PoE 2 is... not fun.

Let me preface this by saying that any and all comments of the nature "no, shut up, it's good" are not constructive enough. If you disagree, please be extensive in your own experience and respectful.

So, to begin with, I'm a veteran PoE 1 player, but I would also very much consider myself in the demographic of people that would love the new version of PoE, in the same vein as most new players. I love souls games, I love what they are trying to do making the game more understandable, have skill variety instead of a single button and trying to preemptively hold back some of the problems of poe 1 with things like low mobility skill options, requiring you to craft in acts, demanding you do varied map pools in endgame and holding you accountable for every death, etc. This is all great... on paper.

Originally I was super hyped with most of these decisions. Things like the gem system rework, the one death per map in endgame, the difficult bosses with a roll made in such a way that you always know what killed you, the reduction in abuses to mobility, clearspeed and sustain to make flasks and moment to moment more varied as well as increasing the situational nature of skills. But having played the game, I think while the intent is there, the execution is a problem.

I won't get into too much detail about every single issue cus I feel they've all been discussed in these forums. And while I agree many have been overblown and there's certainly a number of players that are just unwilling to read or wanna play this like it's poe 1, the real issue to me is that I can't shake the feeling that any and all counterargument to these issues always boils down to "no, it's fine, shut up" or "git gud." Dismissive arguments are very flimsy.

So here's where I get to the thesis: I don't think I'm having fun with poe 2 anymore...

I can put investment into my maps, I can spend all my currency to improve my defenses, I can carefully check and craft my gear before every act boss fight, I can try the trials multiple times and get better till I can get my ascendancies, and in fact I've done all of these. I'm in t11 maps, I've gotten 3 ascendancies, I've spent over 100ex in trade on gear, so on and so forth.

But I always go back to the fact that I'm not having fun. It's stressful and tiresome every time I die on a map or a trial, even though I still have more waystones and I learned from my death, it's still so much lost time and progress that it exhausts me. It's horrible to constantly find new ways in which the game tells me my gear is not enough after putting so much effort on it, and it feels horrible to lose even a single waystone after how much investment you have to put to sustain them.

It all goes back to the fact that no matter how much I play, how "gud I git" or how much I understand the game, it never is enjoyable to overcome it.

What I'm trying to say is: I'm not a poe 1 boomer stuck in my ways, I'm a good player and I been thoroughly, from day one, intentionally unlearning my poe 1 and rereading everything and trying to play the way the devs intended me to. But it's still not an enjoyable game experience.

I think the point I'm trying to make is that we can all bicker and discuss all the feedback we want, we can all disagree weather the game needs changing here or there, but what's unavoidable is that the game is not good right now.

Yeah, maybe you think it's perfectly fine, maybe you think it's good and just needs time, and those are valid, but the reality is that after you go through all the acts and into the endgame and do the trials, you WILL end up in a place where you're constantly frustrated.

I don't have solutions, and I'm tired of pointing out all the problems one by one.

The game just isn't fun. That's all there is to it. And that's really really bad.

I'm in a similar boat, whilst I continue to play poe2 and learn what it takes.
There is a fine line dancing between challenging content and punishing content.
POE2 seems to punish you for making mistakes, even when you learn from them you can never learn enough so the game punishing you more.
It's a brutal experience, which for some can sap the fun... other's thrive in it, it's that simple.

This:

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Seystuff#5465 wrote:

But I always go back to the fact that I'm not having fun. It's stressful and tiresome every time I die on a map or a trial, even though I still have more waystones and I learned from my death, it's still so much lost time and progress that it exhausts me. It's horrible to constantly find new ways in which the game tells me my gear is not enough after putting so much effort on it, and it feels horrible to lose even a single waystone after how much investment you have to put to sustain them.

I agree, and it's a fundamental design issue. It's not so much that the gameplay or system are bad, or that you're not good enough and need to "git gud". This type of game design is simply put not fit for purpose for a game requiring big time investment to advance in an endgame. It's great for a finite game, not for an "endless" game. What you're feeling in my opinion is simply, and predictably given the game design decision made, burnout.
Some people may have (or think they have...) a higher tolerance for constant stress and tension, good for them, but I don't think they are many. We will have to see.

If, as I presume (but could be wrong), your experience is more representative of the majority, it will start to show in the numbers, and GGG will have to adress this.
How ? I'm not a game dev or game designer, but here are a few ideas:
- Significantly decrease the possibility of one-shots
- Simply remove DoD, except for specific identifiable mobs
- Make white mobs trivial
- No more "one death and you're out". If not 6 as in poe1, why not 3 lives like in the good old days
- Make lower tier maps more rewarding somehow, if one wants to simply chill farming easy content
- In campaign: no mobs respawn on death. It's stupid. It's okay for bosses though.

And as the OP said: if you don't agree and your only contribution is "git gud", "skill issue", "go back to poe1", you have to respect the devs "vision", just abstain, it's ok, we've heard it already.

I was having fun when it started, learning a new game, finding new ways to overcome challenges that appeard in Acts... and then I arrive at the Endgame and you get punished left and right. I find a way to get my build good again to get hammered by a nerf that bricked it. I know the feeling, the game is becoming more stressful as you progress, or at the very least try to do so. I try my best to build defenses in my character but there is always something that kills it way to easily, and having to pick a waystone go at it again leaves me sad e frustated.

I played around 1k hours of POE1, but am in somewhat rare situation of developing my own arpg game in unity engine (scale between D1 and D2 let's say).

My impression of POE2 is that is a marvel and almost a miracle in today's gaming industry. From presentation, innovation, sense of pace and creativity, this game is beyond what I hoped could be possible to do in the genre.
When I heard that they are adding a soulslike roll, it was blasphemy to me (because why would you have the need to roll in a genre that has infinite, almost no cooldown teleports), but trying it myself, and in the greater sense of the game, it simply works.

My feeling is that POE2 is almost a philosophical statement of what a ARPG "should be" (in the context of modern tech and the evolution of the genre), as well as a video game. Deliberate slowing of gameplay, increase of difficulty, high cost of experimentation... It's a very bold move from GGG and I believe it will pay off.

Well, roughness around the edges is to be expected since after all, we are all beta testers at this stage. I'm hopeful that GGG will continue to refine things, and it seems so far at least that they are listening to us.

There are certainly some aspects of the game that are unfun right now. And the whole concept of needed skill adjustments, nerfs and buffs, make it difficult right now to build characters without worrying if things are going to render your work moot in a day or a month.

That's the trade off of getting to play early in a beta test phase.

Core game play aspects though probably won't be changed too much, so some things may not pan out to your liking and that's certainly a reason for concern. But I am in agreement with you that on the whole, the presented ideas and direction of the game I find quite appealing. Getting there will take some work however.

So you kind of need to make a choice: hang around and continue to give feedback and test stuff, or opt out for now and check back on the game state in a few months. One's time is valuable, and wasting it on something annoying is something we can do at work or commute or any other life crapola we all have to deal with.

It is encouraging that they are making changes as they see how things are playing out, and they are listening to feedback, so your post is a good one. But don't be shy about complaining here about aspect that are not working for you, even if others have already complained. The more feedback, the better.

I'm having a similar experience. I've actually already just gone back to poe 1 until something happens with 2. It's not an enjoyable game for me, and I just don't want to play it.

I cleared the story and left my feedback. Whether the game changes into something closer to 1 or not ultimately decides whether I come back to 2 or just keep on grinding 1.

true true

The one death issue makes the players too cautious and slow which is contrary to arpg nature. Furthermore it creates anxiety when it is combined with stupid explosions and unfair death situations, they created the game so many years and they failed to take into account the fun factor!

endgame certainly feels.. a bit unpolished.
i think we will get some pretty large changes to systems.

the game does have good bones, if GGG makes smart choices over the next few months it can be king for years to come.

they need to be really careful about knee-jerk changes, the masses arent going to treat the game like its in a development phase.