News Tag: Poe 2 Some Nerfs

Last week, Path of Exile 2 Early Access, which has been at the forefront of the storm since its release, released a major update Patch 0.2.0 Dawn of the Hunt, which added a lot of new game content, such as the new Huntress class, new Ascendancies and a large amount of new endgame content, and most importantly, brought a new league to players.

While adding these new additions to the game, Grinding Gear Games also weakened some of the original classes, skills and gains in order to ensure fairness and justice in the game. The purpose is to bring the thrilling movie-like campaigns of POE 2 to a wider audience and promote the release of its own 1.0 full version.

In this case, some builds that are frequently used by players in the three months after the release will also be affected by the weakening. This guide will show you which builds will no longer be strong in the new leagues after this POE 2 Patch 0.2.0, and which previously unremarkable builds will become more prominent, so that you can make it easier in the future.

General Nerfs

We will start with the general adjustments. Now you are more vulnerable to freeze and shock ailments in combat, but it takes longer to accumulate and stack when you inflict this damage type on the enemy. In addition, when you are hit by an enemy attack that causes heavy stuns, the duration you suffer will be tripled and cannot be blocked or dodged.

So, in most cases, you will definitely die if you are hit by such an attack. The only way to get out of this situation is to buy POE 2 Currency to enhance your mobility and defense before the battle to ensure that you can successfully pass this painful stage.

Not only that, the base duration of Endurance, Frenzy, and Power Charges has been reduced from 20 seconds to 15 seconds, which means that you will have a harder time stacking them during combat and casting higher damage capabilities.

Skills that provide buffs to allies around you also have a significant reduction in radius of presence, which you can see visually change by hovering over the relevant skills.

A look at some of the changes made to POE 2’s massive passive skill tree: the twelve Jewel sockets that could provide you with some big buffs in the endgame have all been removed, making the more difficult game content more challenging.

Note that you can use the command /reclaimjewels in the chat interface with other players to retrieve all the gems you have equipped. Meanwhile, the previously popular Eldritch Battery Keystone, which converts energy shields into mana, will greatly increase your mana consumption during combat, making its usable value much lower.

The nerfs to the passive skill nodes of Falcon Technique, Master Fletching and Spaghettification will also have a big impact on the current player’s build, more or less reducing their own offensive and defensive capabilities.

Advanced Nerfs

In addition to the usual minor tweaks above, there are some changes that have a direct impact, such as Archmage being severely nerfed and the number of projectiles produced by Spark being greatly reduced, so builds that used to be efficient at clearing endgame maps with these two skill gems in previous game content may have a problem surviving in the new Dawn of the Hunt league.

Flame Wall, one of the players’ favorite auxiliary skill gems before, has now received a significant nerf in the additional damage caused by the projectiles fired when traversing high-level maps. Therefore, many players reasonably suspect that it may be more suitable for leveling builds after Patch 0.2.0, rather than endgame builds.

Decompose skill, which you can get from Corpsewade unique boots, now deals much less poison damage than before, and the range of damage is also reduced.

Additionally, the skills that summon Minions have been significantly impacted: they now deal more damage and have more health when facing higher-level enemies, which means they may not be viable enough to support you through endgame content.

Changes to skills like Cast on Minion Death will significantly hurt the combat power players get when using a Summon Raging Spirits build, as it generates less Spirit each time it is cast, and our skill casting speed and frequency will also be negatively affected.

What’s more, Scepters can now only increase all Levels of all Minion Skills by 4 levels, which is a lot less than the previous maximum. On top of that, the quality of these skills will no longer be multiplied by the amount of Spirit they can provide, which will make builds using minions much less capable of endgame expansion.

The above are some of the nerfs made to the existing game content in the current POE 2 Early Access Patch 0.2.0 Dawn of the Hunt released some time ago. At the same time, we will keep tracking some skills, gems or builds worth trying after the patch is released.

Although the original intention of this change is to promote the fair and just game that players feel in it, judging from the comments on some player communities and social platforms, players want the adjustment to be as a smooth curve, which will give every player enough opportunities to explore Atlas in depth, rather than this cliff-like change. I wish you a happy game!