Meta builds and their impact on the game.

It is impossible to deny the influence of the meta on the game, as well as games on the meta. They are interconnected and can ruin the game.

Shall we take a couple of examples?

Expansion Conquerors of the Atlas. The whole update was focused around new bosses, and thanks to their manner of "chatting" before the battle, builds through Traps or Mines could prepare a "surprise" for them and literally one-shot. On a very small budget.

The solution to this problem was a global nerf. Absolutely every build was affected by the additing damage reduction for x seconds at the start of phase on bosses.

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Miners and trappers were almost unaffected, and the addition of Chainbreaker + Berserker only strengthened their advantage.

Chainbreaker has been changed to be unplayable. And still not used.

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Harvest made it possible to create literally perfect items, enormously increasing the power of meta characters, for which the content complexity ceiling was not ready. Most importantly, most of the builds were able to become playable. And the game was consistent in progression.

As a result, Harvest has been nerfed for everyone, and provides very weakened versions of crafting.

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Heist brought the alternative qualities of gems to the game. This refreshed build building and added new ways to upgrade. But due to a bug, a bug, or a bad idea, the alternate quality of the auras increased the effect of "increasing the effect of auras".

As a result, for single players without colossal values ​​of the effect of auras, they left ridiculous values, 4 times less than originally. Again, because of one imba, everyone was punished.

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These most tangible nerfs did little to improve the situation, and only further widened the gap between the meta/broken builds and regular builds. There were still enthusiasts who considered it their duty to one-shot Sirus.

And it came. Another global nerf. Strong nerf support gems. After all, players have too much damage, and the developers want them to use not only support stones for damage. Nobody gave alternatives. As a result, the meta has not changed much, and the usual builds were again weakened by 2-10 times.

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More recently, there has been a realization that the selfcast is too weak, and work has been done to improve the base damage and nerf the support trigger. Everything is so bad that there are values ​​​​of 400% added damage. And this is still not enough to compete with skills that have an overlap, or provide mobility.

And it remains to wait until the design of bosses and mobs stops punishing the player for not having infinite damage or infinite defense. A balanced character with averages will handle most challenges, except for the hidden timer on uber bosses and Rare mobs with Soul Eater.


And these are just the brightest nerfs, which are great as an example of how the meta can ruin the gaming experience for most players due to the meta based on the fact that killing bosses and mobs instantly is more profitable than spending a couple of minutes on an interesting bossfight. But the boss fight wow effect is lost very quickly, and for some reason it is difficult to make it interesting and moderately difficult. Or just not annoying like Eternal Hunger.

I hope in the future work on the bugs will be carried out, and the nerfs of too imb builds will not affect builds that were already weak. And as a result, I hope to see how offended builds become playable again, not only on acts and white maps.