Diablo® III

12/10/2012 08:49 PMPosted by Lylirra

We didn't make any changes to way Health Link works in 1.0.5.

I think the reason I noticed it in 1.05 is that was when monster power was introduced, and I was able to turn up the difficulty to the point that the damage I was taking made this bug stand out to me. That is probably why it seemed like an overnight change to me, if indeed this bug existed prior to 1.05.

12/10/2012 09:34 PMPosted by Lylirra

Nah, you're not wrong. I'll hit up our resident QA representative tomorrow and let him know that the list appears to be a little out of date (the bug was confirmed pretty recently, but I agree that having accurate and up-to-date info is very important).

Thank you.

I am troubled by the lack of transparency and community interaction overall (though you have been on the ball in tonight in particular, for which I commend you) and this response staved off a long-winded mildy drunken mildy belligerent response wondering why my reasonable question went overlooked.

Transparency is not hard. 90% of the complaining and whining in these threads would similarly be staved by simple responses indicating attentiveness and a dedication to the game success. Even a crude public bug-tracker linked to whatever internal bug tracking mechanisms you use would mute a good percentage of the "unanswered questions" the vocal minority harps on about. (eg: you could blindly close/delete any thread in general-discussion related to the inability to report spammers currently if the sticky on top of the bug-report forum contained even a vague mention of there being a possibility of an issue with the spam reporting functionality).

Though it may be too little too late? The disconnect in communication between whomever maintains the 'server status page' and 'scheduled system maintenance' forum threads is not entirely encouraging either. You could hire me even. I'm in the market for a change and would enjoy stress testing d3 for a living. ;)

Blue you have all the rights to be necro-ing. You're a CM!

Thanks for the updates.

We didn't make any changes to way Health Link works in 1.0.5. To clarify, this is how the affix should function:

1. You hit a monster with the Health Link affix.

2. If you successfully deal damage, that monster checks for any other monsters with the Health Link affix that are nearby (nearby = 50 yards).

3. If there are monsters nearby, the damage amount is immediately divided equally with them.

4. If there aren't any monsters nearby, that damage isn't shared and is taken fully by the monster you hit.

Now, there is bug that's currently active that makes it so that Life Steal isn't as effective against monsters with the Health Link affix (the amount of life stolen is diminished when attacking Health Linked monsters), which could account for what you've experienced.

(Sorry to chime in a bit late on this thread, but this was something I wanted to check on with both QA and our development teams. I hope you'll forgive my necro!)

Ah, NOW it makes sense why when elites have reflect damage and health link why I'm constantly dying. When I hit normal reflect damage elites, I get all the life back when using gloom. When they have health link, I don't get all my health back, so my next big cluster arrow hits kills me. Hope it's fixed soon. :)

Any idea on when a fix for lifesteal with health link would be available? Is this a hotfixable thing or do we have to wait for a patch?

My god man MP10 HL+Reflect+Anything is a nightmare.

hmm i havent played in a while but hl was something i did notice when i was playing(after patch 1.05 so is relevant lol).. it was more of the damage that was being divided to the monsters with the hl affix rather than the life leach.. it was not being split by 3 or 4 buy the damage numbers i was seeing, they were about 10-15% of what i normally would see on other similar monsters(same elites different affix).. i understand your saying the life leach is a confirmed bug but from my experience it was more than just that

Hiya Lyrrira. Is there any chance that this and other RD issues might eventually get filed under "unexpected feature" rather than "bug". It's an interesting interaction between two monster affixes.

In general, RD is one of the few monster abilities you have to actaully gear around, and I like the idea that such abilities exist. From a gearing perspective its more fun when the solution isn't always "More DPS!". I know I'm not the only one that likes the way it keeps you honest in terms of keeping sufficient armor, resists, and healing.

Honestly, it would be nice if there were more abilities that couldn't most effectively be dealt with by just adding more DPS (again, from a gearing perspective).

To start let me say that I usually play a barb with smash spec. 59% crit chance, and my crits fall between 600k and 1.2mil with HotA:Smash. Needless to say, Lifesteal is an important stat for me.

So prior to 1.05, the way health link worked was you would deal full damage to each of the monsters in the elite pack with the affix, and then the HP would be redistributed among the monsters within a certain range. It seemed to work well to me, but whatever.

Now, Post 1.05, Health link has been changed, and as far as I can tell, it was an undocumented change, since I didn't see anything in the patch notes. The way it works now is, the damage you deal is immediately divided by the number of monsters in the elite pack so your attack will only deal 1/3 to 1/4 damage (depending on how many monsters there are) and it affects the monsters anywhere on the map, even if they are far apart. The overall affect is the same as far as how much damage the monsters take (unless you relyed on a strategy to split them up in order to bypass the affix), BUT this winds up being a HUGE nerf to anyone who relys on Lifesteal to sustain themselves in these long fights with monsters that have 50million HP. Lifesteal only heals you for the damage numbers you do, and it only accounts for the primary hit you deal on the main target. Therefore, if you only hit 1 target in a Health-Link pack with an ability, you are only getting 1/3-1/4 of your normal lifesteal (on top of 80% lifesteal reduction in inferno).

What I want to know is, was this change meant to make Health-Link packs much more difficult for people who rely on lifesteal to keep themselves alive? Health-Link is for me, the worst affix a monster can have. Not because I try to focus 1 target down as quickly as possible, but when you are used to getting 20k+ hp back when you crit and that number is cut by 2/3, you REALLY feel it. Is lifesteal (along with reflect dmg) supposed to be the most challenging affix for people with high gear levels?

It seems to me that this is an unintended affect since they didn't try to nerf lifesteal any other way, but I would really like someone who knows to respond to this.

Edit: accidentally said reflect damage a couple times when I meant health-link. Brain is going too many directions at once.

Health link still feels the same to me since l heal roughly the same amount back per hit as before the patch. The only real difference l see is the visual amount of damage being dealt which l assume they changed only to give you a better understanding of how much you're really doing to each one rather than seeing the full hit.

12/11/2012 04:47 PMPosted by Lylirra

So the bug regarding life steal is basically that instead of its intended behaviour, which is to have all parts of the reallocated damage count as coming from the player, only the initial reduced damage to the primary target is being counted as "by the player", and the other distributed damage amounts to nearby mobs is being counted as "by the primary target", thus not counted as damage total for use in the life steal returns formula, yes?

More or less. With this particular bug, you're basically only receiving Life back for the damage done to a single enemy in a Health Link pack (i.e. the amount after it's been distributed) rather than the full damage you dealt with the attack to the pack as a whole.

Numbers wise, players are probably receiving about 1/3 less Life back on average when attacking Health Link monsters.

This is actually news to you guys? LS getting cut in 3 or 4 (depending on how many mobs from the pack are left) has been an issue for ages now and l always just assumed it was intentional otherwise health link wouldn't make packs any harder at all.

To clarify, this is how the affix should function:

1. You hit a monster with the Health Link affix.

2. If you successfully deal damage, that monster checks for any other monsters with the Health Link affix that are nearby (nearby = 50 yards).

Point two sounds like an obvious bug. Are you sure that's exactly how it works?

If there are two elite packs in the area, one I am fighting right now and one on the other side of a wall I am not engaged with, the elite pack I am not engaged in is both taking damage and reducing damage on the current elite pack.

?

edit: Don't know why, but the blue's post isn't showing up as blue.

nothing is fair/logic. WIZ,DH,monk receive RD damage from hydra,sentry,sweeping wind and receive no Loh,LS at all.

I would just hit all 3 (or 4) targets with an AOE ability to get the full effect of lifesteal!

12/12/2012 11:54 AMPosted by Iria

I would just hit all 3 (or 4) targets with an AOE ability to get the full effect of lifesteal!

That would give you the effect of lifesteal that you would normally get for hitting one target, you are still getting 1/3 to 1/4 the normal amount you would lifesteal if you hit 4 targets with an aoe ability that did not have health link.

2. If you successfully deal damage, that monster checks for any other monsters with the Health Link affix that are nearby (nearby = 50 yards).

How do i measure 50 yards in game??? I don't understand.