Melee related balance issues on certain mobs, compared to ranged/spells.

The massive melee buffs this league was a huge step in the right direction; extremely significant when it comes to making melee great when compared to ranged or spellcasting. However, melee still suffers in terms of survivability against certain modifier types or boss movesets, especially when compared to ranged.

I know this is a tough thing to balance because any ranged/spell build can easily just use the mechanic designed for melee with the right items/passives/ec (Fortification, for example), so I am not expecting a major overhaul to melee survivability.

However, I think that the best solution right now is to look at how some bosses behave and how monster modifiers affect melee compared to ranged. On that note, I noticed that a lot of the recently added bosses to have certain AI features that limit special attacks while in melee range, which is great.

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Here are some monster modifiers that seem to affect melee significantly more than ranged. Note that I could be 100% wrong in describing the mechanics of these., so take with a grain of salt.

- Most monster on-death effects.
On-death effects that create burning/shocked/chilled/etc ground affect melee much more than ranged as ranged builds are usually not in the proximity of a mob's death. While ranged builds can still be inhibited/blocked by these effects, they usually don't have to get out of the way of them. This isn't always the case, as some on-death effects like caustic orb will follow the killer, regardless of kill range.

- Most monster on-walk effects.
Effects like trailing cold or fire can be large enough to affect someone in melee range who recently walked towards the monster. This is largely due to map modifiers that increase monster range, so 75% of this problem can be chalked up to skill issue.

- Aura-related debuffs
Mostly applies to the "Cursing" modifier, which spawns an effigy that curses. Ranged users can just walk out of it and shoot, but melee users have more of a tougher time with this since the effigy follows its owner closely.

- When hit projectile retaliation spells.
Applies to things like Flame-Retaliation, which spawn a projectile on hit. Ranged users are usually far enough away to dodge these, while melee users are not. Even with the reasonable telegraph time, it still tends to affect melee users more than ranged.

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Here are some existing modifiers that are a step in the right direction in terms of balancing melee/ranged play. Here are some that come to mind.

- Temporal
This is an extreme example, since this seems to affect ranged builds more than melee, but Temporal Shields seems pretty balanced in terms of melee/ranged fairness.

- Siphoning
Enemies inside the circle are immune to this effect. This is really great as most games wouldn't consider this at all.

Great post - it's terrible having to be within striking range of things with mad as aura's or things that die and explode vs with my ranged bro who sits back doing 15x the damage taking no damage lol

I was speaking about it since the very beta. Nothing has really changed.

I also HATE all post mortem effects like floor is lava, balls auto aiming at you constantly (unkillable ofc) and others stuff thats not hard at all, but slowing down gameplay thus annoying!

I have to disagree. I really focused on my defenses this league and with that, I can tank wave 15 simu bosses and t17 deli bosses. Also killed a uber boss without dying.

Wowever, because of all this investment in tankyness I do feel like the damage is lacking and I don't think the damage I can get in exchange for what i currently have is worth it. would be way squishier for not much stronger.