They'll never directly say it, but I am sure they changed their PoE 2 scope and plans when...

i play d3, d4 and poe.


honestly i think d4s biggest crime is that its just bad to play, the builds dont feel fun, its not exciting.


everyone has this presumption with blizzard and diablo. oh it will be great for casuals, it will have a great campaign, the combat/gameplay will feel amazing but it wont have the depth to keep people playing long term.


i think people just keep saying that because its what people presumed before release. i dont think its actually true tho. i think the combat feels shit, it feels clunky, the builds feel basic, bland and bad, the campaign was shit, the early game progression feels like shit.


imo it just doesnt feel fun to play moment by moment.

the items are bad and i feel no attachment to them, the skill customisation is poor, the builds are shallow, the mechanics are convoluted and badly designed, but i think those things wouldnt sink the game if it really was fun to play the builds.

but its just not fun to play at all. i dont even rly buy that theres not enough content cause theres way more content than d3 but people still played d3 because it was actually fun moment by moment killing mobs. theres arguably more content than poe had in 2013 but we kept playing poe.

Another quote theorizing about the fork in the road:

"My belief is that when they initially revealed PoE2 on Exilecon 1 they had the full intention of making it into one game.
Along the way they introduced Ruthless partly as a way to test mechanics and get a feel for peoples interest in a more restrictive game.

When Ruthless flopped, and yes it did, they had their first indication and wakeup call to what people really enjoy and not. They tried to bait some more interest with a race in Ruthless and couldn't even pull in the biggest name in PoE racing.

Here is when they really had an "oh crap" moment and probably changed direction from one game into a split game. Seeing peoples reactions to D4, which is fairly similar, was probably the nail in the coffin and also why all of a sudden the expected release of PoE2 is far beyond their estimate about a year ago."

/u/Xhibbi1

"

innervation wrote:

Another quote theorizing about the fork in the road:

"My belief is that when they initially revealed PoE2 on Exilecon 1 they had the full intention of making it into one game.
Along the way they introduced Ruthless partly as a way to test mechanics and get a feel for peoples interest in a more restrictive game.

When Ruthless flopped, and yes it did, they had their first indication and wakeup call to what people really enjoy and not. They tried to bait some more interest with a race in Ruthless and couldn't even pull in the biggest name in PoE racing.

Here is when they really had an "oh crap" moment and probably changed direction from one game into a split game. Seeing peoples reactions to D4, which is fairly similar, was probably the nail in the coffin and also why all of a sudden the expected release of PoE2 is far beyond their estimate about a year ago."

/u/Xhibbi1

I also believe this theory - imo GGG planned to release PoE2 as a merger with PoE1 at the end of this year/start of next one all the way up to the point where the Crucible Ruthless boss race bombed. That imo was when the decision to make PoE2 a standalone game was made.

They can't nerf everything, make the game slower and fix a lot of mistakes without sugarcoating it to the extreme. They started on that road in 3.15 and people threw their fists in the air. Now they're rejoicing because those nerfs and slowdowns are covered in a very big, sweet coat of sugar called "PoE 2".

"

Phrazz wrote:

They can't nerf everything, make the game slower and fix a lot of mistakes without sugarcoating it to the extreme. They started on that road in 3.15 and people threw their fists in the air. Now they're rejoicing because those nerfs and slowdowns are covered in a very big, sweet coat of sugar called "PoE 2".

I find myself in the rejoicing crowd. PoE 2 might be absolutely great, but it also might not be for me, and now I have peace of mind knowing that it won't devour the current PoE in the process.

"

Xyel wrote:

"

Phrazz wrote:

They can't nerf everything, make the game slower and fix a lot of mistakes without sugarcoating it to the extreme. They started on that road in 3.15 and people threw their fists in the air. Now they're rejoicing because those nerfs and slowdowns are covered in a very big, sweet coat of sugar called "PoE 2".

I find myself in the rejoicing crowd. PoE 2 might be absolutely great, but it also might not be for me, and now I have peace of mind knowing that it won't devour the current PoE in the process.

Yeah, I'm in no crowd, really. I still like PoE 1, and depending on how a well-rounded, well-geared character does in PoE 2, I might like that game too.

The whole us v them thing of poe/diablo is purely in the fandom. D4 makes money for GGG.

Does anyone actually know when the decision to split the games was made?

I suspect it was after the announcement of ExileCon was made and that then made the con a bit of an over promotion. It seems excessive to hold it to announce a Beta in 12 months, but they had no choice once folks bought tickets etc.

Do I recall correctly that Chris said the decision was internally controversial?

It baffles the mind that someone could believe that there's limited overlap between D3, D4 and POE players. As if every single person playing POE is a lifer that refuses to touch any other game in their free time. I wonder when saying this if they're being hyperbolic, ironic or just truly have no grasp on reality.

I've played over 600 hours of POE, nearly the same amount of D3 and about ~50 hours of D4 so far. I've also played Last Epoch for 100 hours, Grim Dawn for 200 or so and a dozen other indie ARPG-like games over the years. I find it far more likely I'm typical of POE's target market than people who exclusively play POE.

Not that I doubt they exist, it just seems to unfathomable to me that they would be the norm in any way.

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ladish wrote:

The whole us v them thing of poe/diablo is purely in the fandom. D4 makes money for GGG.

Agreed. The tribalism around games, particularly in the ARPG genre, is as worthless as in sports or politics.