mapping sucks, and towers are the reason

I have put over 1600hrs into this game now and I have some things to say about the current mapping system.

I'll start by saying what I like about mapping.

The atlas idea is super cool to me. An ever expanding landscape to explore with the various unique maps like citadels etc. This is awesome.

The addition of rogue exiles and asmeri wisps as extra content need some work but are good additions nonetheless.

League mechanics are the meat and bones of mapping and this is where the problem lies.

To farm any mechanic efficiently you must, without exeption find a cluster of towers that overlap. Anything less than 3 feels like a waste of time.

But the biggest waste of time is all the non or minimally irradiated maps you have to work through (yes this is work, not fun) before you've finally juiced your 3+ tower zone and can actually reap the rewards.

It feels like half the time mapping is fun and the other half is just work trying to get to the fun areas.

Why can't it be fun the whole way though?

A friend of mine explained the scarab system to me in poe1 and it sounds fantastic. If poe1 had WASD I would be playing that right now but WASD movement is a dealbreaker for me

I cannot offer a solution for juicing maps that sounds good other than bringing scarabs into poe2, but I hope the devs figure it out because until then I and many others who feel the same will be playing other games