In this guide we’ll talk about some of the big changes we’ve learned about Passive Skill Tree in Path of Exile 2. These changes are derived from Path of Exile 1, from the extinction of Life node to the introduction of the brand new Weapon Passive Skill feature, here we cover everything you need to know. Let’s get started!
Weapon Skill Tree Passive
So let’s jump right into the most interesting change on this list, Weapon Skill Tree Passive in POE 2 Weapon Swap will be incorporated into normal gameplay, with a feature that allows you to choose which weapon set a specific skill will use when it is cast.
For example, you can attach a Staff that provides gem levels for Fire skills to your Firestorm skill, while you may want to attach another weapon set that improves the effect of the shocks you cause to your Spark skill. When you cast one of these skills, you automatically switch to the weapon set it is attached to so that using that skill can benefit from the stats of that weapon.
But as part of this feature, there will also be Weapon Skill Tree Passives, which are a portion of your character’s total Passive Skill allocation. This portion will come from Book of Skill during the campaign, and we don’t know exactly how many you’ll get, but I’d guess it’s around 20 or 25.
These Passive Points differ from Skill Points you get from leveling up, in that they can be attached to a weapon set to be assigned to a specific Passive Skill Tree while that weapon set is active. This, combined with the previously mentioned feature, allows you to assign these weapon specific Passive Points to nodes that will benefit that specific weapon set and its attached skills.
We could imagine a melee character using Two Hand Maces as an offensive weapon, and another Weapon Swap for a more defensive Flail and Shield combo. This character could then use their Weapon Passive Skill to deal more damage while Two Hand Maces is active. With the defensive Shield active, we could then choose to spend the points on a node that provides more armor or a chance to block.
This feature will be part of the build in Path of Exile 2, making it less focused on just one Archetype, and allowing them to focus on other options for specific scenarios.
Starting Position Of Characters
The next big change coming to PoE 2 is the starting position of characters on Passive Skill Tree.
In PoE 1, each class had a specific starting position, which was primarily determined by the class attribute alignment and Archetype category those classes belonged to.
In Path of Exile 2, each class still has a specific starting position, but the positions have been moved. All classes will start in the middle of Skill Tree, and the position they face is once again defined by attribute and archetype alignment.
Something to note here is the removal of Scion class in Path of Exile 2. In PoE 1, Scions started in the middle of the tree and could choose to leave the center in any direction they liked. This class was designed as a sort of Jackal Trades, bridging the gap between any possible unsupported archetypes by allowing easy access to specific areas of the tree in exchange for the mostly weaker Ascendency.
But in POE 2, Scion is gone, and that’s because they’ve added two classes for each attribute alignment, which means there will be a total of six different Ascendency options for each starting position on Passive Skill Tree, helping to solve the problem that Scion solved before.
You may also notice that the middle of the tree has changed significantly as well, with no routes going directly through the middle of the tree. The developers mentioned that the layout of the tree in POE 1 made it harder to balance, so they made it more direct to get from the class starting position to specific Keystones or Clusters by removing the middle of the tree.
Life Node Removal
Speaking of balance, the third notable change between Passive Skill Tree in POE 1 and POE 2 is that Skill Tree in POE 2 will not have Life nodes.
Note that the decision to remove Life nodes would have had a tremendous impact on POE 1 if it was fully implemented, but POE 2 was designed from the beginning to have no Life nodes on the tree. When you think about it this way, this design decision actually makes a lot of sense.
They can better balance the life of ordinary characters, and the life available to players will be largely determined by POE Currency they invest in equipment. At the same time, due to this change, space on Passive Skill Tree without Life nodes is freed up. By the way, there are a lot of Life nodes on POE 1 Skill Tree.
These spaces can be used for more specific character defense investments, which is one of their goals for this change. The developers allow players to use these points to specialize in defense mechanics that make sense for the build they are playing.
Cancel Masteries
Another major change is that Path of Exile 2’s Passive Skill Tree will not have Masteries, at least at the beginning.
Just like the design of no Life nodes on Skill Tree, the concept of no Masteries makes sense in the context of POE 2. After all, Passive Masteries system was originally created to solve the problem of locking unique build-enabling mechanics into specific areas of the tree.
But POE 2’s skill system was designed to be very different from the beginning. It has performance abilities that can be combined with each other and a Support Gem system that limits characters to copies of a support gem. So it makes sense that these more niche offensive mechanics exist on the skills themselves or on specialized support gems that can enhance them.
Travel Nodes Selectable Stats
In addition, POE 2’s Travel Nodes will be stat selectable, providing lower but generally more meaningful stats. When selecting Travel Nodes, you can choose +5 Strength, Intelligence and Dexterity, helping you more easily meet the stat requirements of gear or abilities.
This change is actually huge for leveling, especially considering that the socket colors are gone as well, so you’ll be able to more easily level up the way you want without being limited by your stats or gear sockets.
That’s the major difference between the passive skill trees in Path of Exile 1 and Path of Exile 2.
Outro
So those are the top 5 changes we know about Passive Skill Tree in Path of Exile 2 so far. Let me know what you think of these changes and which changes (if any) you’re most excited about. I think it’s definitely those Weapon Skill Tree Passives, which could end up being an incredible feature! See you next time!
In this guide, I want to talk about the iconic skill in Path of Exile, Summon Raging Spirit. Path of Exile 2 has changed its casting and skill effect in the form of an automatic skill that summons temporary minions whenever you use a fire spell.
Here, we will talk about how SRS in POE 2 differs from POE 1 and explain the mechanics of this skill and how it can be applied to your build.
Differences And Similarities
It has to be said that the implementation of Summon Raging Spirit in Path of Exile 2 is really different. Here is a comparison of the two Support Gems.
Raging Spirit in Path of Exile 2 retains Spirit while it is activated. Your fire spells also summon Raging Spirits, which are short-lived flying flaming skulls that will rush to nearby enemies and quickly attack them. Enemies will not attack these minions directly and can pass through them.
There are also a lot of similarities between the actual minion mechanics of POE 2 and POE 1, which still summons a short-lived minion. It appears to have aggressive behavior and will rush to the enemy, and the enemy still will not directly engage it.
These minions are just like they were in Path of Exile 1, and they will not collide with the enemy. At the same time, they still cannot attack the enemy, but 70% of physical damage is converted into fire instead of 100% of the current SRS in POE 1.
This is pretty much the similarities and differences between the two skills, and it also shows where the new mechanics of this skill in Path of Exile 2 come in handy.
Mechanics Explained
I am very excited about the changes to this skill because not only can we use this Support Gem in POE 2, but GGG can use it to implement other new and old skills in POE 2.
Since this Raging Spirit ability can reserve Spirit, and we know that Spirit is like a reservation resource in POE 2, it will most likely be used to reserve things like Auras or permanent minions.
We actually saw this in a recent Witch gameplay preview, where permanent minions retain Spirit, and will automatically respawn after a short time as long as your other permanent minions haven’t died recently.
We also have temporary minions, which don’t retain Spirit, but they consume resources like corpses to be summoned.
In fact, in one discussion, the developers talked about a very interesting balance between permanent and temporary minions. Minion builds have extremely high single target damage output, but they lack clearing speed. So investing more POE Currency in improving temporary minions clearing speed is always our first strategy to optimize minion builds.
But you can’t really use these temporary minions in boss fights because corpses are not very easy to obtain, and in Path of Exile 2, they will be more limited and there will be no Desecrate ability or anything like that, so players won’t be able to actually generate their own corpses.
This is also what makes the Raging Spirit in POE 2 so interesting, because it’s between permanent and temporary minions. It does reserve Spirits just like permanent minions, but it does so in order to allow you to create temporary minions, which means that these temporary minions will be used in boss fight scenarios.
SRS Synergy With Fire Spells
Let’s take a look at the interaction here and see how it works with your Fire spells.
The Reservation ability allows you to summon Raging Spirits when you use a Fire spell. Any spell with the Fire tag will do.
We achieve this by casting two rows of Fire Area spells to summon one Spirit per 1.5 meter radius, besides which the projectiles from the Fire spells can also summon a Spirit when they hit. This immediately gives you two very interesting ways to scale this ability so that you can summon more Raging Spirits every time you cast those Fire spells.
Besides this, you can also think about scaling Fire spell Area of Effect. Imagine a giant explosion of fire and summoning a swarm of Raging Spirits. I’m not actually sure if it summons Spirits at the location where the spell hits the enemy, or if they spawn next to the corpse, but it will be interesting to see how exactly it works.
Of course, you can also go the projectile route with a Fire spell that fires projectiles, and you can adjust the number of projectiles so you can hit more enemies and summon more minions. Or, you can use a mechanic like Chain or Pierce so you can have a projectile go through multiple enemies and summon multiple minions that way.
Final Thoughts
I can already imagine a Fire Mage throwing Fireballs and summoning a bunch of Raging Spirits in a Popcorn setup, with the minions instantly exploding on top of the enemies, which sounds pretty fun.
This is pretty crazy when you think about it, because this ability simply doesn’t make sense in the context of POE 1, because we didn’t have builds like Spellcaster. They were dealing damage with their abilities, while also summoning minions, and the minions themselves dealing tons of damage.
I really think this is one thing I’m most excited about POE 2. This combination of Archetypes really wasn’t possible in POE 1. And POE 2 gives players more opportunities to have more and more freedom. Anyway, I love this, and that’s what this guide will be all about.
All in all, this Support Gem has me really excited about what else might be coming to Path of Exile 2. Do you have any crazy ideas about how they could implement other parts of POE 1’s abilities into POE 2 in new ways? Let me know what you think of SRS in POE 2.
As POE 3.24 is gradually coming to an end, here we want to talk about the 3 most worthwhile big AOE builds to try in Necropolis League. If you like to wander around the map and challenge some powerful bosses, then these builds must be what you are looking for. Without further ado, let’s get straight to it!
Ultimate Sweep Slayer
The first build we chose is Ultimate Sweep Slayer with Duelist class. Unlike many minor hits like Cyclone, Sweep will deal some big hits and create a huge Area of Effect.
To understand the advantages of this build, I will start with the boss damage. Sweep really has the killing power and can kill Guardians by just spinning your sword four or five times. I promise you, this will even make you feel like a boss.
Not only that, this build also has excellent clear speed because of the huge Area of Effect that almost covers the entire screen.
For the cons, I’ll start with its survivability. Since you need to stay still and close to the enemy to successfully apply skills, this puts you in a vulnerable position. Therefore, I recommend that you always stay a few levels higher than the map you are on and invest in your survivability.
As for the budget, this build is completely affordable. You only need about 90 Chaos Orbs to destroy the endgame in the early game. But if you want to advance to Yellow Maps easily, investing in Chaos Orbs is necessary. Eventually, to finish our Atlas effortlessly, you also need to invest about 6 Divine Orbs.
For the clear speed of this build, it must be worth 9 points. You can use a huge Area of Effect to perform devastating blows. I only deducted one point because you need to stand still to attack and the attack speed is not the best.
Its boss damage is completely incredible and deserves a full 10 points. Even if you only attack a few times per second, they are powerful. Like I said before, they will kill Guardians in less than five attacks.
For its survivability, I would give it 8 points. This build has many layers of defense, such as Permanent Fortify, Evasion and Spell Suppression. You still need to be careful though, as you are always standing still while attacking, which puts you in a vulnerable position.
Archmage Ice Nova Hierophant
Next up, we have the powerful Archmage Ice Nova Hierophant with Templar class. This build works by stacking as much mana as possible and utilizing Archmage Support to convert up to 19% of your mana into additional lightning damage.
The skill we chose is Transfigured Gem Ice Nova of Frostbolts, which deals more damage when close to Frostbolts. To increase the efficiency of our attacks, we use Kitava’s Thirst Helmet to automatically cast Frostbolts for us.
To understand the strengths of this build, we'll start with its boss damage. There are countless Ice Nova stacked on Frostbolts here that will cause the boss to die like a simple monster.
Not only that, but its clear speed is also impressive. With Frostblink of Wintry Blast, we can move across the map quickly while casting Ice Nova in all directions for huge AOE damage.
Now coming to the downsides, I will start by saying that this build is relatively expensive and you need to invest in at least 10 Divine Orbs to make it work. Another problem is that you must have extra mana in all your gear, which can make the gearing process a bit difficult.
To complete this build, there are two mandatory unique items that you need to prioritize acquiring.
The first one is Kitava's Thirst Helmet. When you cast at least 100 mana at a time, it triggers Transfigured Gem, which makes Frostbolts that need to be cast automatically cast, greatly speeding up the clearing.
Next, we also need Anathema Ring. In this case, it makes our curse limit the same as our maximum Power Charge.
For the clear speed of the build, it is undoubtedly full marks. Its extraordinary movement speed is accompanied by Ice Nova that is always everywhere, so that you can’t see the enemies before they are eliminated.
The damage it does to bosses is also amazing, with overlapping Ice Nova casts on countless Frostbolts, the boss doesn't even have a chance to survive for more than two seconds.
For its survivability, I would give it 9 out of 10. Not only does it have a strong health pool and energy shield, but the unique mechanics of this build ensure that 50% of the damage is absorbed by mana before affecting our health pool.
As you know, we have a lot of manas in this build, and we also hit the enemy so many times per second that instant leech will make your health full almost 100% of the time.
Cyclone Of Tumult Slayer
Finally, we have this amazing Cyclone of Tumult Slayer with Dualist class in the first place.
Since Affliction league brought Transfigured Gem, an alternative version of Active Skill Gems, Cyclone Skill gained Cyclone of Tumult. This resulted in Cyclone’s Area of Effect being wider and more powerful while also being much slower.
However, we can eliminate this disadvantage with a simple trick, just have a Cyclone with 33% more damage and 40% more AOE.
For the pros of this build, I will start with the clear speed. It is always moving and can easily cut down all the low-level enemies on the way. Not only that, its boss damage is incredible. Once the build is completed, we can even kill the big boss in a few seconds. On top of that, this build is very simple and easy to assemble.
Now to the cons, I will point out some important issues that you should pay close attention to.
As mentioned before, this build has great survivability once it is completed, but you need to control the progress reasonably when you level up your character because you are always very close to the enemy. If you are not prepared, you will be killed by the enemy in one shot. So before entering the high-level content, it may be a good idea to spend some time to upgrade a few more levels.
Another useful tip about improving your survivability is how to deal with stuns in this build. You can get Stun Immunity on the closer Jewel, but not everyone can afford it right away. If that’s your case, you can also go for Evasion Mastery, which, after using it, makes it impossible to be stunned if you haven’t been hit recently.
For this build, you only need one mandatory unique item, which is Stampede Boots. This ensures that your movement speed is always 150% of its base, which means that the drawback of Cyclone of Tumult is meaningless to us.
For clear speed, we would give it 9 out of 10. Cyclone moves constantly while accompanied by a huge Area of Effect, so you can always farm your map without wasting time stopping to cast spells or doing things like that.
Its boss damage is just amazing and definitely worth 10 points. Once this build is complete, you will easily achieve over 15 million DPS, which is more than enough to destroy everything in a few seconds.
Now, for its survivability, I would give it 9 out of 10. This build achieves over 100,000 Effective HP because of multiple layers of defense and a lot of instant life leech. Now with the huge AOE bonus from Cyclone of Tumult, you don’t even need to get close to the enemy at the end of the game, which will give you more survivability.
That’s all for this guide. What do you think about these AOE builds? Are there any better options that didn’t appear on this list? Have a great day everyone.
Greetings, Exiles! I’m sure you all have received the sad news recently that Path of Exile 2 closed beta, originally scheduled for June 7, 2024, has been postponed, with the developers stating that it will be released “towards the end” in 2024.
However, this also means that we have more time to prepare for a better gaming experience when we enter POE 2. In this guide, we will reveal the gameplay of Witch. So, Witch main players, please don’t miss this guide.
Minion Mechanics
In Path of Exile 2, you can play as Witch, Mistress of Death and Decay, commanding your hordes of the undead and launching attacks on enemies.
Most classes have access to some kind of minions, but if you want to control an army, Witch may be the ideal class choice for you.
In POE 2, most minions do not need to be summoned manually. Celebrant Sceptre gives the player a couple of free warriors, as well as another resource called Spirit, which you can use to acquire any minions you want. You can see this Spirit Bar above the mana.
On the skills screen, you can choose the composition of your army and choose between the various minion variants available. Since this is a level-two area, we can only afford one more minion. However, when minions die, they are automatically resurrected as long as no other minions have died recently. So, before your next battle, all your minions will be resurrected.
You can also command your minions with a dedicated button, telling them to move to a specific location, attack a specific enemy, or even open a chest or portal for you.
We also have temporary minions. Besides this, many minions have command skills that depend on the type of minion you summoned.
Skills
Next, let’s talk about the spells available to Witch class.
Unearth
First up is Unearth, which creates some bone constructs if it kills a monster or hits the corpse of a monster. They can’t take many hits and have a limited lifespan, but you can build a proper army with them.
Contagion
I also use some debuffs with monsters when my minions attack. The first one we can use here is Contagion. If a monster dies with Contagion, it spreads to nearby enemies. And with each spread, the damage increases. So it’s a good idea to try to keep the infection going.
If any corpse is infected when you summon minions, then the minions will also be infected. Every time they hit an enemy, they will continue to infect the enemy. So it’s great to have an army of infected hordes of the undead.
Essence Drain
We can also use another chaos debuff called Essence Drain. This effect has a higher degen on a single target. If the monster is also infected with Contagion, then Essence Drain will spread as well, which can turn into a real disaster.
Bone Storm
I can use a channeling skill like Bone Storm, which creates a devastating burst of sharp spikes. Note that the longer you channel this skill, the more damage it will cause.
Pain Offering
We also have a skill called Pain Offering. These skills allow you to pierce one of your skeletons with a big spike of bone to buff all of your other minions. It makes all of our other minions faster and do more damage.
Profane Ritual
After a battle, we usually have some extra corpses that we don’t want to waste. Profane Ritual can generate Power Charge by consuming corpses, which can buff some of my other spells. If we use it to summon Zombies, we can create more powerful super Zombies that don’t even need corpses to summon them.
We can also use Power Charge to channel Bone Storm. If I do this, it adds a devastating AoE.
Minion Types
Finally, it’s time to focus on the types of minions that Witch can summon.
Zombies
The first one that comes to mind must be Zombies, which are extremely tanky minions. Although they require corpses to summon and won’t resurrect if they die, they are quite tough and can increase the number of your minions.
What’s more, many minions also have command skills. You can command them to deploy Gas Cloud Arrow on the battlefield to deal some sustained damage.
Skeletal Arsonist
In addition, we can summon Skeletal Arsonists, who can throw small Fire Grenades. Besides this, they have a command skill that can detonate your minions with low health. When you see the red indicator, use this skill and the minion will explode.
These bone constructs are especially good because they expire quickly, anyway. So, you can go and farm this area’s boss, Carrion Crone, with all the tools you find to earn a good amount of POE Currency.
Storm Mages
That’s the type of minions you can get in the level two area. But let’s see what the higher level minion gameplay is like.
In a level 30 area, besides still having our trusty warriors, there are many types of minions to choose from, such as Brutes for stunning or Ice Mages for freezing, most of which come with their own special abilities or command skills.
You can also stun enemies by using multiple Storm Mages: a Cleric to heal and revive my minions, and Reavers for high damage. You can also enrage them before the fight to slowly kill them, but Cleric should be able to keep enemies alive while my minions attack.
Storm Mages has a useful skill if a lot of your minions die. He can summon a Lightning Storm to hit the location of each Dead Skeleton in your army.
Monster Corpse
In POE 2, even non-boss monsters can be very devastating, such as Faridun Impaler. It has a wide variety of abilities and is difficult to defeat. But maybe we can make better use of its corpse.
By using Bind Spectre gems, we can take the corpse of any enemy and capture its spirit so that I can use it as a minion. Any monster can be captured, but the spirit cost depends on how powerful the monster is.
Such a powerful enemy requires a lot of spirit, so I have to summon a lot of other minions, but it does seem worth it. If Spectre dies like other minions, it will respawn after a short time.
All in all, Witch in Path of Exile 2 seems to have received some amazing quality of life updates to cater to her unique play style. Her various minion mechanics and gameplay will bring a lot of fun to the game. Even for those who don’t like minion builds, the diverse gameplay of Witch class will make you shine!
Here we’ll talk about a unique item that wasn’t used often in POE 3.24, Yaomac’s Accord. We’ll take a look at its unique mechanics and how it will interact with other aspects of the game, perhaps giving you some new ideas for creating your builds.
Yaomac’s Accord
Yaomac’s Accord is the first weapon to appear in the series so far. This unique sceptre was added as part of Ultimatum mechanic in Ultimatum league, but it wasn’t until POE 3.19, five leagues later, when Trialmaster’s fight entered the core through Tower of Ordeals Map that it became available again.
Then in Affliction League, Ultimatum mechanic finally entered the core, and Trialmaster and all his exclusive loot were reunited with Ultimatum. With the retirement of Tower of Ordeals Map, Yaomac’s Accord dropped exclusively from Trialmaster’s fight itself. According to crowdsourced data, it has a drop rate of about 10%.
Vaal Skill Mechanics Explained
Now, before we discuss the modifiers of this item, we want to note that this POE item has a high synergy with Vaal Skill. So let’s first quickly go over what Vaal Skill consists of. For example, Vaal Arc is Vaal version of Arc spell, accessible through Corrupted Arc Skill, which will grant both the normal Arc spell and its Vaal version without having to consume mana or health.
Using a Vaal Skill requires Souls, and the number of Souls is specific to each different Vaal Skill. By default, we can gain Souls by killing enemies or damaging rare and unique enemies. You can gain one Soul after killing a normal enemy. Then, when damaging a rare or unique enemy, you gain one or six Souls (one for rare enemies, six for unique enemies) for every 2% of health lost.
But this Soul gain has an internal cooldown of 1 second per monster, and Soul will be randomly added to Vaal Skill counter on the character.
For example, if you only have one Vaal Skill, Soul will always recharge that Skill, but if you have two or more Vaal Skills, Soul will randomly select a Vaal Skill to recharge.
Once you have enough Souls, your Vaal Skill will glow red to indicate that it can be used. When you use a Vaal Skill, the character will enter Soul and gain Prevention effect, which prevents the character from gaining Souls for a period.
The duration of Prevention varies for different Vaal Skills, but if the character has multiple Vaal Skills equipped, the duration of Prevention gained by Soul will always be based on Vaal Skill used to trigger Prevention effect of that Soul.
Modifiers
Next, let’s look at the modifiers on Yaomac’s Accord.
Increase Critical Strike Chance
Vaal Skills increase your Critical Strike Chance by 80%-120% for the duration of the effect being applied. So this item is all about getting the most out of your Vaal Skills.
Even though using 80% to 120% damage increase isn’t as much as the damage increase you get on a crafted weapon, it’s still a big part of this stat, and it’s also universal, so it can be used with any Vaal skill that deals damage.
Soul Gain Prevention
Next, we also have: 6%-8% reduced Soul Gain Prevention Duration.
To be honest, modifiers about Soul Gain Prevention are extremely rare. Since there’s good reason to think Soul Gain Prevention is a barrier that prevents Vaal Skills from being used more often, a modifier specifically reducing Soul Gain Prevention could be very useful for this.
This is because a Vaal Skill with a modifiable duration also has a Skill Gem. The fact states that modifiers to Skill Effect Duration also apply to Soul Gain Prevention for this Skill. This means that when you combine a reduced Soul Gain Prevention Duration with a reduced Skill Effect Duration, you can significantly reduce the duration of Soul Gain Prevention, or even potentially remove it entirely.
Soul Catcher unique Flask provides a 10% reduction in Soul Gain Prevention Duration for a Vaal Skill. This also scales with Flask effect while it’s active.
Also available is Triumvirate Authority, a unique Unset Ring that greatly boosts Vaal Skill in the socket. This ring rolls three or four random modifiers from a unique pool depending on whether the item was obtained from a normal Atziri or Uber Atziri encounter. These modifiers include 150% more damage from Socketed Vaal Skill, which is great for Lightning damage.
There’s also Hits from Socketed Vaal Skills ignore Enemy Monster Resistances, which is a powerful modifier. In the list of modifiers it can roll, Socketed Vaal Skill reduces Soul Gain Prevention Duration by 30% by combining it with Soul Catcher, with a maximum roll of 8%.
I should caution you, though, that if your Soul Gain Prevention is reduced by 100% or very close to it, you might consider taking Duration Mastery specifically for the 10% increase in Skill Effect Duration. Since this Mastery barely affects your Soul Gain Prevention when it’s at or near zero, it still increases the duration of Vaal skills.
Shepherd Of Souls
Another notable modifier is Shepherd of Souls. Right now it functions basically like a Keystone, and the effects don’t stack. Even if you dual-wield Yaomac’s Accord Sceptre, you can only benefit from this modifier once.
Shepherd of Souls reduces Soul cost of your Non-Aura Vaal Skills by 80%, but increases their Soul cost by 100% for every Vaal skill you’ve used in the last 8 seconds.
So mastering Shepherd of Souls mechanic allows for the type of top-tier build we dream of, allowing you to somewhat abuse your Vaal skill of choice.
Gain Charges
The last modifier for Yaomac’s Accord is the one we skipped over earlier, Gain an Endurance Charges, Frenzy and Power Charges.
This means you gain one of each charge every time you use a Vaal skill. And since the charge duration refreshes as you gain new charges, as long as you use your Vaal skills regularly, this modifier will allow you to maintain maximum Frenzy and Power Charges until you run into a monster that will remove your charges.
Why Is It So Desolate?
Despite this, Yaomac’s Accord is almost completely unused as a unique item. So far, only four characters have used it in all leagues in Necropolis, throughout the duration of the league.
So why isn’t it used more often? It’s all because Yaomac’s Accord only fits a very niche build archetype that is specialized and tailored to Vaal skills used, and requires a lot of very specific gear.
However, this doesn’t mean that Yaomac’s Accord is a bad unique item. As long as you pair it with the right items or mechanics, it can definitely be the key to a strong build!
Here I’m going to talk about the under-used unique item in Path of Exile, Brine Crown, and talk about how it works and interacts better with other items in the game, especially with the recently added Ascendancies and new unique items.
Brine Crown is a unique item introduced by POE Kalandra League, and synergizes well with both Melding of the Flesh and Aegis Aurora.
To be honest, this unique helmet hasn’t been used very well in a few seasons. While it may not be a particularly interesting item overall, it has a lot of great stats that will definitely make it more frequently used in POE 3.24 and beyond!
Brine Crown
Although it’s only used by less than 25 characters in Necropolis League, many players don’t consider it a forgotten unique, perhaps because the item doesn’t have any super interesting modifiers, but is just a solid unique item.
Brine Crown is a core drop unique item. According to crowdsourced drop data for POE 3.23 Affliction League, this item appears to be a Tier 1 Unique, so you won’t see too many of these outside of high-end Magic Finds.
Modifiers
Let’s take a look at the modifiers on Brine Crown: Increased Armor and Energy Shield by 240% to 300%.
Armor & Energy Shield
You’ll immediately notice that this item has unusually high Armor and Energy Shield for a helmet, especially considering it’s a Hybrid Base with a good modifier roll and 30% quality.
Besides the excellent base, Armor on this helmet can almost go over 1,100, and Energy Shield can go up to about 160, which can greatly increase your survivability.
Additionally, it has quite a bit of defense, which is exactly the theme of Brine Crown. It’s a completely defense-focused unique item, and it has a lot of advantages in defense.
Max Life
Besides the massive Armor and Energy Shield, there is a really nice life roll here, which is an increase of 80 to 100 max life.
In fact, GGG often talks about creating new unique items that are both powerful and interesting. Sometimes they do something new that we haven’t seen before, but usually these items have no life modifiers at all, however Brine Crown is not one of them.
Max Cold Resistance
It then also increases the maximum cold resistance by 3%. This modifier was actually only added to the item in POE 3.19 League patch. It replaces the 5% cold damage reduction modifier that Brine Crown previously had, plus the 3% max cold resistance is a great modifier in itself.
Cannot Be Frozen
Next up is there Cannot be Frozen modifier, which is another very useful stat. Ironically, this modifier may save you from using Soul of the Brine King Pantheon Power, which gives you a 100% chance of avoiding being frozen. Once you upgrade it, you can use a different primary Pantheon Power.
Given the potential use cases for Aegis Aurora mentioned earlier, you might be using Tempest Shield to boost your spell blocking. In this case, you’re already immune to Freeze and Shock, but you can use Betrayal Boost modifier to address Chill issue.
Chilled Ground
The last Brine Crown modifier of note is: 15% chance to create Chilled Ground when Hit with an Attack. This is a fairly unreliable modifier, I have to say, mostly because it’s thematic, but it will provide some defense against melee monsters when triggered, slowing their action speed by at least 10%.
It’s also worth mentioning that Chill inflicted on monsters by Chilled Ground is never considered being inflicted by the character, meaning that even if you use Secrets of Suffering, Leadership’s Price, or other mechanics that prevent you from inflicting Chill, you can technically chill a monster with Chilled Ground created by Brine Crown.
Melding Of The Flesh & Aegis Aurora
Surprisingly, Brine Crown has become much more useful thanks to the presence of Melding of the Flesh. This Unique Jewel makes your elemental resistances capped by your highest elemental resistance, allowing you to scale a single maximum elemental resistance to increase your defense against all incoming elemental damage.
Also, this is a good time to introduce Brine Crown’s best friend, Aegis Aurora. This unique shield pairs perfectly with Brine Crown and Melding of the Flesh, and provides another 5% of maximum cold resistance. When combined with Brine Crown, this gives you 4% of maximum elemental resistance and -4% of maximum resistance.
You can also continue to scale your maximum cold resistance with something like Purity of Ice or Eldritch Gloves Implicit modifier.
But the synergy doesn’t stop there. Because Aegis Aurora also provides a decent amount of Armor and Energy Shield, and it will enable both of these stats through its unique modifier, Recover Energy Shield equal to 2% of Armor when you Block.
Additionally, Brine Crown and Aegis Aurora provide a foundation for armored characters, and their investment in blocking makes your Energy Shield a more powerful defensive layer, especially in the face of incoming blows, where you’ll be blocking more frequently and thus restoring a large amount of Energy Shield.
This combination is especially powerful for Necromancers using Mistress of Sacrifice Ascendancy. Because these setups enable meaningful attack and spell blocking for a fairly negligible investment in POE Currency, and you get a lot of restoration from Aegis Aurora.
You may also consider Glancing Blows, a keystone that lets you take 65% more block damage but doubles your chance to block attacks and spells.
Overall, Glancing Blows will let you take more damage, but it will also make Aegis Aurora’s recovery more consistent, which is especially useful in mapping environments.
One thing that should be noted about the max resistance modifier of Brine Crown and its use with Melding of the Flesh is that Brine Crown does not provide any actual resistance stats. This is a slight drawback that will put more pressure on your other equipment slots.
Why Is It Forgotten?
As I mentioned before, Brine Crown is used by less than 25 characters in Necropolis League. So why isn’t it picked up more often?
Honestly, I really don’t have anything bad to say about this unique item, the real reason it isn’t used too much is that there are modifiers or other unique items that must be used on the helmet, which simply can’t be replaced in certain builds. And the loss of these stats means the loss of an aura or a significant drop in physical damage reduction.
There’s also the fact that this helmet does not have any spell suppression, nor any evasion, so it will also prevent you from using Evasion Mastery to get 15% spell suppression.
But honestly, Brine Crown is still a significant item, especially when paired with Melding of the Flesh and Aegis Aurora, so I will never be surprised to see more builds using this item in the future!
