Yesterday, we noted how Path of Exile players were responding with dismay to the proposed Expedition expansion and league changes, under the belief that the expansion was being designed to nerf what fun is left in the game. The game’s subreddit, for example, was a solid wall of disgruntled memes, dejection, and attempts to get Grinding Gear Games to listen.
Well, the studio is definitely listening. GGG’s Chris Wilson posted as 1867-word missive to the playerbase on Reddit addressing the complaints.
“There has been speculation that I have personally been driving the balance changes to match my original vision for Path of Exile,” he writes. “There is a little truth to this, in that I want to restore areas of the game that were important but have been eroded, but almost every area of specific balance work is the product of a large team of designers working together for a long time to come up with solutions to problems we want to address.”
He explains that POE had reached a “breaking point with power creep” that needed to be addressed once and for all because neither the players nor the devs were happy with the game. “[W]e are very confident that the new Path of Exile is going to be more fun,” he says.
Concerned players are going to need to get a cup of tea and sit down for the whole thing because Wilson then goes on to touch on pretty much everything, from the gem mana cost nerfs and hyperthermia nerfs to aurabot nerfs and the community wiki. He also discusses problems with Ultimatum and its poor retention, admitting that the encounters didn’t have strong combat and that the reward structure was poor.
