1.0.0 Balance Changes

AWESOME changes, specially about Improved Two-Handed Weapons and Mods and the necessary LOW-MID GAME improvements. Congratz on listening the community!

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grepman wrote:

one problem with all auras being %, is that it severely limits diversity of EB builds

whats the point of having 3k mana if you can run the same amount of auras as someone with 300 mana ? the game is already survival + one main skill heavy.

the EB builds if auras are all big % reservation will now boil down to :

1. EB+mana shield (and its gonna be a long journey down there for MS)
2. arctic armour
3. some crazy setup with trigger gems and high-cost skills like Dom Blow. not even sure if that will work, to be honest.

That's a good point. I thought it made sense before, as percent auras (e.g. determination, hatred, purity) reserve a percentage of your mana, and flat bonuses (e.g. anger, wrath, grace, discipline) reserved a flat amount of mana.

These changes to the auras have the potential to be drastic changes to current characters, and I'm disappointed they're essentially glossed over as "rebalanced". I'm sorry, but unless the reservation nodes are plentiful and effective, this change is a straight nerf for the solo player.

I know GGG said they will buff the auras, but that doesn't really help. The solo player is forced to pick survivability over damage. I think for most people, myself included, that doesn't sound like much fun, and just raises my gear requirements.

Again, I'm not going to get worked up because we don't know the actual values yet or the new skill tree, but I'm nervous about the effects of this change. Especially since I have no idea why they identified this as a serious balance problem.

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h3rp3s wrote:

I think that many classes need 3+ auras to feel effective in this game.

Many auras are mandatory.

Purity:

Q How can you get max resists with a -60 in merc?
A Cant be done without Purity even with good gear

Clarity:

Q How you going to regen mana fast enough to pay for that 80+ mana spell 3x a sec?
A Can't be done without max lvl Clarity + passive nodes + mana regen on gear.

With the aura changes you are making this game more dependent on items, which is already frustrating for many.

Also Auras in D2 didnt cost mana. And there were some builds (Auradin) who had multiple auras.

I agree with your overall point, but you don't need Purity to cap resists in merciless, and mana regen can be obtained pretty easily from gear or using mana leech.

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h3rp3s wrote:

Purity:

Q How can you get max resists with a -60 in merc?
A Cant be done without Purity even with good gear

well that's not quite true. with very good gear and no res passives you can max them at 75, no problem

purity is near mandatory because of +4 max resists you cannot get anywhere else besides saffels shield (and thats a pretty specific unique). that's an insane bonus.

Damn, I already had problems reserving HP with Blood Magic on my best character.. now it's gonna get increased fml.

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Inarion1986 wrote:

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ReZar wrote:

Pretty sure you need to use both hands to fire a bow... so yes they are true 2-handers.

But from the game's perspective you get to profit from an offhand-item - the quiver - unlike 2H melee weapons which don't allow for additional stats in your offhand slot. I guess that's what JoOnky was referring to.

Nobody cares about what a standard noob said, bows are bows and bows are 2h weapons, end of story.

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symban wrote:

I think Weaver fight is great in terms of difficulty, and I think Kole type fights totally suck. Make boss fights more strategic and (player) skill dependent, not just a stat check.

Just add constant adds, if you think people will abuse not getting one shot.

While the Weaver fight is awesome after the changes it also is problematic in another sense, any build that doesn't have leech or massive constant regeneration struggles to complete the fight.

So adding constant waves of adds like the weaver fight is a horrible solution in the long run.

btw my fear is that the aura buff will only buff 6 stack parties once more, since maybe its more diffciult to set up all auras then, but cmon, professional 6 stacks will have all auras again and then they are facerolling even more -> fail.

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grepman wrote:

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DarkHeart69 wrote:

I see lots of aura bitching but none of you are taking into account that some of these auras could be lower than 30% we could be running clarity for 20% without reduced mana for all you know. I hope to see anger and wrath take on the same idea as hatred... hello buff to elemental combat builds. Hopefully Vitality, Haste, and Clarity got a much needed buff. Clarity was nice for low lvs but at higher lvs it can't sustain anything let alone something as costly as a 6l Arc.

one problem with all auras being %, is that it severely limits diversity of EB builds

whats the point of having 3k mana if you can run the same amount of auras as someone with 300 mana ? the game is already survival + one main skill heavy.

the EB builds if auras are all big % reservation will now boil down to :

1. EB+mana shield (and its gonna be a long journey down there for MS)
2. arctic armour
3. some crazy setup with trigger gems and high-cost skills like Dom Blow. not even sure if that will work, to be honest.

Now that you mention it, yes, I don't understand why aura mana reservation is % based to begin with. Someone running 3 auras at 30% reservation each, what's the different between having 1000 mana 3000 mana? The person with 1000 mana will have 100 mana left for skills. The person with 3000 mana will have 300 mana left for skills. Going out of your way to get 2000 additional mana get's relegated to 200 additional mana. In end-game 200 mana is nothing and anyone wanting to run 3 auras at 30% reservation each will not go for either 1000 mana or 3000 mana. They will just completely ignore mana altogether and run the 3 auras off their base mana and have 30 to 45 uesless mana left over. In end-game there is almost zero difference between having 45, 100, or 300 mana left for skills. And to me, someone that went out there way to get 3000 mana should have some kind of benefit over someone that completely ignored the the stat.