Dear GGG: You brought over a MASSIVE mistake from PoE1 to PoE2 and it hurts everyone! Resistance?!

It's been a bit since the patch rolled out that got rid of the last -20% res penalty from higher tier maps. At first it made gearing my character easier. Elemental resistance runes I already had socketed became useless though; there really should be a way to replace runes in an item. After a while I no longer had to put any notable effort into balancing my gear for capped res.

I stopped feeling as much much of a desire to get new items since better resistances on them would all be hardcapped and irrelevant. Half the mods on gear became dead mods. The only thing I want now is more ES and damage. Item rarity is also an option, but I don't like magic find conceptually and think it's lame and bad for the game since base drop rarity is balanced around it. That starts to branch into a different topic though.

Overall I think the reduced resistance penalty change ended up predictably as a band-aid fix that didn't actually enrich the game. It just made it easier to reach mandatory stat requirements and made a lot of sources of resistance even less relevant in the later game build stages.

Overall the latest patch was actually pretty good, but resistances as a stat system are still fundamentally messy and could use some love.

All I want for Christmas is for GGG to balance their scaling systems better... And my two front teeth.

I agree with this, especially since it would be different from PoE1. And PoE2 needs to be different compared to PoE1

I like resistances in principle.. one option to fix these via poe1 were additional utility flasks but specifically crafting benchs (add 1-2 implicits/explicits to an item from a list of found recipes), betrayal crafting recipes ( e.g. unique effects or chaos resistance; partially hidden behind boss encounters) and harvest crafts (shift one resistance type to another on an item of same tier).. these were not implemented.. in addition game lacks vendor recipes like in poe1 (e.g. generate amethyst ring base) of items to target craft, and supporting currency such as fossils to target craft resistance gear.. or ways to improve quality on rings and belts to increade magnitude of resistances.. atlas tree also had often options to increase max. resistance or runspeed as a passive etc. Or options to have or craft wildcards on items such as via betrayal where you select one additional implicit/ explicit from options.

If al this was challenging due to unavailabiluty of currency.. pasive skill tree usually offered alot options for mitigation from complex to simple such as via masteries, pure resistances, curse immunity, etc.

In addition auras for resistances existed
Like purity of elements.

With all these measures i was always capable to fix it - sounds easy but it wasnt , however it wasnt only drop dependend. Poe2 feels a bit like a cooked down version.. nevertheless it was already well playable towards 90 in ssf hc with basic knowledge.

I miss the toolbox i used to use from poe1 which adds many options.

+1

Agree with the initial post.
Also I'd like to add that block has a similar problem as resistances, so I think that should also be looked at.

Something similar sounds fine as the resistance suggestion.
Alternatively it could be changed, so blocking doesn't reduce the blocked hit to 0 damage, just partially. And here I don't mean percentage wise reduction, like glancing blows keystone, instead it could just reduce the damage by some value.
This might need a new stat though, so the 1st option seems better.

+1

wholeheartedly agree

+1

+!


I will continue to post this everywhere. But, everyone's problems can be resolved if Life and Resistances always roll on magic gear, and Life. Res and defense % increases always rolled on rare gear. In this way, people would be guaranteed to get some baseline of defenses on all gear and orbs that can be used to reroll at a chance of getting higher or lower values. All other orbs can be used to add lines of suffixes/prefixes to see if you can get rare ones for the perfect equipment.

Players shouldn't have to fight for their lives to obtain the basic defenses the game forces them to have.

No doubt the design can be improved with an elegant solution. Food for thought for the real designers out there:

Resistances that experience attrition as damage is taken. More resistance allows a character to take more punishment/for a longer time. New skill and support gems emphasizing recovering or boosting these layers.
Characters that are less invested can still survive damage but can tolerate less before needing to recover.
Characters that are more invested can recover more quickly and/or need to recover less often (tankiness: they can stand and take it, but not endlessly).

Think something in mind akin to Energy Shield Recharge, without the necessity to avoid all damage and has the possibility for forced recovery via gems, charms, uniques, etc.

This would be another interactivity enhancer on top of the wonderful improvements that PoE II's design has brought to combat.

Ruby Charm
Consumes 40 of 80 Charges on use
Recovers 30% Fire Resistance when Fire Resistance falls below 30%.