Path of Exile News

We're in the process of deploying the 3.10.1 update that contains a fair amount of improvements and fixes to the Delirium League, including a small adjustment that will further increase performance. We'll continue to monitor your reports and make additional improvements to Delirium where possible. Thank you for your feedback and support!

[h3]3.10.1 Patch Notes[/h3]
Delirium Improvements

• Simulacrum Splinters now drop in stacks at the completion of a Delirium encounter.
  
• Made various visual adjustments to Delirium mist to improve visibility of effects below the mist.
  
• Added a variety of coloured lights to monsters and packs with Delirium on-death modifiers to more clearly represent the type of damage their skills will deal.
  
• Added visual identifiers to monsters with the following Delirium modifiers to more clearly indicate that they have a modifier: Spatial Distortion, Cascading Storm, Banishing Flame, Winter Whorl, Crushing Terror, Spawn Dead, Shatter Dead and Putrify Dead.
  
• Improved the telegraphing of skills used by monsters with the Shockbomb and Bolt Cross Delirium modifiers.
  
• The Vengeful Blast modifier now creates a Fire-damage Flameblast (rather than Cold-damage). Improved the telegraphing of the Flameblast as well.
  
• Updated the effects of the Vengeful Skyfire meteors.
  
• Updated the effects and audio of the Crushing Terror telegraph and impact.
  
• Added a ground target marker for Vengeful Soul's Soul Mortar skill.
  
• Added a red tint to the homing Delirium volatile monsters and the ground objects which create them.
  
• Delirium Volatile monsters now have a charge-up animation before they explode, rather than exploding immediately on contact.
  
• Monsters with the Vengeful Stalker modifier are no longer targetable when they are exploding.
  
• The Vengeful Stalker modifier now deals Lightning damage.
  
• The Vengeful Skyfire modifier now creates more tightly clustered Firestorm impacts.
  
• Reduced the frequency of the Spawn Dead, Shatter Dead and Putrify Dead Delirium modifiers appearing on monsters.
  
• Adjusted the reward count pacing in story areas to behave similarly to that of Map areas. This does mean that some areas (such as Harbour Bridge) will no longer be overly rewarding.
  
• Reduced the likelihood of the Talisman reward type being chosen for Delirium rewards.
  
• Reduced the size of the Hysteriagate Simulacrum area. This results in monster density being similar to that of the other Simulacrum areas.
  
• Fixed a bug where some monsters were dropping Simulacrum Splinters after the Delirium mist had subsided.
  
• Fixed a rare bug where Delirium rewards could drop in inaccessible locations.
  
• Fixed a bug where rewards from the additional reward bars added in 3.10.0e did not give credit for the "Obtain Rewards from Delirium Encounters" challenge.
  
• Fixed a bug where the Devastator, Explosive Force and Unspeakable Gifts Cluster Jewel modifiers were causing monsters that aren't ordinarily able to have their corpses destroyed (such as Piety, the Abomination in the Belly of the Beast Level 2) to explode.
  
• Fixed a bug where the "Poisons you inflict on non-Poisoned Enemies deal 300% increased Damage" stat on the Low Tolerance Cluster Jewel notable did not work.
  
• Fixed a bug where the "Warcries count as having 10 additional nearby Enemies" stat on the Cry Wolf Cluster Jewel notable didn't work when using Intimidating Cry.
  
• Fixed a bug where corrupting a Unique Cluster Jewel into a Rare Cluster Jewel didn't generate an enchantment on the Rare Cluster Jewel.
  
• Fixed a rare bug where Fury Hound monsters in the Simulacrum could sometimes become immune to damage.
  
• Fixed a bug where Delirium Unique Items and Cluster Jewels were not dropping at the correct item level in the Simulacrum.
  
• Fixed a bug where Cluster Jewel notables were not being disabled if you had down-leveled below the level requirement of the socketed jewel.
  
• Fixed a bug where The Ascent was using a Delirium environment.
  

General Improvements

• You are now able to select an Atlas Mission via the Map Device.
  
• Areas that have Conqueror Influence can now also have either Shaper or Elder Influence applied to them.
  
• Divination Cards which award Perandus Manor now always do so at a tier that is equivalent to what would be received if you had 4 Watchstones in the appropriate region of your Atlas. Cadiro Perandus will offer Perandus Manor at a tier based on the Watchstone count of the appropriate region of your Atlas.
  
• Doryani's Machinarium now drops at a tier based on the Watchstone count of the appropriate region of your Atlas. This means that if you have 4 Watchstones in the region that contains the Maze Map, Doryani's Machinarium will drop at its maximum tier.
  
• Unique Maps and Vaal Temple Map are no longer highlighted when selecting a Favourite Map.
  
• x% increased Effect of Auras on You modifiers no longer apply to enemy debuff auras.
  
• Arc, when triggered, now targets as close to your target as possible.
  
• Mirage Archers now release their channelled Snipe at maximum stages.
  
• Eye Hatcheries created by Metamorph bosses no longer create damaging ground impacts each time they take damage.
  
• Scale of Esh monsters are now limited to having up to 3 minions at a time.
  
• Adjusted the physics of the Project Wings.
  
• Improved the performance of Bladestorm effects.
  
• Adjusted CPU core usage for processors with fewer cores. This should result in reduced CPU usage and a more responsive game experience.
  
• Fixed an issue with the PlayAlertSound parameter in Item Filters not handling the Continue command correctly.
  
• Fixed a bug where some unique monsters could fail to pathfind to players correctly.
  
• Fixed a bug introduced in 3.10.0 which caused the "Contains additional Divination Cards that give Corrupted Items" modifier found on Diviner's Strongboxes to not work.
  
• Fixed a bug where Vaal souls gained when using the Soul Ripper unique flask were given to a single Vaal skill, rather than being distributed amongst all socketed Vaal skills.
  
• Fixed a bug where running far away from an upgraded Stormbind rune and then returning to it caused it to visibly appear as if it was unupgraded.
  
• Fixed a bug where the ground effect from Hunter Influence Basilisk monsters re-appeared if you ran far away from it and then returned.
  
• Fixed a bug where the Ice Trail created by Veritania, The Redeemer lasted forever.
  
• Fixed a bug introduced in 3.10.0 where the Sawblades thrown by Truth Extractors bounced forever.
  
• Fixed a bug where the effects of the Snipe skill, granted by the Assailum unique helmet, were not correctly removed after using the skill.
  
• Fixed a bug where the visual effects from using Frostblink could get stuck on your character until you changed areas.
  
• Fixed a bug introduced in 3.10.0 which could cause the Pier Map boss to become untargetable.
  
• Fixed a bug causing the location of Animated Weapons' health bar to sometimes be incorrect.
  
• Fixed a bug where the height of some parts of the Morbid Hideout was incorrect, causing it to interact poorly with a number of hideout decorations.
  
• Fixed a bug which caused triggered Raging Spirits to not attack monsters.
  
• Fixed a bug where Kinetic Bolt was able to drop before level 5.
  
• Fixed a bug where party members could interact with the Metamorphosis Vat. They could only say Goodbye!
  
• Fixed a bug introduced shortly before 3.10.0 where Audio Reverb did not work.
  
• Fixed a bug where Thaumaturgy Wings and the Scientist Cloak flickered when certain effects were applied to your character.
  
• Fixed a bug introduced in 3.10.0 that caused the joints of the Wild Panther Pet to become quite entangled.
  
• Fixed a bug introduced in 3.10.0 where the trails from the Orion Weapon Effect became smaller than intended.
  
• Fixed a bug where the trails from the Trinity Aura Effect were sometimes slightly ahead of the rotating spikes.
  
• Fixed an instance crash that could occur when using Zombies.
  
• Fixed an instance crash that could occur during the Gruthkul, Mother of Despair encounter.
  
• Fixed an instance crash that could occur during a Kosis, The Revelation encounter.
  
• Fixed a client crash that could sometimes occur when closing the quest reward window.
  

As part of the Delirium league, we introduced a strange voice who doesn't interact with players directly but instead manifests right in their heads. Nick, one of our narrative designers, has written an article about creation of the Strange Voice and the process behind it. We hope you enjoy it!

__________________________________________________________

When a new league is in the works, there typically comes a point when we have to give the collection of planned mechanics a theme. Delirium was first described to me as an ever-expanding ring that would affect all monsters in an area, granting them powerful effects and making them harder to kill and more dangerous. It would be something that passes through the area quickly, encouraging players to move rapidly between monster packs, but would drop off if the player couldn't keep up with it. Whatever theme we gave this league had to allow for extremely broad but temporary effects.

The idea of something playing tricks on the player character's perception of reality coalesced quite quickly, but it took some time for the Strange Voice to come together. I wanted whoever was talking to you to be funny at times, menacing at others, and ultimately evoke a sense of distorted reality. For inspiration I initially looked to Gene Wilder's performance of Willy Wonka. His character perfectly walked the line between madman and master of his domain. He would weave in and out of eccentricities, cared little for the children he was taking through the factory and rarely, if ever, intervened in their fates.

Where you start when writing a script is rarely where you end. Initial drafts of the Strange Voice script involved more wordplay and taunting and less worldly insight, but with each rewrite it became more interesting to hear what the Voice thought about what was going on, slowly revealing who or what it might actually be, and allowing it to provide knowledge unavailable to the player, reinforcing the idea that it might not just be madness at play (then again, it might be).

Maps, of course, don't have the same linear structure and predictable elements that the campaign has, so that's where many of the taunts ended up. I wanted to make sure we really reinforced the delirious feeling as much as possible here, so I based lines on real traits of mental illness to try to evoke some sliver of what sufferers feel. Some lines play on paranoia ("They are out to get you"), some on anxiety and depression ("You are the cause of great misery", "You will die alone and afraid"), some on delusions of grandeur ("You are the only one who matters") and of persecution ("Everyone you trust has been replaced by illusions. They are trying to get you."), and some that tug at the strings of perception and morality ("You are murdering innocent souls").

I also wanted to play with some of the more memorable lines from other characters, with the voice providing a new twist or different context, playing into the idea that this could all just be a series of hallucinations the player's character is going through.

We had to be careful not to make light of mental illness, as it's a serious matter that many people suffer from. We also wanted to make sure that those suffering from mental illness didn't feel further harmed by some of the voice lines. To that end, not long before launch, we removed a few that we felt might be a little too harsh, even for Path of Exile. There were also a lot of lines that got cut due to certain planned ideas not panning out.

The voice actor, Michael Hallows, did a fantastic job bringing such an eerie character to life, and our resident sound effects wizard Kane took Michael's great performance to another level, playing with distortion to highlight certain words and phrases to great effect.

I've enjoyed watching players unravel the mystery of the Strange Voice. I always get nervous before a launch with a character that feels 'risky', so I was relieved he wasn't widely despised. I don't know if it'll ever make a return or not, but I do know we've got more fun characters in the works.

At the end of this work week, we're planning to deploy Patch 3.10.1 which includes improvements to several aspects of Delirium (including the visual updates we discussed last week), bug fixes and more. We've prepared a preview of the patch notes so that you know what to expect.

Delirium Improvements

• Made various visual adjustments to Delirium mist to improve visibility of effects below the mist.
  
• Added a variety of coloured lights to monsters and packs with Delirium on-death modifiers to more clearly represent the type of damage their skills will deal.
  
• The Vengeful Blast modifier now creates a Fire-damage Flameblast (rather than Cold-damage). We have improved the telegraphing of the Flameblast as well.
  
• Updated the effects of the Vengeful Skyfire meteors.
  
• Updated the effects and audio of the Crushing Terror telegraph and impact.
  
• Added a ground target marker for Vengeful Soul's Soul Mortar skill.
  
• Added a red tint to the homing Delirium volatile monsters and the ground objects which create them.
  
• Delirium Volatile monsters now have a charge-up animation before they explode, rather than exploding immediately when contacted.
  
• Monsters with the Vengeful Stalker modifier are no longer targetable when they are exploding.
  
• The Vengeful Stalker modifier now deals Lightning damage.
  
• The Vengeful Skyfire modifier now creates more tightly clustered Firestorm impacts.
  
• Adjusted the reward count pacing in story areas to behave similarly to that of Map areas. This does mean that some areas (such as Harbour Bridge) will no longer be overly rewarding.
  
• Reduced the size of the Hysteriagate Simulacrum area. This results in monster density being similar to that of the other Simulacrum areas.
  
• Fixed a bug where some monsters were dropping Simulacrum Splinters after the Delirium mist had subsided.
  
• Fixed a rare bug where Delirium rewards could drop in inaccessible locations.
  
• Fixed a bug where rewards from the additional reward bars added in 3.10.0e did not give credit for the "Obtain Rewards from Delirium Encounters" challenge.
  
• Fixed a bug where the Devastator, Explosive Force and Unspeakable Gifts Cluster Jewel modifiers were causing monsters that aren't ordinarily able to have their corpses destroyed (such as Piety, the Abomination in the Belly of the Beast Level 2) to explode.
  
• Fixed a bug where the "Poisons you inflict on non-Poisoned Enemies deal 300% increased Damage" stat on the Low Tolerance Cluster Jewel notable did not work.
  
• Fixed a bug where the "Warcries count as having 10 additional nearby Enemies" stat on the Cry Wolf Cluster Jewel notable didn't work when using Intimidating Cry.
  
• Fixed a bug where corrupting a Unique Cluster Jewel into a Rare Cluster Jewel didn't generate an enchantment on the Rare Cluster Jewel.
  
• Fixed a rare bug where Fury Hound monsters in the Simulacrum could sometimes become immune to damage.
  
• Fixed a bug where Delirium Unique Items and Cluster Jewels were not dropping at the correct item level in the Simulacrum.
  
• Fixed a bug where Cluster Jewel notables were not being disabled if you had down-leveled below the level requirement of the socketed jewel.
  

General Improvements

• You are now able to select an Atlas Mission via the Map Device.
  
• Shaper and Elder Influence can now be applied to areas that also have Conqueror Influence.
  
• Divination Cards which award Perandus Manor now always do so at a tier that is equivalent to what would be received if you had 4 Watchstones in the appropriate region of your Atlas. Cadiro Perandus will offer Perandus Manor at a tier based on the watchstone count of the appropriate region of your Atlas.
  
• Doryani's Machinarium now drops at a tier based on the Watchstone count of the appropriate region of your Atlas. This means that if you have 4 Watchstones in the region that contains the Maze Map, Doryani's Machinarium will drop at its maximum tier.
  
• Unique Maps and Vaal Temple Map are no longer highlighted when selecting a Favourite Map.
  
• x% increased Effect of Auras on You modifiers no longer apply to enemy debuff auras.
  
• Arc, when triggered, now targets as close to your target as possible.
  
• Mirage Archers now release their channelled Snipe at maximum stages.
  
• Eye Hatcheries created by Metamorph bosses no longer create damaging ground impacts each time they take damage.
  
• Scale of Esh monsters are now limited to having up to 3 minions at a time.
  
• Adjusted the physics of the Project Wings.
  
• Improved the performance of Bladestorm effects.
  
• Added an EnableDropSound parameter that can be used in Item Filters.
  
• Fixed an issue with the PlayAlertSound parameter in Item Filters not handling the Continue command correctly.
  
• Fixed a bug where some unique monsters could fail to pathfind to players correctly.
  
• Fixed a bug introduced in 3.10.0 which caused the "Contains additional Divination Cards that give Corrupted Items" modifier found on Diviner's Strongboxes to not work.
  
• Fixed a bug where Vaal souls gained when using the Soul Ripper unique flask were given to a single Vaal skill, rather than being distributed amongst all socketed Vaal skills.
  
• Fixed a bug where running far away from an upgraded Stormbind rune and then returning to it caused it to visibly appear as if it was unupgraded.
  
• Fixed a bug where the ground effect from Hunter Influence Basilisk monsters re-appeared if you ran far away from it and then returned.
  
• Fixed a bug where the Ice Trail created by Veritania, The Redeemer lasted forever.
  
• Fixed a bug introduced in 3.10.0 where the Sawblades thrown by Truth Extractors bounced forever.
  
• Fixed a bug where the effects of the Snipe skill, granted by the Assailum unique helmet, were not correctly removed after using the skill.
  
• Fixed a bug where the visual effects from using Frostblink could get stuck on your character until you changed areas.
  
• Fixed a bug introduced in 3.10.0 which could cause the Pier Map boss to become untargetable.
  
• Fixed a bug causing the location of Animated Weapons' health bar to sometimes be incorrect.
  
• Fixed a bug where the height of some parts of the Morbid Hideout was incorrect, causing it to interact poorly with a number of hideout decorations.
  
• Fixed a bug which caused triggered Raging Spirits to not attack monsters.
  
• Fixed a bug where Kinetic Bolt was able to drop before level 5.
  
• Fixed a bug where party members could interact with the Metamorphosis Vat. They could only say Goodbye!
  
• Fixed a bug introduced shortly before 3.10.0 where Reverb did not work.
  
• Fixed a bug where Thaumaturgy Wings and the Scientist Cloak flickered when certain effects were applied to your character.
  
• Fixed a bug introduced in 3.10.0 that caused the joints of the Wild Panther Pet to become quite entangled.
  
• Fixed a bug introduced in 3.10.0 where the trails from the Orion Weapon Effect became smaller than intended.
  
• Fixed a bug where the trails from the Trinity Aura Effect were sometimes slightly ahead of the rotating spikes.
  
• Fixed an instance crash that could occur when using Zombies.
  
• Fixed an instance crash that could occur during the Gruthkul, Mother of Despair encounter.
  
• Fixed an instance crash that could occur during a Kosis, The Revelation encounter.
  
• Fixed a client crash that could sometimes occur when closing the quest reward window.
  

Please note that these are subject to change prior to the patch's deployment. The 3.10.1 update will be deployed on consoles as soon as possible after its release on PC.

Also, regarding the recent Buffer Underflow error that some users were experiencing, we believe have fully resolved this issue. If you still encounter it, please help us by posting your instance IP address in this thread.

Additionally, the Russian game servers are still under DDOS attack, and we are talking to the server host to try to work out a way this can be mitigated. Thank you so much for your help and your patience.

This is a stressful time for many of us in the world and we want to bring a little light to the moment by offering a free Thaumaturgy Mystery Box! To redeem a free Thaumaturgy Mystery Box all you need to do is to open the in-game shop! The Mystery Box will be automatically added to your account. Please note that visiting the shop on the website does not trigger the free box - it must be accessed from inside the game client.

To receive a free Thaumaturgy Mystery Box, your account has to have been created prior to today. It's only possible to get one box per account.

You'll be able to collect one free mystery box any time within the next week.

Stay safe, everyone! We wish you all the best.

As an island nation in the middle of the South Pacific Ocean, New Zealand has an opportunity to stop the local spread of the recent coronavirus pandemic before it gets too entrenched. With around 100 cases from travellers returning home and two that may have been due to community transmission, our government announced yesterday that all New Zealanders will self-isolate for at least four weeks to eradicate the virus. This includes our entire development team.

The Path of Exile game service will remain online without disruption. Our server administrators were already solving problems from home when needed, so we do not expect any new issues that would affect the live service as a result of being unable to see each other in person.

We have moved all of our staff to working from home. While it's entirely possible for them to do any work they need to away from the office, it raises several new challenges for us.

Firstly, from a technical standpoint, there's a lot of development data for people to patch over the internet from the office to their homes every day. We only have 2gbit of upload speed from the office, shared between a lot of people, so it's going to be slower for people to share work with each other and to update to the most recent build.

Secondly, and more worryingly, communication is going to be more difficult when we're not all in the same big open-plan room. We're a company that relies on face-to-face discussion about important issues, and adjusting to a world of voice and video chat is going to take some time.

Our developers are still prioritising the same work as before (fixing residual Delirium issues, investigating performance concerns, etc). Please bear with us if it takes longer than it usually would due to these new circumstances. We plan to post another update about these improvements in the next couple of days.

We are also working on the 3.11.0 release, which will contain our next league. We expect to have this ready on our usual schedule (i.e. release in mid-June), but will certainly need to re-confirm that time window after actually doing this work-from-home thing in case it affects the schedule.

There's likely some impact to the Path of Exile 2 development timeline. We are absolutely prioritising the triaging of live game issues, then the development of new leagues, with development of the sequel as a third priority. A period of slower Path of Exile 2 development is a small price to pay in these difficult circumstances. We still have our jobs, and if the lockdown succeeds, our health.

We'd like to thank the development team for being so flexible and enthusiastic about this next month, and our community for their ongoing feedback and patience. We are very fortunate to be in New Zealand. Our thoughts and sympathies are with the rest of the world. Stay safe.