I made a pathfinder and I see why it has so much appeal but...

they were your health recovery in D2 and we just chain guzzled them, it wasn't really a good solution I vastly prefer PoE's system for flasks they are a really useful and versatile item slot that most games don't have.

The power flasks give however is too high for their uptime however, especially when they balance around them being up (as they usually are) you can get 20k armour/evade equivalent trivially from 2 flasks yet that much off the passive tree is like 20 pts worth and some deliberate gearing.

Don't even get me started on diamond flask which is good enough that it could be a T1 unique by itself even if it had zero mods, providing a massive damage boost to the games already best scaling option (crit). Where is the Resolute Technique flask that gives 100% attack speed for duration? lol

Diamond flask aside its difficult for them to nerf the defensive flasks as there is an inherent opportunity cost in running defensive flasks in the first place compared to whichever offensive flasks you have available but also the game would play completely differently without them.

I don't really have a good answer about how i'd change them, if I did it would only be part of a sweeping rebalance to the game systems with a general reduction in the top cheese methods and a buff to defenses in general so the flasks could be reduced.

It's not really the flasks I think are in need of change so much as a mitigation rework.

So far I've had the best results running over 50/50 attack/spell dodge, but armor and evasion aren't particularly effective to protect the health pool without outside assistance, typically provided by said flasks.

armour and evasion are underrated, but the issue becomes that they make you very good at mapping and don't do a great deal for bosses, we don't need help mapping because even the shittest build explodes everything on screen in one tap.

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Draegnarrr wrote:

armour and evasion are underrated, but the issue becomes that they make you very good at mapping and don't do a great deal for bosses, we don't need help mapping because even the shittest build explodes everything on screen in one tap.

I'd say that's an exaggeration but a reasonable summary.

Waves can be dangerous when augmented by particular mods.

But as far as general difficulty goes, it's basically reflect and high damage that dictates danger in this game, nothing particularly mechanical.

When I first started PoE, I found myself enjoying the boss fights in the acts as they seemed well-tuned to create difficulty for players sub-optimally geared. There were actual mechanics beyond tank and spank.

Now that I have more experience, the fights I really enjoy are cost prohibitive where failure not only costs xp (Softcore) but a massive loss for the resources needed to open said portals.

It's not like the rewards are guaranteed profit even with success.

It's not just PF , most builds these days utilize flasks heavily and that's not a bad thing. If you want want power from potions then you need to be willing to learn poe piano keys.

I am going to have to roll a PF one of these days.

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GunFinX wrote:

but...

Pathfinder eventually kills your fingers from the constant 12345.

Hence the whole 12345 meme of flask macro. After playing PF enough I Can understand why people would want to use a macro for it(obviously it's considered automation and against TOS which is the only reason i don't).

That is also another reason I brought it up - flasks aren't a situational thing but a constant thing and pf or not, additional repetitiveness in an already repetitive game is not a good thing.