What could GGG do?

"

snapple99 wrote:

My onslaught character is stuck before even normal Piety... although to be fair, when I say "stuck" what I mean is "stuck unless I trade". But going out and finding your own gear in this game is a ridiculous exercise.

Good thing they nerfed my ES to keep my character balanced. This patch makes me glad I'm not playing POE anymore.

This happens to me in Onslaught. It's not bad enough that I have to deal with Desync, Resync and the occasional crashes, I still can't progress fast enough and get stuck gear-wise. And even rolling new characters doesn't help with orbs as I usually need to use some to get gear for them as well. If progress was smoother, re-rolling wouldn't be so bad to be honest. And even in Anarchy it's still frustrating but you can't really afford to just die or zerg on higher difficulties because of the XP loss.

And something that happened the other day which kind of bugged me was that I found a Large Chest and thought "Oh... I guess I'll just get a few useless magic items and that's that". Guess what I got. All whites. Yup, no orbs, no nothing. They should make these like the Resplendent Chests in Diablo III where they have guaranteed rares and maybe also give some orbs to use for crafting. People are already farming specific areas for loot and orbs anyway so if they come across a Large Chest they should think "Holy shit! Jackpot!" and not be like "Yeah, whatever." Also, IIR and IIQ should be bonuses, not a necessity for getting decent stuff.

I'm certain that the devs can see that the criticism made by people is not unreasonable. There are quite a few subjects where I could offer some input or talk about, but threads are often littered with overly defensive fanboys or elitists, so even if I post, my replies will likely get buried beneath the bile.

I would "fix" it in future installments of the game, when we open up Act III.x and act 4, with higher tier items available. I think Affix and Suffix that support up to Ilvlv 80?

let ES based items have a higher diminishing return, so lets say top is now 800 ES for a Ilvl70 item, so let an Ilvl 80 have 850 max ES

Life however, let that one grow a bit more.

Ilvl70, now max 109 I think. Let it grow to 250 on Ilvl 80 items.

This will be the most elegant way I think to balance the game, without going back and forth nerfing and buffing Life and ES. this way, no Unique item needs to be changed as well..

"

eragon1111 wrote:

Love it how GGG forced my friends to spend cash on RMT and not on the game :(

Love how your friends appear to have no self control... I mean, unless GGG held a weapon to their face and told them to buy into RMT..

are we sure higher item tiers will be available outside of maps in the expansion though? Theres a lot to suggest affixes up to lvl100 will be added but also a lot to suggest further expansions will not necessarily raise the level cap of merciless.


I dont really have much to add to the discussion in terms of what GGG should do. I would say though to people stuck, part of this game is strategy, esp in a new league. Some builds are extremely gear dependant, other builds are not, some classes are a lot more versatile and can adapt to what you find. Picking life + armour with IR + elemental weapon based builds, starting as something like a duelist will let you go through the whole game and into maps using just 4 link skills and gear you can find/craft. From there you can farm gears for more specialised characters and plan stuff in advance based on items you have.

Obviously theres an issue here that needs discussed and Im not trying to bypass it by blaming people for the problems theyre facing, but for your own sakes and enjoyment of the game I think its worth thinking a little more about the bigger picture when starting off in a new league with no items and what the quickest way is to achieve what you want. Its certainly not getting stuck behind a gear wall at some stage.

"

CharanJaydemyr wrote:

Yes, all usage of third party, illegal RMT in this game is the devs' fault.

There are two sides to that one and you know it. On one hand the decision to cheat is and always will be at the fault of the cheater. There is no question where "blame" lies.

On the other hand, GGG has setup a system which HIGHLY incents such cheating. I make no bones about it. For me it'd be the only way to even play the game. I just choose to find a different game than cheat. So GGG loses money, either from my failure to play at all or from my giving my money to RMT rather than GGG. No matter who's to blame the monetary loss is GGG's.

"

Snorkle_uk wrote:

Picking life + armour with IR + elemental weapon based builds, starting as something like a duelist will let you go through the whole game and into maps using just 4 link skills and gear you can find/craft

Interesting. I have never found ANY usable rare... 4 link or otherwise. I'd consider 4 link usable at level 69... barely but still usable. I've just never seen such a thing. Perhaps it's worth trying a duelist? Personally, I think you're smoking crack... at least for a solo onslaught player but without personal knowledge I may be wrong. I am more than a bit skeptical about your "craft" argument. Man, this duelist class must be able to use any freakin set of affixes at all for that to be true.

One thing that would really help is to increase the amount of base life you get from Strength. This would help Melee characters the most, but will also still help all other character as well without changing Kaom's much.

"

Tyronis3 wrote:

One thing that would really help is to increase the amount of base life you get from Strength. This would help Melee characters the most, but will also still help all other character as well without changing Kaom's much.

I thought about this as well. GGG could:

1) Reduce the bonus from gear
2) Increase the amount you get at Level-up and from Strength
3) Make nodes more beefy and reduce their numbers because there are too many underwhelming ones. In short, there shouldn't be a bunch of 6% nodes but a couple of 12-18% ones here and there. This can apply to other types as well.

This will achieve the following:

- A better balance since characters won't rely on gear too much and can keep their gear for a little longer until they can find something to replace it.

- Better sense of progression because with bigger stat boosts on level-ups, having meatier nodes, and reducing the clutter of weak or boring ones, leveling will feel more meaningful than it it now, which is currently something like this: *ding* "Ok, cool, now I can use that gem and spend this point and the next three on a couple of STR/INT/DEX nodes or a few measly bonuses before I get to the 'strong' one."

"

snapple99 wrote:

"

Snorkle_uk wrote:

Picking life + armour with IR + elemental weapon based builds, starting as something like a duelist will let you go through the whole game and into maps using just 4 link skills and gear you can find/craft

Interesting. I have never found ANY usable rare... 4 link or otherwise. I'd consider 4 link usable at level 69... barely but still usable. I've just never seen such a thing. Perhaps it's worth trying a duelist? Personally, I think you're smoking crack... at least for a solo onslaught player but without personal knowledge I may be wrong. I am more than a bit skeptical about your "craft" argument. Man, this duelist class must be able to use any freakin set of affixes at all for that to be true.

obviously rng is a factor, and I do agree with the larger point that rng is too too harsh in this game. I gave up playing in the new leagues because I got sick of having unlinked gear and constantly running out of chroms trying to get my sockets right for my skills etc. But I was in maps at this point with 2 characters who had the potential to farm myself out of the hole with rarity gear.

My 4 links I crafted. I agree it can be bs crafting them, I quit the leagues because of this even though anarchy was awesome with the exiles. So dont feel like I am undermining your point, I agree largely with your sentiments. But player to player for your own success and enjoyment Im saying until the situation is sorted out, there are strats that can help. Theres a reason ele cleavers are great in races, theres a reason why, despite often poor late game dps, bow users are so widely seen. Use of weapon ele gems maximises damage from rings, amulet, gloves, belt, auras etc, use of IR makes all evasion, armour and hybrid gear usable, the lack of damage needed from tree to get going allows you to invest heavily in survivability. Use of blood magic removes a need for mana leech gems or any speccing into mana late game.

Can you out dps a righteous fire low shav shavs + maligaros + dream fragments + rainbow stride crit based caster in lvl77 maps? No. But you can wipe out lvl66 maps with 2x 4 links and relatively common gear, giving you a chance to actually find a shavs and get to where you want to be. Skill + Wed + Faster Attacks + Life Leech / Iron Reflexes / Blood Magic / Trolls Blood + Gollems Blood / Catalyse and maybe Amplify if you are using cleave or roa. Its not original, its not clever, its not that powerful, but it is comparatively reliable from a clean start.

"

Vegnarus wrote:

I'm certain that the devs can see that the criticism made by people is not unreasonable.

Actually, it IS unreasonable. The problem is that as soon as I say "self-found" what I'm saying is that I want to play a different game than POE. The barter economy is a core part of their Vision(tm) -- obviously. Everything is balanced to it and it is the single most powerful dynamic in the game. You can't hardly think they failed to notice that.

Also, note that Snorkle_uk, above, mentions there may be a build which can use damned near anything under the sun and solo all the way into maps. To say I'm skeptical of that would be the understatement of the year but without personal testing it's hard to argue against.

"

snapple99 wrote:

"

Vegnarus wrote:

I'm certain that the devs can see that the criticism made by people is not unreasonable.

Actually, it IS unreasonable. The problem is that as soon as I say "self-found" what I'm saying is that I want to play a different game than POE. The barter economy is a core part of their Vision(tm) -- obviously. Everything is balanced to it and it is the single most powerful dynamic in the game. You can't hardly think they failed to notice that.

Also, note that Snorkle_uk, above, mentions there may be a build which can use damned near anything under the sun and solo all the way into maps. To say I'm skeptical of that would be the understatement of the year but without personal testing it's hard to argue against.

Thank God I picked the sarcasm in your post 'cause I actually thought you were serious! =P The suggestions are sound but the problem is getting through the vitriol from other posters and through the possible rigid thinking of the devs. But seeing how they implemented the controversial Permanent Allocation, along with many other changes, I'd say that they really ARE listening.