The -15% exp penalty is obnoxiously bad outdated design.
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The problem is not really with exp loss but with the frankly ridiculous amount of time it takes to level in PoE. Even as early as 70, each level starts to take potentially hours depending on your gear and whether or not you have a consistent crew to play with. In the 80s we're talking days per level. Even people who have been playing 24/7 for three weeks are only in the mid-80s, with a select few being in the upper 80s. This is a game that specifically intends for players to make many new characters and constantly take breaks to play races. It's completely absurd for the level curve to be designed so that it takes many months for a normal player to hit the maximum level. That's longer than any MMORPG.
Coupled with the fact that levels never stop mattering, unlike in D2 where most builds were finished around level 85 or so, PoE's leveling system is just extremely lopsided. This will become particularly obvious if/when people start getting serious about PvP, because when the last dozen levels are actually important instead of being mostly cosmetic, that'll exclude basically all casual players from meaningful PvP. You'll never be able to compete against someone who has fifteen more passive points than you do. GGG are trying to emulate D2's "infinite character progress" but don't seem to realize that the reason it wasn't a problem in D2 was that builds stopped progressing past like 80 skill points. Any further character progress was almost completely meaningless since the added stat points gave very little and the last skill points were mostly useless. To gain the last levels was a psychological factor, a matter of personal satisfaction and bragging rights. It's the opposite in PoE, the last 10-15 passives are actually worth much more than the first. They're the ones that'll let you make completely overpowered builds that nobody else has access to. Exp loss is fine - it's actually a really good form of death penalty - but this kind of leveling curve is broken when matched with a skill system where skill points don't have diminishing returns. If it wasn't important to get past level 85, exp loss wouldn't be a problem. The leveling system is what's broken, especially because it is in stark conflict with the obviously intended gameplay habits of constant temporary races, rerolls due to no full respecs, and a general leaning away from permanency in characters. Last edited by Jakabov#1183 on Feb 11, 2013, 8:00:43 AM
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" I actually made a thread about this point because I think its worth discussion http://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/130193 |
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I'll post it there as well.
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Does it make sense to talk about leveling curves/max level if the game isn't even complete? Max level is 100, add a whole act, and everyone gets the 100.
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Of course it does. It's not like new acts are "coming soon," they're long-term future plans. A few zones will be added here and there, but I very much doubt that content for another 30 levels will be added to the campaign in the foreseeable future. The game still has to be playable and as enjoyable as possible until those future goals come true. Just because something has been vaguely mentioned as a thing for the future does not invalidate all current problems. Act 4 is not coming in two patches -- it's probably not even coming within the first six months. These problems exist here and now, and it's very much worth discussing potential solutions. The game is basically lacking 30 levels worth of content, and that won't be added so soon that the current problems are not a meaningful concern.
They'll never make it easy to get to level 100, that's part of their design intentions -- the problem is that the last levels aren't just cosmetic bragging rights and leaderboard sorting mechanisms, they're actually a tangible part of character progress to such an extent that the last levels are the most important ones. If they wanted to actually emulate D2 correctly and get the benefits of that leveling system without introducing some new, fundamental problems in the process, they would have to make it so the last 10 levels don't give passive points. I think that might actually not be such a bad idea. Then the last levels can remain near-impossible to get, but they'll mostly just be for purposes such as 'ladder-first 100' and 'look how badass I am' -- exactly like in D2. Making it easy to get level 100 would actually be bad for the game, but making those last ten levels unimportant in a practical sense would be good. Last edited by Jakabov#1183 on Feb 11, 2013, 8:24:54 AM
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" Maps are actually very good end game content, they are just prone to horrible RNG, which effects certain character builds more than others (and even more so if you do solo play) |
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" I honestly don't see a problem with this.... " Why would you want to compete against someone who is fifteen levels ahead of you?? I just figured you would only pvp with people who are close to your lvl. Casuals can still have meaningful pvp. Standard Forever
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" well let's see. It has to fulfill the following criteria: 1. doesn't make the player weaker this encourages negative grinding(negative grinding means, that you have to grind yourself back to what you were, rather than grind to become more powerful). 2. It makes the player worry about death. So it has to have some sort of impact and not be trivial to get rid off. So in this short period of time, I came up with: death puzzles (minigames one has to complete to be resurrected), just like in some rpgs you can pick a lock in a minigame way. positive: makes dying a part of the game. negative: people could argue that they want to play PoE, not some minigame. |
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The other possibility would be to make the death penalty constant with the estimated time invested. That means as your level goes up, the absolute percentage of the death penalty for XP would go down, while the time you lost remains constant.
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" This would be a better system. I don't see any reasons a lvl 80+ char should lose an entire day of gameplay or more on death, while a lvl 60 can recuperate a death on the same difficulty level in 30 minutes. Such an unbalanced against higher levels system leads to basically the same type of gaming at high levels in both leagues, as the death in softcore is so costly you need to avoid it by all means. placeholder for creative sig
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