Mosaic kicksin

Hey guys,

So I've been coming across this guy on both duels and BH (for a while now) that just joins with this broken kicksin and start trolling like a noob would. I'm sure many of you came across the guy lol, but I want to know what his build is cause I don't get what makes him nigh-immortal, any of you have any idea?

Each day I'm more convinced Mosaic should be banned.

Whenever a Mosaicsin joins the game I'm in, I leave immediately. I hate this build and everything it stands for (todays Blizzard).

PabloSL wrote: 2 years ago

Hey guys,

Each day I'm more convinced Mosaic should be banned.

I like Mosaic.

Well, the main issue with Mosaic is that it sent the MA sin from trash to off the roof. But it's actually very hard to balance : let the charges expire and you fall in the initial issues of spending half time recharging,

Perhaps simply add a limit to the stackable charges (e.g. 10 max, so 3 PS, 3 of one element, 3 TS, 1 CS ?)

Necrarch wrote: 2 years ago

Well, the main issue with Mosaic is that it sent the MA sin from trash to off the roof. But it's actually very hard to balance : let the charges expire and you fall in the initial issues of spending half time recharging,

Perhaps simply add a limit to the stackable charges (e.g. 10 max, so 3 PS, 3 of one element, 3 TS, 1 CS ?)

The main issue with Charge-dropping is/was that the Charge-up attacks are not only crap but also leave you quite vulnerable as compared to most other better builds. So you actively spent most of your time doing something that was in itself relatively pointless and unnecessarily risky only to then have a split second of feeling like a real build (or a god, depending) before reverting back to uselessness.

That's also why Mosaic is so binary / was pointless trash on the PTR when it wasn't 50% each / is never used with just one of them, as anything but "reliably always up" still leaves you with the required assumption of reverting back to trash.

Balancing Mosaic isn't really much harder than other builds, you'd merely have to get blizz to actually care about balancing. At all. I mean...Mosaic isn't THAT overpowered if you compare it to other stupidly overpowered stuff we've had for ages. It just brought sins more in line with the pre-existing "god tier" of this game. Though they do get there for significantly lower cost than basically anyone else. Compared to "normal" builds, they are of course crazy OP but so are many other things.
Such is the nature of most multi-class games and especially Blizz games (they've never been good at balancing anything other than Starcraft..or rather, they've always made it quite obvious that they don't really care about actual balancing).

Balancing mosaics via a total Charge limit is actually not a bad idea, seeing how that'd Cap their performance while at the same time not really affecting non-Mosaic sins (the two that still exist ^^) as they generally won't get there without charges dropping anyways.

Alternatively, one could always adjust how mosaics themselves work and for example counterbalance the keeping of charges with adding a short cooldown on finishers. Simple numerical balancing at that point albeit probably not the most fun approach from a gameplay perspective.

Adjusting the skills themselves is of course also an option but probably the worst approach possible as balancing those around Mosaic (i.e. nerfing them a fair bit) would just make non-Mosaic MA sins even dumber than they already were.

I would say though that all of the Mosaic "issues" (if any) are rather PvE centric. In terms of (proper) PvP, they're perfectly fine as is (or fairly weak actually) since they shouldn't get the chance to Charge up to begin with..if they do get to full charges, they kinda deserve to be defaulted a win after that.

I really like(d) Mosaic for two main reasons.

1) It introduced the thought that D2R is more than a fan service to relieve some money from us old guys. That we would get regular updates, even such that considerably spice things up, allowing for new builds (or leverage existing low tier builds). It is of course debatable whether Mosaic shall have lifted MA sin to god tier right away. But the basic idea of game maintenance and updates that change/introduce something meaningful without too much tampering on the existing core is a good one imo. Sadly, last seasons indicate that Blizzard pretty much abandoned that idea.

2) Mosaic looked so fresh and otherworldly playstyle-wise, it really motivated me to sink a lot of time into the ladder season to try it. And that's in the end what it should be - motivating players to play, new challenges, etc.

And honestly, it didn't get old so far to watch in a bit of disbelief when obliterating Ubers in few seconds

Jumping in others games to troll is just dumb though, no matter which char they use for that.

sTonedmason wrote: 2 years ago

2) Mosaic looked so fresh and otherworldly playstyle-wise, it really motivated me to sink a lot of time into the ladder season to try it. And that's in the end what it should be - motivating players to play, new challenges, etc.

I would like other itens that enable fresh playstyle/build (similar to some D3 items that make some skills - or set of skills - work differently)
(many "different builds" in D2 are just class A using skills from class B thanks to some unique/runeword)

Well I wouldn't say its irrelevant for PVP as this guy I'm talking about joined a duels game I was in, went elsewhere to Charge up and then killed everyone, we couldn't even get out, fully geared PVP characters, none would last more than a second. If Mosaic can do that then it should be banned, not 2 ways about it.

I was never excited for anything these idiots running blizzard today could release to be honest, its not the blizzard of my childhood/youth and they should stay away from touching the game in any way, they're not remotely worthy of it.

If you manage to flee quickly enough (TP) he'll lose charges and you should be in a much better position ?

PabloSL wrote: 2 years ago

Well I wouldn't say its irrelevant for PVP as this guy I'm talking about joined a duels game I was in, went elsewhere to Charge up and then killed everyone, we couldn't even get out, fully geared PVP characters, none would last more than a second. If Mosaic can do that then it should be banned, not 2 ways about it.

I was never excited for anything these idiots running blizzard today could release to be honest, its not the blizzard of my childhood/youth and they should stay away from touching the game in any way, they're not remotely worthy of it.

Yes of course the Mosaic player charged up and surprised you, what do you expect... This build is very good for PVE and levelling, but not good for PVP (Trapper is much better). That's why life skillers for this build are not worth anywhere near as much as PnB, Lightning and Combat Skills.

By the sounds of it this is public duels, which don't have any enforced rules so expect BM.

As Schnorki pointed out one tactic is to just avoid until the charges are lost. The Mosaic player has to physically hit you with a finishing move and has much slower cast rate. A properly geared Bone Necro or Paladin would make short work it.

Also, most planned / formal duels have builds specially tailored to the opponent. That’s partly why tokens of absolution are sold by the truck load in order to respect on the fly. This actually puts the Mosaic Assassin at another disadvantage because both main and offhand cannot be changed i.e. build becomes far less flexible. To cut a long story short you just were caught of guard and unprepared IMO.

I know the charges should expire but this guy's weren't , that does make any sense?

PabloSL wrote: 2 years ago

I know the charges should expire but this guy's weren't , that does make any sense?

It does not. You need to hit something to refresh the Charge timer.

The only normal ways his charges wouldn't expire are..
- The map was still filled with trash mobs for him to keep charging up on, close enough to town (i.e. not a real pvp game)
- You kept leaving town 1 by 1 every few seconds only to get 1shot and let him refresh his charges (i.e. ya deserve to get wrecked)

That's pretty much it.

In any real pvp scenario (proper pvp that is, not random ganking), all it takes is to faceroll the weako sin before she charges up or - if by some miracle you did let her Charge up - avoid her for 15 seconds so they expire again.