[spoilers] - pindicator is excited for the next Realms Beyond league mechanics

[pindicator]

I spent some time thinking about the next settler to come out of the capital, whether I wanted to send it west or if we wanted to stretch the worker turns out east a little thin in order to get the pig/stone. And then I realized that it wasn't too much trouble to make the change: just giving up the improved cow for an unimproved forest cow in city 7 (which I settle next turn).

And then I completely redid the worker plan because I have 3 workers north of Onslaught and really once I get the basic improvement at Invasion then I only need 1. So rotating workers south actually helps gain some additional worker-turns and smooths out some of the timing on critical improvements for the new cities.

And then I noticed that I can put the next settler out of the capital and have it at the pig/stone site on t82.

... which means stone hookup is around t90

Math finishes around t85 and there are a lot of forests around my next city location. We need to take a serious look at Hanging Gardens. Is t95 a realistic finish date? I'd have 10-11 cities and just as important it would be denial against Old Harry.

I heard a rumor that Pyramids doesn't get stone boosted in this version but I can't find that anywhere in the patch notes? Can anyone confirm? Are there other wonders changed like this? I keep forgetting to check when I play.

[AutomatedTeller]

The tech thread says that this option:

No Wonder Resource modifiers

is on.

[pindicator]

Ah, that would do it! Thanks

[pindicator]

077

Beyond is our 7th city and one of the more fun leagues from the early days of Path of Exile.




And with that we've hit our first major expansion goal. I'm going to fill in the Gems/Horse city next and probably Pig/Stone city after that, but Beyond is the city location that secures both spots and my hold on the center of the mainland. I will still need to head to wheat/clam on the east coast to keep OH from snaking his way all the way south, but I don't think there's any rush there. Based on how he's expanding (he planted city #10 this turn, by the way) I think he recently extended to put a border between us based on where he thinks my capital is and now is expanding in other directions because he doesn't think I'll be pushing eastward any more. And he's right, but I'm guessing he thinks the center of my empire is farther north than what it actually is. Where I put the center of his empire just northeast of what I've explored, since I'm pretty sure my scout was able to get sight on his capital's culture before it turned around (and got eaten by barbs). I suspect that if he knew I was pushing south more he would try to grab more territory down there.

Unfortunately I suck at estimating expenses, and this new city has added twice as many expenses as I expected it to. The current bill:



I'm concerned that I'm going to only be making single digit income when the next two settlers finish. But both of the next 2 cities have good commerce potential.

Notes for optimism: I'll be completing more lighthouses and working more coast tiles, and my focus after the next two cities will be more coastal cities and more seafood.

I also whipped the madrassa at Ambush this turn. We want borders to pop in that city as soon as possible so we can start working the clams there. Then a lighthouse, grow to size 6, and start running specialists. I also switched the build at Nemesis from a lighthouse to a madrassa: that city will get my first great person, Ambush the second.

[pindicator]

078

Next wave of barbarians coming:







I'm feeling stretched a little thin here. I whipped the settler at Onslaught, but if a barbarian shoots that gap just north of Beyond right now I could have a little trouble.

[pindicator]

079

Barbarians gonna barbarian. And I am really feeling short of units in the south.




I messed up the archer timing out of Domination and it won't be able to get on the galley next turn. That makes things even worse, as the warrior can't really come south to defend. If the barbarians warrior had gone northwest instead of northeast I'd have a far easier time - but now I have to cover the worker on top of the cow. I think worst case the barbarian goes north and my worker just pulls back, losing a couple turns on chopping out the granary.

Settler for next city is in position, at the top of the screen. And way up top you can see where Onslaught had the overflow plus a forest chop be enough to finish up its lighthouse this turn. That's important because the pig is going to go to the next city, and Onslaught will need the coast tiles and the extra food from the clam to keep growing at a good clip.

[Miguelito]

Going to return this thread to its original purpose by writing a little wrap-up of Blight league

League goal is the lvl 90 hardcore achievement, as it was the last two leagues. I managed to get my first char killed by Kitava (yep,  act 5c and with >1800 life) so I'm getting a bit skeptical as it seems I've become just too sloppy. but the build was becoming fun, worked well on the Blight encounters and yes the claw life gain is very nice. 

Mana irked me a lot and was actually part of the reason for dying. Forthesecond char I set the double claws to tier 1 in the loot filter, hoping I can get through the acts just using those. Got the first one recently, and mana gain on hit does feel awesome.  Although I'll also try to chance a wasp nest, if I get that I hope to get by with clarity.

Second char also leveled on chaos spells before labyrinth, that felt a lot smoother.

To my great surprise, that character actually scored that goal! This involved a really close call at lvl 89 with 99% xp against Sepulchre Doedre, where I had to portal out of the boss room and not come back. I then took an easy delve to get to lvl 90, then a little while later died at about 15% xp against Phantasmagoria Doedre   (one shot before I first hit her, just ran stupidly into the arena without even Withering Step). That character also dropped quite some nice weapons, a Wasp's Nest for himself, and a Lioneye's Glare and a Touch of Anguish for the other two characters I got to maps this league.

Next I went for a bow char with the vague idea that Lioneye's Glare should be good for critting. Took Slayer (for crit chance) and Ice Shot and died at level 75 against Villa Dominus. I thought with leech I could tank the soul beam. couldn't.

My final char was a raider with the frost blades claw. I really enjoyed this one and am quite frustrated about the way she died Saturday. Sutpidly whirling bladed right into a Blight pack on Atoll map, screen froze for a second (I have a not very good laptop), then she was no more. Sucks because I was almost getting her the final life passives and then I was going to try (tier 8) Elder, a blighted Haunted Mansion map, and the Delve Vaal boss (never done a Delve boss). Wouldn't mind dying to either of those but this was just stupid. Now I don't have another char left for these.

Total deaths this league:
1x Normal labyrinth traps (first Duelist). Curiously, this happens mostly on normal lab. There is always a room right before the last Izaro fight where there is burning ground with either poison darts or islands with spinning tower traps. I somehow have a problem with these.
1x  Overseer Crow ( , but he had a ghost on him and hit for >1000 hp. Should just have restarted)
2x act 5 Kitava yep, managed again with my first Raider. I think I had just like 50% fire res because I just had switched to a 2hand sword and didn't think
1x Abberath   didn't know you could die to this one, but again, 50% fire resistance makes it possible (I had focused on lightning/cold thinking Shavronne and Brine King and was righfully punished)
and the aforementioned 3 in maps, interestingly all at tier 7/8, so I guess the game told me pretty clearly where my ceiling is?

So this was definitely enough of the Hardcore experience, next league I want to see how far I can push endgame on SSF, and then rest with POE until the big update (reinstalling civ right now ). Not really inspired for a character yet, I might even redo a Vortex build I did in Synthesis or the frost blades Raider. Not really excited about the new bow stuff so far. I'd like to consider a crit spell build, but again, no idea which one. Whispering Ice maybe (the card can be farmed easily if the map tier is low enough)?

Any opinions on POE 2? New campaign sure sounds nice, and maybe this time they manage a coherent storyline? The only other thing I took away is that sockets are going to change and apparently you can 6link anything? Don't know if I like that, but going to learn it when it comes out.

[pindicator]

Very cool Miguelito. I doubt I'll ever have the patience for hitting 90 with a HC character. I rarely do even in SC. Actually I just find the repetition boring after a couple maps in a row. Maybe I'll try a HC or HC SSF character next league. But like you I also don't have the best laptop - I think mine is 5 years old at this point - so I'm not sure how many deaths due to software lag I'll run into.

What were your impressions of the assassin rework in the end? I think their defenses are tuned too high right now. I played with only a tabula on mine and while I didn't get into red maps I was able to breeze through yellows. I kept meaning to swap it out for a good 5 link but I found I never needed the defenses.

I'm surprised you didn't give summons a try, because they are really over tuned right now as well. You can do good damage with just about any summoning combination. That's what I found with my Scourge Arrow, Cast While Channeling, SRS, Summon Phantasm on kill build. (Cyclone is probably the better choice but if I'm going to meme build I'm going to do it right.)

I'm really excited for 2.0, and really like the gem change. Right now links are everything when leveling, and I think divesting that from the item system will let you have a lot more freedom to actually focus on the items and not the sockets while you're leveling. As long as they can get the currency cost to get a 6L right I think it'll be an improvement.

[pindicator]

081

I suppose I should have seen this coming when you all informed me that there were no resource modifiers to wonders: Oracle -> Metal Casting -> Great Engineer becomes the one right path for Pyramids.




Settler for the next city landed and will settle next turn. I really don't think the game knows what it is talking about with that blue circle location... We are also hoping for a break in barbarians to swap around the garrisoned units a bit: the archer is going to the new city; from the north an axe will go into Beyond, and the warrior will shuttle north to be the MP at Onslaught. I need a lot more units though; so much that I'm thinking I will whip at Domination to get more of them out.

Where are my hammers going? Into madrassas and lighthouses:




Here's Nemesis. I started building a lighthouse, then realized that I didn't really need the extra food to get to size 7 and start running specialists. We're going to get our first great person out of here, finishing either in the early to mid 90s, depending on if I want to pull another worker out of here first.




Demos for food and hammers look good, but that GNP is still awful. I'll be growing more onto coast tiles in the next 10-20 turns, but there's going to be a lot of specialists too as I try to get 2 great people out. I'm worried that I'm going to be too slow to religions...

And finally, something to get excited about:

I'll go back on the boat next turn, and then we'll just play it cool and see what happens. We're just an exploring galley who doesn't have open borders yet. If we happen to come across a juicy city with no defenses, then that's a bonus!

[pindicator]

082

City #9 is down and my expenses keep skyrocketing.




And Old Harry is just unfair.




I hate my start. I want to be unbalanced like other people