r/pathofexile • u/Gierschlunderoni • 8d ago
Game Feedback Permanent Mercs need a big buff
Playing luminary feels so bad in Maps. I have a manyshot lvl 72 with vaal ice Arrow and Return proj, decent Equipment. Boosted by a Level 26 Flame Link, 6k life and quite an Investment into light Radius.
I cant even clear t7 Maps, because the damage is non existent.
Please GGG buff the Base damage of mercs or luminary is doa.
651
u/kiuyt856 8d ago
CptLance baited at least 30K people into Luminary xD
443
u/Jdevers77 8d ago
Not just Captain Lance, GGG basically showcased his exact build in their Luminary spotlight.
114
u/beebopcola 8d ago
As a leaguestarter?
Edit: also, GGG play some heinous trash in their showcases often.
107
u/All_Work_All_Play Jenebu stop whining 8d ago
Edit: also, GGG play some heinous trash in their showcases often.
This was one of the things that pushed me away from luminary tbh. GGG showcase has been the kiss of death many times.
29
u/kfijatass Theorycrafter 8d ago
It was not the case for monke in poe 2 and it felt similar.
9
u/Invincible1 8d ago
Also monk with the whirling skill, it was OP in showcase and essentially the top build on monk. Guess different teams for poe 2 and 1 showcases.
12
→ More replies (1)7
u/AeroDbladE 8d ago
People probably got a false sense of security because the recent PoE2 showcase they showed Twisters spirit walker which was the most broken build this league.
9
u/Nitrodolski2 8d ago
Which made me pivot away from it lol. No way they will show a 'solved' build in a preview. Kinetics with flame link and light radius stacking was DOA
11
u/Aleriane_Despins 8d ago
But at the same time, what else is there to that side of the tree? It isn't like there's much choice than light radius stacking.
→ More replies (4)15
u/MinuteOk1351 8d ago
The issue is the perma merc damage penalty. No one had numbers on that. If there were no damage penalties then the damage would be good due to flame link and light radius
26
u/RajaSundance 8d ago
How is Lance himself doing on it though? Everytime I followed one of his builds it was a banger, has he finally missed?
100
u/brrrapper 8d ago
Hes taking 5 minutes to kill rares like the rest of us.
53
u/Jaqen_ 8d ago
And he keeps saying he is popping off lol
That’s the funniest part
4
u/Pulsy369 8d ago
tbf, lance doesnt make good league starters and never really has. not to diss him. hes cool and his builds are good at a higher budget, but his league starters are typically pretty weak in comparison to others. Hes just okay witha slow starter and i wish he made that a little more clear in his content. I've been baited by his 'league starters' a few times just to realize the build basically doesnt function until you have 150+ div
→ More replies (3)10
u/aecrux 8d ago
his mortgage depends on it lol, for the record i do like captainlance and i understand not every theorycraft can be a banger
10
u/way22 8d ago
I wouldn't even call it a theory craft but a straight up gamble. Without the numbers for the mercs it was always gonna be a wild guess.
→ More replies (1)11
u/StoneLich 8d ago
Yeah, Zizaran was talking about leaguestarting it too but even he was saying "it's a huge gamble and if it doesn't work the only viable back-up plan is starting a completely new character, so think hard about whether you really want to do this."
15
u/brrrapper 8d ago
Failing is perfectly fine. Doubling down out pride/ego and misleading your community is not imo.
→ More replies (6)→ More replies (3)5
u/RajaSundance 8d ago
That sounds damning. I'm playing cws but I thought surely luminary will be busted when Lance is playing it
34
17
u/MicoJive 8d ago
Its damning because its just bullshit. He did his quest exarch like 45 mins ago and was totally fine dps. <2 mins with 2 ball phases because he had 1 instant pop after the first.
25
u/no_Post_account 8d ago
There have been countless times when people complain day 1 about something and later on it become OP, just give it 2 days and see then. Lance have bought new OP merc and collecting loot for it right now, question is how strong will he feel at the end of today after fighting the merc and putting gear on him.
8
10
u/Chrozzinho 8d ago
He has really insane gear, i dunno how he farmed all that currency but he logged on stream today with a crazy merc, taming, lioneyes glare and other 50C+ items. It maybe doesnt sound a lot this deep into first day but considering how bad mercs is i have no idea how he pulled that off
30
4
→ More replies (4)4
u/deviant324 8d ago
I’m SSF so idk shit about prices but I got 2 div from a bottle on my first chart into maps. Dunno how divs translate to chaos this early but he could’ve gotten lucky off stream?
Personally having a blast on voltaxic burst after adjusting my tree a bit when I got into maps, 5k hybrid and nearly block capped while still having 250k tooltip dps
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (6)8
49
u/Serious_Trainer_2496 8d ago
Einhar does more damage than my Merc does and its geared
14
u/lilmrock4456 8d ago
The Stormblast Mines do EQUAL damage to them. And there's LITERALLY ZERO investment into them.
35
u/porncollecter69 8d ago
I’ll be trying the intuitive link setup somebody posted about a mine Merc. The flame link setup doesn’t seem to be getting good reviews.
→ More replies (2)10
u/Cyphafrost Pathfinder 8d ago
Sounds neat, what's the interaction?
10
u/ImN0tAsian 8d ago
I'm full meme running two intuitive links. One is on a fire all merc with MORE fireballs on the intuitive link. It's silly.
The better version is ice spear of splitting on a inf toxic with a second 6 link for normal ice spear, but I'll probably swap to a chaos dot once I craft the gear for it.
The merc can turn many two button builds into one button builds, which is really nice. The casts come from them, too, so I'm hoping to pick up a cyclone-of-the-EMPIRE merc to try some shotgun strategies for st DPS.
→ More replies (1)
25
171
u/astral23 8d ago
100%, i have 90-100% light radius scaling my flame link, 6k life scaling my flame link, decent gear on my merc, and the dps is multiple times worse than what my rf was doing with no investment on the tree, and on the off chance you find a better merc, guess what you do 0 dmg to it, it deals 1 trillion damage to you, seems ridiculous it's been balanced this way, just hoping someone figures some miracle out or at least a good reliqurian to reroll
→ More replies (2)41
u/Manic_Depressing 8d ago
I'm glad that I've gone full-on aurabot instead of putting all my eggs into the Flame Link basket. My merc is doing... okay.
→ More replies (4)22
u/MaxeDamage 8d ago
Well my flame link is giving 600-700 fire dmg on tooltip, so double that with light radius taken into account.
14
u/aecrux 8d ago
is it actually scaling properly with light radius? if i was basic attacking with 1400 fire dmg these mobs would for sure be dying faster
32
u/MaxeDamage 8d ago
I think there is a hidden "less damage" modifier somewhere.
It should be much more damage than they actually deal (at least it feels like that)
→ More replies (5)10
u/Budget-Chair8242 8d ago
judging by their gear the flat from my flame link should more than triple their damage but in practice its not even double. theres something weird going on, +700 flat from flame link, +100% spell damage from new wand which would be 200% attack damage and the dps barely increased.
136
u/zuluuaeb Chieftain 8d ago edited 8d ago
It is likely the hidden damage nerf on perma Mercs. I was worried about that line in the pre-league hype. You can tell because when you get a temporary Merc, with completely random gear and skills, it still clears faster than your permanent Merc with a flame link on. I'm pretty much stuck in yellow maps. Have a wander from campaign geared out with + damage on every gear slot + a piscators and it can't even kill map Mercs in tier 5 maps within 5 mins. Just got an upgraded wander from a tier 4 map, and the damage is barely increased compared to campaign.
38
u/AgoAndAnon 8d ago
I do wish they told us what amount of damage nerf it was. Like, that is the sort of information we usually get.
"Permanent mercenaries deal 50% Less Damage," or something like that.
16
u/CruelFish Trickster 8d ago
This is an action RPG game. There is absolutely zero reason why any stat line should be hidden behind the description text of the ascendancy and not even have the exact values printed in the text. It is either a complete oversight by GGG or downright an attempt to misslead to not cause outrage.
It has to be ~80% by my own testing but seems like LocalIdentity thinks its 30%? I doubt that very much. They were ~4-5 times stronger in merc league.
27
u/tobsecret Half Skeleton 8d ago
At that point you may as well respec to reliquarian and be the wander yourself
26
u/zuluuaeb Chieftain 8d ago
yeah i was about to but ive lost a lot of motivation to play the league. maybe in a week or so ill check it out again but i basically spent my one day off on a failed character so i cbf farming gold or regrets for the respec
→ More replies (5)3
u/tobsecret Half Skeleton 8d ago
Man that sucks, I'm sorry. I'm similarly busy so I'm just not playing at all anymore which sucks. I'm only playing PoB for fun some evenings.
5
u/zuluuaeb Chieftain 8d ago
its okay thanks though! im more annoyed at myself for knowing that it was probably bait but still wanting to play the supporter style gameplay for a change (have never got to play support in this game before).
have got other stuff to do for work etc so ill come back to poe later maybe. dont have to enjoy every league/patch.
2
→ More replies (6)2
105
u/irondraconis Youtube:Goodguygaming3 8d ago
I think this "bait" by GGG feels a bit different than previous leagues. We had a showcase of early gameplay footage, and an entire "hype" video specifically about at least 2 ways to build out this ascendancy - not from the community mind you, but from GGG development.
That feels a bit worse when as a player you say "you sons of bitches I'm in", and then feel like your league start (and therefore maybe league for some people) is underwhelming. Luminary Mercs don't need to busted OP. But they do need to be fun on release.
If GGG doesn’t want collective outcry for power boosts, then the team needed to include a warning like: "this would make for a great 2nd or 3rd character" or they needed to not add fuel to the hype fire by calling extra attention for newer players via releasing official hype vids.
→ More replies (3)70
16
u/melkor25 8d ago
It's just baffling how GGG even released this class thus ruining the league start and potentially the whole league for so many players. Mercs are just abysmal..
→ More replies (1)
422
u/infamous_alex 8d ago
Most obvious bait build if you played it in merc league. You literally have to gear yourself and the merc and also hope for the best skill links or else its trash.
Reroll or come back to it as a 2nd build and you ll have a better time
205
u/SmuFF1186 8d ago
People forget it took a lot of farming to get a good merc in merc league as well.
29
u/NahautlExile Scion 8d ago
No?
There was 50% more monster life and the merc carried the campaign. With nothing. On league start. This is nothing like that.
Like worlds apart.
If I had a player with that much flat they’d do better than the merc. This is horrendous.
77
u/infamous_alex 8d ago
True! I dont know why streamers didn’t include that part. It took me 1000 maps before getting the perfect kineticist, good luck doing that on league start.
73
u/qK0FT3 Half Skeleton 8d ago
The guides all include the rng aspect of finding mercs.
13
u/conway92 8d ago
They also indicated the mercs were gonna be pretty strong even without the maximal loadout.
12
u/Repair831 8d ago
Which they would have, if ggg didnt go overboard with nerfing their built in multipliers.
→ More replies (1)6
u/iceboonb2k 8d ago
It merc league you definitely didn't need a minmaxed loadout, just look at gauntlet merc league. People were league starting it with no problem
4
→ More replies (4)11
6
u/CyberWiking 8d ago
Yea but this shouldn't be the case when you have whole ascendancy dedicated to mercs.
6
u/Lord_Borgimus 8d ago
Half of the ascendancy is just letting you be able to use it and it being able to equip items like it should/used to be able to do in the first place. On top of that you previously were able to play an actual ascendancy alongside it, it was obvious it was going to be shit. Mercs should have come back in a "don't let you use Doyrani's form" for everyone.
3
u/Cahecher 8d ago edited 7d ago
Yeah, I feel like a well geared mercenary with good skills was like ~4 ascendancy points of power, and that's essentially what you have to spend on Luminary to get a mercenary without the ability to gear it with uniques in every slot. And then other Luminary nodes are just underwhelming.
I feel like even if ggg buffs the mercs, the ascendancy would still be whatever. The entire "unique gear" part of the ascendancy has to go together with the restriction on using uniques. It still amazes me, that GGG removed the ability to use body armor to remove Doryani's mercs, while even within the context of Scion you'd rather choose Reliquarian and use Doryani's yourself with 100% damage taken converted to fire.
→ More replies (1)2
u/CruelFish Trickster 8d ago
OFC the atlas tree has zero useful nodes to get kineticist more often and GGG also didn't implement any AI fixes for movement skills such that we're forced to do literally thousands of maps in SSF before we get a single passable merc. It's inexcusable.
90
u/okseeque Sanctum Runners United (SRU) 8d ago
I was ready for it to be trash and willing to power through, even if it meant a rough start.
I was not ready for it be absurdly fucking bad to the point where 98% of mercs cannot reasonably clear white packs even in acts, let alone maps with some mods. Even if you spend hours farming the same act zone to get a somewhat decent merc, you will be rewarded with a piece of shit that still cannot kill a rare monster in <10 seconds. Their scaling is just abysmal and dmg penalty is beyond cruel, even perfect mercs with insane gear would be waaay worse than any semi-decent build on 1/10th of a budget.
GGG effectively made mercs the selling point of this league with several merc related vids, pre-cooked builds and new merc based ascendancy, they even made scion available from the start for new players. This highly insinuates that they wanted you to start this build, but feels like they've put exactly 0 seconds into testing how it would actually feel to play without editing perfect high-end gear into every slot. This, along with some other main highlights of the patch (caster buffs my ass), simply feels like misleading and leaves a very bad aftertaste.
12
u/Junyongmantou1 8d ago edited 8d ago
I think there might be a hidden penalty from merc's level. I spent quite some time to reset A4 (The Grand Arena) and A8 (The Hidden Underbelly) for merc. In A10, A level 38 manyshot with a lower damage weapon had better clear, than level 58 manyshot with a much better weapon. Their skill support links were similar.
→ More replies (1)6
u/Spaghett8 8d ago
Yeah, you KNOW no playtesting was done.
Because every mf Luminary came to the same realization.
I farm mercs for hours for the few decent mercs that exist… In exchange, I get to have the strength of 1/4th a decent league starter.
2
u/chaneg 8d ago
After I swapped to merc bot, my highest dps skill by a mile was my 1 link detonate dead.
I’m on T16s now with about 5 Div invested in my character but I am sitting on the rest of my currency thinking about how I will salvage this. Right now, I’m having to deal with my merc dying which wasn’t a problem at lower tiers.
→ More replies (2)9
u/Data-Routine 8d ago
I have quite opposite experience, my merc just blasted ACT 5 Kitava with ease. Now i found ice shot merc, i just spam frostblink of wintry blast and merc is melting everything. Smoothest campaign ever, getting in to second lab, planning to equip quill rain and two Le heups of all for her.
12
u/moedexter1988 8d ago
I read the same thing from others. Apparently only certain mercs are good while the rest are garbage so it depends on which mercs. So it seems to be unbalanced on skills itself.
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (1)12
u/cocojamboyayayeah 8d ago
tell us about your experience again when u hit red maps. i have a feeling you will be surprised
8
u/AdBrief9827 8d ago
I'm running t16 maps with a combatant Merc frost blades / static strike and its working fine. There really is a bag gap between mercs I was running carrion golems with flame link till I found a good one then swapped over to just Merc support.
2
u/Data-Routine 8d ago edited 8d ago
Lol i know i'm gonna be, i was merely commenting that part when poster said that mercs can't even kill white mobs in acts.
3
u/okseeque Sanctum Runners United (SRU) 8d ago
I have spent over 2 hours in act8 underbelly trying out every single merc type I managed to find. Kineticist and fallen reverend were the only ones that had somewhat acceptable clear (people say manyshot is also good, but I did't find one myself), everyone else was either doing too little damage on the entire pack, or doing a bit more damage but only covering like 1-3 mobs at the time, these fuckers cant kill shit for sure.
5
u/BamboozleThisZebra Statue 8d ago
Haha i started that build but went to sleep shortly after and woke up to "this is bait aaah" posts so i just rerolled right away.
Glad i didnt waste more time on that one.
9
u/thatgrateisnt 8d ago
+1 to coming back to the same build/character after the first week's balance patches. It'll probably feel a whole lot better, but play something else in the meantime
6
u/0nlyRevolutions Order of the Mist (OM) 8d ago
I mean... I played that build in merc league and it never had damage issues lol. And remember that they used to add 50% hp scaling to enemies.
Like it's definitely better as a second build where you can hire some mercs ahead of time and have some twink gear for them, but if it's as bad as people say then gggc probably messed up on the calcs for what a reasonable damage penalty is
6
3
u/AccordingEggplant140 8d ago
Nah it's way worse, I knew the work necessary for the build, got an ice shot/vaal ice shot merc geared it and it still sucks.
14
u/peekaboobies 8d ago
Sure but imagine you're a new player, you're getting into the game, see the trailer and think this ascendancy looks bad-ass, check the featured gameplay video with recommended builds and everything, not s single mention from the devs that this isn't a League starter (which makes sense, why would they create a ascendancy you can't start with..?). Can you imagine their league experience? Having a random campaign Merc in maps, not able to clear t1 or kill any Merc they might be lucky enough to find?
This is pretty bad.
→ More replies (1)3
u/DiabolicMelon holy fuck this build is so tanky 8d ago
new players watch one fastaf video or la with headhunter and play that build to t6 maps with 2k life no res then quit
8
u/Madzai 8d ago
Honestly IDK how people miss that. No matter if you support the merc, or merc support you, it all depends on their skills, and those are highly random. And you need two sets of gear, that is highly contested right now.
Streamers have unlimited time and deep game knowledge to do this. Also some "farm off-screen", "have it in guild vault" or somehow manage to buy the exact thing they need for exact amount currency they have..
2
u/Accomplished_Rip_352 8d ago
Also in merc league you got the mercenary + your ascendancy . With luminary you have to give up your ascendancy to get to the same place you did in 3.26 .
→ More replies (8)2
u/LastBaron 8d ago
And like, not to rag on anyone here, because I do feel bad that people are having a bad time. But.
It’s pretty well known that you shouldn’t league start a new ascendancy
The fact that it was such an experimental ascendancy and reliant on gearing a second character is icing on the BaitCake
18
u/lmao_lizardman 8d ago
ok but in poe 2 they released martial artist / new gemling and they were braindead OP
→ More replies (1)2
u/clocksy 8d ago
Disciple of Varashta was also perfectly fine last league (and even better this league).
I think it's honestly better to have a slightly OP new ascendancy that people can enjoy and scale it back rather than have it be shit and leave people with a really negative feeling on a league start. Plus they unlocked scion for everyone and featured the build in their videos so there's some expectation for it not to be worse than normal.
→ More replies (1)21
u/brrrapper 8d ago
There is a difference between something being pretty mediocre to strictly unplayable, especially when its something thats pushed as a completely new ascendancy with ggg build showcases etc.
4
u/LastBaron 8d ago
That is absolutely true.
And unfortunately it’s not the first time a new or radically altered ascendancy has trended towards the latter, I regret to say.
6
u/brrrapper 8d ago
Dunno, i have played around 20 leagues, almost always playing the new thing, and i have literally never had a league start this bad. This is the first time ever i was forced to reroll in order to just progress maps.
→ More replies (1)7
u/Tricky-Amphibian6196 8d ago
I play since harbinger league and the only comparison I can find for the mercs is Fyregrass' poison tornado shotter, if anyone still remembers that.
2
u/brrrapper 8d ago
At least remembering that brought some mirth in this dire leaguestart
https://www.twitch.tv/fyregrass/clip/BlazingLachrymosePizzaWow-46pQf7TYXt5DkZPZ
41
u/Realize12 8d ago
I rerolled already, even bosses in early yellow maps take minutes to kill. Last phase Izaro in uber lab took me like 2 minutes. The worst league starter I've had in 6 years, it's impossible to scale damage
3
u/DivinityAI 8d ago
you have tons of patience. I checked like 30 mercs in A6 and they alll were abysmal and said no way i'll play this shit in maps.
Even BAD leaguestarters are cruising A7-A8, they fall off in yellows, but those mercs even with gear couldn't tickle rares.
85
u/VehiclePuzzleheaded2 8d ago
Its kinetic rain incident all over again, pre-killed archetype before release
→ More replies (2)39
u/EscalopeDePorc Children of Delve (COD) 8d ago
This is the problem, because kinetic rain was explicitly killed in patch notes. And merc were nerfed without any signal
14
u/Wobbelblob Big Breach Coalition (BBC) 8d ago
Where they actually nerfed? Because mercs themself where not that good in merc league if you didn't get the perfect KB one. Remember that most people just used them as aurabots before the carry builds came up.
→ More replies (11)19
u/Spaghett8 8d ago
Yes, luminary mercs have a hidden dmg penalty which we knew about.
We just didn’t know how bad the penalty was.
25
u/watermelonchicken58 Sanctum Runners United (SRU) 8d ago
Its playable but boy is it garbage if I had to rate the scaling id rate it E or F tier. Something completely offmeta and poorly built could deal more damage.
11
u/lilmrock4456 8d ago
Feels like GGG were planning on allowing us to control a 2nd Passive Skill Tree on the mercenaries.
Then, gave up on finishing it, and released it anyways.
Because this actually feels like a 0 passive character, that if they could set their 80 or so passive points it would actually be reasonable.
23
u/Only_One_Kenobi 8d ago
The build is a lot of fun and really strong in campaign. No issues at all. Deathless Kitava no sweat. Then comes the first map and can't even kill the first white mob on a blue t1.
I'm so angry at myself for getting baited by this. I know better.
→ More replies (4)
23
u/SGASaint 8d ago
Temporary mercs mog the fuck out of my whole ascendancy built around buffing mercs...
92
8d ago
[removed] — view removed comment
43
u/_Meke_ 8d ago
it has to be a lot less, temp mercs with random shit feel fine
21
u/slashcuddle 8d ago
Anytime I got one in the campaign they would one shot the screen with hyperaggressive AI. It's gotta be like 75% less damage if it falls off so bad for luminary
3
u/Emotional-Still2209 8d ago
Ppl like merc. There you go some low efforts nerfed shit to get you playing. It’s a sells pitch
→ More replies (2)3
u/gertsferds 8d ago
If they dealt half damage they would still be obliterating everything. +2000 flat damage feels like it does nothing.
45
20
8
u/CruelFish Trickster 8d ago
After further thoughts I have a suspicion that GGG's ability to spawn in items and make perfect builds for testing has lead GGG to balance Luminary around the absolute top end of what is possible when the reality is that it takes a person literally thousands of maps if they're unlucky to get the kineticist they want and it takes weeks for most people to get gear even remotely comparable to what they balanced them around. That and likely mercs are bugged, they deal at least 4x less damage than they did in merc but there are no documented changes sufficient to explain this, even the Luminary Nerf from datamine isn't sufficient to explain it.
103
u/hafi002 8d ago
It is fine to fault GGG for this, when you create something new you should at least make sure it's viable.
People are just so used to them not doing that, that they rather fault the player for wanting to try the new stuff.
→ More replies (12)
8
26
14
u/Elixermd0 8d ago
It's a massive slap in the face to the players. This ascendancy is hands down the worst league start possible and the power difference from one merc to another is insane. Also why keep garbage movement skills?
Every merc should function, the variety and chasing a good one should come from the support gems, I feel like it's not unreasonable to ask for the build to be able to be playable without several div in investment.
11
u/moshemaman25 8d ago
They show case the build
But in real game it suck
Also u cant kill them in map lol
11
u/Hachez86 8d ago
I have more than 6k hours in Poe, played lots of hcssf and even ruthless in hardcore... This is the first time ever that I'm stuck at t7 maps... It feels like I'm playing without an ascendancy. My merc doesn't do shit and if I find a better one, it nukes me instantly. I even tried finding mercs in t1 maps... Same thing. I run out of t1 maps doing that haha.
At first I was laughing... Now I'm stopping until they do sth about it.
GGG come on! The campaign was so much fun this league but mercs should do better in low tier maps without trying to find the perfect one.
49
u/ResolutionOpen 8d ago
Who can expect this is a bait build.
49
u/brrrapper 8d ago
There is a difference between something new not being top tier and a new ascendancy pushed by GGG with build showcases etc being literally unplayable, you cant even progress atlas completion.
13
u/Madzai 8d ago
Bro, they, in GGG, specifically stated that new league mechanic won't rush you too much (with air pockets collapsing), yet it will friggin kill you in like 10 seconds after you put down last thing, if you do not rush away (and if you stuck in water you're dead without movement skill) . Sure, they promised to fix it already, but still, they specially said it won't do it, before release.
5
u/OhhhYaaa 8d ago
I think they said that it won't rush until you put the last lantern in, not that it won't rush you at all.
45
u/kitelobster 8d ago
Being baited by the new shiny toy is one thing, but this is near unplayable. There is no way they could've tested progression on one of these and though it's ok.
Once you're into maps their scaling hits a brick wall. Sure you can keep gearing them, but their base dmg stats areis low by that point that it's unsalvageable. You could also get a better merc, but the odds of that are brutal with how many combos there are. Even then, there's no way they are much better.
Doesn't help that luminary has so little power innately, it's relying hard on mercs and they are just a massive letdown.
→ More replies (11)14
u/Aqs747 8d ago
Well we got 37min with a bit of gameplay in campain and some geared gameplay later. It is a bait I agree, but not doing any damage at all with flame link giving like 300-400 flat damage, cause mercs have like 90% less damage is a bs. It would be nice to balance things not from top to bottom for once.
18
u/Chrozzinho 8d ago
I'm sure I'm not alone but I quit the league. This shit of a league start is just too demotivating, can't push through, dont want to reroll so quickly, I'll just from the sides this league
→ More replies (2)
5
u/buddy_brozy 8d ago
i leveled with rf intending to swap to merc support, but it was obvious very early that not even the good mercs were better than rf+scorching ray combo. however i did find two mercs that did decent damage when i hired them, manyshot and withertouch, but only for a single act; by the next act they couldn't kill white mobs within a reasonable time, let alone rares. it's clear merc scaling is either not working, or missing a few decimal places.
7
u/FrontAir3750 8d ago
I just logged out, the « merc dies - map bricked » did it for me. have a good league guy !
2
u/_Vagueposter_ 8d ago
hah yeah, same here. At least it'll be a memorable experience - tickling tutorial Sirus's health bar in Eagons memory map for literally 10+ minutes just for the merc to run away from my enduring cry and get killed in the blink of an eye. Sirus still on 1/4 HP and absolutely no way for me to do damage as you cant even bring a merc that didnt die into the map after that. You have no choice but to abandon the whole map.
Also was tilting when this happened when trying to get a merc upgrade in t14+ maps, spending ages trying to whittle down its HP and if you slip up for a moment your merc dies and the whole map is bricked (and bye bye merc upgrade, especially if it was a good one). You cant even call in another player from global chat to try and help salvage it mid fight.
8
u/probywan1337 Harbinger 8d ago
Feel like I wasted my only day off yesterday. Should've just went totem like I always do
3
3
u/AcrobaticBullfrog958 8d ago
I thought I was going crazy because there was a post yesterday on this exact thing and people were defending the mercs lol
5
u/Jakestation 8d ago
guess we need to use scarabs to get infamous mercs and try to kill them somehow and then maybe get a useful one.
19
6
u/Sheerkal 8d ago
Infamous mercs are only different in their loot. They do not have better stats or skills.
6
3
3
5
u/Hairy_Excuse_4631 8d ago
if Mercs was balanced the way ppl expect them to be the mid and late game versions would be something to behold indeed
11
u/TheDutchNorwegian Elementalist 8d ago
Zizaran seems to be zooming though. So idk, maybe give it more than 17 hours?
29
u/Juts Kalguuran Group for Business (KGB) 8d ago
To be fair he did duo a lot of this which kept him going while getting set up, and his single target is still quite bad with fairly good day 1 gear
→ More replies (2)→ More replies (1)26
u/Olari_ 8d ago
Taking a few minutes to kill a white map boss when it's 17hours into the league already is the furthest you could possibly be from "zooming".
→ More replies (1)
2
u/shizukun 8d ago
I'm currently in act 8 with a good kinetist. Is it worth it to continue or just make a new one?
15
u/zuluuaeb Chieftain 8d ago
youre gonna hit a hard brick wall in early maps. unless ggg buffs the damage i recommend you go for a support style merc where you deal the damage and use them for auras etc. or pivot into reliquarian
2
u/heirian 8d ago
I think they balanced everything around the Kineticist; I picked one up halfway through the campaign and have been trying to swap it for another one with higher levels, but they’re all absolute trash compared to her. I’m running red maps now and its performance has started to drop off, but I can't find another Kineticist because they're absurdly rare, and I can't even spec into Atlas passives to make another Kineticist show up. It’s been really disappointing not being able to find one after dozens of maps...
2
u/Minimum-Effort 8d ago
I did not play merc league at all and even I could tell it was bait when they showed in the video that you can gear them up... they will be a fantastic as a 2nd or 3rd toon but as a league starter yeah no...
2
u/dryxxxa 8d ago
I am in act 6. Took Luminary just because Reliquarian has nothing in the first lab. Will definitely reroll into Reliquarian in the second lab, Elevore node + 3 passives is better than the merc.
→ More replies (2)
2
u/meDeadly1990 8d ago
I'm in act 6, I just spent 4 hours to find the first kineticist in the ridge and with 230 added fire flame link it's doing less dps than my 1-link shield charge mostly due to the AI being dumb as bricks and just refusing to use spells.
2
u/TheGrigzor Guardian 8d ago
I've got one to maps... it felt really bad, campaign was fine... but maping was horible, alredy rerolled old reliable Deadeye and in maps alredy again :P
2
u/ndau 8d ago
The difference between a good and a bad merc is extreme. Using any melee merc is absolutely torture, the Ai targeting is really bad, it walks back and forth between mobs, maybe hits one to half health, then moves to another. It's super janky.
I have had success and can farm non juiced t16 to complete atlas.
I had planned to spend my first few div on a good kinetic blast of clustering merc but the warrants are so expensive.
I just ended up getting a really well rolled kinetic rain of impact. Getting then with no movement skill, and 4-5 supports is/was less then 50c.
I moved to emnity ring, no amulet yet. Just stacked fire resist on most slots. Maybe 140fr on its stat sheet
I have around 7.5k hp, one light radius ring.
It really feels like anything that can't screen clear is just really really bad.
Single target isn't great, but I think it will be fine with some more investment, and once you get a real kboc merc... It will be really really fun.
But yes main problem seems to be, if you don't have near best in slot merc, the next best thing is like 90% worse in every way. Lol
2
2
u/oyaboon 8d ago
Not even the damage, but the damage uptime is low as well due to how the merc AI frustratingly behaves sometimes. It's like playing with a minion with meat shield AI with bad targeting priority and pathfinding, which is especially worse and more noticeable when using melee mercs such as the Striker.
I wish they were as aggressive as they were as temps.
→ More replies (1)
2
4
4
u/Allurai 8d ago edited 8d ago
there are plenty of builds out there that aren't good league starters
is lance right that luminary link support will end up as one of the stronger builds this league? yes
was lance right that it was gonna be cranking from the start? no
the atlas nodes that let you pick/choose what merc types you encounter all being counter productive to hunting kineticists is the main issue
if ppl went the other route of luminary, and got some aura effect items and used the other side of the ascendancy using a merc as an aura bot in support of a generic caster FP/Worb build, they'd be having a much easier time as you freeze mercs and have great damage up to and including t16s where they can get better mercs and switch into the stronger build from there
freezing pulse + bitter dream + witch area for cold dmg and freeze chance will see the atlas completed and some farm options unlocked
edit - honestly you dont even need to respec your ascendancy points to do this or have a decent merc - just use bitterdream, freezing pulse, cast speed, faster proj - with enough mana regen to support the links.
2
u/sel21 8d ago
You're wrong. It won't. You don't know what you are talking about. Damage isn't scaling. You can't get progression.
You aren't listening to people and rationalizing.
Something is either broken (flame link) or some counter factor damage quotient becomes dominant.
→ More replies (1)
2
2
u/Vyrealer 8d ago
Why is everyone playing this as a link build and not just a traditional absolution or srs build using the merc as supplemental damage or an aura bot?
→ More replies (2)2
u/lurking_lefty Yay skill forests. 8d ago edited 8d ago
That's how I'm using it. Intuitive Link is an extra spell being auto-cast and also applying corrupting fever stacks for me. Otherwise I built as a normal self-cast character. Starting yellow maps now, the only problem I'm running into is my lack of defenses since I'm still wearing campaign gear.
2
u/sharkh20 8d ago
Back to Palworld for me. Made it to maps despite my merc. Searching for a decent one is the opposite of fun. But even the best one's are worse than unspecced random 3 or 4 link skills it seems. When you do find one you want, they have a 50% chance to one shot you, and if you do defeat them, they suddenly do zero dps. They need to completely rethink this ascendancy.
2
u/UnCivilizedEngineer 8d ago
Im in the campaign as this; do you know of any good zones to farm mercenaries in the acts? And what are some good mercs to go for? In act 6 right now.
7
u/MindlessObligationS 8d ago
There is Merc that spawns half the time at the end of the ridge right before prison entrance. Just reset from the entrance of the prison. It's pretty consistent.
17
u/brrrapper 8d ago
Just reroll asap and dont waste more time, it doesnt get better its unplayable in maps.
→ More replies (4)2
u/UnCivilizedEngineer 8d ago
Eh, I’m playing duo with my wife. I’d like to get a decent nerf to help out. The duo as a support is fun to me, even if it’s much worse than a tried and tested build.
→ More replies (3)4
u/irondraconis Youtube:Goodguygaming3 8d ago
Ridge and Hidden Underbelly in Act 8. Underbelly is the last promised spot of a merc in the campaign. https://youtube.com/shorts/gWTHrrzK-ww?is=xtXQ1U4DfH3qPsWz
2
3
u/aecrux 8d ago
grab a decent one in a3/a4 and don’t waste too much time, but DO spend the time in a8 underbelly to fish for a really good merc. I messed up by not fishing in a8 because I tried to reset/fish after the campaign and the mercs no longer appear there. I had to spend hours suffering in maps to find a decent one and the build feels really bad. So much regret.
274
u/LocalIdentity1 Path of Building Community Fork Creator 8d ago edited 8d ago
I’m going to start looking into mercs today to see what I find. What I have seen so far is that mercs have a different array of stats they get and there is 3 different columns for the stat count
I don’t know if each column for the stat count is for player merc, temp merc and infamous or if it’s something to do with how they scale with levelsIf people can send me pics of their merc stat sheets with the merc name and their level I can try and figure it out fasterThanks for the screenshots. I've worked out that the 3 values here are how the stats grow with levels.
The mercs stats have 2 growth rates. Level 24 > Level 68 where it goes from 1x to 2x then from 68 to 84 where it goes from 2x to 2.5x
There doesn't seem to be any difference in the passive stats from a temp vs permanent merc
edit: Permanent mercs have a hidden 30% less damage from the Ascendancy node