Talk:Epidemic

We need a nightfall skill trainer. The Holy Llama 18:42, 24 April 2007 (EDT)

Notes thingy

Someone who added the last note before I edited it wrote some unnecessary stuff, eg. pinging team builds (something like 2 necs 1 sin or stuff like that), saying it synergises perfectly with sins and necromancers, misspelled most of it, but I fixed it. See history page (Aspecatable's "cur" edit for more information. Ninjas In The Sky 18:07, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Removed poor notes

Removed anything that had to do with using Epidemic + GoI or anything like that. The only use for Epidemic is BHA + Apply for spreading Dazed, which is already very bad. No one is going to use this skill effectively, since is just not that great. 76.64.185.213 04:02, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Heya, I was just poking around and found on your userpage that apparently the reasoning behind removing the usability notes on this skill was based on PvP skill usage as you mentioned non-clumping tactics of an enemy team.

While that line of reasoning may be valid*, enemy groups behave differently in PvE and these combinations of skills may well be useful there.

Furthermore, the information about the synergy with Glyph of Immolation is important and should be kept as the ordering of effect activation on skill use can be subtle and confusing and any notes that help to clarify it are useful.

• *(a) Considering the 'giant furball' effect I've seen ovserving some GvG games, I'm not sure it wouldn't actually be effective there.
• *(b) If it is actually incredibly hard to use the skill against live players, maybe there should be a PvP version with a larger AoE. Considering the nature of the effect, "Higher Cost + Better Effect --> Greater Overall Usability" may apply here.

--Star Weaver 04:21, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Er . . . I guess I was looking at the old version, didn't see it had already been reset until after I posted. Oh well. --Star Weaver 04:25, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, epidemic's pretty bad. If you have enough fire magic to make glyph of immolation not suck, you might as well be taking searing flames. -Auron 04:43, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Epidemic is THE condition spreading skill for me in PvE. BHA one caster, spread with epidemic. Throw Dirt on melee's closing in, spread with epidemic. Want them crippled too? Use epidemic after one stumbled through your trap. It's a low energy, fast recharge skill, perfect for my R/Me. Hopefully people now realize some skills are also used in a setting other than PvP. --Arduinna 10:22, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

That's nice. It's still pretty bad, because it doesn't do anything. If you're dazing an entire mob with BHA/epi, you don't have barrage to interrupt them all with (or to... y'know, kill them all with). If you're using throw dirt at all, you're doing it wrong; there's no melee in the vast majority of the game worth shutting down, and the few that are worth shutting down are bosses... so a 30r skill isn't going to do anything.

I'm not arguing that no synergy exists. I'm arguing that the skill is so terrible that there's no synergy worth mentioning. I mean, there are some skills that have epic synergy; draw condis and mending touch, or sig midnight and plague sending... but this is a skill that lacks a use because it's so bad.

And in PvE, spreading conditions is simply a waste of time. Nobody runs apply poison in PvE because the 4 pips of degen are useless Some players prefer waiting 5 minutes for their enemies to die instead of blowing them up with barrage/splinter and making the mobs dead instead of poisoned. -Auron 10:42, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

I guess I have to disagree with you Auron, because I use poison a lot in PVE. I guess my 9 characters with 3x protector titles make me a nobody then.-- Wynthyst 10:49, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

I take it that means triple protector somehow makes apply poison not suck? Not following your logic here. -Auron 10:51, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm just saying that by saying that NOBODY uses it, you are discounting a large population of players, including me, who DO use it, and find it as effective as we need it to be. -- Wynthyst 10:57, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Effective... for doing what, exactly? Waiting for opponents to degen to death is much slower than exploding their faces with splinter barrage. -Auron 11:16, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Of course Epidemic doesn't DO anything. But this a team game, if I'm correct. MY role in a 8 man party is to Daze/Blind/Poison/Disease them all. This can be done by one character only, me. The Minion Master tagging along provides ample firepower to keep interrupting the enemy casters. The Searing Flames Eles can blow stuff up without having to be concerned to get Hexed all over the place by enemy casters (who are all dazed), or get harassed by melee's (they are all blind). Healing/Protters have they workload greatly reduced, because a lot of damage is mitigated at the source.

Sure, I can go R/Rt and blow stuff up, but at the same time my OWN party is blown up too. So, once again, Epidemic makes life a lot easier for me. --Arduinna 11:23, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

So because you have 7 other people on your team, you're perfectly okay with taking a bar that doesn't do anything? It wouldn't be faster/more efficient if you didn't also kill stuff? -Auron 11:38, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

By your logic, Auron, everybody would be running 6 Ursan and 2 HB for speed killing stuff. Well, that's definately not the case. What if I don't like also killing stuff? What if I want to keep my team free from harm? What if I enjoy seeing all those casters getting interrupted over and over? What if I don't want to dish out uberdamage on my Ranger but rather put down some traps to snare the enemy? Some people just like to play this game the way the want. Don't try to force your opinion onto other people please. --Arduinna 11:44, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

They would be if that were the most efficient means of killing. That is, however, untrue.

More to the point... how does having 7 other people attacking make the synergy here any good? I could run a gust ele with a bar full of weak water hexes and have a ton of fun, but I wouldn't be doing anything. Sure, I'd have 7 party members doing all the killing for me, but that doesn't make me any less useless.

The vast majority of PvE requires no shutdown - i.e., kournan guards are too piss-weak to require blind as a counter, it's just a waste of time. You could blind them then kill them, or you could just kill them and be done with it. The few areas that do require shutdown generally have huge mobs that kill you quickly if you don't focus fire and finish them all off. In any scenario, my gust bar (and your epidemic bar) aren't worth noting. They're fun - however, in the end, they are inconsequential.

I'm not hunting you down in game and forcing my opinion on you. I play terrible bars for fun too, on occasion - but I don't make the mistake of telling other people to do so as well. This is a note on a wiki page; we don't want to be giving bad advice. If you like to play trash bars for fun, go ahead; but don't give the false impression that the build is good. -Auron 11:50, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Well what do you want then? Make a tally for people for and against this skill? I think it's great, you think it's not. I don't think it's bad advice telling people to bring this skill and transfer conditions, you think it is bad advice. Who's right here? Seeing the revert wars on this page, I'm not the only one who thinks this skill has it merits. --Arduinna 11:58, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

And seeing the revert wars on this page, I'm not the only one who thinks this skill is trash.

I guess we can make a cutoff for skill notes in terms of efficiency. In order to win PvE, you need to kill monsters, not make them all blind/burning/poisoned/bleeding/weakened/etc. If [subjectname here] doesn't kill them (quickly or at all; in this case it doesn't kill them at all), it doesn't win PvE, and thus shouldn't be mentioned ([subjectname here] being any and all of the 1000+ skills that exist but are trash). -Auron 16:28, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

As far as I know, in order to win in PvE, you have to make sure your party doesn't wipe, thereby completing certain objectives. If you can kill 2 out of 3 aatxes in 4 seconds, but the 3rd one wipes your party, you are screwed. If you can kill 3 out of 3 Aatxes in 40 seconds, but your party lives...you live. But that's something else we disagree upon.

But okay, let me check if I'm following you correctly. You want to remove notes from pages because those doesn't directly tell you how to kill monsters quickly? Shouldn't all notes at the Monk's skills be removed then following this logic? All the notes on the Warrior stances? All the notes on Elementalists conserving their energy? I think this is a bit narrow-minded, as (again) not every people's target in PvE is to dish out damage. --Arduinna 19:39, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

(reset indent) I find it annoying that some people disavow any method of play that isn't focused on killing quickly. Yes, you can just play by dead-ifying things very very quickly. My sin does it all the time. You can also play by tactically f@#$-ing up your foes, in the case of my mesmer, or my brother's Curses necro. There is no "best" way to play, and saying otherwise is, well, stupid. Krelus Derian 19:09, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Well said. Then again, whenever something is signed "Auron", you can expect it to ignore your opinion and tell that you're playing wrong. xP RitualDoll 06:52, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

Doesn't Suck That Bad

It's a good way to spread poison or bleeding for a ranger. Barbed Arrows + Poison Arrow + Epidemic. Not bad for a Ranger primary. Bisurge 19:17, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

I don't think this skill is a complete waste though the AoE could be a tad larger. I'm just spitballing here but maybe you could use it by having fragility, applying conditions (Virulence anyone?), using Hypochondria, and finally using Epidemic to hit them with fragility a few times and giving a few foes conditions simultaniously. It might even be possible to use this with something like Foul Feast to get conditions to fling at the enemy with Plague Sending or Plague Signet. Though a tad extreme just to have this skill be effective, you could even set a hero up with Martyr so you can use Foul Feast and Plague Sending/Signet to get all of the conditions off your party and onto the enemy. Not to say any of that stuff would actually prove usefull but I guess the skill only works if you actually use it "correctly" though "correctly" can mean different things to different people with different builds so the real point is that you can't say it is the "wrong" way to play if you use this skill or there is really a "wrong" way to use this skill unless there is absolutly no way for you to get conditions on foes which renders this useless.--Mayonade 02:57, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Of course, with the new Incendiary arrows, you can just apply poison + incendiary or barbed arrows + incendiary. Woo! 76.15.50.131 01:56, 14 August 2008 (UTC)Phelios

So, supposing you use a ViM trapper team and all 8 of you have Fragility, and one of you carries epidemic in case the traps don't own them in the first place... Instant full team damage + conditions. Very effective advance in ViM trapping perhaps? 216.167.172.136 04:25, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

I toss this on my livia even though she doesnt use conditions. I have hayda using Ebon Dust with Blazing Spear + Merciless Spear and livia uses Epidemic perfectly blinding a group of melee foes or ranged ones.--Justice 07:50, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

consider using this with apply poison or poison tip signet ( with barbed arrows ) in AB, then with the new burning arrow, shoot at your shrine, then epidemic. owns poisen arrows with incendiary arrows on a shrine. though ofcourse, you should stick together in AB, but i tend to get rid of my team and go solo capping. with burning arrow, poison and bleeding that would be ( 5+4+3 = 12 degen, which means 20 health loss / second. ) pretty useful to me.213.126.247.227 11:43, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Pvxwiki build for Me/A AP spiker uses this skill in conjuction with Finish him! to spread cracked armor and deep wound. ---- Melisande

Conditions

Fragility,(Insert condition here),Epidempic,Crystal wave(earth)= Boom.Corse,not a bad synergy- but very weak for 4 slots.--Neil2250 . 15:54, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

Spreading of conditions

I never used this skill. But does the spreading of the conditions mean that the targeted foe LOSES al conditions? (if so, big synergy with fragility). The descriptions suggests so 86.80.183.215 16:09, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

No, the target does not lose the condition/s. ~Celestia 16:15, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

There was, however, a previous glitch with Hypochondria that used to have a similar effect to Martyr, causing everyone to lose the conditions, and the target to recieve them all (I believe it was fixed quite some time ago). But no, as stated, the target retains all conditions. Ryuu - talk 16:19, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

Hypochondria still transfers conditions instead of copying them, but it was even more bugged in the past. It used to remove conditions from the target, as well as the other opponents, before applying them again. It was abused in Fragility builds. You could cast Virulence, then Hypochondria, and trigger fragility for each condition on the opponent 4 times a piece. With 4 conditions, that meant at least 14 Fragility triggers within 3 seconds for a single Mesmer. Team Arena builds usually threw hypochondria on to other character's bars just to support the frag-spike, since each extra cast added another 160 damage for 5 energy on a 1 second cast spell. MA Anathe 15:10, 21 May 2010 (UTC)

LolUW

Apply with spiritwall and a drop of shadowsong for easy aatxes. DemonicFahrir 10:05, 28 June 2010 (UTC)

33% Condition boost

Spreading a condition with this skill if you have a mod(example: +33% Crippled duration sword mod) will lengthen the duration of the condition on the adjacent foes but not on target foe. Add to notes? 99.244.36.101 02:09, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

Similar skill for Hexes?

As title, is there a similar skill that spreads hexes? even if it only spreads one hex at a time? --The preceding unsigned comment was added by 78.149.97.247 (talk • contribs) at 18:26, 26 July 2011 (UTC).

No. — Tennessee Ernie Ford (TEF) 03:28, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

Testing with Glyph of immolation

Sorry to rez this topic, but was thinking of running a new MoM build with GoI and epidemic in it. I did some quick testing and noticed a few odd things: After you apply burning to a target with epidemic while under the effects of GoI, immediately all adjacent targets start burning. If you wait for the original burning on the primary target to end, it does so about 1 second BEFORE the adjacent targets stop burning. Is it likely that when you cast epidemic, and when it finishes casting grants a +1 second round up effect? So

• Second 0 cast epidemic on primary target,
• Second 0.25 epidemic takes effect and puts a 4 second burn on all adjacent targets
• Second 4 burning stops on primary target
• Second 4.25 burning is supposed to stop on all adjacent targets but doesn't
• Second 5 burning stops on all adjacent targets.

I take a look at both the health bar of the adjacent target and the animation.

in some cases the animation is rounded, but I am pretty sure this is an interesting phenomenon.72.253.181.235 13:47, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Animation cues aren't a reliable way to determine whether a condition is in effect; the most notable example is that many foes will display a burning animation even though they are immune to the condition. Similarly, the Ice Fort animation always ends at the end of its description's duration, but the protection continues for a longer period using a +x% enchant mod.

There are several skills that apply effects near-simultaneously, but because the game needs to know how to remove them, they are applied sequentially, but almost certainly not 0.25¼ second later.

None of this disproves your theory, but it does mean that we need to do additional testing to confirm it. At the 4s mark, when the primary target stops burning, double-check their health has stopped decaying and confirm that the originally adjacent targets continue suffering the health degen. Ideally, also confirm when the degen starts on the adjacent targets; perhaps it doesn't start until the 1s mark (so it last 4s, but starts later). (Either way, it's an interesting idea of a skill chain.) – Tennessee Ernie Ford (TEF) 19:15, 7 January 2012 (UTC)