Path of Exile catch-all

I'm playing this (since Closed Beta now). Looking for more.

I'm interested in playing this but I probably won't get to it until next week since I want to play The Cave first. A couple questions: I assume there is co-op, is it in the beta? Is there somewhere to find class specific skills without having to look through the entire skill tree?

iaintgotnopants wrote:

I assume there is co-op, is it in the beta? Is there somewhere to find class specific skills without having to look through the entire skill tree?

Yes, yes
There are no class specific skills.

The skill tree is the passive skill tree, it's all boosts with +% to this and that, and the occasional highlight that's more powerful. The six classes start in different locations, but can branch out to wherever they want. Those starting points are biased towards stats for the stereotypical role of that class, and some equipment will have criteria to meet before you can use it.

Skills come from gems that you socket in your equipment (and you can combine effects with some gems that alter skill gems in sockets that are joined to them). I think you're more likely to get certain types of gem from quests when playing as, say, a melee class, but apart from that you can have a wand wielding duelist.

Their patching servers are hilariously overloaded. I am getting a whopping 256/s right now. That's 256 bytes.

I patched during the day and it still took an hour or so to get all 4.5GB. (I foolishly deleted the old beta so the diff didn't happen.)

The game has really benefited from it's time in beta. I had tons of fun as a witch, and the somewhat disconnected nature of things seems to have been smoothed out. It clicks now and I'm definitely in for release.

Yesterday was the first time I played this game. Logged on two hours early and the download went fairly quickly. Logged in right on launch and had a lot of fun for the hour or so I could play.

I haven't played enough to have any deep thoughts about the game yet but here are a few quick observations:

1. Its free, and the microtransactions seem to be designed so you won't get gauged. Very nice.
2. The graphics don't appeal to me as much as D3 but they have a more realistic feel to them and certainly aren't bad.
3. The gameplay seems slower than D3 and doesn't have the same satisfying meaty visceral punch to it. Still, gameplay is the one area where D3 shines above all else and PoE's gameplay is solid.
4. The skill constellation (or whatever you want to call it), skill gems and itemization is where this game seems to really shine. I love some of the design choices they have made and the game seems as if it has a lot more depth and potential longevity to it than D3's disappointing itemization.

Also if you're wondering what you can do with the skill system, take a look at GGG's build of the weeks

Copingsaw wrote:

3. The gameplay seems slower than D3 and doesn't have the same satisfying meaty visceral punch to it. Still, gameplay is the one area where D3 shines above all else and PoE's gameplay is solid.
4. The skill constellation (or whatever you want to call it), skill gems and itemization is where this game seems to really shine. I love some of the design choices they have made and the game seems as if it has a lot more depth and potential longevity to it than D3's disappointing itemization.

That's odd, to me PoE seems to have more "weight" to the attacks with a meatier punch versus D3 (although they're fairly close on that count).

And yeah, the customization and build stuff is really what makes the game so appealing to me.

I started a Witch (last time I was a Duellist, I think) and I'm just loving the ranged combat and the energy shield. How long does this beta last?

Robear wrote:

How long does this beta last?

As far as I know, this is *the* release, and it shouldn't close again.

Scratched wrote:

Remember kids, Hardcore is where it's at. If you're silly enough to go and die, you just go to the normal league and don't lose the character.

That's not really hardcore then :/

Robear wrote:

I started a Witch (last time I was a Duellist, I think) and I'm just loving the ranged combat and the energy shield. How long does this beta last?

No more character wipes. They call it open beta I think because they are testing the load of their servers and stability. There are a few bugs here and there, but this is the release client.

OMG. Thirteen levels between two characters since the open beta started, and I've had work or it would have been more. This is drawing me in far more than Diablo 3 has. Fun fun fun.

Will have a good look at it this weekend
Also need to finish Trine 2 for my pile.

This game has come a LONG way over the past 18 months or so (probably about the last time I played it). I'm not far yet but playing on HC and deathly afraid of dying (haha). This is definitely going to get a good amount of playtime from me. I'm an archer specializing in poison arrows, fire arrows, and some awesome multi-arrow-hit-everything shot. Maybe level 8 or so

Is this intended to be multiple playthrough on the same character like Diablo 3?

You can do that, you get the higher difficulties unlocked for each playthrough. There's also maps and map crafting when you're at the end that lets you make more challenges.

The maps are the actual end-game content as far as I understand it. But basically everything is an item or in some way changeable or upgradeable - even potions!
The designing of that game must have been a really tough process, probably later requiring some tricky coding as well. Love it!

liquid wrote:

The maps are the actual end-game content as far as I understand it. But basically everything is an item or in some way changeable or upgradeable - even potions!
The designing of that game must have been a really tough process, probably later requiring some tricky coding as well. Love it!

It's certainly interesting. It's pretty much an absolute subscription to the Diablo way of doing things, to acknowledge that they're a small studio who can't just pump out content, and that they need to have the complex systems in there to make replaying that content enjoyable and challenging (and with maps ways to mix that content up). As with the BotW videos, there's a lot of ways to combine things in crazy ways that can work well.

Ever since I first started playing in the closed beta, I've loved their solution for potions. It's an elegant and simple solution that works so perfectly that it was one of those head-smacking "I can't believe no has thought of this before, me included!" moments. It is, so far, my favorite solution to the problem of potion-guzzling design in arpg's (yes, I like it even more than Diablo 3's almost-as-brilliant health orb system).

Path of Exile is a fairly smartly designed Diablo-esque action rpg. I hope to see them have a lot of success with the game.

Sunk a few more hours into this. I don't think this one will compete with D3 as the gameplay just isn't as fun. It reminds me more of T2 than D3, which is not a good comparison. These things are hard to put in words but the bottom line is that killing things just isn't as fun as it is in D3. On the other hand, most of the other design decisions they have made are flat out better than D3 so we'll see how well that keeps me interested.

This game has some brilliant design, if it had the smooth and satisfying combat engine of D3 it'd be pretty much perfect as far as this genre of games go. I still think i'll be playing this quite a bit because there seems to be such great depth to discover.

It certainly won't topple D3 for a whole slew of reasons. However, I just want to see PoE be successful.

Frankly, I see no reason not to keep PoE, Torchlight 2, and Diablo 3 all installed and updated on my pc. Despite the issues each game may have, it's a good time to be an action-rpg fan.

Farscry wrote:

Ever since I first started playing in the closed beta, I've loved their solution for potions. It's an elegant and simple solution that works so perfectly that it was one of those head-smacking "I can't believe no has thought of this before, me included!" moments. It is, so far, my favorite solution to the problem of potion-guzzling design in arpg's (yes, I like it even more than Diablo 3's almost-as-brilliant health orb system).

Plus, they have rarities and special powers too. Tres cool.

Yup!

At one point, I had a "standard" potion, a long-lasting but slow-recovery "regen" potion, a resistance-boosting "drink this when fighting big nasties!" potion, and I forget what else.

Turning potions into another form of gear is just such a great idea. Seriously, I don't know why no ARPG has done it before, at least that I've played!

The simple fact that you fill the potions just by playing and killing mobs is a vast improvement over having to find, buy or just plain waste time picking them up. The lack of a gold economy is interesting too. If a merchant pays me with a TP scroll my "money" is always helpful to me in some way.

Definitely not as pretty as D3, but in my experience graphics are one of the few things D3 has going for it.

I just played for the first time since last summer, I think, and 3 hours went by in a flash. The game didn't grab me back then, but it sure did now. As others have said, I really like the gameplay mechanics they've implemented. I can see myself easily sinking many hours into this.

I played some this evening, I think I'm up to level 6. I'm not sure if I'll really stick with it but I'm intrigued. The skill gems are an interesting idea but I'm not sure I like your build being determined by RNG. I really like the potion system. Honestly, it's probably my favorite part of the game so far. The combat isn't very good which is why I'm not sure I'll put much time in. Sure, part of it is that it's early so the combat is really boring but it just doesn't feel right. The starting accuracy for a non-dex character (I'm assuming dex effects accuracy) is terrible. It's frustrating when the game starts out making you fight large groups of people at once but you miss like one out of every three hits.

I'd really like to do some co-op. How does one go about doing that?

By the way, if anyone likes the game but the combat is a problem for him early on I suggest you guys check up some higher level streams like 20-40lvl and see how you like the combat there. The progression from a newb to a badass here is longer than in Diablo for instance.

I've been playing it a lot too. Working on a Shadow right now.

As far as co-op, you can add other players if you know your names. My character is Verrun if you want to add me if you want to do some co-op. I believe once you have one character from someone, you'll have all of them, but I'm not sure about that. Will have to do some testing.