Lmao sites like this that show player count arent accurate.
That site isnt reliable
I actually went to check the page and their graph shows “Max players daily” in LE as 4.4 million during 1.0 peak 
PoE had 7 million
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You are doing the same thing you complained about:
PoE’s system and Last Epoch’s system are basically the same.
Actually, there is a big difference between both: in LE you get a skill you can only get with that mastery and you are locked out of 4 skills and a bunch of passives.
So they would be basically the same if ascendancy gave you a new skill and you could no longer use certain skills and couldn’t access the top right part of the skill tree.
It might not seem like an important distinction, but it actually is, because it makes your choices matter more.
In PoE, while ascendancies are definitely pretty strong and important, you basically get to choose 8 out of 16 for each one. And most of the times the choices are the same.
But in LE choosing your mastery is actually much more impactful.
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And open world with exploration.
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The problem you’re not getting is that Ascendency is closer to something like the advancements in Black Desert Online. You can start as a class and then turn on the advanced class which changes your primary weapon and some skills, but you can swap off of it at any point. The Mastery Class in Last Epoch is more like the advancements in something like Dungeon Fighter Online. Priest-F becomes Hellkite becomes Inferno, you can’t go backwards and become a Hellkite again after becoming an Inferno.
Not every game has to allow “unlimited freedom.” This has been a design choice since the dawn of time for LE, not unlike Grim Dawn where you cant undo your second class pick without using modding tools.
If gear for another subclass is dropping this frequently, sell it and buy gear for your subclass. We were given the 2 guilds for a reason.
Last Epoch: I pick Sentinel. I’m a Sentinel till I reach The End of Time, then I pick Forge Guard. That’s my new class, Forge Guard.
Path of Exile: I pick Witch. I’m a Witch till I do the Lord’s Labyrinth, then I pick an ascendancy and become a Necromancer. That’s my new class, Necromancer.
Seems like it’s similar to me?
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You can undo your ascendancy in PoE, the equivalent is Titan Quest or Grim Dawn, where you are 100% locked in after picking your second class.
As a new player, it may take what, 2 hours to get to the end of time? As a vet, maybe 45 mins if that? This was a design choice, people are mad that the game they paid for is giving them reason to keep playing?
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Zoomer FOMO slaves are mad that they have to stick with a choice instead of being able to flip to whatever they currently perceive as the most optimal character setup.
Which is hilarious, because you’ll never find them complaining they can’t switch from a Sentinel to an Acolyte even though there is no actual difference between locking in your Mastery an hour into the game and if you locked it in at the character creation screen. The only reason they think there’s not is because they use spreadsheets made by other people to lie to themselves about how smart they are.
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Take my like, I couldnt have said it better myself.
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Yes, and PoE decided to forego character identity in terms of building one heavily but instead focus in a lot more on the backstory part being different (even if it’s not impactful).
LE decided to lock in onto that aspect.
So? Ups and down for each of them, flavor, flavor can be discussed but has no answer.
Interesting term, leave the FOMO aspect out since it has nothing of that and we’re golden 
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Ya anytime a person uses PoE as a sample character identity the convo stops there, beyond ascendancies and what your toon physically looks like, anything can be anything. My witch may use a bow to cast a spell, what are you up to ranger?
Class identity is a design choice, and there is nothing inherently wrong with it. Especially when there are distinct archetypes which can put together something totally different from the next guy despite having the same group of skills.
LE accomplishes this quite well imo. For those who feel differently, what is your take on D4? Do you enjoy the options available to you for each class? I sure the hell dont, Minecraft Dungeons almost has as much diversity.
Give the game some time to cook and it may turn into something people look back on, imo it is already sitting as a solid 2nd behind PoE in regards to modern arpgs.
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Just to clarify one thing :
The current situation already is a compromise. And as a compromise nobody is fully happy with it, but you have to do with it to content as many as possible.
Typically, I am not happy with the passive respec part. A gold cost is so negligible it makes using the system at all feel like you are losing almost all character identity. If anything, I’d rather have respeccing a passive make you lose 10% of current level’s XP and deleveling your character when relevant (and being able to overlevel max level a little to be able to avoid losing it at the slightest build correction), to make it actually meaningful, without being so punishing it becomes impossible to make changes.
The whole point is that there are players that like playing THEIR character, and the limitations to switching builds are what makes their character a unique one that isn’t all characters at once. A little like in tabletop role-playing games, where your character is defined by the unique choices you made to react to what happens in the campaign.
And then there are players that like the convenience to switch between whatever build they feel like playing at any moment. And for them any hurdle to respeccing is a bad thing and needs to be removed.
That being said, there’s not one right group and one wrong group. It’s a matter of personal preference, and the game has to try to make a compromise to accommodate its target demographic, and try to get as many extra players as possible.
A significant part of the player base here is one that hated Diablo 3’s lack of commitment to a build, and as such do not want the same thing to happen here. Last Epoch will definitively lose us if they remove the last hurdles to respec, just as they are going to lose OP if they aren’t willing to remove all hurdles. It’s a matter of compromise.
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Yep, as mentioned, flavor. Flavor isn’t right or wrong, it just targets different ideas which aren’t able to exist at the same time.
You’re 100% right.
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This only works because you cut out the second part of my Last Epoch section. My full quote was:
Is Witch to Necromancer a permanent choice? No, it’s not. I can’t believe you tried to use my own quote against me by leaving out details that I specifically wrote. Normally people do that with someone else’s quote.
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I completely agree about the gold cost being negligible, but I completely disagree about losing exp and levels on respec. That’s overly punishing in my opinion, which is why I also completely agree with the next part of your post lol
It’s impossible to make everyone happy, I think a better compromise would be to add a Time Rift dungeon that takes you to that place with all the Shades of yourself. Make it scale with your current level in a way that it’s challenging. Put a boss fight from the pool of campaign bosses you’ve faced so far (based on quest progression) at the end. Clearing it gives a full passive respec.
Could be accessed through the current Respec Lady and it already fits because she’s researching Time Rifts anyway.
Edit: it’s implied, but I wanted to say it explicitly, the Respec could even be explained lore wise as you wiping away the past version of yourself and undoing what has already been done through wibbly wobbly timey whimey stuff. This change would make respeccing passive points more of a chore to decentivize changing passives all the time, while also not punishing the player too much with the exp loss or limited respecs (looking at you D2)
I’m perfectly happy and content with the way mastery locks in and the way skill resets happen.
I think a lot of people barely even notice.
I think a distinct minority don’t like it. Which is why about once every three weeks we get a post disclaiming this fact.
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That would actually be the worst of all worlds. It would completely cull the ability to correct mistakes on a character when it’s too weak, and make the switch between OP builds too easy.
I think passive respec is fine as it is. You don’t usually respec your passives too much unless you’re switching builds and when you do you always switch your skills/skill trees, so you’re capped by that penalty already.
We could use QoL with passive respec, so we don’t have to confirm each point we remove and we don’t have to keep opening and closing respec/passive assign, but otherwise I don’t think passive respec is an issue.
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