Path of Exile (also abbreviated as PoE) is the action role-playing game created by the small developer Grinding Gear Games, which has stood out for its excellent gameplay inspired by the first two Diablo games, its great possibilities to build the character, its dark atmosphere, its unusual economic system based on the exchange of Orbs and for being Free to Play, which is not common in this type of games.

Grinding Gear Games has also done a great job keeping their videogame up to date thanks to constant expansions, patches, DLCs and even community contests, which implement new features in PoE and also keep their players active.

That said, last month saw the release of PoE’s most recent expansion: the long awaited Echoes of the Atlas, which provided a new epilogue to the Conquerors of the Atlas story arc and included a lot of new features that definitely offered a new experience for players of this ARPG. For this reason, the following are the new features implemented in Echoes of the Atlas that had the most impact on the gameplay of Path of Exile.

The Ritual League

One of the most interesting features introduced with this expansion was undoubtedly the Ritual League. This new challenge league implemented in each zone of the game an Altar Ritual, which can be activated to enter a ritual circle where players will constantly fight against huge hordes of enemies until the ritual ends. As enemies are defeated, tributes will be obtained that can be exchanged for all kinds of items and rewards within the Altar Ritual after the fight is over. The more rituals you complete, the better the rewards and the more powerful the enemies will become.

These rituals greatly increased the hours of gameplay and increased the chances of obtaining an exclusive item. However, the Altar Rituals stand out for being quite difficult, so you must have a good build and a lot of skill to be able to survive until the end.

The Ritual League also introduced the curious Sacred Groves on the maps, pre-created groves where you can start Horticrafting and thus expand the harvest mechanics.

The challenging Maven’s Crucible

This new PoE zone was one of the most awaited features by players since Echoes of the Atlas was announced, as it offered challenging boss battles where only the most experienced in this ARPG will have a chance to endure, and that is precisely what this tenth expansion ended up bringing.

In order to access The Maven’s Crucible it is necessary to receive an invitation from Maven himself, which is achieved by defeating three map bosses in Maven’s presence. This large arena contains all the captured bosses of the region, so it will be necessary to fight a large number of bosses in order to finish this challenge.

The first fight in The Maven’s Crucible will be against the three bosses previously defeated against Maven, but now simultaneously. After finishing this fight, you will have to defeat four bosses, then five, then six and finally you will have to face a maniacal fight against ten bosses simultaneously. If you manage to complete this great challenge, it will be possible to finally face Maven, the supreme boss of Atlas. Each combat won in this arena provides two skill points for the Atlas passive skill tree.

Upon completion of The Maven’s Crucible, players obtain the Maven’s Gift, a mechanic that allows them to assign skill points to the aforementioned skill tree. That said, this mechanic now also serves as a token of successful completion of this great challenge.

That said, for complicated situations like this, a good option is to get a good amount of Orbs to exchange for the necessary items to be able to improve the equipment. One of the best ways to get a lot of Orbs quickly is through specialized websites like Eldorado.gg, which provides an excellent platform where you can buy Path of Exile Orbs and Accounts quickly and safely.

The new maps and the Atlas passive skill tree

As expected from an expansion, Echoes of the Atlas included 11 new interesting and varied maps that extend the PoE experience.

In addition, this expansion also brought the Atlas passive skill tree, which allows players to get all kinds of really cool skills in each Atlas region. As you advance in the Maven quest line you will be able to unlock more and more Atlas passive skills. These passive skills not only improve the players’ abilities, but also increase the possibilities in the buildings.

Having said all that, other notable features that Echoes of the Atlas introduced were the Heist integration and the Ascendancy class rebalance, as they also impacted the gameplay. It should also be mentioned that the most recent PoE patch (version 3.13.1) fixes many bugs that the tenth expansion had.