A Deep Dive Into The Shipping Rewards System In POE 3.25 Settlers Of Kalguur
In this guide, we will explain Shipping Rewards System and scaling in POE 3.25 Settlers of Kalguur, from upgrading ports to setting the right set of resources in trade to improve loot using POE 3.25 Shipping League mechanic, everything you need to know is here.
Secret Tips
Before you get started, there are a few things you must know. For those who have tried to fill up Risk Bar by sending random resources, you have been doing it wrong all along, because increasing Shipment Risk does not increase the chance of a boss spawn.
Another important information is that when your cargo arrives, do not use a low level character to collect the rewards! Because the item level of the rewards depends on your character level. Black Flags ports basically reward you with Runes, while Green Flags ports give Tattoos. The more you send, the more Runes/Tattoos you get.
But it’s not that simple. I recommend spending more time on Runes farming, as Runes can become cores like some Tattoos. This is a powerful Benchcraft system, so don’t miss out on the league mechanic.
Upgrading Ports
If you send too many resources to a port, Risk Bar will fill up and you won’t get any excessive loot, because this thing is set based on the port tier. So pay attention to the popular resources.
You can send whatever you want, but in order to upgrade the port, you have to meet the resources they want. Every time you complete a task from a port, you can send more resources. This means you can earn more POE Currency from it. This is basically how Shipping system progresses.
Scaling Rewards
Now here’s something weird, though. Someone ran an entire set of shipments that only focused on 1 port. Later he tried Ribbon, and soon after completing the task, that port jumped to the tier of Ngakanu he was working on. It’s like the entire archipelago is either connected, or it’s a bug. It could also mean there’s some kind of global scaling on your per-process as well.
In each Quota section, you can see a percentage value in green. This is the most important part and also your reward multiplier. The higher the multiplier, the better quality of loot you get. So a high base value of shipment will multiply with this percentage value multiplier. Once you complete your Quota, it will go away.
Note that this multiplier only applies to the resources you need for each port. It’s exactly like a Mapping system. So you can’t just throw all your Scarabs with an Atlas Tree and try to get the exact same loot with this method because someone else is throwing all their Scarabs with Atlas Tree. You have to scale the base value by rolling the monster pack size with a high-level map. That’s how it works here, too. After all, this is POE.
Speaking of mined resources, don’t trade Ores, sell Bars. The more the better! Because a good way to measure the final loot is by the trade value! This is where it can get pretty messy. Because sometimes a certain combination of resources can significantly increase the trade value. You can test it out to see which is the best combination. But this can be very time-consuming for every shipment you send.
Of course, we also briefly tested this resource combination. As I predicted, Thaumaturgic Dust is great for scaling multipliers. Small amounts of Dust do seem to help increase loot, but there are huge diminishing returns.
Now it’s important to note that if you mix several resources in a shipment, you can multiply the loot of all items with some Thaumaturgic Dust, even if the fulfillment is just Wheat. But the base value of the quantity of these resources is low anyway, which means it’s a low multiplier and a waste of money.
So you’re better off just focusing on the other important aspect of scaling loot, which is upgrading your Ports to the highest level. Not only do you get faster speeds and more crew to handle shipments, you also get a multiplier that scales your fulfillment value. This directly means you have more resource sending capacity!
Also, since you have a total of 3 ships to deal with, if you’re having a hard time with Gold, you can batch farm Synthesis Maps, which will earn you an average of 15k Gold per run, which takes about 3 minutes.
Try Different Ports
You might want to ask why not focus on one port and farm things like Scarabs or Catalysts from the beginning? By the way, some Runes are also quite expensive, so focus more on Black Flags ports. There are many answers to this.
One of the reasons is about the fact of reward scaling. If you send resources that meet the quota of a specific port, you will get a lot of rewards that are multiplicative in trade value. The multiplier only applies to the resources required by each port.
If you constantly send unsolicited resources to a port, such as Verisium, hoping to get Fragments, what you will get will be items of very low value.
Therefore, most of the time, you have to send cargo based on what you have and what they want. Secondly, in terms of distance, ports that are farther away will have larger cargo holds. It is more time-consuming, but you can exchange higher value for distance in the multiplier reward system.
Overall, this part of the league mechanic is perfectly designed and well-balanced.
Don’t Hit The Red Bar
If you send more items than the port level can handle, you will notice a high risk warning. Nothing to panic about. Because as you meet the supply needs, things get better. Just like on the map, the greater the risk, the more gambling it is. Still, if you want to get consistent loot, don’t hit the red bar.
Another thing you can do is to hire more crew members to prevent red alerts. After all, it is designed from a practical point of view. The higher the crew level, the more experienced they are in handling the job. But of course, none of this will have any impact on the outcome of losing them or being requisitioned by Pirates. Because that’s pure RNG.
And please note that you don’t have to hire more crew members in low-level fulfillment. They will just waste money. Unless you are doing some high value shipments, you don’t need a 4-man team.
These are all the tips for you to start shipping at POE 3.25 and try to get the maximum reward scaling. Do you have any other ways to achieve more efficient shipping? See you next time!
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The recent Path of Exile 2 Patch 0.4.0 has been undergoing constant changes, with numerous patches and hotfixes optimizing the game based on Fate of the Vaal League mechanics, aiming to improve the overall experience.
Ten days after the release of Patch 0.4.0c hotfix 14, PoE 2 announced that Patch 0.4.0d will be released this week. Based on the announced content, this patch primarily focuses on bug fixes, with some aspects worth highlighting and discussing.
Below, we will provide a preview of this patch and analyze its main features and potential impact.
Patch 0.4.0d overview
The entire patch can be broadly divided into three parts: further optimization and fixes to Fate of the Vaal League mechanics, overall modifications, and comprehensive bug fixes. Undoubtedly, the most noteworthy aspect remains the first part.
Interestingly, even before the patch has been officially released, Fracturing Orbs have already depreciated in value simply by being announced. This means you can more easily acquire them through PoE 2 Divine Orbs to stabilize your gear affixes.
This is likely due to changes in the league system, making this part of the patch analysis a key focus of our guide.
Atziri's Temple boss fight reform
Let's temporarily ignore the usual temple fixes and focus on a new respawn change: if you die while fighting the boss Architect or Atziri in Atziri's Temple, you can respawn in the new temple instance.
However, this opportunity is very limited, as almost the entire temple is destroyed during the boss fight - somewhat like how endgame maps work in the game.
Therefore, when this mechanism is finally implemented, it's expected that not all players will be satisfied with it, but it's necessary because it can curb the possibility of some players seeking cheating due to the inability to respawn.
In short, if you die in these boss fights again later, you should be able to start re-challenging them faster, instead of having to unlock the rooms from scratch.
This means that even if you unfortunately fail on your first attempt, you'll have an extra chance to familiarize yourself with the boss mechanics. In fact, these bosses aren't difficult to defeat; their mechanics are just rather intricate.
Holten exploit fixes
As you know, collecting Energized Crystals by defeating monsters around Vaal Beacons is a crucial part of experiencing Atziri's Temple gameplay, as only with enough crystals can the temple progress.
However, in the game prior to Patch 0.4.0d, there was an issue where Vaal Beacons frequently spawned in an easily accessible location within Holten campaign area.
This allowed players to exploit this by repeatedly resetting dungeons to farm Energized Crystals faster, causing an imbalance in the entire Atziri's Temple system and an abnormal inflation of the value of some rare currencies.
Frankly, the issue of economic inflation was repeatedly mentioned in the player community shortly after Atziri's Temple's release, but for some reason, concrete measures to improve it have only now been introduced. However, better late than never.
Atziri's Chambers fix
As the spawn location of the final boss Atziri, the connection between this chamber and other rooms was previously a mess; sometimes you simply didn't know how to place and connect rooms.
Fortunately, Patch 0.4.0d finally fixed this, allowing Atziri's Chambers to correctly connect to any adjacent room, ensuring the entire mechanism functions more clearly and consistently.
Temple QoL fix
This fix requires you to place at least one room before each run. If you already have a highly optimized temple, you might not want to place any rooms at all, and therefore might mistakenly think this is a weakening change.
However, the purpose of this measure is actually to ensure that you don't accidentally open the temple before placing rooms, and to better guide new players through their first temple.
Of course, considering the needs of different players, the game also allows you to bypass this option. If you're a PC player, hold down Ctrl key and click Run Temple button. If you're a controller player, simply select "Deny" when prompted.
More Atziri's Temple fixes
Besides the highlights above, Patch 0.4.0d focuses on optimizing Atziri's Temple mechanics and includes other details, such as clearer instructions for Atziri's Chambers and more explanations of different mechanics.
The complexity and depth of gameplay have always been major obstacles for new players joining Path of Exile series. Sometimes, new leagues and their new mechanics can even confuse longtime fans.
Therefore, this patch shows that providing clear explanations is more effective in winning over players than creating mystery and raising the barrier to entry through seemingly complex mechanics.
Fracturing Orbs fix
In the first half of this article, we mentioned the devaluation of Fracturing Orbs, primarily due to a bug fixed in Patch 0.4.0d involving Immured Fury - the endgame boss and primary source of Fracturing Orbs drops.
Theoretically, this boss shouldn't spawn in cleansed areas, but previously, clearing excessive corruption would imprint a hidden marker indicating the presence of Immured Fury in certain areas.
This meant players could more easily earn Fracturing Orbs by defeating this boss, leading to an abnormally inflated value and disrupting PoE 2 economy and trade balance.
Fortunately, Patch 0.4.0d fixed this by making Immured Fury spawn completely unpredictably, restoring the rarity of Fracturing Orbs to a more normal level through a more randomized spawn method.
The above content covers what needs to be explained in detail in Patch 0.4.0d. However, there are also some interesting changes and fixes that you can discover and experience one by one through the game after the patch is finally released. Thank you for reading.
As you know, Patch 0.4.0, while adding new classes and other content, also brought many changes to the game's inherent mechanics. Although these changes may not be drastic on their own, they still affect the overall system.
For example, in The Last of the Druids, the left side of the skill tree, focusing on melee, defense, and life/block mechanics, was adjusted, leading to changes in the popular defense configurations used by each class.
This article will introduce the entire defense system and analyze the latest popular defense mechanics and styles during Fate of the Vaal league.
Path of Exile 2 defense mechanism overview
The game's defense system can be roughly divided into four layers: core and secondary defense layers, evasion, and recovery mechanisms. Each layer has multiple different functions that can be used in combat.
The core defense layer refers to the main attributes on the gear, which can be adjusted through the talent tree, such as armor or energy shields, which can directly block damage.
The second layer of defense indirectly transfers or reduces the damage you receive, including blocking, resistance, and more.
Avoidance mainly refers to default or temporary defensive buffs, while recovery restores health after being attacked, such as with flask or leech.
Changes in Patch 0.4.0
This patch primarily focuses on the left side of the skill tree, where the lower half emphasizes strength, while the middle and upper halves emphasize intelligence.
The left-side skill tree focuses entirely on defensive mechanics, containing numerous nodes that increase your health, armor, and block chance. It's key for melee builds that excel in high tanking or health.
The focus on these changes might be because the new Druid class is itself a defensive melee class, so most of the new passive nodes also share these characteristics.
The addition of new nodes and clusters necessitates adjustments to many existing skills. If your previous builds were based on these skills, you'll have to reset them, significantly altering the defensive styles popular during the new league.
The popularity of shield wall styles
The shield mechanic remains highly popular after Patch 0.4.0, primarily due to the surge in shield wall builds. As the most popular starting skill for Warrior class, shield usage has actually increased season by season.
This is perhaps because Patches 0.3.0 and 0.4.0 focused on hardcore single-player modes, where shield wall builds provide effective benefits, especially if you further unlock Titan as an Ascendancy class.
The popularity of Disciple of Varashta
As a newly added Sorceress Ascendancy class, Disciple of Varashta has caused quite a stir in the current league. Based on its powerful defensive capabilities, it performs exceptionally well in modes of varying difficulty.
For example, the passive skill The Fourth Teaching grants a 40% increase in shield recharge rate when your shield is below or equal to 35% of its maximum value.
In other words, the larger your energy shield hit pool, the better this talent node is, because you can maintain a considerable effective hit rate during the initial phase when the higher energy shield regeneration rate takes effect.
This talent node, combined with powerful support skills such as Nascent Hope or Convalescence, can significantly increase the natural regeneration rate of the energy shield, making its charging mechanism more reliable.
Even if you take a lot of damage and your health drops to a low level, you can still benefit from the higher regeneration rate by forcibly charging, ensuring your energy shield is fully charged again.
This Ascendancy class also has a powerful defensive skill called Sacred Rituals, which converts 60% of your current energy shield into armor, thus reducing the physical damage you take.
It's worth mentioning that both of these nodes can be combined with Chaos Inoculation to form one of the most powerful defensive configurations in PoE 2 - Chaos Inoculation is also another key defensive skill in the current league.
Despite a major balance update in patch 0.4.0, energy shields remain significantly stronger than pure health builds, and the addition of Discrete of Varashta has provided an ideal platform for the growth of these builds.
Talisman defense mechanism
This new Druid-friendly gear type cannot be used with shields, leading many Druid players to favor a hybrid health approach to defense.
The updated talent tree features a considerable number of energy shield and armor hybrid talents, so the vast majority of Druid builds focus on investing in energy shields as an extension of health.
Furthermore, many players using Talisman builds utilize the new keystone passive Lord of the Wilds, allowing them to simultaneously use a non-unique scepter and talisman to gain a pure resistance aura.
This not only alleviates gear pressure regarding resistance affixes but also allows for the use of numerous support gems without prior reservation. While this may be a bug, it has been present in the game for some time.
Self-chill and increased speed
In Patch 0.4.0, speed is also one of the most powerful defensive measures. As long as you can move, attack, or cast spells at extremely high speeds, no enemy can hit you or catch you - the best offense is also the best defense.
To achieve this, you can combine Asphyxia's Wrath Broadhead Quiver with Sierran Inheritance Marabout Garb. This quiver reduces the damage you take based on cooldowns, providing you with amazing damage reduction.
Therefore, you are not only unmatched in speed, but even if you do take damage, the damage reduction significantly reduces the actual damage dealt by enemies.
That concludes this introduction. Hopefully, this analytical guide will be helpful in your future crafting of defensive builds in PoE 2!
Path of Exile 3.27 has been running for almost two months, halfway through the League season. As usual, the official announcement for the upcoming livestream indicates that news about the next league will begin in the coming weeks, and that Path of Exile 3.28 will be released as planned in early March 2026.
While it's good that the official update is on schedule, given the large amount of content in each Path of Exile update, such a short timeframe has raised concerns among players about whether the content has been reduced.
Official Update Plan
In June 2025, Path of Exile's lead representative, Jonathan Rogers, clarified the future update plan in an interview, stating that Path of Exile 1 and 2 would both have a four-month update cycle, with the two games alternating in updates. This means that on average, players will see new content for one of the games every two months.
On January 12, 2026, the official forums announced that the Path of Exile 3.28 expansion would be released on schedule in early March, continuing the tradition of a four-month development cycle. This timeline is approximately three months after the release of Path of Exile 2 patch 0.4 in December.
For developers, a fixed update schedule alleviates development pressure. Rogers has admitted that delivering content every two months is quite difficult, but a fixed-date, variable-content model is more conducive to development management.
Update Schedule
Although the official timeline seems balanced, the official update dates are not entirely fixed; they may be released at the beginning of the month or at the end. Based on the principle of alternating updates between the two games and important schedules, this cycle may harbor some risks of imbalance.
Let's look at the update timelines for the two games:
- December 12, 2025: Path of Exile 2 Patch 0.4.0 The Last of the Druids released normally.
- Early March 2026: PoE 3.28 released, approximately three months after PoE 2 Patch 0.4.0.
- April 2026: A possible PoE 2 Patch 0.5 update is expected in about a month.
The official statement indicates they will strive to conclude early testing of PoE 2 by 2026. Therefore, they may adjust the update schedule for Path of Exile 1 to maintain a consistent update pace for PoE 2. Even if they cannot release Patch 1.0 by the end of the year, they will still release a major update to attract more players.
This raises a problem: for an early-stage game like Path of Exile 2, content consumption is faster. While version 0.4 adds the Druid class and Vaal Temple mechanics, the overall content volume still cannot compare to the mature PoE 1.
Potential Issues
Many core players worry that this cycle of one month for Path of Exile 1 and three months for Path of Exile 2 will create a double problem.
Because the mature Path of Exile 1 has more endgame content and three years of accumulated League mechanics, giving players ample choices to farm PoE currency, this is enough to support months of deep gameplay. However, players only have about a month to experience each new league before being drawn to the PoE 2 League.
Path of Exile 2 is currently still in early access. According to the game director, the originally planned six-month Early Access has been extended to approximately one year. Player concerns currently focus on whether its existing content is sufficient to support nearly three months of gameplay.
Furthermore, recent League updates have revealed a high player churn rate for PoE 2. Even with the addition of the new Druid class in patch 0.4.0, significant player attrition has occurred.
This is because the new endgame mechanic, Vaal Temple, initially didn't yield good returns. Subsequent adjustments by the developers, coupled with player discoveries of loopholes, allowed the mechanic to generate a large amount of currency. Several subsequent poor adjustments resulted in Path of Exile 2 patch 0.4.0 experiencing inflation, leading to increased unfairness in trading for ordinary players.
This is actually due to the current lack of endgame content in PoE 2, making players more likely to focus on game issues.
Possible Solutions
Faced with a potentially entrenched imbalance in the update schedule, some constructive alternatives have been discussed within the community. These proposals aim to break the potential vicious cycle and seek a more sustainable update model for both players and developers.
Perhaps a multi-stage update could replace a single full Path of Exile 2 League update. This would give the development team extra buffer time to adjust the timeline while maintaining player activity.
Another direction is to adjust the length of each update cycle. However, this would conflict with the crucial year-end revenue window, and considering that holiday season releases can generate three times the revenue of other months, this solution is less likely to be implemented.
Director Rogers stated that he will maintain communication with the community and promised to experience the game from the player's perspective and understand the reasons behind their feedback. This indicates that the official team may flexibly adjust the plan based on player acceptance of the actual update schedule.
With the release of Path of Exile 3.28 and Path of Exile 2 Patch 0.4.0, you can observe whether this cycle will continue. If this cycle is broken, it may not be through drastic adjustments to update dates, but rather because the official team has found a way to populate Path of Exile 2 with enough new content within a three-month cycle.
Battles with bosses are a constant throughout almost every Path of Exile 2 league, including killing bosses in various acts during leveling and defeating increasingly difficult map bosses in endgame. They are both obstacles and sources of enjoyment.
Therefore, many PoE 2 builds are designed to defeat bosses in the most efficient way possible, and to achieve this, high DPS and survivability are indispensable.
Based on this, this article will introduce how to craft a Monk-based build effective against most bosses during Patch 0.4.0, and its practical performance.
This build overview
This Monk build is based on Ascendancy class Invoker, combining related skills and passives to utilize various control effects to weaken the boss, thereby achieving the effect of killing the boss at the end of the battle.
The advantage of this build lies in its simplicity - most of the time you simply need to keep casting skills and wait for enemies to be killed, and it provides excellent survivability and enemy clearing capabilities.
However, it's important to note that if you plan to use this build in every stage of the game, you'll need to adjust the build's setup based on the actual needs of the current stage, the amount of PoE 2 currency you have, and the rarity of your gear.
Leveling stage
In this stage, your goal is to level up as much as possible while utilizing the league system to earn as much currency as possible to exchange for better gear or enhance the affixes of existing gear.
If you want your Monk build to be even stronger in the endgame, you need to acquire Headhunter Heavy Belt gear as early as possible when completing various acts.
This belt increases your stun threshold by 20-30% and grants you a 20-second attribute bonus from the ability of a rare monster after you kill it. It also provides the following buffs:
- +40-60 to maximum Life
- +20-40 to strength
- +20-40 to dexterity
Since this gear requires defeating a boss to obtain, you can choose other items as substitutes if you find it difficult, but its effect is indeed the best.
Skill selection after entering endgame
To deal sufficient damage to the boss, you need not only to ensure higher DPS but also to break the enemy's armor faster - if the current boss has relevant mechanics.
Based on this, you should first unlock the lineage gem Uul-Netol's Embrac, which helps Herald of Ice become more effective, not only breaking armor but also creating explosions to deal more damage to the boss.
In the endgame phase, killing more bosses requires completing a sufficient number of maps, as you'll always encounter hordes of monsters before the boss appears. Therefore, it's recommended to unlock Whirling Assault as your primary skill.
This is because this skill allows you to accumulate energy orbs faster, and triggering Profane Ritual or Mantra of Destruction continuously builds energy orbs.
These orbs can be used more consistently after adding Flicker Strike and Falling Thunder, resulting in significant damage.
Furthermore, equip Herald of Thunder and Herald of Ash for even stronger AoE damage and faster monster clearing speed. Additionally, equipping Wind Dancer will enhance your defense and survivability.
More skill gems and their corresponding support gem options are as follows:
Whirling Assault:
- Practiced Combo
- Rage III
- Pinpoint Critical
- Magnified Area II
- Oisin's Oath
Falling Thunder:
- Elemental Armament II
- Nova Projectiles I
- Ricochet II
- Pinpoint Critical
- Ice Bite II
Flicker Strike:
- Blindside
- Concentrated Area
- Close Combat II
- Perpetual Charge
- Hit and Run
Charged Staff:
- Prolonged Duration II
- Innervate
- Culling Strike II
- Blind II
- Embitter
Mantra of Destruction:
- Chaos Mastery
- Prolonged Duration II
- Charge Profusion II
- Ailith's Chimes
- Delayed Gratification
Cast on Critical:
- Profane Ritual
- Charge Profusion II
- Overabundance I
- Boundless Energy II
- Energy Retention
Wind Dancer:
- Magnified Area II
- Close Combat II
- Blind II
- Maim
- Elemental Focus
More gear options
Besides the recommended Headhunter Heavy Belt, other gear choices are also important. For weapons, quarterstaff remains the most suitable for Monk - Sinister Quarterstaff is the best due to its highest base critical strike chance.
Building on this, you need to stack frost damage in combat, increasing the damage output of your Herald of Ice and Armour Explosion while ensuring all melee or attack skills have critical strike chance and higher ratings.
It's worth mentioning that you can also roll affixes for your quarterstaff that convert a percentage of physical attack damage into mana, which synergizes well with Oisin's Oath support gem.
As for armor, you should focus on whether your options have energy shields or high enough evasion rating to unlock Ascendancy ability, Lead me through Grace, for more spirit.
The best other gear slot options are as follows:
- Helm - Ancestral Tiara
- Body - Armor Sleek Jacket
- Gloves - Vaal Wraps
- Boots - Quickslip Shoes
- Amulet - Gold Amulet
- Ring - Unset Ring
- Life Flask - Ultimate Life Flask
- Mana Flask - Ultimate Mana Flask
In fact, acquiring gear is only the first step. To maximize their effectiveness and make your entire Monk build more powerful, the key is to consume currency to improve their rarity and affixes.
Fortunately, while crafting this boss-focused build, you will also encounter bosses, resulting in decent currency drops and making your build crafting experience smoother over time.
If you're not focused on challenging higher difficulty maps or bosses, you can also use this recommended build to farm currency in easier maps. While it might seem a bit tedious due to damage overflow, it will help you accumulate wealth quickly!
That concludes this introduction. We hope it has been helpful in ensuring you can continue playing Monk classes during patch 0.4.0! Thank you for reading!
