Defence Guide

In the defence guide for beginners we cover the basics you need to know about key defences like Resistances, Ailments, Armor, Evasion, Life recovery and much more! Having solid defences is very important in Path of Exile. Getting damage and killing thousands of monsters is a blast, but it's no fun when a single projectile puts a stop to your rampage!

Health Pool

When your Life is reduced to zero, you die. Your Life pool is the foundation upon which you build the rest of your defences. It's important to get Life through Gear early on in your Path of Exile 2 journey.

Increase your Life through the following sources:

• Leveling up, you gain +12 Life per Character Level.
• The Strength Attribute, granting +2 maximum Life per Strength
• +#to Maximum Life modifiers on your Gear

Resistances

There are 4 Resistances in Path of Exile, Fire, Cold, Lightning (referred to as Elemental Resistances) and Chaos Resistance. These mitigate the damage you take from their respective type. Resistances start at 0%, and have a cap of 75% by default. Modifiers to Maximum Resistances can increase this cap to 90% greatly reducing the damage you take. Resistances can go negative, and having negative Resistances further increases the damage you take.

While capping your Resistances grants you a massive boost to your survivability, you are not expected to do so during the campaign. Occasionally check your characters defensive sheet and try to stay above at least 30% Elemental Resistances during the Campaign. Keep in mind each Act you complete incurs a -10% penalty to your Resistances so make sure to keep up with your gearing. Having negative Resistances causes you to get oneshot a lot more!

Dying is your cue to check if your defences are still adequate.

Capping your Elemental Resistances at 75% is an important part of your defences as you gear up your character past the campaign. Enemy damage output in Maps is balanced around having capped Resistances, so if you have 50% Fire Resistance, don't think of it as taking half damage from Fire instead think of it as take double damage from Fire. If you take 100 Fire Damage at 75% Fire Resistance, you take 200 Fire Damage at 50% Fire Resistance.

Resistances by Acts

Here's a quick guideline for how to treat Resistances during the leveling process. Elemental Resistances don't need to be capped until you enter your first Waystones but keeping them at an adequate level is important. Chaos Resistance is very nice to have but not expected.

• Act 1 - Check the Caster Vendor for Resistance Rings as it is a great way to keep your Resistances at a good level during the campaign. Look to pick up a Ruby Ring before fighting Draven, a Sapphire Ring (or two) before fightning Lachlann and Geonor. Prioritize Resistance rolls on your Gear over damage upgrades.
• Act 2 - The main elemental damage types you encounter in Act 2 are Fire and Lightning. Prioritize these two but keep your Cold Resistance at least positive.
• Act 3 - Fire and Ligthning damage remain prevalent in Act 3. Keep your Cold Resistance positive at the very least.
• Act 1 to 3 Cruel - The same concepts apply for these as they did for the first 3 Acts. However you should aim to slowly approach your Resistance cap as you get towards the end of the campaign.

By the end of Act 3 Cruel your elemental resistances are -40% by default, assuming you have picked up the permanent +20% Cold/Lightning/Fire Resistance boosts during the campaign. Therefore, you need 115% total Fire, Cold, Lightning Resistance and 75% Chaos to be capped. Resistances above the cap are displayed on your character sheet, but normally don't contribute to your defences. Overcapping them is still a good idea however as there are various sources of reducing your Resistances. For example getting cursed by Flammability might cause you to drop below the 75% cap, making you take massively increased damage.

Ailments and Stun

Ailments are negative effects that either debuff or damage you. Bleed, Freeze, Shock, Poison and getting stunned are extremely dangerous! You may itemize against at least one of them by utilizing a Charm that automatically removes the negative effect when applied to you. Keep in mind Charms are based on charges and do not grant full immunity. Additionally, simply itemizing for defences reduces their lethality.

• Bleed: Deals Physical Damage over Time based on 15% of a hits Physical Damage dealt to life. This damage is doubled while you are moving. Counter Bleeding with Staunching Charm and reducing/avoiding the initial hit with Armour/Evasion.
• Freeze: Prevents you from moving or using skills. It is applied by taking a significant amount of Cold Hit Damage. This ailment is extremely lethal, counter it using a Thawing Charm and gearing for higher Cold Resistance. The less cold damage you take, the less likely it is for you to get frozen! Further reduce the chances by investing into "Increased Elemental Ailment Threshold" on your Passive Tree.
• Chill: Slows your action speed down significantly. It is applied by taking Cold Damage or standing on Chilled Ground. Chill is extremely annoying but rarely lethal. If you want to counter it gear for higher Cold Resistance. Further reduce it by investing into "Increased Elemental Ailment Threshold" on your Passive Tree.
• Shock: Makes you take 20% increased damage. It is applied by taking a significant amount of Lightning Hit Damage or standing on Shocked Ground. This is often a silent killer, as you don't notice the Shock debuff, then get hit and "1-shot" out of nowhere. To counteract Shock gear for higher Lightning Resistance and optionally invest into "Increased Elemental Ailment Threshold". Grounding Charm is another option but there are generally higher value charms you should take instead.
• Ignite: Deals Fire Damage over Time and is based on 20% of the hits fire damage. To counteract Ignite gear for higher Fire Resistance and optionally invest into "Increased Elemental Ailment Threshold" and "Reduced Ignite Duration on You". Dousing Charm is another option but there are generally higher value charms you should take instead.
• Poison: Deals Chaos Damage over Time. Your life globe turns green when you are poisoned. Counteract Poison by acquiring more Chaos Resistance or using an Antidote Charm.
• Stun: Causes you to be unable to act. Caused by taking too much damage too quickly. Get stunned less often by building better defenses and investing into "Increased Stun Threshold" on your Passive Tree and "+# to Stun Threshold" on your Gear.

Base Defences

There are 4 modifiers classified as Defences, these aren't the only way to survive better but whenever the game refers to Defences, Defensive Modifiers, or Global Defenses it means Armor, Evasion or Energy Shield. Bases with a higher Level or Attribute requirement, generally provide more base defences.

• Armor mitigates Physical Damage from hits, regardless of whether the incoming damage is an Attack or Spell. Armor is a powerful mitigation tool throughout the campaign. Armor is very effective at mitigating multiple small hits, but struggles against larger hits.
  • Use Scavenged Plating to increase your Armor. Keep in mind Scavenged Plating requires a source of Armour Break to function.
  • Iron Reflexes converts all your Evasion into extra Armour.

• Evasion gives you a chance to avoid all damage from enemy Strikes and Projeciles. This affects both Attacks and Spells.
  • Acrobatics additionally allows you to Evade Area of Effect damage, but severely reduces your chance to evade.
  • Use Wind Dancer to increase your Evasion.

• Energy Shield (ES) protects your Life against all damage types except Bleed and Poison. If you haven't taken damage for a short amount of time, your Energy Shield begins to Recharge.
  • Chaos damage removes twice as much Energy Shield.
  • Grants good protection against Bleed as it only applies when taking damage to Life.
  • Grim Feast allows you to Overflow your Energy Shield.
  • When Energy Shield is the majority of your hit pool consider investing into the following:
    • "Gain #% of maximum Energy Shield as additional Stun Threshold/Freeze Threshold"
    • "Stun Threshold is based on #% of your Energy Shield instead of Life"
    • Almost mandatory as Stuns do not factor in Energy Shield by default.
  • Chaos Inoculation is a great choice when itemizing heavily for Energy Shield as it removes the dangers of Chaos damage. Setting your HP to 1 is a worthwhile trade-off as it represents a small portion of your total hit pool when heavily investing into ES.

• Mana inherently does not grant any defences to your character unless Mind Over Matter is allocated or you have sources of "#% of Damage is Taken from Mana before Life".
  • Allows you to scale Defences and Offences at the same time with Archmage.
  • Synergizes well with Eldritch Battery, allowing you to acquire massive Mana pools.
  • Mind Over Matter can be used in conjunction with Chaos Inoculation. This is useful for very high mana investment builds that do not invest into Life as it grants Chaos damage immunity. This works as your mana has to be fully exhausted before your life can be damaged.
  • Mind over Matter lowers your Mana Recovery so make sure to itemize to counteract this downside.
  • Mana Remnants allows you to Overflow your Mana.

Armour Formula

While Energy Shield and Evasion are pretty straight forward, Armour is less intuitive. In essence, Armour becomes less effective the higher the hit it defends against is. This means it is excellent at defending at multiple small hits but begins to struggle to mitigate larger hits. The Armour formula is as follows and can never exceed 90% mitigation:

Damage Reduction = Armour/(Armour+ 12 * Damage taken)

With this we can create a rule of thumb to illustrate the loss of effectiveness as the hits increase in size:

• To prevent one third of damage (33%), you need armour 6 times the damage (e.g. 600 armour for 100 damage).
• To prevent half of the damage (50%), you need armour 12 times the damage (e.g. 1200 armour for 100 damage).
• To prevent two thirds of damage (66%), you need armour 24 times the damage (e.g. 2400 armour for 100 damage).
• To prevent 75% of damage, you need armour 36 times the damage (e.g. 3600 armour for 100 damage).
• To prevent 90% of damage, you need armour 108 times the damage (e.g. 10800 armour for 100 damage).

Life Recovery

You mainly rely on Life Flasks to recover Life, so you should continually replace them with better ones as you progress. Do this by purchasing a better flask at the Vendor in town or looting it from a monster.

Here are some other examples of Life Recovery:

• Regeneration: causes your Life to slowly tick up, providing a source of consistent healing.
• Life Leech: Restores your life over time based on a portion of the damage you deal.
• Recoup: Recovers your life for a portion of the hit damage you take over 8 seconds.
• Life Gain on Hit: Recover a portion of your Life when you hit enemies.
• Life Gain on Kill: Recover a portion of your Life on kill.
• Life Gain on Block: Recover a flat amount or percentage of your life on block.

Energy Shield Recovery

• Faster start of Energy Shield Recharge: Reduces the delay before your ES recharges after not taking damage
• Energy Shield Recharge Rate: Increases how quickly your ES recharges
• Regeneration: Zealot's Oath allows sources of Life Regeneration to apply to ES but removes your Energy Shield Recharge
• Recoup: Recovers your ES for a portion of the hit damage you take over 8 seconds.
• Life Flasks: Eternal Youth allows you to Recover Energy Shield instead of Life with Life Flasks.

Mana Recovery

You mainly rely on Mana Flasks to recover Life, so you should continually replace them with better ones as you progress. Do this by purchasing a better flask at the Vendor in town or looting it from a monster.

Here are some other examples of Life Recovery:

• Natural Mana Regeneration: All characters have a baseline Mana Regeneration of 4% of their maximum Mana.
• Mana Regeneration Rate: Scales your Natural Mana Regeneration by a percentage.
• Mana Gain on Kill: Recover a portion of your Mana on kill.
• Recoup: Recovers your mana for a portion of the hit damage you take over 8 seconds.
• Mana Leech: Restores your mana over time based on a portion of the damage you deal.

Dodge Roll

Dodge Roll is your strongest tool to avoid damage. During the Roll you avoid every Strike and Projectile that would otherwise hit you by granting you "Invincibility Frames" for roughly 80% of the animation. Keep in mind Area of Effect damage is not avoided. This is extremely strong when mastered as it allows you to avoid most damage, putting less strain on your recovery and reducing your odds of getting oneshot.

Other Defences

Life, Resistances, Armor, Evasion, Energy Shield & Mana aren't your only ways to deal with damage in Path of Exile 2. Here are some other methods you may commonly encounter during the campaign and early endgame.

• Block: gives you a chance to block all incoming damage from strikes and projectiles and prevent any Ailments it would apply.
  • Glancing Blows doubles your Chance to Block but no longer blocks all damage.
  • Turtle Charm additionally allows you to mitigate Area of Effect damage.
• Reduced/Less Damage Taken: these affixes directly modify the damage you take.
  • Reduced combines additively with other sources. E.g. if you have 3 separate sources of "20% reduced damage taken" you would take 60% reduced damage.
    • Simply add the percentages together: 20%+20%+20%
  • Less combines multiplicatively with other sources. E.g. if you have 3 separate sources of "20% less damage taken" you would take 48.8% less damage.
    • First 20% less: You take 100% - 20% = 80% of the original damage.
    • Second 20% less: You take 80% - (20% of 80%) = 80% - 16% = 64% of the original damage.
    • Third 20% less: You take 64% - (20% of 64%) = 64% - 12.8% = 51.2% of the original damage.
  • Beware: For defences sources of "reduced" are stronger than "less". For damage increases the opposite is the case! Check out our Damage Guide for clarification.

• Damage Shifting: Taking Physical damage as Elemental damage allows you to leverage your Resistances to mitigate more of the damage you take.
  • An affix like: 50% of Physical Damage from Hits taken as Lightning Damage does not apply to Damage over Time.
  • Whereas: 40% of Physical Damage taken as Fire Damage applies to all Physical damage you take including Bleed.
• Damage Taken Before You: Allows you to offload the damage you take to another entity. Granted by skills such as the Warbringers Wooden Wall or the Infernalists Loyal Hellhound Ascendancy Notables.
• Overflow: Overflow allows you to temporarily gain up to double the maximum of your life, mana or energy shield.
  • Sanguimancy allows you to Overflow your life.
  • Grim Feast allows you to Overflow your Energy Shield.
  • Mana Remnants allows you to Overflow your Mana.
• Not previously mentioned Passive Skill Tree Keystones such as:
  • Bulwark to take less damage during your Dodge Roll. Not recommended as it removes its ability to outright avoid Strike and Projectile damage.
  • Heartstopper which causes you to take 50% less damage over time for the first 4 seconds you take DoT damage but causes them to deal 50% more damage if they remain after 4 seconds.
  • Eternal Youth which effectively swaps the behaviour of your Life and Energy Shield (simplified).
  • Vaal Pact to changes your Life Leech to be instant instead of recovering your Life over time. This disables your Life Flask Recovery.
  • Oasis to increase your Recovery from Life Flasks at the cost of disabling your Charms.

Tips & Tricks

There are some enemy mechanics that kill you no matter how good your defences are. Don't get discouraged and instead learn from each death! Many boss abilities have audio cues, so ensure voice lines aren't muted. Observe your enemies to learn their skill patterns and find spots where you can safely position yourself. Nothing is more powerful than not taking any damage at all.

Regardless, here are a few general tips:

• Never stand still! This helps avoid projectiles and ground attacks.
• Don't backtrack, instead push forward or you might run straight into attacks that were coming for you already.
• Beware of on-death effects and corpse explosions. 
• Keep an eye out for damage over time effects to counter them with your Life Flask. 
• Generally the slower and bigger an enemy, the harder they hit. Dodge telegraphed attacks! 
• Pay attention to Rare monsters, you can mouse over them to see their affixes.
• Waystone Modifiers increase the difficulty and can make a map impossible to complete depending on your build.

Most importantly: Streaks of sub optimal gear happen to everyone and make that next upgrade feel all the better. During periods of lower defences play more cautious, stay out of the monsters attack ranges to your best ability and utilize your Dodge Roll.

Summary

Scale your defences with:

• Counter damage by getting your Fire, Cold, Lightning and Chaos Resistances 75%.
• Ailments like Bleed, Freeze, Shock, and Poison are lethal, use Charms and Resistances to counter them.
• Learn how Armor, Evasion and Energy Shield work to boost your survivability. Pay special attention to the way Armour works against big hits.
• Keep your Life Flasks updated to recover your health.
  • Other forms of Life Recovery include Regen, Leech, and Recoup..
• Consider adding in other defensive stats like Block and Damage Shifting to make your build even tankier!
• Understanding the ways enemies deal damage is a crucial part of survival.
• Map mods are often deadly, read your maps before activating them and avoid the most dangerous affixes.
• Move constantly to avoid damage aimed at where you were standing.
• Dodge Rolling is extremely powerful when used correctly.

Credits

Written by Cptn Garbage
Reviewed by Tenkiei