Path of Exile 2 is finally upon us, offering players a unique and fresh take on the aRPG genre that we haven’t seen since the days of Diablo 2. It has six classes available at the moment, with six more to come out as the game continues to be developed.
Each class has two Ascendancies, two extra forms on top of the basic one, each with unique effects and abilities. So, here are all the 12 Ascendancies in Path of Exile 2 and how to unlock them.
Every Ascendancy in PoE 2
There are twelve total ascendancies in PoE 2 early access, or two for each class. They provide your character with an extra sheet of passive abilities, which are leveled up via the several Trials available in the game, the first of which is the Trial of the Sekhemas, which unlocks ascendancy in the first place. It’s found in an area of Act 2 and is a bit hidden, so I advise you to explore the Traitor’s Passage area as much as possible.
So, here are all the ascendancy classes currently available in Path of Exile 2:
The Witch ascendancies: Blood Mage and Infernalist
The Witch sports ascendancies oriented around either blood spells or infernal fire. The first has its spells costing Health as well as Mana while providing you with awesome buffs, heals, leeching, infinite curses, damage mitigation, and so on. On the other hand, the Infernalist gives you mastery over the flames, turning your character into a blazing spellcaster that does a ton of fire damage, has incredible fire resistance, turns damage into fire damage so she can withstand more of it, and even gets a Demon Form to boot.
Both of these ascendancies are viable and useful, with the Infernalist seeming a tad bit more useful due to the more unique and powerful passives it has.
The Warrior ascendancies: Titan and Warbringer
As their names imply, the Warriror’s ascendancy classes are focused on either tanking through everything with a big bonk in your hand or blocking and howling your way through the battlefield. The Titan grants you everything you could think of that is related to the word, from carrying massive chests in your inventory to expanding its capacity to having a lot more HP to receiving a massive increase in armor from equipment. You become a complete colossus with this ascendancy and can face your opponents head-on without a second thought.
The Warbringer gives you the ability to block everything so long as you have a shield equipped (perfect for The Wall builds), and you don’t even have to raise it! There’s also zero cooldown on the Warcry and the ability to explode corpses when using it.
Both of these ascendancies are nigh perfect, and I’d have a hard time choosing between them, so I won’t play favorites here.
The Sorceress ascendancies: Stormweaver and Chronomancer
The Sorceress is a commander of the elements, and Stormweaver only adds to that mastery, improving her shock and frost spells to the utmost. You will call the storms upon your enemies and wreck them with ice and lightning, inflicting them with shock to buff your damage output against them and entering the Arcane Surge for quicker spellcasting and more mana regen.
The Chronomancer is the more exciting of the pair, an ascendancy class that lets you manipulate time itself. Spells have a chance not to go on cooldown when used, you get a whole new skill to reset cooldowns of other spells, you can freeze time for all enemies in an area, and you become blazingly quick every 12 seconds.
While the Stormweaver might be a great option for newer players who don’t like high APM and complex mechanics, I have to say the Chronomancer seems much more busted, at least in its current form.
The Ranger ascendancies: Deadeye and Pathfinder
The Ranger is a highly mobile class that loves taking enemies down from a distance, and this very notion is embodied by the Deadeye ascendancy that grants damage buffs the more your projectile travels, gives you multiple projectiles per shot, removes accuracy penalties when firing at a distance, and so on. It’s perfect for those who wish to stay behind and wreck their enemies before they even come close.
The Pathfinder, on the other hand, focuses on brewing various concoctions and utilizing her flasks for various effects, whether it be chaos bombs, bleeding explosions, or otherwise. She is also focused on moving quickly, ignoring movement penalties as much as possible.
I have to say that these two are pretty interesting each, with the Pathfinder making the class way more unique since the first only amplifies its core mechanics.
The Mercenary ascendancies: Witchhunter and Gemling Legionnaire
The Mercenary is no joke in its basic form, but the ascendancies take him to a whole new level. The Witchhunter grants him ramping damage, exploding enemies, and an instakill mechanic when enemies fall below a certain HP threshold. Full HP enemies also have their HP shredded on the first hit, and the Mercenary gains a Concentration mechanic that debuffs enemies and grants him extra damage against them.
The Gemling Legionnaire is more of a standard class, buffing the Mercenary’s skills with extra quality and levels, doubling bonuses to his stats, reducing the cost of skills, and allowing the duplication of support gems, among other things.
If you’re roleplaying as a Warhammer 40K character and wish to use more unique mechanics, the Witchhunter is the pick for you, but don’t sleep on the Gemling Legionnaire and his skill-buffing passives.
The Monk ascendancies: Invoker and Acolyte of Chayula
The Monk is perhaps the most exciting and powerful class in Path of Exile 2, and for a good reason. His master of the elemental arts is unparalleled, and his ascendancy, Invoker, buffs that by a significant margin. It turns part of his total damage into elemental damage, vastly boosts his energy and spirit, lets him double his Energy Shield by meditating, and lets him buff his elemental damage and prowess by becoming Unbound and unleashing the elements with Elemental Expression.
The other ascendancy, Acolyte of Chayula, grants the Monk mastery over the chaos arts, boosting his chaos damage resistance and giving him a chance to take damage as chaos damage, thus mitigating it partially or fully. His mana leech also serves to regenerate his energy shield, which, if substantial enough, becomes indestructible with the constant recharging. He can also spawn a Breach to collect the Flames of Chayula for various buffs and effects.
These two ascendancies are on par with each other, so you should choose whatever you like, as the Monk is powerful on his own anyway, and any sort of buff helps.
