Bloodmage first ascendency notable - don't take it early.
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For players: DO NOT get your first notable on a blood mage (Sanguimancy) until you have two more points to spend. Its just a straight up nerf to your character until you can access a second notable. You play un-ascended until you get 4 points essentially, but you can spend that first point for 3% inc life. All this node does for you is say "You will now press both flasks after casting spells instead of just the 1." The blood orbs do not spawn far enough away from bosses for you to get them safely, and I've seen so many of them just timeout on me.
For GGG: Spending your first two ascendency points needs to feel good. I get the idea with needing to pay a cost for blood magic, its very thematic, but nobody will spend the second point until they can spend the 4th point when this catches on. I had a hard time playing blood mage, I'm kind of bad at these games and rely on gear to carry me. I couldn't figure out what gear I needed to scale the character so I just switched to a Ranger and having a great time. The first two points on the ascendency really should give me a new vector for power rather than forcing me to spend both of my flasks when I cast spells instead of just 1 of them. Last bumped on Dec 11, 2024, 9:52:30 AM
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I stuck to bloodmage because I like the concept and I don't have enough time to sink into another character (but that would probably be better at this point, sunk cost fallacy), but it makes the game so un-enjoyable. Even when I do defeat a boss with perfect dodging and flask management, it doesn't feel good and the rewards are shit. So you are just supposed to skip very hard encounters or just overlevel everything.
I've never played a class in an ARPG that is this weak or which actively hurts the player for wanting to interact with it. Make the first point give massive buffs to life, scalable by level, make it similar to blood magic, so mana regen is not necessary, make the health orbs scale with levels, or just remove the first notable entirely. Maybe their idea was to have a class be balanced around its 4-pointer, but the fact that the first 2 points actively hurt you is extremely unfun, in a game which is already difficult for mage classes. I spent one hour on the chimera act 3 boss, 4 runs of 15 minutes each because I have no damage. Checked out a friend of mine doing the boss, it took 1 minute. How did they balance this? Are we playing a witch class from a few years ago, did they not try and play with it for the first acts? |
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" I'm assuming they did, but they played/tested it with people who had well above average game knowledge (on account of them being devs and testers). So I'm sure there is some secret sauce here that is just non-trivial to suss out and could be a good time, but maybe that path is too narrow. Yeah blood mage isn't in a good place, I wanted to play with big crits and health manipulation, but I just feel my own health being manipulated instead until I get two more ascendency points. |
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I am in act 5 (cruel act 2) and so far i have had problems with sanguimancy being net negative in 2-3 bosses (worst offender was the gold lava boss, no way to pick them globes up, using ignite and fire damage didnt help).
They generate often enough with some crit i think but when boss hitbox or mechanics deny the globes it does feel like net negative. When i can pick them up on a boss fight i have had no problems with health and sometimes the overcapped life has saved me from a hit. On campaign maps (and i assume in maps once i get there) sanguimancy has been very good for me and i am regularly at 1.5x of my life cap. |
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" Sure but it sounds like by now you have more than the first two points. I'm kind of 'fine' with the node, but right now I'm unspeccing that node the next time I login to that character. I'll put the point back when I have 2 more to spend. Last edited by PastelBot#7520 on Dec 9, 2024, 8:40:08 AM
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PSA: unspeccing Bloodmage Sanguimancy (Life Remnants) eats linked support gems
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" LMAO, holy shit that sucks. GGG please fix. Honestly it should stop you from unspeccing until the skill is empty. Last edited by PastelBot#7520 on Dec 9, 2024, 8:46:40 AM
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" Yes i do have the "progenesis" node now as well and sure it does make it better. I did have to do everything in act 3 with only sanguimancy first though because the trial of chaos in act 3 feels very much overtuned, had to overlevel it by 7 levels. No doubt though that an ascendancy point that must be picked and has even a chance to be net negative effect to your character at start is a problem that should be addressed. I think maybe it is enough to make sure you can pick them up regardless of the gameplay encounter? Or maybe even making you pay just half of the mana cost in life could be justified? |
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My biggest complaint is there just isn't enough synergy between Bloodmage and the minions, which is the whole reason most of us went Witch in the first place instead of Sorc. Minions should pick up the proc'd orbs by default for starters as that would alleviate a lot of the main complains the OP has. But allowing minion to proc orbs, or giving the witch an aura that would shed some of your damage to nearby minions would be good too. This way it makes you more of the tank a lot of people thought bloodmage would be.
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" This is also my biggest complaint. The idea of "infernalist is for minions & you have to play around ignite" or "blood mage is for damage casters" really sucks. Especially if you aren't full aware of that and then basically brick your character because you can't respect. I tried to make an unearth bleed build with gas arrow armor break and it was just so underwhelming. The gas arrow armor break with reavers melting part works fine. I think if you gave more crit dmg to minions nodes, minion contribute to bleed, and life remnants somehow generate corpses blood mage would be very good. Infernalist minions are elemental/ignite orientated, blood mage minions are physical/bleed orientated. |
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