If you are not using a META build, you can't play endgame AT ALL

Build this league a BV Poison Assassin....not really meta, did all Content with Awakener 8.....wheres your argument now?

Other than the harshly limited view on which ascendancy classes can do end game, I do think there is some truth to T15/T16/End Game becoming more exclusive.

I have a Juggernaut that can do any end game boss/map. My friends have chieftains, guardians, gladiators, etc. that can do end game.

On the other extreme, I played a Berserker for a while and that was somewhat miserable. More damage, but one-shots from T16 metamorphs constantly.

On the other hand, end game was getting pretty silly easy in recent leagues with the power creep of things.

It creates quite the conundrum for GGG. Do you balance around the elite gamers who represent a small proportion of the playerbase (but also have a disproportionate influence on a larger proportion of the playerbase), or the casual gamers who want to see end game and feel like their time will ultimately lead to success. If every build was viable, then the game wouldn't be challenging enough. If the game was perfectly balanced, nothing would feel special.

How do you get around the feeling of homogenization making the game feel boring and unspecial, while also trying to make the game accessible to most builds and players?

I personally think the answer is simple: a difficulty slide bar that increases the difficulty in exchange for rewards (IIQ/IIR). Nothing should be gated behind that slide bar...just more chance to get things. At the lowest difficulty, the IIQ/IIR is 0%, or even negative IIQ/IIR.

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Baharoth15 wrote:

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SkulkLife wrote:

Yes, but I would like to create my own build.
I have totaly regreted to start league characters after a year because I don't prefer the actual meta/buffed skills. I don't want to play 500 hours every 3 months, I have life. If you start a summoner you can reach end game much faster with less effort.

The problem is the difference between skills power. Not just 10-20 percent play hours or 10-20 percent currency invested.

So lets check:

You want to play your own build
You don't want to play a lot
You want to play league
You want to beat endgame

Sorry but you can only have 3 of those at the same time, you will have to disregard one.

According to my last two sentence I would like to choose better balance instead of meta builds. Buffed skills can choose four of them (like arc, summoning, blade vortex, vortex, etc) and a lot of skill can't. For example my all time favorite skill is smite. I have to invest much more compared to a necromancer with few ex gear.

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Arrowneous wrote:

Worse then that, you can't have "You don't want to play a lot" and "You want to beat endgame" or "You want to play your own build" and "You want to beat endgame" at the same time.

That's not true from my experience. I don't play a lot due to full time job and I do play my own builds, I even do it more or less SSF as I hate trading.

And I manage the endgame just fine. But it sure took a while to get to this point, I am fairly sure I couldn't get there within one season without changing my way of playing significantly. I'd have to trade a lot more than I like to so I just stay out of leagues.

All those "you have play meta" arguments have kind of a point if you focus on leagues and efficiency, but if you just do your thing and don't give a shit how long it takes you can literally play whatever you want, it's going to work just fine.

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SkulkLife wrote:

According to my last two sentence I would like to choose better balance instead of meta builds. Buffed skills can choose four of them (like arc, summoning, blade vortex, vortex, etc) and a lot of skill can't. For example my all time favorite skill is smite. I have to invest much more compared to a necromancer with few ex gear.

This game is balanced so that a well build character, no matter what skill he is using, can do all content in the game while a badly build character will outright fail. Imo that's decent balancing right there. If you want all builds to be equally good AND equally expensive at the same time then honestly, you want the impossible. Maybe they will be able to close the gap a little if they really try but real equality can't be achieved in a game as complex as this one.

White Knights on Fire in this topic

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ryuukk33 wrote:

The worst thing is this league wants you to kill bosses, but you can't with a normal off-META build!!

GGG balence the game based on the META builds, this is why powercreep increase every league, because of their META shifts

What happens is the normal builds get nerfed league after league as a side effect

THIS SUCKS!!!!!

Totally agree and that is why the majority of the passive tree is useless and goes unused. They are screwing over their own game by designing the game around a few speed builds instead of making the game what they truly set out to do an that is allow player to build anything they want and have fun at it. The realiy is that you have to use one of the top builds to survive endgame and POE-Ninja illustrates that every league. Clearly shows how broken their game is when it comes to play the way you want and design any build. That is total BS.

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Baharoth15 wrote:

This game is balanced so that a well build character, no matter what skill he is using, can do all content in the game while a badly build character will outright fail.

That is total non-sense, because what you are saying is that unless your build is built a specific way, then it will fail because of the way they designed it. That is true and is the problem, it means that what they promote is create your own build and have fun when the reality is build a very specific way to survive endgame or fail.

This get gud mentality is a total illusion because the game only allows for so many builds to survive endgame. That is a total failure on GGGs part.

Git Gud.

I think all skills are somehow viable when you put the currency in.

In the end its all about cost vs efficiency.

By increasing the difficulty in the current league they have widen the gap btw the two metrics on a lot of skills and made current meta even more standing out.

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Raxsyn wrote:

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Baharoth15 wrote:

This game is balanced so that a well build character, no matter what skill he is using, can do all content in the game while a badly build character will outright fail.

That is total non-sense, because what you are saying is that unless your build is built a specific way, then it will fail because of the way they designed it. That is true and is the problem, it means that what they promote is create your own build and have fun when the reality is build a very specific way to survive endgame or fail.

This get gud mentality is a total illusion because the game only allows for so many builds to survive endgame. That is a total failure on GGGs part.

No, it's a failure on the player part. The game sets the rules, a good build acknowledges those rules and moves in their boundaries. A bad build doesn't. If the average trash mob does 3k damage per hit then making a 3k life character without added defenses is a fuck up on the players end. Same for having 60 ele resis when 75 are allowed or running -60 chaos resis in a game that has tons of chaos damage everywhere.

It's like you're taking a trip through australias outback in mid summer wearing a wintercoat and then blame the sun for the fact that you are sweating.

Adjust to the game and stop demanding that the game adjusts to you.