Supporting GGG and PoE, but not necessarily Bestiary Leaguespansion

...Pretty much says it all. I like the support packs, the mtxes are about as great as ever, and I'm compulsively collecting those to this day. Less compulsive about collecting monsters to ritually sacrifice them for power or to ever face the Uber version of a monster I've never faced in its normal mode.

Everyone and their rhoa is making a Bestiary thread so here's mine. Two of the major additions to the game I've already done: I made the first Wraeclastian zoo (at ridiculous self-expense) where no animals are ever ritually sacrificed, I'm proud to say; and I was playing a 'phantasm reaper' style a while ago by mixing Cast on Melee Kill with Cleave and Summon Spectre using The Blood Reaper. Pretty inefficient but it looked amazing with Shadow Spectres.

Ascendancy rework was inevitable and frankly overdue.

Fated Uniques are more useful for non-SSF players. For me Navali's usefulness sort of starts and ends with The Jeweller's Touch.

Finally, I think GGG are implicitly siding with the 'Standard is dead' camp -- both Abyss and this league/expansion add so much power that it seems almost pointless to stay on Standard now. At least one of my guildies finally made the move and I doubt he'll look back. This is fine and well but it seems GGG are incapable of doing anything these days without hammering another nail into the Standard coffin. A pity they already used the name 'Legacy' for a throwaway league (...what a waste) because Standard really should be called 'Legacy league' with no option to make new characters there, just play migrated ones.

Anyway, of course I bought support packs. And while I do not dictate where that money goes (nor would I want to), I want to stipulate this is because I still love PoE and GGG overall. Bestiary might surprise me, but the very base premise of it rubs me the wrong way. It's one thing to hunt monsters in the wild. It's another altogether to cage them and then slaughter them after very likely maltreating them...and to get significant rewards for slaughtering them. I'll kill all the demons and miscreants you throw at me, but murdering captive rhoas and crabs? No thanks.

It's a game.™

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raserei wrote:

It's a game.™

Yeah, it is. And I've always loved how anti-heroic and self-serving the Exile has been, even when almost accidentally saving the world. The will to power drives the Exile's every action, but in their own ways. This, however, seems to be forcing a fairly distinct character trait onto everyone. Everyone's a cultist now...

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raserei wrote:

It's a game.™

Yeah, it is. And I've always loved how anti-heroic and self-serving the Exile has been, even when almost accidentally saving the world. The will to power drives the Exile's every action, but in their own ways. This, however, seems to be forcing a fairly distinct character trait onto everyone. Everyone's a cultist now...

All of the "beasts" we sacrifice attacked us and tried to kill us. In order to survive the rigors of Wraeclast, we simply sacrifice them to aid in our survival. It's not the same as capturing a helpless animal and sacrificing. These "beasts" are trying to kill / eat us. We will be sacrificed to there hunger.

Heck yea I'll kentucky fry a rhoa for +5 dexterity! He came at me and I bro'ed it!

Additions to the game are great, league doesn't look like my thing but will try it out and maybe it will impress me who knows. It's defenitely something that they haven't done in the past. Monsters spawning from cracks on the floor isn't that original for a game like PoE, the pokemon aproach where you capture monsters is definetely something new to try out. Abyss gear was really fun and i'm glad it goes core, i just hope ascendancy nerfs are not too brutal (RIP Slayer/Inquisitor/Raider).

are you a vegan?

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raserei wrote:

It's a game.™

Yeah, it is. And I've always loved how anti-heroic and self-serving the Exile has been, even when almost accidentally saving the world. The will to power drives the Exile's every action, but in their own ways. This, however, seems to be forcing a fairly distinct character trait onto everyone. Everyone's a cultist now...

...we might also be a member of the Cult of Sin since his introduction


and I think most of the Wraeclastians are Cultists

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raserei wrote:

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raserei wrote:

It's a game.™

Yeah, it is. And I've always loved how anti-heroic and self-serving the Exile has been, even when almost accidentally saving the world. The will to power drives the Exile's every action, but in their own ways. This, however, seems to be forcing a fairly distinct character trait onto everyone. Everyone's a cultist now...

All of the "beasts" we sacrifice attacked us and tried to kill us. In order to survive the rigors of Wraeclast, we simply sacrifice them to aid in our survival. It's not the same as capturing a helpless animal and sacrificing. These "beasts" are trying to kill / eat us. We will be sacrificed to there hunger.

Heck yea I'll kentucky fry a rhoa for +5 dexterity! He came at me and I bro'ed it!

A lion tried to attack and kill a hunter because that's what lions do.

The hunter, rather than kill it in self-defence, captured it and then took it home. He put it in a cage. And when he was good and ready, he weakened it and slaughtered it to gain its power with dark rituals. That's your scenario, properly portrayed.

The lion (or the rhoa, or whatever) is not able to choose its actions. The Exile is. Except now there's significant reward to choose the cruel method, the vaguely psychopathic behaviour. Which is fine -- I've long held the Exile is a psychopath anyway. But I think GGG have been too flippant this time in their expression of it. Torturing and killing animals is early stage psychopathic behaviour; the Exile is already up to being an amoral genocide on legs.

It's all just...a bit tasteless really.

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Ocylix wrote:

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raserei wrote:

It's a game.™

Yeah, it is. And I've always loved how anti-heroic and self-serving the Exile has been, even when almost accidentally saving the world. The will to power drives the Exile's every action, but in their own ways. This, however, seems to be forcing a fairly distinct character trait onto everyone. Everyone's a cultist now...

...we might also be a member of the Cult of Sin since his introduction


and I think most of the Wraeclastians are Cultists

I don't. If anything, the Exile has until now been an aggressive iconoclast. The will to power found through killing actual gods? Hell yeah. That's worthy. Found in sacrificing animals? That's...it's beneath the Exile at this point.

Is your guild SSF orientated?

I'm considering making the switch, or at least having an SSF alt, but it literally changes prespective on the entire game.