overall though this doesn’t just apply to Hecate essence it applies to the whole game
“Hecate Essence does not spawn in walls!”
There is no war in-
so true
almost nobody else is quitting the game due to hecate essence
this isnt gonna suddenly make ao drop by 2k average players
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he added a core gameplay mechanic that almost every player is going to seek out at some point or another, then intentionally made it miserable to work with.
that’s not what I call a good sign.
you can argue how important essence is or isn’t all you want, the fact he did this with this intention is, in itself, incredibly bad and there’s no arguing that.
to think this all started with dirt and tanning
Completely agree, but I doubt this will bring about any change. Vetex wants finding Hectate Essence’s to be an odyssey in of itself, and it’s baffling as to why. People will say ‘lore reason!’ but that’s an excuse that falls short when there are plenty of other things in this game that don’t follow the lore for the sake of gameplay. Honestly it’s not even the rarity of the essence or the difficulty of insanity 3, it’s the fact that some islands are so large and since AO is a game that you’ll be fucked if you play over 1 graphic bar, half the time you won’t even see the mist. The best solution I can think of is a radial tag for when you’re near a hectate essence, that only turns on if you’ve stepped on an island for at least 1 minute, preventing the sailing around islands grievance Vetex had while ensuring that we don’t miss them. One can hope I suppose 
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i’m sort of biased because i like feeling like i’m on a journey for a magic change
almost like some sort of “Arcane odyssey™”
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and I don’t mind it being in the dark sea either.
frankly, nobody pre-brig should be seeking out a magic change anyways lol.
if it actually was a rewarding and fun journey that ended with whatever you sought after, that’d be great, I’d love that.
I hate it when that happens
“No, no, I WANT my players to hate my game!”
I don’t think people are gonna hate the entire game over Hecate essence 
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It’s a mere exaggeration for the purpose of jesting, the point is that any dev saying “This game mechanic SHOULD make you miserable” is generally a red flag
I really don’t see how none of this is a red flag to you.
Because I don’t really care about Hecate essence
He only makes it miserable cuz he doesn’t want it in the game in the first place
Think of it like him saying “fine you can have this feature but I’m gonna make it miserable because fuck you”
Im gonna be honest i dont think vetex is actually as bad a dev as he seems, from the looks of it dealing with arcane odyssey and its community 24/7 really takes a toll on him, i imagine it would be easy to get pissed off at your community even if they had good intentions if i had to deal with that. he should probably take a break after full release to compose himself
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He’s not a bad dev but he is bad at handling the sometimes toxic and shitty community professionally
That’s what tech is for
Yea, that’s exactly how I see it, and every word of that is a red flag.
I don’t know what you caring or not about essence has to do with this being an incredibly alarming thing to say.