Save the campaign. Save the game.

Hail, adventurers!

This is a post long on my mind...okay I thought about it today... but it does build upon some thoughts from a by gone age (forum posts from last 2 weeks):

Before you scroll past — this post is for everyone. The veteran who has run this campaign fifteen times. The new player who quit in Act 2. The mapper who just wants to get to the Atlas. And most importantly, the silent majority who tried PoE2, left quietly, and never came back.

This one is for all of us. Before we get into it too far, I want to provide arguments for GETTING RID of the campaign and also KEEPING the campaign because they both have merit imo. TLDR: Offer a skip option but at your cost which would be potentially significant rendering it a viable choice but not without "loss".

THE CASE AGAINST THE CAMPAIGN
(What the community is saying — and they're not entirely wrong)

1) A full campaign run is 20–25 hours for new players and 13–17 hours for veterans — all before the part most people actually consider the game even starts.
2) Acts 2–4 are consistently called out as oversized slogs that punish your time without rewarding it — I'm looking at you, Karui blood warriors.
3) Currency drops during the campaign are too sparse to allow meaningful crafting or upgrading, making progression feel like friction rather than fun.
4) Every league resets everything — meaning veterans face an identical 15–25 hour campaign from scratch each season just to touch their first Waystone.
5) The campaign is narratively identical every single time — same choices, same factions, same outcomes, zero consequence to anything you decide.
6) Ascendancy trials are repetitive, punishing, and feel completely disconnected from how your character actually plays and progresses.
7) Competitors like Diablo 4 and Last Epoch already offer skips or non-linear options — the expectation bar has moved whether we like it or not.

THE CASE FOR FIXING THE CAMPAIGN RATHER THAN SKIPPING IT
(What we should actually be building toward)

1) GGG's director has been crystal clear — a campaign skip isn't coming and he believes ARPGs that implement one ultimately suffer for it — so the real question is how do we make the campaign worth running, not how do we avoid it.
2) The faction infrastructure for meaningful choice already exists — the Twilight Order, the Ardura and Faradun conflict, the Vaal knowledge question — it's all there, it just needs to be activated.
3) Faction allegiances made during the campaign could unlock different Atlas Passive bonuses, Waystone crafting options, exclusive vendor pools, and endgame questlines — making your campaign choices matter where players care most.
4) Permanent mechanical consequences tied to story choices — exclusive gems, unique items, passive bonuses structured just like the Bandit quest — give players a real reason to care that follows them into every hour of endgame.
5) Act 4 has already been called one of the best ARPG acts ever written — the quality is there, GGG can clearly do this, it just needs to be consistent and given actual mechanical teeth across the full campaign.
6) A campaign that genuinely feels different on a second or third character creates real replay value — not just build diversity but narrative diversity, mechanical diversity, and a completely different lens on the world.
7) Every additional player who completes the campaign is a player who reaches the endgame, potentially spends on MTX, generates feedback, and helps fund the refinements the passionate minority keeps asking for.

THE REALITY
(The data nobody in this thread wants to talk about)

Here is the uncomfortable truth sitting underneath every campaign skip debate, every "the game is too slow" or "the game is to easy" thread, and every passionate forum post from a veteran with 2,000+ hours:

The majority of players who tried PoE2 never reached maps at all.

PoE2 launched with an all-time Steam peak of 578,569 concurrent players on December 8, 2024. 300,000 people have left from the all time high never to return. Between patches the floor dropped to approximately 8,000 concurrent players — an 86% collapse from peak. The median PoE2 player logged approximately 4 hours and 25 minutes of total playtime. The campaign requires 20–25 hours minimum for a new player. The math isn't subtle: the median PoE2 player never reached maps. They never saw the endgame. They quit somewhere in the campaign and never came back.

The entire passionate forum debate about mapping, Atlas passives, Waystones, endgame balance, and campaign skips is a conversation being conducted by a small minority about an experience the overwhelming majority of players who ever tried this game never reached.

THE UNCOMFORTABLE TRUTH ABOUT THE PASSIONATE MINORITY
(Hours played without financial commitment measures passion, not influence. GGG's obligation runs toward players they might lose, not players they've already captured.)

Let's talk about who is actually driving this conversation and how much leverage they actually have.

- Hours played measure commitment to the game — they do not measure commercial influence over the people who make it.
- GGG's obligation runs toward players they might lose, not players they've already captured — the forum veteran with 1,000+ hours and one supporter pack is honestly the safest person in the room to disappoint.
- The player GGG actually loses sleep over is the one who tried the game for four hours, hit a wall in Act 2, quietly uninstalled, and never posted about it anywhere — that player represents real recoverable revenue.
- The community loudest about fixing the campaign wants a skip to reach maps faster — which does absolutely nothing for the players GGG actually needs to retain.

THE REAL SPLIT

And this has nothing to do with PoE1 vs PoE2 playstyle preferences:

- The passionate minority defines the game as the endgame — they are already retained, already spending or not spending, and their behavior isn't changing regardless of what GGG does to the campaign.
- The casual majority never arrives at the endgame at all — for them the campaign IS the entire game, and right now that game is an identical corridor with no meaningful choices and nothing at stake.
- Every additional player who makes it through the campaign is a potential MTX customer, a source of feedback, and a resource GGG can reinvest directly into the endgame the passionate minority cares so much about.

GGG's director is right that a skip is a mistake. But a campaign that gives players no reason to care is also a mistake — just a quieter one, measured in hundreds of thousands of players who left without saying a word.

THE SOLUTION
(Skip at your cost. Campaign defines your character which defines your End Game/Atlas Experience.)

First — yes, a campaign skip should be an option. Full stop. You want to get to the Atlas? Go. Nobody is stopping you.

Second — your campaign choices should directly shape your endgame experience, making engagement the obvious and attractive option over skipping.

A character who skipped arrives at the Ziggurat Refuge as a blank slate. No faction allegiances. No Atlas Passive bonuses tied to story choices. No faction-specific Waystone crafting options. No exclusive questlines. No vendor pools unlocked by who they sided with in Act 2. Generic. Unfactionized. Starting from zero.

A character who engaged? They arrive with advantages, options, and endgame content the skipper simply doesn't have access to. The hook isn't "the story is better." The hook is "your story choices give you a head start and a distinct endgame identity."

You can skip. But skipping has a cost.

Three natural fault lines already exist in the campaign just waiting to be activated:

**Act 2** — Ardura or Faradun. Different vendor pools, different crafting recipes, different intel on Oriana's movements. Same act boss. Completely different context arriving at that fight.

**Act 3** — Reckless or Cautious. Pursue the Vaal's dangerous knowledge and unlock high-variance corrupted crafting — the gambler's path. Heed Doryani's warnings and unlock controlled deterministic crafting options plus an exclusive support gem or unique the reckless path never sees — the craftsman's path. Neither is wrong. Both are compelling enough that the reason you choose actually matters.

**Act 4** — Three paths. Open Opposition, Infiltration, or Expose and Betray Both. All three converge on the same boss fight. All three leave your character with permanent consequences — passive bonuses, exclusive gems, unique items, and endgame questlines — structured exactly like the Bandit quest. A permanent mark your character carries into the Atlas from the choice you made getting there.

No single character ever sees the complete picture. The full truth of who Oriana really is, what the Twilight Order actually believed, and why the Beast matters only assembles across multiple playthroughs with different choices. Your first character gets one version of events. Your second gets a different angle. By your third you're filling in gaps you didn't even know existed.

That's not asking GGG to write a Witcher 3. That's asking them to use the story they already wrote more intelligently — parceling it out in ways that reward curiosity and make every character feel like they experienced something that was genuinely their own. And every one of those characters arrives at the Atlas carrying permanent mechanical consequences from choices made in the campaign.

Just like the Bandit quest. Just like PoE1 already proved this community responds to. Flame away! We all want the best for POE2 and the campaign needs to be enjoyable and have meaningful choices that affect end game.

can you stop posting a ChatGPT vomit here?


As we said before and here in the text are the same points.

It's a seasonal game.
Ppl want to reach maps fast as possible. That's where the real game begins.
Grinding your way out of campaign is ridicilous. Nobody want that and devs already know that.
Campaign is too slow and long. Thats why ppl wanna skip it completely or have alternative leveling options to streamline it.
Only the potential posivite outcome for campaign enjoyers is if developers want to add something similar to Torments from Diablo 4, a scalable difficulty option. Of course it will take a developing time. But right now. NOTHING WILL CHANGE. Campaign is going to stay the same and become more streamlined eventually.

THE VISION faced THE REALITY a year ago. It's already too late.

I like the campaign, so far it plays more interesting than Atlas. Not only because there is a true sense of a journey (unlike endless Atlas) but also because it can be played in group and it is fun (unlike Altas where playing in group is just bad).

The only thing they should make is lvl restriction, because later in the season hi-levelers keep ruining all games with their "helping" on bosses (thus annihilating the most engaging gameplay for the group).

The idea of factions and alternative ways is nice ofc, have nothing against it. It would be good to extrapolate it to Atlas too, thus making it more alive. They did that already with Elder fighting Shaper where you could interfere. This was a great idea that should be developed further for the Atlas. Let us choose factions and conquer Atlas for example. It would be cool

The game has problems.
I used to just say "Sweaty" to sum it up.
But its more.

PoE is a mechanically better game to me.
I know this topic is the campaign but if the game was fun.
It wouldn't be an issue.

Everything that should be fun is moderated and served with a side of stink.
The core of the game, "That I expected" was character building.

But there is too much tie in to weapons. and the almost mandated combos that using those weapon imposes. Combine that with the tree which strongly implies that certain classes are using only specific weapons, then you have a poor character builder, that is just masquerading as having depth but is really shallow.

That with the horrible crafting and item drop rates leaves you little to do in those campaign hours other than play slap the pellet bar like a good hamster at the gamba vendor.

You can't build.
You can't craft.
You can't find anything.
You are forced into an anticipated mode of play.
All fun is served with a side of salt and sour.

it takes 20+ hours...

Then the bosses and are just one shot timers.
My experience is there is only one boss, its name is leap slam.
it has many pixel variants to the AOE one shot area.

I don't care if someone posts skill issue, ... its repetitive.
When its over , you don't want to do it again.
Because, what did you do ?
Suffered through the same slog , the same BS boss encounters , so you know , yeah i could try to make something ... why bother , stick with what will get me though this as fast as possible ... CAUSE IM ONLY DOING IT ONCE!

At the end you arrive dissatisfied with what you arrived with.
Having played hours of a character that was not what you wanted but is optimal to get through the game.

And the game is schizophrenic in that it rewards pigeon holeing to a get it over with build. And have races ... like the goal is ..get through this shit as fast you you can. But then .. some meaningful combat trope exists... whats going on?


Wanna have a race GGG ?

First to craft
Boots with 30% run speed

Weapons with .....
Armor set one of 4 options .... A,B,C,D

do that ... dare ya ... best streaming id ever see.
..ohhh he is in first place and ohhhh he bricked it ...

Oh here we go attempt 87 and can she ... ohhh she bricked it...
omg she is beating up her cat with her keyboard ..... what rage!!!

SSF only!!

"

default_mp3#9394 wrote:

can you stop posting a ChatGPT vomit here?

If you think that AI "one shotted" the initial post rather than several hours over the past few weeks inputting multi-page prompts, editing, updating, correcting, fact checking, and ultimately shortening to get a response I paste into this forum text editor to edit/delete line-by-line (by hand) while colorizing before posting-- I'm flattered but, no definitely not the case. Took a heck of a lot more time to construct and not thru ChatGPT.

Additionally, I would suggest you (and everyone) run their reply through AI to fact check it, for coherency, to make a little more polite, etc. It's a great tool although you do have to babysit it.

"

default_mp3#9394 wrote:

As we said before and here in the text are the same points.
It's a seasonal game.

Exactly. Which means the campaign being identical, consequence-free, and mechanically unchanged every single time is a problem that compounds with every new league.

"

default_mp3#9394 wrote:

Ppl want to reach maps fast as possible. That's where the real game begins.
Grinding your way out of campaign is ridicilous.

Correction: You, the passionate minority, want to get to end game as soon as possible. The casual majority rarely (if ever) get there. Stats are provided in the initial post and your response was foretold below:

"

600lbpanther#3839 wrote:

- The player GGG actually loses sleep over is the one who tried the game for four hours, hit a wall in Act 2, quietly uninstalled, and never posted about it anywhere — that player represents real recoverable revenue.
- The community loudest about fixing the campaign wants a skip to reach maps faster — which does absolutely nothing for the players GGG actually needs to retain.
THE REAL SPLIT
And this has nothing to do with PoE1 vs PoE2 playstyle preferences:
- The passionate minority defines the game as the endgame — they are already retained, already spending or not spending, and their behavior isn't changing regardless of what GGG does to the campaign.

"

default_mp3#9394 wrote:

Only the potential posivite outcome for campaign enjoyers is if developers want to add something similar to Torments from Diablo 4, a scalable difficulty option. Of course it will take a developing time. But right now. NOTHING WILL CHANGE. Campaign is going to stay the same and become more streamlined eventually.
THE VISION faced THE REALITY a year ago. It's already too late.

PoE1 launched in 2013 with three acts and players ran on Normal, Cruel, and Merciless difficulty.
In 2015, Act 4 added.
In 2017, Act 5-10 added. Cruel & Merciless removed. Lab reworked.

So definitely not "too late" for an Early Access game in version 0.4 (unless you have inside information on how 1.0 is going to end up). If so, please spill the beans!

"

Azimuthus#1135 wrote:

I like the campaign, so far it plays more interesting than Atlas. Not only because there is a true sense of a journey (unlike endless Atlas) but also because it can be played in group and it is fun (unlike Altas where playing in group is just bad).

The only thing they should make is lvl restriction, because later in the season hi-levelers keep ruining all games with their "helping" on bosses (thus annihilating the most engaging gameplay for the group).

The idea of factions and alternative ways is nice ofc, have nothing against it. It would be good to extrapolate it to Atlas too, thus making it more alive. They did that already with Elder fighting Shaper where you could interfere. This was a great idea that should be developed further for the Atlas. Let us choose factions and conquer Atlas for example. It would be cool

Thank you for the reply and I like the campaign as well. I'm sure there are other changes beyond what I'm suggesting to improve the campaign / end game. Regarding the "help", it does need to be curbed (get rid of the begging!!). Also, I really like your idea of conquering the Atlas. It *would* be cool.

AND Jitter912#4278: SSF for life! Thanks for the reply and like I said above, the campaign may need more improvements than what I'm suggesting. I'm going to ruminate on your post tonight. If I have any *bright ideas* to add, will let ya know!

"

default_mp3#9394 wrote:

can you stop posting a ChatGPT vomit here?


As we said before and here in the text are the same points.

It's a seasonal game.
Ppl want to reach maps fast as possible. That's where the real game begins.
Grinding your way out of campaign is ridicilous. Nobody want that and devs already know that.
Campaign is too slow and long. Thats why ppl wanna skip it completely or have alternative leveling options to streamline it.
Only the potential posivite outcome for campaign enjoyers is if developers want to add something similar to Torments from Diablo 4, a scalable difficulty option. Of course it will take a developing time. But right now. NOTHING WILL CHANGE. Campaign is going to stay the same and become more streamlined eventually.

THE VISION faced THE REALITY a year ago. It's already too late.

Why do you want to skip a big part of the game? Do you buy maxed accounts too, because you can't be bothered to play the game?

I genuinely don't see an issue with Campaign. If so, it is too easy, trivial. You're just pushing forward.

"

The majority of players who tried PoE2 never reached maps at all.

Weakness disgusts me.

Focus should be on the endgame, not Campaign (my opinion).