Game is balanced to following builds, punishes experimentation (1000+ hours played)

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This is bs, I haven’t followed or even read a single guide and now casually doing 15s in ssf as ritualist fire mage

Similar thing with yours. Yours is slightly different than most as you're using ritualist for the extra ring and additional benefit from rings and amulets, bone cage, I assume for crowd control, and firestorm...but the core is pretty similar to other ember builds that also run detonate dead, fire wall, srs...just some of them tend to automate something like detonate dead or run CoI: Comet.

https://youtu.be/bJhF031ckjo?si=DDaV64u9_YSqkeu8

this game is balanced around TRAMPLETOE ...

put it on any build and zoom around in maps lol

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Lord Pinkleton#8277 wrote:
Interesting, all the ballista builds I've seen people running also use tame beasts and oil grenades


Okay, well I don't know what you mean by "also" because I just told you I dropped both of those abilities over the weekend - you know, as part of the whole experimentation thing we were talking about.

almost everyone using grenades is using flash grenades...ripwire is hit or miss


I'm not sure where you're getting that information. I haven't looked at guides but I have looked at some data.

Of the 1,294 Tactician builds tracked by poe2ninja, there are exactly 48 using Flash Grenade as one of their main abilities. If you add Explosive Grenade, it's ~30.

Throw Ripwire Ballista in the mix and I'm one of exactly 2:
https://poe2.ninja/builds/dawn?class=Tactician&skills=Explosive+Grenade,Flash+Grenade,Ripwire+Ballista

And even then you can see that the two of us aren't even using the same supports.

Ballistas oil grenades and companions:
https://youtu.be/7LafJg2whac?si=7bImKwAQ7vC2iEs1
https://youtu.be/3Wj5NdpuvUg?si=MF6n3dJkfSv5sbMm
https://www.youtube.com/live/ag2O4BGvX0E?si=fLVWBOw7dDzRQ-rM

Don't even really need to go looking for the grenadier one as I'm doing my own Tactician grenadier build that also uses Flash and Ripwire...with clusters for laughs; but, I've seen others at this point running similar setups. Which is really what's getting lost in some of the discussions, we can discuss small details: I took this support, they took this passive, this ascendancy.

The Smith ballista build is running the same 3 skills as the Tactician build as the gemling build as the deadeye build. Seems similar with grenades, kitava grenadiers running explosive and flash, witchhunter grenadiers running explosives and flash, deadeye grenadiers running explosives and flash. It certainly seems to me that if you're doing something much of the time you're getting funneled towards a similar end as other people.

And, if I had to guess many of them drop ripwire because it doesn't synergize well with grenades on weapon swap or they have the gear and no longer need it. Similar thing I'm thinking about getting rid of ripwire, I like the utility but there are too many instances where dropping it means I can't fire anymore grenades, it messes with cluster's long cd all the time.

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grynnder#7112 wrote:

It is basically unplayable if you decided just to f around a bit.

I mean, if by "f around" you mean make a build that makes no sense with no attempt to synergize your passives, skills, and supports then sure. A steak will be basically inedible if season it with sand and boil it in bathwater.

If by "f around" you mean come up with your own build by playing the game and tweaking your build as you go, then I've absolutely been f'ing around a bit and the game seems very playable to me so far. I wrapped up this weekend with KotM +2, Xesht +1, and Simulacrum +0:

https://youtu.be/C3gxepk63D4

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Lord Pinkleton#8277 wrote:

Ballistas oil grenades and companions

I told you I don't want to watch guides! Lol.

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It certainly seems to me that if you're doing something much of the time you're getting funneled towards a similar end as other people.

It sure seems like what you're doing is completely dismissing and ignoring all of the ways in which these builds are different and focusing on the fact that they use similar abilities to claim people are being "funneled." Against my better judgment I clicked through those videos and yeah dude - none of those builds play anything like mine.

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if I had to guess many of them drop ripwire because it doesn't synergize well with grenades on weapon swap

I don't weapon swap...

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Similar thing I'm thinking about getting rid of ripwire...it means I can't fire anymore grenades...it messes with cluster's long cd

Yeah, again, that just isn't something I have run into. I ran without Ripwire all yesterday afternoon and tried swapping around from Temporal Chains to Enfeeble, Vulnerability, Flammability, etc. and I just came back to Ripwire because it just feels right -- and isn't that what we're talking about? Like I'm not arguing my build is better than any of the ones you're talking about but it's my build and that makes it more fun for me even if it's not optimal.

If I wanted to be funneled I could certainly funnel myself, but that would be my choice - the game isn't forcing me down any particular path.

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It sure seems like what you're doing is completely dismissing and ignoring all of the ways in which these builds are different and focusing on the fact that they use similar abilities to claim people are being "funneled." Against my better judgment I clicked through those videos and yeah dude - none of those builds play anything like mine.

It sure seems like what you're doing is getting lost in the minutia and ignoring all of the ways in which these builds are almost exactly the same and focusing on the fact that they use slightly different passives or ascendancies to claim people aren't being "funneled".

Depends what you mean with "game". Campaign is perfectly balanced for almost anything you want to do outside of me wishing some interactions would work properly and they don't right now. (Like using poison concoction with scepter should work).

Endgame is not balanced. I i am not sure it can be balanced to the degree that there are no OP builds. And i don't think it should. Experiments are sometimes failed. Builds you talk about are successfull experiments that work. The fact that your didn't doesnt mean the game punishes you. You punished yourself because you dont know game mechanics well enough as the other guy.

And for sure, something like LA should be a little balanced because its far too strong. I don't even care that it clears screen, anybody can do that. The issues with LA are different.

So yeah, i DO agree with what you feel. I just think you misunderstand the problems.

I personally don't feel this is the case for all classes.

I managed to finish the entirety of Act 1 on Normal, with a hammer and strength build, on Huntress.

I was using only Boneshaker, Rolling Slam, Earthquake, Shockwave Totem and Molent Blast. I did craft Perfect Strike as well, but I saw that skill was trash and threw it in the stash. I was also able to beat the Hyena Centaur boss like this.

Another instance where I found the guides to be wrong is regarding Acolyte of Chayula and the Darkness nodes...I beat Jamanra on Normal, with just Poison Arrow, Firewall Stormcaller Arrow and a few support gems on my auto attack (Lacerate+Execute)

While most guides are made by people with sufficient enough time to play test some things, most guide creators can't accommodate for everyone's playstyle.

If I were to judge classes based on off meta potential I'd argue Ranger, Huntress, Witch and maybe Sorceress are the best classes with which to experiment off meta builds

I'm glad to hear about people who're trying stuff out rather than playing checklist simulator. Obviously, this isn't meant to be a reflection on your experience - all I can talk about is my own experience.

To be clear, the campaign was trivial, initially using bleed and then lightning & freeze to trigger frenzy charges. Found an amulet with 110 points in attributes which turned out great and provides 90% increased damage with a Jack of All Trades annoint; found a bunch of sceptres with over 160 spirit, settled on one with 186; used one single chance orb on a Rampart Shield, got a Lycosade. Used Trinity from 65 onwards, DPS on tooltip would go from 25k to 60k and sometimes 90k. Then realized it wasn't really triggering Trinity, and dropped it.

Experimented with a bunch of ideas. Found a way to generate all 3 types of charges in 1 single skill, so as to make Inhibitor mainstream and run Charge Infusion for permanent boost. Most of these ideas worked, even if the morning after you'd realize keeping it simpler and cookie cutter would be more effective.

So yeah, there's been moments, and this isn't about difficulty. Most people are perfectly capable of picking nodes in the passive tree and going about their lives.

The point is that experimenting is costly, mistakes are costly (I've settled on being 85 forever). Could I grind on and focus on levelling? Sure. But what for?

As it is, sure, you'll be powerful at endgame. Or you could hunker down and level to 90 in 8-10 hours (or 6 if you're really focused), but what for?

The game throws a lot of gear at you and endless possibilities of skill combinations, but I feel like someone seeing all that through the window of an expensive restaurant I might one day be able to afford.

And then there's this.

I'm walking in a T11 map, no enemy in sight. 1900 life, 2200 ES, 75% Evasion and 900 mana that receive 24% of damage. Accompanying me there's a supersized Diretusk with a Time Bubble, receiving 10% of damage via Loyalty.

Tooltip DPS on Lightning Spear is 32k, it ramps up to 50k and I estimate actual value is closer to 120k via Ambush and a few other mechanics that don't make it into DPS.

I am shooting from afar, so I rarely see enemies up close. There's nothing onscreen, no traps or events on the ground.

Suddenly I'm dead.

No indication of what killed me, no explosion, no ground effect, nothing. Just dead.

I've died before to 20+ ground effects suddenly laid on top of me and not being able to dodge out in time. It was frustrating, but hei, I tried, failed, died, ok.

But this? One moment you're in a clearing contemplating the charred bodies of your enemies, suddenly, plofff. Dead.

I mean, c'mon.


So now, it'll take me about 20mins to come up with enough exalts to be able to setup another waystone. Fun.