Path of Exile News

Today at 9am NZT we took down the realm for the deployment of the new account system. This migration was expected to take around 4 hours.

The first thing that went wrong was that the migration took longer to run than it did on our test hardware. This extended the downtime for an extra hour past the point that we had budgeted for.

After the realm was brought back up around 2PM NZT, we found that many players were getting disconnected frequently. This was caused by crashes in one of the backend master servers that caused online account session information to be lost.

We spent around 15 minutes trying to investigate the causes of these crashes but were unable to immediately come up with any solutions so we decided to roll back the patch.

Unfortunately in this case, what would normally take a very short amount of time to roll back took a very long time due to the extensive database migrations that had occurred during deployment. The databases are very large and restoring the backup took quite some time. The realm was brought back and the game restored at 3PM NZT.

The restore of the website databases took even longer and resulted in extended website downtime as well (the website was not available until 4:30PM NZT).

After investigation we have discovered that the crashes were caused by a very simple flaw. The constant that represents the length of an account name used in the account session was still accidentally using an old value, before we added the discriminator. If a player logged in with an account name longer than 27 characters then it would result in an exception being thrown when trying to copy the account name into the account session.

This on its own should not have resulted in the master crashing, but this occurred in an area of the code base that was designed to be exception free, which resulted in the entire process crashing.

The bug itself is already fixed, and we have also changed the code to be more resistant to exceptions occurring.

However, we have decided to delay the redeploy of the patch until Monday NZT. It is clear that we need to do another round of QA on this deployment to make sure that we have found all corner cases before we can be confident in deploying it again.

This is not the level of service you should expect from Grinding Gear Games and we are very sorry for the extended downtime.

In order to support Path of Exile 1 and 2 sharing microtransactions as well as Cross Play between all supported platforms in Path of Exile 2, we have had to make some changes to our account system. Here are the changes you can expect.

[h2]Discriminators[/h2]

One of the annoying problems that we previously had was that creating new accounts with the name you wanted was very difficult. With so many accounts, new players often had to try 10 or more times to get a name that wasn't taken.

Since we are merging all platforms accounts into a single account system, we knew that we had to deal with name conflicts anyway, so we have decided to add a "discriminator" number to the end of each account name.



[h2]Sub-accounts[/h2]

The next big change we are making is sub-accounts.

There will be many players who have previously created an account on a console platform as well as on PC. These players can now merge these accounts together so that they can play across both platforms.

When merging accounts, both sub-accounts will still exist and have their characters listed separately. Which account you are currently using can be selected with the account selection box at the top of the character selection screen after you log in.



[h2]Microtransactions[/h2]

The microtransactions purchased on an account are still associated with the individual sub account. If you previously had an account on one of the console realms and also an account on PC with purchases on both then then you can ask support to move them into a single sub-account as a one time action. Characters can not be transferred between sub accounts so you should only do this if you intend to not use the moved microtransactions on that sub-account any more.

Unfortunately, any purchases made on PlayStation platforms cannot be used on other platforms, and purchases made on other platforms cannot be used on PlayStation platforms. Note that these purchases can still be on the same sub-account, but the microtransactions will be marked as unavailable when viewing them in your stash.


[h2]Merging Other Platform Accounts[/h2]

Path of Exile accounts have always been able to support logging in from multiple PC based platforms to the same account, but we are also now allowing you to merge separate accounts that were created on different PC platforms.

If you previously unintentionally created multiple accounts on different platforms you can now merge these accounts together, but note that you can only merge one account created from each platform. For example, you can't merge multiple steam accounts into a single account.

[h2]Downtime[/h2]

To ensure this patch goes smoothly Path of Exile will be unavailable for an extended period of time. We’re expecting this process to take around 4 hours. Sorry for any inconvenience this may cause.

[h2]FAQ[/h2]

[h2]Will I be able to play my Path of Exile 1 console characters on PC?[/h2]
No. While you can share the same account on Path of Exile 1 on Console and PC, the characters will not be shared because Path of Exile 1 does not support Cross Play.

[h2]Will I be able to play my Path of Exile 2 console characters on PC when the game launches in Early Access?[/h2]
Yes. Path of Exile 2 characters can be played across any platform.

[h2]After linking my Xbox and PC accounts, can I use microtransactions that were purchased on my Xbox account on my PC account and vice versa?[/h2]
Yes, but by default the microtransactions on the two accounts will be in separate sub accounts. You can freely choose which sub-account you would like to use on either platform and the microtransactions originally purchased on that sub-account will be available for use on either platform.

You can also contact support if you would like to move the microtransactions onto the same sub account as a one time action, but note that we can not currently move your characters from one sub-account to the other, so you should only do this if you do not intend to use the moved microtransactions on that sub-account any more.

[h2]What should I do if I link the wrong accounts together? [/h2]
Take great care when linking your accounts together. If anything goes awry, contact support. They will be able to unmerge accounts.

[h2]If one of my secondary accounts gets banned or muted, will that affect my primary or other secondary accounts? [/h2]
Yes, if one of your accounts is muted or banned, it will affect all associated accounts.

[h2]If my account is permanently banned in Path of Exile 1, will I be able to use it in Path of Exile 2? [/h2]
No, you will have to create a new account.

[h2]Can I upgrade from a Supporter Pack purchased on console to a higher-tier pack on PC?[/h2]
No. Supporter packs on PC and consoles are considered to be different packs so you can't upgrade between platforms. You can still use all the microtransactions and points between platforms on platforms for which sharing is allowed.

[h2]After Path of Exile 2 is launched in Early Access, will I be able to use the existing Path of Exile 1 account to play it?[/h2]
Yes, you will be able to use the same Path of Exile 1 account to play Path of Exile 2, you would need to purchase a key to join Early Access though.

[h2]I logged into my account and I don't see my characters. Why?[/h2]

In some cases we had to merge two accounts together. Both accounts are still accessible. Use the sub account selector at the top of the character selection screen to change which account you are logged in to.

This has occurred due to various bugs in the past that have led to multiple accounts being created with the same login credentials. If two accounts shared login credentials then we merged the accounts together into sub accounts on the same account. There are 6124 accounts that were merged in this way.

There are also some cases where two accounts share some login credentials and not others. For example, two accounts share a steam login but one of the accounts also has a unique email address. In this case the steam login will be removed from the account that had both login methods connected, leaving both accounts accessible with different login methods. If you want to merge the accounts together, you can do so yourself here. There are 579 accounts that had login methods removed in this way.

During our visit to Tokyo Game Show Game Director Jonathan Rogers showcased several design highlights of Path of Exile 2, including classes, maps, skills and bosses to renowned Japanese action game producer Koji Igarashi, known for his work on the Castlevania series and more recently, Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night.





Jonathan also hosted a panel discussion and played couch co-op with Shuhei Yoshida, who was formerly the President of Sony Interactive Entertainment, now their Head of Indies Initiative. Check out the video below!

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]