For me, Archmage kills caster- and Warcries kill melee-diversity.

"

jsuslak313 wrote:

@raics: This is where I fundamentally disagree. I DON'T think there is a huge gap between many of the skills. I think its primarily the PLAYER that thinks there is a huge gap because they fall into patterns that they personally enjoy. That's not to say that there can be a huge difference in terms of currency or gear investment but that's a whole extra side of PoE that people LOVE. Some people play solely to craft better and better items. Not every build has to be a league-starter.

It doesn't even have to be huge, it just has to be large enough to make you say 'why do I even bother' and that's it, mission complete, because while not everyone is a meta jockey, not everyone is stubborn enough to bother with something so obviously subpar either.

So, just an example, played bone nova bleed cleave some time ago. Ok, that makes sense on paper, bone nova is crap but let's have it just for flavor, we have a slow weapon that hits hard - you get good bleed, worms happy, right? Well no, initially it works but once you hit high level content it simply becomes too slow to play, and kinda turns into a chicken game. The threshold jewel gives you good coverage but if you wait just half a second more than you should before you start swinging it's a coin toss if you die or not. Exhilarating, maybe, but it gets old really fast, so at some point I said fuck this, switched to cyclone and the character improved tenfold just by doing that single thing.

Not to mention that bone nova, amazingly enough, doesn't even work with uul and skills like cleave, you need a followup hit to get it and the point is to hit everything once and watch it die. Assuming you're even able to get a followup, it's so slow you hit once and have to bail right away. So yeah, to sum it up, and forgive me for underlining this, you have a weapon whose main draw is to give you as powerful of a bleed as possible, but playing with slow skills that hit hard is too risky, and it has a special ability triggered by bleed that doesn't even work on a setup like that.

And most of those problems would be fixed with two numbers - give cleave a less crappy speed multiplier, and give it the coverage it has with threshold jewel by default.

yeah, Pestilent - it works without but is AMAZING with. it is something about that extra area melee splash gives so the natural 'explosion' becomes 'chainable'

ive played Pathfinder and non-pathfinder, splash, no splash - for me splash is mandatory to REALLY give this skill justice

and you can do it, the damage numbers are so high

"

sidtherat wrote:

yeah, Pestilent - it works without but is AMAZING with. it is something about that extra area melee splash gives so the natural 'explosion' becomes 'chainable'

ive played Pathfinder and non-pathfinder, splash, no splash - for me splash is mandatory to REALLY give this skill justice

and you can do it, the damage numbers are so high

Hm, makes sense about chaining explosions. Instead exploding 2-3 enemies + prolif you can explode whole pack and then proliferate further which could clear whole screen in some situations.

Haven't tried it before because i was satisfied the way it is without it, but this sound right. Ill try it tonight. Tnx for the advice.

edit:

I tried it and honestly i see no benefit for Pestilent Strike. I still pretty much explode 2-3 enemies at the time but also gimping myself for damage.
I was doing t19 100% deli fine without it. Even extreme numbers on top of me were not an issue as long I could start the chain by killing one of them.

For Viper Strike its another story...

"

sidtherat wrote:

"

jsuslak313 wrote:

I do agree with Baharoth, the primary reason for a "bad" skill that should be trashed is due to play mechanics and NOT numbers.

let us try the 'numbers way' first, ok?

because it IS about the numbers.
...

Yes, this. Both GGG and a sizeable portion of the playerbase seem oddly unaware of how huge a difference stats like base speed, strike range, radius, number of projectiles, etc. can make to a how a skill feels, without even going into damage effectiveness or added base damage.

And when we talk about mechanical changes, not all of them require inventing the wheel: inherent fortify, melee splash, ancestral call, or even projectile chain - or multipliers like more damage against enemies under x debuff - are examples of existing mechanics that can be tacked onto an otherwise lackluster skill.

Instead, we need to wait and wait for a huge amount of dev resources to go into a rework with entirely new graphics and mtx. This has been a problem since I started playing in 2014: small, resource-light numerical balance changes were always an option to try to keep some skills from becoming basically unplayable, but GGG never bothered.

I think the game has always been more constrained and less fun as a result.

Well, someone once told me that Heavy Strike is super viable if you use Ancestral Call and an explody chest, so whatever.

@demon: but everything you described is exactly imo what I was saying...mechanical changes and NOT numbers. Adding fortify, built in ancestral call or splash, or other changing effects is changing the MECHANICS of a skill. Changing the NUMBERS would be to change nothing about the skill except the base damage or base numbers associated with the skill. For example, adjusting the cooldown if the skill already has a cooldown. Adjusting the base damage or added damage if the skill already has base damage mod or added damage...changing the way a skill fundamentally works by adding other effects to it is exactly what certain skills need but this is a mechanical change that completely reworks the skill, nothing to do with numbers. Eventually it WILL have to then adjust the numbers again. @sidtherat's example about ground slam is a MECHANICAL change with the new addition of call of steel completely changing how the skill is being used. It's not just a blanket twink of the existing skill.

Yes new mechanics will AFFECT the numbers but just simply nerfing or boosting existing numbers will do little to the vast majority of non-viable skills. Except in the case of messing around with cooldowns for certain skills.

I do agree though that helm enchants are a mess and should be equalized in terms of effective power across ALL (active) skills.

@frostzor: I agree, again I have played an amazing Heavy Strike build that was built around permanent stunlocking all enemies and WRECKING bosses. I completely disagree with sidtherat's assessment: its another case of him just not liking a skill and writing it off as broken.

@demon: maybe you were actually quoting me and not sidtherat's response...you even mentioned mechanics in your own post.

Highly doubt Call of Ground Slam was intended when they showcased it with the steel skills. Expect nerfs.

You can clearly see the direction that we heading with the way recent meta skills have to be played (aside from aura-stackers), which is multiple button presses and timing them with some rhythm. Expect more similar stuff like this in the future. Even golem builds may be nerfed in general and then they insert mechanics like "50% more damage if summoned after 2 seconds, and 50% less action speed after 5 seconds", just so it forces you to focus on hitting the sweet-spot, in a similar way they fked up Shattering Steel.

"

jsuslak313 wrote:

I agree, again I have played an amazing Heavy Strike build that was built around permanent stunlocking all enemies and WRECKING bosses. I completely disagree with sidtherat's assessment: its another case of him just not liking a skill and writing it off as broken.

Heavy Strike damage effectiveness:
220% base
.85 attack speed
1.2 multiplier from 'double damage'
= 224


Ground Slam damage effectiveness:
150% base
.90 attack speed
1.49 multipier from 'damage to close enemies'
1.49 multiplier (over HS) for not having to waste gem slot on Melee Splash
1.49 multiplier (over HS) for not having to waste gem slot on Ancestrall Call
(you may or may not use one or both, but you have to use at least one)
= 300% if you use one gem slot, 447%. (201% if you enjoy gem swapping..)

the percentages only make sense to compare these two skills, NOT to be used as a generic measure

what i wanted to say is: Heavy Strike IS dogshit. the numbers are NOT there. there is a AOE-native skill that does similar damage (and effectively bigger damage), uses the same stun mechanic, can attack ground, has it easier hitting fast moving enemies and can be used lvl 1 to lvl 100 without single gem swap. aaaand it has no knockback. and can use warcries/exerts for pretty much no cost. (Call of Steel abuse not included)

and stun.. stun is dead. stun-prevention-window makes stuns unreliable gimmick that is fun when it works and deadly if it doesnt.


see? numbers. numbers matter.

what you want to do/suggest is changing skill A into skill B. GGG likes that, sadly their 'reworks' are more often than not FLOPS. id rather see them trying the number buff first and if that doesnt work - do a rework.

Id like to see how anyone can defend current state of Cleave, Dual Strike, Sweep and Heavy Strike. other skills need a serious help too, but i would really like to read 'how we designed new Dual Strike (yep, GGG 'reworked' it..) and how it makes sense to use it because A, B and C reasons'



how to fix Heavy Strike?
base damage: 330%


done. no more reworks, baking AC into a skill or other ideas. numbers make these skills suck because they are too weak to use already available tools to build around them. numbers is the reason why Double Strike is cool. people pay exalts for good Steel Rings to get ~20 flat phys. This skill gives you 140. no wonder it 'works' ffs (clones for bossing is just a bonus, it is the acceptable base numbers that make it an attractive option - despite it being a Strike skill)

"

jsuslak313 wrote:

@demon: maybe you were actually quoting me and not sidtherat's response...you even mentioned mechanics in your own post.

No, I was agreeing with @sidtherat. Boosting not just damage effectiveness but the numerical values of radius, speed, range, etc. makes a huge difference for a skill. If cleave had crazy radius and speed it wouldn’t seem so bad, would it? It static strike hit far more frequently at greater range? If molten strike got its balls back? These are all just numerical changes to existing fields.

My other point about adding entirely new mechanics to a skill was to say this can be done with far less dev resources than a full visual redesign.