Multiplayer Balancing suggestion

It's a great game, and I've played it a lot. BUT, it feels like a completely different experience in multiplayer, which is the main way I and many others want to play. The problem is that the game doesn't handle the same way in multiplayer.

For example, I can have a character that blazes through T15 maps in single-player mode, absorbing all damage and outhealing it while massacring everything. But in the same map, when playing with even just one other person, the same enemies I could previously ignore will now kill me in one hit.

It's not that I can't beef up defenses by sacrificing some offense for defense—that's totally doable and not too hard, in my opinion, though it might be challenging for many players. The issue is that I would need two completely different setups for single-player and multiplayer, and potentially even more setups depending on the number of players. This shouldn't happen.

It's not fun to put hours into fine-tuning your character, only to join a lobby with your buddies and die repeatedly, feeling like your entire build needs to be reworked to survive. On top of that, the amount of damage you must sacrifice to overcome the defensive barrier in multiplayer means that optimally built characters for survival clear maps very slowly. While this is acceptable, it really feels like you're constantly being punished for daring to play with others. These are the problems I want to address.

What I think GGG should do:

Reduce enemy damage scaling based on team size. Scaling enemy health, resistances, quantity, etc., feels completely fine. It's just the damage scaling that makes multiplayer feel like a disadvantage.
Ensure builds perform consistently across multiplayer. Beyond damage, certain mechanics like stun thresholds or builds that rely on specific gimmicks have their breakpoints radically altered in multiplayer, which disrupts their effectiveness.
Investigate level scaling. A couple of levels between 60–99 shouldn't make a huge difference, but if there are any bugs in this area, they could be contributing to the "one-shotted in multiplayer" issue.
Incentivize cooperation. I can't emphasize enough that it should feel good to have another player with you—they're your ally! Playing with others should be fun, but right now, it often makes it easier to die and harder to see what's happening. As a result, it's usually better to spread out, which feels less cooperative in multiplayer.

monsters dont get more damage in multiplayer. normal mobs get 50% more life and bosses get 100% more life, but you have 2 of you in there so you do 100% more damage than you would alone. its just hp too, for stuns, shocks etc they count as if it were single player life.

you got half the agro on you, all in all it should be considerably easier if both characters are roughly as capable of playing solo?

I think since OP is referencing t15 maps this is likely a poe 2 post?


Regardless, monster damage does not scale with more players in either game. It could be that the increased life is making it harder for you to stun/freeze so you're taking more damage, but it shouldn't be such a massive difference that you're complaining about.

Typically when you play multiplayer it's more efficient for one person to play some type of support build whether that's a tank or something else so that one person can CC mobs or tank while the other DPS them down.

op probably isn't killing stuff as fast before they kill him

Yeah the others are touching on it OP but all this means is your build actually kills almost everything instantly when solo.

That is a pretty common state to reach in PoE and is kinda how the game is balanced, if you have 5 friends in with you and every enemy survives you now need defences or CC of some kind to keep a good handle on monsters.

If your build was already glass cannon this is quite hard to suddenly overcome as its crutched dps to dodge being a well rounded build already, and adding substantial defences comes at a very hefty offence penalty usually.