Path of Exile: imo d2 spiritual successor (Free to Play)

[myxomatosii]

edit: 10:15pm video says it'll be up in 5 mins. nothing special but it'll be nice for those who have never played to see, d2 fans esp

To start, D2 is probably my favorite game ever made.

Never touched D3. DRM, RMT, and all the other poor decisions forced me to make the ethical decision to boycott it. Heard about Path of Exile a few days ago from a guildie and had low hopes but with today's internet it takes like 1 hr to try a new game so I queue'd it up.

Upon logging in I was blown away. D3 isn't D3, PoE is D3.

I'm only level 6 right now but I made a video to share with you guys. Nothing flashy, just basic day 1 gameplay. Enjoy. Friend me if you play, Jupiter Jazz on Steam.

Not sure how ingrained microtransactions are yet, but hopefully they've cornered the f2p the way it should be, vanity, dev support, etc.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8YylpWSkr08&feature=youtu.be

Video should be live in two hours or so.

[Tradesonred]

Its pretty cool for a diablo like game, free to play with no pay to win schemes to boot, but it gets boring when u near the end as the grinding starts to get more heavy.

Needs some PVP mode like Dota imo

[stormlord]

I think the spiritual successor is actually Torchlight 2. It's made by the same people who worked on Diablo 2 and were not allowed to work on Diablo 3. The only real change from Diablo 2 is there's no real attempt to keep players on the same network and to ensure they're all playing by the same rules. So what you have is a plethora of Torchlight 2 games and many are following their own rules. People can cheat and create items at will. Beyond this, Torchlight 2 IS the spiritual successor to Diablo 2.

One thing you don't mention is Path of Exile doesn't use random maps. Torchlight 2 does. And I don't think Path of Exile has a single player game. Torchlight 2 does. Probably lots of other things. Oh, and Torchlight 2 can now be substantially modded because GUTS has been released. Can Path of Exile do that?

http://www.torchlight2game.com/news/2013/04/01/guts/

Torchlight 2 is freedom. No big man at the top to push you around.

Learn more here:
http://www.torchlight2game.com/

[Oogei]

Path of exile is an amazing game. The gameplay, crafting, skill system and overall freedom of the game is great., however it's easy to get burnt out on it. Also the RNG for bis items like (6-linked socket chests, weapons etc, is almost impossible to obtain. You don't "need" shit like that to have fun, but if you want to solo very difficult maps you will.

[Pheer]

I think the spiritual successor is actually Torchlight 2. It's made by the same people who worked on Diablo 2 and were not allowed to work on Diablo 3. The only real change from Diablo 2 is there's no real attempt to keep players on the same network and to ensure they're all playing by the same rules. So what you have is a plethora of Torchlight 2 games and many are following their own rules. People can cheat and create items at will. Beyond this, Torchlight 2 IS the spiritual successor to Diablo 2.

One thing you don't mention is Path of Exile doesn't use random maps. Torchlight 2 does. And I don't think Path of Exile has a single player game. Torchlight 2 does. Probably lots of other things. Oh, and Torchlight 2 can now be substantially modded because GUTS has been released. Can Path of Exile do that?

Torchlight 2 is freedom. No big man at the top to push you around.

Learn more here:
http://www.torchlight2game.com/

Path of exile has static zones and their connections to eachother, but maps are always random. In fact the end game content is entirely randomly generated maps

Also PoE has the best item system out of any ARPG ever made. Even a random white item drop can be worth picking up or even quite valuable with the way crafting works.

Torchlight 2 is a fun game to mess around on, but to call it more of a spiritual successor to D2 than PoE is just ridiculous

[myxomatosii]

I think the spiritual successor is actually Torchlight 2. It's made by the same people who worked on Diablo 2 and were not allowed to work on Diablo 3. The only real change from Diablo 2 is there's no real attempt to keep players on the same network and to ensure they're all playing by the same rules. So what you have is a plethora of Torchlight 2 games and many are following their own rules. People can cheat and create items at will. Beyond this, Torchlight 2 IS the spiritual successor to Diablo 2.

One thing you don't mention is Path of Exile doesn't use random maps. Torchlight 2 does. And I don't think Path of Exile has a single player game. Torchlight 2 does. Probably lots of other things. Oh, and Torchlight 2 can now be substantially modded because GUTS has been released. Can Path of Exile do that?

http://www.torchlight2game.com/news/2013/04/01/guts/

Torchlight 2 is freedom. No big man at the top to push you around.

Learn more here:
http://www.torchlight2game.com/

I've played TL2, I stand behind it too. Great game.

The UI elements of PoE really got me tho. Its great to have the same type of inventory etc.

Also the end of d2 was nothing but a grind. i mean btw MF meph/pindles etc and baal hammerdins it was all a grind. but an excellent grind.

one thing i wish it had was the d2 style chat room where your avatar was your actual char, so badass.

[Shaakglith12194]

I played PoE, got a couple chars to like 28 (one I played solo and one with a buddy). I got burned out the minute I replayed a dungeon and thought, "man, I can't wait to get this over with" and it felt like a chore instead of fun. In D2 it was fun repeating zones for some reason, but in PoE I just felt bored. Not putting the game down, it may just be that I'm jaded. Hope you continue to enjoy yourself!

[myxomatosii]

I played PoE, got a couple chars to like 28 (one I played solo and one with a buddy). I got burned out the minute I replayed a dungeon and thought, "man, I can't wait to get this over with" and it felt like a chore instead of fun. In D2 it was fun repeating zones for some reason, but in PoE I just felt bored. Not putting the game down, it may just be that I'm jaded. Hope you continue to enjoy yourself!

Hmm, I hope this doesn't happen.

Worst to worst I'm sure d2's community is still active. Gotta get back to that.

[Tradesonred]

POE gave me more of a diablo feel than TL2, because of the more realistic looking artwork. Not dissing TL2 artwork as i think cartoony graphics can be nice if done well, just that POE has that gritty, realistic diablo feel to it.

[stormlord]

POE gave me more of a diablo feel than TL2, because of the more realistic looking artwork. Not dissing TL2 artwork as i think cartoony graphics can be nice if done well, just that POE has that gritty, realistic diablo feel to it.
Ya I forgot to mention the art being different. It's a pretty big thing, I'll confess.

[stormlord]

Path of exile has static zones and their connections to eachother, but maps are always random. In fact the end game content is entirely randomly generated maps

Also PoE has the best item system out of any ARPG ever made. Even a random white item drop can be worth picking up or even quite valuable with the way crafting works.

Torchlight 2 is a fun game to mess around on, but to call it more of a spiritual successor to D2 than PoE is just ridiculous
I was led to believe the areas in POE are not as well randomly generated as they're in Torchlight 2. I'm wrong to use that as an example if they're better than I'm led to believe they're.

All in all, I think it's a split between POE and Torchlight 2, and they're heads above Diablo 3 as being a spiritual successor to Diablo 2. Then again, there're probably a lot of people who like Diablo 3 the way it's.

In Torchlight 2 there're complaints about the limited respeccing in vanilla. Of course, people can download mods to allow unlimited free respeccing. That's the benefit of Torchlight 2 being a single player type of game with less controlled multiplayer, as opposed to a strictly controlled online game ONLY.

And btw I really love how POE is F2P with only vanity items in the cash shop.

[stormlord]

Take a look at this people, if this doesn't make you wonder...

All are linked from metacritic which is a great way to see user ratings. It's an awesome way to detect if a game has made a giant shift and has caused a lot of anger in its community:
Diablo 3:
http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/diablo-iii
Torchlight 2:
http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/torchlight-ii
Path of Exile:
http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/path-of-exile

Something you notice is OFFICIAL review sites almost always give higher scores to these types of games than the users. The only way to detect the problem is if they have a reliable user review section. Another thing you notice is they'll often have a lot of VERY BAD user reviews, even if the user score is not terrible.

More examples:
http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/command-conquer-4-tiberian-twilight
http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/simcity
http://www.metacritic.com/game/xbox-360/halo-4

Here's one that changed a lot but still managed to have a good user score:
http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/xcom-enemy-unknown

Notice it did have 84 very bad reviews... which is a higher (total reviews/bad reviews) ratio than Path of Exile or Torchlight 2. Most people blame bad reviews on screaming attention-starved fans, but they count for something. In XCOM's case there were a lot of changes to the game. In fact, early in its development it received a lot of hate from fans because of the push towards FPS elements. They shifted away from that and more to the XCOM roots, but still kept a lot of the FPS feel, despite the complaints.

Look at this one:
http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/sid-meiers-civilization-v

Again, user score is lower and lots of bad reviews. This shows you the game changed a lot.

[MrSparkle001]

Does it have more than three acts yet? As much as I enjoyed the game I did not like that there were only three acts over and over.

[Pheer]

Does it have more than three acts yet? As much as I enjoyed the game I did not like that there were only three acts over and over.
Theyre planning on adding more and more acts, I think their eventual plan is that rather than having 3 acts that repeat 3 times, theyll work up to around 9 or 10 completely different acts that you play through to reach endgame. (maps)

Currently about halfway through act 3 merciless (the last difficulty) you get access to the Eternal Laboratory which lets you use the map system.

Maps drop randomly off mobs in late act 2 merciless and act 3 merciless, and you can use currency orbs to roll affixes on them that make them harder. The harder the affixes the more bonus item quantity you get from monsters inside the map.

http://i.imgur.com/4G7kOk2.png


Only level 66 maps drop in merciless I believe, but inside 66 maps you have the potential to have level 67 and 68 maps drop, then in 67s you can have 66, 68, or 69s drop and so on all the way up to level 78 maps now.

At higher level maps even with good gear and a solid build, shit can get sketchy as fuck really fast.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-QwxJeDwEuk&feature=youtu.be

The guy in that video has just under 8k hp and three health pots, at least two of which are instant use and let him heal around 1k hp per full potion, and still almost gets dunked multiple times even after spamming all his potion charges nearly instantly. The game can get pretty grindy but if you roll in a hardcore league youll get plenty of near death moments that get your blood pumping.

Probably quite a few actual deaths as well though:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yw7yFdgWBIo

[MrSparkle001]

It was still a fun game even with only 3 acts and I played mostly hardcore but man for a short while there they had an issue with DDoS or servers or something and it was extremely risky to play. That's when I decided to take a break and wait till the issues were resolved, and I wound up never playing again. That's how I am, I get bored so damned fast.

[Oogei]

theres 4 acts now i believe

[Uteunayr]

I think the spiritual successor is actually Torchlight 2. It's made by the same people who worked on Diablo 2 and were not allowed to work on Diablo 3. The only real change from Diablo 2 is there's no real attempt to keep players on the same network and to ensure they're all playing by the same rules. So what you have is a plethora of Torchlight 2 games and many are following their own rules. People can cheat and create items at will. Beyond this, Torchlight 2 IS the spiritual successor to Diablo 2.

Torchlight II was created by Runic Games which was created by the co-founders of the Diablo series while working at Blizzard North before Blizzard fired Blizzard North and merged with Activision and put Jay Wilson, a RTS game developer, in charge of Diablo 3.

With Torchlight II, add SynergiesMOD to it, and you have about as close to a true Diablo 3 as you will ever see. PoE has the artistic style of Diablo and Diablo 2, but I remain with Torchlight II + SynergiesMOD. Lacking a true Necromancer bothers me in most games. So yes, I agree. It feels like I am playing Diablo 2 in Torchlight II far more than I am in PoE in all ways except artistic style. Heck, even being able to cheat brings me back to open Battle.net. There's some fun to be had with having cheats and exploits available.

PoE is clearly in the Diablo tradition far more than some games out there that are in the same genre, but that doesn't make it a spiritual successor in my eyes.

[phacemeltar]

PoE is going to be a great game as they develop it farther. i remember during beta there was lots of talk about pvp, has this not been implemented yet? i seem to remember people talking about pvp in the chat as though it was going on. this might have changed when beta closed.

[Pheer]

Torchlight II was created by Runic Games which was created by the co-founders of the Diablo series while working at Blizzard North before Blizzard fired Blizzard North and merged with Activision and put Jay Wilson, a RTS game developer, in charge of Diablo 3.

With Torchlight II, add SynergiesMOD to it, and you have about as close to a true Diablo 3 as you will ever see. PoE has the artistic style of Diablo and Diablo 2, but I remain with Torchlight II + SynergiesMOD. Lacking a true Necromancer bothers me in most games. So yes, I agree. It feels like I am playing Diablo 2 in Torchlight II far more than I am in PoE in all ways except artistic style. Heck, even being able to cheat brings me back to open Battle.net. There's some fun to be had with having cheats and exploits available.

PoE is clearly in the Diablo tradition far more than some games out there that are in the same genre, but that doesn't make it a spiritual successor in my eyes.

It probably still wont feel as much like a necromancer as you want it to, but very recently they patched PoE and added some new skills, passives, and uniques all geared towards summoner builds.

[Uteunayr]

Yeah, I got to help design SynergiesMOD's Necromancer creatively, so I am very happy with it as a class. I get to run around with a Spectral Dragon, a bunch of voodoo gnomes, an army of zombies, a bunch of skeletal warriors, some infectious spores, and I get to sling poison spells, bone walls, and all that good stuff from Diablo 2.

I tried to get it so that mana was difficult, so Necromancers would burn their HP into Mana, but the game is honestly just too fast for that type of jank.

My brother's Necromancer took a different approach. Focusing heavily on health, bone armor, bone walls and shit like that, and he played a Necromancer Tank. One of the spells lets you place a curse on your pets, so when they die, it does a lifetap on nearby players that leeches onto the minion's controller. So he'd spam the voodoo gnomes that are high damage, low health, and spam them with bone walls, so any time they died, he got health back and did some damage.

[Breeziyo]

Something about PoE gameplay throws me off every time I play it. I can't pinpoint whether it's the animations or what, but it feels almost sluggish to play. And as much as I like the passive tree, it makes me feel like the class I choose isn't very unique. But that's just me.

The uniques like the boxing gloves are super cool though. If I got into it I'd probably spend more time making neat builds than actually playing the game.

[Oogei]

PoE gameplay is similar to eq, starts out slow but is pretty intense at high levels

[Pheer]

The uniques like the boxing gloves are super cool though. If I got into it I'd probably spend more time making neat builds than actually playing the game.

Facebreakers? Builds based on FBs are my favorites

[Tenlaar]

How does PoE lack a "true necromancer" when you can build a character that is damn near identical to D2 necros, with summons and curses and everything?

[myxomatosii]

PoE is going to be a great game as they develop it farther. i remember during beta there was lots of talk about pvp, has this not been implemented yet? i seem to remember people talking about pvp in the chat as though it was going on. this might have changed when beta closed.

There is PvP. Its arena style, I accidentally challenged my bud who I was playing with earlier. It was quite fun actually despite not being a pvp build myself, haha.

[Breeziyo]

Are y'all bad enough dudes to be playing on Hardcore?

I think I'm going to give PoE another shot. I've been bored with WoW arenas lately.

[Grubbz]

Just started playing poe for the first time and im getting my ass handed to me in the invasion league. if anyone is still playing the game let me know and we can run some shit.

[Tradesonred]

The only thing thats really stopping me from enjoying this game fully is that i cant spend points without looking at builds on the net. Wish there was some way around that. I could just play, but im a min maxer at heart and it will annoy me to basically have to delete a character to learn how to build a toon.

So hows the new content anyway

[Grubbz]

Roll some invasion with me bro, we gonna die anyways lmao.
Waiting on steam to come back up........

[Wrench]

poe a pretty fun game

if you play this more than a couple hours, do the right thing, buy a vanity item

these poor schmucks deserve to get something for their work

[Oogei]

The only thing thats really stopping me from enjoying this game fully is that i cant spend points without looking at builds on the net. Wish there was some way around that. I could just play, but im a min maxer at heart and it will annoy me to basically have to delete a character to learn how to build a toon.

So hows the new content anyway

This is the trouble with PoE imo, you need to research a build to actually compete at high levels of play and even then you may not be able to. Then a patch may occur leaving your build next to useless or not quite as effective. I love PoE at heart and what GGG have done but their RNG system after 70 unless your very lucky sucks. You need to invest lots of time in PoE to be able to actually compete at higher min/max levels,.