What PoE could Learn From Torchlight 2 Mods [Itemization/MagicFind Rant]

First of all, Path of Exile is a great game and I'm still playing it, but I find I'm playing Torchlight 2 more and more instead. I'm not mad at this game either, but at the moment my character roster is full of mid-high levels that I don't want to delete. But the biggest issue is that my most successful character, my Viper Striker has reached end game, and due to the nature of this extremely carefully produced build, it has no room for any noticable magic find.

Which leads to hours of gameplay where I get no useful upgrades or even sellable gear. It makes me feel like I'm being punished in game for making a great Viper Striker who pushes viper strike to the limits, as opposed to a great generic magic finder who pushes magic finding as far as possible.

The reason I'm playing TL2 at the moment is because with Mamba's Extended Mod Merge installed it's itemization is superior to Path of Exile's. The mod in question solves PoE's itemization dilemma by adding over 450 item affixes to the game. Not shitty affixes like % light radius but cool and intersting ones like casting a spell on strike or on hit. % chance to double magic find on kill for x seconds. % chance to convert enemy to ally for x seconds. There are 450 of these kinds of mods for items put in the game.

What this leads to is such diversity among drops that you are put into a situation where almost any piece of gear in the game might be a an upgrade! Anything! Even the lowliest looking blue claw on the floor might be something more amazing than the legendary item you found 4 levels earlier.

I want to end this rant now: But my point is, that PoE could use more item affixes...no, more USEFUL item affixes that fall even on low rarity drops so that magic find becomes less useful and less neccessary overall. I think it would make the game more fun and the endgame more rewarding for non magic find characters.

We all know the answer is to let people mod this game ;v

I'd love to know how much time the average player invests into PoE compared to TL2, I have a feeling the numbers would be lulzy and completely flush your premise down the toilet.

Games that hand you everything you want on a silver platter like TL are geared towards the casual market. PoE is, however, NOT that type of game.

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JahIthBer89 wrote:

I'd love to know how much time the average player invests into PoE compared to TL2, I have a feeling the numbers would be lulzy and completely flush your premise down the toilet.

Games that hand you everything you want on a silver platter like TL are geared towards the casual market. PoE is, however, NOT that type of game.

Obviously as a Path of Exile player for over a year I enjoy difficulty in games I play. So why would I play modded TL2? Because it's difficult. I get one shot more often in TL2 than in Path of exile. All you need is the self control not to cheat. Which I don't. But this isn't even relevant to my first post really.

I really think the best loot system is from titan quest where uniqe monsters or some type of monster could droup a monster specific item that has some uniqestats but special because you could farm monsters for the gear that you actually need

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BearCares wrote:

The reason I'm playing TL2 at the moment is because with Mamba's Extended Mod Merge installed it's itemization is superior to Path of Exile's. The mod in question solves PoE's itemization dilemma by adding over 450 item affixes to the game. Not shitty affixes like % light radius but cool and intersting ones like casting a spell on strike or on hit. % chance to double magic find on kill for x seconds. % chance to convert enemy to ally for x seconds. There are 450 of these kinds of mods for items put in the game.

I'll definitely try that mod. While we have played a reasonable amount of Torchlight 2, we haven't really got a good idea of which mods are being played, and which ones are worth investigating.

Not sure if I can add anything since I've only played TL2 on Normal difficulty. What I played of it was... good. Didn't drag me in, kicking and screaming, like PoE did.

What I liked about it was, as you put it, the drops. I got a LOT of drops and I was upgrading quite constantly with some really awesome equips.

With Path of Exile, I feel like I'm being whipped and still begging my master for more. We grind but most of the loot just isn't great. TL2 overcame shit loot with pets being able to sell your trash for you while continued hunting. It made grinding for that upgrade all the less tedious. What am I saying here? Not necessarily easier... but make things more rewarding for us.

The Legendaries in that game were interesting. They have the same concept GGG originally had in that every Unique was useful and different but wasn't, necessarily, overpowered. Right now I'm disheartened and feel like GGG have strayed from this path. Kaom's, Shav's, Auxium, etc... are basically BiS/GG items or Crown of Thorns which do nothing but piss us off when we find one in Maps. We need more items like Searing Touch, Bones of Ullr, Infernal Mantle, etc... Drops that are fun and useful, though, not overpowered.

Lastly, TL2 is better optimized. I can run TL2 on high graphics without a problem and, yet, PoE can't even handle the lowest settings (hell I want to set it to low but medium is the lowest... what?). Most games allow us to turn off certain effects which, I believe, to be key in drawing in people with low graphics.

TL;DR:

What can GGG learn from TL2? Make drops more rewarding. Giving us GG gear all the time is not the way to do it, obviously, but neither is making us cry tears of frustration over getting another ring of 10000% light radius.

Legendaries/Uniques should find a middle-ground. Right now, many of them are either overpowered, still, or completely useless.

Turn off rain/low graphics setting.

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StormHunter wrote:

I really think the best loot system is from titan quest where uniqe monsters or some type of monster could droup a monster specific item that has some uniqestats but special because you could farm monsters for the gear that you actually need

I on the other hand think that the current system is better. Right now I can alternate between maps/dominus/piety/docks and other zones while still having a chance to get almost everything (except the gated uniques). If I get bored of killing Dominus I can just farm piety and have same chance to get that drop I am looking for. I would get bored more quickly if I would've to farm only Dominus for the one item I am looking for.

Played two characters to level 100 in TL2 vanilla. The itemization in vanilla is completely broken, especially given that there are unique socketables that give you vastly more health pool than any roll on rare item could, alongside things like stackable %dmg reduction where no such stat exists elsewhere in the game. (This resulted in true godmode before they capped the stat in an early patch.)

I have a pretty hard time believing that any mod that doesn't start from square one and completely scrap everything about the game's itemization will actually produce a superior itemization to Path of Exiles. What I think you're actually saying is that PoE's is sparse, which is true, but probably necessary given how widely you can modify and augment your skills with support gems. That's what really does the work of skill granting/proc sort of gear in PoE. I would love to see more affixes available of that fun and gratifying sort, but as of now, because of the prefix/suffix system, the resist penalty, the necessity of integer and percent rolls to get good defense/DPS values, and other things like that, we're basically full up on mods. Anything else, even if it's neat and flashy, would just dilute the pool and effectively be a global nerf to gear.

The only solution I see is to have a completely different piece(s) of gear that rolls new mods, and cannot roll standard mods. Perhaps something like Charms, but with gear slots instead of inventory space.

I couldn't get into TL2 very much... items were too one dimensional. If that big number was higher... use it. If you're struggling, look for a bigger number. It was far too easy to find one too. Just go to the vendor and he likely had one.