Introduction

What are Maps in PoE 2?

Maps in Path of Exile 2 are the main endgame content that you will engage with in Path of Exile 2. They are instanced zones similar to Diablo 4 Nightmare Dungeons or Diablo 3 Rifts and contain a certain number of monsters alongside a boss.

Players can encounter league mechanics inside maps, which are seasonal content added in previous patches. These grant a high amount of loot to the player upon completion, and they can be modified and added by using various fragments or applying skill points in the Atlas skill tree, which we will discuss about later.

When can you start mapping?

In Path of Exile 2, you can start mapping as soon as you finish the campaign. Once you finish the storyline, you will gain access to the map device, which will let you open maps from the atlas by using Waystones. You can then enter these endgame instances to progress through the atlas and earn various rewards such as gear, currency, additional Waystones, and much more.

Using the Map Device

Using the Map Device is straightforward. All you have to do is go to your hideout and interact with the Map Device, and an interface will open up where you can place select a map from the atlas to travel to using a waystone, to which you can add fragments that add or enhance the league mechanics preset in the instance.

How many maps are in PoE 2?

There will be an infinity of maps to choose from in Path of Exile 2’s endgame. Each map will have its unique area, layout, mobs, and boss. This allows players to experience uniqueness in each instance without feeling like the gameplay is too repetitive, as swapping each map has a different layout and packs of mobs inside.

Map Mechanics & Properties

Path of Exile 2 maps come with a variety of mechanics and properties that alter the difficulty and the way the map plays out. These can come as mechanics on the atlas, modifier on waystones which increase or rewards, making the map more challenging, as the waystone's tier, or the added mechanics through fragments or currencies in the map device.

Map Tiers

The tier of the Waystone is the first factor that affects the difficulty and rewards you will encounter during your maps. Depending on the tier of your Waystones, the zone and monster level inside the chosen atlas map will change. Higher levels mean tougher monsters but also higher quality loot and more XP.

Waystones tiers range from 1 to 15, with tier 1-5 waystones being coloured white, 6 through 10 being yellow, and 11 to 15 being red. Commonly, most players tend to farm the highest tier of maps, tier 15, as it rewards the highest amount of loot.

White Maps

White maps (accesed with Waystones of tiers 1-5) are the entry point into Path of Exile 2’s endgame. These usually contain easy-to-defeat monsters as long as you are able to finish the campaign and provide more loot than zones from the campaign. In most cases, you will already have a few white Waystones dropped from the last few zones of the story ready as soon as you unlock the map devices.

Yellow Maps

Yellow maps (accesed with Waystones of tiers 6-10) are the mid-game for Path of Exile 2. These are more challenging than white maps and can provide a small challenge to most players unless you’ve decently upgraded your gear between the time you finished the campaign and cleared a decent amount of low tier maps.

Sometimes, yellow tier maps can be used in some high-end strategies when players combine a lot of challenging league mechanics, which would balance out the increased amount of loot and much tougher monsters from the massive amount of league mechanics with the lesser drops found inside of yellow maps compared to high tier red ones.

Red Maps

Red maps (accesed with Waystones of tiers 11-16) are the bread and butter of Path of Exile 2, with tier 15 maps being the most commonly farmed by players. Using an optimized build and constantly upgrading your gear with currency and items you found while progressing through the map tiers, you should be able to clear T15 maps at a decent pace once you reach them.

While they are the most difficult out of all types of maps, the rewards you can find in them compared to any other tier of maps are definitely worth it. Combining the high amount of loot that drops baseline in them with a variety of high-density league mechanics will be the best way to farm in the endgame for most PoE 2 characters.

Map Types

Other than tier, maps can also be categorized by type. We can split maps into three different main categories: normal maps, unique maps, and influenced maps.

Unique Maps

Unique maps are a specific type of map that can only be found in specific zones of the atlas, which lead the player to areas exclusive to that map, often moving away from the typical playstyle of a map, offering puzzles or a single boss which is more powerful than standard bosses. In most cases, they don’t provide excellent loot but are required to complete the Atlas.

Influenced Maps

Players can also find Influenced Maps, which host a specific league mechanic, and in the cluster of these maps you will also find a portal to the an unique zone which contains the boss for that league mechanic. Completing this area by defeating the Pinnacle boss will grant Atlas passive points for that specific activity. Influenced maps can be infused by Breach, Delirium, Ritual and other league mechanics, or they could simple be "corrupted", all being required for the completion of the Atlas passive tree.

Waystone Modifiers

Other than the Waystone tier, the other factor affecting the difficulty and loot in your maps will be the modifiers you roll using various currencies on your waystones. Suffixes will make the map harder by increasing the stats of enemy mobs or bosses, while prefixes directly increase the amount of loot and XP or make the map easier.

Each affix has a specific pack size, quantity, and rarity bonus, which will be added to all loot that drops in your maps. In most cases, the values of the increases scale directly with the difficulty of the downside, leading to a balanced environment where difficulty also means great rewards for the player.

Waystone Drop Chance

Map Bosses

In Path of Exile 2, each map features its own unique boss or bosses. In most maps, the bosses are easy to defeat, without having too many attacks or being too challenging. Depending on multiple factors, such as the map layout or if the map is influenced, you may encounter some bosses that are tougher or exclusive to that type of map.

Bosses have much higher drop rates than normal mobs, usually dropping a generous amount of loot, so it is worth it to defeat any bosses you may encounter in your maps.

Corrupted and Unidentified Maps

“Corrupted” and “Unidentified” are two tags that can appear on your PoE 2 map items based on how you obtained the map and what currencies you have applied to it to change the modifiers.

In Path of Exile 2, any map of magic or rare quality will drop as unidentified, with players required to use a wisdom scroll to reveal the modifiers on the map. Additionally, one of the possible outcomes when using a vaal orb to corrupt a map is the map turning unidentified and corrupted, with players being unable to reveal the modifiers.

Corrupted maps cannot be modified further and are obtained in multiple ways: they can randomly drop as corrupted from monsters or strongboxes with the corrupted tag; normal maps can be corrupted by using vaal orb with various outcomes (nothing happens, maps become corrupted and unidentified, the map gains two additional modifiers, or the map’s modifiers are rerolled).

8 mod maps

Eight modifier maps are staples from the first game, which we expect to be obtainable in Path of Exile 2 as well, by using similar methods as in PoE 1: using a vaal orb on a normal map, by using a scarab that guarantees that all maps dropped are corrupted with eight modifiers, or randomly from corrupted strongboxes.

Due to the added two affixes, these maps are much more difficult than the usual six modifier maps. They provide a second layer of difficulty because the modifiers present on them cannot be rerolled. On the other hand, they also grant massively increased rewards due to the higher IIQ, IIR, and pack size values.

The Atlas and Atlas Skill Tree

In Path of Exile 2, the Atlas acts like a “collection,” which shows every map you’ve completed out of all available ones in the current league’s pool. Each map completion grants you a small bonus to the drop rate of all maps on all characters in the current league, and they also come with a bonus objective aside from the normal completion.

This bonus objective is relatively simple, requiring players to complete the map on a specific rarity, rewarding you with an Atlas passive skill tree point. These points can be assigned in a passive tree similar to the character skill tree, which grants bonuses toward specific league mechanics on all maps you open.

These bonuses can range from additional chances for specific league mechanics or content to appear in our maps to enhancing particular aspects of a league mechanic, such as adding extra rewards, increasing the existing rewards, or spawning larger amounts of enemies.

By completing every map in the Atlas and its objectives, players can expect to more easily sustain their maps and gain more loot on each map due to the increased amount of league mechanics and loot found, so completing your Atlas as soon as possible is essential for endgame progression.

How to progress through the Atlas

Progressing through the Atlas in PoE 2 comes naturally at the start, by opening and completing maps as soon as you gain them. The more maps you find and complete, the more challenging it gets to find new ones you haven’t encountered yet, and here is where we can recommend a few tips & tricks to speed up your atlas completion:

The atlas bonus slightly increases the drop chance of higher-tier maps. Each new map you complete on the Atlas will grant a small bonus to this passive, allowing you to more easily progress through the maps and reach higher tiers than before. This is also beneficial for sustaining maps, as you will gain more high-tier maps, allowing you access to new areas of the Atlas.

The Atlas passive skill tree is another great feature that enhances mapping that we hope to see in PoE 2. In the prequel it was the main center of attention when it comes to increasing the amount of loot you get from all your maps.

This passive tree is very similar to the one your character has access to, with a starting point from where you have to connect all nodes leading to the ones you want to allocate points in. These offer many bonuses and modifications to the league mechanics, from increasing their chances to spawn to altering how they function or simply increasing the rewards.

Additional passive points can be obtained in two main ways: one passive point is granted each time you complete a bonus objective for a map from the Atlas, and additionally, players can gain points by finishing endgame questlines, which will grant a small amount of extra points.

Defeating certain bosses or completing other activities from PoE 2’s endgame could also grant a couple of skill points, similar to how completing Maven’s invitations in the first game used to grant a point for the first time you clear each one.

Scrying Maps

Scrying is a new feature added in the latest PoE league, and we expect this mapping mechanic to come to Path of Exile 2 as well. Upon defeating the final packs of mobs in a tier 16 or 17 map, players can encounter an NPC called the Nameless Seer.

By interacting with this NPC, players can scry the current map on top of any desired map, replacing the divination card pool of the selected map with the current map’s one. This allows players to play their favorite layouts without missing out on chances to gain chase divination cards.

Crafting Maps & Basic Farming Strategies

Crafting your maps and preparing a strategy before you start a farming session is essential to gain loot in Path of Exile 2. In this section, we will cover every aspect of this topic, helping you make the best choices when preparing for a farming session.

Using Cartographer's Chisels

Cartographer chisels are one of the primary and most used map upgrade currencies available in PoE 2. By applying chisels to maps, you can increase their quality, with the % of quality being decided by the map rarity. Maps can have up to 20% quality, which increases IIQ and IIR by precisely the same amount.

Normal maps gain 5% quality for each used chisel, magic quality maps gain 2% quality per chisel, while rare maps will only gain 1% quality for each chisel. To use Cartographer Chisels in the most efficient way possible, you should quality up normal maps, then proceed further with crafting.

Scarabs and Fragments

Scarabs and fragments are map-related items that can be used alone or only with a map, depending on their type and the amount you place in the map device. Scarabs can be used exclusively with maps and offer a variety of effects to improve the loot from your maps. They can add league mechanics, completely change how they work, or add additional rewards and challenges, being the primary way of “juicing” maps in the game.

On the other hand, we have fragments, which can be used in two main ways:

Kirac Map Mods

Kirac map mods, are a type of upgrade for your maps which can be applied in the map device, right before opening a map. This feature may receive a rename for PoE 2, as Kirac may not be part of the game anymore, but we assume it will take a similar role in allowing players to add an extra league mechanic to their maps.

Applying Kirac map mods came with a cost of various amounts of chaos orbs depending on the league mechanic, but we expect this to change in Path of Exile 2 with the introduction of Gold, as it may be used for this feature instead of using classic currencies.

Sextants

Sextants are a feature that was recently & removed from Path of Exile. These could be used to enhance and add league mechanics to your map, similar to scarabs or Kirac Map Mods. While their effects are still in the game, these were combined with scarabs, simplifying the process and removing scarabs and sextants with less-than-desirable effects.

While we no longer have them in the prequel, we may see them reappear in PoE 2, depending on the route GGG decides to take.

Using Regex when crafting maps

Using Regex to filter out maps when setting up for a farming session is essential for filtering out unwanted mods, or even looking for specific ones you want on your maps. By using Regex, you can bypass the 50-character limit of the search bar by using short versions of the affix names, allowing you to filter up to 12-15 mods at once.

There are tools that can create the filter for you, such as poe.regex. This makes the feature accessible to everyone without having to learn a shortened version of each modifier and write the search query themselves.

Maps with multiple bosses

Some maps in Path of Exile 2 can have multiple bosses, either naturally, or through modifiers on the map. Depending on the layout, some boss fights may have multiple adversaries, and you can also roll modifiers on the item itself which duplicate the map’s bosses. These multiple boss maps are generally used for boss rush strats, as each boss drops loot individually.

Sustaining & Obtaining Maps

Obtaining maps to progress through the game's early stages and sustaining the same map during your farming session are two issues that most PoE 2 players encounter during their journey through Oriath. In this section of our guide, we’ll give some tips & tricks to ensure you will never run out of maps for any activity you have in mind.

Map Recipes

Using the map recipe is one of the main ways players can acquire new maps during the early stages of mapping, as they will often acquire duplicates they have no need for. By combining three maps of the same tier and type in the vendor window players can obtain one map of the next tier, essentially giving them access to both a new map and new tier.

You can see which map you will receive in exchange for your three before completing the trade, so you can check and make sure you need the map for progression before trading in your items, which makes it so much more convenient due to the lack of an RNG element.

Favored maps

Favoring maps is another feature, which you gain access to close to the endgame. It is primarily helpful for sustaining maps during farming sessions, allowing you to keep farming endlessly, as you will constantly drop the map you need or are currently running.

By completing various objectives in the endgame, you can unlock favored map slots, which allow you to pick specific maps to have increased drop rates. Also, certain passives on the atlas skill tree may affect how favoring maps works, allowing you to remove maps from the loot pool, drop only specific maps, and convert the other drops to currency.

PoE 2 Map Tier List

In this section of our guide, we will provide a variety of tier lists, helping you figure out which PoE 2 maps are best for specific activities so you have an easier time picking a map layout based on what you want to target farm.

As soon as we gain more information on what maps are available in PoE 2, their layouts, mob types, and divination card drop pools, we will update this section with tier lists for various activities such as XP farming, best maps overall, best maps for divination cards, best unique maps and more.

FAQ

What is the Atlas Skill Tree in PoE 2?

In Path of Exile 2, the Atlas acts like a skill tree for maps, allowing you to enhance your maps with additional league mechanics and increase the loot you find in your PoE 2 adventures. You can unlock additional skill points by completing various quests and map objectives, allowing you to customize your endgame fully.

What does corrupting a map do?

Corrupting a map in Path of Exile 2 can have multiple outcomes, with each one having an equal chance of occurring:

How do you progress PoE 2 maps?

Progressing through Path of Exile 2 maps is done naturally, by playing new maps you find during your gameplay. Going at your own pace, you will eventually progress through the Atlas, filling out the collection of completed maps.

What does quality do on maps in PoE?

By applying quality to PoE 2 maps using Cartographer’s Chisels, you can expect the IIQ and IIR modifiers to increase by 1% for each percentage of quality you have on the map item.

How do I get a map device in PoE?

To get a map device in Path of Exile 2, you must complete the campaign and finish the introduction questline for maps. This will unlock the map device for use in your hideout.

Can I craft maps in PoE?

In Path of Exile 2 you can craft on maps, but you cannot obtain maps by using other materials at a crafting bench. The most similar feature would be upgrading maps by combining three maps of a lower tier to get one a tier higher or purchasing them directly from vendors in cities or your hideout.

How do you complete a Unique map in PoE?

To complete a unique map in Path of Exile 2, you must defeat the final boss of the map. Sometimes, depending on the unique map, the boss may be locked behind, clearing a specific amount of mobs or solving a puzzle before the portal to the arena or the boss itself spawns.

What do map tiers do in PoE?

PoE 2 map tiers affect the level of the area and monsters inside it, increasing both difficulty and rewards as the map tier goes higher. Generally speaking, players will farm on the highest tier of maps, as they are relatively easy to clear when using an optimized build.

What is a map fragment?

A map fragment is an item that is part of a set that opens a portal to a boss fight. You must own the entire set and place it in the map device to access the area, with most sets comprising four fragments.

What does scrying a map do in PoE?

Scrying a map in PoE 2 allows you to override the map's current divination card drop pool with a different one, letting players farm on layouts they like without missing out on chase divination cards.

What is map Regex in PoE?

Regex, short for regular expression, is a sequence of characters that specifies a match pattern in text, which we can use in Path of Exile 2 to filter modifiers for maps, allowing us to either filter out modifiers we don’t want to run or look specifically for mods that we need for our farming strategy.

What affects map drops in PoE?

There is a large variety of factors that can affect map drops. From the atlas bonus and atlas passive skill trees to the IIQ of the map and scarabs used when opening the portals.

How to get 8 modifiers on poe maps?

You can get eight mods on your PoE 2 maps by corrupting them using a vaal orb, as a drop from corrupted strongboxes, or by using scarabs that guarantee all dropped maps will be corrupted with 8 modifiers.

How do you unlock maps in PoE?

You can unlock maps in PoE 2 by finishing the campaign. As soon as you’re done with the storyline and finish the epilogue, you should have a tutorial questline that introduces you to maps, how they function, and the map device.

What is the best map in PoE?

There isn’t a map that is superior to others in Path of Exile 2. Different maps may be better than others depending on what you want to farm. We strongly recommend checking out the tier list section of our guide, where we rank maps based on various activities if you’re interested in finding out which maps to choose for farming currency or fast XP gains, for example.