2.0 Suggestions & Opinions From A Regular Guy

Hello,

I would like to start by saying first and foremost that I have nothing but respect for all GGG staff and that I do not mean or intend for anything stated below to come across as rude or malicious in any way. I have played PoE 1 for roughly 10 years up until PoE 2 EA dropped, then I completely swapped over to PoE 2. I would like to take the time to offer my insights and opinions on PoE 2 as of its' current state in 2.0. I am not listing anything positive in this post but I do not want that to reflect how I feel about PoE 2 or any of its' staff. Most things stated below are of my own personal opinion and are not factual, if you disagree with a point made then please be polite and respectful with your disagreement, thank you.


1. Huntress Voice - The voice accent really feels off and it does not fit the character at all. The voice lines need some work as well, most of them are not very good. I had to mute all of the dialogue in my game because I could not stand it anymore.

2. Combo Mechanic - I started as the Huntress and I am still Huntress. The gameplay does not feel rewarding enough or fun during campaign or general mapping, even for tough rare mobs. I started in the very first zone with whirling slash and the literal second I had enough gold to go back to town and buy a bow from the vendor, that's what I did. I played lightning arrow + lightning rod until I could swap to gas arrow + flame wall and that's what I did until mid maps where I swapped into Ice Shot. I really did not enjoy the playstyle or the feel of the in and out combat or the combo based style combat. You get instantly destroyed as soon as you get within melee range with the Huntress and it does not feel good.

3. Parry Mechanic - The parry gameplay does not work. There is way too much going on in PoE 2 to Parry anything reliably and it just does not feel good to do. All of the mechanics around it and that involve parry feel bad and are not fun to do.

4. Campaign Difficulty - The initial launch of 2.0 is when I started Huntress and it was extremely difficult. I was in act 4/5 when the patch that nerfed monsters came in the campaign and it definitely started to feel a little bit better at that point but still felt very squishy throughout the entire campaign and early maps. I feel like more than 8 hours to complete the campaign is too long. Pre 2.0 I could complete the campaign without twink gear etc. in roughly 7-8 hours comfortably and this time it took me 17.5 hours. I think a lot of that has to do with the campaign just not feeling fun and feeling more like an uphill battle the entire time. There are very few if any exciting moments of a good drop or even just feeling powerful, it just feels like struggling to survive with almost no reward or incentive. There was not 1 time during campaign or early maps that I felt like I could experiment or test off-meta things out. I suppose if the campaign had way better loot throughout and I was able to make upgrades without relying on using my only exalted orbs to purchase upgrade gear slots from other players, I would probably care less with how long the campaign is. I feel like ideally a player shouldn't feel forced into interacting with trade during the campaign, it just feels bad.

5. Map Tier Difficulty - The monster difficulty from tiers 1-15 feels good and appropriate. The time it takes to progress the atlas through the tiers takes too long in my opinion. You don't even feel like you really start playing the game until the 1-15 tier grind is done. Grinding tiers 1-15 took me roughly 14 hours combined with the campaign of 17.5 hours, almost 32 hours to really start experiencing the game is just way too long.

6. Map Objective Completion Checkpoint - Upon completing the main map objective the new drop-checkpoint that spawns needs to also unlock and grant access to all checkpoints on the map, even if they weren't previously discovered by the player.

7. Boss Indicator (Orange Skull Icon) - This needs a much larger radius indicating the bosses location, some maps such as Hidden Grotto for example do not show the boss until you are way too close to him which forces you to scour the edges of the entire map.

8. Lying Atlas Nodes - There are currently a lot of atlas nodes that show a connecting line from another node but do not actually connect. This is extremely frustrating especially when you can sometimes travel many maps in a planned direction only to find out it won't work; it is really disheartening and feels like a gut punch.

9. Unique Map "The Silent Cave" - Did not grant Atlas skill points upon completion. The map was Tier 14(Area Level 78), the boss dropped loot but not the atlas skill progression book. I made sure I killed all of the other essences before spawning the boss in the middle of the map. The map node has the "Map Failed" status. I have seen many other reports from other players stating that they also cannot complete this map. Currently Bugged.

10. Azmerian Wisps - The wisps need way better prioritizing with the closest rare mob, it seems to be way too random with its' selection. When you have the atlas passive notable "Shining Trail" allocated, and the spirit releases to go possess another rare mob, it does not prioritize the closest rare mob. The wisp almost always takes me to the other side of the map to possess a rare mob and then if it releases again, it can sometimes go back to where it started from to find a rare mob there. This results in crossing the map multiple times and it feels horrible.

11. Rhoa Stun Mechanic - The stun mechanic with the rhoa does not feel good. I completely understand that there has to be a massive penalty for the power that the rhoa mount brings (immunity to small stuns and normal movement speed while attacking) and I do think that a heavy stun mechanic works well as a penalty however, the stun indicator (small exp looking bar above your flasks) while riding the rhoa is not explained at all and it is not visible enough. I also think that the playstyle that the rhoa brings is fighting against itself and I will explain why. The way that I quickly reset my rhoa's stun buildup is by rolling and then mounting again immediately. This can also be done during combat but you have to be good/fast with it. As long as you are aware of your stun meter then you will almost never get stunned on the rhoa. This makes the rhoa mount feel kind of awkward because on one hand you want to go fast and push through packs quickly, but you usually have to reset the stun meter by dismounting and then mounting again which obviously everyone is going to do. My question then is, what about allowing the stun meter to naturally recover after not taking damage from hits for a set amount of time? The delay would also have to make sense to avoid just dismounting and then mounting again. You could even make it as a support gem or perhaps a static ability on the rhoa that can also be modified with reduced duration, I don't know what would work best. I do understand that this is very tricky to balance as you don't want to just completely mitigate the downside of the rhoa but the way that I play with it already, I almost never feel the downside of the heavy stun unless I get caught by a random big hit. I think that the rhoa feels fair especially considering it costs at least 60 spirit, which is the equivelant of 2 normal aura's; and it would just feel good to not have to dismount and then mount again to reset the stun meter. I also still never use the rhoa mount in boss encounters of any kind, I swap to a cast on crit setup or something more useful as you can also only use bow or spear skills while mounted so I do not think that it would impact using the rhoa in boss encounters either if this change was made.

12. Monster On-Death Effects - I find that most of my death's in 2.0 come from being heavy stunned off of my rhoa if I am not paying attention, or from monster on-death effects if I am not paying attention. I really do not understand the reasoning or logic in why there is an additional threat once something has been killed? I do understand that you want combat to have some randomness but, isn't that the job of the monster while it's alive? I always try to swap to a corpse destroying skill for clear regardless of what I play just so that I can negate and avoid all of the on-death effects from monsters; I find that I die way less this way and the game also just feels a lot more fun and immersive. Most of the time with the monster on-death effects it just causes me to stand still and wait for the AoE detonations to go off before I loot or just run around for a few seconds while the tracking projectiles dissolve, it doesn't actually add anything to the combat itself. Please just remove any and all monster abilities and effects once the monster is dead, please.

13. Visual Radius of Skills & Effects like Presence - Can we have a system for viewing our radius of skills and effect whether it be aura's like Herald of Ice, or AoE skills like toxic growth(Pustules), or things like Presence. A separate tab in the gem window when it is slotted into your skills for the visual of the in-game radius, or some type of toggle system; not just the numbers(2.7m). It would be very nice to visually see the radius of all AoE effects instead of just a number radius, this feels very old and dated.

14. Controlled Anoints? - There are currently a number of notables that cannot be anointed such as Finality, Critical Overload, Crashing Wave, etc., why? If it is strictly to control player power then the cost of the anoints set by the player base would make it balance out. If there are notables that you consider too powerful to anoint, then why do they exist?

15. Removed. - I made an error checking this point.

16. PoE 1 Is A Problem - As I stated above I was an avid long-time PoE 1 enjoyer of at least 10 years and I have converted over to PoE 2 entirely. I personally do not understand at all why GGG is continuing to spend resources on PoE 1 at all. PoE 2 is the literal continuation of the story and progression of the game as a whole and it appears evident to me at this point that it is in the best interest of PoE 2 to let PoE 1 go. If you want PoE 2 to be the successor, then let it be the successor and give it everything. There are definitely errors that should not have happened at all, such as the bleed not affecting energy shield issue which only recently got resolved. This was also obviously misunderstood as indicated in interviews unintentionally, and I feel like huge mistakes like this only happen because of how much PoE 1 drains the staff. In my opinion, there are 3 main issues with keeping PoE 1 active. The first is that the team has been pulled too thin and the people at the top end haven't been able to spend the time that is needed to really dive into important aspects of the game and have a true understanding of what is going on. The second is that some of the decision makers got it hard stuck in their mind that PoE 2 is an entirely different game and that certain aspects of PoE 1 didn't correlate with Poe 2, which is obviously wrong. There needs to be cohesion between the PoE 1 staff and PoE 2 staff because I feel very confident that anyone working on PoE 1 would have caught the bleed + energy shield issue immediately. You can design systems to work entirely different in PoE 2 from PoE 1 however, doing so without first understanding why things were designed the way that they were for PoE 1, and how it got there before just deciding its' obsolete or whatever the reason is to change it, will almost always end poorly. The third is that I do not think that the people that GGG have to test the game in-house are experienced enough, and they do not know what to look for while testing as there have been a number of issues that shouldn't have made it to live; which has happened every patch so far.

I hope that this provides some use and benefit if seen by GGG staff and I would also like to say that I love PoE 2 and the game that it is yet to become. Thank you to all GGG staff for all of your passion, hard work, and dedication.

I 100% agree with removal of ALL on death stuff! It just feels like a troll move to piss us off and slow our fun down to a HALT

"

C_J#9042 wrote:

I 100% agree with removal of ALL on death stuff! It just feels like a troll move to piss us off and slow our fun down to a HALT

I don't think their intention is to purposely frustrate us but I can definitely understand why it can feel that way. It is a very old approach from PoE 1 that I hope they reevaluate moving forward in PoE 2.

just IMO.

1) Completely agree - I've had my dialogue set to 0% for months now. Except certain boss fights I'll turn it up a little for sound ques.

2) Not sure what your point is here. That Huntress feels better with a bow compared to spear? Could be a personal preference.

3) Completely agree. Parry is trash but some people might like it. Personally, I think blocking with shield is pointless but some people like it I guess? Blocking and parry mechanics are for the birds in any ARGP.

4) Agreed. Campaign is a slog right now. They are continuously working on this and we are still missing last 3 acts.

5) I can't agree here. Progression in maps regarding T1-T15 is fine.

6) 100% Agree. Killing last rare mob should drop a checkpoint and unlock all other checkpoints.

7) Agree. Could be better visualized.

8) This seems to be a bigger issue in 0.2 than in 0.1 (although did exist). I know they made changes to it and it seems to have made some node connections worse.

9) I'll take your word for it. Haven't found this map node yet.

10) Agree - Wisps need A LOT of work. Honestly this mechanic should have been held off on.

11) Tried Rhoa mount for like five maps and didn't like the overall feel of it in general. Stun mechanic is harsh and needs better visual indicator of buildup.

12) On-death effects - this is very dividing issue. Yes they suck. You also called yourself out though and said you weren't paying attention. If grinding to 100 if your goal - then you have to pay attention. If grinding to 100 is not your goal, then whatever. They are going through on a case-by-case basis and adjusting visual indicators and damage, etc. It needs to be tuned but not removed completely IMO.

13) You can actually see visual radius of Presence but its a pain at the moment. Needs to be made easier.

14) Good points and I've wondered the same. If some nodes are so OP that we can't annoint, why are they on the tree?

15) Not fully understanding your point here. You think suffix should be able to be a prefix and vice versa? Unfortuantely that's just not how the core game works.

16) POE1 itself isn't a problem - but if it's causing staff and development/testing issues in POE2 then it's concerning and I know they are aware of it by commenting on it previously. They're doing what they can.

"

sebzzz#6019 wrote:

just IMO.

1) Completely agree - I've had my dialogue set to 0% for months now. Except certain boss fights I'll turn it up a little for sound ques.

2) Not sure what your point is here. That Huntress feels better with a bow compared to spear? Could be a personal preference.

3) Completely agree. Parry is trash but some people might like it. Personally, I think blocking with shield is pointless but some people like it I guess? Blocking and parry mechanics are for the birds in any ARGP.

4) Agreed. Campaign is a slog right now. They are continuously working on this and we are still missing last 3 acts.

5) I can't agree here. Progression in maps regarding T1-T15 is fine.

6) 100% Agree. Killing last rare mob should drop a checkpoint and unlock all other checkpoints.

7) Agree. Could be better visualized.

8) This seems to be a bigger issue in 0.2 than in 0.1 (although did exist). I know they made changes to it and it seems to have made some node connections worse.

9) I'll take your word for it. Haven't found this map node yet.

10) Agree - Wisps need A LOT of work. Honestly this mechanic should have been held off on.

11) Tried Rhoa mount for like five maps and didn't like the overall feel of it in general. Stun mechanic is harsh and needs better visual indicator of buildup.

12) On-death effects - this is very dividing issue. Yes they suck. You also called yourself out though and said you weren't paying attention. If grinding to 100 if your goal - then you have to pay attention. If grinding to 100 is not your goal, then whatever. They are going through on a case-by-case basis and adjusting visual indicators and damage, etc. It needs to be tuned but not removed completely IMO.

13) You can actually see visual radius of Presence but its a pain at the moment. Needs to be made easier.

14) Good points and I've wondered the same. If some nodes are so OP that we can't annoint, why are they on the tree?

15) Not fully understanding your point here. You think suffix should be able to be a prefix and vice versa? Unfortuantely that's just not how the core game works.

16) POE1 itself isn't a problem - but if it's causing staff and development/testing issues in POE2 then it's concerning and I know they are aware of it by commenting on it previously. They're doing what they can.

Thanks for taking the time with such a detailed response and I was not aware of being able to see Presence radius. I completely respect your difference of opinion but I just wanted to clarify on #2 and #15. #2 - I guess I was just trying to say that the in and out playstyle of most of the Huntress skills do not feel good because they put her into a very vulnerable position when she has zero defenses especially early game. I also hated having to cast the same skill 3 times to build it up and everything with it didn't feel enjoyable to me at all. #15 - I realize I have made a mistake when I went to check this on trade and I have removed this point.