Now is the time to discuss that Path Of Exile 3.21 patch. With some recent information about the upcoming expansion, players have discovered that it will be missing a few things. In particular, there will be no Balance Manifesto in patch 3.21.
Now GGG states here, “Balance Manifesto is really good at conveying certain types of content, especially helpful when they want to do in-depth work on a particular game system. Keeping Balance Manifesto over the years gives us a nice chance are, we can clearly explain these changes in independent ways.”
They also give us a longer period to gather feedback on whether these system changes are going in the right direction. However, they have learned over the years that Balance Manifesto is not well suited for certain types of changes. Although no specific issues have emerged, players’ damage skills have also changed over time.
Balance Manifesto ends up looking like a set of patch notes, but it’s separate from the rest of the actual patch notes. You need to know everything and plan your building adequately.
The damage done by players has changed over time. We communicate these in advance through Balance Manifesto. Balance Manifesto points out that there will be significant changes to both the way Elemental Equilibrium works and the way Elemental overload works. And these will Nerf those Keystones for the purpose of dealing damage to enemies over time.
Players get some power in the form of increased base damage for all of these gems so far. But there’s another very important change in this patch that can’t be communicated right now. Because GGG keeps secrets.
That is the addition of Passive Trade Masteries, which are integral to fully understanding build-breaking changes over time. You can also complete it by acquiring enough POE Currency to ensure that you can successfully complete character building.
So you want to try to avoid this balance changing situation, mostly the latter type. We’ll explain them in the patch notes on Announcement Day and post the full details. While there is no dreaded system rework, we need to ask for feedback about age in advance.
Our balance goal is to provide more options and more fun for as many builds as possible, rather than redesigning game systems in potentially disruptive ways. We can’t wait to unveil the changes and check out the character builds you’ve created.
But in terms of overall balance projections, that would require radical balance changes of the kind that might be precluded by this. But in the end, it all hangs in the balance. I think they may also be some skills that are not used very often at the moment. See important Buffs here, one or two of which may end up being over-Buffed by mistake. But we want to see exactly what happens, which will be revealed in the next few weeks.
Anyway, one of the things is that the patch notes will probably be more important than usual this time around. That’s because we will condense all of these balance changes into this patch note. Perhaps this change in Balance Manifesto will have interesting results.
That’s what I’m planning to do again this time around, so I hope you’ll join in. If you want to know anything, you can discuss it in the community. Come and try it out.
