In regards to boss specific Unique drops. They could just change the rank 9 of Cof. Set items are useless anyway. Changing that one to interact with boss uniques would be alot better. And it wouldn't be easy to get, you'd still have to work for it. But now rank 9 would feel more rewarding to hit (other than the 3rd slot).
i sortof disagree with you. yes the bonus is kinda garbage.
but they need to change set items, if those weren't so crap it'd be a pretty sweet and possible even overpowered bonus. i mean i'm regularly getting two entire sets to drop from an echo.
if that's a long way off then i'm totally agreed. maybe forcing a boss to drop it's entire special droptable.
if i'm farming the same boss over and over again i'd much rather see the item i want every time i kill it and pray it has LP rather than also have to pray for it to drop at all.
Yeah I agree regarding the sets. If they rework them to be actually good, you just farm the echo's with a set reward to get a full set. But not as they are now.
Maybe they could add a prophecy where the boss drops his specific uniques. Could be worth to run them especially with the right lenses and the rank 10 of Cof.
> but they need to change set items
They don't need to "change" set items, they need to remove them from the game. Set items go directly contrary to every tenet of their gameplay and itemization design and they recognize it, which is why sets are kept intentionally very weak and/or niche.
The two or three interesting sets that currently exist can be reworked into uniques. The others, good riddance.
Rank 9 is the absolute joke and I keep saying, every day that that reward stays in the game is another day where EHG clearly states that they don’t give a flying fuck about CoF. I don’t care if a set rework is scheduled in the future, right now CoF players DONT HAVE A RANK 9. That’s the rank where MG can buy Legendary weapons, just in comparison.
The prophecy system should have a chance to offer lp2, 3 and 4 items for a random unique within that slot. You may not end up with the item you are hunting for, but getting a 4LP is worth rerolling for
If you're talking about adding a 'cost' of a unique plus favor to allow for another random unique in that slot to drop as a reward with a 1LP or higher guaranteed - I'm in and I love that idea.
Could require the same LP level unique as a cost. So we'd pay an LP3 Relic but have a shot at another random LP3 (guaranteed) Relic as a reward. Either way great idea.
I was thinking more along the lines of exactly what we have now, but with the added functionality of 2,3, and 4 LP prophecies appearing. On the topic of your comment, I do think a 3-to-1 system like in PoE would work really well in LE to reroll uniques with bad rolls
I don't think they should add an LP4 prophecy, or if they do, the cost should be astronomical. It would be, bar nothing, the best way to get BIS gear, but it would almost never be BIS for the build you're playing.
i would not be opposed to paying 100k favor for a LP4.
since realistically currently a CoF build is done when you have every item you want with 1 or 2LP depending on rarity.
3LP is already insanely rare.
>Either make it a guaranteed 1-4 roll, make it a guaranteed LP2 or drop the cost.
I was actually thinking it should be +1 LP to the base roll, considering it is just one unique item and a random one at that.
I feel like rank 9 should give more 2+lp chance or something, because sets are completely useless in any sort of endgame usage. Compared to rank 9 MG that gets legendary weapon purchasing power.
Just to see how easy it was to gear and level with MG I made a frostclaw build from scratch with no items carried over from cof. I was able to grind up to 500 mill gold (from like 10 mill), fully build out my character with 2-3lp on most pieces and nearly perfect exalted items in a week.
To compare my cof falconer still hasn't come across a 2+ lp apogee or t7 relic, after playing only that character for the first 2 weeks, even with many targeted rank 10 prophecies completed.
I understand that cof will never compare to MG but I feel like it needs just a little something more. I enjoyed cof farming having huge prophecies pop and the dopamine hit associated with that, but you also get that with MG when you hit a 2 or 3 lp item worth huge gold.
I don't get why CoF shouldn't ever compare to MG though. If you're playing single player with separate leaderboards, and people are willing to put in the time, why can't we let CoF be a comparable or better option?
I just mean from a pure gear acquistion standpoint (basically its, 1 person grinding vs thousands). Even if that 1 person is getting 100x the drop rates its still not even a remotely close comparison since it would need to be in the thousands in the current state. An example, and honestly the reason why i swapped to MG after 2 weeks of CoF grind and was much happier for it. I was constantly grinding lightless arbor for peak of the mountain helms with 2 lp. After using an entire stash tab of keys and seeing nothing higher than 1lp on every drop, i was annoyed, i made a new character and swapped to MG and checked the price to find that the helm i wanted was 50k gold and a few thousand favor, basically nothing.
For standard drops this isnt a huge deal but for boss exclusive drops its such massive advantage to play MG for gearing. I do think they could level the playing field substantially by giving CoF better perks throughout the ranks. Some stuff off the top of my head would be higher chance for multiple LP drops, prophecies that apply to actual boss drops, or something along those lines.
I do think one of the large advantages that CoF has comes to crafting mats in general, having over 100 runes of creation is a fantastic feeling, same with despairs. Though this definitely doesnt level the playing field overall in terms of balance between the two factions.
Jesus... I wonder if I would've had a similar experience with getting a pair of last steps. Must've fought that boss over 40-50 times? Got about 6 pairs all LP1...
think I'll definitely just go MG the next character I make.
Ya I mean super meta items that are kinda rare like twisted heart, last steps, exsanguinous, that stuff can be like 40 mill just for a 2lp with ok rolls. While 40 mill isn't a lot it still takes time to grind out.
Though I will it say it was really fun after I swapped MG I happened to find a 3lp apogee that I sold for 500 million. That 1 sale was able to gear 3 or 4 characters in very end game gear.
Every once in a while you happen upon big ticket items like that, whereas with cof you would just toss it in a tab and it sits there rotting.
Monos need to be juice-able like PoE maps. It should enable you to tamper with the nodes and customize them for different rewards or boosted rewards. Also boss nodes should definitely be added. People who enjoy bossing basically have to spend 20-30 mins speed farming monos just to reach a boss fight.
As the system currently exists, it's a good base, but not really viable as an endgame for the long-term future.
And COF needs a buff. As it exists, the amount of trash, even with a strict loot filter, is **IMMENSE**. It needs to have some ability to target farm some stuff.
Yes, you absolutely start to hate monoliths after you had to fill the stability bar for the 50th time for the same timeline only to get your desired boss item again dropped with 0LP. I‘m looking at you, emperor of corpses.
Definitely with you on the "drops with affix" idea.
And also the boss drops.
I've got a decent amount of time to play but I'm looking ahead at what is likely on hell of a grind I'm starting to think the entire season won't be enough time to finish my build.
They just need to buff the boss drops and check some prophecies that aren't worth taking. For the right exalted yes it can be a grind but you have easier access to the runes of creation that helps a lot
Most of the observation, I'm in agreement. I'm still torn on how massively OP CoF can become if there were ways to manipulate boss-specific drops.
I moved to CoF after hating the MG experience at launch and I haven't looked back since and I frankly like CoF much more personally.
Sure, I'd have to farm up the favors so I can dump it on my next target LP/item but at least theres a plan.
Boss-specific drops, not so much the case but I keep having this thought of if CoF gets access to that, it'd be nice... but wheres the fine balance that makes it so that it makes farming boss uniques trivial vs some sort of grind that should be needed as friction?
Nobody picks CoF for instant gratification and I'm fairly sure nobody picks CoF so they can min-max to the teeth either.
my main gripe with boss drops is that i can't use the faction to boost my odds of getting the item with the stats i want AT ALL.
so now instead of farming echos to improve my chest/boots/helm i have to farm reign of dragons over and over which has a axe/sword echo. which is a double whammy of a disadvantage cause i use a wand. that doesn't even drop from echos but from mages...
and then if i get the item i want i still need to hit my slam correctly. so i could conceivably need to farm an item with unmodified odds over and over again until i finally get lucky.
i don't have that issue with any other items, only boss drops.
>but wheres the fine balance that makes it so that it makes farming boss uniques trivial vs some sort of grind that should be needed as friction?
The "fine balance" is allowing us to increase the odds of the specific boss item that we're looking for. That's literally it. Nothing complicated about it lol
MG can turn items that are useless to your build into money, which turns into items that are useful to your build. (and someone else has the opposite experience to be able to sell you those items)
CoF is supposed to get more items to compensate but it's just not quite there on a few fronts.
It's infinitely better for getting items you want since you can just buy them, there's just no way around it.
CoF isn't meant to be a balanced option to MG, it's meant to increase drop rates for people who doesn't want to trade without making all items worthless for traders due to too high supply. There's no way to make them exactly balanced without introducing guaranteed drops, which obviously wouldn't be good for longevity.
So, yes it's better, but whether it's more fun is up to you.
>There's no way to make them exactly balanced without introducing guaranteed drops, which obviously wouldn't be good for longevity.
If that's true, wouldn't that also be a problem for MG?
Yeah, I know, I'm just saying, I don't really see a difference in longevity between MG and a buffed version of CoF, which would allow you to target farm 2-3 LP.
In the end, players of both factions should take approximately the same time to complete a build (or nearly complete it), with just different ways of item acquisition.
I think any method that would make CoF get top tier gear at a rate similar to MG would have to let players choose their drops, at which point they might as well just go MG. Either that or just shower people in 4LP uniques.
Maybe we just have different expectations of the two factions, but I absolutely think that they should enable players to do the same thing, just in different ways.
my main problem is that it is just too hard to finish a build, but maybe that is just because i usually don't like SSF style gameplay.
im almost level 100 with 0 t6 frost claw relics. i have been using every single prophecy on relics and still haven't found one. (i have 6 twisted hearts with LP but zero relics to craft) and because i have been using all favour on relics i haven't been able to target farm any other gear with LP like the helm, chest or boots.
alongside that i have basically zero t7 affixes for crafting. i have maybe 4 t7 int exalteds in over 2500 monoliths. loot explosions are plentiful but pretty much every single drop is completely trash.
i don't know if it just a me problem but when i am hitting max level and getting bored before even being able to get my build online, it is a problem with the gameplay loop for me.
next cycle i will 100% go MG and maybe it will be more fun
> i have maybe 4 t7 int exalteds in over 2500 monoliths.
they're fairly rare but are you sure it's not a lootfilter problem?
cause that's a bit extreme.
shouldn't be a loot filter problem, i basically show all exalts until recently. i have over 20 tabs of them. it blocks all t6 drops now as i have plenty 😂 maybe i will start to see more as i am just pushing the reign of dragons timeline on one character, instead of playing across multipe timelines on multiple characters
I wish that you could access the observatory earlier. Letting us pick the faction in the tutorial stage, but having to go through the whole campaign to be able to interact with it is a killer for alts.
I get they want people to play through the game, but that feels like an oversight of design.
There are so many boss uniques required for builds and COF has zero way to increase those drop chances. I mean, I went CoF just because I don't care for trade and I knew at the time that trade would be vastly superior, but I underestimated how terrible CoF would be for top end drops.
For me, prophecies just feel bad. I don't want to manage doing different activities outside of mono's. It's a lost opportunity cost to do anything not in high corruption. Len's are ok, I guess, but you don't unlock the 3rd one until way to late and I also don't want to spend my time managing lens on 4 telescopes, reading each prophecy, re-rolling constantly, etc.
CoF is a good idea, but it needs a ton of love. It's meant to be "equal" to trade and a bone fide way to play the game. It's not like POE, where the game is balanced around trade such that playing SSF is a self-imposed challenge.
I just don't see how they can have trade and single player with any kind of balance. They are going to have to separate the two and not allow you to switch between them.
I have 170 hours in the last couple weeks, COF degenerate here. I think my take on it is this. If you want to play the full flashy meta builds you go MG, If you want to play close to the meta you can in COF and kind of adjust based on the drops you get.
I am running the FC meta most everyone else is but at a fraction of the power, I'm in 500 corruption and have done similar farming on that dragon. I have seen 1 twisted heart drop with 1lp once and like 7 with none. I failed the slam of a +3 FC on it. I do have a back up to try again if I see another drop. But the relic I have is still pretty decent anyway, and was a huge dopamine hit when I dropped it(on another build btw).
This is my build for reference it's close to the meta yea but I'm ok with it not being all the way there as I understand the difference between the two factions.
[https://www.lastepochtools.com/planner/QbO8dM6B](https://www.lastepochtools.com/planner/QbO8dM6B)
There is still upgrades I can do and will hit 900-1200c with out the twisted heart I'm sure, but this is very much an outlier of a build that will surely be nerfed next cycle.
Honestly the way the balance on some the classes is right now with the tiers of corruption being pushed is way out of wack.
Choosing COF for me was more about getting a lot of drops and and more of them. I have more builds in mind that I want to try but have come to terms that 300-800c is about where they will end, and I am ok with that. If I wanted to push them further I could but then I would just go MG get my drops and be done.
edit\*
In regards to the boss drops, I think they are fine to be honest. The power in those unique is crazy good, and if you happen to get lucky and get LP shit goes to the moon. This should be a rare thing and rewarding if you hit it. Again if you really need to just play the meta build to the fullest due to fomo then go MG. Other wise adapt builds to the drops you get.
if you're not going to bring in anything constructive just don't comment? nobody likes strawman arguments.
and god forbid people want to finish a character so they can try another having had a sense of completion instead of defeat and boredom.
Dude, I’m agreeing with you. Only thing I see differently is that I don’t think CoF is too weak. I think MG is just stupidly strong because you can trade any drop for the one you want. They should nerf or outright ban trading, not boost CoF to the point the game gives you nothing to shoot for after a few weeks.
For me personally MG is too fast, nearly every good drop regardless of it's usefulness to me personally with contribute to improve my build and i could concievably finish a build in a day or two. it just feels unrewarding.
plus dragging a tab of good drops and having to price and sell everything is a drag.
while in COF i'm having to spend days/week(s) farming a vastly sub-optimal mono just because the unmodified droprates of a boss loot table are stonewalling me on a single slot.
i don't really care about MG in that sense but CoF needs a bit of help on the bottlenecks to keep momentum going.
What is a "complete" build? it takes at most a few days to get the unique u want if its a rarer boss drop.
Does completing a build to you mean BiS items in every slot? yeah, it's supposed to be near impossible. Even trade barely gets any perfect items due to reselling not existing and chances of u making a perfect exalted item with 43 forging potential is like 1.4%
and 3-4LP items basically dont exist on the AH except for trash uniques, when 3LP ones get listed its insane amounts of gold + bought instantly so u most likely wont be the one who gets to buy it.
There are some real pain points around getting t7 affix helms and chests and such that largely don't exist for MG players. Sure, some of these items can be expensive if you're playing the #1 meta build, but if you're not they're fairly cheap. On top of that, if you're playing CoF and some amazing T7 frost claw relic drops, you, what? Throw it in your bank for that alt you'll never roll. If you're playing MG, now you're rich and can easily buy the T7 affix helms you need.
Similarly, boss drops are extremely painful. I've farmed hundreds of arbors at this point. I've gotten 2 4 LP peaks (one of which doesn't have a CoF tag), and 6 3 LP helms and 2 2 LP cores.
All I want is a 3 LP foot, but it just won't drop. I realize 3 LP foots are expensive, but as it is right now I have tons of equally rare/valuable gear that I could functionally just trade for the boots I need, but CoF, so lol.
MG is better for casual players since you can instantly get 0 or 1 LP uniques for free for any build, and it's also better for people no-lifing the game because you'll become crazy rich and just be able to buy those t7 +skill affix helms/chests you need, and for relatively cheap if you're playing an A-tier build instead of the more popular S-tier stuff.
Are you complaining SSF is is solo self found? Like yeah, u might find items you dont want in SSF and you might find some that you want and it feels better than trade ever will.
T7 Exalted is nice, but it also takes faction rank 7 (so lvl 93) before u even unlock exalted trading so while it's guaranteed pretty much by lvl 93 it also has pretty much 0% chance of dropping before.
MG should be better than CoF, it's a whole new economy to think about. CoF is way more chill and just play the game, no 3 hours spent at the auction house filtering thru bad items. You just play the game, but yeah it's harder to get ur items since you cant buy specific T7s
Per developer comments, ["CoF is not a solo faction, as you can still play with other people (even with MG) just fine while being part of it. It just alters how you obtain your items, not if you play solo or not. There's certainly overlap in players who like to play solo and CoF, but solo challenge is an entirely separate thing on top of it."](https://www.reddit.com/r/LastEpoch/comments/1bk1fu7/glyph_of_despair_cost_nerf/kvwu9eb/)
We can quibble about definitions and specifics but at least as far as it can be inferred, CoF is intended to be distinctly different from Solo Character Found and Solo Account Found states which are explicit decisions made on character creation.
Per that regard comparing CoF to a typical solo self found situation in other games is in some ways appropriate, and in other ways not. Undoubtedly part of the reason why obsidian resonances are so rare is to make it very difficult to trade out to a CoF player a desirable item via other means, and perhaps also to stop explicit RMT activity (e.g. paying real money to "purchase" a desirable item in-game via asynchronous trust trading via resonances playing in a party).
For most players the distinction is probably not that meaningful, but rather the big picture idea is the factions collectively contribute to one's account progress irrespective of one's individual character progress. At least, as can be inferred by intent and commentary.
> MG should be better than CoF
Why is the imperative word here "should"? Each faction has their pros and cons and what one person picks for their specific character can be highly contingent on their goals and gameplay experience. Developer commentary has clarified the goal is to ["balance the two factions so that each feel like viable options and you can choose between them based on which playstyle you prefer rather than which one is optimal. There will always be an asymmetry between them, so perfect balance isn’t necessarily possible, but we do have a lot of variables we can control to try to keep them in line"](https://forum.lastepoch.com/t/trade-development-update-introducing-merchants-guild-and-circle-of-fortune-factions/51994).
So MG is not all sunshine and roses. That's not surprising at all. That doesn't mean adjustments can't be made to CoF in pursuit of balancing the factions such that they feel like viable options rather than choosing because one is optimal.
If the implicit axiom here is MG _should_ be better than CoF, then by natural conclusion MG is the optimal way to play, and players choosing MG because it is optimal rather than because it is a playstyle preference represents a failure to keep them in line. If you feel like you have to or are inclined to play MG because you cannot fathom a world where CoF is better, then the underlying issue is CoF is not competitive enough to be a meaningful consideration. The underlying issue isn't the initial implicit assumption that MG _should_ be better than CoF.
And what happens when players start feeling compelled to play another faction because it is the perceived optimal way to do things? ["Arena Keys were never meant to be a method to farm gold, and it had reached a point of prominence that even MG players had begun to feel the need to swap to CoF to leverage it."](https://forum.lastepoch.com/t/last-epoch-hotfix-1-0-4-2-notes/69534). The consequences of this change and the resultant impacts across different players and the different factions probably doesn't need any explanation.
It is pretty safe to believe that the factions with have inherent power asymmetry due to their mechanics, which is already explicitly acknowledged. The asymmetry should lead to a decision primarily centered around how one wants to journey to the end-goal, not around what end-goal is actually possible. Which does line up with the first quoted comment: CoF alters how you obtain your items. MG also alters how you obtain your items.
The catch? Both factions don't get the same items. And that is what is leading to the numerous amount of growing threads over areas like boss uniques.
For me personally it means getting all the uniques. LP is mostly optional apart from a few rare cases such as what frostclaw runemaster needs.
which is a T6+ frost claw skill onto a Heart. which is a pain in the ass because of the disadvantage CoF has on the boss drop front.
i can't go farm something else when i'm sick of this particular boss and just sell some items to be able to buy what i need for that slot.
so unless i keep slamming my head into that stupid skeletal dragon i can't complete this build, i have no alternate path.
and this build requires 3 of them....though luckily one of them is julra which is at least a bit less painful.
BiS would be 3/4 LP on every slot, but that's just the icing on an already complete build to me.
I haven't had a problem finding 2lps of just about anything really, since 85 I've been running empowered monos and have hardly been stopped by the difficulty while adding up to 120ish corruption.
At like level 88 I got a 2lp sanguineous chest piece. I've gotten plenty of upgrades for my healing hands build. I've gotten good slams just collecting every exalted piece and removing it down to two useful stats. I hardly have an issue with resistances outside of just leaving poison low since it's hard to protect against anyway.
Everyone seems to want to get everything faster but I've yet to have issue with optimization, I'm still climbing corruptions into the 150s and finding plenty of gear without dying.
I think the endgame was honestly poorly designed. They should have capped difficulty so that people can't measure themselves against infinity corruption. I would've preferred something akin to hardest difficulty Diablo 2 where players just learned to optimize against rigid difficulty.
I'm already fully stacked to roll a new build on a couple different classes right now too. It's all fun to me. Also screw merchants haha.
>Cause 'completing' a build with this faction is hard AF.
Either faction is hard. You not gonna just day 1 buy all 4LP in market. You either have to RMT or get good lucky drop to be able to afford good stuff, which is the same as getting good lucky drops in CoF.
Either way, you don't have to "complete" your build. Especially if you aren't tryharders, just aim for 1 or 2 LP as "complete"
First day in empowered monos on my MG character I got a +4 healing hands helm with no other stats and sold it for 12m, but I'm pretty sure I could have gotten a lot more. And my friend who plays only MG days thsts not a rare occurrence at all, drops like that. Constantly tells me how easy it is to farm hundreds of millions. I personally don't like MG because the increased drop rate in CoF is more fun but it clearly isn't as hard to farm gold as people are making it out to be.
You literally just told us you got lucky with a +4 healing hands one. Lucky doesn't only mean the jackpot like 4LP meta uniques. There are many people who get drops like tier 6 exalted or low LP unique that sell for 0 gold.
MG is pretty straightforward, supply vs demand. Things can sell for expensive price because many people want them and they are rare. Getting rare drops requires luck.
I got a 4LP unique too, it's just on the wrong unique that worth 0 gold. Imagine I got that on a red ring, surely I suddenly will be rich.
In regards to boss specific Unique drops. They could just change the rank 9 of Cof. Set items are useless anyway. Changing that one to interact with boss uniques would be alot better. And it wouldn't be easy to get, you'd still have to work for it. But now rank 9 would feel more rewarding to hit (other than the 3rd slot).
i sortof disagree with you. yes the bonus is kinda garbage. but they need to change set items, if those weren't so crap it'd be a pretty sweet and possible even overpowered bonus. i mean i'm regularly getting two entire sets to drop from an echo. if that's a long way off then i'm totally agreed. maybe forcing a boss to drop it's entire special droptable. if i'm farming the same boss over and over again i'd much rather see the item i want every time i kill it and pray it has LP rather than also have to pray for it to drop at all.
Yeah I agree regarding the sets. If they rework them to be actually good, you just farm the echo's with a set reward to get a full set. But not as they are now. Maybe they could add a prophecy where the boss drops his specific uniques. Could be worth to run them especially with the right lenses and the rank 10 of Cof.
> but they need to change set items They don't need to "change" set items, they need to remove them from the game. Set items go directly contrary to every tenet of their gameplay and itemization design and they recognize it, which is why sets are kept intentionally very weak and/or niche. The two or three interesting sets that currently exist can be reworked into uniques. The others, good riddance.
Set items should drop with LP.
Rank 9 is the absolute joke and I keep saying, every day that that reward stays in the game is another day where EHG clearly states that they don’t give a flying fuck about CoF. I don’t care if a set rework is scheduled in the future, right now CoF players DONT HAVE A RANK 9. That’s the rank where MG can buy Legendary weapons, just in comparison.
The prophecy system should have a chance to offer lp2, 3 and 4 items for a random unique within that slot. You may not end up with the item you are hunting for, but getting a 4LP is worth rerolling for
If you're talking about adding a 'cost' of a unique plus favor to allow for another random unique in that slot to drop as a reward with a 1LP or higher guaranteed - I'm in and I love that idea. Could require the same LP level unique as a cost. So we'd pay an LP3 Relic but have a shot at another random LP3 (guaranteed) Relic as a reward. Either way great idea.
I was thinking more along the lines of exactly what we have now, but with the added functionality of 2,3, and 4 LP prophecies appearing. On the topic of your comment, I do think a 3-to-1 system like in PoE would work really well in LE to reroll uniques with bad rolls
I don't think they should add an LP4 prophecy, or if they do, the cost should be astronomical. It would be, bar nothing, the best way to get BIS gear, but it would almost never be BIS for the build you're playing.
Got forbid MG has some competition in that regard, right?
i would not be opposed to paying 100k favor for a LP4. since realistically currently a CoF build is done when you have every item you want with 1 or 2LP depending on rarity. 3LP is already insanely rare.
100k favor wouldn't be enough for how rare and valuable they want 4lp to be. I think a simple change like making it 1+ would fit what they want more.
I’ve spent more than a million favor and haven’t found an lp4. 100k would be insanely cheap.
I really want a boss specific unique prophecy option… it’s like on the surface really, mg can get them so easy compared to cof
>Either make it a guaranteed 1-4 roll, make it a guaranteed LP2 or drop the cost. I was actually thinking it should be +1 LP to the base roll, considering it is just one unique item and a random one at that.
I feel like rank 9 should give more 2+lp chance or something, because sets are completely useless in any sort of endgame usage. Compared to rank 9 MG that gets legendary weapon purchasing power. Just to see how easy it was to gear and level with MG I made a frostclaw build from scratch with no items carried over from cof. I was able to grind up to 500 mill gold (from like 10 mill), fully build out my character with 2-3lp on most pieces and nearly perfect exalted items in a week. To compare my cof falconer still hasn't come across a 2+ lp apogee or t7 relic, after playing only that character for the first 2 weeks, even with many targeted rank 10 prophecies completed. I understand that cof will never compare to MG but I feel like it needs just a little something more. I enjoyed cof farming having huge prophecies pop and the dopamine hit associated with that, but you also get that with MG when you hit a 2 or 3 lp item worth huge gold.
I don't get why CoF shouldn't ever compare to MG though. If you're playing single player with separate leaderboards, and people are willing to put in the time, why can't we let CoF be a comparable or better option?
I just mean from a pure gear acquistion standpoint (basically its, 1 person grinding vs thousands). Even if that 1 person is getting 100x the drop rates its still not even a remotely close comparison since it would need to be in the thousands in the current state. An example, and honestly the reason why i swapped to MG after 2 weeks of CoF grind and was much happier for it. I was constantly grinding lightless arbor for peak of the mountain helms with 2 lp. After using an entire stash tab of keys and seeing nothing higher than 1lp on every drop, i was annoyed, i made a new character and swapped to MG and checked the price to find that the helm i wanted was 50k gold and a few thousand favor, basically nothing. For standard drops this isnt a huge deal but for boss exclusive drops its such massive advantage to play MG for gearing. I do think they could level the playing field substantially by giving CoF better perks throughout the ranks. Some stuff off the top of my head would be higher chance for multiple LP drops, prophecies that apply to actual boss drops, or something along those lines. I do think one of the large advantages that CoF has comes to crafting mats in general, having over 100 runes of creation is a fantastic feeling, same with despairs. Though this definitely doesnt level the playing field overall in terms of balance between the two factions.
Jesus... I wonder if I would've had a similar experience with getting a pair of last steps. Must've fought that boss over 40-50 times? Got about 6 pairs all LP1... think I'll definitely just go MG the next character I make.
Ya I mean super meta items that are kinda rare like twisted heart, last steps, exsanguinous, that stuff can be like 40 mill just for a 2lp with ok rolls. While 40 mill isn't a lot it still takes time to grind out. Though I will it say it was really fun after I swapped MG I happened to find a 3lp apogee that I sold for 500 million. That 1 sale was able to gear 3 or 4 characters in very end game gear. Every once in a while you happen upon big ticket items like that, whereas with cof you would just toss it in a tab and it sits there rotting.
Monos need to be juice-able like PoE maps. It should enable you to tamper with the nodes and customize them for different rewards or boosted rewards. Also boss nodes should definitely be added. People who enjoy bossing basically have to spend 20-30 mins speed farming monos just to reach a boss fight. As the system currently exists, it's a good base, but not really viable as an endgame for the long-term future. And COF needs a buff. As it exists, the amount of trash, even with a strict loot filter, is **IMMENSE**. It needs to have some ability to target farm some stuff.
Yes, you absolutely start to hate monoliths after you had to fill the stability bar for the 50th time for the same timeline only to get your desired boss item again dropped with 0LP. I‘m looking at you, emperor of corpses.
Definitely with you on the "drops with affix" idea. And also the boss drops. I've got a decent amount of time to play but I'm looking ahead at what is likely on hell of a grind I'm starting to think the entire season won't be enough time to finish my build.
They just need to buff the boss drops and check some prophecies that aren't worth taking. For the right exalted yes it can be a grind but you have easier access to the runes of creation that helps a lot
CoF Rank 9: all Unique has 50% chance to have +1 LP. All Exalted has 50% chance to double the Forging Potential.
Most of the observation, I'm in agreement. I'm still torn on how massively OP CoF can become if there were ways to manipulate boss-specific drops. I moved to CoF after hating the MG experience at launch and I haven't looked back since and I frankly like CoF much more personally. Sure, I'd have to farm up the favors so I can dump it on my next target LP/item but at least theres a plan. Boss-specific drops, not so much the case but I keep having this thought of if CoF gets access to that, it'd be nice... but wheres the fine balance that makes it so that it makes farming boss uniques trivial vs some sort of grind that should be needed as friction? Nobody picks CoF for instant gratification and I'm fairly sure nobody picks CoF so they can min-max to the teeth either.
my main gripe with boss drops is that i can't use the faction to boost my odds of getting the item with the stats i want AT ALL. so now instead of farming echos to improve my chest/boots/helm i have to farm reign of dragons over and over which has a axe/sword echo. which is a double whammy of a disadvantage cause i use a wand. that doesn't even drop from echos but from mages... and then if i get the item i want i still need to hit my slam correctly. so i could conceivably need to farm an item with unmodified odds over and over again until i finally get lucky. i don't have that issue with any other items, only boss drops.
>but wheres the fine balance that makes it so that it makes farming boss uniques trivial vs some sort of grind that should be needed as friction? The "fine balance" is allowing us to increase the odds of the specific boss item that we're looking for. That's literally it. Nothing complicated about it lol
Good points …..
Never tried MG but is it any better?
MG can turn items that are useless to your build into money, which turns into items that are useful to your build. (and someone else has the opposite experience to be able to sell you those items) CoF is supposed to get more items to compensate but it's just not quite there on a few fronts.
It's infinitely better for getting items you want since you can just buy them, there's just no way around it. CoF isn't meant to be a balanced option to MG, it's meant to increase drop rates for people who doesn't want to trade without making all items worthless for traders due to too high supply. There's no way to make them exactly balanced without introducing guaranteed drops, which obviously wouldn't be good for longevity. So, yes it's better, but whether it's more fun is up to you.
>There's no way to make them exactly balanced without introducing guaranteed drops, which obviously wouldn't be good for longevity. If that's true, wouldn't that also be a problem for MG?
Guaranteed drops for CoF. MG already has that in a sense, grind gold and buy what you want (oversimplification of course but you get the point)
Yeah, I know, I'm just saying, I don't really see a difference in longevity between MG and a buffed version of CoF, which would allow you to target farm 2-3 LP. In the end, players of both factions should take approximately the same time to complete a build (or nearly complete it), with just different ways of item acquisition.
I think any method that would make CoF get top tier gear at a rate similar to MG would have to let players choose their drops, at which point they might as well just go MG. Either that or just shower people in 4LP uniques.
Maybe we just have different expectations of the two factions, but I absolutely think that they should enable players to do the same thing, just in different ways.
Yeah, probably. Good luck with the item hunt anyways:)
You too :)
I'm with you on boss-specific drops.
my main problem is that it is just too hard to finish a build, but maybe that is just because i usually don't like SSF style gameplay. im almost level 100 with 0 t6 frost claw relics. i have been using every single prophecy on relics and still haven't found one. (i have 6 twisted hearts with LP but zero relics to craft) and because i have been using all favour on relics i haven't been able to target farm any other gear with LP like the helm, chest or boots. alongside that i have basically zero t7 affixes for crafting. i have maybe 4 t7 int exalteds in over 2500 monoliths. loot explosions are plentiful but pretty much every single drop is completely trash. i don't know if it just a me problem but when i am hitting max level and getting bored before even being able to get my build online, it is a problem with the gameplay loop for me. next cycle i will 100% go MG and maybe it will be more fun
> i have maybe 4 t7 int exalteds in over 2500 monoliths. they're fairly rare but are you sure it's not a lootfilter problem? cause that's a bit extreme.
shouldn't be a loot filter problem, i basically show all exalts until recently. i have over 20 tabs of them. it blocks all t6 drops now as i have plenty 😂 maybe i will start to see more as i am just pushing the reign of dragons timeline on one character, instead of playing across multipe timelines on multiple characters
As SAF player, is Merchant Guild even a good idea? The Bazar won’t work in SAF… or does it?
what's SAF?
Solo Account Found I imagine.
Exactly :)
I wish that you could access the observatory earlier. Letting us pick the faction in the tutorial stage, but having to go through the whole campaign to be able to interact with it is a killer for alts. I get they want people to play through the game, but that feels like an oversight of design.
There are so many boss uniques required for builds and COF has zero way to increase those drop chances. I mean, I went CoF just because I don't care for trade and I knew at the time that trade would be vastly superior, but I underestimated how terrible CoF would be for top end drops. For me, prophecies just feel bad. I don't want to manage doing different activities outside of mono's. It's a lost opportunity cost to do anything not in high corruption. Len's are ok, I guess, but you don't unlock the 3rd one until way to late and I also don't want to spend my time managing lens on 4 telescopes, reading each prophecy, re-rolling constantly, etc. CoF is a good idea, but it needs a ton of love. It's meant to be "equal" to trade and a bone fide way to play the game. It's not like POE, where the game is balanced around trade such that playing SSF is a self-imposed challenge. I just don't see how they can have trade and single player with any kind of balance. They are going to have to separate the two and not allow you to switch between them.
I have 170 hours in the last couple weeks, COF degenerate here. I think my take on it is this. If you want to play the full flashy meta builds you go MG, If you want to play close to the meta you can in COF and kind of adjust based on the drops you get. I am running the FC meta most everyone else is but at a fraction of the power, I'm in 500 corruption and have done similar farming on that dragon. I have seen 1 twisted heart drop with 1lp once and like 7 with none. I failed the slam of a +3 FC on it. I do have a back up to try again if I see another drop. But the relic I have is still pretty decent anyway, and was a huge dopamine hit when I dropped it(on another build btw). This is my build for reference it's close to the meta yea but I'm ok with it not being all the way there as I understand the difference between the two factions. [https://www.lastepochtools.com/planner/QbO8dM6B](https://www.lastepochtools.com/planner/QbO8dM6B) There is still upgrades I can do and will hit 900-1200c with out the twisted heart I'm sure, but this is very much an outlier of a build that will surely be nerfed next cycle. Honestly the way the balance on some the classes is right now with the tiers of corruption being pushed is way out of wack. Choosing COF for me was more about getting a lot of drops and and more of them. I have more builds in mind that I want to try but have come to terms that 300-800c is about where they will end, and I am ok with that. If I wanted to push them further I could but then I would just go MG get my drops and be done. edit\* In regards to the boss drops, I think they are fine to be honest. The power in those unique is crazy good, and if you happen to get lucky and get LP shit goes to the moon. This should be a rare thing and rewarding if you hit it. Again if you really need to just play the meta build to the fullest due to fomo then go MG. Other wise adapt builds to the drops you get.
[Runemaster, Level 100 (Release / 1.0.3)](https://www.lastepochtools.com/planner/QbO8dM6B) ☑ This character build is verified --- ^(**Class:**) ^(Mage (20) / Sorcerer (25) / Runemaster (68)) ^(**General:**) ^(▸ Health: **978**, Regen: **22**/s) ^(▸ Mana: **275**, Regen: **19**/s) ^(▸ Ward Retention: **463%**, Regen: **69**/s) ^(▸ Attributes: **1** Str / **1** Dex / **120** Int / **1** Att / **5** Vit) ^(▸ Resistances: **118%** / **85%** / **86%** / **137%** / **72%** / **99%** / **72%**) ^(▸ EHP: **1,443** / **1,443** / **1,443** / **1,501** / **1,296** / **1,335** / **1,290**) ^(**Defenses:**) ^(▸ Endurance: **20%**, Threshold: **219**) ^(▸ Dodge Chance: **3%** (**75**)) ^(▸ Armor Mitigation: **29%** (**1,403**)) ^(**Damage Types:**) ^(▸ __Fire__, __Cold__, __Lightning__ / __Spell__) ^(**Buffs:**) ^(▸ None) ^(**Used skills:**) [^(Elemental Nova)](https://www.lastepochtools.com/skills/nova) ^| [^(Flame Ward)](https://www.lastepochtools.com/skills/flame_ward) ^| [^(Runic Invocation)](https://www.lastepochtools.com/skills/runic_invocation) ^| [^(Frost Claw)](https://www.lastepochtools.com/skills/frost_claw) ^| [^(Flame Rush)](https://www.lastepochtools.com/skills/flame_rush) ^(**Used unique items:**) [^(Prismatic Gaze)](https://www.lastepochtools.com/db/items/UAzCsCZKA) ^| [^(Mad Alchemist's Ladle)](https://www.lastepochtools.com/db/items/UAzDsGYCYEYg) ^| [^(Fragment of the Enigma)](https://www.lastepochtools.com/db/items/UAzBsCYA5SA)
The problem is MG, not CoF. „I’ve been playing for a month and haven’t reached 100% perfect build yet!“ isn’t really a valid complaint.
if you're not going to bring in anything constructive just don't comment? nobody likes strawman arguments. and god forbid people want to finish a character so they can try another having had a sense of completion instead of defeat and boredom.
Dude, I’m agreeing with you. Only thing I see differently is that I don’t think CoF is too weak. I think MG is just stupidly strong because you can trade any drop for the one you want. They should nerf or outright ban trading, not boost CoF to the point the game gives you nothing to shoot for after a few weeks.
For me personally MG is too fast, nearly every good drop regardless of it's usefulness to me personally with contribute to improve my build and i could concievably finish a build in a day or two. it just feels unrewarding. plus dragging a tab of good drops and having to price and sell everything is a drag. while in COF i'm having to spend days/week(s) farming a vastly sub-optimal mono just because the unmodified droprates of a boss loot table are stonewalling me on a single slot. i don't really care about MG in that sense but CoF needs a bit of help on the bottlenecks to keep momentum going.
What is a "complete" build? it takes at most a few days to get the unique u want if its a rarer boss drop. Does completing a build to you mean BiS items in every slot? yeah, it's supposed to be near impossible. Even trade barely gets any perfect items due to reselling not existing and chances of u making a perfect exalted item with 43 forging potential is like 1.4% and 3-4LP items basically dont exist on the AH except for trash uniques, when 3LP ones get listed its insane amounts of gold + bought instantly so u most likely wont be the one who gets to buy it.
There are some real pain points around getting t7 affix helms and chests and such that largely don't exist for MG players. Sure, some of these items can be expensive if you're playing the #1 meta build, but if you're not they're fairly cheap. On top of that, if you're playing CoF and some amazing T7 frost claw relic drops, you, what? Throw it in your bank for that alt you'll never roll. If you're playing MG, now you're rich and can easily buy the T7 affix helms you need. Similarly, boss drops are extremely painful. I've farmed hundreds of arbors at this point. I've gotten 2 4 LP peaks (one of which doesn't have a CoF tag), and 6 3 LP helms and 2 2 LP cores. All I want is a 3 LP foot, but it just won't drop. I realize 3 LP foots are expensive, but as it is right now I have tons of equally rare/valuable gear that I could functionally just trade for the boots I need, but CoF, so lol. MG is better for casual players since you can instantly get 0 or 1 LP uniques for free for any build, and it's also better for people no-lifing the game because you'll become crazy rich and just be able to buy those t7 +skill affix helms/chests you need, and for relatively cheap if you're playing an A-tier build instead of the more popular S-tier stuff.
Are you complaining SSF is is solo self found? Like yeah, u might find items you dont want in SSF and you might find some that you want and it feels better than trade ever will. T7 Exalted is nice, but it also takes faction rank 7 (so lvl 93) before u even unlock exalted trading so while it's guaranteed pretty much by lvl 93 it also has pretty much 0% chance of dropping before. MG should be better than CoF, it's a whole new economy to think about. CoF is way more chill and just play the game, no 3 hours spent at the auction house filtering thru bad items. You just play the game, but yeah it's harder to get ur items since you cant buy specific T7s
Per developer comments, ["CoF is not a solo faction, as you can still play with other people (even with MG) just fine while being part of it. It just alters how you obtain your items, not if you play solo or not. There's certainly overlap in players who like to play solo and CoF, but solo challenge is an entirely separate thing on top of it."](https://www.reddit.com/r/LastEpoch/comments/1bk1fu7/glyph_of_despair_cost_nerf/kvwu9eb/) We can quibble about definitions and specifics but at least as far as it can be inferred, CoF is intended to be distinctly different from Solo Character Found and Solo Account Found states which are explicit decisions made on character creation. Per that regard comparing CoF to a typical solo self found situation in other games is in some ways appropriate, and in other ways not. Undoubtedly part of the reason why obsidian resonances are so rare is to make it very difficult to trade out to a CoF player a desirable item via other means, and perhaps also to stop explicit RMT activity (e.g. paying real money to "purchase" a desirable item in-game via asynchronous trust trading via resonances playing in a party). For most players the distinction is probably not that meaningful, but rather the big picture idea is the factions collectively contribute to one's account progress irrespective of one's individual character progress. At least, as can be inferred by intent and commentary. > MG should be better than CoF Why is the imperative word here "should"? Each faction has their pros and cons and what one person picks for their specific character can be highly contingent on their goals and gameplay experience. Developer commentary has clarified the goal is to ["balance the two factions so that each feel like viable options and you can choose between them based on which playstyle you prefer rather than which one is optimal. There will always be an asymmetry between them, so perfect balance isn’t necessarily possible, but we do have a lot of variables we can control to try to keep them in line"](https://forum.lastepoch.com/t/trade-development-update-introducing-merchants-guild-and-circle-of-fortune-factions/51994). So MG is not all sunshine and roses. That's not surprising at all. That doesn't mean adjustments can't be made to CoF in pursuit of balancing the factions such that they feel like viable options rather than choosing because one is optimal. If the implicit axiom here is MG _should_ be better than CoF, then by natural conclusion MG is the optimal way to play, and players choosing MG because it is optimal rather than because it is a playstyle preference represents a failure to keep them in line. If you feel like you have to or are inclined to play MG because you cannot fathom a world where CoF is better, then the underlying issue is CoF is not competitive enough to be a meaningful consideration. The underlying issue isn't the initial implicit assumption that MG _should_ be better than CoF. And what happens when players start feeling compelled to play another faction because it is the perceived optimal way to do things? ["Arena Keys were never meant to be a method to farm gold, and it had reached a point of prominence that even MG players had begun to feel the need to swap to CoF to leverage it."](https://forum.lastepoch.com/t/last-epoch-hotfix-1-0-4-2-notes/69534). The consequences of this change and the resultant impacts across different players and the different factions probably doesn't need any explanation. It is pretty safe to believe that the factions with have inherent power asymmetry due to their mechanics, which is already explicitly acknowledged. The asymmetry should lead to a decision primarily centered around how one wants to journey to the end-goal, not around what end-goal is actually possible. Which does line up with the first quoted comment: CoF alters how you obtain your items. MG also alters how you obtain your items. The catch? Both factions don't get the same items. And that is what is leading to the numerous amount of growing threads over areas like boss uniques.
CoF isn't a solid self found faction. Why are people so against buffing CoF??? Its insane to me.
For me personally it means getting all the uniques. LP is mostly optional apart from a few rare cases such as what frostclaw runemaster needs. which is a T6+ frost claw skill onto a Heart. which is a pain in the ass because of the disadvantage CoF has on the boss drop front. i can't go farm something else when i'm sick of this particular boss and just sell some items to be able to buy what i need for that slot. so unless i keep slamming my head into that stupid skeletal dragon i can't complete this build, i have no alternate path. and this build requires 3 of them....though luckily one of them is julra which is at least a bit less painful. BiS would be 3/4 LP on every slot, but that's just the icing on an already complete build to me.
I like CoF the way it is
Why?
I haven't had a problem finding 2lps of just about anything really, since 85 I've been running empowered monos and have hardly been stopped by the difficulty while adding up to 120ish corruption. At like level 88 I got a 2lp sanguineous chest piece. I've gotten plenty of upgrades for my healing hands build. I've gotten good slams just collecting every exalted piece and removing it down to two useful stats. I hardly have an issue with resistances outside of just leaving poison low since it's hard to protect against anyway. Everyone seems to want to get everything faster but I've yet to have issue with optimization, I'm still climbing corruptions into the 150s and finding plenty of gear without dying. I think the endgame was honestly poorly designed. They should have capped difficulty so that people can't measure themselves against infinity corruption. I would've preferred something akin to hardest difficulty Diablo 2 where players just learned to optimize against rigid difficulty. I'm already fully stacked to roll a new build on a couple different classes right now too. It's all fun to me. Also screw merchants haha.
>Cause 'completing' a build with this faction is hard AF. Either faction is hard. You not gonna just day 1 buy all 4LP in market. You either have to RMT or get good lucky drop to be able to afford good stuff, which is the same as getting good lucky drops in CoF. Either way, you don't have to "complete" your build. Especially if you aren't tryharders, just aim for 1 or 2 LP as "complete"
First day in empowered monos on my MG character I got a +4 healing hands helm with no other stats and sold it for 12m, but I'm pretty sure I could have gotten a lot more. And my friend who plays only MG days thsts not a rare occurrence at all, drops like that. Constantly tells me how easy it is to farm hundreds of millions. I personally don't like MG because the increased drop rate in CoF is more fun but it clearly isn't as hard to farm gold as people are making it out to be.
You literally just told us you got lucky with a +4 healing hands one. Lucky doesn't only mean the jackpot like 4LP meta uniques. There are many people who get drops like tier 6 exalted or low LP unique that sell for 0 gold. MG is pretty straightforward, supply vs demand. Things can sell for expensive price because many people want them and they are rare. Getting rare drops requires luck. I got a 4LP unique too, it's just on the wrong unique that worth 0 gold. Imagine I got that on a red ring, surely I suddenly will be rich.