Online:Destructive Touch

	Destructive Touch
Line		Destruction Staff
Line Rank		14	Cost	2970 Magicka
Cast Time		Instant	Duration	20 seconds
Target		Enemy
Range		15 meters
Morphs
		Destructive Clench Converts the damage over time into a new effect based on your staff type.
		Destructive Reach Increases the range. Reduces the cost as the ability ranks up.
Notes Values are based on Max Magicka/Stamina 12000, Max Health 16000, and Weapon/Spell Damage 1000.

Shock Touch

Destructive Touch: Devastate an enemy with an enhanced charge from your staff, dealing [3074 / 3106 / 3140 / 3174] Magic Damage and an additional [9232 / 9323 / 9432 / 9522] Magic Damage over 20 seconds. The initial hit always applies the element's status effect.

Destructive Clench: Devastate an enemy with an enhanced charge from your staff, dealing 3176 Magic Damage. The initial hit always applies the element's status effect. Flame Clench also knocks the enemy back. Frost Clench deals less damage, has increased range, applies Major Maim, immobilizes, and taunts the enemy. Shock Clench converts the attack into an area of effect explosion.

Destructive Reach: Cost: [2970 / 2880 / 2790 / 2700] Magicka, Range: 28 meters.
Devastate an enemy with an enhanced charge from your staff, dealing 3176 Magic Damage and an additional 9533 Magic Damage over 20 seconds. The initial hit always applies the element's status effect.

Destructive Touch deals magic damage and additional damage over time. The Destructive Clench morph removes the damage over time but adds additional effects based on the staff type:

• Flame Clench knocks the target back.
• Frost Clench reduces the damage, increases the range and immobilizes, taunts and reduces the damage of the target.
• Shock Clench deals splash damage to other nearby enemies.

Alternatively, the Destructive Reach morph allows the ability to be used at a greater distance, changing the name to:

• Flame Reach
• Frost Reach
• Shock Reach

Notes

• Destructive Clench is a recommended morph for the Deathweaver build.
• The Destructive Impact set from Dragonstar Arena will reduce the Magicka cost and increase your Weapon and Spell Damage after casting.

Gallery

• 

  Flame Touch

• 

  Frost Touch

Patch Notes

1.1.2

• Increased this ability's damage and magicka cost.

1.6.5

• Destructive Touch has been changed into a damage over time-based attack for all ranks and morphs of all types of staffs. The damage over time component increases in damage with rank.
• Increased the range of this ability to 17 meters from 7 meters.
• Destructive Reach (morph): Increased the range of this ability to 28 meters from 17 meters.
• Destructive Clench (morph): Fire Clench, Frost Clench, and Shock clench will now properly play their particle effects when recast in quick succession.
• Shock Touch, the lightning staff variant of Destructive Touch, now deals damage to nearby targets instead of disorienting the target.
• Tri Focus (passive): This passive now grants a damage bonus of 8% at Rank I, and 15% at Rank II to heavy attacks when the caster is using a fire staff. This passive also now adds splash damage equal to 10% at Rank I, and 20% at Rank II, of the damage of the attack when a caster using a lightning staff uses a heavy attack.
• Frost Touch and its morphs will no longer stun your target before the projectile deals damage.

2.1.4

• Frost Touch and its morphs will no longer apply a half-second stun to the target.
• Normalized the projectile's travel speeds.
• Clarified the tooltips for this ability.
• Flame Touch: This ability will now knock back your enemy instead of stunning them.
• Shock Touch: Removed the area of effect damage, and added a 2.5 second stun. The impact effects have been updated to reflect these changes.
• Flame Clench (morph):
  • Removed the stun from this ability
  • Added an increased damage over time damage
• Shock Clench (morph): Added an area of effect damage that applies near the target.
• Shock Reach (morph): Removed the area of effect damage from this ability, and added a 2.5 second stun. The impact effects have been updated to reflect these changes.

2.2.4

• Flame Reach (morph): This ability now properly applies the knockback up to the correct range (28 meters).

2.7.5

• Adjusted the order of the Active Abilities in this skill line. They now unlock in the following order:
  • Force Shock
  • Wall of Elements
  • Destructive Touch
  • Weakness to Elements
  • Impulse

3.1.5

• Added new icons for each of the elemental variants of Destructive Touch, Wall of Elements, and Impulse.

4.0.5

• Fixed an issue where the Frost Clench and Frost Reach morphs were not displaying their visuals effects and scrolling combat text damage values correctly if they were used repeatedly on an enemy target.

4.2.7

• Weapon Enchantments and poisons will no longer proc from single-target Damage over Time effects of any weapon ability. The following effects can no longer proc Weapon Enchantments or poisons:
  • The Damage over Time from Cleave and its morphs
  • The Damage over Time from Twin Slashes and its morphs
  • All damage from Lacerate and its morphs
  • The residual Damage over Time from Toxic Barrage
  • The Damage over Time from Acid Spray
  • The Damage over Time from Poison Arrow and its morphs
  • The Damage over Time from Destructive Touch and its morphs

4.3.5

• Shock Clench: Fixed an issue where the area of effect detonation of the ability, "Shock Clench Explosion", was not able to critically strike. This ability will now properly scale with your Spell Critical rating and inherent your Critical Hit Damage modifiers.

5.1.5

• Redesigned this ability and its morphs to function as a DoT, rather than a utility skill.
• Reduced the base cost to 2700 from 4050.
• Reduced the initial hit damage by approximately 17%, but increased the DoT by approximately 167% per tick.
• This ability no longer grants additional bonuses depending on the staff you are using.
• This ability now gains 1.1% damage in rank for the entire ability.
• Reduced the range to 15 meters from 17 meters.
• Destructive Clench: This morph retains the unique functionality for each elemental staff type you choose, but no longer deals damage over time. Flame Clench knocks the target back and stuns them for the duration; Frost Clench Immobilizes the target. Shock converts the attack into an AoE explosion, and deals our AoE damage standard.
  • Note: The patch notes incorrectly listed this as Desctructive Reach
• Destructive Reach: This morph increases the range to 28 meters and reduces the cost to 2430 at Rank IV.

5.2.0

• Decreased the damage per tick of this ability and the Destructive Reach morph by approximately 63%.

5.2.3

• Increased the Damage over Time of this ability and the Destructive Reach morph by 33%.

5.2.5

• Decreased the damage per tick of this ability and the Destructive Reach morph by approximately 50%.

5.3.4

• Fixed an issue where the visual effects for this ability's Damage over Time would fail to refresh when using a Lightning staff.

6.2.5

• Fixed an issue where this ability and the Destructive Clench morph would aggro enemies before dealing damage.
  • Destructive Clench (morph): The Frost version of this morph now taunts enemies for 15 seconds.

7.1.5

• This ability and its morphs now guarantee their respective element type's status effect on hit.
• Increased the cost to 2970, up from 2700 to incorporate the added auxiliary effect.
• Increased the range to 15 meters from 14 meters for better consistency since Destructive Clench was already 15 meters.
• The Frost Touch and Reach versions of this ability now deal 80% more damage on its initial hit to make them equal to other ranged spammable damage attacks to give love to those Frost DPS out there.
  • Destructive Clench (morph): The Frost version of this ability still remains tank-focused rather than DPS-focused, and as such has received a cost reduction to 1485, down from 2700. It also applies Major Maim for 5 seconds at rank IV.
  • Developer Comment: With the introduction of the Frostbite set in Update 30, we saw a lot of discussion on the viability of Frost damage sets and how their main drawback - regardless of their power - was there was no Frost damaging ability that could be used as a spammable attack. Rather than bloating those sets further, we've decided to let Frost Touch and its morphs stand out; Frost Touch and Reach now deal ranged spammable damage on initial hit. Additionally, Frost Clench has been missing the mark for being a viable taunt compared to Puncture or Inner Fire, so we've decided to amp it up by introducing a source of on-demand Major Maim, while also reducing the cost. The changes to the base ability also help to gain a form of on demand Minor Brittle, helping both DPS and tanks out regardless of the morph.

8.0.5

• Flame Clench (morph): Fixed an issue where this morph's knock back visuals were not displaying on targets properly.

8.1.5

• This ability and the Destructive Reach versions now last for 20 seconds, up from 10.
• Reduced the damage per tick by 25%.
  • Destructive Clench (morph):
    • Frost Clench now costs 2700 Magicka, up from 1350.
    • Frost Clench now has a range of 28 meters, up from 15.