[POE2] Please, "multiplayer."

PoE is the only "ARPG" game that has multiplayer that isn't really suitable for multiplayer play...

I play on console, so there is that to consider. But, from what I've read about multiplayer PC play, the problems are the same and only dedicated farm-teams seem to be able to really take advantage of multiplayer play. Or, rather, they're the only ones that will put up with PoE's lack of optimization efforts for multiplayer.

I'm not just talking about screen-spam, lag, and outright crashes. I'm more focused on the mechanics used for classes/builds that aren't very finely tuned for multiplayer.

Movement skills are the most difficult to deal with. For many builds, they're critical in terms of survivability. But, in a multiplayer setup with characters viable for single-player play, they mean that players are going to spend a lot of time not actually in range of their multiplayer partners.

Even trying to find one's multiplayer partner in a map is difficult. For my experience, on console, there's no relief - Screen-spam makes the map overlay impossible to decipher. And, if adjusted, it'd have to be "Day-Glo Orange" to be seen, making it too obtrusive for comfort. It often comes down to "Is that a power-charge ball or is that my multiplayer partner on the map overlay."

Synergies can work as they are, but to get powerful ones at least one player is going to have to sacrifice single-play opportunity. That's not terribly bad as even Diablo III has builds like that. But, in PoE, it could be pretty crippling if a build wasn't geared to swap gems frequently between play modes.

Movement skills are also not all the same. Some allow the player to not have to contact certain terrain tile types, others require a clear path. Some have movement distance that easily takes them "off screen" relative to their partners.

A good many issues could be solved with better map overlays, such as directional indicators for multiplayer partners, higher contrast map indicators for them, and better display customization such as limiting terrain "clutter" or reducing its contrast.

Spell effects, buff effects, "flash and awe" effects... All could have display options and even some "Multiplayer-only Default" drop-down options as well. I know that GGG strives to make the game visually striking. That's fine. What's not "fine" is when that desirable marketing effort interferes with actual game-play.

Nobody buys into PoE because it's a great multiplayer game. Nobody... (Well, the "uninformed" might try it out, but they'll quickly find it doesn't work well for that purpose.)

I'd really like to be able to count on PoE2 making mulitplayer a heck of a lot more friendly, especially if it wants to be competitive with it's primary competition. As it is right now, if I wanted to play a multiplayer ARPG, PoE is certainly my very last choice for that game mode.

PoE2 really should pay more attention to that than PoE has. I do understand trying to differentiate one's title, but there's also the common sense approach to consider - Genre players will desire certain features in their choices, else they wouldn't be "genre players."

I feel people are hoping for way too many things with PoE2. I don't expect anything to fundamentally change. The game's still going to be a clusterfuck of bright particle effects obstructing your view of everything.

The problem with multiplayer in this game is that it's designed in the way that it is. Do you really expect players will like having randos join their maps that they invested tons of currency into juicing up, and having to split the loot between each other? That's going to create one hell of a mess for GGG to clean up.

I will be positively surprised if they can make it worthy of multiplayer (NOT the rush/clusterfuck of effects and movement that pass as multiplayer in PoE).

However, I sincerely don't expect them to aim for that. For group play that takes on a more strategic and neatly timed/organized approach, we better look for another game.

PoE 2 will be "yet another league" but with few new world areas and new character models and a fuckton of bugs. This is the thing we all should expect.

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Morkonan wrote:

PoE is the only "ARPG" game that has multiplayer that isn't really suitable for multiplayer play...

...You so sure about that one, chief? I completely agree that PoE is pointless from a multiplayer perspective beyond the shared chat, but at best an ARPG is a casual affair when playing multiplayer. I've never seen one built to be MP first and foremost ('we'd like solo and MP to be equally viable' is the standard line that tells you 'we can't do what we'd like to do') because real-time MP is the realm of the tactical, not the strategic. The ONLY ARPG I've ever played that was truly suitable for multiplayer play is Remnant, and that's because it's as much a Borderlands loot-shooter or dodge-crazy Souls-like as it is ARPG. Every other ARPG I've played, and from Soho down to Brighton I must have played 'em all, has been a case of multiplayer just increasing the clear speed and thus the loot yield. That was true even of Diablo 1. The most fun people had with MP in D2 was utterly chaotic duels in the Blood Moor, true again from the barbarian-only stress test all the way through to Synergies. Darkstone? Single player from memory. Same with Nox. Torchlight 1 too, and the Mp functionality of 2 was too little, too late. Titan Quest had MP but no randomised areas. Diablo 3 is just casual enough to be a blast in MP, but it's nothing you couldn't do alone. Sacred 1 and 2 were solo affairs. Dungeon Siege was closer to a typical CRPG. Baldur's gate: Dark Alliance was kind of fun multiplayer I guess. I mean, I often liken the modern Diablo-clone ARPG to some chimeric descendant of Rogue and Gauntlet, but where the latter was fiercely multiplayer, the former was not, and I think I know which of the two more deeply influenced the foundations of the isometric ARPG genre, given Diablo 1 was original turn-based...

As I noted, ARPGs are typically not tactical but strategic. You aren't coordinating deeply in the moment as you do with a squad shooting game or even some MMOs with demanding team comp that prioritise positioning and rotation of skills. ARPGs are all about doing the same thing, give or take, in the hopes of getting better gear to do the same thing better next time. Full stop. TRADE IS NOT THE MULTIPLAYER MODE OF AN ARPG. It is there purely to facilitate the aforementioned loop. The fact that a weirdly complex market emerged from D2's version of this is ultimately something of a tragedy, because it then encouraged a certain someone to try to replicate it a decade later. The worst of PoE is always when they try to forcibly replicate some of the bottled lightning of its spiritual forebears, and the state of player trading in PoE is by far the worst of that worst.

Which is all to say, ARPGs are typically single player games with very light, shoe-horned multiplayer capability.

I honestly didn't think you'd bought into the marketing abracadabra balderdash that PoE2 is not PoE 4.0. I'd love to be wrong and that it'll feel like a proper sequel shedding the mistakes of the past and building on the lessons (if that isn't tautology), but all indications so far are against that. So why you'd ask them to change something so core to the genre (see above) when PoE2 is not even a rebuild but more of a rather awkward upgrade is...beyond me.

Because that is how I see 'PoE2'. I've mentioned the Ship of Theseus before -- but I think that's being kind about it. At least with the Ship the replacements were gradual, almost organic out of necessity, to the point where asking 'is this the same ship?' is a legitimate query. 'PoE2''s forced transformation is looking more like the Emperor's New Clothes after the Emperor has had an unfortunately thorough battery of cosmetic surgery and maybe some light cybernetic implants to keep him alive. And you go asking this lumbering hulk to go strut down a runway already packed with svelte models *built* for the tactically engaging multiplayer task?

And even if PoE '2' is amazing, to do what you've asked of it, I think it'd have to sacrifice too much of what Exiles like or even in some sickly way love about what it is now. Because as you said:

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Morkonan wrote:

Nobody buys into PoE because it's a great multiplayer game.

Which then raises the question: would they buy into it if it were, IF that meant no longer being the game they currently buy into? Exiles are a terribly misanthropic lot; if they weren't, they'd be playing something else. The main time Exiles are forced to interact is with trade, and how do they go about that? By swindling, lying and cheating each other -- because that's exactly what GGG wanted it to be from the start, or they'd have implemented a less easily exploitable trade system by now. (see: China, console -- two platforms where you can no longer pretend you're a big, bad capitalist cowboy online flipping toilet paper and 'teaching people a life lesson' by way of your amoral abuse of the innocent).

So, y'know. Maybe PoE is exactly the game it's supposed to be.

Your entire post comes off as massive amounts of fart sniffing.

Why even have multiplayer if they are going to make zero effort to balance it. More people would play multiplayer if it was somewhat balanced. What is the point of inviting a friend to play the game, or a new league, only to part ways at end game. It's not a matter of sharing loot. It's a matter of things scaling totally out of control.