Act 4: evasion sucks

While we're at it, throw in Restless Ward as another useless EV chest.

Chest with useless stats and level 71 requirement trading for 1 fuse.

That's right, level SEVENTY ONE requirement.

For 1 fuse.

Like some kind of joke. I honestly don't know whether to laugh or to cry.

Evasion is absurdly strong in a mitigation/avoidance hybrid, it has a multiplying effect on survivability if you have any mitigation to speak of to begin with. Sure, relying completely on evasion is suicidal, but mitigation with no avoidance is also kind of sketchy anyway.

Also, you can evade a lot of Malachai's stuff, including the mortars, which are the scariest thing he does.

"

Ymirok wrote:

"

Charanjaydemyr wrote:

"

Ymirok wrote:

I agree that evasion is extremely bad. It cannot help you at all against physical area damage. There is simply no way to alleviate this issue. Granite flasks can help but that armor will fall off later on.

I honestly think they should just reduce all physical damage of mobs in act 4. Torchoak Grove (and its saplings) is the most annoying boss in the game, in my opinion.

I agree with your points but TG is a fire threat, right? or is it a combination? That would explain a lot.

The saplings are the real problem.

I've a feeling they might deal physical damage aswell, like Kaom. I'm probably wrong though. Either way, I'm a bit salty cuz I got killed offscreen coupled with some inopportune lag. Sorry.

It's a combination of TG and its minions that seem to be the problem. When I went through Cruel on my totem marauder I had to manage flasks and run around a lot just to not die. Then I come up to Kaom, drop totems, refresh charges with EC, and yawn because the combination of armor, AA, fire res, and life regen made it a cakewalk. I had the same buffs up for both, but something about all of TG's minions and their attacks made it more of a problem than Kaom.


Regarding the evasion discussion:

To use stuff from another game, it's been well documented in WoW that burst damage is what kills tanks. To that end, basically all skilled tanks are gearing and using abilities such that they're focusing on mitigation instead of avoidance mechanics like dodge and parry.

The mathematics and simulations have universally shown that relying on avoidance mechanics will result in more burst damage and thus lead to more deaths than if the character invested more in steady mitigation.

Of course, PoE and WoW as games aren't very comparable, but the math on certain interactions still holds true. Relying on something that has a chance to work means there will be times where it doesn't, and you'd best have other defenses in place when that happens. It's not an if; it's a when.


Hm, this is making me curious about the math regarding the diminishing returns and such.


One resource to maybe look at: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1kCeAy43G3LiL0NMFVEgrLy0Uf1DXMjuyx_-7hRq47y4/edit?pli=1#gid=17

Velkor put together that table years ago at https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/58406.

Regarding Blind: Since the effect always halves the chance for the opponent to hit, the relative effect is the same at all evasion levels, which is being hit by half as many attacks as before. It's the relative difference that will get noticed more than the absolute.

In response to the EV/ES stacking, it's a combination of node and itemization problems. Zodiac Leather has a base of 609 evasion, Vaal Regalia has 175 ES, and Sadist Garb has 305 EV and 95 ES. The defenses on the hybrid item are halved, yet the combined effects of them when nodes are factored in will result in less than half of both. Supposedly the hybrid nature means it's more flexible which bridges the gap, but that doesn't seem to be how it's shaping up.

ES/EV Hybrid does not work because it is very resource hungry.

1) You NEED to be CI. It is already bad spliting passives between EV and ES, let alone ES,EV and HP. Even as a pure CI build you need to take shitloads of ES passives. Not to mention that other mitigation or survivability options, like Endurance charges, life leech and life regen are on the other side of the tree, so a big ES pool is nescesery.

2) EV builds are meant to take Acrobatics/PA passive. After all with 5 passives you avoid 1/3 of all incoming hits. But Acro halves your ES.

3) Auras. EV needs grace and ES DESPERATELY needs discipline. So not only there is no room for DPS auras, but even to run these 2 auras you will need to invest in mana or aura passives to sustain your skills, especially since blood magic is not an option. So passives splitting even more. Not even discussing the option of investing so heavily in auras, in order to be able to run a DPS aura.

4) You are still vulnareble to status effects, the old weakness of CI, so you will either risk further or sacrifise gear slots for specific unique items, that are not particularly helpfull.

5) What about DPS? I guess the only viable playstyle will be a caster, since the passives are near there. Crit melee needs a shit tone of passives that you won't be able to afford, and resolute tecnique is pretty much on the oher side of the tree. Not to mention that melee skills need strength, that this side of the tree lacks.

I think the least they can do is for Acro to not halve ES, or at least to only half ES provided by pure ES items, and not hybrid ones. Squizing some mana/es passives would also help(or EV/mana for that matter). Most of these points apply to armour/ES hybrid as well. HP/armour or pure ES will still ne superior. However EV/ES is definetely worse.

"

Poutsos wrote:

ES/EV Hybrid does not work because it is very resource hungry.

1) You NEED to be CI. It is already bad spliting passives between EV and ES, let alone ES,EV and HP. Even as a pure CI build you need to take shitloads of ES passives. Not to mention that other mitigation or survivability options, like Endurance charges, life leech and life regen are on the other side of the tree, so a big ES pool is nescesery.

2) EV builds are meant to take Acrobatics/PA passive. After all with 5 passives you avoid 1/3 of all incoming hits. But Acro halves your ES.

3) Auras. EV needs grace and ES DESPERATELY needs discipline. So not only there is no room for DPS auras, but even to run these 2 auras you will need to invest in mana or aura passives to sustain your skills, especially since blood magic is not an option. So passives splitting even more. Not even discussing the option of investing so heavily in auras, in order to be able to run a DPS aura.

4) You are still vulnareble to status effects, the old weakness of CI, so you will either risk further or sacrifise gear slots for specific unique items, that are not particularly helpfull.

5) What about DPS? I guess the only viable playstyle will be a caster, since the passives are near there. Crit melee needs a shit tone of passives that you won't be able to afford, and resolute tecnique is pretty much on the oher side of the tree. Not to mention that melee skills need strength, that this side of the tree lacks.

I think the least they can do is for Acro to not halve ES, or at least to only half ES provided by pure ES items, and not hybrid ones. Squizing some mana/es passives would also help(or EV/mana for that matter). Most of these points apply to armour/ES hybrid as well. HP/armour or pure ES will still ne superior. However EV/ES is definetely worse.

I dont agree with any of that

"

Charanjaydemyr wrote:

These are all true *as the game stands*.

I try to think more about what can be different in future iterations rather than what needs to be fixed within the current one. It's a fairly subtle distinction, but it's the difference between being limited by existing constraints and seeing what could be with more far-reaching alterations.

The fact that EV/ES needs CI, for example, should not be addressed beyond 'how about...no?'

Then again, I learned long ago not to make specific suggestions regarding the game's balance. It should be enough to point out that EV/ES is completely unviable and yet has been pushed by not one cluster but two as the primary combination of defence/structure for one of the six main classes.

Fairly sure EV/ES is firmly in GGG's too-hard-basket, although calling it a 'basket' is like calling the Dead Sea a puddle of salty tears.

or that

"

Charanjaydemyr wrote:

These are all true *as the game stands*.

I try to think more about what can be different in future iterations rather than what needs to be fixed within the current one. It's a fairly subtle distinction, but it's the difference between being limited by existing constraints and seeing what could be with more far-reaching alterations.

The fact that EV/ES needs CI, for example, should not be addressed beyond 'how about...no?'

Then again, I learned long ago not to make specific suggestions regarding the game's balance. It should be enough to point out that EV/ES is completely unviable and yet has been pushed by not one cluster but two as the primary combination of defence/structure for one of the six main classes.

Fairly sure EV/ES is firmly in GGG's too-hard-basket, although calling it a 'basket' is like calling the Dead Sea a puddle of salty tears.

To be fair, lockstep mode has helped immensely in this area. One of my main EV/ES toons has suddenly become semi viable, just due to WB working without desyncing the game

The whole WB -> Attack -> retreat -> Regen ES (rinse and repeat) playstyle is now possible without having to headbang your screen. Just make sure you get your ES recovery/ES recharge time down to as low as possible (and don't go acrobatics).

Even with just a 5-6k ES pool, you can achieve a lot, WB with faster attacks can dodge a huge ton of stuff that 90% of other builds would be forced to tank

"

Charanjaydemyr wrote:

Does that mean you feel EV/ES can work? Would love to see your working, young man.

of course it can work, why wouldnt it be able to work? Zeno had a ci evasion build last league, it was fine.

I had an iron reflex es/life hybrid shadow, cast on crit wand barrage. It had 5k life, 4k es, 10k armour with an aegis shield, iron reflexes and ghost reaver. I was scaling evasion, using grace, a lot of ev gear, if I dropped IR I had 10k evasion, 5k life, 4k es, if I swapped my aegis shield for a life, es, ev hybrid shield I could have had over 5k life, 5k+ es with over 10k evasion, while still being a very effective offensive build that could just roll through packs of mobs like a tidal wave of instant obliteration.

I have a ci armour/es hybrid character, using an aegis again. Aegis being a 117 es shield, I have 10,500 es and Im a full crit dagger melee damage dealer. I could swap to a 420 es shield, drop the 303 es from discipline, run grace instead, still have 10,500 es and have 10,000 evasion with it, still have the same horrific damage levels, why wouldnt that work? It would be stronger than having 10k evasion and 5k life, a lot stronger as ur not going to get 1 shot with over 10k energy shield.

I see a lot of people saying es/armour or es/evasion hybrids dont work cause of investment. Been running ci hybrid like that for over 2 years and its always worked, not just worked but been absolutely ridiculous power wise. People say u cant do hybrid life + es + (ev or ar), again, Ive played those characters and they work just fine. Ci and hybrid are expensive builds, not saying its going to work on a shoe string but it does work if u have the right items.

"

Charanjaydemyr wrote:

Oh, Zeno. So gear dependent there. Right.

since when is zenocide some kind of highball billionaire player? Hes decent at the game yes, he knows how to make a build and knows how to gear it, hes not AXN or Skyforth.

"

Charanjaydemyr wrote:

Well, yeah. That's the fun thing with PoE. With the right items, you can make just about anything work. I'm talking about a defence/structure combination that is, by all appearances, the 'specialty' of the Shadow. That shouldn't come down to 'the right items'.

everything comes down to the right items.

'could have had' is not speculation, it is a fact, I know its a fact.

daggers take a good dagger to work, are you going to make a case that daggers dont 'work' because you need a good dagger for them to work and a good dagger is both rare and expensive? If you pick an expensive build then youll find it to be expensive. Ci is expensive, Ci + ev/ar is even more expensive, life + es + ev/ar is expensive, crit is expensive... shadow area is expensive, basically. Very expensive, very powerful when invested in.