Remove Honour from the ascension trial or something similar, make it an endgame challenge. But yeah I'm literally on the fence about leveling a warrior until some changes come through 😂
I've done it with both the warrior the witch and the Monk and I found it insanely easy and I was confused about what everybody was complaining about. I feel like everybody's looking at the classes to one dimensionally. 88% of the trial you don't have to fight anybody. You just have to avoid and get to the end. Then the boss you just keep hitting with magna blast and totems and use a bow as well. Remember just because you're one class you can use skills and weapons from other classes right. Every time I see somebody like my buddies complaining about it's hard. It's usually just because of a bad build decision simple as that.
I started poe2 as a warrior and it is pain. Extremely loot depending and slow class. Though I just got a unique gloves that allow my warrior to use ANY mele weapons and skills by changinga their requirements to strength. I bet that will change rhe dynamic quite a bit
@@BigKnecht Started a warrior last night with plans to go titan, with the few leveling uniques I've dropped on my main characters, yeah it's not bad at all!
Definitely agree. Act 1-3 was very difficult but enjoyable. I used a blood mage witch with DD as my main. I’m in act 3 of cruel and just blasting. Can’t wait for maps!
@@MartinVetorri As a WoW player since 2004 that slowly watched the soul sucked out of it to cater to every audience out there, I couldn't agree more! 🍻
Great review! I also enjoy the removal of life nodes on the passive tree and how meaningful rares (and even sometimes magic items) are now as drops in the wild. If they bring scour and alteration back into the game, then we'll be back to square one only picking up the best bases and ignoring 99% of all inferior rares/other items. One can argue that looking for the best/certain bases is still a thing, for sure it is, but it's so much more worth picking up every rare and good magic bases. Without being able to "reset" an item via scouring orbs it actually feels amazing to find something great, or to even just pick up items knowing they could be amazing, that no one can just "easily" craft something better. Loot got so much more valuable now, really enjoying that. And no more endlessly spamming hundreds to thousands of alts on items is a blessing. I wish that better essences would be a more frequent drop though. Since we're using them on magic items and can't just reroll the items, they'd still feel very meaningful even if they dropped ten times as much as now (only dropped a single greater essence so far). And fully agree on runes removal - or at least being able to overwrite them with new ones (since runes drop a ton). As for the endgame: Yea, they pivoted into endgame development very late, and it shows. Good thing is that the endgame is a continous process, new leagues (we even get EA leagues at some point), slowly introducing us to new & old content. In regards to the infinite atlas: Not sure how much I like it yet. On one hand it's cool to be able to explore an endless map and be able to pick out of so many options/maps for each waystone, but there's a definitive lack of having a clear goal (getting to the center of the atlas in old PoE1, or completing the atlas felt very satisfying). Infinite exploration tends to feel less meaningful. Maybe GGG can find a middleground somehow, introducing pathways guiding the endgame route while keeping the atlas infinite. I'd not mind an entirely different, finite atlas, but time will tell how much they want to change the design. We have to remind ourselves that they changed the atlas substantially in PoE1 across the years, similar things can happen for PoE2. The watchtower system is definitely great / better than PoE1 imo once we have lots of different league content to pick from. Lastly, the removal of on-death effects would be greatly appreciated. We shall see, I'm not too hopeful. It definitely doesn't feel great having to watch my step every second, fearing some already killed monster detonates underneath me. Oh, and found my first perfect jewelers orb today. :D Happy Holidays everyone!
I have essence on my atlas and get one in my map fairly frequently, I've only dropped around 3 greater essences so I definitely agree there! And with Essences solving the 100% RNG issue, they definitely need to be more plentiful for us to use on good items for a semi-targeted regal. Whoa you dropped one!? Big congrats 👀
New PoE player here. I agree with most of your points. The game is a good base for Early Access and it will only get better. But Maps need some work. I am about to start my third character (witch after monk and Merc) just to learn more about build crafting/following to understand the why of each decision.
Literally what I've leveled so far too lol I have a 90 Invoker, an 85 Witchhunter and planned to make a caster of some sort next! Welcome to Wraeclast 🍻
Honestly, what you said about the matching your gem colors on gear is exactly why i wished i wasnt broke so i could get PoE2 (finally got it!) Another thing, i heavily agree with the “looking at my characters feet” vibe. This isnt a bullet hell, and it may help some people, but i also super hate that sometimes it will shoot your ability at the enemy you had highlighted and they now moved vs where my cursor is.
Yeah the 1-3 acts then Cruel experience was basically the same for me. League started a Titan Warrior focused on slams. Earthquake and Boneshatter for mobs and Rolling Slam for single target until I found out how busted Perfect Strike is. I died a LOT to bosses (usually 1-2 times minimum each boss, sometimes more like my dozen or so to Draven, Blackjaw, the molten gold titan guy), but after some trial and error and learning their mechanics and attacks it was pretty smooth sailing. Clearing zones was incredibly easy most of the time and only got easier when I discovered Stampede & Armour Explosion which carrier me from Act 3 all the way to maps before what turned out to be a bug with Armour Explosion was fixed. The first three acts were challenging in the same way as a Souls game, but just like you once my build got online and I got better gear throughout Cruel I became able to ignore most of the actual meaty combat and cleared mobs, rares, and even bosses pretty trivially. On one hand it really helped me appreciate the journey in character power and progression I went on, but on the other, it felt bad being able to basically ignore the more "intended" mechanics of dealing with bosses and monsters and playing methodically when I was simply strong enough to not have to care. It took me 8 attempts to beat Count Geonor in Act 1 and felt like a huge accomplishment when I was done. Out of flask charges, heart racing, the last attempt took me probably 10 or 15 minutes. I killed him in 45 seconds in Cruel and probably would've been faster if he didn't have to go through the whole dialogue with Orianna before transforming to phase 2. It was thrilling to realize how far I came, but also a little sad. I hit a wall with my own blind build-making skills (new to PoE with PoE 2 so I didn't really have much knowledge from the first to base anything on) in T8 maps. Consulted some build guides and youtube videos to make some changes to my skills, passive tree, and gearing and now I'm cruising in T12's working my way forward. Overall I absolutely love the game and am excited to see how they build upon this excellent foundation. I think character building and diversity will become better as people get to know the new tree more and they add more skills and weapons and ascendancies to the game. I'm overall very happy with how the combat plays out even still in maps and endgame. I know its not the same methodical combat of the early acts but ARPGs at the end of the day are about character progression and player fantasy. Players will always find ways to out gear and build around any mechanics GGG throws at them. If the EA is anything to go by I see this being a game I play happily for 10+ years, making a new character or two every league. I think GGG has done a phenomenal job and should feel proud about the game they've put out, even in the incomplete stage its in.
Geonor is a prime example I think yeah! Fighting him for the first time and learning the fight was a struggle but I felt SO good after downing him. Fighting him again in Cruel was just a joke lol. I agree wholeheartedly with your points and I'm REALLY excited to see where they take it. I'm blind build making as well and looking up mechanics and interactions I have a question on to usually find a Reddit thread or YT video. But the tooltips, keyword definitions in the tooltips and the new gem calculations have really allowed me to do my own experimenting which is so fun in these early days when not much is known!
I've made the mistake of just following build guides and chasing the meta with ARPGs before, and it gets boring quick. Glad you're content is going to be more about the thought behind choices rather than do this, do that. Subbed. 😊
Yeah once they're out of early access leagues will be every 3-4 months and include an economy/server reset. PoE and even PoE2 have what's called "standard league" which is eternal. Generally standard gets to participate in the league events and do all the same content, it's just on a different server and economy than the challenge league servers (where most people play).
New to PoE and currently at Tier 10 Maps with Monk Invoker. I had kinda the same experience except me finding out that the bell is busted only at endgame. I liked the campaign alot due to its difficulty, but cruel difficulty was just a boring filler tbh. Also endgame needs definitely more polish. I feel like the damage on both sides is way too high. When I die it's always a oneshot and without a death recap I sometimes dont know what exactly it was. I assume it's physical damage due to me only having evades and elemental res (maxxed). My damage is also way to high. I haven't seen a second attack/phase of bosses in ages and that's sad because the bosses were the best part of the campaign. So less damage and smaller map sizes would greatly improve my experience. I also liked it in the campaign when rare monsters are a challenge. Now it is just "burst it before it is unfrozen".
Yeah without CC or an insanely fast Deadeye or otherwise, you're not going to have a good time in the endgame. Without freeze, being melee on Monk would feel awful 😞
Started with the Monk seemed different than other characters I have played in other rpg games, so giving it a shot, I've only got threw Act one so far. Honestly, it seemed to easy, but sure it will increase in difficulty as I go.
In trade league, I disagree about crafting. I'm much better off spending the Exalted Orb trading for what I want than crafting. The chance of the crafted item is so low, that buying a item is a much better bet.
100% more efficient to do that! I still exalt items I identify that are already good at the chance for a giga item and the fact that exalts are so much more common now makes me feel less bad about spending some of them on the thrill of the gamba 🙏
dude this was the best review i have watched and I like everything that was said and agree with you the game is good but can use fine tuning, I love that the game doesn't become a mind numbing run and just deleting everything I like that you have 2 be engage or you can still die haha great review I hope GGG watches this one
I'm afraid to back the game since they might turn it into a brain dead POE1 game experience. I'll wait, I think they will turn it into a screen exploder before long.
@@PingWhisper Yeah the endgame kind of already is (the best builds at least) but the entire game after act 3 felt disjointed from the vibe of those first few acts. I trust Jonathan and Neon but we'll see by the end of early access for sure yeah!
Foundationally it's got legs for sure. GGG has their work cut out for them but they've proven how quickly they work and handle feedback. We won't get a patch or anything until the New Year though likely. Plus it's missing half the classes/ascendancies/weapon options. I've got a very positive outlook for the game despite its current EA issues. We'll see how it's shaping up at the end of EA though and I'll review the state of pre-1.0 launch at that time 🍻
i personally stopped after not even 10 hours... the game just feels so slow compared to 1, maps are way to big imo and there is no real crafting to get items you want... i felt so bad for me that i stopped mid way in act2
@@GavrynGaming i did play few hours after release, before all patches. For me it was the lack of mobility skills, the slow (tho great) animations, getting pushed around by mobs and cornered without any chance to get out and so on. Not really about the loot
"Oh, I love how they removed the HP nodes from the tree. Now everything is so simple and clear. Oooh." I hate you. I hate you, you know? What, are you happy about it? The ES nodes are still there, they don't bother you, no? Because you have a hybrid EHP build, and you can get yourself a defense from these nodes? But for me, on a pure HP build, it's really cool, you know? I go T 16 with 2.3k HP... cool. And, yes, did I already say that I hate you? I repeat: I hate you.
What have your thoughts on these first few weeks of Early Access been?
Ascendancy trials as melee makes me want to uninstall the game. I despise them.
Remove Honour from the ascension trial or something similar, make it an endgame challenge.
But yeah I'm literally on the fence about leveling a warrior until some changes come through 😂
Just ignore it and level your character until you can beat it easily
Yeah over leveling helps a lot, had to do this on my monk
I've done it with both the warrior the witch and the Monk and I found it insanely easy and I was confused about what everybody was complaining about. I feel like everybody's looking at the classes to one dimensionally. 88% of the trial you don't have to fight anybody. You just have to avoid and get to the end. Then the boss you just keep hitting with magna blast and totems and use a bow as well. Remember just because you're one class you can use skills and weapons from other classes right. Every time I see somebody like my buddies complaining about it's hard. It's usually just because of a bad build decision simple as that.
If you are playing warrior, go for shockwave totem build, and it is easy
I started poe2 as a warrior and it is pain. Extremely loot depending and slow class.
Though I just got a unique gloves that allow my warrior to use ANY mele weapons and skills by changinga their requirements to strength.
I bet that will change rhe dynamic quite a bit
I got lucky by choosing the smoother melee experience on Monk, I've heard warrior leveling is rough!
@@GavrynGaming It's definitely a lot easier when you do it as your 2nd charachter or in coop with a friend.
I'm doing both and it's been great.
@@BigKnecht Started a warrior last night with plans to go titan, with the few leveling uniques I've dropped on my main characters, yeah it's not bad at all!
Definitely agree. Act 1-3 was very difficult but enjoyable. I used a blood mage witch with DD as my main. I’m in act 3 of cruel and just blasting. Can’t wait for maps!
I've heard DD is very solid! I think a caster of some kind will be what I try out next, glad you're having fun with it 🍻
Ooooh this is gonna be a good watch for lunch. Thanks, Gav!
EDIT: BANG ON about the campaign and into Cruel/Endgame.
Hope you enjoy man!
A game for everyone is a game for no one. A game made to be ok for everyone is devoid of identity. Poe 2 is great.
@@MartinVetorri As a WoW player since 2004 that slowly watched the soul sucked out of it to cater to every audience out there, I couldn't agree more! 🍻
Great review! I also enjoy the removal of life nodes on the passive tree and how meaningful rares (and even sometimes magic items) are now as drops in the wild. If they bring scour and alteration back into the game, then we'll be back to square one only picking up the best bases and ignoring 99% of all inferior rares/other items. One can argue that looking for the best/certain bases is still a thing, for sure it is, but it's so much more worth picking up every rare and good magic bases. Without being able to "reset" an item via scouring orbs it actually feels amazing to find something great, or to even just pick up items knowing they could be amazing, that no one can just "easily" craft something better. Loot got so much more valuable now, really enjoying that. And no more endlessly spamming hundreds to thousands of alts on items is a blessing.
I wish that better essences would be a more frequent drop though. Since we're using them on magic items and can't just reroll the items, they'd still feel very meaningful even if they dropped ten times as much as now (only dropped a single greater essence so far). And fully agree on runes removal - or at least being able to overwrite them with new ones (since runes drop a ton).
As for the endgame: Yea, they pivoted into endgame development very late, and it shows. Good thing is that the endgame is a continous process, new leagues (we even get EA leagues at some point), slowly introducing us to new & old content.
In regards to the infinite atlas: Not sure how much I like it yet. On one hand it's cool to be able to explore an endless map and be able to pick out of so many options/maps for each waystone, but there's a definitive lack of having a clear goal (getting to the center of the atlas in old PoE1, or completing the atlas felt very satisfying). Infinite exploration tends to feel less meaningful. Maybe GGG can find a middleground somehow, introducing pathways guiding the endgame route while keeping the atlas infinite. I'd not mind an entirely different, finite atlas, but time will tell how much they want to change the design. We have to remind ourselves that they changed the atlas substantially in PoE1 across the years, similar things can happen for PoE2. The watchtower system is definitely great / better than PoE1 imo once we have lots of different league content to pick from.
Lastly, the removal of on-death effects would be greatly appreciated. We shall see, I'm not too hopeful. It definitely doesn't feel great having to watch my step every second, fearing some already killed monster detonates underneath me.
Oh, and found my first perfect jewelers orb today. :D Happy Holidays everyone!
I have essence on my atlas and get one in my map fairly frequently, I've only dropped around 3 greater essences so I definitely agree there! And with Essences solving the 100% RNG issue, they definitely need to be more plentiful for us to use on good items for a semi-targeted regal.
Whoa you dropped one!? Big congrats 👀
New PoE player here. I agree with most of your points. The game is a good base for Early Access and it will only get better. But Maps need some work. I am about to start my third character (witch after monk and Merc) just to learn more about build crafting/following to understand the why of each decision.
Literally what I've leveled so far too lol I have a 90 Invoker, an 85 Witchhunter and planned to make a caster of some sort next! Welcome to Wraeclast 🍻
Honestly, what you said about the matching your gem colors on gear is exactly why i wished i wasnt broke so i could get PoE2 (finally got it!)
Another thing, i heavily agree with the “looking at my characters feet” vibe. This isnt a bullet hell, and it may help some people, but i also super hate that sometimes it will shoot your ability at the enemy you had highlighted and they now moved vs where my cursor is.
Yeah the 1-3 acts then Cruel experience was basically the same for me. League started a Titan Warrior focused on slams. Earthquake and Boneshatter for mobs and Rolling Slam for single target until I found out how busted Perfect Strike is. I died a LOT to bosses (usually 1-2 times minimum each boss, sometimes more like my dozen or so to Draven, Blackjaw, the molten gold titan guy), but after some trial and error and learning their mechanics and attacks it was pretty smooth sailing. Clearing zones was incredibly easy most of the time and only got easier when I discovered Stampede & Armour Explosion which carrier me from Act 3 all the way to maps before what turned out to be a bug with Armour Explosion was fixed.
The first three acts were challenging in the same way as a Souls game, but just like you once my build got online and I got better gear throughout Cruel I became able to ignore most of the actual meaty combat and cleared mobs, rares, and even bosses pretty trivially. On one hand it really helped me appreciate the journey in character power and progression I went on, but on the other, it felt bad being able to basically ignore the more "intended" mechanics of dealing with bosses and monsters and playing methodically when I was simply strong enough to not have to care. It took me 8 attempts to beat Count Geonor in Act 1 and felt like a huge accomplishment when I was done. Out of flask charges, heart racing, the last attempt took me probably 10 or 15 minutes. I killed him in 45 seconds in Cruel and probably would've been faster if he didn't have to go through the whole dialogue with Orianna before transforming to phase 2. It was thrilling to realize how far I came, but also a little sad.
I hit a wall with my own blind build-making skills (new to PoE with PoE 2 so I didn't really have much knowledge from the first to base anything on) in T8 maps. Consulted some build guides and youtube videos to make some changes to my skills, passive tree, and gearing and now I'm cruising in T12's working my way forward. Overall I absolutely love the game and am excited to see how they build upon this excellent foundation. I think character building and diversity will become better as people get to know the new tree more and they add more skills and weapons and ascendancies to the game. I'm overall very happy with how the combat plays out even still in maps and endgame. I know its not the same methodical combat of the early acts but ARPGs at the end of the day are about character progression and player fantasy. Players will always find ways to out gear and build around any mechanics GGG throws at them. If the EA is anything to go by I see this being a game I play happily for 10+ years, making a new character or two every league. I think GGG has done a phenomenal job and should feel proud about the game they've put out, even in the incomplete stage its in.
Geonor is a prime example I think yeah! Fighting him for the first time and learning the fight was a struggle but I felt SO good after downing him. Fighting him again in Cruel was just a joke lol.
I agree wholeheartedly with your points and I'm REALLY excited to see where they take it. I'm blind build making as well and looking up mechanics and interactions I have a question on to usually find a Reddit thread or YT video. But the tooltips, keyword definitions in the tooltips and the new gem calculations have really allowed me to do my own experimenting which is so fun in these early days when not much is known!
I've made the mistake of just following build guides and chasing the meta with ARPGs before, and it gets boring quick. Glad you're content is going to be more about the thought behind choices rather than do this, do that. Subbed. 😊
Question. Will this game be like Diablo 4? Where we have to reset all our characters every season?
Yeah once they're out of early access leagues will be every 3-4 months and include an economy/server reset.
PoE and even PoE2 have what's called "standard league" which is eternal. Generally standard gets to participate in the league events and do all the same content, it's just on a different server and economy than the challenge league servers (where most people play).
New to PoE and currently at Tier 10 Maps with Monk Invoker. I had kinda the same experience except me finding out that the bell is busted only at endgame. I liked the campaign alot due to its difficulty, but cruel difficulty was just a boring filler tbh. Also endgame needs definitely more polish. I feel like the damage on both sides is way too high. When I die it's always a oneshot and without a death recap I sometimes dont know what exactly it was. I assume it's physical damage due to me only having evades and elemental res (maxxed). My damage is also way to high. I haven't seen a second attack/phase of bosses in ages and that's sad because the bosses were the best part of the campaign. So less damage and smaller map sizes would greatly improve my experience. I also liked it in the campaign when rare monsters are a challenge. Now it is just "burst it before it is unfrozen".
Yeah without CC or an insanely fast Deadeye or otherwise, you're not going to have a good time in the endgame. Without freeze, being melee on Monk would feel awful 😞
Started with the Monk seemed different than other characters I have played in other rpg games, so giving it a shot, I've only got threw Act one so far. Honestly, it seemed to easy, but sure it will increase in difficulty as I go.
Act two on normal it's the hardest part of the game, imo
Really good video. Agree with pretty much everything.
To answer the question - NO. This game is still catered to hardcore players ONLY.
Thanks for taking the time to respond! It's definitely a gritty and challenging experience, but I liked that personally! What ARPG do you prefer?
In trade league, I disagree about crafting. I'm much better off spending the Exalted Orb trading for what I want than crafting. The chance of the crafted item is so low, that buying a item is a much better bet.
100% more efficient to do that! I still exalt items I identify that are already good at the chance for a giga item and the fact that exalts are so much more common now makes me feel less bad about spending some of them on the thrill of the gamba 🙏
dude this was the best review i have watched and I like everything that was said and agree with you the game is good but can use fine tuning, I love that the game doesn't become a mind numbing run and just deleting everything I like that you have 2 be engage or you can still die haha
great review I hope GGG watches this one
Cmon pasive tree IS so easy now
D4 is 1/10
poe2 is 10/1
im not here too say more, just annoy the D4 pleb's
I'm afraid to back the game since they might turn it into a brain dead POE1 game experience. I'll wait, I think they will turn it into a screen exploder before long.
@@PingWhisper Yeah the endgame kind of already is (the best builds at least) but the entire game after act 3 felt disjointed from the vibe of those first few acts.
I trust Jonathan and Neon but we'll see by the end of early access for sure yeah!
It’s very good. But bro… perfect? No.
Foundationally it's got legs for sure. GGG has their work cut out for them but they've proven how quickly they work and handle feedback. We won't get a patch or anything until the New Year though likely. Plus it's missing half the classes/ascendancies/weapon options.
I've got a very positive outlook for the game despite its current EA issues. We'll see how it's shaping up at the end of EA though and I'll review the state of pre-1.0 launch at that time 🍻
i killed everything already bro gg biggest problems: armour is very weak mf affecting currency destroyed economy doing towers sucks
Very nice! Yeah really hoping to see all 3 of those addressed in their first big patch after the holidays
i personally stopped after not even 10 hours... the game just feels so slow compared to 1, maps are way to big imo and there is no real crafting to get items you want... i felt so bad for me that i stopped mid way in act2
Did you play before or after the last patch?
This is an important question, the pacing feels a lot better now that campaign rares drop much more loot!
@@GavrynGaming i did play few hours after release, before all patches.
For me it was the lack of mobility skills, the slow (tho great) animations, getting pushed around by mobs and cornered without any chance to get out and so on. Not really about the loot
It's still gambling, with less control, less agency and more headaches. If you take a step back and look objectively at the 2 systems.
"Oh, I love how they removed the HP nodes from the tree. Now everything is so simple and clear. Oooh." I hate you. I hate you, you know? What, are you happy about it? The ES nodes are still there, they don't bother you, no? Because you have a hybrid EHP build, and you can get yourself a defense from these nodes? But for me, on a pure HP build, it's really cool, you know? I go T 16 with 2.3k HP... cool. And, yes, did I already say that I hate you? I repeat: I hate you.
I'm sure ES is getting addressed after the holidays. Happy holidays to you as well kind stranger!
Stop calling set ups “tech” its so cringe
Nothing about the endgame comes even remotely close to being a perfect Arpg formula. GGG has ALOT of work ahead of them.
It did not.
This review is just an ad. Everything you praise has flaws and is inferior to the original mechanics
I'll be more critical at the end of the beta once we see how things have fully shaped but... For Early Access I was really impressed yes!
A game with a up to a year beta isn't caught up with 1 been worked on far ages. Who could that be