Endurance/Frenzy/Power CHARGEs

I am also fan of basically "gamebreaking builds and uniques". Penance brand is great example of the opposite -> it is terrible for the game, because it requires 0 investment. It is exactly the same issue with current implementation and availability of ralakesh. I dont have problem with some 50 mirror scion builds, that are immortal, since it is something to strive for for some people. I just don't want to see 1 div builds be better than 95% of the builds in the game.

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Sameen_Shaw wrote:

You should also play your 1st character after 15000hours with 100% spell suppression and maybe then you can call what is and what is not close to mandatory.

There is reason why 70%~ of HC players run suppression and marauders path across half of the tree for PT and suppress. There is also reason why GGG was restricting more and more access to suppression over time(lowering craft values significantly)

Well first of all, think about how silly that first line is....why would playing Spell Suppression now make me think its any "more" mandatory when it already ISN'T mandatory (hence....I don't use it lol)? I've already ceded that it probably IS damn near mandatory for uber bosses...which I have no interest in, nor does that ceded fact change anything that I've said so far.

There is a reason GGG "restricted" SS values (in quotes because they didn't ACTUALLY restrict it...): they overtuned it when it was first introduced. As far as I know, they didn't restrict it "more and more"; they did a single balance pass across the board after it was introduced. And actually...they INCREASED many of the SS wheels on the tree back in 3.19. All they did was make it less gear-dependent and more tree-dependent which sort of made it EASIER to cap overall.

And yes, there is a reason why lots of HC players run suppression. I say lots because I totally disagree that its anywhere NEAR 70%....not sure where you got that number from but I literally just looked at the top listed lvl 100 HC characters across the first 5 ascendancies and less than half path anywhere near the SS side of the tree or have 100% SS. In fact there are probably MANY reasons why HC might gravitate towards SS.....NONE of them are because SS is mandatory, except in safer HC bossing / uber bossing. A few are:

1) It is cheaper, and there is a greater source of SS on the tree: in a restrictive mode such as HC, where even a chance death means the end you are going to tank up as fast and cheaply as possible.

2) Lots of HC players have the goal of tackling the HARDEST content, where I already agreed that its likely SS and tried-and-true defensive layering exists for the uber bosses.

I have not, and will not, ever play HC so I really can't comment....but it also doesn't matter. HC is a self-inflicted punishment mode and not what the base game is balanced around. Players in HC act VERY differently than players in the base game mode, and they have very different goals, not to mention they represent a SUPER small portion of the community. The absolute tippy top of defense does not render all other defenses obsolete...

I believe I said earlier in the thread....all your comments are coming from a place of the ultra-high level content, which is NOT representative of the game as a whole. Your opinions are formulated with basically only the top most difficult content in mind where 99.9% of players are not going to get to. I don't understand why you keep trying to talk about that type of content as if its a good indicator of what the vast majority would actually find helpful.

As far as "investment", it is NOT all that much more investment to go Armour / redux / block / max resist etc. than it is to go SS / Eva / conversion. Don't get me wrong, it IS easier to cap SS than most other forms of good mitigation or avoidance, but the difference is small in many cases.



Basically, and perhaps I've said it more aggressively and less clearly than I should have: what you are saying is wrong because the REASONING is wrong, and the "ultimatum" nature of your beliefs in defenses is wrong. If we were ONLY talking about uber bossing....maybe what you have been saying holds a LOT more truth to it. But we AREN'T only talking about that.

Also, if we are looking at the "top" HC players....these are the players that really KNOW mitigation. They use almost every possible layer of mitigation available: armour, conversion, max resists, SS, you name it. It's not that SS is mandatory....its that ALL mitigation is mandatory in HC! They need EVERY possible protection to avoid getting clipped at random. It is a BAD metric to compare to OVERALL PoE...where the average 1hko isn't the END for them.

I would equate this argument we are having to a fight with someone who tells me:
"Playing TS is MANDATORY to progress in this game"
"Using x skill is MANDATORY to beat Uber Elder"
"You need to have 50million plus dps to feel comfortable in the endgame"
And btw, these are all REAL arguments and comments that players have said in other threads that I remember...

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jsuslak313 wrote:

Well first of all, think about how silly that first line is....why would playing Spell Suppression now make me think its any "more" mandatory when it already ISN'T mandatory (hence....I don't use it lol)? I've already ceded that it probably IS damn near mandatory for uber bosses...which I have no interest in, nor does that ceded fact change anything that I've said so far.

It isn't even near mandatory for ubers, just convenient. Penetration can be negated by using damage taken as other element mods leaving ubers powerless already. SS is an easy way to deal with spells nothing more, nothing less. Other layers work just as well if not better but might require some more brain cells to set up.

I'd stop having that argument with him if i were you, he makes a wrong statement knowing it's wrong, then excludes all the cases that prove him wrong and sells it as a correct statement. Can't argue against warped logic like that.

I like having debates about defenses, and at least this is a particularly GOOD debate, no matter how strongly I believe the other side to be in the wrong here.

That being said, we have strayed quite far from the main issue of endurance charge stacking being weak. One thing I will add on that front in support of the OP is the idea that there is so much gear centered on leveraging power charges. There is not much centered on leveraging frenzy charges (because they are already powerful for everyone), and there is basically NOTHING that leverages endurance charges.

This does appear to be a design flaw when it comes to endurance charges. Perhaps we need a unique body armour / shield that benefits from stacking endurance charges. Void battery and certain amulets have stood the test of time with charges, but Tidebreaker has not. The only item that's left that works with stacking endurance charges is Nebuloch and it has a pretty darn hefty downside associated with it, with the upsides being a bit....meh. Compare Nebuloch to Void Battery and there is a VERY clear power difference. Especially when you consider that Void Battery was a "normal" unique whereas Nebuloch started as an Elder-exclusive and should have been way more powerful than it is.

It should at LEAST give you +1 max endurance.

I actually forgot Tidebreaker even exists and looking at it right now. It is indeed far faaar weaker than Voidbattery. I mean 7link is cool and all, but the base dmg is so low, it cant be compensated by the endurance charge bonus + the support. I would prefer a new belt(t1/t0) with endurance charge interaction, but armor could definitely be an option too.

What do you think about Veruso's Battering Rams? I like the concept of giving shock immunity to mostly 2h users, but I have hard time putting them into my builds without having some very nice corruption on them. It always seems like something is missing on them and maybe it is the "increased damage per charge", which could be something else like increased area effect?

Every charges should give us 2 buffs imo.

Add cast speed per Power charge.
Remove cast speed from Frenzy charge.
Remove the useless resistance from Endurance charge. Add some useful thing e.g. block chance per charge (both attack and spell block), elemental ailments avoid or reduce elemental damage taken?

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Sameen_Shaw wrote:

I actually forgot Tidebreaker even exists and looking at it right now. It is indeed far faaar weaker than Voidbattery. I mean 7link is cool and all, but the base dmg is so low, it cant be compensated by the endurance charge bonus + the support. I would prefer a new belt(t1/t0) with endurance charge interaction, but armor could definitely be an option too.

What do you think about Veruso's Battering Rams? I like the concept of giving shock immunity to mostly 2h users, but I have hard time putting them into my builds without having some very nice corruption on them. It always seems like something is missing on them and maybe it is the "increased damage per charge", which could be something else like increased area effect?

I actually wouldn't compare tidebreaker to batteries as its a 2H with a very tiny bonus. You can almost ignore the endurance charge stacking bonus on a Tidebreaker (which stinks). I think Nebuloch is a much more direct comparison. Both designed to be dual wielded, both with a fairly "large" downside (except void battery removes its own downside (!)). Tidebreaker used to be OG but I don't hear much about it anymore.

Things like Veruso are fine, but they are quite weak. Lower speed roll than what you can get on rares, no life roll, less "damage" even if you had 10+ endurance charges, etc. Not everything needs to be strong, but Veruso is particularly weak...and nowadays shock immunity is pretty easily obtained. In fact, this is WORSE than shock immunity because "cannot be shocked" removes all self-shock build possibilities and self-ailment builds.