Last Epoch - time travel action-RPG

[abija]

Crafting could also be used to replace affixes/bonuses as opposed to improving them.

You didn't even bother to read about crafting at all before starting this bullshit right? If you get a great drop you don't improve on it. Crafting is for "could have been good if" items.

 

[Lacrymas]

Oh, I would technically be fine with the crafting if there was no RNG involved, don't get me wrong.

 

[Grunker]

Crafting could also be used to replace affixes/bonuses as opposed to improving them.

You didn't even bother to read about crafting at all before starting this bullshit right?

Fake news. By items being useless and you just needing that one good base then you had your perfect item, what Lacrymas ACTUALLY meant was that items were good and you needed a really, really good drop.

 

[Lacrymas]

You do improve the affixes, soooooo. You can also reroll them hoping to improve them when they are all max tier or whatever.

 

[Peachcurl]

Oh, I would technically be fine with the crafting if there was no RNG involved, don't get me wrong.

While I'm not as bothered by it as you seem to be, I do also prefer a deterministic system for crafting. I'd even go so far as say that it'd be trivial to transform the existing system in LE to a deterministic one. But that probably won't happen.

If that's a dealbreaker, may I instead suggest to play some Diablo version, Titan Quest, or Grim Dawn? They have determinstic crafting systems (mostly, there are some small deviations, where minor properties are randomised).

And keep your distance from PoE, it's much much worse in terms of crafting randomness. Can't stress this enough.
Warhammer 40k martyr inquisitor is also somewhat randomised, though again not as bad as PoE, and probably a less interesting system than LE has.

 

[abija]

You do improve the affixes, soooooo. You can also reroll them hoping to improve them when they are all max tier or whatever.

Are you aware of: "Affixes have 7 tiers, with tier 1 being the lowest and tier 7 being the highest. However, only tier 1 through 5 can be created through crafting. Tier 6 and 7 affixes must be on the item when it drops."

 

[Lacrymas]

Oh, I would technically be fine with the crafting if there was no RNG involved, don't get me wrong.

If that's a dealbreaker, may I instead suggest to play some Diablo version, Titan Quest, or Grim Dawn? They have determinstic crafting systems (mostly, there are some small deviations, where minor properties are randomised).

And keep your distance from PoE, it's much much worse in terms of crafting randomness. Can't stress this enough.
Warhammer 40k martyr inquisitor is also somewhat randomised, though again not as bad as PoE, and probably a less interesting system than LE has.

I'm playing both Titan Quest and Grim Dawn right now, lol. But yeah, I've touched PoE once for a bit and never again, that's the reason I'm averse to crafting RNG in hack and slashers.

Are you aware of: "Affixes have 7 tiers, with tier 1 being the lowest and tier 7 being the highest. However, only tier 1 through 5 can be created through crafting. Tier 6 and 7 affixes must be on the item when it drops."

I didn't know this. Interesting.

 

[Lacrymas]

I caved in and got it because I wanted a break from GD/TQ. PoE and Diablo 2/3/4 don't interest me much. Diablo 2 would interest me if it had massive changes, but that's neither here nor there. I created an Acolyte (another surprise, I know), but her initial skill line-up is very strange and clunky if you want to go ranged caster. Marrow Shards are enough on their own and rip through hordes of enemies, but there's no way to synergize them with other skills in a satisfying way. Skelingtons are meh and just there, Rip Blood and Hungering Souls are yet another projectile that are clunky to weave together with Marrow Shards. Wandering Spirits is ok, but it can be used in any build. I'm thinking of respecing to melee Harvest/Bone Curse. Also, masochist mode isn't available before completing the campaign once, so the game is kinda easy overall.

I got 3 uniques before reaching lvl 6, so that was a surprise too. Is there a single reason to play in offline mode?

 

[Lacrymas]

After realizing the mobs are severely undertuned, I decided to start a new acolyte on hardcore and I haven't died since even though I was using a very dumb Marrow Shards build up until lvl 25 or so before switching to a Hungering Souls/Wandering Spirits/Drain Life/Spirit Plague/Wraithform build. Drain Life is kooky strong. Since the mobs actually are severely undertuned, there's little reason to pick up any +damage nodes in your passive trees, so I just went all out +vitality/health and am virtually immortal. Wraithform is also disgustingly strong because it essentially keeps you from dying as long as you can manage its health decay (which is easy due to the aforementioned kooky Drain Life). This is the easiest hardcore challenge I've even tried and I don't think there's any reason to play softcore because of it. Hopefully they go back and rebalance the whole thing.

 

[Spike]

I was getting annoyed with your posts and then you shit on PoE so you're okay in my book.

 

[Lacrymas]

I finished the campaign on hardcore -

Even though it's technically my second character, my first died while I was alt tabbed in an empty room and the game decided to spawn mobs on me. Soooo, overall impressions are mixed, maybe even slightly leaning towards negative. The build variety everyone seems to praise is mostly an illusion due to the campaign being so ridiculously easy (Lagon and Majasa are the only fights where you can potentially die if you aren't paying attention). There are some must-have abilities in each mastery (Death Seal and Reaper Form in the case of Lich, you simply can't be effective without them) and the leaderboards are populated by the same builds for each mastery. Technically every hack and slasher has meta builds, but in actually good hack and slashers like Grim Dawn you have different types of content that is appropriate for varying quality builds. This one realistically only has Monoliths of Fate (the campaign is a joke), the arena seems to be thrown in there as a low-effort alternative, which require builds with specific qualities.

Once you get a good base item which to upgrade via crafting, it's very hard to find an upgrade for a long time, but that doesn't particularly bother me much because I'm used to twinking out my characters and going entire playthroughs without upgrades. The crafting RNG is there just so you aren't kitted out in the best possible gear constantly, which is indeed an issue with this system. Prioritizing health and resistances is your best bet on hardcore because the mobs have very low hp and you don't need +damage for quite a while.

plot details

The map is arguably worse than Grim Dawn's and lacks memorable landmarks. A standout is the very brief flight with the giant eagle. The writing is meh but I did like how you fight future versions of past characters. That seems to be inspired by Soul Reaver where your brother vampires are mutated beyond recognition in the future. Speaking of time, the time traveling seems a bit barebones and eras outside of Divine and Immortal are severely underused. The most interesting and fun aspect of the game is the immortal empire, it would've been far better had the game focused on how the world turns from what it is in the Divine Era into the undead empire. Prediction for how the story will evolve - it will turn out you are the problem because of killing or weakening the old gods, or the void seeps into the world from the time rifts you create with the last epoch artifact. I'm also interested in finding out who the immortal emperor is. Too bad they killed off Alric (who is gay?), he's the only character we spend more time with, not that he's particularly engaging or fleshed out.

At this point in time, ol' reliables in this genre like Grim Dawn, Titan Quest or Diablo 2 (if you are into that sort of thing) are still a better choice imo. I don't see myself playing much more until the game actually comes out, maybe I'll make a mage just to try it because I got a lot of uniques for a fire build, but that's it. Even then, I doubt they will/can do much more up until release. The biggest miss for me in this game is ironically the item system. A huge part of why I like certain hack and slashers is how you get cool unique items throughout your leveling and you start fantasizing how you'll use them for your next character. This game's itemization, however, revolves around generic stat stick items you upgrade with the crafting system to get bigger numbers. Very few uniques are better than generic items and most of the reason for using them is how they change the functionality of certain skills. Which is cool and all, but that's not only a rare occurrence it's also very hit and miss, most uniques don't have good effects or are horribly itemized even if they do, so you are better off using generic items.


TL;DR: 5/10

 

[mediocrepoet]

ol' reliables in this genre like ... Titan Quest

I really don't get how anyone likes Titan Quest. You can stand still spamming attack and just potion if your health gets low. It's like watching a screensaver. Does it get better at some point?

 

[Lacrymas]

ol' reliables in this genre like ... Titan Quest

I really don't get how anyone likes Titan Quest. You can stand still spamming attack and just potion if your health gets low. It's like watching a screensaver. Does it get better at some point?

You literally can not do that in Titan Quest though? Unless you are playing a class with the Defense mastery in it maybe or are talking about the very beginning of the game. You will die if you just stand there and tank mobs by the time you reach Egypt.

 

[mediocrepoet]

ol' reliables in this genre like ... Titan Quest

I really don't get how anyone likes Titan Quest. You can stand still spamming attack and just potion if your health gets low. It's like watching a screensaver. Does it get better at some point?

You literally can not do that in Titan Quest though? Unless you are playing a class with the Defense mastery in it maybe or are talking about the very beginning of the game. You will die if you just stand there and tank mobs by the time you reach Egypt.

That could be. I was bored to tears by the end of Greece and quit in the playthrough where I made it the furthest. Usually I'd quit by the Grecian coast for the same reason.

 

[Lacrymas]

That could be. I was bored to tears by the end of Greece and quit in the playthrough where I made it the furthest. Usually I'd quit by the Grecian coast for the same reason.

Then don't even try Last Epoch, the entire campaign is story mode.

 

[Spike]

ol' reliables in this genre like ... Titan Quest

I really don't get how anyone likes Titan Quest. You can stand still spamming attack and just potion if your health gets low. It's like watching a screensaver. Does it get better at some point?

You literally can not do that in Titan Quest though? Unless you are playing a class with the Defense mastery in it maybe or are talking about the very beginning of the game. You will die if you just stand there and tank mobs by the time you reach Egypt.

That could be. I was bored to tears by the end of Greece and quit in the playthrough where I made it the furthest. Usually I'd quit by the Grecian coast for the same reason.

I have had the same experience with Titan Quest. I dunno man, with Diablo 2 I was hooked from the very first screen, the first strum from the OST. The first time I hit a fallen with my little barb axe. Titan Quest I remember just zoning out and just thinking man this is a cool attempt but it isn't it.

 

[Lacrymas]

Titan Quest's campaign (outside of act 3) is better than Diablo 2's. As for the gameplay, Titan Quest is harder than D2 and a big reason people like it is how you can freely combine 2 masteries to create whatever you want. Then you start getting some cool gear and that naturally makes you think up of other builds which can use these items. Diablo 2 is all about rushing through the difficulties while using the same runewords and then do Baal runs forever.

 

[Spike]

Titan Quest's campaign (outside of act 3) is better than Diablo 2's. As for the gameplay, Titan Quest is harder than D2 and a big reason people like it is how you can freely combine 2 masteries to create whatever you want. Then you start getting some cool gear and that naturally makes you think up of other builds which can use these items. Diablo 2 is all about rushing through the difficulties while using the same runewords and then do Baal runs forever.

"Diablo 2 is all about rushing through the difficulties while using the same runewords and then do Baal runs forever."
Yes.

 

[Zeltak]

Titan Quest's campaign (outside of act 3) is better than Diablo 2's. As for the gameplay, Titan Quest is harder than D2 and a big reason people like it is how you can freely combine 2 masteries to create whatever you want. Then you start getting some cool gear and that naturally makes you think up of other builds which can use these items. Diablo 2 is all about rushing through the difficulties while using the same runewords and then do Baal runs forever.

Your D2 bias is so funny. Runewords fundamentally breaking balance took more than 2 years after D2:LoD was released and making comparisons to end-game state now that the game is completely solved is banal. Titan Quest was boring from the first patch and that never changed.

 

[Lacrymas]

It isn't the year 2000 anymore, so saying how Diablo 2 was better at release is moot, and runewords taking 2 years after LoD to break balance means the game has been a disaster for 20 years now. Titan Quest has never been boring and it's still eminently playable to this day without being trivialized by subsequent power creep.

 

[Reever]

Yeah, I also tried like 3 times to get into TQ and it bored me to tears. It's probably the campaign but also the skill tree doesn't really gel with me. I have the same problem with Grim Dawn.

 

[InD_ImaginE]

Greece part of TQ is easily the worst because it combines the "map too big, too much trash mob" of TQ with "this whole chapter is extended tutorial, the enemy is ezpz"

Game does get better after but yeah, the first Chapter of TQ is just brainlessly boring

 

[Zeltak]

It isn't the year 2000 anymore, so saying how Diablo 2 was better at release is moot, and runewords taking 2 years after LoD to break balance means the game has been a disaster for 20 years now. Titan Quest has never been boring and it's still eminently playable to this day without being trivialized by subsequent power creep.

Pre 1.10 can still be played and D2 at that state is leagues above TQ in every category of game design. Sounds like you got trade scammed in Lut Gholein bar 15 years ago and never recovered.

 

[mediocrepoet]

Yeah, I also tried like 3 times to get into TQ and it bored me to tears. It's probably the campaign but also the skill tree doesn't really gel with me. I have the same problem with Grim Dawn.

Grim Dawn is significantly better than TQ, I tend to bounce off of GD mid-campaign, but I actually finished the OC once (the last time I played it). Still need to do the expansions at some point though.

I think GD is probably a better ARPG than Last Epoch, but LE is prettier. LE's setting is kind of cool with the "dark Chrono Trigger" thing, but the storyline was retarded at least before the Act 1 revamp. Probably still is, but I haven't played it since that came out.

 

[abija]

LE is prettier? Idk, I had a wierd feeling it was mostly made with store bought assets. The character models aren't great either and the last update did more harm than good.