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Discover everything you need to know about the Top 10 Passive Skills in Path of Exile 2 and what makes them unique from others.
Passive skills offer a flexible way to customize your skills and optimize your build for different scenarios in Path of Exile 2. Path of Exile 2 offers more ways to explore your skills to try out various builds. The passive skills are acquired by spending passive skill points on the Passive Skill Tree. Whether you want to be a fire-wielding sorcerer, a summoner commanding an undead army, or a fast-striking melee fighter, your Passive skills define your character. In this guide, we’ll discuss the best Passive skills to use in Path of Exile 2.
What are Passive Skills in POE 2?
Passive skills are a permanent enhancement that improves your character’s stats, abilities, or mechanics. Passive skills in Path of Exile 2 grant bonus attributes and stats to a character. You can gain passive skill points upon gaining a level and then allocate them to a node in the skill tree. The passive skill points are consumed among the four types.
- Attribute- Grants three primary stats: Strength, Dexterity, or Intelligence.
- Small- Grants small passive bonuses such as enhanced attack speed, attack speed, and more.
- Notable- They are found near a chain of Small Passives and change the behavior of skills.
- Keystone- Provide powerful effects but come with a downside.
You can get 122 Passive Skill Points in total and allocate them in the passive skill tree. You can respec or refund your Passive Skill Points at any time through The Hooded One, an NPC located in the Clearfell Encampment. Complete the “Sorrow Among Stones” quest in Act 1, to unlock this feature. However, it will take you 2 to 5 hours, depending on your pace. Consider picking notable passives in the star-shaped cluster from your starting point.
Select the passive nodes that boost your melee combat effectiveness, durability, and specific playstyle preferences. Use Weapon Specialization to quickly change passives, only if you have two weapon sets equipped.
How do you get passive skills in POE 2?
As you level up in Path of Exile 2, you will unlock passive skill points which you can spend on this tree. Each choice will give a passive buff to your character in one way or another. For example, Spell Damage is a small mode that grants a +10% increase in spell damage. The passive skill tree for literally every combined class in the game. Every class has a different starting point on the tree. There are no rules as to where you can or can’t branch off to. Use your passive skill points to invest in the tree, regardless of the direction. Certain quests reward you with additional passive skill points upon completion. There are some special points that you can use to allocate in the skill tree depending on which weapon you have equipped.
Passive Skill Tree in Path of Exile 2
For most new players, the passive skill tree is extremely daunting but actually, it’s quite simple. A character is granted one passive skill point every time they level up and are sometimes even granted more from completing certain quests. In extremely simple we have the intelligence section which focuses on spell damage, summoning, and elemental damage.
Next, we have the Dexterity section which is more focused on ranged combat, evasion, and speed. At the bottom left, we have the Strength section which is more melee and defense-oriented. Next, we’ve passive nodes and they are split into two categories. The small passives that grant minor bonuses such as a small increase in attack speed, spell damage, melee damage, or attributes.
Second, we’ve notable passives. These are larger passive points that grant greater bonuses than the smaller ones but they have stats on them that are often closely related to the small passives leading up to them. Think of these as checkpoints to work towards. On top of this, we have a third passive point but is not entirely compared to the two others. For the third one, we have the keystones which are build changing character defining that often provide a massive amount of power with a downside. However, these downsides can be reduced or worked towards.
Following a specific setup is extremely useful and understanding the passive skill tree can make or break your character. Investing more time in this specific section will definitely upgrade your knowledge of the game.
How to Use Passive Skills
Make sure that the passive skills that you choose boost the damage type or mechanics of your chosen active skills. Focus on using life, resistances, and other defensive passives to enhance your survivability in the game. Press the P on the Keyboard to open the Passive Skill Tree. Press the LMB on the desired node to spend your passive skill point and activate the effect of that skill.
However, some passive require a certain level of strength, dexterity, or intelligence. Unlike other skills gems, passive skills don’t need equipping or manual activation. They are always “on” after being allocated. Passive skills with your combat strategy keep a balance between offense and defense, allowing you to maximize your character’s potential.
Consume points on defensive nodes like life, resistances, or armour to survive tougher encounters. You also need to use points in offensive nodes to boost damage output for clearing mobs. Use the passives that enhance area damage or stun effects for a cluster of enemies or equip passives that enhance single-target damage or survivability. Keystone grants powerful effects, so make sure to choose keystones that complement your playstyle and reduce their downsides with gear.
You can easily get lost in the passive skill menu, so zoom out by using the mouse wheel or your controller bumpers. You can see the search option in the screen’s top right corner to filter out the passive skill you require. Enter the keyword of whatever passive you want but make sure that you type the spellings correctly. The menu will disappear after you search for a keyword. You will notice a glow around the border every half second and that’s your passive skill that you search for. Once done, delete anything you type in the search bar. This search bar is a highlighting feature that helps you identify your desired skills. The game offers hundreds of passive skills and this unique search bar can make your day when used accurately.
10 Best Passive Skills in POE2
Here are the top 10 passive skills to use in Path of Exile 2 to enhance your character’s survivability.
- Inner Faith- 20% increased maximum shield and 20% enhanced evasion rating.
- Spike Pit- create applies 10% increased damage taken to enemies within Jagged Ground.
- Manifold Method- Increase the amount of mana leech and chance to inflict ailments.
- Apocalypse- Increase the Critical Hit Chance of Herald Skills.
- Quick-Change Act- increase weapon swap speed.
- Cull the Hordes- 25% increased culling strike threshold.
- Low Tolerance- inflicts the effect of poison against enemies.
- Woodland Aspect- 25% increased effect of charms.
- Personal Touch- Increase the melee damage on immobilized enemies.
- Heartstopper- Take 50% more DoT if you have not taken damage over time.
1) Inner Faith
20% increased evasion rating. 20% increased maximum shield. 25% reduced effect of curses on you. This defensive node enhances evasion rating and maximum energy shield by 20% and also reduces the effect of curses on you. This node is crucial for defeating monsters and bosses that can reduce your defenses with a curse. You can also use Escape Velocity with this passive because your evasion rating is enhanced to 50%, and you also get a 3% increased movement speed. This skill is perfect for any character scaling Evasion and Energy Shield.
2) Spike Pit
Jagged Ground that you create applies 10% increased damage taken to enemies. Jagged Ground is a unique mechanic in Path of Exile 2 that is caused by certain abilities. Spike Pit is an incredible node for melee classes because monsters that are present in the Jagged Ground’s AoE receive 10% increased damage taken. Titans can enjoy this notable passive due to its heavy reliance on slam skills.
3) Manifold Method
50% increased amount of mana leeched. 30% increased chance to inflict ailments against rare or unique enemies. This passive skill boosts the amount of mana you get from mana leech. It allows you for a more active playstyle if you’re looking to recover your mana quickly. It also boosts your chance of inflicting ailments on rare and unique enemies. Consider the Manifold Method an integral part of your build if you want to go endgame farming with the Monk class in the game. Combine it with the Acolyte of Chula Monk Ascendancy to boost your mana leech per hit, allowing for faster Mana and Energy Shield recovery. This is great for the builds that depend on energy shield and mana leech mechanics.
4) Apocalypse
40% reduced damage. +6% to Critical Hit Chance of Herald Skills. This passive skill reduces your damage by a considerable amount and extra critical hit of Herald skills. This is perfect for the pure mapping builds in the game and mapping is the endgame system. Pair it with Herald of Ash for a better outcome. However, this passive is not the best to pick when creating a Path of Exile 2 character for killing bosses.
5) Quick-Change Act
50% increased weapon swap speed. Weapon swapping allows the players to seamlessly switch between two weapon sets during combat. You also gain increased damage for a short duration after weapon swapping. You can switch to different passive nodes on the fly depending on the weapon you have equipped. This allows you to best build diversity. You can unleash more deadly combos by swapping to a second weapon or vice versa.
6) Cull the Hordes
25% increased culling strike threshold. This passive allows you to kill enemies that are below a certain HP threshold. All you need to do is to lower your enemy’s life, making this mechanic more useful. The Culling Strike threshold in Path of Exile 2 is different from its predecessor. In Path of Exile, the monsters are automatically killed when you attack them while they’re below 10% of their maximum life. Thresholds are now based on monster rarity.
- Normal Monsters: 30%
- Magic Monsters: 20%
- Rare Monsters: 10%
- Unique Monsters: 5%
The magic monsters must have maximum health below 25% when this passive is allocated to slay them with a Culling Strike.
7) Low Tolerance
60% increased effect of poison against enemies that are not poisoned. You can only apply one stack of poison on an enemy best in Path of Exile 2, specifically while getting Low Tolerance. It boosts the destructive component of poison. Poison is a damaging ailment that can make your enemies suffer from chaos DoT. Find a way to decrease the duration of poison on the foes to utilize this skill for better effect.
8) Woodland Aspect
Charms applied to you have a 25% increased effect. This passive skill offers enhanced effect when using flasks under specific conditions instead of providing modifiers akin to ascendancy passive skills. The Thawing Charm provides freeze immunity if you get frozen. This only activates when the charm has full charges. You can use it with other skills that can increase the charm’s effect for better outcome in the game.
9) Personal Touch
20% increased melee damage. 25% increased melee damage against immobilized enemies. This passive skill increases the melee damage in combat allowing you to kill enemies faster. If you somehow immobilize the enemies, then attack the enemies with this skill for enhanced melee damage. Personal Touch is best for the build that focuses on melee attacks. You can also allocate points on Viciousness for +8% melee attack speed and +10 Dexterity.
10) Heartstopper
Take 50% less Damage over Time if you’ve started taking Damage over Time in the past second. Take 50% more Damage over Time if you haven’t started taking Damage over Time in the past second. Heartstopper is a high-risk, high-reward keystone that grants quick reactions to DoT effects like burning ground or poison. This passive node punishes you if you remain in the damaging effect for too long but it also provides reduction for the first second of taking damage over time. This passive skill is best for the builds with strong mobility or instant recovery mechanics while slower builds struggle to manage their downside.
FAQs About Top 10 Passive Skills in Path of Exile 2
How to get passive skills in Path of Exile 2?
As you level up in Path of Exile 2, you will unlock passive skill points which you can spend on this tree. Each choice will give a passive buff to your character in one way or another. Certain quests reward you with additional passive skill points upon completion.
Which is the best passive skill in Path of Exile 2?
Inner Faith is the best passive skill in Path of Exile 2. This defensive node enhances evasion rating and maximum energy shield by 20% and also reduces the effect of curses on you. This node is crucial for defeating monsters and bosses that can reduce your defenses with a curse.
What are the top 10 passive skills in Path of Exile 2?
The best 10 passive skills in the Path of Exile 2 are:
- Inner Faith
- Spike Pit
- Manifold Method
- Apocalypse
- Quick-Change Act
- Cull the Hordes-
- Low Tolerance
- Woodland Aspect
- Personal Touch
- Heartstopper
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