Hi all!  I'm just checking to see if anyone has found the new BALANCE (not the system itself) of the magic crystals to be more of a help, or a hindrance, especially in regards to only two resistance crystals being allowed.  Should the devs change that limit?  If we can buff healing rate, exp gain, max HP, +AP without limit, why was resistance hit so hard?  Just wanting to see what people think, and see how their game has improved since this update.

Peace to you all, and thanks!

That's a good question whether it's worse or better.

Crystals never was balanced in the first place and there was extreme inbalances on the board even before. In PvE it's a clear buff to damage, but in PvP you already had damage option for every slot even before, so the gain here is not that significant, but the defensive options are better on the otherhand.

Some of the removed tradeoffs also made some, previously limited, crystals significantly stronger BIS than they was already.

I like it better, overall.

It's allowed me greater flexibility when it comes to swapping crystal setups for PvE, PvP, Leveling, Defensive setup, and an all-around setup I use for Arsha grinding.  Another benefit I've experienced from it is greater trash loot per hour with my PvE setup, allowing me to stack certain AP crystals.

About resistances, I cannot give a thorough comment as I've never made a build with resistance in mind.  IMO, every class I've tried has enough protections now where they can stay perma-protected in PvE with so many Super Armors and Forward Guards in the game now.  And for PvP, I've only really ever played Sorc, Striker, and a little Succession Ranger -- all classes than have a lot of protections already (assuming you'd consider range a form of protection), so IDK much about resistance stacking.

Thanks for the feedback!  Maybe I just never used the correct crystals before, but I never felt that they did much to help me survive better, or slay monseters quicker.  All I ever really noticed was an improvement to resistance.  I always used what I could, and used what AP, DP DR buffs I could find, and I just learned about evasion and what it really does right before the switch, so I really couldn't say much on evasion.  The classes I primarilly use when grinding are Melee, so Musa, Valkyrie, Nova, Warrior, and obviously, the last three are a bit less manueverable.  Hence my heavy reliance on reisitance.  I can definitely see how stacking 12 Ancient Magic Crystals of Crimson Flame can be handy, or stacking 12 Resplendant Kydict crystals, as we now have the option of doing, but I really wouldn't call this a balance.  Again, most of the comments I ever heard concerning PvP was that DP was the stat needed to be raised, and that one-shot meta classes were kind of an issue..... (this was even before Maegu).  But, then again, I don't do much PvP, so I don't know how broken it was and whether or not this rebalance fixed it.  All know is that all the enemies that inflict knockdown, stun, knockback, etc, do it at a much higher frequency than before, and I find it frustrating.  Ranged classes I use against World Bosses, and Melee I use for grinding.  Maybe I'll have to change my style, but then, what is to become of melee classes?.........

Peace to all!

This is long, but hoping it can help you and others.

I play Sorc mainly, and the common theme among the Sorc community is building resistances are generally looked down upon for PvP -- we have iframes and need as much DPS as we can get -- so resistances are unneccessary if we are playing well (maybe we benefit from grab resist, IDK, I never felt the need for any resistances on Sorc) and building resistance sacrifices DPS.  PvE as well, we have more than enough protections.  Awakened Violation (highly used PvE ability) is unprotected, however, we don't spam it as much as we used to with the introduction of new skills and Violation having reduced DPS on cooldown.  I imagine that for PvE, the classes you grind with can stay protected well, but I don't have much experience with their PvE (sorry!).

As far as AP crystal stacking goes for PvE, it would benefit you a lot to use (community member made) Garmoth.com's gear and crystal planner and look at their hit rate calculator (garmoth.com).  Along with using this (community-made, credit to BigAndShiny) AP cap Google spreadsheet.  https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1ujBurqMysnnXlUQ8LTM2VWsf143M5YRYWKIrLsAWsDA/edit#gid=0 . Utilizing these things correctly in conjunction with one another can help squeeze out every bit of min/max achievable, if that's what you're after.

Quick run-through:

1)  Enter your gear into the gear builder on garmoth.com.  (Gear, buffs, journals).  Skip crystals for now.

2)  Check the monster zone AP spreadsheet, which spots you'll be grinding the most.  Associate your "Monster AP" on garmoth.com with this sheet.

3)  Now, enter your crystals into garmoth.com.

4)  Check the hit rate calculator (menu to the left side of the gear planner).  At base-level, no add-ons / ability accuracy procs.  Aim for anywhere between 80-90% (could be lower, this is just a "safe" number for now) base hit rate.  The reason it's so low is because it doesn't take accuracy modifiers via add-ons and abilities.  If you add in, say 20 - 25% modifier, you'll see you'll achieve 100%+ hit rate.  Keep in mind your class' accuracy modifiers, check your class' skill tree.  Add-ons stack with abilities.

5)  If you are exceeding 100% base hit rate, you are wasting crystal slots.  Try removing Elkarr's, slot in AP crystals in place, and check to see if you are still getting 100% hit rate (with modifiers).  The goal is to get as much AP as possible while maintaining 100%+ hit rate (with modifiers), but also checking the AP caps on the spreadsheet. 

6)  When exceeding the AP cap at most spots, you will get 70% of each AP over the cap, but at Elvia, you only get a measly 5%.  At Elvia spots where you exceed the cap, it is much better to use Exquisite Cron Meal > Simple Cron, as the special attack modifiers (back attack and critial hit) will give you much more DPS.

Using these three tools, I have optimized my PvE crystal setup for Hexe and Gyfin Underground.  These are the two main areas I grind and have relatively high accuracy requirements compared to most other spots.  At base accuracy (buffs, but no modifiers), I am getting 80.05% hit rate at 863 accuracy, but after putting in accuracy modifiers via abilities/add-ons/buffs, I top out at 105%+ at Hexe, 117%+ at Gyfin.  Zero misses and I am within the AP soft caps at these spots.  Olun's and Quint are the only spots (aside from Crypt) where I would need to add more accuracy, but I don't grind there.  So, I'd suggest using these tools and doing a thorough analysis to squeeze out as much min/max as you can (if that's what you want), based on where you grind and the class you use.  Each class is different, so you'd have to analyze, but for the most part, lots of accuracy crystals aren't really needed for PvE.  After doing this myself, I replaced Elkarr's and Hoom's for Crimson Flame and have since seen a dramatic increase in clear speed.

My PvE crystals:

2x Rebellious, 2x Corrupted, 2x Glorious Ah'Krad, 6x Crimson Flame - Power (AP), 1x Dark Red Fang Valor (for AP and perma-level 5 crit with food), and 1x Jin: Viper.  If I were to grind at Quint or Olun's, I'd swap one Crimson Flame for a Jin Viper.

Artifacts / Lightstones:

Target Openings Lightstone combo with 2x Magic AP Artifacts.

Buffs:

Exquisite Cron Meal, Church buffs, Villa buff, Frenzy Draught.  All Adventure Logs completed.

Gear: 

C20 Leebur's, C20 Muskan's, 3x V Blackstar, IV Dawn Earring (will be V soon™).  310/413.

Wow, thanks for the input!  I'll definitely check out the the calculator at Garmoth.com.

And maybe the devs think resistance isn't necessary if you one shot all monsters.... but, it'll take me another year to get PEN Blackstar, and even then, that might not do it all, especially for slower classes.

Yeah, it helps a ton!  Feel free to ask me any questions and add me to your Friend's List, if you want :) happy hunting and wishing you the very best in your Adventures!

I prefer the crystal changes to be honest.

As a eternal newbie lower to mid game PvE player I enjoy the fact I can swap crystal builds whenever I want "outside" of combat without having to waste a bunch of hammers.

It makes it so much easier creating a build or two and then being able to share them to my other characters regardless of the gear they are wearing.

I would not however that while I am newish I can see where the changes could have a negative effect on players tha thave been around a while and want to get into more specialized builds between characters/alts.

While it wouldn't bring back everything those players lost, adding two or three more pages would go a long way in allowing them a wider range of creativity.

At high end, the crystal changes are also an overall positive. It allows for much more focused builds, and the option to swap between them to minmax mulitple scenarios. The only additional wish is to have even more slots to cover even more scenarios. High end players (pve and pvp, not lifeskill) will generally only play 2 characters at one time, so it isnt necesasry to have a specific crystal set for all 30 alts.

The change is negative in effect only for mid level casuals who want to play multiple characters for whatever reason, and for lifeskillers, who can no longer build their crystal set for each lifeskill seperately.

Yeah, I don't mind the fact we can switch at will.  I've come to peace with that.  I'm just scratching my head as to why the nerfed resistance and defense.

To me, it doesn't help in PvE, and they can just nerf skills for PvP, as they already have one set of parameters for PvE and another for PvP.

And yes, I am a more of an active casual player who likes to play with ALL my twenty different characters, as there is just so much to do in this game!  And my style is more melee, than ranged, so I am more likely to be hit and stunned/knocked back/knocked down, so that is why I've been asking around about resistances.

So, as normal, I just happen to be in that group of players who got the raw end of this deal.  But again, I'm kinda wondering why resistance of all things had to be nerfed.

Peace!