Development Manifesto: Harvest Crafting

Finally
God items were being acquired too easily, and most of them don't even required for you to play the game, just keep pressing the remove/add button until you hit something good.
And Path of exile is a game o knowledge, you can play infinite hours and acquire nothing if you don't know what you are doing. If you feel like the game doesn`t have the tools to create powerfull items without harvest, i suggest you guys study a little more

Like many others I don't like this. Casual players wont afford useful crafting anymore

I played this league more than I've played any league ever before, and it was 100% because of deterministic crafting. Ritual sucked, felt tedious and unrewarding, and GGG admitted it before the league was halfway over and did nothing to address it. Trade is absolute trash, and GGG knows it, and does absolutely nothing about it. The one fun point of the league, deterministic crafting, is being removed. I've heard "Chris Wilson hates fun" but it's never been as apparent as it is right now.

This league, I played longer than any league before, completed more achievements than any league before, ran more maps than any league before, made more currency than any league before, had more fun than any league before, completed more content than any league before, and it was 100% due to deterministic crafting. Harvest in this 'modified form might as well just be removed from the game. If easy crafting resulted in people quitting earlier, then none of that would be true. DETERMINISTIC CRAFTING gave me a reason to keep playing, because I had a guaranteed path of upgrading and improving my items up until they were amazing and near-perfect, then I rolled another character and did it again.

Everybody knows, and this manifesto states as much, that the problem was not with harvest, but with TFT and people trading crafts in large quantities. So, rather than address that problem, BAM COMES THE NERFHAMMER. Great job of refined, elegant design there, guys.

Maybe I'll be back for PoE2. With leagues coming out buggy and lackluster, GGG more interested in shoveling out masses of microtransactions than fixing unrewarding rituals, and a policy of sledgehammer smashing the only redeeming quality of the entire league, I think I'll take some time away from the game until either more attention is paid to the quality of the game, or balance is done with a knife and not a blunt heavy object.

Edit: I was planning on writing a long, involved feedback post about what worked this league and what didn't, based on four friends and mine combined feedback, but it seems rather pointless now that everything we planned on praising is going away. GG GGG.

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Graas Hoppa wrote:

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bauermayers wrote:

These nerfs are fine. POE crafting is gambling, no matter if you know what you're doing or not, and harvest goes against that.

It will continue to exist, so there's no reason to whine, but obviously part of this whinny community will whine until the next league begins, just like they do every time GGG change/nerf something. In this case the casuals that want the game balanced around them.

those casuals you explicitly talk down on.. are people with actual lives, a wife and kids + a full time job!!!!

99% of the playerbase is unable to play the game because of how much time they have on their hands... not how skilled they are!!!

99% of playerbase is people in their 30's if not 40's!!!

we don't have time to play 12-18 hours each day because we're working to pay for MTX, which they're gonna lose out on if everyone walks away when this decision is implemented!

stop being selfish and self-centered!

this change hurts everyone, including you, even if you think it won't.. it will hurt you as well!!

just watch path of math's video about this!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdpA_xHXhEA&t=1114s

Matth did a great video and I loved that he stepped back, acknowledged where he is in the spectrum of players, and spoke with the realization that what benefits/detriments him doesn't necessarily have the same effect on the majority of the population that does not have 1,000 exalted orbs to slam for giggles.

"But then there would quickly be nothing left to achieve."
Is that so? I thought GGG have all the data you need to analyze what keeps the people playing and what makes they left. Why there are so many different builds in this league(at least until one month after league releases) is that the harvest crafting supported them and made them playable. Instead of major player can only play some OP builds and then GGG complaining why is nobody playing other builds.

"We don't want to take away the feeling of closing your eyes and Exalting an item, scared to see whether you ruined it or not."
As a player I can say I never wanted crafting equipment is a series of gambling, this is also why harvest crafting is so popular among players. Since the currencies are always presents in the game, can GGG you think of why is nobody using chaos and exalt to craft while the apparent of harvest crafting never disabled the function of currencies?
Players can always annul or exalt with or without present of harvest crafting, but neft harvest crafting like this is only forcing player back to the bad old way.

SSF just became a lot harder!

You will kill the best feature. what GGG want to do ? 98% of players never go over mid game ?
Harvest is best, first time I craft myself my stuff on 9 years...
This Harvest in Ritual league gave me again the interest to play POE, never played so many hours in a league...
next league maybe I'll play another video game.

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We know that many players would love us to keep deterministic crafting in the game because it enables them to complete their items far more quickly than they otherwise would. But then there would quickly be nothing left to achieve.

This statement is hyperbole. It makes assumptions about what your players' goals are and what they consider achievement.

Players will find something to do with the time afforded them by completing items earlier. For example, players can try out more builds (and possibly more of the under-utilized ascendancies) in a league than they otherwise would be able to. IMO you're not going to lose most of your player base early league because they "won the game" with harvest crafts.

If you're really concerned about players completing items too early in a league, perhaps adding a mechanic to unlock the better crafts over time (like Betrayal veiled mods) would be a nice compromise?

please don't go further with this.

How many of your development manifesto threads have hundreds of pages worth of outcry, with ~90% against a change? This is a mistake, GGG.