Path of Exile 2: Item Craft and Currency Guide

One of the fundamental parts of POE is item craft, and understanding this part can make life easier and help you achieve your goal faster and using fewer resources.

In this guide, I will try to provide information from different levels of knowledge to help you at different levels of gameplay. If you know more information, feel free to leave it in the comments so it can be added to the guide and help more people.

But it is also worth mentioning the existence of the game’s Trade site, and that sometimes it may be more worthwhile to seek out the item from other players instead of trying to make it yourself, especially lower-level items that will require at least 2 Exalted and can usually be purchased for 1 to 3 through the in-game market.

Initially speaking about the market, if you don’t have any problems interacting quickly with other people, you can use the game’s own website to search for items of interest that are being sold by other players.

This method can be interesting when you’re looking for specific Unique items that are very important for your build, or even Rare items that can help your leveling or become stronger on maps.

Here you can search for items directly by naming them, or you can add filters for more comprehensive searches. If the site is linked to the game, you can send a message directly through the site, or copy the default dialogue and copy it into the game so that the other player can invite you to their world and you can make the transaction.

Transaction templates are usually the contact of interest and then thanking you for the transaction. Some players like to send personalized messages, but a simple T4T (thanks for trading) is enough for the “good manners” of the game culture. But there are some who don’t say anything, and that’s okay.

To be the one selling, you need to have a Premium tab or some specific tab in the chest, such as the Uniques tab, or the Gems tab. I talk more about this in the specific trade guide.

Here is the Poe 2 trade website:

While the Gold obtained during the game is useful for buying items from NPCs, recovering passive points, or using the consumables market, when we are going to make transactions between players we use Currency items.

Trading traditionally uses these items due to their importance in obtaining better items, and in POE1 there was no money until around POE 2, so purchases from NPCs used these items as well.

These coins can be stored in the special Currency Tab of the Chest, which can also be used to set a price on these Currency and trade with other players.

Another way to trade these items currently is through the NPC responsible for selling random items, which is Alva at the end of the game.

There, with a value in Gold, it is possible to make purchase and sale orders, or automatically obtain items if you use the ratio suggested by the window. This mechanic facilitates the exchange of Currency items, and you can use it to speed up your late game.

Among the Currency items, there are 12 crafting items for equipment. These currency have particular effects to modify items in unique ways, different rarities to get each.

The Orb of Transmutation transforms White Common items into Blue Magic items, adding 1 random modifier to it. This item can be obtained through a drop or by gathering 10 Transmutation Shards, which are usually obtained by disenchanting Blue items.

The Orb of Augmentation adds 1 random modifier to Blue Magic items, making them have up to 2 modifiers. This modifier will complement the Prefix and Suffix duality of the items. This item can be obtained through a drop.

The Regal Orb transforms Blue Magic items into Yellow Rare items, adding 1 random modifier to it. This item can be obtained through a drop or by gathering 10 Regal Shards, which are usually obtained by disenchanting Yellow items.

The Exalted Orb adds 1 random modifier to Yellow Rare items. This item can be obtained through a drop.

The Orb of Alchemy transforms White Common items into Yellow Rare items, adding 4 random modifiers to it. This item can be obtained through a drop.

The Chaos Orb randomly removes 1 modifier from a Rare item and then adds a random modifier to it. This item can be obtained through a drop.

The Orb of Annulment randomly removes 1 modifier from Rare or Magic items. This item can be obtained through a drop.

The Divine Orb randomly modifies the numerical values of items. This variation can be seen by holding ALT while hovering over the item. This item can be obtained through drops.

The Artificer’s Orb adds a socket to the item. Each item type has a limit of 1 or 2 sockets. This item can be obtained through drops or by gathering 10 Artificer’s Shards by destroying items on the Salvage table.

The Orb of Chance has a chance to have 2 results, transforming a Common item into a Unique item or destroying the Common item. The unique item generated is related to the item used as the base. This item can be obtained through drops or by gathering 10 Chance Shards that can be obtained by disenchanting unique items.

The Vaal Orb corrupts the item making it unmodified, but in addition it can generate several random results. This item can be obtained through drops. Some of the confirmed results are:

• Nothing happens.
• The item gains 1 additional random modifier. This may ignore the modifier limit.
• The item loses 1 random modifier.
• The item gains 1 additional socket. This may ignore the item’s socket limit.
• The item gains an additional % of quality. This may ignore the item’s quality limit.
• The item has its numerical values modified. This may modify values to a higher or lower level, and the values may exceed the minimum and maximum limits, including for fixed value items.
  The item is destroyed.

The Mirror of Kalandra makes an exact copy of the chosen item. This item can be obtained through drops

In addition to monetary items, there are additional items that can be used to produce and modify items. They are more focused on being used on maps, so I will return to them later. But for the knowledge factor we have:

• Essences
• Catalysts
• Omens
• Distilletes
• Runes
• Soul Cores

To better understand how craft works, it is important to understand how items work in the game.

Every item in the game that can have a rarity higher than common will have Explicit. These Explicit are the main modifiers that we look at when analyzing an item. They are separated into Prefixes and Suffixes, being limited to 1 Prefix and 1 Suffix for Magic items, and 3 Prefixes and 3 Suffixes for Rare items.

This differentiation between Prefix and Suffix is important because Prefixes and Suffixes have a different list of Modifiers. In simpler terms, a weapon’s prefixes will usually increase the base damage, while suffixes will modify chances and add effects that do not cause damage. This can help make decisions about modifying an item and measure the chances of receiving necessary modifiers, such as the main attributes, spirit, or something else desired.

In addition to Explicit, we have Implicit, which is a fixed property of the item and cannot be lost. Implicit is related to the base item and can be significant for some builds. There are some Implicit with numeric values, these numeric values can be modified.

Each modifier has a different weight to appear, and this chance also depends on the base item. Certain bases have a higher chance of presenting some modifiers, and at the same time may never present others, such as strength items that have a higher chance of receiving armor modifiers, or intelligence items with a higher chance of receiving mana.

These probabilities are divided for both prefixes and suffixes, where each one has its own list of modifiers that can appear.

Some of the most common Prefixes are:

• The item’s main attribute (Armor, Damage, Energy Shield, Dodge)
• The item’s main attribute in %
• Elemental damage for weapons
• HP and Mana for Armor
• Spirit

Some of the most common suffixes are:

• Elemental Resistance
• Attributes (Strength, Dexterity, Intelligence)
• Item Rarity
• HP Regeneration

In addition to the variation between prefixes and suffixes, there is the Modifier Tier. Tiers range from 1 to upwards, where Tier 1 is the weakest and has lower Modifier values. Items with higher Tiers in some modifiers can decrease the odds of new modifiers being added with a higher tier, but this is only decreasing the odds, not completely eliminating it.

To find out the Tier of a Modifier within an item, you just have to look at the corresponding value at the end of the line next to the T. Unique items have these Modifiers with a fixed value and that’s why their Tier is U.

Items have item levels, which are related to the level of the map in which they were dropped. This level limits the maximum Tier Rank that the item can have in the Modifiers, in addition to limiting some Modifiers from appearing on the items.

For this reason, it is not worth keeping items for many levels, feel free to throw some of them away as you get stronger.

When we start the game, we have low access to improvements in our equipment, and at this point we may often use common items. When we have a path of the type of item we want to use in our build, we can take advantage of similar items that we find or buy in NPC to try to increase our power in a targeted way.

But the first important point that we have to be aware of is not to be afraid to use the Orb of Transmutation and the Orb of Enlargement. These orbs may not be so common at the beginning of the game, but eventually they become very common, and besides, it is more important to use them to try to have better items than not to use them.

With this mindset, we can first transform any item we obtain into a blue items, this will guarantee greater power spark at the beginning of the game and ensure our survival. Then, when dropping white items of the desired type, we can always transform it, and if its first property is one of the desired ones, we can add another line to it to try to make it even better. This can be used with potions as well.

Whenever we get enough good items, we can wait and try to improve items that are of a higher level later, thus creating a cycle. In the meantime, we accumulate some resources so we can repeat this for all items of the type we choose, and we have the freedom to try to improve the numbers of our modifiers on items of the same level as the current one if we have a lot of Transmutation Orbs and Enlargement Orbs left over.

It is always a good idea to initially look at the Rare items we find, and search for them in NPC stores, but if we do not have access to good items through these methods, we can then use our Regal Orbs. However, I would like to point out that we can often get very good and cheap items through POE TRADE, the game’s own trading website.

When we get a little stronger and start facing difficulties, we can start generating Rare items to help us. For this we will use Regal, but ideally you will only do this when the other 2 modifiers of the blue item are good for your character, or at least the item are a higher level enough to compensate for the exchange of the item anyway. So now we will have a Rare item with 3 modifiers, which will already strengthen our character a lot.

If the additional property of Regal is good and we have a Rare item with all the modifiers applicable to our character, we can use Exalted Orbs on this item to try to make it even stronger, until we have 1 bad modifier or have 6 modifiers. But remember to stop when you get any bad results, especially at the beginning of the game where Exalted are extremely rare.

Another option is when we drop a good item base with at least 10 levels of difference, or at the late game with bases that we are interested in, is to use the Orb of Alchemy. With this orb we directly obtain a Rare item with 4 modifiers, which can somehow guarantee a better item, and avoid the use of Exalted items that may be rarer than it, but this is still advisable only for items that we are sure will be better than our current item.

When we reach level 20 we can start considering using Runes, they can give us some properties to facilitate what we want in defensive or offensive items.

For weapons we can use elemental damage runes that match the type of damage we are using, no other Rune is worth using at the beginning of the game. The physical damage increase rune becomes interesting at level 40, especially if your build causes Bleed damage. Although it is not worth it, you can use the rune you want if they are left over to test and learn for yourself.

Interesting defensive runes can be those for HP regeneration and Elemental Resistance. These numbers may not seem like much, but they will help you to have more sustainability, especially at higher levels.

White items are usually disposable materials, but this orb allows us to obtain unique versions of these items, and since they have a high level variation, we can obtain great items to help us evolve in the game, and some that we can use permanently or use to trade for more resources.

If you are not interested in using this orb for Trade, do not be afraid to use this item, especially with items with the same item base that you are interested in. There is a high chance that the item will be destroyed, but basically any result in a base that interests you should help you significantly.

Unfortunately, this item is quite rare, so we will not have use for it very often during leveling.

The late game is when most of the crafting items will be used, especially the items that we didn’t use during leveling. Note that the leveling items will still be used here, but new ones will be added to our list.

Initially, we can take Rare items and try to use some Chaos Orbs on them if all of their properties are bad, or at least most of them, and try to improve this item. This can be interesting if we don’t have new bases and have a lot of Chaos stored.

But the real potential can come when we combine the Orbs of Nullification and Chaos Orb. We can do the process of transforming any Magic item with Regal and use the Orb of Nullification to leave it with only 1 modifier, then use the Chaos Orb until we get the most important desired modifier, and complement the item with Exalted, guaranteeing 1 of its modifiers. It is important to note whether the modifier kept is of the type of interest between Suffix or Prefix.

It is also possible to keep using Exalted and Nullification to add new lines, but this would be impracticable due to the cost, and using 1 Chaos would have the same effect as 1 Nullification + 1 Exalted in this case.

After getting a perfect item, it is possible to try to improve its internal numerical values in each modifier, for this we use the Divine Orbs that have this property. But you need to be careful not to have worse results when trying to get perfect results. Ideally we use it to try the most important number, such as a maximum movement speed on a boot.

After finishing the perfect item with the desired number, or having a good item that has potential to be used, we can use a Vaal on it. This Vaal has the potential to lose the item and will certainly make it impossible for modification, but it also has the potential to add much more power to the item and this can help a lot. It is always good to try to take advantage of this potential or sell the item through Trade, but never use this if there is no backup option.

This item is here more as an honorable mention than as a possibility to be used. It is extremely rare, and when you get it you will literally have the item you want, because its property is to create a copy of an item.

You will use this item to copy a perfect item, which cannot be improved in any way.

This item will have a fixed but recurring function, which is to be used in Waystones, because we want them to be as rare as possible, and adding 4 modifiers directly to it and turning it into Rare is something we will always want.

A mechanic that we released in Act 3, we can use it to try to take advantage of bases that we are interested in and that did not obtain good modifiers for us.

This workbench needs some rules to be used:

• The 3 items need to be the same item base. This literally means the same base, which has the same display art with the same item name (second line of the name).
• The 3 items need to have the same Rarity.

The result of this production will be the same base item with the same rarity used, but the item level that will appear is equal to the lowest item level among the items used. In addition, the new item is completely random.

This tool is interesting if we have items with good bases but their modifiers are bad, allowing us to make a new attempt to have a good item. It will particularly be used more when we are working with Waystones, because if they are bad we can still use it when making a new one.

Another variation is in Waystones, where by joining 3 Waystones of the same tier we will obtain 1 Waystone of a higher tier. For example, 3 Waystones of tier 1 give one of tier 2. This transformation is also fixed for 3 items of the same rarity.

Essences are a variety of craft item that resemble crystals and are obtained by killing Rare Monsters that are in crystal prisons on some maps. These monsters can appear on any map at random.

There are currently 24 different essences, some of which transform common items into magical items or magical items into rare items. The main factor of these is that they guarantee a specific type of Modifier on the item they are transforming, and therefore they can be quite in demand.

They can be stored in the Essence Chest Tab, where on the left are the weakest ones, which transform Common items into Magical items, and on the right are the strongest ones, which transform Magical items into Rare items.

Items can receive sockets through the Artisan’s Orbs, or come with these sockets already. These sockets can receive two specific types of items, Runes and Soul Cores. These items have 2 distinct properties in each one, one for when applied to weapons, and another for equipment.

They are the most basic items to add to sockets. Among their 10 variations, they provide more basic and usually minor attributes to items. They help a lot during character leveling, and can be very useful to complement elemental resistances or increase the physical damage of weapons in the end game.

Soul Cores are rarer items and focused on the late game. They can be found more easily in the Trial of Chaos, in the Temple of Chaos, as a reward from the room. Their properties are all in % of something, and can help with damage penetration or even increase the maximum limit of elemental resistances. The only one that isn’t % is the Soul Core which grants extra Spirit

Distilled emotions are used in two specific craftings. When used on Waystones they grant specific Delirium modifiers, and when used on necklaces they can grant one of the Notable Passives. They are stored in the special Chest Tab called Delirium, along with Simulacrum and Simulacrum fragments.

To find out the recipe for the desired Notable Passive, you must open the Passive Tree and hover over the desired passive while holding ALT. This will display the detailed information for the passive and show the drawing of the vials next to the name and the name at the bottom of the frame.