Path of Exile is a MAJESTIC incline

[Ninja Destroyer]

I'm playing Alma Witch, to get familiar with the skill system, been ages since D2 playing so the best thing for me is to go a well known path.

 

[IDtenT]

The Witch's passive skills are actually a bit too complicated for me as there's too much choice. For a duellist like me it's pretty straightforward.

 

[Surf Solar]

@Dark Underlord you can use this thepiratebay.se/torrent/8059167/Path_of_Exile_0.10.0b_Open_Beta_client its legit and approved by the devs aswell.

 

[Angthoron]

Some very selective nostalgia in here. Diablo II had probably the worst map design I've ever encountered. Hurp rectangular fields.

Yeah, this. I remember trying to play D2, starting, getting bored and uninstalling at least 3 times, so exciting and varied it felt.

And people were like "Oh but it gets better after you hit the endgame!" and I was like "Fuck you".

Sounds familiar doesn't it.

 

[LeStryfe79]

PoE is a bit of a slow burn, but it's an incline since it helps weed out the dumb shits that prefer a more craptacular popamole progression.

Reminds me of an argument put to me by a WoW player after I aired my views on how dreary it had become: "Oh, you think WoW is boring but you're only a level 40 warrior? Well, you really gotta get to the high levels. WoW only starts at level 70."

I'm sorry, but the idea that you need to play a game for dozens of hours to get sufficiently leet for the gameplay to open up and become fun just isn't doing it for me. D2 which PoE tries to emulate was fun out of the box, PoE is just grindy, with boring map design and environments to boot.

What PoE gets absolutely right, at least last time I played, is the potion system and the monster damage balance. Even if you play the warrior guy, standing in the middle of a bunch of monsters even in the beginning will likely lead to you dying, making movement more important than in many other games of the type, and I find it appealing how the potion system doesn't simply revolve around TPing to town to stock up on 6000+ healing potions before a major boss fight but actually having to play the game well to get them refilled. Good thinking by the devs there.

By slow burn I mean a fine cigar compared to some shitty chewing tobacco which instantly provides a nicotine fix. PoE does not suck at anytime, but it is a bit of an acquired taste for people who prefer intelligent game design. It's not a perfect game by any stretch, but it's a helluva lot better than a turd that starts out fun but burns out fast. Just because it gets better over time doesn't mean PoE is bad in the beginning, it just means that it has a more subtle curve. It's not a matter of good versus bad, but instead is a matter of lover verses whore. Does that make better sense?

Also, fuck your rose colored glasses. I played D2 for 1000's of hours and PoE is a better game, or at least on it's way to becoming that. PoE has better atmosphere, better loot and skill mechanics, and better multiplayer implementation.

 

[Eyeball]

In other words "the thing I subjectively prefer over the thing you subjectively prefer is obviously objectively superior ohmigod I am so pretentious."

Can't speak for multiplayer (because who wants to interact with other hack and slash players?) but all the other things you cited I found to be FAR superior in D2, with PoE skill and loot mechanics being downright poor in my view. I hate the skill gem system as it relies too much on your gear to work and I dislike not having any gold pieces. As I do not multiplayer, I am not concerned with creating a balanced barter system, and hauling around dozens of various orbs makes sorting an extra unenjoyable chore.

 

[Damned Registrations]

D2 had better atmosphere? WTF were you smoking? Catgirls and goofy midgets and naked warrior womynz. What atmosphere was that exactly? Bad fanfiction?

The skill and loot systems don't even need defending.

 

[Kane]

aussie internet

 

[spectre]

Multiplayer experience ultimately depends on the people you hook up with. While this is true for most games out there, it's even more so, imo, in PoE, because the loot allocation mechanics have high potential to generate butthurt.

I think all comparisons to D2 are pretty moot, because everyone who enjoys the genre pretty much played it to death.

I had very little time to play the recent patch, and I've yet to see act 3. Looking at screenshots, it looks underwhelming, though knowing GGG, they'll still be twiddling with it.

 

[IDtenT]

Multiplayer experience ultimately depends on the people you hook up with. While this is true for most games out there, it's even more so, imo, in PoE, because the loot allocation mechanics have high potential to generate butthurt.

It's far too quick.

What I'd like to see is some party stashes, to help bros out. Not like most currency items you get for magics and rares are worth much.

 

[Rpgsaurus Rex]

I dislike playing co-op in PoE, mainly because with a good build it's completely unneccessary and even counter-productive (much faster to breeze through alone with my favourite dual totem witch) and because of how the loot system works (FFA loot ... too much stress).

Disclaimer: impressions from CB.

IDtenT

Yeah, it sucks. From my experience, you either
a) play with stable groups of friends who you trust to leave your valuables (no matter how valuable) on the ground even after the timer has expired; people like that are damn hard to find "from scratch" because it's sort of acquired ethics, and you'll see plenty of top-level players on server who will still have an atrocious looting reputation, or
b) make own groups with name like "mannered co-op" or something, enforce this attitude and kick those who don't comply; these kinds of parties become more prevalent once you get to post-game on last difficulty (CB); from what I've seen, though, it never gets past "map owner gets maps", loot is simply too hard to control once you get to big groups and a lot of loot modifiers

 

[Eyeball]

D2 had better atmosphere? WTF were you smoking? Catgirls and goofy midgets and naked warrior womynz. What atmosphere was that exactly? Bad fanfiction?

The skill and loot systems don't even need defending.

D2 had far more variety and imagination put in their environments. PoE has different types of bland wasteland, some caves and some dungeons that are more or less interchangable. End.

D2 had demon haunted harems, the insides of giant termite mounds, lost Aztec cities, Egyptian tombs and the awesome Arcane Sanctuary.

No contest, in my book.

 

[Angthoron]

All I remember from Diablo 2 was, until the expansion, great masses of brown

 

[Dickie]

Yeah, it sucks. From my experience, you either
a) play with stable groups of friends who you trust to leave your valuables (no matter how valuable) on the ground even after the timer has expired; people like that are damn hard to find "from scratch" because it's sort of acquired ethics, and you'll see plenty of top-level players on server who will still have an atrocious looting reputation, or
b) make own groups with name like "mannered co-op" or something, enforce this attitude and kick those who don't comply; these kinds of parties become more prevalent once you get to post-game on last difficulty (CB); from what I've seen, though, it never gets past "map owner gets maps", loot is simply too hard to control once you get to big groups and a lot of loot modifiers

That's one of the things I really thought Diablo 3 did well was giving each player his or her own loot drops. The little delay isn't long enough if you're not right there next to the item or trying to decide if you care to get to it in time.

 

[Gregz]

Diablo 2 and PoE are both great games.

 

[Arkeus]

Diablo 2 and PoE are both great games.

But But But!
That's not the whiny way!

 

[Angthoron]

Way to ruin things with reasonable approach.

 

[Damned Registrations]

D2 had better atmosphere? WTF were you smoking? Catgirls and goofy midgets and naked warrior womynz. What atmosphere was that exactly? Bad fanfiction?

The skill and loot systems don't even need defending.

D2 had far more variety and imagination put in their environments. PoE has different types of bland wasteland, some caves and some dungeons that are more or less interchangable. End.

D2 had demon haunted harems, the insides of giant termite mounds, lost Aztec cities, Egyptian tombs and the awesome Arcane Sanctuary.

No contest, in my book.

You must love the atmosphere of WoW too. So much variety. Who gives a fuck about having a coherent theme. No, what we really need are more cow levels and bikini warriors. If only PoE had those it'd have good atmosphere. And nothing gives you that dangerous foreboding feeling quite like wandering around a huge empty rectangle looking for the entrance to the next plot dungeon.

PoE has a fucking ship graveyard, squidmonster grotto, prison, and cliffs in just the first act. They all feel like they belong in the world and they all feel different in the way you move through them and what enemies do in each place. You can't go 60 seconds into diablo 2 without running into a giant goofy hedgehog that looks like a reject from Banjo and Kazooie. And that's honestly one of the better enemies in the game. Certainly a cut above catgirls and the boobzilla horde, or the utterly terrifying FROGS. And nothing makes a world feel darker and more oppressive than a band of lesbians on a camping trip. Or villains whose evil plan is to keep good guys around until you show up to save them. Because why kill Deckard Cain, last of the horadrim and witness to the fall of diablo, when you can leave him around in a cage for no reason? Never mind the act 5 bullshit with the damsel frozen safely in a block of ice for no reason at all. Why not just add a fucking shark pit so you can leap over it.

 

[KoolNoodles]

Haven't played that much, and I liked D2 back in the day(though D1s "atmosphere" was far better for the time I played it). PoE sometimes reminds me of how I felt when I first loaded up Diablo. It's not quite there because I won't ever be able to reproduce that awesome mix of creepy/new feeling with another game probably, but maps in PoE like the Prison in Act 1 really gave me that vibe. I thought it was well done. It looked and felt and sounded like an old claustrophobic medieval dungeon(liberties taken with layout to make levels big enough/varied). Anyways, I enjoyed that map and how it was presented. It was an obvious nod to D1 early levels/butcher, but I'm okay with that.

Edit: Also have to add that a lot of that has to do with sound, lighting, and music. Monsters and the act of killing them sounds pretty good in PoE, the music fits the setting and adds to the mood, the lighting is mostly dark and foreboding. It helps a lot towards giving the game a little extra to push it over the edge.

 

[Damned Registrations]

They're based in NZ too, so technically shouldn't he have a better connection than any of us? ROFL. (Obviously they have other servers as well but even so.)

 

[Machocruz]

Bikini warriors are pretty much in keeping with dark fantasy and sword and sorcery, post Frazetta.

 

[IDtenT]

Yah, the prison levels are pretty much a direct replica of the Diablo butcher. Diablo in atmosphere was a lot better than Diablo 2. Even with all the hype from everywhere I couldn't get into Diablo 2. Not having variable quests as in the first was already a massive blow.

 

[dibens]

Toying with transmutation orbs really pays off. It only takes few tries to get more than +50% damage or armor increase on items. I feel that it's much better to have a blue with uber base stats than yellow which gives rather small bonuses early on.

 

[Damned Registrations]

That's definitely true for a lot of builds. Though I find resists hard to set up without swimming in yellow armor.

 

[Castanova]

Just completed Act 3 and I don't really know what Nim was complaining about with the level design. Sure, some zones are more interesting than others but there was nothing even close to bad enough to make me want to insta-uninstall. Some of the areas were pretty cool, actually, like certain of the Temple levels and the one where you're walking on rooftops over the slums.

I'm playing a Summoner Witch using mostly zombies and a spectre, skeletons for when I need extra backup. Zombies and Skellies are sharing Minion Life/Minion Damage gems, Spectre has its own Minion Damage gem (haven't found a 5L yet obviously). Using Vulnerability until I get the curse passives and then I'll add Enfeeble in there too. Using Firestorm with Chance to Ignite as my nuke... ignite synergizes with Vulnerability, too. Enjoying the build although I do sometimes yearn to actually kill stuff myself.