Omeganova

Because it's not just Ciphers who are affected, and that a mathematically unbalanced game is not enjoyable for those who have to deal with it? Also you say you love playing Priests, but they are also one of the classes adversely effected by this change. Under this new change you will need Strength, Dexterity, Intelligence and Resolve, As opposed to Might, Dexterity and Intelligence of old. The reason this is so bad is that Priests although not to the degree of Ciphers, still relied on their weapon. For a majority of their career their spells are about strengthening themselves and their allies. You don't think it's immersion breaking for a priest of Berath to absolutely suck with his greatsword because it was the only way for his spells to matter at all? As i said in the previous thread lets take two statlines. This is with a Death Godlike who is a multiclass Priest of Berath/Devoted fighter to fully realized the RP of the Pallid Knight. Old System Might:18 Constitution:8 Dexterity:19 Perception:10 Intelligence:19 Resolve:3 New System Might:14 Constitution:8 Dexterity:10 Perception:10 Intelligence:18 Resolve:17 That is a -5% loss in duration, -6% loss in AoE size, a -27% action speed , -18 Ref, -12% melee damage, -8 Fort These are not little things, these are very large losses in overall efficiency. And if i were to run with a Cleric using the former statline just buffing myself and striding into combat. Not only will i have lost any ability to heal myself, but the Priest bonus spells per power level will be completely wasted as i have no ability to damage anything with them It's fair to say that flexibility could very likely be nerfed, becuase it will indeed be taxing to focus on STR and RES, but these changes do not happen in a vacuum, I suppose. If we have 4 months of under powered priests, wizards, ciphers, etc. in the beta there will be changes. They need to buff most casters regardless and I'm sure the after the balancing process we end up with a better game where it isn't mathematical optimal having 3 Resolve. Dumping an attribute called Resolve on a priest in a rpg feels just about as bad as dumping strength on a barbarian But at the end of the day this game just like DnD IS* a game about numbers,but that doesnt mean you still cant RP well. If an attribute does nothing to improve your ability to function in combat in a game where combat is a mainstay, then why are you taking it? Take say DnD 5th edition. Intelligence is pretty much the universal dump stat for anyone that is not a wizard or eldritch knight. Charisma does very little for any fighter, And Wisdom is the exclusive domain of Druids and Clerics but is often left at 10 by all classes because it affects passive perception. Now lets take a standard 27 point buy to make a War Cleric, all stats start at 8 and stats cost as follows (9-1,10-2,11-3,12-4,13-5,14-7 and 15-9) Str:15 Dex:8 Con:14 Int:8 Wis:15 Cha:10 Now in this scenario i leveled out my charisma because maybe i wanted to not have a penalty to conversation skills, but beyond that? what actual purpose would it serve me to increase this stat beyond RP? It's not like while mid combat i can use diplomacy to get the wights from eating my arm. in a game where your resources to define your character are finite stat optimization is rather important

Because it's not just Ciphers who are affected, and that a mathematically unbalanced game is not enjoyable for those who have to deal with it? Also you say you love playing Priests, but they are also one of the classes adversely effected by this change. Under this new change you will need Strength, Dexterity, Intelligence and Resolve, As opposed to Might, Dexterity and Intelligence of old. The reason this is so bad is that Priests although not to the degree of Ciphers, still relied on their weapon. For a majority of their career their spells are about strengthening themselves and their allies. You don't think it's immersion breaking for a priest of Berath to absolutely suck with his greatsword because it was the only way for his spells to matter at all? As i said in the previous thread lets take two statlines. This is with a Death Godlike who is a multiclass Priest of Berath/Devoted fighter to fully realized the RP of the Pallid Knight. Old System Might:18 Constitution:8 Dexterity:19 Perception:10 Intelligence:19 Resolve:3 New System Might:14 Constitution:8 Dexterity:10 Perception:10 Intelligence:18 Resolve:17 That is a -5% loss in duration, -6% loss in AoE size, a -27% action speed , -18 Ref, -12% melee damage, -8 Fort These are not little things, these are very large losses in overall efficiency. And if i were to run with a Cleric using the former statline just buffing myself and striding into combat. Not only will i have lost any ability to heal myself, but the Priest bonus spells per power level will be completely wasted as i have no ability to damage anything with them

The issue in my mind is not even the Deflection, by overtuning Resolve you have just made more character concepts M.A.D without actually preventing the other half from STILL dumping it

I'm going to be frank, this change really blows. I understand that Resolve was in need of something and there have been some good suggestions about it giving +/- affliction time etc.., but this is so heavy handed in the opposite direction. Now Resolve has become a must have for casters along with Intelligence and Dexterity which leaves little else for stat optimization. This especially runs contrary to the idea of mulitclassing where there was a universal damage stat. I was really enjoying working on my character i was going to transfer which was a Priest in PoE 1, and now a fully realized Pallid Knight Priest/Fighter. But these changes throw everything out of wack For example his current statline is Mig:18 Con:8 Dex:19 Per:10 Int:20 Res:3 Now it would have to be Mig:12 Con:8 Dex:14 Per:10 Int:18 Res:16 Now i'm sure some would say "Well now you have to chose if you want use a weapon well or be a blaster" But lets look. The loss of Dexterity will universally slow our casting down and even if we were to cast holy power we would still be at 17 one point lower the previous statlines base. And sure you could argue "Well just use the first statline and just use buffs and healing". And i would, had healing not also been moved to Resolve. it also Strips any use of the extra spells a Berath/Magran/Eothas priest would get unless they all just sword/board and become spell turrets completely forsaking any weapon combat and dumping Might....oh i'm sorry "Strength"