Current State of Path of Exile 2 Dawn Of The Hunt

I'm Raxxanterax and I make Build Guides, Leveling Guides, Tier Lists and More for Diablo 4, Last Epoch, Path of Exile and Path of Exile 2. Here are my thoughts and points of feedback on the POE2 Dawn of the Hunt league after playing and reading feedback from chat all day long. I'll be back on today to blast more and see how Huntress feels going into the endgame!
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*POE2 Guides:*
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#pathofexile2 #POE2 #dawnofthehunt #raxxanterax #maxroll

[erkanerenoglu]

Squeak sounds are not coming from your pet's toy, but from players hitting monsters.

[shaunlan]

It feels like the monsters and our characters are from two different games. My huntress spends 1-3 seconds setting up a combo for some spear that detonates 2 seconds later... meanwhile the monsters are all on meth and moving and attacking at 100 miles an hour

[Fijz]

GGG are like: 'OMG, Ascendancy bosses have 100% more HP than expected, that's a bug — so we fixed that. And as a bonus, you now deal 200% less damage.

[OdaVing-di]

Unfortunately "slow and meaningful" gameplay does not apply to enemies as they bum rush you.

[dennisk]

Our characters all got hit with mean 65% tariffs.

[dudedavid]

My biggest issue w/ the game atm is the stun mechanic. They don't want us to use 1-button builds, but trying to perform a combo when your animations are constantly interrupted by stuns from even the smallest of enemies is infuriating.

[numenorean]

1:36 - toy squeek 1
2:25 - toy squeek 2
2:36 - toy squeek 3
3:26 - toy squeek 4

[ImMobile]

No one would spend 5 minutes fighting an Elden Ring boss if the reward was a healing potion and some gold. This is just not the game format for the strategy they're going for.

[SpidaaaMans]

Played the update all day yesterday and a little today -- I am happy to say that I just bought Last Epoch :)

[daviddaniel]

I think my experience of it is this: The difficulty arises not because the challenge feels immense, but because you feel trivial. So the difficulty FEELS like it arises more from player weakness than monster awesomeness if that makes sense.

[ultra]

*Hidden patch note*
- Fun is now reduced by 50%

[Boss-lpce]

6:30 THIS! THIS IS IT!
Even in FromSoftware's games, the difficulty line isn't flat. It has highs and lows. it's called pacing, and FS is really good at it.

I hope that this is just them trying to figure out the pacing, but missing the mark, and not them saying ''this is what we want it to be, period''.

Thank you so much for making this video man. Our voices aren't as loud as yours.

[dmdiablo]

My character feels the same at level 2 and 50

[lm_gio]

POE1 has Ascendancies. POE2 has Descendancies.

[Arebluud]

@Raxx It's worse than you think. While you were playing the new league, I decided to experience some end-game content with my SSF lvl 91 monk. Here is what I found:
1) RE defenses. GGG's solution to the armor dilemma was not to fix armor but to make the other defenses crap as well. While the moderate nerf to evasion I can understand, the incoming damage-to-player's life/Energy Shield is an exercise in masochism. Chaos Inoculation skill might as well be removed from the Passive Tree (perhaps there are max tier items that make it worth while, but those will never be found by 99% of the player base. That means that you must have max Chaos resist in place.
2) In order to adjust to having no Chaos Immunity, I had to drop some Rarity%. Went from 91% before patch to 60%, currently. That aside, it is pretty clear that Rarity drops took a fully sized sledge hammer to where it don't grow back. In the 24 hours+ I hardly even picked up an item in line with my already existing item levels (and only white items at that) . Basically, instead of collecting loot all I could do is attempt to farm experience and collected resources. The drops simply aren't there. Please understand the full meaning of my point here. I have gotten zero useful even remotely items! And the magical Uniques that were supposed to be aimed at mid- to end game. Well, zero of those as well. Same meaningless crap as before - from the ground, to my inventory, to vendor salvage.
3) My character is at least 4 Tiers weaker that before the patch, but that is not so much a concern as the part where any melee engagement is now outright treacherous (see item 1 above). I was wondering why, among all the nerfs in the patch notes, I saw 100% increase to shock to the Storm Wave skill - a massive boost. Well, now we know why. GGG for whatever reason has no clue how to work melee into their combat system, so they gave the monk a ranged boost. This also explains why the Warrior class can't actually fight, but uses shouts, , totems, angry letters etc. In the post-patch world, you use melee, you die, inevitably...and lose a day's worth of experience progression. Which leads me to item 4...
4) I can not even guarantee my safety on Tier 12. Ground effect explosions (chaos and otherwise) can one shot you, since your defenses are now outright inadequate. I have died four times since the patch, each death from stuff that was not even visible to me (on account of mob density or terrain obstructions) until it exploded, insta-sending my experience bar to hell. Being level 91, that means that my progression to recover from each death is, as I already mentioned, an exercise in masochism.
5) Even at T12 engaging in events such as Asmerian Wisps, Ritual, etc., are akin to suicide. So having them is meaningless as I have to avoid them. Yes, I could drop the difficulty yet another three tiers or more, but then I would be right back to one-tapping mobs, except for no reward of even experience, which brings up the question, why did those changes even occur. The entire experience has been flushed down the toilet.
In summary, to 99% of the people, PoE2 end game is significantly more troubled than its early stages. It is not only not fun whatsoever but a punishment to all those who would invest their long hours to get there.

[Fabe]

I bet the monsters are having a lot of fun stunning, freezing and burning the players😂

[-Taerar-]

This update should have been released on April 1st.

[chiefinasmith]

My biggest issue is that they continue to push this “slow gameplay” bullshit, but do nothing to address monster speed. Your character moves at a snail’s pace but monsters are still as fast as they were in PoE1.

[TheBlackMage]

Dawn of the hunt: The players thought they were the ones who would be hunting, but it's actually the monsters.

[sportschool]

Raxx: "It's an awesome feeling when you get a great reward for what you did"

GGG: "NEIN, NEIN NEIN NEIN!!!!"