Struggling? ... TIPS to enjoy POE2.

I'm loving POE2 and after taking 2 classes to level 20 and then re-rolling and finding the early zones faceroll easy on multiple classes (especially warrior), I feel I've climbed the "learning curve" that some people are struggling with... so I figured I would share some tips.

However, before we talk about them, acceptance of some reality is important.

POE2 is more like Dark Souls and Elden Ring, which each sold 24M copies and are massively more profitable than POE1. This game is (hopefully) going to do an amazing job capturing that bigger audience. Already the POE2 steam peak is 578k, more than double POE1's all time steam record, and the true numbers are probably more extreme. The numbers don't lie, people are *loving* POE2.

You certainly don't have to love POE2, and POE1 is still there for you, but don't think there is some majority of haters out there. If you want to understand why people are loving this game, and why it will probably be 2-4x more popular (and profitable) than POE1, read these tips...

1. You have to HOLD melee skills until they complete, tapping doesn't work and often results in a cancelled skill, especially when you are surrounded... HOLD skills (I consider this a BUG, hopefully they fix)

2. This isn't a hardcore first-time-through campaign (unless you play *very* safe), you need to learn boss mechanics and telegraphs... this is much better to me. I want some challenge. If it's easy enough to hardcore the first time through, think of how boring it will be the 100th.

3. The boss stagger mechanics are *VERY* important, especially for Melee. Below the boss healthbar is the yellow stagger bar. When it staggers, a mob takes 1.5x melee dmg and 1.5x physical dmg and these stack (see tooltip on stagger). For melee, this means you can do 1.5x1.5=2.25x dmg on the boss during stagger. This makes those formerly tough boss fights seem trivial once you understand it.

4. Dodgeroll is a massively overpowered invulnerability-frame. Use it. If you don't care for "watch and react" gameplay, where you see the attack coming and use your iframe to avoid it, then you won't care for POE2, since this is the entire structure of the game. However, many beloved games are based around it, and I hope this gameplay is here to stay in POE2.

5. The skill gem combos that work well in POE2 are *similar* to POE1, but not at all the same, and certainly don't have the same "progression". We can wield lots more skills earlier, with more support gems. It takes some time to experiment and understand where the power spikes are.

6. A good amount of the power moved out of single skills and into layered skill "combos". A simple example is putting a "chance to bleed" gem on one skill, and a "does 30% more dng to bleeding enemies, can't cause bleeding" gem on another skill... The first skill procs bleeding the second one exploits it. You can often layer 2-3 types of damage bonuses like this, in addition to the stagger mechanics, and really dumpster stuff.. but you have to actually pay attention, and not just spam one button like in POE1.

7. The passive tree respects are MASSIVELY cheaper (thankfully!), so it's very viable to start with most of the damage nodes near the beginning, and then when you get more dmg bonus from gear or other passives and don't need these nodes, to respec them by routing around them through survivability or attributes at the base... I do wish they would make respecs support "temporary debt" so you could allocate points first and then remove points, to make reroutes easier, but for now you can just spend a little more gold and get the same outcome.

8. The loot drops are definetly less than POE1 normal, but at the same time, the lack of equipment skill sockets means it's much easier to actually equip something that will help, or even swap out gearsets for particular situations. I personally think they need to massively increase the currency drops in the entire campaign (*especially regal orbs*), because players are experimenting, and these crafting items have so much RNG, the variability from one playre to another is VERY VERY high. So far I'm only noticing this as a progression factor in mid Act 2, where bosses get harder and there are more undodgable AOE skills. For now, I recommend grouping up (either in chat or public parties), as it can make things much easier.

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If you don't care for POE2, be glad they forked the games and are keeping POE1 alive for you. However, if you want to understand why so many players are loving POE2, give it a chance on it's own terms, not in terms of your (obviously) beloved POE1.

Happy Hunting, Exiles.

yeah, also the way skills and supports and the passive tree are, you can swap stuff around.
i found the balbala or w/e boss basically impossible with my skill choice and playstyle at that point. so instead of raging, i had to step back and see what i could change up to do the fight. i changed a couple things up, and boom was able to complete it.

i don't like the sanctum ascendancy stuff though. getting hit and losing honour? this is ridiculous. im a tank character designed to facetank and out sustain my enemies.
hell there is even thorns in the game (and seems to be much more workable than poe1), which is just null and void for this sanctum thing.

it takes my character, how i built them, and negates the strengths completely (hp pool, sustain, life regen). doesn't matter if i can take the damage, i can't take the honour loss.
my attack speed is slow (on purpose) so even if i try to dodge roll every single basic attack by a mob, i don't have enough time inbetween to attack without taking some honour loss

kind of lame on that front

otherwise im freaking loving this game. i wouldn't say its dark souls/elden ring-esque at all though, it just isn't blast blast zoom zoom poe1 with 10 years of power creep

My tip to enjoy poe2 is to uninstall and then shit talk it in stream chats

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KuroSF#6521 wrote:

be glad they forked the games and are keeping POE1 alive for you

Sure, but will it they keep updating it at the same pace as they used too, now that they have PoE 2 to maintain as well?

We'll see

Will we get some major graphics overhaul?

PoE 1 could very much use it

I'm happy they won't shut it down, but we've yet to see what they have in store for it, now that they have 2 games to maintain

PoE1 will be on maintenance mode, don't expect anything great for that branch.

Ah, one of those PoE "players" that've never properly played the game.

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Ah, one of those PoE "players" that've never properly played the game.

I played POE1 for 500 hours according to Steam, which is plenty long enough to have learned that I don't like the combat mechanics.. but there are things I like about it obviously, which is why I have 500 hours. I know this is a short time by POE1 standards, but it's also much longer than anyone who is on the forums talking about POE2. I have 39 hours in POE2, and I fully expect to surpass 500 hours in it by March (I'm retired, gaming is my golf), because I'm with the masses that love it.

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Sure, but will it they keep updating it at the same pace as they used too, now that they have PoE 2 to maintain as well?

I personally expect:

1. POE2 to have a larger playerbase (it already has more interest) and make much more money than POE1

2. so there will be more money to go into both games

3. right now POE1 will get new leagues, while POE2 will get finished

4. POE1 will start to get cross-pollination of the ideas (and artwork quality) that can translate from POE2 without changing the game (some of which is already happening)

5. Beyond this, the playerbases of the games will drive their future.

Who knows. Maybe GGG has some bigger ideas, where they bring the art and stories closer together... or maybe they will just remain separate. Only time will tell.

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HOWEVER... the point of this post was not to have yet another thread where lovers and haters debate... the point of this post is to include concrete things that could help people who are not "getting" POE2 but would like to.

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HOWEVER... the point of this post was not to have yet another thread where lovers and haters debate... the point of this post is to include concrete things that could help people who are not "getting" POE2 but would like to.

There's 3 of them and they already quit.

I get poe2 and I think it's an atrocity.

#1 tip from me, being level 44 and almost clearing the campaign on day 2:
read everything!

Read all the skills & gear things, and try them out, see how they actually act.

Experiment

Case in point: tempest bell and charged staff, as a monk, i felt underpowered and just... meh, until i got these two skills rolling, now that i have them, i stomp through bosses + especially trash mobs (talking 1 shot with rolling thunder slam from 5 power charges + i am the thunder instant 5 power charge refill).