Delve, disrupting gameflow.

I am not a fan of "Delve". I also was not a fan of "Incursion" for the exact same reasons.


Here are my main reasons why:

None of them MESH well with the base leveling progress at all. Both of the leagues are really disruptive. They take you out of your leveling flow just to have you do something completely irrelevant to your story progress, which is needed in order to get to the gem and skill point rewards. Lab at least opens up new powers for your character, but all you get in delves and incursions were item drops, which you could get in any other place in the game (apart from some specific ones which however do not impact the game on ANY level, not like Lab's ascendancies do).

Every other league, its mechanics were incorporated into the main gameflow, heck even Bestiary could be done while progressing normally through the story. As did the rest of the leagues. You could do breaches on the spot, you could do peranduses ghosts on the spot. Sure, sometimes you had a little extra like the arena in Bestiary, but nothing as disruptive as these last couple leagues now.

I am just concerned this will become the new standard. As a very casual gamer that has been playing this game since the beginning, I have witnessed many changes, some good, some less (hello Lab). But I never felt so out of place and out of touch with the game and its gameflow like these past leagues.

Sometimes, less IS more.

If you dont have a good idea for a new league, just throw in some more flashback leagues, but you do not HAVE to release a league every 3 months.



Now, the part of the missed opportunity with Delve.

Why not flesh the Delve league out some more and make it an ALTERNATIVE for leveling up. The ground work certainly is there and all you have to do is flesh out some parts and QOL some others and make skill point and gem rewards accessible from a boss every 5 delve levels or so.

You'd have another groundbreaking league, one that offers a feature no other ARPG would have in that form (Grim Dawn only has an endless wave arena and in Marvel Heroes you still had to do the short storyline to get your skillpoints and its dead anyway).


Just a few thoughts I had while not enjoying POE these last few leagues, which bumms me out greatly because I love the game.

Totally on your side here... but you can simply ignore it until later if that's your thing. I pretty much am. I've done a half dozen legs... enough to know I don't get it. Hope someone comes out with a guide or something that will tell us what we're supposed to be doing down there.

The only thing I can see is that you can target certain types of rewards beforehand. If you need a better weapon, take a path that ends in a weapon. If you need armor, go looking for that. It lets you target your reward, which is new for us. Not sure it's all that helpful, but it's new.

Otherwise, I'm with you... why stop progressing to delve?

Yeah.

Even though I like additions that goes "beside" the main game, I don't like things/mechanics that disrupts your gameplay. The (ridiculously) low amount of sulphite you can store, means you can only delve for a few minutes before you have to play "the regular" game again. I don't get it.

And yes, I know you can upgrade to store more sulphite, but it costs a lot of azurite, which you can only get from delving (for a couple of minutes).

I will agree with you that Delve can get in the way of leveling. I have found myself slowing myself down with exploring the delve. I don't agree with anything else. I happen to like this league. I find it fun, especially in party play. Go figure though, same day as league release we have people complaining.

Like my man Jeff `The Dude' Leboswki said....

"That's just like, your opinion, man."

There is no way to integrate something as in depth as delve naturally into normal gameflow. League content has radically shifted from putting a monster/box/hole inside the game and having interaction being players clicking on an entity and mobs spew out. Since incursions, leagues are their own seperate thing and I think this is a great thing.

I do agree about having delve replace a lot of the dull act content though.

I don't understand the concept of disrupting your leveling flow. I've read your post and essentially you are saying - "delving is different, i don't like that"

You say something about the delving content providing nothing but item drops which you can get from anywhere... ... ... ... ... ...

um... what is the point of a game made by a company whose name is literally GrindingGearGames? So now loot and monsters is no longer relevant to your gameplay experience. Once again, I just don't understand what you are talking about.

People play for different reasons. If you're motivated by finding items, delve gives you items. Many people are motivated by progress towards some goal. Delve doesn't give us that... at least not a goal that we understand.

U can completely ignore delve till u want.

Why is it disrupting your gameflow?

Ive done it at low levels, but then reallized it was not necessary, as Niko already delve to your level for you, so when i reach the level i want i simple start at Niko path.

It just give ppl another option for getting gear while leveling, like on SSF it is a good thing.

"

Shagsbeard wrote:

People play for different reasons. If you're motivated by finding items, delve gives you items. Many people are motivated by progress towards some goal. Delve doesn't give us that... at least not a goal that we understand.

DELVE SPECIFIC ITEMS and delve crafting don't interest you I guess. And have you opened a currency room up yet? I got FOUR Vaal orbs from my first one. That's enough to fund my entire build right there. You gonna be poor compared to everyone who delves.

The only difference in disruption between Breach and say Delve is that one has you loading into a different screen. Once you activate the cart or hit the breach you stop progressing.

The real concern I have with any new feature is how accessible is it while leveling. If you don't have a strong early build or are poor you would often ignore breaches as you would just die and didn't bother with them until late game.

Delve is very accessible and actually very rewarding by doing it. Sure it doesn't progress you through the game, but you gain levels and some good items and currency to keep it going. If anything makes it a lot more easier. If some levels are too hard you don't go deeper.

So enjoy it or ignore it but it is a great feature.