I had high hopes for this game. However, with Mike recently doubling down on a design philosophy of “the majority will never reach max level,” this game is now simply something I do not enjoy. I love getting to max level to theory craft and min/max builds. The modern ARPG design of the end game is where the game starts is something I enjoy. This game had so much potential there with tremendous alt replay value due to the innovative crafting and skill tree systems.
Making the journey from 1-100 a boring, overextended grind fest with an incomplete story and a repetitive corruption loop to get there is just bad design (I loved vanilla D2 too, but for the loot drops, not the 1-100 grind). Forcing people to do boring things while seeing no real progress of their character to extend play time due to the lack of a true endgame makes this game a giant pass in the future for me. Having forced myself to grind two characters to 100 and multiple in the 70-90 range, I dread doing it again when thinking of a new season. The 70-100 snooze grind has created zero desire to play new seasons. Sad, too, as I had many hours since beta and high hopes. At least D4 has improved, and POE2 is on the horizon.
The Devs may change this philosophy and establish a player base, giving a reason for me to return. However, being a small game, I fear it will be too late. Even if they change down the road after seeing how limited of a player base they maintained with the new update, the ship will have sailed. Wolcen 2.0, sigh.
Is the thing you are complaining about that reaching level 100 takes too long?
Or is it he lack of exciting endgame activities during the later stages of the game?
The point Mike wanted to make with this design decision, that EHG wants to avoid a situation where players are expected to reach maximim level and THEN continue doing other stuff.
The journey to level 100 includes all the different activities already and they don’t want to lock any game system behind level 100.
If your critism is the lack of things to do in the later stages of the game. Did you see the roadmap? Every single patch from 1.1 to 1.4 will have new endgame systems and activities.
I honestly don’t understand people saying that reaching level 100 takes too long, as a “bad” thing. The last few levels barely give you any power and you are not locked out of anything by not reaching those higher level.
As long as the activities you do while playing the game are fun, level 100 will come naturally anyway.
To further what Heavy said:
Mike was opposed to extending gameplay AFTER level 100. The question was about a system like paragon in D3. And he said, rightly so, that such a system makes it so that everyone feels like they have to reach level 100 so they can benefit from those post-100 bonuses.
That is what he said they wouldn’t do. We already have factions for post-100 grind.
It’s not likely that the leveling process will be changed from what it currently is.
It is the combination of making 100 take too long to cover up a lack of exciting endgame activities.
I also realize that some people like vanilla D2, with only the top percent making it to 100. I can see that this game may be designed around them. This is what D4 was doing, too, and it led to a max exodus of the player base and D4 bad memes. D4 has the reach to repair from this, and LE does not.
Again, I understand that perhaps Mike wants to cater to the fraction of the top percent player base. That is great, but it loses a lot of people. In doing so, it also loses streamers as there is no content to push or audience to push to. This, again, makes the game less noticeable and makes its population smaller and smaller.
Actually, if anything, the time it takes to reach level 100 is more influenced by PoE than D2. Only without the xp penalty cost.
No. The thing is that level 95 or level 100 makes almost no difference for theorycrafting. There aren’t many relevant things you need with those last few points.
So getting to level 100 is something that isn’t required and is meant more as an achievement for those players that care about that (most don’t).
I completely agree which is what i said in my video here. The devs are gonna speed run the game to its death with this one decision, and the choice of locking offline for a week will be the final nail.
I am glad you experience the game that way; I am sure others do. Unfortunately, I do not. Neither did the people I played with, who have all moved on. I guess time will tell if the majority of the population sees the game like you or sees the game like me.
If we judge by PoE, which does the exact same thing where the vast vast majority of players will never reach level 100, I’d say the majority of the target playerbase agrees.
Not everyone wants the same things. And some changes might even bring more people to the game, but would change the game identity.
I am still struggling to understand your exact critic.
Do you feel forced to reach 100? You are feeling that you are missing power from not being level 100? Or why do you feel the need to reach 100? Do you just want to “finish” the character?
It is totally ok if you persoanlly feel like you want to reach level 100 for a personal goal, but there is objectively not a lot of power in the last 10-15 levels.
We are talking about maybe 5-10% eHP or 0-5% more dmg.
This will not make or break any build or ability to do certain kinds of content.
The exact same build can be made with level ~80 and just missing the last 20 levels in terms of level up HP/Mana and passives will not make that build so muh stronger that it can do more stuff than the level 80 character.
LE is not pulling people from POE other than maybe a short break from POE. POE is better, and POE2 looks even better than that.
LE pulled people from D4. My guess is D4 streamers had a lot to do with that. Guess what? When that happened, D4 changed and pulled back all the players that tried out LE. The major complaint was exactly what I said, and when D4 changed from the long grind with no end game direction to quickly reaching the end game and expanding on the end game, players returned, and it got good reviews.
If LE is trying to target the POE player base, they have already lost. Again, when the new cycle launches, the data will come in, and we will see which perspective the majority of the player bases have.
I image you and Mike both. Which explains the max exodus from LE back to D4. When you only see the game from a narrow lens and do not even try to understand the perspective of the majority, you fail to reach a majority.
Like I said, perhaps LE wants around a 200 player player base going forward. I am just saying thanks for the memories. LE has some great innovative systems (skill tree, circle of fortune guild, crafting) that I really hope D4, POE2, and Grim Dawn implement or continue to implement in their games.
Reaching higher character levels and playing endgame are two different things.
By just doing the bare minimum with Passives and Idols slots you can be in endgame by the time you arel evel 40-45 already in LE. That is 3-6 hours playtime for most people.
LE is exactly the middle ground between PoE and Diablo in that aspect.
Having a certain character levle has nothing to do with it.
Max Character/Paragon level in D4 takes even longer than in reaching Level 100 in LE.
The reason D4 players left for LE is because D4 was just D3 2.0 and that’s not what the players wanted. It had nothing to do with them being a target for LE. They went to LE for the hype (and many won’t return) and because D4 was bad in a lot of aspects. But overall, D4 and LE aren’t competing because D4 wants the casual crowd and LE doesn’t really target them.
Most players will only play for a month, even in PoE. So many players stop playing shortly after the season/league/cycle starts and start a new game. Possibly another ARPG that has a cycle starting as well, like torchlight, LE or even D4.
Many players will keep cycling through games.
As for LE’s target playerbase, yes, it’s much closer to PoE than to D4. And this is because the main target audience is the older D2 playerbase. LE is mostly a mesh of D2 and PoE with a few things sprinkled in.
Finally, PoE being better is subjective. For example, I used to play PoE, left because of the grind burn and the huge power creep.
Currently, my opinion is that LE is better than PoE. But that will always be a personal thing and subjective.
As I said, most players won’t play more than a month in a single cycle/league. This is also true for D4 (even though they don’t release numbers because it’s not convenient). You’ll see another exodus back to LE with 1.1 starts, and you’ll see another exodus to PoE when the next league starts and you’ll see another exodus back to D4 when S5 starts.
First of, you should just speak for yourself and not on behalf of other parts of the community.
Secondly I am actively engaging in a discussion with you because I want to understand your perspective
But I fail to see it, because I think you expressed it very vaguely. You are throwing around with terms like endgame and max level but I don’t read any concise statement what exactly you complain about.
Maximum level and endgame activites are not directly related to each other and they are not synonymous
That’s generally not how seasonal games work. Did you ever wonder why the season start dates are all staggererd? Because there’s an overlap in the player base, possibly a significant one but I have no idea & no numbers to back that up. People play PoE/D4/etc for a few weeks then as they get bored they move to the other one as the new season starts & vice versa.
I’m not disagreeing with your initial premis, but what you’re saying here is based on a fundamental misunderstanding (though it will be correct for some part of the player base).
LE is targetting the mid-range of complexity, PoE is on the higher end & D4 the lower end, they have neither lost nor won.
We will see a big spike as people come back for the new stuff that drops off as they play through it. As I’ve said before, 1.1 will likely have a smaller peak than 1.2 which will likely have a smaller peak than 1.3, etc. It’ll take time to get back to the peak that 1.0 had. This does not mean that the game has failed & that it’s “daed gaem”.
When the new D4 season started & the lack of new content in 1.0? Funny that…
That’s an opinion. It’s very different for different people. I quite POE a long time ago and will never go back. Many people like LE better than POE, I know because they have said that so it’s not just my opinion on the matter.
So untrue. Even the D4 developers have stated people left because D4 was D2 2.0. All the D2 long grind mechanics that are in LE is why people left. The developers have stated this multiple times. You may like D2, and that is fine, but people left because D4 was too much like D2, and people came back when D4 was more like D3. Sorry, but facts matter more than your opinion.
No that is a fact based on player numbers and retention. You saying many people like LE better is an opinion based on zero data and your personal experience.
