Balance Changes in Path of Exile: Betrayal

Ggg you are literally "blizzard-ing" us by giving us things we do not want. If you wanted to take away stat sticks fine but you needed to add more damage to make melee builds viable endgame. 2h is near completely uselesss as well and very few builds are ok and even still surpassed by 1h. Why now have we decided lets kill off every single melee build and focus on making community only have spellcasting choices? Bad move for BALANCE.

What are you doing GGG, please stop binding ascendancies to spells/spell types! Nobody asked for that and nobody wants that! We want to keep our freedom, not lose more of it. I love playing Spellzerkers and all the cool stuff you are trying to limit again... Just don't do it. Also, either buff melee or we will run out of melee players. I was decided to play melee yesterday, read the balance changes and I already know I can't play melee because I would fall way too back in the ladder. It just isn't rewarding this way. I wanna play more melee and more fun self-cast spells. I am really getting bored of all the totems and other stuff. The moment I saw winter orb I knew it is just another totem-like spell I don't care about because I want ACTUAL spells.

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LovieNeverDies wrote:

Molten Strike was the most popular melee skill used in Delve by FAR, well above the next skill combination of Reave/Blade Flurry.

Heck, even Frost Blades was in the top 40 most used skills in Delve.

You should probably either look harder or stop exaggerating. GGG knows how to make a good melee skill that doesn't need a stat stick (read: Molten Strike), they just need to figure out how to do that for more melee skills (read: make them faster / hit multiple times per skill use).

For god's sake, CYCLONE was STILL top 20 in terms of skills used AFTER being nerfed AND being a primarily 2H skill.

People saying, "I can't find a melee build that doesn't stat stick," are either lying or not looking hard enough.

The most boring skill in the game that people loathe about using and is used only to showcase big damage numbers on 100 EX investment. Never have I even considered making a build with Molten Strike because it's just so unimaginative and insanely boring from every aspect of it. Yeah, it was used because it was OP.

Cyclone is the literal opposite, it's fun but again, people loathe about using it because it's weak.

Frostblade was in TOP 40? Out of 42 skills?!
And Sweep was top 41 out of 42 skills?! GGG Truly fixed the balance! Sign me up for Betrayal!

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John_Ra wrote:

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Songweaver wrote:

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silvanesti123 wrote:

Hi, I wanted to play ARC totem hierophant in 3.5 for the first time, but i don't really understand changes that have been made. Instead of placing 3+1 totems I will be able to place 3x2 totems or what?

You no longer get +1 to maximum number of totems summoned. Instead, you place 2 totems per cast, instead of placing 1.

Yes.
And this is a nerf.

And GGG introduced it as a boof at first time
With the new supported skill gems

I get ya .G

Alright, seems interesting.

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rahven32 wrote:

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I_NO wrote:

You're inexperienced.

Another insightful comment from you. Instead of piling on shaper stats you now have to actually craft a weapon that is balanced. So what's the problem. You can still craft a 500+ pdps foil. I never said it wasn't a nerf though. It will be a lot harder to get mirror tier weapons.

Anyone who thought carrying around a couple aura's in your off hand wasn't going to be nerfed was delusional.

I have played this game for about a year now and the highest pDps foil I have personally been able to craft hit 409 pDps.

When you say things like, "You can still craft a 500+ pDps foil," casually as a reply to people complaining about this, you are really not in touch with crafting in this game and how difficult it truly is to make something like that.

Also, the real problem is that you will need to make TWO 500 pDps foils and you'll still be doing about 60% of the DPS you were doing before stat sticks were bricked for melee.

Just so you understand what you are saying, in Standard league, if you search for one handed swords with at least 500 pDps, the first two foils (because let's be serious no one is going to use a Corsair sword over a foil) are listed at 140ex and 195ex.

So yeah, melee is fine, just spend 300+ ex on two items on your DW melee character, that's not a completely ridiculous expectation at all.

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xXx_1 wrote:

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John_Ra wrote:

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Songweaver wrote:

You no longer get +1 to maximum number of totems summoned. Instead, you place 2 totems per cast, instead of placing 1.

Yes.
And this is a nerf.

And GGG introduced it as a boof at first time
With the new supported skill gems

I gey ya .G

That gems adds totems with halved dmg. Even more nerf.
Thats kind of Soul's Wick "improvement" to be straight.
Those well be sooooo popular. Like this jewel..
Similar kind of watering out.

nice material, ggg please change font and colors in patch notes it is hurting my eyes by long reading :P

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I'm also very sure that GGG actually does not have legit / smart play testers and just rely on some random ass feedback that they don't analyze themselves because they don't know any better. When I look all the balance changes and manifestos, it reads out like it was written by some some ultra casual Reddit poster who picks up Armourer Scraps 2 months into league.

Seriously, think, they were "analyzing" for what? 6 months? on how to change stat sticks and THIS was what they came up with? L O L.

All of the changes( aside from CoC) that have been shown so far are something that almost everyone who ACTUALLY PLAY THIS GAME would not want or don't care about at all.

THIS.
Ask if anyone of their staff played 500+ hours in the last league to have that insight.
Simply, they don't.

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Aynix wrote:

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LordVilango wrote:

Rest in RIP almost every melee build

In loving memory of:

Blade Flurry
Reave
Sunder
Tectonic Slam
Smite
Double Strike
Ice Crash
Ground Slam
Consecrated Path
Lacerate

And always remember, It's NERF or nothing.

I played both Ice Crash and Consecrated Path with 2H Staff and I had over 2M Shaper DPS. Just because you suck at the game and cant do anything w/o abusing statsticks doesnt mean melee is dead.

The problem with 2H builds was NEVER damage. It is how poor it feels to play a 2H build and clear maps with a 2H build. It is SLOW compared to literally any other build archetype in the game.

I tried to make a 2H Vaal EQ JUGG using a Brain Rattler and even with over 6.5k life it felt squishy and not mobile enough to escape damage when I needed to, which was pretty often given it is always in danger of being hit with something (the benefits of being melee, yey). I didn't feel confident in T11 Shaped UGS on this build, and it is wearing this:



Just to give you an idea of the level of investment. Even with a near mirror tier 7L hat, EQ just felt bad, slow, and squishy (on a JUGG mind you).

The problem with 2H isn't damage, it never was, it is how the build FEELS to play and how quickly it clears compared to literally every other build archetype in the game (ranged, traps, totems, trigger skills, self-cast, etc).