"Hail, one of many. Eons ago, my kind walked the molten surface of this world. Now, we seek a champion. You must endure the heat of the Crucible. To forge weapons unlike any Wraeclast has ever seen. Take up the power of the Titans and bring obliteration!"
In Path of Exile: Crucible, you'll learn about an ancient race of Titans who once shaped the pristine surface of the Wraeclast. Now I will show you more details about the coming new league 3.21.
3.21 Challenge League
Crucible Forges are scattered throughout Wraeclast. When you find one, choose one of your weapons, and channel the power of the ancient Titans to produce a challenging encounter. The longer you channel, the molten monsters merge into more terrifying foes. You're in control of the difficulty and rewards of these encounters.
In typical Path of Exile fashion, your weapons can now be filled with powerful passive skill trees. Encounters at the Crucible Forges give you experience, allowing you to discover the tree on the weapon and gradually progress through its skills. You can only assign one skill from each tier, so choose your path carefully through each Crucible passive tree. If you're lucky, you'll find certain skills that, when assigned, turn into valuable Path of Exile currency or unique items when sold to vendors.
Endgame Improvements
Path of Exile: Crucible introduces the Atlas Gateways. You can distribute these nodes on the Atlas tree, allowing instant transfers between two locations. There are three pairs of gateways, and each gateway allows going from the left to the right of the tree and vice versa. Each end of the gateway costs an Atlas skill point to distribute but saves you a lot of travel points.
Breach Revamp
Regular Breachstones are now higher level, completely replacing Charged Breachstones, Pure Breachstones, and Enriched Breachstones. Flawless Breachstones can now be upgraded with Blessing or obtained passively from the Atlas tree. The pacing and density of breakthrough monsters have been improved, so the pressure and rewards are consistent throughout the encounter. There are also more items that are tweaked, such as Breach Scarabs, the Betrayal Research Safehouse, Breachstones from Kirac Missions, the Breach Harvest Crafting Option, the Fragment Stash Tab, Divination Cards, Breach Unique Items, Atlas Passives, and so on.
Abyss Revamp
Abyssal Depths now always contain an Abyssal Lich. Abysses can spawn a Stygian Spire instead of their reward chest, which drops a Stygian Vise, jewels, and other items. You're guaranteed to always get a four-hole Abyss alongside your Abyssal Depths rather than just a single hole. GGG has also updated Abyss passives on the Atlas Tree, Abyssal Lich encounter balance, Abyss uniques, and Abyss Scarabs.
Passive Tree and Mastery Improvements
The Crucible expansion provides many new ways to build characters and improve your favorite ones. GGG has revamped approximately half of the Masteries on the passive tree with lots of new build-improving stats to pick from. GGG has also bolstered the tree with new clusters for Link Skills, Stun Mitigation, and Marks and has added a few new Masteries.
GGG has also overhauled the Saboteur and Pathfinder Ascendancy Classes. In addition to Traps and Mines, the Saboteur can now specialize in Triggered Skills and Cooldown Recovery, including the ability to slow down the cooldowns of enemy skills. Pathfinder now has the ability to convert many skills into Concoction-like abilities, consuming flask charges for additional effects.
New Vaal Skills
Path of Exile: Crucible introduces nine new Vaal skills, which augment various builds. They are Vaal Absolution, Vaal Arctic Armour, Vaal Lightning Arrow, Vaal Reap, Vaal Animate Weapon, Vaal Domination, Vaal Ice Shot, Vaal Rejuvenation Totem, and Vaal Firestorm.
New Unique Items
Path of Exile: Crucible also introduces more than ten new unique items, including three that are exclusive to the Crucible Challenge League.
Conclusion
There are also some events, such as the boss kill event, Ruthless, and ExileCon. Path of Exile: Crucible will launch on April 7th (PDT) for PC and Mac and on April 12th for consoles. There is only one week until the 3.21 new league. Let's look forward to it together!
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Path of Exile 3.21: Crucible Expansion Details