I think the developers don’t read the chat, but... (First Impression)

RF deals almost 0 damage. Play minions or lightning strike and be happy.

I like it when you can play through a game as a warrior, then as a mage, and then as an archer, and the game doesn’t restrict you in any way. Yes, playing as a fragile archer may be more challenging in certain situations than playing as an armored warrior, but the archer has other benefits – like speed and damage. That’s how almost all RPGs are designed, and that’s what diversity is – when you finish the game once and want to play it again, but in a slightly different way.

There are games where your build influences how you get through certain parts of the game, like Noita. That game tries to kill you in every possible way, but your task is to adapt and survive in this chaos. By the way, I recommend it to everyone here; in Noita, I enjoy crafting spells more than in PoE. But that’s not an RPG, it’s a roguelike: diversity in roguelikes is achieved through the randomness of events and the decisions the player makes. Often, in roguelikes, finishing the game is not guaranteed, and any wrong decision at the moment can inevitably lead to the character’s death.

Overall, PoE used to feel more like a roguelike to me than a classic RPG. There was very little content; people gathered to farm Dominus, ran maps together, and did Master missions. I built a dual-rapier build, maxed out critical hit multiplier, ignoring everything else, and watched mobs explode, then my character would explode from physical reflect or from an explosive mob – I had to be very careful clearing maps. I never ran Atziri because even regular maps were tough for me. Loot also seemed much scarcer back then, though I don't remember exactly. Despite the limited content and high difficulty, it was a lot of fun.

After some time, Act 4 was added, then all 10 acts. I played very rarely, but I noticed that players no longer gathered together as much.

Now I see a completely different game – it’s pleasant to play, but it still keeps the player on their toes. Many QoL features have been added, annoying reflects and explosive mobs are gone (too bad Monsters Fracture was removed), and a lot of bosses, crafting options, and other content have been added.

I decided to play through it again and see everything I hadn’t seen before, to learn the mechanics. To dive deeper into them, I chose not to buy items from other players, but to craft or loot them myself. I picked an RF build, which had always interested me, and it turned out to be much harder than I thought. Those who say it doesn’t require any buttons are wrong. I had to learn a lot of mechanics and farm a lot before my character stopped dying and started dealing damage. Now I’ve leveled him up to 98, and he easily runs T16 maps, although some bosses take longer to kill than I’d like, but I’m fine with that. There were challenges too – some mobs reduce regeneration, some regenerate insanely fast, but all of that is solvable with a smart approach.

I was enchanted by the variety of mechanics and the depth of the game’s design, and my build seemed like the cherry on top. Naturally, I was already thinking about how to add a couple more cherries. I wanted to play through the game again, maybe try leveling a new character differently – for example, beating the same bosses with poison instead of fire. Unfortunately, this is where a problem appeared. I looked at the builds on poe.ninja – and it feels like almost everyone in the top ranks is using Poison Toxic Rain, Poison Spark, with the same gear. I think this is a result of their effectiveness, but honestly, that’s really boring. It seems like all poison archers are using Ballista Totem because it’s effective, but what if I want to play as an archer, not a totem user?

It seems like the game can be completed with any reasonably built class, rewarding players with progression, and then SUDDENLY it throws a mini-boss at you that you just can’t kill. In Borderlands, there are Invincible Bosses that seem very unfair. Kosis reminded me of them. But those bosses are supposed to be invincible, so if Kosis were an Uber boss, it would be fine.

It seems like top players with the same gear know about such pitfalls and just build boring but effective setups that allow them to beat bosses without much trouble. I, on the other hand, got burned by my character, chosen not for its effectiveness but for its interest. Some players see diversity in the number of builds that deal millions of DPS with different skills, but I can’t figure out how to get to T16 maps without totems on a poison archer or restore my dual-rapier build without the headache of worrying about which hand holds which rapier or the fact that there aren’t many melee skills that fit the duelist's theme and work well with dual wielding.

In conclusion, I like both the PoE from 10 years ago and the modern PoE (without Kosis), but they are completely different games and shouldn’t be mixed. The old game felt more like a roguelike, while today it’s more of an RPG, where variety should be driven by player interest, not artificial limitations. As for Kosis, he fit better in the old version of PoE. If he’s to remain in the current game, he should be an uber boss that players must prepare for, rather than appearing randomly in regular content, where he disrupts the balance and progression.

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xxanderr wrote:

RF deals almost 0 damage. Play minions or lightning strike and be happy.

Gotta love comments like these.

Apparently 8 to 10 million damage, enough to clear 95%+ of all content in the game, is now ZERO damage.

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mefistozxz wrote:

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xxanderr wrote:

RF deals almost 0 damage. Play minions or lightning strike and be happy.

Gotta love comments like these.

Apparently 8 to 10 million damage, enough to clear 95%+ of all content in the game, is now ZERO damage.

Apparently you did not read what the topic starter wrote. It's ok, I'll tell you what he said. He said, that he plays the league starter RF build. What it means? Well, that's easy - it means that this build is cheap, and if you look at poe ninha, you'll understand that throughout all classes and ascendacies only ONE character does 21m damage and exactly 15 do 5-10m. And keep in mind that all those builds cost around 1-5 mirrors (look at their gear to see why).

Therefore, before saying something like "Gotta love comments like these.
Apparently 8 to 10 million damage, enough to clear 95%+ of all content in the game, is now ZERO damage." make sure you understand wtf you even talking about.

"

xxanderr wrote:

Apparently you did not read what the topic starter wrote. It's ok, I'll tell you what he said. He said, that he plays the league starter RF build. What it means? Well, that's easy - it means that this build is cheap, and if you look at poe ninha, you'll understand that throughout all classes and ascendacies only ONE character does 21m damage and exactly 15 do 5-10m. And keep in mind that all those builds cost around 1-5 mirrors (look at their gear to see why).

Therefore, before saying something like "Gotta love comments like these.
Apparently 8 to 10 million damage, enough to clear 95%+ of all content in the game, is now ZERO damage." make sure you understand wtf you even talking about.

Way to dig that hole a little deeper.....clearly YOU didn't read the OP. He didn't say "league starter", he said "beginner-friendly". RF at ALL levels is beginner friendly. Also.....hes playing in Standard so "league starter" is not even a part of this conversation. Plus, any league starter will also show how to push beyond league start. We are over a month into the league, and the OP has been playing a while (he said he completed basically all content). He's freaking level 98.

Take your own advice. Also.....it does NOT require 1-5 mirrors to get to millions of damage with rf lol. Not to mention you totally ignore Fire Trap, which is a staple in nearly all rf builds that ALSO supplies millions of damage. Your PoE Ninja examples are wrong in two ways: 1) they aren't multi-mirror. I opened 1 at random @ 8 million dps and it was MAYBE 150 divines total cost. 2) They are only the high-level builds. Most folks STOP at 95, which aren't even shown on PoE Ninja.

Tell me how little you know about RF in two posts or less....win a prize! Spit in the face of the years of work PoHx has done with RF with self righteous ignorance.