PoE 2 Armour Update: Buff or Hidden Nerf?

Time: 2025-01-21 by mmojugg Game: Path of Exile 2 Guide Tags: PoE2ArmourUpdate

The latest patch for Path of Exile 2 promised an improvement to armour mechanics, claiming a 15% increase in effectiveness. Karion, a well-known source for discussions on armour mechanics, looks at whether this change will truly benefit players or inadvertently nerf certain play styles, particularly melee builds.

Armour Mechanics Update

Patch Notes: The patch notes boasted a 15% increase in armour effectiveness, leading to expectations of a significant increase in player defence.

Actual Implementation:

Formula Adjustment: Rather than changing the actual armour values on items or passives, the change appears to involve tweaking the formula that calculates the damage reduction of armour. The new formula may use a constant value lower than the previous 12, possibly around 10.4, suggesting a potential increase in effectiveness of up to 20%.

No increase in armour values: Items and passive nodes that provide armour have not seen numerical changes; only the damage reduction calculation has changed.

Gameplay Impact

Player defence:

Armour still missing: Despite the buff, armour remains the least desirable defensive stat compared to dodge or energy shield. Players continue to favour items such as the Cloak of Flame, which converts physical damage into fire, making the investment in armour unnecessary.

Monster Toughness:

Increased Monster Armour: The same formula change that increases the effectiveness of player armour also applies to monsters, making them more resistant to physical damage. This has been noticed by players like K who have noticed that monsters take longer to kill.

Specific build effects

Melee builds:

Negligible buff: Melee builds, especially those that focus on physical damage, haven't seen any significant improvement. Top melee builds often bypass the need for armour by using conversion mechanics or focusing on other layers of defence, such as blocking chance from shield nodes.

Minion builds:

Significant impact: Minion builds that generally deal lower damage and rely on armour shred mechanics are disproportionately affected. The patch makes it harder for minions to deal effective damage, especially against monsters with more formidable armour.

Conversion Mechanics:

Nerf to physical conversions: Builds that convert some physical damage into elemental damage (e.g. Skeleton Arsonist) will take a hit as their physical damage component will be less effective, reducing overall damage output and affecting mechanics such as stun.

Broader game impact

Balance: The patch seems to have inadvertently tipped the balance further away from physical damage-based builds, highlighting an ongoing issue in Path of Exile where buffs can sometimes lead to indirect nerfs elsewhere in the game system.

Community Expectations:

Disappointment: Many players, including Karion, were expecting a more dramatic overhaul that would shake up the meta or at least make armour a viable choice. Instead, the tweaks were seen as minor and not addressing the core issues.

Future updates:

Hope for change: There's a collective hope that future patches will address these imbalances more comprehensively, possibly with a new armour formula or by rebalancing the game's mechanics to make all build types viable.

Thank you for reading

While the armour update in Path of Exile 2 was intended as a buff, it has had complex consequences, particularly nerfing melee and minion builds indirectly through increased monster resilience. This situation underscores the delicate balance of Path of Exile's mechanics, where one change can ripple through the game in unexpected ways. Players and designers like Karion are looking forward to future updates that could bring more meaningful adjustments to the game's defensive and offensive capabilities.