Totems making this game too easy?

this aint flamin dude.... just a little heated banter..... haha 8)

if there is no place for that on the forums then i must be in the wrong place.... this is a dark fantasy game right? Not a flamboyant toonfest?

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Rix2k wrote:

who the f*** needs balancing in a Action RPG?

no class need a nerf only a buff....

and anyway everyone can build a totem whats ur problem?
if u dont want to play with a totem u dont have to cry oO

biggest hate in a game is allways changing things buff/nerf politics like WoW or other mmorpgs. nobody need that in a Action RPG.

btw pvp is for fun in this game, not for league.

Not to try and change the subject or anything. But as a diamond supporter don't u think you are kinda setting a bad example with outburts like this. I mean you guys should be pillars of the community idk maybe im crazy... I would think people that spent all the money would care alittle more then this master peace you wrote out sir...

I'm not worried about totems, or any other flavor of the week build, making the game too easy, I'm concerned that it will make it too hard.

There are numerous fringe builds, borderline viable at present but fun to play, if the common builds make hash of the difficulty then it is possible the difficulty will be increased in response, making the borderline fringe builds non-viable.

I'm hoping that GGG will treat the nerf/buff tools as delicate precision instruments and not make wild, large, adjustments that throw everything out of kilter; fixing one problem and creating ten others, reducing the number of viable builds.

The main problem with totems is they make you immune to reflect damage mobs and in hardcore this is a fairly big deal and makes hardcore cheesy. It is what makes totem builds so vastly overpowered is that you can add a lot more damage and crit and not worry about being killed by a reflect damage mob. reflect damage should either hit the totem caster or something needs to be added to stop the totem user from cheesing this mechanic.

The other issue is the ability to use two totems with no drawbacks with the totems using skills.

This means two totems end up doing twice the damage a player can do casting the spell by himself, while still leaving him to cast curses and spells while the totems autofire.
This is what makes totems so mandatory at the end game is they outdps any other spec by a huge margin while doing it with vastly less risk. It wouldn't even be as bad if you couldn't use a decoy totem at the same time, but dual totems and a decoy totem is just op there is not getting around that.

Its not a hard fix. They need to add a drawback or remove the second totem as well as nerf the base damage on spell totem like it is on the other totem ie 50% cast speed and 40% less damage, that or allow us to have full strength arrow/wand totems. That would bring the balance in line with something that is still very very strong but not being vastly superior to every other option out there.

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SunandSteel71 wrote:

this aint flamin dude.... just a little heated banter..... haha 8)

if there is no place for that on the forums then i must be in the wrong place.... this is a dark fantasy game right? Not a flamboyant toonfest?

You need to have a smoke break, or simply dont post. If your not old enough to smoke, try a nap.

Seriously, OP just asked a question, thought, impression about a topic and you talk smack. Give your input without the useless BS, this is Beta feedback ... /facepalm.

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I had a similar thought that spamming certain type of totems are a requirement, without another option. I think this is a similar line of thought as OP, that totems are so good that other options aren't viable - which i dont think is the case in PoE.

I just think some people are laaazy j/k - and totems work well for them :P

Time and mana appear the main drawbacks, although some dudes saying arc totems are OP - hm.

P.S im surprised GGG haven't muted adults who act like kids from the forums, especially in this thread.

The problem with the "not a requirement" argument is that things don't have to be a requirement to be a significant balance issue. Totems aren't required, my marauder can still complete maps okay with a plain 2H sweep build, but my dual totem witch completes them faster, with less risk, with worse gear, and with more freedom to stack mf, meaning totems not being required is irrelevant when they're still so much more efficient. Just because you can complete the content with a non-totem build doesn't make totems not seriously unbalanced.

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thisbutironically wrote:

The problem with the "not a requirement" argument is that things don't have to be a requirement to be a significant balance issue. Totems aren't required, my marauder can still complete maps okay with a plain 2H sweep build, but my dual totem witch completes them faster, with less risk, with worse gear, and with more freedom to stack mf, meaning totems not being required is irrelevant when they're still so much more efficient. Just because you can complete the content with a non-totem build doesn't make totems not seriously unbalanced.

true

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thisbutironically wrote:

my marauder can still complete maps okay with a plain 2H sweep build, but my dual totem witch completes them faster, with less risk, with worse gear, and with more freedom to stack mf, meaning totems not being required is irrelevant when they're still so much more efficient. Just because you can complete the content with a non-totem build doesn't make totems not seriously unbalanced.

I hear what you're saying but is that an issue with Totems, Witches or a combination of both?

I wonder how a Ranger or Mara would go with your Witches items and dual totems?

Prolly a silly thing to test ingame but I'm pretty sure that the difficulties in accessing passive nodes like spell dmg, faster casting, faster projectile etc would see Spell Totems fall in line with more people expectations of balance.

I think it's the synergies that Witches get, (and somewhat for Shadows and Templars too), from their skill tree that have helped to tip Totems into the unbalanced category. Take those synergies away and Spell Totems would be fine.

Maethorr pretty much has it right. Having one Spell Totem isn't OP. Having two Totems isn't OP, unless they're Spell Totems. (Decoy Totem isn't OP; it's a great survival skill but it's mediocre at best for speed runs.) However, having two Spell Totems is kind of OP right now. The only thing I think Maethorr got wrong is that having Decoy Totem on top of 2 Spells is really that big of a deal; the 2 Spells are the injury and the Decoy on top is merely an insult.

I think the best fix would be to turn Extra Totem into a keystone (it deserves it!) and give it an appropriate keystone drawback. My recommendation: 30% less Totem damage. This wouldn't nerf anyone who doesn't pick up the passive, and a lot of other dual-totem tricks (Decoy, Rejuvination, knockback on Shockwave, etc.) wouldn't suffer collateral damage. Also, going double-totem for faster clearing would still be possible (theoretically going from 100% to 140% combined totem damage), but it would be noticeably less OP than it is now; I don't want the double Spell Totem build nerfed into oblivion, I just want other options to compete better.

It is definitely an issue with totems and not with the witches or synergies, the synergies are perfectly balanced when used with a skill like arc/fp/spark as a main attack. In fact without the synergies it would make any other witch build except totems completely unable to play at the endgame.
If you look at it just a spark or arc witch is well balanced with a ranger or a mara. The issue is when you add the totems.

There are quite a few ways to fix it, the first is that the spell totem should have the same drawbacks as the arrow/wand totem which is half attack speed and 40% less damage, That would go a long way to balancing them by itself.




The other thing is the combo of spell totem and decoy totem, they need to be an either or thing, you shouldn't be able to use both at once, this would balance a lot of the cheesiness from the build by itself if mobs would actually target the totems, I think it only really ends up an issue in hardcore, if they made reflect damage target the totem caster they could always leave the ability to use both at once in as well. The issue that with both totems you gain the ability to not have mobs constantly attacking you and you are able to avoid the reflect damage mechanic, which in hardcore and races is a fairly big deal.

Their also needs to be a downside to the second totem keystone, for being a unique keystone it needs to have a downside for balance, it really limits people from making shadow casters because of it. Lastly is that it needs to be at a central location. There are a lot of different specs and classes that would get use of the totems but its prohibitively located for someone like a bow ranger to even thing about using two bow totems.