Σ 2.1 Bugs&Feedback

Discuss Median XL!
Cat_IED
Vampiress
39 | 10
That 125 wall sort of exists for SSF. Its very much contextual. I'd argue its mostly dependent on the number and quality of target farm-able options. Casters can cover more bases with honorifics and crafts in general allowing flexibility in working with random drops. Weapon builds are in trouble without a good RW option which is contextual. There are major gaps in RWs now, but for builds with good easy RW's this wall basically doesn't exist.

Stuff like
Erawan

Erawan
Body Armors

'LemKoCham'
Runeword Level: 83
15% Combat Speeds
5% Chance of Crushing Blow
+(144 to 171)% Enhanced Defense
(27 to 30)% to Strength
(27 to 30)% to Vitality
Physical Resist (13 to 15)%
(15 to 20)% Bonus to Defense
is passably comparable to SU/SSU level items for mere base runes assuming the build cares for STR and Def. Its alternative mid game option is
Dragonheart

Dragonheart
Body Armors

'OhmThulFal'
Runeword Level: 70
+2 to All Skills
30% Attack Speed
30% Cast Speed
30% Block Speed
45% Hit Recovery
+1.625% Enhanced Defense (Based on Character Level)
5% to Dexterity
+(550 to 650) to Life
Cold Resist +25%
. Thats it. That is the extent of 100% guaranteed achievable mid game tier options. If either doesn't fit well, get lucky. And chest, despite being the most important non weapon slot, is at a mere 2 choices. Wasting the best armor slot on an honorific or craft is painful for all. Other slots are worse off.

Helms have
Bogspitter
Bogspitter
Helms

'BerUm'
Runeword Level: 78
20% Chance to cast level 11 Miasma on Melee Attack
+1 to All Skills
Adds 60-179 Poison Damage over 1 seconds
Slows Attacker by (10 to 15)%
+(115 to 143)% Enhanced Defense
Elemental Resists +10%
,
Arcane Protection
Arcane Protection
Circlets

'ArcSur'
Runeword Level: 100
Psicrown Now Explodes Upon Impact
+(1 to 2) to All Skills
+(5 to 10)% Bonus to Spell Focus
+(15 to 20)% to Spell Damage
+(6 to 9) to Psicrown
+(400 to 600) Defense
Regenerate Mana +(20 to 25)%
Physical Resist (5 to 10)%
Elemental/Magic Damage Reduced by (15 to 25)
+(20 to 30) Life after each Kill
+(20 to 30) Mana after each Kill
(20 to 30)% Magic Find
and
Rathma's Blessing

Rathma's Blessing
Circlets

'OrtGlaThulGla'
Runeword Level: 100
+(2 to 3) to All Skills
+50% to Summoned Minion Life
+25% to Summoned Minion Damage
+50% to Summoned Minion Resistances
Lightning Resist +25%
Cold Resist +50%
+10 Cold Absorb
(15 to 20)% Magic Find
.... thats it really. All niche items. No midgame alternatives that can be guaranteed beyond TUs forced to scale beyond intended timelines. Either you are a favored build for the few mid tier guarantees, or you are improvising with outdated stuff until luck sides with you. Have to ride the level 50ish TU item or honorific train to a set/SU/good craft roll. Yet crafts are only solid for certain build archetypes. Which does leave a gap.

Other slots have disparities in favored builds. Gloves offer mid game target farmables for casters. WPN builds... they stick to TU's til enchanted rune RNG favors them.
Brawl
Brawl
Gloves

'ShaelEld'
Runeword Level: 35
7% Chance to cast level 14 Punishers on Melee Attack
+10% Bonus to Poison Skill Duration
15% Attack Speed
+(10 to 13) to Maximum Damage
+(25 to 35) Defense
+(5 to 15) to Strength
(11 to 15)% to Vitality
is basically the pre enhanced rune wpn dmg option... while gloves offer casters
Memory

Memory
Gloves

'IgnVenFulGla'
Runeword Level: 100
+1 to All Skills
+(40 to 50) Spell Focus
10% Cast Speed
+(8 to 10)% to Spell Damage
-11% to Enemy Elemental Resistances
+150 Life Regenerated per Second
, a good mid-late option.

Point is, the guaranteed options are so sparse after the great culling that gaps are left in progression. Either you are lucky enough to have target farmable hard carry options like
Crucible


Crucible
Necromancer Crossbows

'IgnJahGul'
Runeword Level: 100
Famine Grants 1% of Strength and Dexterity as Innate Elemental Damage
Famine No Longer Grants Weapon Physical Damage
25% Chance to cast level 36 Banish on Kill
50% Attack Speed
+(300 to 400) to Attack Rating
-(28 to 35)% to Enemy Fire Resistance
+15% Enhanced Damage
25% to Strength
5% Chance to Avoid Damage
+2 Mana on Striking
which are hard to beat with high rolled SSU's or you are duct taping it all together with honorifics/crafts and TU's. Yet crafts and honorifics offer middling value to certain builds and work adequately on others. Its possible to be screwed on both RW's and hand made items for some builds leaving literally nothing between TU's and sets / SU's. Not a good spot to be in without trade.

The RW culling was heavy handed. The options might well never be missed by online players, but it did help glue certain archetypes through the rough transitory period of the game as SSF.

Doesn't help that some sets seem hard to find/target farm post K3K rework. Used to be a viable stop where a few hours would in all likelihood achieve a full set. Sets are now a twink or trade deal. Defeating their purpose beyond ol' standbys like
Witchhunter's Hood
Witchhunter's Hood
Cap (Sacred)

Defense: (2136 - 2611) to (2161 - 2642)
Required Level: 90
Required Strength:
250
Item Level: 1
+(80 to 120)% Enhanced Defense
10% to Strength
10% to Dexterity
Maximum Elemental Resists +2%
Elemental Resists +(31 to 40)%
Physical Resist 5%
(16 to 20)% Bonus to Defense
Requirements -50%
Socketed (4)

Witchhunter's Attire
(Assassin Claw Set)
that can serve as a cheap patchwork item all game long rather than a cohesive mid game entry package sets are largely intended for.

Hitting both RW's and set target farming capability is a brutal kick in the balls to the unfavored builds without top tier target farmables in critical slots (wpn slots + chest especially).

To be clear, SSF wall at 125 isn't really a thing if the key slots are covered or crafts can offer high value. Its just the builds without these that experience a wall. Favored builds won't find that wall until 130-135 content, even SSF.

The solution is one of three things, or a combination. Make entry level sets drop like candy in some place, make RW's up to elemental runes solid options for all, or improve the value of crafts+honorifics for builds which make middling use of them at present.

Of these, sets have the drawback of making signet acquisition easier while being very difficult to cover all potential builds properly. RW's might step on the toes of SUs or enhanced tier RW's. Crafts and honorifics would potentially dilute the probability of quality rolls if more affixes were introduced. Looks like high vanilla + elemental tier RW's are the cleanest option while entry sets being hard to target farm SSF is simply a weird situation. The latter have no purpose SSF anymore.

The 125-130 SSF wall is real, but it only applies to builds with gaps in intended progression. Gaps created in part by the RW culling and relegating sets to twink or buy status.

I personally would like to see craft value be more universal regardless. A godly rare/craft should have a place late game for more builds. That would offer value both to SSF and the economy alike.

I have no issue with a wall existing in SSF. It just should be more equal in its location. Whether that is 125 bosses, Fauztinville/Viz/Bremm, or Scosglen doesn't matter to me all that much. It shouldn't come down to a build being offered mid game target farmable itemization or not. That isn't the healthiest situation.

Edit: Perhaps a solution through sets could exist. TU's are targetable through AC's. Why not do the same for entry sets? Perhaps 25-50 signets and a pair of AC's could turn a sacred base into a set item of its type? Would change the whole outlook on sets in SSF while having a cost that might turn off any economic impact online.
Bestendigo
Lava Lord
95 | 21
Common Love Badge
Earned over 20 cookies
Fire/Poison/Ice/Light runes is still RNG. I had plenty of Runestones (10+) and almost no various Essences. I had only Poison and Ice runes, cuz these essences kept dropping only, which was useless for my Lightning caster build. It's still RNG, if RNG won't bless you, you won't make these ''niche mid-end runewords''. I could forget about
Memory

Memory
Gloves

'IgnVenFulGla'
Runeword Level: 100
+1 to All Skills
+(40 to 50) Spell Focus
10% Cast Speed
+(8 to 10)% to Spell Damage
-11% to Enemy Elemental Resistances
+150 Life Regenerated per Second
and
Arcane Protection
Arcane Protection
Circlets

'ArcSur'
Runeword Level: 100
Psicrown Now Explodes Upon Impact
+(1 to 2) to All Skills
+(5 to 10)% Bonus to Spell Focus
+(15 to 20)% to Spell Damage
+(6 to 9) to Psicrown
+(400 to 600) Defense
Regenerate Mana +(20 to 25)%
Physical Resist (5 to 10)%
Elemental/Magic Damage Reduced by (15 to 25)
+(20 to 30) Life after each Kill
+(20 to 30) Mana after each Kill
(20 to 30)% Magic Find
unless i farm another xx hours and pray to RNG Gods to finally get Fiery, Arcane and/or Lightning Essence and i could get them only from Zagraal (who was still some challenge, since my gear was trash - thanks RNG), because Runestone/Essence drop chance from casual monsters was close to zero and farming monsters was just a waste of time. And if i keep farming only Teganze for such runes, i won't find any decent sacred items, since Teganze item drop quality is mega poor comparing to Duncraig for example. Lose-lose situation Getting a decent roll from shrines - RNG. Getting right shrines (there's too many shrines i think) - also RNG. Once i wasted 5 Ornate Shrines (which is 50 charges) and i didn't get even one roll that was better than my actual TUs. Can't do nothing against RNG. After all i just got bored and quit playing this character.

As i said, everything i do, depends from RNG. 125+ ubers is a wall for most of characters and players, unless someone is lucky enough to get that desired drop. Either way i am forced to trade and make TG if i want to progress.

Maybe i just have bad luck in MXL, idk. But in other games i don't complain. Sometimes i have luck, sometimes not, just like everyone.
Cat_IED
Vampiress
39 | 10
Elemental runes are target farmable. Of course it's RNG, but they are achievable. Essences aren't that rare. Nothing remotely like fauz runes. Just because I dropped 50 essences for a single fire and single stone doesn't mean much. It's still doable in a short enough timeframe. The extras are useful for optimizing the umbaru treasure so even the bad RNG pays out. It's not an issue imo for SSF.
User avatar
Solfege
Harpylisk
1461 | 209
Common Posting Badge
Posted over 1.000 messages
Legendary Popularity Badge
Has a thread with over 250.000 views
Great Love Badge
Earned over 100 cookies
Common Guide Badge
Created a complete character guide
Not to derail the convo, but since being able to clear Scosglen is kind of a sticking point, there are a couple tricks every build can use to make clearing the map a lot less frustrating. (Maybe these are already common knowledge by now, but I’ll post them here anyway just in case someone doesn’t know.)
  • Adding the “Slain Monsters Rest in Peace” mod to a piece of equipped gear is incredibly helpful for preventing Scytheclaws from respawning or being resurrected or whatever they do to come back to life.
  • Scytheclaws and Dryad Spawn are susceptible to Mind Control (the charm skill from the Tome of Possession you get in Triune). This thing has saved my bacon numerous times (and in numerous rifts) when I’m about to get swarmed. You can also use it to pull tricks on other monsters, such as luring a swarm of Scytheclaws to Etherborn and Mind Controlling them. The Etherborn is more likely to focus on the Scytheclaws rather than you (simply b/c there are more of them), leaving you free to attack the Etherborn in peace for a few seconds. It’s also helpful for when Etherborn use Thunderstorm, b/c the lightning may target charmed monsters instead of you.
I’m not saying these will turn a suboptimal build into a meta Scos farmer, but they may help.
Bestendigo
Lava Lord
95 | 21
Common Love Badge
Earned over 20 cookies
Meanwhile Brother Laz is making a mod for D2:R, i will give it a try once it's released and i hope my luck there won't be as terrible as in MXL right now :D
Opgedronken
Monkey King
274 | 8
sure higher labs and samael may be difficult to achieve ssf, but everything else is pretty doable.
I can get about 2 chars able to farm scos effectively ssf in one season.
I start from scratch each season, but I think even the endgame content could be doable ssf if you develop a char over a longer amount of time.
User avatar
huangyunshy
Onyx Knight
615 | 34
Common Popularity Badge
Has a thread with over 10.000 views
Common Love Badge
Earned over 20 cookies
Great Supporter Badge
Donated 5 times
Great Auction Badge
Won 200 auctions
Great Hunt:Should now have significantly better performance vs enemies next to walls.
Glacial Torrent also has this problem, very unfair and inconvenient.Please fix it officially.
User avatar
LeChatChouette
Thunder Beetle
50 | 1
Cat_IED wrote:Edit: Perhaps a solution through sets could exist. TU's are targetable through AC's. Why not do the same for entry sets? Perhaps 25-50 signets and a pair of AC's could turn a sacred base into a set item of its type? Would change the whole outlook on sets in SSF while having a cost that might turn off any economic impact online.


Imo this would be wonderful for ssf progress
User avatar
Victor
Cog
247 | 37
Common Popularity Badge
Has a thread with over 10.000 views
Common Love Badge
Earned over 20 cookies
huangyunshy wrote:Great Hunt:Should now have significantly better performance vs enemies next to walls.
Glacial Torrent also has this problem, very unfair and inconvenient.Please fix it officially.


+Twisted Claw please
B_ATAKY
Sasquatch
60 | 3
Victor wrote:
huangyunshy wrote:Great Hunt:Should now have significantly better performance vs enemies next to walls.
Glacial Torrent also has this problem, very unfair and inconvenient.Please fix it officially.


+Twisted Claw please

+Arachnomancy please :)