Are you a fan of the sword Oni-Goroshi? -- 01/10/24: wow, a Blackloak-inspired essay!

Blackcloak/Gildenhammer reading time while waiting for PoE 2 to download ;)

Still extremely chuffed that I have that signed Gildenhammer :)

That's one slowarse internet you got there, janie. :)

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Foreverhappychan#4626 wrote:

That's one slowarse internet you got there, janie. :)

Hehe, that's if it can even stand the strain ;) Huge download, 2 of us downloading at the same time will be interesting indeed.

So here is where you are lurking.

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ChanBalam#4639 wrote:

So here is where you are lurking.

Less lurking, more just glancing in. Facebook and Bluesky keep me very busy as regards internet engagement and crap. Much ranting and indie book reviewing.

I gave my poe2 key to one of my wife's gothic lolita fashion friends. She seemed pretty chuffed. :)

Today is more of said indie reading and probably some elden ring. It doesn't run much better on the pro but I'm always coming up with new build ideas there.

I tiptoe closer to just belting book 3 out. Kinds bummed how many readers of BC back in 2015 haven't done GH but eh that's on me for taking 8 years to publish a sequel to a very hefty book. :)

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I tiptoe closer to just belting book 3 out.

My Mrs. gave me Book 1 for my 50th birthday in 2020.
No pressure, I am patient.

Alright kids. Tell me about your PoE 2 experiences. I see plenty of threads of course but I want to hear about it from my friends. And for lack of those, I have you guys. Veteran Exiles one and all, and it is the veteran's take I desire.

Already read it'd give me a migraine on ps5 with my tv distance and no text scaling but still...some of us have waited a decade plus for this.

Was it worth it? Was it not? Spill the tea, as the kids like to say.

If I may chip in, it's worth it, as it's quite the experience.

The world is brilliantly crafted, beautiful, very inviting to exploration, and with some great lore to boot. The bosses are phenomenal in general design, as their move sets fit their personalities, they fit perfectly into the environment, and their voice acting is flawless.

The story is great in act1, mid at best in act2, and awesome in act 3.

Progression is... uneven, where act1 is a ton of fun, act2 is a punsh in the face, and act3 is a ton of fun again, with a flashback to classic poe1 act2, where out of nowhere, monsters start dealing chaos damage. A lot of chaos damage.

The power progression is mostly tied to getting new skill and combing them with the old ones, so the power spikes in progression are much less tied to gear than in poe1.

Item-drops-wise, it's ruthless, and rumor has it they shadow-buffed drop rates earlier today.

Overall, I love the game.

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Foreverhappychan#4626 wrote:

Alright kids. Tell me about your PoE 2 experiences.

I'd say it's quite good albeit a bit rough around the edges. Go figure, it's an early access. It is quite difficult, though certain clasees have an easier time than others. From what I noticed myself and heard others say, monk in particular has quite the rough start.

Progression feels pretty slow at the beginning and calling gear sparse is an understatement. Loot, let alone decent loot is quite rare. Most of my equipment I either bought from a vendor or crafted myself (with honestly rather mediocore stats). The lack of a crafting bench makes fixing resistances significantly more difficult.

The way to get your ascendency class I absolutely despise with a passion. The trial of the Sekhema is near impossible as a melee character when attempting it on-level. Meanwhile the trial of chaos just royally fucks over everyone indiscriminately.

The passive tree feels ok at the moment. No strong opinions in either direction as of now, as I'm not entirely used to it yet. What I CAN say is that the lack of any life nodes makes the pathing a whole lot more interesting.

Speaking of interesting, the story. I absolutely love the story, especially act 2 and 3. Act 1 kinda fell flat for me due to being somewhat stereotypical and more of a tutorial than anything else. Could also just be me not being overly interested in Ezomyte lore. Act 2 and 3 add a ton of lore for the maraketh and vaal respectively, which I found much more intriguing. In particular a certain something the vaal managed to do, but I won't spoil it here. Some areas are a bit too big though in my opionion.

Gameplay is great, but mana can be an issue at times. Plan the tree accordingly. Many of the skills can be combined to great effect, leading to some really fun combos. Those combos are definitely necessary, as there is at least one boss that straight up has a dps check. If you don't meet the required damage output, you're done for. I have not played around yet with weapon specific skill tree nodes, but I might do that on another character.

In terms of anything art-related, the game is beautiful in every way possible. Graphics are great, skills feel impactful and the sound design is just incredible. I first noticed the latter in particular in one level where the floor consists of different material in different areas (stone, wood and mud). Every single one of those types has a different walking sound and the switching between the sounds is very precise. It may not be something a lot of people care about, but I LOVE this.

All in all, I'm having a blast with it. It's difficult, it's rough around the edges and charged staff doesn't count as a lightning skill (despite adding flat lightning damage), but I'm having a ton of fun regardless. I just wish currency items would drop just a little bit more often so I could craft more gear myself.

Overall I'd say slow and very different from PoE 1, but a ton of fun once you properly engage with the way the (new) systems work.

Thanks to you both.

I suppose late 2025 was far too long to wait to indulge my curiosity.



Oh no. This is good.