Blood Mage is still grossly under-powered IMO

[JayCakes]

I have 100 hours into my first character and just reached ACT 1 cruel . I rolled a blood mage, Mistake #1. this character had absolutely no reason being released in anywhere close to this state. Minions still feel clunky and awkward to scale. Unfortunately, this is the only viable leveling build as far as I can tell. Infernal looks strong but blood mage has been absolute torture. this class feels extremely half baked and punishing even after the 30% buff to most if not all of the non-minion skills. stacking health seems to provide very little to no protection against damage and is extremely under powered when compared to stacking energy shield but all of your spells cost life to cast, so you have no choice. Honestly don't roll witch in my opinion until something changes. Whats the point in playing a character that is balanced-ish in the endgame if leveling without someone carrying you through the entire game and buying gear constantly. Every character in the game should be able to clear the story and leveling portion of the game without external help, being strong in the endgame is secondary if i cannot get to the end of the game.

Fixes that i can see that shouldn't impact end game balance too much.

Curses are SOOO weak early and just delay how fast you can apply your damage
-I think this could be fixed with a way to increase spirit without gear modifiers. this could be a use for dexterity for magic based classes as accuracy seems almost irrelevant for mages.

Crit feels very underwhelming even with a 250+ dmg multiplier and over 1,500 dps (chaos). bosses and rare mobs barely get tickled. Crit feels more like a proc mechanic rather than a way to increase damage.

Physical spells are just complete trash. its either long channels or comparatively small AOE, and a lack of CC as Pin seems very weak. unfortunately there seems to be no payoff to these downsides. the summons from unearth are nice but the damage across the board is very low for physical spells let alone trying to get time / space to apply said damage
- I think this could be mitigated by making pin interrupt something instead of just a root
- Make Physical spells the a much higher bleed / poison magnitude compared chaos damage. I think this would both make the class and spell type both unique and viable.

More in-depth skill / support gem information would be very nice ex: (dmg stack order) (what constitutes a presence and what is the range) (what other spells spread on Contagion proc and other similar skill / support gem interactions)

Other POVs would be greatly appreciated. This game feels extremely unapproachable in this early access state, especially if you have not played ARPGs very extensively. Since Early Access is meant for feedback and fixes I thought I would share my opinion.

TLDR : don't make a Blood Mage unless you have a LOT of resources to eat, and expect bosses to take a while to take down This is my opinion after trying 4 different build routes and ~ 6x the resources of the sorceress only to need help clearing every damage check style of interaction in the game. Anything a blood mages should do well, another character does better with less resources.

PLS FIX TEXTURE LOADING CRASHES!! Id rather not see the texture than get booted from my trial of chaos 5 times before I got lucky enough to not crash by the time I got to the loot room. No, the crashes are not consistent, I've noticed it with any texture update : auras, picking up items, using currencies on items, loading into new zones, using an attack, and even just mobs walking onto my screen. I have verified game files, re-installed, and checked all my drivers / bios with no improvement.

[Desync]

You do know this is EARLY ACCESS right? You are basically paying them to TEST out POE 2 in an unfinished nowhere near ready for release state. That's what Tencent does with their EAs. It'll be fixed before ACTUAL RELEASE.