Eliteseraph

I thought it was decent for something that would be on pretty much all the time, passively creating one more affliction. But as with many things in PoE, it appears to be half-baked. I'm REALLY hoping they clean things up in PoE2.

Sorry if this is posted in the wrong area. But here's something I've noticed about the rogue ability "Persistent Distraction": The description makes it sound as though ANY time a rogue is part of a flank that the target will gain the Distracted condition. However, from what I've seen over the course of a few combats is that the distracted condition will only apply when it is the rogue that specifically initiates the flanked condition. Which is to say, the rogue has to be the one to create the flanking. If a target is already flanked, no amount of positoning by the rogue will result in the Distracted condition. Maybe I'm doing it wrong, but it seems like you have to do a LOT of micro-managing of your party just in order to get this talent to activate. I've had enemies be completely surrounded by 4+ allies, all attacking the same thing. But when the rogue rolls up to the dog-pile, no Distracted status gets applied to the enemy. It seems like the Rogue specifically has to be the one that actually runs around the far side of the target. If anyone else hits the target and applies Flanked to the target, the rogues talent will not activate. Has anyone had a different experience with this?

I haven't yet moved into WM content. It's one of the main reasons I'm giving PoE another shot, since it seems like a different game from when I first tried it. It will be interesting to see how long the style holds up. The bears act as a meat shield, giving the chanters time to build chants, and the cipher time to build power. By the time the bears drop, there's summons and plenty of CC to go around.

I went back to one of my original party builds with slight modifications: 2 chanters, 3 rangers with bears, and a cipher, all using ranged weapons. Not only does it not suffer the pathing issues, but it rips through enemies like nothing I've tried before. So much for melee-heavy parties. :/

What I'm seeing with the AI is that any time more than 3 player units are next to each other, any units behind them attempt to run THROUGH the front line and get stuck. They'll wiggle back and forth for a few seconds, then just give up and stand there doing nothing. I've tried messing around with the AI settings, and nothing seems to work. Even when I turn the AI off and manually command units where to go, they often take bizarre, circuitous paths that don't make sense. For example, if a target is just out of melee range and I command my character to attack it, instead of just moving the few feet to get in range it will run the long way around any nearby units to attack. If I had any idea how to make videos I'd put one on youtube to show what I mean. I'll try to describe with a picture. So if I took the character circled in pink and told it to melee the target, instead of just stepping the 2 feet to the right to attack, it will almost always run ALLLLLL the way around the outside as I've indicated. And the rest of the time it will just run somewhere behind the line and stop moving or acting entirely. Personally, I don't get it at all. Obviously not every spot on the map has enough room for everyone to get into position, but this stuff happens in OPEN FIELDS with no obstacles at all. It's bizarre.

eh...I don't find it at all interesting having to click each individual step the character takes to keep him from stopping and dancing in a random spot between him and the target. Even when you disable the AI, the pathing is still garbage. I'll just scrap the all melee idea and go with a normal mixed group. It was an experiment, anyway, and a failed one at that. Learn something new every day, I guess.

Ok, after only 5 levels of all melee, I give up. The AI and pathing are so horrendous that half my party just runs in circles or dances in place instead of attacking something 1 foot away. How did this make it past beta? LOL!

If you play a priest like that, however, won't you end up having to rest all the time as your spells run out? I personally dislike the camping system and abilities you can only use per rest.

Because it's about making a melee heavy team, not a party of casters?

I've actually decided to swap out my fighter for something else after I discovered how tiny the radius on guardian stance is. Maybe drop in another paladin for more aura. Could use Pella that way, which is an added bonus. On a side note, does anyone know if the Rogue ability Dirty Fighting(10% of hits converted to crits) stacks with paladin Zealous Focus(5% of hits converted to crits) and the Hearth Orlan bonus of the same nature(10% of hits converted to crits when targetting the same as an ally)?

I'm not really a fan of priest in this game. Every time I've tried to use one it just didn't seem to be very good. Just not my style, I guess.

I'm using my main PC as the paladin for the better role-play bonuses from reputation. Otherwise I'd use Pella for her attack speed buff on improved flames of devotion, and I absolutely LOVE her voice. The other problem I have is that some of them are a real pain in the ass to get to early enough. For monks, wouldn't it be better to use them as the main tanky character to draw more wounds? Seems like that might detract from the rogue, although it's a good backup if I don't like how rogue tanking works.

I'm not really a fan of using the NPCs for the party, so I'm using all custom characters. I'm thinking of using a rogue tank for retaliation, a paladin and fighter for auras, a barb for general mayhem, and two chanters as support. I'm at work so I haven't had time to do anything but run the idea through my head. I've never used a rogue as a tank, so that should be interesting. I like the overlapping auras and passive buffs, but I suppose the two chanters could be replaced with just about anything. Figured I'd run it past the forums to see what you guys think, and maybe get some suggestions on specific talents and such.

By "scorched earth" I mean killing everything, including shop keeper and quest giver NPCs. Will this break the game, or is it actually viable? Always interesting to see the results of this style of play.

Man...I can't even imagine the level of join pain from trying to play this game on a console with a controller. The level of micro needed is already excessive on the PC with a mouse and KB.