This CHANGE to The Campaign is BIG! | Path of Exile: Return of the Ancients 0.5
Summary
- Campaign Philosophy: Grinding Gear Games (GGG) is overhauling the campaign to reduce completion time but remains committed to not offering a “campaign skip” to preserve character progression.
- Navigation Improvements: New visual cues, such as river paths, glowing roots, signposts, and NPC directions, have been added to guide players through Acts 1, 2, and 3.
- Layout Changes: Several zones have been restructured for better flow, including Traitor’s Passage and the relocation of the Waterways and Azak Bog.
- Ritual Quality of Life: Completing a Ritual now creates a “locust trail” leading to the next one, a feature that also applies to endgame maps.
- Endgame Focus: The 0.5 patch emphasizes the endgame as the primary area for progression, treating the campaign more as a tutorial.
The Campaign Skip Debate
With the 0.5 announcement, GGG is overhauling the campaign to streamline the experience and reduce the time required to reach the endgame. However, a total “campaign skip” is unlikely to be implemented. GGG has consistently maintained that skipping the campaign devalues character progression and the feeling of a build coming together. In Path of Exile, half the fun is the journey of getting a build into a working form. While a skip might be popular in other titles, the focus here remains on improving the campaign’s quality of life rather than removing it entirely.
Endgame vs. Campaign Philosophy
The intention behind streamlining the campaign is to transition players more efficiently into the real “meat and bones” of the game: the endgame. Patch 0.5 includes a massive endgame overhaul, addressing previous issues where progression felt less explicit after the story ended.
In Path of Exile, the campaign serves as a functional tutorial. Most builds do not fully come online until they reach the endgame, where the real progression and challenges occur. For players who run multiple characters per league, these changes significantly reduce the friction of re-leveling.
Act 1: Visual Navigation Cues
Several areas in Act 1 have received visual indicators to help players find objectives faster:
- The Grawlwood: Following the river upstream will now always lead players directly to the Redvale.
- Tree of Souls: Magical glowing roots now appear in the area; following them leads directly to the tree.
- The Grim Tangle: Specific mushroom clusters now mark the proximity of the entrance.
- Hunting Grounds: This large area now features signposts in the middle of paths to lead players to the Oggam Farmlands.
- Bloody Crowbell: A trail of “farm-to-table” bovine remains leads players directly to the boss’s territory.
Ritual Mechanic Improvements
A significant update has been made to the Ritual mechanic to assist with navigation:
- Completing a Ritual in the campaign will create a trail of locusts leading directly to the next Ritual or the boss, Frithorn.
- This feature has also been updated for the endgame; completing a Ritual in a map will now point players toward the next Ritual location. This addresses a common issue where players would lose time searching for remaining Rituals in complex layouts.
Act 2: Navigation and Layout Clarity
- Traitor’s Passage: This zone now features a guaranteed intersection. To navigate it, players can follow Maraketh parchments—used to bind djinn—which will lead directly to the boss, Baubala.
- Titan Valley: The goal of the level is now immediately visible via a giant set of titan heads. Behind each head is a linear canyon. Once a seal is activated at the end of a canyon, a portal spawns to return the player to the start, making the objective loop much smoother.
Act 3: NPCs and Area Relocation
- Explorer Camps: In the jungle areas, players can now talk to explorers who will physically point toward the next area and reveal the destination on the mini-map.
- Zone Relocations:
- The entrance to the Waterways has been moved to the Jungle Ruins (previously in the Infested Barrens).
- An alternate escape route has been added to the Venom Crypts, allowing for a shortcut back through the jungle.
- Azak Bog has been moved inside the Waterways so players no longer have to search for it in the sparse jungle.
Final Thoughts on Patch 0.5
Act 4 is already relatively streamlined, so the focus of these updates was primarily on correcting the design of the first three acts. By making navigation less frustrating, players can spend more time focusing on finding hidden secrets and specific zone advantages that provide extra currency and loot for their builds.
Upcoming build interests for the Return of the Ancients update include a Shield Wall Titan league starter and a Monk build focusing on Mobalytics mapping and the Hollow Palm mechanic.