In Path of Exile 2, mercenaries play an essential role in combat, acting as your loyal allies and offering additional support in battles. While the game doesn’t have a traditional “pet” class like other ARPGs, the mercenary system allows players to summon powerful NPC allies who fight alongside them. These mercenaries can be tailored to complement your playstyle, offering buffs, damage, crowd control, and tanking capabilities. The best mercenary build is one that synergizes with your main character’s abilities and enhances overall effectiveness in combat.

This guide will focus on building an effective mercenary that helps you clear content faster, deal more damage, and stay alive longer in the chaotic world of Path of Exile 2.

Understanding Mercenaries in Path of Exile 2
Mercenaries in Path of Exile 2 are customizable NPC allies that provide a range of utilities. They can be equipped with their own gear, have specialized skills, and level up alongside you. As the game features complex item crafting and deep skill trees, you can create mercenaries that specialize in anything from tanking to healing or dealing massive damage.

Unlike summoning a simple companion or pet, mercenaries in Path of Exile 2 are treated like fully-fledged party members. This means they can be tailored to suit the needs of your character, making them highly effective in various types of combat, including PvE and endgame content.

Key Aspects of a Mercenary Build
When designing your mercenary build, there are several key elements to consider:

Roles: Mercenaries can take on a variety of roles, including tank, damage dealer, support, or crowd control. Depending on your playstyle, you can create a mercenary that complements your character’s strengths. For example, if you are playing a damage-dealing build, a tank mercenary will help draw aggro and soak up damage. Alternatively, if your character is more of a tank, you can build a mercenary that focuses on damage to  POE 2 Currency help accelerate kill speed.

Skills: Mercenaries can be equipped with skills, similar to how your character uses skill gems. These skills can be customized to suit different combat needs, such as providing buffs, healing, or massive area damage. Crafting an effective mercenary build requires selecting the right skills that complement your character’s abilities.

Equipment: Mercenaries can be equipped with their own gear, meaning they can use weapons, armor, and accessories to boost their effectiveness. Ensuring your mercenary has the right gear is crucial for maximizing their potential. You’ll want to provide them with items that enhance their primary role, such as high armor for a tank mercenary or damage-boosting weapons for a DPS-oriented one.

Best Mercenary Build Options
Let’s look at some of the best mercenary builds for different roles in Path of Exile 2:

Tank Mercenary Build
For players looking to focus on damage while having a reliable ally to absorb hits, a tank mercenary build is a solid choice. Tank mercenaries excel at drawing aggro, with high health pools, armor, and resistances to survive the most brutal attacks.

Skills: A tank mercenary should have abilities that increase their survivability, such as Fortify, Shield Charge, or Molten Shell. These skills grant them the ability to mitigate incoming damage, sustain themselves longer in fights, and maintain control over enemy aggression.

Gear: Focus on high armor, life regeneration, and resistances. Equip them with high-defense armor and shields that boost their armor or provide elemental resistances. If possible, include a Life Leech modifier to  POE 2 Currency for sale help them stay alive during tougher encounters.

Playstyle Synergy: This build works well with high-damage characters who lack defensive tools or prefer to focus on offensive output. The tank mercenary will absorb damage while you focus on annihilating enemies with your own damage skills.

DPS Mercenary Build
For players who prefer to play as tanky or more defensive characters, a damage-dealing mercenary can help ensure that enemies are dealt with quickly. DPS mercenaries are all about dishing out massive damage, whether through melee or ranged attacks.

Skills: Equip your mercenary with powerful offensive skills like Dual Strike, Viper Strike, or Heavy Strike for melee builds, or Fireball, Flameblast, or Lightning Arrow for ranged setups. Additionally, buffs such as Anger or Hatred will increase their damage output significantly.

Gear: Focus on damage-boosting gear, especially items that enhance their attack or spell damage. Critical strike chance and multiplier modifiers can help your mercenary deal massive damage. For melee DPS, equip them with weapons that increase attack speed, while for ranged DPS, go for bows or crossbows that enhance projectile damage and elemental effects.

Playstyle Synergy: This build is perfect for tankier builds that need a boost in offensive capability. Your mercenary will handle a large portion of the damage-dealing while you focus on tanking or crowd control.

Support Mercenary Build
Support mercenaries can enhance your own abilities, provide healing, or apply powerful debuffs to enemies. These mercenaries help keep you and your team alive while buffing your offensive capabilities.

Skills: Equip your mercenary with healing or defensive buffs like Flask Support, Vitality, or Divine Blessing. Support mercenaries can also use debuff skills such as Poison, Frostbite, or Enfeeble to weaken enemies and make it easier for you to clear mobs.

Gear: For a support mercenary, you’ll want items that boost energy shield, mana regeneration, and aura effects. Items that increase the potency of their buffs or debuffs will significantly enhance your playthrough, particularly when dealing with high-end content.

Playstyle Synergy: Support mercenaries are ideal for solo players who want to increase their sustainability or group builds that rely on buffs and debuffs. Their primary role is to enhance your survivability and help you deal with tougher encounters.

Crowd Control Mercenary Build
Crowd control mercenaries are designed to incapacitate or slow down enemies, allowing you to focus on dealing damage or escaping dangerous situations.

Skills: Equip your mercenary with crowd-control abilities like Frost Wall, Ensnaring Trap, or Tornado to stun, freeze, or slow down enemies. Crowd control builds are especially useful when you need to stop enemies from overwhelming you in large numbers.

Gear: Crowd control mercenaries benefit from gear that increases their mana regeneration and spell casting speed. Equip them with items that enhance area of effect or debuff resistance to ensure they can cast their crowd control abilities effectively.

Playstyle Synergy: This mercenary works well with any build that struggles with managing large numbers of enemies, especially if you need to control enemy movement or prevent them from attacking your character.

Conclusion
In Path of Exile 2, mercenaries can significantly enhance your gameplay by complementing your character’s abilities and providing additional support, whether it be through tanking, dealing damage, or offering buffs and crowd control. The best mercenary build for you will depend on your playstyle and the role you need them to fill. Whether you focus on creating a tank mercenary to soak up damage, a DPS mercenary to deal massive damage, a support mercenary to enhance your survivability, or a crowd control mercenary to manage enemy groups, you’ll have the flexibility to craft an ally that will improve your overall experience in the game.

In the highly anticipated sequel to the acclaimed action RPG, Path of Exile 2, players will be introduced to a brand-new progression system known as Ascension Classes. These powerful specializations offer players the opportunity to further customize and enhance their characters, unlocking unique abilities, playstyles, and strategies.

What are Ascension Classes? Ascension Classes are a new feature in Path of Exile 2 that allow players to specialize their characters beyond the initial class selection. Once players have reached a certain level or milestone in the game, they will be presented with the opportunity to choose an Ascension Class, which will then grant them access to a new set of skills, passive abilities, and gameplay mechanics.

These Ascension Classes are not simply subclasses or variations of the base classes; they are entirely new specializations that fundamentally alter the way a character plays and interacts with the game world. From the powerful and versatile Battlemage to the elusive and deadly Shadow Assassin, each Ascension Class offers a distinct and compelling playstyle that players can explore and master.

Unlocking Ascension Classes Gaining access to Ascension Classes in Path of Exile 2 will require players to meet specific criteria and complete a series of challenging tasks. The process of unlocking these powerful specializations is not a simple one, and it will require a significant investment of time, effort, and skill.

Reach a Specific Level: The first step in unlocking an Ascension Class is to reach a certain level with your character. This level requirement may vary depending on the class and the specific Ascension Class in question, but it is generally expected to  POE 2 Currency be quite high, likely in the range of level 50 or higher.

Complete Ascension Trials: Once the level requirement has been met, players will need to complete a series of Ascension Trials. These challenging encounters will test the player’s skills, knowledge, and understanding of the game’s mechanics, often requiring them to overcome difficult enemies, solve complex puzzles, or navigate treacherous environments.

Prove Your Worth: After successfully completing the Ascension Trials, players will need to prove their worth to the masters or guardians of the Ascension Classes. This may involve completing a final, climactic challenge or demonstrating their mastery of the class’s core mechanics and playstyle.

Choose Your Path: Upon completing the unlocking process, players will be presented with a choice of Ascension Classes, each with its own unique set of skills, passive abilities, and gameplay mechanics. The choice made at this stage will have a significant impact on the player’s character progression and playstyle, so it is important to carefully consider the options and choose the specialization that best fits their preferred playstyle.

Ascending to New Heights Once an Ascension Class has been unlocked, players will be able to further customize and enhance their characters, unlocking new abilities, passive effects, and even unique items and gear that are specific to POE 2 Currency for sale their chosen specialization.

These Ascension Classes are expected to be a central part of the Path of Exile 2 experience, offering players a deep and rewarding system for character progression and customization. By mastering the challenges required to unlock these powerful specializations, players will be able to create truly unique and formidable characters, capable of tackling the most demanding content the game has to offer.

The journey to unlock an Ascension Class in Path of Exile 2 is sure to be a challenging and engaging one, requiring players to demonstrate their skill, knowledge, and dedication to the game. But for those who are willing to put in the effort, the rewards of unlocking a powerful Ascension Class and shaping their character to their exact specifications will be well worth it.