renown is a VERY bad idea

Context for those who were wondering WTF the OP was on about :

https://www.poewiki.net/wiki/Mercenary#Renown

(Did I miss it or it wasn't even mentioned in the big presentation video ??)

The gate of entry is so small, its 3 renown. People not liking this, i dont get it.

If you were going to do the mechanic anyways....it means nothing. If you werent going to do the mechanic it also means nothing.

I dont see a situation where making you actually run the mechanic when youre hunting for a good one is a drawback.

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Relationship#0359 wrote:

The gate of entry is so small, its 3 renown. People not liking this, i dont get it.

If you were going to do the mechanic anyways....it means nothing. If you werent going to do the mechanic it also means nothing.

I dont see a situation where making you actually run the mechanic when youre hunting for a good one is a drawback.

It CHANGES how you interact with the mechanic. That is the point. Plus, what about everything in between "doing it all the time" and "never doing it"? It changes the mechanic from choice and proper design, to luck and improper design.

And there are significant drawbacks to a small "gate of entry". It offers very little flexibility, you will either be in full garbage mode or fully buffed and no middle. With a system like that, what is even the point of it existing? It would make far MORE sense if the scaling was larger. Plus, that could allow for additional "ideas" such as customizations (a la OG sentinel "tree").

Ultimately you are right, in the grand scheme of things it doesn't make a BIG difference to how you might play the game. But that doesn't change how bad of an idea it is, nor the fact that it shouldn't exist (as it currently is). And you even wrote....it means nothing. Why have it then? It's entirely unnecessary. Infamous mercenary chance ALREADY scales with difficulty of map mods, and likely map tier.

Minimally invasive doesn't excuse poor design: thats why the entire community has been clamoring for most QoL features since 2013...minimally invasive "poor" design, that actually DOES end up having an impact on your game experience. "What does it matter, its a small problem" is a terrible argument.

Renown is a "looking tax". That is its only purpose. Which is pretty stupid. And it excuses the lack of rewards and usefulness at lower renown, a fairly stupid limiter to place on the content that is already almost entirely randomly generated.

I get that it adds player friction to people who just want to shop for either a merc or items without running them but gating the better rewards and mercs behind that friction is the correct way to do it.

If player A does the mechanic 100000 times and player B does it 3, player B shouldn't get the same level of access as player A (on average). The more you do the more you benefit, that's pretty normal.

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Relationship#0359 wrote:

The gate of entry is so small, its 3 renown. People not liking this, i dont get it.

If you were going to do the mechanic anyways....it means nothing. If you werent going to do the mechanic it also means nothing.

I dont see a situation where making you actually run the mechanic when youre hunting for a good one is a drawback.

Considering mercs are likely to use PvP rules against you, there's a good chance not every build can take on every merc.

Why should players be punished for not wanting to lose 10% exp?

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Pizzarugi#6258 wrote:

"

Relationship#0359 wrote:

The gate of entry is so small, its 3 renown. People not liking this, i dont get it.

If you were going to do the mechanic anyways....it means nothing. If you werent going to do the mechanic it also means nothing.

I dont see a situation where making you actually run the mechanic when youre hunting for a good one is a drawback.

Considering mercs are likely to use PvP rules against you, there's a good chance not every build can take on every merc.

Why should players be punished for not wanting to lose 10% exp?

If thats the case, right?

Then the player whose build cant run it, never would. So it requiring more work is meaningless because that build couldnt do it in the first place.

"

Relationship#0359 wrote:

I get that it adds player friction to people who just want to shop for either a merc or items without running them but gating the better rewards and mercs behind that friction is the correct way to do it.

If player A does the mechanic 100000 times and player B does it 3, player B shouldn't get the same level of access as player A (on average). The more you do the more you benefit, that's pretty normal.

What are you trying to say? That will STILL be true, without renown lol. The more you do it, the more you benefit.

More trarthan gems. More new items. More chances at a better or "perfect" mercenary.

The "level of access" is the amount of times you interact with it, regardless of the useless renown level. Player A doing the mechanic 100000 times has the SAME access as Player B doing the mechanic 3 times via renown: the access being level 3 renown. The difference is that Player A has proportionally better odds at getting something useful through sheer numerical advantage.

Incorrect because in this case player B is simply checking the merc and not engaging and leaving. Player A is getting a benefit for keeping their renown system up to 3 but the drawback is player A is engaging with it every map.

Why should player B get the same level of offers when player A is investing more time?

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Relationship#0359 wrote:

[...]
Then the player whose build cant run it, never would. So it requiring more work is meaningless because that build couldnt do it in the first place.

Wait, you can use your currently hired merc to help you in the fight with the new merc, can't you ?

thats a good question