Version 1.0.0

Patch notes
These are the official patch notes for Version 1.0.0 released by Grinding Gear Games.

New Four-Month Challenge Leagues

 * Four month challenge leagues are a great opportunity for a fresh start. All your old characters and items are still present in the Standard and Hardcore leagues, but you're encouraged to join the new economies, complete challenges and climb the ladder!
 * The new challenge leagues include a set of eight new challenges! If you complete all of them, you'll receive an exclusive Domination/Nemesis challenge shirt. 61 players completed all the challenges in the last pair of four-month leagues.
 * Domination: A variety of powerful Shrines now spawn throughout Wraeclast, surrounded by large groups of monsters that are influenced by their power. These monsters receive substantial bonuses or are protected by their shrine's effects in some way. If you are able to tag the shrine, you receive these powers for a short time. It's often very risky to run in and try to claim the shrine, but it is a gamble that can pay off. One of the new challenges is to tag each of the shrine types.
 * Nemesis: Nemesis is a Hardcore league (characters who die are converted to Standard characters). Rare monsters have one guaranteed mod from the Nemesis Pool, which makes the fight substantially harder. One of the challenges is to kill a rare with each of the Nemesis mods.
 * The new challenge leagues have introduced five new base types of items - four new Flasks and a Ring.
 * The cannot drop as a base type in Domination and Nemesis league but it can be created with a new vendor recipe. Unique Prismatic Rings can still drop in these leagues.
 * There are six new Unique items that can drop in either challenge league, plus one that can only drop in Domination and one that can only drop in Nemesis.
 * The Support Gem can not be obtained in these Challenge leagues.
 * Increased Item Quantity mods cannot spawn on Magic and Rare items in these leagues.

Content - Major

 * Added the Scion, Path of Exile's prestige character class. She is aligned with all three core attributes (Strength, Dexterity and Intelligence) and starts in the center of the passive tree. She's only available once you've unlocked her by playing through Normal difficulty and rescuing her. Existing accounts that have finished Normal difficulty before start with her unlocked.
 * Added six new world areas (in all three difficulty levels) across three new tilesets. There are three new quests.
 * Added a grand finale boss fight.
 * Added eight new end-game Maps including a new tier of level 78 maps.
 * Added 11 new Unique Items, three of which are designed by our community and eight which can only drop in the Domination and Nemesis leagues. Six of those eight appear in either challenge league, but there's also one that is exclusive to each league.
 * Added two new Halloween Microtransactions - Demon Hand Pet and Decapitation Helmet Skin. They're for exclusively for sale until the end of November 1.
 * Added six new monster types, three of which are exclusive to the new areas. The other three appear in previous areas also, such as the Cannibals who have replaced the Scavengers in early Act One.
 * Many existing monsters have received new abilities when added to the new world areas.
 * Added a new Rogue Exile - Xandro Blooddrinker, based on member of our community who won the "Well Dressed Exile Competition".
 * The Eternal Laboratory has been visually revamped and is now present in the Solaris Temple. In Normal and Cruel difficulties, it contains lore.
 * Added a new curse, Silence, that monsters can use on you.

Content - New Skills

 * Added a new Strength/Dexterity Skill Gem - : Throws a spectral copy of your melee weapon. It flies out and then returns to you, in a spinning attack that strikes enemies in its path.
 * Added a new Strength/Intelligence Skill Gem - : Animates a melee weapon or armour, attaching it to an invisible Guardian that fights by your side. Animating multiple items attaches them to the same Guardian. Guardians killed in PvP areas will not lose their items.
 * Added a new Dexterity/Intelligence Skill Gem - : Animates a melee weapon to fight by your side. There's no limit on the number of weapons you can animate.
 * Added a new Dexterity Support Gem -.
 * Added a new Strength Support Gem -.
 * We've added Trigger Gems, a new type of Support Gem that causes linked skills to be cast automatically on certain conditions. This patch includes six of these, with more coming in subsequent updates.
 * Added a new Intelligence Trigger Support Gem -.
 * Added a new Dexterity/Intelligence Trigger Support Gem -.
 * Added a new Strength/Intelligence Trigger Support Gem -.
 * Added a new Dexterity/Intelligence Trigger Support Gem -.
 * Added a new Strength/Intelligence Trigger Support Gem -.
 * Added a new Intelligence/Dexterity Trigger Support Gem -.
 * Added a new Keystone Passive Skill - Mind over Matter: When hit, 30% of damage is taken from mana before life.
 * Added a rebalanced Keystone Passive Skill - Avatar of Fire: 50% of your physical/lightning/cold damage is converted to fire damage. You can't deal non-fire damage.

Features - Major

 * Added an achievement system. Achievements are somewhat easier than Challenges and can be completed in any league. We expect to add at least one new achievement per two-weekly ongoing content patch.
 * Added new Player Profile pages on the website. These list your current/historic accomplishments in many categories (races, PvP, challenges, achievements) and allow you to pin the results you're proudest of.
 * The development team and Gold/Diamond/Exalted/Eternal/Ruler supporters are now listed in the game's credits. These are displayed upon completion of the game.
 * Waypoints, quest locations and story glyphs have been updated to have nicer graphical markers on the minimap.

Features - Guilds

 * We've added Guilds! To create one, use the Social screen. Guilds can initially hold 30 members, but more slots can be purchased.
 * There are three membership tiers - Leader, Office and Member. Leaders can change permissions. Officers can invite people to the guild.
 * There's a guild chat channel (bound to the & symbol). It spans across leagues.
 * Powerful guilds can obtain tags that appear next to their members' names in chat. This requires sacrificing a set of end-game Maps, each of which corresponds to a letter or symbol in the tag. Tags are unique and some symbols are much rarer than others.
 * You can purchase Premium Guild Stash Tabs which allow you to store your guild's wealth. You can set permissions for different tiers of members to view, add items and remove items.
 * Guild purchases are handled by the guild leader. Players can visit their guild page on pathofexile.com to donate points to their guild.
 * Guild Challenges are coming very soon!

Features - Player vs. Player

 * We've added a Capture the Flag PvP mode. It's available at Greust (and now Maramoa in Merciless) like normal PvP. Supported team sizes are 3v3 and 6v6.
 * Rapid-fire PvP tournaments will start with PvP Season One (which is approximately three weeks after Release). There may be some experimental ones before that. *More PvP balance and usability changes are on the way.
 * Dueling will be enabled very soon!

Features - Minor

 * Magic and rare monsters now have new effects to indicate their presence. Lights have been removed from many rare and unique monsters.
 * The Path of Exile logo on the title screen is now 3D.
 * Improved the visual appearance of metal in the graphics engine.
 * Changed the colour of the Twitch chat text to turquoise because Guild chat is grey.
 * The graphics engine has had several performance optimisations.
 * Players now cannot spend or reserve their last point of life with Blood Magic.
 * Chaos damage now has its own section on item display popups.
 * Improved markup of terrain to prevent players catching on some objects as they run past.

Content - Minor

 * Merciless PvP is now handled by Maramoa rather than Greust.
 * Some of the previously drop-only Skill and Support Gems are available from a new side quest. The new Trigger Gems are also available in this quest. The other new side quest offers utility flasks and rare items.
 * The "Sharp and Cruel" and "Sever the Hand" quests in Merciless now offer rare items as rewards, rather than Skill or Support Gems.
 * Some monsters now have "Far Shot" causing them to do less damage to closer targets and more damage to farther away targets.
 * The Crematorium has been reduced to one level in size.
 * The Slums waypoint has been moved to the Crematorium. If you previously had the Slums waypoint, you will be awarded the Crematorium waypoint.
 * The Solaris Temple has been reduced to two levels. If you previously had the Solaris Temple Level 3 waypoint, you will be awarded the Solaris Temple Level 2 waypoint.
 * The Shock and Horror boss in the has been revamped.
 * The and  Unique items now have their own 3D art.
 * The effect for has been improved.
 * Added new portal effects including special Map portals.
 * Some world areas have been renamed.
 * The Coast (formerly The Terraces) now has new types of chests.
 * The new Ground Ice looks awesome.
 * Removed some carts from the.
 * Adjusted the size of the.
 * Adjusted the size of the.
 * Adjusted the density of monsters in the.
 * Continued to incrementally improve the sound, art, effects and environments.

Balance Changes - General

 * The experience equation has been changed so that the minimum experience you receive when too high or too low level is 2% (before it is split among the players). This means that farming non-Map areas until level 100 is actually plausible now.
 * Characters now receive 8 life per level rather than 6.
 * Increased the monster life bonus per additional player by 25% in Cruel and 50% in Merciless.
 * Shock has been reduced to 30% increased damage taken per stack rather than 40%.
 * Blinded players now have minimum light radius.
 * The damage reflection auras have been reduced to 15%.
 * Starting attributes for each character class now add to 60 rather than 58.

Balance Changes - Items

 * 40% of the item quantity bonus for additional party members is now shifted towards item rarity. Gems and currency items still receive the old item quantity bonus.
 * Diminishing returns for player item quantity and item rarity have been changed so that they are slightly less effective.
 * Item drops from Merveil, Brutus, Vaal Oversoul, Piety and Dominus have been substantially increased in Cruel and Merciless difficulties.
 * When using, you're now 233% more likely to roll four linked sockets and 25% more likely to roll five linked sockets.
 * The implicit resistances possible on the have been reduced slightly.
 * The damage of two-handed weapons has been increased.
 * New higher physical and elemental damage mods have been created for two-handed weapons.
 * Bows also receive the increased damage and the new two-handed physical damage mods, but only have access to one-handed elemental damage mods.
 * Staves have received new higher two-handed spell damage mods.
 * Some of the rarest Unique items can now only drop from end-game Maps.
 * The drop rate of the has been substantially reduced.
 * When traded to a vendor, three now become an, instead of a.
 * New implicit mods have been added to the (Weapon Elemental Damage) and the  (Local Crit Chance).
 * The mod can no longer spawn on shields.
 * All shield defences have been reduced by 17%.

Balance Changes - Unique Items

 * The following Unique items have been directly buffed. Using a Divine Orb on an existing version will roll new mods in the new ranges.
 * Increased Physical Damage has been increased.
 * Increased Mana Cost of Skills has been reduced.
 * Increased Physical Damage has been increased.
 * Attack Speed has been increased.
 * Increased Evasion has been increased. Acrobatics now also grants a better dodge chance than before.
 * Attack Speed on Full Life and Movement Speed on Low Life have both been increased.
 * Reflected Cold Damage has been increased.
 * Increased Armour and Energy Shield has been increased.
 * Attack Speed has been increased.
 * Block While Dual Wielding has been increased.
 * Increased Energy Shield has been increased.
 * Increased Physical Damage per 10 Strength has been increased.
 * Increased Armour and Energy Shield, Chaos Damage reflected to melee attackers and the Chance to Create Desecrated Ground have all been increased.
 * Added Lightning Damage, Chaos Resistance and Chance to Create Consecrated Ground have all been increased.
 * The following Unique items have been nerfed. Using a Divine Orb on an existing version will roll new mods in the new ranges.
 * More Unarmed Physical Damage has been reduced.
 * Increased Physical Damage has been reduced.
 * Increased Movement Speed has been reduced.
 * All Elemental Resistances has been reduced.
 * Increased Energy Shield has been reduced.
 * Lightning Damage has been reduced.
 * Weapon Elemental Damage has been reduced.
 * The following Unique items have had more complex changes:
 * Increased Life has been reduced to 500. Increased Fire Damage has been added. A Divine Orb used on an existing version would only update the life.
 * Melee Damage Reflect has been increased. It also now has additional life. A Divine Orb used on an existing copy will only reroll the Melee Damage Reflect.
 * Now requires character level 11 to equip.
 * The flat Evasion bonus has been changed to Increased Evasion percentage. Existing ones will have the new property, but the old value. Using a Divine will reroll the value to the new one. Additionally, its Increased Global Critical Strike Chance and Attack Speed have been improved.

Balance Changes - Monsters

 * Piety the Empyrean in the and the Shadow of the Vaal in the  now have significantly higher item quantity and rarity.
 * Monster skill costs and mana pools now increase proportional to their level in a more natural way.
 * The descriptions of properties on magic and rare monsters have been made more concise so that they're easier to read in combat.
 * The Unwavering monster accuracy prefix has been renamed to Precise.
 * Map Bosses now have 60% reduced curse effect (up from 50%).
 * Act bosses now have 70% reduced curse effect (up from 40%).
 * Rogue Exiles now have 50% reduced curse effect (up from 0%).
 * Grapplers will now discharge when they have any kind of Charge, not just Power Charges.

Balance Changes - Active Skills

 * The following skills have had their mana costs reduced:, , , , , , , , and.
 * The following skills have had their mana costs increased:, and.
 * Damage progression past level 1 has been reduced.
 * Damage is increased at lower levels. Spark duration has been heavily reduced.
 * Damage at high levels has been reduced by around 40% at level 15.
 * Damage at high levels has been reduced by around 30% at level 15.
 * Damage has been increased by around 23%.
 * Damage at high levels has been reduced (around 10% less damage at level 15).
 * Damage at high levels has been reduced (around 10% less damage at level 15).
 * The life leech from has been rescaled and adjusted. It now also leeches mana when a corpse is consumed. It will now consume corpses when you're missing either life or mana.
 * The damage bonus now starts at 40% instead of 30%, but only increases by 1% per level, instead of 3%. Righteous Fire now burns nearby monsters and the character based on a percentage of life and a percentage of energy shield of the caster.
 * The dual wielding penalty for Cleave is now multiplicative and includes elemental damage.
 * The bonus to Critical Multiplier has been reduced by a flat 20% at all levels.

Balance Changes - Auras

 * For all Auras: Base area of effect has been increased. The area of effect bonus from quality has been doubled.
 * The mana cost for all auras except has been changed to 60% reservation. Edit: Blood Magic is very strong because the auras are so powerful and the mana reservation can be mitigated very heavily using passives, items and the support gem.
 * Damage has been increased.
 * Damage has been increased.
 * Damage increase has been increased.
 * Maximum resistances provided have been reduced.
 * Attack Speed, Cast Speed and Movement speed increases have been increased. Haste now follows the same progression of area of effect changes as other auras.
 * Life Regeneration has been increased.
 * Energy Shield granted has been increased.
 * Evasion granted has been increased.
 * The mana regeneration has been increased by around 15% at all levels.

Balance Changes - Support Gems

 * Mana cost reduced. Damage reduced by 21%.
 * Damage reduction increased from 40% to 50%.
 * Damage reduction increased from 40% to 50%.
 * The quality bonus has been changed to Mine Laying Speed.
 * Damage increase has been reduced at all levels by a flat 5%.

Balance Changes - Passive Skill Tree

 * Two new Keystone Passives described under "Content" above have been added.
 * The centre of the tree has been significantly reworked to facilitate the Scion.
 * Several clusters and Keystones have had their locations moved.
 * Acrobatics and Phase Acrobatics have been increased to providing 30% dodge chance.
 * Most percentage based life passives have been increased by 2%. Several life passives have been removed from the tree or integrated into nearby nodes.
 * Small chaos resistance nodes have been removed or integrated into nearby passives.
 * Several damage clusters have had defensive bonuses added to them.
 * The early Shadow tree has been given more access to mana. Flat mana has been added to one of the life nodes and Mental Acuity now offers 20% mana regeneration.
 * The early Marauder tree has had the Strength bonuses from early melee notables increased. The versatility cluster also offers mana cost reduction.
 * The early Witch tree has had life flask bonuses changes for nodes that provide general flask effect improvements. General Spell damage nodes have been improved.
 * Several Notable Passives have been renamed.
 * A new notable called Arcane Vision has been added which adds accuracy and "Light Radius is based on Energy Shield instead of Life".

Bug Fixes

 * You now can't use an on a fully linked item or a  on a fully socketed item.
 * The client can now patch when its Content.ggpk file is marked as read-only. This used to be a problem if you downloaded it from a torrent.
 * You can't drop items in PvP areas any more.
 * Fixed a bug where you could apply cosmetic skins to an item if it had already been skinned with a Skin Transfer.
 * can no longer destroy items stored with Skin Transfer.
 * Transferred skins now display correctly when the item is linked in chat.
 * will no longer drop fireballs out of line-of-sight of the target location.
 * Fixed problems related to when 's sound plays.
 * Fixed a bug where linking microtransaction items on the forums wouldn't work correctly.
 * Fixed a bug in the Way Forward quest where the spikes in the Prisoner's Gate would not be raised if you had the Seal key but hadn't seen *Piety raise them.
 * Fixed a bug in where the first arc in the chain would attempt to re-target to things outside its maximum range.
 * Fixed a bug where the Client can permanently stop rendering anything when a Windows "move" command is issued.
 * Rare degeneration bears that generate with an aura from a mod now cast their degeneration aura properly as well.
 * Fixed a bug where the life gain per hit from spells when using displayed incorrectly.