Here there,
So it’s been a few weeks since the huge patch version 0.7.8 and a couple of hot fixes got released.
The first impressions settled down, new buildguides start to spread. Here is some feedback regarding the changes.
While I try to be objective I know that I am biased at some point. I play LE for a while now and I really like it at its current state. So everything that is an improvement feels great. While viewed from some distance changes may seem mandatory.
I am in no way easy to please. I have high requirements for a good loot game. LE just clicked at some point and just absolutely fits my expectations. The direction of development so far is on par with my own expectations. Imho you’re absolutely tuning right spots.
Chapter 8
The New Chapter is awesome. I like everything about it.
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New enemy types with new skills. Very good animations and sounds. I love the Sirens and those things that hop out of the water when you come near to the sea.
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Bossfights are very nice. Multiple phases with different mechanics. Looking forward to what you do with the coming and also the old bosses.
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The quests are also ok. Rescue some people, collect some eggs. Nothing complex but solid.
Regarding quests I have a little suggestion. I saw some complaints about difficulty spikes during story. That was exactly my experience, too, when I started with LE. I think you could add class specific quest rewards to aid the player to be prepared for the next chapter. Give players a choice of items with some random and a fix stat that suits the coming tasks. For example during the Ruined Era you grand items with Void resistance. At the end you get something with necrotic resistance. At the end of the Imperial Era you get something with fire/cold resistance and so on. This prevents the difficulty spikes between the different chapters. At the end of the story the player should have gotten some gear to start endgame without getting ripped. -
Leveldesign really is great. I made a post about level design some time ago where @rik_dawson replied to. It’s great to see the leveldesign improve. Very good job!
Chapter 8 nailed it for me. Lake Liath and Lagons Temple are new highlights. The seamless entry into Liath’s Tower is nice. This is something we’ll see in the older levels, too, I guess. Entering small dungeons or buildings would be very nice.
Destruction of structures is nice. Love it when pillars break. This also was added to older chapters (with 0.7.7 already I think).
What could see some improvement is Tetima. When I entered that level in Chapter 8 I realised for the first time, that this is a city. When you walk through Imperial Tetima this is not obvious. At least not for me.
Now Tetima is presented as a city. But it still lacks the city feeling. There should be more action. Kids chasing each other, merchants arguing about prices or the quality of their goods. Theres so much that’s supposed to happen. Big crowds of NPCs, musicians, taverns (the lack of taverns in this game is very obvious, beer only is a very rare drop and can’t be used actually), beggars, pets like dogs and cats, goats. This brings me to another topic…
Critters
I really like that you added some small creatures. Though I don’t find them very present. I have to admit that I have not seen any of them. I can’t remember. There was no moment when I thought “Oh, look! What do we have here.” Maybe there should be many more of them. And they could be more obvious. When you would ask me if there are critters in the game, I could not answer. If you have to search for them most people won’t be aware that there are any.
New Items
Having class specific items with class related implicit stats and restrictions what affixes can roll on them is a huge improvement in my opinion. Its easier to gear. As a new player you are more guided in getting proper items for your class. The new affixes add a lot to this. These changes are awesome and theres nothing that can convince me otherwise.
Adding new 2D (I think 3D art as well?) so items on character fit the pic in the inventory makes a difference. It’s a detail I wasn’t aware of that it bothers me, untill you fixed it. Weird.
What I’d like to know is if we get item models with more ornamentation. Badass, fierce looking stuff. Right now the models look plain. Is this something you consider for the future? Or is it a design decision to be more on the realistic side? Or is this badass stuff only available via MTX?
New Skills
The skilldesign of the recently added skills is very nice. You created interesting skill tress with a lot of variety. While some of the older skills have only one useful route, the new ones offer different directions that encourage experimenting. Really nice so far. Death Seal has become my favourite skill atm. I think it’s a bit too powerful in comparison to some other skills, but that’s something that can be tweaked easily. All the new skills feel good.
New Passive trees
You did a good job with the passive trees. The base trees have been buffed quiet a bit. Theres nice stuff in there that makes me spend more points than needed. So propably exactly what you wanted.
Changes To Ward
This may be the most controversial point. Ward needed a nerf really bad. And now it’s here. The result is that the pre patch ward users have a hard time to adept to the new behaviour. People talk a lot about that the nerf was too hard and their class is unplayable now. This is not true I think - I mean the “unplayable” part. Mage and Acolyte still are great classes to play. They got a bit more squishy and you need more awareness to play. People got lazy with Flame Ward on autocast playstyle and now struggle because they can’t facetank anymore. Many people stated that they liked that caster classes in LE were not that squishy glass cannons like in other games. Well now it’s more a traditional role distribution. But that’s ok for me. Mage archetype is supposed to be a damage dealer that’s drawback is his lower survivability. Its not good for the game balance when classes are best in tanking and damage at the same time.
This said, the ward nerf was to hard I think. Maybe it’s intended. I thought about how I would get people to try something different.
Ward builds don’t work anymore. So people try new builds and have to make other things work. And see: Suddenly health and protections is viable. Where does this come from? There was no change in the way of how protections and hp work. It’s exactly the same as before. The changes in items and some new affixes make it a bit easier to build this defences, but mechanically nothing changed. Only that ward isn’t present anymore.
So this very hard nerf as a result forces people to build other defenses they did not use before. They realise that it isn’t as bad as they thought it would be. And when ward is buffed to be viable again, people know that they could build either way or combine both defensive mechanics with each other. If you would have nerfed ward only a bit, people would not have respecced and tested the limit of other mechanics. It would not have been necessary. So I assume you did this for this exact purpose. Defenitely a pro move .
Actually we have the exact opposite in comparison to the builds pre patch 0.7.8. Only viable routes of skills and passives were “all in ward”. Nothing else. Now all these skill routes and passives got obsolete. People use other routes and mostly skip everything regarding ward.
I tried a low life Lich build with lots of ward retention and Exang. I get a decent eHP pool with a lot if base ward that also regenerates very fast. But additional sources of ward generation did not work for me. I tried Rip Blood and Soul Feast with a lot if ward in hit. It did not work. The ward decays so fast that I don’t have any advantage in using these skills as ward generators. Perhaps you get a good amount with BiS gear what I don’t have.
So I am curious how the story about ward continues. In summary I think it was a good move to nerf ward that hard. Now we can improve it step by step and we players learned that theres is more than just one way to build defences. This knowledge will still be there in the future.
Endgame Meta
One thing is changing in a direction I am not sure if I am confident with: Clearspeed of endgame maps and the change of viable builds. Whereas it was important to have good defensive stats to be able to survive higher endgame runs/waves its converting into a more DPS based style. Enemies are hitting very hard so the best defense is to kill them as fast as possible. Glass cannon is more viable than before.
I’m no POE player, but I tried to watch some streams recently. It was awful to watch. Gameplay is like 4x ffwd. Also I’ve seen many POE players comment on the speed of LE that they like it and hope LE never changes into POEs speed meta. Now LE is far from being like POE but the speed is increasing imho.
Is it just me? Are you aware of this? Is this intended?
Questions
I have some questions about some details of your actual plans regarding class balance:
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What classes do you consider being best polished and what classes will get a overhaul?
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For example there were some hints about the Sentinel getting changes in the future because it’s the “oldest” class and feels less intuitive to build. What would be your goal being addressed by an overhaul?
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Same for necro. What’s are your plans regarding the lack of build diversity on a Necro summoner? Is this an actual issue for you?
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Mage and Primalist seem relatively complete in regard of how the class mechanics work. Or are there some changes for them on the roadmap?
This are some relatively open questions and I would be happy for any kind of information you are able to share.
- Can you tease us a bit? What are the features you are most excited about to get implemented? What’s it that you think will blow our minds?
In the end I am very positive about the changes and hyped for the things to come. LE community is increasing noticeably. That’s great.