Come on, he is visibly easier
Allways happens like this.
With new buffs all content is nerfed around 40% in high level waves. But Grava still screw my cleartime =(
The buffs to offensive towers are noticeable. I used some inferno towers for the -enemy damage and they cleared most trash mobs that came near and did a lot of damage otherwise.
That would be good especially for people who like fun runs. Btw, are tower kills still not included in the score? Would be good if it does now, so that they’ll acutallt be viable for real farming.
My experience thus far would fit this description. We had a lightning tower on and the damn thing was one-shotting bosses – although I should note that not being a fan of number fountains, it was impossible for me to tell how healthy it was at that moment.
They seem very strong. It does open up the possibility of a more diverse array of banners and towers now. I think that that is a positive direction having played with just Stonewall for so long. It’s now fun to use these other options.
After lots of testing and broken nerves i came to the conlusion that the new Crucible is more accessible to melee overall though just enough so you can “do it” with all the buffs + banner. Otherwise its pointless and its the same as before - impossible or at least so slow that you cant farm. Talking here about WB, Commando etc.
Not to mention there are stealth buffs to lots of enemies in there - Cuba heals much much more now then pre patch,the ugdenbog witches attacks hurts much more, Alex meteor as mentioned got like 3x the dmg, Grava is asshole still as i dont feel any changes to him.
Overall currently if i want to farm greens 150-170 i am pigeonholed to very few builds where you can fast and safe do it. If you just want to do one run - then indeed many many builds can do it now (with all buffs that is). From my personal perspective the changes are net loss from farming perspective.
One thing which can alleviate this frustration is to significantly increase the tribute rewards at W170 so you can run all the time with 4x buffs.
Some additional thoughts - Tributes and Buffs
Currently they are literally a crutch to overcome the ridiculous onslought you get in there.
Really there are tons of builds who can farm 150-170 with 4 buffs + banner - but try without banner and the difference is day and night (if you are melee especially).
As 4 buffs + banner seems to be required - cut down the costs of these or increase appropriately the Tributes rewarded.
By melee do you mean s&b? How long is your clear time with 4 buffs no banner? Are you using defensive or offensive devotion? Can’t really comment on real farming just yet cause I don’t farm anymore but maybe try 3 buffs 1 banner and check the difference.
I don’t know, Crucible is still the same to me. If I fight with e.g. Aleksander, when no other monster is alive, he can’t deal more than 10% of my HP with one meteor, but if I lag, even a little bit, he oneshots me. I don’t think it’s the game mode’s fault, but the game overall, since if I don’t take damage at all, and I lag, no matter what and how much of it hits me, I take literally no damage. It’s frustrating because I was in wave 161, when fighting Aleksander and ~30 other monsters, I lost literally no health due to the healing banner, but then I lagged for like a second, and died instantly with 26k HP, 5k armor (buffs applied) and everything overcapped by at least 25%. My DA is no way low, because it’s over 3000. The Crucible run made me remember why I don’t like Crucible in general.
Oh, and Kuba is a motherfucker. Just irritating due to his massive heal. But he’s fun. 
Well, come on now, they nerfed it a bit, but it’s still a testament to how min-maxed your build/gear is. And surely kiting builds with stuff like dots/double mirror/double heal will be easier to navigate. Although out of my 7 chars I did it with 3 melee chars and it wasn’t that hard.
I mean, in general it is not hard, if your PC doesn’t lag. I die only because I lag and then lose 100% of my HP after I unlag.
The only damage source that can kill this particular character I ran Crucible today is percentage of health damage or heavy reduction stacking. And Ekket’Zul or Gabal’Thun, those two are weird and always shred (but not kill) every of my character, no matter the resists.
This new crucible seems more forgiving. I finally got solo 150 with my 2h melee autoattack build without circuit breakers.
The banner and blessing buffs feel good.