Is this what it means "throwing the towel"?

"

Phrazz wrote:

This intense focus on "a player has to play all 4 months non-stop, or else the league is a dud" is tiresome.

I... Don't think anyone is saying this. Like at all. In fact most are saying this is too long a dev cycle and to go back to 3 months, or essentially where is 3.25 because they are bored.

I guess we will agree to disagree on player numbers / engagement for GGG. Unlike D4, where every player is monetized, GGG needs players playing to make money. You get no argument from me that GGG revenue is front loaded on league launch weeks 1-3, but even if it's 80/20 or 70/30, thats a big number to "not care about"

That said, I would also argue that if a league is not received well, or players are disenfranchised about changes (see Expedition), that GGG should not be concerned about those returning players the subsequent league, which would then impact the bottom line.

I guess the TLDR here is that if your league tanks, yeah you should care. To be fair I think Neon does care, so again I don't really agree with the "not caring" premise you are making on player reception.

"

DarthSki44 wrote:

I... Don't think anyone is saying this.

Except that's exactly what some, and OP, seem to imply. That somehow one odd ball league and suddenly they are "throwing the towel".

This trend has been set since the beginning. Sometimes we get good leagues and sometimes we don't. That's all there is to it.

"

DarthSki44 wrote:

For me personally, especially in a F2P game, player retention and engagement are the most important.

You do this in terms of percentages so that it's an even comparison.

PoE has obviously grown significantly, so raw player numbers are up, but if the percentage of those players don't engage, or quit (this league at record pace), thats... well bluntly, a problem.

Having a ton of people play your game is great. Having them leave in record fashion because the league is subpar, is not.

That's not the business model nowdays, whilst it was decades ago, this is not the case anymore.
It's financially beneficial to have a swarm of gamers come in the door, throw money and leave.
Why is leaving good? Less support required as the audience is smaller, less server requirements, less power, less resources overall.
Blizzard are in this same business model, get people in for the expansion get them to pay a front door cost have zero care if they hang around. The players that do hang around in small numbers is less noise, less pressure. They can then work on hyping up the next expansion, rinse and repeat.
The advantage GGG have is they do it ever 3~4 months, compared to the slower developed games where they can only get a swarm of gamers in the front door once every few years.

I think it is funny that ggg runs mtx sales while they have serious issues with retention a month after league launches.

Who are they advertising too? Veterans own the mtx they want, new players quit after a week or so.

It isn't just one bad league but several over the years. GGG quickly became a laughingstock in the eyes of many. From ugly mtx, to mtx prices, to server stability, to the lackluster drops.

Poe has a lot of potential and a lot more problems. For many being close to good or great is far worse then being average. A game dev can only sell hype for so long before its gone.

"

DarthSki44 wrote:

To be fair I think Neon does care, so again I don't really agree with the "not caring" premise you are making on player reception.

Again, the "who cares" part was directed at the long term effects of a bad league. We have NO idea, we will never have an idea - so I can't care. Second, of course the developers care - every developer wants their game to be played as much as possible - and they all want to make money. But no, I don't think they are overly concerned about one bad league once in a while, because if history has showed us anything, it is that people keep coming back, hoping/wanting that the next league will be better. I think most players - and the developers know that with how progressive the game is, and how much they experiemting/taking chances, some leagues here and there will be less popular than others.

But several bad leagues in a row? Well, that's another thing. But we've had some bangers lately.

"

roundishcap wrote:

I think it is funny that ggg runs mtx sales while they have serious issues with retention a month after league launches.

Who are they advertising too?

Don't look too deeply into this, it's an automatic script that changes the mtx specials at specific times on specific days.
The only difference is weekend specials get an announcement, whether it be generic on tailored, it's a fairly automated process.

Cheers for the replies re: legacy. It was a clunker with the leaguestones, true.

___

I keep forgetting who started this thread. That's a good sign, because it means the conversation has grown far past its single-post origin.

Something I've been pondering regarding PoE 2 is just how complete it will be on launch/early access, and how much content they'll reserve for the first chunk of leagues/seasons. It's hard to judge because the only precedent we have is PoE 1 and that was a pantser for the most part. PoE 2 benefits from a LOT of experience and all we've seen so far is essentially 'demo' material. The best looking stuff they can expose to actual play, all very likely from the early to mid core game.

This is thinking very far ahead but I do wonder how long PoE 2 will thrive on base game support, and what the first 'blocks' will look like. I suspect they won't be anywhere near as ambitious as some of the game-changers we've seen in PoE 1, and they will probably be designed to integrate with the core game much more smoothly than said game-changers. Which then leads me wonder also: will that be enough to satisfy Exiles who are used to game-changing leagues/'expansions'?

My hope purely as a gamer and de facto life-long supporter is that the core game is fleshed out enough to be enjoyable by itself, but that every update adds a new way of playing that is largely voluntary. This way new players won't be overwhelmed by a core game that has turned into something that requires homework before playing. In other words, core PoE 2 should always be accessible to newbies and 'on-board' smoothly.

Hell of a balancing act for a game series that is notorious and beloved for its exclusivity.

Holy shit, friends. I think that's the first time I've referred to Path of Exile as a game series in well over 30,000 posts on here in 12 years. Mark the fuckin' calendar.

"

ArtCrusade wrote:

Personally, I buy supporter packs because I genuinely believe they're trying to deliver good content, and apart from some nitpicking I can only find a few things worth criticizing about Necropolis. Won't be true for everyone of course

whenever i buy a supporter pack its plainly because the supporter pack has some cool mtx/effect/feature. regardless of how well i like the current league or current state of POE.

initially, i justified buying supporter packs because i wanted to reward devs for making this F2P non P2W (debatable) game. i honestly loved the concept of the game to bits.

in most cases i would actually reduce or stop supporting. but POE is the first of its kind in many aspects. especially because of the "designing a game to be played forever" philosophy that chris championed.

despite not liking how melee is or how somethings functioned in the game, i kept pouring my support because i justified it with the mindset that POE2 has been announced (back then) and all my gear/characters would still be playable in POE2 (before the separation was announced).

all the supporters i bought was a step closer for POE to become better since "POE2 will fix that".

so if talking about salt, i was really super salty with the announcement of POE2 being separate.

the way it felt was GGG promised one thing then ran off with my money to develop something else.

i no longer care about this issue because of all the recent interviews where GGG explained how they ended up having to split the game. the reasons as well as admittance on how things were bad. the teasers of whats to come. everything. i understand and accept it and in fact support their decision to separate the game fully.

having said that, i still have some resentment for them not giving us this info earlier and perhaps even before the 2nd exilecon. announcing the separation as tho it was a great feature really had me salty. in retrospect i too would prefer poe2 be separate but GGG made little effort to make us understand it. and i guess everyone did not want to be salty because of exilecon. we wanted everyone to be happy and enjoy the event.

Resentment is far too strong an emotion for something that doesn't even know your name.

"

roundishcap wrote:

I think it is funny that ggg runs mtx sales while they have serious issues with retention a month after league launches.

Who are they advertising too? Veterans own the mtx they want, new players quit after a week or so.

Pretty sure I count as a "Veteran" PoE player, and I still have MTXs on my watch list that I will now never buy unless GGG somehow issues a Supporter Pack SO amazing that I cannot resist buying it for the shinies, with the points serving simply as a minor bonus. It certainly won't be to support GGG, but only to satisfy some FOMO itch. ='[.]'=