Why I think Path of Exile 1 passive skill tree is better.

Hello,

I said a few times that I think Path of Exile 1 skill tree was better than PoE 2 skill tree, because it made me think more and offered more meaningful choices. I want to answer to why that is in detail.

So one reason I think this is, because the nodes in PoE 1 seemed more convoluted and thus you for example had to think about whether a flat increase would benefit you, or whether a percentage was better. I don't really see that in PoE 2, but I might be mistaken.

Another reason for me, and I think this is the main reason, is because of the attribute nodes, which you can now either set to dex, str or int and have flexibility about it, even respecc them that way, by just going to the hooded one.

Why I think this is bad, is because often times there seem to be some requirements pushed onto me by gear or by skills mainly, which make me have a certain amount of int, str or dex. I then go ahead and respecc my character in order to have that attribute. And you can do this on the fly here. It felt more difficult to just do that in PoE 1, because at least how I perceived it, and I am not a veteran of PoE 1, is that orbs of regret were a limited resource gained through quests.

So what happens next is that I just take some random nodes and get attributes by putting points into those nodes. Often times I then have some kind of "arm" of nodes extending outwards from my build. Sometimes I rearrange that arm and respecc making another arm going somewhere else, with a little bit of gold invested of course, which I do have plenty, because I saw some nodes that interest me.

In PoE 1 I did it different. Every time I had a skill point to give I looked at "my surroundings". I looked where I could reach with that skill point from where I had already put points. I calculated whether it was worth going a specific route in the skill tree to reach a certain node or whether I should just take a node that was near to me. I also then looked for nodes which might interest me and could benefit my build.

I also do that in Path of Exile 2. But this whole process, I feel, has been reduced to looking for nodes that might fit my build. And because the skill tree is so vast and unsightly, and convoluted in this way (not by nature of the modifiers of the nodes themselves, like in PoE 1, but rather the structure of the skill tree itself), it might take me some time to find those nodes and plan my path to them accordingly. But the whole "See what's in my vicinity, plan my ressources carefully, because orbs of regret are rare, wage whether I should get flat bonus or percentage" is not in this game at the moment, atleast not that I can perceive it.

I also think that nodes being either str, dex or int and you not being able to be flexible about it made you plan ahead more carefully and adapt your gear and build according to what is available to you right now instead of you just being able to dump some stat by using 5 skill points into some random nodes somewhere and then being able to use skills or gear you otherwise wouldn't be able to.

What do you guys think?