What do you prefer in D3 over PoE, and visa versa?

D3

- Engine/Graphics: When it comes to combat/gameplay D3 wins. It's smooth, precise and rarely do you have the moment of "wtf why isn't this going off / wtf is this delay etc" that I find often in PoE. You can actually enjoy melee as well in D3.

- Leveling: I'm all for being forced to go through the story ONCE. The addition of Adventure mode was a godsend. I wish that killing Malachai in cruel would offer a "corrupted" map device that will randomly create a "map" matching your level up to w/e the merc dry lakes level is. Give it a 1 min CD so people aren't spam opening portals for the servers and create a system that acknowledges your level which in turns progresses you through the story line (completing story only quests). You'd have to go back and complete the skill point/respec quests. I know it would be a mess to get that going but it's a wish.

- "Respecing": The ability to theorycraft/test fun build ideas (usually fun farming builds for mid rifts/ t10) is simple, quick and painless without permanent costs if your idea fails. With PoE's greater build diversity and openness to making unique builds I want to try things out but leveling a new char every time is just hell and causes me to quit for the league once I get to 3 / 4 chars.

PoE

- Build Diversity: When you can pick a skill and then go, "hmmmm what class should i go with" ... "I picked this cuz of my playstyle" .... etc ... it's really good to see. D3's one cookie cutter build to rule them all for each class is boring. When the answer to "why can't I progress further?" is "you picked the wrong set", then it's a bad design IMO.

- Trading: Collecting currency and having an economy is nice. It creates a community. Something D3 doesn't have at all when you can only trade items with people you group with. Can't find something and hand it over to a clan member who needs it if they are in another game. And being able to to buy that one item that you can't seem to get and help your progression in power is nice.

- Constant updates: D3 is dead. At most a couple sets get tweeked and create a "new meta" for a couple classes twice a year. There isn't hope that this will change, just the wait for the announcement of what game is being made at blizcon (D4 or D2 remake), which will hopefully copy PoE's strengths and combine it with their superior engine. PoE's leagues where they experiment with new ideas is great, even if it turns out to be ehhh like talisman at least it's a new thing being added that causes people to try / spend time playing.


TLDR: I play PoE mostly for the creativity and content updates that I can experience with others (guildies). I play D3 for the smooth, beautiful game play and easy entry into the game.

Like most people have said, D3 is much smoother and optimized much better than PoE will likely ever be.

Really though my biggest complaint between D3 and PoE is how insanely crappy cyclone is compared to whirlwind. I have yet to see any compelling reason why the cyclone gem is designed the way it is (with the line movement and minimum distance) when the damage calculation is the same regardless of how you move as long as you stay on the mob. Why can't you just spin in place?

D3 has better graphics and doenst penalize death other than lose your exp pool. Nothing other than these 2

wich i REALY prefer in D3 is the "rift system". just run as many rifts as u want. and in poe u have to find maps .... biggest BS imo (like zero map drops in a t15 140% quality 40% packsize map....) i realy hate this map system in poe

and i hate the 10% exp loose in standard. i mean why, just WHY?!? so at lvl 90+ u have to play as a HC char to make progress. but i dont play HC because i dont like it, so WHY GGG are you forcing me to this -.-"

and ofc the cyclone/whirlwind wich is way better in D3


so in the end, if GGG removes the 10% exp loose and changes their "map system" to something like this im fine:

Make all White map for free in the atlas (you can run them as much as you want if u onced finshed them). And if u want, enchant them: put an trans/alch/chisel/vaal in the map device. so you run the maps u want with random properties (this has to be done for each time u want enchant a "run"). k thx bye

D3 pros:
- Better first impression. The fighting is faster-paced right off the bat and you unlock cool abilities real quick. It's a lot more accessible and makes you feel like a badass quicker. PoE can feel sluggish and clunky at first with your super slow attack/cast speed and the comparably less flashy presentation. Not to mention that mini-heart attack one gets the first time they see the passive tree. PoE is scary as fk for new people unless they already have a fetish for spreadsheets.

- It's casual, and I don't mean that in a bad way necessarily. It eases players in at a nice pace and lets them transition smoothly into the late game, which is not even particularly complex. As a nice turn-your-brain-off-and-unwind game, it does the job quite a bit better than PoE.

- Build change versatility for free. Now I'm well aware that this massively demeans character identity and development and I agree. If I had an SRS necro and wanted to make a flameblast ele, I'd prefer to definitely roll a whole new character. The problem is with similar builds. If I just wanted to make a necro with a slight shift in minion priorities (still SRS but maybe with a bit more spectre focus) I'd have to completely remake a new character that really plays out quite similarly to the first. I can't just change the same character back and forth because the regret orb cost everytime I want to flip flop the build would drive me to the ground. In D3, if I just wanted to change my CA build to use Multishot and back again from time to time, it'd be ridiculously simple. It helps keep things fresh and less monotonous.

PoE pros:
- Presentation. Yeah, D3 looks prettier and does a much better job at Michael Baying the crowd in, but I'm personally more biased towards the somber dark atmosphere in PoE. I like how everything from your surroundings to the towns to even you gear looks ragged and barely held together, it has a nice theme. It does take some time to get going, but once you're fully built up, you can have as much a power fantasy as D3 while also having a stronger theme.

- Leveling. You level a wiz in D3, you've leveled every wiz. I loved to play HC in D3 for a while until I got tired of the slog back to 70. In PoE the couple times i tried HC and died I thought, "eh, I'll try something different next time", after you die once per class on D3, there's no something different. I'm all for punishment (I do like HC after all), but I'm not into boring as heck content.

- Design uniqueness. I really like how weird the mechanics are for this game. Skills being gems, currency being consumable items, ability to reroll not only your gear, but things like chests, and even explorable areas for their mods. The characters being quite distinct while also being quite open in terms of what you're allowed to do. It's a lot of weird, unique pieces that somehow manage to fit together nicely. As a game design enthusiast, this game's design is quality porn to me.

- Build depth. Though I did like D3 as a more casual option, the hand-crafted builds were a huge turn-off. The way the sets were the only way to play and each set pretty much had a complete group of BiS specifically created to be run with them was bad design imo. Build making was basically 1. Pick a set 2. Look up the legendary list for anything that mentions the skills you use with that set 3. Pick the ones with the biggest numbers 4. Faceroll content. Then they started giving sets out for free on ladders for just hitting lvl 70, further trivializing the build-making. I appreciate the whole im-tired-from-work-so-i-just-want-to-unwind-without-thinking thing, but I think they committed to it WAY too hard.

- Seasons on D3 are just raw resets. Leagues in PoE have interesting sht happening in them. Even the leagues that kinda flopped were way better an experience than D3 seasons >_>

Imo, D3's only selling points are its accessibility and shallow-ness. It's nice for someone who is just getting into the genre and just wants to unwind, but it has no meat in its bones for anyone looking for more than that.