Recent changes to PoE have a meaning.

I personally think GGG is slowly trying to make PoE 1 into a slow mode to be more likely PoE 2 will be.

Every change they make becomes more obvious, and for what i've seen so far i would probably skip PoE 2 entirely.

I wonder what goes thru their minds when they see the backlash of the community to what is to be PoE 2, maybe delay it entirely?

Thing is, they have enough money to support two seperate games. If patch 3.19 is a preview for POE 2 I am not playing and paying.

On the other hand I would love to play POE fun mode like 3.13 with all the QoL changes we had until now.

But I suspect they won't do that because then players will have a choice and the result could be emberassing for POE 2 and their developers.

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FiftyShadesOfCovfefe wrote:

Thing is, they have enough money to support two seperate games. If patch 3.19 is a preview for POE 2 I am not playing and paying.

On the other hand I would love to play POE fun mode like 3.13 with all the QoL changes we had until now.

But I suspect they won't do that because then players will have a choice and the result could be emberassing for POE 2 and their developers.

I recently saw a video, I think it was Tenkiei that said Poe 2 is not a new game, it's just PoE with a massive game engine and mechanics overhaul.

Yeah, Poe 1 and 2 will be merged, only campaign remain seperate. But my point is, they have the money to give players a choice and make it two games (Fun POE 1 and 'Vision' POE 2).

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FiftyShadesOfCovfefe wrote:

Yeah, Poe 1 and 2 will be merged, only campaign remain seperate. But my point is, they have the money to give players a choice and make it two games (Fun POE 1 and 'Vision' POE 2).

But then nobody would play PoE 2... I mean, imagine if the league launched in 2 versions - current Lake of Kalandra, and Lake of Kalandra Classic, which would have been 3.13 PoE with current endgame system and the new mechanic... what percentage of the playerbase do you think would choose the current version?

There is one important point to consider. Pretty much every other ARPG is slow, being fast is POE's USP. Personally I never liked the speed meta or the insane droprates of juiced content, so i'm hoping it will work out well in the end, but it doesnt help with the feeling that most of the changes over the last 18 months make the game much worse for newer / casual players. Nerfing gem power instead of top end gear, buffing rares to the point that the tanky ones are so hard to kill without huge investment etc etc.

Lots of players just want to play the game in a semi-self found way, having fun trying new builds, finding and crafting items. The concept of gearing up through a website, and grinding for a month at top speed to get anywhere, constantly being interrupted to sell items isnt fun to a lot of people. Sure they want to be able to trade items with their friends, and buy that build defining unique, but when they try to craft something, and realise they have just thrown their wealth away to make a 2c item, it feels bad.

I have tried to introduce about 50 people to POE over the past 8 years, and all of them are put off by the actual mechanics of it. They would rather play D3 because they can have their own adventure that makes sense, not be overwhelmed, told they have to follow somebody's character guide, install a loot filter etc.

The current changes we have seen, overwhelmingly cater to people who play POE as a job, 8+ hours a day. Builds are still broken and overpowered, but only for people who play all day and invest huge ammounts in their characters. I like that there is a game that can cater to hardcore players like that, but it has left the experience feeling gutted for people who dont have that sort of time.

There needs to be a fun game for both types of players. And so much needs to be fixed, rare items should be better on the low end, quests should offer choices of levelling uniques. Stop relying on trading to fix everything, when it feels terrible to engage with for most people. Dont make act1, the literal tutorial to the game, the hardest act in the game. The campaign is long enough to have a proper difficulty curve.

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Xyel wrote:

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FiftyShadesOfCovfefe wrote:

Yeah, Poe 1 and 2 will be merged, only campaign remain seperate. But my point is, they have the money to give players a choice and make it two games (Fun POE 1 and 'Vision' POE 2).

But then nobody would play PoE 2... I mean, imagine if the league launched in 2 versions - current Lake of Kalandra, and Lake of Kalandra Classic, which would have been 3.13 PoE with current endgame system and the new mechanic... what percentage of the playerbase do you think would choose the current version?

Exactly. But you have to remember 2.888.887 of the 3.333.333 shares of Grinding Gear Games Limited are hold by Tencent Mobility Limited, that is 86%. They are in it for the money and not for the founders 'vision'. If they transform fun POE into hard mode 'vision' POE 2, basically kill fun POE, this game will loose a big chunk of its playerbase. Ultimatively, that will hurt the bottom line.

For past ~2 years I didnt change my mind - PoE 2 will be the final nail to the coffin that will kill this game.

Time for POE classic

I agree all these changes are laying the groundwork for Poe 2 and it looks like a game I do not want to play. My biggest problem right now is omitting the massive nerf to loot drops from patch notes/manifesto was a ploy to sell supporter packs up until the point people actually played the league and got angry. That is disgusting. Once you lose the trust of a player base it is almost impossible to get it back, and they have 100% lost my trust. I will never give them another dime of my money. They knew this change was massive and they omitted it on purpose for money period.