Steam Early Access has been tough on Path of Exile 2 so far. While Grinding Gear Games' sequel has proved incredibly popular, plenty of the studio's changes have also been controversial. PoE 2's endgame has been under constant surveillance, as it evolves alongside the rest of the ARPG. Now, with update 0.2.0h, GGG is introducing some game-changing improvements, and they should be here very soon.
In a new developer blog, Grinding Gear Games outlines all of the major endgame and quality-of-life changes it has planned for already mentioned some of these improvements recently, but now we're getting into the details.
For starters, Grinding Gear Games unpacks the Breach improvements it previously teased for the action RPG. So far, Breaches have had an issue where too many monsters spawn in tight spaces, but that's about to change. With the newest update, Grinding Gear Games is altering how monsters spawn in Breaches to make them more reliable, and raising the minimum experience of an encounter. The shortest time for a Breach, assuming no monsters are killed, is also being increased to 20 seconds, while killing Magic or Rare enemies will extend the time more than just eliminating normal enemies.
"Previously, we spoke about dropping fewer stacks of Splinters in larger quantities, but instead of that, we're making a more drastic improvement," GGG writes. "We will now vacuum up all the Breach Splinters dropped during a Breach encounter and drop them at your location when the Breach concludes. If you are in a party, it will drop multiple stacks that are randomly allocated."
Grinding Gear Games is also adding the Ritual Stash Tab to PoE 2, which you can use to store Omens and Audience with the King Fragments. The Socketable Stash Tab will also hold your Runes, Talismans, and Soul Cores, and it comes with a button that allows you to upgrade runes without needing a Reforging Bench. You'll find these in the microtransaction store once patch 0.2.0h is released.
As for loot drops, GGG its there are still "outliers" that require improvement. "In 0.2.0h we're going to be making Perfect Jeweller's Orbs and Level 20 Uncut Skill and Spirit Gems significantly more common," the studio says. "These will still be relatively rare, but it was often the case people would get very far into their endgame and character progression before even finding one."
Grinding Gear Games also outlines the Shrine changes it has planned. Both the Greed and Corrupting Shrines have been completely disabled – the team says they were "just bad" and rarely added any benefits. GGG has also made it so rarer Shrines, like Diamond and Divine ones, will now appear far more often, meaning you can reap their rewards at a faster rate. GGG adds that it has increased the duration of "almost all Shrines," giving you up to 90 seconds to use some of them going forward.
If you've been having some major trouble locating Rogue Exiles, don't worry, because GGG has taken aim at them as well. Their aggro range has been reduced, so they are more commonly on the screen before their health bar appears, meaning you won't be left wondering who that extra-large life bar belongs to. Rogue Exiles also have far brighter lights on them now, alongside minimap icons when in combat, to help you spot them much easier at a glance.
To round out the 0.2.0h improvements, GGG is making some changes to Azmerian Wisps in order to improve their behavior when you have two active at once. The Spirit of the Spring Hare and Spirit of the Fox were also too rare, so Grinding Gear Games has made them three times more common to incentivise their "hectic and rewarding outcomes."
Grinding Gear Games is hopeful it can deploy Path of Exile 2 0.2.0h by the end of the week, meaning we should have it by Friday May 16.
With update 0.2.0h around the corner, make sure you check out all the Path of Exile 2 class.
You can follow us on Google News for daily PC games news, reviews, and guides. We've also got a vibrant community Discord server, where you can chat about this story with of the team and fellow readers.