Path of Exile 1 News

After 9 years, Path of Exile 1 3.27 finally brings a rework to Assassin class, a Shadow class's Ascendancy. This overhaul is comprehensive, significantly enhancing Assassin class's damage output and survivability.

This is great news for players who have always loved Assassin class. So what specific changes have been made in POE 3.27? Below, I will introduce the changes to Assassin class from two aspects.

Enhanced Damage Output

Previously, Assassin class's damage output was heavily criticized. As an Assassin, it was difficult to kill enemies quickly, especially against shielded enemies. POE Keepers of the Flame clearly considered these issues and optimized three aspects: Critical Strike Chance Notable, Poison's piercing damage, and Power Charge acquisition.

Increased Critical Strike Chance

POE 3.27 added a new Notable to Assassin class's Ascendancies that grants a significant Critical Strike Chance bonus, known as Assassination Style. Unlike other Notables, you can choose between Knife in the Back and For the Jugular.

Both Notables trigger Culling Strike after Critical Strikes. Critical Strike Chance and Critical Strike Multiplier bonuses are related to the enemy's health. Knife in the Back grants 100% Critical Strikes against healthy enemies and 100% Critical Strike Multiplier against low-health enemies. For the Jugular does the opposite.

This bonus has simple trigger conditions and is the primary source of increased damage in the new Assassin class.

In addition to Assassination Style, the new Mystical Infusion Notable also increases your Base Spell's Critical Strike Chance, aligning it with your Main Hand Weapon.

Assassin class in Patch 3.27 has an additional effect against Rare or Unique Enemies. This is related to the new Deathmarked Notable, which marks the enemy after you land a Critical Strike, making them unable to dodge your attack and thus increasing its hit rate.

The Deathmarked Notable's mark does not consume Mana. Combined with the previous two Notables that increase Critical Strike Chance, it allows you to virtually mark Rare or Unique Enemies 100% of the time.

Poison Damage Increased

Path of Exile 3.27 rework adjusted The Toxic Delivery Notable and added the Infused Toxins Notable.

In the new league, you'll find that each of your attacks can inflict Poison on enemies, extending Poison duration by up to 100% with repeated attacks. While Poison damage is slightly reduced compared to before, it can increase Critical Strike Chance by up to 2.0%.

And surprisingly, Poison now has strong penetration; it's no longer blocked by enemy shields, so you won't have to struggle too much against enemies with high shields.

Power Charge Acquisition

The Unstable Infusion Notable Ascendancy Passive Skill's overall Power Charge acquisition chance has been increased, with a 5% increase during Critical Strike and a 10% increase during Non-Critical Strike.

This change makes your skill rotation more efficient, allowing you to unleash more skills in the same amount of time. This makes Assassins more effective at clearing enemies and gaining POE Currency.

Also Read: Path Of Exile 3.27 Keepers Of The Flame League Breach Mechanic Explained And Other New Features

Improved Survivability

POE 3.27 also enhances Assassin class's survivability in several ways, making it easier for them to handle high-difficulty challenges.

First, the aforementioned Toxic Delivery Notable Ascendancy Passive Skill has been revamped. It now restores a portion of your health after killing enemies with Poison effect. This Notable is significantly stronger after the adjustments.

Second, the newly added Shadowed Blood Notable has two interesting mechanics: it converts Physical Damage into health, and its health regeneration is unaffected by Damaging Ailments. This allows you to handle high physical damage enemies more easily and is less vulnerable to situations with Damaging Ailments.

Third, the Mistwalker Notable Ascendancy Passive Skill can now dodge all attacks, twice as effective as before. You no longer need to worry about whether you can successfully dodge.

Finally, there's Opportunistic, a Notable specifically designed for situations with multiple Rare and Unique Enemies. POE 3.27 update increased its damage reduction by 15%.

Theoretically, the reworked Assassin class in Path of Exile Keepers of the Flame is still worth anticipating. If it can synergize well with the later updated Bloodline Ascendancies, Assassin's strength could reach an even higher level.

After playing for so many seasons, Abyss scarab farming in PoE 3.26 is undoubtedly the top strategy I’ve tried.

It’s low-cost and much simpler to operate than complex strategies like Blight, and crucially, it’s incredibly profitable.

I wouldn’t be exaggerating to call it the ultimate scarab farming method. Not only does farming it yield tons of scarabs and Divine Orbs, but you’ll also unexpectedly get a bunch of Natural Divination cards, a real bonus.

How To Farm Abyss?

Want to know how I do it? Let me break down the core principles first, so even those who haven’t tried it can quickly grasp them.

The steps are actually quite simple:

First, clear the map as usual, picking up scarabs as you go, leaving no one behind.

Then, clear each Abyss one by one.

Here’s the kicker: thanks to Abyss Scarabs in the building complex, every time an Abyss moves, a ton of mini hoard chests spawn.

Finally, open all the chests and pocket the profits.

Why does this strategy work so smoothly? The answer is The Caster Mastery. This talent gives you a 25% chance to open nearby chests when casting spells. Without it, this gameplay would become a Quickfest speedrun nightmare.

With it, you can advance incredibly quickly through Abyss and easily collect loot.

I specifically choose Tier 16.5 maps with high scarab drop rates; this alone significantly increases profitability.

Atlas Tree

Let’s talk about the Atlas tree. The core idea is to block out mechanics that drop low-cost scarabs, but keep mechanics like Harvest, Blight, and Ultimatum, as these are where most expensive scarabs drop.

I personally play Singular Focus, so I only drop on maps I enjoy. If you want more variety, skip this talent.

I also chose Abyssal Army Cluster for extra mobs and XP, but it’s optional.

You can also invest points in scarab chants and Corrupted Gaze clusters, but these gems aren’t easy to sell, so I prefer scarab chants. For the rest of Atlas, just follow my strategy.

Choosing Scarabs

Scarab selection is also a bit tricky. I always use two Abyss Scarabs and one Abyss Scarab of Edifice; these three are core and can’t be changed.

For the remaining two, I use Cartography Scarab of Corruption, which drops eight more mod maps.

You’ll also get an Abyss Scarab of Multitudes, allowing you to farm more monsters. If you want to maximize your profits and your build can handle it, you can swap the last two for Scarab of Risk.

However, be aware that this may increase the map difficulty significantly, potentially leading to a complete disaster.

For map equipment, you absolutely must choose equipment with Abyss affix, no question about it. Also, pay attention to the map Tier; Tier 16.5 or 17 is ideal, as scarab drop rates are already higher in these maps.

You can also further increase your chances with Maven’s Chisel of Scarabs. My goal is to get a scarab chance of at least 150% on the map, but higher is better.

The aforementioned Caster Mastery is a real boon for lazy players. I simply run around the map, casting a Punishment Curse that triggers the curse, and chests automatically open, eliminating the need to click on them one by one.

The first time I didn’t have this talent, I couldn’t stand it after just three maps; manually opening chests was too much of a chore.

I’ve also discovered that compared to other farming methods, this strategy yields a truly astonishing number of Natural Divination cards, which is a significant bonus.

That’s pretty much it. Honestly, it’s working incredibly well for me right now, and I highly recommend giving it a try.

Overall, Abyssal Scarab farming in PoE 3.26 is a great strategy worth trying due to its low cost, ease of use, and high returns. Add in the extra drops of Natural Divination cards, and the value for money is excellent. Interested players should give it a try.

In POE 3.26, there is a super practical way to farm experience. The core idea of this method is the same as the strategy shared by some netizens last year. After optimization, it is still powerful now.

Take the blaster character as an example. From level 99 to level 100, you can get more than 100 million XP per hour steadily; if the level is lower than level 99, the XP you get is even more impressive. After all, the experience penalty from level 99 to level 100 is particularly heavy, and the upgrade speed at low levels is like riding a rocket.

Before sharing this strategy in detail, let’s compare it with another more expensive way to reach level 100.

The key to the other method is to rely on an item that can skip the boss - Tul’s Flawless Breachstone.

This method can theoretically earn 200 million XP per hour, but in reality, this Breachstone will require you to fight the boss for extra income. And this method is usually a team rotation system, and people in and out of the team are common. Once these downtimes are deducted, the average experience is greatly reduced.

Domination Scarab Of Evolution Brings Huge Benefits

However, the strategy I am going to introduce can easily catch up with or even exceed that goal. It can be done alone or in a team. The key is that you can also get a lot of POE Divine Orbs by the way. It is simply killing two birds with one stone.

The core mechanism of this strategy is Domination Scarab of Evolution. Simply put, when you kill monsters with Evolving Shrine Buffs, they will evolve.

This means that white monsters will become magic monsters, magic monsters will become rare monsters, and the monsters you encounter will be more challenging, but each evolution of them will also mean more experience points. Benefits and risks coexist.

How To Farm Experience Quickly?

So, the operation process is very clear. Once you enter the map, you must run to one of the Shrines. Once you get Evolving Shrine buff, immediately open all Breakes, and open as many as possible, so that you can sweep the entire map as quickly as possible.

Here is a little trick to make the effect even better. Wearing The Gull (a unique Raven Mask) can buy players extra time before the critical Evolution Shrine buff disappears, which is really useful.

In addition, each map has two Evolution Shrines. Our goal is to complete Breakes within the duration of the buff of these two Shrines, which gives us exactly 3 minutes to complete the entire map.

What is reassuring is that the map we chose is 8-Mod Jungle Valley, which has an incredibly high density of breakes and is very efficient to farm.

However, I would like to remind you that this strategy has a prerequisite. Either you or someone in your team must have fast AoE clearing capabilities, otherwise the effect will be greatly reduced.

Map Setup

To better execute the strategy, we also need to have a good map setup.

Let’s look at the Map Device first. You need to prepare two Domination Scarabs of Evolution, each of which consumes about 1 Chaos Orb, and three Breach Scarabs, which also consume about one Chaos.

In addition, you need to invest 4 POE Chaos Orbs in the Crafting Bench. With this calculation, a total of 9 Chaos are invested in each map.

There are also some requirements for choosing maps. You need to choose 8-Mod and open layout. The most popular ones are Jungle Valley and Dunes.

Remember, don’t add Delirium Orbs randomly, otherwise it will slow down the speed of farming the map. If your map damage is not enough, the farming experience will be reduced.

Let’s look at Atlas tree. Our focus is to make full use of breathaches. Because of the addition of 8-Mod, the density of breaths will be very high, and with 100% Chance for Beyond, the dense breaths will spawn a large number of Beyond monsters. The combination of the two will give you surprisingly high XP.

As for Eater of Worlds Altars, it is optional. In fact, it may slow down the speed a little because you have to spend time looking at modifiers, but I usually use it when running 8-Mod maps, because if you are lucky, you can encounter Divine Altar, which can produce a lot of Divines, after all, the Quantity and Pack Size there are large.

In general, although the settings related to Eater of Worlds are optional, the effect is indeed quite obvious. This strategy combines Shrines, Beyond and Breach, which is simple to operate but very effective.

This strategy is simple and easy to understand, greatly improves the efficiency of farming XP, and also drops unexpected surprises. When players master this operation method, they can easily upgrade in POE 3.26 and deal with highly challenging tasks with ease.

In POE 3.25, the developers have made adjustments to the game's physical Damage Taken As modifiers. Purity Watcher's Eye modifiers have ushered in a new version, and physical strike damage taken as two elements instead of the previous corresponding elements.

For example, when the player is affected by Purity of Fire, 10% to 20% of Cold And Lightning damage will be taken as Fire.

Note that the scope of these modifiers is not just strike damage, but all damage. This adjustment has greatly weakened Fizz Taken As Setups, but don't be discouraged, because new defense settings have also been set.

When Divine Flesh, Font Of Thunder, Purity Of Lightning Watches Eye Modifiers are combined, all Fire and Cold Damage can be converted to Chaos or Thunder Damage.

In Secrets of the Atlas, there is a gem that is very similar to Watcher's Eye, which is Bound By Destiny. It can only be obtained from the three new Pinnacle bosses and is very rare.

When you defeat Pinnacle boss, other unprecedented rewards will also drop, such as powerful weapons and a large amount of POE Currency.

Bound by Destiny will randomly trigger three modifiers, each of which will only be triggered when a certain number of affected items of a specific type are equipped.

This modifier is powerful and applies to all elemental damage (including continuous damage), but the only drawback is that it needs to be affected by a specific aura to take effect, which has a trade-off mechanism.

To use this modifier, you need to equip four Hunter Influenced items, which may include Influenced items crafted with Awakener's Orb. In addition, you can also get influenced core drop unique items.

When a Unique is in the core drop pool and meets the conditions of being a Unique of that specific base type, the player can use an Omen of Fortune. However, there are some Divination Cards that are chosen from the random pool and will award Influenced Uniques.

Chaos Inoculation & Incandescent Heart

Bound By Destiny Modifier damage does not bypass Energy Shield, and can be used with Chaos Inoculation to remove 10% of Elemental Damage as Chaos Damage, which is a very powerful effect.

Bound By Destiny Modifier and Incandescent Heart are also a great combination, 35% of Elemental Damage is removed from the calculation, leaving 65% as normal damage reduction, and there is no way to break the damage reduction mechanism.

Divine Flesh & Font of Thunder

Let's focus on the powerful Divine Flesh & Font of Thunder combination. At max check, with this modifier on, 60% of Elemental Damage you take is Chaos Damage, and 40% of Cold And Fire is converted to Lightning.

This is much better than using Purity Of Lightning Watches Eye Modifier, as you take more Chaos Damage, and Divine Flesh itself provides 5% additional Chaos Resistance.

Second, this also helps with Lightning Penetration, allowing you to avoid 60% of damage penetration, while avoiding all Fire and Cold Penetration.

Since most damage is taken as chaos, focus on Chaos Resistance, or use other methods to mitigate Chaos Damage.

My suggestion is stacking Born Of Chaos Clusters, or utilizing Doppelgänger Guise Unique Armor, or utilizing Fourth Vow, and you can also upgrade Soul Of Shikari Pantheon to reduce Chaos Damage by 5%.

However, be careful with Shock Modifier of Font Of Thunder. This can be solved with Shock Avoidance or Immunity, but that is only one setting enabled by this new Dual Modifier.

Divine Flesh & Flawed Refuge

Divine Flesh & Flawed Refuge can replace Font Of Thunder to perform the same function, making 40% of Elemental Damage be Taken As Physical Damage.

This combination is the nemesis of Elemental Penetration, you will be immune to it and will not be affected by any negative effects of Elemental Penetration and Shield.

One thing to note is that this modifier only applies to hits, which is different from Font Of Thunder. Therefore, for 40% of Elemental Damage without Damage taken as chaos, if it is continuous Elemental Damage, you will convert it to Elemental Damage normally.

However, you can still get some benefits from this Shield, such as when using Juggernaut, when other item combinations reach 100% damage taken, this Bound By Destiny Modifier will fill the gap before.

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Due to the rarity of Purity Of Fire Sublime Vision, it is now expensive, and it may cost dozens of POE Divine Orbs to get it, which is not a good deal. However, it can still deal 100% damage without Purity Of Fire Sublime Vision, but 10% Taken As Chaos Damage.

Secondly, by using Tempered By War, Dawnreaker and Purity Of Fire Watchers Eye, and Bound By Destiny Modifier, 90% of cold and lightning damage can be converted to fire, and 10% Elemental Damage can be converted to Chaos. It also allows aura skills to get rid of Sublime Vision restrictions and reduce damage by 10% when using Bound By Destiny Modifier.

Similar to Font Of Thunder Setup, this combination can convert 60% of Elemental Damage to Chaos and 40% of Cold and Lightning Damage to Fire damage, which is more resistant to Fire Penetration than Tempered By War Setup, but may be more fragile.

How To Use These Setups?

Doppelgänger Guise, Fourth Vow and Juggernaut mentioned above are all perfect matches for Divine Flesh.

For example, Juggernaut can convert 15% of Armor into Chaos Damage it causes. When combined with Divine Flesh, the damage will bypass Energy Shield, and it can also reduce Physical Damage by 10% when Energy Shield is full (it is always full).

Of course, there are other combinations, such as Eldrich battery with Energy Shield, or Font of Thunder or Fire Setup, using Purity Aura and Atacking Maximum Resistance Jewels to increase the Resistance limit to 90%.

Bound By Destiny Modifier really adds a lot of diverse challenges to POE. It is powerful and can easily realize quite a lot of defensive formations. Although the concept may be a little complicated, I believe that players can gradually appreciate its charm in the process of exploring the function.