Path of Exile

Malinatar

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No, I mean using flares instead of the cart since azurite become a non-issue eventually. That is not to say this isn't easily fixable, my point is more that the league still has major issues and we're at the halfway point. This cannot become a permanent addition to the game without working out many bugs or even just unintended usages.

On top of that, delve is very obtrusive to existing game mechanics. A lot of builds simply suck to play in the mines. I had to give up on my Indigon CI character because he depended on leech for sustain. That's not say the build can't adapt, but requiring a specific Watcher's Eye is a bit much.

Essences, along with some other crafting methods, are quite marginalized with fossils. Personally, I don't give a shit, crafting before fossils sucked a fat dick and fossils are awesome. But you have to objectively realize that they are too powerful and it's not great that they spend development resources effectively cannibalizing existing core mechanics.

Except ghosts. Ghosts can go fuck themselves.

I hope to god they make this a permanent mechanic. If their intent was to make the league and PoE in general more accessible to normies/baddies like me, they definitely hit the nail on the head. By now I would have hit a currency/gear wall and moved onto a different game like I do with every league. I also read comments that SSF players (RaizQT in particular) are still playing SSF and not moving to trade leagues due to Delves and I think that is a good thing.
 
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Deathwing

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Why is that a good thing? All the gear I'm wearing is from trading. I don't want them encouraging SSF unless some serious rebalancing of gear drops happens.
 

Malinatar

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Why is that a good thing? All the gear I'm wearing is from trading. I don't want them encouraging SSF unless some serious rebalancing of gear drops happens.

Anything that keeps people playing what they want to play is a good thing to me.
 
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Vorph

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I must be unlucky as usual because I've done a bunch of fossil crafting on a stat stick and a minion jewel and haven't seen anything even remotely usable. Even if you narrow down the affix pool a bit, you still have to hit the higher tiers. At best it seems a marginal improvement over the utter shitshow that normal crafting is, still nowhere near enough that I'd ever try SSF.
 

fletch101

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I must be unlucky as usual because I've done a bunch of fossil crafting on a stat stick and a minion jewel and haven't seen anything even remotely usable. Even if you narrow down the affix pool a bit, you still have to hit the higher tiers. At best it seems a marginal improvement over the utter shitshow that normal crafting is, still nowhere near enough that I'd ever try SSF.

Is this the life Blue Gem users are relegated to?
 

Captain Suave

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Why is that a good thing? All the gear I'm wearing is from trading. I don't want them encouraging SSF unless some serious rebalancing of gear drops happens.

Personally, I always play SSF and find it very frustrating when the game isn't tuned to allow it. I'd much rather spend my limited time playing the core game than trying to trade with people.

I take it that SSF is viable now in some fashion? I haven't played PoE in a couple years but I love me some ARPG and would pick it up again if I didn't hit a hard gear wall.
 
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Xevy

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I think this type of stuff makes SSF look waaaaaaaaaaay better and more interesting. I'd love to play it and make builds off the crazy fucking items I made/found with fossils. Right now I just put them up for decent prices and watch them rot in my bank because there's so many 350dps 1handers that what used to be like 10ex is worth like 1ex now.

I think when they do their "event" soon they'll use it to figure out some things going forward with delve. I hope it's infinite delve with no sulphite so they can really determine how fucked it is. I'd love to see a no maps/delve only event just to see what kind of ridiculous items still come out. The only thing that would be hurting would be shaper/elder bases.
 
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Deathwing

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Personally, I always play SSF and find it very frustrating when the game isn't tuned to allow it. I'd much rather spend my limited time playing the core game than trying to trade with people.

I take it that SSF is viable now in some fashion? I haven't played PoE in a couple years but I love me some ARPG and would pick it up again if I didn't hit a hard gear wall.
As always, it depends on your build. The spectrum of what builds are functional and feasible in SSF has definitely increased. But if your build requires a specific item to even function, well, good luck. The Indigon CI build I mentioned before needs a Skyforth, no way am I going to hope to find that in SSF.
 

zombiewizardhawk

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SSF is and always has been functional, you just have to play accordingly as Deathwing said instead of trying to play one of the minmax 8 mandatory items ez-clear all content 9trillion dps builds.
 

Byr

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Think one of the GGG leads did an interview lately where they said that often the leagues that drop loot easily are the best received by the playerbase but suffer from the worst player retention. Players reach their goals quickly and just stop playing.

/edit Found it

Grinding Gear walks a tightrope with Path of Exile, rewarding and restricting players in exquisite balance. “If we make the game more rewarding, people will quit faster, even though they feel they’re having a better time,” says Rogers. “Some of the leagues that have been the best in terms of player reception have also been some of the worst in terms of retention for our company, so we’ve got to be careful. It’s a tension, but ultimately, we’re always trying to make people have the best time.”

The pain of designing Path of Exile’s exquisite balance of restriction and reward
 
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Korrupt

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SSF is and always has been functional, you just have to play accordingly as Deathwing said instead of trying to play one of the minmax 8 mandatory items ez-clear all content 9trillion dps builds.

You guys realize a website exists that shows all builds that aren't private in leagues right? You can see the exact builds and gear people are using to 100. Most of this forum should be searching for level 95 builds. People use every build known to man in SSF and its fine to play in -

poe.ninja
 
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Malinatar

Lord Nagafen Raider
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Think one of the GGG leads did an interview lately where they said that often the leagues that drop loot easily are the best received by the playerbase but suffer from the worst player retention. Players reach their goals quickly and just stop playing.

/edit Found it

The pain of designing Path of Exile’s exquisite balance of restriction and reward

I wonder what the average "retention" period is for a league. A month, maybe 6 weeks tops regardless if you meet your "goals" or not. People blow their MTX load in the first week or so I assume anyways so I don't really understand how retention is even a factor in their decision making process and let's be real, it's all about their bottom line. I don't see how making a league fun for players and having it well received can be construed as a bad thing in any way shape or form. Make a league fun, print more money with new/returning disgruntled players, use this additional cash influx to make the game better.
 

Deathwing

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You guys realize a website exists that shows all builds that aren't private in leagues right? You can see the exact builds and gear people are using to 100. Most of this forum should be searching for level 95 builds. People use every build known to man in SSF and its fine to play in -

poe.ninja
The existence of exceptions does not mean it's fine. If I wanted to play a build with Nebuloch and Xoph's Blood, the list is already down to 9 players above level 80. That Skyforth build I mentioned before? 1 person has a Skyforth in SSF.
 

Deathwing

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I wonder what the average "retention" period is for a league. A month, maybe 6 weeks tops regardless if you meet your "goals" or not. People blow their MTX load in the first week or so I assume anyways so I don't really understand how retention is even a factor in their decision making process and let's be real, it's all about their bottom line. I don't see how making a league fun for players and having it well received can be construed as a bad thing in any way shape or form. Make a league fun, print more money with new/returning disgruntled players, use this additional cash influx to make the game better.
I'd love to see the MTX numbers because I too think those purchases are heavily front loaded.
 

James

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Anyone done a Death's Oath Occultist build? Picked up a 3b 2g 1r Death's Oath last night, but concerned about single target damage.
 

Nirgon

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I do love one shotting map bosses with vaal Det dead + desecrate on this Inquisitor. I will miss that the most when I do the ranged attack totem/barrage trickster next season.


He just needs a good movespeed injection.
Flame dash sux. Might replace with some faster attacks leapslam setup, I don't even know lol. Staff caster is some fun power to wield but the mobility is just absolutely not worth it for mapping.
 

fletch101

Lord Nagafen Raider
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Korrupt Korrupt I have the Elder Guardians spawned, waiting on ticking Atlas so you can get them for the challenge. HMU if you're on Friday evening, fletch101 / Goose_aw
 
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zombiewizardhawk

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I wonder what the average "retention" period is for a league. A month, maybe 6 weeks tops regardless if you meet your "goals" or not. People blow their MTX load in the first week or so I assume anyways so I don't really understand how retention is even a factor in their decision making process and let's be real, it's all about their bottom line. I don't see how making a league fun for players and having it well received can be construed as a bad thing in any way shape or form. Make a league fun, print more money with new/returning disgruntled players, use this additional cash influx to make the game better.

Because people who don't start leagues the day they release might be less inclined to play if there are 17 people online after the first 3 weeks of a league?
 
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