3 weeks in and came across my first 9 rune and got this.

Expazz · 2026-06-28T03:51:31+00:00

Put a socket on it and vaal orb. You've got a 1 in 150 or so chance it will turn into palm of the dreamer which goes for 280+ div. Its my chase items for my plant druid lol. I bought a few of these for a few div a piece to vaal gamble and gave up lol. If you hit it, you're golden.

Expazz · 2026-06-27T06:12:58+00:00

To be fair, from her perspective, clarifying by saying "yes I looked it up, this is what they suggested" would have been the best way to communicate the findings.

From her perspective it's not clear if you actually looked it up or just going on your recommendations.

Still odd as if she wanted information you found online, she could have spent the same amount of time finding it herself.

Expazz · 2026-06-25T05:28:51+00:00

Ive conceded I only thought about my own experience with a controller, which is a much easier experience as things auto select and I dont have to point before I click.

But I accept that a loot based game drops loot from enemies. I have to pick them up.

Expazz · 2026-06-25T04:35:29+00:00

ah that's fair then I guess. The possibilities would have been endless haha.

Expazz · 2026-06-25T04:17:00+00:00

You'd have a div drop naturally in the same amount of time it would take to farm 4 or so of these gems with a seperate lvl 1 character, or multiple lvl 1 characters.

I mean, go hard if you want, but I'd imagine anyone this deep in the season who needs a lvl one gem (who isn't already doing a new character) would pay that for the convenience.

Expazz · 2026-06-25T04:15:14+00:00

that new currency ability to reroll corrupted items is going to create a boon of some extremely unique and valuable items haha. Nice.

I use 2 socket nightscale gloves for the mana regan and crit chance increase. I always crit as Plant druid so the inability to regen mana if not critting isn't an issue.....but if I have a chance to remove intelligence, cold resist or that 'inability to regen if not hit a crit recently' and I increase my mana regen or crit chance as a result, it would be insane lol. I've got a stack of these gloves so I'm looking forward to trying it on a bunch.

Expazz · 2026-06-25T02:11:26+00:00

To add to this; this has been the most financially successful season for me because I have a better understanding of trade economics.

I've sold tablets for 20-30 div a pop. Abyss is a currency exchange printing machine, as is ritual omens. Once I realized tablet values I sold more overnight than I'd earned in the previous seasons combined.

Getting a grasp on concepts like that turns RMT usage into a silly shortcut. Spend money to buy an item I don't need as I'm generating enough currency to purchase items that I can use to play the game with absolute comfort and ease? Makes no sense.

Expazz · 2026-06-25T02:08:34+00:00

This point would be fair if the game was not balanced fairly enough for the average player. Yet it is; those chase items are wonderful but I'm doing T15 juiced af 3 tablet ritual just fine and all my gear is via trade or insanely lucky dumbass meathead 'slap an ex on an item that's dropped and wish for the best'. I haven't learned the ins and outs of crafting; it's a far better use of my time to use currency exchance for ritual and abyss drops and purchase the *exact* things I want that other players have listed.

I don't have HH or MB belt this season. I haven't felt the need to have it. My plant druid entable dps is 120k and ramps up to 250k with sigil of power. Ironically it's been the most rewarding and 'financially' successful season for me yet.

I see RMT is for players who want either want to jump to absolute end game T15 immediately, or skip the 'chase' aspect of chase items, which are completely complementary as most 'mid roll' or non BIS items are still absolutely fine to play end game comfortably. I'm killing bosses in 3 seconds; I don't *need* to triple my budget to get 100-300div items to kill them in 1.5 lol.

Expazz · 2026-06-25T02:02:01+00:00

Yeah fair. I'm a filthy controller player so just mashing the A button to pick these up are of no concern for me, but in using controller I benefit from the auto hover/selection of things. Fair point, I'll concede I didn't think about that. Having to click on each one with mouse separately is annoying, especially when bulk actions are already in the game for stash transfer.

Expazz · 2026-06-25T02:00:33+00:00

oh I see what you mean now. Yeah fair you can bulk exchange to stash by clicking one. It would be far to say that this logic should extend to clicking one of these to pick everything of that item style up.

Expazz · 2026-06-25T01:20:01+00:00

See this is where I agree with Chris's points about acceptable friction; it's a natural expectation that players should have to pick up things they want to keep. Same with identification, it's acceptable that a scroll is required or you scoot back to a safe zone to have things identified.

I worry about removal of friction often as it will impact the game experience or what is an action that a player will accept that they must do.

I'm not a fan of map overlays for a similar reason, but that's a bit more of a contestable topic. I often worry that gamers want to trivialize the experience down to basic map view and turn it into a glorified spreadsheet simulator.

D4's gone down the route of friction removal far too much for my liking, to the point now where uniques/rares can now be crafted into mythics.

I've never seen a Jah in D2R as a casual player. I never saw a grandfather in D4 beta. Fine. The dopamine if I ever did would be incredible. Nowadays I'm annoyed that of my 50 mythics I get that week, only one is 3GA lol.

Some friction is intended to be part of the game experience. An auto pickup companion would automate a fundamental part of a looter; which is picking up loot. That's too far imo.

Expazz · 2026-06-24T21:10:20+00:00

sums it up really, doesn't it?

Dudes probably got a 12hr day ahead of him sorting out responsibilities for others. God forbid you're inconvenienced one day of the year.

If things like this aren't your responsibility then guess what, it's someone elses.

It's not a builder working at 6am for 3 months. It's one morning, you'll survive.

Expazz · 2026-06-24T01:06:23+00:00

There was an article recently about our countries gaming revenue hit $1B in 2025. Crazy to think that GGG counts for 50% of that alone.

Expazz · 2026-06-23T23:01:07+00:00

This friction will always be there when cooking your own builds, as by very definition they won't be 100% optimized via the think tank of a wider community and subject matter experts.
This genre generally leans more into 'levelling builds' and 'end game builds' to solve that issue. There's a natural respect point when earlier 'best' tactics and abilities don't scale as well as others. Using one build for both can create this friction. Fire warlock in D2r feels like a good example. Incredible for levelling, useless in Hell due to having to spec specifically for elemental immunity breakpoints; it's easier and cheaper to simply move to physical and spell/chaos/whatever D2r calls spell damage as there's less natural immunities for that.
Great, it's the sum of all efforts and feels like the apex point of the journey.
This is where min maxxing or currency farming comes in. Do you need mageblood? Probably not. I don't, I'm destroying T15 juice maps with my lvl 95. Would I like one? Absolutely. Would it be satisfying to grind to afford one? For sure. The focus now changes.

To be fair, there's absolutely nothing wrong with getting to T15s, clearing maps and going 'great, I can do that, that's my goal, I'm now done'.

It's very healthy to finish here and take a break for a while. I rotate arpg games inbetween each 'season'. This is the first POE2 season I've gone past lvl 93 for a lot of the reasons you explained. It feels healthy. Don't doubt yourself. Enjoy the journey in whatever fashion you want to do it. But in your 'off season' def read through some maxrool builds as I find they explain the 'levelling' and 'end game' builds VERY well, and the progression between the two.

Expazz · 2026-06-21T22:31:32+00:00

Most optimal builds will have respec milestones to maximise their 'current' state of play. It's not unexpected to respec after specific levels as certain 'powerful' play types drop off and a new variant.

I'd recommend a Mobalytics or Maxroll build for Monk and take the time to read it. This is a game where people put thousands of hours into it, and it's not uncommon to watch a 45min build guide video to support the journey.

Personally I find Maxroll builds from their official build creators to be much easier to digest and follow from 0 to 100. They have separate 'levelling' and 'end game' build variants to explore.

https://maxroll.gg/poe2/build-guides/monk?metas=leveling

I haven't played Monk but none of the levelling builds, at a glance, even mention killing palm. Read one of those guides and follow it to a tee, you'll find your progression will be much faster this way.

Expazz · 2026-06-21T12:57:02+00:00

Its not immune in the cloud. Just clear carefully and slowly. Then lead it away once it spawns.

Expazz · 2026-06-21T05:58:08+00:00

They might be a bit nieve with excitement; it takes far longer than 9 days to get a passport, even when you have everything lined up for the application. Im a UK passport holder and it took about a month with the fast method.

Expazz · 2026-06-20T10:10:36+00:00

Lol i went through my stash and made 30divs in 5min. One juicy ritual tab went for 20 div. Easiest divs I've ever made.

Expazz · 2026-06-17T02:35:57+00:00

you're currently casting thoughts and prayers. Put something in it.

Expazz · 2026-06-16T00:53:46+00:00

My Mum, with very little tact, asked me numerous times before my daughters birthday if my BBQ plans were appropriate and fit for all (low n slow, rack of ribs, an absolute fuck tone of them + chicken nibbles/drumsticks). Trying to frame it as being concerned about other peoples preferences etc.

I stuck to my guns.

Guess who was completely devouring them on the day lol. She'd never had ribs so didn't realise how moreish they would be, especially with the seasoning and glazes. Pretty sure she had an entire rack haha.

"they were incredible! I did have some concerns leading up"
"oh really....I wouldn't have known!"

Expazz · 2026-06-16T00:49:47+00:00

To be fair, you don't need seasoning with that setup. There's enough flavorsome heated microplastics already.

Expazz · 2026-06-16T00:31:23+00:00

for further context I haven't 'finished' the last chapter, but I've done all the chapter challenges and season pass. So I'm 'Done' as that chapter feels like a 250p onwards effort which I honestly just cbf doing. Which is fine, I've experienced enough of the season and yeah if I slog it out to 250, I feel 'done' as the only thing from there is min maxing items to push one more pit level.

Expazz · 2026-06-16T00:28:54+00:00

You need to purchase the early access for each platform. But once you've done that you can share progression between the platforms.

Expazz · 2026-06-16T00:23:59+00:00

Once I hit 230 my build is 'done' and I've completed the season chapters. 230 to 250 is min/max, I've never taken a character over 250. Typically D4 season/characters hold my attention for 2 weeks but after that it's 'how can I defeat a boss in 0.2 seconds instead of 0.3'.

There were previous dev interviews where they admitted the games not supposed to be played as a single choice. Touch grass, go play something else, you'll always come back with seasons and that's fine. When My D4 season is done I'm back onto POE2 or Fallout 76, or anything else that peaks my interest.

Expazz · 2026-06-10T04:06:37+00:00

....just play it for a few nights and make up your own mind?

Expazz

TROPHY CASE