The reason for the low level of active players in Path of Exile

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nGio wrote:

So again I ask, who is the target audience of PoE? It's clearly not the younger generation, but instead it's the D2 generation. The problem is that the D2 generation grew up, got jobs, got married, had kids, etc. We can't grind like we used to. Can we put in 20-30 hours a week? Sure. But we aren't doing 20 hour marathon sleepovers at our friends' houses anymore.

What arpgs need now is the best of both, a hybrid of the old school D2 grinder with the youth of today's generation, who don't particularly enjoy arpgs. This is imo the biggest dilemma, and the reason that arpg after arpg falls into the toilet. PoE will never be D2, so GGG needs to decide who they're target audience is before this game bleeds out anymore players. At some point GGG and their loyalists will have to come to grips that like every arpg since D2 this just isn't working, and it's too bad because this game could be great.

So, if I was married and one year removed from becoming a father when D2 was released can I be a part of the same "D2 Generation"?

See, my experience of D2 was so much less about the gear and so much more about creating indelible memories of epic games with online friends, creating lasting relationships that continue across games. In that respect, PoE is a great game. It provides an incredible venue for my gaming community to "gather" and play with one another, and, in many ways, for one another. That the game appears to reward cooperative play further enhances enjoyment.

All of these "discussions" are firmly rooted in subjectivity.

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Reinhart wrote:

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nGio wrote:

Well, I found an Aegis Aurora in Nemesis about 350 hours ago. Since then, I literally haven't found a single thing worth 1ex+. I have traded up thousands of Alterations and hundreds of Chaos all in an attempt at crafting a single item. I'm not asking for "tons of awesome shit", but if I look back at the last 350 hours being wasted I have no ambition towards grinding anymore. A small carrot every 100 hours or so isn't asking too much.

If we multiply the drop rate of item X (which was originally worth 1 exalt) with 1000 %, do you still think that item will be worth one exalt?

What are you ACTUALLY asking for?

As a hardcore 8+ hour a day gamer, what am I asking for? A reason to keep trying.

I some lost interest because the gear required to equip a new tier 1 character is too high and I do not want to feed rmters my precious mirrors and exalts so they can dupe an item for the 30th time and laugh in my face for having played the game legitimately.

The first aspect, tier 1 gear cost is a part of the game and completely my own fault for requiring such a high level of play to be 'fun'.

the second second, top end gear being accessible only through mirroring for a fee instead of crafting/item finding is a game design fault of GGG's in conjunction with the rampant rmt that has been allowed to fester.

For the most part I sit in town waiting for trades until I can afford a ridiculously one more expensive gear slot and repeat for likely months until I can actually play said character.

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nGio wrote:

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Reinhart wrote:

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nGio wrote:

Well, I found an Aegis Aurora in Nemesis about 350 hours ago. Since then, I literally haven't found a single thing worth 1ex+. I have traded up thousands of Alterations and hundreds of Chaos all in an attempt at crafting a single item. I'm not asking for "tons of awesome shit", but if I look back at the last 350 hours being wasted I have no ambition towards grinding anymore. A small carrot every 100 hours or so isn't asking too much.

If we multiply the drop rate of item X (which was originally worth 1 exalt) with 1000 %, do you still think that item will be worth one exalt?

What are you ACTUALLY asking for?

As a hardcore 8+ hour a day gamer, what am I asking for? A reason to keep trying.

But exactly as he is saying if GGG were to increase the drop rate of Shav's from say .01% chance from dominus to .05% chance what would that do to the price? It's still a really low chance but they are now dropping 5 times more often than they were, meaning they will be worth 1/5 or so of what they are now.

So your new argument will be "Well I found 2 shavs but I only got 5 ex from each, WTF! I could have gotten more per hour by just farming alts!"

You can't please all the players all of the time, but you can please some of the players some of the time. That is the thought process behind RNG. I'm sorry that at this moment you are not the one receiving drops, but who's to say you would find 2 amazing 30 ex uniques the next map you run?

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nGio wrote:

As a hardcore 8+ hour a day gamer, what am I asking for? A reason to keep trying.

I'm not picking on you or trying to devalue your opinion but I've been playing since june '12 and I've never, not ever, found a top tier unique from a drop. In all that time I've had just 1 exalt drop. I managed to 6l one item that I've since destroyed in one of my regular account wipes. I've borrowed from friends GG items temporarily just to try out some builds but never had a really high quality character myself. I still play like a good no-lifer should, sounds silly I guess but I enjoy my play in spite of my lack of luck. I guess my point is don't pressure yourself so much to be like the joneses and just have fun with it.

Edit: lmao the more I think about it its actually depressing. So much for being noble and going self found. XD

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toyotatundra wrote:

Fundamentally a very good game, but there are about 20 layers of RNG wrapped around the good parts. It's a game that rewards those who will play 16h a day every day or RMT, and punishes the rest.

By the time you reach lvl 80, time to reroll your char or play another game. GGG need to help players with the end-game, it's not rewarding as it can be.

well said.

Seconded ^ ........ Dear RNGesus please give me a reason to try or I might go RIP my 88 and all other char's just .....well, Just because screw this shit drop rate that's why. Original OP posted 1500 hours, that is actually low for a league char, and in those 1500 hours ( which lots of us have ) how many of us have had that 'one' drop that could actually be flipped and turned into a fun build testing character with niche gear? My guess is less than 1 % of the player base, and that is a high estimate going by posts.

This leaves players with 3 options:

1. Play game but never get to fully experience it........BORING
2. flip items like a mad trade spam assasin until you accumlate enough currency to buy build enabling gear........ BORING
3. win the f'n lottery on a drop.....definitely not boring but it'll almost never happen.

I don't have specific feedback, just my own experience on new players:

I tried to get my friends to stick with the game, they'd all enjoyed titan quest and torchlight, I had a guild stash with plenty of tabs for everyone to use, gave away lots of gear and gave them advice on how the mechanics of the game work.

Then after a week or two everyone got bored cause while we were all playing at the same time, everyone was at different speeds and it ended up with everyone basically playing solo most of the time, just with a special chat tab and a shared stash. And solo play makes the game so much worse that there's really no way to convince someone the game is worth playing if they don't see the other side of things.

Plus despite the games wonderful complexities, the margin for error is abysmal. The amount of times my friends asked for advice only for me to have to say they were doing it all wrong sucked. I knew that while it'd be better to learn through error, they weren't going to enjoy remaking a character after reaching level 20-30. While experienced players can do that in an hour, new players it can take a day or more.

They're then set back to 0 and are away from the group, again playing solo or needing to be rushed. By this point they'd all looked up character guides instead of making their own, by which point there was no experimentation or agency at all, they were just checking off which skill they needed to trade for or be given in order to make the build they're told is easiest for new players.

Eventually they all went back to dota 2, cause while that's a game of clicking on things and known for a similarly large learning curve, it just wins out when it comes to playing with friends. Considering POE demands group play, that's a problem. Or vise versa.


As for myself, to this day I still stubbornly play solo other than to grind up a character through the usual ledge/fellshrine/docks. When you can't even have something as basic as teleporting to other players to catch up to them without having to bug them and make them stop to get your ass next to theirs... it just sucks to quest in a group. Even if it's with friends.

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Nephalim wrote:

top end gear being accessible only through mirroring for a fee instead of crafting/item finding is a game design fault of GGG's in conjunction with the rampant rmt that has been allowed to fester.

How do you think those mirror worthy items came about?

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Cribstaxx wrote:

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Nephalim wrote:

top end gear being accessible only through mirroring for a fee instead of crafting/item finding is a game design fault of GGG's in conjunction with the rampant rmt that has been allowed to fester.

How do you think those mirror worthy items came about?

RMT of course *chuckle*