So these melee changes...

Perhaps the patch notes will reveal some hidden gems (improvements) but a lot of the community have been asking for an inherent defensive benefit to playing melee tag gems and actively being in melee. Mark said (paraphrasing) "being in melee means a number of defensive changes..." but what I'm seeing is:

- endurance charges get a buffed for ele damage reduction, so all melee must stack endurance charges now?
- higher base armor/evasion/ES item types but everyone has access to this, not just melee
- we will need a fortify mastery or to sacrifice a 6L spot for fortify support to get fortify?
- fortify has no further buffs besides the 20% hit reduction? for example, 20% reduction to dots?
- spell suppression still exists in its current overpowered form and is thus mandatory from any source that it can be acquired?
- therefore right side builds are still godmode defensively unless the phys-to-ele conversion nerf is HUGE?
- block is easier to increase and potentially cap but spell block is still generally unaccessible for melee outside of "versatile combatant" and block is still useless against dots?

On the offensive side:

- we lost totem buffs which were a HUGE amount of damage for an endgame-scaled melee build
- in exchange, we get more damage scaling on melee gem levels, tinctures (melee only?), and warcries?
- does Mark realize just how horrible the melee offensive deficiency was outside of outliers like replica alberons?
- accuracy is still present in its currently (punishing) scaling form?
- several strike skills still have a baseline target hitting of 1?
- how reasonable will it be for melee players to get good endgame weapon upgrades unless they nolife dump currency into standard league crafting since graveyard crafting is gone?
- we get new banners which are like old totems but don't die and the passive tree conveniently has multiple new banner wheels to give you the hint of "this is where you get back your lost damage so this is mandatory."

On scale of 1 to 100, I think this patch is like a 17 on the scale that it needs to address both melee offensive and defensive issues. I'm not seeing the "Melee league login bro" euphoria claimed from many others in chat.

You should definitely add "legacy vaal pact for melee" into the defensive list.

Instant leech is HUGE, back in ye olden times it made builds nearly invincible as long as they could stay in combat, which is why it got nerfed into the ground.

true measure of success will be streamers participation - if streamers who play 'for the win' will play melee - it is fine. they play what works, rarely ever touch the fluff

wont be throwing names around but you know the type of streamers - efficiency, speed, phasing ubers. i do not see Gladiator being even considered for that. it is still a pleb class with no endgame potential


i seriously doubt that people are going to pick heavy strike over hexblast mines or melee over bow for any scenario. years of neglect wont be fixed by moving mandatory temporary buffs from 'items that die' to 'items that reserve mana' and i honestly do not see much more

Yes instant leech is nice but I don't want to be playing constant ping-pong of full and near zero life just because i'm in melee and I don't have a set of defensive buffs that the community was asking for.

If the melee defensive changes can be summarized as better endurance charges, more attack block, instant leech, and a bit more max res, then again I'm not seeing the euphoria here. I don't think Mark realizes (or cares) just how bad the defensive situation is for melee. For example, where are the inherent ailment defenses (e.g. duration reduction) for playing melee?

Removing totems was like 1% of the total pain of playing melee, meh.

nowadays instant leech is crap compared to 'old days'. the 10% maxHP/hit limit is still in place. so with 4aps, you need 2.5s to leech full globe. it is actually slower than someone who is invested into regen

it is better with low life but still - nothing ground breaking, wont be used much as the drawback is HORRIFIC in practice. i expect near 0% usage

(and you can use it on BloodSeeker claw even now - nothing special)

you just listed a ton of awesome changes, but as if these are bad things.


oh they gave me more defences, this means i have to get more defences? omg how terrible.

mark doubled the damage of melee skills, does he realise they didnt do enough damage???


em, yeah? hence the change?



some people are just never happy, melee sucks is a way of life apparently.

What i have seen so far (no patch notes yet) looks pretty decent. No more totem buffs and compensation baked into skill gems is a wonderful move.

Saving this before the OP deletes.

"

you just listed a ton of awesome changes, but as if these are bad things.

I listed a bunch of underwhelming positive changes together with a bunch of overpowered features (e.g. spell suppression) that have apparently (unless its hidden in patch notes) received no change.

You do know that a positive change can be relatively major or minor right for the issue it is trying to address? The defensive changes here in particular are suggesting a very minor improvement to the state of melee.

"

Saving this before the OP deletes.

Nah man this thread isn't going anywhere unless the mods nuke it. There needs to be some voice of reason in this forum to counteract the "EVERYTHING FIXED MELEE LEAGUE LOGIN BRO" euphoria that has little backing it. Looking forward to all the endgame gladiators getting mowed down by offscreen goatmen barrages.

Oh hey I forgot endurance charges are available to everyone. I guess caster/ranged wins again.

One more thing, don't remove your totem keybinds guys. You'll be using them to spam mandatory banners now. A+ gameplay.

Edit: I scrolled through the patch notes and the only further notable defensive change was that the new defiance banner temporarily grants some spell suppression while you are in its area of effect. I don't even have words for how laughably bad this is relative to the godmode overall state of spell suppression.

The champ and jugg ascendancies also received huge nerfs. Looks like the devil is in the details this patch and it's business as usual. Time to find another game.

so patch notes are out:

- huge % increases to most skills
- SEVERE loss of attack speed across the board (rage, protector, things like challenger charges)
- loss of ALL added damage. in some cases barely compensated by % changes. things like Double Strike are actually nerfed (?)

if these changes along with less flashy stuff like 'chance for hit to ignore phys resist' turn out to be 20% net buff i will be shocked. 20%.. is not even near 'enough'

also, people are GROSSLY underestimating what doubling of mana cost does to a build. 5 base mana is acceptable, 9 base mana equals Lifetap - and this is net damage nerf

what is truly bizzare is what happens to Call to Arms and warcry automation. it is pure garbage now

in general: is there anyone who starts hexblast mines-type build that will consider playing melee 'for the win'? i doubt it.

everyone will try one melee build, realise just how punishing it is (essences, blight) and reroll into a build that actually can benefit from some of these changes

i do not see myself exploring this much, it turned out to be a PR stunt more than actual change



stars of 3.25 - aura effect, spell suppression, phys damage being shittiest damage type: no changes.