Why the "You need more health" paradigm is bad

"Why the "You need more health" paradigm is bad"

It isn't.

HP isn't about the digits itself, but that they represent. Usually, they represent 1-10 = the amount of blows from more dangerous mobs your character can take in a shitty situation.

PoE is now a game where you measure your high-level character by how many solid, dangerous blows it can tank. If your character can take two serious blows and still have time to bubbling-pot you're fine.

You need more health to survive the 1-10 hits, because the hits will present themselves.

I also tend to disagree with the thesis. Perhaps the title should be changed to:

Why the "You need more health" paradigm is bad for encouraging racing, competitions and other skill-based play in a game that is ostensibly focused on grinding for gear and levels efficiently

Then you need not post anything more, because the contradictions are right there for everyone to read and ponder ;)

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octer93 wrote:

The result is if you go full dmg and die like once every 10-15 maps you don't even make any progress when you start getting closer to lvl 100.

See, that's the thing. You are assuming that "more health = dying less often". And since dying is bad, more health would be always a good thing. That's what the great majority of this community thinks, it appears. Only, you're wrong.

The less hit you are, the less your health matter. If you never get hit, having 10.000 health or 1 health wouldn't make any difference. So the idea that more health makes you die less often isn't necessarily true - and just increasing health isn't the only, nor the best, way to die less.

I'm amazed at how people never mention it. You can overcome a challenge by grinding more and more until you can just face tank it, or you can overcome a challenge by becoming a more skilled player and playing better, so you don't need to face tank or to have more health. While the former is far easier, sure, it's amazing that people pretend the latter doesn't exist. Like this:

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Cergic wrote:

PoE is now a game where you measure your high-level character by how many solid, dangerous blows it can tank.

Not really.

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Erasculio wrote:

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octer93 wrote:

The result is if you go full dmg and die like once every 10-15 maps you don't even make any progress when you start getting closer to lvl 100.

See, that's the thing. You are assuming that "more health = dying less often". And since dying is bad, more health would be always a good thing. That's what the great majority of this community thinks, it appears. Only, you're wrong.

The less hit you are, the less your health matter. If you never get hit, having 10.000 health or 1 health wouldn't make any difference. So the idea that more health makes you die less often isn't necessarily true - and just increasing health isn't the only, nor the best, way to die less.

I'm amazed at how people never mention it. You can overcome a challenge by grinding more and more until you can just face tank it, or you can overcome a challenge by becoming a more skilled player and playing better, so you don't need to face tank or to have more health. While the former is far easier, sure, it's amazing that people pretend the latter doesn't exist. Like this:

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Cergic wrote:

PoE is now a game where you measure your high-level character by how many solid, dangerous blows it can tank.

Not really.

[Removed by Support] If you actually try to hit lvl 100 you can't stay safe without getting hit once, there is just too much rng like otherworldy creatures jumping/dashing you offscreen, for now as well desyncs. No matter how skilled you are if you have no health at all you will die sooner or later to smth unexpected and imo if you say smth else you just lack knowledge about this game.

Furthermore you're actually trying to tell me that you should be able to be low health and not die, so there would be no benefit from having more health/resistances? Never seen a game like this in my entire life and I'm playing games since I've been 4-5 years old. You always have the choice to go more life or dmg, but the thing you don't realize is that in HC and races you just can't die EVEN ONCE or it is over and that is the big difference. Most good players good level fast without almost dying, but at some point they would to some crazy rng stuff and there's nothing you can do about that to that extent no matter how good you are. If you are so fond of that idea make a HC character, make a build with literally no health, hit let's say lvl 90+ playing solo, prove it and you're the most godlike player ever. [Removed by Support]

PS. in the 1mhc a guy died who had 12k combined life+es, he probably was a bad player who relied only on being able to take a lot of dmg right? If you consider you can actually die with that amount of Life to some crazy 1shot. [Removed by Support]

Game lacks ACTUAL diverse builds currently. Its pick your LMB attack and then stack either health or shields. Hybrid builds have a tough time especially while leveling. Stacking shields also has the problem of not being able to resist stuns, freeze, etc. Making life builds far superior IMO. Also its harder to find good CI equipment as a new character so again, most players will lean towards life builds.

And I've wondered for ages why the hell Mind Over Matter is in the Duelist skill tree... Like... really? Can we please buff Energy Shield builds especially during early/mid levels? And put the MoM node in the caster area of the tree where it belongs.

Honestly, great game, bad playstyle selection.

I've been waiting ages for a high mobility dexterity dodge build but it won't happen till a) they have more active skills and b) non-life builds get buffed so that they're on par.

The game is too focused on RNG and numbers than actual player input/actions.

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nhemin wrote:

Game lacks ACTUAL diverse builds currently. Its pick your LMB attack and then stack either health or shields. Hybrid builds have a tough time especially while leveling. Stacking shields also has the problem of not being able to resist stuns, freeze, etc. Making life builds far superior IMO. Also its harder to find good CI equipment as a new character so again, most players will lean towards life builds.

And I've wondered for ages why the hell Mind Over Matter is in the Duelist skill tree... Like... really? Can we please buff Energy Shield builds especially during early/mid levels? And put the MoM node in the caster area of the tree where it belongs.

Honestly, great game, bad playstyle selection.

I've been waiting ages for a high mobility dexterity dodge build but it won't happen till a) they have more active skills and b) non-life builds get buffed so that they're on par.

The game is too focused on RNG and numbers than actual player input/actions.

Actually I think most people use the main attack on the right mouse button.

Game for sure doesn't lack actual build diversity, theres plenty of build out there that can do various things for all sorts of budgets or item, but then again the game is getting changed significantly in 2.0 so we've yet to see how much that changes things up.

Going ES build early is just asking for trouble there is a reason why people go life and that is the life rolls pick up on items much earlier ilevel then ES does, not to mention ES is typically most important on shields, chest and helms, typically in that order. Whereas with life based builds you can get life on pretty much ever slot, you get the majority of your ES on those 3 pieces and now also with the %es master crafted on rings.

MoM is in the duelist tree because its literally on the opposite side of the tree from EB, which is not only a powerful keystone but typically one that when in combination with MoM is extremely powerful, unfortunately theres also a unqiue that provides the same keystone so people tend to use that instead, but EB is being changed in beta significantly. Duelist MIGHT be able to use it with the changes they are making in his area, but he will have to invest to do so. MoM shouldnt be in the top 1/2 of the tree, like I said its extremely powerful for casters, if anything move it up inbetween duelist, ranger and just below the scion area, but that only going to save casters a few points vs its current location.

ES naturally scales better then life with ilevel, not sure how you expect GGG to buff ES when the best rolled gear only drops in higher level maps for it.

I can't really take you seriously when you said things like actual diversity and bad playstyle selection, life or beta the game is better then anything else out there in terms of these 2 points especially.

More active skills what exactly is it that you want? There is a reason why most people just use 1 attack and that is because they can scale it with 5 support gems vs a secondary attack they can only scale with 3, although people still do this and lots of the new things being added in 2.0 help the idea of using multiple attacks to get various things.

What exactly are you wanting to fix RNG, i've never had any good luck with it TBH and I still love the game. Divination cards are being added in 2.0 that allow for you to farm an area over and over again to get cards that can be turned in to get an item, these will cover plenty of items, everything from shavs, mjolner, binos, ect.

Honestly if you aren't in beta, as long as you don't care about spoilers you should be watching some of the popular poe streamers, lots of things are changing to improve PoE in 2.0 and I think you will like most of what they are doing.

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Erasculio wrote:

Now imagine a very, VERY good player. One that has amazing field awareness, that has great knowledge about every map, that can use mobility skills very well, and thus who can avoid almost all enemy attacks. That player needs very little health, because he/she can use skill to avoid taking damage in the first place.

I'm sorry but this is not true. Even if you know the map and everything mobs are random. You can't avoid getting a blue devourer pack to one-shot you coming from the ground in a +damage map. You can't avoid a random unlucky crit, you can't see that blue deadly rhoa charging at you from km away in a hasted dark map, you can't see that monster with reflect 2 screens away whose aura makes you die from the monsters on your screen, you can't avoid some attacks at all. So nope. You said it yourself: "and thus who can avoid almost all enemy attacks" it's that ALMOST what kills you.

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goetzjam wrote:

Actually I think most people use the main attack on the right mouse button.

Actually most people by end game figure out you don't need the "basic attack" button at all and can fit more skills on your skill bar by replacing it. I guess you still haven't figured that one out though.

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goetzjam wrote:

Game for sure doesn't lack actual build diversity, theres plenty of build out there that can do various things for all sorts of budgets or item, but then again the game is getting changed significantly in 2.0 so we've yet to see how much that changes things up.

All the builds except maybe for summoner and certain trap builds have you spamming 1 skill over and over and over and over again. With no need to ever cast any other skills because you're stacking 4 auras and have a 6 link to your spammy skill/spell. That's not really diversity in gameplay. It just has a different name and effect but essentially plays the same. I've been playing this game a long time as well and I'm not afraid to call it out for what it is. Don't get me wrong, I like the game but I'd like to see it ACTUALLY improve. Not just tweak numbers.

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goetzjam wrote:

Going ES build early is just asking for trouble...

And that's the point of this whole post/thread is that it SHOULDN'T be asking for trouble. Did you honestly read any of this? This is why there is a suggestion part of the forum is because people want to see this changed. We don't want to have to be pigeon holed into life builds. We want other options for leveling and gameplay.

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goetzjam wrote:

MoM is in the duelist tree because its literally on the opposite side of the tree from EB...

So what? Its used for casters and NEEDS to be near the caster or caster hybrid trees. The unique item is there so that you don't have to spend a point in the tree if you get lucky and get your hands on one. Making a specific unique a requirement for ALL energy shield build (Eldritch Battery builds) is ridiculous. Hence why we want to move away from life builds.

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goetzjam wrote:

More active skills what exactly is it that you want?

I want exactly what I said: more active skills. If that requires making 6-links obsolete, then great. Remove them so that we can have more skill selection instead of just 'roiding up 1 skill which dominates everything. Its currently more mundane than Diablo 3's gameplay.

I took a look at some of the streamers and some of the previewed skills coming out and while they are "cool", they still don't add a whole lot to the 'active' part of the gameplay. Golems needed to be added for ages but they're still pretty passive. The taunt skills look interesting for tank gameplay but I still worry that GGG will run into the same problems they have in the past. Which is crit rate/damage and 1 skill only spamming. Simply because there are so many ways to buff one particular skill and not enough way for skill gems to synergize through active buffs.

Combo skills would be great or at least things that synergized well with one another even for a solo player.

Just imagine when base life per level was half what it is now, and the smallest life nodes were 8% apiece (18% for Toughness).

Things are much, much better than they used to be.

Do people still make all health builds? In Softcore? I know I get a pretty good amount of damage. Guess I suck at paradigms.

A 100% health multiplier is pretty good, but even if they're all 5% nodes that's only 20 points out of your character. At high levels you get like 100 skill points, so that's only a small fraction of the build. Let's not make a mountain of the molehill.