ACT 1 Difficulty

I've recently been playing through the acts to get faster at reaching the end game. I have noticed after several runs, most of my trouble is in ACT 1.
Now im not going to claim to be some professional but ive played poe since beta and usually get bored in the mapping stage around t12 maps or so. But i have pushed all the way to T16 and killed a few bosses.

My concern is specifically with new player experience. I'm not sure I have encountered a game that had such a punishing and unfair first hour. Relative to Act 2 or the later areas of Act 1.

Mud flats, Submerged passage and even Ledge for some reason are some of the hardest zones in the first half of the campaign.

The rate at which you get stun locked or slowed is absolutely insane. Retention rates for this I don't imagine are good. Obviously this all smooths out later on in the game. I remember when the pantheon was first introduced and that modifier for you cannot be stunned if you have been stunned in the last 2 seconds mod appeared on my screen and I asked. "Why isn't this just how it works"
I have rarely played without this pantheon buff. The only times I haven't I've had a lot of stun resist or immunity.

Now there seems to be a serious problem with the rhoas in mudflats because not only do they charge from across the screen they also have a lot of stun. Now if you somehow got surrounded by enemies that can stun you a lot. I could understand. But theyre very quick, and accurate when charging. Then we come to Submerged passage where there are so many slows that if you cannot 1-2 shot these sirens (speaking for new player experience again here) I don't know how you could possibly enjoy this section at all. the passages are so narrow that it becomes easy to get locked in place here while getting slowed from all directions. Thankfully the suicide squids aren't introduced yet but even still for the 4-6th zone of the game it seems like a bit much.

As a relatively experienced player I really do not get any enjoyment from these zones. I don't imagine new players are going to look at this game kindly with this kind of stuff.

that flame throwing guy in the ledge can dish out some serious damage for how hard it is to see him with the new mob density and for how similar he looks to the rest of the mobs. And lastly for smaller mobs did you really need to add those really fast mobs to the prison? I don't think theyre necessarily annoying or anything but it really removes a lot of the essence the prison used to have with all the slow moving yet scary enemies. It seems odd that theres just these smiling friends entities zooming around at mach speed. and it really takes me out of the game when I see them. They feel very out of place.

Finally I would like to request that brutus big arena be restored. Fighting him in a hallway is dull and uninteresting. Also his attacks have been bugged forever and his hitboxes don't correctly line up, even on the shavron version and other versions of him. Idk how its gone unfixed for years being that hes one of the first things players will see in your game.

This really depends on what class you're playing. Marauder is pretty miserable early on unless you mule splitting steel. Most everything else is ez mode. if you can get the spark, caustic arrow, or splitting steel. act 1 is 100x easier than ground slam with 70% chance to hit.

Marauder needs some kind of accuracy handicap early on imo.

I agree with the OP. Beginner players don't know squat about what to choose or what to play. They stumble through Act 1 ignorant of how to play or respond to the monster threats.

Does GGG have goals for first time players in Act 1-3 as to what they should be learning about their game and how to interact with it?

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ChanBalam wrote:

I agree with the OP. Beginner players don't know squat about what to choose or what to play. They stumble through Act 1 ignorant of how to play or respond to the monster threats.

Does GGG have goals for first time players in Act 1-3 as to what they should be learning about their game and how to interact with it?

Well if new players are like me they want to hulk smash on steriods man and act 1 is as annoying as possible on marauder. if youre playing a caster or bow boy if act 1 sucks for you then idk what to tell you. the rhoas are the only scary parts on witch the rest is pretty easy.

Playing as the Witch and getting stunlocked by Fire Fury on The Coast was interesting. A first time player encountering that would not have had a happy time.

Act 1 was buffed a few* patches ago.
Chris said something about scaling up the difficulty of the Acts.

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xjjanie wrote:

Playing as the Witch and getting stunlocked by Fire Fury on The Coast was interesting. A first time player encountering that would not have had a happy time.

i think a roadblock scary monster in the form of a unique monster isnt at all a bad thing. It will make sure you're on your toes when you see a unique monster is all.

act 1 is hard just due to you are without any gear. Once you have some sort of gear to boost dps and resistance, you can cheese the area

1st char in league with poor equip - about 1 year ago.
Act 1, first underground area after Mud Flats.
___________

I was frozen permanently and be killed by 3-5 hits.
The reason was clear, I had zero cold resi.

Ok, act 1 end boss is and was dangerous with low cold resi but now white mobs at level 5-7?

I am playing PoE since 2013 and never experienced that before.


Solution was to craft a cold resi ring using vendor recipe
blue gem + iron ring
The 27% cold resi was enough to avoid/reduce the freezing.

Do you think any new Poe player would do this?

(I know that recipe is one of the loading screen hints.)

I always got the impression that GGG filled act 1 with freezing and stunning mobs specifically because they dont want your average gamer to be able to get into PoE. They wanted there to be a barrier that filters out anyone who isnt "hardcore" enough.