Rezbot

It was kind of needed. A fury druid could literally lock down the entire battlefield with stuns, and they still can, it's just not as easy as it was before. I'm playing through without one in my group this time, but it was a little silly before. Druids are still a solid choice for a party member if you're looking to replace you're healer role, or supplement your support and AoE Dps roles. I do miss having 6 party members, there's so many possible builds I want to try still. ^_^

Lol This essentially boils down to "If you don't do what I want, then I'll quit and throw a tantrum" Pillars of Fan, you did realize from playing the Turn based mode so far, that the skills, spells and abilities changed, (drastically in some cases) between Turn based mode and standard mode? There would be no way to balance it. Many builds and talents work very well in the standard mode, but perform poorly in Turn based mode. Even if somehow they implemented the ability to switch between the two modes at will, your skill builds and strategies would differ completely between the two modes. Your demand is a bit unreasonable... If you're willing to quit on a great game like this for such a silly reason, then it really is your loss. Hopefully we will see you again in POE3!

Hoping for the next patch soon ^_^ I love the turn based mode, excited to see what the patch brings for class and mechanic changes. I'm trying to hold off overplaying it and getting burnt out. Trying to amuse myself other games in the meantime, but i check for Deadfire updates everyday still

I really enjoyed TB mode so far. I'll wait for the beta to end so I don't get burned out though. The extra time each battle takes can be a bit tedious at times, but the level of detail that battles are now fought at is a good throw back to older games like Final Fantasy Tactics, which is a whole ball of wonderful to me. While it's true some builds are really broken, and some classes have some advantages/disadvantages in this mode, the overall experience is still great. balance will always be hard, I mean, the original game on PotD is meant for 5 people, but can be solo'd or duo'd with the right set up and prep. So balance is always going to be difficult. Things I'm personally seeing so far that need review: Black Jacket -- The thing that needs attention here is that the Black Jacket can change weapon sets on OTHER peoples turns. So during the mage's turn you can click over to your Black Jacket and change to the shield set if you forgot to do so on your actual turn. This seems to be an unintended effect. Druid -Shapeshift/Spiritshift -- If you lose spiritshift or shapeshift while casting another spell, it will INTERRUPT the current spell cast and waste the Druids turn. I don't think this was intended? Dual Wield vs 2H -- I touch on this below in this post about how aoe is a problem for Melee heavy teams in PotD. The damage reduction of Dual Wield (-35%) is somewhat offset by being able to full attack each round, but it's still a slog to get through even 1 on 1 melee in TB. When my level 5 assassin/devoted saber rogue is only swinging (hits) for ~50 on one target, and my Evoker wizard is using fireball for 50 dmg to 5 targets (not counting the evoker 'double-cast' procs) in the same round, it's hard to not bring a heavy magic team. Maybe this could be offset by raising the damage of melee and ranged weapons by ~25%? Or somehow reward melee/ranged that has high dexterity/attack speed and/or low initiative. Armor -- I'm sure you're aware of this, but armor is kind of an issue. There really isn't any downfall to wearing med/heavy armor for the whole team, unless your party build REQUIRES you to go first. Usually, you'll spend your first round buffing/debuffing and letting the enemy get closer to you. And since spells will finish in that round, or first in the next round, there isn't a penalty to bulking up your team in heavy gear. Even when I have a lightly armored mage that goes first in combat, I'll delay their turn so the enemy will move closer and group up. I love a melee heavy team in the normal mode, but TB mode brought mages back to the forefront for me. Granted they require a lot more protection and strategic placement as the AI is MUCH better in TB mode about interrupts. However I find mages are much more fun to play now. Circling back to balance, it seems that mages may need a little more tweaking in this department, since they essentially get off 1 spell per round, it is a little difficult to bench a wizard or two that can cast lightning bolt or fireball 3 times in the same time span as an Assassin rogue getting 3 dual wield attacks. I'd love to bring a physical team back into the fold, but it's really difficult to pass up on the insane AoE dps mages can produce in just about the same time span as a melee DPS. Looks like this is mostly due to the changes to Initiative, and recovery time(attack speed). Since you can't focus on stacking attack speed to get as many swings as possible. Fextralife made a couple interesting points that in TB mode, the focus has shifted from maxing dps in as short a time frame as possible, to more of a crowd control focus (the example they use is Divinity: Original Sin). Are there any plans to bring Melee back a little bit? Maybe something like 'Action Surge' from DnD that allows the melee classes an extra action on their turn, once per combat, almost like an empower. My main issue currently with bringing a Melee team in PotD is that there isn't really an answer for swarms of mobs, Barbarian + Mob stance isn't enough especially with the higher armor and deflection of PotD. Anyways, just my two thoughts. I'm really liking TB mode, and look forward to your adjustments once it leaves Beta. Thanks folks

Logged in today and my Ranger is stuck with an infinite reload bug. regardless of command given, or unequipping all weapons and reequipping them, the character will try to continuously reload their weapon

Is there a limit to the number of party members that will participate in ship to ship boarding combat? If not, could you theoretically recruit all normal companions, and create numerous custom party members, and basically throw an army of party members at the enemy when boarding?

One thing to be careful of is your Barb. If you go Berserker subclass and haven't taken precautions against the confusion affect, your entire melee team will suffer from Carnage. =)

Good day everyone! Long time PoE fan, been anxiously awaiting PoE2. Didn't get into the beta sadly, but would someone with the beta mind educating me on possible pitfalls this party combination? Yes, it's melee heavy, everything I'm hearing about PoE is that Casters are still so-so, and I find I enjoy the game more with a brawler team. I'll take any insight you have on things that work, or areas that might fall flat. Melee Tank --- Unbroken+Shieldbearer Ranged Healer --- Lifegiver Druid (bow?) Melee DPS --- Berserker+Devoted (2h vs DW?) I'm concerned about the Berserker, can someone finally clarify if the confusion will cause friendly fire on carnage? This would definietely push me to MageSlayer instead due to the amount of melee in this group. Melee DPS --- Assassin+SoulBlade (2h for big opening hit, then DW?) Will Bleakwalker be a better choice over soulblade? Early burst from backstab/FoD and Auras VS. frequent SoulBlade burst. Range DPS --- Sharpshooter+Devoted/Beckoner (are dual pistols still worthwhile?) Was thinking devoted for single target dps vs Beckoner because the Zoo sounds fun, but i might run into space issues with the summons preventing the melee team from easily reaching their targets. Thank you for your help!