Path of Exile

[Rasix]

There’s a stash tab sale on a regular monthly rotation.  I wouldn’t spend money unless you can actually get to map farming. I don’t imagine you got through the acts in 2 days.

[ezrast]

Path of Exile without tabs is the demo. The tabs are the box price.

But yeah, you gotta be at peace with letting stuff go. There's basically nothing you should be hanging on to at that point other than currency and leveling uniques.

[Rasix]

Worst. League launch. Ever.

Holy shit.

[Trippy]

With the added drama of people griping cause some streamers can apparently play without queuing.

[Draegan]

With all the launch bullshit aside, and GGG banning streamers for exploits I dig the league mechanic.

Playing a bloodslinger and its fun not sure how long I can play for though. The only loot I give a shit about is stuff from the mechanic because at least the rewards are actually worth looking at.

[Rasix]

I'm actually quite enjoying this league so far. Reddit is losing its collective shit, but what else is new. For the first time in a few leagues, I actually enjoy my league starter and it's scaling quite well.

Minion instability SRS using a Tavukai and Siegebreaker with zombies for support. Due to the league mechanic, I've also been able to invest a few exalts into it. +1 minion level wand with trigger. 6 link helm with +2 minion skill gem level. There's some obvious upgrades I can make as well, along with better cluster jewels that should allow this to scale further. I'm not feeling the rush to reroll especially that uber lab is done.

I'm thinking I might make an exsanguinate scion next or maybe try a trapper. Trapper would be great as well for the league mechanic.

[Draegan]

I'm playing Stormbind. 

https://pastebin.com/0JZSMuD7

I'm decently tanky and my damage ain't terrible. I think my AOE overlap allows for 9 runes to hit a boss at the same time.

[Rasix]

You are a masochist.  

I keep waffling on what I want to do with my next build, so I just keep pumping currency into my SRS bomber. It still keeps getting better. Managed to do Sirus and Catarina with only a couple deaths due to me being bad, old, and colorblind as fuck (red on red, green on green). If I could work in being element immune, that would be huge.

Currently looking at an ele hit raider, mana miner ascendant or still something with the new blood skills. All super expensive.

[Draegan]

I'm playing an art bomber too. Just act 9 though. Can't be assed to play this game much anymore.

[Rasix]

Self chill mechanic is just too fun. You can probably make this work for sub 10ex, although a lot of the items are more expensive due to people trying out the build.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Bro_o6_XRI

Doesn't really come online until you can use an Inpulsa and equip the required cluster jewels, so just level as whatever.

[Draegan]

Took a few days off and came back and leveling a chieftain revenge build I saw Mathil playing. Looks dumb but different.

[Rasix]

New league lands on the 23rd. Tons of nerfs coming. I'm not sure I really like this approach. I'm not someone that absolutely blasts through maps, so this will just make certain parts of the end game more of a slog.

Still, there's 19 new skill gems, and most of them look pretty neat. Some of these may be safe enough to start with if they can also be built with another skill. Slam totems look interesting.

[Draegan]

I'd like to try to make the reaper work. Assuming I can still play the game.

4L Reaper
6L Bladestorm
4L Battlemage Cry Exsanguinate

Corrupted Fever/HoP somewhere

Glad build.

I'll probably end up quitting before maps anyway - the end game is still boring and stupid as fuck.

[Rasix]

And it'll take longer now to get through it. Nerfs, nerfs everywhere (again). Flash rework is just a big nerf, although flasks do need to be changed desperately. Trigger builds got nerfed, and apparently that includes spellslinger. And to top it off, Act 1 got "rebalanced" to be harder (wtf).

That reaper build concept sounds interesting. I'd worry that Glad just won't have enough damage (minion nodes/ascendency bonuses)  and that the best reaper build will still rely on scaling the gem level. I'd like to see it work, it would be an amazingly tanky boss killer, but I'll probably be boring and go necro. Because if it sucks, I can just pivot to some other minion build.

Totems and traps seem like they'll be amazing, as unlike other archetypes, they just got buffs. A slam totem chieftain might be pretty fun.

This is the first league in a while that I've thought about just skipping entirely. Partially due to burnout, but partially due to the sinking feeling that they're going to fuck this rebalance up pretty hard and the game will just feel bad to play. They're chasing the D2 dragon pretty hard, and I'm not really sure they'll nail it this go around.

[Draegan]

No idea how any of it scales. It's just a play on bleeds.

Seismic trap is probably going to be the thing.

[Draegan]

I also don't think there is a way to scale trap damage and minion damage . That would be a fun combo.

[Rasix]

Huuuuuuuuuuggggggggge mana nerfs. If you liked running out of mana, you'll love this! I guess maybe I'll be leveling with totems or traps. Everything else is probably going to feel pretty awful.

edit:
Trigger wands got dicked too. Necromancer not looking so great.

Just a sample I did on a Tectonic Slam 6 link was a 35% increase in mana usage. This is combined with a roughly 40% decrease in the power of the support gems. You're probably losing an aura out of this, so kiss another 10-25% damage goodbye. 

To gird thy loins, expect 20-40% higher mana costs for most skills, 30-50% reduction in power (if not completely dead), less effective awakened gem options, less effect alternative quality options, slow attack speeds, etc. This is going to feel baaaaad. (Reaper might be fine. But if it sucks, you're not looking at a great 1-1 substitution.)

[Soulflame]

I'm confused, how does this compete with a D2 re-release.

[Rasix]

I never really liked D2 that much. So, I'm not really looking toward playing the re-release. So, that's not really a factor for me.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[Rendakor]

Thing is, a lot of these nerfs seem a long time coming. Mana has been trivial forever, as has the idea of 100% uptime on flasks. The former means mana might as well not exist, while the latter makes flasks just another piece of gear instead of something you want to use intelligently. Trigger builds had to get nerfed because they were even worse offenders in regards to mana not existing.

D2 doesn't come out until September, so I suspect it will be the next league that really competes with it (though if they stick to 3 month leagues, this one will still be running).

[Rasix]

They won't release at the same time. GGG would delay in case D2 got pushed back. I wouldn't put it past them to have this schedule just so they can play D2 for a while before the next league and not worry about the game cutting into the streamers playing the next expansion.

Flasks only really have 100% uptime if you're a pathfinder or ascendant with the nodes. I don't think I've played a build lately where that was even a concern while mapping. It's just going to mostly feel like dogshit while leveling. Plus combined with the damage

The mana thing is going to feel like ass. I'd rather trivialize mana costs then wait for skills to become available or run mana flasks (which will have shit sustain). They've nerfed mana regen, mana scaling, but I don't think they've touched mana leech.

I know it's "needed" but doing all of this in one league is just going to feel like a slog. It's a triple factor nerf across 3 very large and important aspects of the feel of the game. This is just a terrible idea to pile it all on at once. I'm willing to give it a try, but I'm not hopeful.

[Rendakor]

I'm used to always running at least one mana flask, so that's not really going to hurt me a lot. I also never really use flasks other than life/mana/runspeed while leveling.

Making leveling feel worse is my biggest worry honestly, since grinding the acts is the worst part of the game to me. I like maps and the other various endgame systems (Heists finally got fun once I figured out what was valuable and how the Grand Heists worked) much more, but usually only play one or two toons per league because getting them there is such an awful slog.

[Rendakor]

I'm enjoying this league a lot. Playing SST Gladiator, which I didn't realize is a meta build until I was already committed. It's a lot of fun dashing around like Cap, and I really don't feel particularly weak or vulnerable compared to previous leagues. I'm still in early tier maps though, and working on gearing out. Meanwhile, the Expedition mechanic is really fun; it feels like Blight except you have much more control over it and can properly configure risk vs reward based on the order you blow up each of the things. The logbooks are fantastic, and it's a shame they are incredibly rare.

[Draegan]

I love the expedition mechanics but I can't make a build stick. Rerolled a ton already this league.

SST is fun though, so is shield crush.

I've got a Storm Rain build in Act 5.

[Rasix]

If someone wants to try a FR totem build, I stuck a 5 link Soul Mantle in the guild bank. I got lucky and managed to six link mine last night.  I can also toss in the Kikizarus if needed, as I bought a Veridi's Veil (sp). The cluster jewels for this one are pretty expensive, but I have a couple mediums and a large that someone could reroll as well.

Build is mega squishy and you get one shot if someone stares at you for more than a second. It has very high damage potential and actually doesn't feel like shit compared to a lot of skills right now.

[grunk]

this game is dead, long live diablo 2 re

[Rasix]

New challenge league announcement just finished. It's really fucking good. Lots of QoL features on top of what looks like a really good core mechanic. I am psyched, especially since Expedition was such a bummer for me.

[Draegan]

All the changes just seem to make the game better. League mechanic looks fun too.

[rattran]

Sanctum is another shit league, AN was removed, but by that they just mean renamed. And the league mechanic doesn't work with melee, which was nerfed again.

But there's now Ruthless mode, which is regular POE but with pretty much no drops. I just don't get the appeal.

[Draegan]

Sanctum is another shit league, AN was removed, but by that they just mean renamed. And the league mechanic doesn't work with melee, which was nerfed again.

But there's now Ruthless mode, which is regular POE but with pretty much no drops. I just don't get the appeal.

New league is quite fun imo. I'm playing quite a bit.

Melee has always been crap in this game.

[rattran]

They keep making melee worse, and fucking up other shit. RF doesn't work with the new league either.

[Azuredream]

This is the most I've played a league since Ultimatum. The sanctum is really fun, it really has that 'just one more map so I can finish this run' feeling. I am playing a totem build however and I can see how it would be unplayable for melee until you get enough damage to just one-tap all the guards. I'm interested to see if they'll make some part of it core. They're on record as saying Sanctified Relics are not staying so they'd have to give some other kind of reward if they wanted to keep it in the game somehow. I've heard people on reddit speculate that it could be a lab replacement/alternative in poe2.

[Rasix]

This is the most I've played a league since Ultimatum. The sanctum is really fun, it really has that 'just one more map so I can finish this run' feeling. I am playing a totem build however and I can see how it would be unplayable for melee until you get enough damage to just one-tap all the guards. I'm interested to see if they'll make some part of it core. They're on record as saying Sanctified Relics are not staying so they'd have to give some other kind of reward if they wanted to keep it in the game somehow. I've heard people on reddit speculate that it could be a lab replacement/alternative in poe2.

I'd never ascend in that scenario. 

[Draegan]

I played Poison SRS and killed most things, sold everything and made a hexblast trickster miner and can easily clear T16s.

Played a few other jank builds into reds and quit quickly. (1 day ish of playing)

I may be done, currency is raining from the sky I've got a paultry 6-7 divs in stuff on me and I feel poor. Nothing is really affordable that would interest me in playing more.

[Rasix]

Decided to try the poison SRS since I could afford to get it started and SRS is probably my most played skill. Might as well give it a shot before poison/SRS is potentially nerfed.

This build slaps. Gems aren't 20 and it does T16s and Elderslayers at lvl 80 (82 now). This might be the most bonkers single target DPS I've played since Archmage support on release. Still need to work on the defenses, get better Ghastly jewels, and farm an Amanamu's Gaze. An Ashes of the Stars would also help, but I'm poor as shit at the moment. The effort to get in all of the auras I needed was a bit annoying. Still, this build is probably good to go on less than 6 Divines.

I did actually clear a Sanctum on my EA ballista champ. If I knew defense didn't matter for shit in Sanctum, I probably would have rolled something else at the start. Solid character, but it'll feel weak until you sort your bow and get some more levels in you.