Incline Path of Exile 2 - now available on Early Access

[Cohesion]

I have 3 days and 10 hours played on my Sorc so far, I play video games for a living otherwise there's no way I could commit this much time to it.

Are you some kind of popular streamer/youtuber? What does it mean to play games for a living (assuming you don't engage in some shit like selling in-game items/carry for realbux)? Just curious.

 

[Israfael]

Yeah I think I'll put this game on hold for now, fighting this flying Trial of Chaos boss plus AIDS Ultimatum mechanics as melee was a miserable experience.

Which one? There are two of them, one muilti-elemental damage chicken and the other one like deathbird from elden ring (physical damage and spawns adds). I've met both, failed on the chicken and then a few levels later I've passed the deathbird after i've got more or less tolearble ultimatum mods. Now I'm actually stuck with lab3 because the quest is bugged or whatever (prolly have to do ultimatum in a6)

 

[Saark]

Are you some kind of popular streamer/youtuber? What does it mean to play games for a living (assuming you don't engage in some shit like selling in-game items/carry for realbux)? Just curious.

I manage ~50 people for an Online Media Outlet (not gonna name any names here ofc), including Guidewriters, Newswriters etc. so playing video games is typically billable hours. Nice work when you can get it, but also means you gotta play some dogshit titles from time to time simply because it might be something that might end up popular. With how heavily things are tied to the marketing schemes of the developers these days, even shit titles end up getting a few hundred thousand viewers the first few days of the games' release cycle.

There's stupid amounts of money in it due to online advertisement being a massive bubble that does not seem to burst anytime soon. I personally cannot fathom that any of the ad campaigns these companies are running are actually profitable, it's just money they throw into a large pit of fire to burn before the taxman comes knocking. Looking at the sponsored streams for PoE2 alone, that shit probably cost low 7-figure numbers. Big streamers with 5k+ concurrent viewers typically cost anywhere from 20k to 50k for 4 hours of sponsored gameplay, which is heavily dependent on the streamer and how much their CCV (Concurrent Viewership) drops off into a sponsored stream. People like Asmongold can ask 6-figures and typically still get a deal, i.e. he was offered ~400k to play Genshin Impact for ~6-8hrs (and declined). Suffice it to say, I doubt that the companies make that back in sales, seeing how whatever agency GGG ran with ended up contracting close to a hundred people for sponsored streams on Twitch alone. But publishers and studios just throw it out as marketing expenses to keep profitability low and pay no taxes, so it works out in the end I guess. This business is fucking dumb.

 

[Cohesion]

Are you some kind of popular streamer/youtuber? What does it mean to play games for a living (assuming you don't engage in some shit like selling in-game items/carry for realbux)? Just curious.

I manage ~50 people for an Online Media Outlet (not gonna name any names here ofc), including Guidewriters, Newswriters etc. so playing video games is typically billable hours. Nice work when you can get it, but also means you gotta play some dogshit titles from time to time simply because it might be something that might end up popular. With how heavily things are tied to the marketing schemes of the developers these days, even shit titles end up getting a few hundred thousand viewers the first few days of the games' release cycle.

There's stupid amounts of money in it due to online advertisement being a massive bubble that does not seem to burst anytime soon. I personally cannot fathom that any of the ad campaigns these companies are running are actually profitable, it's just money they throw into a large pit of fire to burn before the taxman comes knocking. Looking at the sponsored streams for PoE2 alone, that shit probably cost low 7-figure numbers. Big streamers with 5k+ concurrent viewers typically cost anywhere from 20k to 50k for 4 hours of sponsored gameplay, which is heavily dependent on the streamer and how much their CCV (Concurrent Viewership) drops off into a sponsored stream. People like Asmongold can ask 6-figures and typically still get a deal, i.e. he was offered ~400k to play Genshin Impact for ~6-8hrs. Suffice it to say, I doubt that the companies make that back in sales, seeing how whatever agency GGG ran with ended up contracting close to a hundred people for sponsored streams on Twitch alone. But publishes just throw it out as marketing expenses to keep profitability low and pay no taxes, so it works out in the end I guess. This business is fucking dumb.

Thanks, very informative inside info.
What do you think about Asmongold?

 

[frajaq]

Yeah I think I'll put this game on hold for now, fighting this flying Trial of Chaos boss plus AIDS Ultimatum mechanics as melee was a miserable experience.

Which one? There are two of them, one muilti-elemental damage chicken and the other one like deathbird from elden ring (physical damage and spawns adds). I've met both, failed on the chicken and then a few levels later I've passed the deathbird after i've got more or less tolearble ultimatum mods. Now I'm actually stuck with lab3 because the quest is bugged or whatever (prolly have to do ultimatum in a6)

the multi damage chicken, the worst part really was him just flying around the platforms, so I had to walk up the stairs (while enduring the Ultimatum mechanics), he does like one or two attacks, and flies to somewhere else... I have to walk down the stairs while enduring snare/shock/chill/stun... just to able to tickle him with damage again

 

[Saark]

What do you think about Asmongold?

He's a piece of shit just like 99% of streamers. There's a few genuinely good people out there but the vast majority of streamer just put on a face for the public and end up being drama whores and cunts behind the scenes. And then you have some that built an entire streaming persona around being unlikeable pieces of shit and somehow they still get 5-digit viewership numbers. At the end of the day its entertainment, and almost nothing of what you see is real.
For what it's worth (which is basically nothing), he does seem to be a bit more grounded in reality than most other streamers of his popularity. But they all have skeletons in their closet, and it's no surprise that we've seen more statutory rape and blackmail charges against bigger streamers recently, cause the entire scene is incredibly fucked up. If its some 10k+ viewership streamer, odds are they diddled some 10-15 year old fangirls at least once in their career.

 

[mediocrepoet]

What do you think about Asmongold?

He's a piece of shit just like 99% of streamers. There's a few genuinely good people out there but the vast majority of streamer just put on a face for the public and end up being drama whores and cunts behind the scenes. And then you have some that built an entire streaming persona around being unlikeable pieces of shit and somehow they still get 5-digit viewership numbers. At the end of the day its entertainment, and almost nothing of what you see is real.
For what it's worth (which is basically nothing), he does seem to be a bit more grounded in reality than most other streamers of his popularity. But they all have skeletons in their closet, and it's no surprise that we've seen more statutory rape and blackmail charges against bigger streamers recently, cause the entire scene is incredibly fucked up. If its some 10k+ viewership streamer, odds are they diddled some 10-15 year old fangirls at least once in their career.

What's it like working at IGN and then seeing your work get bashed here?

 

[Cohesion]

Chill, guy isn't on Skinwalker's list.

Which class atm is OK or OP/UP? Friends are telling me that witch or merc are one of the better classes to start?

No melee suggestions please
Imagine I've never played poe1 and want something like full minion necro or frozen orb d2 sorc.

 

[Kruyurk]

Yeah that's fair. Given that the model is F2P and it's actually a pretty polished product, I figure selling you QOL stuff is totally legit.

There is a discount on stash tabs going on for the next few days. These happen about once a month. The currency tab is the most useful to sort your stuff.

 

[Jermu]

build is pretty much done and happy how its working now (spark)



gonna do some changes later mainly to reduce spark mana cost or get rid of archmage or get more mana after kill

 

[Ismaul]

I'm now in Act3, and while I really like the game and my playthrough, and I love a challenge, getting fucked and getting gud to overcome it, I wonder if the game as is will have staying power when the proposition becomes to restart this every 3-4 months. Don't get me wrong, the game as is is great for a couple playthroughs, but I'm not sure it will endure in the long term without some changes.

As it is, playing through the campaign is a much longer time investment than PoE1's, so you won't reach the endgame as fast. For people who don't nolife the game, it might take a couple weeks to get to the endgame. This means a lot of content will mostly only be accessible to the nolifers, much more than in PoE1. Many will start to push the endgame only for the league to end and them having to start over. Some also take days off to push to the endgame, but that might not be enough now. Sure, the coming checkpoint teleporting, and maybe even removing enemy respawns will alleviate that, but I'm not sure it'll be enough. I typically play SSF, and in PoE1 the 3 month league is often just enough for me to get to pinnacle bosses but not enough to do them all properly because of lacking equipment to really fight without a significant risk of wasting the fragments.

Difficulty is fun, but tedius repetition of low/mid-level difficult content isn't. To me it seems obvious that the game will move into PoE1's direction of making the campaign easier to reach endgame with less friction, or it won't work as a seasonal game. It might work as a Grim Dawn type solo aRPG though. So I expect the challenges will stay but move more towards endgame rather than early game, or more for bosses but less for trash mobs.

Also, aRPGs are all about power fantasy, and for that you need to be able to sometimes crush your enemies like they're nothing, to feel that progression. That's the whole point of trash mobs. Now it really feels like difficulty is always on an even level with mobs, always challenging, always requiring your full concentrated attention and effort. There is no lulls, only peaks and more intense peaks when fighting bosses.

I know everyone here is having fun dunking on PoE1 redditors, but they might have a point or two.

 

[Cohesion]

Gift just keeps giving:

The salt is real!
Veilguard has nothing even remotely funny lol
Edit: more tears before inevitable nerfs.

 

[Jermu]

stay away from me or I snap I just played some poe2

 

[mediocrepoet]

I'm now in Act3, and while I really like the game and my playthrough, and I love a challenge, getting fucked and getting gud to overcome it, I wonder if the game as is will have staying power when the proposition becomes to restart this every 3-4 months. Don't get me wrong, the game as is is great for a couple playthroughs, but I'm not sure it will endure in the long term without some changes.

As it is, playing through the campaign is a much longer time investment than PoE1's, so you won't reach the endgame as fast. For people who don't nolife the game, it might take a couple weeks to get to the endgame. This means a lot of content will mostly only be accessible to the nolifers, much more than in PoE1. Many will start to push the endgame only for the league to end and them having to start over. Some also take days off to push to the endgame, but that might not be enough now. Sure, the coming checkpoint teleporting, and maybe even removing enemy respawns will alleviate that, but I'm not sure it'll be enough. I typically play SSF, and in PoE1 the 3 month league is often just enough for me to get to pinnacle bosses but not enough to do them all properly because of lacking equipment to really fight without a significant risk of wasting the fragments.

Difficulty is fun, but tedius repetition of low/mid-level difficult content isn't. To me it seems obvious that the game will move into PoE1's direction of making the campaign easier to reach endgame with less friction, or it won't work as a seasonal game. It might work as a Grim Dawn type solo aRPG though. So I expect the challenges will stay but move more towards endgame rather than early game, or more for bosses but less for trash mobs.

Also, aRPGs are all about power fantasy, and for that you need to be able to sometimes crush your enemies like they're nothing, to feel that progression. That's the whole point of trash mobs. Now it really feels like difficulty is always on an even level with mobs, always challenging, always requiring your full concentrated attention and effort. There is no lulls, only peaks and more intense peaks when fighting bosses.

I know everyone here is having fun dunking on PoE1 redditors, but they might have a point or two.

I have to admit, I normally don't think of this stuff in the context of "seasons". The entire seasons thing is bizarre to me. Build up a character or two... then dump it and restart it every few months. The infinite autism hamster wheel.

 

[mediocrepoet]

View attachment 58638
stay away from me or I snap I just played some poe2

 

[Ismaul]

I have to admit, I normally don't think of this stuff in the context of "seasons". The entire seasons thing is bizarre to me. Build up a character or two... then dump it and restart it every few months. The infinite autism hamster wheel.

Agreed. But that's what PoE's model is: new seasons are where the new fun content is, so you have to start over to see it.

GGG builds the wheel, and the hamsters love running in it. The whole business model is based on selling supporter packs to PoE1 redditors every season, despite them not needing it to access the content. But PoE2's wheel has too much resistance and requires a bit of grease for the hamsters to enjoy, I think. Hamsters want the wheel to go wheee.

 

[Cyberarmy]

Heh, all these crying about bosses and difficulty reminds me of Dark Souls 1 times

 

[BlackAdderBG]

This shit needed to be delayed at least one more year, the game feels actually bad to play in end game. For once all the systems are bare-bones and poorly thought-out, or more precisely they are aimless, this is actual beta stage of the game. While some may be glad that early access is real beta the problem is that there is nothing exciting on the horizon for the new mapping system and GGG doesn't seem to have any idea where to take it. The current mapping can not stay like that, it has zero design put in it and it's obvious they threw this together in the last minute. They copied the shitty Last Epoch implementation of pointless, repetitive, empty zones and made it worse by removing the reward you get after clearing a map that had 5 rares spread out in a zone that is bigger that 5 maps in LE.
The gem system- absolute trash in its current state. Aside from the points most people already made about their levels been tied to the area level and been unable to level them up if you are stuck, the restrictions to specific weapon types and the insane amount of different gems that will need to be added, there is a bigger problem- most of the support gems have the absolute trash design of if you want that effect it will cost you something else or the D4 absolute pinnacle of great design, you get that effect on thursday around 3 PM if it rains.
Treversing terrain is shit even on the best class for moving around- the Monk.
Been stunned is annoying mechanic that GGG has tried to implement for years, good job it's in PoE2 and is still terrible, now you can't build immunity against it unless you spnet 20 passive ponts and 4 gear slots. But then you get frozen, slowed, burned, shocked, poisoned and bleed is applied just to be sure you can't move around much. What is the best way to deal with all that shit? Just play ranged and delete the screen before any mob can even approach you.
Ground effects and 10 different things blowing up around you is still terrible enemy design, now with the added shittiness of not having movement skills, been twice as slow and on top of that the map design is attrocius so half the time you are in a corridor that one mob can block you. What is the best way to deal with all that shit? Just play ranged and delete the screen before any mob can even approach you.

Want to play slow, approach tactically and use set ups for cool combos. Tough luck the end game is Breach, Ritual, Sanctum, Ultimatum and Beyond. What is the best way to deal with all that shit? Just play ranged and delete the screen before any mob can even approach you, but not you want to do it on a timer so you have to be faster.

Otherwise pretty fun to play, can't wait for the new PoE league though.

 

[ArchAngel]

Yeah I think I'll put this game on hold for now, fighting this flying Trial of Chaos boss plus AIDS Ultimatum mechanics as melee was a miserable experience.

Still wanna see what the next classes and ascendacies are gonna be like!

Yea I got stuck on that shit, failed about 10 times and decided to do it later when I do more damage or can tank more.

 

[mediocrepoet]

I just finished Act 2. Guy's like: And now it's time to reveal who I really am...
Me: Nah, it's ok. I don't care.
Guy's like: Here is my tragic backstory blah blah blah blah.
Me: *clicking intensifies*

Anyway, I think people are right that once you figure out the game's overall mechanics and movement and such, it's actually not that bad. Even more so now that they let you almost but not quite dodge through people. Since then I haven't gotten trapped even by ambushes that are clearly meant for you to clear a path or die (last Act 2 map up to the Act boss).

Basically need to level a bit or respec a bit to pick up more dex nodes to actually slot my new level of skill gems I got during that last level. Meh x5. They should've given you enough of a base from leveling to keep up with your core stat skills without needing to go out of your way to just pick up stat nodes. I was actually surprised that they didn't tbh.

 

[ArchAngel]

I just finished Act 2. Guy's like: And now it's time to reveal who I really am...
Me: Nah, it's ok. I don't care.
Guy's like: Here is my tragic backstory blah blah blah blah.
Me: *clicking intensifies*

Anyway, I think people are right that once you figure out the game's overall mechanics and movement and such, it's actually not that bad. Even more so now that they let you almost but not quite dodge through people. Since then I haven't gotten trapped even by ambushes that are clearly meant for you to clear a path or die (last Act 2 map up to the Act boss).

Basically need to level a bit or respec a bit to pick up more dex nodes to actually slot my new level of skill gems I got during that last level. Meh x5. They should've given you enough of a base from leveling to keep up with your core stat skills without needing to go out of your way to just pick up stat nodes. I was actually surprised that they didn't tbh.

If they did that picking up stat bonus passive points would feel even more like a waste.

 

[mediocrepoet]

I just finished Act 2. Guy's like: And now it's time to reveal who I really am...
Me: Nah, it's ok. I don't care.
Guy's like: Here is my tragic backstory blah blah blah blah.
Me: *clicking intensifies*

Anyway, I think people are right that once you figure out the game's overall mechanics and movement and such, it's actually not that bad. Even more so now that they let you almost but not quite dodge through people. Since then I haven't gotten trapped even by ambushes that are clearly meant for you to clear a path or die (last Act 2 map up to the Act boss).

Basically need to level a bit or respec a bit to pick up more dex nodes to actually slot my new level of skill gems I got during that last level. Meh x5. They should've given you enough of a base from leveling to keep up with your core stat skills without needing to go out of your way to just pick up stat nodes. I was actually surprised that they didn't tbh.

If they did that picking up stat bonus passive points would feel even more like a waste.

Yeah, probably. It's interesting to me that the stats themselves basically do nothing except sort out what you can kit out with, which I suppose indirectly impacts your damage, etc.

 

[blessed king of longing]

Did PoE1 had enemies respawn when you die? It's kinda annoying.

nope, it's actually useful for grinding out levels. go to a high mob density area, get killed at the end, run it back

 

[mediocrepoet]

Picked up some various stash tabs on sale. I can see how this could become expensive if you're an OCD packrat like me.

 

[Ismaul]

Picked up some various stash tabs on sale. I can see how this could become expensive if you're an OCD packrat like me.

Ok I'll just put in 10$. 20$? Why not just upgrade to 60$, I get tabs and skins on top for the same price. Everything I'll ever need. What a steal!

Few years later, lemme see how much I spent on stash tabs. Can't be that much, I never buy skins. Oh just 350$? Might as well get some more to round it off.