I'm confused as to why people enjoy the moment to moment gameplay of this game

After about 120ish hours I'm almost up to tier 15 maps now and I'm starting to realize there hasn't been a single memorable point in this game for me from a gameplay perspective.

I tried poe1 but point and click movement wasn't really my thing so I moved on from it, but after hearing wasd was coming I figured I'd give it a try. the rpg mechanics/character building are, while imbalanced, incredibly deep and interesting and I've had a really fun time building my character and testing out ideas. The setting and aesthetic are also really cool and interesting. I love the dark and gritty design.

But when I sit back and think about the actual meat and potatoes of what I'm doing when I'm actually fighting things in the game, this is pretty disappointing as far as top down action games go for just how hyped up it was. It's like the crying baby vs hydrogen bomb meme comparing this game to any of the roguelikes that follow a similar gameplay style like Isaac or Hades.

Mobbing, which I'm feeling is about 95% of the gameplay, is mind numbingly boring. Mobs don't kill me, their movesets are irrelevant and nothing they do besides push me around has mattered since I got my resists/defences up outside of maybe the big crow dudes or a couple of the Vaal mobs. I have yet to encounter a group of mobs that requires me to pay attention to the game and do something that's not kiting the pack/strafing around them. at most there will be one to two aoe's or projectiles on the screen to weave through and that's it.

Rare modifiers and arbitrary mechanics designed to create artificial difficulty(like honour, afflictions, ultimatum modifiers((though some of the ultimatum mods are pretty cool)), and map modifiers) are literally the only threatening aspects of the game I'm worried about while mobbing. I don't assess the mob types/movesets in front of me and play accordingly. I see if the map has resist pen/too many damage mods and don't do it, hover over the yellow mob running at me to see if it has bonus damage or explodes on death, or hope I don't have to take 40% less damage/0 defenses in the trials, or just accept it whenever I get one tapped by an aoe I didn't notice through visual clutter.

Bosses, which despite being the most interesting part of the gameplay while making up about 5% of the gameplay(bosses with actual mechanics being closer to .01%), range from pretty cool, to miserably boring/broken. Forgetting the fact you have a singular attempt to kill them the bosses at the ends of the ascendancy trials and pinnacle bosses(haven't gotten to fight pinnacles yet myself but they look fun) are actually interesting and cool bosses. The other 98% of bosses however both die too fast to actually do mechanics and have an incredibly slim number of mechanics that can't be solved by strafing around them and dodge rolling when the DONG noise plays.

Am I wrong? Does the actual action gameplay of this game have something I'm missing? The final floor ascendancy bosses and pinnacle boss runs I've seen clips of seem like the only compelling mechanical gameplay points and even then beyond only having a single try to do it they aren't anything insane aside from hp/damage numbers.

I think you have the wrong type of RPG.

When PoE 1 came out it didn't even really have a story, the entire purpose of these games is to build the most interesting/fun character for you to play. The story and gameplay is usually pretty lackluster.

PoE 2 has sort of bridged that gap with some of the boss encounters but at it's core it is an ARPG and the goal is to make your toon as powerful as possible. Part of the fun is getting to the point where you CAN obliterate a boss in 10 seconds.

And you cannot tell me that the Queen of Filth does not have a special place in your mind...

"Mobs don't kill me"

Tell me you've never played POE2 without telling me you've never played POE2.

I'm in the same boat, they promised a lot of changes from PoE1 but I feel like it's mostly copy paste.

Early access of course so I will keep an eye out, but my enjoyment after 135 hours has diminished with the once again chaotic marketplace and the lack of self sustainability.

Bosses are great but few and far in-between, rare monsters are only challenging in campaign and are, if nothing else, annoying endgame. Not challenging, annoying. And maps is mostly fun but doing t15s a while now and it's just rinse and repeat.

I can not understand the core playerbase who can keep playing this year after year.
Kudos to them but my mind requires more to stay interested.

MY suggestion is to stop playing, and don't post on the forums any longer. You obviously don't like the game and you aren't giving valuable feedback. You are just complaining that its boring. Go do something else

People like it because it's a new game not because it's good. I've tried out most of the archetypes in PoE 2 and they all felt worse than PoE 1 with the exception of monk "melee" that felt very enjoyable to play.

It seems to me that you have a problem with the genre as a whole, and not necessarily PoE 2, and because of that, your expectation was probably a little bit wrong.

How many ARPGs have you played before, and how many of them do you feel made things differently?

They need to add more end game map bosses that require skillful dodging like the campaign does.

I'm confused why people like Grey's Anatomy. I guess we are in the same boat. I'll play PoE 2 and you go watch that show and we'll meet up later to discuss our findings.

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DingdongButtguy#6942 wrote:

arbitrary mechanics designed to create artificial difficulty

Oh dear, it looks like you've mentioned the artificial difficulty meme, even though all difficulty is artificial since it's a video game. Maybe you meant to say "Thing I don't like."