Been around, still know nothing

Just start playing and have fun. Find some kind soul to be kinda your tutor that you can whisper questions when they arise( I would say you can add me as a friend and ask me anything anytime, but I am not online much at this point of league)

You are gonna fuck up at least your first character. Maybe the first three. Its okay. This is a game where people are constantly rerolling. Most do not play one character forever. It just takes time and experience to learn the tree, skills, content, etc. Oh, and always have the wiki opened.

Ive played this game since open beta. And I suck, too. My biggest problem is: I suck so hard, I cant even learn from my mistakes. When I fuck up a char, all I know is "I die too often" and "I dont deal enough damage", but I dont know how to fix my mistake.

I usually end up copying builds and thats fine with me.

Check out this guy's program: https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/1716360

Massive help trying to understand and play with the tree and gear without having to spend oodles of regrets or having to suffer a shit build.

You can essentially create a fictional hero and see somewhat how well it could do. There is still no substitute for actually playing but it gives you a pretty good ballpark.

The thing about the true is it may look massive, but everything is pretty standard once you understand the type of builds out there that are viable. Like anything in PoE, you won't ever take some nodes regardless and others, are always found on every single build. Learning these comes with time.

But always expect your first build to be shit and your next few to be sort of okay. After a while, it becomes pretty obvious how finite and static most things are and then you'll be like man this tree is boring af, I'm picking the same nodes all the time we need a change lol

Thanks everyone for the replies. I really appreciate them.

Hey you're not alone. We started just days apart. Coming up on 5 year I still have yet to even find one exalt. But I'm having a ton a fun with this game, just as long as I'm playing my way and not trying to keep up with joneses.

This league I've gotten to level 80 and T7 maps and that's about the best for me. I'm happy and having a blast.

:-)

I started in Closed beta as well, take your time and realize that some of your characters might end up in the scrap heap.

i just play whatever is meta nowadays , on release day was different thing but we didn´t have that many choices and uniques (OMG SHAVS SHAVS KAOMS 1k LIFE)

the tree looks confusing to someone not grasping it yet , but is actually very basic.

youve the defensive nodes , going shield 1h ? take 1h shieldnodes physdmg.
going elemental dmg 1h shield ? take elemental nodes shield nodes no physdmg.
going CI phys dmg ? take ES nodes , ES on gear as high as possible combined with INT MANA on tree.
going lifebuild eva/hybrid/armor? take all the lifenodes in your vicinity and branch out to prefered weapon nodes% or spellnodes.
same goes for totem.

its 75%gear and 25% skilltree.
most builds stop caring about skillpoints post 85 and others keep scaling to 100.
honestly PoEs skilltree is overhyped and finalfantasy wheel was there long before PoE for example.
at first it did fuck with my brain good too , but if you do some research and branch out seeing what different asscandies have to offer over others - you get a pretty clear grip on which baseclass is the most powerful for XYZ build.

"

lordcool wrote:

I bought into the game 4.5 years ago and never really got into it. My question is this: Is there any clear and easy to understand way to figure this game out? Just play?? I have a very real anxiety about trying because the skill tree is so massive. It stops me from even trying. I feel bad cause the games seems like something that begs to be loved.. i just feel i am not capable. It's on me. But any tips or advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

I play for some time too and it took me awhile to get into game since I was casual player. What I have learned is, since I play casual and would like to experience end game, its much easier to follow builds (that I seem to like) than to make one from scratch. Most of the time I end up adjusting builds gear/skill wise to suit my needs or preference.

To get to end content/gear farming is a must. There are many ways you can make currency. Some people like to farm uber lab/atziri or Shaper and make builds/chars just with that intention. Some people farm maps or Prophecies (Pale Court). Nowadays I see people farm Chayula and other Breach maps. I farmed maps and Prophecies and managed to finish 2 builds and 36 challenges and still have 10+ exalted worth of currency.

Also, I recommend using poe trade, poe wiki and item filter. Helped me a lot. These are all essential info and tools you need as poe player. If you need help finishing challenges or leveling Masters I recommend chat channels /global 820 and /trade 820

And in the end I although I'm mostly solo player I recommend party/guild play for faster progress.

And don't craft unless you know what you are doing. Most time its much cheaper to buy item you want than craft it yourself.

Thats pretty much from my experience playing poe. Hope this helps. Good luck.

Facts: i am not here since beta, 8 months into the game, coming from D3 - in the top 100 barbs in leaderboards for 3 consecutive seasons, having super fun with my peeps in this wonderful game with a wonderful community (95% goods players and experts- 5% trolls and thieves.lol)

Recommendations: what the other folks said prior me in this thread plus the following:
dont waste time & currency on things you dont know
dont try to invent the wheel
use twitch if you can and ask questions about stuff/meet ppl/socialize (dont copy 100% streamers' actions)
follow the forum and reddit (with a grain of salt)

good luck!