Game is too fast.

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buhdunkadunk wrote:

I don't think the game is at the point it's too fast yet. It's close but it still took two and a half days for the first 100 in the two week. Once we start getting 100's within 24 hours then yes it's time to look into the speed issue.

You dont think that the average people that can reach lv90 in a week (not even playing fulltime) is something insane? I mean, level 90 is very near the maximum level. Just reaching it in a week makes the game absolutely crazy. Leveling should be something hard: I unedrstand that there will always be some "pro" guys who will reach the maximum level a lot faster than others, and this is ok. But if the average people achieve that result in a week, then there is a huge problem.

And the source of the problem is speed: if you can reach something like 130kkk exp/h, its just because your movement speed is very high. Its not only a matter of monster's life; it does matter how fast you can cover up the entire area.

I would point even this, to explain why the game has become too fast: do you guys notice the affixes of rare or blue monsters? These informations should be very important to be know by the player, though in the game, now, no one cares. This happens, not only because they are oneshot (maybe even offscreen, so you cant put the cursor on them), but because you do so many attacks in a second that the rares dies without letting you read everything even if you would to. Or you could be oneshot from them coz you couldnt manage to read them, because they went on you too fast. This is just wrong.
And maybe you die coz you are a melee that couldn't see a rare with volatile iceblood+increased life in a map with -15% max res: this would a damn stupid death.

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Wispo wrote:

Many builds doesn't have offscreen capabilities at all....
In a nutshell, not everyone plays crit bow or crit spark :/

Like i said before: I am the one who complains about speed, but i've never played those meta builds. I think even "normal" builds like i did this league (Blade vortex and fireball) are just too fast.

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Wispo wrote:

Many builds doesn't have offscreen capabilities at all....
In a nutshell, not everyone plays crit bow or crit spark :/

the thing is, i reached this point with an RT bow build thanks to ascendancies.

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Serge91 wrote:

You dont think that the average people that can reach lv90 in a week (not even playing fulltime) is something insane? I mean, level 90 is very near the maximum level. Just reaching it in a week makes the game absolutely crazy. Leveling should be something hard: I unedrstand that there will always be some "pro" guys who will reach the maximum level a lot faster than others, and this is ok. But if the average people achieve that result in a week, then there is a huge problem.

there's nothing wrong with reaching lvl 90 in a week. i do admit that the level what 'everyone should reach' keeps getting higher and higher (95 or so atm), which is a problem, but getting to 90 should be relatively easy even for on and off players.

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Wispo wrote:

Many builds doesn't have offscreen capabilities at all....
In a nutshell, not everyone plays crit bow or crit spark :/

You don't need to play a super optimized build to have an insane clear speed these days.

Earthquake can pretty 1-shot the whole screen.
Caustic Arrow 1-shots most packs.
More or less anything related with Cast-on-Crit (+whirling blades)
Defensive 6-7K low dps Voltaxic Builds (That means the 200%+ increased life builds with somewhat low damage)
Blade Vortex (again whirling blades)
Reave

I and many others could keep listing builds that have a great clear speed which is way to fast. What these builds have in common is you clear mobs at such a high rate they don't even get a chance to fight back.

This is why reflect, fire- / frost- / thunder-bearers, Volatile Blood and porcupines are so dangerous. Because they deal damage after they died. Hell it is about the only damage you will receive in this game :(

It has gone to far. Way to far. The power creep is real :(

I feel there's some confusion about which speeds we're talking about here.

One topic is encounter length, which is pretty definitively over too fast, what I feel the OP was getting at, and which I already covered.

Entirely separate is character action speed. (Animation speed is irrelevant except for potential visual awesomeness.) Here, again, human reaction speed should be the metric: if an action your character takes is much greater than your reaction time (which varies from 0.16 to 0.5 seconds), it feels slow and sluggish, like you're waiting for animations to finish; if your action time is much smaller than your reaction time, it loses discrete-number-ness and feels like "channeling" a skill.

Generally speaking good design avoids putting players in situations where they're speed is less than 2 or greater than 6 actions per second; by "actions" I mean the ability to choose, so take Multistrike APS and divide by 3 to get actions per second. Ideally, viable options are scattered throughout the 2-6 APS range to accommodate a variety of individual reaction times.

Given those very realistic standards, I feel top-end Attack and Cast speeds in PoE are actually just about right. If anything, they're too slow because of the low end; playing a low-level character as an experienced player is somewhat maddening due to the slow action speeds.

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mynameisonlyforthegods wrote:

there's nothing wrong with reaching lvl 90 in a week.

Oh yes there is, because around 90 is the turning point for a lot of players where levelling and upgrades become too slow to be really engaging and it's where a lot of players just stop playing their character because chaining maps after map to grind one more level is just boring.

2 years ago, I could play at least 2 months during a temp league because my first 1-2 chars used to die, and then I levelled one up to 85-90 and this process took me at least 1.5-2 months.
Now, a league is interesting 2 weeks, maybe 3. I'm 89 in the 2 weeks flashback while playing almost solo self found with 1.5 days /played. Char is already boring, I'm gonna probably push 1 or 2 more levels but that's it.

The game is WAY too easy, and the fact that 0.01% of the content is hard (t15, uber atziri) doesn't change this fact. GGG missed 2 opportunities to rebalance the game : the removal of desync and ascendancy classes. These 2 points hugely simplified the game, and nothing was changed / added to balance them. It's still a very fun game but I'll play less and less time each league if we continue like this. Right now, they could double all mobs' hp and do a *1.5 to dmg dealt, and it would still be playable. The game needs a huge rebalancing from coast normal to end game maps.

I tasted my first 70+ movement speed char (and according clear speed). I'll never play anything with less speed.
Finally the game has decent speed! And doesn't feel like molasses

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Dawmz wrote:

Spoiler

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mynameisonlyforthegods wrote:

there's nothing wrong with reaching lvl 90 in a week.

Oh yes there is, because around 90 is the turning point for a lot of players where levelling and upgrades become too slow to be really engaging and it's where a lot of players just stop playing their character because chaining maps after map to grind one more level is just boring.

2 years ago, I could play at least 2 months during a temp league because my first 1-2 chars used to die, and then I levelled one up to 85-90 and this process took me at least 1.5-2 months.
Now, a league is interesting 2 weeks, maybe 3. I'm 89 in the 2 weeks flashback while playing almost solo self found with 1.5 days /played. Char is already boring, I'm gonna probably push 1 or 2 more levels but that's it.

The game is WAY too easy, and the fact that 0.01% of the content is hard (t15, uber atziri) doesn't change this fact. GGG missed 2 opportunities to rebalance the game : the removal of desync and ascendancy classes. These 2 points hugely simplified the game, and nothing was changed / added to balance them. It's still a very fun game but I'll play less and less time each league if we continue like this. Right now, they could double all mobs' hp and do a *1.5 to dmg dealt, and it would still be playable. The game needs a huge rebalancing from coast normal to end game maps.

 Your viewpoint of PoE is highly skewed by your high skill level and the fact that you can devote 5 hours a day to playing PoE. Many of us have real lives and can't or don't want to have to play 5 hours every day or settle on a level 90 build taking 6 months to reach. Too much grind or too much time to get to a high level build is bad and GGG knows it. The average attention span of players is shrinking and as more and more games are vying for players attention all the time GGG has to adjust the playing speed to keep up with gamers. If PoE stays slow and even more time consuming than it is now many will quit and GGG can't afford to have a mass exodus of players who are burned out on grinding. Without players and their mtx GGG is history.

 You are also not taking into consideration the fact that every arpg needs to continue to make players feel empowered to keep them playing. If everything stayed the same then boredom quickly sets in and it's "game over" I quit. So GGG has to slowly increase the power and speed of play. This is what power creep is all about. Without it there will not be very many long term players and without retention GGG is history.

 GGG must keep on the path of bigger and badder to entice new players and hook them long enough to get past the newbie learning phase and hope they become long term players. GGG has to factor in a ton of things that you aren't taking into consideration. Even with the changes made last fall to make Normal easier for new players Chris stated in the State of Exile #51 podcast that approximately half of new players trying out PoE quit at the Brutus boss battle. If GGG can't get new players past the first boss battle then how is making PoE harder and slower going to help? GGG already faces an uphill climb just to get their title noticed by an ever increasing instant gratification world of gamers. Keeping PoE slower paced won't help their bottom line.

Guys, it's simple.

Studying human reaction time shows players will experience a live-action game in "turns" of 0.16 to 0.5 seconds.

In order to have a strategic feel, a game must last AT LEAST 3 turns. Therefore, for live-action combats to feel engaging the combat must last AT LEAST 1.5 seconds (since we need to be inclusive at accommodate the 0.5s reaction-time players). One-button screen wipes are cancer, especially ranged, and off-screen is just patently absurd.

Epic games have 20 turns or more. Boss kills in under 10 seconds are not a good sign.

Going past 40 turns is normally bad. Giving bosses "enrage" mechanics about 15 seconds in is not a bad idea.

Attack and Cast speeds should generally result in animations which lock the player for at least 0.16 but not more than 0.5 seconds, meaning 2-6 APS in non-Multistrike, non-Echo situations. It's okay to have some stuff which takes more than 0.5s but it should be very gimmicky, like a unique item or a single active skill; 2 APS should be minimum unless you're actively seeking to be slower.

Currently, late-game PoE has encounters which are bizarrely short (whether won or lost), and early-game PoE has player actions which take an agonizingly long time to execute. Please try to realize these are fundamentally different issues.

Builds I've played recently:

Soulthirst Crit Ice Crash: VERY fast, build around maximizing Soul Eater. Once it gets rolling, I have between 6 and 15 Leap Slams per second, and about double that many Ice Crashes. Very intense build, many executions to get correct to maximize clear speed and fun.

Fireball Prolif Elementalist: VERY slow. I walk, I toss a fireball, it travels, it explodes, and then I try to lure mobs into the burn zone. I have to make sure I don't get swarmed, engage from a long distance (especially with Rolling Flames), and generally play carefully.

Crit Heralds Autocaster: So bad... I was super-squishy with inconsistent dps. My char was in constant danger, both of taking too much damage AND running out of mana because of EB/MoM. And I died to reflect in like 3 hits of HoT. But it was still fun to play, even though progress was very slow. Nonetheless, this build funded my 2 other builds this league.

Cyclone max block/sblock Blind Hybrid GR/LGoH Gladiator: Pretty slow, since using a claw = pretty low range, and my move speed isn't so fast nor my damage. Non-crit claw is pretty low deeps, too. However, I can never die. Honestly the build is a bit TOO safe, so safe it's boring.

Static Strike Varunastra VP Berserker: Mix between fast and slow. Slow because targeted melee, also high execution because of that, but fast because high attack speed + WB, also high run speed and Rampage. The speed on this one feels about right, it's a frantic playstyle but I don't clear maps instantly.


What I've tried to illustrate is that there are a lot of different builds with different speeds, both clearspeed and speed of character progression. Playing slower builds IS sometimes more fun than playing super-fast builds, and YOU CAN CHOOSE which you want to play. Is playing slowly disadvantageous? Of course it is, because time = money. That would be the case no matter how fast builds were; the fastest builds with tolerable defenses would be the best ones, at least in SC. However, you don't have to play the most advantageous builds.

I don't think the "clear speed meta" really needs to change, myself. There are plenty of options for non-clear-speed builds, and increasing the overall power level of players has enabled a lot of builds that were completely non-viable before (such as Crit Heralds).


I do wish that mobs were more responsive. I can walk up to a spider and oh, hey, it notices
s me, it kind of starts walking towards me, nah changed its mind, no, okay it's going to attack, oh wait I 1-shot it like ten seconds ago. Some mobs are better than others, for example the Sceptre of God mobs generally work the way I'd expect them to, but in general I wish there were less variance in mob speed, and the slower ones got bumped up a bit.

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Arrowneous wrote:

 GGG must keep on the path of bigger and badder to entice new players and hook them long enough to get past the newbie learning phase and hope they become long term players. GGG has to factor in a ton of things that you aren't taking into consideration. Even with the changes made last fall to make Normal easier for new players Chris stated in the State of Exile #51 podcast that approximately half of new players trying out PoE quit at the Brutus boss battle. If GGG can't get new players past the first boss battle then how is making PoE harder and slower going to help? GGG already faces an uphill climb just to get their title noticed by an ever increasing instant gratification world of gamers. Keeping PoE slower paced won't help their bottom line.

I didnt want to say that the game needs to be harder (though, some maps, need really to be rebalance; leveling is good, maybe it could be even easier normal/cruel, to let people study and learn the game through trial&error withouth punishing them too much: leveling is just something "temporary" for reaching the real core of the game: maps).

And i didnt say that the game needs to be slow. I just said that the game is too fast, has too effects, too many attacks you do and recieve while fightning against a pack of mobs. There is no "minimal" strategy in any fight because you cant understand nothing (except atziri): if you can oneshot everything, then its fine (reducing the game in attack and rush on forever: but this becomes boring, its not challenging), and the more speed you can reach the better; if you cant (maybe in red maps), then you go where you can shot everything to farm currency in order to buy better gear, until you manage to do it in almost every content.
This is what i would call bad design. A good design should let the player with normal gear "i try something risky, maybe i fail, but maybe if I'll be careful enough i could manage to do it".
I remember that farming chaos orbs wasn't so easy in the old times (now monster level is very high even while leveling): and we can see now that chaos orbs aren't a valuable currency since a long time, and they progressively decrease their value every league. This should be reviewed. With the insane clearspeed that can be reached by almost every build, farming chaos isn't something challenging nor risky (there's 0.00001% chance for an ilvl 75- rare item to roll good mods, especially weapons... maybe easier for rings/ammy, but their drop chance is so high that no one cares).

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What I've tried to illustrate is that there are a lot of different builds with different speeds, both clearspeed and speed of character progression. Playing slower builds IS sometimes more fun than playing super-fast builds, and YOU CAN CHOOSE which you want to play. Is playing slowly disadvantageous? Of course it is, because time = money. That would be the case no matter how fast builds were; the fastest builds with tolerable defenses would be the best ones, at least in SC. However, you don't have to play the most advantageous builds.

Yes there are some slower builds, i said i didn't play the faster builds possible in fact, though the crazy speed problem still remains.
But if you are so slow that you dont shot monsters at least in yellow maps, then you have simply did a bad build design. And im saying this sadly: the game forces you to play builds that oneshots everything in yellow maps even with crappy gear. I wish this was a choice: to be a little slower but safer instead of other build. But it isn't. The build that oneshots everything offscreen are clearly even safer. This is nonsense.
This because the monsters arent challenging, because everything is too fast and reduces in "mobs die in 0.5sec" or you die in a couple of seconds (or even shotted, even if you have the tankiest build possible).