Path of Exile 3.16 Balance - Part 2 - Core Character Defences and Recovery

I like the changes so far, each attributes now are impactful, i'll start to care about them now (previously i was simply just ignoring them), so that's a very good change

I'm kinda disappointed about removing cast speed on shields.., i am afraid that'll make people pick more dual wielding or 2H.. at least to me, that won't encourage me to pick shields for spell casting.. unfortunately

We need a non-melee defensive buff, for casters and archers.
I know Fortify is supposed to offset melee chars being in the thick of things, but even as a non-melee I still find myself constantly overwhelmed by monsters in melee range.

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All of this looks great, but is "Avatar of the Chase" getting anything back for the lost 25% more evasion?

Those 2 manifesto are really great this league is looking to be really promising keep up the work !

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[...]anything here is subject to change based on our further testing and your feedback.[...]

I don't know if GGG really reads all posts, or just whatever gets most upvoted on reddit... but here's my shot:

The EE, EO, nerfs, and life Flask recovery rate changes look like are going to hurt pretty badly Petrified Blood Righteous Fire levelling builds.

PBRF works like this: You cap your fire resistance, use Petrified Blood, and carry a belt full of life flasks (minimum 3). Activate RF and heal most of the degen with flasks, and over regen with Vitality and/or Siphoning Trap. Use lifetap to fine tune recovery. As long as you don't recove more life from flasks that you lose from RF, you will never reach full life. This allows you to queue the flasks, when you reach the boss of the area you provably have accumulated a few minutes to kill him without regaining charges.

If your final build uses scion life wheel, you can play this. It's damage increases with life, and you only need 20 points for EE, EO, and a bit of damage, that you can respect later with quests respect points.

PBRF builds are a league starter, viable without uniques or twink gear (from level 24), very comfortable to play (it's literally a walk), very safe, and his biggest attractive is that very easily transitions to a final build (that you can't play as intented at earlier levels because it requires enabling uniques, ascendancy skills, or a minimum level). It's not a popular one, but it would hurt me so much to lose it.

EE and EO are specially relevant when you're using a 4L or even 3L. I know you say you're increasing DOTs, but provably is going to be a change be made thinking on 6L skill links. My requests is that you buff RF damage between levels 3 and 18 as if players were using it in a 3L or 4L configuration, please. Afterall, this configuration is provably the main use RF sees during the campaing, before Rise of the Phoenix/Saffell's Frame/High level purity of Fire are options.

The recovery rate of life flasks will make harder queueing them effectively. Already, levels 50-60 of this build was complicated because of the recovery rate of Sanctified Life flasks were so out of line with the normal progression of the rests of the flasks... If you're going to give all life flasks the same treatment Sanctified Flasks have, can be good for the build, as long as some reliable non-RNG method to increase the duration is accessible. Either some bench crafting duration on belts (currently unlocked in act 8, and very low values), or Saturated mod can be forced (vendor recipe that copies the prefixes of the first flask, beast crafting option), or if you're going to change Lifetap do it with this also in mind, or even a re-do of Survival Skills. I know your first reaction is "just craft some", but at 3 flasks per tier, 6 tiers of flasks, and 15 possible prefixes, you need ~270 alterations to fund the build. It stops being a league starter option.

I don't say don't do the changes you intend, but if the build is hit from three sides, it won't survive. With just a couple considerations (not balancing RF linearly across all levels and realistic access to some method to increase flasks duration, even if at a lower recovery rate cost).

I understand the build is not popular, if you have any question just ask it. Clearing the campaign isn't popular either, please don't hurt a build made to make the process less painful.

EDIT: One good solution for the flasks issue would be to move "Catalyzed" prefix to a level 2, and to allow 3 Sanctified Flask to convert to 1 Divine Flask through vendor recipe. Because the vendor recipe copies the itemlevel of the lowest of it's ingredients, it's possible to have a level 1 flask at higher tiers, as long as you upgrade it from vendor recipes. This narrows the pool of possible prefixes to just two (or one, if you push "Catalyzed" one higher). But the furthest you can go doing this is up to Sanctified Flask (level 50). And of course, don't halve sanctified life flasks duration because it's already half than the others.

Im interested in playing this patch, however I don't think these changes fundamentally change how defences work and how much impact they have. That needs far more attention, maybe in 4.0.

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"Versatile Combatant is now a Keystone Passive on the Passive Skill Tree: Grants +2% Chance to Block Spell Damage for each 1% Overcapped Chance to Block Attack Damage."

You got me excited.

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"Also grants -25% to maximum Chance to Block Attack Damage, and -25% to maximum Chance to Block Spell Damage. This means that if you have a 75% chance to Block Attack Damage, allocating this Keystone Passive grants you a 50% chance to Block Attack Damage, as well as a 50% chance to Block Spell Damage."

And then you shit on my face.
STOP.ADDING.---EXCESSIVE---.PUNISHING.TRADEOFFS.

It often feels you literally overcompensate in nerfs because you are terrified of actually letting players DEFEND themselves. If players can't make a tankzilla this league with your new buffs, as in they want to play S.L.O.W. and tanky, you have to re-evaluate a lot more in design.

The biggest defence changes that excites me is stacking faster start of ES regen.

I also read in the notes "Tempest Shield can no longer be supported with supports because the mana reservation cost is TOO DAMN HIGH".
- Was this intentional?

1 - The fetish for getting items from the ground is still on, that's sad without loot improvements;
2 - I see a lot of defensive buffs gated behind RNG and Passive Points, but I don't see extra points or loot improvements to deal with the RNG;
3 - On top of that, a lot of nerfs to cheap defensive mechanics.

I hope you guys are right about defenses being more easily accessible now, but this part 2 seems to me like another nerf.

Feels good man ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)