With the reveal stream finally concluded, Grinding Gear Games have posted the full patch notes for the upcoming Path of Exile League, Affliction! These are over 13,000 words long, and it's always good to read them, but we've taken the time to highlight the more interesting stuff we found within! Let's take a look. Our commentary will be written in italic. We will not be touching on specific skill gem changes, as we have no way of knowing whether they'll be good or bad until we know more about their Transfigured versions.

You may want to read up our recap of the Affliction announcement, which includes information on Ultimatum's return and more, as well as the gameplay walkthrough of the Mercenary, Path of Exile 2's freshest class, before diving into the patch notes!

The Big Stuff

This is what we're most excited about:

  • Ultimatum has returned to the core game!
  • Ultimatum Encounters are now 10 rounds by default, though I sincerely hope you intend to last longer than 2 rounds.
  • Vaal Aspects, previously known as Ultimatum Aspects, combine into a new Unique Jewel instead of the The Tower of Ordeals Map. What could it be?!
  • The Shifting Ire has been removed from the Foundry Map Boss fight. Existing Shifting Ires that have been captured in a Ritual Vessel are now "Ciergan, Shadow Alchemist" instead. Thank you.
  • A substantial amount of damage-dealing skills have had their quality stats buffed. In most cases they will be significantly more powerful than before, and also more interesting. Many supports have also received changes to their quality stats.

Our favorite disgruntled employee of Chaos has returned!

The Medium, Still Cool Stuff

We're excited about these too, but not as much as the other stuff!

  • Four new Divination cards.
  • The following Uniques have been added to the core drop pool: Ahuana's Bite, Akoya's Gaze, Bound Fate, Dead Reckoning, Defiance of Destiny, Ikiaho's Promise, Kahuturoa's Certainty, Kaom's Binding, Kiloava's Bluster, Maata's Teaching, Rakiata's Dance, Tawhanuku's Timing, Utula's Hunger. Trial of the Ancestors still lives in our hearts.
  • 16 new Unique Items, 7 of these being new Replica Uniques.
  • Added a new Tainted Catalyst that can be obtained from the Trialmaster. It applies a random quality type and amount of quality to a Corrupted Ring, Amulet or Belt, and replaces other quality types.
  • Metamorph has been removed from the core game. Itemised Metamorph Samples will be deleted upon logging in. Bye, Metamorph, but I still wanted to keep the organs!
  • The following Metamorph Uniques have been added to the core drop pool: Astral Projector, Fury Valve, Mother's Embrace, and Warrior's Legacy.
  • When Delirium fog has ceased its movement due to players engaging in other League content, walking out of the mist will no longer cause the Delirium fog to dissipate.
  • Some of the more common but very low value Currencies are no longer offered as rewards at the end of Grand Heists. Good riddance, Orbs of Fusing!
  • Increased the stack size of Currency offered as rewards at the end of Grand Heists.
  • With the Destructive Play Atlas Keystone allocated, killing the Map boss before The Maven can cast Up The Stakes no longer causes her to leave without summoning additional bosses.

Later!

The Stuff That Scares Us

We're not so sure about these!

  • Ultimatum modifiers that previously had 3 tiers of difficulty, such as Stormcaller Runes, now have 4 tiers of difficulty.
  • Catalysts are no longer offered as Ritual Rewards, or a reward type for Delirium Rewards.
  • Existing Amorphous Delirium Orbs will be replaced with Challenging Delirium Orbs, which add layers of Delirium with the Ultimatum Item rewards type to Maps. This is the only source of Challenging Delirium Orbs, these are unobtainable as item drops from any other source. Yikes!
  • Reduced the drop rate of Forbidden Tomes. Boo!
  • Some existing skill gems have had stats or interactions removed from the base gem and moved to the Transfigured versions to provide more focused support for pre-existing alternate playstyles.
  • The vendor recipe for turning a Level 20 Gem into a 20% Quality Level 1 version of that Gem no longer works with Skill Gems, as the benefit Quality provides to damage dealing Skills is now more powerful. The vendor recipe can now only be used with non-Awakened Support Gems.
  • Anomalous, Divergent and Phantasmal Quality Gems have been removed from the game. Existing alternate Quality Gems now have the base Quality effect found on the respective Gem.
  • Imperial Delirium Orbs can no longer be obtained. Give us our orbs back!
  • Grand Spectrum Unique Jewels no longer drop from Izaro's Treasure Chests at the end of the Labyrinth. They can now drop from Labyrinth Troves and Emperor's Vaults found throughout Merciless and Eternal Labyrinths.
  • Labyrinth rewards can no longer be obtained from other league content. We'll be running lab for the rest of our lives now!
  • The Ashes of the Stars Unique Amulet no longer provides 10-20% increased Reservation Efficiency of Skills. Existing items can be updated with a Divine Orb and a momentary lapse in judgement. But why.
  • The Replica Dragonfang's Flight Unique Amulet now provides +5-10% to all Elemental Resistances (previously +10-15%), 5-10 increased Reservation Efficiency of Skills (previously 10-15%), and causes Items and Gems to have 5-10% reduced Attribute Requirements (previously 10-15%). Existing items can be updated to the new values with a Divine Orb, but why on Wraeclast would you do that? The hits just keep coming!
  • The "Maven releases all Bosses at once" modifier can once again roll on Maven's Invitations. Run!

Are they a joke to you?!

Right, well that was quite the journey! Of course, it's important to note the patch notes don't go into much detail about what you can find in Affliction, arguably the most exciting of the upcoming changes and additions, so it's natural for our gaze to focus on the scary things we find within! Regardless, we highly recommend you go through the patch notes yourself to get a full idea of the extent of changes coming.

Have you looked through the patch notes? How do you feel about them? Let us know in the comments below!