Descent Chest Feedback

The purpose of this feedback is to look at the chest rewards in Descent to identify where the options are most interesting, where they are too one-sided, and gather feedback from others who have had different experiences on the subject.

For reference, here are a few different sources on the contents of Descent Chests, in case there are some discrepencies:
http://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Descent_Chests
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AoYgKe1CFjlrdHhKMzFyT21xMVlENUdDSnhkTWh5OHc#gid=0
https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/442549/page/1

I have mainly played Duelist and Marauder in Descent races so my chest feedback is focused on these two classes. I'm going to avoid commenting on skills because there's plenty of other discussions about that, so chests which just give skills will be skipped in this review. I'm going to use this format "Chest XN" where X=(Chest Number) and N=(A|C) for "Alluring" or "Curious". Things in both Chests will be separated.

---------------------------------------

I'm going to be basing this on Duelists chests, but it pretty much applies to Marauder chests as well.

Chest 1A: 2x Quicksilvers, 2x Wisdom
Chest 1C: 2x Medium Lifes, 1x Small Mana, 1x Small Life
Comments: It's a pretty good choice, but I always go for Alluring. I usually find a Medium Life by Frozen Abyss (where the difference between Small and Medium starts to matter), but I have never found a single Quicksilver Flask from drops in any Descent Race, and I've done about 10-15 of them. So the choice is between something that will be useful immediately, and won't ever get another shot at; versus something that might have been found anyway by the time it's finally useful, and takes a while before it matters.
Suggestion: I don't think the Curious Chest needs to be any better, but the Alluring Chest could probably afford to be a bit weaker. I would try removing the Wisdom Scrolls from it. Also, raise the droprate of Quicksilvers in Descent.

Chest 2: Skill gems, no comment

Chest 3A: Coral Ring, Paua Ring
Chest 3C: Choice of Class-appropriate weapons
Both: Augmentation, Transmutation
Comments: When I started Descent I always went for the weapons. Now I always go for the rings, specifically, the Coral Ring. It takes a while to get 2x good rings so there is virtually no chance the Coral Ring will not stick with me for a long time. The weapons are a nice plus, but I will probably find something equivalent or better by the end of the goatmen level. Once I realized it's harder to stay alive in Descent than it is to go quickly, I concluded the Coral Ring is pretty much godly gear. I'll never pick the Curious Chest again.
Suggestion: The Augmentation definitely needs to be removed from the Alluring Chest. The question is whether the Transmutation needs to go too. I am undecided on that because I think a good argument could be made either way, and without testing it's tough to tell. Maybe add an additional Transmutation to the Curious as well, so the choice is really between a Coral Ring and a couple of magical weapons (which won't be so easily replaced on the next floor).

Chest 4A: 2x Alchemy
Chest 4C: 3x Wisdom, 2x Trasmutation, 2x Medium Mana, Coral Amulet
Comments: This one was tough for me to judge when I started playing Descent, but now that I've played a few I always pick Alchemy. All the stuff in the Curious chest is nice to have, but none of it is really important. Alchemy Orbs are. This is another really lopsided chest.
Suggestion: Just give 1x Alchemy Orb in the Alluring. Then I think they would be pretty balanced (although I would probably still pick Alluring every time).

Chest 5-6: Skill gems, no comment

Chest 7A: Socket fixing gems
Chest 7C: 1x Alchemy, 1x Chaos
Both: 3x Whetstones, Class-appropriate weapons
Comments: This one has the potential to be close, but I usually pick the Alch/Chaos. I don't mind giving up a piece of gear for sockets, besides I always get so flustered using the socket fixers that I waste more time trying to properly unequip/modify/re-equip the items/gems that it costs more time than it's worth. Maybe top level players have better mouse precision and can cope with the convoluted process of socket fixing in a race environment, but I'm a hopeless case.
Suggestion: This really depends on what high-level racers think. But with only 1 support and 3 skills for the majority of the race that socket fixing doesn't seem too important, especially at this point in the race. All that being said, I would suggest moving the socket fixers later in the race, and put some large flasks in this chest to replace them. This means flasks on the next chest would need to be re-evaluated as well.

Chest 8A: 1x Augmentation, 2x Transmutation, Large Mana, 2x each resist ring
Chest 8C: 2x Chaos, 1x Alchemy, Greater Life, Large Life, 2x Coral
Comments: The only stuff in the Alluring Chest that doesn't have a superior equivalent in the Curious Chest is the resist rings. But the reason I pick Curious is because I could really use some more potions at this point. I don't find white rings to be that useful anymore; as I've already got my Transmuted Coral from Chest 3, and something else that's pretty decent either found or made (probably from one of the many Alchemy Orbs I've picked).
Suggestion: I think it's time for some amulets here. Alluring can have Agate/Citrine/Turqoise and Curious gets Amber/Jade/Lapis. The supply of Augmentations and Transmutations on Alluring needs to be tripled.

Chest 9A: 3x Whetstones, Rustic, Class-appropriate weapons
Chest 9C: 3x Scraps, Leather, Class-appropriate armor
Both: 2x Alchemy
This would be an interesting choice if I wasn't already decked out in rares, and too low level to use the new stuff. The only things that matter to me are the belts and the quality boosters. Whetstones are a bit better than Scraps, but Leather is much better than Rustic. If I haven't found a good belt yet I will pick Curious for the Leather, otherwise I pick Alluring for the Whetstones.
Suggestions: I have no idea what to do here.

Chest 10-11: Skill gems, no comment

Chests 12+: I haven't gotten that far so no comment

-------------------------------------------

I was hoping other players would post their own experiences/suggestions on Descent Chests, especially players of different classes. Also if you think my chest choices are wrong or they are close choices where I call them a landslide then let me know about that too!

Chest One: I actually always go for the life flasks nowadays; you must have better life flask luck than me, because I've been burned more than once going Quicksilver and never seeing a life flask upgrade by Frozen Abyss, at which point it's often game over (zone is hard enough as it is). I can manage on Mediums, but I'm doomed if I'm stuck on Smalls.

Chest Two: As duelist, I normally just skip this one entirely; I've got a trail of Voidbearers, I'm scared for my life, and the gems suck anyways.

Chest Three: Easiest choice ever if you haven't had any ring drops. If I have an Iron Ring this can be close, as I doubt I'll be replacing the Iron, and I can use the Transmute on the ring I hate. One time I had an Iron and a Coral drop and didn't think long before going swords.

Chest Four: Agree completely. Alchs are very strong.

Chest Five: For duelist, I feel Hatred is very strong. I know Leap Slam is a good skill but it's no aura.

Chest Six: This is by far the toughest Duelist choice. Added Fire is insanely useful immediately, but Life on Hit is awesome in the survivability department. This is a good choice.

Chest Seven: Alchemy/Chaos, hands down.

Chest Eight: This one is also very situational. The resist rings can be worth it if you haven't yet used the Alch/Chaos from the previous chest (lucky with early gear); if you are out of Alch/Chaos and have a white ring you go for more Alch/Chaos.

Chest Nine: Agree completely.

Chest Ten: For duelist, I feel this is a no-brainer; grab the Leap Slam you didn't grab before. You're having enough mana issues before trying to spam Enduring Cry, escape skills are good panic buttons, and Frenzy is actually a better single-target than Dual Strike.

Chest Eleven: I've picked up this chest, but never with more than a couple minutes left. I feel Multistrike is the better choice.

Chest Twelve: No comment.

I just had an interesting idea: what if Chest 6 (support gem) and Chest 8 (resist rings vs. potions) were swapped? The support gem has an equip level of 12 so you can't use it at Chest 6 anyway, and large potions/resist rings have lower equip levels. It would be even better if resist rings could have their level requirement reduced to 9 or 10 somehow (I don't think that would mess up normal game balance too much!)

Choosing between resist rings and larger potions before Merveil's lair would be a really tough choice!

Just played the 24h Descent Race. I'm going to re-evaluate some of my commentary above, and fill in the blanks for the last few chests.

Chest 1A: 2x Quicksilvers, 2x Wisdom
Chest 1C: 2x Medium Lifes, 1x Small Mana, 1x Small Life
Comments: Good Choice

Chest 2: Skill gems, no comment

Chest 3A: Coral Ring, Paua Ring
Chest 3C: Choice of Class-appropriate weapons
Both: Augmentation, Transmutation
Comments: Coral Ring > all

Chest 4A: 2x Alchemy
Chest 4C: 3x Wisdom, 2x Trasmutation, 2x Medium Mana, Coral Amulet
Comments: Alchemy Orbs too good

Chest 5-6: Skill gems
Comments: I would like to see Chest 6 moved up to Chest 7 since there's no way you will be able to use the support gem at this point. I was carefully leveling in every zone to avoid deaths and STILL didn't reach level 12 till halfway through the Frozen Abyss (a little before Chest 7).

Chest 7A: 7x Socket fixing gems
Chest 7C: 1x Alchemy, 1x Chaos
Both: 3x Whetstones, Class-appropriate weapons
Comments: Curious is better unless you have a great weapon (or other armor) already equipped that you know you will use for a while and you have a socket problem. That's a rare situation at this stage of the game. Socket fixing could probably be split between the chests (Jeweler's for both chests, but Chromatics and Fusing in opposite chests), give the chests a different identity in some other way. Amulets.... would love to see those somewhere other than the bad choice in Chest 4.

Chest 8A: 1x Augmentation, 2x Transmutation, Large Mana, 2x each resist ring
Chest 8C: 2x Chaos, 1x Alchemy, Greater Life, Large Life, 2x Coral
Comments: Curious better because of the potions. Curious also has better secondary stuff, but the primary differentiator here is the potions.

Chest 9A: 3x Whetstones, Rustic, Class-appropriate weapons
Chest 9C: 3x Scraps, Leather, Class-appropriate armor
Both: 2x Alchemy
Comments: No change in opinion. Still couldn't use gear from this chest even though I leveled a lot more than the usual 1hr Descent mode.

Chest 10-11: Skill gems
Comments: Levels are really a problem at this point, can't use any of this stuff till the next floor or two down. Remember, I am carefully leveling in each zone because no time limit.

----

(Duelist Chests)
Chest 12A: 2x Regret, 2x Glassblower, Granite Potion
Chest 12C: 2x Regal, Alchemy, Onyx Amulet
Both: 3x Wisdom
Comments: Why would I need a Regret Orb? You know what I would want though- some Blessed Orbs. The Wisdoms were a godsend after the Exiles depleted my supply and I had a bunch of rares sitting in my inventory. Maybe that doesn't happen in normal race situation, but I killed all the Exiles (I wouldn't recommend facing Ash Lessard unless overgeared or using ranged attacks).

Chest 13A: 8x Socket Fixing Gems
Chest 13C: Jeweler's, Chromatic, Alchemy, Chaos
Both: Grand Life, Grand Mana
Comments: The potions are a joke. With L26 requirement These will not be usable in the 1hr race... ever. At this point the only stuff that wasn't highly enchanted and difficult to replace were potions. There's not a lot of Transmutes in Descent, especially when you get deeper. Until getting to this point it's not that noticeable, but now what I want is some Transmutes. Alchemy Orbs now less useful, though Chaos still handy. Socket fixing not so bad if it lets me use both my support gems.

Chest 14A: 7x Socket Fixing Gems
Chest 14C: 2x Alchemy, 2x Chaos, Exalted
Comments: You gotta be kidding me. Take the socket fixers in last chest if you need em, this chest is an obvious choice. Exalted Orb is cool and great bonus to add to an already exceptional rare. I honestly want to see Exalted in both chests as a reward for players, not a choice. Feels great to finally get to use this item after playing the game for months. I feel sorry for anyone that got here and picked the Alluring Chest, because they missed out on something really fun.

Chest 15: I just reset this zone to see if I could get more fire resist gear for the boss. Will report back if I manage to "win" Descent mode.

Yaaa, Duelist Alluring chest rewards in Hall of Heroes, Desecrated and Infernal Shrine are an absolute joke.

Rergets, Fusings, Jewls and Chromies compared to Regals, Alchs, Chaos and Exalt. Oh yeah...

I just blind picked all the crappy alluring chests in my 24h run - was real fun in Infernal having no alchs to roll any fire rings, but on the other hand having 7-8 Fus/Jewls :D :D

Chest set 1 is awful, as at least one quicksilver is mandatory for most classes to have a shot at the leaderboard, yet no one except ranger can reliably progress with only small life flasks past a certain point, and the next guaranteed flask upgrade isnt available for 7 more zones. This should be changed to a choice between 1 quicksilver and 2 medium lifes, or 2 medium life and 1 quicksilver.

The same arguement goes for rings, amulets, belts and mana flasks- acquiring at least one of each of these per slot shouldnt be left entirely to chance or require sacrificing something thats obviously leagues better (such as alchs). The absence of stat amulets in chests was also glaringly noticable.

Skill gem choices could obviously (drop only gems dominating the leaderboards for half the classes and all) use a complete overhaul as well.

Socket vs affix orb choices should be more like the suggestion for chest set 1, with many of 1 type and few of the other in each chest.

Offense vs defense choices (weapons vs torso, helm etc) seem ok, mainly because no class outright fails when basic defensive slots get ignored for a few levels.

Blue vs white monster ratios need to be equalized for all players. The exact monster types, affixes and placements dont matter, as long as everyone has roughly the same opportunity to obtain the same amount of experience in the end.

I think adding a 3rd chest type would offer a large improvement in potential build diversity. Split non-competing base rings (coral, paua, iron or ruby, sapphire, topaz etc) and amulets (jade, lapis, amber) across them while still offering at least 1 ubiquitously required basic upgrade like life/mana flasks and a couple wisdom scrolls in each chest.

Overall, the randomness in standard races can be strongly mitigated by vendors, recipes, quest rewards and zone resets, and descent chest choices and monster spawns need to emulate that randomness mitigation or the dominant factor in determining winners will continue to be nothing more than pure dumb luck.

I'll do the witch, as I'm a masochist and play her.

Provisions:

- Fireball: Fine, typical starting skill. Aside from the small aoe/large monster combination in the first 2 areas which makes it really hard to kill more than 2 monsters with a shot. And the Fire/Elemental Resists stuff. Lackluster.
- Raise Zombie: Do I even need to crucify having this as an option? Minions are worthless in races.

Phrecia outskirts
- Life Flasks or Quicksilver. RNG gamble that the game will drop the opposite. Fine, I guess.

heart of phrecia
Freezing pulse/Ice Spear: Decent combination, but limited to cold/ice. A little bit to similar in function for descent with fireball, imo. Personal dislike of freezing pulse forces me to choose the opposite. Later support gems aren't worth much for support.

Firestorm/Spark: Tended to pick this. Decent Aoe/single target combo. Variety of elements provide more options against resistances and more likely to get a +1 skill thats usable. However, the draw back is both are brutal on the mana. Needs +mana equipment/flasks/regen nodes/clarity in some fashion to be able to spam. Overall I like this combination for the flexibility.

lost cathedral
This set of chests is bad. Rings (life!!) are a must. Sometimes they don't drop. Goat horns/other wands drop like candy. Twig shield is redundant.

capricious tomb
Another no brainer for my build. The alcs are required (either +1 skills or +dex) Either way, more mods = better. Maybe if GGG cranked up currency drops like advertised, this wouldn't be such a no brainer. The rest of the time is praying for something worth alching.
Mana flasks, offset by other options, and relatively easy to get. Mediums at this point are stupid anyway. Should be medium/large? Transmutes: usually common enough as is. so much more inferior to alcs and the other stuff isn't worth anything.

Arachnids
Power siphon/Clarity. Regen > all in a "famine"-esque event. Especially when the other option is minions.
Skeletons. Minions are useless. Damage and damage sustainment are the only things that matter.

Tomb of statues
Fork/Minion life vs. Added Lightning. Actually a choice for once, sorta. Depends on what gems you picked earlier (or drops?!). Either can be useful

Spork is great. Except for that whole required dexterity. Can't even use the damn dex. +1 wand w/ blue-green linked. Really good in the tight passages.

simian caves
Depends on whats dropped to then that needs to be offset. Resist become very important after this point.

skeletons
Giant pile of currency/crap. Leather belt > Chain belt. Currency/whites are fine.

Forbidden ruins
Does it matter after this point? Not like witches get here with enough time left to matter, or at a high enough level to use any of these gems.
Aside from more damn minion stuff. the curse choices are ok. Really, discharge? Level 24 skill now? Not only that, one thats terrible at low levels.

Everything after this point is moot as far as the chests go.

Witch feedback:
- Stat points!? Where the hell am I supposed to get them? Theres no freaking vendors to compensate for bad RNG.. ES sucks early. Wasting currency on a level 1 base dex piece at level 15 praying for a +dex roll so I can equip fork is amusing. Really, Qarl/Chris, you should try it. Even better, getting +9 roll. Or finally finding an oiled vest with +dex (note: you can't wear it). Its awesome. Or wasting 5 passive points to grab that +10 dex node. Special.
For note: Witches can wear up to a scale/padded/chainmail vest before getting screwed by stat points requirements. Aside from ES (which sucks early thanks to long regen delay)
Solution: Drop some jade/amber/lapis amulets in the chests somewhere. Nice little oversight on this one. Its ok tho, you got the coral ammy in there. Thanks!.
-Fix the gems obviously (ice nova/firetrap/ek?) Get rid of minions.

General suggests:
- Buff currency drops massively so we can actually do stuff with them. Make it so we will find multiple alchs/chaos/ etc without just relying on the chests.
- Have all gems accessible, whether from the starting chest, or a chest at each tier. 1, 4, 10, 12, 19.
- lower support level requirements for descent so we can actually use them when we get them, or reconfigure chests based on getting to those chests 3 levels earlier than they can be used.
- Find some other "choices" to make based on the chests, assuming the above.
- Currently the chests are almost too binary. Theres not really much real choice, It's an illusion. And even then, some things that should be in chests to compensate for the lack of vendors, aren't, or only appear once.

The above is feedback for the 1hr descent, and I agree with most of it. Especially agree that there should be a chest with a jade amulet (and the other one has an amber amulet) or something.
For the open descent, though, you don't need a quicksilver flask, so you can rock along with 3 mana flasks and don't need any mana regen at all.

Also, Skeletons are awesome once you get to the higher levels. Massive survivability boost against harder enemies, especially with LoTD (only 1 passive point, and like you said, what else are you going to spend them on?). In a non-race version of descent, I would definitely get skeletons over clarity. Clarity's mana reservation is unwieldy unless you have some mana on gear.

"

dudiobugtron wrote:

The above is feedback for the 1hr descent, and I agree with most of it. Especially agree that there should be a chest with a jade amulet (and the other one has an amber amulet) or something.
For the open descent, though, you don't need a quicksilver flask, so you can rock along with 3 mana flasks and don't need any mana regen at all.

Also, Skeletons are awesome once you get to the higher levels. Massive survivability boost against harder enemies, especially with LoTD (only 1 passive point, and like you said, what else are you going to spend them on?). In a non-race version of descent, I would definitely get skeletons over clarity. Clarity's mana reservation is unwieldy unless you have some mana on gear.

I didn't run the 24 hour at all. Only have the 1 hour experience to go off of. Everything completely changes when the time limit is removed. More kills = more RNG chances, time to kill all the bosses, etc. More time to kite/regen. etc.

Agree, would probably take the skellies in unlimited time. But, for a race, minions have no role. Trying to balance around both open/race circumstances is futile. Further emphasize my plea to allow ALL gems to be chosen from.

Thanks for this feedback. We will be making changes to the chests for Season 4 Descent. (Specifically they will be updated by GGG_Neon)