Early access for Path of Exile 2 feels like being handed a familiar toolbox, then realising half the tools have been redesigned. The passive tree still sprawls and the gem system still invites late-night tinkering, but the moment-to-moment fighting asks more of you. You dodge, you wait for openings, you actually read what a boss is doing. And yeah, you'll see plenty of people planning their first upgrades around cheap PoE 2 Items because the wrong early gear choice can make the campaign feel way longer than it needs to.

Where The Fun Turns Into Friction

Spend five minutes in community threads and you'll get whiplash. One post is a neat trick for smoothing mana costs, the next is a full-on argument about pacing. The "Dawn of the Hunt" update is where the mood really shifted. A lot of players felt it dragged combat into molasses: more waiting, more kiting, less of that snappy "one more zone" rhythm. The complaints weren't just salty takes, either. People pointed out how small nerfs stacked up, how movement felt punished, and how the difficulty spikes didn't line up with what the game had taught you so far.

Build Paths And Endgame Reality

Then there's the question every ARPG lives or dies on: what happens after the campaign. Right now, some builds feel oddly guided, like the tree has a "correct" highway and everything else is a scenic route with potholes. You can still experiment, but you'll notice how quickly certain paths pay off while others stall out. Bugs don't help, especially when they hit rewards or boss behaviour and you're left guessing if you messed up or the game did. Endgame mapping has promise, but it doesn't yet have that layered, long-haul depth veterans expect, so players are filling the gaps with homebrew challenges and lots of shared spreadsheets.

Updates That Actually Move The Needle

To be fair, Grinding Gear Games isn't ignoring the noise. Big drops like "The Third Edict" changed the feel of the campaign and made trading less of a headache, which is huge for anyone who hates wasting an evening whispering strangers. "The Last of the Druids" landing a shapeshifting class was another solid swing; it brought new build loops and gave theorycrafters a fresh reason to reroll. On top of that, the steady trickle of balance tweaks and quality-of-life fixes matters more than it sounds, especially when it improves responsiveness and reduces those little networking hiccups that get you killed.

What Players Are Doing About It

Most of us are adapting in real time: picking safer levelling skills, swapping supports earlier, and treating bosses like puzzles instead of speed bumps. You'll also see people leaning on community testing to avoid bricked setups, and when someone wants a smoother progression curve, they often look for a reliable shop with fast delivery and clear stock info like U4GM so they can spend more time learning fights and less time grinding the same zones.