Path of Exile replace 3.20 has been revealed by Grinding Gear Video games, and it centres round a brand new roguelike dungeon coming to the RPG recreation known as The Forbidden Sanctum. As well as, the replace is transforming a number of huge methods together with the Atlas Tree and Eldritch altars, in addition to offering some huge buffs to underused distinctive weapons. It would additionally see the introduction of recent Path of Exile monster mods to exchange the controversial Archnemesis system, and the complete rollout for a Ruthless mode geared toward hardcore Diablo 2 veterans.
Path of Exile: The Forbidden Sanctum centres across the titular roguelike dungeon. Very like many earlier PoE expansions, this dungeon is designed to combine properly with the Path of Exile leveling expertise – which means you’ll be capable of dive into its lethal depths early on in your journey, although it’ll doubtless take you a lot makes an attempt to make it during. With each new space or map you discover in the principle recreation, you’ll be capable of enter the Sanctum.
Your journey into the Forbidden Sanctum is decided by a brand new useful resource known as Resolve – producer Chris Wilson explains that the crew wished to distinguish your progress from participant well being, which may fluctuate wildly from second to second. Getting hit by monsters or environmental hazards will scale back your Resolve – in some circumstances, extra dramatically so than they really impression your character’s well being. Which means that it’s doable to lose a run within the Sanctum with out truly dying, which might be welcome reduction for these on hardcore characters.
As with lots of the finest roguelike video games, you’ll plot out a course as you go, selecting between completely different room varieties that every have completely different results in your run. Some rooms will provide you with Afflictions that can apply debuffs that accumulate as your run progresses. You’ll be able to even run into Main Afflictions at sure factors, which may have very dramatic results similar to halting your Resolve restoration altogether. On the flipside, you will discover Boons – and Main Boons – that offer you advantages to counter these detriments.
At sure factors, you’ll run throughout Fountain rooms that may replenish your Resolve, within the vein of video games similar to Hades (which Wilson cites as a key affect for the mode, together with the likes of The Binding of Isaac, FTL, and even classics similar to the unique Rogue itself). Fountains can restore much more resolve – however at a value. As you progress, you’ll additionally accumulate a brand new foreign money known as Aureus cash that may be spent at retailers, however aren’t carried over between runs.
In true roguelike trend, you’ll generally be provided the choice to take an Accursed Pact. These will give you three highly effective boons, however with heavy prices similar to shedding hefty chunks of your Resolve or taking up a number of damaging Afflictions. You’ll be able to decide any one in every of them, although Wilson reassures us that you simply do have the choice to move them up altogether if the chance sounds too nice for its related reward.
As for what you may count on to get out of the Forbidden Sanctum, there are three key takeaways. Firstly, you’ll be capable of get common merchandise drops from monsters within the Sanctum very like you’ll in common play, so there’s nonetheless a great likelihood you’ll discover some respectable improve alongside the way in which. Secondly, some rooms will provide a foreign money reward with a twist – you may select to take it instantly, or gamble it for a better payout do you have to clear the present ground, or a good better reward when you can beat the entire run. Wilson jokes that the preliminary rewards are very beneficiant, however that the crew hopes the temptation to gamble for even greater payouts will show too robust to disregard.
Lastly, one can find Relics over the course of the run that act as a meta-progression of kinds and could be positioned right into a particular altar to make your future Sanctum runs stronger. Finally, you’ll come throughout a particular Sanctified Relic with mods that may instantly have an effect on your character’s construct – these can’t be crafted or modified via typical means, however they are often altered by sure rooms you’ll encounter whereas exploring the Sanctum, as a reward for many who conquer its challenges.
The Forbidden Sanctum is definitely essentially the most thrilling new function coming within the Path of Exile 3.20 enlargement, but it surely’s removed from the one one. There’s additionally a revamp to the Atlas Tree, permitting gamers to focus extra on specialisations, and adjustments to Eldritch Altars to be extra specific about which rewards you’ll earn from them.
This explicit change displays the aforementioned introduction of a brand new monster mods system set to exchange Archnemesis mods. As mentioned within the pre-update stability manifesto, this goals to exchange mods which have a number of completely different results with ones that every have one particular, clearly said impact, serving to to enhance on-the-fly readability for gamers to shortly recognise what a monster can do and what may make it harmful.
Additionally launched with Path of Exile 3.20 are a number of new ability gems – Volcanic Fissure is a fiery slam assault that may chase enemies round corners earlier than erupting, whereas Frozen Legion summons a hoop of icy statues round your character that every one assault in a giant sweeping cleave along with your presently geared up weapon. Frozen Legion builds up a number of stacks, that are all consumed on use to summon that many statues concurrently for enormous burst injury throughout a number of overlapping hits.
There are additionally new Vaal melee expertise, which proceed the development of Vaal ability gems. These assist you to accumulate souls as you kill enemies, unlocking a particular Vaal variant of the ability that can be utilized as soon as sufficient souls have been collected. Vaal Flicker Strike sparkles dozens of additional occasions – it’s a dangerous manoeuvre, as you’re susceptible through the course of, however when you survive till the top you then’ll unleash enormous injury towards each enemy hit.
In the meantime, Vaal Cleave has two distinctive buffs: one which triggers while you kill a uncommon enemy that means that you can quickly steal its mods and use them as your personal, and one which triggers while you kill a uncommon or distinctive enemy, buffing your common Cleave dramatically. With good utilization, Wilson means that gamers ought to be capable of hold this Cleave buff up virtually indefinitely with repeated makes use of of Vaal Cleave.
Together with a spread of recent distinctive gadgets – some from the Forbidden Sanctum, and others merely discovered within the base recreation – Path of Exile 3.20 additionally introduces some heavy buffs for sure distinctive weapons. Typically, these are gadgets that are typically underused, and Wilson tells us that the main focus is nearly at all times a giant buff to their injury stat, with “round ten iconic underused distinctive weapons” being focused.
There’s additionally some rebalancing for Curses to make them stronger towards distinctive monsters and pinnacle bosses, and beforehand introduced updates to Jewels that ought to make them a greater supply of ailment mitigation for gamers to utilize. Gamers may count on some good high quality of life adjustments – power shields are actually proven as a separate bar above your character, quite than overlaid in your well being, and Beastcrafting recipes that add mods to flasks will now truly say precisely what the mod will do.
Lastly, the much-touted Path of Exile Ruthless mode, which is an extra character toggle that allows way more merchandise shortage, will grow to be out there to all in 3.20. Wilson says this non-compulsory mode is focused at old-school Diablo 2 gamers and those that actually need to be sure each improve feels significant, however notes that the crew shall be aggressive in rebalancing it throughout this preliminary, experimental rollout.
You’ll be able to watch the Path of Exile: The Forbidden Sanctum reveal under:
The Forbidden Sanctum definitely feels like an thrilling addition, and we will’t wait to attempt it out when Path of Exile replace 3.20 The Forbidden Sanctum releases on December 9.
It’ll be fascinating to see what different updates observe this as Grinding Gear Video games continues its march in the direction of Path of Exile 2, which Wilson tells us is making good progress. Within the meantime, we’ve received extra of one of the best video games like Diablo you can play on PC.
