Path of Exile 2 developers outline upcoming changes in mid-season patch

GGG is handing out numerous buffs to underperforming Skills in an upcoming Path of Exile 2 patch (likely 0.2.1). Today, in a roundabout sort of early patch notes, an official blog post detailed what's coming. This doesn't include buffs specific to every class' Skills (notably, the buffs' framing imply Monk and Mercenary are already in a good place). However, some significant broad QoL additions will smooth the journey over regardless of which build you're playing.

To start with what this technically "mid-season" Path of Exile 2 patch has in store for us, we'll list out these bigger changes.

All the big QoL changes in Path of Exile 2's upcoming patch (early patch notes)

These changes do a lot for quality of life (Image via GGG)

Mapping QoL

Right off the bat, the biggest new QoL change coming in Path of Exile 2 soon will make Endgame mapping much more convenient. The upcoming patch makes it so that Rare monsters will show up on minimap at all times. In other words, these targets will be visible immediately after you load into the map.

A more specific changes is that the Delirium fog will last 2.5x longer, which makes farming the Distilled Emotions and thereby Amulet Anointment a much easier goal.

Two big Rune changes

Some big upgrades are also coming in the crafting side of things. Socketables are the path to power GGG wants to present, so the patch will make the following providences:

Wands and Staves can now have sockets (though not Sceptres apparently).
New +Attribute Runes are coming.

Artificer's Orbs can now be found throughout the campaign as guaranteed reward drops.

Also Read: All new Crafting options in Path of Exile 2 Dawn of The Hunt

ES - Bleed Interactions (and CI buff)

Energy Shields will no longer prevent the application of Bleed, both on players and monsters. This is a big net positive change for player power, as it will make Bleed-reliant skills like Rake to be much more viable for mapping.

Furthermore, the Chaos Inculation node now blocks Bleed even though it's theoretically not Chaos damage. To give ES and CI even more of a buff, the nearby passive clusters that grant you additional stun threshold based on your maximum energy shield now also increase your ailment threshold.

All confirmed class balance changes so far in upcoming Path of Exile 2 patch

There's something for everyone to look forward to (Image via GGG)

Sorceress-specific changes

Arc now does a lightning explosion when it hits a shocked enemy but can no longer shock. It does not consume the shock.
Eye of Winter now gains bonus elemental damage when passing through other elemental orbs like Solar Orb, Orb of Storms or Frost Bomb.
Incinerate's exposure duration has been increased to eight seconds from two seconds.
Mana Tempest can now be used with all spells, and has been changed to cause empowered spells to split to additional targets instead of chaining or forking.
Frostbolt explosion radius has been increased by 50%.
Ice Nova's freeze buildup has been increased significantly.
Frost Bomb exposure duration has been increased to eight seconds from five seconds.
Mana remnants has been changed to work with other elemental ailments than just shock.
We are lowering the delay for Ignites spreading from sources such as the Wildfire support to one second from two seconds, but the radius has been decreased slightly.

Huntress-specific changes

Parried enemies can no longer evade your attacks.
The spear stuck in enemies by Rapid Assault now always bleeds on hit when you detonate it, the AoE has been increased by 20% and the detonate does 67% more damage.
Spearfield's spear duration has been increased to 10 seconds from six seconds, and had it's damage growth increased, dealing 30% more damage by Level 20.
Herald of Blood no longer deletes the corpses of Rares or Uniques, allowing you to use Ritual Sacrifice on the rares.

Warrior-specific changes

Temper Weapon on Smith of Kitava now adds 3 empowerments per strike of your weapon, and is 25% faster. The damage might need to come down a little.
Shield Wall is now detonatable with Warcries.
Armour break being applied to players by monsters no longer has the 20% extra physical damage modifier that was intended to only be a buff to players, and we have also reduced its duration to 4 seconds from 12. In addition, there was a bug where partial armour breaks were never removed on the player.

Ranger Specific Changes

Stormcaller arrow now proliferates shocks to nearby enemies in a small radius and has had its AoE radius increased by 50%.
Lightning Rod damage has been increased by 30%, and their duration has been increased to 20 seconds.
Lightning Arrow has had the radius at which it arcs to targets increased by 50%.
Tornado Shots maximum duration has been increased to 15 seconds

A new Support Gem called Inhibitor prevents (Frenzy, Power, Endurance) charges being consumed but increases the damage of the supported skill by 4% for each type of charge you have.

GGG are also "currently doing a pass to investigate" monster speed in specific places where you are likely to get swarmed, and will rescale it in the most extreme cases.

On a closing note, it also mentioned it banned 310 players for deliberately abusing a Unique Ritual tablet to generate a lot of high-tier currencies.

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About the author

Sambit Pal is an esports Journalist on Gaming and MMO at Sportskeeda. He has Master's degree in English Literature. In his spare time, he is an amateur sleuth trying to trace the Riven Mafia in Warframe, and a recovering Bethesda modding addict. He also secretly enjoys action Roguelites, a severe lack of gitting gud notwithstanding.

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Edited by Angad Sharma