Arfmor VS Evasion VS Energy Shield?

[Bongoboy]

I am kinda new, played when POE launches for some while and stopped for a looong time. So now i give it another go.

I played 2 toons to level 50'ish already and both have the same problem. One Toon was a Witch as Summoner and the other was a Ranger on Bow.
The Witch had as much Energy Shield as she had Life, yet she would get 1shot by the boss in act 4 and 5. I have the same issue with the Ranger, which uses Evasion gear exclusively.

So i checked what all 3 of those do, Armor supposed Reduces Physical Damage taken, Evasion supposed let you Evade Physical Attacks.
The way i understand Evasion, if you got 50% Evasion then one hit misses you and every second hit Hits.
Eneregy Shield is, supposed like HP and takes a while to start regenerating.

But, wearing the apropriate Level gear, my Evasion cant get to 50%, which is bad. In order to be useful it would need to be at least 70-75% ... or do i miss something here? I mean you WILL always take FULL Damage from the Hits you not Evade?
That would mean Armor is much more Useful, as it Reduces Damage taken, but if every hit actuallt Hits i am not that sure how good it is then.

So here the question, HOW am i supposed to build my Toon? Is it possible to just go for ONE Major Stat? Or do i need to diversify, get some Armor, some Evasion ... as pure Evasion doesn't seem to work out and i doubt that pure Armor does.

[Ser Pounce]

First of all, Bosses after act 4 and 5 mainly do chaos damage, which bypass energy shield (with one exception due to a node in the skill tree). Then, having lot of evasion won't be enough to keep you alive. It's always good to have some armor to go with the evasion. And even more important : you need hp. I can't stress this enough : Life node in the tree are VERY important and life on items is too. Having lot of armor/evasion/block chance won't be enough to save you by themselve in the end game, you'll still need a good chunk of HP (talking about lvl 80-90 here : 5k hp isn't too bad but it's not that great either).

It's better to mix your defensive tools. You can go with armor or evasion only (or have both) but you will need HP and life leech (and even block chance if you play shield or dual weild) to stay alive. And resistances are very important too. Especially after act 5 and 10, since both of those acts lower your resistances (-30% at the end of act 5, -60 at the end of act 10).

[Hexo Mia]

Originally posted by The Pale Horseman:

First of all, Bosses after act 4 and 5 mainly do chaos damage, which bypass energy shield (with one exception due to a node in the skill tree). Then, having lot of evasion won't be enough to keep you alive. It's always good to have some armor to go with the evasion. And even more important : you need hp. I can't stress this enough : Life node in the tree are VERY important and life on items is too. Having lot of armor/evasion/block chance won't be enough to save you by themselve in the end game, you'll still need a good chunk of HP (talking about lvl 80-90 here : 5k hp isn't too bad but it's not that great either).

It's better to mix your defensive tools. You can go with armor or evasion only (or have both) but you will need HP and life leech (and even block chance if you play shield or dual weild) to stay alive. And resistances are very important too. Especially after act 5 and 10, since both of those acts lower your resistances (-30% at the end of act 5, -60 at the end of act 10).

speaking of HP, is a Chaos Inoculation Build still viable for end game?

[Ser Pounce]

Originally posted by Roderick✪Legend:

Originally posted by The Pale Horseman:

First of all, Bosses after act 4 and 5 mainly do chaos damage, which bypass energy shield (with one exception due to a node in the skill tree). Then, having lot of evasion won't be enough to keep you alive. It's always good to have some armor to go with the evasion. And even more important : you need hp. I can't stress this enough : Life node in the tree are VERY important and life on items is too. Having lot of armor/evasion/block chance won't be enough to save you by themselve in the end game, you'll still need a good chunk of HP (talking about lvl 80-90 here : 5k hp isn't too bad but it's not that great either).

It's better to mix your defensive tools. You can go with armor or evasion only (or have both) but you will need HP and life leech (and even block chance if you play shield or dual weild) to stay alive. And resistances are very important too. Especially after act 5 and 10, since both of those acts lower your resistances (-30% at the end of act 5, -60 at the end of act 10).

speaking of HP, is a Chaos Inoculation Build still viable for end game?

As far as I know, yes. You can totally go for it without a problem. But viable, meaning efficient in a build of the actual meta, I don't know. I'm not an expert at all. Don't hesitate to check on the official forum for a more complete answer.
Plus, I mostly play physical DPS build (Maybe one day I will play with spell or elemental damage...)

[Bongoboy]

Well i know i need HP, but i not see enough nodes in the Tree. Yes there are some, but in the Witches, Rangers and Shadows parts of the tree it looks dry. Compared to Duelist, Marauder and Templar.

Yeah, i guess the tree makes you want to grab certain things(like all Frenzy Talents or Block Cnances) that interest you, but in the end what you should do is mainly stay in your part of the Skill Tree and grab some offensive from there that fits your Choice of Weapons(Bow, 1h&Shield or Dualwield for Ranger)and then invest into Resistances, Life and grab those golden nodes that give allot for 1 point.

For armor Choice, it's sad that you just can not roll with a pure Evasion build. Kind of a Flaw if you ask me. Whats the point to have pure Evasion armor, if you cant push it to 65-70% easily? I mean without any real "Armor" you not have the ... Armor to reduce ANY damage, thus you would HAVE TO Evade alamost all attacks.
Its good that you can block with 1hShield, 2h and Dual Wield but again, even IF you push the block chance to 50% that don't save you either.
And Energy Shield can be bypassed by Chaos Dammage, plus since you have ZERO Armor you will take full hits like the Evasion one.

Why build in pure Armor, Evasion and Energy Shield items in the first place, if you can't build a Toon purely around one of those? The best is basically to get Armor/Eneregy Shield or Armor?Evasion ... or grab that "Iron Reflexes" which then transforms all your Evasion into Armor. Not ideal, but hey! What is.

On the Ranger i got so much trouble to stay alive, i have "Acrobatics" and "Phase Actobatics", 40% Dodge chance VS Physical and 30% Dodge chance VS Magic, inclusing 50% Evasion, doesns'thelp allot. Certain Rares in part to Act 6 ... still 2 shot me.


I would really wish thiss Game had a Battle Log like MMOs have it, or some kind of indicator when i evade something or when i am hit.

[Drake]

Rule number one about defence in POE : never build around a single defence type. NEVER.

A build needs at least 3 or 4 layers, at the very least.

First example, an evasion build. Making an evasion build doesn't mean maxing evasion. An evasion build uses evasion armor, then you need HP, a lot of it, aim for 180-200% on the tree (at least 5-6k by level 80), counting jewels ( if you're on the dex side or the tree, picking 4 jewel nodes for hp jewels is really what you want, especially now in abyss league with the eye jewels and their flat HP).
Then you need acrobatics/phase acrobatics or block/spell block (depending if you use a shield or not), it will kick in if evasion fails. You will also need life leech/life on hit to keep you HP up.
Then 2 other layers new people usually miss, the gems and the flasks. A defence gem setup is mandatory in POE, the cast when damage taken/immortal call/increased duration is the one usually used, you can throw in arctic armor or molten shell, a movement skill to manually dodge stuff (will save you more times than you would know).
About flasks, for an evasion build, you need at least a basalt flask, that's mandatory, a basalt flask is what will keep you alive in case you get hit by a big physical hit.

Then in your first post, you said evasion goes against physical attacks. NO. Evasion goes against all attacks, physical, elemental and chaos, it just doesn't counter spells. Armor goes against physical damage (attack and spell). Energy shield can soak anything but chaos damage (attack and spell).

Also forget stuff like iron reflexe unless you know exactly the maths behind, that's a trap. Armor is one of the least useful defences in the game, it only works against trash mobs, because the heavier the hit it, the more it will penetrate armor, doesn't matter how much you have. When playing an armor build, you actually just need the armor stat on your stuff, you never pick armor nodes on the tree, you only pick HP, HP regen or life leech. Then you take a stibnite flask so that you blind nearby mobs (blind gives you an evasion bonus depending on how less you have, if you have 0 you gain 50%, if you have 50% you gain +25% so 75%).

[Ser Pounce]

Originally posted by Lithariel:

Well i know i need HP, but i not see enough nodes in the Tree. Yes there are some, but in the Witches, Rangers and Shadows parts of the tree it looks dry. Compared to Duelist, Marauder and Templar.

Yeah, i guess the tree makes you want to grab certain things(like all Frenzy Talents or Block Cnances) that interest you, but in the end what you should do is mainly stay in your part of the Skill Tree and grab some offensive from there that fits your Choice of Weapons(Bow, 1h&Shield or Dualwield for Ranger)and then invest into Resistances, Life and grab those golden nodes that give allot for 1 point.

One of your mistake is here : Unless you're looking for something special, you rarely stay in one tree. It's really worth to spend a few points to get to those big life nodes. Offensive nodes are important for sure but fof 121 points (for lvl 100), it's only around 20-30 invested in them. Ranger and shadow tree are tricky because you need a lot of investement in both points and gears to have enough survivability. On the other hand, they can really have a high DPS with some decent items (That's why a lot of people like the Duelist tho : his tree is quite versatile)/

Originally posted by Lithariel:

Its good that you can block with 1hShield, 2h and Dual Wield but again, even IF you push the block chance to 50% that don't save you either.
And Energy Shield can be bypassed by Chaos Dammage, plus since you have ZERO Armor you will take full hits like the Evasion one.

The 50% block chance won't save you by hitself most of the time but it does make you quite tanky actually. But it won't be enough by itself.
People who build around energy shield tend to go for chaos inoculation. Otherwise it's better to just get HP.

Originally posted by Lithariel:

I would really wish thiss Game had a Battle Log like MMOs have it, or some kind of indicator when i evade something or when i am hit.

It would be useful for sure ! The learning curve of the game is hard but it's worth it. I got 300+ hours in it and still feel like there's a ton of things I'm totally ignorant of.

[mss73055]

ES is viable in end game, but you will not reach it. The game is balanced, or even nerfed, for gear of old what new players cannot buy, cannot craft and cannot find.

The biggest potion is about 4000. Around that point ES becomes an option.

There is difference between "end game of streamers" and "you having fun playing this game".
The way to fun:
1 **runspeed**
2 attack speed (note spell echo and multistrike do reduce your mobility)
3 health, resistance
4 armour
5 evasion