My quick thoughts on this topic. Currently the only leaderboard is for the arena, and most of the competition comes early into the cycle such as first 100 or first boss kill. By mid cycle, all this hypes dies down, players leave, and anyone playing is kinda in limbo just waiting for next cycle.
I think making changes mid-cycle would not impact the enjoyment or experience for the majority of players (currently). I also believe that not making these changes hinders the games ability to catch up with other ARPG’s. If EHG is a small studio, then they are already behind in development power compared to company’s like GGG and Blizzard. How does restricting content from being updated sooner make sense?
If you mean buffs, then they will once they are ready and tested.
But it’s been a debated topic already about nerfs and their stance is that they don’t want to nerf mid-cycle because it takes away from player investment.
If you start the cycle with a self-made build based on tooltips / direct info, then that should be what you can achieve. Nerfing/'balancing" interactions halfway through the cycle makes players feel punished for trying out new things and is even worse for the longevity of the game.
Plus, a lot of players rotate through several ARPGs (D4, PoE, GD, LE,…) so they are always gonna leave after a month or so to go play the other season/league/cycle. Adding half-cycle patches isn’t gonna change that.
Not nerfs and buffs so much but, actual changes. A couple of examples, changing how nodes spawn in monos so they generate more gear type nodes and not so many key, affix, glyphs and runes. Or adding a couple of nodes to skill trees that feel very lack luster such as werebear, giving the ability to proc EQ and Nado, not just maelstrom.
