Path of Exile: Torment League Mechanic Guide

Welcome to our Torment league mechanic guide! This is one of the simpler leagues where you've only really got a single thing to deal with: The Tormented Spirits themselves. Let's dig right in and see what these spectral shades are up to.

Torment is considered Extra Content and has a baseline non-zero chance to appear in any map.

Our league mechanic guides are structured according to "Depth" - the deeper you go into the article, the more complex the mechanics get. If it all becomes too much, take a break from this guide, play with the league mechanic enough to master the fundamentals then come back and delve deeper!

Difficulty: Low-Average
Complexity: None

The icon that denotes Torment content.

Depth 1 - Tormented Spirit Mechanics

You've likely already met this league's content, Tormented Spirits: Spooky transparent green ghosts that scream and run away from you. The way they work is very simple:

• When you approach them, they begin to flee away from you. Keep following it to make it flee further.
• As they flee, any Normal or Magic monsters they touch are imbued with additional power.
• If they touch a Rare or Unique monster, they'll possess it, making it considerably more powerful and rewarding.
• Regardless of the type of Tormented Spirit, any monster they touch gains a little extra movement, attack and cast speed, as well as increased Item Quantity and Item Rarity.

Alright, so that's their purpose - have them flee into other monsters to make them more dangerous, but more rewarding. But what if you don't do that? Tormented Spirits have an initial "90% les damage taken" buff that tapers off over 15 seconds after you first meet one of them. In addition, for each monster a Tormented Spirit touches, it'll permanently take 5% increased damage. Each Tormented Spirit can touch up to 50 monsters.

Basically, they get an initial damage reduction to encourage you to let them flee and empower other monsters. You can, however, choose to kill them before they start empowering nearby enemies. When your build is strong enough, you might just kill them in a split-second. Let's talk about their loot in their various forms:

• If a Tormented Spirit is killed without possessing a Rare or Unique monster, it is guaranteed to drop one Rare item.
• A Rare monster possessed by a Tormented Spirit is guaranteed to drop at least two Rare items.
• A Unique monster possessed by a Tormented Spirit is guaranteed to drop at least three Rare items.

Now, there's also the option that you don't kill the Tormented Spirit, but it also finds no permanent host (Rare or Unique monster). After a while, it'll just vanish, leaving no items on the floor.

How do you know a monster has been touched or possessed by a Tormented Spirit? Simple:

• Any modifiers it grants to a monster are written in green.
• Normal and Magic monsters are Touched. For example, a Tormented Blasphemer who touched a Magic monster will give it the "Blasphemer's Touch" modifier.
• Rare and Unique Monsters are referred to as Possessed, but the modifier you see on the monster will be called, in this case, "Blasphemer's Grip".
• What's more, Rare and Unique monsters can be possessed by multiple Tormented Spirits. Watch out!

That's it, really, on the most basic level. Let's talk about the types of Tormented Spirits you may encounter.

Depth 2 - Tormented Spirit Types

There's lots of them. Too many to list here, so check out our Tormented Spirit Cheat Sheet to get a full look at the various ghosts you can encounter. You don't really need to remember what any of them do, because most times, what'll actually pose a threat is the increased baseline stats they give to other monsters by default. Still, let's take a look at a couple examples of common Tormented Spirits you'll encounter and their unique abilities:

As you can see, while in the first example, there's extra buffs added for the Rare / Unique monster on top of the buffs added to Normal / Magic monsters, the second example does something entirely different. Each Tormented Spirit comes with its own unique effects and they don't necessarily get more powerful based on the strength of the monster that's touched or possessed.

Depth 3 - Unusual Tormented Spirits

There's three Tormented Spirits you can't encounter normally and must force into your map using the Torment Scarab of Peculiarity in your map device. They have special drops. Let's take a look:

As you can see, the Tormented Heretic drops its bonus Rare Item only if you kill it before it possesses a monster!

Depth 4 - More Tormented Spirits & Torment Scarabs

Want to guarantee some Tormented Spirits on your map? Here's a few ways to go about it:

• Using the Torment map crafting option, which costs 2 Chaos Orbs, guarantees your map will be haunted by 3 additional Tormented Spirits.
• Using the Torment Scarab will guarantee your map is haunted by 5 additional Tormented Spirits. You can use up to 4 of these Scarabs per map!
• The Paranormal Meeting Notable passive node on your Atlas Passive Tree will guarantee one Tormented Spirit every map.
• When you roll the modifiers of your maps, you may come across one that says "Unique Monsters are Possessed". This entirely circumvents the first part of the mechanic with the fleeing spirit; all the Unique monsters - including the boss - in the map will be "pre-possessed" by a random Spirit.

In addition, there's two more Scarabs that modify your Torment experience. Remember, these do not guarantee Tormented Spirits in your map - you'll have to combine them with one or more of the above options to ensure they won't go to waste:

• Torment Scarab of Peculiarity - We discussed this one in the previous section!
• Torment Scarab of Release - 25% chance to recycle each Tormented Spirit, cool!
• Torment Scarab of Possession - Can use up to 4 of these at once, guaranteeing possession of all Rare monsters in the map! 

Depth 5 - Tormented Atlas Passive Tree

Torment doesn't have much of a presence on the Atlas, but the few passive nodes it does are pretty cool. Here's some passive effects that shouldn't be overlooked:

• Right before the Paranormal Meeting Notable we previously discussed, the three small passives nodes called "Tormented Spirit Duration" are very useful if you want more time for the Spirit to find monsters to touch or possess.
• On the topmost Torment cluster, the Seance Notable does all the work for you and pre-touches & pre-possesses five monsters packs in your map. Great!
• The left-most cluster is the most interesting:
  • The Unrelenting Torment Notable occasionally spawns several Tormented Spirits in the map boss area, usually three. You can wait for them to possess the boss for a whole lotta' extra danger but also more loot!
  • The Speaker of the Dead Keystone passive turns the entire mechanic on its head! Run into the Tormented Spirit and it'll possess you for 20 seconds, granting you some of its buffs and letting you touch up to 20 Normal or Magic monsters! Wack!

There's also the Exiled Will Notable node that belongs to the central Rogue Exile cluster, which will guarantee any Rogue Exiles you find in your maps are pre-possessed by a Tormented Spirit! Combined with Ruckus, things can get pretty crazy...

Other Considerations

Rare or Unique possessed monsters can be a little tough to fight, but are generally still alright. However, when several layers of Path of Exile's various mechanics come together, the fight can become extremely deadly. You should be a little more cautious around:

• Monsters that are possessed by several Tormented Spirits.
• Bestiary Beasts that are possessed by a Tormented Spirit.
• Essence monsters that are possessed by a Tormented Spirit.
• The Haunted Ritual Altar will spawn several Tormented Spirits for the duration of the encounter, which can add a lot more pressure in the fairly tiny circular arena, especially if they manage to possess Rare or Unique monsters.

Want to mess around with Tormented Spirits? Having the Fairgraves' Tricorne Unique helmet equipped will allow you to be touched by Tormented Spirits!