Feedback on Abnormal Drop Rates and Mechanism Optimization in China Regional Studio Team Packing

Feedback on Abnormal Drop Rates and Mechanism Optimization in China Regional Studio Team Packing


I am a player who has been involved with Path of Exile since the purchase of the beta codes for Path of Exile 1, and I was also among the first to experience the first seasons of both Path of Exile 1 and Path of Exile 2. As a relatively experienced Diablo series player, I have some suggestions regarding the current issue of abnormal drop rates in the past two seasons.

First, I fully appreciate GGG's encouragement of group play, which is similar to the KB (Kill Baal) and KC (Kill Countess) gameplay styles from the original Diablo Battle.net. However, the issue lies in how the stacked drop mechanism has profoundly impacted the game's economy and core gameplay. Since most Path of Exile players are young or middle-aged adults who don't have the time for disciplined, scheduled group play, nearly 90% of the player base hopes to enjoy the game in their spare time by constructing their own builds and investing effort into high-difficulty maps to obtain currency and high-tier equipment drops for satisfaction. Yet, this stacked drop mechanism has disrupted the experience for the majority of players.

A significant portion of the player base consists of studios, the common enemy of both GGG and players. Like locusts, they spread across the game, using extreme and unbalanced methods to obtain large quantities of valuable items and profit from them, thereby destabilizing the in-game economy. This has led to a massive loss of regular players. As someone who is also involved in the game industry, I am well aware that when a game's player base continues to decline, it becomes a disaster for the game studio's revenue. In other words, if I play the game normally every day, diligently crafting a build I'm proud of, and battling through high-difficulty maps, only to see my rewards dwarfed by those who exploit the stacked drop rates to the extreme—thousandths of a percent—I doubt I'd be in the mood to purchase cosmetics or make additional purchases on the official website. After all, I'm not having fun in the process.

Studios take advantage of the stacked drop rates, with a single map sometimes yielding 80 or more Divine Orbs. This is unacceptable to me and severely damages the game's economy, planting seeds of future instability. If every season, players fear studio group farming and no longer want to invest time and effort into building their own characters because the effort-to-reward ratio is severely imbalanced, it will be detrimental to the game's future.

The above are the issues I've identified.

My suggestions are as follows: First, balance group play through rarity weighting. For example, in Diablo 2's KB (Kill Baal), many people participate, often referred to as 8PP mode, and everyone enjoys it. However, the drop rate does not increase to an extreme extent. The advantages of group farming—more monsters and faster clearing speed—can still be highlighted, but the stacked drop rates should not result in an excessive, massive output of currency, which is unhealthy.

The second approach is to implement separate drops for group players after applying rarity weighting. This way, the benefits of grouping are still evident. For instance, if one player has a 100% rarity and another has 0%, after weighting, both might end up around 50%, and they would receive two monster drops. Additionally, I hope the official will set a treasure grade curve for extremely high rarity (commonly referred to as MF, Magic Find) to keep it within a normal range, such as 200-300%. When this range is significantly exceeded, the currency drop rate should not increase substantially; instead, there could be more equipment drops, yellow items, or dye items. I believe this could be an excellent solution.

In past feedback, I have been satisfied with GGG's speed and approach to addressing issues, and I hope this time they will provide some response to my feedback. As for whether it will be adopted, I don't hold high hopes—perhaps the official has a better solution. But as a devoted fan of Path of Exile 2, these are words I felt I needed to say.