Zoom is not fun. It's loot FOMO

Okay, I made fabricated straw man version of your thoughts.

Show me what your thoughts are.

I was there when they released diablo you know?
I played the sequel. I played the expansion of the sequel.
I played pretty much everything.

You show up and tell me that I have been playing strife amazon with too much speed. That I should not teleport too much with my sorc. That I should not jump with my barb.

And on top of this - you come here and say "you are not having fun".

In what universe?

Quarter of a century we are using run and gun.
And I say -we- because this includes you.

Why did you made your characters in POE fast?

You know people can see your account?

And then if you do one thing, but talk something completely different, who is making straw man versions of who's thoughts?

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allanballan6ix9ine#1114 a écrit :

hi ! i'd like to weigh on this topic but i'm a bit confused by the term zoom. are you guys talking about fast action and movement speed gameplay or broken builds that trivialize the entire game with minimal investment?

Welcome. The answer to your question will likely change depending on the person, and their opinions about it.

So for me, when I think about "zoom" I am not thinking about mobility, and moving around fast. I think moving quickly and fast action speed is fine, and should be a part of what makes builds different.

When I talk about the negative aspects of "zoom", I am mainly talking about your second description, of broken builds that trivialize the entire game with minimal investment.

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allanballan6ix9ine#1114 a écrit :

i want "zoom" to be in the game, but players need to (imo) earn the ability to trivialize content by being good at the game, a lvl 1 souls run is a great example of this.

Right so if I can interpret that as I would express it:

I want players to feel powerful and be mobile in the game, but players should not reach a point where they are trivializing the content until much later, and with skill/knowledge investment.

Fast is fine. Clearing the entire screen of monsters before they one-shot you, as "the norm", is not so good.

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WhisperSlade#0532 a écrit :

Fast is fine. Clearing the entire screen of monsters before they one-shot you, as "the norm", is not so good.

Which ironically is exactly what your occultist with 80% travel skill reduction is doing.

And because "it's not fun" you made multiple of them during the years.

And spend thousands of hours leveling them.

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Skellymancer#5263 a écrit :

I was there when they released diablo you know?
I played the sequel. I played the expansion of the sequel.
I played pretty much everything.

I was born in the 80s, I grew up playing the Diablo 1 & 2.
This does not impress me, I don't care, and it has no bearing on the discussion except to act as an authoritative argument with no substance.

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Skellymancer#5263 a écrit :

You show up and tell me that I have been playing strife amazon with too much speed. That I should not teleport too much with my sorc. That I should not jump with my barb.

I have no problem with mobility speed, both in and out of combat. I think it's good. My critique, is with instantly deleting all the monsters off the screen before they can even attack you, and the need to balance monsters to one-shot you to counter-act this meta.

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Skellymancer#5263 a écrit :

And on top of this - you come here and say "you are not having fun".

I didn't say that. I do have fun in both PoE1 & PoE2.
My title "Zoom is not fun, It's loot FOMO" is a short title to convey an idea. People play zoom because it generates loot. Not because nobody can find it fun, but because I think the game can be better.

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Skellymancer#5263 a écrit :

Why did you made your characters in POE fast?

Meta, fomo, to complete the league mtx fast so I can play PoE2 again.

"

Skellymancer#5263 a écrit :

You know people can see your account?

yep.

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Skellymancer#5263 a écrit :

And then if you do one thing, but talk something completely different, who is making straw man versions of who's thoughts?

That's not what a straw man is.
What you're trying to say is that I'm a hypocrite and contradicting myself. But I'm not, because both of these things are true: "I play zoom meta because it's the most effective build to complete the league, and I think the game could be better by eliminating the zoom meta". And don't confuse mobility with zoom. Mobility is fine.

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Skellymancer#5263 a écrit :

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WhisperSlade#0532 a écrit :

Fast is fine. Clearing the entire screen of monsters before they one-shot you, as "the norm", is not so good.

Which ironically is exactly what your occultist with 80% travel skill reduction is doing.

And because "it's not fun" you made multiple of them during the years.

And spend thousands of hours leveling them.

Do you completely misunderstand every point on purpose, or is it coming naturally to you.

Move speed is not the type of 'zoom' I'm talking about, and everyone plays meta, to get the league over with.

Okay, I disagree, you disagree.

Obviously we won't find common ground. I will show myself out, and close the door behind me.

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Skellymancer#5263 a écrit :

Okay, I disagree, you disagree.

Obviously we won't find common ground. I will show myself out, and close the door behind me.

You're fine, and your opinion is welcome. But since everyone is here because we like PoE in our own way, try to understand what people are saying and have a constructive disagreement about it. Try to convince & understand people, not "beat" them.

Edit: I think part of the confusion is that you thought I meant "zoom" as movement speed. That's not really it. I mean trivializing enemies, and clear speed with no (or rarely) combat challenge.

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WhisperSlade#0532 a écrit :

I want players to feel powerful and be mobile in the game, but players should not reach a point where they are trivializing the content until much later, and with skill/knowledge investment.

Fast is fine. Clearing the entire screen of monsters before they one-shot you, as "the norm", is not so good.

thank you for clarifying. i fully agree with that statement, however i'm not sure how big the portion of the player base that shares this opinion is and i don't want the developers to cater the game only to players that agree with us.

personally i'm very much in favor of scaling the rewards primary with skill/knowledge and the workaround for that being high time investment.

i'm envisioning something like T1-15 maps remaining the way they are now and T16's having a completely different way of scaling and playing the endgame, a way more congruent with the initial PoE 2 marketing minus the slow pace, which made me interested in the game in the first place (i didn't come over from PoE1).

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allanballan6ix9ine#1114 a écrit :

thank you for clarifying. i fully agree with that statement, however i'm not sure how big the portion of the player base that shares this opinion is and i don't want the developers to cater the game only to players that agree with us.

That's a fair idea, that the majority of the player base should decide. This is why in principle, I think it would be a good idea for GGG to put a question/poll system in the game, where they can get the opinion of the players without them needing to leave the game and come onto the forums. After that, it will be up to GGG to interpret and decide what's best from there, with that information.

Everyone has their preference, and there's no accounting for taste. But without trying to sound too presumptuous, I worry that many players might be confusing their immediate experience of being competitive in the current meta, with what the game could be like if the meta was different. This is all, on a spectrum of sorts: methodical to zoom

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allanballan6ix9ine#1114 a écrit :

personally i'm very much in favor of scaling the rewards primary with skill/knowledge and the workaround for that being high time investment.

i'm envisioning something like T1-15 maps remaining the way they are now and T16's having a completely different way of scaling and playing the endgame, a way more congruent with the initial PoE 2 marketing minus the slow pace, which made me interested in the game in the first place (i didn't come over from PoE1).

Cool idea. It would be pretty involved to expound right now the 'broader idea' i would implement as generally, it would involve a lot of trial and error, but the end-goal would be the slower pace you mentioned.

Unfortunately too, the "fast versus slow" concept tends to conflate the movement and skill speed, with the length of the fights.

Perhaps the best way to convey the 'vision', is to ask: which in PoE2 right now, is a more interesting encounter, the regular mobs, or the bosses? And if the answer is the bosses, the follow up question is "what if the rest of the game were that sort of encounter?" Not so much boss fights, but enemies that you didn't (always) steam-roll, which lasted a bit of time, where the fights were "slower" (I might prefer the term engaging, or interesting)

Edit: It would also be beneficial to lower the mob density in exchange for tougher monsters, to complement the different style of encounters, and which of course would have their XP and drops increased to compensate. This would benefit the visual clarity immensely at the same time.

cheers =)

"

You know, I will be honest.

I think you do not get it because you never has.
And I will explain why I think that way.

We do not reach zoom level.

Your build is what zooms, and it zooms from very early.

You zoom zoom white maps. Upgrade, zoom zoom yellow. Upgrade, zoom zoom red. Star juicing.

It is not like we walk into red and start clearing them for half hour per map, and then we reach some point where we clear them for few minutes.

This play style is from T1 to T16.
Running, killing and looting pretty much all the time.

And you feel like God in T1, and then like God in T16.

And it is fun in T1 and fun in T16.

If I zoom zoom early on - I quit. Just that simple. But thing is, you don't. If you do - very soon you are unable to because difficulty rises up very fast. So no - you do not zoom zoom early on. But when it stops on T16 - this is where it becomes insanely boring. And this is where I quit all the time.

Yes, this is possible to zoom-zoom early if you stop progressing. Like, get lvl 30, return to Act 1 and start zoomzooming. But this is crap. I enjoy the game only when I can push on and when it takes time to kill monsters. If there is nowhere to push and what is left is just that braindead gameplay - I quit.