Path of Exile 2 Endgame Guide: Unlock the Secrets of Endgame Mechanics

Path of Exile 2 boasts a deep and rich endgame experience with a multitude of systems and content that will keep you glued to your screen. After finishing the acts, your journey will continue in the Ziggurat Refuge. This Path of Exile 2 Endgame guide will cover all the content and activities you'll encounter after reaching level 65 and completing the first three acts on both difficulty settings. Much has evolved since the original game and its Atlas of Worlds. The developers have retained popular elements from the first game's post-campaign content while discarding less successful or exciting aspects.

In PoE 2, the endlessly scalable map system empowers you to design your ideal endgame. It features multiple progression systems and mechanics, allowing you to focus on your preferred activities without feeling obligated to engage with everything. That's the core concept. Now, let's explore the specifics.

 

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The Atlas

In Path of Exile 2, the Atlas is the main endgame, a large and constantly changing map. After the main story, patches of corruption remain across the land, and your goal is to eliminate them.

The Ziggurat, a temple in the center of the atlas, serves as your main area. Here, you open your portals to enter the maps.

To open a portal, you need a Waystone. Waystone tiers determine monster difficulty. You select a connected area on the Atlas, insert a Waystone, and travel to the new location.

Each map is randomly generated, including monster types, visuals, and layout, ensuring a unique experience each time. Your objective is to defeat all rare and unique enemies to complete the map and unlock adjacent areas for exploration. If you die within a map, it's permanently lost, forcing you to find an alternate route through the Atlas.

Maps also contain random encounters beyond regular monster groups:

• Precursor Artifacts: These corrupted relics attract monsters. Defeating these monsters grants a temporary buff for the rest of the map, such as:

Increased movement speed

An elemental shield that damages nearby enemies

Increased experience gain

Increased chance for rare item drops

• Strongboxes: These chests contain valuable loot but are also trapped. Opening them releases monsters and negative effects. You can enhance Strongboxes with currency orbs.

Waystones

Waystones unlock maps. Like other items, you can use orbs to enhance them, increasing their rarity and adding modifiers.

You can customize Waystones using the same currency items you use for crafting equipment. Orbs of Transmutation can add prefixes for better rewards, while Orbs of Augmentation add suffixes to increase the difficulty. These changes can make a normal Waystone much more rewarding—or risky!

Upgrading Waystones is key for unlocking higher tiers and endgame progression, but it increases the difficulty. You need to be careful when crafting Waystones. Some maps have more monsters than others, and you might find maps with more magic or rare chests, or even unique monsters. Map layouts also vary, from simple and linear to large and open. Good endgame strategies in Path of Exile 2 involve experimenting with different modifiers and figuring out which maps are best for getting the most rewards.

Clearing corruption from higher-tier Waystones earns you points to spend in the Atlas skill tree for further customization.

You might be wondering how to progress through the Path of Exile 2 Atlas. The basic loop is straightforward: you start with a Waystone, use it to open a connected map, clear that map, find more Waystones, and continue exploring. That's the general idea. However, the endgame has more depth than just that.

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Atlas Passive Skill Tree

The Atlas skill tree lets you further customize the Atlas nodes, increasing monster numbers or rewards across the entire map. This allows you to tailor the endgame to your preferences. The tree has many nodes, each with a global effect, and a dedicated section for each endgame mechanic, so you don't need to reset your points to try different activities.

As you explore the Atlas, you'll find maps in different biomes with unique visuals. There are also special locations like towns and cities built by Wraeclast's inhabitants, containing unique items.

To help with exploration, you can activate towers that reveal nearby areas and nodes, which is great for planning your path.

Some maps are affected by corruption, which increases the difficulty and number of enemies but also boosts rewards.

Boss Encounters

Some nodes have icons indicating a boss fight. These bosses are stronger versions of those from the main story. You can either fight or skip them. The Atlas skill tree has a section dedicated to boss nodes, letting you customize the encounters and rewards.

Unique Maps and Nodes

Scattered throughout the Atlas are unique maps and special nodes. For example, the Untainted Paradise offers a huge experience boost, making it ideal for leveling. Other maps might have a unique NPC with special offerings.

Hideouts

You can also create your own base or hideout. You must find a special node on the Atlas, use a Waystone, and clear the area. Then, you can claim it as your personal hideout and decorate it.

Like in Path of Exile 1, hideouts in Path of Exile 2 are a key part of player customization, offering a personal space for crafting, storage, and interacting with NPCs.

Path of Exile 2 Atlas Exploration Tips

Here are some tips on exploring and progressing the atlas:

• Use Towers: Activate Precursor Towers to reveal nodes and plan your way.

• Upgrade Waystones: Use orbs to add modifiers to Waystones for better rewards or greater challenges.

• Find Unique Nodes: Look for special locations like cities or the Untainted Paradise for unique items and extra experience.

• Use the Atlas Tree: Spend points in the Atlas Tree to improve your preferred mechanics and customize your rewards.

• Handle Corruption: Corrupted maps are harder but offer better rewards, so make sure your build is strong enough.

Using these strategies will help you progress faster and get the most out of your time in the Atlas. Remember to explore and experiment to find what works best for you.

Endgame Mechanics

Endgame Mechanic: Breach

Breaches are tears in reality that spawn monsters. Killing monsters keeps the Breach open longer and increases rewards. Clasped hands within Breaches drop extra items.

• Breach Tablets: These items add more Breach encounters to maps. Currency items can modify tablets to change monster density, clasped hands, and more.

• Breach Pinnacle Boss: Gathering Breach Splinters creates a Breachstone, which opens a portal to the Twisted Domain and the boss Xesht. Defeating Xesht grants unique items and points for the Breach section of the Atlas tree, which can increase Breach difficulty and rewards.

Endgame Mechanic: Ritual

Ritual altars require you to kill monsters within a circle. Interacting with the altar resurrects these monsters for another fight. Completing Rituals awards Tribute, a currency used to buy items at the altars. Each successive Ritual in the same map spawns more monsters, increasing both difficulty and Tribute rewards.

• Omens: These items modify crafting outcomes.

• Ritual Tablets: Add more Ritual encounters to maps.

• Ritual Pinnacle Boss: The King in the Mists offers unique items and Atlas tree points.

Endgame Mechanic: Delirium

Delirium maps have magical mirrors that spread a mist. Staying in the mist increases monster strength and rewards. Killing rare or unique enemies can spawn extra demons.

• Distilled Emotions: This crafting material can be used to add passive skills to amulets or add the Delirium mechanic to Waypoints.

• Delirium Tablets: Enhance Delirium encounters.

• Delirium Pinnacle Encounter: Simulacrum Splinters create a portal to the Simulacrum map, where you fight waves of enemies and bosses like Omniphobia for rewards and Atlas tree points.

Endgame Mechanic: Expedition

You help Kalguuran settlers unearth artifacts using explosives. Planting explosives near burial sites resurrects enemies. More sites mean more enemies and rewards.

• Remnants: Special burial sites that increase enemy power and rewards.

• Vendors: Dannig, Rog, Tujen, and Gwennen offer rewards for artifacts.

• Expedition Tablets: Increase the number of burial sites or explosion radius.

• Logbook: Special maps with marked treasure locations for large-scale excavations.

• Expedition Pinnacle Boss: Olroth, found in Logbooks, drops unique items and Atlas tree points.

Endgame Trials

The Ascendancy Trials from the main story return in the endgame with increased difficulty and rewards. The Trial of the Sekhemas and Trial of Chaos offer significant challenges and unique rewards.

Key Endgame Concepts:

• The Atlas is the core endgame map system.

• Waystones unlock maps and can be modified.

• The Atlas skill tree allows for further customization.

• Corrupted maps are more difficult but offer better rewards.

• Hideouts are customizable player bases.

The Final Boss

The biggest challenge in Path of Exile 2's endgame is a battle against the final boss, who resides in a huge, mysterious fortress. This fortress, partly buried underground, has a massive pillar of fire and ash at its heart and is surrounded by a perilous maze. The maze's purpose is unclear—it might be there to keep people out, or maybe to keep something in. This fortress requires three keys to enter. These keys are held by powerful faction leaders known as "Uber Act Bosses." These bosses are heavily guarded by powerful lieutenants in nearby areas, and if you can't beat them, they'll move somewhere else, forcing you to find them again.

If you manage to defeat all three Uber bosses and get their keys, you’ll open the gates to this imposing fortress and face the ultimate Path of Exile 2 endgame boss. What awaits you inside is a mystery, but it's designed to be the hardest challenge in the entire game, and it even has its own reward system to further customize your character after you succeed.

Conclusion

This  Path of Exile 2 Endgame guide aimed to explain the Path of Exile 2 endgame in a clear and understandable way. The key takeaway about PoE 2's late-game content is the incredible freedom it gives players. The interconnected areas and customizable paths let you influence the challenges and encounters you face. Each of the four main mechanics uses special items to expand its presence, allowing you to focus on what you enjoy most. Each mechanic also has its own progression system so that you can tailor your experience. Plus, the overall progression system itself offers extensive customization.

The sheer amount of content is impressive. Even in early access, players can spend hundreds of hours exploring rare areas, experiencing dynamic encounters, and fighting tough bosses. We hope this guide has helped you understand the PoE 2 endgame better and that the Atlas map doesn't seem so daunting now. Good luck, Exile!

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