Path of Exile 2’s largest, and final, Early Access Patch is now fully revealed. Find out what’s changed and the major changes you should be aware of going into leaguestart.
Highlights
The biggest highlights of the patch are the huge overhauls to the Campaign and Endgame, the new League, as well as new ascendancies to try out.
Campaign Changes
While not fully revealed, several changes to the campaign have been made to streamline the progression. This includes a lot of environmental guidance as well as changes to the map layouts.
It will take time for a lot of this to be documented, but as more information on this becomes available, the community as a whole will slowly get quicker at completing the campaign.
Addtionally, some less desirable modifiers for Martial Weapons have be pushed higher in level, making it much easier to roll better Martial Weapons. In particular this mostly applies to Act 1.
Endgame Changes
We covered much of the endgame changes in our coverage of the Return of the Ancients Reveal, but we’ll highlight some of the reward changes here that makes them very interesting.
Masters of the Atlas
The Endgame Atlas now has three Masters of the Atlas that can be unlocked by completing different tasks, unlocking powerful bonuses to apply to all of your Waystones. You’ll want to prioritize unlocking at least one of these early on in Atlas Progression as possible.
To unlock each Master, you’ll need to do the following:
- Doryani’s Science – Clear a Corruption Nexus.
- Hilda’s Hunting – Visit Hilda’s Camp south-west of your starting point.
- Jado’s Spycraft – Complete an anomaly map, located near your starting point.
Delirium
For Delirium, the biggest additions it has, apart from the new boss dropping new or even Raven-touched uniques, is access to a new Amulet type and the ability to craft Jewels with Liquid Emotions.
Raven-touched Unique items can drop, allowing a handful of non-amulet Uniques to be Instilled. In particular, this is a more interesting addition for new Uniques, but the idea of being able to Instill a Notable like Dynamism or Efficient Inscriptions on to Collapsing Horizon seems like it’d be a huge upgrade if you can.
The new amulet type offers a lot of power via two Instilled Notables, at the cost of giving up an explicit modifier. Landing good combinations of Notables will provide powerful item bases to craft on.
Liquid Emotions are now going to act similar to Essences, but for Jewels. This gives a level of control over your jewel crafting that previously was not available. While they’ll still involve some RNG, it’s more more manageable, especially when making use of Orbs of Annulment.
Breach
Breach by far has the highest concentration of new item bases, including: Grasping Mail Armour, 6 Ring Bases, 4 Amulet bases, and 4 Belt Bases. Additionally, these can also be made to roll new Caster and Minion Modifiers.
How desirable each of these bases are will depend on what they provide, and if they fit into “meta” builds. Rings and Belts are currently very stagnant, though the Rings and Amulets will still need to compete with Gold Ring and Amulets for endgame builds.
The Crafting offered by the Genesis tree is also going to be huge for getting better jewelry, especially for those interested in playing SSF. The full extent of what it offers isn’t known, but it does allow for control over both bases and modifiers.
Last but not least for Breach, new Jewel Catalysts will be available to add quality to any jewels. In particular, this has potential to be incredibly powerful for many Jewels, particularly those intended to be paired with The Adorned, adding another boost to their values before getting the multiplicative boost.
Ritual
While it was mentioned in our Reveal coverage, the biggest change to be aware for Ritual is that Ritual Windows will now only be Uniques or Omens, unless otherwise modified by the Ritual Atlas Tree. This will make it easier to get some of the more common, but useful unique items, potentially as early as Freythorn if you’re lucky.
With the general Ritual strategy of deferring items until they are cheaper, this means Audience with the King will be far more accessible. Of course, this also means needing to keep track of what Uniques are good to pick up, but in situation where you have little to defer, means more frequent Audience with the King, and by extension the Rite of the Nameless.
Fate of the Vaal
It’s worth repeating, but the snaking strategy that made this mechanic horribly broken last league is outright dead. In theory, this means far fewer Currencies and Unique Items being printed from the mechanic.
Vaal Infusers are also split by item type now, so you’ll need to be careful you’re getting the correct ones. Additionally, a number of Vaal Cultivation Orb bonuses have been adjusted. Notably those that affect Life Costs and Energy Shield, but more importantly the +Level to All Skills Gems on the Vertex is now +Level to all Curse Skills, making the item significantly more niche.
Abyss
Nothing too big for Abyss other than Abyss Omens are strictly endgame drops, though this also means that during the campaign, it may be more likely to see the various Gnawed Bones.
The only other notable change is that Endgame Modifiers to Chests quantity will now apply to Abyssal Depths, as well as increasing the chances of finding an Abyssal Depths to keep them as common as they are regardless of chest modifiers.
Expedition
With Runes of Aldur being an Expedition focused mechanic, it will be disabled for Standard until the league concludes. Additionally, the Unique Tablet for Expedition has also been disabled, likely with pending a rework.
As a huge Quality of Life update for Expedition, the Expedition Vendors will now pull currency from your stash.
Runes of Aldur League
This was also covered in our coverage of the early Reveal and Announcement. So we’ll talk a bit more about the rewards here as well.
Unique Verisium Runeforging is going to be a very potent option and potentially unlock some powerful build options, via upgraded low-level uniques. Here is one item per type that have interesting modifiers, but can be limiting due to their Damage or Defences:
- Frostbreath (Mace)
- Splinter of Loratta (Spear)
- Matsya (Quarterstaff)
- Death’s Harp (Bow)
- Rampart Raptor (Crossbow)
- Dark Defiler (Sceptre)
- Enezun’s Charge (Wand)
- The Searing Touch (Staff)
- Wandering Reliquary (Body Armour)
- Deidbell (Helm)
- Maligaro’s Virtuosity (Gloves)
- Windscream (Boots)
- Crest of Ardura (Shield)
- Silverthorne (Buckler)
- Threaded Light (Focus)
- Asphyxia’s Wrath (Quiver)
There are several new runes, over 100 in fact, that provide all sorts of new modifiers and crafting potential to keep an eye out for. Not to mention the new Kalguuran Skill and Support Gems.
Though of note, the Recombinator has been removed as a crafting option. While it had its uses for higher-end crafts, all of the options being added in its stead seem like they’ll be more reliable.
New Ascendancies
With the Return of the Ancients Update comes two brand new Ascendancy Classes, Spirit Walker for the Huntress and Martial Artist for the Monk, as well as a new upgrade path for the Acolyte of Chayula.
Sprit Walker
The Spirit Walker Ascendancy for the Huntress allows her to harness the power of the Azmeri Spirits, gaining a variety of Boons to empower other skills and create Companions. They also gain the ability to Tame Bosses, and even gain additional power from socketed Idols.
Martial Artist
The Martial Artist Ascendancy for the monk is a master of illusions. They’re able to create illusory copies of themselves to perform Skills as well as create illusory Tempest Bells. They excel in Unarmed Combat, gaining bonuses to the unarmed style and altering their equipped Gloves to have more powerful Modifiers.
Balance and Meta Impact
There are a slew of balance changes coming as well, which may impact builds that were common in the meta, either for leveling or endgame. Below we’ve summarized a handful of changes that impact those builds.
Cast on Critical Comet Blood Mage and Leech
The biggest hit this build has taken are the sweeping changes to Leech. With a Single Leech instance and it being capped to 40,000 damage, and all forms of Instant Leech being removed, it will be much harder to scale. With investment, it may still be viable, but will require far more investment.
Blood Mage itself received a buff to Vitality Siphon, being 20% Spell damage leech as well, up from 10%. This is likely to compensate for the Leech Change, so builds not relying on CoC Comet aren’t punished as much.
The Vertex’s +Level to All Skills Cultivated Modifier has changed to +Level of Curse Skills. This is a huge hit to Gem Levels overall, but unlike Attack Weapons, Magical Weapons still retain their current +Level of Spell Skills modifiers.
It’s skill damage remains mostly unchanged, save for Fire-infused Comet losing a large chunk of its damage. With that being the only direct nerf, it’s not likely to hold the archetype back.
Leveling Archetype Changes
Surprisingly, Twister itself remains untouched. It remains as a strong build that scales well into late game for Spear Builds.
Maces got some love, with Rolling Slam trading some of its damage for speed. This makes it a great way to set up Boneshatter, especially with Brink I Support becoming a Level 1 Support.
Shield Wall now requires more Armour Investment to reach the same levels of damage. With it being overtuned previously, this is closer to bring it in line with other options.
Poisonburst Arrow now has a flat 3 second Poison at all Levels and gains less Poison magnitude from quality. Additionally, Pathfinder’s Overwhelming Toxicity Node now applies 50% less duration of Poisons, nerfed from 35%. Running Assault was also reduced to 30% less movement speed penalty while using skills, down from 50%.
Lightning Arrow’s Beams can no longer chain on to the same target. This impacts its synergy with Lightning Rod a bit, but likely not to a noticeable degree.
Snipe’s base damage was buffed, but it’s bonus to Explosion from Unique Enemies was reduced at lower levels.
Ice Strike’s Damage is unchanged, but its quality has changed from 10% more Attack Speed to 20% increased attack Speed. This makes it better earlier, but scale slightly worse.
Minions received a number of changes, including new Support Gems as well as Ring Modifiers available through Breach. Additionally, the Last Gasp (and Tecrod’s Revenge) Support will keep a minion alive for its full duration. The only nerf it received is to the Commanding Rage Notable, granting less overall Attack Speed.
Defenses
Deflect has had it’s formula adjusted, which makes it slightly weaker at lower investment, but much stronger at higher investment. This will likely make pure Dexterity Builds much more defensive.
There was previously a mention of Armour and Evasion being increased at early levels in the reveal stream, but appear to have not made it in.
Energy Shield has been heavily impacted by several nerfs. Many Notable Passives granting Faster Start of Energy Shield Recharge and Energy Shield Recharge have been reduced, removed, or replaced.
Ghost Dance Shroud gain rate no longer scales with duration, instead scaling with Cooldown Recovery Rate. Additionally, it recover 2% of total Evasion Rating as Energy Shield per second when a Shroud has been recently lost (4s), instead of 5% as a single instance. This overall will make Ghost Dance less powerful against frequent hits, but generally better for infrequent hits.
Official Patch Notes
Due to the large volume of Patch Notes, we’ll only be providing a direct link to the Official Patch Notes.
