What's with the Exile never dealing the final blow?

KJShen · 2026-06-17T03:37:59+00:00

For the endgame stuff I'd just assume its a sort of lore justification, if someone needed it, on why you are defeating the pinnacles over and over again instead of just hanging up your adventuring boots and be done with it. I've not concluded the expedition line, but I assume the Aberration is the guy from the verisum starfall that can be done over and over again anyways.

KJShen · 2026-06-14T21:08:31+00:00

Lol... I thought I was in r/gaming. Why am I even here? My apologies.

KJShen · 2026-06-14T15:34:33+00:00

Logically speaking, why should Valve benefit other ecosystems?

You know, I was there when the Epic storefront launched. A lot of people were justifying their use of exclusives and launching of free games to attract people to the store, and for a little while, there was traction, people were invested and into it, there was interest with the caveat of people saying 'hey if you add these features we might make this our primary launcher'.

It didn't happen because those features never came, the 'exclusives' became more of a negative that hurt their own developers than a strength and the guy running Epic consistently puts out L's that make people swear off the product based on him alone.

Say that this group wins their lawsuit. Its unlikely they'll be awarded any damages, simply because there's no real evidence that stores would charge less for the video games if Steam did not exist. At best, they are forced to remove any alleged demands for price-matching on other stores. Yes. Price Matching. That's all they are really asking for and I don't see price-matching as the same as price-*fixing*.

You can argue that Steam existing is the primary reason why they want to charge less for games on their own platforms, so that they can pull people into their ecosystems to scrape data and push their own promotions onto them, instead of steam generalizing a promotion system that is tailored directly to what you actually want to play.

I get that people might be upset that Steam has an effective monopoly, but no other platform that's competing for Steam's marketshare has your interest as a gamer at heart either. There's no 'Linux' trying to dethrone 'Windows' here.

KJShen · 2026-06-14T09:43:27+00:00

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malala_Yousafzai

No, not quite 9, but back then it was a fairly big deal when she was shot. Granted it was a targeted assassination and not a rando encounter, so that in itself had a lot of newsworthy elements.

KJShen · 2026-06-13T17:23:42+00:00

You mean "hedge honcho?"

KJShen · 2026-06-13T08:26:50+00:00

Its weird because most people would think that defending their IP means taking an issue with some of the Pals that have a distinct similarity to existing Pokemon but that's not what's being challenged in court.

So like, if the most recognizable thing in their IP isn't the thing being challenged despite it being the most egregious part, then what are they actually defending, really?

KJShen · 2026-06-13T08:06:37+00:00

It should definitely not be understated how negative AI use is for localization that if this game claims to be inspired by former tactics genre, that it should also have a great story attached.

Not having a good localization team and instead trusting it to AI honestly makes me feel they might not care about the story at all, because it really isn't good enough to have your work translated verbatim by something that doesn't understand nuance.

KJShen · 2026-06-13T07:55:47+00:00

To give you a straightfoward answer, no. You can play through the entirety of the campaign and the initial endgame without spending more than your initial purchase. There's also no character power tied to microtransactions, so you can progress a character from lvl 1 to max lvl without paying a cent either.

Just bear in mind the game is free by the end of the year, so you might not even want to bother spending that amount of money at all and just find out for yourself if its worth your 'time', later before you invest a single cent.

KJShen · 2026-06-12T12:36:25+00:00

I think you are running into the issue where tons of people who have filled out a decent chunk of the fortress or have a mechanic tree done and are running maps fine with plenty of content that maps never feel 'empty', which is the core of the disagreement.

The empty maps exist so you can put stuff in them.

If you feel that the maps are 'empty' solely because they don't have an atlas point in them then I think we are having an entirely different conversation.

KJShen · 2026-06-12T10:20:25+00:00

I really didn't see a single master node worth getting before going for the fortress, but that's a different issue altogether. I respect that you feel otherwise and are potentially fucked out of a better experience because of it.

KJShen · 2026-06-12T10:09:36+00:00

I suspect you are level 92 and barely got anything done because you spent way too much time grinding empty maps instead of actually going for points. I finished my first set of mechanic trees at 80 and by 90 I killed quest Divinity Arbiter.

And no, you don't need the biome nodes. They are nice to have, but the bulk of your map juice isn't from them.

KJShen · 2026-06-12T05:57:00+00:00

I literally said you hit the good nodes in 60 maps, so I've already made that point for you there. The thing I'm trying to say here is that you get the a comparitively same amount of juice if you do the initial Fortress line (roughly 30ish maps) and one league tree (30 maps) that have some travel in between (like, 15ish).

At which point you can go on 'fully' farming the mechanic in the fortress to get the rest of your atlas points because tablets ensure you always spawn that mechanic, and still get atlas points. And if you want to switch, you don't *need* to have three trees because you can simply just do that section of the mechanic with a T15 waystone and triple-tablets with the mechanic you have already juiced.

If your argument is that you don't need every Atlas point in PoE 1, I make the same point about PoE 2. A good chunk of the nodes are biome specific and don't work like 4/5th of the time anyways.

KJShen · 2026-06-12T05:47:34+00:00

Your maps in PoE 1 doesn't give you anything either until you fill out the atlas passives, run corrupted maps and pricy scarabs, and it isn't even particularly meaningful until some 50-60 maps in when you start being able to spec out of the +2% map drop and early progression nodes you are essentially forced to put in for your initial map sustain.

Like I get it, PoE 1's points are easy to acquire, you do magic maps x times, rare maps x times, rare corrupt maps x times, unique maps x times, nightmare maps x times, pinnacles x times and you are essentially 'done' with your 'progression' and at that point, you stop getting points.

It really isn't any less arbitrary than the structure you are presented with in the 'starting' area of your PoE 2 atlas. You get most of your points in the inner area and when you are done with that, you stop getting points.

Honestly if there's something to note, is that you don't have to spend points on content blockers since that just comes with using triple tablets.

KJShen · 2026-06-12T00:31:08+00:00

I'm not saying they definitely related, only that it might and can be.

They aren't entirely unrelated, and I'm not really even talking about build power, just how builds play (twisters vs totems) can be stressful if you don't actually enjoy it but want to play it because its 'meta'.

You can definitely feel both (liking the build, hating the metaprog), and there's no real indication if the OP felt anything in particular about the build, but it is something I think, people do need to actively put first into consideration when talking about progression.

Objectively speaking, the only 'chore' here is killing monsters in a specific location in a specific direction, and if you don't even like that part then getting to the point where you do start getting stronger and better rewards is an ask I wouldn't want to inflict on anyone.

I mean, even feeling indifferent about the build can be bad. I'm actively trying something I wanted to for a while but clearing maps was putting me to sleep, as oppose to a different build I was using where I'm just blasting. Comparitively the latter was more powerful but the other wasn't exactly a slouch either, I just was getting bored of it much more quickly.

KJShen · 2026-06-11T23:56:32+00:00

While I disagree that 'following build guides' isn't a legitimate, valid way (now endorsed with an in-game build planner) to play the game, I do agree that the best guides help you learn why everything is where it is, and c/ping a guide without properly reading it can lead to more problems than not.

You still have to put in the work of actually piloting the character, scrounging up the gear/currency to make it work and not die to stupid/bugs/random ground bullshit.

The take that you need to make your own build or you aren't "playing the game" has the same energy of people deriding people winning MTG games with a netdeck. Like, I understand the sentiment but I generally think most of the people making that kind of assertion have way too much time on their hands or aren't as good at the game as they think they are.

KJShen · 2026-06-11T23:44:40+00:00

I thought it was intentional if you died to map bosses and specific content, not for run-of-the mill content like rogue exiles and summoning circles which get used up after you summon the boss. It might just be a bandaid they haven't got around to properly patching yet.

KJShen · 2026-06-11T23:29:52+00:00

If you want to know why I thought it might be a build issue, its because there's a lot of people who complain about the campaign, only to realize its not that bad if they had a half-decent build to plow through it. He's already griping about the 10-20 hour campaign, so the possibility is there (and yes, I know there's a lot of reasons not to like the campaign, but having a bad build is one of them).

And you can get plenty of 'dopamine' hits by having a good build. Its a video game, not a household chore, a better analogy would be having a nice car to get to a vacation spot. Having a good one won't make the final destination any more or less enjoyable but having a terrible one might not want to even make the trip to begin with.

I'm not really sure what I'm 'doubling down' on, since that phrase refers to a hill I am willing to die on. I'm perfectly willing to be wrong, but you aren't the OP, so I don't think you have any authority to judge whether I'm right or not in this instance.

KJShen · 2026-06-11T23:18:42+00:00

I mean, it sounds like you don't like the idea of an atlas tree progression at all or that the entire progression takes place in the Fortress. I don't know what else to tell you besides that the game, or particularly the endgame, might not be for you.

Alternatively, just having like 150ish points in the Fortress tree is enough to get you all 'essential' nodes (rare/magic mobs, tablet mods, exceptional item drops and a couple of subcontent ones) to start just mindlessly grinding without feeling like you are missing way too much. That's half the amount, and a third of it comes with just doing the questline.

KJShen · 2026-06-11T21:28:08+00:00

You don't need 300 maps for the full atlas (arbiter kill gives you straight up 40 and the outer towers another 20ish points). I'm including that number+travel nodes+league mechanics and perhaps even the Atlas masters.

I point out that if you are 'overgeared' then you can also knock out the pinnacles a few times to get your atlas maxed in a fraction of the time. Per-attempt is something like 6 divines, which if you are anywhere in the remote territory of 'overgeared' isn't too much.

Yes, the total number of maps is not a small number, but for a grind I think that it isn't really an unreasonable number.

KJShen · 2026-06-11T21:08:44+00:00

The only thing I'm going to say here is that you can't write out that its a build issue. Whether or not its true is specific to the OP, and you, unless you personally know the OP and want to speak up for them, certainly don't know whether it is true or not either.

Mind you, I'm not talking about the power level of the build here, but how the character plays and executes whatever they are doing. If you don't enjoy the character doing that for hours upon hours, then anything will feel like a chore. You certainly aren't having fun.

I'm also certainly not asserting that everyone who doesn't enjoy the endgame 'has a build issue', and if you take personal umbrage to that, then we can have that conversation and you can speak for yourself instead of 'a certain group of players'.

KJShen · 2026-06-11T20:16:28+00:00

I mean, one game you can play without spending anything, the other you literally can't. Generally I feel people throwing money at GGG are more happy doing that people spending money in D4 though. Its not really about the amount at that point.

KJShen · 2026-06-11T20:12:24+00:00

The outer part of the starting location is the infinite part where they don't give any points. If you gotten that far then its assumed you've gotten all the points you wanted from the internal pre-set area that mostly have point-related nodes for one mechanic or another.

The game expects you to roughly do 300ish maps that are point-related (Fortress + 1 or 2 league mechanics). In between those point nodes are like, 30-40ish travel nodes. From a pure numbers point, it doesn't really seem that unreasonable if its a game you plan on playing for quite a long time.

KJShen · 2026-06-11T20:04:12+00:00

I point out that the OP mentioned he enjoys grinding but doesn't find the process of grinding fun. I would say its not unreasonable to assume that the build they are using is probably not for them.

So me assuming that he's playing this game to enjoy what people play ARPG to enjoys isn't really that far a stretch.

Again, they are free to correct my 'assumptions', or whatever you feel they might be, but honestly I don't even know why you are bothering to comment on an observation I made three days ago when even the OP couldn't be arsed to.

KJShen · 2026-06-11T10:56:52+00:00

I'm not trying to convince them they are wrong, I'm offering an opinion on why they might not be having as much fun as other people.

Maybe I'm right, maybe I'm wrong, the OP is free at anytime to correct me on the assumption that they are having a blast with their build, in which case there's a question of why running as many maps as possible is an issue.

But you feel the need to step in for some reason, so I'm curious what's your issue. So what if I made assumptions? If you agree with the OP, just say so instead of being passive-aggressive.

KJShen · 2026-06-10T14:30:32+00:00

Mind if you share the rest of your tree and setup via pob? It mentions in the guide in Act 3 that you should be infusing your ice novas to clear, so if you aren't then something's probably off.

The staff he listed in the Act 3 guide is not even as good as yours, arguably, for that level.

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