[2018] Skill Reveal: Armageddon Brand

We've already revealed Storm Brand, the first of a new skill type coming alongside Path of Exile: Betrayal. Today we'll look at the other new Brand skill, Armageddon Brand. We'll also talk about some other new Brand synergies that are being added.

Armageddon Brand binds to a nearby enemy when placed, and summons flaming meteors above them that come crashing down, damaging enemies in an area. It naturally applies powerful Ignite effects. As with other brands, it returns to an inactive state when the Branded enemy dies, and will reattach if another enemy enters its range.

Armageddon Brand has a longer activation time than Storm Brand, which can be modified by new Brand passives as well as Cast Time modifiers, but its placement time is much shorter, making it quick to deploy multiple Armageddon Brands.

We're also introducing a new Brand Recall skill, an instant cast ability that pulls all of your Brands to your location, extends their duration and activates their effects instantly. This means you don't need to keep re-casting Brands as you move, and it increases their damage output as you can quickly trigger the activation delay. After being Recalled, Brands have increased attachment radius, letting them jump to further enemies.

Unlike other skill gems, Brand Recall only has 6 levels, but each level greatly increases cooldown recovery speed. This makes the skill great with modifiers that increase gem level, letting you Recall much more often.

We're adding a number of new effects to the passive tree; a new Keystone, a new notable for the Hierophant, and a number of new nodes spread throughout the Templar and Witch area of the Passive Tree. These all have a variety of effects that enhance your Brand's damage, activation speed, and attachment range, as well as increasing the maximum number of brands that you can have active.

" Iamod wrote: So here's a question: Do they keep hitting until the target dies, or is there a duration of the brand?

There are two durations on a Brand - they have a total duration they can be attached for, and a total duration they can be left on the ground unattached. They expire if either runs out. This means time a Brand is on the ground between enemies, and thus not dealing damage, doesn't count towards it's attached duration.

" geoffreytuck wrote: So it's literally just traps but you called them brands instead. Either way, it's new skills, so that's cool.

Brands are funcamentally very different from traps. Storm Brand is very like Orb of Storms, the closest equivalent in-game to Armageddon Brand is Firestorm - the difference being that Brands attach to enemies and only damage while attached, rather than staying where they were put, which makes playing them quite different than those skills.

Brands are a skill you cast that damages things repeatedly. Traps are a separate object which uses a different skill. This leads to a lot of mechanically important differences.