Slated for launch on December 13, 2025 (PH Time), the Path of Exile 2: The Last of the Druids update brings the new Druid class, Grinding Gear Games announced.
Other new content PoE 2 players can expect includes a dungeon-crafting league mechanic and a potent new Pinnacle endgame boss. There will also be reworks and a balance overhaul.
Try the Druid's versatile spell kit during Free Weekend. It is available from December 13 to 16 on PC, Steam, Xbox, PlayStation, and the Epic Games Store.
More details about PoE 2 patch 0.4.0 below. (Also see: patch 0.3.0)
Shapeshift With The Druid
With his kingdom devastated by the King in the Mists, the Druid wandered Ogham's woodlands, losing his humanity. As a reborn man, he searches for his wife and his humanity.
The Druid uses the Talisman, a new weapon that summons Draiocht to transform into a beast. Each Talisman lets the Druid shapeshift into a more lethal form:
- Wolf: Use lunar energy to relentlessly strike and freeze your adversaries with cold damage. The true alpha wolf can summon minions to fight with it.
- Bear: Create Rage to destroy enemies, with each roar increasing its destructive power.
- Wyvern: Fly above the battlefield and consume newly defeated enemies to boost its abilities. It can also unleash lightning, fire, and aerial destruction.
The Druid rules the earth and storms in human form. Roots entangle his opponents, volcanoes erupt, and thunder rages. Command the new Spell Totem skill to cast any spell for a time. As a Bear or Wyvern, consuming rage or corpses generates endurance or power charges for totem creation.
Shaman Ascends
Become the Shaman, who uses Rage to boost spell effects, including meteors, elemental storms, and magical force. Ancient Azmerian Maji wisdom allows the Shaman to harness the power of newly awakened Runes and Idols. Wisdom of the Maji unlocks Shaman-exclusive modifiers for each Rune and Idol, enabling advanced build customization. The Shaman becomes a live conduit of elemental disaster by focusing on the Bringer of the Apocalypse node. Multi-elemental storms overwhelm any enemy that challenges nature's wrath after sustained elemental damage.
Distort time with the Druid's second ascendancy class, the Oracle, to foretell movements before they happen and Foresight to receive skill usage premonitions; performing the same skill increases damage. Converging Paths allows the Oracle to activate Moment of Vulnerability and blend future and present timelines to attack both simultaneously, improving combat precision when enemies are vulnerable to Freeze, Stun, or Electrocution.
As an Oracle, Druids gain over 130 passives. By focusing on The Unseen Path, the Oracle gathers power from alternate futures to gain abilities like Self-Sacrificing, which lowers minion Spirit Costs to increase summons at higher reservation costs, and Corruption Endures, which grants a rare chance to evade death.
Rebalancing, Reworks, and Extra Support Gems
Over 30 new Support Gems, including Lineage Supports, provide build versatility. Accelerated Growth causes hazardous botanical detonations, while Tectonic smashes allow each class to unleash deadly effects with more cascading smashes.
Moreover, this update adds 11 Unique items and balance adjustments. Nine new Lineage Supports join 21 reworked ones. Other than the two new Druid Ascendancies, most current Ascendancies have undergone balance tweaks, with the Smith of Kitava experiencing major changes.
In addition to Druid skills, over 90 active skills in all classes have been rebalanced. After this revamp, the passive tree contains almost 250 new passive skills.
Monster density will not grow on higher-tier maps to improve fight clarity. Instead of 40% more monsters, foes will reward 40% more item drops, XP, and HP (excluding bosses). Monster speed modifiers have been lowered to prevent swarming. Also, Delirium fog has been greatly reduced, improving visuals.
CPU load, multithreading, and performance optimization are also priorities. Players may expect 25% higher frame rates and fewer frame spikes, especially on consoles. Additional performance improvements are being developed and will be released in the following months.
New 'Fate of the Vaal' League
Relive Vaal civilization's peak. The hopeless goal of perpetual youth drives Queen Atziri to abandon her empire. To resist rewriting history, defeat the Royal Architect and Atziri's loyalists.
With corruption returning to Wraeclast, combat the evil energy from Vaal beacons sprouting from the earth and redirect their essence. By activating the beacons, Lira Vaal, an ancient temple, will be accessible.
Customize Your Temple Crawl
Temple rooms unlock using beacons. Six can be arranged however desired. Some chambers survive each run, while others are destroyed. Continued beacon clearing adds rooms, intricacy, and rewards. Over a dozen room types have unique opponents, mechanics, and reward pools.
Room placement matters for optimum benefits. Players can place a Commander to control a Garrison of Troops, making monsters harder and more rewarding. After running the temple, some rooms will destabilize, forcing you to add six more rooms each time, expanding the temple. Find Medallions that change room behavior, double-corruption opportunities, and experimental Vaal mechanisms that replace limbs with mechanical ones.
Vaal Crafting: New Mechanisms
Special crafting mechanisms you can find in the temple:
- Triumph of Juatalotli: Replaces corrupted Vaal Unique Item modifiers with Vaal-specific ones.
- Precursor Machine: With ancient energy, it corrupts Tablets.
- Triumph of Jiquani: Ruins Soul Cores
- Kishara's Acquisition: Variously successful socketable salvage attempts from equipment.
Atziri: New Pinnacle Boss
Xipocado, an Atziri devotee, blocks deeper temple access. Overcoming him unlocks crafting tools and brings you closer to the queen. Known for her beauty, Atziri was the Queen who brought her followers down; now, she is the Pinnacle Boss. Rewrite history and change Vaal fate.
By conquering her corrupted form, players can get Atziri's Rule, a strong staff that exalts all corrupted gems and lets them trade life for damage. When used, Mirrors of Refraction appear across the battlefield, and projectiles shot into them explode into a splitting nova and chain from mirror to mirror, greatly increasing offensive capability.
Abyssals
Abyssals, Atlas passives, and new endgame Tablets will be permanent endgame mechanics. Close the cracks for Uniques and other rewards. Waystone abyssal crafting and instilling were removed to reduce friction and visual clutter. Tablet modifiers have been buffed to compensate. After defeating the Arbiter of Ash, players can upgrade Tablets to Rare with four modifiers, spending standard currency.
Remind you guys, while Path of Exile 2 is a forthcoming free-to-play (F2P) title, it currently offers paid early access for Windows, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S. – PinoyTechSaga
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