Diamond Skin

Diamond Skin is a Utility Wizard skill unlocked at Level 9, protecting the caster from incoming damage.

Background

Diamond Skin in the Arena.

Calling upon Arcane forces, the Wizard can make her skin hard as diamond for short period of time.

Skill Effects

The following is a very quick list. See the Diamond Skin 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.

Skill		Effect
Diamond Skin (Level 9)		Transform your skin to diamond for 5 seconds absorbing up to 2661 damage from incoming attacks. Cooldown: 25 seconds
	Mirror Skin	Reflects 160% of damage absorbed back at the attacker.
	Enduring Skin	Increase duration to 21 seconds.
	Crystal Shell	Increase the maximum absorption amount to 6919 damage.
	Prism	Reduce Arcane Power cost of all spells by 14 while Diamond Skin is active.
	Diamond Shards	When Diamond Skin wears off, diamond shards will explode in all directions dealing 18 - 36 physical damage to enemies nearby.

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

Skill Design

Diamond skin absorbs all types incoming damage. The skill expires after the duration runs out, or it absorbs the maximum possible damage. There is a substantial cool down before it can be recast, and the short duration makes it wise to cast just before damage is to be taken.

Synergies

Diamond Skin benefits from the following passive skills:

Evocation is a Wizard passive skill unlocked at Level 13, which reduces all cooldowns.

Description

Name	Level	Description

<skill class="Wizard">Evocation</skill>

Synergies

No synergies with any active skills or other Wizard passives are known.

Development

Passive skills have had a long and storied history. When Diablo III debuted at the WWI 2008, skill trees included passive skills, much like in Diablo II. In 2010, it was announced that passive skills had been renamed traits and separated out from active skills. At the July 2011 Press Event, Blizzard announced that passive skills were once again in the game, replacing the traits system.

Beta

Evocation was not seen until it showed up in the Diablo III beta as a level 26 passive. In Beta Patch 13, Evocation was moved to level 28. When passives were reorganized for Beta Patch 14, it was dropped to level 13.

References

• HardRock's Wizard Passive Skills — IncGamers 6th Sep 2011
• Wizard Passive Skills — Blizzard's Official Diablo III Site

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Development

Diamond Skin was first shown at BlizzCon 2008 when the Wizard debuted. It was originally named Stone Skin and was at Tier II on the Conjuring Skill Tree. It absorbed 30 damage at rank 1, and appeared as a rough textured sort of graininess.

For BlizzCon 2009, Stone Skin was at Tier III and sported much improved damage reduction, as well as improved visuals. Flux discussed the new look:[1]

[Stone Skin] didn’t show up well on the slender Wizard. The new version is quite different and impossible to miss. The wizard is now sheathed in glowing blue crystals, almost like some superhero made from sapphires. In fact, the skill is so different in look that the team is probably going to rename it, though they’ve not settled on a change from Stone Skin, yet.

Soon afterwords, the development team did indeed change the name to Diamond Skin to better fit the new visuals.

Diamond Skin was one of the Wizard's skills in the BlizzCon 2010 PvP demo, where it was occasionally a life saver, but only if used properly, as Flux explained:[2]

At level 5 with a rune it absorbed 150 damage of any type, but the duration was quite short, so you had to cast it just before you needed it. Also, 150 sounded like a lot, but a Meteor or grinding Barb could do double that in a second, and Wizards with Diamond Skin on tended to feel invulnerable, and stuck around in dangerous, melee situations longer than they should have.

Skill tiers were removed for the July 2011 Press Event, and Diamond Skin became a level 9 skill.

Previous Versions

See the Wizard skill archive for more details on previous versions of Diamond Skin (or Stone Skin) and other Wizard skills.
Or see Stone Skin for the original version of this skill.

Media

Diamond Skin can be seen in action on video here:

• Gameplay: Blizzcon 2008 (original Stone Skin appearance)
• Gameplay: Blizzcon 2010 (in the Arena)

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

• Diablo III screenshots and pictures
• Diamond Skin specific gallery contents

• 

  Diamond skin in use in the Battle Arena.

• 

  Diamond Skin casted, and then later "breaking".

References

• BlizzCon 2008 Wizard Gameplay Report
• BlizzCon 2009 Character Panel, Skill Improvements
• BlizzCon 2009 Full Wizard Skill Trees
• BlizzCon 2010 PvP Hands-on Report
• Zediono's translation of JudgeHype's pre-beta report -- IncGamers 1st Aug 2011

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Template:Skill navbox Necromancer bloodandbone

Template:Skill navbox Necromancer reanimation

Template:Skill navbox Necromancer curses