Spells, Self-casting and skill viability in general
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While I'm excited for the new league and am likely going to play the initial week or two as per usual, I'm yet again disappointed at lack of meaningful skill changes to many of the skills that I've enjoyed playing in the past or would be interested to build around.
Buffing scorching ray of immolations damage by ~20% isnt suddenly going to make unusable garbage skill into playable. Sure that might be a buff for someone playing RF, but I would rather play the scorching ray as the main skill. Same goes for exsanguinates DoT portion. ~20% buff to lackluster DPS wont change a damn thing in practice, especially when in order to get any meaningful DPS out of the skill you're already shoehorned into building a character with absolutely trash defenses. And again why bother when you can turn it into a mine skill, put on a heatshiver and just win the game? Patch notes literally do nothing to change the meta but raise the barrier to entry for the top skills like Lightning strike and Zenith. Now rather than being 200 div to clear everything you need to pay what 400 div? (except for Hexblast... RIP I suppose, but then again its mine build so... tough luck) This is the usual problem of nerfing top end rather than buffing the low end, where you first make the top level skill unreachable for less hardcore audience. Repeating this process you eventually push a given skill down far enough that even top level players abandon it and then the skill is left unused by everyone. All I'm getting to with this rant is that I would like to be able to pick just about any skill and make it viable, ideally in more than one way. Heck or even just being able to tell someone new to the game:"yes just pick a witch and start lopping fireballs, see how far you'll get", without knowing that I'm setting them up for failure and what I should be telling them instead is:"Dont bother casting spells yourself, throw mines instead or use some attack that fires projectiles that can return" (side note: LoL @ splitting steel enjoyers). That being said, I appreciate small changes being made here and there and hope to see more in the future. Changes to things like Unleash and spellslinger support are likely on the right track, but I doubt they'll be enough to make real difference. oh and just incase Inb4:"any skill is viable with enough time investment.". Unfortunately I dont get to play the game as full-time job, so its literally choice between playing mines or not playing at all... and I'd rather not play at all at that point. Last bumped on Jun 7, 2025, 10:22:13 AM
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well, i think that your take on 'most skills are unviable' is wrong. but you are right that there are skills that simply outperform the crap of anything else
what happens then is perception problem when less proficient players expect to be successful and are able to do well ONLY with skills overtuned as duck there is also the goal progression - people measure themselves against top-end-pinnacle content (ubers, deep delve, 100% deli and stuff) while not being even mildly engaged with the game (flask from the campaign, TERRIBLE gear, lvl 18 gems etc) truth is: with some limited exceptions you can do 4 voidstones (my threshold of what i call 'viable') on any skill in league start scenario. that means no mirrors, no guild help, no uber expensive items and no lucky drop to fund something ridiculous my Necro Settlers starter was (brace yourself): Galvanic Field + Orb of Storms + ShockNova SELF-CAST hierophant I am pretty sure you would diss this build at first mention. it wont ever kill Uber Sirus, because I would fail the dps check (degen pools) but all non-Uber bosses? no problems. and it is actually great 300+ delve farmer and I even made great use of 1c boots that nobody cares about gear at lvl 95:
Spoiler
im pretty sure I could do the same with Fireball, Scorching Ray or Bladestorm of Uncertainity (oh wait, I did that last one in phrecia) but i understand that comparing these builds to lightning strike or hexblast mines is stupid. these builds were absolutely overtuned as duck from what I can see there are few subtle but compounding self-cast buffs that combined with neutering the overperforming outliers that made everything else look bad should make a serious difference - self-cast mana costs go down thanks to 140->130% mana cost multiplier reduction. it is HUGE - arcane surge buff is quite substantial (both lvl1 stat and support gem) - unleash/pinpoint/spell echo/intensify gained around ~10% more damage each - and most spells got ~20% more that is HUGE compounding change. but if your perspective is 'only top builds are playable' than, well, nothing has changed for you ps. 'returning projectiles' is a garbage mechanic that should have never been added into this game. it is impossible to balance, looks riddiculous and any skill that can use it is forced to use it. it should have never been added |
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If you think you need two hundred divines to clear everything with literally any skill in the game, you need to find better streamers than the ones you are watching. I have friends who regularly beat ubers with heavy strike, on a hell of a lot less than two hundred div.
I'm pretty sure I could clear T17 maps with flame dash on two hundred divines. |
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" 4 voidstones meaning you're able to farm white t14s or "alch & go" t16s without overtly many mods that you can't run (e.g. reduced flask charges for pathfinder)? Either way I'd put the term "viability" somewhere in the ball park of being able to farm at least one one or more of the non-uber endgame bosses without too much effort (exarch, eater and/or maven). And I'll be the first to admit that its matter of having wrong perspective to some extent. I keep repeating this pattern of Path of building something "different but fun and cozy" to play near start of every league, but the numbers just don't add up and everything keeps reminding that I shouldnt even try to come up with anything different or something that I specifically want to play. Just build the miner and win the game, dont bother self casting, you're just nerfing yourself. I feel that the game is too restrictive in general with too obvious "correct solutions". But then again at least its not as bad as PoE2 with 48% lightning spear representation... Lightning strike being just 14% after all. " the point I was making with the 200 div number was more towards pointing that the Lightning strike nerf simply moves the imaginary "goal post" or 200 div to 400 div. I dont know (and dont care) how much investment you actually need to play lightning strike comfortably as I'm not interested in playing it. |
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" So you're saying something that you know isn't correct as if it were correct, and you don't care? That's the point I'm making. When you exaggerate this much you completely undermine and invalidate whatever other points you were hoping to make. |
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" stick with this measuring stick but actually apply it, you'll be surprised how many builds can achieve this and you can probably do it for <5 div on about 95% of them. Viability is abused as badly as EHP by the PoE general populace where players are adamant that builds with sub 20m dps are awful and just not possible to play or make currency on. 20m dps makes the game so trivial I avoid the skill in future to prevent myself thinking its normal :p get out there and try some skills, LS is overrated, Trickster isn't overrated but you can play everything else regardless especially without secondary requirements (SSF, HC etc) |
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" Sure. I could have used "under 10 div miner" being turned into "just over 20 div miner" instead as the example, but the numbers really don't matter when it comes to the broader point of goal post simply being shifted and larger problems remaining unsolved (e.g. Self-casting being considerably worse option than utilizing mines or playing attack skills w/ returning projectiles). |
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" in case of that Galvanic Field character - that meant running T16s with juiced expedition and harvest + delving down to around 320 + Destructive Play (my fav atlas mechanic). zero issues. i knew the same effort with LS build would have gotten me better speed but.. I just dont care? ive made ~20 chars in Settlers and only one was close to meta - all of them could farm t16 with mods, do invitations, click altars or kill endgame bosses (excluding ubers, i do not like that content) if you tell your friend to go with Fireball - he will be fine, just tell him to actually care more about defences than damage. each time i see someone venting on the forums it is ~85 lvl character with 3 life flasks, one white quicksilver, ES boots on Berserker and pretty much no life on gear (or survivability equivalent). at that point it is not the matter of 'shit skill' but rather garbage all over the place build that wouldnt work with even with LS note: I still think that the gap between 'meta' and 'regular' is HUGE and unexcusable. but if your goal is to kill maven and uber elder for 4 voidstones, you can do it on pretty much any skill you name, in few different ways, not breaking the bank. Fireball, Scorching Ray - they will do as long as the character at least pretends to make some sense |
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But you didn't say 10 div or 5 div, you said 400 div. You said I can't get a tasty candy bar for under $40. Everyone here is saying you can get a great candy bar for 5 dollars and you're saying the number doesn't matter when it is the entire part of contention.
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" I get what you're saying... especially the "Dont care" part and wish I could not get this constant nagging feeling of "Why should I bother spending time and effort on Build I came up with when there's the obvious solution out there already solved by someone else?". I made two characters at start of Settlers, both which turned out mid for one or another reason, third one I couldnt even bother to fully level up due to constantly feeling that I was just wasting my time playing unoptimally. " Lets be pedantic and say that the 5 dollar candy bar has nuts in it and I'm lethally allergic to them. And further my point was that the particular candy bar labeled "Lightning Strike" also contains trace amounts of nuts in it and I wouldnt eat it either way, even if I could afford it. And dont get me wrong, either way I'll keep looking for the build.. I mean "candy bars" that I can both like and afford. |
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