The Amulet Problem (Ashes + Omniscience)

You can see it coming. Currently 61% of all level 100 characters on ninja use those two. 37% for Ashes, 24% for Omniscience. This is among 13.329 level 100 characters on Archnemesis SC.

Below level 100 the proportion will be even bigger. These amulets are chaser-unique power level, yet they are very common and affordable by nearly everyone. Because of this, there is very little room for negotiation for any other item going into this slot. You need a mirror-tier rare amulet to compete with those and for a lot of builds even that isn't possible. The 7-link chaser amulet from 3.16 is only used in 0.6% of characters. This is a real 7-link btw, not these shaper claws that have a crap ton of level 18 supports with 0 quality.

A gear slot being dominated by 2 items on any budget level (level 100 assumes high budget already, but these are used on any budget, even single-digit ex) is really not good and a nerf is definitely coming.

Now, there are 3 ways to conduct it.

1) (and this is my preferred way). Butcher the drop rate of these. Make them worth 30-50 ex. Make them chasers, something you eventually upgrade to instead of starting with it. This way there is still room for 1-10 ex rare ammys to be used.

2) Nerf the item itself. Eg Omni gives 1% pierce per 15-20 Omni opposed to 10. Ashes lose +1 to all skills or cap out at 20% quality. This is not preferred as the line between a chaser and trash item is narrow. I don't want them to become tier4 uniques not even shown by my loot filter.

3) Give it Venitor's Gamble treatment. The item itself is common but getting a well-rolled one requires heavy divine investment (or getting very lucky with the drop itself).

Example of this treatment for Ashes:
Quality: -30 to +30
Gem level: -1 to +1
Reservation: -20 to +20
This is enough to make a well rolled one require at least several exalted worth of divines. On average at least.

What do you think? Which way of nerf do you prefer? Becasue the nerf is coming. I'm sure of it.

We need another amulet slot so we can use both at the same time.

Ashes needs to be rarer, I don't think it should be nerfed because frankly its an exciting item that enables some really fun interactions and numerically isn't too busted compared to a really good rare neck, its just easier to acquire so the go to for now.

Omniscience needs a numerical nerf or change because it fixes its own drawback, wanting attributes on all your equipment should create a balance conundrum as you try to get your resists in and tick all the relevant boxes. This isn't the case though as it infact solves all your resist problems for you, it also gives far more penetration than any other source in the game even with shit default stats.

Thats my take at least, I'd only do fairly minor tweaks though I don't think either should be destroyed and it would be easy to make omniscience unusable.

Ventor Gamble treatment sounds like a good solution. Negative quality gems can provide some interesting interactions, if implemented properly (Anomalous Bone Offering, Divergent Convocation, etc).

"

kaijyuu2 wrote:

We need another amulet slot so we can use both at the same time.

This guy gets it.

Ashes just do 2 powerful things (+1 gems, -reservation) with an interesting thing on top (quality)

the -reservation should go. it is just not needed. the resulting amulet is still amazing build enabling item yet you can clearly see the price you pay for that


Omni is just stupid and even cut in half wont change that. how anyone could not see anything wrong with an amulet that grants you 100%+ ele pen? and on top of that you get all the res, not even trying.

ofc the problem is not the amulet itself - the problem is that over recent years GGG DOUBLED the stats you can get via various sources of +ATT and +%ATT. it might have been 'ok' when 1000 STR was a top result. right now getting 2000 is not a feat - same applies to 'omni' meta stat

you guys are overrating ashes

+1 amulets arent that rare anymore because they dont need influnce and a nomal amulet can give +2 level for 1 gem class (+1 all,+1 fire etc)

you can add crit,dot multi or other things on top of that

ashes is awesome and used so much because it offers a lot of power for a low price and can be used for intresting stuff with the +quality to gems

it doesnt offer life
the lack of other denfensive/offensive stats is compensated by the reservation effect i would say


the +skil lgem amulets not beeing influenced is a much bigger deal that a lot of players think,it not makes the bases more common it allows to use fractured amulets for this as well

using a fractured amulet with 1 good stat (doesnt have to be +gems) and than throw 3 or 4 socketed resonators with the +gem fossil and other fossils that block mods on it and you get very good results,very fast

there are a lot of harvest options to with cannot roll attack/spell mods and reroll suffix/prefix

another thing that poe ninja doesnt show is amulet swaping for certain fights

i.e. i love using ashes for normal mapping,because it offers aoe,cdr for movemenskills or other nice utility things
for the big bosses i swap to a more dps amulet

Rather not see nerfs just make them chase uniques, it's ok for op items to exist just not when they are 50c-1ex.

Ashes is fine

it sees a ton of use because its a great budget amulet and has more use cases than just a damage boost like omni

extra aura space over self power(great for minions)
+quality which is great for alt quality gem builds

omni definitely needs a numerical nerf for both the resists and the ele pen... like halving it and it would still be powerful if you build around it.

This threads dangerous almost everyones in agreement which can only mean the changes won't be lmao