Energy Shield and Life

"

Smear wrote:

You're witnessing the beginning of the end of PoE.

Most likely the unfortunate truth.

WAIT ! WHAT ?!!

They are NERFING the ES instead of BOASTING IT ?!

Now this is just sad. GGG pidgeonholing players into life builds... Reminds me of a certain company that does the same thing with one of their games... *cough* Blizzard *cough*

On a side note: R.I.P. Energy Shield. We will miss you for being awesome, and for making Low Life builds a possibility.


Edit: Witches don't exist anymore, since they are the poster child for Energy Shield builds.

Holy hell !

Are You GGG guys for real ?!

I am full life build, and I can clearly state 1 LIFE = 1.5 up 2.5 ES, and You are nerfing it ?!

WHY ?!

Great news, f*ck the ES boring builds. Some people are crying but they are playing with the same ES builds, even with same items

I have a few main thoughts on the rebalance...

• ES has been massively overpowered for ages, to the point where taking anything other than a 5-digit ES VP+GR build has been nothing more than a self-imposed "challenge." It's NOT fun for a game to basically tell you "we sold you the game on all these choices, but you're only going to do well if you take one very specific choice." It means the game isn't doing well what it's SUPPOSED to do well. I play Path of Exile to have a game where I can get creative, and win based upon my skill... But often enough, the key to success for ANYONE is NOT "git gud," but instead "copy the meta and you'll never have to git gud."
  
  
• My main concern is whether the rebalance will be precise enough. GGG, at least, does recognize that technically, there should be ES builds out there that are NEITHER LL or CI; this includes both ES+evasion and ES+armour builds, as well as those that build just ES and Life. Under the current regime, they're VERY unviable to build; worse than going pure evasion or pure armour, and that much further beneath CI & LL. GGG needs to ensure that they don't hurt these builds even MORE, even if they fail to make them more on a par with the "pure" builds.
  
  
• Naturally, it's always a concern on whether a rebalance ("nerf") might get more over-zealous; somewhat hand-in-hand with the above, there's a question of who might be negatively affected that wasn't part of the problem to begin with. If we're talking statistical distribution, the problematic builds/characters are those at the tail end of the curve; those that are well above the rest of the possible range.
  
  In this regard, I do question the wisdom of a direct (especially non-retro) nerf to ES mods. The fact that it leaves some (now VERY powerful) legacies will be problematic for Standard, given that's now the biggest league, NOT the challenge league. (consequences of a maturing game) As it's easier to alt on a single high-tier defense mod over getting a rare with multiple mods of the right type, I fear this may actually stratify gear a bit MORE, placing an even-higher necessity (and hence premium) on the high-end gear.
  
  
• And again, I do hope that GGG doesn't make the mistake they made back in 2.3.0 just to get at the ONE singular build (Voltaxic Spark) that was upsetting the game's balance. That was a really ham-fisted change that inadvertently ruined two of my characters, making them almost entirely unviable, while barely bringing Voltaxic Sparkers back in line; we saw a lot of 'em until the streamers got bored with that and moved onto Blade Vortex.
  
  One major thing to consider is the difference in ES users, which can, in a way, all be broken into categories by what their chestpiece is:
  • LL users with a Shavronne's Wrappings. A few seasons ago, this was the main meta, and they're still pretty popular/viable, owing to stacking 10+ auras at once.
  • CI users with an 850+ ES Vaal Regalia. By FAR the meta defense build since the beginning of 2.4.0. Easily builds 15,000-20,000 total hits, and combined with GR+VP, basically trivializes Shaper and other endgame encounters.
  • Everything else. Literally, every other endgame (T11-T17) build using an ES-providing chest NOT one of the above two can all be put together, and STILL be less common than either of those above, which is problematic when you have uniques like The Beast Fur Shawl and Infernal Mantle, alongside hybrid defense (ES+armour or ES+evasion) chests... To say nothing of the (currently useless) ES+max life chests. GGG needs to make sure they don't shove THESE chestpieces even further into the abyss in their effort to put Vaal Regalia and Shav's in their proper place.
  
  
• Lastly, the outpouring of salt from players that, at a glance, relied on cookie-cutter meta to be hilarious.

"

Smear wrote:

Actually, by killing a large chunk of the player base's builds, you might as well say "RIP fucking PoE".

Because when all this silly nerfing is over, the only thing left will be vanilla players with no desire to excel at the game.

Or rather, "RIP all the players that can't think for themselves and have to rely on copy-paste builds." And trust me, it won't be so bad; give it a couple of weeks and the streamers will have another build for you to copy-paste and redo Quid with.

"

BlazeSTX wrote:

They are NERFING the ES instead of BOASTING IT ?!

Well, the fact that you wrote "boasting" instead of "Boosting" speaks volumes... Also, you didn't read the Manifesto, did you? ES (and CI+GR+VP in particular) has been wildly overpowered since at least the beginning of Atlas of Worlds.

"

ThorTX wrote:

I am full life build, and I can clearly state 1 LIFE = 1.5 up 2.5 ES, and You are nerfing it ?!

Well, if you'd noted how builds work, or even read what they said... Even if we took "1 life = 2.5 ES," the balance is still whack since you can relatively easily fit 25,000 ES on a character without sacrificing clear speed, while GGG notes the theoretical cap for a useless rock is around 9,000 life.

Given the practical cap while still retaining viable clear speed is closer to 5,000 life, (most of my life-based builds land very close to this!) by that measure ES should cap out around only 7,500-12,500, or in other words, half or less of what they do currently.

"

ACGIFT wrote:

I have a few main thoughts on the rebalance...

• ES has been massively overpowered for ages, to the point where taking anything other than a 5-digit ES VP+GR build has been nothing more than a self-imposed "challenge." It's NOT fun for a game to basically tell you "we sold you the game on all these choices, but you're only going to do well if you take one very specific choice."

• 
  that's nonsense. There will always be a best build. And a small group of slightly inferior builds that are 2nd tier, with the rest falling off more or less quickly. Hierarchies are fun not balance.
  
  Ive played games since 97 and every good game ive played until today had major imbalances in it. It is often that only a few things win out you should not be able to just do whatever.
  
  Which exposes this balance mania as an endless nerf train that never ends until every build is the same and it doesnt matter what you build because you get a guarantee for success by design in the name of build diversity. fuck that shit
  

u pussy wizzards still crying lol

Passive tree didnt changed, life node still far from grouping and still need waste 80% our node to get few life mode... %life didnt buffed at all and no change per level/base life buff.

Trolling again huh ?