Path of Exile

I have very little experience with PoE, as I've been playing between shifts at my new job. I can try to shed a little light. Keep in mind, I am currently a level 24 Duelist.

1 - I hear that endgame is nice, with the "map" system. I suggest you look up how that all works.

2 - The game relies on the awe-inspiring 1350-slot passive skill grid thingie. It's kind of a "false sense of choice" situation, because you can only go far from the point where you start on the grid, and certain things will certainly mesh with your class better than other things. However, you probably will end up with something pretty different from other people based on your preferred playstyle, your gear and your gems/levels. You get very few re-spec points during a playthrough (from what I've heard), so you if you want to drastically change your build/try something new, you WILL have to re-roll a new character.

3 - I do not think these builds are as viable as others, but they may work. Refer to point two.

4 - I have been flying through levels. I made a first Duelist to just test the waters, and made it to 23 in just a few short hours of not knowing what to do. I remade and in another couple hours I had a build planned out better than before and I was level 24 with half the gems I need for end-game.

5 - I play in the blue league (what is it called? Eh, the one with the shrines) and I feel like elite packs are absolutely no different from trash mobs. However, I do think this changes in higher difficulties, so you might want to watch out for that. I know that tankier builds are safer, but that's pretty much common sense.

My only gripes with the game so far:

-The character models scare me with how bad they are (especially when selecting which character to create, god they look emaciated, dirty and sad)
-The minimap/map looks like a pile of pomegranate, sitting on top of an even bigger pile of pomegranate. Holy crap it's so bad
-I wish there were more noob-friendly reminders to get people acquainted to the unique systems of the game. I kind of felt thrown into it when I started collecting gems, then connected sockets and support gems took it deeper, with not much explanation.

Overall, I have a positive impression of this game, and I hope it takes off!

I'm a D3 player looking for something to tide me over until RoS comes out and (hopefully) fixes D3's problems, and I have a few questions:

1. It is my understanding that the character customization is one of the main reasons why PoE is "what D3 should have been", but what other advantages does it have over D3? Does it have the actual Endgame content that D3 lacks?

2. The character customization, exactly how much do we get to experiment with it? Do we get to fix mistakes, or is it like pre-respec D2 where we have to start all over again to fix mistakes/swap things up because we found a legendary that would make another skill better than what we've been using?

3. Furthermore, since you can apparently use the Skill Tree to boost anything and from the sounds of things make Marauders with magic abilities, I'm wondering, are such hybrid builds viable?

4. How is the EXP curve?

5. Since there's an EXP penalty upon death in this game, I'm wondering, does the game have cheap deaths like D3 has when you fight, for example, Vortex Arcane Enchanted Fire Chains enemies in narrow spaces or anything of the sort?

it kinda has endgame content in maps but it's apparently very difficult to maintain a good map pool of high level maps.

well you get respec points along the way and you can get orbs of regret to give you more respec points but each orb only gives you one respec point, and regret is about 1.2 per chaos right now in domination, so doing a full respec costs about 150 chaos. That's a ton of currency. That's essentially several perfect unique items with all gems included.
Fortunately you probably won't need to run yourself quite that high but it's honestly more worth it to just start over than respec entirely.

"viable" yes.
will they get you through merciless dominus without paying for boss runs? nooooooooo.

exp curve isn't bad actually.

penalty only comes in cruel and merciless, you usually know your way around the game by then. you're only gonna die if you're unprepared for big bosses.

I'm a D3 player looking for something to tide me over until RoS comes out and (hopefully) fixes D3's problems, and I have a few questions:

1. It is my understanding that the character customization is one of the main reasons why PoE is "what D3 should have been", but what other advantages does it have over D3? Does it have the actual Endgame content that D3 lacks?

2. The character customization, exactly how much do we get to experiment with it? Do we get to fix mistakes, or is it like pre-respec D2 where we have to start all over again to fix mistakes/swap things up because we found a legendary that would make another skill better than what we've been using?

3. Furthermore, since you can apparently use the Skill Tree to boost anything and from the sounds of things make Marauders with magic abilities, I'm wondering, are such hybrid builds viable?

4. How is the EXP curve?

5. Since there's an EXP penalty upon death in this game, I'm wondering, does the game have cheap deaths like D3 has when you fight, for example, Vortex Arcane Enchanted Fire Chains enemies in narrow spaces or anything of the sort?

1. Endgame content in Path of Exile is often referred to as "Maps". It works like this;

• High level enemies drop maps at a semi-rare rate
  
• Maps are placed into a machine that you gain access to shortly before the end of Merciless (the highest difficulty).
  
• The map is consumed to randomly generate a high level area based on the name of the map you put into the machine (Dungeon, Dried Lake, Dunes, etc)
  
• Maps can be Magic, Rare, Unique, etc. just like regular items. The modifiers will increase the difficulty of the area but also increase the quantity of items that drop - for example, "Area has patches of burning ground" or "Player life regeneration is halved".
  

2. You get "respec points" from quests that allow you to refund a spent point. You can use them to fix minor mistakes. You can also use an expensive currency item to give you respec points, but it's inadvisable to do so for large overhauls unless you're like, level 85+.

There are plenty of skill builders/planners both offline and online that make the whole thing a lot easier.

3. You can make any class into literally anything you want - A bow-wielding Marauder, for example, is a strong and completely viable build.

4. Exp curve is great until around 85/90+ from what I've heard. After that it realllly slows down.

5. Modifiers on yellow enemies are not anywhere near as devastating as they are in D3. The most dangerous thing is probably Reflects Physical Damage/Reflects Elemental Damage and even then it's not going to kill you unless you went complete glass cannon.

I'm a D3 player looking for something to tide me over until RoS comes out and (hopefully) fixes D3's problems, and I have a few questions:

1. It is my understanding that the character customization is one of the main reasons why PoE is "what D3 should have been", but what other advantages does it have over D3? Does it have the actual Endgame content that D3 lacks?

2. The character customization, exactly how much do we get to experiment with it? Do we get to fix mistakes, or is it like pre-respec D2 where we have to start all over again to fix mistakes/swap things up because we found a legendary that would make another skill better than what we've been using?

3. Furthermore, since you can apparently use the Skill Tree to boost anything and from the sounds of things make Marauders with magic abilities, I'm wondering, are such hybrid builds viable?

4. How is the EXP curve?

5. Since there's an EXP penalty upon death in this game, I'm wondering, does the game have cheap deaths like D3 has when you fight, for example, Vortex Arcane Enchanted Fire Chains enemies in narrow spaces or anything of the sort?

Many people gave good answers to this already so I wanted to expand on this.

1. In Diablo 3, if your loot didn't have the trifecta stats then it was basically useless. It is true you are always looking for the main stats in PoE but there's an element of choice. Do you want evasion/armour/energy shield or maybe a hybrid on gear? Do you want to go physical or elemental or spell damage for wands? Even if an item is awful for you, it can be amazing for another player whereas every d3 barb will want to use the same legendary/2H weapon with the same kinds of stats. I find the amount of choices a bad thing too since this means people can't instantly jump in and have fun for PoE because it takes (a lot of) time to understand how everything works and once you do, you will appreciate the game much more.

2. You get a total of 18 respec points by finishing the quests. The regret orbs that everyone talked about aren't too expensive so you can actually use some if it was absolute necessary. It is much easier to reroll though if you messed up more than +20 points. However, you are not tied to any skills permanently so if you found a legendary you wanted to use and you must use a different skill, as long as your passive tree is similar to the other build, you can just swap out the skills.

3. You can travel to other parts of the passive tree so yeah, those builds are possible. Besides, you can scale strength(maruader side) to your spell/range damage through support gems or a certain passive keynode.

5. There are no cheap deaths where you're completely hopeless and just die(fear, vortex, jailer i'm looking at you). As you understand the mechanics, you will understand how and why you died. I find the only legitimate excuse to die is if you desync or lag.

There are no cheap deaths where you're completely hopeless and just die(fear, vortex, jailer i'm looking at you). As you understand the mechanics, you will understand how and why you died. I find the only legitimate excuse to die is if you desync or lag.

At least not until you reach Merciless. Piety, in particular. I don't see how she's even possible to solo on HC if you aren't 40 levels over her, I died like 50 times to her on normal mode and was already slightly overleveled/overgeared; on the first one if she decides to use the lightning orb twice in a row you aren't going to survive, and the second one has a ton of pomegranate like that too. And it's not just like I was playing on an UP build, I had the same issue with her for 4 different classes, including a decently geared tank Templar with very high resists. The main reason I quit playing until they balance it better is that summoner is 100% worthless in this game, summons do not meatshield at all, so by Merciless my summoner was dying an average of 20 times to every act boss/miniboss simply because absolutely every attack they had 1 shot her.

Can you link me your passive skill build? I think I know why it is you're dying that much.

Can you link me your passive skill build? I think I know why it is you're dying that much.

Because I don't have enough HP (or ES depending on CI) nodes on my summoner, I know; but in order to get all of the summon nodes, I have no choice but to do that. They are so far from each other, they really need to move them around to be more accessible. As for the Templar, I don't have a clue why it doesn't work, so here.

Actually, they changed the tree a lot since I last played, so that would be irrelevant too. Basically, I was using staff shock damage build, I had max res with it and around 150% HP from nodes. I hate endurance charges but I used them because they are the only way to not get destroyed, so I had both +1 charges for that. I use Resolute Technique for all my melee builds, so it's not a crit build; lacks damage but no misses helps a lot with cc and upkeep.

Made a Marauder after I got pissed off at how much my Duelist was dying. It's much more survivable and enjoyable that way, the attacks are fun as well.
However, I have terrible luck on Marauder and I haven't got any Chaos Orbs while Duelist gathered like 15 while just leveling :/
Regardless, I'm having a lot of fun and I think this game will last for quite some time... compared to D3. I regret even more spending my money on D3.

Looks fun! Currently installing it now. I'll get to it when I get home from work tomorrow evening!

That's a game which is better then MapleStory in every way, and let's face it the 2D means nothing much now.
Only thing that is keeping me from playing this more is I can't choose a male necromancer and that's what i played in diablo 2.
The skill tree allows you practice whatever skills and stats you want no matter what starting class you are, and you never have to restock on potions as they fill while you kill, oh and did I mention active and buff skills are in the form of gems that are socketable and dessocketable and they have EXP of their own.
Also a small detail that this game is openly saying it's Fair to Play and never going down a path of pay to wi...

If anyone wants to add me, I'd love some friends to chat with! D; Kevdox is my guys name D; Just started out as a marauder.

Guys, if you post your name please post if you're on Domination, Standard, Nemesis, or Hardcore.
I dunno if Dre feels like updating the OP of this thread so I might just start another thread where things like player lists can be updated with ease and regularity.

Guys, if you post your name please post if you're on Domination, Standard, Nemesis, or Hardcore.
I dunno if Dre feels like updating the OP of this thread so I might just start another thread where things like player lists can be updated with ease and regularity.

That may be a good idea. And I forgot about the different difficulties? I am on Domination? The one it had highlighted first right off the bat. What's the difference between them all?

That may be a good idea. And I forgot about the different difficulties? I am on Domination? The one it had highlighted first right off the bat. What's the difference between them all?

Standard: Permanent Softcore league(ladder). When you die, you only lose experience above Cruel difficulty.
Hardcore: Permanent Hardcore league. When you die, your character is moved to Standard league.

Domination: 4 Month Softcore league. There are exclusive items/uniques that only spawn in this league as well as the recently added shrine effects.
Nemesis: 4 Month Hardcore league. No shrine effects but every elite has a special "nemesis" mod. When you die, your character is moved to standard league and not domination.

When the two 4 month leagues end, they get moved to their respective permanent leagues. No matter what, your character can end up in Standard league. The point of the 4 month leagues is they give everyone a chance to start fresh and there's no inflated economy like you would get in the Standard league.

xWords- Domination
For those that want to friend me

Game is great, I actually can't find any flaws in it concerning gameplay, other than desycning and lag which goes with any online game and a poor internet connection. The game is very well thought out and it's most outstanding feature is how customizable any character you want to play is.

From what i've heard it's more like the successor to D2 in essence what D3 should have been, i never played D2 so i can't say. I'm running a duel wield duelist with claws and a bloodmagic build with high hp and regen with a 1 hit wonder combo: Doublestrike/multistrike/meleesplash/life leech. I dub it the wolverine build and the attack beserker barrage . Ofc i have other skills i can use such as flicker strike for getting to places but the core of my build is that attack combo, and not being able to be frozen or stunned which i have accomplish through certain items and keystone passives. I can pretty much tank and solo any boss barring certain 1 hit kills or rather super high nukes like the last boss'.

Pro tip for any new player, for more on resistance and hp/ energy shield passive rather than damage. By act 3 the game becomes an outlast scenario where you are more likely do die before you can kill if you don't have enough survivablity, and monsters always find a way to get at you.
Evasion is kinda crappy, even with over 80% it would simply mean you will have a 20% chance to die if you get hit, which basically means you will die alot because of the amount of attacks coming your way.
Going from Solo to any party increases the difficulty quite signicantly, so be careful if you are running a glass-cannon build and joining a party, unless you are a range character with sufficient tanks as party members.

Name. Jazeon/Jazanthasm - Domination.

For all my exhortations, I forgot to post my league.
I'm Endothermian/Mandated on Domination.

Game is great, I actually can't find any flaws in it concerning gameplay, other than desycning and lag which goes with any online game and a poor internet connection. The game is very well thought out and it's most outstanding feature is how customizable any character you want to play is.

From what i've heard it's more like the successor to D2 in essence what D3 should have been, i never played D2 so i can't say. I'm running a duel wield duelist with claws and a bloodmagic build with high hp and regen with a 1 hit wonder combo: Doublestrike/multistrike/meleesplash/life leech. I dub it the wolverine build and the attack beserker barrage . Ofc i have other skills i can use such as flicker strike for getting to places but the core of my build is that attack combo, and not being able to be frozen or stunned which i have accomplish through certain items and keystone passives. I can pretty much tank and solo any boss barring certain 1 hit kills or rather super high nukes like the last boss'.

Pro tip for any new player, for more on resistance and hp/ energy shield passive rather than damage. By act 3 the game becomes an outlast scenario where you are more likely do die before you can kill if you don't have enough survivablity, and monsters always find a way to get at you.
Evasion is kinda crappy, even with over 80% it would simply mean you will have a 20% chance to die if you get hit, which basically means you will die alot because of the amount of attacks coming your way.
Going from Solo to any party increases the difficulty quite signicantly, so be careful if you are running a glass-cannon build and joining a party, unless you are a range character with sufficient tanks as party members.

Name. Jazeon/Jazanthasm - Domination.

From what I was reading in a guide for Marauders that is the case for armor too. Focusing on resitastance, hp and energy shield is indeed the way to go.
I think that it makes it harder for new players to know what stats they should focus on when gearing. Sometimes I have trouble figuring out which piece of gear I should be wearing when they have similar stats.

Evasion is good to stack if you use Iron Reflexes.

Evasion is pretty underrated! Both armour and evasion have their uses. Armour is good for small multiple hits while evasion can be good for large single hits. The way armour works is the larger the hit, the less armour matters and eventually the physical hit can be so large that it can completely negate your armour(see graph to see what I mean). When I solo bosses/extra damage elites I usually pop my evasion flask and when I want to tank lots of mobs, I pop my armour flask.

Of course, if you want to go Iron Reflexes(convert all evasion to armour) then you definitely can as well. It's all preference.