Popular Opinion: League Challenges Should Require Solo Completion

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cowmoo275#3095 wrote:

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You’re mixing up terms and then arguing against your own setup. I never said “control” the market. I said design should acknowledge the multiplayer environment it already produces. That’s not manipulation, it’s alignment.

Carries aren’t “cheats” of the market; they’re an expression of it. When time and skill have tradable value, that’s exactly what a functioning multiplayer economy looks like. Pretending otherwise is just moralizing player behavior.

Your “musician” analogy is a false equivalence. I’m not saying everyone is playing together, I’m saying everyone affects everyone else’s performance. That is multiplayer interaction.

And honestly, calling the whole argument “bananas” while redefining basic terms like “multiplayer” and “fairness” isn’t analysis, it’s just rhetorical fog. PoE’s gameplay depends on collective behavior, whether you’re mapping solo or trading bulk. Ignoring that reality doesn’t make it less multiplayer, just less honest.

P.S.: You’re stacking your argument on redefinitions, not reasoning. You’ve shifted “reflect” to mean “exist,” turned “fairness” into an economic abstraction, narrowed “multiplayer” to only mean synchronous play, and labeled emergent behavior like carries as “manipulation” just to make the framing fit.

That’s four semantic pivots in one post, all to dodge the core point: design should acknowledge how players actually interact. Whether that’s trade, cooperation, or carries, it’s still multiplayer behavior.
You can’t win a definition war by changing the dictionary mid-argument.

Bump for visibility, we need some impactful changes in 3.27 or 3.28.
Let’s keep the momentum of all the good QoL going and push for even more thoughtful improvements!

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VoidWhisperer42#5989 wrote:

Bump for visibility, we need some impactful changes in 3.27 or 3.28.
Let’s keep the momentum of all the good QoL going and push for even more thoughtful improvements!

+1.

Carries are a part of SC Trade and its economy. Always will be. This is an objective fact that will never change.

+1 for this.

They should also introduce challenges and reward tiers exclusive for the 0.0001% of playerbase and challenge their 20+ mirror builds to the limits :)

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Pashid#4643 wrote:

+1 for this.

They should also introduce challenges and reward tiers exclusive for the 0.0001% of playerbase and challenge their 20+ mirror builds to the limits :)

Now that’s a really solid idea. Instead of introducing entirely new challenges beyond the current 40, GGG could tier the existing 40 into progressive stages, similar to how they already handle tiered MTX rewards.

Tier 1 could be unlocked simply by playing the league and exploring the new content, light engagement, but still active participation. Progression at this stage should come naturally through gameplay, not shortcuts or carries.

Tier 2 would represent a deeper level of involvement, rewarding players who push further into endgame content while still ensuring that progress can’t be bypassed, you have to actually play and earn it.

Tier 3 would align with the current 40/40 expectations, challenging, grind-heavy, and demanding genuine mastery. Again, no skipping via carries, every step should reflect personal achievement and actual engagement.

And since some MTX already feature a Tier 4, this could serve as the true aspirational milestone. It would reward those who fully commit to the league, players who invest time, effort, and creativity into crafting optimized builds and conquering the hardest content. This would redefine the “40/40” standard as a meaningful badge of dedication and skill, not just a checklist that can be outsourced.

This approach would restore the sense of accomplishment behind challenges while still keeping lower-engagement players satisfied. They’d still earn their Tier 1 MTX through casual participation, even if the higher tiers remain out of reach for now. It’s fair, motivating, and keeps players invested longer, instead of having them drop off two weeks in because they either:

a) don’t engage with new or endgame content, or
b) buy their way to 40/40, burn out, and quit because they’ve exhausted the fun without truly playing the game. Or both.

In short, this kind of tiered challenge system would bring meaning, progression, and longevity back to the challenge structure, while also keeping FOMO in check. Everyone would still get something for participating at the most basic level, but those who truly put in the effort would earn the full, shiny bling-blings that show they went all in and actually played to get there.


Time to cook something special for 3.28, GGG. Out of all the ARPG devs out there, you’ve proven you know exactly what hits, what leaves players with a bad taste, and what the majority of your playerbase truly enjoys. Don’t lose that flavor, let’s bring a great challenge rework with the next league and redefine the very meaning of what challenges in ARPGs should stand for!

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Z3RoNightMare#7140 wrote:

That’s four semantic pivots in one post, all to dodge the core point: design should acknowledge how players actually interact. Whether that’s trade, cooperation, or carries, it’s still multiplayer behavior.
You can’t win a definition war by changing the dictionary mid-argument.

So obviously what I thought was a very simple post went completely over your head....

The entire point of a market, of a trade system, is that no one NEEDS to acknowledge it exists. It is AUTOMATICALLY acknowledged by everything simply because it exists. That's the point. The only real thing that needs to acknowledge a market's existence in this game are RNG rates. That's it. Maybe sink designs as well. This is enough for the entire game, no matter what the content may be, to acknowledge the market. But no actual gameplay needs to specifically address it in any way: the market, and the gameplay itself, will naturally reach an equilibrium together.

No one, no matter how much they equate it, is asking for "SSF mode" in trade. Challenges shouldn't EVER have the requirement "you must use gear that you completely farmed yourself, having never used trade". That would be "acknowledging the market"....and actively designing against it instead of naturally letting it play its role.

So many complaints we regularly see on these forums are because of this immutable fact of markets. It's generally because players are attempting to refuse or go against acknowledging something that simply IS acknowledged automatically by nature of its existence and inclusion in the game mode.

The reason why carries are "cheats" of the market is because carries, at least as they pertain to extra-game CHALLENGES, should NOT exist. They exist in our current market now because there is a PROBLEM with how they are designed. And folks who buy their challenges are exploiting this problem. If it is an expression of anything, it is an expression of the exact FAULT in the system that this thread is addressing.

Real life doesn't HAVE to have laws against printing your own currencies. And if it didn't, folks who did print their own currency would simply be working within the bounds of the market (a natural extension, by your description). But that doesn't make it any less of a PROBLEM that such a thing might be possible. It is damaging the "whole" by existing. THAT is the very point of this entire thread.




I'm not making semantic pivots, I'm trying in multiple different ways to try to get you to understand that "multiplayer" in gaming literally translates to "players that play the game together". A trade economy or market is NOT THE SAME THING as players playing the game together. The "gameplay", or at the very least 90% of it, even through the design of challenges......is fighting monsters, getting loot, using the loot, and improving your build. The market is simply a means to get players ready for that. But the actual GAMEPLAY, the part where "multiplayer" comes into the equation, is just not the market by itself: it's everything else that you ultimately use the market FOR.

This isn't even like.....a hard or new concept. I hate to copy some of the other guys rhetoric, but that's just a straight up objective fact of "Multiplayer gaming vs. Single Player gaming".
"The social interaction and challenge of playing with or against other people are key aspects that distinguish multiplayer games from single-player games." -NOT a simple trade system.

It isn't 100% WRONG to say that, because we have trade and a market, PoE is a multiplayer environment. BUT it is absolutely an extreme stretch to say that that aspect alone makes the game a "multiplayer game". It really, really....isn't. Just like how, simply having party play be "possible" doesn't make this game true "multiplayer". That's the reason why the VAST majority of players aren't playing in parties: it isn't designed for it.

And just as you are trying to claim that challenges should be designed to "acknowledge" the existence of the market and multiplayer.....it also needs to "acknowledge" that TRUE multiplayer when it comes to actual gameplay is practically unheard of or impossible in PoE's game design. At least in how challenges are CURRENTLY designed.

A bunch of pages back, I already listed a few ideas of how GGG could actually implement TRUE multiplayer challenges: ex) defeat uber elder in a party, but you only deal (and must deal) damage to the Elder. That actually creates and encourages true multiplayer gameplay for a multiplayer challenge. Plus...that's a legitimate challenge BEYOND the "normal" way we would approach the game. That is what challenges exist for: going beyond "normal". Not shortcuts, shortcuts are "normal" gameplay.

Need a rush? Go for it.
Need a carry through a boss for a voidstone? Go for it.
Need someone to kill a t17 boss for you? Go for it.

Just not for completing challenges.

It's about time to change the title of the thread again back to 'Unpopular Opinion' imo.

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SunsetVista#4840 wrote:

It's about time to change the title of the thread again back to 'Unpopular Opinion' imo.

That’s quite inaccurate, given that it’s clearly visible in this discussion that there’s broad support and strong interest in the topic. Those opposed to the idea seem to be a small minority, so calling it “unpopular” would be misleading considering the active engagement it’s received. I’ve updated the title to better reflect the current situation, as it was long overdue for a more accurate description.

That said, the title itself doesn’t matter all that much, since GGG evaluates every piece of feedback regardless. What truly counts is the content and quality, providing well-reasoned arguments and evidence-based support rather than relying on made-up numbers that don’t hold up. We also shouldn’t downplay the strength of the community’s feedback by making it seem less supported than it actually is.

Always stood for this

Absolutely yes