Path of Exile 3.0 (the other Diablo clone)

[Drasius]

My experience with the Labyrinth has been decidedly different,
It usually takes me dozens of tries to get through, as usually
the traps or the third boss fight would do me in, and of course
random game crashes are responsible for more than a few failed runs.


Anyway, I'm looking forward to seeing exactly how they changed the Lab this time round.

Are you going in 5-10 levels over the lab level? 'Cause if not, try that instead as it makes a pretty big difference.

Spoiler: Spoilers about some of the changes to the lab in case you don't want to know beforehand

Show

- The new lab has less rooms to go through on normal & cruel
- The layouts are easier and the keys are in the same area as the doors on normal and cruel
- Darkshrines are always good, there are more of them and any buffs now last the entire lab, not just one area
- Normal and Cruel limit the types of buffs Izzy can get
- the trinkets (like charge disruptors and such) are generally easier to get and less out of the way
- Some changes also affect Merciless too, but the Endgame lab is effectively unchanged bar the darkshrines being hilariously OP now (one result is a divine shrine that lasts until the end of the lab!)

Oh another thought,
has anybody found any interesting combos will the new gems ?

Also am I the only one noticing the lack of gem venders in this release ?
I know the one in the library is still there But I don't recall any other ones offhand...

Orb of storms - increased crit/power charge on crit - low lvl arcane surge is pretty win.
Melee can do pure phys with brutality/ruthless instead of having to go hatred and/or herald of fire.
That's about it since we didn't get a huge amount of new stuff, mostly just changes to existing stuff. Storm burst is lacklustre at endgame, dark pact is enjoying some success (but 'Zerker makes anything strong) and charged dash has a few fans but appears a bit hard to use without some practice.

All the gem vendors are still there from Acts 1-4 (though you still have to do the quests that unlock them before you can buy them) and Siosa still sells most things but for some select gems you'll need to see Lilly in Act 6/Act 10 (the ones that needed >lvl 34 got moved I think). I don't recall if the vendor from Act 5 has a gem page since I haven't needed anything there yet.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

So, this game. After watching Quill18 stream it then do a little LP of it, I decided to try it out. Keeping in mind that I am a complete and total newbie at this game. Here's some of my first impressions, having seen nothing but Quill18's videos (which had significant parts cut because 'boring stuff you've already done') and what I have observed myself.

* The passive skill tree reminds me of FF X. That's not an insult, I like it. I like it a lot. Almost any character can get into any passive skill they want if they really want it. Not that they *should*, but the option is there.

-- The good part about this is that you are flexible in what you can do. The bad thing is that it is more than a little overwhelming for a newbie.

* Gems, sockets, and such seem very FF VII-esque. I didn't like it in FF VII, but it seems to work much better here. After all, with D2, it was all about sockets and runewords at the end, this just makes it viable in the early game as well.

-- This is also great, because it means any character, in theory, can get any skill in the game. Again, not that anyone *should* necessarily, but they *could*. It also means trying to get That One Skill is a little annoying, but maybe at higher levels the vendors have the skills you are looking for?

* The combinations are almost limitless. You can have a perfectly viable Marauder caster (in fact, Quill's run was a double fire totem build with some fire traps thrown in because he couldn't really do much else), or you can have a melee-centric one (as long as you've got some AoE).

-- The number of viable builds, even to the late game, is pretty broad, so you aren't locked into any one single archetype, which you kinda are in D2 and even D3 really. And you get some respec points if you screw up. Even better is there are at least some builds which are gear-agnostic, meaning you don't have to farm for a specific legendary item just to be viable. There are some builds that take advantage of legendaries, but that's not all you have, which is a refreshing change from D2/D3.

* There is no 'gold' currency. Everything is on a barter system, and all of your materials are at least somewhat useful

-- Perhaps the biggest change, and one I really approve of. I'm trying to build a stock of Scrolls of Wisdom, but I keep having to identify things to sell them for shards, unless I'm doing things wrong. This makes me want to pick up whites to make a few extra scrolls of wisdom, which only clutters up my inventory and makes my progression slower. I'm virtually certain I'm Doing It Wrong somehow, but I don't know a better way.

Right now, I'm a wee tyke, playing on Standard. A Marauder going into a melee focused build, using Ground Slam and Heavy Strike. I don't have a 'life gain on hit' support yet, I suppose I'm not high enough level yet, but I do have a Bleed On Hit support in Ground Slam and a support for Heavy Strike that makes every third hit deal significantly more damage and stun. It's... okay. I like the AoE right off the bat with a melee character, still early in Act I, around level 8 or so.

I'm making a beeline for Resolute Technique. I haven't decided yet to go 1h or 2h yet. On the one hand, 1h gives me a shield with extra slots and more defense. 2h would give me more attack but fewer potential gem slots. I suppose there's also Staves I could use this with. Some of the staff passives deal with crits, which are meaningless to me, but I can get a lot of extra block and damage out of them. I'm just not sure how viable that would be, or how easy it would be to get a staff with red sockets.

My primary complaint about the game is lag. I'm packing 16GB RAM and an NVidia 1050Ti, it is *NOT* graphic lag, which means it is almost certainly latency to the local server. Which has already killed me once, and caused me to fail a quest with some guy I met out in the field. My bandwidth is also pretty huge, up to 50Mb/s, seeing as how I run a cable modem, so it isn't a problem on MY end. This makes me a sad panda, and if I decide to not continue playing this game, this will be the reason why.

I am running it through WINE, so maybe there's some configuration there I can use to streamline it? I dunno.

On the whole, it's great. It beats out D2 and D3 by miles. I'd say it is even superior to Torchlight 2, which is high praise coming from me. But if I can't eliminate the lag, I really won't be able to enjoy it much.

[Drasius]

* Gems, sockets, and such seem very FF VII-esque. I didn't like it in FF VII, but it seems to work much better here. After all, with D2, it was all about sockets and runewords at the end, this just makes it viable in the early game as well.

-- This is also great, because it means any character, in theory, can get any skill in the game. Again, not that anyone *should* necessarily, but they *could*. It also means trying to get That One Skill is a little annoying, but maybe at higher levels the vendors have the skills you are looking for?

Various acts have skill gem vendors, though you need to finish certain quests before certain gems become available and until you do a specific quest for a specific optional vendor that you're not told about in act3, not every gem is available to every class via vendors (and even then there's a few more that you have to wait until act 5 for). There's also ~3-5 gems that are never sold and only drop from enemies, but they are generally not required for anything but the most min-maxed of characters anyway.

* The combinations are almost limitless. You can have a perfectly viable Marauder caster (in fact, Quill's run was a double fire totem build with some fire traps thrown in because he couldn't really do much else), or you can have a melee-centric one (as long as you've got some AoE).

-- The number of viable builds, even to the late game, is pretty broad, so you aren't locked into any one single archetype, which you kinda are in D2 and even D3 really. And you get some respec points if you screw up. Even better is there are at least some builds which are gear-agnostic, meaning you don't have to farm for a specific legendary item just to be viable. There are some builds that take advantage of legendaries, but that's not all you have, which is a refreshing change from D2/D3.

One of the marauder acendancies is a bit broken and is generally just the best for everything at the moment, so you will see far more beefcake casters than you "should". There's a pretty hard wall at various points that will restrict what builds you can play, though they are fairly late game and some people will never see that far anyway even with the right build due to gear restrictions.

* There is no 'gold' currency. Everything is on a barter system, and all of your materials are at least somewhat useful

-- Perhaps the biggest change, and one I really approve of. I'm trying to build a stock of Scrolls of Wisdom, but I keep having to identify things to sell them for shards, unless I'm doing things wrong. This makes me want to pick up whites to make a few extra scrolls of wisdom, which only clutters up my inventory and makes my progression slower. I'm virtually certain I'm Doing It Wrong somehow, but I don't know a better way.

You are "doing it wrong" sort of. Wis scrolls are only in short supply for the first few hours. By then you should have picked up enough random crap to have a nigh endless supply of scrolls. Blacksmith whetstones, armourer scraps and orbs of transmutation all sell for multiple wis scrolls each. Don't hoarde them, convert them to scrolls once you have more than ~20 until you're set for scrolls. Most players filter them out as picking up scrolls is generally a waste of time.

If you are picking up anything except for useful rares, currency orbs or uniques, stop. Worst comes to worst, you can trade 1 chaos for like 200'ish wis scrolls.

Right now, I'm a wee tyke, playing on Standard. A Marauder going into a melee focused build, using Ground Slam and Heavy Strike. I don't have a 'life gain on hit' support yet, I suppose I'm not high enough level yet, but I do have a Bleed On Hit support in Ground Slam and a support for Heavy Strike that makes every third hit deal significantly more damage and stun. It's... okay. I like the AoE right off the bat with a melee character, still early in Act I, around level 8 or so.

Standard is ... not optimal. The economy there is all sorts of busted. Given that we've just started a new league and you're only lvl 8, consider joining the Harbinger league if you intend on staying around. Not to mention that there's new league specific toys that you can only get by playing Harbinger.

As for builds, just like D2, you're going to screw up your first character unless you're following a build giude. Accept it and life is much easier. Don't get too used to the starter skills, again, much like D2, most of them aren't intended for lategame (with a few exceptions, especially with threshold jewels). This goes double for melee.

Just like D2, the aim is to do 1 thing and do it well. Pick a skill you like (make sure it's not single target by the way, unless it's flicker strike) and then concentrate on pumping that as much as possible while all your other slots are dedicated to supprting skills. It won't matter for the first ~30 levels, but once you hit act 4'ish, a lack of focus will make your life difficult.

I'm making a beeline for Resolute Technique. I haven't decided yet to go 1h or 2h yet. On the one hand, 1h gives me a shield with extra slots and more defense. 2h would give me more attack but fewer potential gem slots. I suppose there's also Staves I could use this with. Some of the staff passives deal with crits, which are meaningless to me, but I can get a lot of extra block and damage out of them. I'm just not sure how viable that would be, or how easy it would be to get a staff with red sockets.

Actually, 2 handers can have up to 6 slots, all linked while 1 hand and shield (or dual wield) can only ever have 2x3 linked slots. You want more links since that's where most of your damage comes from.

Staves ... aren't great. Probably avoid them for now while you're learning and come back to them later if you're keen, though if you do happen to find that gem in the rough, by all means, go nuts, but an RT staff build? Probably not.

You're never told anywhere, but you get a bunch of bonus stuff for dual weilding too - more damage, faster attacks and an inherant 15% chance to block (compared to the ~25% chance you get on most shields).

Socket colours are dependant on stat requirements. The higher the relevant stat (str = red, dex = green, int = blue), the more likely an item is to have a socket be that colour. It's relatively easy to get red sockets on a staff, even at higher levels (since staves have a str requirement) though they will also roll a bunch of blue sockets too since they're also meant for casters and have an int requirement.

Overall, it's a lot easier to get acceptable damage out of a 2hander than it is to get it out of sword and board while dual weilding comes with the problem of needing 2 good weapons (or 1 really good weapon and a stat stick). Unless you invest heavily in block on the tree or take 1 of 2 specific ascendancies, don't expect to ever have any reasonable amount of block.

My primary complaint about the game is lag. I'm packing 16GB RAM and an NVidia 1050Ti, it is *NOT* graphic lag, which means it is almost certainly latency to the local server. Which has already killed me once, and caused me to fail a quest with some guy I met out in the field. My bandwidth is also pretty huge, up to 50Mb/s, seeing as how I run a cable modem, so it isn't a problem on MY end. This makes me a sad panda, and if I decide to not continue playing this game, this will be the reason why.

Can't help you there beyond letting you know that it's been reported that the game has issues with non-nvidia cards. The most common solution is to run in directX 9 instead of DX11, though it doesn't work for everyone.

Don't worry too much about getting killed, you only lose XP once you're into act 6 and beyond. The quest that was failed is also insignificant, it's just a crafting person and the early levels (like, before level 50) are worth so little influence that most people just skip them and wait until they reach maps to bother.

[Sian]

2h would give me more attack but fewer potential gem slots

Not quite, 2hs can have up to 6 gemslots, while onehanded (and shields) can only have 3 gemslots

[ShneekeyTheLost]

You are "doing it wrong" sort of. Wis scrolls are only in short supply for the first few hours. By then you should have picked up enough random crap to have a nigh endless supply of scrolls. Blacksmith whetstones, armourer scraps and orbs of transmutation all sell for multiple wis scrolls each. Don't hoarde them, convert them to scrolls once you have more than ~20 until you're set for scrolls. Most players filter them out as picking up scrolls is generally a waste of time.

If you are picking up anything except for useful rares, currency orbs or uniques, stop. Worst comes to worst, you can trade 1 chaos for like 200'ish wis scrolls.



Standard is ... not optimal. The economy there is all sorts of busted. Given that we've just started a new league and you're only lvl 8, consider joining the Harbinger league if you intend on staying around. Not to mention that there's new league specific toys that you can only get by playing Harbinger.

I intend to play this game as single-player, without any trading or anything. I've turned off all the chat channels, including Local. I realize why it isn't possible for it to be offline, but I'd prefer to be as 'single player game' as possible. I play games to get away from idiots and morons, not to interact with them. Which is what 90% of any server's population is going to consist of.

As for builds, just like D2, you're going to screw up your first character unless you're following a build giude. Accept it and life is much easier. Don't get too used to the starter skills, again, much like D2, most of them aren't intended for lategame (with a few exceptions, especially with threshold jewels). This goes double for melee.

Just like D2, the aim is to do 1 thing and do it well. Pick a skill you like (make sure it's not single target by the way, unless it's flicker strike) and then concentrate on pumping that as much as possible while all your other slots are dedicated to supprting skills. It won't matter for the first ~30 levels, but once you hit act 4'ish, a lack of focus will make your life difficult.

Well, I figure that I'm going to need one AoE skill for clearing and one Damage Dump for boss battles. So I went with Ground Slam for the AoE and Heavy Strike for single-target dps. Obviously, as better skills reveal themselves, I'll probably be shifting focus, but my initial idea, with admittedly zero knowledge of game mechanics, is to go with physical damage and bleed. I've heard that bleed/poison/other DoT's don't stack anymore, quite a lot of complaining about something like that at any rate, so I figure I can focus on Bleed as my DoT of preference, with the understanding that DoT is typically very weak in a game like this, but as long as it doesn't block me from doing something more useful I consider it more like the sprinkles on top.

And yea, I don't expect this character to be 'uber', I just want to start clearing and building up my store of resources so that my next character can have advantages that this one never had.

\Actually, 2 handers can have up to 6 slots, all linked while 1 hand and shield (or dual wield) can only ever have 2x3 linked slots. You want more links since that's where most of your damage comes from.

Staves ... aren't great. Probably avoid them for now while you're learning and come back to them later if you're keen, though if you do happen to find that gem in the rough, by all means, go nuts, but an RT staff build? Probably not.

You're never told anywhere, but you get a bunch of bonus stuff for dual weilding too - more damage, faster attacks and an inherant 15% chance to block (compared to the ~25% chance you get on most shields).

Socket colours are dependant on stat requirements. The higher the relevant stat (str = red, dex = green, int = blue), the more likely an item is to have a socket be that colour. It's relatively easy to get red sockets on a staff, even at higher levels (since staves have a str requirement) though they will also roll a bunch of blue sockets too since they're also meant for casters and have an int requirement.

Overall, it's a lot easier to get acceptable damage out of a 2hander than it is to get it out of sword and board while dual weilding comes with the problem of needing 2 good weapons (or 1 really good weapon and a stat stick). Unless you invest heavily in block on the tree or take 1 of 2 specific ascendancies, don't expect to ever have any reasonable amount of block.

Interesting. So would you suggest a 2h or dual-wielding for a newbie? Sounds like 2h has more potential, but dual-wielding has some defensive capabilities.

Can't help you there beyond letting you know that it's been reported that the game has issues with non-nvidia cards. The most common solution is to run in directX 9 instead of DX11, though it doesn't work for everyone.

I am running an NVidia card, a 1050Ti. And I am running in Dx9, since I'm running it through WINE and Dx11 support in WINE is still... problematic.

Don't worry too much about getting killed, you only lose XP once you're into act 6 and beyond. The quest that was failed is also insignificant, it's just a crafting person and the early levels (like, before level 50) are worth so little influence that most people just skip them and wait until they reach maps to bother.

Ahh, good. I've heard something about getting your own base from one of them after a while, was hoping I didn't lock myself out of doing that.

[N810]

"Ahh, good. I've heard something about getting your own base from one of them after a while, was hoping I didn't lock myself out of doing that. "
occasional you will meat someone out in the middle of a battlefield handing out quest,
if you do enough of these you will get a base, and you can invite these guys to hang out there,
They act as venders and they still give out quest there but only one a day each,
eventual after even more quest you will unlock crafting benches that you can modify your equipment with.

[lord_khaine]

So i got a bit of a question, does anyone have any broad recomendations for what to do with a Scion?
I like her lore and personality/voice, but its a little hard deciding on what to do with her.

[Starwulf]

"Ahh, good. I've heard something about getting your own base from one of them after a while, was hoping I didn't lock myself out of doing that. "
occasional you will meat someone out in the middle of a battlefield handing out quest,
if you do enough of these you will get a base, and you can invite these guys to hang out there,
They act as venders and they still give out quest there but only one a day each,
eventual after even more quest you will unlock crafting benches that you can modify your equipment with.

This last part isn't entirely true. You can unlock the crafting benches for every "Master" out there once you've leveled one of them up enough(level 3) to be invited to make a base with them. I don't remember the command you have to type, but it's easily googled I'm sure. Leveling them up affects what mods you can craft on them, but again, you can get every crafting bench(including Zana's) as soon as you have a base.

/claim_crafting_benches

Is the command line.

So i got a bit of a question, does anyone have any broad recomendations for what to do with a Scion?
I like her lore and personality/voice, but its a little hard deciding on what to do with her.

Unless she got buffed in 3.0(I haven't played yet, busy with D3 and Overwatch atm), she's junk, and has been junk for many, many seasons. Jack of all trades, master of none, which in this game is NOT a good thing.

[lord_khaine]

Alright thanks. Thankfully im only playing against myself. So i guess the main question is just how junky she is?

[The Hellbug]

One of the big things that hurts her is that her early nodes are just really bad. You can basically spec into whatever you want, but you'll basically be making a beeline for the part of the tree the better character for that strategy would have used.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

So I've reached Act II. I've swapped out Ground Smash for Sunder, tacked on both Add Fire Damage Support and Life On Hit support gems to it. This is... mana-intensive for my mostly physical build, but I have a good mana potion. I also have Leap Smash for mobility and utility. I'm about two passive skill points away from my first goal, Resolute Technique. Once I do that, I think I'll make a beeline for Blood Magic, it just seems too useful to me to not do.

I got semi-lucky with my weapon. It's only a blue, but it rolled extra fire damage and life per hit, so I'm certainly not going to complain. Also not complaining about the three linked red slots, which is where my Sunder + Fire Damage + Life On Hit combo is located. It'll be tough to upgrade out of that.

Unfortunately, many of my armor slots still are catch-as-catch-can, and very sub-optimal, but it is what it is.

I'm still low on Scrolls of Wisdom, but I suppose that's my play style as much as anything. I've gotten some interesting materials. Found a beastie encased in ice. Killed it, got something that will guarantee a rare with life steal on it... VERY nice, but I think I'm going to save that for much later on a weapon worth using it on.

My only problem is the lag, particular during the Siren boss fight, it was lagging all over the place. This is... not okay. D3 doesn't lag like this, not sure why this game does. I've got all the graphics on minimum settings, with a video card FAR more powerful than I should need. I'm betting it is some WINE configuration somewhere that needs to be tweaked, so I shall be consulting with my fellow Penguins to see if I can solve it.

[Starwulf]

One of the big things that hurts her is that her early nodes are just really bad. You can basically spec into whatever you want, but you'll basically be making a beeline for the part of the tree the better character for that strategy would have used.

Yep. Which means whereas most builds have really hit their stride by 75 or so, you're only just starting. Most builds are good by 80-85, any Scion build is going to require you to level to at least 90 before it's going to be on par with another character using the same build.

Plus, her Lab bonuses are either non-existent, or also just absolute crap, which is a huge downer, as they are quite, quite nice for other characters(even esoteric builds can get a good bump in strength from the Lab bonuses, but Scion is just left out in the cold(or was, I didn't play last season, and haven't started this season yet).

I'm still low on Scrolls of Wisdom, but I suppose that's my play style as much as anything. I've gotten some interesting materials. Found a beastie encased in ice. Killed it, got something that will guarantee a rare with life steal on it... VERY nice, but I think I'm going to save that for much later on a weapon worth using it on.

Use it now, those things have level requirements that can't be EXCEEDED, so either use it now, or it ends up being wasted(or transmuted up a notch I guess if you get 2 more of the same type and tier). And since you're not going to be trading or anything, I'd heavily advise using it now, as you won't be getting into the higher tier of stuff until a fair amount later then most people. It's honestly even worse then hoarding Mega-elixirs in Final Fantasy(or anything similar) until the final boss, because at least they have that use in the final boss confrontation, the thing you just found literally has an expiration date on it's usefulness.

[Drasius]

I intend to play this game as single-player, without any trading or anything. I've turned off all the chat channels, including Local. I realize why it isn't possible for it to be offline, but I'd prefer to be as 'single player game' as possible. I play games to get away from idiots and morons, not to interact with them. Which is what 90% of any server's population is going to consist of.

Fair enough mate, I play SSF too (Solo Self Found). It's even an option for an entirely seperate league, but it's only available after you've beaten the Act 4 boss (it might be act 5 now with 3.0).

Well, I figure that I'm going to need one AoE skill for clearing and one Damage Dump for boss battles. So I went with Ground Slam for the AoE and Heavy Strike for single-target dps. Obviously, as better skills reveal themselves, I'll probably be shifting focus, but my initial idea, with admittedly zero knowledge of game mechanics, is to go with physical damage and bleed. I've heard that bleed/poison/other DoT's don't stack anymore, quite a lot of complaining about something like that at any rate, so I figure I can focus on Bleed as my DoT of preference, with the understanding that DoT is typically very weak in a game like this, but as long as it doesn't block me from doing something more useful I consider it more like the sprinkles on top.

Sort of to both. Generally you can ramp your AoE skills up to silly levels anyway and most boss encounters have additional chaff that spawns (to give you flask charges). There's generally 2 gems considered nigh mandatory for every melee skill - Melee Damage Support and Melee Splash Support (the latter only if you're running a single target skill).

DoT's got hit extremely hard, but they were also extremely broken too, so it's going to take a bit to find the balance again. Almost no matter what you do, bleed will only ever be ~10% of your damage and while that's not nothing, it's not spectaular either and you can get much better results elsewhere on the tree and gear.

And yea, I don't expect this character to be 'uber', I just want to start clearing and building up my store of resources so that my next character can have advantages that this one never had.

Yep, league starters are a thing and you're on the right track with sunder.

Interesting. So would you suggest a 2h or dual-wielding for a newbie? Sounds like 2h has more potential, but dual-wielding has some defensive capabilities.

Probably 2 hander since offense is generally the best defense in PoE to a large extent and marauder has a relatively easy time stacking both life and 2 hand damage. It's a matter of degrees mostly, but 2 hand is probably easier to start out with.

Ahh, good. I've heard something about getting your own base from one of them after a while, was hoping I didn't lock myself out of doing that.

Help one of the masters enough to get them to lvl 3 and they'll offer you a hideout where you can get the others to join (eventually). Don't focus on 1 master to the exclusion of others however (not that you get a choice, they appear randomly), they all gain XP interdependant of the others and helping one (or not helping) has no effect on another. Failing missions has no drawback beyond not getting the XP available. You'll still see that master again in other areas.

So i got a bit of a question, does anyone have any broad recomendations for what to do with a Scion?
I like her lore and personality/voice, but its a little hard deciding on what to do with her.

Pick another, better character? She can do anything the others can do (unless you're talking absolute lategame and even then it's possible, just harder), so pick a skill and a theme you like and go for it. Her big issue is having her "special ability" be that she can do anything, in a game that not only allows any character to do anything, but heavily rewards focussing on 1 thing to the exclusion of almost everything else. About the only thing she has in her favour is that the Scion life nodes are a HUGE source of life which is generally in short supply on the right side of the tree, so anything there is eay, but her issue is that almost every other node she has sucks and you have to pick a way out. Going Righteous Fire and taking the regen cluster out isn't bad, but RF isn't a beginner skill, so that makes things a little more difficult.

Alternately, since almost every left side tree build ends up in the Scion life wheel anyway, you don't lose much by taking the handful of melee nodes to get there and then biulding her like any other melee option.

Her ascendancy options aren't awesome, though a few stand out. Slayer and Elementalist both get the 50% reflect reduction, so that's immediately a stong option for your chosen path if melee/elemental damage. Scion Assassin is almost as strong as Shadow assassin while allowing another ascendancy, more skills and easy access to life nodes. Raider gets you frenzy charges on HIT against rares/uniques while means you're not boned when fighting bosses which is nice and Heirophant gets you another totem with no downside other than being Scion which can combo well with Ancestral bond or even another ascendancy life Chieftan.

Worst comes to worst, pick a build you like and once you finish merciless lab (urgh, such a long way away), you can allocate nodes from their starting point in addition to Scion, so you can respec out of Scion and be someone else, but that just means you're stuck with watered down ascendancies in exchange for an akward build, 5 extra skill points and +80 stats.

Tell us what you'd like to run (even if just generic like ranged/caster/melee, though if you had a theme in midn that'd help more) and we can perhaps suggest something.

This last part isn't entirely true. You can unlock the crafting benches for every "Master" out there once you've leveled one of them up enough(level 3) to be invited to make a base with them. I don't remember the command you have to type, but it's easily googled I'm sure. Leveling them up affects what mods you can craft on them, but again, you can get every crafting bench(including Zana's) as soon as you have a base.

/claim_crafting_benches

Is the command line.

That got removed in 3.0 IIRC.

Unless she got buffed in 3.0(I haven't played yet, busy with D3 and Overwatch atm), she's junk, and has been junk for many, many seasons. Jack of all trades, master of none, which in this game is NOT a good thing.

Actually, she did get buffed quite significantly in 3.0. Still not as good as the others, but the gap is far less vast now. Starting nodes still suck though.

Alright thanks. Thankfully im only playing against myself. So i guess the main question is just how junky she is?

For late maps/guardians/shaper? Noticably worse than other choices. For anything up to ~ Tier 8 maps, it's nothing you can't overcome. For getting through the story (beating Act 10)? Nothing that you'll even notice. Depends on your goals for the character.

So I've reached Act II. I've swapped out Ground Smash for Sunder, tacked on both Add Fire Damage Support and Life On Hit support gems to it. This is... mana-intensive for my mostly physical build, but I have a good mana potion. I also have Leap Smash for mobility and utility. I'm about two passive skill points away from my first goal, Resolute Technique. Once I do that, I think I'll make a beeline for Blood Magic, it just seems too useful to me to not do.

Uhh, be careful with that, blood magic removes ALL your mana and some of the auras which you'll get very shortly and are very handy, reserve a large % of mana (or life with blood magic). Even then, if you're struggling to power stuff via mana, you're likely going to have just as many problems keeping your health up. It's also not that hard to come by +X mana per kill rings which can heavily offset mana costs early. Ideally, you'd get some -ve mana cost jewellery from Elreon, but you won't have him leveled yet, so that's not an option just yet.

I'd strongly suggest sticking with a mana flask for now, but grab it if you want, you can always respec out of it if it doesn't work out like you'd hoped.

I got semi-lucky with my weapon. It's only a blue, but it rolled extra fire damage and life per hit, so I'm certainly not going to complain. Also not complaining about the three linked red slots, which is where my Sunder + Fire Damage + Life On Hit combo is located. It'll be tough to upgrade out of that.

See below to vendor recipe link.

Unfortunately, many of my armor slots still are catch-as-catch-can, and very sub-optimal, but it is what it is.

Yep, get used to this for SSF. Eventually you'll get enough crafting material to have whatever you need, but it's not required early anyway, so you'll be fine.

I'm still low on Scrolls of Wisdom, but I suppose that's my play style as much as anything. I've gotten some interesting materials. Found a beastie encased in ice. Killed it, got something that will guarantee a rare with life steal on it... VERY nice, but I think I'm going to save that for much later on a weapon worth using it on.

You get essences fairly frequently, so spend 'em while they're useful as mentioned above. Second - Life leech doesn't work like it does in D2 (unless you get Vaal Pact), you can only leech up to 20% of your life per second (though there are a couple of nodes on the tree that improve this) while also only gaining up to 2% of you life per hit and it's basically life gain over time, it's not instant (as opposed to life gain on hit, which is a fixed amount per hit and instant). Life gain on hit is better early when the amount recovered compared to your meager life pool is good but later on even 0.4% leech can be enough to keep you topped up (since better builds have damage in the hundreds of thousands or even millions and max life is generally ~6-9k)

The best part of essences is that they give you a rare item (up to 3 prefix and 3 suffix) and you know what you're going to get for at least 1 affix. As mentioned earlier though, all the low level essences have lvl caps built in (it will say it up the tip when you hover over it, something along the lines of mods limited to maximum lvl 35).

Another option that you don't get told about by the game is that vendors act much like the Horadric cube in D2, if you sell certain things to them, they give you upgraded items in return. Weapon [any] + magic (or rare) rustic sash + one (1) blacksmith's whetstone = magic weapon of same type with 40-49% increased damage (magic belt) or 50 - 69% increased damage (rare belt)

See here: https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Vendor_recipe_system for the various options that you're never told about (unless they're in the new help section that just got added to 3.0).

My only problem is the lag, particular during the Siren boss fight, it was lagging all over the place. This is... not okay. D3 doesn't lag like this, not sure why this game does. I've got all the graphics on minimum settings, with a video card FAR more powerful than I should need. I'm betting it is some WINE configuration somewhere that needs to be tweaked, so I shall be consulting with my fellow Penguins to see if I can solve it.

Perhaps search/ask around on both their offical forums and the PoE reddit page. The Reddit people are surprisingly helpful for the most part and GGG seems to give the PoE reddit more attention than they do their own forums for some reason.

[Starwulf]

That got removed in 3.0 IIRC.



Actually, she did get buffed quite significantly in 3.0. Still not as good as the others, but the gap is far less vast now. Starting nodes still suck though.

mmm, that's what I get for not reading the patch notes yet, thanks for the tip though. Wonder why they removed the claim all crafting benches, it wasn't hurting anything, didn't particularly offer much advantage, as all the stuff you would want to craft onto a weapon would still require you to level the master to 6-8 anyways.

Good to hear that she got buffed, was one of the most common complaints I read on the forums(both reddit, and poe forums themselves) when it came to character-based stuff. With access to all those life nodes early on, might be interesting to try out a build with her sometime.

Speaking of, what kind of builds are popular thus far this season? When I start up I'm going to be trying a different build this time around, last 3 times I've played, I've gone with my traditional split+chain crit build, but I've gotten pretty bored with that, and without absolute top end gear, it's hard to make it really end-game capable(I always hit a wall around t14 maps or so. Could push into some t15 maps, but t16 was literally off-limits, and my luck in finding valuable stuff last time I played(2 seasons ago) was pretty abysmal, so I didn't end up with a very powerful character. I normally don't do cookie cutter builds, but I really want to get into all end-game stuff this time around(Shaper and stuff like that), so that'll the route I'll be going.

Another option that you don't get told about by the game is that vendors act much like the Horadric cube in D2, if you sell certain things to them, they give you upgraded items in return. Weapon [any] + magic (or rare) rustic sash + one (1) blacksmith's whetstone = magic weapon of same type with 40-49% increased damage (magic belt) or 50 - 69% increased damage (rare belt)

See here: https://pathofexile.gamepedia.com/Vendor_recipe_system for the various options that you're never told about (unless they're in the new help section that just got added to 3.0).

Also wanted to thank/praise you for posting that. I realize now that when I mentioned the "Upgrading of the essences" in my previous post to Shneeky, I didn't mention anything about how to do it, which was pretty silly of me. I sometimes forget that this game is really, really overwhelming/complicated for newer players, so much stuff is left unsaid throughout the course of the game, and unless you really, really study the forums and help threads, you aren't going to know a fraction of the stuff that's possible in game. For me it's old-hat I guess(Having been around since back in the day when they were giving away alpha/beta keys on the forums, and they only had up to the Warden in-game to play), so again, good job on spreading the knowledge that I failed to do so :).

[Drasius]

Speaking of, what kind of builds are popular thus far this season? When I start up I'm going to be trying a different build this time around, last 3 times I've played, I've gone with my traditional split+chain crit build, but I've gotten pretty bored with that, and without absolute top end gear, it's hard to make it really end-game capable(I always hit a wall around t14 maps or so. Could push into some t15 maps, but t16 was literally off-limits, and my luck in finding valuable stuff last time I played(2 seasons ago) was pretty abysmal, so I didn't end up with a very powerful character. I normally don't do cookie cutter builds, but I really want to get into all end-game stuff this time around(Shaper and stuff like that), so that'll the route I'll be going.

Baron SRS, Self Cast Dark Pact, Ele-conversion anything (usually crit-quisitor to ignore resists and stack more damage), TS/Barrage raider, BV, BF, pizza sticks, the regular stuff. Anything that wasn't reliant on poison or other double dipping mechanics and was strong in 2.6 is just as strong in 3.0. Not much else has changed except for the total destruction of ES based builds and the huge buff to map boss life. VP is still insanely OP, 'Zerk + [any skill] still viable due to VP and cloaked in savagery.

IIRC the first HC shaper kill was done with RF + scorching ray trickster, so there's got to be some merit to that.

There was a ~5 million dps ele barrage raider build floating around that seemed like it should rock quite a few socks if farming shaper was your bag.

[Sian]

Been feeling a bit meh about my Slayer Archer (just started at act 4), and were considering swapping back to Totem Hierophant because i liked it so much, so how's this for a baseline build when having completed Cruel Lab?, and then from there-on out stacking +Fire/Spell/Ele Damage and defensives? ... my vague idea is to deploy Flame Totems, and use Firestorm+Flammability ... not entirely sure what (if anything) skill i should use for Bosses or if they aforementioned is enough

[Drasius]

Been feeling a bit meh about my Slayer Archer (just started at act 4), and were considering swapping back to Totem Hierophant because i liked it so much, so how's this for a baseline build when having completed Cruel Lab?, and then from there-on out stacking +Fire/Spell/Ele Damage and defensives? ... my vague idea is to deploy Flame Totems, and use Firestorm+Flammability ... not entirely sure what (if anything) skill i should use for Bosses or if they aforementioned is enough

It's totems, so sure, it'll work, because totems, but you've basically got no life increase there. Again, totems, so you can almost certainly make it work, but you're going to be unbelievably squishy.

Can't say I've ever played hiero for the totems (weird, I know) nor any build where totems were more than a quality of life thing for bosses (though I have a dark pack necro w/skelly & Wither totems in the works) so I'm just going to link a couple of guides (though they're not flame based) and leave it at that;

- https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/1931084
- https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/1942074

[Siosilvar]

Needs more life. Like, a LOT more life. I'm not sure you'll be able to finish act 4 with only 39% increased life. I'd do something like this instead. It has the same or slightly more damage than your build would have when advanced to the same level, but it has 3500 life instead of 2500. It does use Blood Magic to get there, so you won't be able to run any auras, but there aren't many good ones for a life totem build anyway.

[lord_khaine]

Pick another, better character? She can do anything the others can do (unless you're talking absolute lategame and even then it's possible, just harder), so pick a skill and a theme you like and go for it. Her big issue is having her "special ability" be that she can do anything, in a game that not only allows any character to do anything, but heavily rewards focussing on 1 thing to the exclusion of almost everything else. About the only thing she has in her favour is that the Scion life nodes are a HUGE source of life which is generally in short supply on the right side of the tree, so anything there is eay, but her issue is that almost every other node she has sucks and you have to pick a way out. Going Righteous Fire and taking the regen cluster out isn't bad, but RF isn't a beginner skill, so that makes things a little more difficult.

Alternately, since almost every left side tree build ends up in the Scion life wheel anyway, you don't lose much by taking the handful of melee nodes to get there and then biulding her like any other melee option.

Her ascendancy options aren't awesome, though a few stand out. Slayer and Elementalist both get the 50% reflect reduction, so that's immediately a stong option for your chosen path if melee/elemental damage. Scion Assassin is almost as strong as Shadow assassin while allowing another ascendancy, more skills and easy access to life nodes. Raider gets you frenzy charges on HIT against rares/uniques while means you're not boned when fighting bosses which is nice and Heirophant gets you another totem with no downside other than being Scion which can combo well with Ancestral bond or even another ascendancy life Chieftan.

Worst comes to worst, pick a build you like and once you finish merciless lab (urgh, such a long way away), you can allocate nodes from their starting point in addition to Scion, so you can respec out of Scion and be someone else, but that just means you're stuck with watered down ascendancies in exchange for an akward build, 5 extra skill points and +80 stats.

Tell us what you'd like to run (even if just generic like ranged/caster/melee, though if you had a theme in midn that'd help more) and we can perhaps suggest something.

Alright thanks a lot. I guess im not actually to fixed on anything specific. I do have a general preference for gish style characters (fighter/mages), mainly because only having to click 1 button kinda leaves me bored to fast. That means i like trying to build synergy between the usage of different skills.
But else, a melee who dabbles in casting or a caster who dabbles in melee. And i then dont know if it would be weapon&shield, 2hander or 2 weapons.

As for my goal, thats mainly to go though all 10 acts and experience the entire story.

[Sian]

Needs more life. Like, a LOT more life. I'm not sure you'll be able to finish act 4 with only 39% increased life. I'd do something like this instead. It has the same or slightly more damage than your build would have when advanced to the same level, but it has 3500 life instead of 2500. It does use Blood Magic to get there, so you won't be able to run any auras, but there aren't many good ones for a life totem build anyway.

Eh my Hierophant in the previous league was pushing through Act 4 Cruel with no significant issue with barely any more +Life%, only having problems with Breach leaguestones for the first couple of Cruel acts. Remember Totem users can largely stay away from the fight and focus on dodging abilities that are thrown their way (for an example ... my Bow-Dualist had a much harder time doing new normal Lab than my Totem-Templar had in the old, disregarding the couple of times I didn't have a clue what to expect on the templar which was my first character, and terribly built, in spite of having much stronger life/resist)

[Drasius]

Alright thanks a lot. I guess im not actually to fixed on anything specific. I do have a general preference for gish style characters (fighter/mages), mainly because only having to click 1 button kinda leaves me bored to fast. That means i like trying to build synergy between the usage of different skills.
But else, a melee who dabbles in casting or a caster who dabbles in melee. And i then dont know if it would be weapon&shield, 2hander or 2 weapons.

As for my goal, thats mainly to go though all 10 acts and experience the entire story.

Might I recommend Frost Blades? It's kinda 2 button only (whirling blades/frost blades) but it fits with the Gish style and is fairly strong while also being easy to start. Alternately the new Dark pact has 2 modes, 1 for casting on yourself, another for casting on skellies which can be either self cast or "auto" summoned from a totem. Another one is frostbolt and frost nova/vortex who gain a 40% multiplicative damage increase if you cast them on your frostbolt projectile. This one isn't explored much 'cause, well, the general aim is to clear the screen with 1 click, so combos are generally too much work if they don't involve cast while channeling or cast when damage taken.

Actually, speaking of CwC, another to consider would be blade flurry combined with blade vortex (or bladefall, but BV is stronger). That would let you cast something while you channel your melee skill, and it's another one that is fairly easy to start (though it'll be a bit boring until you get your gems which is lvl 12 for BV and 28 for both BF's). *checks* Yep, there's already a guide (though it's a sparse one) for this: https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/1919987

The more I think about it, the more I'd recommend the BF CwC BV scion, but really, it's going to depend on what skills you like the look/feel of since there's no point in spending [x] hours on something you don't enjoy. Blade vortex is absolutely amazing against bosses however - just wind up your stacks and stand next to them. Even easier with flurry too.

If you're only looking to do the story, you can generally make almost anything work, though Act10 can be fairly punishing for quite a few builds that can faceroll everything else, especially the last boss.

Eh my Hierophant in the previous league was pushing through Act 4 Cruel with no significant issue with barely any more +Life%, only having problems with Breach leaguestones for the first couple of Cruel acts. Remember Totem users can largely stay away from the fight and focus on dodging abilities that are thrown their way (for an example ... my Bow-Dualist had a much harder time doing new normal Lab than my Totem-Templar had in the old, disregarding the couple of times I didn't have a clue what to expect on the templar which was my first character, and terribly built, in spite of having much stronger life/resist)

If act 5 doesn't quickly disabuse you of the notion that it has any resemblance to cruel difficulty then act 6 certainly will. Acts 1-3 for cruel were a joke. Act 6 is a strong wake up call to start taking things seriously. Those Karui archers and totems don't muck about.

[Sian]

If act 5 doesn't quickly disabuse you of the notion that it has any resemblance to cruel difficulty then act 6 certainly will. Acts 1-3 for cruel were a joke. Act 6 is a strong wake up call to start taking things seriously. Those Karui archers and totems don't muck about.

... how's Mind over Matter (30% of damage taken from Mana) seen? that might be a 'cheap' and easy way (given that i go right past it already) to be a bit beefier

[lord_khaine]

Thanks for the feedback, i will take a closer look at the frost blades, Dark pact and Whirling blades skills. When i get them that is. Initially i think im going to go though the first couple of acts, and see what i actually find of interesting skills.

But that reminds me, are there any noteable or keystone skills near the scion starting point thats worth aiming towards?
Especially for a melee/magic hybrid style?

[ShneekeyTheLost]

About the changes to the bandits in 3.0...

Apparently you can craft 20x orbs of regret with an amulet and pick up a tome that gives you that bandit's bonus. Does this remove your previous bandit's bonus? What if you killed them all and got the two passive skill points, does it remove them?

I'm about to do bandits, and don't want to enormously screw up there, because Oak is looking mighty dang tempting for me since I'm going physical damage. But if I can get two passive points AND get Oak's ability... well, that's just plain better. I don't have 20 orbs of regret yet, but it is at least a goal I could aim for, and a permanent bonus like that for mats and an amulet I can get from a vendor? That's just damn wow.

[Sian]

About the changes to the bandits in 3.0...

Apparently you can craft 20x orbs of regret with an amulet and pick up a tome that gives you that bandit's bonus. Does this remove your previous bandit's bonus? What if you killed them all and got the two passive skill points, does it remove them?

Yes ... you remove your previous choice and get to choose a new thing

[Drasius]

... how's Mind over Matter (30% of damage taken from Mana) seen? that might be a 'cheap' and easy way (given that i go right past it already) to be a bit beefier

MoM is great ... as long as you:
- have enough mana to absorb the damage
- have a way to replenish the mana so it keeps being useful
- don't plan on using too much reservation for things like blasphemy, auras or heralds
- don't get stuck with no way to use your skills because after taking 1 hit you're OoM
It's easier said than done for many builds since blasphemy warlord's mark fixes so many problems, especially for builds that would normally want to use MoM

Thanks for the feedback, i will take a closer look at the frost blades, Dark pact and Whirling blades skills. When i get them that is. Initially i think im going to go though the first couple of acts, and see what i actually find of interesting skills.

Frost Blades can be bought from Nessa as soon as you get into the Act 1 starting town if you're a shadow/ranger/duelist/scion or recieved as a reward for getting there as shadow/ranger. Dark pact is an Act 3 reward for witch, can be bought from clarissa after killing gravicius for witch/shadow/scion and whirling blades is an act 1 reward (or can be bought if you want something else) for killing brutus for shadow/ranger/duelist. Everyone else will have to wait until Siosa in act 3 to have them become available.

But that reminds me, are there any noteable or keystone skills near the scion starting point thats worth aiming towards?
Especially for a melee/magic hybrid style?

Not really, that's one of the problems with Scion - all the nodes near her starting area suck a big fat one (except the life wheel, but it's a pain to have to go through there if you're not relying on melee damage and they're only like 8% melee increase anyway, so even for melee they're not great. For a gish, take the melee and life nodes on the right, then take the spell damage nodes out towards harrier. Most builds get those life nodes regardless of where they start and a large % of those builds will also grab Vaal Pact, which is just around the corner from Harrier. VP is generally something for later as early on you're not leeching enough to make giving up regen worthwhile.

Elemental Equilibrium can be very strong if you can use it reliably (almost always ends up being due to orb of storms), though that can get old fast and it's not as reliable as you'd think if your attack rate is too quick. And before you ask, no, if you have 2 or three elements, they all get + 25% resist and none of them get -50%.

About the changes to the bandits in 3.0...

Apparently you can craft 20x orbs of regret with an amulet and pick up a tome that gives you that bandit's bonus. Does this remove your previous bandit's bonus? What if you killed them all and got the two passive skill points, does it remove them?

I'm about to do bandits, and don't want to enormously screw up there, because Oak is looking mighty dang tempting for me since I'm going physical damage. But if I can get two passive points AND get Oak's ability... well, that's just plain better. I don't have 20 orbs of regret yet, but it is at least a goal I could aim for, and a permanent bonus like that for mats and an amulet I can get from a vendor? That's just damn wow.

Do you really think it would be that easy (not that 20 regrets is super easy to obtain)? No, you give up which ever one you chose for your new choice. New bandits are pretty difficult to screw up since they all have their uses and so does 2 skill points. Keep in mind however that 20% phys damage isn't much when you're already getting ~200% from the tree and another ~300% from gear.

[Sian]

It's easier said than done for many builds since blasphemy warlord's mark fixes so many problems, especially for builds that would normally want to use MoM

Warlord's Mark? ... what does that do to significantly raise your 'effective survivability'? don't you mean Enfeeble?

[The Hellbug]

That actually reminds me an interesting point, and one that's valuable for new players to learn: the difference between increased/reduced and more/less on damage.

The long story short is that increased/reduced apply additively based on your base damage, while more/less apply multiplicatively after that--a very important distinction.

Edit on warlords mark: It makes enemies easier to stun, which means less incoming damage. More importantly (I'm pretty sure), it gives really easy leech. Finally, endurance charges are always nice even if some builds use them way better than others.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

That actually reminds me an interesting point, and one that's valuable for new players to learn: the difference between increased/reduced and more/less on damage.

The long story short is that increased/reduced apply additively based on your base damage, while more/less apply multiplicatively after that--a very important distinction.

Edit on warlords mark: It makes enemies easier to stun, which means less incoming damage. More importantly (I'm pretty sure), it gives really easy leech. Finally, endurance charges are always nice even if some builds use them way better than others.

Oh... now THAT is useful information!

So basically, you add up all the percents, then multiply the total by base damage, right? This is a Parson's Gambit scenario, I suppose.

Once you get enough percentages, flat damage bonuses get the entire multiplier and might end up giving more end-result damage than the equivalent percentage boost.

With this in mind, I may well just go for the two passive skill points, which are NEVER a BAD thing.

Or, if I want to get a bit min-maxy, start off with Oak's because 1% regen and 20% damage and 2% damage mitigation is pretty damn sexy at the moment. Then around level 40ish or so, after those numbers are less attractive, I'll have the twenty regret orbs and get the passive skill points. But that sounds like a lot more trouble than it is really worth, even for the short term.

I'd almost go for Alira for the resist all, which is ALWAYS going to be relevant, but I've almost got Resolute, so crits will be meaningless to me, and if I go Blood Magic (depending on how auras and reserved mana pool work), the mana regen will also be worthless to me. Of course, there is always Mortal Conviction right behind Blood Magic which reduces mana/life reservation by 50% to mitigate that significantly

[The Hellbug]

Here are another couple things that might help you:

You generally don't need elemental resists from passives--gear should be able to cover it more efficiently, especially later on. If you are a melee build, Oak is frequently a good pick--20% melee physical and 1% regen are already better than two bad nodes, and the 1% additional physical damage reduction scales well with armor.

Kraityn is nice too, especially if you are getting dodge chance from something else (note that that's dodge and not evasion--two different things).

As you said, though, the 2 skill points are always solid.

Finally, this just sort of brings up another potentially helpful point. Additive defenses (increased resist caps, additional physical damage reduction, increased dodge or block chance) scale better the more you already have of them. An example:

Let's say you have 50% physical damage reduction and you get +5% physical damage reduction. This means you are taking 45% physical damage instead of 50%, an effective 10% increase in physical survivability.

Now let's say you had 80% physical damage reduction before getting that 5%. Now you're going from 20% damage to 15%, knocking off a whole quarter of the physical damage you were taking.

Just some food for thought, especially on why those resist flasks can be situationally useful even at full resists.