Grinding Gear Games’ isometric action role-playing game (ARPG) Path of Exile 2 continues to build up its arsenal since its launch in early access late last year, as its next major update, titled The Third Edict, is perhaps the game’s biggest one yet, introducing a new campaign act, its first league and a whole bunch of balance improvements and quality-of-life upgrades.
Following the debut of the Huntress class in the previous update, there isn’t another new one this time around, with the update instead focused on building upon the foundations of the game.
Headlining the update will be the introduction of Act 4, a new campaign act that will take players across the seas to a new set of islands called the Ngamakanui archipelago, where they will hunt down pieces of an ancient weapon. The act will be non-linear in design, meaning players will be able to visit the eight islands in any order they choose, encountering over 100 new monster types and 12 new boss encounters.
With the arrival of Act 4, Grinding Gear Games will also adjust how campaign progression works. Previously, upon completion of the first three acts, players would then need to redo these campaigns in the Cruel difficulty to level themselves up sufficiently and tackle the endgame. With the next update, gone are the Cruel difficulty missions, and after completing Act 4, players will now gain access to three temporary mini-acts titled “Interludes”, each introducing side stories and, when combined, adds 19 new areas and 9 new bosses for players to encounter. It is to be noted, however, that these missions will be time-limited in nature and once the game gets updated with Acts 5 and 6, they will no longer be available to players.
Experienced Path of Exile 2 players can also test their mettle in the game’s first official league, The Rise of the Abyssal. Players will be able to create a new character in the league, kickstarting a campaign that includes a new economy and new game mechanics. In this league, areas now contain dangerous fissures that spew out enemies and even bosses, tasking players to clear them, alongside the area’s original baddies, before sealing the fissure and reaping the rewards, which may include a rare new Abyssal modifier. The dangerous pits have other effects, too, like infecting and buffing nearby creatures, and additionally, players might sometimes have the opportunity to jump into them to face the unknown horrors lurking beneath the surface.
The final major addition to the game is perhaps the most fan-requested, and that’s asynchronous trading, with players now able to discover a new merchant in Act 4, who joins their hideout and serves as a key figure in trading. With this new character, players will be able to deposit the loot they wish to trade with other players, set its price, and make the listing available on Path of Exile 2’s trading website, where interested parties can find and buy items, even when the seller is offline, which cuts down on the busywork of the current trade system, where players have to physically meet and trade in-game.
Apart from these major additions, Path of Exile 2 will also receive a slew of balance improvements in the update, including a host of new skills and buffs for each class, with most catered to boosting the effectiveness of some skills which are currently not as effective. These include changes to how some Warrior skills work, making it so that players no longer need to invest accuracy into close-range builds, or a new mechanic called deflection, which buffs evasion for dexterity-based characters by reducing damage from hits.
There’s even a new sprint mechanic being added to the game, which will definitely make traversal more efficient, although the trade-off is that players will be knocked down and made vulnerable if they are not careful and get hit while sprinting. Support gems will also be overhauled, adding new tiers, balance reworks and allowing them to be slotted into multiple skills at the same time. New Lineage Support Gems will also be added, powerful, rare drops that can be gained from clearing specific bosses.
That’s just scratching the surface, too, as Path of Exile 2 will also receive a bunch of other gameplay improvements, alongside 25 new Endgame maps to explore, bringing no shortage of content for both new and returning players to engage with. Players can check out the full list of changes coming in The Third Edict via the game’s official website.
Path of Exile 2: Third Edict will launch on 29 August 2025, 1pm PDT (30 August 4am SGT), with the game also receiving a Free Weekend campaign, allowing players to try the new and existing content without requiring an Early Access key from 29 August 1pm PDT to 1 September 1pm PDT (2 September 4am SGT).
Kevin is a reformed PC Master Race gamer with a penchant for franchise “duds” like Darksiders III and Dead Space 3. He has made it his life-long mission to play every single major game release – lest his wallet dies trying.
