Crucis

Personally, I'm curious if there's any rough estimate on when the devs think that 3.02 will go live. This week? Next week? The week after that?

I agree with your point about scrolls and Lore. I think that part of the problem is related to how spellcasting (and abilities') power, duration, and AoE are tied generically to the same two attributes, no matter the class. The result of this is that you can have a barbarian, whom the current was attributes are designed, may have high Might and INT scores, and if that barbarian has a good Lore score, he will end up being to cast spell from a scroll with just as much effect as a wizard with the same Might and INT scores. Of course, "fixing" this would require a drastic change in the way that attributes are applied. I know that I would like this, but others wouldn't. I'd love to see abilities' durations and AoE's tied to attributes that were more in keeping with the nature of their class, rather than blindly tied to INT by default. For example, I think that it'd make more sense for a Paladin's abilities or a Priest's spells and abilities to be tied to Resolve, since I think that Resolve would be a strong measure of the strength of any paladin's or priest's beliefs, and hence the driving factor in the duration and size of AoE's (and arguably, even the power of those abilities and spells, rather than Might). I personally think that it'd make the classes more interesting if the duration, AoE, and power of their spells and/or spell-like abilities were tied to attributes that varied by class and were rationally tied to attributes that made real sense for each class. Barbs and perhaps Fighters might have these abilities tied to Might. Paladins and Priests and probably Monks might be tied to Resolve. Wizards and probably Ciphers and Chanters would likely be tied to INT. Rogues would probably be tied to PER. And so on. Anyways, just a wishful thought...

1. Just because you run across some camping supplies (when you're already fully stocked) doesn't mean that you have to stop and rest. I'll often leave them there, and keep on going, and when I feel it *IS* time to rest, I'll fall back to where these supplies are (assuming that I'm in the same dungeon, even if I might have to go up a level), take my rest there and grab the supplies to keep my camping supplies maxed out. 2. As for the second paragraph, yeah, there's some truth to what you say about personal restrictions. OTOH, I don't agree about the "that's clearly not how the game is designed to be played" part. The game is not designed to force you to rest often. But neither is it designed to force you to rest only when absolutely necessary. Even with the camping supplies mechanic, there's a lot of room for variation in how often one rests. I somewhat suspect that it's this way because the devs knew that there's always going to be a portion of the players who will want to spam magic like crazy and rest really often, and who would whine and whine and whine if they couldn't. Personally, I wish that the entire concept of rest was more restrictive in a way that essentially a more "realistic" model of play that prevented excessive resting and far more strongly encouraged continuing forward, and also forced you to be more conservative in one's expenditure of limited memorized spells, at least until you met a big boss, when it would clearly be time to let it all hang out. I wouldn't mind if there was a risk of having the party's rest interrupted by random encounters, like occurred in the BG games, IIRC. I also wish that there was a risk of random encounters as you traveled between outdoor map areas in the wildnerness (or heck even in the cities), since these would increase the risk the party would face of traveling while badly wounded and probably force you to approach these fights in a way to protect your wounded party members. 3. As for martial classes vs spellcasters regarding weapons, you're right, with the exception of the class limited soulbound weapons. And even then, any class can wield class limited soulbound weapons, as long as they don't bind them. Look at the Redeemer. Arguably, its best power is the ability to destroy vessels on a portion of hits. And this ability does not require the weapon to be bound to the character, meaning that a character of any class could use the Redeemer and go around nuking vessels (provided that they were of a high enough level). 4. I agree 100% with your final sentence.

When I played my monk PC, there was a point where she was taking more damage than she could reliably handle as a front liner. So I moved her to the second row and did the following. I armed her with a hunting bow, since it's in the same weapons group as fists. And I'd have her take a few shots, to give the battle time to develop. And when I saw an opening or a spot where the monk's hand to hand skills could be best put to use, I'd have her switch back to fists and run right into the fray. If it happened to be a battle where the enemy had some spell casters in the rear, I'd often have my monk run straight for those casters instead of supporting the front liners, because 1v1 a monk almost always makes mincemeat out of any caster. The point was that I didn't view this monk as a ranged combatant. She was only using a ranged weapon as a means of doing something useful while I allowed the battle to develop, before I sent her into melee. Also, I suppose that I could have had her use a harder hitting ranged weapon, but I wanted to stick to the roleplaying (and her weapon group) and use the hunting bow. OF course, she was lightly armored and could produce a very nice RoF. But I suppose that if one was playing a more heavily armored monk and using this tactic, maybe a harder hitting weapon might make more sense.

The thing with "Vancian" (I hate that term) casters is that their strength is in direct proportion to how often you rest.

I agree with Jerek. If one spams their per-rest abilities and spells and rests extremely frequently, of course the spellcasting classes look amazing. OTOH, I think that if players tried to play their party relatively close to the edge of their health (probably not really meaning that you rest when at lesat one gets in the red, but perhaps when you have multiple characters in the yellow and below 50% health), and you've probably expended a solid portion (at least 50%?) of their memorized spells, I think that things would look a LOT different. And solid, durable, if unspectacular physical combatants like fighters, paladins, and even rangers (chanters and ciphers as well, since they don't use memorized spells) might start looking a lot better. Another issue I have is that I suspect that there are a number of players who may have the following strategy, probably unconsciously. They go with a balls to the wall, all-in offense strategy, trying to take out the enemy ASAP. If they win, great. If they lose, reload and try balls to the wall all over again until they get it right. And they probably rest more often (due to heavier use of their per-rest abilities and spells) than a party that depends more on a slower, but steady physical combat style that makes tactical use of per-rest abilities and spells, rather than trying to pummel every group of enemies they face with them. I suspect that the slow but steady combat style will have a lot more ability to go longer between rests than the all-in offensive style. Also, I think that people are judging the quality of the various classes based on their personal play style, preferred difficulty level, and whether they play solo or with a full party or somewhere in between. But some of these people aren't being up front about these play style preferences, and are, intentionally or not, trying to presenting their opinion as the end all and be all of class rankings without this extremely important contextual data.

Kdub, I think that you're being a little over the top when saying that Fighters do nothing for the team. Sure, they may not be the highest DPS characters. OTOH, my experience is that their durability and strong if not spectacular damage output makes a fighter a rock in a party's front line. Also, if you want to try to find ways to minimize or at least reduce your micromanagement of the team, fighters tend to be fairly hands off compared to other front liners, like monks. Mind you, I'm not dissing Paladins when I say this. I like having a paladin around as well, even if I don't expect him or her to be a spectacular damage producer. I'm probably still disappointed with Fighters from the 2.0 Defender nerf. I started with Fighters in 1.0 and thought they were great iron golems of death. 2.0 made me see the real cracks in their structure and that is when I discovered Monks and the Juggernaut. After that I feel that Fighters just don't "bring it" They are pretty lite on micro and I do like Charge, but they fall in with the Monk, Barbarian and Rogue as 'buffies" while Chanters and Paladins are "buffers" The "buffers" get the 1+1=4 effect going for the team. Out of the "buffies" the Fighter brings better defense but the game is easier with more offense and just enough defense. Your defense only needs to be "good enough for long enough". I still prefer having a real fighter around, because over a long battle, their durability will usually keep them on their feet when other less durable class characters have checked out (unless revived). At least that's been my experience. In long battles where I've started losing party members, I've always been able to count on Eder being one of those who will still be on his feet and fighting the good fight. The problem with "your defense only needs to be good enough for long enough" is that there are times when it's just not good enough, and you won't achieve eventual victory due to the durability and endurance of toughest, hardest to kill dudes. You'll achieve it with another familiar strategy ... the reload strategy. Personally, while I don't play Iron Man mode, I also don't want to build parties around a foreknowledge that if my party can't hack a long battle, there's always Plan B (i.e. reload). Put another way, maybe this is an example of the old "tortoise and the hare" fable, where the more offensively minded classes like monks are the hares, while the fighters are the more slow and steady tortoises. The hares may be good for those 100 meter dashes, but give me a good durable fighter for those marathon battles.

Kdub, I think that you're being a little over the top when saying that Fighters do nothing for the team. Sure, they may not be the highest DPS characters. OTOH, my experience is that their durability and strong if not spectacular damage output makes a fighter a rock in a party's front line. Also, if you want to try to find ways to minimize or at least reduce your micromanagement of the team, fighters tend to be fairly hands off compared to other front liners, like monks. Mind you, I'm not dissing Paladins when I say this. I like having a paladin around as well, even if I don't expect him or her to be a spectacular damage producer.

Brim, I think that you're falling prey to overly high expectations. You seem to be expecting that Paladins must be great/the best at something offensive, when their best feature is to support the party while providing a completely capable and durable front line tank. And yes, they do their support differently from priests. However, IIRC, the various things lay on hands and exhortations that pallies have, they're able to cast faster than anything similar by a priest. Also, it can be very convenient to have both a paladin and a priest because you never know when one or the other might get knocked out and it's nice to have some backup. One ability that I found invaluable in my most recent party was Aegis of Loyalty. It's outstanding for those times when you run into fampyrs or others who cast charm spells. All the pally has to do is land a "love tap" of an attack on the charmed one, and presto! he's back on the home team! As for orders and their abilities, honestly, none of the orders playable by a PC impresses me much with their order's abilities. Arguably the best order's abilities are those belonging to Pallegina's order, particularly the new Wrath of the Five Suns ability. Honestly, I think that you're expecting too much out of paladins in terms of them being offensive beasts. That's not the role that they were designed to fill by the devs. And while I may not agree with that role and wish that they more capable offensively, they're far from useless or weak, or a burden to the team. Don't discount the value of the +5 accuracy bonus from Zealous Focus. Nor overlook the value of using the Outworn Buckler with its aura of +5 to all defenses of nearby team mates. Just remember that the job of the paladin is to "lead" the party, to inspire and support them, not necessarily be the highest damage output character on the team.

Kdubya, I'd rather have the free DR and see monks be more true to the fantasy monk paradigm. But one thing that could be done to mitigate your concern would be to make it so that the added DR only works in light armor or less. I sort of agree with the last sentence. Monks are great when they can get in 1 on 1 melee situations. But in my limited experience with them (I played a monk PC thru to the end), they seemed a bit squishy to be a true "hold the line" front liner in the mold of a well armored fighter or paladin or even a chanter. (On a side note, it just seems odd to me that chanters should have a higher base DEFL than paladins.) Monks seem like they're all about themselves in combat, in terms of what they bring to the table. Paladins and Chanters both bring abilities that help those around them. But with monks it seems like their abilities are all focused on hitting the guy right in front of him. And that's OK, as long as you realize what a monk will do in a party and work with it. But yes, there's definitely something to having characters of classes who will synergize well together.

They give 10% ranged damage. Ah. Thanks. I don't know by a 10% damage bump hardly seems worth it compared to various other uses for the slot, like +9 to deflection, or big bonuses to attributes. Or even the +5 bonus to accuracy. That's one I like because my thinking is that damage buffs don't mean much if you can't hit in the first place.

What are these "Archer's Gloves"? They're not in the gamepedia wiki's list of gloves and gauntlets.

Luckman, I agree about day and night and wishing that there was more difference between them. One of the things I really liked about BG1, way back when, was that at night, the stores closed. But the later IE games all cities and towns acted like there was no difference between night and day. Stores remained open. The people on the street never went home. And so on. Also, while BG2 had this (IMO) flaw, it had one other thing that I liked. In some cities, vampires could turn up at night. So if you wanted to travel in those cities at night, you had to be wary of the random vampire attack. Of course, in PoE, fampyrs no longer worry about night and day, which is a change I do NOT like. That was one paradigm or cliche that was perfectly fine as is and didn't need changing. But I digress.

I understand what you're saying. I just think that the idea of a weaponless warrior monk wearing serious armor is wrong. Light "armor" is OK, but heavier than that and it seems to me that you're starting to talk about a character who is no longer someone who should be fighting weaponless. As for wizards and swords, I have no problem with wizards wielding whatever weapons they like, though I think that one might make a case that maybe druids should be limited to non-metal weapons. Of course, with the weapons groups the way they're currently set, you end up with the only two non-metal melee weapons, clubs and staffs, in different groups. So I don't think that this sort of limitation would work well in PoE as it currently exists. Also, monks would probably fare better if unarmored or lightly armored if they'd been given bonuses to their DR every few levels, similar to their regular increase in unarmed damage and accuracy.

Well, apparently not anymore (the ones in Searing Falls)... :D And it's a damned shame.

One thing that struck me as really wrong here was that the Abbey has that pool where Maneha is able to take a little dip and have her memories washed away. So that left me asking, why do all those low tiders have to spend years of silent "torture" only to be followed by getting flushed down Ondra's toilet to have their memories washed away? Why couldn't they use the same pool that Maneha used? Honestly, that seemed like a major flaw in the entire Abbey storyline.

I guess that I'm a throwback. I've never been overly fond of putting casters in the front row. Oh, it's one thing if the front row comes to them, or if the caster is sort of in the role of second row off-tank, like I usually do with Durance. My optimal situation has always been to have my tanks holding the enemies at bay and off of the casters, even if I have to use my first and second rows to do it and leave some breathing room for my offensive casters to work without being harassed by the enemy. But tastes vary.

Rangers aren't bad at all. There are just some players who have the mindset that if a character isn't a spellcaster, then it's a "bad" ranged character. In their minds, non-spellcasters belong in melee and only spellcasters should be ranged combatants. Don't listen to them.

Fireballs, I'm assuming that you're in the Abbey of the Fallen Moon, given how many of these monks it sounds like you're facing. And yes, they're very tough. I went in there with a max level party on Normal difficulty, and they were still far from easy. And the final "boss" battle was very difficult. I found the monks so difficult for a while that I actually had to fallback and return to Caed Nua and switch up my party roster. I replaced the merc wizard I had in the party with GM because I felt that her mental powers would be of more use than a wizard's nukes, not to mention that she'd be generally a bit tougher and more durable if forced into melee. the party mix that got me through the Abbey was: Eder (fighter), Pallegina (pally), Kana (chanter), Durance (priest), Alastyr (PC rogue), and GM (cipher). Any items that you have the increase your defense from being stunned or even your defenses WHILE stunned would be helpful, since you will have characters who get stunned. Also knocked down as well. Having your priest casting spells that help in this regard would be a big help as well. Tactically speaking, in combat, try to focus your fire on wounded enemies and finish them off ASAP. Of course, this is a fairly normal thing all the time in this game. But it becomes critical in these monk battles because they do have healers who will cast healing spells. Get the "Badly Wounded" and particularly "Near Death" enemies dead before their priests can heal them up!!! It also doesn't hurt to try to kill their priests to prevent them from having this support, though in some battles it may be difficult to engage a priest who is well behind the lines when you're being swarmed with monks and fighters and such. Another thing, be prepared to use your priest to cast Withdraw spells on badly wounded party members. It can be a real life saver.

Of course, you want to see where you're going. But to me, that's not the point. Even above ground, parties travel during the night in the dark. And frankly, it should be a lot darker at night, even above ground, unless Eora has, let's say, 2 moons and one assumes that one of those moons is always in the night sky. A bit of a stretch, I think, astronomically speaking, but an explanation even if an imperfect one. The point is, as someone crawling around in the dark, be it in a dungeon or above ground at night, of course you WANT to see where you're going. But that doesn't mean that you should be able to, at least not without making an effort, like having to carry torches, etc. This would also open up opportunities for items that allowed the wearer to see in the dark without aid of a torch. Also, one would think that trying to be stealthy while carrying a torch would be rather difficult. And another point... As I've said above twice, unless the inhabitants of a dungeon can see in the dark, one would assume that they want to have the part of the dungeon lit as much as you do. So it seems that there would be a lot of dungeons that would be lit, simply because the people dwelling there are going to want it illuminated, which of course means that it's nicely lit for you too.

Aesthetics and visual range. In a pitch-black dungeon you'd only be able to see as far as your light source reaches. This would have significant repercussions on encounter design, as you wouldn't be able to see how many of them lurk in the darkness. You could have enemy parties with light sources too of course. Agreed. However, as I said above, unless the creatures who inhabit the dungeon can see in the dark, they're going to want to have the place lit as well. So there is a bit of a rationale for having at least some of a dungeon lit.

I like the idea of the dark, dank dungeon/cave system. That said, if there are things living in that cave/mine/dungeon, it's not exactly surprising that its dwellers choose to light it up. But on the flip side, unless they're using some magical means of lighting or have some sort of luminescent thing that glows in the dark, lighting an entire cave with torches would seem to be rather wasteful, since wood doesn't exactly grow underground, and the cave dwellers' supply of combustible materials would likely be limited. They'd be more likely to only light those areas that NEED to be lit at any given moment so that they could conserve their limited supply of torch "resources". So in the end, there really is some logic behind these dungeon/cave systems being lit. Unless the cave dwellers can see in the dark, they're going to like their "home" lit as much as any visitors (i.e. the player's party) would like it lit.

Balance reasons. I think that a better question is ... why aren't wands, rods, and scepters all in the same weapons groups? I mean, come on, they're just a little stick that shoots a burst of magical energy. The idea that they're in 2 different weapons groups is silly. But, of course, the entire weapons group concept is silly, IMO, so why should I expect anything to be any different where magical implements are concerned?

Here's an idea for those who don't like fighting so-called "trash mobs": They're part of the game. If you don't like it, stop whining and go play a different game.

I agree that using any significant armor on a monk seems to break many people's role playing immersion. Which is weird, since this is a monk. If people are in the kind of battlefield situation where anyone is wearing armor, they are all wearing armor. That is a real world monk, not a monk as described in the class description (I think). Frankly, what I see above is a fighter by any other name.