GDC Talk - "Cursed Problems in Game Design"

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Sol_Starving wrote:

everyday we stray further from any kind of pvp or co-op aspects and everyone seems to have forgotten this, or are just resigned in the idea that POE someday will have it.

I don't care at all for co-op, and I usually say I'm against PVP, I just realized that could be really fun though. If they let you PVP in SSF that would be awesome.

I always assumed (it's not assuming, it's obviously right) that PVP in this game was nothing but RMTing dicks who can't win in actual competitive games. Pitting completely self built characters against each other would be really neat though.

The problem with path of exile is we are in between B and C, we're not squarely in either. We do have limited trade, but trading is far and away the best way to gear up your character, not to mention that 99.99% of item drops aren't exciting or even upgrades. It's that 0.01% that gets traded. And of that 0.01% that gets traded only about 1% is worth an exalt or more.

Also, 1453R, I disagree on the crafting aspect. Quite a large portion of trade goods are crafted, and most people who do high end crafting do it to sell the result.

There is no problem, right inbetween is probably where you want to be and lots of stuff drop with value, we just dont know what that value is when we get it and put it in the stash "for later". cant just put it up and let people bid and if it was that easy the market would get flooded and value drops

most of us got exalts worth of stuff in the stash without realizing it

No trading, no value of anything you cant use and what you need must be reasonably likely to drop for you. too easy (dont need to set buyout, more items to compare to, quick and smooth) and the market gets flooded, items devalue, everything but the most rare items gets dirt cheap. you end up with a ruined economy or adjusted droprates or trade limitations, the other end of the spectrum. youll never find what you need yourself.

this is not rocket science but people that really want an AH ignore these arguments, they hate when the d3 AH is brought up (there is no better example, similar game) and none other game has achieved a good AH without limitations
i like being able to buy an item, use it and sell it. nothing is lost if you can sell it for what you bought it (profit if more) so not keen on any version of boe, bop

the economy and the balance is one of PoEs best features

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Nidal wrote:

There is no problem, right inbetween is probably where you want to be and lots of stuff drop with value, we just dont know what that value is when we get it and put it in the stash "for later". cant just put it up and let people bid and if it was that easy the market would get flooded and value drops

most of us got exalts worth of stuff in the stash without realizing it

No trading, no value of anything you cant use and what you need must be reasonably likely to drop for you. too easy (dont need to set buyout, more items to compare to, quick and smooth) and the market gets flooded, items devalue, everything but the most rare items gets dirt cheap. you end up with a ruined economy or adjusted droprates or trade limitations, the other end of the spectrum. youll never find what you need yourself.

this is not rocket science but people that really want an AH ignore these arguments, they hate when the d3 AH is brought up (there is no better example, similar game) and none other game has achieved a good AH without limitations
i like being able to buy an item, use it and sell it. nothing is lost if you can sell it for what you bought it (profit if more) so not keen on any version of boe, bop

the economy and the balance is one of PoEs best features

You can't really argue that D3 and PoE don't have the same kind of itemization, and that itemization was D3's biggest downfall. It remains so to this day even after the removal of the AH and RMAH. Not trying to turn this into another AH thread here because both sides are entrenched and unwilling to back down, but being in the middle of the two half-solutions does not equal a whole solution. It's still only a half. GGG needs to figure out how to make a full solution.

D3 went from one extreme end to the other. Easy to use ah, no limits (very low droprates of anything decent to maintain value) to no trading at all. Now you can find your weapon pretty easy, then you need it ancient. And then pretty soon youre throwing away all the copies until you find a primal

GGG made one of the best economies in a game ever, things fluctuate in value sometimes hourly due to supply and demand
Its not hard to trade. The hard part is knowing the value of what you buy or sell

And thats ok. There are enough games out there to hold your hand. We have the tools to trade, market is free. GGG have a full solution, they dont need to do anything

Cursed is like a really poor choice of words IMO its more like opposed. There isn't anything that stops these problems being addressed except that an opposing idea is present on the other side of the design.

Most games go for a suitable balance but as most seem to be focusing on itemisation i'll go with that.

The problem with itemisation is actually extremely simple to describe, either you have gear be worthless because its so easy to obtain or items will become restricted by the subversive elements present in any game with trading.

There are a variety of systems developers put in place to combat either of those problems but frankly none of them work. Bind on pickup is a common cop out for example but really BoP just focuses attention on anything that isn't while simultaneously making your game feel dumb.

GGG currently tread an OK line down the middle, personal drops are garbage but if they weren't they'd just be upping power creep further than they already did about the most we can hope for in this regard is for drops to be streamlined so at least we don't get bombarded.

Edit: Feel compelled to point out that these discussions frankly frustrate me, not because they aren't worth talking about but because recently there has been increasing prevalence that everything must be "fixed" or can be. Some things aren't actually broken they are there because it was the best choice available of which none are good.

2nd Edit: All the best game economies I can think of wouldn't function in 2020, parasites would ruin them instantly and tbh we'd end up exactly where we are in PoE. At a certain stage of development you have to stop and realize that 99% of the restrictions you place on trading are actually there to stop a tiny percentage of players that are hell bent on gaming whatever system you put in place.

The results of this thread, and every other thread that was directly about or eluded to a AH spirals into two teams with very little overlap in ideas or outcomes.

They can be distilled into arguments and counterarguments that neither side ever hears; or pretends to not hear.


Argument: Limited items listed at a time.
Counterargument: Just make more accounts to list more items.

Argument: Listing price on items to avoid flooding.
Counterargument: Item value will still deflate to listing value + one alchemy

Argument: AH would let you trade while playing the game.
Counterargument: AH would devalue all your items due to market being flooded.

Argument: Supply would explode in the market deflating value.
Counterargument: Demand would increase as more people would want to trade.

Argument: Bots would own an automated trade process.
Counterargument: Bots already rule POE. Who cares.

Argument: Just try it. What's the harm?
Counterargument: It is much harder to take something away than to never give it.

Argument: GGG is incapable of making a good AH, that's why they don't do it.
Counterargument: They already made a AH; they just made it hard to find items on purpose to keep the principle of trading should be hard.

Argument: GGG likes the current situation because they are secretly an RMT company.
Counterargument: I can't see anything because of the glare off your tinfoil hat.

I could keep going and going...

These threads by default prove the OPs assertion that this is a "cursed problem" that is a damned if they do, and damned if they don't.

I'm personally happy that they chose the gating mechanism that they have. I think it strikes a balance that I'm comfortable with. And everyone feels like they didn't win....that probably means they made the right choice :)

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jtggm1985 wrote:

GGG needs to figure out how to make a full solution.

There IS no "full solution". Maybe there is for YOU (or me), but there isn't for everyone - at the same time. The answer will always be somewhere in between. The easier, more efficient trade gets, the more devalued your play time will be, so - as I've said before - everyone with close to 46 chromosomes, knows that trade needs to be limited. And trust me, some people will ALWAYS see it as a "half solution" as longs as they don't have access to everything they want, when they want it.

- Account bound items? Fairly sure it would raise more havoc in here than the current system.

- Limits on how many trade spots or how many transactions you can do each day? More havoc.

- Limits on how you search items, like they have on the console realms? Ask them it it's good.

No, the solution is indeed "cursed". There is no "pleasing everyone". And I think it's pretty sad that people don't recognize this, and throw a little bit of respect/(pity?) at GGG for having to deal with this dilemma, and stop DEMANDING change just for the sake of change. And no, I'm not saying trade can't be improved, because it obviously can. I'm just saying that the next "pleasing everyone" solution from GGG, might not be what YOU or I want.

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Nubatron wrote:

I'm personally happy that they chose the gating mechanism that they have. I think it strikes a balance that I'm comfortable with. And everyone feels like they didn't win....that probably means they made the right choice :)

I agree.

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Sol_Starving wrote:

everyday we stray further from any kind of pvp or co-op aspects and everyone seems to have forgotten this, or are just resigned in the idea that POE someday will have it

They made an entire patch dedicated to PvP a long time ago, and likely were planning to flesh it out even more. The community collectively thumbed it down. And by 'thumbed it down' I don't mean that it told GGG the patch and its implemented PvP improvements weren't good enough, I mean it told them we were mostly not interested in PvP to begin with. And that mostly hasn't changed. Everytime someone makes a thread suggesting they put more focus on PvP, it quickly gets people making it clear they've no interest in the idea and would rather GGG work on other things. GGG simply got the message the community sent.

On the other hand, trade is something virtually everyone and their dog seems to have some kind of interest in, one way or another.

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Exile009 wrote:

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Sol_Starving wrote:

everyday we stray further from any kind of pvp or co-op aspects and everyone seems to have forgotten this, or are just resigned in the idea that POE someday will have it

They made an entire patch dedicated to PvP a long time ago, and likely were planning to flesh it out even more. The community collectively thumbed it down. And by 'thumbed it down' I don't mean that it told GGG the patch and its implemented PvP improvements weren't good enough, I mean it told them we were mostly not interested in PvP to begin with. And that mostly hasn't changed. Everytime someone makes a thread suggesting they put more focus on PvP, it quickly gets people making it clear they've no interest in the idea and would rather GGG work on other things. GGG simply got the message the community sent.

On the other hand, trade is something virtually everyone and their dog seems to have some kind of interest in, one way or another.

yeah problem is the community thumbed it down because players interested in pvp left this game many years ago since patch after patch we strayed further and further from that.
another point is, who thumbed it down? the whole population playing the game? or some streamer and it's fanbase? people playing fantaPoe on reddit?
also i follow this game on & off to see if there is some improvment or change at heart in game design, and i never heard of a pvp patch.

also a pvp patch should come sided with a league/event related to it. THEN the real community who is playing this game can thumbs it down, and not the people playing fantaPoE on reddit.

everyone is interested in trade because it is the only way they can reach endgame in reasonable time with the build they like to play.
you are not interested in trade, you are interested in the fastest way to play the build you want, and trade is the only time viable mechanic that allows you to do that.

trade will self regulate itself around the restriction/balance GGG will make.
thik better ways to improve this game guys.