The fun's disappeared. Why GGG?

I'm at the point today of going 'fuck this' to bad mechanics, poor design choices and anti-fun inclusions (ground particles which players can't modify, map DCs, awful trade system, map gating, oneshot mechanics, I'm looking at each of you!).

I'd love to see a proper manifesto post which goes into *any* detail on the why of some of the changes have been made, and whether there's consideration of backing any of them out. Yes, the why. Not 'we did this/we will do this'. That doesn't tell me anything. Not some poorly thought out PR such as '+2 map drops can get players in trouble!'. Actual reasons.

- I'm not psyched to be levelling another enlighten just to I can eventually spec one of my characters.
- I'm not loving the extreme RNG any more, if I ever did. Not to mention the constant nerfs to anything good/usable.
- I'm not keen on getting single level 71 map drops in bullet hell oneshot high level maps. Presuming I can get there without DCing.
- I'm not feeling pumped about the level of defenses/life needed just to be running said maps. Or the repeated inclusion of cheap oneshots into the 'main' game (ball lightning obelisks ftw, for example).
- I'm growing bored of listening to my computer whinge at all the particles. Which I can't turn down because... Developer says so.
- A flood of new content has been added... just not tuned or even tested (why didn't the map DC issue come up and get fixed in beta?).
- I haven't had a drop in the last 6 months that is of any real use.

Many things about 2.0 are telling me don't bother. Don't bother trying to be in high level maps (might as well run 5 73s rather than a 76-77). Don't bother waiting for better eq, because it's not going to drop and divination cards won't get it for you either. Don't bother investing into a character or skill, because it'll get ripped up. Don't expect your ARPG character to play like one; expect random, and worse, cheap deaths.

Don't fight it; it's not worth the trouble. Ok, I get it. Thanks.

I agree. Been struggling myself with the horrible optimization of the game. I've got a nice rig, yet I still die frequently to 1-2 second fps lockups.

PoE is the first ARPG I have played in the last 15 years that I've played softcore on for that very reason.

1 shot / cheap deaths / deaths from lag spikes due to poor optimization does not equal a hard game. it equals a tedious one.

before anything more is added to this game work needs to be done on the optimization, its just getting worse.

map drops are a joke. it's not fun.

On the one hand I changed my build and it improved significantly with 2.0. I'm able to run the same maps as before, but with higher level mobs in them and with mods that I never would have even tried previously.

On the other hand, I used to be able to run 74-77 maps regularly with only 8q and only 2 mods and still get similar maps to drop to keep running them. I didn't get to 93 farming level 71 maps.

Now, I'm running maps with 90q 40i more or less consistently and getting nothing or maps -2 or more levels dropping from the bosses.

Generally if I get an equal or higher map drop, its from mobs, not the map boss. When one does drop it is usually lower. I thought bosses were supposed to have 20% chance to drop +2 map level and not 10% to drop -2...

Other than that 2.0 is good. Some bosses really suck, but that is nothing new. I'd like to see the rest of the new maps, but I'm not buying them.

Its probably good I can't see them just yet as I got wrecked by Malformation 12 times already, and Zana sent me to Village Ruins which wasn't so bad. I separated the bosses and went in to fight the dog thing which one shot me. I went back and hit it the .5 seconds I needed to finish it off and went out and finished off the bird thing easily enough.

Phantasmagoria seems to get some people, but I have no problem with it. I even ran it with shocked ground and added lightning damage mods and had no close calls.

The card system is fun, though I got tired of farming western forest for Incantation cards for several days with a ton of MF and never getting a single one. I know Springs map is probably where its at, though I don't know if my higher level drops my card find chances in WF or not. But as I said, I'll probably never see a Springs map drop as things stand now.

It used to be an easy map, and I stopped bothering to pick it up since it was so low level lol

...

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davidnn5 wrote:

- I'm not psyched to be levelling another enlighten just to I can eventually spec one of my characters.

enlighten realy isn't needed, more like an endgame goal.

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davidnn5 wrote:

- I'm not loving the extreme RNG any more, if I ever did. Not to mention the constant nerfs to anything good/usable.

RNG is pretty much the nature of a RPG.
that being said forsaken Masters fixed allot in that regard.
and you can always trade if thats not enough.

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davidnn5 wrote:

- I'm not keen on getting single level 71 map drops in bullet hell oneshot high level maps. Presuming I can get there without DCing.

there realy aren't many 1shots in the game and most are avoidable.
the few that aren't are forseeable and you jsut don't engage on that mob if you don't wanna die.

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davidnn5 wrote:

- I'm not feeling pumped about the level of defenses/life needed just to be running said maps. Or the repeated inclusion of cheap oneshots into the 'main' game (ball lightning obelisks ftw, for example).

you mean 'i dont like i can't put everything into dps so i cant 1 shot entire packs and cheesing my way to victory'

Sjaka: You and I are in different places in the spectrum. You're yet to experience some of the real grind. Conversely I'm yet to experience the final 5 levels to 100, so other players have a different view than I on that. Namely, that it is or was worthwhile bothering!

So please, go ahead and tell me Baldur's Gate was pretty much RNG for everything. Cause it was an RPG. Skyrim was an RPG. Final Fantasy is a RPG. RNG RNG RNG and nothing but, eh?

Heck, Bard's Tale was an RPG, and one of the best. The deaths in all of those felt earned, not random and bizarre.

Edit: Don't mean to be unkind, but you clearly haven't been xping in hundreds upon hundreds of 78+ maps. Which, in 2.0, have some really awful tuning. Balance gone haywire.

Ah the ever elusive 'fun'. If I were to compile the list of what qqers consider 'fun' and 'not fun' and what a game would need to have to have all fun, wed have a single player game with boa items, little to no RNG, zero to no defenses, extremely few deaths, reaching 100 by casuals in 30 days, and uniques and currency raining.

What's even more ironic is that there are games like this.

BTW silly to compare poe to BG Skyrim and FF.

But if you wanna talk rng in BG, load up the original, make a mage with magic missile then come out to the "welcome wolf" (google if you dont get the reference) and see how you do against him with 4hp. half the time you will fail the dice roll and die.

Basically, poe equivalent would be if hillock on normal would kill you half the time and you wouldn't able to do anything about i

This is what games used to do, hit you in the mouth, not the carebear bullshit of today.

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grepman wrote:

BTW silly to compare poe to BG Skyrim and FF.

But if you wanna talk rng in BG, load up the original, make a mage with magic missile then come out to the "welcome wolf" (google if you dont get the reference) and see how you do against him with 4hp. half the time you will fail the dice roll and die.

Basically, poe equivalent would be if hillock on normal would kill you half the time and you wouldn't able to do anything about i

This is what games used to do, hit you in the mouth, not the carebear bullshit of today.

Dude, nobody liked that back then either. That's why games are different now. It's not some conspiracy to make us all into soft feminine losers, it's because people wanted games that weren't sadistic. Developers have complied with our wishes.

A serious question: are you implying PoE would be better with random Russian roulette deaths? I mean, the game sometimes feels like that anyway, but ostensibly we actually have control over our deaths through builds, gear, and gameplay - are you saying that should be removed? Because that's what your post seems to imply; my apologies if I'm misinterpreting it.

game is broke, poe uninstalled, challenge complete