Unique items and ascendancy classes

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Well, to be honest, it sounds to me like perhaps PoE is not your thing.

Yes, you nailed it. That's why I might come back to test it again in a couple of years, to see if it's slightly more than whatever I'd call it right now (which won't be nice and might give me a temporary ban). I finished the Atlas this league, I consider myself to be sufficiently fulfilled with my progress. Not with the frustration and anger it gave me, though, but at least the experience wasn't completely negative.

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Hitman473107#7521 wrote:

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Well, to be honest, it sounds to me like perhaps PoE is not your thing.

Yes, you nailed it. That's why I might come back to test it again in a couple of years, to see if it's slightly more than whatever I'd call it right now (which won't be nice and might give me a temporary ban). I finished the Atlas this league, I consider myself to be sufficiently fulfilled with my progress. Not with the frustration and anger it gave me, though, but at least the experience wasn't completely negative.

Not everything is for everybody. PoE is an aquired taste to be sure. If you completed the Atlas, it sounds like you did pretty well and had at least some sense of accomplishment.

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There are a lot of more simplistic games out there if you want.

Sorry to jump back in, but I sense a hint of needless ridicule here towards me, so let me address your point. There's nothing special about this game, its gameplay is an unintelligible mess (especially when it comes to any league encounters), where no one can figure out who is hitting who and with what. You just dive in and hope for the best, there's no strategy at all involved. It's way too laggy, especially on the memory-influenced maps, because they decided to add a ton of special effects, as if that would improve the game in any way. It's also laggy because it fills the screen with a ton of enemies, instead of having less (like Diablo does) and scaling their power to end up with the same total. And its difficulty is way over the edge, here and there, no matter how much you try to cover all your gaps. And there are many gaps to cover and not much to cover them with. This is where the problem is, not that there are many holes to cover, but because you don't have enough relevant things to cover a sufficient amount of them. It's not about being complicated, it's just that it lacks imagination, common sense and all the good things that it could have borrowed from its predecessors like Diablo. I'm not looking for simplistic things, just intelligent and feasible enough. Or I just might be bad (in some unexplainable way) at this game and it's actually the best thing that ever existed. I don't really care which one is it, in the end.

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Hitman473107#7521 wrote:

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There are a lot of more simplistic games out there if you want.

Sorry to jump back in, but I sense a hint of needless ridicule here towards me, so let me address your point.

Not ridicule. PoE is incredibly complex and technical. "Simplistic" does not mean negative things. As an example, Tetris is one of my favorite games. It is not terribly complex. It is very simple in strategy and in play control. Simplistic is what it means. "Simple." Simple does not mean "bad."

Path of Exile does not have a "skill tree" - it has a "skill forest." The the equipment has extremely complex interactions with skills and characters stats. Most of the players here love the extreme levels of technicality. But that's not everyone's cup of tea.

Which is also fine. It's good that there are different games for people who wants highly complex mechanical interactions and people who want to throw on some powerful unique items and slay legions of monster without needing a build guide.

There are games out there for all of us to enjoy.

I will note, you don't see me on the blizzard forums asking to make Diablo more complicated. They have their game and their audience, GGG has theirs.

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Path of Exile does not have a "skill tree" - it has a "skill forest."

I agree, that's why I became attracted to it and still am - the potential of countless possibilities. But the thrill of building on top of the tree's complexity is only surpassed by the disappointment of seeing 95% (if not more) of the possibilities bearing little fruit, when matched with the game's actual difficulty. In other words, the system is great in theory, but useless in actual practice. Otherwise, 50% of the possible builds would enjoy this game even with moderate gear, like they would at Diablo. And in my humble opinion, I balanced and optimized every relevant thing that I could, for my latest build, and the experience was far from enjoyable in enough cases. I'd rather have quality over quantity any day. But, again, maybe it's just me. Why are you and others so determined to defend this game, as it is, does it pay your bills or what?

this game can be completed (4 voidstones is my definition of completion) on ANY damaging skill you name, with pretty much any ascendancy choice

you base your experience on your character and project that on others

ubers, deep delve, sanctum etc - are for top investment and/or specialised builds.

but 4 voidstones is possible with solo-self-found gear on ANY damaging skill/class combo you name. there are plenty of 'first time players' completing that on fascinating setups that experienced players would have never tried.


it just requires some knowledge and/or willingness to learn. you try to pretend this game is extremely-random-difficult-punishing but your character you base this on is not geared at all, your tree is all over the place and you seem to be missing A LOT of understanding how mechanics work. there are entry level guides - you might benefit A LOT from them.

if not for the lucky-lucky block you would have never completed atlas - that lucky block carried you despite having gear from late act 6.

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I balanced and optimized every relevant thing that I could, for my latest build, and the experience was far from enjoyable in enough cases

no, you didnt. your character is a total, complete, mess. Gladiator can be build in dozens upon dozens of ways - poe.ninja will show you how others did it (check SSF ladder to not be intimidated with high-end gear). the only good part of that build is the shield, everything else warrants immediate replacement with 1c item from trade or random rare from the floor

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Hitman473107#7521 wrote:

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Path of Exile does not have a "skill tree" - it has a "skill forest."

I agree, that's why I became attracted to it and still am - the potential of countless possibilities. But the thrill of building on top of the tree's complexity is only surpassed by the disappointment of seeing 95% (if not more) of the possibilities bearing little fruit, when matched with the game's actual difficulty. In other words, the system is great in theory, but useless in actual practice. Otherwise, 50% of the possible builds would enjoy this game even with moderate gear, like they would at Diablo. And in my humble opinion, I balanced and optimized every relevant thing that I could, for my latest build, and the experience was far from enjoyable in enough cases. I'd rather have quality over quantity any day. But, again, maybe it's just me. Why are you and others so determined to defend this game, as it is, does it pay your bills or what?

It's a deliberate design decision by the devs. Most Uniques in this particular game are made to change the way a skill or character works, not directly give it power. They wanted power to come from rares, skill-interactions, character build and player made gear. Its works this way because they intended it to.

As to why we defend these design choices, well, I can only speak for myself - I like those choices. PoE is made to appeal to people who enjoy complex system interactions, and is not designed to be maximally accessible.

And there is nothing wrong with that.

Just as there is nothing innately "wrong" with games that are more about tossing on some uniques with stats and resists and slaying a legion of monsters.

Just different preferences for different people.

I'm glad there is a variety.

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Hitman473107#7521 wrote:

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Dude....I am well aware of how the defenses of this game works. I'm not entirely sure you are though.

That's great for you and insignificant for me, since I've done my own research and had my own experience with this game. You and everyone else who write on the internet are simply gods who know everything and are completely right all the time, while I'm just someone who can't tie his shoe laces right. If I had a picture with all of you anonymous individuals, I'd frame it next to Jesus and the other saints. There we go, dismissed.

It must be difficult to be you

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but 4 voidstones is possible with solo-self-found gear on ANY damaging skill/class combo you name.

if not for the lucky-lucky block you would have never completed atlas - that lucky block carried you despite having gear from late act 6.

Wow, it must be great to contradict yourself and even in the same post. On the other hand, your only argument that makes any sense is "better gear", as I've proven time and again in our talks. The skills and gems are well chosen. And why do you keep harassing me everywhere if you're so confident that you're right?

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no, you didnt. your character is a total, complete, mess.

Nah, it's one of the best out there, with the right gear. All your hate and obsession towards my build just reveals jealousy, that's all. You're just fixated and need to snap out of it.

For everyone hating me and my build, I'm still waiting for the precise calculations, between my version and yours. The constraints are - melee physical build, with high phys and bleeding damage, high stun chance, the same attack and movement speed, high chance to block both attacks and spells and even some small amount of life leech for sustenance. Show me what extra life and damage you gain, in order to ensure easier progress and survivability through any encounter, while keeping all the other mentioned advantages and not ending up with any additional disadvantages. And do it only by changing the passive skill tree and skill gems used, since better gear doesn't reflect the ability to build a good character concept and is mostly based on chance and overall gameplay hours spent. If there's no such contribution to the debate, you should ask yourselves why do you still persist in your hate and nonsense? If your version is at least twice higher at the mentioned mechanics (at least max life or dps) and maintains the same other mechanics that I've mentioned unaltered, I'll admit that there are some tricks that I didn't stumble upon and gain valuable experience for any future attempt to finish this game. The poe planner link and the enumeration of the main damaging skills, together with their supports, will suffice, so I can do my own analysis.