 60.5 % more damage per attack for the

Eth Ca.

So overall, I think the DPS for the

Eth CA clearly dwarfs that of the

Thresher, right? Unless I'm missing something. Insight doesn't seem to have much in the ways of on-hit flat proccing effects (ie, critical strikes scales with damage per attack just ifne).

Katonda wrote: 2 years ago

So you're losing 50% ED by not having

Eth. I'd say that by itself is enough to rule out any polearm when comparing to others of a similar tier. If you have some on-hit procs like

Enchant/curses/crushing, etc, then it's a different story potentially...

For polearms (and all weapons generally), the faster they hit, the lower their average damage per hit is and the lower their native damage per second is.

At the risk of looking silly for quoting myself, I already as much. Of the 60.5% damage discrepancy you observed, 50% is due to ethereal characteristic and the remainder due to the weapon class (base speed). I would look at average weapon damage as well as the spread. Some people prefer high spread weapons like the

Colossus Voulge for those really big crits, where others prefer a more consistent approach to help with mercenary survival since every hit leads to decent life leech with a weapon like

Cryptic Axe. Personally, I'm in the latter camp. In the same line of arguing for consistency, I'm usually happy to

Sacrifice average damage per second for attack speed. More frequent hits means more chances to leech life and apply weapon effects.

Also, with the calculator, have a look at the table stats, to see how far you are way from breakpoints. The further you are away from them, either above or below, the more potential for overall improvement there is by equipping alternative gear.

Not silly at all, ty for breaking it down!

I went ahead and made an Insight out of the

Eth CV and compared all three in a series of

Baal Runs (Lister the Unlikely is a great test subject). I can't really tell much difference between the

Eth CV and the

Eth CA. But I can definitely tell the difference between both of them and non-

Eth

Thresher, which is significantly slower.

I think I'll stick with the

Eth CA because it has the lvl 17 aura aleady and I don't feel like doing a bunch of Hell Countess runs; but from what I can tell, the

Eth CA is on par with the

Eth CV anyway!

EDIT: Also great point on looking at the frames. At 45 IAS exactly (Treachery but no andy, just using horadric crest), the

Eth CV and the

Eth CA both seem to give the exact same frames per attack (if I'm remembering correctly).

Both CV and CA have the same weapon speed modifiers, that's why they feel so similar. Their breakpoints are at 35 IAS and 56 IAS when used by an act 2 mercenary. If you somehow add a 15 IAS jewel to your helmet, you would have 60 IAS. That would put you past the 56 IAS breakpoint. Currently you're at the 35 IAS breakpoint, which you overshot by 10 IAS. Not much you can do about it, since it all comes from one piece.

However, one of the reasons many consider

Andariel's Visage to be BiS for Act 2 merc, is when coupled with a 15IAS jewel, the 35 IAS breakpoint is perfectly reached.

There's a really good overview here. Just be sure you're looking at the

Jab table.

One more thing specific to Insight, take a look at the level of

Critical Strike. It scales very well the first few levels, so every point counts.

It's a chance for your merc to double his damage.

No need to re-roll your level 17

Meditation Insight though!