Leagues - the defining difference of PoE, cash shop and all.

One thing that I think many are missing (especially with regards to the item shops) is... Leagues. I see many discussions on the whole 'p2w' dribble, I think I can provide a bit more perspective. GGG has mentioned some league specifics, but leagues have huge potential, far beyond what's expected.

For all those who are worried about how they implement and what they offer in the cash shop, GGG might easily implement the following leagues:

"No Cash shop, No Trading League" -- this league has no access to the cash shop, and no ability to trade.

"Item Shop Bliss League" -- this league is a full-on item shop haven. Many cash shop items can ONLY be found in this league, and all purchases are 15% less than other shop-enabled leagues.

"Hardcore Public PvP League" -- this league features 'Public' zones throughout the acts which are full on pvp with possible item drops on death. Up to 12 characters per instance can duke it out, with a large endgame instance capable of holding 24 players with no npcs.

"True Death League -- This league is not for the faint of heart. Experience and monster rewards are doubled, difficulty quadrupled, and if you die you're gone forever. Only 1 playable character per account, stash reset on death.

"Sexy League" -- This is our social league, and many cosmetic items only found in our item shop can be crafted, plus a few you won't find anywhere else!

And lets not forget that most 'ladder' leagues will be devoid of item shop items, which allow a truly even playing field as they are seen currently in the weekend ladders.

I could go on all day with league ideas, I just want to give you some food for thought and GGG some direct input.

So I believe it would be very easy for them to make these specialty leagues, they've already shown their league ability to have an incredible amount of trackable stats. The hardest part would be to narrow them down to the most desirable, tweak and add as they see where the population of players primarily play.

And with this, they easily appeal to every single type of player while eliminating the skeptics casual vs hardcore, social vs solo, and F2p vs P2W. All styles can be accommodated, and would intentionally bring like-minded players together in the leagues of their choice.

I don't like these ideas tbh.

Splitting game in too much league don't seems that good too me. This is not an MMORPG anways, it's ARPG.

Besides, we don't even know what will be in the cashshop.

I think it would be essential that all leagues have access to the same cash shop items. A player shouldn't have to choose between being able to make his character visually unique or playing the rule set he wants to play.

As far as different leagues, there will be more. PvP-focused leagues are already planned, including hardcore and cut-throat (where you drop items). Ironman is another interesting one, where flasks don't refill in town and there is no vendor trading or default mana regen.

I like the idea of a no-trade league, but that can easily be overcome by drop trading. I don't know if the game could support a way to defeat that.

I really don't think they'll implement any of the leagues you've mentioned, but it is rather creative.

I could see them potentially restricting certain purchases to certain leagues. For example, full respecs (I'm totally speculating that they'll even exist) could be Default only and not available in Hardcore.

There is also a possibility they could have sales for characters created in a new league so you can pick up that nifty pair of pants at a discount on a new character, then later transfer it to Default.

However, I believe the main use of leagues will still be for Default, Hardcore, Cutthroat, and Ladder Rushes and other competitions.

Bind on pickup would resolve that issue.

The rest of the ideas aren't great in my opinion.

Thanks for the responses. However it appears my point was missed.

I'm not proposing these league ideas be used, rather I'm implying that leagues can take many shapes with accompanying examples, and will be the leveling field of all the 'p2w' arguments while offering many options beyond.

Extremely terrible ideas

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Psomm wrote:

Thanks for the responses. However it appears my point was missed.

I'm not proposing these league ideas be used, rather I'm implying that leagues can take many shapes with accompanying examples, and will be the leveling field of all the 'p2w' arguments while offering many options beyond.

Yes, leagues can take many different forms, and I think it's potentially a really interesting feature of the game.

But I'm not really sure how they'll be any kind of leveling field for p2w arguments, since the developers' stated aim is to not make the game pay-to-win in the first place. I mean they are running a business; there'd be very little incentive for them to run a "no cash shop" league.

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Bordam wrote:

Extremely terrible ideas

QFT.

In order for the game to be successful and profitable, it will need to be split between as few leagues as possible. I think hardcore and default are really all we need.