Modifying the endurance charges - Not every melee class out there can stack these.
Changing the armor formula - As above, not every melee uses armor.
Uh, yes we do. See, to be a properly viable melee, especially if you're two handed, you will need to stack Strength for raw damage, and most gear that uses strength has Armour on it. Scale, Plate, Chain, all have Armour (Scale also has Evasion and Chain has Energy Shield, but they all have Armour listed on them.)
So Armour needs to be redesigned in compensation.
"
lyravega wrote:
Melee stance could improve defenses, and could reduce melee damage taken for example. Use your imagination for the rest.
That's what Armour should be doing. What it's doing now is, and I hate to say this but, idiotic. At higher levels and difficulties it's useless. It should never be.
YOU do, but not every melee does. For example melee shadows or witches. They need to be viable too, but getting to decent levels of armor is almost prohibitive because of their proximity to sufficient amounts of strength and / or IR.
Currently, it's even WORSE for a melee shadow than it is for a melee everything else, but it was clearly within the design to have melee based shadows. After all, the entire second node on their non-magic path is devoted entirely to melee passives, and the weapon nodes nearby are primarily claw, dagger, and bow nodes.
They need to be able to survive in melee range too, and despite armors current failings, evasion is even worse.
And to top it off, it's incredibly difficult for things like melee shadows and rangers and witches to access Endurance charges, which are currently the only sufficient way to tank.
As an aside, improving armor also to make it do "what it should be doing" is just going to make templars and marauders who do not fight in melee range even stronger, unless melee has a significant damage advantage. Which, at the moment, it does not.
Why would it make Templars and Marauders better? These guys might as well be wearing the Templar's nappy, because nothing is getting close enough to touch them. And if something does, they're dead, usually in or two hits.
Armour as it stands now, does NOT add to health. What makes Marauders and Templars so powerful is the easy access to HP nodes (and the Templar gets Catalyst within like three levels.) Armour is as useful as PAPER in Merciless. Evasion's useless? Well, duh. It's an all or nothing, binary choice. Either you get hit for full, or they miss you. It's also the first thing calculated by the game, then armour, then energy shield, then HP. But what makes Evasion so bad is the increased accuracy of the monsters.
But Melee in general is the issue here. Not just armour, not just evasion, all of it. Because no one uses it in the end game. There are no Cleave/Sweep Maraunders in the end game, no Sweep Templars, no Flicker Strike Duelists, or any other true melee builds, because you NEED a ranged attack, or you will get crushed. In one shot.
Right now, I'm on Act 3 Normal, but the moment I have any Voidbearers anywhere near me, I put down the keyboard and get a drink, because in less than a minute, I will be worn to nothing. And when you're surrounded by everything that's blue, the moment you step off the Waypoint plate, not very fun.
Modifying the endurance charges - Not every melee class out there can stack these.
Changing the armor formula - As above, not every melee uses armor.
Uh, yes we do. See, to be a properly viable melee, especially if you're two handed, you will need to stack Strength for raw damage, and most gear that uses strength has Armour on it. Scale, Plate, Chain, all have Armour (Scale also has Evasion and Chain has Energy Shield, but they all have Armour listed on them.)
So Armour needs to be redesigned in compensation.
"
lyravega wrote:
Melee stance could improve defenses, and could reduce melee damage taken for example. Use your imagination for the rest.
That's what Armour should be doing. What it's doing now is, and I hate to say this but, idiotic. At higher levels and difficulties it's useless. It should never be.
So, by your logic, marauders and templars should be fixed, but other melee builds and classes can go to hell?
No.
Not every build & character can access to endurance charge nodes, or can wear armour. Not every weapon has STR as the main stat - daggers and claws have no STR requirement on them at all. One thing that STR gives you as a bonus is, physical damage increase, and that's it.
There is nothing that says a proper melee uses 2 handed weapons. You know what's idiotic? That's right, your words are. Since you are having tunnel-vision at the moment, further communication is not possible, don't bother quoting or whatsoever.
So, by your logic, marauders and templars should be fixed, but other melee builds and classes can go to hell?
No.
Not every build & character can access to endurance charge nodes, or can wear armour. Not every weapon has STR as the main stat - daggers and claws have no STR requirement on them at all. One thing that STR gives you as a bonus is, physical damage increase, and that's it.
There is nothing that says a proper melee uses 2 handed weapons. You know what's idiotic? That's right, your words are. Since you are having tunnel-vision at the moment, further communication is not possible, don't bother quoting or whatsoever.
Im sorry this is stupid.
If you are melee, you either have access to armor,evasion,block or energy shield. Gear gives you all those stats. So if you are not getting armor, then you are getting ES. And if you are not getting CI, then you are getting evasion, and if you are not getting evasion, then you are getting block
Or any combination of the above
Almost everyone agrees that armor is a terrible stat. People also agree that evasion is pretty useless. ES in its current spot is fine, and I don't really know whether block is good or not. Believe it or not, shadow CI is viable at very high levels due to having a very high ES + mobility (you damage a bit, whirling blades out, recover shield, rinse and repeat), and since shield scales much higher than health, its very effective.
In any case, if you are doing melee shadow CI, you are going to be fragile. Shadow is fragile by nature. We are talking about the fact that pure tanks (who melee) are pointless in this game because they can't tank anything. Any buff to armor would make pure tanks more viable, and any buff to evasion would make a melee shadow/ranger more viable (as well as duelist).
tldr, you are going to have some form of defense regardless of what type of melee you are
Last edited by deteego#6606 on Feb 9, 2013, 4:27:15 AM
Well first off, ES isn't really "fine" now. It's really weak and requires way too much investment to make you able to take any hits. Combined with the fact of zero mitigation, ES melee would never, ever be viable (at any gear level) in the current state of the game.
But the other problem with just focusing on passive defenses like Armor (and even if you include evasion and ES) is that it isn't a buff to melee - it's a global buff to everyone. Casters, summoners, bow users, totem spammers. Everyone gets some form of passive 'defense', so simply buffing that defense isn't going to change the parity between ranged and melee.
If you buff armor, for example, high enough to make it so melee chars can actually tank stuff using armor (and life leech and other skills) you will end up making casters and bow users who rely on armor godlike because they will be unkillable.
That's why whatever happens has to be more than just buffing defenses or nerfing enemy damage.
The real question is this : How to make melee viable across all character types (Int, Dex, Str) without making the non-melee characters even stronger in the process?
Simply buffing armor (or armor, evasion, and ES) isn't a correct answer to that question because it makes ranged significantly more powerful as well.
Theoretically, we could say something like: Reduce enemy damage, increase enemy hps by significantly, and increase the damage on melee skills other than ground slam and lightning strike. To try and push ranged chars into taking dps passives, while melee chars can continue to dump all their points into life. This might fix the parity some, but it wouldn't be ideal because all the melee damage nodes would still go unused, and it runs the risk of switching the balance around dramatically (if melee could farm significantly faster, would people even continue to play ranged?)
So, can you answer the question? How to make melee viable across all character types (Int, Dex, Str) without making the non-melee characters even stronger in the process?
So, can you answer the question? How to make melee viable across all character types (Int, Dex, Str) without making the non-melee characters even stronger in the process?
You know what would be fun? If being in melee range of an enemy would make their spells fizzle and ranged attacks miss. I don't mind not being able to tank large melee groups with my melee ranger, but I can kite those and attack surgically. What is terribly annoying is getting a face full of fireballs from every damn caster I attack. Would also balance out arrow dodging a bit.
Make defences better at close range like point blank does to projectile attacks. If you have to sacrifice all ranged attacks for this, so be it. You're going to have to make it available for all characters though.
So, by your logic, marauders and templars should be fixed, but other melee builds and classes can go to hell?
No.
Not every build & character can access to endurance charge nodes, or can wear armour. Not every weapon has STR as the main stat - daggers and claws have no STR requirement on them at all. One thing that STR gives you as a bonus is, physical damage increase, and that's it.
There is nothing that says a proper melee uses 2 handed weapons. You know what's idiotic? That's right, your words are. Since you are having tunnel-vision at the moment, further communication is not possible, don't bother quoting or whatsoever.
Im sorry this is stupid.
If you are melee, you either have access to armor,evasion,block or energy shield. Gear gives you all those stats. So if you are not getting armor, then you are getting ES. And if you are not getting CI, then you are getting evasion, and if you are not getting evasion, then you are getting block
Or any combination of the above
Almost everyone agrees that armor is a terrible stat. People also agree that evasion is pretty useless. ES in its current spot is fine, and I don't really know whether block is good or not. Believe it or not, shadow CI is viable at very high levels due to having a very high ES + mobility (you damage a bit, whirling blades out, recover shield, rinse and repeat), and since shield scales much higher than health, its very effective.
In any case, if you are doing melee shadow CI, you are going to be fragile. Shadow is fragile by nature. We are talking about the fact that pure tanks (who melee) are pointless in this game because they can't tank anything. Any buff to armor would make pure tanks more viable, and any buff to evasion would make a melee shadow/ranger more viable (as well as duelist).
tldr, you are going to have some form of defense regardless of what type of melee you are
I am replying to him. He says that endurance charges and/or armor needs to be buffed, and in his vision, melee has to have STR as main stat, should use 2 handers, and should equip armor.
Also, please tell me which part I say melee doesn't need defense. Go ahead please do. Nowhere. And lastly, we are talking in melee in general, not just talking about marauders or templars, or how armor sucks. Melee in general.
Back to topic, remember what Diablo 3 does to make it a little bit easier for melee characters; all melee characters (well, Barbarians and Monks) have 30% damage reduction (from all sources I think, not just melee). Which is similiar to my melee stance suggestion, more or less.
Last edited by lyravega#6200 on Feb 9, 2013, 11:37:10 AM
So, by your logic, marauders and templars should be fixed, but other melee builds and classes can go to hell?
No.
Not every build & character can access to endurance charge nodes, or can wear armour. Not every weapon has STR as the main stat - daggers and claws have no STR requirement on them at all. One thing that STR gives you as a bonus is, physical damage increase, and that's it.
There is nothing that says a proper melee uses 2 handed weapons. You know what's idiotic? That's right, your words are. Since you are having tunnel-vision at the moment, further communication is not possible, don't bother quoting or whatsoever.
Im sorry this is stupid.
If you are melee, you either have access to armor,evasion,block or energy shield. Gear gives you all those stats. So if you are not getting armor, then you are getting ES. And if you are not getting CI, then you are getting evasion, and if you are not getting evasion, then you are getting block
Or any combination of the above
Almost everyone agrees that armor is a terrible stat. People also agree that evasion is pretty useless. ES in its current spot is fine, and I don't really know whether block is good or not. Believe it or not, shadow CI is viable at very high levels due to having a very high ES + mobility (you damage a bit, whirling blades out, recover shield, rinse and repeat), and since shield scales much higher than health, its very effective.
In any case, if you are doing melee shadow CI, you are going to be fragile. Shadow is fragile by nature. We are talking about the fact that pure tanks (who melee) are pointless in this game because they can't tank anything. Any buff to armor would make pure tanks more viable, and any buff to evasion would make a melee shadow/ranger more viable (as well as duelist).
tldr, you are going to have some form of defense regardless of what type of melee you are
I am replying to him. He says that endurance charges and/or armor needs to be buffed, and in his vision, melee has to have STR as main stat, should use 2 handers, and should equip armor.
Also, please tell me which part I say melee doesn't need defense. Go ahead please do. Nowhere. And lastly, we are talking in melee in general, not just talking about marauders or templars, or how armor sucks. Melee in general.
Back to topic, remember what Diablo 3 does to make it a little bit easier for melee characters; all melee characters (well, Barbarians and Monks) have 30% damage reduction (from all sources I think, not just melee). Which is similiar to my melee stance suggestion, more or less.
That isn't really going to work in PoE, because there isn't any definition of a melee class. Whether you are melee or not depends on your playstyle, and not your class. So that means, if we wan't to buff melee, we have to buff the stats that melee characters are more likely to get.
In this case, its either evasion or armor. Melee classes will always have much more of (those) stats, than other classes. If they don't, then they should, but so far from what I have seen, that is the case
having supp gems like fork, chain and lmp/gmp is the core reason ranged is so wrong AND versatile
one support gem that couold help melee would be something like....
volcanic touch support gem(yes, magmus!)
-corpse explodes when killed with linked melee skill dealing a % of its hp as AoE fire dmg around it
-would have similar functionality to power syphon where hitting a monster right before it dies would still activate it
-would obv do lower dmg then detonate dead and infernal blow (maybe 8%?)
why should the ranged character have less risk and more reward(dmg)?
ign = ultrahiangle
Last edited by ultrahiangle#4938 on Feb 9, 2013, 7:57:17 PM
