Path of Exile 0.5.5 is almost here, and Grinding Gear Games just dropped some last-minute patch notes. There are quite a few changes to older league mechanics, some important endgame adjustments, and a bunch of bug fixes that could affect certain builds.
I went through the notes and pulled out the changes I think are actually worth knowing before league start, including whether any of them affect my Adonis Ego Gemling Legionnaire setup.
Ritual Is Now in Every Campaign Zone
One of the biggest changes is to Ritual. It will now appear in every zone throughout the campaign and can provide either currency or equipment as you level.
Twice per act, you’ll also be able to encounter special boss Rituals. These have their own pool of unique items that you can choose from.
Endgame Ritual remains similar to last league, where the rewards will include either unique items or Omens.
There’s also a new endgame currency called Sacred Bloom. From what I understand, you can use it from the map overworld to spread Sacred Bloom across multiple maps, making them more rewarding but also more difficult.
Ritual Tablets are changing too. Using multiple tablets can potentially cause additional Ritual Altars to spawn, which should mean more Tribute and more reward opportunities.
Trial of Chaos Gets a Major Endgame Rework
Trial of Chaos has been completely reworked for the endgame. The basic idea is pretty simple: push the difficulty higher and you get better rewards in return.
The main changes are:
- Pack size, monster effectiveness, and rare monsters can scale up.
- You can run the trial three times back-to-back.
- Every 10 rooms, you can either leave with your key fragment or continue.
- You can push the same run to 20 or 30 rooms.
- Completing all 30 rooms guarantees all three keys, allowing you to fight the Trialmaster every full run.
The longer you continue, the more dangerous the trial becomes because you’re building up additional debuffs. At the same time, the rewards become more valuable.
What Builds Should You Use?
If you’re planning to specialize in Ritual or Trial of Chaos, I’d look closely at Chaos Inoculation Energy Shield builds.
Both mechanics have a lot of Bleed and Chaos Damage, which makes Chaos Inoculation a natural fit. It sets your life to 1 but gives you immunity to Bleed and Chaos Damage.
Ritual also looks particularly good for projectile-heavy builds like Spark or Twister because enemies are contained within the Ritual circle. That gives projectiles more opportunities to overlap and hit targets multiple times.
Energy Shield builds should also have an advantage in Trial of Chaos because they can reach high maximum hit values. That’s going to matter when you’re carrying a large number of debuffs into the later rooms and taking increasingly high amounts of damage.
Gemling Legionnaire spellcasters that transition into Chaos Inoculation are another setup I’m interested in, especially because you can become crit immune.
For my own Trial of Chaos plans, I’m probably going to move away from my Twister league starter and eventually switch into a Chaos Inoculation spellcaster. I think that could be one of the better setups for pushing this content.
Other Endgame Changes
Ruins of Uldur, which was the main mechanic of the 0.5 league, is now moving into the core game. That means it will appear occasionally rather than being present in every map.
Expedition is also changing, with the mechanic now being found through new Expedition Tablets.
Abyss has received an update as well. You’ll now find Abyssal Ravines in the overworld, and seeing one means Abysses are guaranteed to appear in those maps.
The Arbiter of Divinity progression is also being simplified. You’ll complete the quest version, find two keys, combine them, and fight the Arbiter again. After that second kill, the entire passive tree is unlocked.
So compared with the previous progression, you’ll need fewer Arbiter kills to unlock everything.
Weapon-Swap Bug Fixes
The weapon-swap fixes are probably the part that generated the most questions for me.
There are four fixes here that I think are worth understanding:
- Skills from an alternate weapon set can no longer be used without the appropriate weapon swap.
- Snapshotting effects from Prisma Belize and From Nothing jewels has been fixed.
- Auras and support gems from inactive weapon sets can no longer continue applying to the player.
- Unique-item granted skills can no longer be used with non-unique weapons equipped on another weapon set.
Some of these interactions allowed players to effectively get benefits from a weapon set without actually using it. For example, an aura or support gem could remain active after switching away from the weapon set where it was equipped.
Does This Break My Adonis Ego Setup?
This was probably the weapon-swap fix I was asked about the most.
The good news is that I don’t believe these changes break the way I’m using Adonis Ego.
My setup generates power charges on Weapon Set 2 and then swaps back to Weapon Set 1 to cast Adonis Ego. This is intentional because keeping the power charges active permanently comes with a significant penalty.
The important part is that I’m not relying on an unintended snapshot. If you cast Adonis Ego on Weapon Set 2 and then switch away, the effect disappears.
I have heard about another interaction where players were apparently able to disable their second Adonis Ego while somehow keeping the buff active on Weapon Set 1. If that’s the interaction being targeted by this fix, then that form of abuse should no longer work.
You also don’t technically need two Adonis Egos for my setup. I’m using two because it lets me have damage runes on the main weapon and utility runes on the second one for generating additional power charges.
If you want the Pinnacle to Power buff through the intended setup, you still need to wield Adonis Ego on your main weapon set. I’m not completely certain whether this specific patch note is targeting this interaction or another build, but I don’t expect it to affect the normal way I’m using the setup.
Final Thoughts
Overall, I don’t think these last-minute changes completely change my league-start plans.
The Ritual changes look interesting, but Trial of Chaos is probably the update I’m most excited to test with a Chaos Inoculation spellcaster. The combination of Energy Shield and Chaos Inoculation seems particularly well suited to the damage and debuffs you’ll encounter when pushing deeper.
The weapon-swap fixes are worth understanding, especially if your build relies on unusual interactions, but I don’t expect them to break my Adonis Ego setup when it’s used properly.
We’re also getting a challenge league with MTX rewards tied to the reward track.
Strafe is an ARPG content creator and gamer focused on Path of Exile (PoE) and Path of Exile 2 (PoE 2). His content comes from hands-on gameplay, exploring builds, bosses, mechanics, maps, and the many challenges that make the PoE experience so addictive.
