POE2 disrespecting our time (Post-0.4.0)

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Valsacar#0268 wrote:

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Japonbu#0742 wrote:

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llindvior#2871 wrote:

What you want is "SSF Noob" or "SSF Pretend", ask them to add that.

Call it "SSF Employed", "SSF Adult", or "SSF I-Touch-Grass"—I don't care what the label is.

Last Epoch calls it Circle of Fortune, and it’s widely praised because it respects the player's time without removing the difficulty of the content.

You seem to be confusing Time Sink with Skill. Running the same map 500 times hoping for RNG to bless you isn't "skill". It's just tolerance for repetition. I want to test my mechanics against bosses, not test my patience against a slot machine.

If wanting a game loop that fits into a healthy lifestyle makes me a "noob" in your eyes, I’ll wear that badge happily.

SSF was created by PLAYERS to be a CHALLENGE. GGG later added it as an official mode, RESPECTING THE PLAYERS. If you don't like the challenge, then don't do it.

Point to a DEAD game as examples of what is good... not really the best idea. LE was brain dead easy, because of things like CoF dropping stupid amounts of "useable" loot. LE is dead, not in any small part because all of the "quality of life" and "respect our time" features makes for a game that offers no challenge and no reason to keep playing it.

I know the history perfectly well. But "Respecting the players" implies giving us a mode that is functionally playable without needing 3rd party tools, not just adding a toggle button that says "Good luck, loot is disabled."

And regarding your take on Last Epoch and "Dead Games": You are confusing Retention with Burnout.

People didn't quit Last Epoch because "the loot was too usable" or because the game respected their time. That is an absurd take.

Players quit when they feel their time is being wasted (Burnout).

Players play more when they can efficiently gear up and try new builds (Alt-holism).

If the game respects my time and I finish a character in 3 weeks instead of 2 months, I don't quit. I roll a second character. But if the game forces me to grind for 2 months just to make one character work, I quit the league entirely out of exhaustion.

QoL doesn't kill games. Tedium kills games. I'd rather play a "Developer-Assisted" game where I can actually experience the content, than a "Purist" game where I spend 90% of my time clicking chests for scraps.

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Sakanabi#6664 wrote:

3. SSF isn't about Knowledge, it's about Math. "Knowledge" doesn't change drop tables. The game's drop rates are balanced around thousands of players filtering items into a Trade Economy. When you apply those same rates to a Solo player, the math simply doesn't work without a massive time sink. I know how to craft and farm. The problem is that farming a specific Unique in SSF can take 100 hours of RNG, whereas in Trade, I could farm currency for 5 hours and buy it. Buffing SSF drops doesn't "trivialize" the game; it simply adjusts the math to account for the lack of trading.

That's a good thing about SSF imo - you don't play builds based on specific uniques unless you already dropped them. You play self-sufficient builds, you play with what you get not with what you want to get. Biggest part of the challenge is make a build which is powerful enough even without optimized gear or build-enabling unique.[/quote]

I mean thats your opinion. I can say i see it different. In SSF you should be able to achieve stuff without a huge time investment. The time difference you need to invest compared to Trade is very steep.

And i dont think people see SSF as a challange they see Hardcore as a challenge, but not SSF. People play SSF because they dont want to bother with trade, but they want to achieve the same stuff. Just slower, but not this slow.

And yes SSF is not a challenge imo[/quote]

And that's your opinion. I don't see a single reason why SSF cannot be a challenge mode. If devs decide it should be then it will be and I'm 100% for that decision. I don't play HC in any online game because dying to lag is not my vision of fun but getting things slowly on my own is.[/quote]

I respect your stance on HC. Losing a character to a server hiccup or lag spike is miserable, and I avoid HC for the exact same reason.

But we have to draw a line between "Challenge" and "Tedium".

You said: "If devs decide it should be then it will be." Sure, but devs can also make mistakes. They decided Druids should walk at a snail's pace in 0.4.0, and the community universally hated it. Just because it's a "decision" doesn't mean it's good design.

Challenge is beating a difficult boss with suboptimal gear because you played well. Artificial Difficulty is needing to run the same map 500 times because the drop rate is balanced for an economy you aren't participating in.

I’m fine with "getting things slowly." I’m not fine with "getting things so slowly that the League ends before I finish my build." There has to be a middle ground between "Free Loot" and "Second Job."

I respect your stance on HC. Losing a character to a server hiccup or lag spike is miserable, and I avoid HC for the exact same reason.

But we have to draw a line between "Challenge" and "Tedium".

You said: "If devs decide it should be then it will be." Sure, but devs can also make mistakes. They decided Druids should walk at a snail's pace in 0.4.0, and the community universally hated it. Just because it's a "decision" doesn't mean it's good design.

Challenge is beating a difficult boss with suboptimal gear because you played well. Artificial Difficulty is needing to run the same map 500 times because the drop rate is balanced for an economy you aren't participating in.

I’m fine with "getting things slowly." I’m not fine with "getting things so slowly that the League ends before I finish my build." There has to be a middle ground between "Free Loot" and "Second Job."

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Sakanabi#6664 wrote:

And that's your opinion. I don't see a single reason why SSF cannot be a challenge mode. If devs decide it should be then it will be and I'm 100% for that decision. I don't play HC in any online game because dying to lag is not my vision of fun but getting things slowly on my own is.

But gating it behind time investment isnt really challenging. Its just time. Thats not a challenge

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Japonbu#0742 wrote:

That is 2.5 Months.

Good thing you have 4 months.

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Valsacar#0268 wrote:

SSF was created by PLAYERS to be a CHALLENGE. GGG later added it as an official mode, RESPECTING THE PLAYERS. If you don't like the challenge, then don't do it.

Point to a DEAD game as examples of what is good... not really the best idea. LE was brain dead easy, because of things like CoF dropping stupid amounts of "useable" loot. LE is dead, not in any small part because all of the "quality of life" and "respect our time" features makes for a game that offers no challenge and no reason to keep playing it.

At least for me, my wish for SSF is not to be comparable with Trade; my wish for SSF is not to be unbearably unbalanced as in some of its current aspects [I made a list in previous comment]. Just that.

LE just needs more content... and a faster development cycle ;)

Great post I just want my 6 portals back tired of feeling like im playing hardcore when I dont want to.

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SoFaux#7759 wrote:

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Japonbu#0742 wrote:

That is 2.5 Months.

Good thing you have 4 months.

It’s not about having the time. It’s about the quality of that time.

Just because the server is open for 4 months doesn't mean the progression should be artificially stretched to fill it. I want to play PoE 2. I want to focus on this game. But I want to spend those 4 months actually playing the game—making multiple builds, pushing high-tier content, and experimenting.

I don't want to spend 3 of those months struggling just to get one character to a functional state because the drop rates are balanced for Trade.

Good Design: 4 months of fun, action, and rerolling new builds.

Current Design: 4 months of slow progression and RNG-gating.

Having "enough time" is not an excuse for bad pacing.

I feel you and I agree with you and I will keep supporting you and other and we will keep posting about this walking simulator and time wasting in their game every season untill we see the game go in the right direction.

If they are blind we will hold their hands and help them move forward.

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Valandhir#3958 wrote:

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llindvior#2871 wrote:

What you want is "SSF Noob" or "SSF Pretend", ask them to add that.

A broader set of modes hard/easier would actually do the game a world of good, in that you are right.

You're describing attack vectors. Characters can migrate from the SSF economy to the trade economy. Advantages in SSF could be exploited for use in trade.

GGG could re-imagine the entire league structure. There's risk in changing a formula that has been profitable for years. (Remember that Last Epoch is losing money, while the PoE's are not.) But it's possible at least from a technical perspective, to stop some characters from migrating out of micro-leagues. In terms of prioritization, long after the full game and endgame is shipped and stable.

To repeat my own feedback: I like things the way they are.