Pure Wizard vs Blood Mage vs Evoke, Nature Godlike vs Helmets

[Livegood118]

Just wondering what peoples' views are on the issues in the title?

 

Wizard Subclasses

 

I feel like the current limitations on spell selections for specialist Wizards and the recovery penalty don't seem to outweigh the loss of access to two spell schools?

 

Is losing access to Transmutation (Combusting Wounds, Slicken, Arcane Dampener, Arcane Cleanse, Pull of Eora) and Conjuration (Chill Fog, Arcane Veil, Wall of Flame, Spirit Lance, Wall of Draining, Piercing Sigil) on an Evoker really worth the +2PL for evocation spells, the 15% echo effect and the 10% recovery penalty to non-evocation spells?

 

Maybe Evokers are really good? e.g. +2 Evoker Bonus, +1 Nature Godlike, +2 Magran's Favour, +2 Sun and Moon, +1 Evocation Gloves, +2 Potion of Ascension, +5 Empower = +15PL to a Fire spell, with the 15% echo chance, which seems kinda nuts.

 

How does Blood Mage compare to pure Wizard? Blood Mage seems like it definitely has the edge, although maybe empower with the empower talents later in the game makes pure Wizard worth it from the long term perspective? Resources aren't ever an issue once you have access to brilliant. 

 

Nature Godlike vs. Helmet + Racial

 

Thoughts on this welcome. The only helmets that would seem to make it worth it imo are Helm of the White Void, Thaos's Headdress and Rekvu's Fractured Casque. Racials seem useful in terms of getting extra affliction resistance. 

[Verde]

Granted I haven't played a Blood Mage, but Empower is so good for a Nuker. Maybe a Blood Mage plays differently, but I couldn't give up Empower.

 

Nature Godlike Ancient is beastly. +1PL Plant / Beast class + PL3 Thicket + 1PL racial Inspiration bonus + 1PL Prestige = profit.

Edited March 26, 2019 by Verde

[Ophiuchus]

Another nice "bonus" to Evoker is that most Illusion and Enchantment buffs have very little or no recovery time.

[thelee]

Granted I haven't played a Blood Mage, but Empower is so good for a Nuker. Maybe a Blood Mage plays differently, but I couldn't give up Empower.

 

Nature Godlike Ancient is beastly. +1PL Plant / Beast class + PL3 Thicket + 1PL racial Inspiration bonus + 1PL Prestige = profit.

 

blood mage and wizards are effectively different playstyles. blood mage is amazing because you can spam the same set of spells way past what any other mage could do. this can be way more powerful than empower. but if you're just going to play a blood mage like any other wizard except with a much slower and random self-empower mechanism, you're probably going to be underwhelmed.

 

also +100. nature godlike is awesome, way worth losing the helm. wizards, druids, monks, barbs, priests all have super trivial ways to trigger the +1 PL it's not even conditional.

[heldred]

99% of the game an Evoker crushes over the Bloodmage.

 

Bloodmages are helpful in megaboss battles, but mostly as buffed-up-warriors swinging a weapon, not as DPS casters (for me, opinion only).  

 

My regular mages had enough buffs to last Duro battle...  so maybe the Bloodmage is overrated.   Before someone posts a link showing a Bloodmage casting 100x Slickens... it really doesn't matter when an Evoker nukes a room to ash.

 

Lastly no helmet is game-changing in POE2... nice to have only.  However, many of the godlike became uglier in POE2 (I blame Eothas for turning the Nature godlike into leprechauns and Death godlike into vegetable heads) and it really leaves you some mediocre options (unless modded).  

[Boeroer]

Loosing Combusting Wounds, Pull oE, Wall of Flame (esp. in combo with Combusting Wounds) and Chillfog (and some other really good spells) is too big of a sacrifice for me. Those spells can turn the tides of most encounters easily. Gaining 2 PL with Missiles and stuff and get a small chance to doulbe-cast: it's not worth it in my opinion.

 

Wellspring of Life is really nice. Totally worth the headgear slot. If there was a headgear that would do the same I would wear it with many builds.

 

I also like Empower (one of the last per-rest mechanics (kind of) left from PoE). Because of that I don't use Bloodmage a lot in a full party. There you usually don't run out of spells that often and if you do you still have Empower (if you didn't use it to cast something really strong). Different story if going solo of course. The longer the fight the more important refreshing resources become.

[thelee]

My regular mages had enough buffs to last Duro battle...  so maybe the Bloodmage is overrated.   Before someone posts a link showing a Bloodmage casting 100x Slickens... it really doesn't matter when an Evoker nukes a room to ash.

it's not just about spamming slickens at bosses you know. blood mages can also repeatedly cast your favorite evocation spell over and over again (along with other excluded spells). sure they won't be able to one-hit-end-combat in late game like an empowered [insert high-end damage spell] can, but I would argue most of the game is not about ending combat with one super-empowered AL8/9 spell.

[brasilgringo]

I agree with Boerer and thelee.  Moreso if you are doing a solo run, where Tactician/Bloodmage or Priest/Bloodmage is a lot more powerful.

In a party, I *might* go Evoker just for missle fun.

Edited March 26, 2019 by brasilgringo

[heldred]

I completely agree in solo games or using smaller parties, Wiz/Bloodmage, Fighter/Tactician, Chanters, and Ciphers are incredibly helpful, since they have renewable resources.  

 

However, my prior answer considers:

1) The base game on POTD is easy "for an experienced POE player" and you can use whatever your want (naked runs are possible for some classes) -which reminds me they should have a god challenge that blocks you from using any magic item or weapon.  

2) For megabosses, my tactics almost always rely upon buffed melee grinding down the enemy, with a few heals and/or debuffs sprinkled in there

3) Most of my "full party runs" have a Blood, Tact, Chanter and/or Cipher in the mix to provide some renewable resources, but not a requirement to win

 

When it comes to megabosses (1% of the game), for solo-play you should definitely choose a tanky-class with renewable resource (Chanter/Pali, Blood/Tact, Cipher solo or Cipher/Blood, etc. there are lots of combos).  For a full party, you can still win any battle without renewable resources (since melee/ranged weapons are renewable), so I don't sweat choosing one class over another.  To be fair, 99% of the fights past level 10 can be won with a well placed, empowered spell with corresponding PL-gear (and carefully selected to enemy defenses).  I recently played through SSS and my front line rarely entered melee, since the back line nuked everything to dust in the first 8 seconds... scary, but that's all it takes, outside of survivor battles.

[Woopee]

 

My regular mages had enough buffs to last Duro battle...  so maybe the Bloodmage is overrated.   Before someone posts a link showing a Bloodmage casting 100x Slickens... it really doesn't matter when an Evoker nukes a room to ash.

it's not just about spamming slickens at bosses you know. blood mages can also repeatedly cast your favorite evocation spell over and over again (along with other excluded spells). sure they won't be able to one-hit-end-combat in late game like an empowered [insert high-end damage spell] can, but I would argue most of the game is not about ending combat with one super-empowered AL8/9 spell.

 

Evokers can cast them over and over again too if you have Brilliant! Blood mage may be more versatile, but in my experience even un-empowered evocations are really strong with all the PL buffs you can pile on. It wasn't my main character but could dish out crazy damage with no limits because I had 3 ciphers in that party. 

[Livegood118]

Ok thanks for the views everyone. So do you think it's fair to summarise the sub-class choices as follows?

 

Blood Mage

- Strongest versatility early to mid game, equivalent versatility to pure Wizard late game

- Unique ability provides the most benefits (sustain, repeat casting of same spell) in early to mid game, but becomes less relevant once Brilliant/Resource refreshing abilities become available and casting level 8/9 spells become priorities

- Works well in a multi-class, particularly as a martial multi

- May accidentally kill self

- Consideration should be given to having other party members or choosing a multi-class choice to heal and diminish negative effects of blood sacrifice 

- Passive health restore a nice perk

- Least potential for "burst damage" of the three options in mid to late game (No Empower), though only option that can spam the same spell over and before before resource refreshing abilities become available from other party members

- Discrepancy in damage from less power-casting abilities vs. Evoker might be compensated for against enemies that aren't fire resistant through combusting wounds 

 

Evoker

- Least versatility of the three options. Loses access to important protection spells (e.g. Minoletta Sigil), other nice spells like slicken, combusting wounds and chill fog and spells that are super useful vs. other spellcasters (arcane Dampener, wall of draining, arcane cleanse).

- Strongest "Power-caster" and strongest potential for burst damage

- Unique ability (+2 PL, 15% Echo) provides value on a consistent basis throughout the game

- Works best as a single class 

- Doesn't have the sustain of a blood mage in early to mid game, but once Brilliant/Resource refreshing abilities this becomes irrelevant. Equivalent sustain to pure Wizard.

 

Pure Wizard

- Strong versatility (Blood Mage stronger versatility early to mid game)

- Weakest "power caster" until high levels, where being able to empower means pure wizard beats out Bloodmage. Bloodmage beats it in low to mid levels through resource refreshing and spell spam (but is weaker once resource refreshing/level 8/9 spells become a priority). Will never be as good a powercaster as Evoker.

- Discrepancy in damage from less power-casting abilities vs. Evoker might be compensated for against enemies that aren't fire resistant through combusting wounds 

- Works best as pure class but also very good in multis.

- Doesn't have the sustain of a blood mage in early to mid game. Once Brilliant/Resource refreshing abilities become available this becomes irrelevant.

Edited March 26, 2019 by Livegood118

[Livegood118]

I suppose I should say that in long fights, without another party member that can refresh resources, the Blood Mage would seem to come out on top both in terms of their sustain and in terms of spell spamming abilities.

 

Also - I'm not really convinced by the benefits of the nature Godlike for a few reasons:

 

- In the early to mid-game, Rekvu's Casque (+1 all spell casts with Vaporous Grimoire) or Thaos Headdress (+5 accuracy vs. flanked) + afflictions resistance would seem to outweigh + 1 PL

- In the mid to late game, +10 accuracy to all mind and body afflictions cast by the Wizard (Helm of White Void) + affliction resistance seems to outweigh +1 PL

Edited March 26, 2019 by Livegood118

[Verde]

I find the White Void helm to be better on Ciphers, but Druids do have nasty body afflictions. You wouldn't run a Nature Godlike Cipher would you ?

[thelee]

i wouldn't personally put much stock into the blood mage's health's regen. it's soooo slow, and the blood mage needs to eat through health resource pretty quickly to really realize its potential. it only really works as part of a larger package of heal options.

 

also, while brilliant indeed helps wizard/evoker catch up, it can be slow if not metagamed properly, and brilliant also works with a blood mage - it's not like the blood mage doesn't also benefit from it

[Livegood118]

also, while brilliant indeed helps wizard/evoker catch up, it can be slow if not metagamed properly, and brilliant also works with a blood mage - it's not like the blood mage doesn't also benefit from it

Idk. Once I’ve gotten access to brilliant I’ve never had issues with resource generation. To me, at high levels, in a party that has easy access to brilliant inspiration, the difference between a blood mage and a standard wizard is a constant +1 power levels from blood sacrifice vs. access to Empower. My gut is telling me, particularly with empower talents, that the pure wizard probably wins out in the end.

 

Edit: Also, I just finished reading your very helpful thread on power levels I kinda “get” now why people might feel the +1PL from the nature godlike is worth it. Had no idea PL scaling affected the base damage/duration rather than just being another additive value.

Edited March 26, 2019 by Livegood118

[Boeroer]

Yeah - I guess a lot of people don't know and thus don't realize how goot additional PLs are. Also a reason why so many people think multiclasses are superior (while I think it's the opposite as long as you have a Full Party).

 

But in their defense: the information is obscured. How would you know if you didn't read here or run excessive tests?

[thelee]

it's ironic that however much effort they put into demurk a lot of mechanics from poe1, pl scaling is probably the murkiest mechanic between the two games. before i understood it i considered it a horrible systems design failure. now that i understand it, now it's more of a UX or UI failure.

Edited March 27, 2019 by thelee