POE is ACTUALLY dying not the drama queen kind, but the actual kind... From Developer Hubris

Longtime player (since launch). Have about 3000 hours in PoE and I recently, finally quit. I don’t really think I am going to be changing any minds here, but I thought I would at least explain why I have decided to throw in the towel after all of these years. Don’t get me wrong, POE was and maybe still is a great great game. But it’s just not for me anymore.

I’m basically a casual player at this point in my life. Would like to be able to just jump in a few hours every week to blow off some steam, but POE has reached a point for me where that isn’t actually possible any more.

Because of my “casual” status, the majority of my time in POE has actually been in standard soft core, because I simply don’t have the time to start from scratch every few months, which is what the last couple of leagues have forced me to do. For me, a big part of any rpg is continuity and character progression. The idea of having a character for years, that you may have to tweak incrementally now and then or find a new BIS item now and then is incredibly appealing for me.

I have to say, one of the most annoying things the developers have done in the last couple of years is to intentionally over buff an item or skill knowing full well that they would be either nerfing it back to earth the very next league or just flat out destroying it completely. For me, the buff to cyclone and it’s subsequent nerfing was the beginning of my realization that this was their MO. I didn’t think that much of it, but the last year or two has just been too much. I usually have a roster of about 6 characters and after the last year or two of changes I have 1 that is playable. The rest of them are literally unplayable. To me, this suggests the Devs have no respect for my time. Like I said l, I just want to be able to log in every now and then, tweak a character and be good to go without having to completely rebuild a character from scratch every 3 months.

I have no problem when developers introduce new items or content in good faith and later discover that there were unintended consequences and that things have to be adjusted or “balanced” later. But when items or skills are intentionally made OP and then promptly destroyed the next patch—well that is just lazy and destructive game design IMO. 3.16 saw max block gladiators basically destroyed. And heaven forbid you used spectral shield throw, because the devs destroyed it literally one league after knowingly buffing it to the moon.

On top of massive and puzzling class specific changes (can someone explain to me how I am supposed to use Defy Pain? Or why they had to remove the intuitive and actually useful life/mana leech notable for it?), the radical changes to core ARPG mechanics (like getting rid of dodge—I mean, wtf is spell suppression??? Lol), the completely ludicrous, convoluted crafting system (I hate crafting—if I wanted to craft, I would take up pottery), innumerable types of currency and shards, bloated league mechanics, one shot deaths and increasingly poor performance—I’ve finally had enough.

yeah I have the same feeling as the upper poster. Devs aren't stupid, they know very well when they release something broke/op. They do on purpose just to shift meta. All this blablabla powercreep balance is bs. They didnt slow down powercreep this league they only shift witch skills they WANT u to play to achieve the same power creep (even more). Look at dps builds are pulling rn and tell me the powercreep is not the same.

This simply destroy any kind of progression u may have with a char as u know for sure it will be completely destroyed next league or so.

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JaguarXXX wrote:

Longtime player (since launch). Have about 3000 hours in PoE and I recently, finally quit. I don’t really think I am going to be changing any minds here, but I thought I would at least explain why I have decided to throw in the towel after all of these years. Don’t get me wrong, POE was and maybe still is a great great game. But it’s just not for me anymore.

I’m basically a casual player at this point in my life. Would like to be able to just jump in a few hours every week to blow off some steam, but POE has reached a point for me where that isn’t actually possible any more.

Because of my “casual” status, the majority of my time in POE has actually been in standard soft core, because I simply don’t have the time to start from scratch every few months, which is what the last couple of leagues have forced me to do. For me, a big part of any rpg is continuity and character progression. The idea of having a character for years, that you may have to tweak incrementally now and then or find a new BIS item now and then is incredibly appealing for me.

I have to say, one of the most annoying things the developers have done in the last couple of years is to intentionally over buff an item or skill knowing full well that they would be either nerfing it back to earth the very next league or just flat out destroying it completely. For me, the buff to cyclone and it’s subsequent nerfing was the beginning of my realization that this was their MO. I didn’t think that much of it, but the last year or two has just been too much. I usually have a roster of about 6 characters and after the last year or two of changes I have 1 that is playable. The rest of them are literally unplayable. To me, this suggests the Devs have no respect for my time. Like I said l, I just want to be able to log in every now and then, tweak a character and be good to go without having to completely rebuild a character from scratch every 3 months.

I have no problem when developers introduce new items or content in good faith and later discover that there were unintended consequences and that things have to be adjusted or “balanced” later. But when items or skills are intentionally made OP and then promptly destroyed the next patch—well that is just lazy and destructive game design IMO. 3.16 saw max block gladiators basically destroyed. And heaven forbid you used spectral shield throw, because the devs destroyed it literally one league after knowingly buffing it to the moon.

On top of massive and puzzling class specific changes (can someone explain to me how I am supposed to use Defy Pain? Or why they had to remove the intuitive and actually useful life/mana leech notable for it?), the radical changes to core ARPG mechanics (like getting rid of dodge—I mean, wtf is spell suppression??? Lol), the completely ludicrous, convoluted crafting system (I hate crafting—if I wanted to craft, I would take up pottery), innumerable types of currency and shards, bloated league mechanics, one shot deaths and increasingly poor performance—I’ve finally had enough.

Very nice post, I feel it could have been a new thread exploring some of these good points.

I find myself in a similar situation. Although I have given up on the idea of any long term character and tend to strip and delete the character after a league or two of inactivity.

I will add from myself that a lot now depends on the player's crafting skills. Currently, those who can do it and their RNG is very lucky ... They are currently declaring what the prices look like. For example, an end-game body armor or a helmet can cost as much as on a standard server (and its sometimes 1+ mirrors). Players who barely have time to drop a currency still have a dilemma, because it took them so long to buy or not to buy an expensive item. Without it, they can't even meet end-game bosses. On the other hand, they realize how much it cost them. And suddenly it turns out that despite the purchase, you now have to bring the rest of the eq so that everything sticks again (max resist, armor / eve, blosk and now also spell supp), And it turns out that for the build to work, now you need to buy a cluster and other jewels.
And we come to the end, we now have a group of people who play every league. You can see it at the end of the league, when some get what they wanted and leave, then come back (or not). However, more and more veterans are disappointed from league to league. More and more elements that players do not want (mainly, more powerful mobs, weakened builds, more and more RNG). It discourages veterans from playing as much as possible, and new players are also reluctant to play a game that is so complicated.
I can see one solution, to give players the opportunity to fight bosses for a long time ... okay, cool. But give them the opportunity to survive and not in the form of several dozen defensive statuses that can be obtained from items or ascendency. Give us more hp, more ES, more mana! In other games raid boss is one of the coolest things in end-game because fights are long, deadly, but players are backed up by good eq and character skills plus strategies. And here we have die or not to die.

I just came back after a what, year break.

I have been saying from experience exactly what is being complained about here. The Devs making stuff "harder", gated, nerfing and insufficiently buffing, recycling their same ideas of horde attacks as "Seasonal challenging leagues", which is laughable.

I started playing on my now-resting Alt in 2013, shortly after the game became so to say "publicly interesting". It wasn't prime time, but enough people were playing. The environment was toxic already due to Free to Play, lots of losers with big egos or low self esteem coming in and bashing each other in chat. Turned off chat the very day I first played and rarely turned it back on since.

You could back then use a 4l and Split arrow and reach and defeat merciless dominus with it, the final boss of the time i started playing.

Spectral Throw was another godlike skill to use. You would find a 5l and it was an actual buff to your damage and playability.

But quickly, some time after Nemesis league, the first larger nerfs hit the game - the powerful "Ground Slam" became nerfed, as did many other skills. What used to be possible, soloing Dominus on Merciless deathless with just one attack and all your flasks, was impossible.

Good, we need to change how we play, I thought. And from there on, the game became harder and harder, which was a nice change. Then came the ultimate breaking point: GGG decided to buff enemy HP.

Now, many people claimed "you need to change your playstyle completely" and from there on, I have not been able to get into maps, let alone finish some of the mediocre maps, if I ever made it into maps before giving up. The game hasn't changed in a more challenging way, it is as it was mentioned, the game of metas. There is no other way. There is no "use any skill and win" anymore.

This was what made PoE into PoE though. The ability to make EVERYTHING work with no investement, just play, gather gear, craft some gear, and level up level up level up, get the gems you need, and play.

Now, it's about how many exalts you put into gear and oh fuck off.

This game has become pay to win without using actual currency. I always played a "SSF" approach, as I did with Diablo2 way back when it came out. You play solo offline for yourself, and gather gear to get stronger. HERE? You NEED to buy or craft, and for that, you need to play hours over hours a day.

I had my time when I was a hardcore gamer in PoE, dropping a mirror here, finishing hard maps there. But ever since the dreaded nerfs became more and more, and "Buffs" were announced that were actually NO BUFFS but more nerfs, I have had a harder and harder time to play at all.

To me the game has become bad. I had many streams on YT before where it was fun, people asking to play with me, and I said "no, sorry, i am playing solo self found and it's fun as it is". But lately, or rather, the recent years, I have had found myself deleting streams and aborting them with absolutely hate filled tirades against GGG, full of slurs and name calling, and I am not proud of it.

The decisions of GGG just bring out the worst in me, and it is why I have been avoiding this absolute trainwreck of a game for the last idk how many seasons or leagues.

I'll give it a try right now, have already reinstalled and am ready to go - just let me tell you, I can predict that nothing has changed, nothing has improved, same "hordes of enemies thrown at you challenging new league mode!" and what not.

You have added too much content that nobody wants to do, do people even delve? Heists even good? Why do the menagerie bullsh.... ehem. You get what I mean. Too much stuff nobody needs, and no substance underneath all of it. A hollow corpse of a game with glittering diamonds on the outside, like a turd sprinkled with gold powder to make it look "royalesque". But if the turd is still a turd, and the hollow corpse still has nothing inside of it, then all the external glitter and glamour only blinds those with the shallow minds to allow this.

If you think PoE still is good, you aren't right in the head. The game WAS great, but those times are over. Them days are over, and it was years ago where GGG ruined everything with braindead decisions.

Still, I will give this trainwreck another go, and see if I can keep my motivation up til level 40 or 60. But playing in the high 90's? Get out of here. The game isn't that fascinating anymore that I even want to try to get to high levels.

Now that's that. Good luck everyone, and I hope this will be a bit less of a waste of time than the last leagues I played.

It is drama thread, but this League performed really poorly, that's a fact. Scourge is worse numbers wise than Expedition, despite 3.16 is objectively much better state of the game.

I don't know whether it was about Scourge itself or not enough buffs, but 3.16 performance is evident. I think it's both of these factors.

We need polished awesome rewarding Leagues that feel good to interact with on day one. Evidently people are not gonna tolerate Leagues that need to be improved or fixed for weeks anymore. Stop releasing Leagues in such a terrible state GGG.

GGG needs to unnerf support gems and flasks - feeling powerless and slow without insane gear is one of the main reasons players quit.

Stop making acts (and base game in general) harder, it just makes levelling much more annoying - nobody wants it. Except few masochists and some hardcore streamers I guess.

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SunL4D2 wrote:

It is drama thread, but this League performed really poorly, that's a fact. Scourge is worse numbers wise than Expedition, despite 3.16 is objectively much better state of the game.

I don't know whether it was about Scourge itself or not enough buffs, but 3.16 performance is evident. I think it's both of these factors.

We need polished awesome rewarding Leagues that feel good to interact with on day one. Evidently people are not gonna tolerate Leagues that need to be improved or fixed for weeks anymore. Stop releasing Leagues in such a terrible state GGG.

GGG needs to unnerf support gems and flasks - feeling powerless and slow without insane gear is one of the main reasons players quit.

Stop making acts (and base game in general) harder, it just makes levelling much more annoying - nobody wants it. Except few masochists and some hardcore streamers I guess.

The new mastery tree was also a sizeable nerf to many build types, requiring further and forced investment into clusters and extreme crafting to get some of their power back.

They talked about how 3.16 was going to be all good news and no nerfs, but they just hid the nerfs in the mastery tree.

"

Toxaplume45 wrote:

The new mastery tree was also a sizeable nerf to many build types, requiring further and forced investment into clusters and extreme crafting to get some of their power back.

They talked about how 3.16 was going to be all good news and no nerfs, but they just hid the nerfs in the mastery tree.

This was bound to happen with a sizable change like that. It's impossible to make that many changes to tree, without some oversights/balance issues. I especially think physical non-DoT attack builds got it worst. Was trying to PoB several impale builds - even imported gear from my OP Ritual-Harvest Cycloner, and was FAR from the numbers I'm comfortable with.

I don't think we need to buff all support gems back to 3.14 levels, but there is some work needed to make certain archetypes feel good again. That certain builds get nerfed here and there will never be a problem, but when whole archetypes are "left behind", they need to react.

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Phrazz wrote:

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Toxaplume45 wrote:

The new mastery tree was also a sizeable nerf to many build types, requiring further and forced investment into clusters and extreme crafting to get some of their power back.

They talked about how 3.16 was going to be all good news and no nerfs, but they just hid the nerfs in the mastery tree.

This was bound to happen with a sizable change like that. It's impossible to make that many changes to tree, without some oversights/balance issues. I especially think physical non-DoT attack builds got it worst. Was trying to PoB several impale builds - even imported gear from my OP Ritual-Harvest Cycloner, and was FAR from the numbers I'm comfortable with.

I don't think we need to buff all support gems back to 3.14 levels, but there is some work needed to make certain archetypes feel good again. That certain builds get nerfed here and there will never be a problem, but when whole archetypes are "left behind", they need to react.

Impale, brands, elemental minions, ignite, and a bunch of totem builds got eviscerated. Even regular minion builds got nerfed pretty sizably but can work around by earlier and more costly investment into clusters.

Not arguing, just adding to.

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BndrIPL wrote:

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I does feel like that, yes. Simply cranking up the hardness maybe makes it more fun for some guys that don't get challenged enough in their life otherwise but the flipside is there will be many that will just find it too hard and stressful and will just say fuck it.