Grief vs heavens Light

Can someone explain why you would use Grief over inserting a Lo/ Mal in a +3skill 2OS Heaven’s Light. Doesn’t that do the same thing but you get the +3? What am I missing here and why wouldn’t that be the more appropriate option?

The main thing about Grief is the flat 340-400 damage. This flat damage (as opposed to the 250-300 enhanced damage on Heaven's Light) is applied directly as base weapon (or Smite) damage and his then multiplied with all other ED modifiers (Fortitude, ...) whereas Heaven's Light only keeps its 140-208 base damage to be multiplied and the 250-300ED is added to other multipliers. I.e. the final raw damage with Grief is just worlds beyond what you would reach with Heaven's Light.

That having been said, the one thing that sucks about Grief that Heaven's Light would actually win out on is the lack of crushing blow. But you can get enough of that from other sources still.

Also, since the dmg on Grief is a flat bonus and not an ED multiplier, the base weapon damage actually matters very little, allowing you to throw it into a Phase Blade for both, massive speed and indestructibleness (which should totally be a word).



Edit: Adding example math cuz..why not?

Say you have:
- A 300% ED Heaven's Light vs. a 400 dmg Grief Phase Blade
- A 300% ED Fortitude
- Lvl 20 Fanaticism for 373% ED
- Lvl 20 Zeal for 96% ED

With Heaven's Light, you get:
140 - 208 base damage, multiplied by (300 + 300 + 373 + 96)% ED
= 1636 - 2431 damage

With Grief, you get:
(31 - 35 base damage, plus 400 flat damage), multiplied by (300 + 373 + 96)% ED
= 3745 - 3780 damage

The more %ED you get (higher skill levels, Phoenix, Steelrend, whathaveyou), the more extreme the difference becomes.

And as a final addition: In the specific case of a smiter, the bonus reason is that ED on your weapon (i.e. Heaven's Light) does not apply to Smite damage. Whereas flat damage on your weapon (i.e. Grief) is added to your base Smite damage and then multiplied forward (even though the broken character screen doesn't show it).

im using astreon Eth for Zeal got 93% crushing blow build works like a charm

astreon my fave weapon all time

Interesting thanks for the response. You’d totally be losing out a little on IAS, but I feel like there is a creative way to make it happen. I suppose the +3 to skills is just not enough to get it over the hump, especially since You’d be spending the same Lo and Mal to accomplish what you would in a Grief?

Imabucket wrote: 4 years ago

Interesting thanks for the response. You’d totally be losing out a little on IAS, but I feel like there is a creative way to make it happen. I suppose the +3 to skills is just not enough to get it over the hump, especially since You’d be spending the same Lo and Mal to accomplish what you would in a Grief?

Not even close, no. The 3 skills are nice but they don't more than double your damage (which is basically what Grief does in a well geared scenario).