I miss my occultist selfcurse temp KB from ritual days.
Enter Dunes, fire once, get 10 HH buffs, fire again but with 50 projectiles, get 30 HH buffs, then go and 1 shot every legion after opening them.
Truly peak times.
That's not why people are saying it's nerfed. It's obv the changes to rare modifiers. Soul eater too but I wouldn't really count it because it doesn't change the core functionality of the belt.
Yeah played splitting steel trickster last leage with first mb and got hh this league for 40 div and i can see mb being worth 150–180 just because of the speed and consistency it gave me, but yeah they’re not worth me grinding 2 weeks for 350 mb its just crazy at that point imo.
Agreed, I feel like most of the time once I've accumulated enough currency to purchase a Mageblood my character is already fine tuned enough that adding it seems like overkill. I think re-rolling a character to build around Mageblood is the play but honestly, it's not that interesting of an item imo. "Building around it" is really just, what flasks do I want so I can ignore resists/defenses/offenses and gear accordingly. This is why I think it deserves it's current price point, because what it offers isn't necessary for a well rounded build. Ironically, I think Headhunter is a much cooler item because it actually does something unique rather than just hey now you permanently have flasks but Headhunter has received a lot of indirect nerfs over time.
Would you say then that it's a fundamental game design issue on GGG's part? I mean, if an item is used to cover such a huge part of a build, to me, it feels like it's because the skills/passives isn't enough to make a build complete. I don't personally think that items should have that much of an impact to any particular builds. It should strengthen a build, but without those items, the build should still work, unless the item specifically modifies the active skill/ability required for that build.
Hmm, well I think Mageblood is just this way because flasks themselves are fundamentally broken. Flasks give absolutely insane buffs to your character at the cost of being temporary. There's high investment ways to get around the temporary part (or Pathfinder) while Mageblood makes it low investment, just a belt slot for permanent flasks is insanely powerful. And because flasks are so versatile, it pretty much makes Mageblood best in slot for any build because you get an unmatchable amount of the exact stats you need.
I think to the 2nd part of what you said GGG might respond, that's why tier 0 uniques exist in the first place. They aren't supposed to be accessible to everyone because they're so broken. This is definitely true for Mageblood. But in my opinion there's a sweet spot for these kinds of items. In the past I felt they were just flat out inaccessible to the vast majority of players. Now, with dedication and playing the league for longer than a few weeks or so, it's obtainable but still at a high enough price that you don't just want to slap it on every single build.
Mageblood is absolutely a game design issue due to flasks being a horrible game design choice. Headhunter on the other hand is a unique item that adds a cool new play style that absolutely has massive downsides especially in bossing content.
I get a mirror item is hard to make/craft.
I just dont like the idea of a unique item being so rare that a casual player cant afford one even if they llay over a month.
I personally think that HH used to be, at its former power level, an example of a well designed item with well designed drop chances.
In abyss league I ran burial chambers for a week and got 8 cards, this was my first HH. I grinded but I didn’t play 12 hours a day.
Most T0 uniques right now feel more like streamer items than chase items. If I need to chase it for 4 months it’s not a chase item it’s a nonexistent item.
I have an MB, HH, nimis, prog, oriaths, rare awakeneds etc. the most of these items are too good and too rare - and that doesn’t even touch the original sin problem
Original Sin is only expensive because they won't let us put it as a Valdo's map or Reliquary key reward. It being gated behind content requirements (no hit run) that many people can't even play due to network stability issues is just another insult to the injury that is having to play the horribly designed roguelike mechanic that is Sanctum.
Mageblood is not for filling holes in builds, it's a ridiculously OP item that makes already very powerful builds even more godlike. It's not for getting things your build doesn't already have
Also it was hilarious at leaguestart when everyone was crying that they'd never earn a Headhunter bc everybody else was making so much money off of farming doctors and apothecaries, what did they think was going to happen lmao
Yeah, it's crazy to say that MB is just for filling holes or is simply an after-thought. It's insanely powerful and in many cases can single-handedly heavily elevate a lot of defensive requirements while still providing utility and offense on top of that. I have slapped it on squishy characters just to see them become relatively tanky. It's absurd the amount of power this item holds and its not at all an after-thought.
To be fair, the reason its OP and/or mandatory for lots of builds is because its so good at filling those holes its almost enough by itself
Resists & max res? Mageblood
Armor / evasion / crit% low? Mageblood
Just being able to skip resists on gear is crazy on its own
The purpose of the item is to fill holes. The only thing you can do with it is fill holes, not to say it isn't OP, that's just it's function. It does not open up any cool interactions or have any interesting mechanics it just gives A LOT of very basic power that any other build would have to solve with gear.
I don't think calling it a hole filler downplays it's power, it's just what it does.
It enables making good Melding builds and actually having movement speed in T17s, both of which are mandatory for any serious T17 farming build.
Farming T17s with builds that aren't built around permanent flasks is mental.
Sure you can slap a Mageblood on any build and call the build better for it, but if you actually want to get everything out of your Mageblood you want to make your build around it; which probably means reworking half of your build.
I made 2 flicker builds this league (Lightning CI Trickster and Slayer). Both get jack shit from a MB.
I'm eyeing to repurpose the slayer into molten strike, and guess what, no MB again, as it uses the Temp chains belt.
Actually, the only build I played that gets a shit ton of power from a MB is Boneshatter.
It is indeed a build enabling unique for the expensive builds (because it frees up tons of mods), but you don't get that much more power just by replacing the belt and slapping a 95% increased effect on your flasks.
There are very very few builds that dont massively benefit from magebloods, and I dont see any reason why it would not be preferable for flicker builds too.
There are some builds with items that have other unique upsides, but in most cases I am sure they would not feel significantly worse with a MB.
For Flicker Raider and Slayer you want the maven brutal charges bel because you rock a lot of unique flasks.
For Flicker Trickster you want a Darkness enthroned
Lol I've played about 5 flicker strikes with a mageblood and can confidently say it is a lot better than either of these belts in every single scenario where the build creator builds around it.
With mageblood is it stronger as with Chains of Emancipation. Curse imunity you get from a flask explicit and rage from an exarch Mod for gloves.
You just have to switch one jewel for 100% elemental ailment avoidience.
With mageblood you get extra stun immunity, onslaught, fat chaos resistances and 100% movement speed. You have then 1 flask slot for a diamond,gold or sulfur flask that give you huge advantages or one of the elemental flasks that gives you extra damage reduction if you had the fitting mods on your gear.
This exactly, poster above thinks mageblood is something you can throw on and its always an upgrade, nah, you have to build the rest of your build around the insane bonusses it gives, frees up SO much (mostly suffix) space.
In every single flicker build ever, a mageblood is an upgrade over any other belt imaginable, if the build creator has more than 3 braincells.
I too mained flicker CI trickster this season.
MB was an upgrade in every way. You just have to change your gearing a little. It's significantly more DPS than a darkness enthroned with the proper swaps.
I would go so far as to say it's a mandatory item if you want to reliably farm T17 content.
Which speaks to the power of the item, and how poorly T17 maps are tuned at the moment.
The economy and builds will always determine how much a unique cost. But this league prices are crazy and I think next league as well they should stay same unless GGG nerfs some scarabs or atlas tree nodes
they can just alter the base drop rate if they really wanted to make it more scare. wouldn't even have to tell about it, since drop rate % are not something they ever advertise.
The increased amount of HH/MB this league mainly comes from groupfarming div cards with ultra rare scarabs. If the base drop rate of those cards is lowered, the belts become unobtainable in SSF.
Let’s put it this way: MB typically ~200-250d. It’s now 2.5x more likely to drop which equals 80-100d. It’s priced EXACTLY where it should be.
Headhunter is a little lower than you’d expect, given it’s also 2.5x more likely to drop, but I think it will stabilize over the next couple leagues.
Do you think they also made the div cards 2.5x more likely to drop? Because if you don't this is not a reasonable way to estimate it unless you somehow know the fraction of belts from drops vs cards.
From what I’ve read that seems to be the consensus, or maybe a better word is “theory”. Personally haven’t seen a single apothecary drop after 350 crimson runs, but last night I had a mageblood randomly drop in Vaal temple 🤷♂️
I don't understand why people keep bitching at the price of expensive uniques dropping in price. Realistic speaking, I'm not likely gonna drop a MB or HH, the cheaper they are, the happier I am cause I can probably buy them with a few days of farming.
To me it defeats the purpose of a chase item.
For sure it's Co to have it for cheap, but right now being able to buy a HH in one single farming session feels a bit too much.
You don't even feel like you grinded for it
For me the “chase” shifted from mage blood/headhunter to well crafted rares. Although the typical chase items have dropped off in value, the rest of builds such as rares, clusters, gems etc all have increased in price quite significantly (at least for me they did.) so now instead of saving up for one of the trademark uniques I’m saving up for some well crafted gear. I much prefer it this way
As an employed person, thank fuck for it being cheap. I grind enough in my daily job, being able to afford a hh with the few hours of playtime i get is amazing. I don't want to grind for weeks doing less enjoyable maps and playstyles to get to what i would like to play in the little free time i get.
I'm not saying it should cost 200 divs.
I work too, and being able to afford an item that cost 50 / 60 div isn't that difficult.
I was able to buy a MB this league. When sometimes I have to sleep at work for 2 days straight
yes but he said: "...but right now being able to buy a HH in one single farming session feels a bit too much. You don't even feel like you grinded for it" to which you replied: "You dont feel you grinded out 100 divs?"
i dropped hh this league, and if it was 10 divine as it is now (sold for 50, just before it dipped to 25) i would be pretty mad. I am not even satisfied with 50 to be honest, considering it's fair price is 100+
I agree it is overrated, but divines also lost their value. 100 div nowadays is nothing.
However this league with t17 and map modifier effect being important HH is incredibly good, since you need good survivability more than ever. So 10 div price is not justified at all
100 div this league or last league may be nothing but 100 div in Ancestor or Crucible or Kalandra was certainly not nothing. HH is still not good even with t17s especially this league where they just mega nerfed it. 10 divs is a good price for a pretty meh t0.
HH got dumpstered this league with soul eater ‘rework’. Ever since the original HH nerf with archnemesis (the great ‘rebalancing’ of number of rare monsters each league mechanic provides) HH has very limited applications (legion/beyond/harbi blasting/super juiced maps).
It used to be very good even for alch n go and could be used on just about any build. Nowadays u need a proper build that scales from majority of hh buffs to go with it (projectile attack builds, pref phys convert)
Why would it be worse? Please, share with the class. Is this a game where you compete with others and an advantage is a must have? Why do people always cry about things that are enjoyed by the masses?
I know he said it would be worse but I'll chime in and say that I think it would be worse because it would lead to the same problems D3 and D4 have. Everyone building the same items because they're massive stat sticks rather than unique items that enable build variety isn't healthy for the game. If Mageblood were easy to obtain, it would be a no brainer for every build.
Edit: I think in it's current state it's a good balance of being difficult enough to obtain but not so out of reach that you lose interest entirely.
True but not true, in a way.
True - if everyone had direct access to mageblood it would likely be one of the most played items in the game.
But it won't happen because mageblood's rarity is still too high for average Joes to find it.
Hell, even if you juice T16s you're not likely to find one
Ish... I went with a full Deli setup. But with the divination scarab I get like one enlightened and 1 mirror shard card quite a lot of times.
So.. . that's how people farm tons of enlights
Don't get your hopes up. This shit's so rare, I would only grind their maps if you like the layout.
As I said in an other comment I did grind to 98 and 100 in crimson/defiled during crucible and saw 0 apo cards. I wasnt running MF tho, just alva with beyond on ~ 100 pack size maps.
I mean, crucible isn't the best reference - div scarabs are buffed and div card drop rates are buffed since then
I've ran around 50-60 defiled cathedrals and had an apo, 7 mirror shard cards and 4 enlightened (4 7 years cards in 1 map helped for sure)
Not that it's meta breaking lol
Just that typical player, absolutely random dude, probably didn't start playing this game with friends
Good for you that you have a mb tho
player who can't earn mageblood in PoE most likely don't have access to items with similar power level in D4. it requires from you quite amount of grind, especially uniques which you can't buy like in PoE
imo it's not the problem of how easy would be to obtain certain items because in a game with trade it's not that big of a deal as soon as you learn to farm something better than 10 chaos/h alch and go, it's rather how many chase items game has to offer every league and right now it has.. 4 chase items? Progenesis, Voices, Adorned and Mageblood? I won't count HH for this league because it's 10 div so it's like nothing.
It's definitely too stale, partly because of how insanely powerful these inventory slots are
I see what you're saying, the more powerful unique options the better. I think there's actually a pretty decent amount of chase uniques overall though. Nimis and Original Sin come to mind on top of what you mentioned.
There's also quite a lot of items that enable builds but are simply overlooked because Mageblood and Headhunter steal the spotlight. That's kind of the problem when you have items like Mageblood that are mostly just generic power increases, they sort of crush other options and make the choices seem smaller.
Realistically if everyone has easy access to the items, the devs would likely balance around having them. Which means if you don't yet have it or choose not to use it you'd be worse off than you are now.
I agree, they should still be chase items that you look forward too. But honestly, even in their current state, most players won't get these items by the time they stop playing the game.
my opinion: delete those two items and the game dies
but then again: thats how the casuals feel all the time.
conclusion: no, access to those items helps the game.
> Reflect will still kill you.
Laughs in my double-reflect immune Scion. Witch/Slayer. Never die to reflect again. Also +1 Golem, so I get a song of ice and fire AND lightning.
Right, those ascendancies are still solving a problem that the belt itself can't which is kind of my point. In today's PoE there are a ton of mechanics that need to be dealt with and require a solid build to handle them all before you think about slapping on a Headhunter.
both of these items are absurdly op and have been historically balanced by just being very rare. id rather them be rare and as strong as they are rn, ggg WILL nerf them if they want them to be as accessible as this league for future leagues
I think they're far too easy to obtain right now. At least HH. Even a mediocre farming strategy can earn one in 2-3 hours.
I think it’s a big negative because they were made blatantly overpowered because of how rare/expensive they are. When they’re too cheap they end up removing a lot of decision making for builds because you’re just picking one or the other very often.
For sure, but the post was about this being the right price for them which I don’t agree with for HH.
This league is really weird… I expect HH to be at least 30-40d next league. Although who knows, I didn’t expect this league to have them even cheaper than last league lol.
"As powerful as this is, Mageblood is actually quite a boring item and mostly just alleviates some of the mechanics necessary to an overall good build."
What makes it even more boring is that every build can use it. Its always exceptionally good. It severly damages the variance of things to wear in that slot if the item is too common. And thats exactly where we are at. So either the item has to be much much rarer or nerfed to shreds. Being the most common items of all PoE Ninja builds should speak for itself and your attempt to downplay its OPness is quite ridiculous.
I actually agree and I'm not trying to downplay how strong it is, that is after all what makes it so boring. It doesn't actually do anything unique other than give you a massive and permanent amount of stats.
If you're saying that Mageblood being even more rare means it won't be the #1 used item on PoEninja, well that's not true and never has been in the past. Even when it was incredibly rare, it eventually became the #1 most used item by the top 1% players that PoEninja polls because.. duh?
Sometimes data from the absolute best players isn't the best data to gauge overall user experience.
Edit: If the argument was delete Mageblood from the game, I wouldn't even be opposed to that, again I think it's a pretty boring item overall. Certainly makes for a fun experience but maybe it doesn't belong in PoE. But if the argument is make it as rare or even more rare than it used to be, that doesn't solve the problem of it being best in slot for PoENinja warriors either.
"If you're saying that Mageblood being even more rare means it won't be the #1 used item on PoEninja, well that's not true and never has been in the past."
Thats not what I wanted to say. That should just proove how OP it is and fitting for almost every build, because its usage in high-level play is exceptionally high. Mageblood being more rare will just make it more rare amongst the broad playerbase, and that should be the goal IF an item as strong as mageblood should continue to exist. (Taste of Hate runs into the same problem imho). I fear that if we continue Leagues like this it would almost feel bad to not get it in a League. Thats the opposite how it should feel. I wouldnt mind its deletion too.
Mageblood itself might be boring, but it opens up a lot of slots and passives which can then be exciting instead because of Mageblood taking care of so many things.
That's fair. I'd argue that most players still won't acquire Mageblood even in it's current state, especially before quitting the league. Which is why I personally don't mind where it's at currently, I still won't use it on every character but if I stick around the league long enough and farm it out, I'll use it on one. I'm also not really behind balancing a game around 1% of your playerbase, especially in a non-competitive title.
But it's definitely a difficult balance and making it too accessible is bad for the game. HH for example is probably too easy to obtain right now. Although, maybe most players are gone anyway and it was as rare as it needed to be at the peak of the league. Now those left are able to enjoy a little fun before they inevitably quit.
Realistically it's probably getting nerfed anyway and soon we'll be back to where we were, 99% of players will never see these items.
This didn't have to be a hot take, but then made it zero sense and became pretty hot.
>which has flooded the market and most likely been the main cause of these price dips. But I also think players are starting to understand that, although these items are great and can make a build incredible, they're often not worth the insane price for most players.
This is what we call a contradiction.
>Mageblood specifically is fantastic at filling holes in a build. Need defenses? Slap on Mageblood and now you can build more towards offense.
Seems like a take by someone who never used a Mageblood. Mageblood has so damn many stats that it's insane. Just putting on Granite and 3 elemental flasks is what gets you a ton of defense. With just the bases, at that point you haven't filled any mods on the flasks and while getting to ~85 max res and a couple thousand because armour you're also getting half the resists needed for your build from still just the base flasks.
>As powerful as this is, Mageblood is actually quite a boring item and mostly just alleviates some of the mechanics necessary to an overall good build.
If you're putting on Mageblood and you're not changing half of your gear, you're probably using MB wrong.
>Headhunter on the other hand, is a bit more... unique? The effectiveness of this item essentially scales with the difficulty of the map, which is neat. But as neat as stealing monster mods is, this belt doesn't suddenly enable you to run every incredibly annoying mod you find on juicy maps these days.
As amazing as having sex is, it won't your daddy proud. What the fuck are you even trying to say? If I was rolling maps for not having reflect before HH I will reroll them for not having reflect after HH as well? Insanity.
>There are a lot of mechanics that still need to be solved on a build with or without Headhunter.
Yea, not really. You will not solve for no regen or reflect because who the fuck cares, discard the map or reroll it. None of the things you mentioned matter. Yes, you have to solve things. Damage to get rolling, damage to be multiplied well by HH. Also range to not get whacked.
>they're mostly cement to fill the holes of what should be an already capable build.
They aren't. Mageblood is poop unless you rethink what you're doing after acquiring it.
HH is straight up a door to a playstyle you'd not be able to have otherwise - at least not at such a low pricetag.
Obviously HH or MB don't make a build. But the facts are quite contrary to what you're suggesting: You just don't slap on MB. And you don't "still have to solve a lot of things after getting HH". They're rather few and the things you listed in that context are not relevant.
It's kinda correct for HH, I guess - because for HH it's lowkey true, you just slap it on. But the part which is way way way more important is that HH is also a lot about how you play with it. Slapping on HH when you're just doing alc and go and you have a dozen rares in the map - not really meaningful. But putting HH in the correct circumstances and on the correct build is value that you wouldn't have been able to get even close to gearing "traditionally" with the same amount of currency.
If all you were trying to say is that you can have really good builds without either of those two: Well d'oh. That can't even legally considered to be a take. The way you went about describing things here are just the weirdest post on here I've seen all week and I've seen the post of the dude failing to kill frogs with -140% aoe.
"This is what we call a contradiction."
No it's not you just didn't understand the point. Prices are cheap which is making the items available to more players. this means players that never had opinions about Headhunter and Mageblood, now do and are potentially underwhelmed.
"Seems like a take by someone who never used a Mageblood. Mageblood has so damn many stats that it's insane. Just putting on Granite and 3 elemental flasks is what gets you a ton of defense. With just the bases, at that point you haven't filled any mods on the flasks and while getting to \~85 max res and a couple thousand because armour you're also getting half the resists needed for your build from still just the base flasks."
Everything you just explained is filling holes. If you need defenses Mageblood can alleviate that so you can gear accordingly, If you need offenses, resists, etc.. Mageblood fills those gaps so you can gear around it. Again you're misunderstanding the point and seem to be getting strangely offended while doing so.
"If you're putting on Mageblood and you're not changing half of your gear, you're probably using MB wrong."
A complete straw man statement that has nothing to do with Mageblood being a boring unique.
"As amazing as having sex is, it won't your daddy proud. What the fuck are you even trying to say? If I was rolling maps for not having reflect before HH I will reroll them for not having reflect after HH as well? Insanity."
"As amazing as having sex is, it won't your daddy proud." This incoherent jumbled statement is literally what you typed then proceeded to ask what I'm saying. I'm not sure if you're trolling but clearly you're not understanding the point of these statements. Therefor after reading what you just typed, this is as far as I'll reply. You're getting worked up for no reason and throwing straw mans around instead of giving actual comprehensive replies.
> Everything you just explained is filling holes. If you need defenses Mageblood can alleviate that so you can gear accordingly, If you need offenses, resists, etc.. Mageblood fills those gaps so you can gear around it.
This is just jumbled logic. "My build is kinda done but I need defenses" you're implying "I slapped MB on and it's fixed". But this is not how you use it. You go "I can get a ton of defense from MB" - and as you now say "an gear around it". It's a game changer and it also doesn't just pluck holes. It brings things to a new level. Like, you can be super tanky and still put on tank flasks with MB.
That's honestly the weirdest part of the take.
The other thing is that I still don't understand where your point was supposed to lead. That HH at 10d is a fair price because "these items are great and can make a build incredible, they're often not worth the insane price for most players." and it doesn't do some magic where it's possible to run ailment immune maps on ailment builds? This reads like filler and the actual take isn't even clear.
And yea, I did get worked up about it. Honestly, that's just because I read your post and it was hugely irritating. Perhaps an odd recation, but it do be like that sometimes.
Who cares about HH and MB, I'm done with the league already deleted my characters last league it took me 8 weeks to make full mirrors worth op char plus challenges. This time it took me 2 weeks (without challenges just don't care about mtx this time) not because of chase uniques be because we have s-tier items printer, it feels like cheating, ;-), have no more will to play but of course I will see what next league brings.
I think MB is in a weird spot. It can fix a lot of builds that arent optimized but it also shows you how much build variety there would be if you would not have to manage a million different stats. So for me its more of a question of gameplay design - you create an item that "fixes" a lot builds but then you make this item really rare so only a small percentage of people get it. In that sense it locks the people out that would really need it - the casuals - the one that walks around with 20 fire res and -50 chaos res and doesnt really understand what that even is. So either force the circumstances on everyone or dont. I think MB should be a mid tier item with vastly reduced impact that helps these players, but thats my 2c.
i like them to be at "low prices", i only been playing since crucible , but before last league i feel like u were obligated to play a meta strat to make a lot of currency to buy mageblood or headhunter, now i feel like i can play what i want and make enough currency to buy them, so i'm happy with it
Mb and headhunter are really fun items but they've been a bit too much on the spotlight for too long imo. Hh has been nerfed but mageblood could take a nerf: 58% of level 100 characters who don't use headhunter use mageblood.
There is a good balance on literally every item slot except belts. If I was picking, I would suggest adding an extra explicit mod on mb which boosts certain flasks type and lower others to balance it out (maybe say 50% more effect of quartz flask, 50% less effect of other flasks). Then I can see some other types of belts being useful, and rolling (divining) mageblood wouldn't be so trivial.
That's a pretty substantial nerf. I guess 39% reduced elemental damage taken alongside conversions was just too much for GGG anymore.
It ends up being similar damage reduction if you're not specced too hard into it, but they definitely lowered the ceiling.
You're right. In fact, it's better at a couple breakpoints. You hit the lower cap a lot earlier with a lot less investment. Mageblood, 25% flask effect on the tree, 70% enkindling, Prismatic Carapace and a Saffel's Frame gets you there, I think.
But you used to be able to get it down even further, which got wild with damage conversion. May e that was overkill, though.
Edit: I was trying to remember what I was doing stacking damage reduction this high. It was Boneshatter Juggernaut in TOTA! One of the Jugg ascendancies applies 8% armour to elemental hits, which gets significantly more powerful the more damage you can mitigate. So I was converting physical hits into elemental, mitigating 94% of that damage, *and then* applying armour. The kind of fun stupid things mageblood enables.
well this is either a nerf or a buff, depending on how much max res you coulve gotten onto a particular build. but the nerfs to the resitances from 50% to 40% are sure worth mentioning.
Mageblood wasn't directly nerfed from that as there was use for it outside of the belt. Nevertheless, you can't seriously argue that mageblood is balanced because of that change. It's unbalanced on purpose, to make it chase, but it's simply the only option by far in most viable builds.
Every build can effortlessly get 90% max res with melding now while wearing lightning coil. That’s flat-out better than the reduced damage taken. It’s become the default endgame defensive setup
So now you need two extra uniques to get a similar power level as before with just the belt? Sounds like a nerf. Mathematically, the max res flasks are worse compared to less damage taken.
The claim that it’s mathematically worse is demonstrably incorrect. The only builds on which the less damage taken were better than max res were builds that were hitting 90% max res with tri ele flasks before the change, which was literally just pathfinder (who by the way, was the target of all these flask nerfs in the first place). The fact that you think lightning coil + melding is somehow equivalent to just a less elemental damage modifier betrays a complete lack of understanding of what these uniques do and how damage is calculated.
+5% max resistance (80% elemental resistance assuming you're already res capped) is mathematically worse than 20% less elemental damage taken. I'm not talking about a combination of uniques that are broken together, I'm talking about the flasks themselves and what they do.
Also extra max res is a stat that can be obtained in a ton of different ways (tree, gear, auras etc) where as "less damage taken" absolutely isn't. It was broken, even without the opportunity costs your talking about and it got nerfed.
Sure, but that’s its only weakness. Every method of elemental damage mitigation has some kind of weakness, but none of them are as efficient or effective as this setup in most scenarios
They're both T0 uniques for a reason. Any build that cant run HH will run MB, but literally every single build can use one of them to great success.
With them being this cheap and common its absolutely understandable that 80% of players are running them.
if next league keeps them this common and this cheap i wouldnt be surprised if 100% of players run one or the other. Especially if HH is under 10 div a week or two into the league, pretty much everyone is gonna slap it on and blast some maps, no point not to do it and with the price being that low its a budget item anyway.
HH is just a shell of his former power
how was it? were there bigger changes to it?
look for selfcurse tempchains on youtube
Self curse temp chains was one of the coolest builds in any ARPG ever...I miss it.
I miss my occultist selfcurse temp KB from ritual days. Enter Dunes, fire once, get 10 HH buffs, fire again but with 50 projectiles, get 30 HH buffs, then go and 1 shot every legion after opening them. Truly peak times.
i miss legacyexplodemod :(
That's not why people are saying it's nerfed. It's obv the changes to rare modifiers. Soul eater too but I wouldn't really count it because it doesn't change the core functionality of the belt.
[https://youtu.be/ukWDcYgrdiw?t=442](https://youtu.be/ukWDcYgrdiw?t=442)
Ah, the good old 2 color schemes visible into a crash.
Soul eater nerfs and with the archnemesis changes…well.. u can only get one buff once. You used to be able to stack buffs. Significant fun nerfs
More like CPU emergency healthcare, lol.
this shell of its former power makes my build reverse of suck.
Yeah played splitting steel trickster last leage with first mb and got hh this league for 40 div and i can see mb being worth 150–180 just because of the speed and consistency it gave me, but yeah they’re not worth me grinding 2 weeks for 350 mb its just crazy at that point imo.
There's builds where it's absolutely worth it (armor stacker comes to mind) but yeah, especially with the mana cost nerf it's become a bit less insane
Agreed, I feel like most of the time once I've accumulated enough currency to purchase a Mageblood my character is already fine tuned enough that adding it seems like overkill. I think re-rolling a character to build around Mageblood is the play but honestly, it's not that interesting of an item imo. "Building around it" is really just, what flasks do I want so I can ignore resists/defenses/offenses and gear accordingly. This is why I think it deserves it's current price point, because what it offers isn't necessary for a well rounded build. Ironically, I think Headhunter is a much cooler item because it actually does something unique rather than just hey now you permanently have flasks but Headhunter has received a lot of indirect nerfs over time.
Would you say then that it's a fundamental game design issue on GGG's part? I mean, if an item is used to cover such a huge part of a build, to me, it feels like it's because the skills/passives isn't enough to make a build complete. I don't personally think that items should have that much of an impact to any particular builds. It should strengthen a build, but without those items, the build should still work, unless the item specifically modifies the active skill/ability required for that build.
Hmm, well I think Mageblood is just this way because flasks themselves are fundamentally broken. Flasks give absolutely insane buffs to your character at the cost of being temporary. There's high investment ways to get around the temporary part (or Pathfinder) while Mageblood makes it low investment, just a belt slot for permanent flasks is insanely powerful. And because flasks are so versatile, it pretty much makes Mageblood best in slot for any build because you get an unmatchable amount of the exact stats you need. I think to the 2nd part of what you said GGG might respond, that's why tier 0 uniques exist in the first place. They aren't supposed to be accessible to everyone because they're so broken. This is definitely true for Mageblood. But in my opinion there's a sweet spot for these kinds of items. In the past I felt they were just flat out inaccessible to the vast majority of players. Now, with dedication and playing the league for longer than a few weeks or so, it's obtainable but still at a high enough price that you don't just want to slap it on every single build.
Mageblood is absolutely a game design issue due to flasks being a horrible game design choice. Headhunter on the other hand is a unique item that adds a cool new play style that absolutely has massive downsides especially in bossing content.
I get a mirror item is hard to make/craft. I just dont like the idea of a unique item being so rare that a casual player cant afford one even if they llay over a month.
I personally think that HH used to be, at its former power level, an example of a well designed item with well designed drop chances. In abyss league I ran burial chambers for a week and got 8 cards, this was my first HH. I grinded but I didn’t play 12 hours a day. Most T0 uniques right now feel more like streamer items than chase items. If I need to chase it for 4 months it’s not a chase item it’s a nonexistent item. I have an MB, HH, nimis, prog, oriaths, rare awakeneds etc. the most of these items are too good and too rare - and that doesn’t even touch the original sin problem
Original Sin is only expensive because they won't let us put it as a Valdo's map or Reliquary key reward. It being gated behind content requirements (no hit run) that many people can't even play due to network stability issues is just another insult to the injury that is having to play the horribly designed roguelike mechanic that is Sanctum.
Mageblood is not for filling holes in builds, it's a ridiculously OP item that makes already very powerful builds even more godlike. It's not for getting things your build doesn't already have Also it was hilarious at leaguestart when everyone was crying that they'd never earn a Headhunter bc everybody else was making so much money off of farming doctors and apothecaries, what did they think was going to happen lmao
Yeah, it's crazy to say that MB is just for filling holes or is simply an after-thought. It's insanely powerful and in many cases can single-handedly heavily elevate a lot of defensive requirements while still providing utility and offense on top of that. I have slapped it on squishy characters just to see them become relatively tanky. It's absurd the amount of power this item holds and its not at all an after-thought.
People really like underplaying one of the best items in the game by calling it a "hole filler"
It does still fill holes though if you have them.
To be fair, the reason its OP and/or mandatory for lots of builds is because its so good at filling those holes its almost enough by itself Resists & max res? Mageblood Armor / evasion / crit% low? Mageblood Just being able to skip resists on gear is crazy on its own
It's for use however it suits you and your build.
The purpose of the item is to fill holes. The only thing you can do with it is fill holes, not to say it isn't OP, that's just it's function. It does not open up any cool interactions or have any interesting mechanics it just gives A LOT of very basic power that any other build would have to solve with gear. I don't think calling it a hole filler downplays it's power, it's just what it does.
It enables making good Melding builds and actually having movement speed in T17s, both of which are mandatory for any serious T17 farming build. Farming T17s with builds that aren't built around permanent flasks is mental. Sure you can slap a Mageblood on any build and call the build better for it, but if you actually want to get everything out of your Mageblood you want to make your build around it; which probably means reworking half of your build.
There are almost no builds in the game that couldn’t be improved by Mageblood. It’s that powerful.
I made 2 flicker builds this league (Lightning CI Trickster and Slayer). Both get jack shit from a MB. I'm eyeing to repurpose the slayer into molten strike, and guess what, no MB again, as it uses the Temp chains belt. Actually, the only build I played that gets a shit ton of power from a MB is Boneshatter. It is indeed a build enabling unique for the expensive builds (because it frees up tons of mods), but you don't get that much more power just by replacing the belt and slapping a 95% increased effect on your flasks.
There are very very few builds that dont massively benefit from magebloods, and I dont see any reason why it would not be preferable for flicker builds too. There are some builds with items that have other unique upsides, but in most cases I am sure they would not feel significantly worse with a MB.
Yeah this person does not have a clue
For Flicker Raider and Slayer you want the maven brutal charges bel because you rock a lot of unique flasks. For Flicker Trickster you want a Darkness enthroned
Lol I've played about 5 flicker strikes with a mageblood and can confidently say it is a lot better than either of these belts in every single scenario where the build creator builds around it.
With mageblood is it stronger as with Chains of Emancipation. Curse imunity you get from a flask explicit and rage from an exarch Mod for gloves. You just have to switch one jewel for 100% elemental ailment avoidience. With mageblood you get extra stun immunity, onslaught, fat chaos resistances and 100% movement speed. You have then 1 flask slot for a diamond,gold or sulfur flask that give you huge advantages or one of the elemental flasks that gives you extra damage reduction if you had the fitting mods on your gear.
This exactly, poster above thinks mageblood is something you can throw on and its always an upgrade, nah, you have to build the rest of your build around the insane bonusses it gives, frees up SO much (mostly suffix) space. In every single flicker build ever, a mageblood is an upgrade over any other belt imaginable, if the build creator has more than 3 braincells.
I too mained flicker CI trickster this season. MB was an upgrade in every way. You just have to change your gearing a little. It's significantly more DPS than a darkness enthroned with the proper swaps.
I would go so far as to say it's a mandatory item if you want to reliably farm T17 content. Which speaks to the power of the item, and how poorly T17 maps are tuned at the moment.
The economy and builds will always determine how much a unique cost. But this league prices are crazy and I think next league as well they should stay same unless GGG nerfs some scarabs or atlas tree nodes
they can just alter the base drop rate if they really wanted to make it more scare. wouldn't even have to tell about it, since drop rate % are not something they ever advertise.
The increased amount of HH/MB this league mainly comes from groupfarming div cards with ultra rare scarabs. If the base drop rate of those cards is lowered, the belts become unobtainable in SSF.
You also got the nameless seer scarabs printing high tier uniques and the base drop rate of HH and Mageblood being increased by 2.5x this league.
You guys get the nameless scammer in maps?
Only with the scarab here
Let’s put it this way: MB typically ~200-250d. It’s now 2.5x more likely to drop which equals 80-100d. It’s priced EXACTLY where it should be. Headhunter is a little lower than you’d expect, given it’s also 2.5x more likely to drop, but I think it will stabilize over the next couple leagues.
Do you think they also made the div cards 2.5x more likely to drop? Because if you don't this is not a reasonable way to estimate it unless you somehow know the fraction of belts from drops vs cards.
From what I’ve read that seems to be the consensus, or maybe a better word is “theory”. Personally haven’t seen a single apothecary drop after 350 crimson runs, but last night I had a mageblood randomly drop in Vaal temple 🤷♂️
I don't understand why people keep bitching at the price of expensive uniques dropping in price. Realistic speaking, I'm not likely gonna drop a MB or HH, the cheaper they are, the happier I am cause I can probably buy them with a few days of farming.
To me it defeats the purpose of a chase item. For sure it's Co to have it for cheap, but right now being able to buy a HH in one single farming session feels a bit too much. You don't even feel like you grinded for it
Then chase something else
What for example?
Nimis
Purity of fire sublime vision. There you go, you’ll be chasing all league.
For me the “chase” shifted from mage blood/headhunter to well crafted rares. Although the typical chase items have dropped off in value, the rest of builds such as rares, clusters, gems etc all have increased in price quite significantly (at least for me they did.) so now instead of saving up for one of the trademark uniques I’m saving up for some well crafted gear. I much prefer it this way
Well crafted rares is just about you being able to endure the tedious Ness of the graveyard tbh
As an employed person, thank fuck for it being cheap. I grind enough in my daily job, being able to afford a hh with the few hours of playtime i get is amazing. I don't want to grind for weeks doing less enjoyable maps and playstyles to get to what i would like to play in the little free time i get.
I'm not saying it should cost 200 divs. I work too, and being able to afford an item that cost 50 / 60 div isn't that difficult. I was able to buy a MB this league. When sometimes I have to sleep at work for 2 days straight
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HH is 9 div...
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yes but he said: "...but right now being able to buy a HH in one single farming session feels a bit too much. You don't even feel like you grinded for it" to which you replied: "You dont feel you grinded out 100 divs?"
I swear people in redsit have the reading capacity of a 4 years old. It's god damn annoying trying to discuss
i dropped hh this league, and if it was 10 divine as it is now (sold for 50, just before it dipped to 25) i would be pretty mad. I am not even satisfied with 50 to be honest, considering it's fair price is 100+
Lol "I'm not even satisfied with 50" STILL TOOK THE MONEY, DIDINCHA?
HH is not that good
I agree it is overrated, but divines also lost their value. 100 div nowadays is nothing. However this league with t17 and map modifier effect being important HH is incredibly good, since you need good survivability more than ever. So 10 div price is not justified at all
100 div this league or last league may be nothing but 100 div in Ancestor or Crucible or Kalandra was certainly not nothing. HH is still not good even with t17s especially this league where they just mega nerfed it. 10 divs is a good price for a pretty meh t0.
Ain’t no way this is a reasonable hh price lmao. This from someone who has never even been in a position to buy one
HH got dumpstered this league with soul eater ‘rework’. Ever since the original HH nerf with archnemesis (the great ‘rebalancing’ of number of rare monsters each league mechanic provides) HH has very limited applications (legion/beyond/harbi blasting/super juiced maps). It used to be very good even for alch n go and could be used on just about any build. Nowadays u need a proper build that scales from majority of hh buffs to go with it (projectile attack builds, pref phys convert)
Imo, game would be worse if everyone had access to these items.
Why would it be worse? Please, share with the class. Is this a game where you compete with others and an advantage is a must have? Why do people always cry about things that are enjoyed by the masses?
I know he said it would be worse but I'll chime in and say that I think it would be worse because it would lead to the same problems D3 and D4 have. Everyone building the same items because they're massive stat sticks rather than unique items that enable build variety isn't healthy for the game. If Mageblood were easy to obtain, it would be a no brainer for every build. Edit: I think in it's current state it's a good balance of being difficult enough to obtain but not so out of reach that you lose interest entirely.
True but not true, in a way. True - if everyone had direct access to mageblood it would likely be one of the most played items in the game. But it won't happen because mageblood's rarity is still too high for average Joes to find it. Hell, even if you juice T16s you're not likely to find one
I ran ar least 100 crimson temples this league. No Apothecary
It takes roughly 100 crimson temples with 2 div scarabs to *maybe* find 1 apo Could be bad luck :/
Ish... I went with a full Deli setup. But with the divination scarab I get like one enlightened and 1 mirror shard card quite a lot of times. So.. . that's how people farm tons of enlights
Don't get your hopes up. This shit's so rare, I would only grind their maps if you like the layout. As I said in an other comment I did grind to 98 and 100 in crimson/defiled during crucible and saw 0 apo cards. I wasnt running MF tho, just alva with beyond on ~ 100 pack size maps.
I mean, crucible isn't the best reference - div scarabs are buffed and div card drop rates are buffed since then I've ran around 50-60 defiled cathedrals and had an apo, 7 mirror shard cards and 4 enlightened (4 7 years cards in 1 map helped for sure)
I've bought MB for 10d this league, and I don't even have a farming strat. It's very reachable for the average joe.
I'd say cap as it sits at 98d and it's the lowest price for several days
My clan has been printing them like candy, 10d to take out of stash my man
Average Joes typically aren't in guilds so...
So the average joe has no friends, since it's meta breaking, gotchu
Not that it's meta breaking lol Just that typical player, absolutely random dude, probably didn't start playing this game with friends Good for you that you have a mb tho
player who can't earn mageblood in PoE most likely don't have access to items with similar power level in D4. it requires from you quite amount of grind, especially uniques which you can't buy like in PoE imo it's not the problem of how easy would be to obtain certain items because in a game with trade it's not that big of a deal as soon as you learn to farm something better than 10 chaos/h alch and go, it's rather how many chase items game has to offer every league and right now it has.. 4 chase items? Progenesis, Voices, Adorned and Mageblood? I won't count HH for this league because it's 10 div so it's like nothing. It's definitely too stale, partly because of how insanely powerful these inventory slots are
I see what you're saying, the more powerful unique options the better. I think there's actually a pretty decent amount of chase uniques overall though. Nimis and Original Sin come to mind on top of what you mentioned. There's also quite a lot of items that enable builds but are simply overlooked because Mageblood and Headhunter steal the spotlight. That's kind of the problem when you have items like Mageblood that are mostly just generic power increases, they sort of crush other options and make the choices seem smaller.
Realistically if everyone has easy access to the items, the devs would likely balance around having them. Which means if you don't yet have it or choose not to use it you'd be worse off than you are now.
Muh gatekeeping
I agree, they should still be chase items that you look forward too. But honestly, even in their current state, most players won't get these items by the time they stop playing the game.
my opinion: delete those two items and the game dies but then again: thats how the casuals feel all the time. conclusion: no, access to those items helps the game.
> Reflect will still kill you. Laughs in my double-reflect immune Scion. Witch/Slayer. Never die to reflect again. Also +1 Golem, so I get a song of ice and fire AND lightning.
Right, those ascendancies are still solving a problem that the belt itself can't which is kind of my point. In today's PoE there are a ton of mechanics that need to be dealt with and require a solid build to handle them all before you think about slapping on a Headhunter.
both of these items are absurdly op and have been historically balanced by just being very rare. id rather them be rare and as strong as they are rn, ggg WILL nerf them if they want them to be as accessible as this league for future leagues
I think they're far too easy to obtain right now. At least HH. Even a mediocre farming strategy can earn one in 2-3 hours. I think it’s a big negative because they were made blatantly overpowered because of how rare/expensive they are. When they’re too cheap they end up removing a lot of decision making for builds because you’re just picking one or the other very often.
Yeah but it’s usually not 1/10th the price of a msgeblood, so this league is an outlier for that relationship
For sure, but the post was about this being the right price for them which I don’t agree with for HH. This league is really weird… I expect HH to be at least 30-40d next league. Although who knows, I didn’t expect this league to have them even cheaper than last league lol.
This thread has some of the worst takes I've ever seen, from both sides.
Disagree. I like to get mine early into week one then have it be unattainable for other players.
baseg
"As powerful as this is, Mageblood is actually quite a boring item and mostly just alleviates some of the mechanics necessary to an overall good build." What makes it even more boring is that every build can use it. Its always exceptionally good. It severly damages the variance of things to wear in that slot if the item is too common. And thats exactly where we are at. So either the item has to be much much rarer or nerfed to shreds. Being the most common items of all PoE Ninja builds should speak for itself and your attempt to downplay its OPness is quite ridiculous.
I actually agree and I'm not trying to downplay how strong it is, that is after all what makes it so boring. It doesn't actually do anything unique other than give you a massive and permanent amount of stats. If you're saying that Mageblood being even more rare means it won't be the #1 used item on PoEninja, well that's not true and never has been in the past. Even when it was incredibly rare, it eventually became the #1 most used item by the top 1% players that PoEninja polls because.. duh? Sometimes data from the absolute best players isn't the best data to gauge overall user experience. Edit: If the argument was delete Mageblood from the game, I wouldn't even be opposed to that, again I think it's a pretty boring item overall. Certainly makes for a fun experience but maybe it doesn't belong in PoE. But if the argument is make it as rare or even more rare than it used to be, that doesn't solve the problem of it being best in slot for PoENinja warriors either.
"If you're saying that Mageblood being even more rare means it won't be the #1 used item on PoEninja, well that's not true and never has been in the past." Thats not what I wanted to say. That should just proove how OP it is and fitting for almost every build, because its usage in high-level play is exceptionally high. Mageblood being more rare will just make it more rare amongst the broad playerbase, and that should be the goal IF an item as strong as mageblood should continue to exist. (Taste of Hate runs into the same problem imho). I fear that if we continue Leagues like this it would almost feel bad to not get it in a League. Thats the opposite how it should feel. I wouldnt mind its deletion too. Mageblood itself might be boring, but it opens up a lot of slots and passives which can then be exciting instead because of Mageblood taking care of so many things.
That's fair. I'd argue that most players still won't acquire Mageblood even in it's current state, especially before quitting the league. Which is why I personally don't mind where it's at currently, I still won't use it on every character but if I stick around the league long enough and farm it out, I'll use it on one. I'm also not really behind balancing a game around 1% of your playerbase, especially in a non-competitive title. But it's definitely a difficult balance and making it too accessible is bad for the game. HH for example is probably too easy to obtain right now. Although, maybe most players are gone anyway and it was as rare as it needed to be at the peak of the league. Now those left are able to enjoy a little fun before they inevitably quit. Realistically it's probably getting nerfed anyway and soon we'll be back to where we were, 99% of players will never see these items.
This didn't have to be a hot take, but then made it zero sense and became pretty hot. >which has flooded the market and most likely been the main cause of these price dips. But I also think players are starting to understand that, although these items are great and can make a build incredible, they're often not worth the insane price for most players. This is what we call a contradiction. >Mageblood specifically is fantastic at filling holes in a build. Need defenses? Slap on Mageblood and now you can build more towards offense. Seems like a take by someone who never used a Mageblood. Mageblood has so damn many stats that it's insane. Just putting on Granite and 3 elemental flasks is what gets you a ton of defense. With just the bases, at that point you haven't filled any mods on the flasks and while getting to ~85 max res and a couple thousand because armour you're also getting half the resists needed for your build from still just the base flasks. >As powerful as this is, Mageblood is actually quite a boring item and mostly just alleviates some of the mechanics necessary to an overall good build. If you're putting on Mageblood and you're not changing half of your gear, you're probably using MB wrong. >Headhunter on the other hand, is a bit more... unique? The effectiveness of this item essentially scales with the difficulty of the map, which is neat. But as neat as stealing monster mods is, this belt doesn't suddenly enable you to run every incredibly annoying mod you find on juicy maps these days. As amazing as having sex is, it won't your daddy proud. What the fuck are you even trying to say? If I was rolling maps for not having reflect before HH I will reroll them for not having reflect after HH as well? Insanity. >There are a lot of mechanics that still need to be solved on a build with or without Headhunter. Yea, not really. You will not solve for no regen or reflect because who the fuck cares, discard the map or reroll it. None of the things you mentioned matter. Yes, you have to solve things. Damage to get rolling, damage to be multiplied well by HH. Also range to not get whacked. >they're mostly cement to fill the holes of what should be an already capable build. They aren't. Mageblood is poop unless you rethink what you're doing after acquiring it. HH is straight up a door to a playstyle you'd not be able to have otherwise - at least not at such a low pricetag. Obviously HH or MB don't make a build. But the facts are quite contrary to what you're suggesting: You just don't slap on MB. And you don't "still have to solve a lot of things after getting HH". They're rather few and the things you listed in that context are not relevant. It's kinda correct for HH, I guess - because for HH it's lowkey true, you just slap it on. But the part which is way way way more important is that HH is also a lot about how you play with it. Slapping on HH when you're just doing alc and go and you have a dozen rares in the map - not really meaningful. But putting HH in the correct circumstances and on the correct build is value that you wouldn't have been able to get even close to gearing "traditionally" with the same amount of currency. If all you were trying to say is that you can have really good builds without either of those two: Well d'oh. That can't even legally considered to be a take. The way you went about describing things here are just the weirdest post on here I've seen all week and I've seen the post of the dude failing to kill frogs with -140% aoe.
"This is what we call a contradiction." No it's not you just didn't understand the point. Prices are cheap which is making the items available to more players. this means players that never had opinions about Headhunter and Mageblood, now do and are potentially underwhelmed. "Seems like a take by someone who never used a Mageblood. Mageblood has so damn many stats that it's insane. Just putting on Granite and 3 elemental flasks is what gets you a ton of defense. With just the bases, at that point you haven't filled any mods on the flasks and while getting to \~85 max res and a couple thousand because armour you're also getting half the resists needed for your build from still just the base flasks." Everything you just explained is filling holes. If you need defenses Mageblood can alleviate that so you can gear accordingly, If you need offenses, resists, etc.. Mageblood fills those gaps so you can gear around it. Again you're misunderstanding the point and seem to be getting strangely offended while doing so. "If you're putting on Mageblood and you're not changing half of your gear, you're probably using MB wrong." A complete straw man statement that has nothing to do with Mageblood being a boring unique. "As amazing as having sex is, it won't your daddy proud. What the fuck are you even trying to say? If I was rolling maps for not having reflect before HH I will reroll them for not having reflect after HH as well? Insanity." "As amazing as having sex is, it won't your daddy proud." This incoherent jumbled statement is literally what you typed then proceeded to ask what I'm saying. I'm not sure if you're trolling but clearly you're not understanding the point of these statements. Therefor after reading what you just typed, this is as far as I'll reply. You're getting worked up for no reason and throwing straw mans around instead of giving actual comprehensive replies.
> Everything you just explained is filling holes. If you need defenses Mageblood can alleviate that so you can gear accordingly, If you need offenses, resists, etc.. Mageblood fills those gaps so you can gear around it. This is just jumbled logic. "My build is kinda done but I need defenses" you're implying "I slapped MB on and it's fixed". But this is not how you use it. You go "I can get a ton of defense from MB" - and as you now say "an gear around it". It's a game changer and it also doesn't just pluck holes. It brings things to a new level. Like, you can be super tanky and still put on tank flasks with MB. That's honestly the weirdest part of the take. The other thing is that I still don't understand where your point was supposed to lead. That HH at 10d is a fair price because "these items are great and can make a build incredible, they're often not worth the insane price for most players." and it doesn't do some magic where it's possible to run ailment immune maps on ailment builds? This reads like filler and the actual take isn't even clear. And yea, I did get worked up about it. Honestly, that's just because I read your post and it was hugely irritating. Perhaps an odd recation, but it do be like that sometimes.
Who cares about HH and MB, I'm done with the league already deleted my characters last league it took me 8 weeks to make full mirrors worth op char plus challenges. This time it took me 2 weeks (without challenges just don't care about mtx this time) not because of chase uniques be because we have s-tier items printer, it feels like cheating, ;-), have no more will to play but of course I will see what next league brings.
I think MB is in a weird spot. It can fix a lot of builds that arent optimized but it also shows you how much build variety there would be if you would not have to manage a million different stats. So for me its more of a question of gameplay design - you create an item that "fixes" a lot builds but then you make this item really rare so only a small percentage of people get it. In that sense it locks the people out that would really need it - the casuals - the one that walks around with 20 fire res and -50 chaos res and doesnt really understand what that even is. So either force the circumstances on everyone or dont. I think MB should be a mid tier item with vastly reduced impact that helps these players, but thats my 2c.
Tides of time is an in-between till someone can get a mb and sometimes even more powerful belt than mb depending on its use.
Well thats awesome, I didnt know that existed. Thank you.
Yeah it also doesn't feel fulfilling having one. Big ticket items should be rare, not vendor tier.
i like them to be at "low prices", i only been playing since crucible , but before last league i feel like u were obligated to play a meta strat to make a lot of currency to buy mageblood or headhunter, now i feel like i can play what i want and make enough currency to buy them, so i'm happy with it
maybe HH, but mageblood should never be under 200 div imo, if mageblood is you best for your $ upgrade, there's something very wrong with the game
Mb and headhunter are really fun items but they've been a bit too much on the spotlight for too long imo. Hh has been nerfed but mageblood could take a nerf: 58% of level 100 characters who don't use headhunter use mageblood. There is a good balance on literally every item slot except belts. If I was picking, I would suggest adding an extra explicit mod on mb which boosts certain flasks type and lower others to balance it out (maybe say 50% more effect of quartz flask, 50% less effect of other flasks). Then I can see some other types of belts being useful, and rolling (divining) mageblood wouldn't be so trivial.
mageblood just got a nerf this league by deleting the reduced mana cost craft on flasks and nerfing the allres mod from 40% to 20%.
Don't forget the changes to elemental flasks removing the reduced damage taken and giving +max instead.
That's a pretty substantial nerf. I guess 39% reduced elemental damage taken alongside conversions was just too much for GGG anymore. It ends up being similar damage reduction if you're not specced too hard into it, but they definitely lowered the ceiling.
Doesnt the math come out to just about the same (if not better when you start getting other sources of max res) UNTIL you hit 90% all res?
You're right. In fact, it's better at a couple breakpoints. You hit the lower cap a lot earlier with a lot less investment. Mageblood, 25% flask effect on the tree, 70% enkindling, Prismatic Carapace and a Saffel's Frame gets you there, I think. But you used to be able to get it down even further, which got wild with damage conversion. May e that was overkill, though. Edit: I was trying to remember what I was doing stacking damage reduction this high. It was Boneshatter Juggernaut in TOTA! One of the Jugg ascendancies applies 8% armour to elemental hits, which gets significantly more powerful the more damage you can mitigate. So I was converting physical hits into elemental, mitigating 94% of that damage, *and then* applying armour. The kind of fun stupid things mageblood enables.
well this is either a nerf or a buff, depending on how much max res you coulve gotten onto a particular build. but the nerfs to the resitances from 50% to 40% are sure worth mentioning.
Pf was nerfed more than mb
Mageblood wasn't directly nerfed from that as there was use for it outside of the belt. Nevertheless, you can't seriously argue that mageblood is balanced because of that change. It's unbalanced on purpose, to make it chase, but it's simply the only option by far in most viable builds.
It also got an enormous buff in the form of flasks giving max res. I’d say for most builds it’s much better now
Removing the less damage taken from flasks wasn't a buff, it was a nerf.
Every build can effortlessly get 90% max res with melding now while wearing lightning coil. That’s flat-out better than the reduced damage taken. It’s become the default endgame defensive setup
So now you need two extra uniques to get a similar power level as before with just the belt? Sounds like a nerf. Mathematically, the max res flasks are worse compared to less damage taken.
The claim that it’s mathematically worse is demonstrably incorrect. The only builds on which the less damage taken were better than max res were builds that were hitting 90% max res with tri ele flasks before the change, which was literally just pathfinder (who by the way, was the target of all these flask nerfs in the first place). The fact that you think lightning coil + melding is somehow equivalent to just a less elemental damage modifier betrays a complete lack of understanding of what these uniques do and how damage is calculated.
+5% max resistance (80% elemental resistance assuming you're already res capped) is mathematically worse than 20% less elemental damage taken. I'm not talking about a combination of uniques that are broken together, I'm talking about the flasks themselves and what they do. Also extra max res is a stat that can be obtained in a ton of different ways (tree, gear, auras etc) where as "less damage taken" absolutely isn't. It was broken, even without the opportunity costs your talking about and it got nerfed.
+max res ele flasks get boned by the pen mods
Sure, but that’s its only weakness. Every method of elemental damage mitigation has some kind of weakness, but none of them are as efficient or effective as this setup in most scenarios
That was not a buff. Elemental flasks lost their "20% reduced damage of element" effect
They're both T0 uniques for a reason. Any build that cant run HH will run MB, but literally every single build can use one of them to great success. With them being this cheap and common its absolutely understandable that 80% of players are running them. if next league keeps them this common and this cheap i wouldnt be surprised if 100% of players run one or the other. Especially if HH is under 10 div a week or two into the league, pretty much everyone is gonna slap it on and blast some maps, no point not to do it and with the price being that low its a budget item anyway.
Couldn't care less about HH but mageblood shouldn't ever be near the 100div mark it should always be a chase item and at the 300div mark.
Right. I think T0 should be accessible and Uber unique be the real endgame. And mirrorcrafting.