Path Of Exile

Theydon Bois

Just finished it tonight on Normal (CO-OP with a friend), but I died as the final boss went down and going back through my TP, I did not get the quest marker, and my mate did.

I could not go through the portal to Cruel either, so the game is bugged for me....not happy, as I may well have played it solo on Cruel....

drinkturps

Sorry to hear that. Tonight was my first time back on since the beta and I'm getting my head around the changes. I've dived into Nemesis mode with a nice and easy 2 Handed Marauder to get some stuff in the stash for trading. It's still very good fun.

drinkturps

Absolutely loving this again. I found a Perandus signet and I've put on my up and coming Split Arrow ranger. At level 29 I have got 145 ID scrolls in my stash! I've also found a Quill Rain bow so I will try an exploding arrow toon once I've got enough gems in the stash.

Theydon Bois

I got an email back from support quite quickly, but they just said I would need to do it again. I just joined a random party and we did it, so I am in Cruel now.

The party laid so many portals though that I zoned accidentally more than once!

Theydon Bois

Finished Act I of Cruel now, Siren is bloody hard to Solo, even though I mowed through pretty much everything else with no problems. I ended up kiting her around in a poisonous cloud until I could get to a point where I could try and set her alight with fire arrows.

Theydon Bois

I thought I would try and write up a few words about this game, as I really enjoy the ARPG games and played through most of them (Diablo I & II, Titan Quest & IT, Torchlight I & II, Van Helsing, and only don't have D3 due to cost - though this may change when the patch comes) and for me, the Daddy of them all has been Titan Quest. I probably sunk 200  hrs in that and Immortal Throne (they don't show on my Steam games as I had them pre-steam and loved the game so much I rebought them on Steam) and played through the game on all three difficulty ratings.

So how does Path of Exile square up to these other great ARPG's? Bloody good actually.
Really bloody good.

Graphics

The effects on everything are superb, the gem levelling, the elemental attacks, the frozen or burning mob/player effects, the animations for mobs blinking, tunnelling, dissolving, ghosting, all of it. The backdrops for locations (towns, villages, caves, forests, battlegrounds) are lush with a huge amount of detail, the characters look excellent, with a large amount of clothing variants.

Maps

Excellent. How many ways can you actually put dead ends into a seemingly open ended area? You will be surprised, and they do it very well. With some much detail, the minimap adds yellow 'corridors' to show connecting areas in case the foliage or camera angle is in your way, and there are plenty of variations - cave textures are repeated more often than not, but I suppose its quite hard to come up with new ways to portray rocks, so I will let them off that.

Mobs

A Huge amount of variation with the usual casters, fighters and ranged mobs, and then mixed abilities, casting, teleporting, swarms, etc.  There is a nice mix of normal and yellow bosses, and then end of act bosses. I think I would have liked to see more 'bigger than yellow but less than end of act bosses' like in TQ, but other than that, jolly good indeed.

Skill Tree & Classes

Ah, the bread and butter of all ARPG's, the skill tree. This is where PoE fails, as it has no skill tree at all! Instead, it has a freaking skill WEB. No mere tree for this game, but a spiders web that depending on class, your start point changes. You gain skill points per level and for completing some quests and you can customise your (one of 6) classes to a stupid amount of variations. I thought TQ ability to combine two classes and then pick and choose from their respective trees brilliantly varied, but this is something else.

Loot

Ah, the loot. You want to pour of the minute of the items found, min/maxing to gain resists/hp/regen/dps? You will spend hours doing so. You want the ability to create and improve items? You will spend hours doing so. You want to take your item as you like the look of it, wipe it, and new stats, add sockets and reforge links? You will spend hours doing so.

Like most other ARPGs, you never seem to find the right item for your class, but this only makes you want to farm and then replay the whole game again on the next difficulty. There are sockets to add spells and effects to your attacks, and gems to improve the quality of the items - so the combinations of items available is staggering.

Overall

So add them all together and what have you got? A cracking game, and even diehard 'nothing will beat Titan Quest' ARPGers will admit that this is fantastic. The game itself is free, and you really do not need to spend a penny to enjoy it - I may drop some money on it to say thanks rather than any real need to want a shiny effect on my hat or glowing footprints (even though they do look smart) A fourth act or more locations per act may have tipped it over the edge, but this is right up there, surpassing both Torchlights and Van Helsing, and  right on the tailcoats of TQ.

There is simply not an excuse to not download this on Steam right now.

drinkturps

Good work! I had a death in Nemesis yesterday, my Level 32 Dual Strike/Melee splasher got zapped by a group of void bearers in the Docks. Another classic death caused by overconfidence.

I am rebuilding and have managed to lay my hands on a Quill Rain, Explosive Arrow and Flammability. I'm now making a Scion to do this and I've got her up to Level 20 and started experimenting. It's insanely fun but the mana costs are terrible. Pew pew pew, boom boom boom! Next stop elemental proliferation for my split arrow and then the burning damage nodes in the Witch area.... hope to have another play tomorrow.


EDIT: Nice write up by the way Theydon! Agree with everything you say about the game too. The passive skill tree is something else and has to be seen to be believed!

drinkturps

It was a bad day for some of the Nemesis ladder runners yesterday. Place number 10 at level 97 and Place 20 at level 95 both died. Can't remember their names but I think they were streamers. It's the way the global chat explodes as soon as a high ranked ladder runner dies with all the reeeep! messages.

My explosive arrow Scion is plodding on. Up to level 32 now, nearly got to Blood Magic as the mana overheads are preventing me from equipping more life based gear. I've picked up an animate guardian which is quite amusing for the cute factor but their survivability is pretty poor. It does make a nice distraction and keeps the baddies away for a small period of time so I can lay the arrows down.

Theydon Bois

Were they hardcore characters? I may try a Hardcore character myself, but I reckon I may find myself abusing an alt-F4 macro at times.....

I am about 4 points away from the Evasion = Armour point, late for my character (especially as I had a respec as well) but I did not want to go through a copy of everyone else and wanted to experiment. Now it does seem that although my evasion is ~1800, so I don't get hit often, when I do, it bloody hurts and I had some yard trash hitting me for 300 damage even with 100 energy shield.

drinkturps

Yep, they were hardcore characters (on Nemesis). Basically Nemesis is a tougher version of hardcore where the boss monsters have a nemesis mod that makes them and any other monster in the immediate area more tougher. It's a race mode that finishes at the end of next month. Your toons (if still alive) return to Hardcore mode at the end of the ladder. Also if you die in Nemesis or Hardcore mode you character moves into the standard league. To lose a level 97 or a 95 must be heart wrenching after all that effort but that's hardcore. Don't play it unless you are prepared for the deaths that WILL happen.

I've always loved hardcore modes as it really gets your heart pumping and adds that extra level of tension when playing.