Oh, yes! An Expedition awaits. What a joyous time to embark on an adventure, detonate explosives, and fight off hordes of undead Kalguur. To what end, you ask? Riches, glory, and power. Of course. Path of Exile’s latest expansion can be played today and includes all the hallmarks of the best games in the action RPG genre – powerful items, intense combat and, of course, terrifying, everpresent death.
In Expedition, you’ll assist Kalguuran traders in their efforts to recover the artifacts lost by their ancestors. Unable to fight the dangers of Wraeclast alone, they enlist your violent services to clear out their Expedition sites so that they may plunder the treasures buried below. You must strategically lay a series of explosives, detonate them, and then cull the deadly horde that rises from the earth. If you can manage this, ancient Kalguuran artifacts will be yours for the taking. Each of the Kalguuran traders provides a unique style of trade, offering the opportunity to deal, barter or gamble the artifacts in exchange for their tempting wares.
You may also discover Logbooks which chronicle the whereabouts of many hidden treasures from their past. These Logbooks can be crafted to maximise their danger and level of rewards. Take them to Dannig, the Kalguuran leader, and he’ll give passage to these far-off locations. These sprawling Expedition sites expose an unfathomable horde of monsters once unearthed. These areas can also contain secret passages which lead to exotic treasures and formidable bosses.
In addition to the tempting lure of hidden treasure in the Expedition League, you’ll also uncover 19 new ways to build your character. Path of Exile is all about customising your gameplay to your heart’s desire and one of the fundamental building blocks of doing so is through skill and support gems. In this expansion, we wanted to really shake up Path of Exile’s metagame by providing a swathe of new options for character building. As such, we designed 19 new gems that are each themed around our Ascendancy Classes.
One of our favourite gems from this lineup is the new Summon Reaper skill, it was designed for Necromancers and summons a powerful minion which performs powerful attacks that cause enemies to bleed, can be commanded to attack specific locations, and literally feeds off of your other minions. There’s also the Spectral Helix gem which was designed for the Ascendant. It throws out a ghostly copy of your weapon which spirals outward from your location, harming any enemies it passes through.
As an extension of our desire to shake up Path of Exile’s metagame, we’ve also made some massive balance changes. Expedition is Path of Exile’s 30th expansion since its Closed Beta, and because every expansion introduces powerful new options for character building, players are now more powerful than ever. The balance changes in Expedition will help to restore the challenge that Path of Exile is known for. We’ve also reworked our flask system to encourage more thoughtful, interactive gameplay and provide interesting new ways for players to mitigate incoming damage.
If you haven’t played before, if it’s been a while since you have, or you’re a regular pro, now is the perfect time to play Path of Exile. Not only is it free to play but right now the entire community is taking up the challenge of finding the new best gameplay strategies and you can be right there with them. In a game where knowledge is power, having a shakeup of this scale really levels the playing field. Each expansion introduces a fresh economy and competitive ladder for you to make your mark in. You can also complete challenges in exchange for exclusive cosmetic rewards! Did we mention it’s free? (No, really – no demo version, no pay to win. Just cosmetics, if you want.)
If you find yourself absorbed in the world of Wraeclast, you’ll be happy to know that we put out expansions every thirteen weeks. We hope to see you there.