Path of Exile II
 

Path of Exile II Releases in Early Access tomorrow, December 6th, 2024. The price to get in is $30 for early access, but the game will be free if you wait for the official release (approximately 6 months to 1 year from now).

The game will feature 12 classes, with 3 subclasses each, for 36 unique playstyles. The early access will only feature 12 subclasses from 6 classes to start and will slowly add more until the full release. The 12 subclasses will be posted in the next post.

Who else is ready?

Edit...

For those that don't know, you only get to choose one subclass and you can't revert your choice after you allocate your first point into that subclasses' ascendancy tree. You only get to choose 4 of the numbered Ascendancy Points and if one is in line after another, it's required to take it's predecessor to get to it.

am excite

I'm going to start with Titan and I'm hype.

If anyone is new to PoE and you want help or guidance, let me know. I have over 6000 hours played in PoE 1 and I would love more people to play with. If you've never played because jumping in seemed too complicated, now's a great time, and I'm willing to help!

downloading it right now on PS5

I expect this to be the greatest game ever made

Need to go over the ascendancies, I haven't decided on which one to start with yet. Blood mage does look interesting and probably strong. Also considering a poison class because I like poison/dot builds in POE1, tough choice.

I already have my 4 first characters planned out.

1. Titan Slams with dual wielding 2 handers. Big Bonk
2. Lifestacking Crit Spell Bloodmage
3. Cast on Critical Strike Ele Invoker

The fourth is going to be a Witchhunter which I'll play w/ controller on my xbox, while the rest will be on PC.

I WILL TRY

I'm going to be that guy holding out for the free release while still blasting PoE 1. I have reservations over the "slower" pace they are going for in PoE 2 to the point where I'm not willing to fork over money to test it when PoE 1 is still getting support and updates.

I'm with you there, I love the fast pace of POE and bossing is my least favorite part of it. I love running juicy, max pack size 8 mod maps with the atlas tree making it as hard as possible for better loot. Choosing the maps with the best layouts, best div cards and skip the boss if there's a phase that you have to wait for.

POE1 will still be worked on, there will be more leagues for it as well. But I'm going all in on POE2 until late January when the next POE1 league drops.

I loved this settlers 2.0 event, wrapping up everything today. The lantern was more fun than I thought it would be and it also helps that I dropped a mageblood early on. First and only time that will happen!

I leaguestarted Settlers 4 times already (Trade, SSF, Necro Trade, Necro SSF). I am completely done w/ this league and ready for something new and Poe2 will scratch that itch.

I've been waiting for this thread. Going to play the New First Descendant patch and wait to see builds before I jump in. I hope ya'll enjoy your game, seems most think this will be their favorite ARPG ever.

I think I'm just gonna go deadeye for the first playthrough, keep it simple for the first one

What time does it launch?

2 pm Eastern

well the 30 seconds I got to play was amazing!

I'm starting with some jank infernal flame minion shit because I keep going back and forth with what I want to start with and I'm just gonna commit to that. Plenty of time to think about it with the servers not working.

Good thing I waited, launch day is a disaster like most big launches. Most are saying they are getting the message they don't have access to EA and can't play. The GGG website is down completely as well. I think The First Descendant has been the only game that launched smooth as butter, not sure why every American game never has enough server capacity for launch.

From the looks of it, the servers are still getting hammered and there's lots of delay.

Is anyone able to play this right now? Or do you have to be a streamer? :P
I would like a little minireview, is this more like a Dark Souls ARPG? Early reviews are ok, you can always change your mind later.

It's epic.

Are you playing Buck?

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You try hards taking breaks or just hard sweating it out? LMAO ;)

I started over 3 times yesterday

finally committed to the Sorc with spark and arc. Only in Act 2, Act 1 was pretty difficult but it's pretty ****ing awesome so far.

I'll be checking out Sorc when I play, good to hear. I'm not much on the Dark Souls type of stuff or extra button mashing as my Arthritis annoys me far too often. I'll give it a spin at some point though.

ya it seems like they want you to use more buttons this go around, I've always made sure to build one button builds, main skill on square, utility that's used a lot on triangle, movement skill on circle, instant skill on x and utility stuff that's only used on bosses or anything super tanky on L2 + circle/square/x/triangle. If a build requires more than that I don't do that build.

But it's really not a problem so far, I pretty much have the same set up. The only difference is I have 2 damage skills and I do like how the skill gems are set up with not needing links, super nice.

Combat is great as are the graphics. The item system to me at level 30 has been about the worst i've seen. I haven't found/crafted a real upgrade since my level 10 to 14 gear. Also not a huge fan of the bosses being huge 8 plus minute dying fests. Also yet to get an item drop and think Wow that's great. I know it's early access so we shall see but to me it's mostly players that like the Dark Souls type of gameplay.

That's what they were going for. It was no secret. It's also why I said I wasn't going to pay to beta test it and just stick to PoE1 until it releases for free. Feel like people forgot that Chris Wilson said that PoE1 Ruthless was basically alpha PoE2. Show of hands... who played Ruthless?

I've been watching videos reviewing it so far and it's about what I expected. I just learned that they removed the alteration orb. Lol. What? It's just shit like that which is completely dumb. They want you to craft with less deterministic methods, so they take away the orb that lets you roll magic items... huh? So now you get to do the exact same thing in a more deliberately annoying fashion by collecting white items over and over to use transmutes and augments. It's just not fun. Let me skip the part of collecting infinite white bases and just roll one of them. It's even worse that white bases have different percentiles, unless that changed in PoE2. So if you changed your filter to not show white bases unless it was one of the two or three very best bases and then on top of that only show it if it was above 90% or 95%, it would be a good while before another one showed up on your screen.

PoE1 is goated, imo. There is nothing more satisfying than juicing the shit out of a map with mobs ontop of mobs ontop of mobs and having the whole entire screen of 100+ mobs go boom in one massive explosion and doing it at break neck speed. I'll get to PoE2 when it's time. Hopefully shit changes in the next 10 or so months and I appreciate the people who forked over money to beta test it for me. If not, PoE1 is still going to be supported so I'm good with that too.

I wish the graphics in POE1 were great, I would absolutely be playing that. I'm at the point in gaming where if it doesn't have top notch graphics I struggle to play/enjoy it.

POE2 you can hardly find crafting mats for upgrades. I used what I had and rolled complete garbage so it's RNG and you hardly ever get upgrades. Just feels like the same spell effects no matter what you do and that's not exciting at all as it feels like your items have no effect whatsoever other than resistances.

I would be interested to hear what others feedback is so far playing.

Have to agree.

I played POE1 beta about 10 years ago when I still had a PC that could play games. It was an amazing time. I think they want to replicate the progression that it went through over the years but probably more focused on their 'vision'

It is definitely ruthless mode and nah I never played ruthless. I also agree about the no alteration thing like that's pretty annoying.

The good:

-the socket system, it's nice not having to worry about colors and sockets and you can have a lot of different skills going. The downside of that is your gem levels are dependent on drops or buying them, which I just bought some level ups today because I'm only on T4 maps atm and level 15 is all that's dropping there.

-getting a good item is more meaningful I guess

The bad:

-they nerfed my build to the ground and took a while to get going with a different one

-vision crafting is painful

-map sustain, although I probably just need more atlas passives

-campaign is hella long which will deter me even more from making multiple builds

-too many maps have too much backtracking

-can't re-enter a map if you die but I guess I understand what they are going for there. But you can still portal out of a map and go back in...

-mana costs are too damn high, I'm running inspiration ffs

overall I'm enjoying it though and will pretty much play only this until a new POE1 league drops

How long is the campaign in POE1? It's been 10 plus years since I finished it and I don't remember much of anything about it.

it's not bad once you know it, the same might be said for POE2 but I dunno.

I'm kinda slow compared to the speed runners, but I'll be in maps on the 2nd day. 8-12 hours. But it will be longer if you aren't used to the pathing and knowing exactly where to go.

I also forgot a couple of other positives about POE2

gold is good, using it for respec'ing is better than needing regret orbs. Using an NPC to ID your items is also good. No portal scrolls is good.

They still don't have loot filters for console players and even though I'm not running juicy shit and dropping a lot of stuff, it sucks not having a loot filter. I also hate the explosion that every rare monster does in maps, it just drops the frames and is painful to look at.

Still the entire point of an ARPG to me is loot and having an actual progression path. Mix not progressing item wise with painfully slow killing and leveling/backtracking/running away and it's just really annoying. Just call it an overhead Souls like game(No Rest For The Wicked) and be done with it.

I'm definitely progressing, just slower. I need to start looking at the trade site for upgrades I guess. I will say that I'm not sure about how I feel about crossplay. On console we had a trade market in POE1 that PC never had and it made selling things a lot more enjoyable, maybe not as much for buying stuff. But I also have to go to another room for my computer and look up trade, whisper a bunch of people until someone responds and I don't have access to the 3rd party tools that makes that part easy for PC players either. But on the flip side there will be a lot more availability on things.

Ok big update here.

I found a Unique helm and my luck changed right away. I found a couple more upgrades and I've been having a blast. I know it's Early Access but it can go from the worst slog to incredible in an instant. I haven't had this much fun ARPG wise maybe since Diablo 1, it's super satisfying and well done. The combat is amazing, the visuals are stunning and incredibly creative.

So i was not a huge poe1 fan. I tried to play it6 or 8 times over the years and couldnt get into it

I have put more time into poe2 in 10 days than i did in poe1 in 10 years.

Its far and away better for me, a Diablo enjoyer, than poe1.

That being said it can get frustrating at times with progression, its not perfect, but it doesnt have the benefit of 10 years of trial and error as poe1 does, so poe1 enjoyers I think have to take a little bit of a breath and go back to poe1 while it simmers. Its EA. Who cares if we are beta testing it for them, still plenty of fun to be had.

nice, what build are you starting out with?

https://maxroll.gg/poe2/build-guides...assives-header

Using that to level, I might change it up for endgame so I'm not doing my ascendancy yet. I really like cold and the frost wall is amazing in this game. I deviated a bit on what I'm using from that build, but it's working well right now.

oh nice, that's basically what I did to get through the last part of the campaign and then they promptly nerfed the **** out of cast on freeze. Now I'm doing spark archmage and it's going pretty good. Frost wall is a great skill, I actually use it on this spark stormweaver.

I've been eyeing this build or close to it for endgame but due to constant nerfs I'm holding off until I absolutely have to make a choice.

<iframe width="640" height="480" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/YSi2IVYrToM" title="Spark Stormweaver Melts T15 Maps EASILY! Best Sorceress Build - Path of Exile 2 Guide" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>

2nd build looks intriguing, trying to talk my buddy into playing this(Witch)

<iframe width="640" height="480" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Hx2JMB4WK_8" title="Path of Exile 2 - Stop Hammer Time Build Guide (VERY STRONG Melee Chronomancer) Hammer of the Gods" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>

The only thing about that build I think they could nerf is archmage. I hope they don't though. Or they would change the way the amulet works that converts mana to energy shield, not sure if it's intended that you can run eldritch battery and still have a lot of energy shield. I'm not even at that point yet.

There's a monk build that looks pretty awesome too

I did Act 1 with all characters except Monk and I got a Sorc Stormweaver to Act 3.

I have a level 84 Titan Warrior and a Level 72 Deadeye Ranger.

I'm not that excited about the game in it's current state, but it's just as good as D4 if not better in it's current state.

You must have a lot of time to play, I'm on act 3 with my Sorc level 38. I also take my time and don't really care to race to the end.

I got sick last week so I had 4 days off. Went sorta hard, but I'm done w/ hardcore now. It's definitely just a beta.

<iframe width="640" height="480" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/1QC2OPLWJFM" title="Here&#39;s Why 99% of PoE2 Players WILL QUIT in the END GAME." frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>

This guy seems like he enjoys the game, but doesn't really know how to play. I had no problems with map sustain by simply spec'ing into map sustain.

The endgame is just bad right now and that's because it's merely a placeholder. The best part of the game is the campaign right now.

I still can't picture wanting to redo the campaign over and over every season.

<iframe width="640" height="480" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/2aaZsnQdOKw" title="MASSIVE Balance Patch Hits Path of Exile 2 (QoL, Buffs, New GEMS)" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Massive buffs to a lot of things and nerfs to endgame difficulty.

<iframe width="640" height="480" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/d1OqovISX2I" title="NEW TRADE Tool Dropped &amp; Changes Everything in Path of Exile 2" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Something to keep an eye on, looks amazing and necessary

Basically the same thing PoE1 has with Awakened PoE Trade. They just changed the name of it for PoE2 because the dev for it doesn't play PoE2 so someone else is adding the support.

really wish there was a way to use that on PS5

Get a PC bro ;)

<iframe width="800" height="600" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Qte3WvqTbrg" title="Path of Exile 2 - New Best OP 1 SHOT Stormweaver Build Guide - Broken Lightning Warp Combo Found!" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Ok this looks amazing

might be bait

but now that I'm in T15, or T17 with extra levels on them. It's pretty good. The maps aren't juicy in the same sense that POE1 is but if you just spec into all of the rare monster stuff that's where the loot is.

I'm also not used to this poe trade with crossplay. It's actually nice having so much things available to buy. Console is kind of SSF lite, like I'll always craft any rare gear that I'm using myself because there is literally nothing on the market. This is easy mode compared to console in POE1 without crossplay.

It's also funny when I throw something in my 1 exalt folder and it's too cheap, literally hundreds of whispers and that tells me that it has more value.

I would much prefer an Auction House but this is the next best thing.

No it's not bait, that dude made my favorite Diablo 4 builds.




<iframe width="800" height="600" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/rbbx9a-yvTE" title="Path of Exile 2 - New Best Most GAME BREAKING Ascendancy - Class &amp; Build Power Ranking T15 Guide!" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>

How deep into end game are you though? In his game play clips hes doing mid tier maps because he's got X/8 tier 9/10/11 maps completed and he's getting absolutely chunked. Like every pack he's getting hit 1 time for about a third of his ES. There's a lot of builds that bait you in like that but then when you get to true end game it turns into a 500 death build and progression stops.

There's only a few build makers I trust in PoE. #1 is Ruetoo, imo. The thing with Ruetoo is that he's a very popular build maker and one of the top streamers so if you are coming in late on one of his builds that he is playing then everything is going to sky rocket in price, so you either get in early or you use a different build of his he isn't currently playing. Then the high end HC racers like Jungroan make pretty safe builds.

I never heard of that guy and I'm always weary of videos like that and it looked like he was about to die in lower tier maps but if you trust him. I usually analyze poeninja for builds but I don't think there is one for poe2 yet.

A lot of youtubers with POE1 would do bait videos showing a clip of them killing a boss quickly and the build would be terrible to try and do yourself. But there are plenty of good build makers too. That build looks like it has potential though, that's some serious single target damage even if it's lower tier.

And ya the way trade is on this is pretty annoying, an auction house would be awesome but GGG would never do that. They want it to be annoying to trade, that's their 'vision.' Console has a trade market, which is almost an auction house but the seller has to accept and not instant buyout. Lots of price fixing with that set up though but still way more convenient to sell stuff.

I'm not sure he knows much about POE other than what he's picked up but this guy makes some of the more fun overpowered builds for D4. That's all I was saying, but I will certainly look around before I commit to something. He almost always plays sorcerers or mages, it's his passion in these games although he did do Spiritborn when D4 xpac launched just because it was so overpowered compared to other classes.

I'm more or less waiting to see if someone finds a great OP cold based build as I prefer that because it freezes and slows enemies. Maybe it won't happen after the Comet nerf but we shall see.

I haven't looked into cold much since I switched. Comet on cast on freeze with 2 self cast comets was still working for me to finish the campaign with. I haven't seen any builds that aren't based around archmage and mana stacking for stormweaver tbh. I fully expect this to get nerfed too, just a matter of when. I'm hoping for later rather than sooner.

Reminds me of the The First Descendants 1000 youtubers that show you a "boss killing" build and pick the 1 Kaiju that has like 1/10th of the HP to show you. Take DOWN Devourer in 5 seconds! LMAO Most of those builds are pure trash and you have lots of small guys trying to make names for themselves on build vids.

<iframe width="640" height="480" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/FxOO6k-btBI" title="Path of Exile 2 - Make ANY Gear OP FAST &amp; EASY - 29 IMPORTANT ALL Class Build Tips - Best Guide!" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>

one thing he missed was be careful with the trade site. It's valuing divines at about 5 exalts (they are worth about 70) so it's showing them ahead of things priced 7-10 exalts. I did lose about 40 exalts paying a div for a greater jeweler orb because of that and now I know to sort by exalted orbs.

The currency exchange is nice, nobody used it on console and I like getting instantly paid.

Still hoping for an Auction house but I doubt it happens.

Also updated the Sorc build a few hours ago

<iframe width="640" height="480" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/g43ZYgf_6wY" title="Path of Exile 2 - New Best 10 MILLION DPS 1 SHOT Stormweaver Build Guide - Upgraded Teleport Combo!" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>

people have been wanting an AH for so long, I don't think they'll ever do it. They have said publicly that they want trading to be hard otherwise they think it's too easy to get geared.

I'm sort of following captain lances version only not even close to the gear that he has. There's a lot of min maxing you can do with this type of build and I'm rolling through the end game maps at level 92 but with some upgrades changed I could quadruple my damage. Just grinding currency right now and trying to level. Still haven't seen the citadels for the end game bosses though

I'm kinda bummed that this realm doesn't matter. I heard before EA launch that this realm would end up the normal realm stuff. Now I heard it will have it's own EA category so none of this really matters.

oh I thought it was just standard. There are players that play standard but most players are going to play the new leagues. This beta will be 6 months so we'll see.

The game is going to be so different to what it is now by the time it officially launches that the characters you built now will be invalid. Happens usually 4 times a year w/ fresh start economy reset. Get used to it.

oh I'm definitely used to it. This is a beta afterall, I'm gonna be sad when they nerf archmage but I'll just start a new character. Looking forward to seeing what they do with leagues this time around and what goes core or if they take a different approach. I think they regretted making everything go core for the first several years because there was a lot of power creep. I'm probably going to refrain from min maxing this any further and just save my currency. They are off until the holiday's end because they are in New Zealand so after that I'm expecting my build to get the nerf. I think almost half of the playerbase is doing this build too

I will be playing standard league, I don't have the time to invest otherwise. I was hoping this WAS standard league, at least it was stated to be that by the devs last time I checked.

it says it's standard, I haven't heard anything about them wiping anything. I think it was in the FAQ a while back but I'm not sure.

It seems overwhelming at first, but there's nothing like a fresh league for veteran exiles.

I asked around on the forums and everyone is saying they're going to make this it's own early release league which will be separate from standard.

oh well that's dumb. I kind of like seeing my collection of shit grow in standard lol

Will there be wipes during Early Access?

No, there will not be a wipe. We will do new leagues but none of your characters will be wiped, they will just go to a league called Early Access (so they will never be in Standard). In some cases characters in old leagues might be somewhat broken by balance changes though. After launch the "Early Access" characters will still exist.


I don't know why they care about standard. They never used to but over the past year or two they started nerfing things and didn't let them go legacy. Standard should be all of the OP shit that people have collected during the years IMO. So that is kind of dumb. But it's not that big of a deal, the leagues are where it's at and you should give them a try.

I'm not going to waste 50 hours going through the campaign every season, just incredibly boring to me. I don't care to race to get stuff on the ladder never been my thing in gaming. Like Frazod said gaming is me time, I don't care about trophies or anything but fun time. Might as well just call it a roguelike than an RPG tbh.

I get it, personally I love starting fresh every few months. Plus this is the only game I still like, no other game scratches any itch for me anymore.

Another thing that bothers me about this game is playing coop I can do most of the killing and get next to zero drops. Why not just let everyone have their own loot? With the Level scaling bullshit it totally discourages group/coop play. Really makes no sense why they do it this way whatsoever.


Also why not let me use mouse/kb AND gamepad at the same time? Why do i have to logout to do that? Diablo 4 you can use either at any time. Tedious doing inventory tetris with an effin controller.


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You gotta stop watching this guy and watch some seasoned POE content creators. He is not good, nor does he give good advice.

That video is based on a Jungroan build. I'm pretty confident its legit. Im also pretty confident it's unobtainable for 99.9% of the player base.

They do good work but yes JD is also correct that build he says it's not obtainable by most. My gripes I listed are from my experience though not the build guys. It's Early access I get it but hopefully they change how many things work including the crazy punishing endgame and loss of experience. Also I watch a lot of different build channels but that dude does Sorc builds great no matter the game.