3- Passive tree has changed numerous times
--- added bonus? new skill gems means your current tree might be useless to try that skill out... I guess it's time to roll another character.
Oh Kripparrian ... haven't heard that name in a while.
You are correct... when it comes right down to it I'm perfectly ok playing this game single player. That is not something they will ever entertain however and as a developer I understand why.
I'm sitting at work discussing with everyone here (who have also played POE) how we all agree and how the arguments against it are rather paper thin.
So let's continue to address some of the things mentioned above:
1- The population of Standard League and (arguably) the entire game is diminishing.
Correct, because the game is now 4 years old. Yes, there continues to be new content and as I've mentioned that is fantastic. It's amazing that a smallish community is able to continuing supporting GGG in their endeavors. The fact remains is that the game is aging at this point. Any new people are easily turned away once they realize the amount of commitment needed in order to be successful. This is a negative for the game. It always has been.
2- Having a casual league will be full of people who never trade and have no idea what they're doing with each other.
Ok... and? So what? How does that affect you? Don't play in the casual league. I expect this in any game really. Put all us idiots in the same spot... I'm ok with that. Even in standard I turn off the chat log immediately.
3- You get respecs like once every three months! ITS FINE!
No... no it's not. If that's your play method requirement then the game is broken. The reason for most of those respecs is that the passive tree is changing constantly... it is impossible to keep up with. Adding one more barrier to us filthy casuals.
4- "We could just mix hardcore and standard!"
no... just no. You can't. You will have a community of hardcore twinks and this will remove the permanency aspect by making you simply buy the best gear immediately from the easier players. The economy would collapse for hardcore players.
5- Development time would need to be split!
No. Not really. The balance of the game doesn't change at all with a casual community. The only thing that WILL change is the economy. The economy will be minimal. This is a given. Things will be incredibly cheap because the economy in that filthy casual league will be full of supply and no demand. That's perfectly ok. There will STILL be people in the trade channel selling to us fools because it's easier to buy than to get ourselves. The economy won't be non-existent it'll just be different.
6- GGG is a business not a charity!
Yes, you are correct. They are. They like money. Just like all of us. And yes, to some extent adding playtime by requiring a player to do a certain thing is a valid way of creating more revenue. I've been doing this a long time, this is not a foreign concept to me. However, there are diminishing returns on this, and you need to be very careful in the way that you present it. My current argument is that they are losing more playing due to the hardcore nature of the game than they are keeping around.
That is: more players = more money. Less players with a longer playtime = less money. This is statistical fact, you can do some research if you like but it is so. There are MANY MANY other ways in which POE adds longevity to play time however. The ridiculous amount of skill gems (not a complaint, I love it), the massive tree and the many ways to reconfigure it, extended content, interesting new leagues and ladders. They have more than enough content to make up for loss of this one thing.
7- "I have a gazillion characters it's not that hard!"
Right... but you have TIME. Something that many of us that complain are (and always have been) lacking. Yes, I lack skill too I don't deny that. But so what? Why do you care if I'm not in the same league as you? Let me suck. Creating that many characters to level 60-70 is a HUGE time investment. The problem is you don't even realize the amount of time you've put in to those characters. I can't just take a weekend and make a character. I have 3 kids. That's not an option.
-----------------
Again, most of the people who complain are rife with "you're just stupid". Well ok... then let me be stupid and still play the game.
The ones who are trying to offer actual reasons... I applaud you... but most of the reasons are simply not true and can easily be debunked. The only reason I've ever seen for them NOT doing it is "we don't want casuals". Well... casuals spend money too.
I chewed through all this myself (after years still more of a solo player than party/trade mogul), and when you get stuck on a character, this game truly starts to become mighty unappealing, punishing, prohobitive.
When you´re stuck and don´t have much time on your hands, all the "viable" options really aren´t options. Leveling a new character, just to correct some mistakes, will take a couple days. Farming up currency to trade and buy regrets, might take a lot longer than you like. Perhaps you cannot even do so because you somehow got stuck in a bad spot where you cannot equip your stuff anymore.
Heck, even at level 99 and with lots of experience, I sometimes find myself running out of orbs when experimenting on new builds. And THANKS to GGG´s permanent balance rework, I started again at 2.5, needing to find a new build because I was Mjölnering along until 2.4 patch hit the realm and turned this awesome build to crap. Took a break for entire 2.4 duration and only came back to 2.5.
Since then, I spent somewhere between 30-50 ex trying out builds, recoloring chestpieces, buying some enabling uniques, respeccing this and that etc, and the frustration when you eventually go broke is HUGE.
Nobody likes to do stupid mindless farming just to be able to play the game in a way he likes, and with the game being so complex, it can take very long to even find out what that exactly is.
So, I can definitely sympathize with the request. Sometimes all you wanna do is PLAY and not work through the wiki/youtube/forums for hours and hours until you might come up with a nice plan. Not everybody is a Kripparrian who beats the game in theory before actually making a build and playing it.
If you are a casual and want free respecs whenever you like, why play PoE as there are better options on the market - D3 for example - as those already are numbing the meaning of "choice => consequence"...
The respecs are a given until GGG stops messing with the skill tree and actually finds a sweet spot regarding balance, after they could give them as candy and remove Regret Orbs, or make you pick those Regrets as sole mean to readjust the skill tree for an existing character...
Standard SSF will be the go to league for casuals that don't want to trade, all others will probably choose Standard.
Come one with the time investment - you get proporțional satisfaction per amount or else no one would lose even a single hour playing the game - on a permanent league, you get the luxury to never lose progress, heck, even hardcore characters are dropped on Standard and not removed altogether when they die...
If you enjoy the game, you'll get better at it with time, as even the worst player could get a bad build to at least level 90, but that would require also the player to think and adapt if he wants to overcome the obstacles...
PSS: Our almighty TencentGGG overlords are very scrupulous regarding criticizing their abilities to take proper decisions and consider everything "needlessly harsh and condescending"...
Good to know "free speech" doesn't apply in any form or manner on the forums these days...
Last edited by sofocle10000 on Feb 21, 2017, 12:53:15 PM
My highest level character took a long damn time to get him there, FYI. I am an awful player who still loves to play.
It drives me mad when I offer reasons for this to exist and everyone immediately offers options that aren't really options. A reset every 3 months does nothing to alleviate this problem. It is a sorry excuse from a group of people who are simply more hardcore than the group of people that contains me.
The defense of "it makes choices matter" is fantastic, but as a developer myself both in gaming as well as spending a good amount of time in creating tools for the stuff I create I understand that just because I intend a game or tool to be used one way does not mean that everyone wants to use it that way. It's perfectly acceptable for these two styles of game play to live alongside one another.
This is the part I will never understand. I am not asking anyone to sacrifice that option. The regular league is perfectly fine to work this way. I absolutely see the merit of this style of gameplay. That doesn't mean that there can't be a league that I have described as well.
Enough with this "it's only a few hours" because it is not. For a player like me, not only is it unlikely that I'm good enough to level that fast, it is also unlikely I can find that kind of time to play. Please stop trying to defend the game in that way, not everyone plays that way or is able to do so.
Does this make me a sucky gamer? Yes, absolutely! But to argue "YOU SHOULDN'T PLAY OUR GAME" is ludicrous.
Being a developer, you should know that what you are asking costs money. so your first order of the day should be justifying the cost. Show some solid numbers that will prove that the cost to benefit ratio will be favorable to the company. As a developer, I am sure you are more than aware that pulling any numbers out of your ass will only hurt your cause.
I played D3. I've played enough D3. I like D3. I also like POE. To me a skill reset is the only thing holding me back from playing more POE. Everything else about the game I love.
Oh Kripparrian ... haven't heard that name in a while.
You are correct... when it comes right down to it I'm perfectly ok playing this game single player. That is not something they will ever entertain however and as a developer I understand why.
I'm sitting at work discussing with everyone here (who have also played POE) how we all agree and how the arguments against it are rather paper thin.
So let's continue to address some of the things mentioned above:
1- The population of Standard League and (arguably) the entire game is diminishing.
Correct, because the game is now 4 years old. Yes, there continues to be new content and as I've mentioned that is fantastic. It's amazing that a smallish community is able to continuing supporting GGG in their endeavors. The fact remains is that the game is aging at this point. Any new people are easily turned away once they realize the amount of commitment needed in order to be successful. This is a negative for the game. It always has been.
2- Having a casual league will be full of people who never trade and have no idea what they're doing with each other.
Ok... and? So what? How does that affect you? Don't play in the casual league. I expect this in any game really. Put all us idiots in the same spot... I'm ok with that. Even in standard I turn off the chat log immediately.
3- You get respecs like once every three months! ITS FINE!
No... no it's not. If that's your play method requirement then the game is broken. The reason for most of those respecs is that the passive tree is changing constantly... it is impossible to keep up with. Adding one more barrier to us filthy casuals.
4- "We could just mix hardcore and standard!"
no... just no. You can't. You will have a community of hardcore twinks and this will remove the permanency aspect by making you simply buy the best gear immediately from the easier players. The economy would collapse for hardcore players.
5- Development time would need to be split!
No. Not really. The balance of the game doesn't change at all with a casual community. The only thing that WILL change is the economy. The economy will be minimal. This is a given. Things will be incredibly cheap because the economy in that filthy casual league will be full of supply and no demand. That's perfectly ok. There will STILL be people in the trade channel selling to us fools because it's easier to buy than to get ourselves. The economy won't be non-existent it'll just be different.
6- GGG is a business not a charity!
Yes, you are correct. They are. They like money. Just like all of us. And yes, to some extent adding playtime by requiring a player to do a certain thing is a valid way of creating more revenue. I've been doing this a long time, this is not a foreign concept to me. However, there are diminishing returns on this, and you need to be very careful in the way that you present it. My current argument is that they are losing more playing due to the hardcore nature of the game than they are keeping around.
That is: more players = more money. Less players with a longer playtime = less money. This is statistical fact, you can do some research if you like but it is so. There are MANY MANY other ways in which POE adds longevity to play time however. The ridiculous amount of skill gems (not a complaint, I love it), the massive tree and the many ways to reconfigure it, extended content, interesting new leagues and ladders. They have more than enough content to make up for loss of this one thing.
7- "I have a gazillion characters it's not that hard!"
Right... but you have TIME. Something that many of us that complain are (and always have been) lacking. Yes, I lack skill too I don't deny that. But so what? Why do you care if I'm not in the same league as you? Let me suck. Creating that many characters to level 60-70 is a HUGE time investment. The problem is you don't even realize the amount of time you've put in to those characters. I can't just take a weekend and make a character. I have 3 kids. That's not an option.
-----------------
Again, most of the people who complain are rife with "you're just stupid". Well ok... then let me be stupid and still play the game.
The ones who are trying to offer actual reasons... I applaud you... but most of the reasons are simply not true and can easily be debunked. The only reason I've ever seen for them NOT doing it is "we don't want casuals". Well... casuals spend money too.
I chewed through all this myself (after years still more of a solo player than party/trade mogul), and when you get stuck on a character, this game truly starts to become mighty unappealing, punishing, prohobitive.
When you´re stuck and don´t have much time on your hands, all the "viable" options really aren´t options. Leveling a new character, just to correct some mistakes, will take a couple days. Farming up currency to trade and buy regrets, might take a lot longer than you like. Perhaps you cannot even do so because you somehow got stuck in a bad spot where you cannot equip your stuff anymore.
Heck, even at level 99 and with lots of experience, I sometimes find myself running out of orbs when experimenting on new builds. And THANKS to GGG´s permanent balance rework, I started again at 2.5, needing to find a new build because I was Mjölnering along until 2.4 patch hit the realm and turned this awesome build to crap. Took a break for entire 2.4 duration and only came back to 2.5.
Since then, I spent somewhere between 30-50 ex trying out builds, recoloring chestpieces, buying some enabling uniques, respeccing this and that etc, and the frustration when you eventually go broke is HUGE.
Nobody likes to do stupid mindless farming just to be able to play the game in a way he likes, and with the game being so complex, it can take very long to even find out what that exactly is.
So, I can definitely sympathize with the request. Sometimes all you wanna do is PLAY and not work through the wiki/youtube/forums for hours and hours until you might come up with a nice plan. Not everybody is a Kripparrian who beats the game in theory before actually making a build and playing it.
If you are a casual and want free respecs whenever you like, why play PoE as there are better options on the market - D3 for example - as those already are numbing the meaning of "choice => consequence"...
The respecs are a given until GGG stops messing with the skill tree and actually finds a sweet spot regarding balance, after they could give them as candy and remove Regret Orbs, or make you pick those Regrets as sole mean to readjust the skill tree for an existing character...
Standard SSF will be the go to league for casuals that don't want to trade, all others will probably choose Standard.
Come one with the time investment - you get proporțional satisfaction per amount or else no one would lose even a single hour playing the game - on a permanent league, you get the luxury to never lose progress, heck, even hardcore characters are dropped on Standard and not removed altogether when they die...
If you enjoy the game, you'll get better at it with time, as even the worst player could get a bad build to at least level 90, but that would require also the player to think and adapt if he wants to overcome the obstacles...
You are very salty for a person who has done literally everything in this game, and given them a huge amount of monetary support. You clearly have a great amount of disposable time and money. I am envious.
You are correct, pulling numbers out of my arse would be silly. Also, be careful the way you word this statement. It would not cost money to make this change. What we are talking about has exactly zero cost investment from their end: the ability to reset skills is already there.
Instead what we're talking about is a potential shift in revenue sources. So, since I don't have any actual numbers to prove this... as there aren't many games that have made this kind of switch... I can point to similar games like D3 that have gained far more footing that POE ever has. Now... of course D2 was wildly popular and used this hardcore methodology in the beginning, but MOST gamers have changed. What worked then doesn't work as well now.
Take a look at the games that are available these days. Take a look at series that have been ongoing for a long time even. Take a look at the way they are played. Take a look at the way they've evolved and those features that have changed over the years and you'll find that this is one of the things that has changed significantly over the years.
The unfortunate truth is that mass market beats a small dedicated lot every time. Now, I think POE is amazing as is... but this is a massive barrier. It still will likely never be as popular as D3 and not just because of the name but also because it still takes a person with some creativity to play this game and enjoy it due to the way they've designed the skill system. But I still think the number of players and potential revenue goes up not down by opening this door.
Being a developer, you should know that what you are asking costs money. so your first order of the day should be justifying the cost. Show some solid numbers that will prove that the cost to benefit ratio will be favorable to the company. As a developer, I am sure you are more than aware that pulling any numbers out of your ass will only hurt your cause.
I played D3. I've played enough D3. I like D3. I also like POE. To me a skill reset is the only thing holding me back from playing more POE. Everything else about the game I love.
Well, then you'll be excited to know that the reroll is GGG's solution to your problem, and they are improving everything related to it to provide a seamless experience starting from 3.0.
They want you to try different builds as often as you could, more than they will concede on opening the respecs, as it's hard to get them to encourage tackling the end game content from an EXP point, and God forbid to actually make the level 100 an achievement for honing your "skill play" versus the difficult content...
PSS: Our almighty TencentGGG overlords are very scrupulous regarding criticizing their abilities to take proper decisions and consider everything "needlessly harsh and condescending"...
Good to know "free speech" doesn't apply in any form or manner on the forums these days...
They have been improving everything since day 1. This is probably the most actively supported game on the market today. Which is still amazing given the number of players. We have some amazing contributors, there is no doubt there.
However, the same argument keeps coming up. As you've just pointed out: they don't want casuals.
You are correct, at some point opening it up would make that coveted achievement of level 100 having less of an impact. That's hardly a reason to limit your player base -- but can again be mitigated by limiting achievements to casuals only. That way you won't make the mistake of thinking my terrible skills are anywhere near yours (literally not sarcasm).
To the previous point about dev costs... yes this would incur a minimal development cost to introduce!
That all being said, I'm not sure what you meant by your first statement. "The reroll is GGG's solution to your problem".
I played D3. I've played enough D3. I like D3. I also like POE. To me a skill reset is the only thing holding me back from playing more POE. Everything else about the game I love.
Well, then you'll be excited to know that the reroll is GGG's solution to your problem, and they are improving everything related to it to provide a seamless experience starting from 3.0.
They want you to try different builds as often as you could, more than they will concede on opening the respecs, as it's hard to get them to encourage tackling the end game content from an EXP point, and God forbid to actually make the level 100 an achievement for honing your "skill play" versus the difficult content...
