POE 2 speed slowed down. Yay or Nay ?

Yay.
I feel that people are not aware that camera is not so much zoom in and this makes the game slower alone.

I'm pretty sure poe 2 is fun for a new player base while most poe 1 players will stick with poe 1 because of the slower speed. But in the end.... only time can tell.

I hope it slows down to a more tactical pace just exploding screens is boring literally why I quit D4 just one button face rollin everything , no challenge = no fun for me. However I think the Devs are on a giant bait and switch where it looks slow to set a hook and then end game is just gonna be blasting. I hate that term "blasting" what a terrible way to consume something without getting the slow roasted enjoyment.

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Hammerhorn_Oathsworn wrote:

I hope it slows down to a more tactical pace just exploding screens is boring
[...]
I hate that term "blasting" what a terrible way to consume something without getting the slow roasted enjoyment.

That might be the wrong genre for you, then. It's how it's always been and what it has always boiled down to. You can try "The Riftbreaker" if you want a mix of tactical tower defense and ARPG.

This whole "tactical" ARPG doesn't really work for something Diablo-esque, at least not the way I think you are describing it. Most of those are turn-based, because that is the staple tactical gameplay mechanic. The more "tactical" a game gets, the more slowed down it needs to be, because we are not robots that can analyze 100 scenarios in under 100ms. It more sounds like you want PoE to turn into Starcraft, which isn't gonna happen, and you could just play Starcraft instead (I'm aware these can get quite fast).

The more they move away from the top level genre and closer to Souls-likes, the more Souls-like it becomes and the greater the audience shift will be. They are not known for Souls-like gameplay, so it makes no sense to do that. Some elements can be implemented, but they are hardly genre-defining or anything special, i.e. the dodge roll, but the more you adapt, the more you become what you are trying to adapt to.

Grim Dawn also borrowed some concepts, i.e. the on-death "gravestone" that allows you to regain a portion of your lost EXP if you "pick it up". And Dark Souls wasn't even the first, no, that would be Eternal Ring, also made by FromSoft, and very similar to the Demon's Souls and Dark Souls that followed.

Regarding "tactical gameplay"...

I think it boils down to the balance between gameplay, monster density and gear - and in what degree gear should impact your approach to gameplay situations.

In other types of ARPGs, like Dark Souls, Elden Ring or whatever, timing (and memory) is everything, and gear doesn't really matter that much. The focus is you and your reactions. Fun? Sure, but it doesn't really let you fight hordes og monsters in the same way as Hack'n Slash ARPGs.

And monster density is key in this discussion. We can boil it down to a simple question: Do you want to fight heaps of monsters? Do you want PoE/PoE2 to have high monster density? Well, if you do, the game has to tone down the tactical gameplay to a certain degree, and some/most of your defense has to rely heavily (but not completely) on gear.

And historically, gear is the main driving force of Hack'n Slash ARPGs. Most games in the genre wants you to chase better and better gear. Gear is (and should be) important. It should matter. A lot! Should a defensive, tanky character have to be as "tactical" as a glass cannon? Should you be able to tank "most" incoming hits? Or should a tanky character have to dodge the same amount of hits as a squishy character?

All of this is a delicate balance. While PoE 1 arguably has too high monster density, is too fast and relies too much on gear, I think the opposite is worse. Only time can tell if PoE 2 finds a better balance.

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Phrazz wrote:

We can boil it down to a simple question: Do you want to fight heaps of monsters?

Yes. That is what I'm here for, building freedom and complexity aside.

I agree that it's boring when every build essentially does the same thing, i.e. nearly every "Strike" build going for AoE splash damage and explosions to pop every pack instantly; that's not any different from other skills that can inherently do that. That, I concur, is a balancing act that needs addressing, but when I'm pooping out >150 spells per second, then I expect this type of gameplay and not tactical dodging and carefully reading every enemy move. And if they decide to kill that for good, then I'll also be out for good and simply go play something else. I stopped playing Grim Dawn for this very reason, more or less.

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BaumisMagicalWorld wrote:

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Phrazz wrote:

We can boil it down to a simple question: Do you want to fight heaps of monsters?

Yes. That is what I'm here for, building freedom and complexity aside.

I agree that it's boring when every build essentially does the same thing, i.e. nearly every "Strike" build going for AoE splash damage and explosions to pop every pack instantly; that's not any different from other skills that can inherently do that. That, I concur, is a balancing act that needs addressing, but when I'm pooping out >150 spells per second, then I expect this type of gameplay and not tactical dodging and carefully reading every enemy move. And if they decide to kill that for good, then I'll also be out for good and simply go play something else. I stopped playing Grim Dawn for this very reason, more or less.

That gif is exactly and precisely what the fans/champions of PoE2 absolutely freaking hate. It is the literal worst. I've played the game for ten years, and while I've never broken into Streamer Memer 100T DPS Mavens-per-microsecond nonsense, I still know the game quite well. I have no idea what is happening in that screenshot beyond "somebody is committing a Jousis-style crusade against the servers with trigger effects". You cannot see where the PC is in that morass of particle effects, you cannot see where the bosses are, you cannot see the map - you cannot see jack monkey squat except an epileptic nightmare explosion of malevolent insanity.

Other games can have huge amounts of effects and projectiles onscreen without being utterly, completely, and irreversibly unreadable the way that gif is. Look at Touhou - an average danmaku attack has hundreds of bullets onscreen in all manner of elaborate patterns, and yet you're never unable to read the battle. You can lose track, sure - the skill in Touhou and other bullet-hell games is being able to keep your cool and read the flow of enemy attack patterns - but you're never physically unable to read the fight.

That gif? Skynet couldn't read that fight. The Matrix couldn't parse what's happening in that madness. That sort of absolute chaos is utterly, utterly repellant to any sort of new player, as well as any player who wants to feel like they're controlling a character instead of just throwing a nuclear glitter bomb at the screen.

To answer Phrazz's questions, I do want to fight hordes of monsters. More accurately, I want to fight hordes of monsters. Engage in battle and defeat them with ability and tactics as well as gear, rather than simply clicking once to explode entire instances. I really don't think gear is somehow going to "not matter" in PoE2 the way some people are saying. we've all seen the streamers who get dogshit luck with their drops struggling while the guy who finds a rare weapon with +70% damage flies through content like he's got rocket skates. Gear will enhance and enable tactics, gear will cover for recklessness or weaknesses in tactics, and gear will determine the ceiling of what you can handle, same as it always has. Excellent tactics and battle skill can only go so far.

This is Path of Exile - builds that can facetank everything and not care about dodges or active block or anything else are inevitable. If you're determined to build a PoE1-style one-button facetank smashclicker and you have a couple hundred Mirrors lying around because of market botting, you'll be fine. The thing Grinding Gear is doing is putting those tools in the game for the people who want to use them, so people who can't scale to the ludicrous and utterly unachievable zenith required of a PoE1 build can partially compensate by being better players. By, to borrow a phrase from the hated game series everyone is ripping on here, gitting gud. They'll never be AS good as the five-hundred-Mirror builds, but maybe they can get, I'unno...twenty percent closer?

And they can enjoy the game more while they do it because they are fighting the demon hordes of Wraeclast, not just Cookie Clicking their way through them. At least to start. Five years of power creep in, we all know we'll be right back where we started. So just wait for it, I guess.

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1453R wrote:

I have no idea what is happening in that screenshot beyond "somebody is committing a Jousis-style crusade against the servers with trigger effects". You cannot see where the PC is in that morass of particle effects, you cannot see where the bosses are, you cannot see the map - you cannot see jack monkey squat except an epileptic nightmare explosion of malevolent insanity.

That's a you-problem. Been playing these builds for years, I can totally see what's happening in this GIF. Pretty easy to spot where I am, too, since I've centered HP bars always on. And I completed that fight with exactly 1 death (because I thought the Elder's ring already popped and I stepped out and died). That's The Feared, by the way, an inherently chaotic fight.

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1453R wrote:

That sort of absolute chaos is utterly, utterly repellant to any sort of new player, as well as any player who wants to feel like they're controlling a character instead of just throwing a nuclear glitter bomb at the screen.

Funny you should say that. Every person I showed this, even non-gamers, was like "What the fuck? That's cool, what is it?"

And it gets even better once I start trying to explain to them - in layman terms - how and why it works and what it does. You can literally see it in their faces when the "oh, shit" moment hits and they realize how complex a "simple video game" can be.

Could be a 'me' problem. Could also be that Grinding Gear has years of evidence that new player entry/retention in this game is terrible compared to similar genres, in part because you show someone that and say "this is what any given normal build looks like, if you're not doing this you're a failure at the game" and a lot of people simply shrug and write the game off. Evidence seems to suggest GGG considers the issue more widespread than one cranky middle-aged woman on the forums.

There's maybe a couple thousand people on the planet - in total - who can look at that gif and know what's happening. And a nontrivial percentage of people who can look at that gif and know what's happening are going to say "I know what's happening there and I hate it". You can't sell an entire new headline game that took over seven years to build to a sub-100 percentage of a couple thousand people. PoE1 can continue to be made for the exclusive enjoyment of those couple thousand people while telling everyone else to get bent. PoE2 has its sights set a little higher.

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1453R wrote:

Could be a 'me' problem. Could also be that Grinding Gear has years of evidence that new player entry/retention in this game is terrible compared to similar genres, in part because you show someone that and say "this is what any given normal build looks like, if you're not doing this you're a failure at the game" and a lot of people simply shrug and write the game off. Evidence seems to suggest GGG considers the issue more widespread than one cranky middle-aged woman on the forums.

Evidence of this particular type of build putting off new players? Please do provide those referral links.

First you take on the role of the self-proclaimed head speaker for a whole crowd you think exists, and now not only do you make up things as you spin that narrative in your head, you also went the extra mile to try and insult me because I disagreed with you.

For the record, you are about as correct in your statements as you are with your poorly attempted insult: I'm neither middle-aged, nor a woman, nor am I cranky. Good try, though.