Character Balance in Path of Exile: Lake of Kalandra

I am sorry GGG but you created my Best and most favourited game ever..... and Than you destroyed it... Thanks....

It's clear that the game GGG wants to make is a harder, grindier game. There are players who want that too, and I'm glad they are getting the sort of changes they enjoy. It's nice that those players get options like Hardcore, as well as having Hard Mode to look forward to.

For other players, though, we lack good options. So as to not ramble on forever, I wish GGG would look into a game mode that goes in the other direction difficulty-wise. Have a casual league or something like that. Not everyone wants to be completely ground into the dirt while they are trying to figure out the obtuse mechanisms of the game.

If I were to make a big ask, I'd say that Path of Exile is so close to the game I want to play, I've played it for years, I just wish I could just tweak it a bit. I'd love support for players being able to properly host their own games, to be able to play on modded servers with my friends, which are the things that kept a lot of games (Diablo 2 included) alive for us. It opens up a whole new aspect of the community, and as other games have shown, community modding can turn up new mechanics and balance concepts that the base game could learn from to make things better for everyone.

All that said, I'm still holding out for the league announcement to see if there will at least be something of interest in the new mechanic. If nothing else a fun mechanic would be nice to poke around with.

can we just remove melee please so i don't have to hear people complain about melee every single league.

Finally a Trapper league :)

Every time I want to invest in the game (stash tabs, MTX, etc.) They make a huge nerf change and then the gameplay gets bad and I go play other games. So GGG if you want the typical player to spend $$$ keep it more consistent from league to league. Instead of worrying about the 1% of players who can beat the game anyway.

I don't know how this is going to pan out, but right now it seems like a big letdown.
The build I play could be ok, but removing easily accessible defenses will inevitably increase the need for grind.
Which I just dislike.

Go play your hard mode GGG. I have had enough with this constant barrage of nerfs of players and making the mobs oneshot everything

I like that fortify gets buffed for melee, but most of the patchnotes are nerfs. It feels like "no fun allowed". Defiance banner gets nerfed to garbage tier, maybe its a bit strong together with determination and grace, but not everyone can reserve 110% of there mana to get this three auras. Maybe i wanna use just the Defiance banner alone for a litte extra defence, but with that tiny bit of defence it now gives its useless. Maybe you should balance stuff with the general playerbase in mind and not what the top 1% of players can squish out.

i'm a noob, i need ~15 minutes for a mid tier map. I get oneshotted in red maps. I'm to weak, and now with the patch coming, i get even weaker :D .

We are at this point just waiting for POE2 to come out to see if many of the issues with the game get sorted out.

Or worse POE1 is just beta testing how they want POE to be balanced in the years to come after POE2. I just have an overall feeling people are just getting tired of the game (even some content makers).

Not saying the game will die etc it's just the hype for updates isn't there as it used to be. Been playing since Perandus and I've noticed it over the last few years. People will claim it's been like that for longer it's just I play leagues for maybe a few weeks now. So I don't see the long-term effect of a weak content league. Damn, I use to play leagues from start to finish a few years ago.

At this rate,. POE2 Is going to be a bust

As a player who started to play in 3.9 metamorph league , which is not so long ago compared to PoE veteran , I can safely say this is the worst manifesto I've ever red.

I am not that much disappointed by the nerfs (all of them seems fair except aura reservation nerfs cause they provide a buff to lackluster builds) than I am by the lack of buffs and metachanges. So many skills and archetypes are undertuned or dead and not even relevant for the actual state of the game right now with uber bosses (cold dot , mana builds , strike skills -except LS-). So many ascendancies are just bad and I don't even think you realise that (Assassin , Trickster , Hiero , Jugg , Pathfinder even Ascendant should get a complete rework).

Are we supposed to play the same bullshit skills over and over again to enjoy the whole game? I don't know , seems like we are taking this way.

Seismic : Not enough to be relevant
LS : Not even touched
Nightblade : Not even touched

and some of those builds , may be 10 in total , are so far away from the other that's not even if you want to play those build as a starter to do good.

This patch should have been THE GREAT balance patch , we are far from it. Balance got worse and worse since I started playing that's for sure. 3.15 was the first nail in the coffin , 3.19 might be the final one. Not because the changes are bad , they are way insufficient especially for the buffs.

Buff low-end , Nerf high-end. Give us back the fantasy , the appeal of ascendancies and skills. The game feel so bland right now.
I want to be baited into exciting-buffed-reworked-new skill for a leaguestart and I want to feel I have the choice to be wrong in my leaguestarter , just to take the gamble. I don't feel like it can happen right now anymore sadly.

Stop thinking for a League or 2 about gear , this shouldn't be your main focus right now. Think about gear when character balance is decent , it's not.