Path Of Exile Deserve Special Attention

The first contact with the game is a bit strange. Without the iconic cinematics of the Diablo series, you are thrown directly onto a beach. What you know is that you are on the mainland of Wraeclast, the only survivor of the wreckage of the prison ship that brought you here, since in the big city you did some big-caliber bullshit, or it was simply not BFF of the big- over there. You are now an Exile.

Wraeclast is a type of penal colony, but one soon realizes that things are a bit more complicated: what was meant to be a lifelong sentence may well end up on the death penalty. Everything here wants to kill you, from the undead to the descendants of the ancient empire, through the fauna and flora of the place. Nothing very different from Australia.

Shortly afterwards you meet other survivors, some Exiles like you, other castaways, other explorers who simply have no more ways of leaving the place. There is no government or police, the authorities come and go by the edge of the sword (rusty and blind). From here it is each by itself as long as the story unfolds.

Game mechanics

From a technical point of view the game is an ARPG, Diablo-like, like so many others. If you do not like the style you will not like PoE, simple as that. Whether you've played the Blizzard trilogy or been enthralled with Torchlight, maybe it's time to try GGG's creation.

The elements that differentiate PoE from their peers deserve special attention. The main points:

• There is no trade. Everything works on the basis of barter. Remember what was said: there is no government or police. Anthropologically, the concept of "currency" is given simply by the authority of a nation. What value would you give for a suitcase full of $ 100 bills on a desert island? And gold, the most malleable metal in the universe, what kind of weapon would it be, where a weapon makes the difference between life and death?
• The passive skill system is not a tree, but an octopus with a thousand arms. One of the biggest criticisms of Diablo III was the skill scheme, which allows a very small customization of the character. PoE has created a passive skills system that, while appearing scary at first contact, can become a new standard in the RPG industry.
• Active abilities are common to all characters and defined by the possession of a gem that provides this ability. Unlike Diablo or Torchlight, where gems in weapon sockets and armor give bonus to the item, they provide new attack forms and gain levels as you go (but only when equipped). And they are colored both gems and sockets.
• Healing potions and mana are different from the best-known style games. A single flask allows for various uses, and is automatically filled as you kill enemies. The difference is the size of the bottle, which allows more or less doses before emptying. Simple and, as such, great.

Those who played Metro 2033 and Metro: Last Light will more easily understand how to make purchases and sales in PoE. In this game you have ammunition of military level and other "homemade", of inferior quality. The first ones are coins, which you can exchange for new weapons or literally burn in that most difficult boss.

Here the coins are items, or Path of Exile orbs, that can be exchanged for equipment or consumed, increasing the power of an equipment already possessed. It is up to the player to decide what it is worth or not to do with their rich little marbles bag, which is best to make your character stronger and more suitable for killing monsters and "upar".

When you level up, you gain a passive skill point. When viewing the menus of these skills, some people will cry, shout and shrink in the corner of the room in a fetal position, overwhelmed by the obscene variety of options. Others will take 5 minutes to analyze the system and laugh at how ingeniously designed it is.

Basically, each skill costs one point, there is no pricing. To open a certain skill you must have made the way to it, buying the skills that connect your starting point to the destination.

Some skills are grouped in circles denoting bonuses for the same skill, such as magic, sword, two weapons, two-handed weapons, and so on. Among these circles are generic bonuses for attributes that are requirements. For example, if you want to reach the circle of magic skills, you will inevitably have to buy intelligence and mana bonuses on the course.

My particular example is of a Shadow where I spent several points on increasing dexterity and some on strength, to get into dual-wielding specialization. After I closed this circle, I forked the way back to enter the circle of spades, which I also closed. As a result, my Shadow is an expert at using two swords. They could be two maces or two daggers or sword-and-shield or... You got it.

It is important to note that each character's starting point is different. You can be a witch with dual-sword-wielding, no problem, but your path will be bigger than shadow's in the previous example and more points will need to be spent.

At the end of the day the possibilities are countless and nothing prevents you from being a Marauder (a.k.a. Barbarian) master of magic.

"Respec" or redistribute points can be done with some items, but is limited. It's not easy to redo a level 25 character: you can at most correct a 5-point character, and that's it. My recommendation: Decide early on that you want to specialize, locate the circles for such and choose the best path, which can be longer and give more bonuses or shorter and master earlier.

The special attacks, provided by the gems, are made available when the player inserts the gem into a slot, regardless of whether the weapon, helmet, boots, etc. A 3-socket breastplate armor will allow you to have more skills than an armor with a single socket, but even if these 3 sockets are not the same color as your gems, they may not be worth it.

A choice that happens often is when you get a better item than your current one, but without the right sockets. Is it better to gain +30 armor and quit using your Glacial Hammer or continue to evolve without gaining the bonus? Or, bet on spending a Chromatic Orb, which changes the color of the sockets and twist to get the right color? It is up to the player to choose.