Defence>DPS

[Dev3ko]

Well, Season 2 of Last Epoch hasn't really changed the overall approach to the game—defense is still far more important than raw DPS. Pure DPS builds just don't make much sense, especially considering the boss mechanics where enemies gain a damage shield every time you take off 25% of their health.

Many offensive skills have underwhelming scaling, and most DPS skills share nearly identical coefficients, which discourages creative or high-risk builds. Just look at the current meta—most popular builds are 90% defense and only 10% offense. That’s part of the reason why some players claim the game feels too easy.

Many players choose classes with passive trees that offer strong defensive options, which also convert that defense into damage. It’s an efficient strategy that feels heavily incentivized. What really surprised me, though, is how Mage and its subclasses have a lot of passives that trigger effects when casting high-cost spells—yet sustaining mana in longer fights is a nightmare.

Pretty much 99% of caster builds are forced to rely on Focus and autocasting spells during channeling, which severely limits build variety. The only form of mana regeneration available is percentage-based, with no flat "+X mana per second" regeneration that could help define the identity of casters. So you're basically forced into a pure Focus setup, which kills off a lot of interesting possibilities. Why go through all the hassle when you can just follow the meta?

And regarding DPS itself—even in endgame, it's not as relevant if you're running around as an unstoppable tank who doesn’t even need to dodge. Since beta, not much has changed. The trend is the same: some classes got reworks and minor updates, but it’s far from enough. Others haven’t received any real support since beta.

Just take a look at popular build websites—it's easy to spot which classes have potential and which ones have been completely ignored. I understand the concept of meta builds—it’s a common theme in ARPGs—but it would be great if the devs showed some love to the forgotten ones that are just collecting dust in the corner.

Boss Shielding: Fighting Emperor of Corpses or God Hunter Argentus becomes a test of endurance, not damage, because their phase mechanics negate burst DPS.

Defensive Meta Builds: Ward-focused Lich, Retaliation Paladin, or Frostbite Shaman—all heavily defensive with only modest DPS.

Mage Mana Issue: A Runemaster using expensive sigils and spells can’t sustain mana without Focus, which locks them into predictable rotations.

Build Diversity Problem: Spellblade has fun melee concepts, but suffers in endgame due to lack of support and underwhelming scaling compared to meta tanks.

[Pizzarugi]

I'd rather the game have a tank meta than a DPS meta. We have way too many zoom-and-boom ARPGs where their idea of challenging difficulty is 1shotting you before you 1shot the screen.

[NotxEevee]

Ennemies can't kill you when they're dead.

[Dev3ko]

Originally posted by Pizzarugi:

I'd rather the game have a tank meta than a DPS meta. We have way too many zoom-and-boom ARPGs where their idea of challenging difficulty is 1shotting you before you 1shot the screen.

It makes absolutely no sense to me, and I don’t see a problem with making both versions legitimate and functional. Especially since at high corruption, DPS doesn’t matter — you can have the same DPS at 0 corruption in Monolith and at 1000 corruption, and you’ll still deal the same damage without any changes.
What’s the point of having a mage class, which — as we know from this genre — is typically a glass cannon with huge DPS potential, if it doesn’t work in a game where defense matters?
And that’s why it doesn’t perform well in a game where survivability is important. Meanwhile, 80% of the people complaining that the game is too easy are playing Paladin, Void Knight, or Sentinel Guard. :)

[Ravenkid9266]

Part of this is a hold over from when damage was interfered with by shadow systems like DDR and boss ward. The other part is due to afficx locations, most builds can't get damage on half of the item mods.

[Dev3ko]

Originally posted by NotxEevee:

Ennemies can't kill you when they're dead.

Yeah, but you’re also not dealing any damage when you're dead :).
Besides, when it comes to mages, the number of viable glass cannon builds is limited to the passive Focus tree or minions. That’s the problem.
A pure glass cannon makes no sense if you can’t even cast during long fights because you’re out of mana. And % mana regen gives so little that without Focus or mana stacking, the class just doesn't work.
The class balance is still heavily skewed. Even though many other classes also rely on mana, they perform better than mages, who are limited in terms of defense, DPS, and mana sustain. Mages mana cost is higher than other claess, as well as numbers on spell is same. So it's more like war of tanks than arpg xD

[Dev3ko]

Originally posted by Ravenkid9266:

Part of this is a hold over from when damage was interfered with by shadow systems like DDR and boss ward. The other part is due to afficx locations, most builds can't get damage on half of the item mods.

I completely agree with that — that’s exactly what I meant as well. A lot of mechanics from the beta were never properly addressed or documented. These leftover systems still affect gameplay, and it's frustrating that they haven’t been rebalanced or made transparent even after release.

[Ravenkid9266]

Originally posted by Dev3ko:

Originally posted by Ravenkid9266:

Part of this is a hold over from when damage was interfered with by shadow systems like DDR and boss ward. The other part is due to afficx locations, most builds can't get damage on half of the item mods.

I completely agree with that — that’s exactly what I meant as well. A lot of mechanics from the beta were never properly addressed or documented. These leftover systems still affect gameplay, and it's frustrating that they haven’t been rebalanced or made transparent even after release.

No I mean people do not change habits easily. DDR and mostly boss ward got removed but the habit remains.

[asdaf]

defences are just easy to get in this game, like 50% melee leech on just one piece of gear? tonnes of ward to never be one shot etc, insane regens, dont really need much defences in the first place, i dont even need to try to cap resists game naturally will do it for you lol.

[Little Strawberry]

OP... just go play Diablo 3 if you only want to focus on damage and dislike resource management / tactics, but LE is the middle ground between D3 and PoE... and PoE builds are 95% defense, so this isn't going to get better in your case. Also, the "shields" for phases just prevent instant one shots in most cases - you can still blow up bosses and skips several phases as long as it's not a single tick nuke. Seriously, don't force yourself to play this game when you want to play Diablo 3, because this game isn't trying to replace D3 or PoE.

[Dev3ko]

Originally posted by Little Strawberry:

OP... just go play Diablo 3 if you only want to focus on damage and dislike resource management / tactics, but LE is the middle ground between D3 and PoE... and PoE builds are 95% defense, so this isn't going to get better in your case. Also, the "shields" for phases just prevent instant one shots in most cases - you can still blow up bosses and skips several phases as long as it's not a single tick nuke. Seriously, don't force yourself to play this game when you want to play Diablo 3, because this game isn't trying to replace D3 or PoE.

You completely missed my point. The mana cost of some spells is around 80–110 mana, while their base damage is the same as spells from other classes that cost only 6–18 mana. The damage and scaling are nearly identical. The issue isn’t about how to play, but rather how difficult it is to create diverse builds when the main focus is on defenses.

In this case, if you don’t stack mana or regeneration, or don’t rely on auto-bombing with focus spells, you can forget about doing any endgame content. Do you get it now?

The problem isn’t that you need to build a lot of defense — the problem is that not many classes even have the possibility to do it effectively. And at the same time, you can’t go for a full glass cannon approach either, because the game simply doesn’t allow it.

Honestly, it feels like you might be new to the game and don’t really know how things were back in beta compared to now. The game is unbalanced — some of it due to bugs that the devs couldn’t fix, so they just turned them into “features.” Class balance is a mess. Some classes can just effortlessly jump into content, while others can invest in the best gear and still deal only 1% of the damage those other classes can do.

Besides, if every player just stayed silent, we’d still be playing crappy games. It’s time for change — for expanding ideas, not sticking to narrow mindsets. Learn to accept other people’s opinions, even if they don’t align with yours.

If you’re a fan of meta builds, go ahead — no one is stopping you from playing them. But there are people who would like to try something different, because they find a particular spell or attack mechanic interesting. But in this game, that’s simply not possible — at least not until a new season drops with some uniques that finally make it viable.

Yes, since beta, tons of new builds have become possible thanks to uniques. But still, a large number of them remain unplayable. There’s also no real identity between classes like mage or fighter. A mage has the same mana regeneration potential as a warrior, which is completely unacceptable by any fantasy standard.

Don’t be critical just because you enjoy something — contribute to the discussion with a proper argument instead of saying things like “go play D3.” That kind of comment is weak and disappointing, especially when you’re not adding anything meaningful to the conversation.

[donut32]

found your problem after 4 seconds of skimming your post:

"Just take a look at popular build websites"

stop copying other peoples homework and youll have more fun playing these kinds of games

[Dev3ko]

Originally posted by donut32:

found your problem after 4 seconds of skimming your post:

"Just take a look at popular build websites"

stop copying other peoples homework and youll have more fun playing these kinds of games

If you read evrything you'll get I make my own build... Idk how you get it that I copy other ppl build... If I do, i'll be same as 90% of users complain about "how game is too easy" LOL