Q&A with the Developers!

I've seen some screenshots dating back since 2006, so next year will be ten years you've been developing the game. Are you gonna celebrate in some way? Maybe with us?

Short question - are you going to do something about rarity/quantity systems ?



Explanation: (my reddit post from about year ago, but still pretty accurate as things didn't change at all)

I think that magic find as it is now is just dumb. There is literally no reason to put on your best items, as that means you will be finding MUCH less loot. I can do 76 maps alone either in mf gear or "better" gear. However, what is the point of running maps in that "better" gear, when it doesn't have rarity, so you get less drops ? It's almost like the game punishes you for using your best gear and promotes wearing junk with rarity. The whole point of this game is to find better and better items, but wearing that better items is contradictory to finding other better items - it's a loop.

IMO the best solutions would be either: Allowing people to add lowest rarity affix to ANY piece of gear via crafting/vendor recipe (something like item rarity gem + regal orb + item = the same item with lowest rarity affix), and then upgrade that rarity affix also via crafting/vendor (xx regal orbs + yy blessed orbs + item with rarity affix = the same item with tier higher rarity affix). That way you would be able to wear your best gear without giving up on rarity, because you could always add it by dumping currency. Also there would be practical use to these useless blessed orbs. Also such approach adds another currency sink should be healthy for game economy.

Removing rarity/quantity entirely from gear/gems, making it league-wide stat that is acquirable up to a cap only by doing certain activities, like for example sacrificing experience on a character (just as if you died in non-hardcore league, xxx exp for yyy % rarity, good combo with current expansion theme), disenchanting rares/uniques (something like gw2, alternative to vendoring trash for alterations, crowns of thorns would finally have practical use), completing challenges/achievements (promotes game diversity instead of doing xxxth map or yyyth dominus/piety run), or even by completing special quests (atziri/uber atziri giving xxx% rarity ? partial reward for future atziri-like content ?)

During the new boss fight with Rigwald, at one point Rigwald turns into a wolf form. Has GGG considered transformation skills that would be available for the players?

Secondly, can Rigwald drop fight his specific uniques even if their i-level is above the area and enemy level of the fight itself?

Do you accept international interns ?

How do you feel about the current state of evasion/armor stacking? Do you plan on making armor/evasion more abundant in the tree in future updates?

"

Wiesl_1404 wrote:

Since Carl, had not really much to say about my questions on the last Frontseatgamer episode due to time issues i would like to ask some of my questions here once again hoping for a more detailed answer, thanks


- Power Creep:
Since 2.0 PoE seems to hit some form of power creep and it doesn't seem to go away or getting ajusted with the anouncment of the 2.2 expansion. Power creep in games like this is very dangerous and hard to control if it already has infested your game. I would like to how the DEVs are feeling about power creep in PoE, how to keep it in check and how to find nice balance between inovativ new powerfull, impactfull mechanics to keep the game interesting and fresh and absolutly broken outclassing overshadowing stuff added to to game.

Right now, powercreep feels very real in PoE - characters are able to deal much more damage and clear much faster than back in 1.0-1.3 (even without burn prolif). Carl mentioned that powercreep is inevitable in his opionion on the podcast, i agree at some point as long it isn't going out of hand.

- Difficulty:
Diffculty is a very important factor in a game like PoE. When a game is too hard, nowbody or very few people would play it, if a game is too easy, people get bored very fast and leave. PoE has had it's phases were it was very hard and it's phases were it was realtivly easy. I would like to know what the DEVs thinks about difficulty in general in relation to PoE, is it better to have a moderatly hard or a moderatly easy game - what is the goal in terms of overall difficulty for PoE in the future. I would also like him to elaborate on "artificial difficulty".

I'd say you have to be careful that all skills can be made to feel powerful, such that there isn't just 1 or 2 crazy skills that everyone has to use - or suddenly there is no build diversity, and no game. If you make almost everything bad, it isn't removing power creep, its breaking the game. You want players to be able to feel like they are breaking them game with their dps when really they aren't. Just slowly introduce a new tier of maps and give each jump in tier a healthy increase in hitpoints and all your problems are solved. That and consider nerfing the few truely crazy broken things, to keep all skills viable.

How about polish translation ?

"More than 20 monsters remain."

Any plans to raise this?

Hypothermia and DoT; how do they interact? Using poison as an example, does Hypothermia apply once to the initial hit and then once again to the DoT?

GGG,

Thank you for such amazing game!

...

Dear Chris,

I hope you will read this message and appreciate if you can answer
(even if is in personal).

Just two questions:

1. Is it hard or expensive to be made permanent, starting from scratch
lower level league with more/biger ratio drops?

2. Do you plan to make or is it any chance to have option
to buy POE for offline mode only?

Thank you in advance and

Happy New Year to all of You.