Late last year, we started a series of polls to design a microtransaction with the community. Before our artists finalise the concepts for a novelty themed Cyclone effect, we want to ask you for suggestions! If you are in need of inspiration, we are thinking along the lines of the Celestial Cat Soulrend or Summon Raging Bees Effects. Leave your ideas below and we will look through them all in and then put the best/most feasible ones together for you to vote on for the next poll!

Once the concepts are complete, we will open up the final poll with the artwork for you to choose the final design. We can't wait to see what you come up with!

In Path of Exile 2, much has changed in the world of Wraeclast, which means that the way we approach telling its story also needs to be different. In today's news post, Narrative Designer Matt Dymerski, shares some of the narrative design philosophies being adopted to craft a more immersive story and experience in Path of Exile 2.

The following is written from Matt's perspective.

---

Newer players might not realize this, but Path of Exile was written in stages. When I started playing, the Lunaris Temple was the end of the game, and Piety was the final boss. Act 4 didn’t arrive until 2015, and Acts 5 through 10 followed in 2017. The years between saw significant upgrades in Grinding Gear Games’ capabilities and focus, but also held complications with the availability of voice actors and writers. Path of Exile 2 represents the company’s first opportunity to build a complete sequel story all at once. That means myself - your resident Narrative Designer - and a team of fantastic level designers, artists, and voice actors will be along for the entire ride. With that in mind, I’d like to share some narrative design philosophies about how we’re approaching the story and experience of Path of Exile 2.

First and foremost, we’re approaching Wraeclast as a living world. Allies and antagonists alike have their own goals and desires. They’re looting ancient artifacts, they’re out waging war, and sometimes, if you anger them enough, they might even come looking for you when you least expect it - because the malevolent forces at play in Path of Exile 2 are smart, capable, and dedicated to their cause. They’ll be making moves against you while you carve your way across the continent. Twenty years before, they saw what a talented Exile can do, so they’ll quickly realize what you represent. Take that as you will...

With enemies making more interesting choices, we want the player to be able to do so in kind, both to aid replayability and to improve immersion. Story-wise, we aim to give the player choices to make about how to proceed through an act. Wherever possible, these choices will also have consequences. Sometimes, you may not be able to achieve all of your objectives, and you’ll have to choose - and events will play out differently as a result. For another example, quests are being designed with all of our types of players in mind. Often, if you skip talking to an NPC, you’ll still be able to pick up a vague version of their quest from environmental clues along the way. If you manage to skip the clues as well and complete the quest completely blind, the NPCs will be grateful, but possibly bewildered. From their perspective, you’re a crazed antisocial barbarian who charged through their town, killed a bunch of monsters, then randomly brought them a highly personal item like a cat dropping off a dead bird. But thanks, I suppose?

Hopefully, these choices will help us minimize the classic RPG feeling of a ‘random walk.’ Every place we go should be intentional. We’ll hitch a ride on caravans. We’ll ride rhoas. Maybe we’ll take a boat. This expands the size of the world and lets us go to cooler destinations, because it’s not believable that multiple different wonders of the world are next to each other, but it is believable that we could travel weeks overland to reach each of them - in real time (just kidding, this isn’t Desert Bus).

This is all part of another intentional design philosophy: story through action. We’re well aware that Path of Exile hosts players of many types, many of which rarely listen to dialogue. For better immersion, we’re shifting what we can into actual events. While the ‘living world’ I’ve described is happening, the player gets to run and fight, and what they perceive about the story should be much more active. Don’t be surprised if you encounter NPCs out in the world having conversations before you arrive or already fighting the good fight. Figuring out who they are fighting and why will have to happen naturally in the course of battle!

All of this should hopefully combine to create a connected world that works so well that you can actually guess what NPCs might do based on their personality or history. The events of Path of Exile 1 certainly lend themselves to this, given that the characters involved have had twenty years to react. There’s a ton more I’d like to get into in the future, but for now I’ll leave off with an open-ended question: in terms of places and people, what would you most like to see again from Path of Exile 1?

While it's only been a few days since Ultimatum's launch, we wanted to provide the community with an overview of what we're currently working on. We don't feel that major changes to the league are required just yet, but this might change soon as it's still quite early.

Some Issues we're working on:

• We're keeping a close eye on the experience of Ultimatum encounters and their balance.
  
• The Razor Dance Ultimatum Modifier is not currently enabled. We are working on fixing up some issues found at the last minute prior to Ultimatum's launch that required us to temporarily disable this modifier. As it is required for Ultimatum challenges, we will enable this modifier as soon as it is fixed and tested.
  
• Some Ultimatum waves sometimes give no reward. This is a very rare issue but we are working on a fix as soon as possible.
  
• We're working on a solution to channeling abilities being released or stopped in-between Ultimatum waves.
  
• The Betrayal Syndicate board has graphical issues which were fixed as of 3.14.0c, though resetting your Betrayal board by defeating the Mastermind will fix up remaining cases.
  
• Bestiary's Blood Altar no longer filters the level of beasts for the first slot. A fix for this is being worked on. For now, manually select an appropriate level beast in the first slot, if available.
  
• The description for the Inquisitor's Fanaticism ascendancy passive will be correctly updated to specify that it reduces all costs and not just mana costs.
  
• We're currently looking into a bug where Quivers are dropping from some sources more often than intended.
  
• Fixed a bug where The Vaal Omnitect in Temple of Atzoatl could sometimes be unkillable.

Upcoming bug fixes that are ready and currently being tested for inclusion in future patches:

• Fixed a bug where Flameblast microtransactions could be applied to the Blood Sacrament skill granted by the Relic of the Pact unique wand.
  
• Added "Immunity to Chaos Damage" to the character sheet screen if the character has the Chaos Inoculation keystone passive skill allocated.
  
• Fixed a bug where items could sometimes drop in unreachable locations in Caldera Map.
  
• Fixed a bug where items could sometimes drop in unreachable locations in Siege Map.
  
• Fixed a bug where the "Elemental Aegis" buff from the Elementalist ascendancy passive "Bastion of Elements" would not re-apply in the same area if you died.
  
• Fixed a bug where Cruelty was not being offered for purchase from Yeena for the Duelist.
  
• Fixed a bug where Arc would still be out of range when you walk to a target to cast it.
  
• Fixed a bug where Tormented Spirits would use their skills when inside a defeated Betrayal target.
  
• Fixed a bug where Divergent Phase Run's quality stat succeeded less often than intended.
  
• Fixed a bug where The Vaal Omnitect in Temple of Atzoatl could sometimes be unkillable.

If you are looking to add some dramatic flair to your playlists, then we have the perfect track for you! The Apollyon Mystery Box soundtrack is now available as a free download. You can find the links below.

To download the Apollyon Mystery Box soundtrack, click (or Right-click, “Save link as”) on the file type you prefer: .flac or .mp3.

We know how much you love our composer Kamil’s music, so if you can’t get enough, check out his Soundcloud here or YouTube channel.

Ultimatum has been out for a few days now and while we're keeping an eye on feedback and reports regarding Ultimatum, we wanted to showcase some awesome Path of Exile-inspired creations from our community. Check them out!


















We can’t wait to see what else our players come up with next. If you’d like to share any artwork or fan art with us and your fellow Exiles, please post your submissions on the Community Showcase forum or our subreddit.

Whether you side with the Light or the Dark, the Apollyon Mystery Box is now available! It contains 38 new ethereal cosmetic effects, some of which can be combined to create a stunning unique version for even deeper character customisation. Check out the full trailer to see what's available!

Click here to find out more about the Apollyon Mystery Box!

Get ready to risk it all because Path of Exile: Ultimatum launches in less than a day! We can't wait to see what you're willing to sacrifice for the chance at ungodly riches. In this news post, we've gathered all the information you need to know about what happens on launch day and how to start downloading early.

The realm goes down and patching begins at 10AM April 16 PDT.

The servers go live at 1PM April 16 PDT.

You can also check the countdown on our Ultimatum page. Three hours before the end of the countdown, the realm will go down and patching will begin shortly after. When the countdown ends, the servers will be live and you'll be able to join the Ultimatum League!

The patch size for the update will be around 4.8GB on Steam.

If you're looking for some extra character slots for the launch, we're running a sale on these right now! This is also your last chance to get Warlord Mystery Boxes! It will leave the store when our next mystery box becomes available! Keep in mind that if you haven't taken advantage of it yet, it's still possible to get one free Warlord Mystery Box when you spend any amount of points in the store. NOTE: this is only possible once per account. Additional purchases do not grant additional mystery boxes. If you need some extra points, we recommend checking out the Ultimatum supporter packs.

In case you still haven't decided which build to play with, check out the Class subsections on the forum for suggestions from the community. Many of our community streamers are also providing build guides on YouTube.

If you want a new look to match your build, check out the Nexus stores of your favourite creators for their favourite Armour Sets to support them as well as the development of Path of Exile!

If you're not able to play the game on launch day, be sure to check out our community streamers on Twitch! See you at launch!

In Path of Exile: Ultimatum, we've added four new skill and support gems as well as made a variety of changes to existing gems. To help you plan your build for the upcoming launch, we've prepared gem data at level 20 with 20% quality for all new and changed gems.

Check them out here!

The full patch notes for Path of Exile: Ultimatum are now available!



In order to help you prepare your builds and item filters we've also gathered the Passive Tree and Item Filter information.

We've listed the changes to the passive tree in the Patch Notes but if you're a community tool creator, you can find the JSON data here. If you're not sure what to do with this information, don't worry too much! We'll update Path of Exile's built-in item filter in the game and the Passive Skill Tree on the website alongside the launch of the Ultimatum expansion.

• Added the rest of the new Atlas base types to existing filters
  
• Changed Convoking Wand to be included in the Atlas base type filtering
  
• New unique Abyss jewels should now be filtered as unique items
  
• Abyss jewels should now be filtered by rarity

Item Class: Active Skill Gem

• Exsanguinate
  
• Corrupting Fever
  
• Reap
  
• Petrified Blood

Item Class: Support Skill Gem

• Arrogance Support
  
• Bloodthirst Support
  
• Cruelty Support
  
• Lifetap Support

Item Class: Divination Cards

• Winter's Embrace
  
• Sambodhi's Wisdom
  
• The Enthusiasts
  
• Broken Promises
  
• Brush, Paint and Palette
  
• Deadly Joy
  
• The Adventuring Spirit
  
• The Eternal War
  
• Prejudice
  
• The Shortcut
  
• The Card Sharp
  
• A Modest Request
  
• Luminous Trove
  
• The Hook

Item Class: Stackable Currency

• Veiled Chaos Orb
  
• Noxious Catalyst
  
• Accelerating Catalyst
  
• Unstable Catalyst
  
• Tainted Oil

Item Class: Incubator

• Blighted Incubator
  
• Morphing Incubator
  
• Maddening Incubator

Item Class: Map Fragment

• Rusted Blight Scarab
  
• Polished Blight Scarab
  
• Gilded Blight Scarab
  
• Winged Blight Scarab
  
• Rusted Abyss Scarab
  
• Polished Abyss Scarab
  
• Gilded Abyss Scarab
  
• Winged Abyss Scarab
  
• Sacred Blossom

Item Class: Misc Map Item

• Vaal Reliquary Key
  
• Chronicle of Atzoatl
  
• Inscribed Ultimatum

Item Class: Amulet

• Seaglass Amulet

Item Class: Body Armour

• Grasping Mail

Item Class: Boots

• Blessed Boots

Item Class: Gloves

• Apothecary's Gloves

Item Class: Quiver

• Artillery Quiver

Item Class: Ring

• Iolite Ring

• Blood Magic Support has been split into Arrogance and Lifetap Support. Existing Blood Magic Support Gems will be converted to Arrogance Support Gems.

Note that there has not been a shuffle of the Atlas for Ultimatum. Map tiers are unchanged from Ritual.

Tier 1

• Pen Map
  
• Arcade Map
  
• Jungle Valley Map
  
• Coves Map

Tier 2

• Peninsula Map
  
• Grotto Map
  
• Volcano Map
  
• Frozen Cabins Map
  
• Fields Map
  
• Wharf Map
  
• Underground Sea Map
  
• Crater Map
  
• Underground River Map
  
• Gardens Map
  
• Infested Valley Map
  
• Tropical Island Map
  
• Moon Temple Map
  
• Tower Map
  
• Arena Map
  
• Promenade Map
  
• Lair Map
  
• Spider Forest Map
  
• Defiled Cathedral Map
  
• Sunken City Map

Tier 3

• Graveyard Map
  
• Arid Lake Map
  
• Strand Map
  
• Glacier Map
  
• Canyon Map
  
• Forking River Map
  
• Sulphur Vents Map
  
• Toxic Sewer Map
  
• Ancient City Map
  
• Ashen Wood Map
  
• Cemetery Map
  
• Lava Chamber Map
  
• Laboratory Map
  
• Overgrown Ruin Map
  
• Vaal Pyramid Map
  
• Geode Map
  
• Courtyard Map
  
• Mud Geyser Map
  
• Shore Map
  
• Temple Map
  
• Belfry Map
  
• Pier Map
  
• Orchard Map
  
• Factory Map
  
• Primordial Blocks Map
  
• Plaza Map
  
• Basilica Map
  
• Reef Map

Tier 4

• Lookout Map
  
• Desert Map
  
• Marshes Map
  
• Iceberg Map
  
• Cage Map
  
• Leyline Map
  
• Courthouse Map
  
• Channel Map
  
• Academy Map
  
• Ramparts Map
  
• Dunes Map
  
• Bone Crypt Map
  
• Museum Map
  
• Wasteland Map
  
• Precinct Map
  
• Primordial Pool Map
  
• Crystal Ore Map
  
• Arsenal Map
  
• Crimson Temple Map

Tier 5

• Cells Map
  
• Chateau Map
  
• Lighthouse Map
  
• Haunted Mansion Map
  
• Atoll Map
  
• Armoury Map
  
• Waste Pool Map
  
• Shrine Map
  
• Desert Spring Map
  
• Palace Map
  
• Carcass Map
  
• The Beachhead Map

Tier 6

• Malformation Map
  
• Silo Map

Tier 7

• Waterways Map
  
• Dark Forest Map

Tier 8

• Alleyways Map
  
• Dry Sea Map
  
• Racecourse Map

Tier 9

• Dungeon Map
  
• Relic Chambers Map
  
• Spider Lair Map
  
• Mausoleum Map
  
• Mineral Pools Map
  
• Overgrown Shrine Map
  
• Stagnation Map

Tier 10

• Forbidden Woods Map
  
• Phantasmagoria Map
  
• Scriptorium Map
  
• Ghetto Map
  
• The Beachhead Map

Tier 11

• Flooded Mine Map
  
• Fungal Hollow Map
  
• Port Map
  
• Grave Trough Map
  
• Cold River Map
  
• Conservatory Map
  
• Ivory Temple Map

Tier 12

• Crimson Township Map
  
• Coral Ruins Map
  
• Siege Map
  
• Shipyard Map
  
• Dig Map

Tier 13

• Maze Map
  
• Plateau Map
  
• Cursed Crypt Map
  
• Park Map

Tier 14

• Beach Map
  
• Excavation Map
  
• City Square Map
  
• Barrows Map
  
• Thicket Map
  
• Residence Map
  
• Sepulchre Map
  
• Mesa Map
  
• Caldera Map
  
• Core Map
  
• Colosseum Map
  
• Acid Caverns Map
  
• Bramble Valley Map

Tier 15

• Foundry Map
  
• Bazaar Map
  
• Estuary Map
  
• Vault Map
  
• Arachnid Tomb Map
  
• Bog Map
  
• Colonnade Map
  
• Summit Map
  
• Castle Ruins Map
  
• Villa Map
  
• Terrace Map
  
• Lava Lake Map
  
• The Beachhead Map

Tier 16

• Burial Chambers Map
  
• Arachnid Nest Map
  
• Pit Map
  
• Necropolis Map
  
• Pit of the Chimera Map
  
• Lair of the Hydra Map
  
• Maze of the Minotaur Map
  
• Forge of the Phoenix Map
  
• Vaal Temple Map
  
• The Beachhead Map

Alongside every new league, we aim to make balance changes to a wide variety of character systems to improve build and playstyle diversity. This league, we've focused on rebalancing a few specific game mechanics related to new blood-themed skills and Vaal skills, while lowering the power of specific mechanics that were dominating the metagame and were too far above the level of power we aim for.

We've also made changes to the Atlas Passive trees after reviewing their balance and as a result of both Ritual becoming a core mechanic alongside the upcoming league reward changes.

We haven't included the changes to league rewards described in our announcement here.

Low life, Low Mana and Low Energy Shield now all count as being on 50% or below. This new threshold is both a bit more obvious at a glance, and is large enough a value that a player could survive for a long time on Low Life with the help of the new Petrified Blood skill. As a result, certain skills, passives and items have been rebalanced to compensate. For example, the Punishment curse's effect that causes enemies to take more damage while on low life has been reduced in power as it now takes effect for a larger portion of the monster's life. We've made similar changes to the Assassin's "Ambush and Assassinate" passive, Infernal Mantle, and Replica Last Resort.

The Blood Magic Support gem has been split into two gems, as the lack of a damage multiplier made it a poor choice for primary skills. Now each of these new supports is balanced for the appropriate use case.

There are a small number of new passive clusters on the Passive Skill Tree for generic physical damage, as well as Physical Damage over Time Multiplier to better support the new skills. Certain sources of Bleeding Damage and Damage over time Multiplier for Bleeding have been changed to Physical Damage over Time to let them apply to Corrupted Blood and the new Reap and Exsanguinate skills. These include The Gladiator's Gratuitous Violence passive and the Ascendant's Gladiator notable. Not all bleed related passives and modifiers on items have been changed, so a full Bleed invested build and a build using both Bleeding and Corrupted Blood won't always look the same.

Corrupted Blood now never counts as Bleeding damage, so reductions to bleeding damage taken no longer affect it. The Staunching flask modifier and Pathfinder's Master Surgeon notable now state that they apply to both Bleeding and Corrupted Blood. Corrupted Blood's damage has been rebalanced so it is more consistent between sources, so specific monsters that had very high Corrupted Blood damage will no longer be as strong, while others that dealt almost no damage will be dealing a more noticeable amount.

Bladestorm now has a multiplier to Bleeding damage while in Blood Stance, similar to the multiplier on Lacerate, to enable Bleeding builds on the blood themed skill.The Elder-influenced Weapon modifiers that grant a chance for Poisons or Bleeds inflicted with this Weapon to deal 100% more Damage have been removed. In their place, Elder-influenced Weapons can now roll a new Local Poison or Bleed Damage over Time Multiplier modifier. The double damage chance modifiers were too multiplicatively powerful for these builds, providing power that only the modifier granted, so they've been changed to an effect that is additive with other Bleed/Poison damage multipliers.

The way skills specify costs has been refactored. Skills now specify what resource they use. Consequently, stats can specify whether they affect all costs/reservations, or some combination. For example, the Righteous Decree notable on the Templar now reduces Mana Costs of Skills, while the Tireless notable affects all skill costs. Some existing passive skills and items have been updated to affect all costs or reservations, but many effects are now resource specific where appropriate, like the Inspiration support. These changes also open up new possibilities for alternate costs. For example, the Chainbreaker keystone no longer removes rage on Hit, instead adding a small Rage cost to all skills (which would then be affected by skill cost modifiers). This has allowed us to keep Chainbreaker functional with spells while still losing rage when used alongside skills that don't hit like Damage over Time spells.

As a major benefit of these changes, reservation skills no longer have an associated cost by default, so you don't need the current mana available to reserve a skill. Even when your mana is completely depleted, you can still enable an aura, making it much easier to swap out auras or turn one on again if you accidentally disabled it.

Because of this, Mine skills now have both a mana cost and mana reservation. This means that both modifiers to costs and reservation both affect their appropriate parts of mine costs, so Indigon no longer provides spell damage without affecting mine costs at all.

We've made a series of changes to Atlas Passives for a variety of reasons:

• Certain modifiers provided more rewards than the average rewards granted by Atlas passives, so have had their chance or rewards lowered. Some are obvious ones like High Value Targets or Diplomatic Escort, while others are more subtle like Seance, which effectively added so much item quantity to areas that it was subtly boosting core drops like maps more than a single Atlas mechanic should.
  
• Certain modifiers provided fewer rewards than the standard reward increase per point invested, so have had their chance or rewards increased. For example, the rewards from the Invasion Exotic Goods notable have been improved.
  
• Certain effects made more sense grouped together, like the Incursion passive saying "All monsters in Incursions are at least magic" has been moved off Glennach Cairns on to the existing Time Dilation modifier on Lex Ejoris, so Lex Ejoris is now completely focused on having more rewarding individual Incursion runs and Glennach Cairns focuses on creating the best possible Temple.
  
• Ritual has been added to Haewark Hamlet, with two notables available. It replaces Beyond there. Power Hungry no longer exists, and the Per Diemon notable has been moved to Glennach Cairns at a slightly lowered value, as the pun was too good not to keep.

We've made a balance pass on damaging Vaal skills, making them a more interesting choice relative to the Vaal skills that provide ongoing buffs. We want damaging Vaal skills in particular to have more reasons to be used by a larger variety of builds.

• The uptime for Vaal skills has been improved via various means. Soul generation on Unique monsters has been increased to 6 souls per 2% life lost, with a 1 second cooldown. This is twice as many souls as before.
  
• Damaging Vaal skills have had their Soul Gain Prevention times lowered relative to the duration of the Vaal skill. For Vaal skills that don't have a duration or ongoing effect the Soul Gain Prevention time is usually just 1 second.
  
• Reduced the Vaal Soul Cost and/or increased the Number of Uses on Vaal Skills that had relatively lower impact per use compared to other Vaal skills.
  
• A balance pass has been made on all Damaging Vaal Skills. Note in all cases these have been buffs, except for Vaal Righteous Fire, which now provides less damage to Spells while active and now sacrifices a larger amount of your total Energy Shield and Life. We felt it was too easy for any Spellcaster to use this skill to get significantly more Spell damage for a long duration, with very little downside. Note the Fire Damage over Time aspect of the skill has been increased, keeping this an attractive option for builds focussing on Burning damage.
  
• We have introduced several new unique items and made adjustments to existing ones to either give higher uptime of Vaal skills at some cost or allow you to utilise Vaal skills more easily on builds that struggle to fit them in.

We've made balance passes on a large variety of skills that are performing above acceptable power levels, either through damage, speed of clearing content, or defensive benefits.

These include Blade Vortex, Blade Blast, Toxic Rain, General's Cry with Channelled skills, Seismic Cry, Carrion Golem, and Vitality.

Frost Bomb and Wave of Conviction have had their Exposure values lowered, as these skills provided too large an elemental resistance reduction compared to other mechanics that have higher investment or penalties against bosses.

Flesh and Stone now has a 35% mana reservation (from 25%). The defensive power of the skill in Sand Stance and the offensive power in Blood Stance was too high relative to other reservation effects. We've added a small reduction to Stance skill reservation cost on the Blood and Sand specialization cluster near the Duelist to bring the cost down slightly for appropriate builds.

Vigilant Strike and its threshold jewel, The Vigil, have changed how they handle Fortify Duration and the durations granted, so that The Vigil doesn't result in a very long duration Fortify effect, instead granting a shorter Fortify duration than a high level Vigilant Strike. Vigilant Strike's base Fortify duration now scales with gem level, rather than through an increased fortify duration stat. Previously, players could gain 30 seconds of fortify from two sockets and a single jewel, which was far too cheap for the defensive power offered.

Divergent Berserk alternate quality now grants the Berserk buff 0.25% more Spell Damage per quality (from 1%). The effect was providing too much damage to Spellcasters when paired with effects that increase gem quality, such as the Enhance support.

Quivers as Caster Offhands

Critical Strike Chance, Critical Strike Multiplier, Damage over Time Multiplier and Chain modifiers on quivers now only apply to Attacks or Bow Skills. The Signal Fire and Rigwald's Quills unique quivers have also had their Physical Damage Added as Fire and Projectiles Fork modifiers changed to be with Attacks only.

Bows with a quiver could outclass many caster weapons for a variety of builds, so this change brings total offensive power to a more reasonable balance without removing the option entirely, and also makes a lot more thematic sense.

Physical Explosion Body Armours

Influence and Synthesis modifiers that caused enemies killed to explode dealing physical damage will no longer have a 100% chance to apply. Their replacement modifiers grant "Enemies you Kill have a chance to Explode, Dealing a tenth of their Life as Physical Damage", with a new lower tier Influence mod being introduced that has a lower chance. This keeps the mechanic and opens up the possibility of stacking explode chance with high investment, but it will no longer reliably wipe out packs of monsters through a chain reaction of explosions.

Harvest Monster Life

The base life of all Harvest monsters has been reduced by 30-50%, but Harvest machinery gives monsters around 100% extra increased life on average. The intention is no difficulty change in Harvest fights, but Harvest monsters created with the Desecrate skill have life values more in line with other Desecratable monsters in the game. This is to address corpse explosion builds getting a significant damage boost from having spectres of specific Harvest monsters. This strategy will still work, but the difference in monsters used won't be so significant.

Hexproof

Modifiers that allow your Hexes to affect Hexproof Enemies (such as the Cospri's Will unique Body Armour) no longer allow your Hexes to affect yourself while you have Hexproof (as you are not your own Enemy).

Poison Sextant

The Sextant modifier which granted players increased Damage and Movement Speed for each Poison on them has been removed. Savvy players could run every map with this Sextant effect applied - usually through Fracturing specific maps and the Harvest map enchantment that didn't consume Sextant uses. With certain items that allowed them to apply large numbers of Poison buffs to themselves, they could achieve extreme Damage and Movement Speed with little investment.

Note to partially compensate as we believe self-Poison is an interesting playstyle, we have added a new Unique item that retains the Damage and Movement Speed per Poison stats. However these stats will now be capped at specific value.

Fractured Fossils and Beast-Splitting

Splitting an item through Beast-crafting now applies a split tag to both items (similar to “Mirrored”). Items that have Fractured Fossils used on them also gain the split tag. Split items cannot be split/mirrored again, and cannot have Imprints made of them or applied to them.

Atlas Mission Sustain

We've removed the bonus mission chance from Awakening objective bonuses, as Atlas passives combined with this bonus and other mechanics were resulting in an almost endless supply of missions. We've decided to keep the Atlas passives at full strength and remove the Awakening objective bonus so the player has the choice to invest in more Atlas missions if they desire.

Delirium Item Quantity and Rarity

We've lowered and standardised the amount of Item Quantity and Rarity granted by Delirium fog, so they now give up to double the inbuilt item Rarity of monsters, and up to 50% the item quantity of monsters. This now caps out at maximum depth, rather than at 50% depth as was previously the case.

We are wary about how accessible normally scarce stats, such as Area of Effect, Skill Effect Duration, Aura Effect and Projectile Speed are on Cluster Jewel notables, given you can stack multiple of the same notable on the passive tree. As a result we have made small numerical nerfs to several Cluster Jewel notables that grant the above stats.

As a relatively minor ascendancy change, Pain Reaver has been replaced with a new passive skill on the Berserker, providing defensive benefits once you lose life from an enemy hit. It is designed as a high risk defensive/recovery mechanic, granting the faster leech rate from Pain Reaver more easily but with an associated risk. The effects of the Berserker's Flawless Savagery notable are no longer limited to Attacks, and the small passives apply 10% increased physical damage instead of the old 12% increased Physical Damage with Attacks.

Immortal Ambition Keystone's ‘Life Leech effects Recover Energy Shield instead while on Full Life' stat is now limited by ‘Maximum total Energy Shield Recovery from Leech' instead of by ‘Maximum total Life Recovery from Leech'. Combined with the Corrupted Soul Keystone and the powerful recovery source of life leech, it provided too great an increase to a character's combined recovery. This change preserves the desirable Life Effects not being removed at Full Life aspect of the Keystone, but limits how easy it is to recover your Energy Shield pool.

Corrupted Soul Keystone now causes you to Gain 15% of Maximum Life as Extra Maximum Energy Shield (from 20%). The Keystone allowed life base characters to get large amounts of Energy Shield very easily, while the Non-Chaos Damage taken bypasses Energy Shield stat didn't prove to be a significant downside for most builds taking the Keystone.

As mentioned above, the Chainbreaker Keystone no longer causes you to lose 5 Rage when you Hit an Enemy, but now instead has skills cost +3 Rage. The Keystone allowed certain skills that either didn't hit such as Bane, or skills that didn't count as you such as Totems and Mines to completely bypass the downside.

Hardened Scars no longer grants Fortify during the Effect of any Life Flask. Instead now grants Fortify while Recovering Life from a Life Flask. The Notable was granting Fortify too easily to any character that could maintain uptime on a Hallowed Hybrid Flask with the Enduring Prefix.

The Necromancer's Essence Glutton notable has had the amount of Mana regenerated when you Consume a Corpse lowered from 8% to 4%. It was providing more base Mana Regeneration than any other source.

Primal Aegis from the Elementalist's Bastion of Elements skill now takes 75 Damage per Allocated Notable Passive Skill (from 100). The Aegis effect went out too strong in the Elementalist rework.