The shadow is a design disaster

ive played claw melee solo self found and got higher level than any char u have deathless.

understanding how to build one in terms of passives, gems and acquiring the gear in either trade or self found might be things you just need to learn more about, you shouldnt dismiss the idea that you are doing some things wrong.

maybe you would benefit from playing a softcore league for a while, understanding and experiencing what your actual destination is might help you understand how to get there.

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sonicphi wrote:

Everything works in standard literally anything, u just have to play enough to buy good enough gear, you missed the point entirely.

This is a little silly...the same could be said about ANY part of PoE. You play enough to buy/create good enough gear, and then you make anything work. That is the essence of this game lol.

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Snorkle_uk wrote:

ev/es works, daggers and claws work, you can make melee shadows with trickster or assassin using a dagger or claw with es+ev as your defence and faceroll the entire endgame map system.

kinda works

as in - you can blitz with dps successfully, but it is 'despite' ev/es not 'because' of it

details (note: ive been ev/es enjoyer since 1.3)


- EV does very little in the endgame as an avoidance mechanic, it is simply all spells/degens nowadays. in the past EV/ES relied HEAVILY on Spell Dodge.
- ES recharge - requires very stand-off playstyle that simply is not an option for some encounters. even with full investment into 'faster recharge delay' (my fav mechanic in POE). it works, but it is actually quite expensive on affixes
- degens will stop it anyway. getting immunity to ALL degens seems possible, but again it is very expensive
- you need either LARGE ES buffer or good phys damage mitigation/conversion/whatever

sure, all these can be fixed in one way or another (ES replenishment is done universally with Ghost Shroud, without this mechanic ES/EV pretty much no longer works). leech is cool, but without access to 'faster leech' and with penalty to recharge - it is rather meh imo
block + ES on block? cool, but then why EV that directly cuts into EV effectiveness? capped spell block + EV + ES - great, but that costs 10 times more than any other archetype
and lets not forget that EV/ES hybrid gear requires INSANE rolls, forces Tricksters and certain Masteries to reach satisfactory numbers. it really gets more and more expensive (comparatively)

there are lots of crutches (split personality + INT stacking + shaper touch + maybe energy blade) but again - the COST of these is insane compared to alternatives. even HP/ES + faster recharge seems cheaper - and i actually made it work in 3.17.

all that because a) game is spell/degen heavy b) spell dodge is gone

so yeah, it works, but way worse than before while being FAR more expensive

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Snorkle_uk wrote:

ive played claw melee solo self found and got higher level than any char u have deathless.

understanding how to build one in terms of passives, gems and acquiring the gear in either trade or self found might be things you just need to learn more about, you shouldnt dismiss the idea that you are doing some things wrong.

maybe you would benefit from playing a softcore league for a while, understanding and experiencing what your actual destination is might help you understand how to get there.

I dont care how big you e-peen is really, u missed the point of the thread entirely.

The "default" way of playing shadow is absolute trash, the way the devs tell you you should play shadow DOES NOT WORK!

This is not even an argument is a known fact, just go to poe.ninja e check what is being played, the shadow is being played like a witch or an archer. Just because people can make it work doesnt make it ok. Theres new player experience to think about for example, imersion in the game, no one should have to read a bible just to make the most basic of builds work.

Also if you are so good and know oh so much, go make a shadow a in hardcore(or any character LOL) with how the game tells you to play without a starter and a respec and then come here again, see how far you get and how good the game feels to play.

Build diversity is at an all time low but the community picks metas.

The flood of Elementalist was surprising to me. I expected Hiero, Sabo and Deadeye to top the lists. I almost went with Astral Projector Hiero myself but wanted to try out Storm Rain.

I don't agree with "class" playstyle expectancy though. That's kinda what's killing build diversity. ie Melee Elementalist was a lot of fun. It's up to the player to design their play style.

Traps are one of the biggest builds right now if you look at poe.ninja. Additionally while it's not great for the current league mechanic, Flicker is generally a decent mapping build and it plays pretty well on new trickster(nothing saying you cant dual wield with this build comfortably). And I'd certainly say flicker is a very ninja/assassin-y type ability seeing as you are teleporting behind enemies and cutting them down. I'm actually sorta lost as to your frustration here.

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Xzorn wrote:

I don't agree with "class" playstyle expectancy though. That's kinda what's killing build diversity. ie Melee Elementalist was a lot of fun. It's up to the player to design their play style.

As someone who made one of the earliest Meleemancers on Diablo 2, I completely agree with that sentiment *but* also think it's important that any given character can also, or at least, meet their playstyle expectancy based on promotional art, in-game introductions and so on.

And this isn't something limited to PoE at all. One of the most common sins in video/computer gaming is box/promotional art completely misleading potential players. Most recently, there's a character/class in Darktide depicted by the promotional art and the devs as being apt to use a 2 handed chainsword for close-ranged murdermurderbzzzzzzFORTHEEMPERORRRRRandshit -- but because their actual passives are often 'on hit', the logical choice is to go small, fast weapons and pretty much anyone using that class into endgame is doing just that. Amusingly even the guide sites are like 'this giant eviscerator is the Zealot's best weapon' while over on reddit meta agreement is it's all about the knife and axe.

But can the promoted style work? Eh, sure, if you favour style over effectiveness and nothing wrong with that. 'I want to play Zealot as it's meant to be played not by the meta what build can I use?' is a common query.

I suppose my point would be I believe good character design/balance results in primary suggested playstyle (let's say Shadow with a single dagger here, based on the introduction of his character) should be perfectly viable, off-class shenanigans like, say, a 2 handed sword Shadow should be as viable *but harder work to set up*, and tucked between the two are the OP styles that players need to discover for themselves.

That to me would have been GGG's chef kiss of class definition. And I think for several other Exiles it's true: the Witch is introduced as a caster; the Marauder as a lughead whackafreak; the Duelist as, well, a duelist; Ranger with her bow...these all accord with the rough model I suggested as good design. but the Shadow? Fuhgeddaboudit. OP remains right on that count.

It really doesn't have that much to do with build diversity -- if anything, a clearer idea of where each style sits increases diversity because the devs at least take these styles into account. What kills diversity is almost class variant-agnostic: it's the assumption that any player can and will tune for optimal destruction regardless of any other factor, including class identity and potential.

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Lemonlord wrote:

And I'd certainly say flicker is a very ninja/assassin-y type ability seeing as you are teleporting behind enemies and cutting them down. I'm actually sorta lost as to your frustration here.

I'll just repeat what I said earlier:

"

Flicker Strike was initially a Duelist skill, and when they added the frenzy charge limitation, it became much more of a Ranger skill too. I know it's tempting to conflate 'assassin' with 'anime teleporting sword shit', but I wouldn't advise it with PoE.

__

The really, really big problem is that so much of 'class identity' in RPGs has relied on unique skills, and POE has none.

If I say 'Sorceress D2' you're going to think 'Fireball', 'Frozen Orb', maybe 'Chain Lightning'.

If I say 'Amazon D2', you're going to think 'strafe', 'multiple shot', 'valkyrie', and so on.

These are part of her core identity. Can you do other things? Sure. You can and should try an Enchant Meleesorc; my highest level HC character was a super high dodge/evade/block sword and board Amazon. That shit's hilarious. But it's mostly hilarious because it *defies* the identity already established. A case of doing it just to see if you can.

But with PoE, given there are no unique skills or even gear per class, the archetypes are a lot more flexible. You all know that, but let me use a different word there: they're a lot less stable too. You can't really put much on top of them and trust it to stay there instead of buckling under the weight. Ascendancies are the most significant class definition factor and they're *relatively* new. They're also kind of a mess in the Shadow's case.

So that's why everyone's defaulting to 'Shadow=Assassin" in terms of image (because that's exactly what he is) but then when asked how to make him work, it becomes "Shadow=Saboteur" because that's how to make him work. Two acceptable class definitions/identities...except that one of them is literally his job title back in Oriath, and thus has always been associated with him, even before Ascendancies were introduced.

Fun fact: before the Shadow was introduced, GGG had not released his name, only that he'd be an Int/Dex hybrid. My guess was 'Trickster'. Technically, I was right -- just way ahead of my time.

At any rate, can you play the Shadow as an assassin in PoE? No you can not; this isn't a stealth game accommodating that sort of thing. It's not Tenchuu or Thief or Assassin's Creed. It's an isometric Diablo clone where one vs many is the default. You can play him as an Assassin (capital A indicating class change/Ascendancy) but you're not going to be doing much assassinating as one. Better off just critting the shit out of everything at once.

So really, what they should have done was instead of depicting the Shadow as a knife-wielding single target precision killer in his introduction, they should have stuck with the Dex/Int hybrid image and depicted him as someone apt to lay traps, throw magical daggers or otherwise employ sorcerous subterfuge to get the job done. THAT is his role in Wraeclast. Why they'd show his role in Oriath is beyond me -- Exile is all about leaving that life behind and growing in power through the gauntlet that is Wraeclast.

...And you can bet they'll be taking this sort of thing into account when they design and release the Replacement Killers in Path of Exile's second campaign.

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sonicphi wrote:

the way the devs tell you you should play shadow DOES NOT WORK!... Just because people can make it work doesnt make it ok...

it doesnt work, but people can make it work? if it doesnt work how can people make it work?


it does work, if it doesnt work the way you are doing it maybe theres some things youre doing that arnt working? weve all done things in poe that didnt work, none of us should dismiss the idea that the reason they didnt work was because we made mistakes.


the fact hardly anyone plays shadow that way is a problem, for sure. but the reason they dont is not because it doesnt work, its not because claws or daggers or ev+es are broken, all that stuff works fine its just not popular because the skills are not exciting, they are old and theres other stuff you can do thats more effective.


theres been times when it has been popular and a lot of people were playing ci shadows with claw or dagger, and theres been times when bows have been fairly garbage that couldnt keep up with the 'meta' options.

thats not ideal, imo there should always be good builds being played for the architypes. but theyve always worked, they have always been viable to just play self found and beat the campaign and map system all the way to the top tier.



its not an e-peen thing, u said i play with no skill because of the game modes i play and hence my opinion isnt valid, i was speaking directly to that reasoning, no more no less.

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Also if you are so good and know oh so much, go make a shadow a in hardcore(or any character LOL) with how the game tells you to play without a starter and a respec and then come here again, see how far you get and how good the game feels to play.

im not a good player, and ive not bothered keeping up with all the cool toys the game has developed over the last 3+ years. but im a basic journeyman player who has many hours experience, im fairly sure i could take almost any main damage skill in the game, pick the starting class you would most associate it with and make a build idea to get started within half an hour that could beat the campaign and farm red tier maps self found as it develops.

i dont need to be good or know everything to do that, i just have to understand some core principals of putting together viable characters. just stack hp, defences and damage in an efficient, effective manner.

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Foreverhappychan wrote:

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Xzorn wrote:

I don't agree with "class" playstyle expectancy though. That's kinda what's killing build diversity. ie Melee Elementalist was a lot of fun. It's up to the player to design their play style.

As someone who made one of the earliest Meleemancers on Diablo 2, I completely agree with that sentiment *but* also think it's important that any given character can also, or at least, meet their playstyle expectancy based on promotional art, in-game introductions and so on.

It really doesn't have that much to do with build diversity -- if anything, a clearer idea of where each style sits increases diversity because the devs at least take these styles into account. What kills diversity is almost class variant-agnostic: it's the assumption that any player can and will tune for optimal destruction regardless of any other factor, including class identity and potential.

As a "Starting" perspective and of course giving each Ascendancy their own identity I agree. Having a preset you can follow if you want and it works or totally deviate from this which is essentially a "class-less" system, something I normally associate with PoE, Elder Scrolls series, Divinity OS2 and similar.

Design of Ascendancy options plays a huge part in this. I never liked this addition to the game for things like Bleed Damage Bonus. At the same time I think Trickster was done incredibly well.

Sections of the passive tree using specific defense and damage / weapon types are generally fine for me. What I can't get behind are more recent changes like Fortify being by Duelist when technically every starting point can melee. These are the things killing build diversity.

Obviously there's the base-line issues which are hurting build diversity as well. Pure Physical, Impale, Ignite, Poison, Bleed and pretty much anything back loaded isn't so hot.

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Xzorn wrote:

What I can't get behind are more recent changes like Fortify being by Duelist when technically every starting point can melee.

Could you please elaborate on this one? I'm not up to date with recent changes. I have a few guesses but I'd rather just get your clarification before responding more thoroughly.