Why we need Fist/claw proficiency : concrete exemple...

[theBalthazar]

 

I can't avoid the malus of Devoted while i am in spiritshifting.

Edited December 24, 2017 by theBalthazar

[AndreaColombo]

Agree. I’ve been advocating for an unarmed proficiency since day one especially for this reason. Devoted/Monk who wants to use fists is also impossible right now.

[Juodas Varnas]

Can we also get knuckle duster weapons?

For those non-monks who want to punch people in the face.

[Dr. Hieronymous Alloy]

What should the modal be then?

[theBalthazar]

What should the modal be then? 

 

 

Hum...

 

Fist / claw. So,You have not the weight of the weapon... Action speed is a possible angle. Speed generally oposite to accuracy... So...

 

Fist

Fury of Living (Trademark by Balthazar : p)

-5 accuracy +20 % action speed.

 

Claw

Violent Laceration

-5 accuracy +20 % damage.

[dunehunter]

if Devoted/Monk is bad now due to no unarmed proficiency. Then why nobody mention BlackJack/Druid :D

 

I hope we can archive the goal of ‘no bad build’ later. But I just can’t think a way to make blackjack work with any classes that wanna summon weapons.

 

Their subclass feature is way too specific to be useful in most case, if this subclass can only be used for one or two combo, I think it is a bad design.

Edited December 25, 2017 by dunehunter

[theBalthazar]

I hope we can archive the goal of ‘no bad build’ later.

 

 

No bad build with POE2 :XD:

 

El famoso "optimal and viable of josh : p

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fvyrEhAMUPo&feature=youtu.be&t=13m10s

 

Primary goal : p

 

BlackJack/Druid

 

 

OMG...

 

Worst bad build ever. No switch = black jacket useless. + no spells because spiritshift, A shifter spiritshifter 3 strength 19 resolve. Always transformed.

 

Not optimal...

 

But... not viable too : p

Edited December 25, 2017 by theBalthazar

[blotter]

Fist

Fury of Living (Trademark by Balthazar : p)

-5 accuracy +20 % action speed.

 

Or they could call it Flurry of Blows to appeal to the D&D monk crowd. It does seem like it could end up being redundant for monks, given the existence of the Swift Strikes ability, but then again, it could free up ability points that otherwise go towards the ability or equipment slots that would be tied up with equipment to get Recovery down to 0 if not for the boost. In either case, it's probably a good thing that the modal doesn't build on any of the things that monks already get augmented via Transcendent Suffering while still giving monks an edge in terms of getting a greater benefit from the modal by offsetting its downside more easily via Transcendent Suffering's bonuses.

 

In an earlier thread on this topic, Climhazzard suggested a Pressure Point Strike modal for unarmed proficiency to allow unarmed attacks to impose afflictions at the cost of damage or recovery. I think this is a good direction for unarmed combat that wouldn't necessarily require monk abilities to be useful. Targetting pressure points seems more mystical/monkish to me (especially against extremely large, undead, plant-based, elemental, and/or heavily armored targets), so I'd personally be inclined to rename it Disruptive Blows and have the flavor text focus more on the use of unarmed strikes to interfere with effective movement/balance, but in terms of the mechanics, the modal could reduce the damage of unarmed attacks while causing them to interrupt targets or knock them prone on a critical hit.

Edited December 25, 2017 by blotter

[AndreaColombo]

Unarmed proficiency would benefit Devoted/Monk builds too, both for Transcendent Suffering and The Long Pain.

 

If Kalakoth’s Minor Blights are given the unarmed proficiency too, Devoted/Wizards everywhere would rejoice

[Dr. Hieronymous Alloy]

What should the modal be then?

 

 

To answer my own question --

 

I'd suggest an interrupt bonus.

[Erik-Dirk]

Well... obviously this isn't the ONLY solution, the malus could simply not apply to fists/universal weapons.
However I think a fist proficiency is a better option as otherwise choosing crushing weapons as a devoted/monk would be an illogical choice.
Also negating the malus for universal weapons would essentially mean there is no drawback to choosing devoted for the end game.

[KDubya]

This raises the following questions for me:

 

1. Should fists be a viable weapon for non-monks?
   • ​In my opinion no. Punching a guy in armor should result in you breaking your hand if you have not spent your lifetime at the Shou Lin temple learning the special techniques.
   • In game fists without Transcendent Suffering would never gain damage or penetration. They'd be the worst possible weapon pick for anyone. In fact they should have much less than the five penetration that weapons start with.
2. ​​​Is unarmed fighting by a Monk too weak?
   • ​When it actually works (save/load wipes it) fists seem to be doing more than fast weapon damage at a fast weapon speed. (hard to tell due to bad UI) if so then fists will be the undisputed DPS king.
3. Is Druid shapeshifting weak?
   • ​From the admittedly small sample size of a few playthroughs, shapeshifting seems really powerful. Again not seeing where this needs to be buffed.

 

It looks like it is only the Devoted subclass that has issues and even there they avoid the penalty and just miss out on the bonus.

[AndreaColombo]

That’s why we need the unarmed proficiency. Just doing away with the penalty means you’d be better off picking an unkitted Fighter anyway (and the issue with universal weapons has been abundantly discussed in the bug subforum—they should probably specify in the Devoted’s subclass description that its penalty also constitutes an exception to the “universal proficiency” rule.)

 

Picking the unarmed proficiency as a non-Monk or non-Druid would be an odd choice, as you wouldn’t have Transcendent Suffering or Spiritshift. However we need a way for the Devoted to become proficient in those weapons. They give up all others and have recently been nerfed to boot—least we can do is give them a chance to really pick whatever weapon (the blights would be a stretch as they aren’t melee.)

[Boeroer]

Concerning Kalakoth's Minor Blights + Devoted: isn't it so that the chosen weapon of the Devoted has to be a melee weapon? Or did they scrap that idea?

 

I would have created an unarmed proficiency. It is a type of weapon after all. And the modals come with gains and drawbacks anyways, so no big power gain here.

 

That way you can always decide to insert some additional "unarmed" weapons like pit fighter gloves, knuckle dusters, artificial claws, push daggers, whatever that use the unarmed proficiency and are not specifically made for monks.

 

I also wouldn't make the modal too esoteric. This would again tie the proficiency to monks exclusively. Instead something generic like more damage but slower speed or so would be ok.

[AndreaColombo]

Devoted’s being limited to melee is still a thing; that’s why I called the blights a stretch I’d love to be able to use them as a Devoted but I understand that’s probably just not meant to be.

[MaxQuest]

If you have unarmed Barb/Paladin it's weird that you can get +6 acc with proficient weapons talent, and fists... are excluded; because Aegis of Loyalty works only with unarmed attacks now...

 

---

Edit:

 

Should fists be a viable weapon for non-monks?

• ​In my opinion no. Punching a guy in armor should result in you breaking your hand if you have not spent your lifetime at the Shou Lin temple learning the special techniques.
• In game fists without Transcendent Suffering would never gain damage or penetration. They'd be the worst possible weapon pick for anyone. In fact they should have much less than the five penetration that weapons start with.

Agreed regarding that generally fists should not be viable damage-dealing weapon for non-monks, with the minor exceptions:

- if a character actually spent a lot of time learning the needed techniques - imagine if the was a chain of general talents (so you needed like 2-3 of them in order to reach 80% of monk's fist efficiency)

- if there are some magic summoned gauntlets from some high-level spell

 

And yes, agreeing that base fists should have lower Penetration.

Also fists could have a proficiency modal.

 

Personally I'd like there to be even more than 1 (mutually-exclusive) modals for that as it increases the character's specialization: (beware random placeholder names)

- concusive blows - provides a chance to stun, at the cost of higher recovery

- iron fist - increases PEN, but character takes a small % of delivered damage proportional with AR-PEN

- deflecting weave - melee strikes deal less damage but mess enemy targeting with non-instant attacks and abilities. Struck enemy is affected by 40% hit-to-graze and graze-to-miss conversion for 1.5s.

Edited December 26, 2017 by MaxQuest

[blotter]

This raises the following questions for me:

1. Should fists be a viable weapon for non-monks?
   • ​In my opinion no. Punching a guy in armor should result in you breaking your hand if you have not spent your lifetime at the Shou Lin temple learning the special techniques.
   • In game fists without Transcendent Suffering would never gain damage or penetration. They'd be the worst possible weapon pick for anyone. In fact they should have much less than the five penetration that weapons start with.
2. ​​​Is unarmed fighting by a Monk too weak?
   • ​When it actually works (save/load wipes it) fists seem to be doing more than fast weapon damage at a fast weapon speed. (hard to tell due to bad UI) if so then fists will be the undisputed DPS king 
3. Is Druid shapeshifting weak?​

• ​From the admittedly small sample size of a few playthroughs, shapeshifting seems really powerful. Again not seeing where this needs to be buffed.

It looks like it is only the Devoted subclass that has issues and even there they avoid the penalty and just miss out on the bonus.

 

Re: Question #1 - Proficiencies are supposed to reflect specialized training and techniques, and being able to hurt people with your fists seems as appropriate (to me) for a Fire Godlike Devoted or an Aumaua Berserker as it is for an Orlan monk of any stripe. This is already a game where we can use wooden clubs and staves to bludgeon flame blights to death without catching on fire and use daggers to carve up oozes without melting our hands off in the process, so it seems strange to insist that punching armored people without breaking our fists is taking things a step too far.

 

Re: Question #2 - I suspect that unarmed attacks are likely to slide into obsolescence as the game progresses and better weapons pile up, but even if I'm right, anything that could resolve that would be way too problematic to give out as freely, and as early, as proficiencies are.

 

Then again, proficiencies are supposed to be about providing benefits with meaningful downsides rather than straightforward boosts to weapon strength, so I'm not sure why the inclusion of an unarmed proficiency would need to be justified in terms of the inadequacy of base unarmed attacks. I don't really care about druids at all, but the same reasoning applies in the case of Spiritshift attacks.

 

That way you can always decide to insert some additional "unarmed" weapons like pit fighter gloves, knuckle dusters, artificial claws, push daggers, whatever that use the unarmed proficiency and are not specifically made for monks.

 

I'd love to see "unarmed" weapon types make it into the game, but I'm pretty sure that Sawyer vetoed that in an earlier interview (I'm thinking during that lengthy end of backer campaign countdown video, but I'm not sure) on the grounds that they would be too niche to justify the resource expenditure and the player demand for universally accessible weapons like this might not be sufficient to prove otherwise.

 

I also wouldn't make the modal too esoteric. This would again tie the proficiency to monks exclusively. Instead something generic like more damage but slower speed or so would be ok.

 

One of the problems with coming up with a balanced Unarmed proficiency is that both monks and non-monks need to be considered simultaneously so that what's suitable for one isn't excessive or inadequate for the other.

 

A modal to increase unarmed damage to the point that it would make selecting the proficiency appealing for non-monks would run the risk of boosting a monk's unarmed damage to unreasonable extremes. Even if a balance that leaves the damage from unarmed attacks competitive for non-monks but not excessive for monks can be struck, the proficiency will still rapidly become irrelevant for non-monks as the game expects you to be wielding fine, exceptional, superb, or legendary weapons (as well as anything beyond that) and enemy AR increases to reflect this. 

 

A Penetration modal might be less problematic in this regard since there's a stricter ceiling to it. I'd worry about how this would interact with the Penetration bonus from Transcendent Suffering, but it's probably going to be similar to that of equivalently tiered weapons if not somewhat below (especially for multiclassed monks) and I suspect it won't be easy for monks to hit the ceiling for Penetration with their fists even with the use of Thunderous Blows, given the nerf to the Tenacious inspiration. For non-monks, though, this probably doesn't do much more than delay the irrelevance of unarmed attacks for a few more levels: if the modal's equivalent to the Sword or Stiletto's, then 7 Penetration's going to lag pretty far behind well before the endgame, and if it's more, then we start to edge back towards problems with how it plays with Transcendent Suffering/Thunderous Blows during potentially significant sections of the game even if it settles over the long term.

 

I think the advantage of an Interrupt modal for unarmed attacks is that it sidesteps the balancing concerns of appropriate Damage/Penetration values for monks vs non-monks by aiming to be useful in a different way altogether, albeit a situational one. It's not going to make unarmed attacks stand out as a top weapon choice for non-monks by any means, but it might be handy enough on occasion to dual wield with or leave a slot in reserve and the value of a quick, resource-free Interrupt attack seems likely to remain at least somewhat stable throughout the game.

Edited December 26, 2017 by blotter

[Erik-Dirk]

That’s why we need the unarmed proficiency. Just doing away with the penalty means you’d be better off picking an unkitted Fighter anyway

Actually the reason this wouldn't be a good idea is exactly the opposite, A monk/devoted could choose to specialize in sabers gaining the devoted bonus and have no penalty for fists if they required crush damage, or wanted a range weapon.

That being said the lower power level for multiclass may already compensate for this.

 

 

One of the problems with coming up with a balanced Unarmed proficiency is that both monks and non-monks need to be considered simultaneously so that what's suitable for one isn't excessive or inadequate for the other.

 

~ Text between deleted~

 

I think the advantage of an Interrupt modal for unarmed attacks is that it sidesteps the balancing concerns of appropriate Damage/Penetration values for monks vs non-monks by aiming to be useful in a different way altogether, albeit a situational one. It's not going to make unarmed attacks stand out as a top weapon choice for non-monks by any means, but it might be handy enough on occasion to dual wield with or leave a slot in reserve and the value of a quick, resource-free Interrupt attack seems likely to remain at least somewhat stable throughout the game.

 

Actually there doesn't have to be a balance, the modal could override the monk bonus so long as that was clearly stated at character creation.

A utility modal is a good solution though.

[blotter]

Actually there doesn't have to be a balance, the modal could override the monk bonus so long as that was clearly stated at character creation.

True, I honestly hadn't even considered that. It would be a departure from the way that every other proficiency works for every other class, but I can't deny that it allows for a lot more flexibility in deciding what to do with the proficiency.

 

It'd also be something of a shame for monks to have no use for an unarmed proficiency's modal, but selecting it would allow them to blend Transcendent Suffering with the Devoted's  subclass benefits as well as various passives that are tied to weapon proficiencies so it's not exactly wasted either.

 

Maybe an alternative for the proficiency would be an if/then setup where non-monks get a standard damage/Penetration bonus or whatever while the modal would treat a monk's power level as being +1 or +2 higher for the purpose of calculating Transcendent Suffering bonuses at the cost of increased recovery for unarmed attacks.