What other Ascendancies should be updated?

Gladiator and Assassin, like everyone is saying. Maybe Glad's weapon mastery could include staves and bows? I doubt that's the identity GGG wants with Gladiator. Bleed bow Glad sounds fun.

War of Attrition seems like it's strong for day 1, 2-voidstone runs and then that's about it. Something that's not as useful after a hundred or more divine orbs is put into a build. Challenger charges were way cooler.

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moerutora#4751 wrote:

I mean... Starter Builds Exist for that same reason, no? Do you also agree that all skills should be great at the get go?

I dont think so. I think some Ascendancies should be 'starter' friendly also. Granted, the Assaassin having pretty clunky poison notables isnt ideal and could be changed or elaborated on.

This is the wrong definition of "starter build". Starter builds are only starters because they have 1 of 2 things (or both): easy mechanics and/or low budget to get off the ground. You are loading a LOT of wrong information and conflations into such a simple sentence right there.

They are starters in that you "start" a new league with them because they perform well when you have nothing. That doesn't automatically mean they STOP performing....that's ridiculous. Consider two of the most popular starters of all time, RF and SRS. Both are starters because they are easy to use and easy to get rocking and rolling. And BOTH are also very powerful endgame builds with a few tweaks FROM the starter build variant, and more investment.

But its already true that ALL skills can excel at aspects of all content at any difficulty. Every single one. It's just a matter of budget. There doesn't exist a "starter skill" that literally ONLY exists to be used in the early game. Starter build simply translates to "low budget no dedicated uniques".





Ascendancies are meant to be build-defining choices....not stopgaps or stepping stones. You aren't meant to change ascendancies as swiftly or as readily as changing a skill choice, or even the rest of your entire tree. When an ascendancy such as Assassin (literally the only current example of this) does everything it brings to the table strictly worse than other ascendancies.....there's no reason for it to exist. Which is a major problem.

The starter "classes" are the pre-ascendancies. Or even partial ascendancies in some scenarios of leveling a build. But an entire ascendancy should never be "starter". That doesn't make any sense.....that's such a weird thing to say especially from someone who clearly is experienced at this game.

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moerutora#4751 wrote:

Honestly, I think Assassin is fine. Its a starter class that you can spec out of. I thought the same about Raider - it was fine and then u spec out.

That is a clear sign they're not okay actually. Last change to Assassin was in Blight league... which was in 2019. It even fails being a starter class because if you check any league at any point Assassin will be at the very bottom of the list.

Ascendancies should feel majorly impactful and have enough identity to make you not want to spec out of it.

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ArtCrusade#4438 wrote:

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moerutora#4751 wrote:

Honestly, I think Assassin is fine. Its a starter class that you can spec out of. I thought the same about Raider - it was fine and then u spec out.

That is a clear sign they're not okay actually. Last change to Assassin was in Blight league... which was in 2019. It even fails being a starter class because if you check any league at any point Assassin will be at the very bottom of the list.

Ascendancies should feel majorly impactful and have enough identity to make you not want to spec out of it.

Assassin is easy-cheese Sanctum. It's the easiest variant of Penance Brand to put together in my opinion. Super cheap gear, too. It's an outstanding league starter in that regard.

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Beavith#5056 wrote:

Assassin is easy-cheese Sanctum. It's the easiest variant of Penance Brand to put together in my opinion. Super cheap gear, too. It's an outstanding league starter in that regard.

Sure, but Trickster will still be better with better gear which kinda reinforces my argument? So I'm not sure what to take from your reply honestly?

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ArtCrusade#4438 wrote:

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Beavith#5056 wrote:

Assassin is easy-cheese Sanctum. It's the easiest variant of Penance Brand to put together in my opinion. Super cheap gear, too. It's an outstanding league starter in that regard.

Sure, but Trickster will still be better with better gear which kinda reinforces my argument? So I'm not sure what to take from your reply honestly?

If I start Shadow, I usually go Assassin and then re-spec later because of my preferred early-game. I've also made other Assassin builds that handle end-game just fine, the most recent being Poison Spark.

Trickster is great with more gear for certain skills, that's obvious. You're not taking a geared up Trickster through early Sanctum though. You're not taking a geared up Trickster through Sanctum at all anyway...

Trickster being the de facto best Ascendancy doesn't mean that Assassin doesn't have its place. It just needs to be updated and maybe some survivability nodes besides that awful Elusive point and the conditional Less damage multiplier when at least two enemies are nearby or whatever it is.

It's really not as bad as people think it is.

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Beavith#5056 wrote:

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ArtCrusade#4438 wrote:

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Beavith#5056 wrote:

Assassin is easy-cheese Sanctum. It's the easiest variant of Penance Brand to put together in my opinion. Super cheap gear, too. It's an outstanding league starter in that regard.

Sure, but Trickster will still be better with better gear which kinda reinforces my argument? So I'm not sure what to take from your reply honestly?

If I start Shadow, I usually go Assassin and then re-spec later because of my preferred early-game. I've also made other Assassin builds that handle end-game just fine, the most recent being Poison Spark.

Trickster is great with more gear for certain skills, that's obvious. You're not taking a geared up Trickster through early Sanctum though. You're not taking a geared up Trickster through Sanctum at all anyway...

Trickster being the de facto best Ascendancy doesn't mean that Assassin doesn't have its place. It just needs to be updated and maybe some survivability nodes besides that awful Elusive point and the conditional Less damage multiplier when at least two enemies are nearby or whatever it is.

It's really not as bad as people think it is.

I really don't want to be snarky, but you sound like you want to argue against me but end up in the same position, which is that Assassin needs changes to become more relevant in this day and age

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ArtCrusade#4438 wrote:

I really don't want to be snarky, but you sound like you want to argue against me but end up in the same position, which is that Assassin needs changes to become more relevant in this day and age

I definitely agree with you on a point here, and no snark was taken. It's all good. I agree with you that it needs updating, I don't agree that it's so bad that I want to re-spec out of it the moment I get gear for a Trickster.

Chieftain- increase the explosion to 30%
Elementalist- add 30% chance to explode to burn, shock, freeze damage

yes exploding monsters is extremely fun, peak enjoyment, so why not have it more?

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MadLaneX#7464 wrote:

Chieftain- increase the explosion to 30%
Elementalist- add 30% chance to explode to burn, shock, freeze damage

yes exploding monsters is extremely fun, peak enjoyment, so why not have it more?

Hehe, yeah it's a ton of fun.

Chieftain does have an extremely low chance to explode, so I agree there. Elementalist would be cool and all but Occultist has it so I don't think they would add it to another for Witch.