Some feedback from a returning player

Hi there,

I ve been playing Path of Exile since Open Beta, taking several breaks in between,
I ve not played every league but a lot of them.

My last break from this game lasted about 2 years (last login 2023),
I returned to the game this league.

I would like to point out a few things.

First of all I started playing this league more than 1 month in, I was not part of the league start, yet I am still playing and my character is about to hit level 100 (never before done).
I think the game is in its best state it ever has been, the last time I have enjoyed this game as much was in Harbinger league playing Hardcore having finally unlimited access to the endgame through Harbinger Orbs.

And I think this is the main reason the game is so good right now, you have limited the gatekeeping, limited the pointless punishing of players and made access to everything easier.
Before this patch I only ever did the boss fight when I just leveled up, I intentionally skipped so many encounters because I did not want to lose all my XP to Sirus, this is fixed now and it is a great thing.

I also spent a lot of time in Kingsmarch, becoming a massive goldfarmer.
In a a different context this might sound awful, but in POE it makes a lot of sense, I spent hours and millions of gold trying to min max my workforce (mostly trying to get lower wage workers) and its fun.
I also got a mirror shard from on of the shipments which was awesome.

The gold farming meant I was mapping like never before and for some reason I do not fully understand the ingame economy this league is absolutely awesome so that almost everything makes sense.
I can delve and it feels worth my time, I can do boss runs and it feels worth my time, I can farm gold/dust in maps and it feels worth my time, Heist is very rewarding (but also tedious) and so on.
I am not sure how you achieved this but it has never been like that before, really great.

I think the new story line is also nice, just curious when it will actually conclude, but looking forward to that.

However considering all this I noticed a few things that felt off in this league compared to the rest.

1.
Nameless Seer:
I wish this NPC would either not exist or needs massive changes how to find him.
I run over 100 maps, all T16, 2 different types of maps, I used every scarab known to man and also looked up "strategies" and I simply have not found him a single time in a T16 yet, checking my chat log after every map.
This is either a bug or it is very bad design, this hunting for the Seer has completely killed the fun of mapping for me.
And ive heard from several other players that they run 300+ maps and have not encountered the Seer....

Can we please get a system where this NPC just spawns after a fixed amount of map completions?
25 maps completed, Seer spawns, I dont see any problem with that, I just want to scry a map, I dont care about his uniques.
The current system serves no purpose but to frustrate those that actually want to use him and its again a massive endgame gatekeeping that I thought we were finally rid of.

2. Originator Maps that drop
I dont understand the point of these maps.
They are way more difficult but not in any way more rewarding, the Petal abilities are all bad except for the gold one.
After running a lot of these maps I started opening them only to check if they rolled the items to gold ability and if not leave the map, they are not worth running at all in my opinion.

Convert normal enemies to blue/rare -> never works
Steal modifiers or elites -> who cares, almost never does anything and the duration is way to low, if I leave the map to trade, its all gone
Steal souls -> Boooring
Increase or decrease quantity -> never does anything, feels like you are sabotaging yourself most of the time
Rarity items dont drop -> just why
Convert items to gold -> YES this is good

In general these map add tiny loot buffs that never felt impactful,
while increasing the difficulty immensely especially with mods like "Maven intervention" and others.
I think these maps have no place in the game right now, at least the ones that drop, the one from Eagon are better obviously.

I literally started putting them in the trash, kinda sad.

If you compare these maps to T17 maps for example it makes even less sense.
While I personally also dislike T17 maps because the bosses are to hard,
T17 maps are massively rewarding, especially if you invest into them,
the increase in difficulty is justified and even the bosses have special drops which somewhat justifies them being so difficult (still hate it tho).
But with dropped Originator maps nothing makes sense really unless you get the items to gold Petal ability.

3. Flawless Breachstones
I understand this is considered difficult content, but it is not difficult.

I have failed these breachstones 9 out of 10 times simply because my character is not able to move fast enough (and im running 30% ms boots with onslaught)
It had nothing to with not having enough damage or not being tanky enough but everything with having taken a wrong turn in the map somewhere and simply not having 100% movement speed.
I think this is a terrible way to scale "difficulty", I think there should simply be 10 seconds added to the timer at the start, you are massively punished for not playing a zoom zoom build no matter your damage or tankiness.

ALso the difference between normal breachstones and flawless ones is insane,
normal breachstones i finsh with 40+ seconds left (area level 81) and flawless breachstones I fail midway through with no time left... even though i killed literally everything on screen all the time... (area level 84).
This is not a good balance and I wish this was changed.

I am quite sure that most of the playerbase will run into the same problem,
this is basically gatekeeping because of not enough movement speed,
I really dont understand why this is in the game.

In any case I enjoyed this league very much,
I will level my character to 100 and im planing to play 1 more after that.
I will return for the next league as well if I have the time.

I also think you should consider making Mercenaries part of the core game.
It would be cool if we could simply hire Mercs in town or find "contracts" in the endgame to get mercs in our hideout again.
I equipped my merc with some insane items and it really felt like gearing up a second character, I really wish this stays in the game, it also is one of the reason why the economy is so good this league, there simply is more demand for stuff because everyone has 2 characters at least.

I think Doryani's Prototype should not work on mercs and it not good for game balance, I think this armor should just be removed from the game honestly, it just causes balance problems everywhere, but aside from that mercs have been a great addition to the game, helping players to fix weakness in their builds with the help of their merc.

Thanks for reading and stay sane exiles.