i love new arctic armour as long as...

I have an ambivalent stance on the whole AA issue.

On the one hand i think that AA was overrated all along. Little return (immunity to voidbearers/tittybitches) for a huge investment. I played a lot of spellcasters and the only time i bothered using it was when facing the cells boss and against the atziri trio (so i could ignore the spawning tittybitches).
And as for the embittered CI users: Use chayula or live with the stunlock consequences. That's the tradeoff for wearing an offense buffing amulet.

Making AA available for melee is a much needed defensive buff for that class. And don't start arguing with fortify etc. Melee was still in a bad spot with the increased monster damage.


On the other hand i regret that it looses its unique flavour. One should be able to distinguish different classes by the defense and offense mechanisms they can use. Instead we get one generic mechanism that tones down the diversity that is (was?) one of the strong sides of poe.

I don't get it why GGG didn't use the old AA, scratched the movement mana drain and put on the "only works when standing stiil" mod? That way it would be usable with the new EB and would still be a spellcaster (or lets say a mana based) mechanism.
CI getting caught by tittybitches while moving? Stunlock->AA kicks in->immunity->lightning warp away.
It would still be a class specific mechanism that serves a niche purpose without being op.

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Bada_Bing написал:

Little return (immunity to voidbearers/tittybitches) for a huge investment.

That was the problem most likely, immunity sucks as a concept, that's why we have no elemental-immune or absorbing enemies. In a game where a typical build is highly specialized and has very little flexibility with all these socked shenanigans we can't really have it. The only tolerated ones are curse immunity because curses just help you kill stuff and status immunity for Atziri because she's highly optional and you need a specific setup to kill her anyway.

Of course, I'm not saying that lack of flexibility is a good thing in general, but if a game that has free skill system like PoE allows for it, that usually means lack of challenge. So yeah, it sucks but it's kinda necessary and it's good devs see that so they don't play with immunities too much.

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raics написал:

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Bada_Bing написал:

Little return (immunity to voidbearers/tittybitches) for a huge investment.

That was the problem most likely,

If that was the problem, all they had to do was remove/rework the -fire damage part. What they did makes little sense unless they have some other plans in the pipeline to fix caster/ES survivability, or they might think the ES recharge improvements and the MoM relocation are sufficient.

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Zed_ написал:

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raics написал:

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Bada_Bing написал:

Little return (immunity to voidbearers/tittybitches) for a huge investment.

That was the problem most likely,

If that was the problem, all they had to do was remove/rework the -fire damage part. What they did makes little sense unless they have some other plans in the pipeline to fix caster/ES survivability, or they might think the ES recharge improvements and the MoM relocation are sufficient.

Flat reduction is problematic in general, any enemy that does small amount of either physical or fire, or 50/50 physical/fire like titty bitches or raging spirits will either do no damage or very little. And there's also reflect, the dangerous one comes in many small chunks.

Anyway, you can see this was intended as a caster/ranged defense more than melee because of 'less damage', it was made that way so it wouldn't stack with fortify. Furthermore, evaders and casters have little mitigation so they take big hits which is where new AA counts the most.

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raics написал:

Flat reduction is problematic in general, any enemy that does small amount of either physical or fire, or 50/50 physical/fire like titty bitches or raging spirits will either do no damage or very little. And there's also reflect, the dangerous one comes in many small chunks.

Anyway, you can see this was intended as a caster/ranged defense more than melee because of 'less damage', it was made that way so it wouldn't stack with fortify. Furthermore, evaders and casters have little mitigation so they take big hits which is where new AA counts the most.

Flat reduction can be problematic, but I always felt that the old AA was synergistic with caster/ES builds who are at the most risk of being repeatedly stunned by relatively small hits (MoM mitigation doesn't help with this at all). I won't deny the reflect "immunity" was unnecessary.

Less damage% doesn't help casters more than others at all - maybe evasion builds who are at risk of unlucky 1-shots. As you pointed out, it's just a multiplier, which comes after armor calculation afaik. The fact that it doesn't stack with fortify only prevents it from being extremely strong for melee.
If it turns out to be strong, anyone who cares about defenses can and will use it. If it turns out to be mediocre/weak, only casters will use it - because they don't have access to better options.

Casters also require a lot of mana regen and Clarity just to be able to cast spells, while phys attackers usually work with a few% mana leech. The old AA was at least some return on that investment, other than being able to use abilities.

seems like the new one won't offer much protection versus the rapid hitting monsters voidbearers, titty bitches and turbo lizards.

that is what aa was good for. and reducing some damage via lightning thorns and reflect.

So if it was the flat damage that was problematic and the less is so it doesn't stack with fortify, what is the point of the stationary only restriction? Yhere are so many times where if i'm playing a squishier type character like a caster, I start running as soon as i'm hit to avoid subsequent hits. Like when a pack of frogs jump at me, I start running. Usually I don't avoid getting hit completely though. The only way the new AA gives me any benefit is if I just stand there and facetank. Why would they restrict this buff to facetanking builds?

Well, Ive made dozens builds and theorycrafted hundreds and honestly, I can see no reason why I would want to use this with any of them. I doubt that 12% less damage taken solves anything

I can surely live without the old AA, but the reason Id be sad is because it would reduce the possibilities of defensive (reflect) solutions for some builds, mostly fire ones that deal secondary damage (cant be blocked/dodged/evaded)

for example Ive made FB IB build focusing on exlosions damage and huge AoE. Huge AoE overlap creates insane amounts of hits. Old AA covered that (reflect), now Im left with Vaal Pact (far away from the path) or stacking fire res near to 100%.. similar with some Exlp arrow or (Vaal) DD builds...

I personally hope that in the end, GGG is going to come with more interesting and fun solution

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Ludvator написал:

Well, Ive made dozens builds and theorycrafted hundreds and honestly, I can see no reason why I would want to use this with any of them. I doubt that 12% less damage taken solves anything

I can surely live without the old AA, but the reason Id be sad is because it would reduce the possibilities of defensive (reflect) solutions for some builds, mostly fire ones that deal secondary damage (cant be blocked/dodged/evaded)

for example Ive made FB IB build focusing on exlosions damage and huge AoE. Huge AoE overlap creates insane amounts of hits. Old AA covered that (reflect), now Im left with Vaal Pact (far away from the path) or stacking fire res near to 100%.. similar with some Exlp arrow or (Vaal) DD builds...

I personally hope that in the end, GGG is going to come with more interesting and fun solution

you forget this item:



also atziri's gloves could help.

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kompaniet написал:

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Ludvator написал:

Well, Ive made dozens builds and theorycrafted hundreds and honestly, I can see no reason why I would want to use this with any of them. I doubt that 12% less damage taken solves anything

I can surely live without the old AA, but the reason Id be sad is because it would reduce the possibilities of defensive (reflect) solutions for some builds, mostly fire ones that deal secondary damage (cant be blocked/dodged/evaded)

for example Ive made FB IB build focusing on exlosions damage and huge AoE. Huge AoE overlap creates insane amounts of hits. Old AA covered that (reflect), now Im left with Vaal Pact (far away from the path) or stacking fire res near to 100%.. similar with some Exlp arrow or (Vaal) DD builds...

I personally hope that in the end, GGG is going to come with more interesting and fun solution

you forget this item:

also atziri's gloves could help.

for my specific mentioned FB IB build - nope. In general, yes