[Megathread] Path of Exile

[Dezerte]

I think trading needs to be annoying, to discourage it. If they make it too easy and comfortable (like the AH in D3) it could very well cause the same issues to PoE as it did for D3. But I don't know if that is really the real reason, as I imagine determined players are going to use trading either way.

On a personal note, I'd love a balanced self-found league where drop rates are adjusted for a no-trading economy.

[I Push Buttons]

I think trading needs to be annoying, to discourage it. If they make it too easy and comfortable (like the AH in D3) it could very well cause the same issues to PoE as it did for D3. But I don't know if that is really the real reason, as I imagine determined players are going to use trading either way.

On a personal note, I'd love a balanced self-found league where drop rates are adjusted for a no-trading economy.

But they don't discourage it. It is entirely encouraged since there is no smart loot in this game. Unless you have tens of thousands of hours to spend mindlessly grinding, you can literally never get the specific things you need for any particular build (unless its some generic build where the gear doesn't particularly matter). Even with the tens of thousands of hours of grinding you probably wouldn't even get what you seek.

The loot in this game is basically built around trading.

[Dezerte]

But they don't discourage it. It is entirely encouraged since there is no smart loot in this game. Unless you have tens of thousands of hours to spend mindlessly grinding, you can literally never get the specific things you need for any particular build (unless its some generic build where the gear doesn't particularly matter). Even with the tens of thousands of hours of grinding you probably wouldn't even get what you seek.

The loot in this game is basically built around trading.

So was D3, perhaps more so with the RMAH. What I was getting at is that making trading too easy, too accessible might shift the meta of the game like it did for D3. And this is perhaps one big reason why GGG isn't so keen on having e.g. an AH.

[endersblade]

You sure your builds weren't fucked? Every character I've made has been a breeze until around 80, that's when I actually start buying gear for them. Until then I throw a few alchemy orbs at some good grey base items and just run with that. I also noticed people who die a lot ignore resists, which you simply can't do.
Most builds finish at 92, so it sucks you never got to see your builds complete and taking down shaper and stuff. I really don't get what's so hard about the trading system. Is it that people just don't want to or know how to interact with other people? Even when the majority of the interaction is click accept, go to hideout, click trade, done? I've used poe trade so many times, never had any issues. I actually prefer it to any in game ah, since I can be so specific in what I'm looking for when searching.

I'm resist capped on everyone, and most have positive Chaos res too.

The trading sucks because you spend so much time trying to get an actual response from people. I can't tell you how many times I've found just the absolute perfect item for a price I could afford, and then spent hours or even days trying to get the person to fucking respond to me. Like, why even post shit for sale if you aren't going to actually sell it? And that's just one example. Dealing with hostile players, people who get pissed off at you for whispering them, people who try to charge you for more after you show up, people who try to straight up rip you off...the problem with the trade system isn't trading, it's the other fucking players.

If THAT is what GGG wants to use to make the trade system 'balanced', then fuck them. Nobody should have to deal with a negative experience like that, nor should GGG actually SUPPORT it.

[Deleted]

I think trading needs to be annoying, to discourage it.

Sorry but i do strongly disagree.
You want to discourage it? then disable it, otherwise make it as easy and scam proof as possible.
With this method you do only encourage scamming, and shady practices.

[Dezerte]

Sorry but i do strongly disagree.
You want to discourage it? then disable it, otherwise make it as easy and scam proof as possible.
With this method you do only encourage scamming, and shady practices.

I meant if GGG wants to prevent PoE from potentially suffering the same problems that D3 did with their AH, then this would be a concern for GGG.

[Coldkil]

I meant if GGG wants to prevent PoE from potentially suffering the same problems that D3 did with their AH, then this would be a concern for GGG.

Exactly. When trading is easy (AH or similar tools), then it becomes exponentially more efficient than playing the game. It's not being scam proof. It's being able to full deck a character without playing the game at all.

[Deleted]

I meant if GGG wants to prevent PoE from potentially suffering the same problems that D3 did with their AH, then this would be a concern for GGG.

If they wanted that, i do think they would go the same route D3 went with ROS.
I am not a person too keen on conspiracy theories, but the trading system being so cluncky, and as @I Push Buttons pointed out, the absence of smart loot, it is only explained if they somehow benefit from the shady system or if they do have any technical issue preventing them from implementing a far better trading system.

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Exactly. When trading is easy (AH or similar tools), then it becomes exponentially more efficient than playing the game. It's not being scam proof. It's being able to full deck a character without playing the game at all.

Yep, but you could also implement a mixed system, an efficient and easy AH with limitations, so you do not destroy the game, but you prevent the scamming and the clunkiness of the trading.
For example, you can trade a reasonable maximum of loot pieces in a given time period, beyond that you go back to grinding, so no one will get full decked via trading unless they want to wait a long time for doing so.

[Coldkil]

Yep, but you could also implement a mixed system, an efficient and easy AH with limitations, so you do not destroy the game, but you prevent the scamming and the clunkiness of the trading.
For example, you can trade a reasonable maximum of loot pieces in a given time period, beyond that you go back to grinding, so no one will get full decked via trading unless they want to wait a long time for doing so.

Sure, they could. I'm not saying it's not reasonable, but i think they are just going the safe route. It works for now and there's quite a balance. Also, it's worth noting that most of the trade is done by a small percentage of the playerbase because of the annoyance and the fact economy is completely flawed and run by people who accumulated so much currency over the years. Most people play solo and never trade.

While i think that yes, there's way to make the thing better, then it's up to GGG to choose if and how. Basically, it's not worth to them. They give something that it's already present but official (a website to search for trades) but then it's up to you.

[cudomix]

I have no problem with items being hard to trade, but currency can be a nightmare sometimes. Getting 1000+ fusing is a clusterfuck between converting your assorted stuff into more sellable stuff, following market trends, scammers and price fixers, afk people etc... It's probably an intentional decision to reduce amount of good items, but as someone who absolutely adores min-maxing sheer tediousness of currency trading burns me out fairly quickly. Shame, because game keeps getting better and better.

[Redblade]

Agree. Though this is on line with their philosophy - they cannot stop people making third party stuff to make trading easier. Instead they provide an official source while they take steps so trades don't become so easy people will just buy everything right on start.

People complained that they had to go to a third party site...GGG fixed it and the very same people still complain. They want an AH and nothing but an AH will stop their moaning, any other argument from the same people is just a means to that end. And as GGG them selves stated that there will never be an AH in PoE it's fair to say that no matter how much they complain it won't happen.

[blackblade]

Just straight forward: look at what the AH/RMAH did to D3. It was just better to buy your stuff than actually playing the game. Trading needs to be integrated but not a prominent aspect. And this is a very big proof.

The D3 ah was exasperated by the fact that gold was basically useless in game, the range of rolls on drops was waaay to wide, and it was incredibly easy to use.

Moving from that to Absolutely 0 trade, was probably a mistake though.

[Redblade]

I have to disagree with this personally. My biggest draw to this game wasn't farming for the items I wanted. That has always been the single worst part about Diablo-esque games. I only really started enjoying a class when it came to fruition. I have all the required uniques, I have really good but not too expensive rares, and just raping through maps. Before that point it takes me so much effort to play a new character, because they just suck so much until you get the gear, gems, and talents required to make the full build work.

So basically you hate the genre and only want to play fully developed characters...here's a suggestion for you, play singe player games where you can cheat.

It's why I ultimately gave up on this game. GGG seemed hellbent on nerfing builds, making gear hard to obtain, making crafting fucking impossible and expensive, and make trade is hard and unreliable as possible. I got one of each class up to about 75ish, to a point where I couldn't advance without getting better, more optimized, more expensive gear, and stopped playing. I hit a wall on each character, got tired of dying and losing all that experience, and finally just gave up.

Since open beta the game as become much much easier through power creep and nerfs has always been a part of the game in order to shift the meta. Gear is easier to get now by magnitudes, crafting is not only easier than ever and cheaper by magnitudes. Trade has also been made much much easier and now won't "require" a third party site even.

PoE is a game you play long term, it's designed as such and knowledge is king. For example I could take a char to 75 in two days max without buying a single piece of gear if I had to. Only using currency found on said char to buy gear and I could easily clear up to and including T15 maps. Either your builds were bad or you just give up way to easily...

[XDurionX]

Exactly. When trading is easy (AH or similar tools), then it becomes exponentially more efficient than playing the game. It's not being scam proof. It's being able to full deck a character without playing the game at all.

Except that all of this doesn't affect prices of items at all. If you can "complete" your character with an AH, you can do so without as well. It just takes more time. Time that is not fun at all. This is about QoL, not about game mechanics.

[Redblade]

Yep, but you could also implement a mixed system, an efficient and easy AH with limitations, so you do not destroy the game, but you prevent the scamming and the clunkiness of the trading.
For example, you can trade a reasonable maximum of loot pieces in a given time period, beyond that you go back to grinding, so no one will get full decked via trading unless they want to wait a long time for doing so.

Not possible as it's a F2P game where you can have literally as many accounts as you want.

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Except that all of this doesn't affect prices of items at all. If you can "complete" your character with an AH, you can do so without as well. It just takes more time. Time that is not fun at all. This is about QoL, not about game mechanics.

So you get how the restriction on trade works but fail to see why it's there?

If I were to make a popular build and sat down to buy everything I needed before I started leveling it would take me the better part of a day to figure out what I wanted/needed, calculate resists to balance them and make sure I'm EW capped, find sellers that are around to sell and possibly haggle of some prices.

With an AH I'd do the same in a 30 min to an hour...

On the other end of that most of the things I sell has a value of 10c or more as anything less than that after the first week or two of a league is just not worth the hassle...with an AH I'd simply list everything that had a potential value. And so would everyone else thus flooding the market with items making everything but the top 5% of items worth anything.

The losers in this scenario are the casual players who won't find any of those 5% items to actually see some real currency.

[XDurionX]

Not possible as it's a F2P game where you can have literally as many accounts as you want.

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So you get how the restriction on trade works but fail to see why it's there?

If I were to make a popular build and sat down to buy everything I needed before I started leveling it would take me the better part of a day to figure out what I wanted/needed, calculate resists to balance them and make sure I'm EW capped, find sellers that are around to sell and possibly haggle of some prices.

With an AH I'd do the same in a 30 min to an hour...

On the other end of that most of the things I sell has a value of 10c or more as anything less than that after the first week or two of a league is just not worth the hassle...with an AH I'd simply list everything that had a potential value. And so would everyone else thus flooding the market with items making everything but the top 5% of items worth anything.

The losers in this scenario are the casual players who won't find any of those 5% items to actually see some real currency.

Farming the currency takes the same amount of time. The prices for items are the same, assuming equal drop rates. The only difference is, that in one scenario i spend 10 minutes in the AH, in the other scenario i spend 10 hours spamming whispers. Annoying for sellers and especially annoying for buyers. If you want to scare away players, the latter is the way to go.

Items are valuable because they're rare, not because i have to sit in my hideout for 12 hours to get them.

[Redblade]

Farming the currency takes the same amount of time. The prices for items are the same, assuming equal drop rates. The only difference is, that in one scenario i spend 10 minutes in the AH, in the other sceario i spend 10 hours spamming whispers. Annoying for sellers and especially annoying for buyers. If you want to scare away players, the latter is the way to go.

Ok as you still don't seem to get it. If they make trading take 10 time less time, drop rates would have to be cut by at least 10 as well. Is that clear enough?

Items are valuable because they're rare, not because i have to sit in my hideout for 12 hours to get them.

They are rare because a lot of people don't want the hassle of trading and because out of the items that are available only 10-25% or so are ever online at the same time. An AH means 100% is online at any given time and isn't subject to AFK issues meaning everything becomes much more common from an availability standpoint.

[XDurionX]

Ok as you still don't seem to get it. If they make trading take 10 time less time, drop rates would have to be cut by at least 10 as well. Is that clear enough?



They are rare because a lot of people don't want the hassle of trading and because out of the items that are available only 10-25% or so are ever online at the same time. An AH means 100% is online at any given time and isn't subject to AFK issues meaning everything becomes much more common from an availability standpoint.

That's bullshit. That would only be true if the game consisted of trading only. Which it doesn't.

If you prefer waiting for someone to reply to your whisper, feel free. I'd prefer PLAYING THE ACTUAL GAME.

[Redblade]

That's bullshit. That would only be true if the game consisted of trading only. Which it doesn't.

If you prefer waiting for someone to reply to your whisper, feel free. I'd prefer PLAYING THE ACTUAL GAME.

It's been true for every game I played since the dawn of internet including PoE. When they added public stash tabs you noticed straight away how it affected prices on items and forced you to adapt how you approached trading.

But what do I know about trading, I'm pretty small time and this is my currency after playing Harbinger for about 4-5 weeks...

[XDurionX]

snip

Grats i guess? If you want trading to be shitty for the sake of being shitty, PoE is your game. For me it's the reason why i stopped playing.