Self found can use a bit of love

@OP

Tbh I dont experienced the problem you seem to have with maps. In general I'm not a SSF player, but I dont buy maps at all so we should be on same level on map drops. Even tho I didnt had that much time since start of the new leagues, I've unlocked allmost all maps up to t12 (would been even higher if I had more time and didnt created another char). Also my first char is lv 90 the other is 81 or so. I've lvl'ed to 90 mostly without running any higher map than t10 (except 1 time to unlock the t11 & t12 I droped), I could've run higher but was thinking its better to run lower maps while my char gets exp in lower maps while I complete at least most of the low maps.


On a side note, I had only 1 time at a league start where I had pretty bad RNG on map drops where I was pretty long in t1 - t6, but that was just 1 time. On every other league start everything was ok with maps drops for me, and I've played every league since open beta.



Also (no offense intended) your hole post looks like "I want faster progression, at least close to what non SSF players are at atm" - and I dont see a reason that this should happen at all if one consider what this game was designed for / designed around and in fact is only playable online.
Wasnt the whole SSF thing part of making your playthrough harder / more challenging? or is it just that u dont want to trade / play with others? Probably I'm missing sth.

"

Shalashaska wrote:

Also (no offense intended) your hole post looks like "I want faster progression, at least close to what non SSF players are at atm"

Literally nothing in my post should have led you to that conclusion. Not one single issue I listed was with the rate of progression. Not one single suggestion I gave would lead to faster progression.

I said it earlier and I'll say it again: I have no issue with the rate of progression for self found play in POE.

The game should never be balanced for solo self found players. It is s challenge imposed on ones self for their own enjoyment of the game. It is a choice in a game balanced around trade. This is not Diablo 3 so if you don't enjoy SSF then play the game the way it was intended.

1) Roll a character who can buy the gem you want.

2) If this difficulty is removed from the game, then what is the point of playing SSF to increase the difficulty?

3) If you're having trouble getting through the Atlas then you shouldn't be using Shaper Orbs at all. The actual problem with them is that you are forced to use them to dilute your drops or waste inventory space on them.

4) Again, the point of Self Found is to make rare items truly rare because you can't acquire them from other players, making it easy eliminates the point.

It sounds like you don't see SSF as a challenge mode and instead just use it as a badge to mask that you simply don't like trading.

I still find it very strange that people will defend literally any negative aspect of the game, no matter how bad it is, as long as doing so allows them to attack self found players in some way.

There's an incredibly common idea floating around that wanting a negative aspect of the game improved is somehow a complete betrayal of the self found ideal. Not wanting some gems to be impossible to acquire when playing character based self found does not mean that a person hates self found play. Not wanting absurd levels of unfun grinding to be required to get a map to drop does not mean that a person hates self found play.

Do not make the mistake of conflating a distaste for unfun aspects of the game with not liking "difficulty" or "challenge," as if muling a gem or grinding low level maps for a dozen hours to get a specific map to drop are somehow either one of those things.

There are many reasons a person may want to play self found. They are all valid reasons. Even if a person only wants to play self found because they hate trading, that is completely valid. You are not the arbiter of how people are allowed to enjoy games.

Please put on your critical thinking hats and ask yourself if what you are saying is remotely reasonable, rational, or logical before responding. So many responses are none of those things, and that makes me sad.

What part of the games design dont you understand? This game is balanced around trading. This game is balanced around trading. This game is balanced around trading.

If you don't want to trade in a game all about trading at the very core, then deal with it. You want those quest only gems, then you got to make a character specifically for it. All other gems except the drop only ones are at vendors. Do not mistake what it is I am saying to you as defending a negative because i am not doing that. I am defending a positive.

Do you comprehend the statement you are making? Do you understand how this game will be destroyed if it was balanced for SSF play. This is not Diablo 3. While D3 prides it self as being a cooperative game, nearly no one plays in a group because solo game play is more efficient. When playing POE solo without trading becomes the norm and is easy there is no longer a reason to play at all. In order to balance the game for SSF to please you, drop rates would have to increase, meaning the economy turns to trash, just to make you feel better about your choice to not trade.

It is as simple as that. If you don't want to mule gems, then buy them. No one will know but you and that 1 person and you can pretend you were SSF for real.

Saying "the game is balanced around trading" isn't a blanket defense for every little design decision. Drop rates? Applies. Atlas? Applies. Vendor offers? Sometimes applies (to the sorts of items everyone vendors and no one trades), doesn't always apply (to the items which traders trade).

I understand the argument that the trading version of the game comes first. But when self-found can be helped with essentially zero impact on trade, why not? The assumption in your argument, Jgizle, is that the trading version must be hurt for self-found to be helped. By carefully choosing how to help self-found, I think this isn't always the case.

People bandy around the term "simulator" inappropriately ever since shitty Steam games turned "Simulator" into a meme. But NPC vendors literally are the game's trade simulators. They need buffing in a way which lets tradeable items vendor for less than projected market value, but more than they do now.

"

dudiobugtron wrote:

It's OK to not trade for maps, you just have to use the right terminology when complaining about it.

For eg:
If you say "The map system sucks for self-found players", GGG won't seem to care.
If you say "The map system sucks for sustaining maps", GGG will seem to care a lot, and will release like 50 patches to try to get the balance right. Even though 'sustaining' maps yourself is exactly the same as playing self-found.

This isn't true at all. When you're trying to self-sustain maps, the rolling goal is "do not run out of maps of relevant tier" which means you roll MUCH higher than "expected return of 1 relevant-tier map on average" to avoid the failure state; you need better than break-even odds. When you trade for maps, the rolling goal is "generate more market value than currency invested," which means you shouldn't be rolling your maps to nearly as high of a standard; you only need break-even odds. This is a HUGE difference in rolling philosophy.

Here's something I've mentioned in previous self found threads that I neglected to mention here:

Don't attack self found play. Don't attack self found players. Instead, for each of the complaints people have and each of the suggestions they give, defend the existing state of the game.

Also, and I know it's hard, but please do your best to comprehend the words people write and understand what they are actually saying. Nobody in this thread has asked GGG to balance the game around self found play. Still, a number of people have replied attacking that idea. Please stop doing that.

"

Jennik wrote:

Here's something I've mentioned in previous self found threads that I neglected to mention here:

Don't attack self found play. Don't attack self found players. Instead, for each of the complaints people have and each of the suggestions they give, defend the existing state of the game.

Also, and I know it's hard, but please do your best to comprehend the words people write and understand what they are actually saying. Nobody in this thread has asked GGG to balance the game around self found play. Still, a number of people have replied attacking that idea. Please stop doing that.

Then what are you asking them to do? I play solo self found and I think you're being ridiculous.