The Crystallised Omniscience Anomalous Tornado Shot Deadeye is an endgame monster capable of farming all Mapping content at the highest efficiency. The build excels at clearing fast while still having good single target damage. 

It has the best clear speed of any build in the game, and potentially the highest level of min-maxability, making it a great endgame build to sink many hours and poe currency into perfecting.

Skills
Tornado Shot
Tornado Shot is the primary source of damage of this build. Positioning is key as Far Shot significantly increases the amount of damage you deal depending on the distance between you and your target. Tornado shot primary projectiles can hit once, but the secondary projectiles can shotgun.

Utility And Auras
Determination grants a base amount of Armour with a means to scale it thanks to its inherent more multiplier. Molten Shell linked to Cast when Damage Taken Support mitigates burst damage, absorbing 75% of incoming damage for a short duration. While you can't use Molten Shell yourself in this setup, Vaal Molten Shell gives you an on demand panic button for an even bigger shield that absorbs 35-40% of incoming damage.

Hatred and Herald of Purity are your damage Auras. Herald of Purity helps to scale your base Physical Damage. Hatred provides a % of your base Physical Damage as extra Cold Damage as well as a % more Cold Damage multiplier. Precision helps you cap your Accuracy and grant some Critical Strike chance.

Mark on Hit
Sniper's Mark suits your Projectile-based build. Enemies take increased damage, and Projectiles split when they hit the target affected by it. We link it to Mark On Hit Support to automate its application. This easily gives us Frenzy Charges and extra damage to bosses and tanky rares/uniques.

Mobility
Flame Dash allows for swift mobility in all situations. It allows you to blink over obstacles on a cooldown, and is instant on it's first recent cast.

Ascendancy

The Deadeye is our choice as it offers many speed mapping enhancements, Additional Projectiles, Chain and Damage.

*Gathering Winds provides a total of 20% Action speed when Gale Force is fully stacked, providing a more multiplier to Attack and Movement Speed.
*Ricochet provides an additional Chain, making your projectiles bounce from enemy to enemy like heat seeking missiles. This effect also applies to 30% of all projectiles which hit walls.
*Endless Munitions provides two additional projectiles, which is a big damage increase for single target thanks to Anomalous Tornado Shot's shotgunning capabilities and improved clear speed.
*Focal Point provides damage reduction while mapping, and a substantial damage boost by increasing Sniper's Mark effectiveness.
*Far Shot grants a massive damage increase for targets that are further away from you, allowing you to deal optimal damage at a safe distance. This notable is granted thanks to Forbidden Flame & Forbidden Flesh.

Key Build Info
Tornado Shot is the primary source of damage for this build. Tornado Shot like other projectile based attacks does not shotgun, however the secondary Projectiles which emit from the tornadoes at the targeted locations do. When positioning, make sure to place yourself as far away from your target as possible to get the most out of Far Shot, place down your Ballista Totem Support and fire right on top of your target to deal the highest possible damage.

To ensure that your Critical Strike Chance is as high as possible do the following:
*Only equip a bow with a tier 3+ Critical Strike Chance roll.
*Roll a flask with the #% Increased Critical Strike Chance During Flask Effect suffix.
*Equip a Diamond Flask.
*Lioneye's Fall at the Shadow location to convert Claw nodes into Bow.
*A Watcher's Eye with % to Critical Strike Chance while affected by Hatred.

Crystallised Omniscience converts all of our attributes into the Omniscience (omni) Stat. This means Dexterity won't grant Evasion and Accuracy, Strength won't grant Life and Melee Damage, and Intelligence won't grant Energy Shield. Omniscience grants 1% elemental penetration and 1% to elemental resistances per 15 Omniscience. It is important to note that how much Omniscience you're getting out of an explicit can be deceptive, for example: +25 to Dexterity and Intelligence is equal to 25 Omniscience, +12 to All Attributes is equal to 12 Omniscience.

Crystallised Omniscience can be used to almost cap our Resistances, and provides a massive amount of generic Elemental Penetration. This allows builds to avoid focusing on one specific elemental damage type to be efficient.

Trinity Support and other conditional damage notables found on the passive tree work well with this setup. The sweet spot for Omniscience is approximately 1500. This almost caps our Resistances exclusively from Attributes. Beyond that, it is still a nice stat to stack, however diminishing returns are incurred. The damage increase granted by Penetration damage does not scale linearly, so after a certain amount, other stats become favorable.

Skill Gems
Gems are a fundamental part of your build, so getting the correct link setups before taking on content is your main goal.

*Tornado Shot
*Awakened Elemental Damage with Attacks Support
*Inspiration Support
*Trinity Support
*Mirage Archer Support
*Awakened Chain Support

*Tornado Shot
*Awakened Elemental Damage with Attacks Support
*Ballista Totem Support
*Inspiration Support
*Awakened Vicious Projectiles Support
*Focused Ballista Support

*Enlighten Support
*Herald of Purity
*Hatred
*Determination

*Sniper's Mark
*Mark On Hit Support
*Precision
*Blood and Sand

*Flame Dash
*Blood Rage
*Molten Shell
*Cast when Damage Taken Support

Tornado Shot
Anomalous Tornado Shot is our main damaging ability. The Anomalous alternative quality is used because it provides an easy way to convert a large portion of your damage to elemental. This conversion along with a Cold Mastery present on the Passive Skill Tree grant a total of 100% Physical to Elemental Conversion. With Trinity Support in your build, an icon appears in the top left corner of the screen indicating the current state of the buff. If you see all three bars filled after attacking an enemy, you are on the right track. If one remains empty, you need to rebalance two of your three elemental damage types so that their average damage done is roughly equal.

Cast when Damage Taken Support
Inspiration Support grants us a considerable boost to both our elemental damage and critical strike chance. Most importantly it greatly reduces the Mana cost. Anomalous Awakened Elemental Damage with Attacks Support is a multiplier for elemental attack skills. Anomalous Mirage Archer Support causes linked bow skills to summon a ghostly archer. When the player hits an enemy with the supported skill, a temporary Mirage Archer is summoned above the player that uses that skill. Awakened Chain Support causes projectiles to chain when they hit an enemy. This causes projectiles to target another enemy in range and seek towards them. It continues to chain until all the chains are used up.

Ballista Setup
Like your first setup you use Anomalous Tornado Shot linked to Awakened Elemental Damage with Attacks Support & Divergent Inspiration Support. Ballista Totem Support modifies the skill so that instead of you casting, a ballista totem is summoned which uses the skill. Focused Ballista Support makes your ballista totem attack only when you use your primary Anomalous Tornado Shot setup. Awakened Vicious Projectiles Support grants one of the biggest damage multipliers in the game, at the expense of attack speed for your totems.

Auras
Hatred is your main active offensive Aura. It provides a large amount of Physical Damge as extra Cold Damage as well as % more Cold Damage that greatly increases your overall DPS. Determination and Grace are your main active defensive auras. They provide a bonus flat as well as a % multiplier to both Armor and Evasion to scale up our base defences. Anomalous Blood and Sand while in sand stance provides Projectile Speed and Damage. Precision is a gem which reserves more Mana and grants more flat accuracy as it is leveled up. Therefore, it is important to balance out its level to ensure we still have enough Mana to play comfortably. If there is ever a point where your accuracy rating is not capped (but you cannot afford to level up precision any higher) you should invest more into passive skills that grant accuracy or find equipment with either % increased or flat accuracy. Link the gems with the highest reservation cost to Enlighten Support level 3-4 to increase the reservation efficiency.

Guard Skills
Molten Shell linked to Cast when Damage Taken Support provide us with a massive defensive boost. It is best to keep Cast when Damage Taken Support at level 6 and Molten Shell at level 13. It ensures the buff procs more often with little to no downside. When you take 897 damage the gem automatically triggers, granting the player a huge absorb shield which scales with Armor. The more Armor, the larger the absorb shield, up to a maximum of 10,000. Keep in mind that Molten Shell only works against Hit damage, not Damage over Time.

Single Target Debuff
Sniper's Mark linked to Mark On Hit Support triggers when a rare or unique enemy is hit, marking him. This grants a lot of additional damage and splitting projectiles. It's important to keep track of the skill's high Mana cost, which can easily deplete your entire unreserved pool. In that case keep Sniper's Mark at a lower level until you can support it.

Mobility
Flame Dash is a movement spell that causes the player to teleport to a target location. It has an instant cast time if not cast continuously, making it a great tool to blink to a spot when you find yourself in a dangerous situation.

The Forbidden Sanctum brings roguelike gameplay to Path of Exile. Sanctum is an out of map mechanic that can be interacted with once every map/zone or saved up to do all at once (8 encounters saved at once). The mechanic sees players entering the Forbidden sanctum and plotting their path through a 4 floor dungeon consisting of 32 rooms of varying types. At the end of each floor of 8 rooms players can expect to face a challenging boss.

The Sanctum features a variety of challenges; but also tools to overcome them. While inside you'll have an extra healthbar-like resource called "resolve", which takes 'damage' whenever your player is hit by monsters or traps. Upon losing all your resolve your run will end and you must start over.

Sanctums provide a range of tools to assist you in getting as far as possible each run; expect to find fountains in marked rooms to recover your resolve, powerful boons to assist you against enemies and Aureus coins used to exchange with the sanctums merchant for even more power.

In this Forbidden Sanctum guide you will learn how to maximize your loot and optimize your play with essential tips and tricks.

Sanctum Rooms
There are many types of rooms in the Sanctum each of which serve their own purpose, the current rooms to consider are:
*Offering Rooms grant the player a choice of gaining immediate currency items, currency at the end of the floor or at the end of the sanctum. The riskier the option, the more rewarding it is. Failing to reach the goal specified will result in the loss of the currency.

*Merchant Rooms contain a vendor that will offer you powerful boons to make your run easier at the cost of Aureus coins. The Merchant may also rarely offer you Sanctified as well as Normal Relics for a high price.

*Fountain Rooms contain a fountain that can be used to restore your resolve. Afflicted fountain rooms also exist and restore more resolve at the cost of applying an affliction to your run. Rarely you may encounter one of two special fountains Benevolent (Grant maximum resolve and a Boon) or Radiant (Grant Inspiration and a Boon, remove an affliction)

*Accursed Pact Rooms offer players 3 sets of choices. Each choice consists of an upside and a downside. Players can select up to all 3 pacts if they wish to, or may choose to not take a pact at all. After making at least one pact you will gain access to a random currency offering.

*Treasure Rooms come in two variants Minor (two chests) and Major (5 chests) that contain chests filled with aureus coins upon completion. These coins can be exchanged with encounters for additional power during your current Sanctum.

*Afflicted Rooms are highlighted in purple and when entered will curse you with an affliction for the remainder of the run. Choosing a path leading to an Afflicted Room should be carefully considered, as you may want to entirely avoid certain dangerous afflictions.

Relics
Relics are a permanent form of power progression within the Forbidden Sanctum. As you progress through the league you will unlock slots on your relic altar that you can fill with relics you find. Relics on your altar will grant their effects to you on your sanctum runs, there are 3 sizes of relics each of which have their own modifier pools.

Small Relics (2x1)
*+x To Maximum Resolve (Prefix)
*Gain x aureus coins at the start of the sanctum (Prefix)
*Gain x Inspiration at the start of the sanctum (Prefix)
*Monsters have x% chance to drop double Aureus Coins (Suffix)
*Chests have x% chance to drop double Aureus Coins (Suffix)
*Gain x resolve when you kill a boss (Suffix)
*x additional rooms are revealed on the sanctum map (suffix)

Medium Relics (3x1)
*x% increased resolve recovered (Prefix)
*Gain x Inspiration at the start of each floor (Prefix)
*Guards take x% increased damage (Prefix)
*Bosses take x% increased damage (Prefix)
*The merchant has x additional choices (Prefix)
*x% reduced merchant prices (Suffix)
*x aureus coins when you complete a room (Suffix)
*Recover x resolve when you complete a room (Suffix)
*Gain x resolve when you use a fountain (Suffix)
*Guards impact x% reduced resolve (Suffix)
*Bosses impact x% reduced resolve (Suffix)

Large Relics (2x2)(4x1)
*Gain x Inspiration when you receive an affliction (Prefix)
*x% increased maximum resolve (Prefix)
*Monsters take x% increased damage (Prefix)
*Gain x maximum resolve when you kill a boss (Suffix)
*Gain x maximum resolve when you use a fountain (Suffix)
*x% chance to avoid gaining an affliction (Suffix)
*Monsters impact x% reduced resolve (Suffix)

You may have multiple relics on your bench and their effects stack additively. Having a good relic loadout is essential for farming the Forbidden Sanctum efficiently.

Rewards
The Forbidden Sanctum allows you to pick your level of difficulty and reward in offering rooms. Early in the league, picking the lower risk option is likely to be the most profitable approach. Selecting the option to defer rewards until the very end of a Sanctum run will likely be required in order for its rewards to compete with the profitability of other high end strategies

Roughly 40% of the rooms within the Sanctum are 'offering' rooms that grant currency. Players are given the opportunity to pick which rooms to enter, therefore choosing a path ahead of time that leads to a high amount of offering rooms will lead to improved overall rewards.

The Forbidden Sanctum introduces a new equipable item class; "The Sanctified Relic". This relic can only be acquired from the league mechanic. These relics are bind on account, active even outside the sanctum and incredibly powerful. Sanctified Relics are not a tradeable reward, but they're still very valuable and are likely to make the sanctum worth farming regardless of other rewards.

Gameplay
You will gain access to 1 additional Forbidden Sanctum room per Campaign Zone or Atlas Map that you complete, so farming smaller/shorter Maps are ideal for stacking up a full Sanctum floor to run all at once (8 rooms).

When mapping, prepare your sanctum floor while running a low investment atlas strategy such as Eldritch Altar or Alch and Go farming in order to maximise your currency gains while trying to farm Sanctum content.

When selecting your path through the sanctum, plot a course that provides the most connected rooms. Granting you a higher chance of encountering an offering room. Select the highest risk level you think you can do in offering rooms to receive loot worth your time, taking a risk is better than receiving a paltry reward.

Monitor your resolve and Aureus Coins at all times, selecting merchant and fountain rooms only when necessary.

Map Choice
When farming Forbidden Sanctum in the endgame, small maps that can be completed quickly are always preferred to maximize the amount of floors you can clear per session. The maps below are fantastic choices for speed mapping.

*City Square/Mesa are considered the fastest and most linear maps in Path of Exile. They are  almost identical every time you run them, making them the top picks for speed mapping strategies. Being so small and fast to run means they don't have the best natural mob counts, thus they are difficult to sustain effectively without investment.

*Toxic Sewer is one of the best map layouts in Path of Exile, boasting a strong natural monster count for easy map sustain. It is one of the only linear indoor maps, making it a great choice for builds without a lot of AoE that still want to clear extremely fast.

*Ashen Wood  is a small open layout map with a good natural mob count and a very easy boss. It also drops The Scout Divination Card which adds additional profit to your farming sessions.

*Canyon is similar to Ashen Wood. It is a small open layout map with almost no terrain to obstruct your movement or league mechanics. This makes it easy to run and a great candidate for synergising with other leagues.

Materials
Rolling Maps
Rolling your maps correctly is mandatory for making profit and sustaining maps in the end game. For this strategy, roll all of your maps using the following materials that you intend to run for Forbidden Sanctum.

*Clean Your Maps -  Ensure all of your maps are identified and then use an Orb of Scouring to make them all normal rarity, since achieving 20% quality on white maps requires significantly less Cartographer's Chisels.

*Chiseling - Use Cartographer's Chisels on all of your maps until each one is 20% quality.

*Alchemy Orbs - Use Orb of Alchemys on every map you have at 20% quality. Re-roll maps your character cannot run using Orb of Scouring and Orb of Alchemy.

*Vaal Orbs - Use Vaal Orbs on all of your appropriately rolled maps. Some maps may transform or receive new modifiers, so weed out any maps with modifiers your build cannot run or maps that are no longer on a favourable layout. On average, using Vaal Orbs on high tiers maps is always worth it.

Optimizing
Strategy Synergies
To ensure you're making as much currency as possible in the end game you should combine your forbidden sanctum preparations with another atlas strategy. The strategies we recommend include the following:

*Eldritch Altar Farming

*Alch and Go

Orbs of Horizon
If you are struggling to sustain high tier maps with layouts that are ideal for speed mapping, you can use Orbs of Horizons to transform maps you don't have a use for into better layouts.

Each tier of maps will transform into a specific set of map layouts which change each league. Use Orbs of Horizons on the following tiers of maps you don't have a use for to re-stock your map pool.

*Tier 16 - Toxic Sewer, Graveyard

*Tier 15 - Dunes, Ashen Wood, Grotto

*Tier 14 - Canyon, Underground Sea

Some of these maps are fantastic for speed mapping while some are just mediocre, however using all of the recommended maps here will allow you to easily sustain a map pool early on in a league.
Read More: Game Experiences on Forbidden Sanctum in POE 3.20

Path of Exile's latest expansion and Challenge League, The Forbidden Sanctum, has received some new content with patch 3.20.1. It adds seven new Unique Relics that drop from the Sanctum Boss's final form.

With Patch 3.20.1, Path of Exile has added two new treasures to the Forbidden Sanctum, Unique Relics sure to test even the most potent adventurers. These rules enable characters level 80 and up with exclusive rewards for conquering this challenging area, including rare items dropped by bosses along your journey.

Players can now take advantage of 41 new currency items called "Lycia's Invocation" which will allow them to power up their non-Corrupted Sanctified Relics with special Keystones. Additionally, combatants close to a target in Sanctum will be relieved from hefty Resolve damage, perfect for those who prefer an aggressive play style.

3.20.1 Patch Notes
This patch introduces new Sanctum content, improvements to the current Kirac's Vault Pass and adds support for the 2023 Core Supporter Packs as detailed in our news post last week. It also contains a variety of improvements and bug fixes to both Sanctum and non-Sanctum content, and some buffs to the modifiers applied to Blighted Maps through anointing them with Oils.

Sanctum Updates and Improvements
*Introduced 7 new Unique Relics that drop from the final form of the Sanctum Boss. These Relics challenge you to complete an entire run of The Forbidden Sanctum at area level 80+ under special rules. If you're able to complete such a run, you'll be rewarded in new and special ways. However, the Unique Relic will be destroyed regardless of the outcome of your run, so if you fail to complete it, you'll forfeit your potential rewards.

*Some of these Unique Relics cause the Herald of the Scourge to drop additional or specific items, while others causes Aureus Coins to be converted to certain outcomes upon defeating the Herald of the Scourge.

*We've also introduced a new Unique Ring that can be earned by defeating the Herald of the Scourge with one of the new Unique Relics active.

*Introduced 41 new Lycia's Invocation currency items. These can be applied to non-Corrupted Sanctified Relics to add their respective Keystone to the Relic.

*Boons and Afflictions that provide increases and reductions to the effect of your Relics now specify that they do not affect Unique Relics.

*Characters that are up close to their target now take even less damage to their Resolve.

*Sanctum Quests are no longer hidden with the Enable Quest Tracking option disabled. We've also made improvements to these Quests to reduce the chance they are missed when first entering the relevant town area.

*Party Members are now able to view the Map of the area owner's Sanctum, if they currently have a run active.

*Party members can now store a Sanctum room for later when the map owner runs their Sanctum room for the area.

*The Resolve bar now flashes when you heal or damage your Resolve.

*Added a display to show which Affliction was removed when you cleansed an Affliction.

*The Sanctified Relic Slot has been moved from the Sanctum Map and is now located in the Inventory panel.

*Sanctified Relics can now be compared with your equipped one by using the Compare Item Descriptions keybind (Ctrl, by default).

*The wave skill used by the final form of the Sanctum Boss now spawns far fewer lightning bolts with each wave, though the lightning bolts are slightly larger. The delay between each wave has also been slightly increased.

*You can no longer gain a new multi-stage Boon or Affliction, such as Lilting Melody, if you already have a later stage of that same Boon or Affliction.

*The Hungry Fangs Affliction and Wooden Effigy Boon now impact Resolve multiplicatively, instead of being additive with stats that impact resolve on Relics.

*Tweaked the position of the skulls that fire tracking beams in the third floor of the Sanctum.

*Updated the Prayer Beads Boon to clarify Resolve is able to be lost after the next room has been completed.

Other Improvements
*Added support for the new Core Supporter Packs.

*Added five more microtransactions to Kirac's Vault Pass in the form of these additional mystery boxes from Path of Exile's past: Warlord, Polaris, Twilight, Harmony and Sin/Innocence.

*Huck now brings along his Rogue Equipment when accompanying you in Maps.

*Significantly increased the experience gained from killing Metamorph Monsters.

*You can no longer animation-cancel Vaal Venom Gyre, Vaal Volcanic Fissure, Vaal Blade Flurry, Vaal Caustic Arrow and Vaal Molten Strike before the point in the animation that damage is dealt.
The Balance of Terror Unique Jewel no longer has a level requirement.

*Completing the Mastermind's Lair now awards credit towards the Suspicious Syndicate challenge.
Updated one component of the Complete Harbinger Encounters challenge to "Use any Harbinger, Ancient or Fracturing Orb", instead of just Fracturing Orb.

*Updated various descriptions of conditional modifiers, such as the increased Damage against Ignited Enemies modifier on Gang's Momentum, to clarify the kinds of damage they can apply to.

*Updated the "Cycling Resistances" monster modifier text to "Cycling Damage Reduction" as it is more accurate.

*The Cartographer Divination Card has received new flavour text.

Path of Exile Update 3.20.1 Patch Notes – Blight Atlas Passive Changes
*The Blight Atlas Passives that provided your Maps with Blight Encounters a chance to contain an additional Blight Encounter have irreconcilable issues that result in areas with two Blight Encounters failing to generate reliably, so we have replaced these stats.

*The small Atlas Passives now provide "5% chance on Completing your Maps to gain a free use of the Blight Map Crafting Option."

*The small Atlas Passive at the entry of this cluster that provided your maps a +4% chance to contain a Blight Encounter now provides "Lanes of Blight Encounters in your Maps have 5% chance for an additional Reward Chest" and "2% chance on Completing your Maps to gain a free use of the Blight Map Crafting Option."

*The Mycelial Swarm Notable Atlas Passive now provides "Blight Map Crafting Option is always available" and "50% reduced cost of the Blight Map Crafting Option."

The Seismic Trap Saboteur is a league start All-rounder that excels in single target and can take on most Endgame Bosses on a moderate budget. This build is a fast mapper and has no issues running straight to Red Maps. Throw your traps swiftly, and escape easily with this hit and run play style.

Ascendancy

The Saboteur is our choice as it offers many Trap bonuses and important defensive improvements.

*Born in the Shadows Blinds all nearby enemies & gives you 15% reduced damage taken from Blinded enemies.

*Pyromaniac is our main source of recovery, granting 10% Life Regeneration and Immunity to Ignite and Shock.

*Perfect Crime grants additional damage for each Trap out. Make sure to use many Traps while Seismic is out to boost your damage.

*Chain Reaction for Trap Cooldown Recovery and Area of Effect gives a HUGE boost to overall Seismic Trap damage output.

Key Build Infor
There is a respec out of Toxic Strikes. Only do this after you've Anointed your Amulet with Toxic Strikes. Make sure to synchronize the Gear, Skill and Passive Tree progression. The Mid Game Passive Tree and Skill Gems should only be swapped to after obtaining The Devouring Diadem.

Playstyle
When playing as Seismic Trap Saboteur your primary focus is to lay down your Seismic Trap in good spots and to make sure you keep enemies within your Traps AOE to maximize your damage output.

Mapping
While mapping, Exsanguinate Traps are your main source of clear. Spam them near targets; only throw Seismic Trap to help clear out very dense screens and tougher enemies. Shield Charge and Flame Dash to get you quickly to the next monster or out of danger.

Bossing
Use your Malevolence to activate it's temporary Aura effect. Throw all Seismic Trap charges onto the boss before triggering the fight when possible (Lab, Map bosses, starts of Pinnacle Bosses). Then throw 6-9 Blade Traps (making sure to not hit your trap limit and over-ride your Seismic Trap). Trigger the boss, curse them with Despair and Temporal Chains while also proccing your Focus cooldown (when you get one).

Pantheon
For Major Pantheon, select Brine King to gain Immunity to Freeze and Reduction of Chill Effect. This bonus is not baseline and needs to be acquired with a Divine Vessel.

For Minor Pantheon, select Shakari and upgrade it. This gives you defences against Poisons and Chaos Degens.

Skill Gems
Purchase 2 Items that have 3 Green sockets for your weapon swap. Put six Seismic Trap in your Weapon Swap to Level while your progress your Atlas. Corrupt them to Level 21 once they hit Level 20. This is how your Gem setup should look like before entering Maps:

*Armour: Seismic Trap - Awakened Unbound Ailments Support - Advanced Traps Support - Trap and Mine Damage Support - Awakened Deadly Ailments Support - Empower Support.

*Grace - Herald of Agony - Summon Skitterbots - Determination.

*Malevolence - Divine Blessing Support - Shield Charge - Faster Attacks Support

*Boots: Exsanguinate - Trap Support - Cluster Traps Support - Chain Support

*Boots: Withering Touch Support - Cluster Traps Support - Additional Accuracy Support - Blade Trap

*Cast when Damage Taken Support - Molten Shell - Flame Dash

*Despair - Temporal Chains - Withering Step

*Ring: Defiance Banner

End Game Gem Setup
Purchase and use a Level 3 Empower Support to link in your Body Armour after you've obtained a Skin of the Lords. You need a Divergent Herald of Agony to drop some Poison Chance on the tree, and an Anomalous Molten Shell for an extra boost in your defence.

Skill Tree

Recommended Farming Content
The first step is to progress through the Atlas following our Atlas Progression Guide. This build can farm all the content in POE, so these are just general guidelines. If you're struggling in higher tier content it is always recommended you go a step back and farm up more Currency and Gear. Clicking the League Mechanics below takes you to either a full Explanation Guide or a detailed Currency Farming Guide based around maximizing your profits from that mechanic or content.

The Explosive Arrow Ballista Elementalist is a great Allrounder Leaguestarter. It kills bosses with huge Ignites and clears whole screens of monsters with the Ignite Proliferation Support. For how strong the build is, it does have some intricate mechanics, which means attention to detail matters! This build doesn't require any Uniques or specific stats to start with but can upgrade to an absolute monster in the late game, making it perfect for a leaguestart scenario.

Important Skills

1) Explosive Arrow
Explosive Arrow supported with Ballista Totem Support is our main damage dealer.
It applies Fuses that explode after a short duration. The more Fuses the enemy had, the more damage they take.
Firing this skill with Ballistas enables us to apply more fuses in a shorter time period, resulting in bigger Ignites overal.

Ascendancy
1) The Elementalist is an easy choice for Explosive Arrow as it offers incredible boosts to Damage, Area of Effect and Defensive Capabilities.

2) Shaper of Flames allows ALL of your damage to Ignite, not just Fire Damage (this even includes Chaos Damage). Shaper of Flames also makes "Hits always Ignite", which means you don't need any Chance to Ignite at all.

3) Mastermind of Discord reduces Elemental Resistances of our enemies, making it a great tool against Bosses and highly resistant enemies.

4) Heart of Destruction gives you a huge Area of Effect Bonus while clearing hordes of monsters, converting the bonus to Damage instead whenever you face a Unique Enemy.

5) Bastion of Elements gives you a huge defensive layer against elemental damage, while also making it so your Ballistas' damage can't be reflected back to them.

Mistakes to Avoid
1) Getting Added Fire Damage on Gear
This disables your Exposure caused by Elemental Equilibrium (explained above).
Remember that with Shaper of Flames, all damage Ignites, not just Fire Damage. This means Cold and Lightning Damage do the same thing as added Fire Damage without disabling Exposure!
While "added Fire Damage" is bad, "increased Fire Damage" is completely fine and a great stat to have to increase your Ignite Damage!

2) Having a Source of Pierce/Chain or Fork
Explosive Arrow only puts a Fuse onto the last enemy it hits.
If you, for example, have "Projectiles Pierce 1 additional Target" and are up against a boss, it pierces through that enemy and applies no Fuses whatsoever. This completely invalidates your build, so be careful!

3) Using Barrage Support
Barrage Support might seem good because it helps you apply your Fuses faster. However, we hit the Maximum Fuse Count of 20 easily without it, so using it more than halves our damage, for no gain.
Stick to the recommended Support Gems in the Skill Gem Section!

4) Ignoring Accuracy
Explosive Arrow kinda looks like a spell, but it's an attack and therefore adheres to Accuracy scaling. If you don't have enough Accuracy (98-100% recommended) your fuses are going to miss, resulting in smaller explosions and Ignites!

5) Using Slow Bows
Your Attack Rate is as critical as the damage of your Ignites.
Slow attacking Bows look good on paper, but are actually really bad due to their low Attack Rate. This is also why Storm Cloud is such a good choice early on!

Key Leveling Notes
While this is a build guide for Explosive Arrow, we primarily use Holy Flame Totem and Flame Wall to level until 32. This is because 32 is the correct time to complete the Normal Labyrinth. Upon getting Shaper of Flames, switching over to using Explosive Arrow will be much easier.

This build will do Library in Act 3 to gain Explosive Arrow, Ballista Totem Support, Determination, Grace, and Purity of Elements. These gems won't be used for now, but are instead put in your gear to level up. Gems gain XP even in your off-hand!

The "Wand Craft" is the easiest way to make any caster leveling better. Selling a magic wand, an Orb of Alteration, and a normal Topaz Ring produces a wand like this: Snapping Driftwood Wand.

If you need a magic wand, purchase a 3-linked Wand from Nessa with favorable colors, those being Blue-Blue-Green, Blue-Blue-Blue, or Blue-Green-Red. Then use an Orb of Transmutation on it. If you need a Topaz Ring, you can sell an Iron Ring with any Skill Gem that is colored Green.

Skill Gems
1) Two-Handed Ranged: Explosive Arrow - Ballista Totem Support - Ignite Proliferation Support - Lifetap Support - Awakened Deadly Ailments Support - Awakened Burning Damage Support

2) Arcanist Brand - Flammability - Flame Surge

3) Determination - Grace - Defiance Banner - Precision

4) Lightning Spire Trap - Combustion Support

5) Frenzy - Faster Attacks Support

6) Vaal Molten Shell

7) Flame Dash

8) Summon Lightning Golem

Skill Tree

Explosive Arrow Setup
Explosive Arrow supported by Ballista Totem Support is our main damage dealer. We add Faster Attacks Support to apply fuses faster and Ignite Proliferation Support to improve clearspeed.
Once you have a fifth link, add Deadly Ailments Support and as a 6th link add Elemental Damage with Attacks Support.
Once you are at endgame and you have Divine Orbs to buy better gear, replace Deadly Ailments Support with the better Awakened Deadly Ailments Support and Elemental Damage with Attacks Support with Awakened Burning Damage Support.

Arcanist Brand Setup
Arcanist Brand triggers supported skills on enemies it is attached to.
One of the skills you trigger is Flame Surge, which applies a Burning Ground that deals damage to enemies standing on it.
The other skill is your main curse: Flammability, which reduces enemy Fire Resistances, which is especially important against Bosses and tanky rares.

Aura Setup
Your 3 main Auras are used to increase your defensive capabilities.
First, Determination grants you a huge amount of Armour, which reduces incoming Physical Damage significantly. On top of that, you use Grace which grants a chance to evade enemy attacks outright.

These Auras are supplemented by Defiance Banner which increases both Armour and Evasion further. Don't think too much about putting your banner down, it's mostly there for the passive bonus it gives.

On top of the defensive Auras, you also have Precision, which increases your Accuracy substantially. This solves one of your weaknesses, since you are a Bow Build starting in the Witch area.

The amount of Reservation Precision takes depends on its level, so always check if you can support leveling it up before!

Combustion Trigger
Lightning Spire Traps only purpose is hitting enemies to apply the Combustion Support debuff. Because of Ancestral Bond, you don't deal damage yourself, therefore you are unable to Ignite an enemy and apply Combustion Support. To circumvent that, use a Trap because it still deals damage.

Movement Skill
Use Flame Dash as your main Movement Skill. No Support Gems are needed.

Frenzy
Whenever you hit an enemy with Frenzy, you gain a Frenzy Charge, which gives you more Damage and increased Attack Speed. To refresh them during boss fights you need to land an attack periodically. Faster Attacks Support is only there to make the skill feel smoother.

Vaal Molten Shell
Molten Shell gives you a defensive shield that can absorb enemy damage depending on how much Armour you have. Since Molten Shell has no cast-time, put it on your left-mouse button(move) to automatically activate it whenever the cooldown is up. Vaal Molten Shell is something you only press whenever you are in danger. It makes you almost invincible whenever it is active.

Lightning Golem
Summon Lightning Golem increases your Attack Speed slightly. It's not important for the build but it's better than nothing. If you are starved for sockets, this is the gem to cut first.

Summary
Explosive Arrow Ballista is an incredible Allrounder Build that can take you through everything Path of Exile has to offer.

You place Ballistas, which are small turrets that shoot and do damage for you, unleashing huge Ignites in the process.

This playstyle allows you to dodge enemy attacks and deal damage at the same time.

This build rewards players who care about small upgrades and attention to detail, since there are certain pitfalls you can succumb to. If you overcome those hurdles, you will have an incredibly strong build.

Should I go corrupting fever gladiator? or maybe it's time to try out Explosive Arrow Ballista Elementalist? What about Lightning Strike? I don't know about you, but I'm sure lots of people having a really hard time choosing what build a league start this time. Of course this is nothing new at this point, it's practically tradition to try between different builds before the new league actually starts. I can't be the only one that make the build guides, you're probably flooded with guides of the absolute best league starters builds for POE 3.20, so let's just dissect what makes a good League starter for you.

First off, what qualifies as a good League starter is incredibly subjective, we've each had our own experiences with different builds, and we will naturally compare other builds. Some people even only play one build for many years and won't settle for anything less than being an Uber boss killer on day one of the league. On the other hand, some one just started playing the game last league, and it is really hoping you can make it to maps clearing this time around a good build with less POE Currency costing.

Three Main Build Genre
But if you're playing in hardcore or ruthless or solo self, then it goes without saying that you'll absolutely need to factor builds aspect into your choice of League starter. So I like to separate builds into three main categories. First up, Fast Mappers, these are builds designed with running through maps fast and efficiently, think about auto bombers cast on crit builds. So on the goal for these guys is to blast through as many screens of the monsters per second as possible, while still doing enough damage to kill map bosses without too much trouble.

Secondly we've got Bossers, Bossers are builds meant for killing end game bosses with ease oftentimes, these are either totems traps, or mines, or minion builds, since they have a big uptime advantage on their DPS compared to other types of builds, allowing them to just run around dodging everything coming at them. While these builds can still complete Maps, they would rather be spending their time in actual end game Boss Fights once they have all.

The last big category is All Rounders, these are builds that don't specialize in either fast mapping or easy bossing, but are competent enough in both, they're in the middle and are generally safe builds to play if your goal is to just get through maps and do some endgame bossing, like spark and toxic rain builds.

Keep in mind that builds in this category could usually be pushed in either direction if you really wanted to with enough Currency Orbs investment, so those are the three main types of bills that I think of.

Other Build Genre
However these categories only really encompass good or meta builds, what about your funky Glacial Hammer builds or Firestorm? These types of builds I would put under the For Fun category, just as important as any of the other types of builds, Fou Fun builds are oftentimes interesting and not necessarily good builds, don't get me wrong, they could come up to a totally crazy build as well, and I wouldn't be all that surprised. But generally when playing one of these builds, the expectation is that you'll eventually hit a wall in progression where you either need to farm up a bunch of currency for better gear to push past it, or just decide to play something else. If you're okay with that, and just want to explore new builds that look fun to you, this is the way to go finally.

The last category that comes to my mind I've simply dubbed Other, these are good builds that are hyper focused on accomplishing a specific thing that isn't mapping or Bossing, like specific builds for currency farming or something else. Reddit and Poe ninja are all helpful places to find build ideas, just find something that looks fun to you.

So here are two good Mapper I would like to recommend that can be used widely in POE 3.20 Expansion.

Build Recommendation
Mapper One:
Corrupting Fever Champion is a top League start Mapper created with a focus on speed, explosions and survivability. For the skills, we can use Corrupting Fever, Kinetic Blast,Utility and Auras, Reap, Vulnerability. As the main skill, Sacrifice the blood in your veins to activate Corrupting Fever, causing hits against enemies to apply a stacking Corrupting Blood debuff causing Physical Damage over Time.

Meanwhile Utility and Auras is our primary movement ability providing quick progress through maps. To escape in the blink of an eye, use Frostblink to instantly teleport away evading large telegraphed attacks or quick reactive abilities. Unleash your anger and become frenzied with Blood Rage giving you Frenzy Charges on kill and additional attack speed. Thus Champion is the best choice as it offers the best defences in the game and gives you very powerful damage through Adrenaline and Aura effect.

Playstyle
When playing as the Corrupting Fever Champion you aim and click your Kinetic Blast into large monster packs applying the Corrupted Blood debuff and applying a separate bleed which triggers your Haemophilia on kill explosions. Every 20 seconds reactivate Corrupting Fever to take your Life down below 50%, triggering First to Strike, Last to Fall giving Adrenaline.

Mapping
When mapping as the Corrupting Fever Champion apply your Corrupted Blood to enemies with Kinetic Blast and then quickly Shield Charge to the next pack of monsters. For stronger enemies use Reap to quickly dispatch them.

Skill Gems
Gems are a fundamental part of your build, and getting the correct link setups and levels before entering Maps is your main goal. This is how your Gems look throughout the endgame stage of progression.

*Corrupting Fever - Awakend Brutality Support - Awakend Swift Affliction Support - Efficacy Support - Empower Support - Reap

*Anomalous Kinetic Blast - Maim Support - Greater Multiple Projectiles Support - Lifetap Support

*Flam Dash - Lifetap Support - Storm Brand - Culling Strike Support

*Handed Ranged: Malevolence, Tempest Shiled, Enduring cry

*Shiled: Shiled charge - Faster Attacks Supports - War Banner

*Cast When Damage Taken Support - Molten Shell, Pride - Vitality

At this point in the build your gearing should be starting to finalize. Purchase from another Player or grind from Syndicate missions a T4 Vorichi in the research branch to switch a random number of sockets into White. This allows you to easily swap your Kinetic Blast setup to a Frenzy and Maim Support setup which allows you to obtain Frenzy Charges on bosses while also causing them to take 10% increased Physical Damage from being Maimed.

The next big upgrade is to purchase an Empower Support at Level 4 to put in your 6-Link and a Anomalous Kinetic Blast giving you an additional 2 Pierce. Your Auras change to include a Vitality and Tempest Shield at the cost of your Herald of Purity. This is because you obtain such a valuable amount of Life recovery and Spell Block, and your gear is good enough to give a bit of damage up for that.

Skill Tree

Mapper Two:

Poison Blade Vortex Occultist offers one of the smoothest mapping experiences of any league starter build thanks to Profane Bloom explosion chains and Plague Bearer. Combining these skills allows fast map clearing with a low investment, however it can be min maxed to be fantastic for late endgame as well.

The Occultist is the best choice for Poison Blade Vortex as it provides explosions for great clear, and an additional curse. It also gives an easy way to cap your Chaos Resistance whilst reducing enemies resistances and additional free applications of Wither stacks for even more damage.

*Profane Bloom causes your curses to have a chance to consume the corpse of your enemies, triggering an explosions dealing a quarter of their Maximum Life to nearby enemies.

*Void Beacon gives nearby enemies -20% to Chaos Resistance and prevents them from regenerating Life.

*Withering Presence applies a Wither stack to nearby enemies for every second you are near them, gives you +60% to Chaos Resistance, and makes you deal 15% more Chaos Damage.

*Malediction allows you to inflict an additional Curse on enemies.

Mapping
Activate your Blade Vortex and repeat casting until you've reached 10 blades. Charge through packs until you're at Maximum Plague Value. Activate your Plague Bearer and Shield Charge through packs of monsters, letting your Profane Bloom explode packs whilst maintaining 10 Blade Vortex stacks.

Bossing
Save your Plague Bearer to use on the Map Boss if you know you are nearing it. Apply your Curses and activate Plague Bearer to inflict additional damage. If you have the Vaal version of Blade Vortex; Vaal Blade Vortex this is the best time to use it to best make use of the additional poisons it can inflict.

Skill Gems
Gems are an fundamental part of your build, getting the correct link setups before entering Maps and leveling those Gems as you progress through the Atlas is one of your main goals.

*Armour: VAAL BLADE VORTEX - AWAKENED UNBOUND AILMENTS SUPPORT - AWAKENED UNLEASH SUPPORT - AWAKENED DEADLY AILMENTS SUPPORT - EFFICACY SUPPORT - AWAKENED VOID MANIPULATION SUPPORT

*DIVINE BLESSING SUPPORT - MALEVOLENCE - INCREASED DURATION SUPPORT

*Shield: AWAKENED BLASPHEMY SUPPORT - TEMPORAL CHAINS - PUNISHMENT

*Helmet: RACE - DETERMINATION - DIVERGENT HERALD OF AGONY - ENLIGHTEN SUPPORT

*CAST WHEN DAMAGE TAKEN SUPPORT - MOLTEN SHELL, SHIELD CHARGE - FASTER ATTACKs SUPPORT

*PLAGUE BEARER - AWAKENED INCREASED AREA OF EFFECT SUPPORT - EMPOWER SUPPORT - EMPOWER SUPPORT

*Ring: DESPAIR

Skill Tree:

Hey guys, this time before the POE 3.20 league starts, I wanted to do some quickly guides on some small things that we explored throughout the week. Some things you might have missed some interesting items and some interactions, maybe it can help you out.

Mark of Submission
So firstly let's get into curse on hit, and why Mark of Submission is an incredible start into the league, and might even hold out for a long time until End Game Gear. Most curses like Despair got nerfed quite a bit this league, they got normalized which means the difference between level one and a level 20 gem is quite huge. That's pretty rough when Curson hit only let you apply level one, especially because you also can't get increased effect anymore from them, it's straight up triggers so now for a lot of the other builds like Flammability, maybe it's not that big thing, you have a lot of sources of minus resistance.

There's also penetration on hit based builds, but on chaos builds if you don't have the minus 20 resistance, there is literally nothing else in the game at least. So the difference between -50 and -30 especially a League start is huge. So basically this ring gives you an extra -18 resistance, not even talking about that this ring just consistently costs one chaos, it's impossible for this one to go up really, because it is just so common versus a curse on hit ring.

What I'm trying to say, especially if your chaos based build, get yourself a Mark of Submission. If you're in a cultist, do not forget that enemies only explode if they're actually cursed, stuff like Blasphemy will not count to enemies that aren't around you, so if you off screen then it doesn't explode.

Tainted Orb of Fusing
Number two, Tainted Orb of Fusing just got buffed, it's gonna be a lot easier to get six links if you guys played Scourge. That is a huge buff for mostly spells, because it will be quite easy to get more common six links that you would use, like Cloak of Flame, Lightning Coil. If you're running any of these even a Belly of the Beast can be an incredible damage boost, and definitely do not use Fusings unless you absolutely have to always use Tainted Orb of Fusing.

Actually it should be even easier to get Tainted Orb of Fusing, so you can get like plus two AOE, plus two projectile, plus two duration, just look out for it, they're obviously going to be sought after. But with some of these uniques, they're just so common and it is going to be impossible not to find a good one, which means if you have one of these chests, you get 20% more damage for free.

Withering Step
Another small tip, if poison build is one of your main builds with Withering Step, then just make sure that if you're assassin, don't take this node, or if you have boots with elusive, remove them. Because the Nerf on Withering Stepp does not just mean that you can't reset the elusive, it also means that you can't even activate, it also negating all the Wither you could get.

Meanwhile, there is a currency that people are freaking out currently, which is called Fraction and we don't know anything about this orb. We don't know how rare it is, but a lot of people are talking about early farming. I'm not so sure about this now, but don't get me wrong, this orb is insane at early game. Now my guess would be that this is probably very hard to get, so people are not just going to grind it in their early game, it's going to be something that people looking for after day four or day five, some people even after two weeks. So I don't know how good it is to farm this early.

Do you have any build puzzles for new league? Do not worry, today I would give you a build for the upcoming 3.20 sanctum league, and this is not necessarily the safest league starter, but it is for a melee league started build that lots of people asked, specifically using the new skills, Volcanic Fissure. Today we're going to give you some ideas of how can you use it in game play.

First of all I have to say Volcanic Fissure is a new skill, so actually it is incredibly unsafe and I am not going to recommend this for new players usually. However you can check the POE Ninja for some good players or  builds, check out what they're doing.

We don't really know what's going to be some upsides and downsides for this skill indetails, but if you are a new player, we do have a lot of other league starters that are going to be safer, but we wanted to make sure that we put this out there, for those that really want to try something new.

Then let's talk little bit about the theory for this build, how do things work and what are you planning to do. Current plan could be Trinity Support with Winter Spirit, and Hatred. Hatred's really good on Champion, because you have a bunch of horror effect, Ele weakness is also quite strong. So obviously this is not a full build guide, because the skill is not out yet, but asking questions and see what's going on as a backup option is good for everyone. A really nice thing about this build is that it is a champion so there are so many things you could try into it. If the build ends up being trashed, and obviously you can just remake a new character.

It is always a huge risk to start with a new skill, because if it end up being bad, it could affect you quite a lot. For example when you're playing in trade stuffs, and you're trying to get to maps first to make a lot of Divine Orbs, it is a risk when you start league with this skill.

So right now you can see that in POE Ninja just few people are using this new skills, how they process in the early game is going to be step by step, but obviously, the absolute best day is going to be in the futuer and seeing how they handle everything. Meanwhile things might be changing on the another problem, with the new skill is not updated totally as a part of build yet. As we just got what Volcanic Fissure is going to look like at level 20.

Here is the recommend skills you can use from POE Ninja:

Flask:

*Effervescent Divine Life Flask

*Constant Quicksilver Flask of the Prism

*Practitioner's Jade Flask of the Falcon

*Continuous Quartz Flask of the lbex

*Measured Granite Flask of the Curlew

Read More: League Start Builds for the Forbidden Sanctum in POE 3.20 Expansion

If you are a big fan of rougelike games, and accidentally you love Path of Exile as well, POE 3.20 Expansion The Forbidden Sanctum can be your game of the year.

Read More: PoE The Forbidden Sanctum Will Turns Into A Roguelike Game

So as for the beginners or some players missed POE for a while, what is the priority for a new league start? A proper Build, so today I would like to intro some of my favourite build that may be powerful in POE 3.20 Expansion beginning, without further ado, let's get it.

Bone Shatter Slayer:
The First one is Bone Shatter Slayer, Bone Sheddar is a melee strike skill that whenever you hit an enemy, it also hits you back for a certain amount of physical damage, but in response to that you also get trauma stacks. The more trauma Stacks you have, the more damage your next hit will deal. This build actually has great clear for melee build, and it's probably the only melee build that I'm comfortable putting onto this list.

This build has incredible defenses, you get a ton of armor and a ton of regeneration, with slayer's over leech recovering you thousands of Life per second.

A little bit of a downside here is that with most melee builds you need a little bit of crafting knowledge to get your weapons going, or at least know how to trade for them with different POE Currency Orbs.

This build is not the greatest boss killers ever, and that's mostly because it's just so melee, and quite a few of the very end game bosses are not that forgiving when you're just standing in front of it. if you're a good player and you know boss mechanics, that is no problem whatsoever. For a lot of people, this will be not the best choice, however if you want to be a beefy melee boy, this is the way to go.

Caustic Arrow Poison Ballista Trickster:
If you do not like melee gameplay, we have the Caustic Arrow Poison Ballista Trickster here, Ballista Trickste is a bow projectile that spreads caustic ground whenever it hits an enemy. What a lot of people don't know is that this actually has a hit portion, which deals decent damage. But the big upside is it can actually overlap, meaning you can times 7 to times 9 your damage on something, absolutely insane when you farming bosses.

Meanwhile it still having great area of effect against everything else, and this makes it so you have a lot better damage potential, you can even actually use Caustic Arrow as a main skill. Now the advantage of this build is, the Ballista build it's actually one of the fastest ones, you don't really have any delayed damage.

This build also has incredible single target, especially once you get some of your endgame gear. This is definitely one of those League start builds that you can push all the way into Uber bosses. Another big thing is the trickster ascendancy solves one of the biggest problems that ballista builds usually have, which is life recovery. Trickster polymath node basically takes away all your worries, Caustic Arrow Poison Ballista Trickster is probably the closest league start build to perfect.

Minion builds:
When it comes to that, and at the end, I want to quickly mention Minion builds, now it seems like Minion builds are not in the best state currently, I'm not really sure which build I would link to, and I'm also not very knowledgeable about them. However I suggest that you guys can keep focus on POE Ninja to keep reading and learning, for the latest updates.

That's all predictiones for the top builds list you can use in league start now, there's a lot of builds I didn't mention here, and obviously more of them are viable. If your build is not out here, it doesn't matter, because the main things in POE 3.20 is just have fun. We will keep updating in the future, do not foget following us, see you guys next time.

Path Of Exile's been kicking about for nearly a decade, but it's still receiving hefty chunks of fresh stuff every three months. The latest, roguelike expansion Forbidden Sanctum, was revealed fully during a livestream by devs Grinding Gear Games.

The Forbidden Sanctum throws your character into the foreboding depths of its titular dungeons, challenging them to survive runs as best they can across four floors. Each floor has a boss to tackle, but they are the least of your problems. You'll also stumble into rooms that Grinding Gear's CEO Chris Wilson calls "afflicted". Your character can succumb to minor and major afflictions by entering these rooms, but they can be balanced out or counteracted by finding boons of varying strengths. Afflictions will build up throughout a run, though, making things harder the more you press on further, with better POE Currency loots.

GGG said they've been influenced by a whole batch of different roguelikes while designing The Forbidden Sanctum, from The Binding Of Isaac all the way back to Rogue itself. Every run through the Sanctum will be different. You'll have to keep an eye on your character's resolve level, lowered by enemy attacks and environmental hazards, to prevent them from dropping out. Some rooms present your character with a resolve-refilling fountain, but others have afflicted fountains that offer more than the usual top-up of resolve. As you might expect, these can cause more trouble than they're worth.

Onto the spoils, or why else would you be playing a roguelike? You'll also be presented with choices throughout your run to either accept rewards on the spot or wait to receive better ones after you've taken on a floor's boss and won. To preserve the roguelike experience for players, the devs insist that the powerful relics you come across during runs will be account-linked and not tradeable. Your character will also come across a special altar during their Sanctum exploration, letting you place a relic on it to ensure it won't disappear if you crash out of a run. As with all scary final bosses, the one at the end of Sanctum has some unique items to pick up, that is, if you can best it.

Another expansion isn't all that's coming up for Path Of Exile. There'll be some endgame rebalances, including a rework of the Atlas passive skill tree, and the Ruthless mode intended for endgame players will release when the expansion launches.

Path Of Exile is a free to play download from Steam and the Epic Games Store. You can nab it on PS4 and Xbox One, too. The 3.20 Forbidden Sanctum expansion arrives in-game on December 9th.