Elric Galad

Note that heavy armor affects only recovery but not reload time. Consequently, heavy armor is not too much loss of DPS with firearms and arbalests. So if you want a ranged DPS emergency tank, you can go guns & steel style.

This is BG spiritual successor. That's what backers paid for. It is far less cheesy than his ancestor, but super per rest caster spells are BG trademark. You could just rest before every single fight in this time, so it was far worse than now. But no one complained because games were not really balanced. It was dark ages before the birth of WoW... PoE tried to mitigate the problem to make the game more compatible with today's standards, but they can't remove this aspect of the game without removing BG spirit. Well, CC might be a bit too strong by the way. In BG, there were no graze and a tons of spell/status immunities. So I admit this could be a problem.

So, now that it is said in another thread that per encounter spells are going to be completely changed, we can now speak about reasonable changes to chanter class.

Perfect !!! Balanced and save a bit of fun. Lvl 1 Slicken, blessing, sunbeam Lvl 2 not sure, repulsing seal, swarm Lvl 3 Alacrityn, circle of protection, returning storm. Now, I just have to wait chanter and fighter buff... And everything will be perfect. Forever. The perfection I've waited for so long... Infinity, I can finally touch your feet !!!

I think the conclusion is : Don't worry, both are pretty good. Simply play the one that appeals you the most.

Yeah, top ranged DPS is Wizard. And druid probably second. Spellcasters you know...

Setting per encounter spells to be per rest spells still sounds like the dark side of class balance. It's shorter. It's easier. It would do the job (at least for me). It will save a lot of time to prepare cookies. It is certainly not the funniest, however. But I see it as the only likely to happen, from dev amount of work perspective. I don't hope for something else. I can even do it myself with IE mods. Maybe I'm getting old. Or just nostalgic about BG casters. Which also means I'm getting old.

One important thing to note is that Ranger's pet are not taken into account in the DPS / Number of kills log. And since 2.0, this is a HUGE bias. Pets (with pet's talents), especially Wolf, do almost as much damage as a melee DPSer like melee cipher. Surely not as much as rogue, but you have a Ranged DPSer to support you. But Pets are melee. So if you want the top ranged damage dealer, rogue is still the best. Ranger Multiclass talent enable rogues to do a crazy +80% lash alpha strike (especially crazy with rogue damage modifers). However, for overall DPS (and utility), I think ranger is currently slightly above.

Bonus from activated bonus and modal does not stack. For example cautious attack does not stack with wizard deflection self buff.

Hehe, if you read the thread about per encounter spells, you'll see that I m actually arguing about the necessity to remove per encounter spells for the sake of balance ^^

A part of the problem seems that it is hard to "divide" phrase. Decreasing their cost by 1 unit bascially means substracting 33% of their cost. Multiply by 10 generated phrases and Invocation costs will greatly help balancing task. (This is just an example) In the proposal from Elerond, for example, Invocation cost could by reduced by 5 units instead of 10(1) His idea is reasonable but decreasing to 0 Phrases indeed leads to side-effects. I agree about one thing in the above posts : Chants are fine as they are and don't require any buff.

Interesting question about low level spell scaling. Currently, only Accuracy scale with spells. CC spells does not need more scaling in my opinion. 6s incapacitation at level 1 or at level 14 is anyway 6s incapacitation. I think only Damage and healing Spells need level scaling. They should scale more or less like Ranger's pet or Spriritshift Damage, which means about +20% every 3 levels. This may require them to start at a slightly lower basis.

Basically, you're right, and the analysis you made in previous page is what I think to be the best way to do (with a couple of open points, like summon duration, which has been implemented in 2.0 anyway). There should be something like a fix duration (12s, based on level 1 chants and invocations) The key interesting details to raise should be things like : - How much time for a level 1 invocation powered by level 1 chants at level 14 ? - When we speak about same duration for maximum level chant with maximum level invocation, are we speaking about chanting only maximum level chants, or having at least 1 in the mix ? 12s to summon ogres with Aefyllath Ues Mith Fyr + Come come swift wind, OR 12s to summon ogres with Aefyllath Ues Mith Fyr + Dragon slashe, dragon Trashed) There is also the other (minor) problem of chanters that is class talents which are currently poor. THis could be interesting to discuss but is clearly not critical.

By the way, every skilled player should know that the most powerful party is : - 1 Priest - 5 Wizards It can only be argued that : - 1 additional priest can be cool - 1 Paladin for top tanking can be comfortable without dampening too much your party pure power - Some Wizards could maybe be replaced by druids. That is the status of how far we are from balance if we remove the per rest considerations. I personnaly don't see the problem, because I don't rest all the times. But I will start thinking it is a problem if per encounter continue scaling. But hey, I could use a mod anyway ^^

I agree with the "not so much", and this is exactly why I believe that removing Per Encounter spells in the base game would be a mistake. I just would like an option to allow more balanced* gameplay. (*"More balanced in case you repect the game's untold principle of not resting all the time. Butthurt can be seen as an incitative way to promote this principle ^^. Time limit for quests should have been the best "roleplay-friendly" way to do so, but it is usually seen as too unfriendly for players") Furthermore, it might be a Single Player games, but it is a Single Player Party Games. I feel bad if some party member are lacklusters. I feel bad if I can't pick a particular class because it will never shine among his teammates. If I had to pick only 1 character, I think I will less feel it. But maybe I am too sensitive ^^

I see your point. But I think it does change class balance in practice. I have some kind of "untold assumptions" in my reasonning that might be seen as a bias. Like for example : "for the sake of epicness, my party won't go back to the hostel after a couple of fights." I like having party members that are MVP for a whole dungeon, and other that are MVP for boss fights. As long as I respect my own rule of epicness above, that makes all party members shine at specific moments. Maybe I'm thinking like this because it has always been the case in my old IE games parties. But I really think PoE has been designed following this principle. What you're rising is not just a problem of spelcasters, it is an issue about the whole "per rest / per encounter" stuff, which is inspired by Tabletop games where GM ensures it does matter. In a videogames, players are more or less doing half of GM job (unless, for example, Time limit for quests are implemented). Personnaly, I think per rest ressource management is one of the interesting aspects of the gameplay. It add another dimension to the gameplay (that you can completely skip if you're really blocked in some occasions) It makes you feel more like "a dungeon explorer who can be short on ropes" and not a Diablo 3-like mass-slaughterer (I have spent a lot of time on Diablo 3, so it is not a criticism. It is just not what I'm looking for in PoE.) It is not only a problem of Butthurtness, but also a problem of roleplay. Resting all the time is a bit cheesy in my opinion. Cheese could be fun, but I can't see it as a "mainstream" problem.

So, now we are in front of the problem. 10s chants with 6 phrases invocations. Even with 4s level 1 chants, you need 24s to cast a level 4 Invocation. Nothing is worse that having some useless abilities. For me, the only issue with chanter is Ressource Scaling for Invocations. Apart this, I think Chanters are really fine (they have the most unique design of PoE classes in my opinion). I definitely think this is the hardest PoE design issue to correct. So, let's try to make a design ^^ In the end, we could : - Submit it to Obsidian (Which mean the more simple is the change, the more likely it has a chance to draw attention)... - Hope a moder would like to use it ^^ My opinion is that we could try to start by defining "Requirements" : For example : - Low level chants should generate more ressource than high level ones - High Level Invocations should cost more ressources than low level ones - Ressource generation should be mostly based on passive chanting (a couple of talents generating ressources in a more active way could be possible, but I think it should never become the main source of "phrases") - Chanter philosophy should be to be more useful in long battles. - Chanter are a special type of "spellcasters." Spellcasters should be versatile. Not to say that Chanters are not versatile. I think they are (that's not the current problem), but we should keep this in mind. - Chanters should not be paladins. (They have close roles in a party, as they are Tanky Support and Supportive Tank. This is not a problem as long as their abilities are different enough. Design change on Chanter should emphasize their differences.) - Chanters should have a rather passive gameplay. "Rather passive" should not mean "utterly boring". I have a couple of ideas for Solutions, but I think my ideas are less important than a kind of consensus, especially about could be needed ^^

So, what's about Novice Suffering and Druid Spriritshift ? If it doesn't work, I would whine because it's a bug. If it works, I would whine because it's OP ^^ Basically, my preferred outcome would be an official confirmation that it shouldn't stack (because who just cumulate 2 scaling accuracy and damage bonus).

The point is Obsidian need an official version that is more or less balancer. They should not rely too much on Mod to do so. That's why I belive that an option to make spell only per rest should be included in the base game. This should be an Option (like Expert / Non Expert or companion auto-respec when you find them) because : - per encounter spells does not BREAK the game. It only makes it UMBALANCED which is not so much a problem for single player game. - per encounter spells are a lot of fun for a lot of players. But my opinion is that : - Only per rest only spell can bring balance to the world of PoE, without complex redesign that would require a LOT of work from Obsidian. Changes like 1-2 per encounter spells or additional low level spells are more a job for moders IMHO ) - I really believe that it won't make casters Underpowered, they will still have options easy encounters. I even believe that these options (blast, Spiritshif) are currently completely overshadowed by encounter spells at high level. - The "unbalance" issue will grow with additional Add-on and levels. Soon or later, Obsidian will need to fix it. And the fix might hurt. My opinion is that this is a "fun vs balance" issue. Both deserve to be included in the base game.

Not far from monk I'm currenrly playing. I'll go Iron wheel, but maybe it's because I don't feel flagellant path attractive. I'll be curious about your wound management. You seem to have a lot of wound spenders, plus turning wheel (which need a lot of wounds to be efficient due to 25% DR of the lash damages).

If you really want to go flail, then choose a class that have an intresic bonus to damage like melee rogue or melee cipher. I think flail can be good for interrupt due to fast speed and graze to hit granting +25 to interrupt. So high perception and maybe interrupting blows.

I would agree with both of you : a few per encounter spells and a few more low level spells wouldn't hurt. But I think casters class would be ok (and even powerful) even without this and without per encounter spells. Spellcasters have other abilities that can help to give them per encounter use. I personnally think Spiritshift is really ok since 2.0, wizards have blast and arcane assault and priest interdiction, radiance, and +10 accuracy weapon talents. I think in a certain way it compensates in easy encounters for not having too much low level spells and no per encounter spells. In a certain way, it makes caster playstyle more diversified.

There are 2 kind of DoT : Area DoT that affects a zone and roll against full DR. And "debuff" DoT that are applied to a character even when he/she moves like all other status. These ones are applied against 25% DR.

The more I think about it, the more I believe that spells should be only per rest. A lot of abilities of non-caster classes have been balanced in some ways taking into account that they are per encounter. Take the example of blinding strike or Knockdown : before level 9, they are useful tools for small encounters. After level 9, they suddenly become total lacklusters when wizard start spamming slicken 4x times per encounter. My current party is lvl 8. Spells are per rest and I feel it is more epic this way. It is not even that per encounter spells scale too fast, it is that they kill the thrill of managing ressources, as well as they kill abilities meant to carry small encounters (like chanters support or cipher spells). I think it will be better to have a way to disable them in standard game, but there is an IE mod to do so anyway. So for my next playthrough, I'll choose this option.

For sure 6 wizards would be hard to challenge but I still believe that 6 druids could be better. Druids get a 20% speed boost at high level, and speed boost like DAoM only affects recovery which is about 60% of action time. So that's net difference of about 18% speed. I tend to consider druid spells as slighly more destructive. Their main advantages is that they combine high damages with small CC effects. What makes more difference are the storm spells. Start encounter, cast storm (level 3 or 5 according to your needs), and once casting is done for 6 druids (who didn't have to aim or get a good position), the encounter could be pretty much over. Wizard CC can end an encounter pretty quickly but it is a bit harder to aim while ennemy is moving. Finally, druids are probably better at low level with spiritshift. They also have healing, which is handy. I'm not sure it is easy to decide which one is better. Both parties would be incredibly powerful, so it would be hard to define the right criteria.