This works in concert with skill gems, which slot into pieces of equipment and give your character spells and abilities to POE currency trade use in combat (unlike Diablo 3, they don't have any given abilities). Items will often have multiple gem slots, and sometimes they're linked together. If I put an ability like Orb of Storms into a slot and then link it with Curse on Hit, Flammability and Vulnerability, each time my Orb of Storms hits an enemy it'll also apply both of those curses to them. It's essentially a highly robust spell-crafting system.
But it's when skill gems and the passive tree overlap that things get really exciting. My Necromancer relies solely on Scorching Ray to deal damage. Naturally, I've unlocked plenty of nodes that increase fire damage, but a few major nodes have these clever synergies that are really fun to unlock. Take Elemental Equilibrium for example, which makes enemies I hit with elemental damage temporarily receive 25 percent resistance to those elements and -50 percent resistance to other elements.
How could that be useful to me? Well, when an enemy is hit by Orb of Storms, they become more resistant to lightning damage but weaker to fire. And because Scorching Ray is a damage over time ability, it doesn't actually "hit" an enemy, so I never risk making them more resistant to fire by accident. That's just one of a dozen small synergies my character has. I've never been much of a theory crafter, but seeing my build slowly come together as I unlock more major nodes has been a rewarding experience.
Seeing my build slowly come together as I unlock more major nodes has been a rewarding experience.
Path of Exile's core combat will never be as satisfying as Diablo 3's. It's slower and lacks the same kinetic energy as monsters ragdoll and the environment crumbles from your attacks. But what it lacks in animation and action, it makes up for in spades with the strategic depth that comes from slowly molding a character from such a robust system. I don't feel nearly as attached to any of my Diablo characters because I feel like I've invested so much time into intimately understanding how my Witch works. She feels handcrafted even though I built her from a template. And with her passive tree nearly complete and a good deal of her skills in place, she burns through packs of monsters with tremendous ferocity. It's like booting up a new PC build for the first time, hearing it whir to life and wanting to POE currency for sale shout "It's alive!"
