Counter-attack Gems vs Evasion

I love the idea of the new counter-attack gems, Vengeance, Reckoning, and Riposte. I'm not convinced about their balance, but hey, that's not my concern. But in trying to build for them, I've noticed something.

Having high Evasion and/or Dodge makes counter-attacks suck.

With a (very standard) 50% evasion, Vengeance has a 15% chance to proc. Both Reckoning and Riposte will have a chance to proc equal to half your sheet block chance. With the lower numbers on block chance, and especially with Acrobatics affecting block chance, that's unlikely to be better than 25%.

Meanwhile, every character with ES, armour, Lightning Coil or MoM can benefit from a 30% Vengeance, or equip a shield for anywhere between 25 and 75% chance for Reckoning. I'd assume counter-attacks don't stack, but if they do you could actually run all three of them with no extra value spent (aside gem slots, I guess.)


Now, I totally get that that's partly the point. These gems are designed to make block a more offensively attractive stat. But Vengeance feels to me like allowing the 2handed players to join the fun, while on the other side of the tree, Evasion-based characters just aren't allowed to. They get significantly less benefit from the gems just for their choice of defense. They already nerfed the evasion+block synergy through Acrobatics, but now they even discourage it by making those gems not worth the investment.


I'm not asking for that to change somehow. What I'm asking for is pretty simple. All I'd like is a counter-attack gem that triggers on either Dodge or Evade. I don't care if they're weaker versions to account for the ease of getting dodge chance or for how high evasion is possible to stack (50% may be baseline, 75% isn't all that difficult). I just want to share in the fun. Is that too much to ask?

Thing is, this gems are a buff for those who receive the damage...

They aren't supposed to be good for evasion. The interaction between evasion, dodge, spell dodge, block, spell block, blind and decoy totem sprinkled on top is already too strong so why would they care to buff it? They just nerfed block and acrobatics synergy.

The counterattack gems are there to make armored melee more attractive.

@Charan: Yeah, I forgot that the game actually counts evasion/dodge as never sending any information to the server at all. That kind of puts a hamper in an On Dodge counterattack. It's be possible, but it's require a complete change of how the system works, which is probably too much to ask.

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Kahirn wrote:

They aren't supposed to be good for evasion. The interaction between evasion, dodge, spell dodge, block, spell block, blind and decoy totem sprinkled on top is already too strong so why would they care to buff it? They just nerfed block and acrobatics synergy.

The counterattack gems are there to make armored melee more attractive.

Why armored melee? Evasion melee shouldn't be viable? RIP evasion melee, as it stays in the same state it was already in pre-1.3, aka RIP status.

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Legatus1982 wrote:

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Kahirn wrote:

They aren't supposed to be good for evasion. The interaction between evasion, dodge, spell dodge, block, spell block, blind and decoy totem sprinkled on top is already too strong so why would they care to buff it? They just nerfed block and acrobatics synergy.

The counterattack gems are there to make armored melee more attractive.

Why armored melee? Evasion melee shouldn't be viable? RIP evasion melee, as it stays in the same state it was already in pre-1.3, aka RIP status.

Evasion melee has been much better than armored melee for a very long time now. Its a problem when pretty much everyone that can is going evasion/acro/block. GGG pretty much destroyed armor mechanics with the introduction of lightning coil and near permanent physical invulnerability immortal call. Its the reason why pretty much every challenging boss does high elemental damage. They've made armor mechanics worthless. You can't tune physical damage from bosses anymore. Armored melee needs alot of help. Counterattack gems are a start.

Its insane that they nerfed granite flasks / iron reflexs because of the effect they had on armor mechanics yet added things much worse than it into the game.

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Kahirn wrote:

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Legatus1982 wrote:

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Kahirn wrote:

They aren't supposed to be good for evasion. The interaction between evasion, dodge, spell dodge, block, spell block, blind and decoy totem sprinkled on top is already too strong so why would they care to buff it? They just nerfed block and acrobatics synergy.

The counterattack gems are there to make armored melee more attractive.

Why armored melee? Evasion melee shouldn't be viable? RIP evasion melee, as it stays in the same state it was already in pre-1.3, aka RIP status.

Evasion melee has been much better than armored melee for a very long time now. Its a problem when pretty much everyone that can is going evasion/acro/block. GGG pretty much destroyed armor mechanics with the introduction of lightning coil and near permanent physical invulnerability immortal call. Its the reason why pretty much every challenging boss does high elemental damage. They've made armor mechanics worthless. You can't tune physical damage from bosses anymore. Armored melee needs alot of help. Counterattack gems are a start.

Its insane that they nerfed granite flasks / iron reflexs because of the effect they had on armor mechanics yet added things much worse than it into the game.

Evasion Melee was in a really bad spot once they nerfed the life nodes. It took alot to pick up 160-170%+ HP along with Evasion/Acro/High Block and still manage good damage within a 105 points or so (you were really stretching it). The more recent nerfs just made it useless.


I'm not really understanding this whole idea that melee shouldn't be able to tank mobs; it seems almost ludicrous to me.

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CharanJaydemyr wrote:

Also, acrobatics has always been weirdly placed. It's right at the Shadow's pinnacle, and yet it neuters what is expressed as half his native defence, being Energy Shield.

Now that Acrobatics has lost block, it's implicitly for pure evasion users...thus it really should be closer to the Ranger. Or...is EV/ES truly a lost cause? If so, nullification and void barrier need serious work.

I'm glad you noticed this lack of common sense for the dex/int gear.

In my entire life I have literally never heard of anyone even considering the possibility of going hybrid EV/ES on an HC character. Literally, never seen it happen, not on a stream, not on a build in the shadow forums, not in general discussion or in feedback forums, NEVER ONCE seen anyone even attempt to hybrid those defensive options.

And it makes sense not to. How would you possibly survive? Your pitifully low ES would be easily bypassed by chaos mobs and kill you, because there's no chance you could go CI with such a low ES value (not fully ES). And the evasion, while helpful, from hybrid gear will have you evading about 1 in 4 hits.

When is the last time you saw someone pick up a carnal armor/sadist garb and be like "oh man, just the base I was looking for to craft my ultimate armor piece"?

Then there's this awesomely thought out item:


Which has an implicit THORNS mod. When is the last time you saw someone try to build around thorns? When is the last time thorns became useful on a character based on avoidance rather than mitigation? You know, because the shield has EVASION on it.

I shake my head in disgust every time I look at hybrid EV/ES gear. I was only ever able to pull off a character mapping with hybrid gear by using EB with MoM and AA, but I really feel like that isn't how the class should work. EV/ES gear literally fills me with rage every time I see it.

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CharanJaydemyr wrote:

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Kahirn wrote:

They aren't supposed to be good for evasion. The interaction between evasion, dodge, spell dodge, block, spell block, blind and decoy totem sprinkled on top is already too strong so why would they care to buff it? They just nerfed block and acrobatics synergy.

The counterattack gems are there to make armored melee more attractive.

And yet it takes a lot of agility and evasive skill to pull off a riposte in real life.

I think the on damage taken damage return gem is fine for armour users, but if GGG are going to divorce blocking from Evasion, then I think an evasion based counter is only fair.

Also, acrobatics has always been weirdly placed. It's right at the Shadow's pinnacle, and yet it neuters what is expressed as half his native defence, being Energy Shield.

Now that Acrobatics has lost block, it's implicitly for pure evasion users...thus it really should be closer to the Ranger. Or...is EV/ES truly a lost cause? If so, nullification and void barrier need serious work.

Aaaanyway, the whole thing is fine until you start digging. Like a lot of PoE.

I completely agree