POE2 and SSF

ho ho ho

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Waitubold wrote:

Short version:

Buffing drop rarity for SSF is not about giving SSF any sort of advantage. It's about giving SSF parity, and I think you need to reconsider your stance on that, given that you're about to make trading a lot easier

not buffing drops in SSF wasn't about them avoiding giving you an advantage, it's about SSF being a CHALLENGE and to a lesser degree not forcing people to play it because they feel more rewarded (players tend go for the phat loot even if they can't trade it so there WILL be posts about being forced to play SSF just like there are posts about people being forced to play ranged instead of melee)

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lagwin1980 wrote:

not buffing drops in SSF wasn't about them avoiding giving you an advantage, it's about SSF being a CHALLENGE and to a lesser degree not forcing people to play it because they feel more rewarded (players tend go for the phat loot even if they can't trade it so there WILL be posts about being forced to play SSF just like there are posts about people being forced to play ranged instead of melee)

I heard not long ago from Jonathan, that's not the case. Can you give us source?

Personally, I play SSF because its more difficult, I dont need it to be easier.

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lagwin1980 wrote:

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Waitubold wrote:

Short version:

Buffing drop rarity for SSF is not about giving SSF any sort of advantage. It's about giving SSF parity, and I think you need to reconsider your stance on that, given that you're about to make trading a lot easier

not buffing drops in SSF wasn't about them avoiding giving you an advantage, it's about SSF being a CHALLENGE and to a lesser degree not forcing people to play it because they feel more rewarded (players tend go for the phat loot even if they can't trade it so there WILL be posts about being forced to play SSF just like there are posts about people being forced to play ranged instead of melee)

Being forced to trade seems the more obvious example. If presenting an option with easier item acquisition means forcing people to take that option, then we're all being forced to trade. And we don't like people being forced to do things, right?

Now, the word "forced" is not accurate here of course. The very existence of SSF players demonstrates that nobody is being forced to "follow the items". I suspect the use of the "forced" is because people know that it evokes negative/scary connotations (that aren't actually rational), and/or that accurate descriptions would sound less persuasive (which is telling).

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Teret3 wrote:

Personally, I play SSF because its more difficult, I dont need it to be easier.

Luckily, you can still get the exact same experience in HC that you get in HC SSF. People who want a game mode with more reasonable item access without being built around a nonsensical 'economy' don't have that option.

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GusTheCrocodile wrote:

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lagwin1980 wrote:

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Waitubold wrote:

Short version:

Buffing drop rarity for SSF is not about giving SSF any sort of advantage. It's about giving SSF parity, and I think you need to reconsider your stance on that, given that you're about to make trading a lot easier

not buffing drops in SSF wasn't about them avoiding giving you an advantage, it's about SSF being a CHALLENGE and to a lesser degree not forcing people to play it because they feel more rewarded (players tend go for the phat loot even if they can't trade it so there WILL be posts about being forced to play SSF just like there are posts about people being forced to play ranged instead of melee)

Being forced to trade seems the more obvious example. If presenting an option with easier item acquisition means forcing people to take that option, then we're all being forced to trade. And we don't like people being forced to do things, right?

Now, the word "forced" is not accurate here of course. The very existence of SSF players demonstrates that nobody is being forced to "follow the items". I suspect the use of the "forced" is because people know that it evokes negative/scary connotations (that aren't actually rational), and/or that accurate descriptions would sound less persuasive (which is telling).

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Teret3 wrote:

Personally, I play SSF because its more difficult, I dont need it to be easier.

Luckily, you can still get the exact same experience in HC that you get in HC SSF. People who want a game mode with more reasonable item access without being built around a nonsensical 'economy' don't have that option.

The problem lies in having both Trade and SSF being balanced identically, i.e. around trade. Now you have one mode with easier item acquisition, i.e. trading, and gameplay that's balanced around the assumption that everybody involved is acquiring their gear by trading, and mode without trade that is still balanced around the assumption that trade is readily available. For those that genuinely want a harder version of the game, that's great, but a quick perusal of this thread shows pretty clearly that there's a significant segment of the player base who don't want the game to be harder, but who also don't want to essentially have no options excepts trading in order to experience all of the game's fun content.

Currently, these people are being given a choice between spending precious time on activity they don't enjoy, i.e trading, or having a straight-up worse time playing the game because a significant portion of the game's content is essentially not accessible without trading: either you can't run the harder content, or you can't engage with the latest league mechanic because you're stuck in Standard. And, yes, HC and Ruthless also exist for those that just want a challenge, but that doesn't address the needs (or desires) of those that aren't looking for extra challenge.

Is that the same as "forcing" them to trade? If you're one of those people, you might feel like it does; it certainly sets us a set of incentives and penalties which seems, at minimum, mildly coercive. The question then becomes: how numerous are those people? If it's just a few weirdos, say twenty percent or less, then GGG can safely ignore the issue; if it's forty, or sixty, or eighty percent of their customer base, though, then maybe they can't, since there's now a viable competitor in Eleventh Hour Games who actually are catering to them.

This is why my OP urged GGG to actually pull some telemetry data, and check. I still think they should do that; given that the one time we know they pulled metrics the number seemed to imply that over ninety percent of players couldn't be trading, I think the current stat is probably a lot higher than most seem to be assuming.

Last Epoch is also pretty great, BTW, and the Circle of Fortune system is every bit as good as it promised to be. If GGG aren't taking notes, and planning to implement something similar in PoE2, then they might be making a mistake, there.

Are you looking for an equal amount of time to get the same item?

What I mean by that is this: if I want item X in non-SSF, it takes me 10 hours to grind the currency to trade for it. Are you looking for the same grind in SSF of 10 hours to produce the same outcome?

If yes, I think that's ridiculous. Trade should be viewed as difficult on purpose to create resistance to trade always replacing drops, and also as a tool to be used to achieve your goals. It's not necessarily meant to be fun; just like walking between packs/areas or leveling in the game isn't necessarily supposed to be fun in and of itself. It's part of the game and a tool to be used for progression and to counter the resistance created by the developer; an additional dimension that someone needs to account for to succeed at the game.

Now imagine you make these things equal. That is one less dimension a player needs to consider in their progression. If a player has two choices that have equal outcomes, one with N variables to consider and the other with N+1 variables to consider; players will choose the one with less variables because the outcome is the same.

For me, this breaks the pact between the player and developer. The developer creates resistance to progression, and one of those resistances is adding additional factors that you have to consider in order to progress. Players do the opposite by searching for ways to beat the game (whatever that means) in the most efficient way possible. When a player has to create their own resistance, the developer has fallen short for that particular player (different topic, but adjacent depending on where this conversation goes).

Viewing trade as a fun/no-fun part of the game is the wrong lens from my perspective. It's a tool to counter resistance created by the developer (lower drops). It's an additional factor that players need to consider in order to progress as efficiently as possible.

Additionally, asking for SSF to get drops that counter the lack of trade does the exact opposite of the intended purpose of SSF when created: it makes it the default easy mode, when originally it was supposed to be added difficulty for those that opt into it.

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Nubatron wrote:

For me, this breaks the pact between the player and developer.

Exactly. This whole debate was spurred again with the release of Last Epoch and already I hear some people say that after being impressed initially, the lower resistance to high tier gear feels bad in the long run.

What's there to work towards if everything is easy?

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Nubatron wrote:

Are you looking for an equal amount of time to get the same item?

What I mean by that is this: if I want item X in non-SSF, it takes me 10 hours to grind the currency to trade for it. Are you looking for the same grind in SSF of 10 hours to produce the same outcome?

If yes, I think that's ridiculous. Trade should viewed as difficult on purpose to create resistance to trade always replacing drops, and also as a tool to be used to achieve your goals. It's not necessarily meant to be fun; just like walking between packs/areas or leveling in the game isn't necessarily supposed to be fun in and of itself. It's part of the game and a tool to be used for progression and to counter the resistance created by the developer; an additional dimension that someone needs to account for to succeed at the game.

So... games are not meant to be fun? I should be willing to do un-fun chores with my leisure time, just because you love the grind? That's... an interesting take, for sure, but I think we'll have to agree to disagree on this point. I know that ARPGs are somewhat grind-y by nature, but there's a point of diminishing returns on that. I picked up PoE ten years ago, and kept playing it, because it was more fun than the alternatives that existed at the time.

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Nubatron wrote:

Now imagine you make these things equal. That is one less dimension a player needs to consider in their progression. If a player has two choices that have equal outcomes, one with N variables to consider and the other with N+1 variables to consider; players will choose the one with less variables because the outcome is the same.

Drops are generated randomly. No additional variables are required; there are already no guarantees that you'd get any specific item in the game, no matter how long you grind. Trade effectively crowd-sources the effort involved, generating a pool of items which can be accessed more easily by trading than by playing the game and waiting for the items to drop randomly. Again, trade accelerates progress through the game; it's not requiring additional effort, it's just shifting the focus of that effort from the fun stuff in the game, to stuff outside of the game that some find to be less fun. If you're not one of those people, that's fine -- I'm not arguing that PoE2 shouldn't have trade at all -- but Jonathan is talking about reducing the friction between players and trade, not keeping it current levels.

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Nubatron wrote:

For me, this breaks the pact between the player and developer. The developer creates resistance to progression, and one of those resistances is adding additional factors that you have to consider in order to progress. Players do the opposite by searching for ways to beat the game (whatever that means) in the most efficient way possible. When a player has to create their own resistance, the developer has fallen short for that particular player (different topic, but adjacent depending on where this conversation goes).

What pact? The only pact I ever entered into with GGG is that they'd make a game, and I'd give them money to support that effort if I liked the game. As for games needing friction to be interesting, sure, I'll agree there, but why does trade have to be the primary source of that friction? Why can't they balance a trade-free mode so that the amount of time invested to reach the same game content is about equal to what trading players experience, with the monsters providing all the friction that players have to overcome to progress? Again, EHG did exactly this in their game; why can't GGG do the same with PoE2? You're just assuming that the status quo is necessarily good, simply because it's the status quo, and therefore must be preserved, but you're doing that after EHG have already demonstrated that to be false.

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Nubatron wrote:

Viewing trade as a fun/no-fun part of the game is the wrong lens from my perspective. It's a tool to counter resistance created by the developer (lower drops). It's an additional factor that players need to consider in order to progress as efficiently as possible.

To me, asking for SSF to get drops that counter the lack of trade does the exact opposite of the intended purpose of SSF when created: it makes it the default easy mode, when originally it was supposed to be added difficulty for those that opt into it.

This is pretty circular. The tool, trade, is only required here because drops are being kept artificially scarce, which is only being done because the game is balanced around the needs of its trade economy. If the game didn't have to be balanced around trade, if there were an alternate mode available in which you could skip the chores and just do the fun stuff, why is that bad? Why should I not view any part of a game through the lens of whether it's fun to do or not?

Like, yes, games are supposed to present the player with some friction, and some amount of friction is actually required for the game to be fun... but too much friction, or friction in parts of the game where they're not strictly necessary, isn't fun, it's just frustrating. IRL, I accept the frustrations because I must, but this is a game we're talking about, here. I would think the balance, the focus, of the game's developers should always be on what's fun. Why else make a game?

Sorry, @Nubatron, but I think I shall decline to approach my leisure time this way. You do you, and may the doing bring you joy, but I think that I'll continue to insist that fun is the entire point of play, and to insist that the games I play be mostly fun, most of the time, for as long as I do so.

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Nubatron wrote:

It's not necessarily meant to be fun; just like walking between packs/areas or leveling in the game isn't necessarily supposed to be fun in and of itself.

Uh, I'll give you "walking between packs", but what people commonly refer to as "leveling" is many many hours worth of painstakingly constructed videogame campaign. It is absolutely supposed to be fun in and of itself.

Unless you do just mean the act of clicking that level-up button and assigning the point. Which I do happen to enjoy (indeed, skill tree planning/advancement is probably the thing I enjoy most in the game).

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Nubatron wrote:

For me, this breaks the pact between the player and developer.

The only pact I've made with the developer is agreeing to abide by the Terms of Service, not agreeing to adopt a particular viewpoint about "dimensions of progression".

You don't need trade in order to have 'resistance to progression', nor to overcome it. There are countless games out there without trade at all, showing that it's not actually a vital ingredient.

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Nubatron wrote:

Viewing trade as a fun/no-fun part of the game is the wrong lens from my perspective.

That's fine, but it can still be an entirely valid lens from other people's perspective. This isn't a job, it's my leisure time and I'm not interested in spending it doing things I really dislike doing.

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Nubatron wrote:

Additionally, asking for SSF to get drops that counter the lack of trade does the exact opposite of the intended purpose of SSF when created: it makes it the default easy mode, when originally it was supposed to be added difficulty for those that opt into it.

The original intended purpose doesn't matter though. It's not sacred. You can't upset or offend it. It's not even a thing anymore, it's a thought someone had a long time ago.

All discussion of potential changes to a game is implicitly about making changes from the developers' original intentions. That's okay, that's normal.