Caster vs Melee unbalances around lvl 70s

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ScrotieMcB escribió:

Think you've got this backwards. RNGesus doesn't care what the flavor of the month is, he drops all kinds of items... and if anything, more people equipping melee weapons would mean less available for trade.

No, if there aren't many people playing melee there's less stuff available because people are unsure of what's usable. GG gear filters in but you aren't getting these cheap because everyone knows they are good. 1 chaos gear is sold by people who understand the item is a good gap filler.

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While I definitely agree that ES is the most gear-intensive defense, doesn't this essentially invalidate your original point? If casters tend to be gear-dependent on their EHP, while melee tend to be gear-dependent on the DPS, and EHP is more important for progression, doesn't that mean casters have it worse off as far as gear dependence goes?

When talking strictly DPS, no. If the argument is about progression, or feeling weak then sure, life is at a huge advantage during this gap and the whole span before it.

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Fruz escribió:

So no, caster's dps should definitely not be higher overall.

Should also not be lower overall, and this is problem at the moment.

They should, they have other advantages I just mentioned.

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Fruz escribió:

They should, they have other advantages I just mentioned.

When I compare my FP or EK shadow with my crit Reave ranger I don't see those casters advantages. Not even mentioning my FB marauder, he is simple guy, just kills, its his "CC".

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Fruz escribió:

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MissBum escribió:

And i dont mind eHP differences, in general casters should ofcourse have less survivability, but the damage differences should compensate for that wich currently isnt the case.

No it shouldn't.
Caster have range advantage => positioning advantage and elemental status effect advantages ( which can bring cc, being another positioning advantage ).
Their dps should not be higher, it is the case in other game where caster are much much less tanky than melee ( => mmos ), but this is not possible in PoE where there is a "tankyness minimum" that already goes beyond that : res need to be capped and the health pool must be big enough to survive damage spikes ( not one shot mechanism @Vaal ofc ).

So no, caster's dps should definitely not be higher overall.

- The range advantage easily gets compensated by melee by their much better life regen options and tank.
- Caster IS much much less tanky than melee, definitely at the level range i'm talking about. You cant use alot of passives for the tank, because dps is already that crappy.

But it would be interesting to see how long it takes an average caster to get to 80+ and compare it with a melee build. Maybe that would prove me wrong, maybe not ;)


PS about your 'positioning' advantage: Do you know how much time it takes and thus effects the average dps? :p

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Moosifer escribió:

Well the opposite is true too. Melee requires a weapon upgrade while caster just plays and gets stronger as they level. If you're doing a week race or a new league, can't find/afford a new weapon you're pretty screwed as melee. Leveling up your gems is not going to be a major difference like it will with spells.

One has higher potential, the other is more consistent. Seems balanced when you think about it.

*Disclaimer: spellcaster for me is not a character using traps nor farting his way through Wraeclast with Discharge nor using dual totem build and doing nothing by himself.

As far as end-game maps are concerned, you can theorycraft something has higher potential while the other one has lower cost etc. etc.

The facts are 90% of people I meet in PUGs are melee.
Most of the ppl running high level maps I play with are melee.

Before 1.0.0 killed RF, there were quite a few dual totem sporkers and even a fellow freeze pulser (very, very rare breed). Now there's just a discharger here and there.

If you browse Witch forums looking for builds, there are just dischargers, even infernal blow or cyclone witches, but the amount of 'active' spellcasters is abysmal. And if a build for let's say a freeze pulser appears, it's not super effective due to the double void batteries and a 6L chests you need to get to pass the 10K DPS mark.

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Fruz escribió:

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MissBum escribió:

And i dont mind eHP differences, in general casters should ofcourse have less survivability, but the damage differences should compensate for that wich currently isnt the case.

No it shouldn't.
Caster have range advantage => positioning advantage and elemental status effect advantages ( which can bring cc, being another positioning advantage ).
Their dps should not be higher, it is the case in other game where caster are much much less tanky than melee ( => mmos ), but this is not possible in PoE where there is a "tankyness minimum" that already goes beyond that : res need to be capped and the health pool must be big enough to survive damage spikes ( not one shot mechanism @Vaal ofc ).

So no, caster's dps should definitely not be higher overall.

range advangage - no such thing, try playing a 6 man map. Everyone gets near mobs.

tankiness - well you must be joking, try getting punctured as a CI. moreover, you will never have as much EVA or armour as an HP/melee based char (much less STR or DEX, much less armour /eva nodes around)

elemental status ailments - yeah, that's awesome. now run a map with hexproof mobs.

Really, get 30 exalted orbs and buy (from scratch) equipment for a melee and for a caster. Compare the clearing speed VS amount of deaths you sustain running maps for a month.

If you're not that reach, compare how many seconds does it take your melee char to solo kill off a group of 5 skeleton on a 6 man map and then ask a spellcasting party member to do the same.

BTW Spellcasters DPS should be higher, according to the fantasy canon. Melee survivability should be higher, on the other hand.

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entropus escribió:

(...)

You just argued for that the game isn't balanced around normal or domination. I very much agree.

The range advantage is more important the larger the death penalty. If you have a shitty death penalty like in Standard and Domination, melees will of course be more daring and take larger risks of dying.

The positioning advantage is about not getting hit, or much, much less, it is not about the clearing speed, it's about the safety of the char.

And caster are built almost as tanky as standard melee ( not talking about full tanks @ 7 end charges and max block/armor ), since they reach high amount of ES ( sometimes/often higher than life, it's about the gear you have ) and cap their res.
You have a shitload of int <=> ES.

Bringing puncture is a joke, you can crush puncture archer easily at range, and every CI char should have staunching flasks.

Fact is : in most situations, the melee will get hit, and the caster won't.
The exception being leap slam/devourers/flickers.
And I'm not even speaking about totems here.
Those are the obvious advantages of a caster, which means that he should not have the same dps as a melee.

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entropus escribió:

BTW Spellcasters DPS should be higher, according to the fantasy canon. Melee survivability should be higher, on the other hand.

Not in a game with gear/survability checks everywhere.
You can't really build a glass canon with desyncs anyway.
In PoE ( atm ), survability of melee is not much higher, dps is, that's just how it works.


And that's really funny to see all those QQs when couple of months ago, people were whining because melee was not strong enough ....

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entropus escribió:

*Disclaimer: spellcaster for me is not a character using traps nor farting his way through Wraeclast with Discharge nor using dual totem build and doing nothing by himself.

As far as end-game maps are concerned, you can theorycraft something has higher potential while the other one has lower cost etc. etc.

The facts are 90% of people I meet in PUGs are melee.
Most of the ppl running high level maps I play with are melee.

Before 1.0.0 killed RF, there were quite a few dual totem sporkers and even a fellow freeze pulser (very, very rare breed). Now there's just a discharger here and there.

If you browse Witch forums looking for builds, there are just dischargers, even infernal blow or cyclone witches, but the amount of 'active' spellcasters is abysmal. And if a build for let's say a freeze pulser appears, it's not super effective due to the double void batteries and a 6L chests you need to get to pass the 10K DPS mark.

You have to be kidding me, have you taken long breaks from the game that's why you don't see trends or something? You have a CB tag so you have to see the flows in changes here. Wasn't it a few months ago that everyone was saying melee was absolute garbage, now they are gods?

Everyone is still messing with spectral throw. Melee crit builds are finally catching fire. 2h weapons just had a big buff. Life just had a good buff. People are just gravitating towards melee because casters are being nerfed back down to a reasonable level while melee is heading up to meet them.

FP and EK builds are very powerful. I had a very good fireball build. Storm call is bound to have some popularity for a while, whether it's good or not is irrelevant. Spork was nerfed but not dead. Once people figure out how powerful RF life IW builds are those will pick up in popularity.

How are you surprised at all that PUBs are mostly melee?

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Fruz escribió:

And that's really funny to see all those QQs when couple of months ago, people were whining because melee was not strong enough ....

I'm now whining, I'm smiling, I play melee for last 11 months, my casters are only for fun and gear sink (I don't trade and how many Searing Touches you can vendor...).

And my casters, although geared on the same (often better) level as my melee, have pathetic survivability and DPS and no number of "positioning" and "cc" change it.

But I like my casters and hope, that GGG in the end will clean up this "balancing" mess we have at the moment.

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Moosifer escribió:

FP and EK builds are very powerful.

But at what gear level?

This is my Reave ranger gear:



And this is my EK shadow gear:



Do you think, who solo farms more efficiently lowbies? I'm not into prices, but do you think, who's gear is much more expensive?