Grasp of the Dead

Grasp of the Dead is a Support Witch Doctor skill unlocked at level 3. This skill is a curse; it inflicts victims with much slower foot speed and deals damage as well. It's highly useful in the Arena PvP.

Background

Grasp of the Dead in action

A powerful debuff. This curses the target with much reduced movement speed and deals damage as well.

Skill Effects

The following is a very quick list. See the Grasp of the Dead rune effects page for a more thorough summary of rune effects, or any of the individual rune pages for numbers, screenshots, blue quotes, and much more.

Icon	Skill	Description

Grasp of the Dead Command (Level 3)

[e] Cost: 53 Mana Cooldown: 8 seconds Hands reach out from the ground slowing enemy movement by 50% and dealing 50% weapon damage per second as Physical for 8 seconds.

| | Groping Eels | Increases the damage done to 51 physical damage per second. |- | width="40px" | | Rain of Corpses | Corpses fall from the sky dealing 46 - 85 physical damage to nearby enemies. |- | width="40px" | | Unbreakable Grasp | Increase the slow amount to 64%. |- | width="40px" | | Desperate Grasp | Reduces the cooldown to 4.5 seconds. |- | width="40px" | | Death is Life | Killed targets have a 65% chance to produce a health globe. |-

|}

Note: Information is based on a level 60 character and rank 7 runestones.

Skill Design

Runed Grasp of the Dead cast on a Wizard.

This skill is powerful, but has a very small radius of effect. Possibly this can be increased with a runestone. As it is, GotD requires precise aim and timing to hit a moving target.

Synergies

• No synergies with any of the passive skills are yet known.

Development

Grasp of the Dead was first listed in the BlizzCon 2009 gameplay demo at Tier III in the Zombie Skill Tree, but it had not yet been implemented.

This skill was present on the pre-made Witch Doctor in the Blizzcon 2010 Arena as a Tier 3 skill, and was quite effective. Skill tiers were removed for the July 2011 Press Event, and Grasp of the Dead became a level 3 skill.

Media

Grasp of the Dead can be seen in action on video here:

• Gameplay: Blizzcon 2010 (in the Arena)
• Video: Blizzcon 2010 Arena
• Video: August 2011 Witch Doctor Skill Animations

You can find pictures in the Diablo III screenshot and picture gallery:

• Diablo III screenshots and pictures
• Grasp of the Dead specific gallery contents

References

• BlizzCon 2009 Full Witch Doctor Skill Trees and Stats
• BlizzCon 2010 PvP Hands-on Report
• Zediono's translation of JudgeHype's pre-beta report -- IncGamers 1st Aug 2011
• Witch Doctor Active Skills -- Diablo III 13th Sep 2011

Template:Skill navbox Necromancer primary

Template:Skill navbox Necromancer secondary

Template:Skill navbox Necromancer corpses

Template:Skill navbox Necromancer bloodandbone

Template:Skill navbox Necromancer reanimation

Template:Skill navbox Necromancer curses