Natalia_GGG

In Path of Exile: Heist, we're introducing several new skills and reworking some past ones. Today's news post covers more detail of new skills like Blazing Salvo, Steel Skills and the long-awaited Discharge rework.

Blazing Salvo
Blazing Salvo releases a torrent of fiery mortars that can hit enemies as they fly and land in rapid succession, with each mortar causing an explosion. When targeting up close, the explosions can hit a target multiple times, while targeting at range causes them to spread out and have a higher explosion radius, giving you a wide damage spread.

The skill rewards clever positioning, making it well suited to casting by hand or by being careful about placement of totems, traps and mines. Multiple Projectile supports result in more damage up close and more reliable area spread, while Fork lets the mortars split into two if they hit enemies, with each exploding separately. Combine the skill with Void Sphere to draw enemies in for a concent... Read more

In Path of Exile: Heist we're making some changes to curses to provide incentive to self-cast them. We've made some small changes to existing curse mechanics, improved their visuals and added one new curse skill and one new support gem.

An Overview of Curses
Curses are among some of the first skills that were introduced to Path of Exile. Over time, we've introduced a number of ways to take advantage of their mechanics like the Blasphemy Support which creates a curse-aura, or adding the ability to apply curses with the Curse on Hit support.

While having a number of methods of applying a curse is certainly a good thing, there was a lot of automatic-cursing going on and we wanted to give some incentives to those who wanted to take the time to actually cast a curse manually on a pack of monsters.

While we were doing this, it felt like a good opportunity to review all curse gems and see what other improvements could be made. We were going to see if we c... Read more

Alongside Path of Exile: Heist, we're introducing four new skills which produce powerful, long-lasting effects that allow you to take control over an area. The interesting effects generated by each skill mean that they are a good fit alongside a wide variety of builds but also offer a particular benefit to spellcasters that need to stand still to spread damage.

Void Sphere
Void Sphere creates an object that generates a pulse within a large radius. This pulse deals physical and chaos damage and pulls normal, magic and rare enemies toward its centre. The first few pulses generated by Void Sphere have a much greater gravitational pull than subsequent pulses. All enemies in its area of influence will also be hindered. The effect of this debuff increases the closer enemies are to the centre of the sphere. Enemies that die within the area affected by the Void Sphere will have their corpses sucked into the void.

Void Sphere can be useful for controlling dangerous ... Read more

In the coming week, we'll be deploying the 3.11.2 patch which contains many technical changes to the internals of Path of Exile in preparation for the release of Heist. This patch changes the way that Path of Exile stores its data, requiring a complete redownload of the game. There are a number of improvements we have been waiting several years to make which each require a full redownload, so we were able to bundle them all together at this opportunity. Today's news post explains what has changed and why.

Changing how Path of Exile Stores its Data
After a decade of our current technique, we're changing how Path of Exile stores its internal data files. The technical specifics of this are irrelevant to the playerbase, but there are some advantages that we'll detail in this post.

A Full Re-download
Firstly, it's important to understand that this will require a re-download of the entire game for all users. That's a large cost (both in terms of time a... Read more

This September we're teaming up with community streamer Zizaran to host a boss-kill event where players can compete to kill The Awakener while playing in Heist HC SSF mode. Zizaran's event sponsor, Shopify, will be teaming up with him to supply $40,000 to the race's prize pool. On top of the cash prizes for players, there will also be microtransaction prizes provided by us. To top it all off, Shopify will be supplying $13,000 in microtransactions to community streamers to give away during the event! Find out more in this news post.



How to Participate
This event runs for the first month of Heist, starting on September 18 (PDT). Only characters playing in the Heist HC SSF League will be counted for the cash prize.

As normal, you can place Watchstones in Citadels in the Atlas. These level up your maps an... Read more

Yesterday, we posted many answers to the community's most frequently asked questions about our upcoming expansion, Heist. There's even more to discuss, so we're posting another round of answers!

In case you missed it, shortly after Heist's announcement, our Co-Founder and Managing Director, Chris Wilson, was live with ZiggyD for a Q&A. Check it out below!



Do Markers, Contracts and Blueprints drop in other league areas such as Betrayal Safehouses and the Temple of Atzoatl?
Yes, they do.

Will Rogues have juicy banter and dialogue between each other like members of the Syndicate did?
Yes! Our narrative designers, Nick and Matt, have put a huge amount of work into the writing of Heist.

How do Thieves' Trinkets work in a party?
The effect of a Trinket is tied to the ... Read more

Yesterday we revealed the details of our September expansion, Path of Exile: Heist. We've gathered the answers to the most commonly asked questions and put them into one place for you to peruse.

Before you dive in, we wanted to announce that this Thursday at 3pm (PDT) we'll also be participating in an AMA on /r/games to talk about all things Heist and the process of making Path of Exile. Come join us!

Where do you get Markers, Contracts and Blueprints from?
All three drop from monsters throughout the world, including in Delves and the Labyrinth. You can also get Blueprints (Grand Heists) from Contracts (Heists). If you successfully complete a Heist and turn in the Artifact, you'll also receive a sum of Markers greater than you paid to run the Heist.

What do Artifacts do?
Artifacts are the main objective from a (non-Grand) Heist. The Artifact you're seeking will be shown on the contract before the Heist commences. If you complete the Heis... Read more

We're proud to announce Path of Exile: Heist! Hire skilled thieves to help you pull off risky Heists. Steal valuable artifacts to fund and train your crew as you plan towards the execution of a Grand Heist. Our September expansion contains the Heist challenge league, nine new Skills and Support Gems, revamps of Curses, Steel Skills, and various Spells. Grand Heists offer exclusive new rewards such as Weapon and Body Armour Enchantments, Heist Trinkets, Alternate-quality Gems, Replica Unique Items and Experimented Base Types. Please check out the announcement page[pathofexile.com], watch the ... Read more

September 1st marks ten years since Path of Exile was first announced! If you're interested to see how the game looked exactly 10 years ago, check out the announcement trailer below!



Coincidentally, we'll be announcing our next expansion just the next day. We have finished our press tour, having shown our next expansion to 19 news outlets. As usual, the journalist embargo lifts at 2pm PDT (9am NZ time) tomorrow, so you can expect the detailed information and interviews being posted on various news sites alongside the announcement and trailer on our site. In addition, be sure to tune into ZiggyD's stream[www.t... Read more

In just a couple of days we'll be announcing our September expansion! Alongside the announcement we'll also introduce a new set of league supporter packs. In addition to their usual content, these supporter packs will contain a new type of Character Effect which we've wanted to try out for a long time.

These character effects start with a minimal visual effect which charges up as you slay monsters. There are six visual phases until it's at its full glorious effect. After a short time without killing monsters, it will phase back down to its original look.

We've prepared a preview of one of them today. Watch the video below!

If you've ever wanted to design a microtransaction for Path of Exile, now is your chance! In this series of news, we invite the Path of Exile community to cast their vote on a selection of options to design a new microtransaction, these options range from its type, theme, colour scheme, effects etc. Our team will create the final result and make it available at a later date.

We're starting this process with today's poll which will determine which type of microtransaction we design. You get to choose from the following types of cosmetic effects: Helmet, Character Effect, Weapon Effect, Weapon Skin, Skill Effect, Shield, Portal. The poll is available from the time of this post until Tuesday September 1st (PDT) next week. Note that there will be several versions of this poll across the other language news and we'll tally the results together before determining the outcome.

We're very curious to see what will come out of this!

... Read more