What’s the SOUL of POE2 ? /+Ideas

TLDR: imo POE2 is lacking an own SOUL/Main idea - some ideas to get there, by reflecting on my 60+h Play-through with Skywalker Monk

My Campaign experience
Norm: Playtime: 29h / Deaths: 106
Cruel: Playtime: 17h / Deaths: 25
Build Idea: All in on DMG, lightning + Crit
Used SSF invoker monk with just 4 ascendancy points and only lesser jeweler orbs (so max 4 socket gems)

Norm felt challenging, and good (here the game is a little bit like an aRPG Soulslike)
Cruel was more like a joke in comparison (once my build was up - felt like Anakin clearing the Jedi temple (ring the Bell ;)
Maps - played until Tier 4 - meh - does not fit into the new trail of game difficulty
The game again turns into a SLOT MACHINE on maps.

Game Identity
Ok so, POE2 is a hybrid - integrating some stuff of D2R and Demon Souls - on some point, this worked out.
On the other hand, it leads to the main problem I have. What’s its own identity? What’s the soul of POE2?
POE1 had the core own idea in Skill gems, and that links and color is on the gear.
POE2 erased the main issues with that. So gear is now „free“ to use sockets with runes like D2R.
But now what? Socket numbers can go up, you can implement ideas like socket resets, rune upgrades, runewords…..etc.
But it will remain a copied idea and adds no evolution to the item system overall.

Gameplay is the same - Hard difficulty and dodge rolling was adopted from Demon Souls.
This idea works well for Norm difficulty, but above that, the game mechanics do not work with it.
POE2 again turns into a slot machine concerning endgame and not a challenging game experience.
In DS the concept of a challenging game experience is consistent throughout the game.
For POE2 it feels like there is missing consistency about the core concept, the heart and souls it wants to be.
For now, its a little bit DS in the beginning, a little bit D2R in between, and a lot POE1 in the endgame.

Item progression
So here imo lies the biggest chance for POE2 to evolve the core aRPG mechanisms out there.
Overall I like the idea that gear is CREATED - Not Dropped.
So for example let us grind for mats and create the gear
The way rn is good - finding norm items, making it magic, then regal it, exalt it
But then we should have a way of further upgrading - Like upping the power lvl of the item, adding affixes, upgrading the tier lvl of affixes, add influences on it, add special abilities to it (like D4).
Campaign is waaaay to long for the fact that 90%+ of items is useless in endgame.
For casual players like me 40+h every season is a thing that definitely keeps me from playing this game longterm.

Take Base items, and make them viable from scratch to endgame.
I want my items - to EVOLVE with my play-trough.
So, I get a base item, and with more playtime - I add more power to it.
This would take out the Slot machine mechanic which is desperately what I want to see erased.
Because imo this is the biggest soulless mechanic to the game.

The idea of power upgrading of gear worked very well in games like Demon Souls, Secret of mana.
Limiting the items progression to a simple amount.
When you watch content creators in POE1+2, you see 10+ stash tabs filled with good items.
And all players that have 100+ Hours on the game now what I am referring to.
In the beginning you struggle, but later you find TONS of shit which fills your stash tabs forever.
Maybe 1-2% you can trade, but because everyone can get to that point, trade is limited to utility items and hyper rare rolled items.
Games without that can focus more on gameplay and game difficulty.
The point where I can explode whole screens and items drop like rain, is where is loose interest in the game.

I guess there will be other opinions on that, but I think POE2 made some good choices which already work well in norm difficulty.
Now GGG should continue this path and make some clear choices. IMO this should be to continue to Focus on Game difficulty, Clarity and an own soul for item Progression. Thus erasing the ridiculous amounts of dropped items and the clearspeed mainly.

Leading us to my last point wich is magic find.
POE2 is trying to copy D2R again in this part. It is a fair try, but look at what happened to D2R with it. You need like 200MF to farm effectively, making viable gear limited to these items that have either good MF stats (like War travs and Shako) or with sockets to add 25% MF via Runes or gems. (Btw the easiest idea to quick fix MF issues, is to introduce a rune that gives +% increased rarity).
Which again makes up the Soul question. What’s the core soul of POE2?
I know it is supposed to be a D2R successor - but shouldn’t it be an improvement to it rather then copying its ideas?
I prefer seeing you come up with an own soul - on top of a game, that now has so much more to offer than before.


IDEAS:

Magic find (aka %increased rarity)
Introduce an (IST) Rune with +% increased rarity

Item progression:
- Low level items should have limited number of affixes - NOT restricted stat ranges
Cause +7% fire res and stuff like that is just completely useless
I prefer situation based items - boss with high fire damage - take the fire res ring
This would open up the possibility of upgrading items with more affixes in higher levels
Converting campaign items to useful endgame items
You could also add a way to increase the affix tiers in higher level - transforming a campaign item to endgame

Runes:
add a „clear runes“ possibility
Update Runes - „Tier 1 - X“
„Runewords“ (if you don’t get license issues with D2 ;)

Skill Gems:
I feel like that the current system needs a change
1 Tab full of Uncut Skill Gems I didn’t need - The decision to go away from gem Sockets on gear was right - but somehow it also feels like this took away the „SOUL“ of Poe. Poe1 gem sockets where like Prio 1 - links and colors over stats in campaign
Also why limiting skill gems slots? Its not like chars get op with more skills - spirit limits this
So limiting slots only forces me to switch gem setup for boss fights etc….
IDEA: Maybe give me an option like with the weapon swaps - Skill gem swap

Quality of Life:
Make campaign mandatory ONCE per class per account
Simple pathing in maps - clear way to clear key waypoints - but increasing difficulty over the path (add a minimum waystone requirement?)
Continue making clear decisions - I would like to see the game difficulty go up even more - also the item progression should feel consistent


Open world = bs
I’ll finish with some word on open world mechanics.
To create a picture here - Demon Souls had a simple map mechanic - „Stones“/ Worlds as starting points, progression in these deeper and deeper - Every shortcut made, felt like a milestone.
For me, adding 1000 „mappoints“ doesn’t add any value to the game.
Same as adding mounts did not. Riding through endless way to big maps…..pointless.
It’s where D4 screwed it. It’s where Elden ring screwed it.
When I just ride from waypoint a to b on the map and can even run through enemies like they are paper, this is where the world loses all SOUL.
This is where it loses its credibility. Also Sekiro was like that.
It leaves me with this thought: „Why would I even care to kill mobs?“
Again, sorry but I loved Demon Souls for that. It was consistent.
You could try to rush it, but in the end, that lead to 100 deaths or a lucky try, leaving me with the conclusion that it is more time efficient to play the game RIGHT. Which meant to slow it down, take my time, kill enemies 1:1, and celebrate when I made a milestone.

So, quo vadis, POE2?

You think too much take it easy, nobody want to struggle and if you do while playing STOP now !

Early access just started, Poe is great poe2 will be even greater have some faith