Regarding Thicket in PVP nowadays (especially at endgame)

First of all, I want to say that I know some threads have already been created in the past regarding Thicket, but they are messy and completely outdated nowadays.

In a recent thread, CapnK said Thicket was really underestimated and could be useful in some situations. I've been playing my mystic as a main since more than three years and I have some experience with this class, but I probably play it with my own style, with my good and bad habits. And since I always try to improve myself, maybe reconsidering Thicket could be a good thing.

I will try by myself in NW, but, since I'm really sceptical so far, I wanted first to analyse what Thicket could bring in theory. For that I will bring some facts, but I will need my fellow mystics to give me some more information and also share their feelings about that skill on the playing field.



I) Damage

This is the easiest part to analyse on theory because maths don't lie. But feel free to correct me if I forgot some factors.

As an almost endgame mystic, I have 60k mag att when full buffed, and 80k if I double spark (I won't double spark often but it's to compare with the two sparks required for Thicket).

My weapon is Reincarnation+12 and it's average base attack is 2784 if Im' not mistaken.

So below I will compare the raw damage dealt by Thicket, with the raw damage dealt by Nature's Vengeance, and the raw damage dealt by NW after double sparking.

No need to compare with triple sparking here, but keep in mind that rapid growth or mistress leech will affect your base mag attack (thus affect NV raw damage as well) but won't increase Thicket damage at all since the base weapon damage remains the same.

I could also add that as far as I know thicket is considered as using plants and is not affected by attack level (and spirit ?) as much as "regular" skills.


Thicket (sage version) damage is 12 times weapon damage +8500 which means :

2784*12 + 8500 = 41908


NV (sage version) is base magic damage + 100% weapon damage + 1200 which means :

Without sparking (no chi required at all, you will even gain some) : 60 000 + 2784 +1200 = 63984 (already more than thicket)

After double sparking : 80 000 + 2784 + 1200 = 83 984 (it means twice the damage of thicket without taking into account attack level or spirit which would increase the difference. also note that you're supposed to be able to cast NV twice during the same time as 1 thicket


I know that probably no descent mystic will use thicket for DDing in 1v1 but it's clearer with some numbers. If some people want to argue that thicket is an AOE, then without even talking about the small effect area, I can do the same comparison with Swirling Mist if needed.

Obviously the wood debuff from demon version could increase the damage of your teammates in some situation and then be a good thing for overall damage, but in my opinion it won't be enough to compensate in 1v1 situation (or with no other mystic/veno around). And I'm sage anyway




II) Crowd control

Thicket can silence and/or freeze the target and this is obviously the main reason to use it. Still I'm not convinced about the real interest in using it (because of the two sparks cost, I wouldn't say the same if the cost was 30 chi or maybe even 1 spark)

But here, I will have more questions than answers for the moment.


Firstly, in practice do you consider thicket as a massive crowd control skill or more as a monotarget one ? The zone of effect is really small and when I tried to use it in TW in the past, there were really few situations where more than on person could be hit.

Secondly, does anyone know the exact probability to get a freeze or silence ? As I said 2 sparks for a silence instead of triplesparking and DDing or using natural barrier + leech summon, is kinda expensive to me. But the lower the chances are to get a freeze or silence, the more important the waste would be.


Finally I would like to know in which kind of situation you use it, and why you think it's more efficient than anything else at that time.

I guess nobody would use it on R9.3 AA, right (because of the chances for the purify to occur) ?*

Against an endgame barb or seeker or even BM with a lot of HP, would it really be that useful ? Rather than using sublime transfusion and try to DD as much as possible ?

CapnK was talking about sins or archers and those are probably the best opponents to use ticket on, but well... what are everyone's experiences while trying to use it through tidal ? And concerning archers, I guess it can be useful with a good timing but I will have to try it.




Note : I will edit the whole post once I will be back home this evening (EU time) to make it easier to read.