Path of Exile 2

Path of Exile 2 (also known as POE2) is a sequel to Path of Exile, currently in development by Grinding Gear Games.. It was announced on November 15, 2019, during ExileCon 2019.. Initially announced a major "Version 4.0" update to the first game with a new act campaign, it has since been changed to be a completely separate game that will be supported alongside POE1. During ExileCon 2023, the Closed Beta date was announced as starting on June 7, 2024 and will last the duration of a full league (approximately 3 months). A launch date for the game's release has not yet been announced.

Path of Exile 2 will introduce a completely new game, although microtransactions will be shared with both games whenever applicable. There will be six acts and an overhaul of many of the game's core systems. The skill gem system will be drastically changed, removing gem sockets from equipment and moving them to active skill gems instead. Other additions and changes include a major visual rework with physics-based rendering, an overhaul to combat and itemization, new base classes and Ascendancy classes, and an unannounced rework of the passive skill tree and endgame.

System changes

Gameplay mechanics

Players will have access to a dodge roll at all times, using the spacebar button by default. It has no cooldown or other limitations and can be further modified via the passive tree. The start of the roll animation avoids projectiles and attacks, and can be used to cancel skill animations. Rolls cannot be cancelled, however. Rolling covers more initial distance but overall travels the same distance as walking. Roll speed is affected by movement speed. You can roll while transformed.

Spirit: A new resource called Spirit is added in addition to Life and Mana. Spirit is used to reserve skills with persistent effects like buffs and auras, upkeep permanent minions, and enable trigger meta gems. Spirit can be increased through story boss rewards, modifiers, and sceptres.

Crowd control: Crowd control effects like freeze, stun, immobilize, and electrocute now "build up" if not immediately applied, allowing them to affect bosses at a certain threshold. Bosses become resistant to crowd control for a period after it wears off.

Traps and Mines: Traps have been completely overhauled and are no longer considered attacks or spells, dealing a separate damage type - "trap damage". Additionally, traps now require a "trap" weapon type, which determines Trap Trigger Delay and Detonation Type (e.g. Proximity (trap playstyle) or Manual (mine playstyle)).

Death:

• Reservations do not deactivate on death.
• Dying and reviving in the Acts will return you to the start of the zone and respawn monsters.
• Bosses are typically preceded by checkpoints. Dying to a boss resets it, preventing corpse rushing.
• Logging out returns you to the save state you logged out from, preventing the use of logout macros to avoid death.
• Party members that die to a boss will be locked out of the instance, unless they are revived by another party member still in the instance.

Miscellaneous:

• Projectiles are affected by gravity. Projectiles lose vertical height as they travel further, reducing off-screening from projectiles.
• Culling strike kills normal, magic, rare, and unique enemies at 30%, 20%, 10%, and 5% life respectively.
• Conversion now only scales by the final damage type, and does not remember converted damage types. (e.g. 100% Physical to Cold no longer scales with Physical).
• Charges do not grant inherent bonuses and instead are used to empower skills which spend them. Skills that spend charges cannot grant charges.
• Light radius modifiers extend the range of the minimap's fog of war.
• A new stat called Deflection is added, which functions like Spell Suppression, but for attack damage. Chance to Deflect appears as an implicit on dexterity shields.
• Nearby distance is measured in meters rather than units.
• The Hooded One can identify all items in your inventory in town
• Dialogue and quest states will differ if you skip lore from NPCs and interactibles.
• The game pauses while looking at the World Map.
• New status condition: "Immobilised". Effect of immobilised scales off of the damage of the hit that inflicted it. The Impale skill can be used to inflict this condition. While an enemy is immobilised, they perform no actions and a circle effect appears over their head, giving the appearance of an enemy that is stunned in PoE 1.
• Hits can now "Break" armour, weakening its effect. The armour broken is a flat amount.
• There are Wells in towns that restore you to full life and mana and recharge your flasks. It's no longer done automatically upon entering a town.
• There is a 2.5 second cast time for opening portals mid-combat. Taking damage during the cast time will interrupt it. Entering a portal during a boss fight won't reset their life.
• Support for optional WASD movement.
• Crossplay between PC and console versions.

Monsters

Killing normal rarity monsters no longer grants flask charges.

Defeating optional story Bosses can grant items that grant permanent attributes and Spirit bonuses. These upgrades are character-specific. Larger bosses are more mobile because they can have multiple hitboxes, unlike the limit of 1 in POE1.

Characters

Character selection screen

The character models have been reworked for higher resolution and dynamic movement. Character models also have a new rigging system that improves the physics of equipment and MTX. Characters now have new dynamic walking/running/sprinting animation based on movement speed.

Classes

Path of Exile 2 has twelve base classes, with each single or hybrid attribute combinations being represented by two classes. They share the same starting location in the skill tree, but have different Ascendancy classes and skill gems associated with them. The Scion is not playable in POE2.

The available classes are as follows:

• Strength: Marauder - axes
• Strength: Warrior - maces
• Dexterity: Ranger - bows
• Dexterity: Huntress - spears
• Intelligence: Witch - minions and occult spells
• Intelligence: Sorceress - elemental spells
• Str/Dex: Duelist - swords
• Str/Dex: Mercenary - crossbows
• Int/Dex: Shadow - daggers and traps
• Int/Dex: Monk - unarmed and quarterstaves
• Str/Int: Templar - flails
• Str/Int: Druid - shapeshift spells

Ascendancies

Each base class has three Ascendancy classes to choose from, resulting in 36 Ascendancy classes. The new ascendancy classes will not be available through the labyrinths, but through other means in the new campaign in Acts 2, 3, and 4. Some Ascendancy classes will be moved to another base class, such as Elementalist now being a Sorceress Ascendancy class.

This section needs to be updated.

Reason: Ascendancies may have changed following the Exilecon 2023 character rework

Please update this article to reflect newly available information. Relevant discussion may be found on the talk page.

The following Ascendancies were teased in Exilecon 2019, though they may not be relevant in the current iteration:

• Survivalist (Ranger) - Projectile effects, Spell Avoidance
• Tactician (Ranger) - Spears, Flare Arrow (meta "arrow rain" skill), ballistas, melee bow attacks
• Beastmaster (Ranger) - Shapeshift (Werecat (crit), Bear); Wild Cat Companion (Cheetah, Lion, Panther), Aspect buffs
• Defiler (Witch) -
• Arcanist (Witch) - Lightning damage and Energy system
• Unnamed Marauder - Ancestral proxies and Ancestor Totems
• Reaver - Melee and ally buffer

Passive skill tree

Path of Exile 2 has a Dual Specialization system which enables two different passive skill tree setups that update dynamically when you weapon swap. Shapeshift forms also have a separate specialization. Only a limited amount of passive points can be allocated this way, earned by using quest Skill Books.

Masteries are not found on the new skill tree, but passive skills are numerous than the base game. Passives tend to be less weapon-specific and are more likely to grant generic modifiers.

Skills

Skills now can inherently turn mid-animation, with a wider angle of turning for skills with longer animation times. Additionally, many skills now dynamically move the player forward if targeting far away or have other in-built mobility. Certain skills also allow movement during the skill animation.

The majority of skills now have unique animations. Moreover, each skill has a set of faster animations played when a character reaches certain thresholds of attack or cast speed. These animations cut out portions of the animation's start and end.

Mana cost is spent throughout the skill instead of on use; cancelling the skill or getting stunned will not consume mana. Most skills can be cancelled, with dodge roll forcibly cancelling most skills.

Most attack skills are now weapon specific, sometimes with added distinction between one and two-handed versions.

Skills can also be assigned to use a specific or any weapon set, dynamically weapon swapping based on your Dual Specialization settings. Weapon swapping has a slight delay based on the weapon's size.

Skills granted by ascendancy classes or items will now scale with skill levels based on the character's progression rather than be granted at an arbitrary specific level.

Wand skills like Kinetic BlastKinetic BlastAttack, Projectile, AoE
Level: (1-20)
Cost: (15-16) Mana
Attack Damage: (140-155)% of base
Effectiveness of Added Damage: (140-155)%
AoE Radius: 14Requires Level 28Fires a projectile from a Wand that causes a series of area explosions in a secondary radius around its point of impact, each damaging enemies.Kinetic Blast creates 4 additional explosions
35% less Area Damage
Base explosion radius is 1.4 metres
Base secondary radius is 2 metres

Additional Effects From 1-20% Quality:
Kinetic Blast creates (0.05-1) additional explosionsPlace into an item socket of the right colour to gain this skill. Right click to remove from a socket. are spells. Brands have been merged in totem skills.

Skills now have independently selectable advanced settings, such as Attack in Place and targeting options like minion/totem aggression.

Skill gems & sockets

New skill screen as seen on ExileCon.

Items no longer contain sockets. Instead, the gem menu contains 9 slots for skill gems or meta gems.

• Socket number: Skill gems now drop with a variable amount of sockets, up to 5 (for a 6-linked skill). Skill gems have at minimum 2 sockets, and can be upgraded to 3, 4, or 5 sockets deterministically with three tiers of Jeweller's Orbs.
• Socket colour: Socket colours are randomized, by can be deterministically chosen using a Chromatic OrbChromatic OrbStack Size: 20Reforges the colour of sockets on an itemRight click this item then left click a socketed item to apply it..
• Links: Sockets are always linked, which is why Orb of FusingOrb of FusingStack Size: 20Reforges the links between sockets on an itemRight click this item then left click a socketed item to apply it. The item's quality increases the chances of obtaining more links. is not available POE2.

Meta gems: Meta gems are special types of skill gems that and can be supported by both support gems and other skill gems. Meta gems can trigger skills or provide more complex effects. Most trigger meta gems activate the supported gems when you fulfill the condition enough times.

Support gems: Support gems can be socketed into skill and meta gems. Support gems now no longer provide raw more damage modifiers, and instead are purely focused on utility. Support gems now add stat requirements to the skill gem's base attribute requirements.

Players can find "Uncut Skill Gems" which can be crafted into a skill gem in the Gemcutting menu. Skills in the Gemcutting menu are categorized by each of the 12 character classes, but are not class-locked; any skill of appropriate level can be crafted on any character. The resulting gem's level will be scaled relative to its item level.

Items

Weapons and armour have stronger stat and visual identity within their archetypes. Base items are now consistently visually themed around their drop locations in the Acts, and can only be purchased from related themed vendors. Additionally, the name of base-type items are consistent between each attribute combination. Most weapon categories that have generic implicits on all base types no longer do, making room for more interesting implicit modifiers.

• Daggers are purely attack themed, and can roll around 15% base crit.
• Sceptres grant base Spirit and roll aura-like modifiers.
• Quarterstaves replace Warstaves and are completely separate from Staves.
• Staves provide a spell skill as an implicit, have no attack stats, and are 4x1 in size.
• Wands have no attack stats.

Introduced four new weapon types:

• Spears - hybrid melee/ranged attack weapons
• Crossbows - crossbow type (Burst Shot, Rapid Shot, Power Shot), and socketed Ammo skills (Piercing, Incendiary, Permafrost) dynamically change effects of skill. Can equip attachments in offhand which also grant skill (Oil Grenade Launcher, Flash Grenade Launcher)
• Traps - determines throw speed and detonation type for trap skills
• Flails - new melee strength/intelligence weapon with medium base crit chance (~10%)

Each base type will have a Unique version at release that closely ties with the base item's visual identity. Iconic POE1 uniques such as Shavronne's WrappingsShavronne's Wrappings
Occultist's VestmentEnergy Shield: (274-377)
Movement Speed: -3%Requires Level 62, 180 Int(3-10)% increased Spell Damage(100-150)% increased Energy Shield
10% faster start of Energy Shield Recharge
+(30-40)% to Lightning Resistance
Reflects 1 to 250 Lightning Damage to Melee Attackers
Chaos Damage taken does not bypass Energy ShieldShavronne's apparel became ever more extravagant
as her body and soul became ever more corrupted. or HeadhunterHeadhunter
Leather BeltRequires Level 40+(25-40) to maximum Life+(40-55) to Strength
+(40-55) to Dexterity
+(50-60) to maximum Life
(20-30)% increased Damage with Hits against Rare monsters
When you Kill a Rare monster, you gain its Modifiers for 60 seconds"A man's soul rules from a cavern of bone, learns and
judges through flesh-born windows. The heart is meat.
The head is where the Man is."
- Lavianga, Advisor to Kaom will be adapted for POE2 with new modifiers or base types.

Gold: GoldGoldStack Size: 5000Can be spent at Vendors drops throughout the game and can be used for buying or gambling items at vendors. Gold has proximity auto-pickup similar to Azurite.

Currency: Orb of FusingOrb of FusingStack Size: 20Reforges the links between sockets on an itemRight click this item then left click a socketed item to apply it. The item's quality increases the chances of obtaining more links., Orb of AlterationOrb of AlterationStack Size: 20Reforges a magic item with new random modifiersRight click this item then left click a magic item to apply it., and Orb of ScouringOrb of ScouringStack Size: 30Removes all modifiers from an itemRight click this item then left click on a magic or rare item to apply it. have been removed from the game. Chaos OrbChaos OrbStack Size: 20Reforges a rare item with new random modifiersRight click this item then left click a rare item to apply it. now removes one random modifier and then adds a new random modifier, similar to Harvest Craft behaviour.

The Crafting Bench has also been removed. To compensate, vendors now sell significantly more magic and rare items, and the modifier pools on items have been updated to make relevant stats more common.

Item rarity: Item Rarity now affects currency drops, making bosses and unique monsters a good source of rare currency.

Flasks: Flasks stats are more reactive in effect rather than granting constant buffs. Quicksilver FlaskQuicksilver FlaskLasts 6.00 Seconds
Consumes 30 of 60 Charges on use
40% increased Movement SpeedRequires Level 4Right click to drink. Can only hold charges while in belt. Refills as you kill monsters.s are removed. A "Guard Flask" provides effects similar to and replaces guard skills. A "Well" object can be found in towns. Clicking on on it will refill your flasks.

Storyline

SPOILER WARNING ▾ [Expand] ▾

• Act 1: Takes place in a temperate region with dark forests, bogs and crypts.
• Act 2: The Vastiri Desert, where the players must follow a caravan across the arid plains.
• Act 3: Ruins of the Vaal civilization, now overgrown by tropical jungle.
• Act 4: The Port of Kingsmarch located on the coast of Forsaken Phrecia, and surrounding Karui Archipelago
• Act 5: Unknown
• Act 6: Unknown

Endgame

Endgame will have different storyline from POE1. Map will contain revamped versions of story bosses. Map modifiers can roll league mechanics. No other details have been revealed.

Videos/Overview

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Lore

20 years have gone since the death of Kitava. Since his death, society has been slowly rebuilding, but Corruption has once again started to spread throughout Wraeclast. The people whisper of a ghastly living Seed that drives those around it to madness...