Lets talk about Armour, Energy Shield, and Evasion.

Oh my god! It looks i wrote Chris instead of Erik. Sorry Erik, probably it's because it was late in the morning and we got used to Chris posting :)

When i think about it, it probably sounded like i complain to Chris about you're drawing that red line :)
Sorry again. I just commented about the current look of red line and i was writing it to you...

When PoE was just started, people ware discussing which of AR, EV, and ES is best defense.
Now, people discuss which of Life and ES is better, and no one cares about defense.

"

enoecarg wrote:

When PoE was just started, people ware discussing which of AR, EV, and ES is best defense.
Now, people discuss which of Life and ES is better, and no one cares about defense.

It was a different game back then. Slower pace and deadlier enemies. Or maybe my charachters were just weak :)

I think evasion is still quite good. It used to be very strong when you could have evasion + dodge + block at the same time. It's still pretty strong with a lightning coil or other items that have phys damage taken as elemental damage.

"

kompaniet wrote:

"

enoecarg wrote:

When PoE was just started, people ware discussing which of AR, EV, and ES is best defense.
Now, people discuss which of Life and ES is better, and no one cares about defense.

It was a different game back then. Slower pace and deadlier enemies. Or maybe my charachters were just weak :)

Were logout macros as popular back then as they are now?

I'm afraid I don't know. I never played hc or payed any attention to what was going on there.

"

Rory wrote:

the large damage spikes are infrequent, and more manageable.

I don't mean to be rude or something but it's a bit little far too late to do so.

Nerf incoming damage spikes for Evasion > whine from Armor/ES users > nerf Evasion > whine from Evasion users > nerf incoming damage spikes for Evasion .

In current game state, a person who's trying to keep his gear more or less actual without investing too much time to grind for necessary pieces,
ESPECIALLY at long strange trip from lvl1 to lvl50 during which farming for geat is more or less pointless,
can get insta-killed by nearly anything.
Simultaneous crits from a number of trash white mobs / one good crit from tough rare monster / one _simple hit_ from rare monster with especially nasty mods combination / Kitava10 at SSF with improper build - and our honest player is a goner.

Patching up damage spikes for just Evasion will just add one more player-irritating event in Path of Exile's updates story.

I just don't get two ideas.
1. How people can reach level 70 without dying at Hardcore in a reasonable time?
2. How can a game revolving around random rare instakills most of the time and almost guaranteed instakills at specific moments be enjoyable?

During 675 hours I played

I managed to reach Maps once.
Yea, I was pretty stubborn. And unfortunate.

How many time of it was enjoyable?
Around 3 hours (out of 675!) in total.
1. First hour in the game ever.
2. First attempt to kill Normal Malachai (when Cruel and Merciless Malachais existed, pre-nerf, with characters of more or less similar level with his location)
3. Cracked open my first and only Strange Barrel strongbox.

The rest is either mindless grind or frustration after yet another instakill caught from non-unique crappy monster.

'the large damage spikes' are not the problem for Evasion.
'the large damage spikes' are the problem for whole game.

You know what?
Screw flat values. And screw Health.
Change the way how defensive stats are being displayed completely + change in-game passives completely.

1. Amassing life is pointless since random instakills can happen anywhere. So let's remove life at all. Any hit is lethal unless...
2. No flat values for defensive stats anymore. Each item with such a stat provides flat +% chance to Soak(ex-ES)/Avoid(ex-Evasion)/Ignore(ex-Armor, phys only) incoming hit instead.
3. After usual Dodge check (if any), current chance to Soak/Avoid a hit is being modified by a percentage of current Resistance vs incoming damage type (except physical). Then, chance to Soak is rolled. If it fails - then, chance to Avoid is rolled. Then, if it fails and the damage is physical - chance to Ignore is rolled.

_Technically_, right now your crazy system works in exactly this manner.

Player either soaks (not Soaks) incoming damage with a help of pots (useless vs damage spikes since non-instant), life leech (useless against damage spikes as insta-leech got nerfed, at last) and defensive stats (main source of survivability) - or dies quickly (instantly in most of cases).

Health is mandatory.
Health nodes litter passives tree.
Health is still useless vs damage spikes.
Health as a core measure of survivability brings hella lot of problems related to balancing health refilling sources.

Then remove it, at last!

Only flat chances will remain and positioning will become a main source of survivability - but it also currently is!

Bosses are either HP sacks or instakill machines with AoE crap which exhausts you quickly.
Non-bosses are either swarming you to death or not posing any threat.

Let it be a real unconcealed feature then!
Stop hiding from yourselves, you're moving the game in exactly this way - so take a shortcut!

I (as ex-player already ) don't expect much result from posting my opinion here, even if taking into account that one of game devs took a peek into this topic and answered (which is rare nowadays).

Still, I hope that one way or another the game will either stop pretending to be an ARPG and will reveal its true 1HKO Challenge nature - or will return to genre's roots where logout macroses meaned nothing and even grind was enjoyable and less infuriating.

With or without involving you.
And with or without involving me. Without, preferrably, for now.

o7