Vaal skill

Several different Vaal skill gems

The Vaal civilization may have existed thousands of years ago, but it had its own form of skill gems. Brutally powerful and fueled by the sacrifice of foes...

Description on the official Path of Exile website

Vaal skills are granted by Vaal skill gems, a special type of corrupt skill gem that grants an alternative version of the skill with powerful added effects fueled by the souls of slain enemies, as well as the regular version of the skill.

Vaal skill gems can be looted from vaal side areas, certain strongboxes, certain divination card, and bosses of corrupted maps. It is also possible to create a Vaal skill gem by using a (or Lapidary Lens) on a corresponding normal skill gem (e.g. using a Vaal Orb on has a chance of turning it into ).

Mechanics

Vaal skill gems grant both the base version of the skill and the Vaal version of the skill. Anything supported to the Vaal skill gem will apply to both skills, as long as they're applicable.

Souls

To use a Vaal skill, its gem must first be charged by collecting souls. Souls can be obtained by killing enemies, granting 1 souls per kill. Souls can also be obtained when damaging Rare or Unique enemies (1 or 6 souls, respectively, per 2% life lost with a 1 second cooldown). Each soul gained will charge a random Vaal skill equipped on the character. Souls will never charge a Vaal skill in the character's secondary weapon set. Souls are also tracked per skill, not per gem. In other words, you cannot store multiple charges of the same skill by equipping multiple copies of the Vaal skill gem.

Collected souls cannot be transferred between zone instances; instead, each instance maintains its own soul counter for each gem. Therefore, entering a new instance will start a new counter for each gem but returning to a previously visited instance will restore each counter to its previous value.

Once a Vaal skill collects a sufficient number of souls, it is charged with one use. The number of souls per use depends on the skill. Some Vaal skill gems can store enough souls for more than one use. Once a gem's maximum soul capacity is reached, it can collect no additional souls until they are spent by using the skill. Once used, the Vaal skill will be unable to gain souls for a few seconds. The length of soul gain prevention time varies between skills, and effects that modify the duration of the skill will also modify the duration of the soul gain prevention time. The soul gain prevention is global, which means you will not be able to gain any souls for any vaal skill at all.

A vaal gem that collected souls in an instance will keep these souls during a gem swap, a drop on the ground or putting it in the inventory afterwards.

Party - All players near monsters killed gain the same number of vaal souls as if they had killed it alone. Therefore characters who do not kill can still gain vaal souls in a party. In a party all kills by a player with Soul Eater will not give vaal souls to the party.

Soul Eater will prevent solo characters from gaining any vaal souls during the buff effect.

Sextants can apply the following modifiers to maps:

• Players' Vaal Skills do not apply Soul Gain Prevention.

• Players gain an additional vaal soul on kill.

Other mechanics

Vaal skills cannot be supported with , , and .

Vaal skills themselves can not be activated by trigger effects, but they can be used as a trigger.

Any effects that modify the original skill, such as Helmet Enchantments and Threshold jewels, will also affect the Vaal version of the skill as well.

Even if a Vaal skill has a gem tag that doesn't apply it to the base version, both versions will have that gem tag. For example, a skill gem will have the Duration tag on both Purity of Fire and Vaal Impurity of Fire and are affected by modifiers such as +X to Level of Socketed Duration Gems, while a normal skill gem won't be.

Because a can't be used on corrupted gems, getting quality on vaal gems is substantially harder than it is on a regular gem. Vaal gems must either drop with quality or a normal gem already with quality must have a used on it and be turned into a corrupted Vaal gem.

List of vaal skill gems

Sorted by attribute

Vaal Skills have requirements based on each of the three main attributes, and can be easily identified by the attribute colour.

A list of active skill gems granting vaal skills is displayed below.

The skill Gluttony of Elements, which is obtained by equipping , also counts as a Vaal skill.

Unique items

The following unique items affect the player's Vaal skills:

Achievements

The following achievements are related to Vaal skill gems:

Name	Description
Virtue Corruption	Corrupt a skill gem into a Vaal skill gem.
Vaal Gemling	Have a Vaal Skill Gem reach level 20.

Version history

Version	Changes
3.14.0	Vaal Skill Gems can now only be obtained from a set of specific methods such as Vaal Side Areas, Divination Cards (that specifically grant Vaal Skill Gems) and the Lapidary Lens in the Temple of Atzoatl. Damaging unique enemies now generates 6 Vaal souls (previously 3) per 2% life it loses, with a 1 second cooldown.
3.8.0	Modifiers to Vaal Soul Cost now work consistently with how modifiers to Mana Cost work. Namely, they now calculate the total amount to subtract from the cost, rounded down, and then apply that reduction to the cost of the Vaal skill. Previously, it calculated the new cost of the skill, and then rounded down, resulting in instances where Vaal skills had no Soul cost.
3.6.0	Vaal skills now have their appropriate surge effects.
3.4.0	Vaal Soul Gain Prevention time is now modified by modifiers to skill duration and buff duration if those modifiers in some way affect the associated skill. For example, reducing the duration of Vaal Earthquake will also reduce the Vaal Soul Gain Prevention time, while increasing the duration of Vaal Haste will increase the Vaal Soul Gain Prevention time.
3.3.0	Vaal skill gems now also grant the base version of the skill at the same level and quality as the Vaal gem. For example, a Vaal Burning Arrow skill gem now grants both the Vaal Burning Arrow and the Burning Arrow skills. Using a Vaal skill now prevents you from gaining souls for all Vaal skills for a short period of time after the skill is used. The duration of this effect varies from skill to skill. Whereas previously the cost of Vaal skills would increase in areas after Act 5, and again after Act 10, the cost of all Vaal skills is now consistent throughout the game. This is worth keeping in mind when looking at the following changes, as although many Vaal skill costs have been raised when compared to their base cost previously, they are typically now lower than the cost you would have paid in higher-level areas. Damaging rare enemies now generates 1 Vaal soul per 2% life it loses, with a 1 second cooldown. Damaging unique enemies now generates 3 Vaal souls per 2% life it loses, with a 1 second cooldown.
3.0.0	Vaal skill soul costs are increased by 50% of their base soul cost upon completion of Act 5, and increased by a total of 100% of their base soul cost upon completion of Act 10. Like the resistance penalties, these costs affect your character in all game areas.
1.2.1	Vaal skills can now trigger other skills. Like before, they can not be triggered themselves.
1.1.0	Introduced to the game.