My POE2 review so far. IE: Give back power to the players.

Just some thoughts of mine after playing the new 0.20 DotH Patch, coming from 2.5k hours in POE 1, 150 hours in POE 2 so far.

I feel like this game is so unhinged on how much RNG needs to be relied on for literally everything (and even according from the top players that seems to be subpar as well). It makes the campaign a slog and even in endgame the top players are having problems with getting the currency they need to sustain the fun factor.

My suggestion would be to bring back more of the deterministic elements that made POE so great. Crafting SUCKS in this game. The campaign takes far too long to progress through and when you do run into a roadblock, you're forced to grind in the campaign to get things only to have a small chance of being able to cover the gap in offense/defense that you're trying to fill? Ridiculous!

Removing the ability to deterministically craft, benchcraft, having scarcity of movespeed on items/the passive tree in such large maps, very imbalanced abilities generally funneling you into a small number of builds. It's not fun man. That dodge roll definitely needs some tuning and less of a movespeed debuff if you're going to allow enemies to stunlock TF out of us.

Yeah, we get that you don't want to make it POE 1, but at least make a game where other people besides you enjoy.

And let me tell ya, I experimented the other day by playing as a complete novice, acting like I didn't know how to look builds up and go to the vast amount of online resources that seasoned players know how to use and it was one of the worst gaming experiences I've had. This game is absolutely poison for new players that don't know about POE Ninja, Exiled Exchange, Online trading, etc. Sure, it's easy for me with a second screen to access these things on my PC, but I've got to imagine that this can't be good for the console players that you're trying to bring in.

Let's also cover the topic of white mobs aka trash mobs. They're called trash mobs for a reason, because they're supposed to fulfill easy kills and minor amounts of loot; not pose a meaningful threat. Campaign white mobs should not take that long to kill or be able to instantly swarm you with no chance of escape, while also requiring combos to get rid of. This is SUCH a bore.

In reference to what a recent interview with Dropped Frames (Dropped Frames Episode 425), I'd like to see how the developers think the game should be played. Furthermore, you guys should get someone who's never played POE to try it on stream with no explanation and only using the resources available in the game to learn how to play. It's been the community that does more to guide people than the in-game resources. I swear you'll find some glaring oversights that would probably cover what you're missing, because so far the feedback and live chat to discuss the development of this game has been scarce in comparison to how you've worked with your players in the past.

I don't hate it because it's not POE 1, far from it. The story, the visual work, the sound design and music is all fantastic. I just don't think you guys realize that making a sequel to a game and removing so many "fun"damental elements from it's predecessor is going to have players dropping out from participating, especially when most the mobs are moving at POE 1 speed while I'm stuck with my slow ass POE 2 dodge roll.

Some of the recent patches have moved towards this and I hope to see more of that in the future.

TLDR;
-Bring back more deterministic crafting options.
-Work more closely with completely vanilla players to optimize the experience.
-Tune the dodge roll to keep up with the ridiculous modifiers that mobs have since they don't need cool downs for abilities that can be repeated before your previous roll end.
-Integrate more resources ingame (filters, trade site, price check, suggested builds)
-Make campaign trash mobs, trash again.
-Make movespeed more common/maps smaller.
-Clarify "the vision" of the game.