Interview with Chris and Additional Season Two Races

Thanks a bunch for continuing to be awesome. Haven't been able to play much, due to my own poor internet connection. But it's still nice to see all the updates, for when I get back in.

Probably Map Device update.

I can't wait for the aggressive rubberbanding...

It just keeps getting better and better ! Awesome ! :D

Just take my money already!! Damnit! I love this game so much <3

i hate u Chris , i wont sleep anymore until u reveal what these secret awsomeness are...

Hello everyone. I am new to this game and it looks really nice. I have some questions.

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GON: So what is your peak concurrent player count?

Chris: We’ve hit 70,000 in the first week of release.

So there were 70k players online at the same time in the first week of release?

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GON: Have you identified any issues in the beta that you’ll need to address going forward before launch?

Chris: We have found a lot of things based on player feedback and our own analytics that we can improve. There are various systems that we’ve been working on with the players to find better solutions to. For example loot allocation in the game, a lot of players would like it to be a bit more forgiving and less free-for-all,...

A bit more forgiving? What do you mean? Easier drops? And by less free-for-all you mean that drops should drop to a random person in the party no matter what they are, instead of dropping for the first one that picks them like it's now? So slower people from parties could have a chance of getting uniques and other items that now drop for the whole party?

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GON: When we last spoke you anticipated the third act being the final before launch. How do you feel about that now?

Chris: We added most of the third act in beta release, missing off about the last third of that act. And we are expecting that we will have that as the major content added at launch. It basically finishes off the story, adds a much more climactic boss encounter, and a lot of new areas. And we’re also working on the fourth act of the game which isn’t going to be ready for launch at the end of this year, but it will come maybe 9-12 months after that.

If there will be more acts, what will you do with difficulties? Will you make a system so that, for example players that already passed normal, wouldn't be able to acces act 4 cruel until they pass act 4 normal even if it would be too easy for them?

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GON: Fair enough! So you’ve activated the in-game cash shop?

Chris: Yeah, when open beta started we stopped selling access to it...

So before open beta you had to pay to play this game?

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GON: Have you been seeing a lot of people willing to pay out for new stuff?

Chris: It’s been very good, looking at the rates of support from the users and we’ve been finding it helps to run specials so that people can get some of the more premium things at a discount occasionally if they’re patient.

By premium things you still mean microtransactions, not equipment or orbs, right?

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We have quite an interesting plan for the future of Path of Exile which involves both continuing forward with the core game, new acts and so on, but also taking advantage of the league system where we can run — think of it as new servers of the game that have a fresh economy and new rulesets.

I don't care about leagues, but please do not make more permanent leagues such as hardcore. I've heard people talking about it and it would be just pointless. It would be like clones. People say it would be for fresh economy that won't be broken, but they will break too. Anyway, broken economy here isn't as bad as in other games since you can get lucky, get a nice drop such as an expensive unique/rare or quality gem or exalted orb etc. and then you won't care about economy too much. You would actually want it to be broken sometimes, so you would get more for your lucky drop.

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GON: Do you have any plans to introduce a real cash economy into these events? Betting on peoples’ performance for example?

Chris: We are very interested in catering towards the more meta e-sports style stuff. With regards to wagering, I mean we’ve discussed wagering from in-game items all the way up to real money and… of course there a lot of legal implications of real-money wagering, and similar kind of abuse issues that can happen with in-game wagering. I mean people will happily throw matches and stuff to get a better sword, if needed. It does have some interesting points but we really value our streaming community and the people who take the events seriously as a pseudo e-sport, and we have better streaming integration coming in the future for example.

Realy money involved... well, it would be great if we could also wager or do something so we could real money, but that won't happen. Why would you do that? Anyway, the fact that money can't bring advantages(at the moment atleast, hopefully forever or until you won't get enough money from buyers anymore because they are just microtransactions) is already very good. Well, it wouldn't disturb me, a non-buyer, only if you would do both for real money or other items. For example, there is a league, and I bet with a rare sword, while a buyer bets with 5$, but the chances would be the same, not more for the buyer because he bets with real money instead of items.

Also, what does meta e-sports mean exactly?

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GON: I’ve been playing Neverwinter, and a lot of people are using their Foundry tool to create maps that are basically just easy mob grinds and experience farms. Is this the sort of thing you’d have to worry about with player-authoring tools as well?

Again, why is Neverwinter everywhere?

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GON: Making it too easy does sound pointless, but… I guess if they’re willing to pay you money?

Chris: It should be interesting. Though it really depends. As long as we can keep it safe for the other users. You’ve probably seen with the design of our microtransactions the goal is that people with money can’t get any kind of advantage over other people in terms of actual progress.

I like your answer, except for the first 4 words... "It should be interesting" now that makes you suspicious. :)

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GON: And that seems to be working out quite well for you — there’s a lot of MMOs which are struggling with microtransactions because people know it’s pay-to-win, and so they avoid the whole game like the plague.

Chris: Yeah. It’s difficult as a player to commit yourself to playing something where you know that someone can just trump all of your work by spending twenty bucks.

Yes, even if I like that there are no advantages(yet) for real money, I still wonder how does this game survive just with cosmetic microtransactions? Are there so many people that buy them just so they have shiny items instead of the normal rusted graphic items?

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Dreggon wrote:

I'm interested to see what you have planned. I'm hoping that there isn't some subtle thing you've overlooked, but that's what testers are for! : )

I can't imagine what it could be. Permanent leagues? Cut-throat? Opt-in world cut-throat PvP for existing leagues? That would be awesome.

Please. No. What permanent league, why and what for? Useless. Also, cut-throat PvP would only be good with an option to turn it on or off, don't think about yourself only, there are many players that hate it, they just want to farm and get better then PvP, not be forced to PvP and get killed by higher players while farming. Anyway, to be able to do that, that would also mean to allow everyone to invade instances, so no chance someone could farm or level. Only if items wouldn't drop and there wouldn't be that 30% EXP penalty.


Sorry for big wall of text but I am curious about the future of this game. Thanks.

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By premium things you still mean microtransactions, not equipment or orbs, right?

Yup, just the shinies, or cosmetic pets, hat things, or dances. Will probably be more things later. Equipment and orbs would be pay to win. And POE is very against pay to win. Which leads into the next question I can answer.

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Yes, even if I like that there are no advantages(yet) for real money, I still wonder how does this game survive just with cosmetic microtransactions? Are there so many people that buy them just so they have shiny items instead of the normal rusted graphic items?

Yeah, I think enough people like the shiny items enough to buy them, or the pets. Also, there are plenty of people like me who are happy enough to just support a game that is not pay to win. As Chris said in the interview, some people avoid multiplayer games with pay2win due to it being unethical.

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So before open beta you had to pay to play this game?

Yeah, you could buy supporter packs, ranging from $10 for a beta key, to a $1000 for all kinds of cool things and being able to design a unique item. Apart from getting microtransaction points, you got other things, like an exclusive pet kiwi, and some actual goods if you gave over $50.

I'm curious, why are servers so much more expensive in NZ/AU?

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extending Season Two to finish on approximately June 7

YES, please !

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haplessG00N wrote:

I'm curious, why are servers so much more expensive in NZ/AU?

Chris said the real problem is international bandwidth costs. My guess is that "the cause" is the low population density compared to other continents and the high fixed costs of oceans fiber get to be split on less heads.