Delve Costing Changes

Sustaining red maps is NOT hard.

There is a very good reason why there are always thousands of red maps for sale - because anyone running them will inevitably acquire surplus. This is just a fact if you play smart (chisels, rare maps, Zana mapmods like beyond/bloodlines, sextants, all the basics) - even if you have dry streaks, you will always end up getting more than you run over a longer period.

In ADDITION to the fact that even without league mechanics running high end maps will produce a surplus, delve itself drops tons of high end maps. A single vaal outpost node usually gives 1-4 T16 maps, which is insane. Not to mention Zana 7/8 map machine mods which can force low tier maps to T15/16 for a very cheap price. That's even without counting the fact that the maps are sold and are very cheap.

There is absolutely zero reason for anyone to complain that high tier maps are hard to sustain. If you can't do this, you have no business in high end delves anyhow. Delves have good loot and exp; it would completely break the game balance to allow people to do them freely, it's already too much sulphite that's given out from low level maps - the curve should have definitely stayed exponential. The only giving out even more sulphite - or removing it- could work is removing the OP fossils from the game, as well as nerfing delve xp and loot gain by at least twofold.

Please stop trying to destroy the game by casualization - if you feel you can't access endgame content as a new or casual player, that is EXACTLY how it is supposed to be. Endgame content by definition is only for experienced players who have worked and grinded hard to access it.

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Boganist wrote:

Sustaining red maps is NOT hard.

True
If your only aim is to sustain them without regard for cost

4 chisels, every single map
Alch
Additional chaos to get 25 monster pack size
Alternatively scour/alch
Vaal
+whatever Zana mod you choose
+Sacrifice Fragment
Averages to 5-6c per map
And that's assuming you didn't buy the map
And then you run 3 red maps without getting a single red map in a row.
And everything that drops within the map is absolute shit

The "quit playing the league mechanic" league patch.

Yay profit motive making you look foolish.

Here's what you did:

You gated league content behind maps and then didn't address the known problem of map "sustain."

This LOOKS really stupid, but the truth is that your motivation isn't player enjoyment, it's profit.

Again, this place is a casino. And you're playing with emotions to induce spending.

"

TheDudeOfGaming wrote:

"

Boganist wrote:

Sustaining red maps is NOT hard.

True
If your only aim is to sustain them without regard for cost

4 chisels, every single map
Alch
Additional chaos to get 25 monster pack size
Alternatively scour/alch
Vaal
+whatever Zana mod you choose
+Sacrifice Fragment
Averages to 5-6c per map
And that's assuming you didn't buy the map
And then you run 3 red maps without getting a single red map in a row.
And everything that drops within the map is absolute shit

And it more than pays itself back. I've done this every league I've played and I've always completed the full atlas. No trouble with money either, for example this league I bought a Headhunter after a week of the league even though I'd spent hundreds and hundreds of chaos into buffing maps. But that's because for every 1 chaos you sink into a map, you get 2-4 in return on average, at least. Not in currency format, but when accounting all the things you sell and new maps drops.

"

Boganist wrote:

"

TheDudeOfGaming wrote:

"

Boganist wrote:

Sustaining red maps is NOT hard.

True
If your only aim is to sustain them without regard for cost

4 chisels, every single map
Alch
Additional chaos to get 25 monster pack size
Alternatively scour/alch
Vaal
+whatever Zana mod you choose
+Sacrifice Fragment
Averages to 5-6c per map
And that's assuming you didn't buy the map
And then you run 3 red maps without getting a single red map in a row.
And everything that drops within the map is absolute shit

And it more than pays itself back. I've done this every league I've played and I've always completed the full atlas. No trouble with money either, for example this league I bought a Headhunter after a week of the league even though I'd spent hundreds and hundreds of chaos into buffing maps. But that's because for every 1 chaos you sink into a map, you get 2-4 in return on average, at least. Not in currency format, but when accounting all the things you sell and new maps drops.

Then I must be doing something wrong, because I keep throwing currency into maps without getting much in return.
I might get lucky once in a blue moon with several red map drops, but I mostly see below tier 10 map drops with 130+ atlas bonus.

And then, of course, the pain and hassle of selling surplus maps without an AH/trade system in game.
But I ain't even want to get into that right now.

It's doable.
But it sure as fuck ain't enjoyable.

"

Innomen wrote:

The "quit playing the league mechanic" league patch.

THIS.

You created an amazing league mechanic.
You got more players happier than ever, enjoying the game.
And then...
...you took that amazing league mechanic away from those happy players and sent them back to the map grind.

Forcing everybody to grind maps in a league solely dedicated to the Delve is one of the most WTF design decisions I've ever seen in almost 20 years of playing this type of games.

'POE Sulphite Patch' is going to be remembered across the field for sure. And not in a good way.

Thank you Chris! Great changes! I love your willingness to respond to community concerns, GGG is by far my favorite game developer. Stay amazing!

They want us to play maps and not delve. Why the delve hype then. This decision makes zero sense.

This is the first league i've made a character that can properly clear red maps and i was pleasantly surprised by how easy it was to sustain them, knowing that I usually have a lot of trouble sustaining high yellows (and did this time too).

I 4 chis + alch + chaos + vaal every map i do. If i get ele reflect I sell the map. I get an average of ~2 red maps per red map I do. I can't sustain tier 14+ but i end up with a large surplus of 11s and 12s. Even though I'm pretty liberal with buying maps that i want to do for influence or tier, my currency still seems to be going up a lot.

There are times when i do 2 T15 maps in a row and get nothing from it and that is a bummer but there are also times when i do a T15 map and get multiple T15 maps from it and that is groovy.

My atlas bonus was ~100 when i started on red maps and they were immediately sustainable. I used horizon orbs to reroll my extra maps into things i hadn't done yet. IDK if that makes a difference.

The latest sulphite changes are disappointing though. I read the patch notes as implying they were going to be buffing sulphite gains for people gaining their sulphite through high tier maps but i seem to have been nerfed.

Before while doing T14/15 maps i made 150-200 sulphite per node and it costed ~100 sulphite to delve at level (not depth) 79

now I'm making ~800 sulphite per node and its costing me ~500 sulphite to delve.

Its not that much worse but its definitely a little slower than it was before, and i was looking forward to it speeding up.

also I agree that delves shouldn't be too easy to do. I like the juicy loot and the way path is balanced requires a gating mechanism (although it could be currency instead of grinding, i think, like eternal lab or running bosses does, maybe make a tradeable currency item that gives you sulphite?)

Thank you for the patch. My suphite income per map is 5x up. I guess most negative posters just overleveled delve...