Sometimes I feel like I'm playing a VERY different game from everyone else...

"

DarthSki44 wrote:

And lastly, bemoaning an entire generation of gamers....

For fucks sake, DarthSki, can you just stop? I didn't say that at all. "Entire"? Nope. "Games"? Yup. "A lot"? Yeah. "Gamers"? Nope. Who's moving posts now, just to totally change my words to something you feel comfortable in breaking down? Stop with the strawmen and have an actual discussion, please.

And I'm not moving any goal posts here. Success is subjective. That's my whole point here. Should a new/casual player expect/aim to beat everything in his first league/month/whatever in a very grindy, hardcore game? No. Can he still succeed based on his own goals? Of course he can. Can he progress? Of course. Will he learn along the way? If he's willing to. Can he have fun? Of course.

What's your point here? That the game is easier for an experienced player? Isn't that the case in all video games? It's called a learning curve.

I've met tons of new players through my guild that found/finds PoE enjoyable. Sure, they got their asses kicked a few times, but if steamrolling a game is what it takes to make it "enjoyable", we can just end every conversation here and now.

And I have NEVER(!) made a case that PoE is new player friendly, and I will never make that case - because it's not, and it's not trying to be. But that does NOT mean that some new players can't find it enjoyable. Some new players WANT to learn, they WANT to explore, they WANT to try, fail, learn, try and conquer.

ALL PoE players were new players once and stuck around. Some did of course start to play when the game was simpler, others have started recently.

Short answer, OP, is that a lot of people only have so much time to play Path of Exile. It's why I've fallen off recent leagues and didn't play at all between last December and yesterday - I have a full-time job and other stuff to do, Path's constant league blitz and insistence that you sink forty hours a week EVERY week into Path got tiresome for a while.

But even beyond that? I could play a character for a dozen hours only to discover its passive tree is an unsalvageable mess and have to scrap it and start over...or I could sink twenty minutes into Path of Building and have a plan to follow with the knowledge that the tree is baseline functional. I could go SSF and spend the entire game feeling lucky I have a 4-link and desperately hoping to get my resistances above 50%...or I could use the trade site and get gear that actually works. I could do a lot of "Just play the game", but I wouldn't be able to get as far or do as much in my limited gaming time without leaning on some third-party tools. And since Grinding Gear itself hosts the wiki and has assembled trade sites, they know these tools are popular and acknowledge them as part of the game.

At this stage, can I memeblast my way into maps on bootstrap 4-links with whatever halfway competent build I feel like? Generally, yeah. Could I always do that? No. It took a couple thousand hours of playing, both "just playing" as well as researching and following guides on both various builds and also different game mechanics. Competent use of third-party resources and tools makes me feel better and more confident about the playtime I DO get, makes it feel like less of a slapass waste. That's valuable to me. If it's not valuable to you, no worries. You can simply not use the tools and be perfectly fine, ne?

Today i logged in, beat malachai, got bored, logged off.

Played D3, got bored, logged off.

D4 sucks, already tryed that shit today. No meaningful customization early game and i'm not sitting in that pile of shit until "endgame".

MMOs have been dead since anti-trading because bots. And since they were developed to glue the player, all the tutorial-esque effort was in early to mid levels, where you keep seeing new gear. Which is where MOBAs took over and are still there.

Everything else is fake and lgb++(in classic RWJ on youtube they used to say fake and gay, which i find perfectly reasonable, but i want to safeguard myself if that even works). Modern trash. Smoke it or leave it.

I played the game yeah. For 5 minutes. And it would've been 2 minutes, if the game didn't force me to get all the organs, i really hate that about PoE, that it keeps chaining me from place to place. I prefer to play at my own pace.

But i also spent a few hours theorycrafting builds, all of which failed bad! There is no mention of that on the forums, no complaints. I played the game, but i still got bored. How many times are you going to keep playing the same game over and over and over ? That's up to you, man. Fucking weirdos.

You all are meme-ing shit. There is some legitimate criticism, some people, mainly kids, complaining about literally everything, and some people, who need the right motivator to get going. Just distinguish fairly, or respond to the right post instead of putting them all in one basket.

But you are right too. When i played the game i was also motivated by a guy, who wrote something like that. And by hansolo always saying to run packcheck, so the game actually worked(!). And at that time i didn't write shit on the forums, because i was just either playing or doing something else.

We have to win this fight. We have to say, what we want to say. In spite of all the kids, all the people in their little thoughts in their heads, their own mentality. WE ARE ENTITLED TO OUR OWN OPINION!!! And as reasonable academics it is easily enough to suggest actual improvements and not turn it in to a turd. But saying anything is like you are inviting entire gangs of hooligans to have turf wars against each other. Either they shut you up or other people speak up and derail what you were saying. Isn't it awesome ?!

"

Phrazz wrote:

And I have NEVER(!) made a case that PoE is new player friendly, and I will never make that case - because it's not, and it's not trying to be. But that does NOT mean that some new players can't find it enjoyable. Some new players WANT to learn, they WANT to explore, they WANT to try, fail, learn, try and conquer.

Reading your other post until the last paragraph gave me exactly that impression though, and in the worst way i might add.

You said that all the "critics" have huge flaws in their claims to the point of them being stupid for even making them and then you pulled the "You can make it through the campaign without 3rd party tools!!!" card.
Sure, you can beat the first 10?% of the game without 3rd party tools if you are willing to literally zerk your way past bosses (i didn't even bother counting the number of deaths against Kitava in my first play through but it's likely in mid double digits).

For all that grand acting about how flawed other peoples arguments are that's really a pathetic counterpoint. Without 3rd party tools you can't trade, you don't have a loot filter, you can't craft, you can't plan/make builds and you get zero information how pretty much anything works in this game.

Yeah, you can still beat the tutorial that doesn't teach you anything without any of that but honestly what kind of argument is that? And to make it even better you flat out admit in your last paragraph that the "critics" you've been shitting on in the beginning are actually right on all their points.

Besides, how many of all those new players in your guild became a member of said guild without the forums hm? Because the moment they used this forum to get in there is a 3rd party tool involved. Sure you can enjoy POE as a new player if you don't mind digging into it using all the resources there are, nobody said otherwise. But being new and using none of those tools AND still having fun past the first 5 acts, I'd say that requires a severe suffering fetish.

"

Phrazz wrote:

"

DarthSki44 wrote:

And lastly, bemoaning an entire generation of gamers....

For fucks sake, DarthSki, can you just stop? I didn't say that at all. "Entire"? Nope. "Games"? Yup. "A lot"? Yeah. "Gamers"? Nope. Who's moving posts now, just to totally change my words to something you feel comfortable in breaking down? Stop with the strawmen and have an actual discussion, please.

And I'm not moving any goal posts here. Success is subjective. That's my whole point here. Should a new/casual player expect/aim to beat everything in his first league/month/whatever in a very grindy, hardcore game? No. Can he still succeed based on his own goals? Of course he can. Can he progress? Of course. Will he learn along the way? If he's willing to. Can he have fun? Of course.

What's your point here? That the game is easier for an experienced player? Isn't that the case in all video games? It's called a learning curve.

I've met tons of new players through my guild that found/finds PoE enjoyable. Sure, they got their asses kicked a few times, but if steamrolling a game is what it takes to make it "enjoyable", we can just end every conversation here and now.

And I have NEVER(!) made a case that PoE is new player friendly, and I will never make that case - because it's not, and it's not trying to be. But that does NOT mean that some new players can't find it enjoyable. Some new players WANT to learn, they WANT to explore, they WANT to try, fail, learn, try and conquer.

ALL PoE players were new players once and stuck around. Some did of course start to play when the game was simpler, others have started recently.

For my entire response that what's you decided to quote? After you spent paragraphs expanding on what "people today need handed to them". Fucking come on. Anyone can read what you wrote. Feel however you want, but we both know why you wrote it. NOTHING is ever 100% one way or the other, so don't try and back pedal with "I didn't mean everyone" that's insulting to everyone's intelligence. We all known this isn't an all or nothing situation when discussing players. It never is, and it's statistically impossible. Let's get over that please.

Again you are struggling with my point(s)? I don't think you are, like at all. Sure is there someone new somewhere in the world that will enjoy PoE completely in the dark. Yes. What the fuck does that have to do with literally anything when we are discussing swaths of entire player segments in the casual/average arena? If experienced players use tools to be successful, how do you think that impacts the lesser players without? Again come on. This isn't theoretical physics.

PoE is absolutely reliant on 3rd party tools in its current scope realistically. Could they do away with them and the game still work? Sure. To their own peril I guess. It's multiplicative with new player and casual player hostility. There is data to back that up. I'm not concerned with specific personal anecdotes from your guild (which I dont even know if it's true or not). There are plenty of "trying PoE blind for the first time" videos, and they are brutal. The game is brutal in terms of accessibility and onboarding.

Which brings us back to the point of this thread. The game experience fluctuates WILDLY in PoE. The thread title is exactly right for a ton of players. The gulf that exists between player types is MASSIVE, and often the cause for many of the friction points the community has. (And for whom GGG balances the game)

I went in cold in PoE back in Perandus. I couldn't get much to work well, but I did get to t4 maps with my not-holy-at-all flame totem Hierophant. First trading I did was through the forum. I remember needing 80 chaos orbs and farmed them. Raw, because I did not know of the chaos recipe.


Got my first HH in Incursion; t3 burial spam kb wander. From then on, HH kind of became a goal. Cleared all content on an aura stacker in Heist, kind of a new goal. Got a Mageblood on a 1k div build in Kalandra. Had to get another MB in crucible.

The flip side is that it's just not for me to disregard all build guides and streams out there before a new league starts. It's too hard to reduce my goals, and I've plenty of experience running into issues that would stagnate me and my chance to reach them. For example, I thought I was Grimro.


Everyone is somewhere different in this crazy range of PoE, I guess.

"

DarthSki44 wrote:

For my entire response that what's you decided to quote? After you spent paragraphs expanding on what "people today need handed to them".

You're doing it again... I never said anything about what any people need handed to them. I was talking about games. You even use quotation marks this time around, and still deliberately misquote me. Can you please stop? I used the word "please" now. Shall I throw in a "pretty" too?

"

PoE is absolutely reliant on 3rd party tools in its current scope realistically

This is what I have a problem with, when used in the same discussion as "new players". A new player, playing through the campaign, does not need third party tools. They don't even know about them. They probably do not care about them. They are blindly finding their way through the game. Some will like it, some will not.

If we set the bar at "beating the endgame" or "min-maxing", I will gladly agree that we are closing in on a "requirement" when it comes to third party tools. And that's where my previous points came from; people use the end of the endgame as a "baseline" in PoE - that doesn't really apply to new/casual players, who probably will never see that part of the game, maybe doesn't want to see that part of the game and maybe shouln't aim towards it either. Players happy with playing the story.

The requirement of those tools is solely dependent on what you're trying to achieve, which I think is very important to mention.

"

Baharoth15 wrote:

You said that all the "critics" have huge flaws in their claims to the point of them being stupid for even making them.

Did I really say "all critics"? No. Did I call them stupid? No. This is all you. I said the most eager critics, and limited it to certain arguments which are flawed. And they are. Do you need a PhD to succeed in PoE (which was one of the examples I used)? No you do not. Do you really disagree here? Why don't you just read what I write instead of doing everything you can to interpret it beyond my words?

I'll quote you again:

"

Baharoth15 wrote:

You said that all the "critics" have huge flaws in their claims to the point of them being stupid for even making them.

Please tell me where I wrote this.

"

jsuslak313 wrote:

I've spent a lot of time on the forums. Perhaps that is my undoing.

Most (keyword: most, not ALL) complaints boil down to "Why do we need 3rd party software to play the game", "Why doesn't the game tell us x", "Where is information y", throws glass at the wall, ragequits, GGG FIX IT.

Is the entire player-base no longer capable of simply playing the game?

When I play this game, even now with a lot of experience under my belt, I learn new things....by playing the game! The only 3rd party software I use is PoB, and that's mainly because after my first few builds of a league I just want to try out someone else's work because its fun and quick. But I've never felt like I NEEDED PoB, NEEDED build guides, NEEDED youtube videos etc. That's such a weird concept to me...

When I pick up a game, the first thing I do is sit down and play the game. I'm not about to read a wiki, or read a guide, or watch someone else play the game. I play the damn game myself. I make stupid decisions, I adjust, I learn, I have a fun time. I hit walls that might last days, but eventually I'll overcome the wall and progress even further and NEVER hit that wall again.

Why has gaming reversed direction? ESPECIALLY within the PoE community. Since when do you read the wikipedia synopsis of a movie before going to see the movie? Since when do you look up all the best strategies before you sit down and play a game? Since when do you feel like you need to know every little thing about a game before you just experience it for yourself? Since when do you ONLY enjoy a game when you immediately have the most power possible right from the beginning? THat's like playing a game for the first time, with all the cheat codes enabled from the very start.

It boggles my mind and frustrates me to no end. I keep coming back for more, but I notice myself always being driven to the same responses to various threads...just play the game! Observe what is happening around you! Feel out your character and gameplay! So what if your build isn't optimized to hell? So what if your underpowered? Are you having fun? Running a PoE simulator just isn't the same experience as playing PoE.

Don't you use TFT? Or am i confusing you with someone else? If so i apologize.

Anyhow i just wanted to say if that is the case, then you most definitely are playing a different game from everyone else.

Maybe not literally but the reports from every TFT user before and after using it indicates the profit margins are way out of wack if you're a member of that community versus not a member just in item availability alone, so much is taken off the market and sold exclusively there which i would have had access to prior to this whole mess and i did very well because of it.. its hurting more and more now when i have to spend an hour to buy a single map instead of hundreds of them with relative ease only a few patches before this community took the game by storm.

"

DarthSki44 wrote:

PoE is absolutely reliant on 3rd party tools in its current scope realistically.

Do you need any third party stuff to launch or run the game? are you forced to use any of the tools? nope, so your statement is entirely wrong diabloski.

Close to every game has third party tools and stuff, even D4 already has plenty of handy and useful third party stuff made by the community and not Activision Blizzard itself.
Pretty much every game, not just PoE comes with a large range of tools or helpful websites which are not entirely necessary or required to play and enjoy the game, but handy to use to enhance your experience or to help you with min-maxing of stats.

Do you need to buy wheels for your car?

Hell no, you can spend years and years trying to understand how to produce one and developing the necessary technology, gathering/making the necessary materials for that.

How about you produce your own car as well, a little more complex now, right? So add years and years and years on end, maybe you won't even be alive anymore trying to do all that on your own. This is you playing a game so complex like POE without the use of third party tools. Doable? Hell yeah, but not time efficient at all.

Most of us don't have this much free time to play, as we have RL jobs, families and so on. So we cannot afford to "build our own cars", we have to resort to third party tools (buy cars from car companies!).

Hope it helps!

Cheers.