… as they continue to make balance changes and add new content, it starts to grow more and more BS to the point that the game mechanically starts to feel unplayable. I find standard to be far too easy to build defenses for and tank dangerous stuff. Meanwhile, Masocism mode starts to feel too hard to build defenses for (it is not that hard to get one-shot at 75% resist and 30% armor).
I would very like much a middle ground “Veteran” mode that doesn’t double enemy damage because the game simply isn’t balanced enough to make that viable without ultra tank and expensive/long grind builds. Making up for the 50% loss in player damage is easy enough, it’s the fact that the dangerous stuff that is an “Oh, fuck no” moment in standard become an “oh, fuck that” moment instead. Gear just doesn’t keep up defensive-wise and there are only so many health, armor, and other defensive nodes in your passive tree.
lol problem is getting to that point in end game, as well. The final monoliths were just getting to be too much last I played, had a masochism Blademaster get to level 91, while my standard necro was just a face roll and I got bored before getting that high (also playing at 10 FPS in some areas/against certain monsters, optimization feels surprisingly slow to implement but 0.9.0 sounds promising). And here now I’m reminded again of why I’d like to see a middle ground to current Masochism because I want the pre-monolith game to be a challenge, as well. Started a void knight to see how the game plays now and I had to grind another like 8 levels (to level 62 or 63) and find a couple more pieces to craft before I finally managed to kill Majasa. Can kill her with my eyes closed on a standard character. Then, Outcasts mono needed more necro resist to finish. So, bit of grinding is ok for this point in end game… for now… Blademaster ground for hours before I finally burnt out (though the crafting improvements could fix that for me now).
Come to think of it, once you’ve beaten the game at least once and reach Monoliths, what they could do is allow players to adjust difficulty themselves via the corruption mechanic so that leveling isn’t a push over for those that know the game well enough to handle it. Something I hope they consider revisiting should enough people want a better challenge before hitting end game. Even if there is no additional material reward, knowing I can make the leveling process more entertaining (and drop the added corruption when ready to do so if need be) is a definite positive.
