Author Topic: Path of Exile  (Read 2383 times)

Adelante

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Path of Exile
« on: March 04, 2013, 09:35:19 PM »
www.pathofexile.com

Path of Exile is an indie Action RPG in the same vein as the Diablo series, Titan Quest, and others that are light on story telling but heavy on the hack/slash/loot formula that made Diablo 2 such a monster success.

It includes several unique elements that I don't think have been done before (at least I have not seen them) such as the flask system, skills linked to gems instead of characters, and a massively massive passive skill tree.  Currency is also not linked to Gold or other moneys but instead directly to the crafting system.

Seriously, if you like Diablo, give this a shot and see if you like it.  Stick with it at least through the first Act so you can get to the point where decent loot starts dropping and you can start seeing definite benefits due to your choices in the passive skill tree.


Kistulot

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Re: Path of Exile
« Reply #1 on: March 05, 2013, 02:45:59 AM »
Its fun, but I see how people feel who were always complaining that it was hard to play when they could be playing in Mids, because the planner is soooo fun, but I just don't know what's best to use on it, if that makes any sense.

It also has a bit of a problem in that there's no traditional money, just bartering with scrolls and odd items, and honestly it felt hard for me to ever use the store and I ended up with a crazy stockpiling and with over 5 stacks of identify scrolls across my three characters.

I will give them that it is a solid game, fun enough, and for a game supported by microtrans it had nothing that felt limiting. I have a hard time believing it'll survive off of that given that so little is... needful.
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Adelante

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Re: Path of Exile
« Reply #2 on: March 05, 2013, 04:06:56 AM »
I had  to read the first sentence a few times to get what you meant - yes, it can be pretty complicated trying to build characters in Path of Exile.  I think that's a large part of the allure of the game for me.  My Marauder is probably not going to be exactly like any other Marauder out there.  Right now I'm leveling up a new Templar, still in Act 1, and I'm going primarily defensive to start.  I worked my way left on the tree to get the Armor + Energy Shield passives along with the +Health% passives.   Next I'm going to go up a little ways to get more +Int so I can level up more of my active skill gems and go towards the Shield passives up that way, then back further left from where I stopped recently so I can get the Shield passives over there.  Once I get all that stuff sorted I'll be level 30-ish and ready to focus on offensive passive skills for a while, get some more damage going.

I'm not a fan of the currency system.  I would have preferred a gold standard but it seems to be bringing the community together to make fair trades right now.  We'll see how long that lasts, but the market fluctuates and people are remarkably pleasant about the trades. 

The microtransactions are all cosmetic (things like alternate skill effects & glowing particle effects for weapons/armor) and a few storage things (I think).

I've enjoyed it quite a bit thus far even with the usual Beta bugs one finds.

Mistress Urd

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Re: Path of Exile
« Reply #3 on: March 06, 2013, 08:38:04 PM »
I was a big fan of D2 and since the closeure of CoH been playing that with my friends.

After being disappointed with D3 and TL2 I'll have to take a look at this one.

Looking over the website, I am not a fan of leveling ladders, people with RL don't have enough time to complete with the 24/7 teams who play in 8 hour shifts and I find games with micro transactions to be rather suspect. I'll still give it a look, after Diablo 1 1/2 and 1 3/4 maybe someone will make something better than D2.

Adelante

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Re: Path of Exile
« Reply #4 on: March 07, 2013, 04:24:26 AM »
About the leveling ladders - I completely ignore the.  They're pointless for the casual players and will have zero impact on you and your gameplay.


I very highly recommend playing the game with friends but be aware that loot drops are shared and your loot is reserved for you for only a few seconds.  A lot of PuGs have broken up over loot disputes, just be forewarned.

That said... it's so much more fun to play with friends.  The game gets much more difficult but at the same time so much more fun.

General Idiot

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Re: Path of Exile
« Reply #5 on: March 07, 2013, 11:49:31 AM »
Hmm.... I may have to look into this. Diablo 3 wasn't much and Torchlight 2 was significantly better but still didn't manage to hold my interest for long. This might.

Mistress Urd

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Re: Path of Exile
« Reply #6 on: March 08, 2013, 10:41:35 PM »
Hmm.... I may have to look into this. Diablo 3 wasn't much and Torchlight 2 was significantly better but still didn't manage to hold my interest for long. This might.

Both of those games had better gfx than D2 but fall short of the old gold standard. Maybe games have evolved and we expect more or they just aren't as good.

Kistulot

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Re: Path of Exile
« Reply #7 on: March 09, 2013, 06:43:32 AM »
Personally I liked Diablo 1 far more than Diablo 2.

For me it was the excitement of going down one dungeon, starting out fighting paltry skeletons and taking the fight right to Hell itself. A lot of long slow running around sections is just dull. The "overworld" feeling areas are never as fun as the actual dungeons, and Diablo 1 might have only lacked them due to the ease of making in door environs and sticking to the theme, but still it worked much better for me.

I do like that Path of Exile is less abilities-are-wholly-based-on-class (I hated that about Diablo 2 compared to 1, spells being universal with just one class skill each felt better) and more on the materia, but I dislike the randomness of the recoloring of materia slots, and some of the items just feel faffy..

BUT! I will say you cant judge this game harshly for its microtransactions. They're all niceities. They dont even skimp on the bank space. You have what... six bank tabs? That's insanely generous given they charge for more and each bank tab is huge. They could have given me one of those and I'd grumble but accept it. Compare that to how tiny the bank spaces feel in GW2, and they're amazingly generous. If you want to /dance you have to pay sure, but I paid for the popdance emote, so I cant judge that too bad...
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Aggelakis

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Re: Path of Exile
« Reply #8 on: March 09, 2013, 08:31:56 AM »
Downloaded and chopped my way through the first little bit just past the first town... it's nice, but I don't know how well it will keep my interest. I have Torchlight/TL2, D2/D3, and some little knight game sitting unused on my game HDD too.

Am not a fan of how rarely portal scrolls drop and how often loot drops, so I'm either running back to town or losing out on the fiddly currencies.
Bob Dole!! Bob Dole. Bob Dole! Bob Dole. Bob Dole. Bob Dole... Bob Dole... Bob... Dole...... Bob...


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Adelante

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Re: Path of Exile
« Reply #9 on: March 09, 2013, 06:30:03 PM »
Yeah, you can't really judge the game based on the first little bit.  By the end of the first Act you will have buttloads of scrolls and will have collected a ridiculous amount of currency orbs and such. 

I think I was level 8 (right after beating the boss in the Prison) when I stopped picking up white items to sell just because I had plenty of scrolls already. 

On the slots in items, and their coloring... it can get frustrating to have such a great item but it not having the slots you need.  That's why there's the orbs, and yes, the results are random, but that's part of the fun of the game as well.  Playing in end-game is mostly trying to get better loot & maxing it out to your own specifications.