The Illusion of Complexity

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Nephalim wrote:

There are a near infinite number of viable end game builds but only a handful that are end game optimal.

Unless youre going for 100 on the most OP gunboat of a build possible, i do not see the reason to complain about build , skill and item diversity.

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Xavderion wrote:

Completely disagree. Most skills/passive nodes are useful and viable if you build around them. There will always be some builds that are better than others, this is not chess after all.

Yes, you can make bad skills "viable" with epic gear. That same gear can be used to make far better builds with better skills.
Point noted, but not accepted.


I'm switching to a different league.
Not domination, nemesis, standard or hardcore.
League of Legends.
Patching right now. Time for a fun game that actually works.

Dont play ranked right now, season 4 reset happened 2 days ago.

To me, a viable build is a build where you feel powerful and entertained while playing the game and doing good in high level content.

Very few builds, that are not just slight variations of "standard" builds, will let you be powerful in endgame. Try mapping for a few days in 75+ maps, there's little variation going on in there. If there were 100s of "viable" builds there would be huge differences between high level players. There's not. There's like 5 archetypes.

I like how this got dumped in feedback.

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I like how this got dumped in feedback.

GGG is cutthroat yo! :D

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xXx_EliteHardcorePro_xXx wrote:

Dont play ranked right now, season 4 reset happened 2 days ago.

I'll be rockin' ARAM yo.

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Most people use the same select few skill gems, while the rest are the domain of newbies, until they find out that that skill they've been using is terrible when compared to the "viable" few.

That's not really true unless you have a different definition of "few". Here are some very viable and used endgame gems:

- EK
- Freezing pulse.
- Fireball
- Siphon
- Elemental hit
- Lightning strike
- Flicker
- Lightning arrow
- Split arrow
- Groundslam
- Heavystrike
- zombie,skelly,spelltotem
- Infernal blow
- Rain of arrows
- Dualstrike

.. And the list goes on.

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Expansive skill tree, yet many of the nodes are just useless, or comparitively weaker than others. Most people use the same select few passives (eg life nodes)

Life nodes are indeed often used but there is huge build diversity outside that. You're extremely vague so I'm not sure what to address here. Almost no endgame players end up with the same tree, I'll just leave it at that.

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Plenty of items/mods, yet many are just useless (eg reduced requirements) or just weaker than others. Most people look for the same set of optimal mods regardless of their "build"

That's just false. There is similiar defensive mods to max resistance and life but beyond that there is huge diversity. The amulet is the best gearslot to explain this. Some builds hugely value physical damage with lifeleech/manaleech while other builds want 50+ dex on their ammys and 60 crit multi. Other builds just want Manaregen combined with resistance(due to using too many uniques) while others focus on WED + crit chance.

There is a lot of variety you're outright ignoring.

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Uniques are mostly trash, with a handful of useful low-level/common items, and a handful of high-level/you're-never-going-to-find-it-rare-trollface.jpg items.

Well I guess I should have figured you're trolling. A "handful", really now? There is many dozen leveling uniques that are extremely useful. Check the wiki if you don't believe me, I don't believe I have to list that.

One of my characters alone uses a handful of high level uniques so again just spouting misinformation.

doublepost

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Robert_Paulson wrote:

So many skill gems, yet most are either buggy as hell (eg cyclone) or just weaker than other choices. Most people use the same select few skill gems, while the rest are the domain of newbies, until they find out that that skill they've been using is terrible when compared to the "viable" few.

Expansive skill tree, yet many of the nodes are just useless, or comparitively weaker than others. Most people use the same select few passives (eg life nodes), while the rest are the domain of newbies, until they find out that their passive tree is terrible and they need to reroll into a "viable" build.

Plenty of items/mods, yet many are just useless (eg reduced requirements) or just weaker than others. Most people look for the same set of optimal mods regardless of their "build", while the rest of them are the domain of newbies, until they learn that gear should be +life/%def/+def/res/res/res or it's vendor trash.
Uniques are mostly trash, with a handful of useful low-level/common items, and a handful of high-level/you're-never-going-to-find-it-rare-trollface.jpg items.

Once you cut the wheat from the chaff, there's not a lot of wheat left.

Discuss.

Totally agreed.

Remove choice. Just give players the best option from the start. That's the best way to design a game. Choice is just an illusion and we all know everybody just wants to be the best anyway.

I mean, occasionally someone discovers something new in PoE which shifts the fotm so that it's the best skill now-- but this is so rare and-- really, giving players no choice is so much better than false choice.

Love your refrain without catching its meanings :)