I'm Unhappy I Put As Much Money As I Did In This Game

Ok Septile your right, all the people that feel the game is unrewarding are just doing it wrong. There is nothing wrong with the game, there is something wrong with the players. Feel better now?

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Septile wrote:

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raics wrote:

Very perceptive, you probably also noted how much effort went into making elemental builds fiddly, underpowered or just plain annoying to play, since CB. And not surprising, elemental attackers get most of their damage from auras and caster get most of it from gems. Which means they're much less gear dependent in general, and you can't have that in a trade-centric game, it's bad for business.

?

They literally just doubled the spell damage and elemental damage nodes in the starting caster trees and the caster trees are next in line for a new pass, the aura changes were a massive buff to ele wanders(my build at least), and they added several extremely powerful vaal gems that scale like crazy with elemental.

Which all amounts to jack shit, honestly, they give us increases and enemies get multipliers, so to speak, act bosses, map bosses and exiles are all curse resistant, curse-immune is far too common a mod both on maps and rares, and enemies often run around with resists so heavily overcapped one curse does nothing. And if you play on DoT even penetration gems do nothing for you.

And atziri is, most conveniently immune to elemental statuses, which are pretty much the only remaining reason to bother. In the meantime, physical builds don't have a single care on their mind.

I mean, this is nothing new, it has been discussed to exhaustion.

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Hilbert wrote:

Try to create a melee caster or a Ranger with Melee Abilities.

This is just impossibleto have both abilities on an equal level.

And that's one of my favorite pet peeves, you can't build a hybrid that isn't totally pointless to use, hell you can't even get it to work with what little points you got left from mandatory overinvestment into defense. I can build an honest-to god classic battlemage in most ARPGs and RPGs, even in extremely restricting DnD rulesets. But not in PoE, the game of freedom and choice.

And I refuse to use trigger gems for that, it's idiotic and has nothing to do with what battlemage is about, it's an insult to the archetype.

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Wittgenstein wrote:

by 'low on the priority list' I meant that of all the things these guys and gals have to get done, my unique isn't in the top 10. I am just guessing. Maybe Chris is screaming at them every morning to get mine done... "To hell with ACT 4 we need to get this ring in the game!!"

I consider PoE the best ARPG due to its overarching ideas, like the open passive web and the skill system. However the layers of RNG and the restrictions they are putting on this openness in the name of 'balance' I just don't like. So what if a % of the playerbase uses the same skills? Why give us an open web if we can't break it? So, no, I don't regret giving them the money per say, I just regret the direction they have gone with the game and how that direction restricts my enjoyment.

For an example. In an earlier build of PoE you could have multiples of the same skill gem in different pieces of gear linked with different mod gems - and it would be treated as if you had 1 skill with 12 mod gems on it. Now, of course, that lead to very broken builds, but at the same time I LOVED being able to just create this fire spewing god of a witch who shot off spells like a Gatling gun. it was just FUN to do, you know? Now though everything is just beaten down and washed out. Like the web, you used to have 4 paths from any starting point to choose from but now you have 2. So why have the web at all? Why not just have different passives unlock at levels and then have those slightly branch into different areas... because that's basically what you have now.

Originally I thought this game was going to be a much more open experience with a much less punishing RNG crafting system. Why did I think that way? No idea. I just did. So I am not angry about supporting GGG - hell just knowing that I helped in some small way to bring a game to people who really do love everything about it, that's just awesome.

Good post.

They try to sell us on the skill tree, but after you play the game for a while you realize it's not any different from any other ARPG's skill tree.

They basically just crowded all the skill trees on to one image and added some overlap, and used this to pretend that there is some big over-arching theme of creativity and sandbox.

This, of course, couldn't be further from the truth.

Just like you said, there's very little actual "choice" involved. Builds are spoon-fed to players, and if players do anything creative that GGG doesn't like (which is pretty much anything), they will make it impossible.

Build diversity has lessened substantially since I started playing. Itemization has gotten more bland and boring.

The skill tree has been crippled, as well, and will continue to be even more crippled. They don't want classes doing interesting things. They want the exact opposite.

They want to pigeonhole you as much as possible to "constrain" your power and possibilities. I think it's honestly because the devs have become control freaks. They have a desire to feel that they are in control of the game, and not the players. The game is suffering because of this.

Edit: it would honestly be helpful if they just displayed on a giant banner what builds they intend you to play during the current "expansion."

For instance:

Welcome to Sacrifice of the Vaal!
We are officially endorsing Searing Bond and Spectral Throw builds this time around, so play those or you agree to the terms that your build may be utter shit.

Have fun, and remember to stay in touch for our next series of officially endorsed builds! And remember to start now! These builds only stay strong for a limited time!

-GGG

"

CharanJaydemyr wrote:

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IceM wrote:

Ok Septile your right, all the people that feel the game is unrewarding are just doing it wrong. There is nothing wrong with the game, there is something wrong with the players. Feel better now?

And you wonder why people think you're a troll.

Actually charan, you have become one of the biggest trolls yourself, but thats ok right.....because its you. Besides that was the best response to give him, I am no longer going to get in BS hair splitting debates where users take your words and twist them to create straw men arguments. That game is old.

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Septile wrote:

The drops in D3 are still complete garbage. The only reason you get anything is because of the safety net they put in where you're guaranteed to get a legendary after a certain amount of time. I've never found ANYTHING outside of that designated time(it's 2-4 hours I don't know).

It's common knowledge that it's path of trade maybe on this forum and other communities which make up, what, 0.1% of the PoE playerbase? Less? More? But outside of that I have several friends who never trade and I myself rarely, if ever, trade.

If you want to be a competitive player then yes, you need to trade. It's a no brainer that you use every resource available to be competitive. But the majority of players are not competitive, I'm not competitive anymore, so there's no need to trade unless you're part of the significant minority that wants to be at the top of the ladder. Several of the people I see complaining about trading don't even play hardcore or participate even semi-frequently in races.

How many of these people have ever gambled? Most of the time you get nothing for what you put in, if you're lucky you'll break even, if you're absurdly lucky you'll hit the jackpot. The vast majority of gamblers will never ever hit a jackpot in their life, and yet they continue to gamble from time to time. Anybody who gambles expecting to win is considered an idiot by any sane individual, but people do it because they enjoy it and appreciate the potential for what they could get out of it.

I don't really know what people are expecting, I enjoy the process of thinking of a build that kills things well and then killing those things, the gear just helps that goal along. There are only very few builds that actually require very difficult to find gear, but in the meantime there are tons of builds that don't require that at all.

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raics wrote:

Very perceptive, you probably also noted how much effort went into making elemental builds fiddly, underpowered or just plain annoying to play, since CB. And not surprising, elemental attackers get most of their damage from auras and caster get most of it from gems. Which means they're much less gear dependent in general, and you can't have that in a trade-centric game, it's bad for business.

?

They literally just doubled the spell damage and elemental damage nodes in the starting caster trees and the caster trees are next in line for a new pass, the aura changes were a massive buff to ele wanders(my build at least), and they added several extremely powerful vaal gems that scale like crazy with elemental.

Without going into extensive detail, trading is a big part of this game, even the developers, not moderators, have said that it is an economy driven game. They enjoy seeing it expand as such. There isn't a lot of thought put into the builds, the way the system is made, you generally go for 240% maxiumum life and grab any resist or damage nodes on the way, it's very typical for builds to follow similar paths because of the way it's set up. You can enjoy the game, and love it even, that's just fine, everyone is different, but to deny it has any issues is silly, it supports the current direction the game is going, and for many more people, it's not fun the way it's set up.

Another note, the way your'e acting reflects very pooly on GGG's decision to make you a forum moderator. The first reply you've posted on here was about people "Bitching", which is both unprofessional and mean spirited. The majority people on this thread are voicing an opinion, they find flaws with a game that we all play or have played. Speaking in the manner you have throughout your posts here reflects poorly on you, and GGG should reconsider their title of your forum moderator. Purposely antagonizing posters and blurting ignorance is not the way you should go about things if you want people to understand your opinion.

Can I just add something that has been broken for a while and I think really effects the overall playability of certain builds?

For me I don't see the point of dexterity other than the developers think it should be in there because it is some kind of archetypal RPG attribute. I mean if you think about it dexterity benefits you nothing other than it allows you to meet the req for specific gear. Most people don't need the additional accuracy and the +ev only benefits those taking IR which is just about everyone running a dexterity build. This is in part due to problems with evasion itself, but it also has to do with the fact that +str and +int nodes are, in general, much more useful.

Think about it, both +str and +int add to actually useful defensive stats like life and es, furthermore they both add to the strength of your skills either by boosting your mana pool allowing you to spam more or by increasing physical damage. Dexterity has none of these advantages yet we are still stuck pathing through these +dex nodes just to be forced to take IR.

I know dexterity probably wont be given a boost, but it would be nice if instead of giving you crap stats it gave you some kind of hybrid of int/str benefits.

/rant

Just for the record... I too think that GGG has "gone off the rails". I don't think they crashed and burned though. They need to realize that they don't need to one-up themselves every 4 months to have a great game.

yea the game isn't rewarding, it is punishing. the further you go, the weaker you are. penalty resist? lame.

they should halved the rng factor in everything.

First, let me say that I respect your right to your opinion.

The factual content of your post, however, is very disputable.


The content you posted is entirely listed beneath the spoiler tag. Hence you are not allowed to claim that only part of your post is present.

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tikitaki wrote:

Spoiler

They try to sell us on the skill tree, but after you play the game for a while you realize it's not any different from any other ARPG's skill tree.

They basically just crowded all the skill trees on to one image and added some overlap, and used this to pretend that there is some big over-arching theme of creativity and sandbox.

This, of course, couldn't be further from the truth.

Just like you said, there's very little actual "choice" involved. Builds are spoon-fed to players, and if players do anything creative that GGG doesn't like (which is pretty much anything), they will make it impossible.

Build diversity has lessened substantially since I started playing. Itemization has gotten more bland and boring.

The skill tree has been crippled, as well, and will continue to be even more crippled. They don't want classes doing interesting things. They want the exact opposite.

They want to pigeonhole you as much as possible to "constrain" your power and possibilities. I think it's honestly because the devs have become control freaks. They have a desire to feel that they are in control of the game, and not the players. The game is suffering because of this.

Edit: it would honestly be helpful if they just displayed on a giant banner what builds they intend you to play during the current "expansion."

For instance:

Welcome to Sacrifice of the Vaal!
We are officially endorsing Searing Bond and Spectral Throw builds this time around, so play those or you agree to the terms that your build may be utter shit.

Have fun, and remember to stay in touch for our next series of officially endorsed builds! And remember to start now! These builds only stay strong for a limited time!

-GGG

Now for the responses - for simplification I will put what you said in italics.


They try to sell us on the skill tree, but after you play the game for a while you realize it's not any different from any other ARPG's skill tree.

1) Any class can access any skill. Diablo 2 didn't have that, Diablo 3 doesn't have that.
Hence the skill tree is different from at least two other ARPG games. Your statement is thus proven FALSE.

They basically just crowded all the skill trees on to one image and added some overlap, and used this to pretend that there is some big over-arching theme of creativity and sandbox.

2) They aren't separate skill trees. Many, if not most skill trees for classes involve tiers of skills. You can't pick Level 12 skills until you have taken a level 6 skill in that tree for instance. The skill tree is called a tree in fact because it branches out. Trees don't normally connect from one branch tip to the next, nor from the branch tip to the root of the tree.

As an example, The Amazon skill tree in Diablo 2 has three parts, so we will look at the Passive and Magic Skills section. In Diablo 2, you can take Inner Sight at level 1, but you can't take Slow Missiles until level 6, and you HAVE to take Inner Sight if you want Slow Missiles. Near the bottom, if you want Valkyrie, you must take Inner Sight, Dodge, Slow Missiles, Avoid, Decoy and Evade before you can put a single point in Valkyrie.

If Diablo 2 was set up Path of Exile skill tree style - You could take one point in Inner Sight, one in Slow Missiles, One in Decoy and at Level 4 you could have Valkyrie.


Furthermore, The Sorceress could probably get Valkyrie at level 12 after going through her Cold skill tree.

Imagine Diablo 2 where the skill tree (not items or runewords) allows a Sorceress to use Warcries to boost her skills, Auras to boost her spells, a Valkyrie, Summoned Grizzly, some Skeletal Mages and Lower Resists/Amp damage.

That is an entirely different animal. Path of Exile didn't just crowd the skill trees together and add some overlap. There are specific paths - some of elemental damage, some of defense, some of critical strikes etc. Path of Exile is a carefully constructed network where GGG allows and encourages build diversity.

You can make some very bad builds in PoE. GGG is not here to hold your hand. GGG does not cripple the skill tree and they do not have specific builds they want people to play.

If you had read enough of their posts, you would know that the opposite is true. When too many people are playing almost the exact same build is when that build may get a nerf from GGG. Usually, it is because that build is too over powered, or the build is being exploited.

The fact that GGG alters the skill tree and tries to bring some balance back is also a sign that they don't want any one or two builds being the obvious choice.

That is why Spectral Throw and the Scion's path got a small nerf. It may get nerfed again.

GGG has buffed Melee, and they have buffed spell casters. They have nerfed Discharge, Cast on Damage Taken, Avatar of Fire, Lightning Arrow and other skills when it is clear that the skill is far more powerful than others.


GGG didn't endorse Searing Bond or Spectral Throw, and they aren't the only viable builds. I haven't touched either skill for the Ambush league and my character is not having any problems at all working her way through merciless - even with relatively junky gear. The character does not have anything above a 5 link, and not a single piece of gear that would trade for more than a few alts.

There are plenty of other builds that I have not played before that I could go with and not have much trouble either. There are lots of viable builds for the game. I know because I see players using all types of builds just cruising through the game.


GGG is not pigeon-holing anyone. What they are doing is more similar to not allowing nuclear powered machine gun equipped pigeons to compete against ordinary pigeons.

There are more types of builds that can make it to end game now, then there were a year ago. Your profile is hidden, but if you went back even further than a year, there would be even less viable builds.

There was no Cyclone, No Spectral Throw, No Searing Bond, No Rain of Arrows, No Lightning Trappers, No Sporkers, No Ethereal Knives, No Viper Strike, etc.

There was Fireball, Discharge, Ground Slam, Lightning Arrow, Freeze Pulse and Ice Spear.

That was about all everyone played, because many of the new skills and the support gems that made other builds possible didn't even exist.

To summarize this -Concerning Path of Exile's skill tree, game design or choices, there is nothing factually true to what you posted.

NOTHING.