The game feels horrible to play the 3.15 nerfs + the 3.16 nerfs have just killed this game

I absolutely agree and I've said this number of times

The game is going downhill since 3.14, 3.15 support gem nerfs were a huge mistake, 3.16 contains big nerfs, they just decided not to talk about it and hid this as well as they can, basically its false advertisement

No damage, no defenses, no meaningful item progression, map sustain is garbage, 90% of builds are unplayable without unhealthy time investments, no "character power fantasy", this is very sad

Funny that they said that new unique items are awsome and they are proud to present them... well mageblood 140ex, squire 60ex, amulets 30-70ex, aspirational content... I want to ask GGG: who are you making this game for?

This is my feedback. My suggestions are the same: unnerf support gems and/or give like 20 more passive points, buff underused skills and items. Because right now this mess is unplayable

Supply and demand. Several days ago the squire used to cost between 35 and 50 exalts. Now, as more people get wealthy, it is natural for its price to increase. If you want to use these prime items - just play standard and eventually you'll collect enough currency.

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Tainted_Fate wrote:

I absolutely agree and I've said this number of times

The game is going downhill since 3.14, 3.15 support gem nerfs were a huge mistake

I agree. It is incredible how they are able to make the game less fun to play.

I called it a day after league reveal, but nobody wanted to have their precious hype ruined.

GGG keeps hitting poor players in the name of addressing powercreep, but ultimately do nothing except introduce more for the rich who are barely affected at all by the nerfs in 3.14, 3.15, and 3.16. It's bad enough that nothing was done to address punishing mechanics like timers that only exist for gatekeeping poor and slow players, they decided to add yet another with Scourge. And to add insult to injury, the only people who really benefit from Scourge 'crafting' are the wealthy who have the kind of money lying around to brick potentially good items and not break their stash.

At the rate things are going, poor players may be pushed completely out of endgame.

Either the nerfs need to be reverted, or we should demand more from GGG to do "the great equalizer" nerfs by going after the real powercreep in the game. T1 mods, influenced mods, elevated mods, cluster jewel stacking, things that are breaking the game, but is only truly accessible to those who are rich enough to afford it.

You can bet when GGG eventually reveals the next league for 3.17, they'll mention even more hits to the poor and pile on more powercreep for the wealthy. And this is going to be the next big Atlas rework they had planned, so this means even more peak endgame content only they will have access to and exclusively profit from.

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Tainted_Fate wrote:

The game is going downhill since 3.14, 3.15 support gem nerfs were a huge mistake

Nah, I'll agree with snorkie, the support gem nerf was great idea, it's something that should have been done a long time ago. Because as long as you're getting ~40% more damage per gem slot there's no utility they can offer us that can compete with that, so utility gems are dead in the water unless they also give you 30% more damage plus utility. So, it's clear enough, if players aren't willing to sacrifice more than 10-15% damage for utility, that's what dps gems should give you.

And it has other perks too, if a casual can't get the exact item he wants in 6L, then 5L will do for the moment, because not a single setup in the game requires 6 links for basic functionality, at worst it's 4 + 2 pure dps. And they don't have to worry about players not wanting that extra 15% damage, people spend a ton for less than that.
Another perk is you don't have to be too careful about 7+ link items because they can't get too broken, and skills with bad support options aren't too gimped. Also, you don't see everyone running around in white t-shirts. Hell, that item is the symbol of everything (or almost everything) wrong with the PoE gem system, it's messed up that people want something that completely bypasses it that badly.
Finally, it's easier for the passive tree to compete with gems as a character improvement route, how many passives is 40% more damage in endgame? That's one of the reasons fortify failed as a pure defense support, for instance, that amount of defense could be gotten on the tree easier than you'd get 40% more damage.

Of course, you have to adjust the rest of the game to accommodate a change like that, the problem is they didn't do that.

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raics wrote:

Of course, you have to adjust the rest of the game to accommodate a change like that, the problem is they didn't do that.

This is exactly my problem with the game right now. I've said before that the nerfs are good and we should be toning down powercreep in concept, but GGG's been borking the execution terribly. A lot of game mechanics, as they exist right now, were designed originally with older power standards that are no longer achievable for the average player. Metamorphs being powerful, timers, the twice-buffed mob HP and damage, Heist overtuned enemies. These are all relics of a time when the average player was more powerful than they are now, yet none have been nerfed.

Instead we now have a game that's heavily skewed in favor of rich players who can afford to buy powercreep which still exists in the game. They're not affected by these nerfs, they're the ones who can still comfortably run the rest of the game which wasn't adjusted.

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raics wrote:

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Tainted_Fate wrote:

The game is going downhill since 3.14, 3.15 support gem nerfs were a huge mistake

Nah, I'll agree with snorkie, the support gem nerf was great idea, it's something that should have been done a long time ago. Because as long as you're getting ~40% more damage per gem slot there's no utility they can offer us that can compete with that, so utility gems are dead in the water unless they also give you 30% more damage plus utility. So, it's clear enough, if players aren't willing to sacrifice more than 10-15% damage for utility, that's what dps gems should give you

how about buffing utility gems instead of breaking the game

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Tainted_Fate wrote:

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raics wrote:

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Tainted_Fate wrote:

The game is going downhill since 3.14, 3.15 support gem nerfs were a huge mistake

Nah, I'll agree with snorkie, the support gem nerf was great idea, it's something that should have been done a long time ago. Because as long as you're getting ~40% more damage per gem slot there's no utility they can offer us that can compete with that, so utility gems are dead in the water unless they also give you 30% more damage plus utility. So, it's clear enough, if players aren't willing to sacrifice more than 10-15% damage for utility, that's what dps gems should give you

how about buffing utility gems instead of breaking the game

If GGG's unwilling to tone down the rest of the game, this would've been a much more desirable option.

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Tainted_Fate wrote:

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raics wrote:

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Tainted_Fate wrote:

The game is going downhill since 3.14, 3.15 support gem nerfs were a huge mistake

Nah, I'll agree with snorkie, the support gem nerf was great idea, it's something that should have been done a long time ago. Because as long as you're getting ~40% more damage per gem slot there's no utility they can offer us that can compete with that, so utility gems are dead in the water unless they also give you 30% more damage plus utility. So, it's clear enough, if players aren't willing to sacrifice more than 10-15% damage for utility, that's what dps gems should give you

how about buffing utility gems instead of breaking the game

Because 'buffing utility gems' means turning them into dps gems with utility. That's just a bandaid that addresses one specific problem, too much dps per gem slot is a core issue that affects more than just that.

So, nerfing dps supports and either buffing base skill damage or nerfing monster hp to compensate (I'd personally prefer the latter because it goes against global power creep) is a better option overall.

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Xarien wrote:

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Snorkle_uk wrote:

they need to keep the support gem nerfs, and actually if anything they need to nerf support gems even more.

I disagree. The ones who are complaining, the ones the devs tries the hardest to cater to isn't the casuals, it's the top 5% or whatever who crafts godlike items.

Since they are the ones finding that the game "becomes too easy" after achieving GG items since they have like 100+ hours a week to play the game, then it's THEM and THEIR power level that needs to be brought down, not EVERYOBODY's power level through the nerf of support gems.

THEY want harder content. I do not because I don't have the time investment that they do. And this is where GGG keeps on screwing up. They need to find a way to lower the power level of the top players WITHOUT it being taken out on us "casual plebs".

i dont think you are seeing the actual difference nerfing support gems and flask dps etc has on game balance. stick with me on this mate, ill go through some numbers in a minute and hopefully ull see where im coming from. by nerfing support gems and flasks they lower the difference between the top players and the noobs, which you seem to think is the opposite.

theyre not trying to cater to a small %, theyre trying to make a good game that lots of people enjoy and they can feel proud of.


this is what you are not seeing when it comes to nerfing support gems, and it goes along with the flask damage nerfs..

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it's THEM and THEIR power level that needs to be brought down, not EVERYOBODY's power level through the nerf of support gems.

they are addressing this and this is why they needed to nerf supports and should nerf them even further tbh.


the problem here is sources of 'more' damage. the multipliers. increased damage is all added together, i presume you understand the difference between 'increased' damage and 'more' damage in this game.


what you are talking about is essentially having a game balance problem where you have this 1% elite who do 10 million dps and then a lot of normal noobish players who are doing 500k dps, and the game is impossible to balance around that disparity in damage right? youre accusing ggg of balancing around the 20 million guys and essentially fucking over the noobs as a result. you think they should bring down the top guys so that damage difference isnt as big right?

yes, yes you are right, and thats what nerfing supports and flasks does.


if an elite player and a noob player both play fireball, they have the same gem with the same basic damage give or take. they both get to level 90 and have the same increased damage from passives. the reason the elite player has 20x more damage on their build is because they know how to stack 'more' multipliers, they use more 'more's in their damage amplification chain. the noob has a 5 link and one of his 4 supports is some sort of goofy utility gem that doesnt add dps but does something 'interesting'. the noob essentially has a fireball with 3 more multipliers from 3 damage supports.

the big boy elite player has a 6 link with 5 high class damage multipliers, he also has some auras adding what is effectively sources of more damage, he has flasks acting as more damage multipliers, hes using buffs like arcane surge that give him more damage, curses, exposures...

so lets say the elite guy has 10 sources of more multipliers and the noob has 3.



now lets calc the damage chains and difference in final dps in 2 different situations, a game where the average source of 'more' damage gives 50% more damage, and one where it gives 20%.

both start with 100 base damage, just for maths sake.


in a game where an average more damage source is 50%:

noob: 100 base damage, 3 sources of 50% more damage = 338 damage.

elite: 100 base damage, 10 sources of 50% more damage = 5,767 damage.



now in a game where an average more damage source is 20%:


noob: 100 base damage, 3 sources of 20% more damage = 173 damage

elite: 100 base damage, 10 sources of 20% more damage = 619 damage.




do you see the difference there? in a game where an average source of more damage is 50% more, the elite player has 17x more damage than the noob, in a game where its 20% he has about 3.5x more damage. thats a gargantuan difference in the dps gap between elites and noobs when you bring sources of more damage down from 50% to 20%.


this is why its been so impossible to balance these elite end players vs nooby players, the size of the multiplicative damage layers provided by 'more' damage sources like supports, flasks, auras and curses is so big that the results of stacking them are insane. 17x more damage compared to 3.5x more damage. think about it.

in a given state of game balance where the elite takes 2 minutes to kill an uber boss the noob would take 34 minutes, compared to the other balance state where the elite takes 2 minutes and the noob takes 7 minutes.

what sounds like better game balance?


if they want to address this...

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it's THEM and THEIR power level that needs to be brought down, not EVERYOBODY's power level through the nerf of support gems.

then what they needed to do was nerf sources of more damage, mainly supports and dps flasks. thats exactly what they did, they are fixing this problem, they are doing exactly what you want them to do which is bring down the difference between top end and low end players.

this is how it has to happen. thats why i say this...

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Snorkle_uk wrote:

then they need to buff the base damage of skills or reduce the health of monsters, NOT reverse the support gem nerfs.

forget the end value of everyones dps, what you want is the relative dps of high end vs low end to come down right? so the answer is to do what they did, nerf all sources of 'more' damage, and then if people dont have enough damage you use a method that is equal for everyone like buffing base damage provided by all skill gems or lowering the health numbers on monsters.





its important that we understand this as players, that we understand what we want and what the changes we are asking for have, what the changes they are making have. if you really care about the difference between high end and low end players being too big you need to be praising them for nerfing sources of more damage and asking for them to go further, to nerf them even more, and then you need to talk about the values of monster health in relation to the dps people are left with after the changes. that is how the game can be fixed, it cant be fixed by reversing the support gem nerfs, that is the worst thing they could possibly do.


we need to have some faith in them, they do understand, they are trying to make the changes to get from here to a better game state on a lot of these issues. but WE need to understand the process too.

what raics is syaing is completely right. have they rebalanced the game to compensate for the completely correct move to nerf sources of more damage? this is where our conversation needs to be, thats the relevant debate on the serious issue moving forward. has the game been balanced relative to current dps levels?

give examples, im down for that conversation, if were gonna have it lets talk numbers, lets talk how long its taking to kill shit, is it feeling good or not?