'Natural' Character Progression

There really should be a more natural approach, grounded, more real approach to progression, presentation and playstyle in this game.

The 'maturity' and 'luxury', and even the originality of Path of Exile's narrative & aesthetics, with its heavier tone and natural kind of quest for power (circumstances promote it) is what draws people in, in my opinion.
It is the "Build Your Own Fun" self-realization that keeps many people
who love the niche playing though.

I believe this connects seamlessly with my suggestions.




So many Tiers, lost in the rain.

Converted and DoTs multiplying damage.

Increases and More . . time to go now.


Install a Giant Rainforest Ecosystem in your Studio to [Improve Vigor]: "An Invasive Species Could Be THE END to My Giant Rainforest Vivarium"
a story in the middle of its telling

Get everyone adjusted to Nature . . . start with this, or people will not adjust easily. 4 months of passive adjusting to Nature. Its influence will be impressive.

EDIT
------------------------------------------
Major:

"

Have every 'juice' into a map increase the difficulty of the Boss. Make things Square. Strong. If it's juiced it's juiced. It is what it is. Some things may affect Boss more, others Mobs more.
I am just answering the phenom of Rares stronger than Bosses.
This will simplify everything for YOU, the DEV or PLAYER . . and the Player or Dev.

------------------------------------------

The presentation of complexity is important. Options and numbers shouldn't be introduced all at once or before killing Brutus, even. The passive tree already shows too much too soon.

You don't know who you are repelling with your presentation/ reputation/ first-hour game experience because they aren't anywhere near the game.

Having to use passive points and skill gems so early into the game is a bit too much.

I don't think the inventory should be opened until 10 minutes into the game. I don't think the passive tree should be opened until 20 minutes into the game.
These are good general outlines for bringing in new players.

The passive tree shouldn't show every other character's section, it should only show the 'starter' area until another 10 minutes in (30 minutes total), at which point the half of each neighboring character's tree that is on the same side as your own character is revealed. This is about 11 points away from start. 1.5 hours total in, show the whole passive tree.

To accommodate for this there are some Designs that will kill 2 birds with 1 stone.

Design 1: Slower experience gain, especially starting out. This should be a result of fewer enemies killed from simple, generally weak attacks. Lethality should not be too high either direction, with perhaps a few exceptions.
> This is good for introducing the feel of the game, the enemies, timings, range, hitboxes, getting adjusted to UI, getting adjusted to visual & audio information and sensation.

Design 2: The simpler, generally weaker attacks should be the default attack and variations of default attack(s) & movement. I usually avoid speaking into the void so I am only mentioning this because it is already recognized as a good idea by GGG, since they're doing that with PoE 2.
> This makes the character less of an arcade-like prop. This adds depth that is more familiar and less 'grand'. Things only scale up from here so it is good to start with something a bit less shocking & 'inventive'.
> This is a better kit for the rest of the game. PoE 2 is already doing something like this. I believe in smaller, simpler movement variations and attack variations though. Like real life.

Design 3: Every feature should feel good.
> The more immersive the less of a prop things feel like.
> Each character attracts a different kind of player. This is an important consideration.

Design 4: Hitboxes should be very accurate. Server should be very stable and issues ironed out.
> The more immersive the less of a prop things feel like.

Design 5: Servers should leave a lot of the processing client-side and audit it closely, implementing a pause, rewind, and logging for when client-side/ server-side behavior is messed up.
> Hackers can't play the game if they are getting impossible outcomes -- detected and froze. Keeps pausing and rewinding until it is clear that there is a problem.
> Deep analyze when this keeps happening. Deep analyze hacks, figure out what the 'impossible outcome' is and how to detect it efficiently & effectively.
> There is too much reliance on the Server. Either have something so flexible and advanced it feels like client-side or have it more client-side.
> If this results in exploits then just keep it server-side and fix the problems.

--------------------------------------------------------------
Natural Dev Progression
--------------------------------------------------------------

This will be useful for interviewing and testing candidate hires as well as testing and brushing up your vets.
Useful to any executive or management that needs to know what 'level' people are at.

Ask them this Advent Of Code question and see how far they get in optimizing it:

https://youtu.be/U16RnpV48KQ?feature=shared

"I Have Never Worked| Prime Reacts" (I've heard these kinds of stories for over a decade: https://youtu.be/46DkGih90a8?feature=shared

Your technicians, those that work closely with them, and probably some designers that barely work with them should be able to go through, study, and complete the exercises in these books:

> Gelfand's "Algebra", "Functions and Graphs", "Trigonometry", "Method of Coordinates" (all basic math)
> Euclid's "Elements 1 - 13" every exercise is immediately explained (good for a sense of proofing, intuitions relating to general mathematical logic and in particular geometry, and to make their brain less mush)
> The Foundations of Geometry by David Hilbert use their other half of the brain some more.
> Computability Theory by S. Barry Cooper makes sense

These 4 series/books are widely recognized. They have good reputations and are very competent at what they set out to do.


You can't get mush brains to conquer more difficult topics & problems. Thus they should be tested and 'study' time wedged out with a rest after.
> 1 hour of study/exercises, 20 minute break besides lunch after. Ensure everyone is working at a certain level with fundamentals fresh in their brain flesh.

2 - 7 months and 5 hours each work week should be about enough time for each bulleted point (of which there are 4).

For the sharp & competent it should be 2 months of "brushing up", good for 'warming up' in the morning or 'cooling down' in the evening. Like walking.

This will promote better abstract and logical thinking. It is an actual 'trickle down' effect and helps when it comes time to research for solutions or solve day to day week to week month to month problems that arise.

Am I wrong? Don't tell me.


> The Art of Computer Programming Volumes 1 - 4B by Knuth
>> Full of exercises, you won't know how your team does until the questions are put in front of them. Replace some exercises with similar from another source so that 'cheating' is exposed & prevented.

Give this one 4 - 9 months each volume, 5 hours per work week. Should be easier to do after the other math books are 'conquered'.

> Leetcode or similar. Get their 'rank' up. Good stuff.

30 minutes of this each workday for 1 month, after a Knuth volume is finished and before starting another.


Yeah all of this is seems long-term but you won't know who is a mush brain until you put people through it.

"I feel bad for new programmers" : https://youtu.be/jL88IAxoYOk?feature=shared

"$135 Billion Accidentally Deleted By Google" You want people In-House. You want backups. You want backups of backups. You want multiple fallbacks that don't rely on one another. You want money in different places: https://youtu.be/hzPdd00OTeg?feature=shared

"They got away with this??" (Blizzard) : https://youtu.be/KGQSTDm5ois?feature=shared



--------------------------------------------------------------
Message to Game Developers
--------------------------------------------------------------



Section 1: Short-list of Natural Progression and Natural Immersion
I believe these are good for the game after the 5 Designs are implemented.


Added difficulty for Ruthless and Naked Savage mode where applicable:
> Flasks and Healing/ Mana regen lasts much much longer but is less effective or equally effective (healing/ mana takes 5x longer). Auras and Regen less effective by 40 - 70% overall. Rebalance game.
> Flasks require 3 seconds to ingest, modified by attack speed, and can be interrupted. Evasion goes down by half, evading while ingesting is .05s delay, and shield prevents interruption (.05s delay per hit) if health is unaffected, unless stunned or knockedback, hit below 2% of health is a delay of .05s up to 6% of health, DoT up to 6% of health (separate) is a slow of 50% to ingestion time.
> Capsules Now Available; quicker, more difficult to interrupt/lower delay, and can be kept in the mouth and activate at a certain health level or accidentally when savagely struck.
> Regen including flasks nerfed across the board.
> Nessa heal and other heals nerfed big time and not available until Medicine Chest quest is complete, or requires reagent resupply.
> Standing around a fire and food produces a regeneration 'buff' (like 20 minutes buff from food in-game, 7 minutes fire -- 1 minute to apply food, 1 minute 20s to apply fire warmth). Food from cooking creatures killed, limited supply & resupply at locales (or requiring trade), and Kingsmarch. Better food offers some small stat increases and better regeneration.


Naked Savage Mode exclusives (check out my game mode suggestion in the other thread):
> New armor scaling and armor numbers on stuff, to be less inflated.
> Raw Damage is received on unarmed strike against target, modified based on what is struck and damage dealt. Generally = 2.5% - 25% of damage dealt, reduced by your Natural Armor.
>> If 10% of health is damaged in this way, disables hand. 10% each hand. Game keeps track.
>>> Class of enemy armor should generally inform returned damage. Strength plate and whatever is similar to it = 25% of damage is returned. Silk & normal flesh = 2.5% of damage is returned (almost nothing).
>>>> Crits reflect same damage as if not-a-Crit, meaning there is no extra reflected damage.
>>>>> Hands have 10% extra Natural armor
> Armor formula is different, if Armor = Damage, 1/3 of the damage is gone. If Armor is 2x the Damage, then 1/2 of the Damage is gone.
> Vision cone and Fog of War . Basic and slightly underpowered stealth . One kind of stealth is a test of character attributes. Another is a test of your actual vision. This requires different graphics settings available to allow for performance over vibe.
> Some indication that enemies are within perception when you are zoomed in or that they are off-screen but 'perceivable' by your character. This can be a test of your actual attention with subtle color change on the fringe of your screen and/or it is also a test of your attributes/ stats & class.
> A way of looking off-screen into a direction if you have good Perception.
> A way to channel long-range vision if you are a magic woman.
> A way to sense enemies and lifeforce if you are strong strong.


Additional Attribute Stats:

"

Marauder class armor: +1 each level. 100 total. 2+1 base.
Tempest/Duelist class armor: +1 every other level. 50 total. 2 base.
Others class armor: +1 every fourth level. 25 total. 1 base.

"

New Rule of thumb
To prevent one third of damage (33%), you need armour 1 times the damage (e.g. 100 armour for 100 damage)
To prevent half of damage (50%), you need armour 2 times the damage (e.g. 200 armour for 100 damage)
To prevent two thirds of damage (66%), you need armour 4 times the damage (e.g. 400 armour for 100 damage)
To prevent three quarters of damage (75%), you need armour 8 times the damage (e.g. 800 armour for 100 damage)
To prevent 90% of damage, you need armour 16 times the damage (e.g. 1600 armour for 100 damage)
Armour will never prevent more damage than its value divided by 2.5 (e.g. 1000 armour will never prevent more than 400 damage)

"

Alert: Every 10 Dexterity: +.1 Perception
Insightful: Every 10 Intelligence: +.1 Enemy Comprehension

"

Sandbagging: Every 10 Strength should = +1 Armor (Natural Armor)
Angry Critic: Every 16/17 Dexterity should = Add 0.1% Global Critical Chance
Astrologer: Every 20 Intelligence should = +0.1 - 1 Spell Damage

"

Intimidating: Every 16/17 Strength = +0.25 - 1 Melee Physical Damage
Necessary Evil: Every 20 Dexterity = +1% Attack & Cast Speed
Human Calculator: Every 25 Intelligence = +1% Spell Damage

Globe Trotter: Every 20 Strength = +1% Maximum Life
Ephemeral: Every 25 Dexterity = +1% Global Critical Damage
Knowledge Grotto: Every 33 Intelligence = +1% Mana

Cretin: Every 25 Strength = +.2% Maximum Life Regeneration per 5 seconds (.1% per 5 base)
Savvy: Every 33 Dexterity = +.5% Movement Speed
Spy: Every 50 Intelligence = +5 Energy Shield (-5 base for non-int, 0 for half int, 5 for witch)

Bully: Every 33 Strength = +1 Maximum Rage (10 base)
Sniper: Every 50 Dexterity = +1 Projectile Range (with accuracy)
Spider: Every 100 Intelligence = +1% Gem Quality

Tankard: Every 50 Strength = +0.5% Elemental Resistance, +0.25% Chaos Resistance, +0.1% Spell Damage Reduction ; Double #.#% = Flat Reduction
Lucky: Every 100 Dexterity = +? Lucky Evasion and Attack at Full Health, Unlucky for Enemy Weapon & Spell Damage Range
Eternal: Every 200 Intelligence = +1 Level of Socketed Gem

Warrior: Every 100 Strength = +0.4 Rage every Phys Attack, +0.1 Rage every Hit recieved (.2 Rage every Phys Attack base, .05 Rage every Hit Recieved base)
Hunter: Every 200 Dexterity = +1 Global Projectile Penetration (certain enemies cost .5, 1, 2, rare 3 to penetrate, strength block adds 1, dex block minus 1, int block no change)
Mage: Every 400 Intelligence = +1 Gem Slot (+1 link anywhere, player choice)

Berserker: Every 200 Strength: +1 Minimum Rage
Hunter-Killer: Every 400 Dexterity: +1 Global Projectile #

Destroyer: Every 400 Strength: +3 Minimum Weapon Damage

> I am sure there is room for other character challenges for the less-strong such as Templar and Duelist.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Section 2: A Message to GGG; Ramblings and Numbers: My Original Draft
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


I Have A Vision, GGG Should Accept It: Adding More Natural Stat Progression To The Characters.

>This would be good for the lifeforce. Aids playing entirely on immersion rather than numbers.

>Currently there is little direct progression from experience. You get to choose where and how you invest points. The attributes do not increase unless you sacrifice your starting strength (Starting Strength? Mark Rippetoe?) or some nearby 'Mastery'; only Life and a small amount of Accuracy is innate. These innate gains are the same across all characters, apparently. Maybe there is some hidden stuff but I do not think there is much to speak of if at all.

>> This challenges immersion and storytelling. The action itself is the progenitor of gain yet it is alchemized into mercurial will-choice after-the-fact. Pure sorcery.

>>> Leveling would feel better if innate evolution of the attributes and ability of the characters existed in every version of the game. I believe that it would just be a better game with better player retention.

>>(On that note: shade out the passive tree areas outside of one's character slice, illuminate one's section; if you want to retain more. That is my opinion. Reveal more of the passive tree as level increases. Everything on the complete opposite side doesn't need to be seen.

>>> Everything within 11 points of travel may be revealed but focus lighting and 'emphasis' on the immediate choices and beginning sections.)


>I wanted to punch-out Hillock and keep going to get away from the hording, financial system with its currency juggling, the probability matrices, and the random extreme number manipulation transport meatgrinder that is Atlas & 20,000 Leagues I had nothing to do with.

>>This made the character less "Mercurial", less "Liquid", less "Doesn't Matter What Class You Start With You Can Be Anything", less "Arcade Game" -- .
This is especially good for the less mercurial character 'Marauder' . Not everyone enjoys highly mercurial games; yet there is still abundant room for it here. This would feel good and is positive overall if learned from.


Funny Observation and Challenge to the true "Class Fantasy" as some put it:
> 0 Armor when naked? I could have 200 strength, be level 50, and still scrape my knee on a log . I should be un-scrape-able . My punches should do more than 5 - 20 damage at level 50 (estimating with passive nodes) . My punches should instakill a Level 1 Witch when I am Level 100 with 400 Strength. My naked punches should do more than 6 - 24 damage (a fourth or less of her health on average). It's 2 - 8 dmg level 1. I do not have a particular interest in punching women but who else is weaker? A child? My point is made with words.



Attribute Progression:

>Attribute contributions outside of special interactions with Unique items have always been low. Instead of intuitive scaling they're in their own silly world. Reminds me of liquidity . . . definitely Not Strong. That is Dex or Int, a gamer/ dev 'bias'. PoE narratives have great stuff though: congratulations Inters & Dexters. You have soul and mind

>>(this is also a reference to the categories for tattoos, where Dex & Int are 'Mind' and 'Soul' tattoos).

>To illustrate: Hitting 1500 Strength is a nice idea but you get low stats from it if you think of the Marauder as "45x stronger" as compared to Game Start (32 Strength).

>> You get 300% Melee Damage (4x harder hitting) and 750 Life. Witch and everyone else has 650 Base Life at level 50, 1250 life at level 100. The health part is lacking but 300% on unarmed 2-8 dmg is a legit joke. I laughed. It was funny. Then less funny.

>>> Flat damage a part of character/ attribute progress would solve this.

> First: Change base attributes to 100 Total. This is because becoming 45x stronger from gear is mercurial & strange. Unnatural. Magic shit.

>> 56 Main, 22 22 Off. GAIN 2 Main Attribute and 1 Off Attribute every level. An extra 300 Attribute points at level 100. 256 Str, 72 Dex 72 Int.

>>> Numbers elsewhere in the game would have to change of course (everything), but the stats from the attributes should be felt a bit extra.

> This is like a fist-full of progress --- but a juggernaut bigger than '0' natural progress.

"

Sandbagging: Every 10 Strength should = +1 Armor (Natural Armor)
Angry Critic: Every 16/17 Dexterity should = Add 0.1% Global Critical Chance
Astrologer: Every 20 Intelligence should = +0.1 - 1 Spell Damage

> The other characters needs some kind of immersive scaling too.

>> Accuracy and Critical Chance should also affect the "luckiness" of weapon damage. Whether it will be high or low in the damage range.

> GGG made armor scaling crazy -- this makes it more difficult to settle the idea of armor and damage in the head. I will suggest a better armor-to-damage ratio later in this post.

>> Back to Attributes:

"

Intimidating: Every 16/17 Strength = +0.25 - 1 Melee Physical Damage
Necessary Evil: Every 20 Dexterity = +1% Attack & Cast Speed
Human Calculator: Every 25 Intelligence = +1% Spell Damage

Globe Trotter: Every 20 Strength = +1% Maximum Life
Ephemeral: Every 25 Dexterity = +1% Global Critical Damage
Knowledge Grotto: Every 33 Intelligence = +1% Mana

Cretin: Every 25 Strength = +.2% Maximum Life Regeneration per 5 seconds (.1% per 5 base)
Savvy: Every 33 Dexterity = +.5% Movement Speed
Spy: Every 50 Intelligence = +5 Energy Shield (-5 base for non-int, 0 for half int, 5 for witch)

Bully: Every 33 Strength = +1 Maximum Rage (10 base)
Sniper: Every 50 Dexterity = +1 Projectile Range (with accuracy)
Spider: Every 100 Intelligence = +1% Gem Quality

Tankard: Every 50 Strength = +0.5% Elemental Resistance, +0.25% Chaos Resistance, +0.1% Spell Damage Reduction ; Double #.#% = Flat Reduction
Lucky: Every 100 Dexterity = +? Lucky Evasion and Attack at Full Health, Unlucky for Enemy Weapon Damage Range
Eternal: Every 200 Intelligence = +1 Level of Socketed Gem

Warrior: Every 100 Strength = +0.4 Rage every Phys Attack, +0.1 Rage every Hit recieved (.2 Rage every Phys Attack base, .05 Rage every Hit Recieved base)
Hunter: Every 200 Dexterity = +1 Global Projectile Penetration (certain enemies cost .5, 1, 2, rare 3 to penetrate, strength block adds 1, dex block minus 1, int block no change)
Mage: Every 400 Intelligence = +1 Gem Slot (+1 link anywhere, player choice)

Berserker: Every 200 Strength: +1 Minimum Rage
Hunter-Killer: Every 400 Dexterity: +1 Global Projectile #

Destroyer: Every 400 Strength: +3 Minimum Weapon Damage

> Yeah I guess the gem stuff would scale a lot more for Intelligence characters. Makes sense. Makes good.

> The regen gameplay is weird so I set its progression low from Strength. I think regeneration should be lower overall and its expectation/ necessity lower too . In terms of narrative and game design I think this is easier and better.

>> Regen overall should decrease 90%. I think shield having high regen is a good way of differentiating it and I appreciate how it works -- -50% overall on shield regen.

> Cramming 'monster packs' is weird. Also it slows my CPU. Reliance on regeneration and monster packs should go down. The code is probably obtuse in places too -- using too much hardware, software not optimal.

>> Area exploration and questing could go up somewhat. I like how Act 1 starts partially from its potential. I like the combat partially from its potential as well.

>>> Instead of a bunch of random shit weapons getting vendored for scroll scraps while giga slaughtering countless cannibals, dinosaur raptor birds, armed ghosts, and women-made-of-water; like a supreme Mega Threat Apex Predator; it would be more natural to bring crab/rhoa and firewood to be cooked for health regen while slowly conquering the different environments.


Armor Progression:

Who has the most natural armor?

Clearly being tough belongs to the Strong. Templar seems a bit tough but Duelist is probably deceptively tough -- just like one might underestimate some old nut. All trickling down from the Mountain of Strength known as Maroider.

And of course this armor should apply to Bleed & Corrupted Blood.

"

Marauder class armor: +1 each level. 100 total. 2+1 base.
Tempest/Duelist class armor: +1 every other level. 50 total. 2 base.
Others class armor: +1 every fourth level. 25 total. 1 base.

The other characters should have good base character progression besides attributes that mirrors their attribute progression but I am unmotivated to type all of that out.
The point of having character as well as attribute progression is to compare 2 characters (lets say 2 Marauders) with vastly different level with the exact same attributes -- the higher level wins. The extra attributes on the lower level character would come from gear I guess.



Thinking About It:

"

Rule of thumb
To prevent one third of damage (33%), you need armour 2.5 times the damage (e.g. 250 armour for 100 damage)
To prevent half of damage (50%), you need armour 5 times the damage (e.g. 500 armour for 100 damage)
To prevent two thirds of damage (66%), you need armour 10 times the damage (e.g. 1000 armour for 100 damage)
To prevent three quarters of damage (75%), you need armour 15 times the damage (e.g. 1500 armour for 100 damage)
To prevent 90% of damage, you need armour 45 times the damage (e.g. 4500 armour for 100 damage)
Armour will never prevent more damage than its value divided by 5 (e.g. 1000 armour will never prevent more than 200 damage)

This scaling is crrrraaaaazy. This is like surfing a 150 ft wave.
Clear "chasing the dragon" behavior was behind this. It works but is madness.
I think I can do better, something more intuitive to look at. It sits in the mind well.

"

New Rule of thumb
To prevent one third of damage (33%), you need armour 1 times the damage (e.g. 100 armour for 100 damage)
To prevent half of damage (50%), you need armour 2 times the damage (e.g. 200 armour for 100 damage)
To prevent two thirds of damage (66%), you need armour 4 times the damage (e.g. 400 armour for 100 damage)
To prevent three quarters of damage (75%), you need armour 8 times the damage (e.g. 800 armour for 100 damage)
To prevent 90% of damage, you need armour 16 times the damage (e.g. 1600 armour for 100 damage)
Armour will never prevent more damage than its value divided by 2.5 (e.g. 1000 armour will never prevent more than 400 damage)

Second I do believe in the Power of Flat Reduction. It's borderline religious. I think the Flat Reduction shouldn't be entirely consistent but instead a range of .25% - 2.5% of the armor value based on the kind of armor.

Strength plate/shield gets highest flat reduction of 2.5% of the armor value. Natural Strength & Class Armor gets .25% along with Silk or whatever.

After preventing 90% of 100 damage with 1600 plate armor, a flat reduction of 40 brings the damage to 0. This is the equivalent of sitting inside a Tank. 1600 Strength Plate is a big number. I believe the armor numbers in the game should decrease overall along with damage numbers.

What ratio of strength plate Armor to Damage results in 0 effective damage?: About 860 Armor to 100 Damage. I didn't check but that's about right.


Talk of millions of damage per second has graced my eyes and ears. Before and during playing this game. I find this crazy. I am doing 2 - 8 damage unarmed, maybe 30 damage with a club and Heavy Strike on the beach. Then people are doing 1 million times that? I find this lacks Body. Pure Numeracy.

How does a weapon magically go from 16 dmg to 140 dmg when it looks the exact same? I don't know. With magical weapons it makes sense. With normal weapons I have a hard time imagining it. This taxes my suspension of disbelief and I like getting immersed.


My suggestions might look like a lot less fun than "100x my stock options" but the game ran away with inflation.
My suggestions are more "grug smash 2 rocks together, strong rock win" -- but that's just how it is. That's what it means to be Thick. That's the difference between Dex & Int aesthetics & numbers and Strength Reality. Armor & Damage liquidity is great but a bar of Gold buys a house today like it bought a house 100 years ago. Some things are what everything else is compared to to know its value -- a liquid fluid mercurial financial game (should) compare itself to a fixed BODACIOUS reality.

MY STRENGTH IS NOT LIQUID . MY BRAWNY NATURAL DURABILITY IS NOT LIQUID . I WILL NOT BE SUBDUED . THIS IS FOR EVERY BODY .

Furthermore, Blocks should be an effective armor increase (starting a bit low perhaps but then effectively multiplying itself when blocking; based on passive coverage vs active blocking); flat reduction % of armor improves from a dex/int shield block


Other Characters and Attributes

For everyone else they should get an off-screen mechanic too. "Enemy sense" is pretty good for the Marocker. Ranger with a 'Focus' mechanic that lets camera drift is pretty good -- they're snipers basically. Witch being capable of seeing beyond walls, channel to see distant areas or drift-- seems magical.

In general, enemy sense is good for everyone. This way Fog of War can be implemented. Various Cones of Sight even. A processing-light (low hardware use) proximity audio even.

Given how different things can be between characters it would certainly be immersive and change gameplay.

>For Strength: Rage required for natural enemy sense. Minimum rage useful here.

>> Edge of screen should turn more red (darker in corners) based on presence of enemies. That way I can tell when enemies are off-screen, especially when zoomed in.

>>> Red should be slightly higher on side of screen where the enemies are off-screen. Keep the enemy direction indication subtle or non-existent until they are barely off-screen or there is direct line-of-sight for the character. 'General Red ness' should show with some good distance to it though -- roused to readiness.

"

Alert: Every 10 Dexterity: +.1 Perception or something
Insightful: Every 10 Intelligence: +.1 Enemy Comprehension or something

Thanks For Reading

------------------------------------------------

For Difficult Devs

Try a Safe Infrared Heat Lamp and some sunlight

20 minutes walking, some regular water, and 1/4 of daily electrolytes sodium & potassium. That's about 250 mg of sodium & 800 mg of potassium -- which are a % of their compound.

Corporate Japan stretches & monkey bars
And daily easy stretches (warm ups) . . . and those monkey bars. . . tell them not to swing or overdo it.

steal the 100 year japanese health routine: https://youtu.be/0xfDmrcI7OI?feature=shared

--------
Message to Devs
--------
This Is Why Managers Don't Trust Programmers...

Quite a read

My god , such a wall of text but I managed it.
Most of what you said makes sense, a little ‘clarity’ lacking in places but I got the general thoughts.

I think 80-90% of what you’ve said is basically the PoE2 ‘mantra’, time will tell but it feels like the direction of the new IP. Whether it will work as you hope or not, time only will tell.

As for PoE, I think it’s sometimes hard to remember this game was born of 3 ‘novices’ who wanted to do better than was around at the time. It’s been many years and the original code would have had many ‘errors’ by today’s standards which were further compounded by additions at regular intervals.
To be fair to GGG they haven’t done too badly at handling this behemoth, perhaps with PoE2 they will get time to retroactively improve PoE based on successes in PoE2.

Fair play to you for taking what must have been an age to write up this post. It’s not whining or critical (beyond the obvious suggestive concepts), and it’s well thought out (in general, few things some coders might disagree with).

Hope it gets some traction.

Thanks. I do not like speaking into the void so I waited until GGG was already doing most of what I would have suggested 10 years ago -- to suggest something more while voicing support for their evolution.

It is a game for fun, but the perspective that it should remain like an 'arcade' game, and solely mercurial, doesn't make sense to me and I think it didn't make sense to GGG when they developed the game for several years.

The constantly changing meta, all the different Unique modifiers and abilities, all that has changed seemed to have the goal of improving their own ability.

With this impression I decided to wait until GGG acted on their own to make the game less 'arcade' and more immersive. Then, with PoE 2 close enough to release, I have spoken ♐

I worry that with focus on boss battles and the success of "Soulslike" they will become more 'arcade'. I hope to encourage immersion. The success of the Souls games and Elden Ring, and Black Myth Wukong is most definitely to do with depth of theme and immersion -- not 'solely' difficulty.

The feel, the experience must be respected.

I don’t disagree with the pseudo-arcade feel of PoE, in fact it’s fun for me but that’s a personal perspective not necessarily shared by others. I worry about the ‘souls like’ direction of PoE2 and feel this might be a ‘turn off’ for me, time will tell. I sincerely hope they are not being dragged into the ‘souls like’ success trap.

The meta changes and balancing has been problematic for them I think, it’s hard to keep the so called power creep under control. Especially with the behemoth code base.

We should keep our fingers crossed PoE2 delivers on their and our hopes for a successor.

Thank you for your input.

The soulslike influence is "dangerous" but I can tell, and feel, that the Black Myth Wukong is at least partially a correcting influence. The combat is interesting even if a lot of it is Light Attack & Heavy Attack . . . the Stances are quite interesting and it is well put together overall.

The immersion is quite good in that game too. Well done to them. It's getting an award probably.

As long as people don't believe there's a cheap fix, a cheap win and cheap lotto win . . there is less gambling for a 'win'. A craft should be respected if one wants to excel at it.

The problem with any ‘souls like’ mechanic in PoE would be loot rng. If I get blocked by inability to defeat act 3 (for example) final boss and need to spend days (based on PoE1 loot rng) farming suitable gear to beat the fight I will just give up.
The success of any game in the souls genre, whatever one it is, is a slippery path (pun unintended but spotted it). Sure if the loot to gear a character is readily (and I don’t mean rng dependant) available and it’s just a mechanics lesson that’s fine. I worry about ‘gear check’ being an element and for me at least (with historical rng) an utter turn off.

Also you mention light and heavy attacks, thankfully JR has already said they dislike the D4 builder spender style. I doubt we will see anything similar but maybe a heavy attack that debuffs followed but light attacks that are quick an make use of that debuff, these have been inferred by the use of various lightning arrows in the ‘ranger’ video iirc (might have been another class, I forget)

I don't know what is Souls-like about RNG since from what I've played you pick stuff up off of corpses or after killing something without RNG.

Do you mean dodge skill-expression making those who do not dodge every hit need to farm a lot more to clear something? Because devs make bosses more difficult to clear if one doesn't dodge everything (bosses kill quickly and are more difficult to dodge)?

It is a delicate balance with creative solutions & evolutions.

"

Dylan_Schreiner wrote:

I don't know what is Souls-like about RNG since from what I've played you pick stuff up off of corpses or after killing something without RNG.

Do you mean skill-expression making those who do not dodge every hit need to farm a lot more to clear something?

It is a delicate balance with creative solutions & evolutions.

I mean PoE is massively affected, or rather the player of it is, by rng of rolls on loot.
Combine that with a ‘soul like’ boss fight that relies not only on skills but gear and you’re asking for trouble imo in PoE