thelee

Patch notes are never going to be comprehensive. Sometimes some bugs get fixed and don't get written up formally enough to be included. Other times a bug was a side effect of something else and gets fixed indirectly. And no one is going to be able to tell you for sure because I don't think many people had this no-encounter problem. The only way you'll be able to know for sure is to start a new game yourself. I mean... are you even sure it was a bug? And not that some of these random encounters are gated by other in-game triggers that you may or may not have flipped?

ranger has concussive tranquilizer that really eats up beneficial durations (-30). priest has cleansing flame and magran's fire which removes a little duration at each tick. there's also street sweeper, which shaves off -5s and can be upgraded to only target beneficial effects at -10. but wizard is by far the best. that is one of their core competencies (arcane dampener, wall of draining, arcane cleanse)

I am seeing this issue as well after I recruited a Bleak Walker as a test. Watch is Kind Wayfarer and 15; Shieldbearer is around 12; and the Bleak Walker I just recruited is 10. So your Disposition choices now affect companions as well? If so, then I guess I have to scrap ever playing a Kind Wayfarer together with Bleak Walker! Yeah, I researched this a while ago (I probably should consolidate all this stuff somewhere so it doesn't disappear on the Nth page of forums).

So from what you guys are saying, there is no direct "silence" spell or attack that works reliably. Instead, I have to get it as an indirect effect through a more comprehensive shutdown attacks such as stun, paralyze, frighten, etc. frighten isn't a "complete shutdown" effect like terrify. it literally just prevents enemies from using "offensive" abilities/spells (in addition to reducing resolve by 5 and reducing power level by 3). highly effective against things like wizards and ciphers (and even like sirens or wraiths) but much less effective against priests and druids for example. n.b. i feel like i've seen that if you cast frighten while an enemy has an offensive ability queued up, they still end up using it, though they won't do anything after that. maybe someone can verify if frighten works 100% correctly.

It's supposed to completely remove recovery, but I think there's a bug with guns where there's always a minimum reloading time. I feel like there was a general issue like this a while ago, but I thought minimum reload times was fixed. I expect Bullet-Time to act more like how The Red Hand works, which fires twice in a row without any reloading break. So I would expect Bullet-Time to let me fire continuously for ~5-6 seconds. Instead, it acts merely as if I am very, very fast, which while still an upgrade is not quite as good as being able to fire repeatedly without pause. Here's a youtube video that I uploaded demonstrating how even with "0.0" reloading time I am still reloading for a decent amount of time in between each shot (albeit still pretty fast). The duration on Bullet-Time is extremely long because I hit myself with Salvation of Time to test the effectiveness of this combo . (Note that in fact, on my first test run of this I barely even noticed Bullet-Time was triggering because with Rapid Reload enabled on a dual-wielding character my reload time is already pretty low.) In the first bit of the video I show that I have a bullet-time buff active, then I show that my reloading time is 0.0 and then rest of it is my hireling repeatedly shooting at poor Birna with reloads. Related, secondary bug: Bullet-Time has no displayed effect next to a character portrait or in combat tool-tip. I mean, neither do some other effects but it seems like it would be nice to see it triggered so even in the ~5-6s (up to 35s from two casts of Salvation of Time), I can respond appropriately (disabling rapid reload and enabling the imbued ammuniation modal for example). Dropbox link to a save where I'm testing this, along with output_log: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/s49gbpstwnwjurp/AAD4uol_4-4UA2GP3mBJ4cV9a?dl=0

hence trickster a rogue can still equip shield and get weapon and shield proficiency, however blasphemous that might sound for a "striker" class. you can also lean on an ally (priest, paladin for +25 and to a lesser extent chanter for +10 and cipher for mindweb). it is a party game, after all, even though a lot of us like to talk builds that are "self-contained" even though most of them would probably likely flop for an actual solo attempt.

To add on to what's been said: Riposte is not junk. Its power level is roughly in line with most other passives in the game or in the rogue tree. But unlike most of those other passives, Riposte has really high upside if you multi-class, are a trickster, or are otherwise able to even get your deflection up even modestly (frankly just even using Escape every now and then gives you high Riposte upside). And in certain set ups Riposte can be a huge DPS increase even considering a lowish proc rate. Sometimes I think people on the forums are like "this isn't as easily abusable as in PoE1 or as I initially thought. Therefore it must suck because those two extremes are the only options."

I haven't had the time to attempt Belranga, but is the gist of all successful strategies: block the big spider off with little spiders that are tanked and then range the big spider to death?

wow, good job on the solo! quick note: afaict from my attempts, it only uses it a few times early on... i think it must be triggered by specific (high) health thresholds, because in my several attempts it had the same usage pattern each time, and after the few early uses I never saw it use it again later into the fight (even as i dropped it into bloodied/near death territory).

Priest stasis (withdrawal) is a defensive healing spell. Cipher's is a flexible target-anyone ability, no? That flexibility comes at a price. Can use it on defense (without healing), but also to sequester an annoying enemy away (or multiple enemies) until you've gotten rid of their friends. (After having done SSS would've been handy for my underoptimized party to have had a cipher to Stasis away some of the monsters on the Survival track challenges). Also, I forget--is this the one that lets dots continue unabated? If so, that adds to its power level. PL7 also contains Ancestor's Memory, which is amazing.

For anyone who cares, I updated this to be more relevant in 3.0 (and also because I plan on referring to it for another character build/mechanics write up, so it seemed prudent for this to be up-to-date).

Ciphers are extremely good at crowd control though. When the PoTD re-balancing first happened and I was still adjusting to the new curve (especially early on) I was pretty much carried by charm/dominate effects that the cipher can basically do at will. On another note, grazes are much more punishing to ciphers than they were in PoE1, so perception or perception inspirations are more important for a cipher. (In PoE1 grazes were an additive -50% modifier which you could easily trivialize with bonuses. In PoE2 grazes are very close a x.5 multiplier [slightly more complicated than that, but just to illustrate how much stronger it is], so it's much harder to trivialize/dwarf with bonuses, and therefore grazes are much costlier for focus generation than before. I think the math works out that might or dex is still better for net focus generation (i did the math for an ascendant at one point), but on PotD early game especially perception is more important than it was in PoE1. If you're planning on picking up CC spells then obviously perception becomes more important than might/dex because it improves your focus generation and also helps your CC in ways neither might or dex can.

dayumn i love these ideas

i haven't tried this challenge yet, but i think those potions or spells that reduce the duration of active negative effects will be effective. (potion of major recovery is -10 seconds, litany is -5 and eothas is -10, which may do way more effective healing than many potions of miraculous healing, not to mention suppress affliction or liberating exhortation; i've used them before against other dots)

I'll be honest and say that I don't completely agree with this "bug." I think it's a completely reasonable thing to design an ability and decide "...nah, this shouldn't benefit from Spirit of Decay" even though it does corrode damage. Coming from the world of IWD, IWD2, or PoE1 where these talents boosted a specific damage type universally, it is certainly unintuitive by comparison, but in terms of general systems design I don't think it's unreasonable.

See screenshot: Dropbox link to save game and output log: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/oi47plnvqeizw1s/AAAsI6xThZtIEK8MXpbV3bkEa?dl=0

The whole coping strategy for Abydon's is to have lots of disposable weapons to use on trash fights. On solo it might be rougher because fights last so much longer, but for a 5-person party I have lots of spare equipment (sometimes just waiting in a spare weapon slot) and save my uniques for when I really want to bust them out. It helps that it appears that damaged equipment sells for the same as undamaged, so instead of repairing the common trash I just sell it. But yes, you have to be really deliberate because otherwise you are just constantly losing money as the game goes on due to costs > most rewards (other than bounties). And it also means relying on all the disposal magical trash weapons means your power level is going to be lagging behind a non-Abydon challenge. I think it makes for an interesting challenge, but now that SSS is out with lots of bullet sponges I'm a little less keen on Abydon's challenge because it would suck to be fighting a multi-thousand-HP monster and damage all your best equipment to shreds over the course of a single fight. (Also when you start getting exceptional or superb scaling on your summoned weapons, they are huge money savers.) get a torch or use the starting saber torch and keep it on a melee character, try fighting only during daytime, or use a stealthy scouting party member. Doesn't solve the "problem", when trying to do a ranged solo play. You can't hold a torch (or light source) and use most ranged weapons. (pistols excluded) What I need is a mod with a bow / crossbow / arbalest with a light source attached. LOL +100 upvotes for some sort of tactical flashlight enchant on an arbalest or crossbow

it's effectively a new skill at the new power level. So it won't show up in PL1, it'll show up in PL3.

This may be intended behavior, but upon killing Kuaro, I got a Matakau as part of the loot. Thing is, Matakau is also something I start with as a pre-purchase bonus. Now, this may be intentional, because I either sold my Matakau or it may be on a character not in my party, so maybe this is an intended optional drop if you don't actively already have Matakau in your inventory so that people who didn't pre-purchase the game can still have access to Matakau. But reporting just in case. Attached screenshot of Matakau reward: Dropbox link to output_log and save before and after fight: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/zt34zg4sgr1330c/AACbp2kT2nvTnfZ0rtwt9kIza?dl=0

Ongoing issue with various encounters that I've been reporting where at the start of a ship-to-ship encounter (after you close to board) the opening bark made by the enemy captain is wrongly attributed to your mainchar. Screenshot proof of Kuaro's opening bark instead being attributed to my mainchar (Topher): Dropbox link to output log and save: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/8mf6m6lcjv55rfl/AABplsR_dfp_LYztoQRDrxbna?dl=0

Just to confirm I got this from completing Pallegina's quest in 3.0.1 and it's bugged like this.

Equipped on my nature godlike mainchar, which means I either get Nimbus of Death (death godlike or watcher) or Nature's Shelter (nature godlike), depending on which has higher "priority." Instead I get Lunar Heart (+1 PL), which is intended for moon godlikes. Screenshot proof: Googling around it looks like this has been reported before, so I'm reporting it again as a reminder that it's still broken.

get a torch or use the starting saber torch and keep it on a melee character, try fighting only during daytime, or use a stealthy scouting party. How many meters do you gain with the torch? Is it the same with Xoti's lantern and the sabre? yep. And lighting effects don't stack. If one is already using the lantern or has the sabre torch, adding the other or additional torches won't help. Torches also count as clubs for weapon proficiency purposes, which is a fun thing that I never before needed to know pre-skaen's challenge. I actually kind wish now we had magical non-sabre torches.

get a torch or use the starting saber torch and keep it on a melee character, try fighting only during daytime, or use a stealthy scouting party member.

Actually the one real difference between those failures and the most recent, successful attempt is that for some reason my gaming PC wasn't updating and was still on 3.0.0.26. The laptop I tried it on this morning (that succeeded) was at 3.0.1. maybe there was a ninja fix in the patch?