Our new season of competitive Path of Exile play starts this coming weekend. It includes both our eleventh Race Season and second PvP Seasons, with prizes generously provided by Alienware! Today's news post will describe the broad changes from previous seasons of competitive play. We'll be posting full schedules within a couple of days.

We've posted Season 4 Episode 5 of Build of the Week. This week's build is Witch that uses Avatar of Fire and a clever combination of items to convert all of the damage from two Shockwave Totems and a Hatred Aura to fire damage, which is amplified by their passives. For more information, check out the author's build guide here!

We are really enjoying your submissions to our Community Showcase forum and we're keen to see more! In light of this, we are hosting a Fan Art competition for the next two weeks! Today's Community Showcase features a short animation, fan art, a hideout/fanfiction cross-over and a pickle surprise.

Read the full post here.

Hideout of the Week is a video series that showcases awesome Hideouts created by Path of Exile community members. This week's hideout is a small port for a ship called The Scarlet Corsair which captures the rugged nature of a pirate’s life. You can find out more information from the author's thread here.

To submit a Hideout for the next episode, please post about it in the Hideouts forum.

This is the first episode of our Hideout of the Week series that I have been in charge of. Please let me know if you have any feedback. Thanks for watching!

We've successfully deployed patch 1.3.1, which introduces the Hall of the Grandmasters Unique Map and many other changes. Click here to read its patch notes. This patch contained two new microtransactions - the Seraph Bow Skin and the Verdant Blink and Mirror Arrow effect. Press "M" in game to purchase these. You should also check out the new Season Eleven Race Rewards!

We're expecting to deploy patch 1.3.1 tomorrow. We will release the full patch notes during the deployment countdown. In the meantime, today's news update includes new microtransaction videos, our current unique design plan for Act Four and information about our next Race and PvP seasons.

We are running two sales on Stash Tab Bundles this weekend! For the first 24 hours (Saturday, PST), we've discounted Premium Stash Tab Bundles by 17.5%. On Sunday, Regular Stash Tab Bundles are discounted by 26.6%. To check out these offers, press M in-game. Thanks again for the generous support!

We've posted Season 4 Episode 4 of Build of the Week. This week's build is a very cool combo - it uses Vaal Molten Shell and the Scold's Bridle unique helmet to constantly explode itself while using Cyclone to kill monsters. For more information, check out the author's build guide here!

Thank you to everyone who has been submitting their creative works to our community! It's been great to see what you guys come up with. Today's Community Showcase includes two pieces of fan art, a satirical Atziri-kill guide and a highlight.

The Hall of the Grandmasters map will be introduced in patch 1.3.1 which we're currently planning to deploy early next week at the latest. We've assembled this news piece to give you an insight into what's coming and an overview of the development process.