The huge divide between "good" players and "normies"

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Obyrith wrote:

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Strickl3r wrote:

The problems start with stuff like farming Expedition, Essences or Delve especially where you have to kill them.

I guess the mindset even then could be to just use some form of Taunt and run away, then resolve to not expect as reliable a return from that content in future. After all, you don't have to kill something just because you're trying to farm it. RNG is still involved in what mods roll, so you can just take the hit on your investment and view it as a strategic consideration about that the value of that content. (This is the most Ruthless-logic argument, of course)

Delve should be separated from the rest here. There is no in-game way to "run away" from an endpoint Delve mob. You need to kill it or use some out-of-game "run away" (log out). And thats IMO simply bad design and should be fixed.

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exsea wrote:

OP

I mean, I TOTALLY agree with your main point that making the campaign harder is NOT the right way to go. I have been a part of numerous threads advocating for an "easy mode" for those players that simply wish to have more frequent drops, easier enemies, etc. Or players just don't have enough time to make any headway in the league. Sure they can play in standard with no time commitment, but doing so exponentially increases the overall time they would need to make progress since everything costs an arm and a leg. Even I, as a 10+ year veteran of the game with 15000 hours under my belt, would LOVE a game mode like that. It can't simply always be "the game is too easy, make it harder!", or adding league content and endgame content that keeps getting harder and harder without paying ANY attention to the other side of things.

And to other's points: while valid, I think its a bit misleading to say "well you can just run white t1-5 non-rare maps if you want an easier game". I mean....yea sure you can but that's like telling a whole 25% or possibly more of the entire regular player base that they don't deserve access to a large part of the game. There is "regular" endgame progression and then there is "optional" endgame progression and I would argue atlas completion is a fundamental part of the BASE endgame that everyone should be able to do within a league. White maps of course, maybe blue. But definitely through to t16. I might even lump regular versions of atlas bosses into that, Sirus/Maven/Eater/Exarch/Shaper/Elder. EVERYTHING else, legion abyss ubers bossing beyond harvest rare maps scarabs sextants watchstones blahblahblahblah is all POST-endgame that NOT everyone should be able to handle in every difficulty of map. This is just my opinion, I am well aware that this is MY individual vision of a "goalpost" that the average player should be able to reach.

PoE is not a one-size-fits-all, that is absolutely for sure. And it NEVER should be. The game shouldn't dumb itself down in any way for the players that like it as-is. BUT I think it would be immensely valuable to add a more accessible mode to newer players rather than continuing to add harder and harder content and things like Ruthless. Prior to Ruthless, we already had 3 "harder" options to choose from in SSF/HCSFF/HC. Almost every new mechanic added to the game is harder than the previous one. And the ONE time they gave power to the less experienced players (harvest), they took it away immediately. They are fond of making new game modes, make one for the OTHER playerbase too!

For a definition, I'd describe casual as less than 120 hours played per month. 360 hours per league roughly if they played all the way through.

There are a lot of people who play 40-70 hours per week at league start that aren't the 0.1% with mageblood in 3 days just as an example. In 120 hours if casual, you will probably get to mapping and maybe complete half of the atlas, maybe complete the entire atlas and get voidstones by the end of the league if not paying for boss carries. I generally think most veteran players are giving a more generous hourly commitment are getting the same done in the first 2 weeks of the league with some time to spare, especially if they buy boss carries for the voidstones for progression's sake. I can continue, but the general statement is made by time commitment there.

I really don't think the game is primarily intended for casual play. You can be casual and play, but it wouldn't be very rewarding. What's rewarding in the game can pretty much be summed up as not very casual. A casual player will pretty much never be killing an uber boss with a well-balanced character that they created nor edited the build recommendations for.

The game is really just about creating a powerful character, and GGG fudging numbers for casual play won't feel rewarding because you're really not creating a powerful character anymore, you're playing a walking simulator.

I think the game is plenty difficult, and there are manipulations to make things harder for the veterans that challenge most veterans. I'm watching streamers die regularly every day.

Also, I think league start veterans think it's too easy primarily because they're playing proven league start builds. If playing atypical league start skills the campaign scales up in difficulty the same way it feels to new players that don't know how to compensate for early character weakness to some extent.

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Toforto wrote:

I mean, all it takes for you to become a "good player" is download pob community fork and copy a meta build then farm some easy currency from something like Sanctum to pour it all into the build and become a god. I do that every league yet I'm not a good player lol, I have to buy carries for my voidstones(the only fights I do myself are quest exarch and eater) and then if there's a challenge this league for killing uber bosses or any of the other uber content like wave 30 simulacrum or blight-ravaged map I buy carries for all of that too. I've done 5 of the 7 uber bosses before but I'm just too lazy and can't be bothered dying 4-5 times and being annoyed by them. And the only reason I hate the maven fight and that I always buy a carry for it is because of the memory game. If it didn't have that I'd gladly do it solo.


I have over 5000 hours yet I've never made a build myself, how much time I've played or what I've done doesn't matter. My 237 mil dps doesn't matter because I still suck at a lot of skill-based parts of the game. Having a good build just lets me enjoy the game how I like to enjoy it. And the only goal I have every league is to do challenges then I just quit. Unless I really wanna level a 2nd char for a meme build.

And I don't even do any of the super tryhard stuff like selling all your misc smaller currency on 3rd party websites or on tft, I never juice maps or prepare them before running, I just roll them one by one in my stash lol. I never use sextants or deli orbs. I spam random scarabs with Growing Hordes for packsize mostly. I never have a specific atlas strategy like in all those youtube videos you see, I just farm alch&go maps and do master missions and shit just drops anyway. Whether its a random fractured item that sells for 15 div or some rare div card from an altar mod. And I always sell all my Maven's Writs(which have gotten stupidly expensive this league). I run my atlas with all the guardian map drop nodes so I randomly maven them and do their invitations, then I sell all my fragments from those guardians for some more currency. Usually I do all my elders myself just for the chance at a nice watcher's eye then sell the uber elder fragments. And all of that is more than enough to keep getting some nice currency while farming 28 map rotations with influence for invitations for even more currency. I've never used Wandering Path or Grand Design on the atlas tree.

Thanks for being so honest. A lot of people bought their gear and copied some uber build and start to think they now are god-tier gamers shitting on 'normies' who just play a regular build with low-tier items.

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Orbaal wrote:

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exsea wrote:

Like I said: This is extremely quick & dirty math - almost guaranteed to be incorrect but still way closer to the truth than the Steam numbers.

The absolute epitome of "Trust me, bro."

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jsuslak313 wrote:

I mean, I TOTALLY agree with your main point that making the campaign harder is NOT the right way to go. I have been a part of numerous threads advocating for an "easy mode" for those players that simply wish to have more frequent drops, easier enemies, etc.

Almost every new mechanic added to the game is harder than the previous one. And the ONE time they gave power to the less experienced players (harvest), they took it away immediately. They are fond of making new game modes, make one for the OTHER playerbase too!

in regards to item drops. POE actually was not as harsh as it is now. actually low level farming was a thing. but due to the rise of bots and due to GGG not liking the fact people were HAPPY playing low level areas non stop made them create the 6 level penalty.

a lot of stronger players are not affected at all so they really cant relate. for a newer player, in a normal arpg if you're weak you have 2 options.

1. farm for more gear, either by naturally dropping better gear, crafting better gear or trade
2. get more xp and level up, higher levels give u more stats/passives/ability to equip better gear.

in poe if you suck ass/made bad decisions you'll find it VERY hard to farm new gear as item drops can be cruelly pitiful with you getting a few scraps of chromatics, barely seeing a jeweller or a fuse.

this creates a barrier for crafting since you're poor to begin with, you cant really craft, but maybe at least you can slap a bench craft. to help.

eventually you would simply overlevel and your drops would suffer as a result.

that gets you to trading being the best option.

now you've got good gear BUT WAIT! you cant use it straight. huh? why? dont forget socketing, linking and colouring. an ancient artificial problem introduced by GGG that they intended to fix with POE2.

its something that a better player simply would not be able to relate to and the easy "fix" for them is, oh, you made a mistake, you should have played a starter build. use a spell as spells scale with level so you are less gear dependent. use this skill as you will be safer attacking from a distance or that skill as it hits many enemies at once.

for sure they are not wrong but to me i like natural progression where we enjoy the game as we play. GD is a perfect example of this "natural progression". you can hit a brick wall but you could grind for better gear in a feasible amount of time AND you could level up more to gain more power to better deal with the enemy. you dont NEED a guide.

but thats where POE is currently at.

to me i have accepted that i need to temper my expectations. there are things that i simply cant do, either due to skill, lacking of gear, or refusal to play a proper build. thats on me. but whats not on me is the experience i have playing the game.

i m at level 99 on std. i got to like what? 30-40% xp by solo mapping? GGG teased a new atlas passive reducing enemy damage at the cost of them having more hp. i stopped leveling and waited for the patch to drop. OH FUCK. it was a trap! it came with AN. my 40% quickly dwindled to zero.

my ENJOYMENT of the game EVAPORATED. this isnt even touching the fact that i m getting PITIFUL LOOT from running safe magic maps. i barely get a pure divine drop a week.

the game doesnt need to have an easy mode. i would argue that the BASE level of difficulty should be adjusted tho. let AN mods be an opt in or out via atlas passives. make base item drops more generous. also improve the game performance

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Orbaal wrote:

Lets do some quick & dirty math:

- 90% completing eternal lab
- 70% reaching lvl 90
- 32% killing Eater/Exarch
- 18% Killing Maven

i think a better benchmark is to extrapolate based on voll kill achievement (act 4) which ushered a new age of poe (10 Acts). At least this way we can get the "active player base" from one snap shot in time. disregarding a ton of old achievements such as brutus kills which could have occurred may years back.

that sits at 27%

15% cleared act 2. extrapolated thats 55% of the player base (15/27).

so extrapolated using voll kill as a benchmark we can get

55% finished the campaign
30% completed eternal lab
26% reached level 90
12% cleared eater/exarch
6.6% cleared maven

i actually find it still interesting. 12% is still a large number of players that cleared eater/exarch.

then it drops by almost half to those who cleared maven.

personally i find having all watchstones highly beneficial. if i m already balls deep into poe to have cleared eater/exarch i would WANT to clear maven no matter what. i personally failed 20-30 maven writs before killing her myself for the first time. similarly a lot of elder/shaper sets were failures. now i m in a temp league i'd just opt to get carried.

its SO easy to get carried. some people get carried for free, some need to pay a fee. its really not difficult to clear maven if your purpose is just to get the extra voidstone.

but this begs the question. WHY after so many years have this number been stuck at 50% less players clearing maven.

i m heavily biased. i would assume the game became less fun for them. FOMO is strong. some players like myself really want to clear bosses by ourselves. i personally still havent cleared the feared/ubers but i m refraining as i want to achieve it myself. but after so many years of tempering my expectations i m close to just letting myself carried.

for sure there may be other reasons that players could have stopped progressing. but this is steam achievements. eater/exarch achievements are newer than maven yet the clear rate is inverse.

personally i never want to engage with maven ever again. i've accepted my dumb brain cant do memory games especially under pressure. i've resolved to just get carried if i ever play temp leagues.

personally the game just keeps getting harder. the enjoyment keeps slipping thru my fingers. there is a meme phrase. "no fun allowed". its just like the harvest mechanic. which was arguably one of the best things to happen to players but was nerfed to the ground.

my best jewels which could be worth a huge lot now were crafted thanks to harvest. now i just buy jewels from players. i stay the hell away from crafting. i do not enjoy it. it is simply more efficient to buy from other players. then again GGG doesnt like us trading and intentionally made trading difficult. ironically they themselves introduced chase items that are highly random such as watcher's eye or that which was taken which are obviously meant to be traded around.

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exsea wrote:

so extrapolated using voll kill as a benchmark we can get

55% finished the campaign
30% completed eternal lab
26% reached level 90
12% cleared eater/exarch
6.6% cleared maven

i actually find it still interesting. 12% is still a large number of players that cleared eater/exarch.

then it drops by almost half to those who cleared maven.

personally i find having all watchstones highly beneficial. if i m already balls deep into poe to have cleared eater/exarch i would WANT to clear maven no matter what. i personally failed 20-30 maven writs before killing her myself for the first time. similarly a lot of elder/shaper sets were failures. now i m in a temp league i'd just opt to get carried.

I wont argue those numbers, because I think those are still healthy enough.


As to "why so few maven kills?":

If you want to kill eater/exarch all you need to do is kill 28 random t14+ map bosses. If you allocted 10% chance to get 1 bonus progress its closer to 25 map bosses per attempt.

Maven requires 10way boss fights, dropping a singular maven frag. So you have to repeat this 10 times and cant be random 14+ map bosses, it has to be different ones - adding up to a whooping 100 maps per attempt. You have to have those maps ready to go to begin with and early on in the league chances are you wont.
Alternatively you could do any of her other invitations, dropping some 3-5 frags. However those invitations require specific maps, which you wont have readily available early on either, your build has to be able to do it and you have to know those things exist to begin with.

If you dont know those invitations exist or how to unlock them, then you have to grind 100 maps per maven attempt vs 25-28 maps per eater/exarch attempt.

Additionally, I dont think many players die to Maven herself all that often but to her arena effects. Whether its misplaced degen puddles or her memory game or both, doesnt really matter. You cant really outgear this stuff or skip her arena mechanics and simply dps her down, whereas eater/exarch can be outgeared and their arena mechanics can be skipped - even tho it does cost a portal.
But if you dont die to eater/exarch then losing a few portals to their arena effects wont matter.


In the end Maven is way more grindy per attempt and way more frustrating, if you cant handle her arena effects. Other than that I cant think of any meaningful barriers holding players back.
Id even argue she is the easiest boss in the game, if you ignore the arena effects and thats likely why she is so frustrating to deal with. Because if you think you could totally take her on but get screwed by arena effects all the time and then have to grind yet another 100 maps or pay 1-2 div for a full maven set just to get screwed again, why even bother?

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exsea wrote:

the game doesnt need to have an easy mode. i would argue that the BASE level of difficulty should be adjusted tho. let AN mods be an opt in or out via atlas passives. make base item drops more generous. also improve the game performance

This is a fundamental divide I have with you right here. The BASE game simply cannot be adjusted to be easier at this point in its history. It has been far too long developed in a singular direction. I think if you were to adjust the base game NOW, there would be far more people upset than if they were to offer a "separate" option for players wanting an easier, shorter experience. I can see the audience for an "easy" mode being the same size as the audience for "ruthless". The massive "rest" of the players are perfectly fine with the BASE game as it currently stands.

And to be absolutely fair, the drop rate in the normal trade leagues is absolutely fine....because you are expected to trade. If you DON'T want to interact with trade, you are going AGAINST the drop rate design which is why it feels like this needs to be adjusted. However, in an "easy mode" with higher drop rates, players would opt into this as a TRUE SSF mode that is actually balanced around SSF and NOT trade rates. That is the major major difference here. The BASE game should NOT be changed because it would catastrophically dismantle the entire trade market.

With regards to your comments about gear: the crafting process of a piece of gear INCLUDES coloring and linking. This is not a separate step, as you like to think or describe. You craft the mods, the links, and the colors and that makes a FULL item. When you make a "good" rare, you don't THEN have to craft sockets....it only becomes a "good" rare for you when it HAS the sockets you need.

And yes...PoE from 5/10 years ago was of course easier (in a way) in terms of "drops" and crafting because there were far less mods and bases in the pool. But along with the overabundance of mods in current PoE, we are now dropping exponentially more currency. So the overall "experience" is VERY similar to how it used to be, with the best items being similarly out of reach but the bottom/mid items being the same, if not much more in reach to the majority. IF you are interacting with trade.