The joys of playing a Meta Build, and how badly Incursion can screw you without one

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ajo wrote:

Spoiler

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sofocle10000 wrote:

And if I still have to hunt that f@#&ing Elder in the red maps a lot longer to finally complete the goddamn memory fragment quest (locked at 14/15 for a "few" attempts already), I will just stop playing entirely after leveling my main to 100 - as much as I enjoy attempting and succeeding more times than I would dream to run even "asinine" content without any fear of death, not progressing through that ultimate Zana quest will be the last drop...

Alas there might be some hope left. Things couldn't get a lot worse. Right? /s

The primary purpose for chasing Elder around is to sell map-tabs. WFTA rewarded you for hoarding maps since the spawns are random. If you already hoarded those random maps, then you wouldn't have to get them by other means. This saves you both time, currency while also provides you with a much "smoother" game-play. Basically the same concept as every other space-occupying loot-design in the game.

I may be naive but I think that there is more hope now since TencentGGG don't have to design/expect their cashcow to deliver a constant flow and can instead aim for long-term goals.

Neah, I just want the Elder orb to shape a map to 16, sure, I'll have to ask a friend to kill Shaper as I'm almost certain that my main falls just below the DPS + sustainability threshold, and my casual n00b hoarder piloting skills feel just a tad subpar at times.

I still regret my indecision when I actually had the chance to get the Elder orb and keep it into a bench (just killed Shaper before Bestiary, and it was available, but there was no sign that it will disappear as a reward)...

Regardless, I never had problems sustaining maps, and I always "farmed" a decent pool, heck, I could run even T14-16 trans + aug instead of alch & go/chisel + alch + vaal + frag + sext if the map is great, and still sustain >T12-13 maps indefinitely (fully completed Atlas bonus helps). I am just too casual regarding investments into maps, especially as I don't use any form of MF except the "ethical kill loot as I try to find enemies to vanquish"...

The schism between me simply swapping Static Strike for Ice Crash (the Multistrike change is epic BTW), or God forbid Sunder - not to even mention Blade Flurry, which I think it goes to "bonkers awe" levels even without me touching the build and simply swapping a unique claw, is simply too damn much.

My main can take a lot of punishment, heck, it even uses Punishment as a further offensive buff vs ALL the T15 content, and still I think if I combine it with the "opie-op meta flavour of the league" will impress me with all my quirky use of various skills - the current number on the skillbar is too small, especially as we can get Vaal versions of those, it needs a "little" improvement - have you ever seen a melee character using 1 main single target namelocking damage skill, 1 utility skill, 1 alternate damage skill, the new Vaal bonus skill, self casting an offensive curse, summoning a golem and always using a mobility skill? It's the most entertaining way to play REAL melee in PoE, especially if you go "ham" and cap your damage via RT to and give ALL content a chance to fight back.

It's also the only reason why I reached level 99 on my main, and maybe even 100, it's simply "fun" IMHO.

But no one should be a glutton for punishment. There is a reason why my signature will remain that accurate description of PoE. And TencentGGG should "git gud and up to snuff" and improve the experience of those n00bs that make the wrong choice that @sidtherat so clearly exemplifies.

That needs to be addressed "yesterday"...

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sidtherat wrote:

i would like one of you 'everything is ok, just git gud at building chars' people try and replicate the same with burning arrow. no twink, garbo gear, no effort, pretty much no risk

Honestly now, you probably can, I managed it around that level with flame dash and searing bond, a dash of incinerate because you can't really play that combo yet without extra totems and I'm not a total idiot. But yeah, garbo 2-3 link gear and can't really complain it was overly hard, the game just doesn't have any backbone left at that level.

Though at my current level with an extra dash totem from ascendancy and decent 4 links I pretty much ditched incinerate, it isn't needed as a crutch anymore and I'm cutting it pretty close to full clearing incursions if the layout is good. Of course, the totems often just stand around if they can't dash for whatever reason and the mana cost is about as obnoxious as orb of storms specced for dps so a relative newcomer with that idea would have probably abandoned in it utter disgust come act 2. Fortunately, they rarely have ideas of that sort as the most common advice is to just copy build X, sure, sometimes it's Mathil's and they end up crashing and burning but it usually works.

I suppose the game getting this overwhelming is a mixed blessing of sorts, newcomers have no illusions they can do anything themselves anymore.

I am playing 2 builds right now. One is a slow stunner, one is clear speed cheese.... safe to say only the clear speed meta character actually can enjoy temple runs...

It would be nice if we could choose the challenge option for the incursion to allow diversity. I would happily trade the timer for a "all monsters deal 100% more damage" challenge option for my stunner.

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raics wrote:

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joachimbond wrote:

alll these flavors...

and y'all choose to be salty.

how about playing the game for the game instead of trying to stack up against others who are using what What WHAAT??? different skills? Ever thought of playing without looking at what other people are doing? Maybe...

Might be wrong here, but the point of the thread seems to be you can't fully experience the game if you don't play what the devs want you to and instead go for your spectral throw coc essence drain assassin hybrid.

What I'm saying is that the onus is not upon GGG to make every choice the best choice for you.

I choose summoners because that's what I like. I don't blame the devs because it results in my clearspeed being slow.

I CHOOSE a slow playstyle because it has engaging mechanics and enjoyable visuals. I know summoners can go fast, don't bother arguing against that.

But just because a skill exists doesn't mean that it's going to give you an enjoyable experience. Play st/coc all you want. It'll never clear as fast as something more like cospri's shield charge. Suck it up, own your choice like an adult, and play the fucking game. I'm not saying this to you directly, just in general. I don't recall seeing you dish out salt like chartain others who whinge that they feel like they're being funnelled to certain skills.

YES. Some skills are going to clear FASTER. get over it. There are ways to make slow builds faster (stacking attack speed, melee splash, inc aoe, will make vigilant strike clear much better), but just because a top tier of speed exists doesn't mean that the devs WANT you to only play those fast skills. You're thinking like a racer if you think that. Well, guess what? not nearly everyone in this game is a racer. Not even close to a majority. even people who participate in races (like the flashback race we just had) aren't necessarily there to show off their speed. I was there to experience stacked league mechanics, and I had a ball.

If you want to be in the top tier of speed, there will always exist several skills for you to choose from. If you want to play a playstyle that engages you, using skills you find fun and exciting, do that. Don't assume that GGG owes it to the playerbase to make those things the same.

That's like the "western leftist progressives" wanting equal outcomes (equity) instead of equal opportunities (equality). That kind of thinking, when enforced or enacted, ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS ends up making things shittier for EVERYONE.

Honestly I'm more upset that GGG refuses to let weapon effects apply to shields.

Im running a necro right now... Not having too many issues with incursion's. Its more of a layout issue. Open space and I own it. Lots of doors slows the specs down.

You need to run a devoto's and mouse macro those speed jugs.

On the flip side... Some of those incursions get quite rippy and necro is still fairly tanky.

NS

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joachimbond wrote:

But just because a skill exists doesn't mean that it's going to give you an enjoyable experience.

What's the point of it then? Instead of killing monsters the drawing board goal was to suck the life out of the player by the ancient kung-fu technique of a hundred thousand mosquito bites :)

I don't mind having weak setups, especially if they're concepts that shouldn't work well or the whole thing is just poorly concocted, but sometimes perfectly legit stuff finds itself on that list or we have extremely cheap and simple setups squashing the game outright. In a game like this you'd expect that the builds that cleverly synergize all of the intricate mechanics that poe has and require a lot of time/money to set up to perform the best but that ends up being the case as often as it's not, there's just very little consistency to it.

Anyway, the point of my example wasn't that there are underpowered setups, if it was just the power level it wouldn't be a problem, but those all too often also have issues they aren't supposed to have and run into hurdles that feel almost entirely arbitrary, shackled by remnants of outdated restrictions that have zero significance in current and most of the past meta cycles. And nothing is usually done about those thousands little edge cases because it was never their time to get into the spotlight.

We can probably use fighting games to illustrate the issue the best. Powerful and fun characters are obviously popular, powerful and lame characters can also be popular because to some winning matters the most, weak characters can also be very popular if they're fun to play. You know what's the problem? The ones that are weak and lame, nobody uses those.