The zoom-zoom crowd does not understand that they could keep getting their dopamine hit even if they kill enemies slower, but the drop rate is increased. The only difference is that the actual process of playing will be enjoyable, not just the anticipation of the divine orb drop.
Campaign feels slow to them only because the comparison to endgame exists. If the entire game - drop rates included - was balanced around meaningful combat, everyone would be happy. They may not see it, but that would be the outcome.
That's kinda why I feel like campaign, both in PoE1 and PoE2, feels like a slog. They're unrewarding, and all the good stuff is tucked away in the endgame. Campaign has good meaningful combat, but it doesn't feel enjoyable when you spend several minutes chipping a boss to death and dodging their attacks only to get maybe a scroll of wisdom. At this point, I just want this over with as quickly as possible so I can start exploring the atlas.
If they rebalanced drop rates around meaningful combat, that might keep campaign slogging as an enjoyable experience.
PoE players: Our game has a wide diversity of builds.
Also PoE players: The [league mechanic] doesn't need to be nerfed, you just need to play a [current meta] build!
And the winds will cry / and many men will die / and all the waves will bow down / to the Loreley
The zoom-zoom crowd does not understand that they could keep getting their dopamine hit even if they kill enemies slower, but the drop rate is increased. The only difference is that the actual process of playing will be enjoyable, not just the anticipation of the divine orb drop.
Campaign feels slow to them only because the comparison to endgame exists. If the entire game - drop rates included - was balanced around meaningful combat, everyone would be happy. They may not see it, but that would be the outcome.
While I love souls games, this doesn't realistically work.
The objective of POE after your first few playthroughs will NEVER be doing the campaign for the 50th time.
It's to get currency / gear / power as fast as you can.
It's to do the "Strats" that give you the highest divines per hour, so you can get strong fast, buy huge mirror tier items, etc etc. This is what keeps you hooked to a league for 200+ hours.
You will not play the campaign more than 20-30 hours. While I love the feeling of act 1 in POE 2 (It's done masterfully), I don't share the sentiment of changing the enitre endgame to be forced and slow just so we have this monotone slow gameplay.
I WANT to get faster , stronger , bigger aoes etc as endgame approaches, so I feel meaningful progression. If you have forced meaningful combat all the time, we won't feel the progression of becoming a god. It's a power fantasy game. The problem is the pinnacles and enemies are way too easy right now, and that ceiling needs to be raised and some builds balanced.
But the thread is also full of zoomer midwits that are either making irrelevant arguments or just baiting with obviously false remarks. When they say "speed is king", what they do not realise is that the visceral combat crowd makes no argument against this fact. Of course the goal of a character building genre is to improve the character in every metric, especially speed. The problem is the amount of speed that the game allows for, and the amount of speed that is required to fight off the hordes of monsters.
Slow everything down, refocus on methodical combos, design an array of abillities for each monster, cut monster density tenfold if not more, massively buff drop rates in exchange, and you get your visceral combat. Is speed no longer king? Not at all. Speed is still very much the goal, along with mechanical skill and monster knowledge. You just can't attain as much speed as before, but neither do you need as much because you're not running from a dozen double hasted packs.
Maybe they just want you guys to play the campaign and quit -- Id rather them just focus on endgame as nobody truly cares about the campaign. Most of us wish the game didn't even HAVE a campaign, let alone a giant ass slow slog that takes more than a COUPLE hours.
This is beyond ridiculous, this just sounds like you want to play a private server of PoE with the tags "Instant level 100/ free starter gear/ Skill vendor" and so on... absolutely ridiculous.
You couldn't be more wrong. I'm accused of being a 1%'er constantly, I earn all the top gear every single league. I'm just not into repeating the same story again and again. I've played POE 1 for like 6 years and i'm sick to HELL of the campaign, and the POE 1 campaign is only a couple hours, and it's a horrible experience after a couple YEARS.
You tourists won't be here playing the campaign in 3-4 years, I will be, and it's gonna fucking suck. I plan to play POE forever. I don't even play other games, I just wait for new leagues.
I also don't replay "story" games. I play them once, and never again, because there's no more fun to be had after you've done it and seen the story.
After the initial run, doing the campaign is just painful...
If that's how much you hate witnessing your own character's progression, then maybe you should stick to Path of Building instead. Sounds to me like you're not getting much out of the actual gameplay.
The zoom-zoom crowd does not understand that they could keep getting their dopamine hit even if they kill enemies slower, but the drop rate is increased. The only difference is that the actual process of playing will be enjoyable, not just the anticipation of the divine orb drop.
Campaign feels slow to them only because the comparison to endgame exists. If the entire game - drop rates included - was balanced around meaningful combat, everyone would be happy. They may not see it, but that would be the outcome.
While I love souls games, this doesn't realistically work.
The objective of POE after your first few playthroughs will NEVER be doing the campaign for the 50th time.
It's to get currency / gear / power as fast as you can.
It's to do the "Strats" that give you the highest divines per hour, so you can get strong fast, buy huge mirror tier items, etc etc. This is what keeps you hooked to a league for 200+ hours.
You will not play the campaign more than 20-30 hours. While I love the feeling of act 1 in POE 2 (It's done masterfully), I don't share the sentiment of changing the enitre endgame to be forced and slow just so we have this monotone slow gameplay.
I WANT to get faster , stronger , bigger aoes etc as endgame approaches, so I feel meaningful progression. If you have forced meaningful combat all the time, we won't feel the progression of becoming a god. It's a power fantasy game. The problem is the pinnacles and enemies are way too easy right now, and that ceiling needs to be raised and some builds balanced.
what keep you hooked is a challenge, what do you need more power for if not to overcome that challenge.
however, more challenge doesn't mean the game should devolve into zoom... you can just as easily make boss drops more meaningfull and keep it less zoom.
lastly, "meaningfull progression" is a joke if you have to constantly add mechanics to hamper it... at that point you are just making more complexity for the illusion of progression.
Agreed with Kerchunk on that. If you're not having fun with a build make a fun build. You're not feeding your family with divines so what's the rush?
I don't think "play slow if you want a slow game" is a good argument at all. You're just punishing the player who cares about diversity while keeping the meta the same, cutting your own leg while everyone else is running in front of you with multiple legs lol
The mechanics that only exist because of a person running with 5 legs will still exist for the person who cut their leg and runs with only 1. They put a pitfall in the road because the person with 5 legs was too fast, but it affects the person with 1 leg even more, and that pitfall didn't have to exist in the first place if the person with 5 legs didn't exist in the first place
"Just play for fun bro"
Sounds reasonable at first, but if slower builds get punished with worse loot, slower progression, and even higher death risk even if you go full tank, then "just be casual bro" isn’t actually a choice, it’s telling someone to accept being worse at the game in every measurable way you can imagine. Idk about you but I'm a quite competitive person myself, even if I don't plan to tryhard
People don't just follow meta out of nowhere, they follow based on incentives the game itself gives. If the whole game gives you incentives to go faster, then that's what any reasonably competitive person would do to compete. Doesn't mean they like what the game is proposing
"Just handicap yourself and play slow while others clap you bro" is just a big cope
I'm not saying GGG shouldn't make changes to slow the game down. What I'm saying is that given the current state of the game people who don't find meta zoom builds fun can make their own choice to use a slower build.
Anyway who are you competing with? guys on reddit?
Been said since 0.1 that the game has an identity crisis and can't decide what it wants to be. Many systems, but most noticeably going from campaign to endgame/leagues, have the different philosophies clashing.
My early access feedback (0.1): https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/3639607
My Witch early access feedback (0.1): https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/3632153
My 0.3 https://www.pathofexile.com/forum/view-thread/3850769
Game is simple as that a hodgepodge of a shitload of different ideas and systems that just dont fit together. That is sth that can be excused for being an early access title. That the devs dont really know the direction them,self is a bit more concerning to me considering the game is almost out for a year. At this Pace we have a game that fits together in 2028 sth
