General 0.3.0 Feedback
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I feel like I do this every patch now, but I like making one passive post with all of my feedback regarding balance, progression, and such.
What's Changed for me from 0.2.0 (Prev thread for context)
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I am overall happier with the game. Between Asnyc Trade and the adjustment to currencies and crafting in general, it feels great to trade for and craft items.
The ability to craft alone as made the patch more enjoyable for me personally, as I've been able to craft most of my gear from scratch, either to save currency or just for fun. This is quite the jump from how I played before, where I mainly played SSF in a Trade League, using only the Currency Exchange. Not having to deal with scammers, Price Fixers, etc (at least in the same capacity) and making it easier to also sell items with little friction has made it far and away the best patch so far. Even if I were to play in SSF, the experience would still be great, with the added crafting options. I wouldn't get to use them quite as often as in a trade league, but just having the option is a huge leap forward. Abyss
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Overall, I'm very happy with Abyss, to the point where I strongly feel the systems of Abyss need to go core. Not only for Crafting and SSF reasons, but just overall with gameplay and how it interacts with different existing mechanics.
If it does go core, I'd like it to be able to interact with Ritual, providing more access to the Omens, if not as part of a patch during the 0.3 cycle. While this occasionally would dilute the pool of Ritual rewards, more access to the Abyss Omens outside of random drops would be welcomed. One pain point I still have with Abyss is specifically the Shadewalker Monster Modifier. This single affix is by far the most annoying and unbalanced modifier to be added to the pool. Honestly, this modifier should be split in two.. Having a monster teleport on top of us with a high damage aura that also prevents any kind of recovery is just a recipe for disaster. It's like "Shroud Walker" and "Prevent recover above 50%" were mashed together, which is already a pretty unfun combination in itself, but then amped up to prevent all recovery AND deal high DoT. This creates what is easily one of the most anti-melee monster modifiers. While also not a massive problem for builds that have AoE, Undying Will can also be painful to encounter sometimes. This feels like a permanent "Periodic Invulnerability" aura, though with a smaller area. If, for some reason, the enemy with this aura cannot be targeted or damaged, this becomes very unfun to deal with. Say, in combination with "Proximal Tangibility", it doesn't matter if you can survive the protected enemies anymore; if enemies affected by Undying Will surround you and you cannot reach the monster with the aura by any means, you're effectively softlocked. Leaving the only option of logging out and back in to your hideout/town to escape. There's a reason the basic version has downtime. The last point for Abyss, at least until covering crafting stuff later, is that there are so many modifiers that even over the ~150 hours I've gotten in since league start, I've only seen once or twice at most, and generally only as natural spawns in Abyssal Depths. Modifiers like Eruption of Souls, Unstable Revanants, and Lifestealer Aura. These effects are so uncommon that they weren't even listed on the wiki at all during the first week of the league, and some are still missing information currently. Crafting
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Overall very happy with the direction of crafting, its actually in a place where it's feasible to more or less, deterministically craft a variety of endgame items. This is exactly what POE2 needed. That said, there are still some improvements left to be made.
Greater and Perfect Currency
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These are phenomenal additions to the game, offering a great way to enable high end crafting. That said, some Greater currencies could stand to be a little less rare than they are in the endgame, namely Greater Regals/Exalts. These are often the "budget" option for high-end crafts, but they don't feel quite plentiful enough to want to commit to using them regularly.
But outside of these two, every other basic currency feels great to use, and drops are more or less an expected rate. Essences
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Essences are great in their current iteration. All of them feel impactful and have their uses, except for the Perfect Essences of Insulation, Grounding, Thawing, and Opulence.
Outside of maybe some ultra-niche build on Chronomancer, Recoup still doesn't feel like it's in a great place. The Perfect Essence of Ruin, at least, has its place in CI builds. IF the elemental versions were similar, that at least opens up unique synergies for things like mitigating phys damage or even triggering other bonuses through self-damage converted to an element. The Perfect Essence of Opulence feels like a throwaway. What modifier would someone even want to give up in favor of finding slightly more Gold? I feel like there has to be a more interesting modifier that could be made to at least synergize with something. Something like "Increased Rarity of Item from Chests" as a suggestion to throw there. This would at least have some synergy with Strongboxes and be worth at least some consideration. Omens
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With the addition and removal of some Omens, these are in a much better spot overall. They enable a lot of high-end crafting, with some of the more impactful ones not being obscenely expensive.
I'm not entirely sure why the decision to remove Dextral/Sinistral Coronation was made, though. Combined with Homogenising Coronation, these would have similar (but lesser) value as their Exaltation counterparts. They'd be a great alternative to using Essences to add a second or third modifier if our item either doesn't have a practical Essence to use, or we have a modifier we'd want more of. I'm still not sure why Omen of Refreshment exists either. I guess it's an okay pairing with Resurgence, but there doesn't seem to be much of a demand for it, and it just feels like filler atm. Also kinda of disappointing that Ritual Altars don't have a chance of rolling Abyss Omens when an Abyss spawns near any of the altars. I feel like it's a missed opportunity to expand the Abyss mechanics. Recombination
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While not touched directly, Recombination did see some indirect buffs and nerfs from the other crafting changes.
It pairs exceptionally well with Perfect Orb of Transmutation and Augmentation, to try and set up great crafting bases without simply spamming Orbs of Annulment. However, with the changes to Essences, this is still a less desirable option, as the grand majority of Essences only interact with Magic Items now. Even if we deliberately choose a Prefix and a Suffix, the resulting item is always Rare, despite fitting the limitations of a Magic Item. Plus, while it is almost certainly just a balancing thing, the low odds of recombining the higher-tier mods are still awful. Even with the Omen of Recombination in play (which is a very helpful addition, btw), the base odds are generally so low that it's still not really helping the system work in our favor. I'll still look towards a system I mentioned before, where the floor is partially determined by the number of modifiers in play. A Limit of ~10% for any Prefix+Suffix recombination, 7.5% for recombining two Prefix/Suffix, 5% for any three mods split 2:1, and no floor for triple Prefix/Suffix or 4+ mods. With odds even being sort of reasonable at 10%, the Omen is effectively bumping that up to a 19% chance. This would bring more value to this omen and Recombination as more than a way to gamble when starting a craft. Endgame
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I won't go into any crazy depth here, but since Endgame is going to be a big focus of 0.4, I wanted to give my current thoughts.
edit: I've updated this section to also talk about 0.3.1 changes where relevant Towers, Tablets, Atlas
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0.3.1 fixed a lot of the issues, though it introduced some new ones. The control (and freedom) offered by the updated system is fantastic. It's nice not to have to run a worse layout, simply because RNG determined that it would get the tablet benefits.
As I thought prior to the patch going live, it seems rolling good tablets is just as painful, if not worse, as it ever was. At least with the control over the tablets, it's slightly balanced by sustain generally being better, though some precursor tablets Azmeri Spirits
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While there are some exceptionally powerful talismans and such offered by Spirits, they're slow, and still generally feel unrewarding. Thankfully, 0.3.1 at least made it possible to interact with them on a more consistent basis, so that's one issue taken care of.
They feel like they're meant to be POE2's version of Tormented Spirits, while using Wildwood Wisps as a base. And honestly, without the same level of general persistence as the Wisps or the means to invest in them like Tormented Spirits via the Atlas to make them more appealing, they fall flat. We honestly need something to the effect of the Speaker of the Dead (For Tormented Spirit) atlas passive from POE1 for them. Having the spirit attach to us for a duration and provide a loot drop when it expires would likely resolve MANY of the issues this mechanic is plagued by. It fixes the issues with speed, and likely the resulting rewards too, as we're not forced to settle with one Rare, or two if we're lucky and trigger the chance for it to be released. This already exists to a limited extent on the Rite of Passage Golden Charm, just acting solely as a buff, rather than a way to interact with this mechanic. Rogue Exiles
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Rogue Exiles can be fairly rewarding in the endgame, especially with Abyss. 0.3.1 made it more consistent to engage with them as well, though the tablet modifier for this is still exceedingly rare.
Even when invested in, their spawn rate is so low without a Tablet. Even the 0.3.1 map content changes haven't made their natural occurrence common enough to not require the tablet. At least with the improved crafting that came with 0.3.0, they can be a good source of higher Item Level Bases for crafting. This is arguably where most of their value currently lies, since the odds of them wearing any valuable or interesting uniques are exceptionally low. Shrines and Strongboxes
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Putting these together as they're both fairly common with and without any investment but provide the same safe and consistent bonuses throughout endgame. Wouldn't be opposed to more unique strongboxes, though.
Breach
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Breach feels like it's in a weird place since its previous changes. It's fairly consistent, but doesn't feel as rewarding as it used to without running Xesht.
The same also goes for the Catalysts. They used to be very common even in lower-tier maps; now it's rare to see them even in T15/16 maps. The main source of them seems to be the huge pile that drops just before Xesht. Much like a lot of currency drops, they're too heavily affected by Rarity. No rarity, no Catalysts. Expedition
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Expedition still feels fairly consistent and rewarding. It would be nice to see Splinter be able to drop at a low rate outside of Logbooks, though. Either just as part of the drop tables or perhaps as a point to invest in.
Extreme Archaeology is quite fun to obtain early on, making it generally quicker to complete early expeditions. It's not really an endgame thing, but why does the effective introduction to Expedition in Act 4 (Plunder's Point) get completely wasted if a character were to die? Kind of defeats the purpose if there are no respawns or retries. Delirium
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It's there, it exists, and is useful. Also quite consistently rewarding, assuming characters can handle the effects applied by delirium. It's another endgame mechanic heavily influenced by rarity.
Ritual
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With the addition and removal of some Omens, Ritual is far more rewarding on a more consistent basis now. It's a little unfortunate that the Sinistral/Dextral Coronation Omens were removed when they'd also be useful.
I'll still continue to hate the weird Area Level 80 restriction put on some of the good omens. It makes them far more scarce than they should be. At least with the 0.3.1 changes, we can at least guarantee Ritual Maps are Irratidated. Balance (sort of)
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Not really going super deep on overall balance here, just talking about classes I've played this patch or have taken time to revisit in standard.
Hollow Palm Ice Strike Witchhunter [0.3]
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My starter for the league, has been super fun and scaled well all the way into endgame. Some modifiers are still hell for Melee, but DPS is high enough and in combination with the extra explosions, clearing packs and single target alike are a breeze.
Only Issue I've had is where my character will just fail to jump to targets with both Ice Strike and Shattering Palm. Not entirely sure what causes this, but it does make the build a little clunky when it occurs. Probably worth stating again though that Shade Walker is not a fun enemy modifier to deal with, and melee builds suffer the most. Elemental Sundering Minion Lich [0.3]
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Had high hopes for this, but Elemental Sundering just doesn't work with Ice Armor from Frost Mages as I expected it to.
It absolutely should, and it's disappointing this skill continues to be forgotten. This could have been such a cool interaction for it to help bring it some consistency in light of nothing providing a super consistent ignite anymore. I've at least pivoted to using all three Elemental skeletons for now to try and make it work, and it is very satisfying when it works. Please, fix the interaction with Ice Armor to work with this skill, and it'll feel like a solid build. Firestorm Stormweaver [0.3]
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Build is fun and great for bosses, but Firestorm still doesn't feel like the main skill of the build, despite that being the intention. Almost feels more like a Living Bomb build honestly.
It's incredibly inconsistent without Fire Infusions, and lacks damage without the others. Fire Infusions also increases the size of the storm, but not the bolts, which hurts its ability to actually be a main skill. It spreads out the damage, but makes the overall area coverage much worse. It also relies on the other Infusions to be able to fully leverage Trinity for damage, but without Elemental Equilibrium or Refracted Infusion, it's incredibly hard to generate Cold Infusions. There needs to be more options besides Frost Bomb that don't rely on having to freeze an enemy, like Elemental Siphon or Snap. Despite some of the Ascendancies Stormweaver has, it's really only gaining benefits from Constant Gale /Force of Will (due to it being a MoM build) and Multiplying Squalls for extra burst with Unleash Firestorm. Probably going to do another thread at some point talking about this Ascendancy. Doedre's Undoing Lich [0.3]
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This has been by far one of the most enjoyable builds I've made and played this league. It hit all the right marks and feels very similar to the Vixen's Entrapment build in POE1 that I also enjoyed.
The AoE and damage are good with relatively low investment, which allows it to work right from Level 65. It scales well with investment, letting it even handle bosses with the right upgrades. I regret not starting this over Hollow Palm, and that's saying something, given how powerful Hollow Palm can be. Explosive Concoction [0.3 / Std]
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Wasn't expecting this to be as good as it had been in the past, but despite not massively improving its stats, Hollow Palm does return them to some semblance of their former glory. This is because it actually allows them to use Heralds and Wind Dancer once more, which they were previously unable to do due to Unarmed not being considered a martial weapon. They finally have a reason to get extra spirit once again.
It makes me a bit sad that Thunderfist wasn't given a generic Unarmed Crit Chance bonus, rather than a melee-specific version. However, it is one more tool that concotions can use to improve their clear speed alongside the new Nova Projectiles. They still severely lack any amount of Level scaling beyond Amulets, not even seeming to have access to Prism of Belief. They also have quality listed in the game, but still cannot be given quality by any means other than passives afaik. Otherwise, definitely feels a lot more viable than it has in the past. A lot of unintentional support for the archetype, but nothing to truly help it shine bright. They'll always feel like a generally weaker playstyle, especially now in the current game state where it's fairly easy to gear up and buy/craft insane items. Essence Drain Lich [0.3 / Std]
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Leveled the minion Lich with this, no doubts that it holds up in the endgame as it always has. Definitely given a real chance to shine this league with the extra density around Abysses
Archmage Spark [0.3 / Std]
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Base on its performance as a filler damage option for the Firestorm Build, and new supports like Vilenta's Propulsion helping it out, it's definitely going to be a strong option. Not entirely sure if Archmage would be viable still, given that it seems much harder to reach higher levels of mana.
Minion/Totem Tactician [0.3 / Std]
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A Friend has been playing a build with the new mortar cannon that just does obscene damage, so it's safe to say this is in a better place this patch, and most of the related builds were ironed out by the scaling changes.
Incinerate Pathfinder [Std]
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Untested, as the Flammability changes (particularly with consumed ignite) interact just doesn't feel like it'd do the things I want it to do. Not bad by any means, especially if converting to Chaos and just focusing on the raw damage portion of the skill.
Twister Ritualist [Std]
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Given it relied on Whirling Slash for mobility and to carry elemental ground around more consistently, and both of those aspects have been nerfed, I'm hesitant to touch it ever again. Maybe it'll see a resurgence like Spark did.
Boneshatter Titan [Std]
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Just as good, if not better than it ever was. I just don't find Warrior that enjoyable.
Glacial Bolt Merc [Std]
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Played with it a bit while testing for a different build idea, does not feel good nor consistent without the support of Siege Ballistae or Mortar Cannon.
It can still be fun, but the strength it had for bossing potential is all but removed. Multi-shot doesn't do the back-to-back shots anymore, crystals do less damage when they immediately explode, and just so much extra jank to it that it's not worth it. Last edited by GnRGaming#4085 on Oct 6, 2025, 8:20:12 AM Last bumped on Oct 6, 2025, 7:33:56 AM
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In light of the upcoming 0.3.1 patch, I've adjusted some of the thoughts here for Endgame. I've also adjusted my notes for the builds I've played in the balance section (multiple times since the original post actually!).
0.3.1 sounds like a major improvement overall, but I'm interested to see what other changes and fixes are coming along with that. |
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I agree with most of this, except;
1. Not all crafting was great, Homogenous crafting in particular is too generally powerful when we have all these good guaranteed slams from essences etc., and I would rather have those slams than homogenous crafting. It makes too many types of rare items found on the ground far less valuable. I do not sell many rares this league. While I don't like ID'ing rares too much, I still think the main draw of blasting PoE2 for me was the possibility of finding close to mirror rares just on the ground. It is also a bit too powerful to have deterministic movespeed and 100% effect of socketed items on boots, it just makes non-exceptional boots worthless. 2. Abyss mobs being dangerous is one of the things I've enjoyed the most about late-game in 0.3. While it's a bit insane, there has to be insane things to kill strong characters. When I run abyss I am really wired in compared to other content. I do not like the idea of nerfing them to be just another rare essentially. |
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" While I agree with Homogenous Exaltation being powerful, until we have other means of crafting available, it's nice to have crafting not just simply boil down to luck. It still takes a degree of knowledge to get the most out of it, which crafting sorely lacked before this. I don't think it takes away from ground loot being valuable either. Because you can still luck into something that's good enough to use as-is, but can still craft on it to improve it without much reliance on luck. Most of the useful omens are cheap to buy, or common enough to find in rituals. I don't mind the Abyss Monsters being deadly, but some modifiers are a little over-tuned and shouldn't go core as-is. Just the couple I called out are the only major problems I've had out of all the modifiers they do have. They have plenty of great damage modifiers and such that could be bumped up slightly, as they are both dangerous and have counterplay outside of playing a completely different build.iii |
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