I'm surprised that in the Behavior Editor there is no such conditionals for Ascendant that is like 'Self: At max focus'. Imo this is very important for an Ascendant AI to work functionally.

Yeah, this is an issue, especially since when you Ascend you have a very limited time window in which to cast as much as possible. 

 

The funny thing is there are conditionals for "Has 90 focus" or whatever so for the first few levels . . .

Yeah, this is an issue, especially since when you Ascend you have a very limited time window in which to cast as much as possible. 

 

The funny thing is there are conditionals for "Has 90 focus" or whatever so for the first few levels . . .

 

Ascendant is way much better now, since the spell speed is much faster for cipher, and the duration of Ascend is very long now, my 20 INT Ascendant has a duration of around 30 second Ascend which is more than enough for me to spam all good spells, maybe too good in late game.

But only when...

 

 

Ascendant is way much better now, since the spell speed is much faster for cipher, and the duration of Ascend is very long now, my 20 INT Ascendant has a duration of around 30 second Ascend which is more than enough for me to spam all good spells, maybe too good in late game.

 

 

Yeah, my "feel" is that maybe it should drop to a 15 second base instead of a 20 second base, BUT having to wait to cast effectively really is a big hit since the opening seconds of combat are the most tactically valuable, so i might be wrong and 20 might be fine.

 

I also suspect there's going to be a late-game issue where it takes progressively longer and longer to hit max focus. Early game, a single blunderbuss blast might be enough, depending on build; by midgame even an optimized build is gonna need dual blundy's ;  by late game . . . you're gonna need more than just the initial alpha strike damage to get your numbers up past rookie levels. 

 

So it might balance out. After this run I'll try a "scaled up" run of the beta at like 10th level and see how it differs.

Edited April 2, 20187 yr by Dr. Hieronymous Alloy

Ascendant is pretty strong, but there's a ton of builds in much more dire need of nerfs imo. With how many broken stuff there's currently in the game Ascendant probably only qualifies for "above average", at least with the current spell selection. Would likely get OP with amplified wave and such, although depends on how much they'll nerf it in PoE2.

Edited April 2, 20187 yr by MadDemiurg

Can you please post your Ascendant's stats?

Interested.

Can you please post your Ascendant's stats?

Interested.

 

 

I've tested a few values.

 

First I tried was Might 15 / con 5 / Dex 15 / Per 19 / Int 19 / Res 5 , on PotD, using dual blunderbuss. It worked well but the "alpha strike" was a little weak, and it would often take a couple of extra attacks to max out.

 

After that I tried Might 18  / Dex 12 but it was a little slow at casting during the Ascendance, especially if I wore any armor at all.

 

I don't like going below 5 res or con for survivability (plus there's a nice square 10 if they get an inspiration).

 

Lowering Per is probably the "on paper" best option but on PotD Per is very useful and I really like having at least one character with very high Per to spot secrets and traps.

 

I ended up settling on 16/14 Might/dex but a lot of it will depend on the availability of items with +might/dex in the final game, and how damage thresholds increase in late game when the Ascendant has a *very* big pool of focus to fill. 

 

 

Ascendant is way much better now, since the spell speed is much faster for cipher, and the duration of Ascend is very long now, my 20 INT Ascendant has a duration of around 30 second Ascend which is more than enough for me to spam all good spells, maybe too good in late game.

 

Yeah, my "feel" is that maybe it should drop to a 15 second base instead of a 20 second base, BUT having to wait to cast effectively really is a big hit since the opening seconds of combat are the most tactically valuable, so i might be wrong and 20 might be fine.

 

I also suspect there's going to be a late-game issue where it takes progressively longer and longer to hit max focus. Early game, a single blunderbuss blast might be enough, depending on build; by midgame even an optimized build is gonna need dual blundy's ; by late game . . . you're gonna need more than just the initial alpha strike damage to get your numbers up past rookie levels.

 

So it might balance out. After this run I'll try a "scaled up" run of the beta at like 10th level and see how it differs.

Make sense, that’s why Im always whining that +max focus is not a bonus but a penalty for Ascedant ( it is a bonus in their description lmao )