Even in its’ current early access “double-mint-gum” state – POE 2 is the best ARPG ever made by a significant margin. There are some hurdles to enjoying the experience though. Please read the following guides below to avoid some of those hurdles:- How to use weapon sets and allocation points in POE 2.- How to use a controller and mouse simultaneously in POE 2.- How to build a POE 2 skill tree as a strength/block character.- How to make the most of POE 2 trade time / down time / town time.1. Weapon Swapping and Assigning Weapon Set Allocation Points Guide:You do not have to press a button to swap weapons. In order to swap weapons: First, press “O” to assign the inputs you want to use for your skills under “input.” Next in order to assign the skill you want to use to a weapon set press “G” then click the arrow to the right of the skill. A window will pop out to the right. At the bottom of that new window there will be weapon set check boxes. They are both checked by default (a strange choice). Just un-check the box for the weapon you aren’t using for each skill. Finally, after you’ve un-chosen a weapon set for each of your skills, close the skill menu. Now assign your skills to different inputs by left clicking the squares in the lower right side of the screen and then left clicking the icon for the corresponding skill you want on that button. Pushing the assigned input button (shown under the squares in the lower right) will now automatically swap to that corresponding weapon set (the box you left checked earlier) and use that skill.Second, after you earn some weapon set allocations, if you decide to allocate some your passive skill points to different nodes for use with different weapon sets you need to have both skill points and weapon set allocations to spend. You know if you have skill points by pressing the “p” key to bring up your passive tree; your skill point number is the number in the very upper right corner of that screen. Your weapon allocation points are the two numbers under the skill point number. If the skill point number or the weapon allocation number are zero, then you cannot assign anything to that weapon set at the moment. Don’t worry – you can respec skill points if you decide to use your allocations later. The weapon set allocations allow you to spend 1 skill point in two different passive tree locations by having a skill point and then left clicking the arrow to the left of the words “weapon set” then clicking a passive node. You can only do this if you have positive weapon allocations for that weapon set AND positive skill points. IMPORTANT: For some reason currently these allocations can NOT be used to allocate jewel socket nodes (jewel sockets are empty looking nodes on the passive tree where you can slot jewel items that have stats.)2. How to Use a Controller and Mouse Simultaneously in POE 2 Guide:If you are playing on Steam, there is a 4th hidden control method that is actually THE BEST method for controlling you character. First select the WASD input method in POE 2 then alt tab. With your controller plugged in and turned on, if you are looking at POE 2 in your Steam library, there will be a controller button on the right hand side, under the POE 2 banner image. This button allows you to override each steam game’s default controller scheme. Dont worry you can press the button again to turn off the changes at anytime if you dont like them. After you click the button, under Recommended Layouts – select “Keyboard (WASD) and Mouse.” Then remap Left Trigger to Space Bar so you can use it to roll dodge in game. You can do this by clicking “Edit Layout” then “Triggers,” then, on the right side, next to Left Trigger make Full Pull = Space Bar and Soft Pull = Space Bar. This whole process will effectively make your controller be detected as an additional keyboard/mouse. You can now use the left joystick to control your character and left trigger to dodge roll in game while simultaneously using your mouse and mouse buttons to aim and use abilities. You can also pick up items, mange inventory, and use skills/skill menus with your mouse and use controller to move/roll without logging out to switch control types.3. One Way To Build A Strength/Block Character in POE 2 Guide:While looking at skill tree, in the upper right hand corner utilize the “Search here” box to find nodes on the tree. From Warrior or Mercenary Starting Area to “Giant’s Blood.” Take “Cruel Methods” and “Pile On.” From Warrior or Mercenary starting area to “Colossal Weapon.” From “Colossal Weapon” to “Unexpected Finesse.” “Unexpected Finesse” to “Polymathy.” “Polymathy” to “Iron Reflexes.” Now, in the upper right hand corner where it says “Search here,” type “Strength” Path to any/some/all of the glowing nodes in southwest section of the skill tree. Type “Block” in the same search bar and path to any/some/all glowing nodes in the southwest of skill tree. See next paragraph for skills and gear.Skills/Gear. Left Click with Armour Breaker – Linked with Armour Explosion, Demolisher, and Martial Tempo. Then Right Click with Sunder – Linked with Heavy Swing, Heft, and Super Critical. Hat/Gloves/Belt – Resistances, Life, Strength. Body – High Armor/Strength and Resistances. Rings/Amulet – Resistances, life/strength, at least one with 5% mana leech. Weapon – Any Cultist Greathammer, Advanced Cultist Greathammer or Expert Cultist Greathammer. Must have plus to “Level of all Melee Skills” and plus some type of ADDED and/or % physical damage. Other damage or some attack speed is nice but not required. Shield – Some Armor and the “Life gained when you Block” enchant stat or the Recover % Life on Block stat. Boots – Movement Speed / Resists4. POE 2 Trade Time / Down time / Town Time Guide:Respecing costs more as you level. Try to keep some gold on you to respec several points.If you see a item with percent quality on it and/or an item with a socket in it, even if it’s not good, pick it up to salvage it later. Also, if you see one of these in the store for a reasonable amount of gold from a vendor – purchase it to salvage. You’ll get shards that you can use for upgrading gear and trading at the currency exchange market later on.Finally, you can “disenchant” rare items for regal orb shards in town at a npc. It is “hidden” as one of the dialog options. (strange choice) Unique items become chance shards if you “disenchant” them at the npc. Most unique items will be worth more to other players though – so I recommend you save them – wait for a GGG point shop stash tab sale and then buy one currency tab and one premium quad tab with your early access shop points (you can right click premium tabs in your stash and then make public for trading with other players, within the tab, you can right click items to list your items for orbs on the poe2 homepage trade search section). The trade search on the POE 2 homepage can also be used to find gear for your builds. For example for the Strength build above you would type “Strength” under Stat Filters then pick one, add a minimum value then search.Good Luck Exiles!
