When will the new meta-game arrive?

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Boem wrote:

Because going crit for over a year is starting to get bothersome and i don't think i am alone.

Since GGG is manually forcing the meta-shifts, when can we expect a new one to arrive?

I love this game and what it offers, however from a min-max point of view every one of my builds in the last year have been "how do i get all of these crit nodes and push in a workable hp pool and defense".

This happened on 80% of my builds in the past year. The rare 20%, i just know pre-construction that they are fail-builds, but i run them anyway cause why not, it's fun and backed up with the trading game, i can make them function at a relative efficiency. I say relative, because if we compare them with my crit designs the currency vs efficiency ratio shifts dramatically in favor of crit.(pick up ambusher in 77 map, craft celebration on it + master craft crit, hardly a harsh investment?)

My issue is not so much with crit vs non-crit, it's more about how obvious it is a crit build will out-shine a non-crit. I would love to theory-craft a non-crit and still have a shadow of a doubt that it might function at a similar efficiency of a crit build.

So i am wondering, when will some stuff change around to bring some doubt into my mind, when could i honestly say "hmm i don't know if a crit version of this build would be better?"

I did RF casters with a lot of investment "non-crit" style. = crit won easily, free ailments, more freedom in defense and better offense to boot.

Did the same on melee variations, roughly 3x exalt investment in non-crit version. Crit still beat it easily.

Bow chars, didn't even make a non-crit char since it's so blatantly obvious how strong the bow crit nodes are. I could probably have 30 free points on a non-crit version and still come short.

Personally i would welcome a lowering of all damage so crit is nothing more then a free ailment buff and flask charges. The game could be about strategy and preparations again, but i guess that would infuriate a lot of players who enjoy rofl-stomping all existing content.

However i am left wondering, when will the meta change if ever come and how do they expect to do this?

Crit reminds me of the legacy debate "we're stuck with it since players invested in it, emotionally and in pixels" and i fear just like in that scenario, it will just remain in the same state it currently is thumbing down the game for all and making what would be a myriad of choices into a black/white choice game.

Feel free to contribute, just felt like stating this since i play this game a lot, hate it or love it i can't be arsed about that. My love is for GGG and what they accomplished and my hate is for the fear they have of implementing stuff that would allow balance and obfuscate player-build choices increasing build diversity.

As it stands, build diversity has boiled down to binary option. Go crit or non-crit and at the end of all the theory-crafting and min-maxing, crit always comes out on top and not just by a slight margin.

Peace,

-Boem-

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Vincendra wrote:

While I agree with the general sentiment, I have build a RT Melee build in the SC temp league which feels as strong as a Crit build and has Uber atziri nearly down (had her in split phase 3 with 2 portals left, then got obliterated by 2 unlucky storm calls ;_;).

Anyways, only for mapping up to 78, most of the noncrit builds perform as well as critbuilds can.

On the other hand, Crit Dagger is still as rediculous as before, even if it needs more investment now. I feel especially the safe Permafreeze from Hatred helps out crit builds so much more then noncrit, even if they go for the 10% status ailment templar nodes.

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Shagsbeard wrote:

When I think of "crit build" I think of the old monk stereotype. The guy could kill you just by touching you in the right way. He had to sacrifice pretty much everything to get there.

Other archetypes would crit from time to time, but not as their basic attack. Crit should be capped at about 10% UNLESS something significant is sacrificed to get it higher.

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gilrad wrote:

I think PART of the solution has been in development since 1.2 hit, all the additional ways to proc elemental status ailments outside crit. Doesn't make up for the huge damage disparity, but it does help that players that want to consistently freeze, ignite, or shock enemies can do so without going crit. Some skills are actually better at procing status ailments using "chance to XX" than crit, mostly because "chance to XX" rolls on each hit while crit rolls on each use.

At this point I think the simplest solution would be to simply reduce the base crit multiplier to something like 1.1 or 1.2. If you want the damage you're going to have to invest in crit multi as well as crit chance.