Nearly everything must be obtainable far earlier.

We want to play the game using our character, our builds, our gear, the systems, the mechanics.
Not have to finish the game before we can even make them / start using them.
If we're done by the time we can start, there's no point in bothering.

--
I have a build I made out for using Abyssal Lich.
I will probably never actually make this character.
Why? Because by the time I can access the ascension, I would be so far into the game that I would be done with the character. Moving on to the next character, the next league, or just not playing anymore until the next time I cycle around to the game, which will ofc be in another league.

It's great to have special extra ascensions that have to be accessed with some extra task. I think that's a cool thing to include.
But that task needs to be available in Act 2 alongside the first ascension.

We need to be able to get a low level Kulemak invitation to become Abyssal Liches in the early campaign, so that we actually get to play the game as Abyssal Liches. Why care about an ascension I can't access early enough to get to use it?

As it stands, it still feels like they aren't in the game.
You don't get to play as an Abyssal, you have to do everything as not-your-build then unlock it after your done. Pointless.
It's like having your favorite weapon in the game be the reward for 100%ing the game so there's nothing to use the weapon for.


--
A currency so rare and lately obtained I'll never possess any is exactly the same as a currency that doesn't exist in the first place.
You tried to "improve" the currency and crafting systems by adding in tiers of currency, but what you actually did was make both currency and crafting less accessible than ever before.

Ever orb that doesn't have a name starting with "perfect" is too unlikly to get mods of tiers that don't brick the item, making the perfects the only ones worth ever even trying to use for crafting.
As such, I cannot afford to even try crafting.

I have no perfect orbs. I have single digit greater aug/trans, no greater regals or exalts.
By the time I have any perfects whatsoever, or an amount of greaters that matters, the league will be over.
For all intents and purposes, the higher tier orbs don't exist.

Likewise, all these omens and perfect essences that are needed to actually get anywhere with crafting, also functionally do not exist.
They are too rare, the only become obtainable far too late, the game is played as if they were not in the game, and by the time one has any, it's too late to use them because the league has ended.

Greater orbs need to already be dropping in the campaign.
Perfect orbs need to already be dropping as early as T3-5 maps.
And this is without stacking rarity on the character.

Rituals for omens need to start appearing during campaign.
Perfect essences should be liable to spawn as soon as you hit maps.
I'd say expeditions should be happening in campaign so we can use recombinator, if the recombinator wasn't a joke that can never be expected to work anyway.

The crafting system, and therefor all the currencies to use it, needs to be available for actual functional use throughout the entire game.
Crafting should already be satisfying to start using in Act 1, instead you have to be Scrooge McDuck diving into a vault of gold before it's worth looking at the crafting bench.

A mechanic is supposed to be in the game so that you can use it while you play the game.
If you can't use the mechanic until you've already done most of what the game offers, that's the same as the mechanic just not being included in the first place.
"Congratulations you beat the final boss! You have unlocked the ability to dodge roll! Wouldn't it have been nice to have that in all those fights you already did?"

--
Those above notions also apply in various smaller ways.
Gear and gems as definding elements of a build, but only being usable too late in game, (or perhaps ceasing to be usable too early, in the case of low level uniques we might have wanted to use late game).

Take uniques. Or in some potential cases even non-unique but still special eqiupment.

Build defining uniques that a player is liable to make a special build for.
If there is a unique that has a build-defining function a player will want to do a run of the game using, then there should be both a high level and low level version of that unique (or a least high/low level but distinct versions of the function it serves in a build), or just one that you can start using early that scales up with you.

Pillar of the Caged God is a statstick weapon you can use from the beginning of the game, that then scales with you, albeit because its a statstick.
Pillar is an a example of a well designed build defining unique.

Imagine for me that Pillar had a minimum level requirement of 80.
So you couldn't actually use you statstick on your statstick build until very late in the game, having to play all that time without it.
I'm sure you can all acknowledge how annoying that would be, and that's how it feels with Abyssal Lich and the crafting system.

How about defining skill gems?
Companions. Tame beast.
Why, pray tell, does my companion build character have to be halfway through campaign before they can make the Tame Beast gem to actually have a companion?
If I'm playing as a companion build, I want want to play using the companion build. I want to already be speccing into companion clusters and have my first pet in Act 1, maybe the beginning of 2. Instead I was already in Act 3 before I could make the gem. It's not as egregious as these other examples of things that I have to have already basically beaten the game to use but it's still something that could be doable sooner.

--
Finishing your build is not supposed to be the last thing you do, and it's not supposed to be something you have to finish the game in order to do.

Finishing your build is something thats supposed to happen while there's still a sizable amount of remaining content to do using the finished build.
That's the point of making the build. To get to use it.

I'm building to play using what I've made, not playing to make it.
Let me make it early enough that I actually get to play using it.

just no

every player goes with a leveling build and end endgame build

you're asking to be spoonfed with a LADLE lol

+1 Shouldn't need a "levelling" and an "endgame" build
Should be able to get through the campaign and finish it without needing to make detrimental tweaks the second you get to endgame, Tweaks should be made all throughout campaign to GET US READY FOR ENDGAME!

Dont even get our third ascension untill after campaign??? When I discovered that initially lost alotta motivation to try other builds, I have to dedicate this much time to 1 character???? They have made it nescasary to have 2 different builds, 1 to quickly rush through, then 1 to actually play the game...

Even certain skill gems like galvanic shards and shockburst rounds, I main galvanic shards for horde and shockburst for solo, its a perfect combo, yet you dont get shockburst rounds till what skill gem 11? Galvanic shards can be gotten at skill gem 5... so whole campaign pre much caters towards armour piercing rounds + high velocity for single target, galvanic for horde, then second I reach skill gem level 11 never touch high velocity or armour piercing again as I just wanna be pure lightning, certain ways the campaign has been setup and gears us towards is contrary and opposite to the flow of current endgame...

It was nice in POE1 to play your main skill by latest lvl28 and see how the build develops over time through the campaign.

I don't care about the rest of the stuff but at least let the skill gems all be unlocked early enough. Playing another skill for a long time just to swap into the one you want to play later just feels awkward/bad.

Letting us have more skill options early enough will also make the campaign feel less repetitive.

One of the awful aspects is that you can make it past level 50 before knowing that your brainstorm build just absolutely will not work. I’m sure a lot of that is experience and knowledge of what is and isn’t effective.
It has to be.

With that being said, the new players don’t see it like that.
If they go in blind reasonably thinking it could be a fun video game, they’ll hit a wall and quit.
Less population means less revenue.

"

Jobama#9902 wrote:

+1 Shouldn't need a "levelling" and an "endgame" build
Should be able to get through the campaign and finish it without needing to make detrimental tweaks the second you get to endgame, Tweaks should be made all throughout campaign to GET US READY FOR ENDGAME!

Dont even get our third ascension untill after campaign??? When I discovered that initially lost alotta motivation to try other builds, I have to dedicate this much time to 1 character???? They have made it nescasary to have 2 different builds, 1 to quickly rush through, then 1 to actually play the game...

Even certain skill gems like galvanic shards and shockburst rounds, I main galvanic shards for horde and shockburst for solo, its a perfect combo, yet you dont get shockburst rounds till what skill gem 11? Galvanic shards can be gotten at skill gem 5... so whole campaign pre much caters towards armour piercing rounds + high velocity for single target, galvanic for horde, then second I reach skill gem level 11 never touch high velocity or armour piercing again as I just wanna be pure lightning, certain ways the campaign has been setup and gears us towards is contrary and opposite to the flow of current endgame...

you don't "need" it, it's just more efficient
having everything available immediately with no changes in how you're playing as you progress is just bad imo

"

tdonov5#2743 wrote:

just no

every player goes with a leveling build and end endgame build

you're asking to be spoonfed with a LADLE lol

I am not asking to be spoonfed.

I am asking to be allowed to eat with my spoon if I want to use a spoon, and allowed to eat with my fork if I want to use a fork.

I should not have to use the spoon until I unlock the fork, nor have to use the fork until I unlock the spoon.
Both should be available from the start so I get to play with the build I want.

Having a separate build to level with and only change to the other in endgame is just bad design.
Expecting to switch from X build to Y build instead of using the one you actually wanted the whole time is bad design.

I want to campaign and level with X build, then endgame with X build. Using it the whole way through.
Then on a different character I want to campaign and level with Y build, then endgame with Y build. Using it the whole way through.

It's about time, and spending it.
I picked X build, Y build, Z build, whichever one I chose, because I want to spend time playing that build. Not another build.
Getting to play as Y should not require wasting time playing X instead. You should just be able to play Y.

"

tdonov5#2743 wrote:

just no

every player goes with a leveling build and end endgame build

you're asking to be spoonfed with a LADLE lol

Would agree with this.

"

tdonov5#2743 wrote:

just no

every player goes with a leveling build and end endgame build

you're asking to be spoonfed with a LADLE lol

Not really? I understand what he is saying. Let us take companions for example, with the Druid coming out with the next league. I imagine they WILL do something like this for companions since companion druid is a whole thing. You have to wait to level 31 to get the Tame Beast gem. You get ONE companion unless you take the key notable that lets you get a second of a different type. This means that you are stuck resetting zones to try and get one of the 2 mods that are actually USEFUL on a companion, in Haste Aura or Increased Phys Damage aura. Why is there NOT currently a low level equivalent of the Witch summon gems that lets you get say... regular wolves or crows out? Both of which would fit quite nicely into a huntress or ranger build. Now, I understand they do not have every skill they intend to put in the game, in the game. There are still several classes to be released, with their requisite weapons and skills. But at the same time, if they intend for a playstyle to be played in the CURRENT game, it should be at some level playable from at the very latest the end of Act 1.

PS... I never use a separate build for levelling and endgame. If the build I am trying cannot actually make it through without needing major rework, then the build is bad and I start over. So not EVERY player goes with a levelling build/end game build. If I am going to be remaking the whole build anyway, I would rather replay the game with that build from the start.

"

Jitter912#4278 wrote:

"

tdonov5#2743 wrote:

just no

every player goes with a leveling build and end endgame build

you're asking to be spoonfed with a LADLE lol

[Removed by Support]

Although I agree with your point, I actually did try both. My first guy this league was an acolyte caster idea I knew that would work and sounded fun. I had NO idea of how long it would take for that ball to get rolling. My leveling experience with him this league was one of these worst, if not THE worst experience I have ever had leveling any character in any game. It was flat out awful.
My forum posts show how miserable the campaign was. I was ready to quit due to it. The numbers were there it just wasn't coming together until well past the campaign. It works now, great in fact. It didn't work at all during the campaign. My objective was to use the chaos nodes of the acolyte to boost chaos damage as a caster. All of the nodes are right there. Sure I made a few mistakes but they should not have been as significant as they turned out to be.

So, I didn't think I'd do it but I wanted to do a quarterstaff amazon but I always wanted to see what all of the fuss about lightning arrow was about so I thought I'd level that then switch after the awful campaign.
It's not even the same game.
It's not made by the same company. It's not sold in the same store. It's completely different. The contrast is so prevalent that it baffles me that it even came close to testing.