Path of Exile Crafting Resource Guide

Path of Exile Crafting Resource Guide by Invalesco

Not sure if there are any crafting guides around. So decided to post this in the hope that more fantastic items will be available for purchase (and at the same time showcase some of my better items hehe)

List of Orbs Used
1. Orb of Alchemy – Upgrades a white item to a rare item
2. Orb of Scouring – Downgrades rare/magic item to a white
3. Chaos Orb – Reforges a rare item
4. Orb of Chance – Upgrades a white item to a magic/rare/unique
5. Regal Orb – Adds ONE mod to a magic item (changing it into a rare)
6. Exalted Orb – Adds ONE mod to a rare item (max of 6 mods)
7. Divine Orb – Rerolls the values on an item’s mods
8. Blessed Orb – Rerolls the value on an item’s implicit mod.
9. Chromatic Orb – Rerolls the colours on an item’s sockets.
10. Jeweller’s Orb – Rerolls the number of sockets on an item
11. Orb of Fusing – Rerolls the links on an item
12. Orb of Transmutation – Changes a white item to a magic item
13. Orb of Augmentation – Adds a mod to a magic item with only 1 mod.

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Crafting Tips
Craft only when:
1. Your item is that good such that it is extremely tough to purchase/find an upgrade
2. You need an upgrade desperately or you won’t survive the next boss encounter
3. You’re in a race and need an upgrade asap to give you the upper hand
4. You’ve found a nice item that would be an upgrade but needs better links/colours/sockets

Know your limits!
1. Be reasonable. Don’t overspend if you can help it. You will need your orbs later on too
2. Would you rather spend 5 chaos on a level 30 item or buy a better level 40 item for 1 chaos?

How much should I expect to spend?
Depends! If you just want a decent upgrade over a decent item, 10 Chaos orbs or so might get you there if you’re lucky. If you want the mother of all upgrades, be prepared to spend at least 40 GCPs or so worth of orbs to craft it.

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Crafting Rule Number 1
All craftable rares can have up to 6 mods.
Of these 6, 3 will be prefixes while the remaining 3 will be suffixes.

If you want to know what mods are prefixes and what mods are suffixes, click on Item Data

Crafting Rule Number 2
Not all mods can spawn on all items. For instance, movement speed mods can only spawn on boots. IIR/IIQ mods cannot spawn on chestpieces, weapons, belts or shields. Increased attack speed can only spawn on Weapons/Quivers, rings etc.

In addition, not all mods can attain the highest level mod for every single item. For instance, the attack speed mod can reach 13% on gloves but only 7% on rings.

Velkor has managed to create a very good spreadsheet that has those values at Mods Compendium

Crafting Rule Number 3
The type of mods an item can have depends on it’s itemlevel.

Have a look at the above screenshot. The circled “Level” indicates the itemlevel required to spawn that particular mod.

For instance, an ilevel 69 ES gear can spawn all of the above mods. an ilevel 43 item however can spawn all of the above mods EXCEPT Blazing, Scintillating and Incandescent.

Crafting Rule Number 4
Certain mods may exist as prefixes or suffixes, for instance, IIR and %Increased Block and Stun Recovery.

Crafting Rule Number 5
Before you craft an item, it is perhaps better if you quality it first. This ensures that you save on armourer scraps/blacksmith whetstones as it takes 4 Scraps/Whetstones to quality a white to 20%, 10 to quality a blue to 20%, and 20 to quality a rare to 20%.
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Basic Crafting
This is as basic as it gets.
Usually applicable to the first two difficulties: Normal and Cruel.

If you have a white item and need it to be better there are three things you can do.

1. Transmute it with an Orb of Transmutation and hope for a decent magic item OR
2. Chance it with an Orb of Chance and hope for a decent magic/rare item or even a unique! OR
3. Alch it and hope for a decent rare.

Before you Alch it, be sure to follow Crafting Rule Number 5 first (if you have enough whetstones/scraps)
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Advanced Crafting
In most cases early on in the game, using an Alch alone on an item and hoping for an upgrade is enough. There is not much point in wasting Chaos Orbs on low level items. However, if you want to craft the ultimate final upgrade, you’ll have to end up being much more liberal with your orbs.

There are two principal methods for crafting end-game gear:
1. The Chaos Game
2. The Systematic Alt/Regal/Exalt Method

The Chaos Game

Basically, you get an item that you want to craft, alch it then proceed to Chaos it till you get mods which you’re happy with. This is the preferred method during mid to late-game when you just want any decent item that might be an upgrade. If you want to craft the ultimate item or if you’re looking for specific mods however, it is advised to use method 2.

Note: an alternative to using a Chaos Orb is to Scour the item, then Alch it again

The Systematic Alt/Regal/Exalt Method

Step 1: Transmute an item
Step 2: If it has only one mod, Augment itAt this stage, this will be a magic item with 2 mods, one of which will be a prefix and the other will be a suffix.

Step 3: Does it have a mod that you’re looking for in particular? If not, use an Alteration orb on it till you get the mod you’re looking for. If yes, proceed to Step 4.

Step 4: Regal it

When you Regal an item, the regaled mod can be either a prefix or a suffix

Step 5: Out of the 3 mods it now has, does it have the two mods that you’re looking for? If not, use an Orb of Scouring on it and start all over again from Step 1. If yes, congratulations! Proceed to Step 6.

Step 6: Exalt it three times.

Step 7: Can the mod values be rolled higher? Use a Divine Orb! No idea how? Check the “How to use a Divine Orb” section below!

As you can see, this method allows for greater control over the mods that you want on your item. It is probably the best method if you want to craft the ultimate defensive gear such as chestpieces, headgears, shields as pretty much the main mods you want for these pieces are the two prefixes: %Increased defense and +defense value. In addition, these pieces tend to have fewer types of possible mods, making it relatively easier to get the mods you want within the trans/aug and subsequent regal.

Weapons and hybrid weapons in particular can spawn a much higher number of possible mod types, hence I usually just play the Chaos game on them. Although if you have enough alts/regals to spend, you can of course try that as well.

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Sockets/Links

This is where Jeweller’s Orbs and Orbs of Fusing (the bane of every crafter) come in.

The number of sockets an item can have depends on its item type and itemlevel.

Item type
1h Weapons/Wands and Shields can have up to 3 Sockets.
Quivers cannot have any sockets.
2h Weapons and Bows can have up to 6 Sockets
Headgear, Boots and Gloves can have up to 4 sockets.
Chestpieces can have up to 6 Sockets.

Itemlevel (from mechanics thread)
1 socket : 1
2 sockets: 1
3 sockets: 15
4 sockets: 28
5 sockets: 35
6 sockets: 50

Jeweller Orbs work by randomly reforging the number of sockets on an item. For instance, if you have an itemlevel 50 Chestpiece, each time you use a jeweller Orb on it will give you a random chance of getting 1-6 Sockets excluding the already pre-existing number of sockets.

The number of links an item can have, as well as the number of possible combinations of links it can have depends on the number of sockets it has.

For instance, if you have an unlinked 2S item, you have a 100% chance of fusing the 2 sockets together, since that’s the only probable result that excludes the current item state.

If you have an unlinked 3S item and you fuse it, you then have a 33% chance of getting a 2L + 1S, a 33% chance of getting 1S + 2L, and a 33% chance of getting a 3L.

As you can see, the higher the number of sockets on an item, the lower your chance of linking all the sockets together.

Don’t be deceived by the name Orbs of Fusing, they may as well just be Orbs of Unfusing (a common in game joke). This is because they do not add links cumulatively and can remove links as well.

The holy grail for most crafters is to be able to fuse 6L items. My advice: don’t get too overtly obsessed over it. 5Ls are hard enough to get as it is and are usually good enough for most builds.

I find that the below animation created by Stickymaddness is the best example of how Orbs of Fusing will work on a typical 6S item.

Tip for crafting 5Ls
If you want to craft 5Ls, start from a 6S item. This way you have two possible combinations for 5Ls and hence a higher chance of getting a 5L. If you’re lucky enough you may even get a 6L before a 5L! (that’s what happened to me)

Misc. tips contributed by dzordzo
There is not much point in trying to socket/fuse low level items to get 4Ls. You’ll find it far cheaper to just find white 4Ls and using an alch on them.

It might be a good idea to use 1 fusing orb on a 6S (white) item you find, because MIGHT get a 5L/6L, and even if you don’t, you can sell the 6S to a vendor for 7 jewellers, which is still a net profit of 3 jewellers.

Colouring of Sockets

There are 3 different colours of sockets that can exist on items.
Green, Blue, RedRed represents the Str attribute.
Green represents the Dex attribute.
Blue represents the Int attribute.

You’ll find that pure Str items tend to roll Red sockets more often, pure Dex for Green and pure Blue for Int.

Hence, when you use Chromatic Orbs, please be realistic!

Let’s say you have a Coronal Leather (which is a pure dex piece), the odds of you rolling 5 Red Sockets on it are minuscule. It could take you as many as 1000 Chromes and still not be able to get those colours! They can exist, I have seen before a pure dex item with 5 red sockets belonging to Erenor but it is extremely expensive to achieve.

For example,

this item although a pure Int item only has 4 non-blue coloured sockets on it and it took me more than 400 chromes just to achieve this particular colour combination.

Oh no! Does this mean that if I am an ES Int user and I need 2R, 1G and 1B, I have to resort to using a Str based Armour item which is totally irrelevant to my class?

Ans: Thankfully, No. This is where Hybrid Items come in.

Hybrid items are items which have 2 kinds of attribute requirements. For instance, Str/Int, Int/Dex, Str/Dex.

It is generally much easier to roll colour combinations which would otherwise have been very tough on pure attribute items on hybrid items.

Example, after 150 Chromes trying to get 2R, 1G and 1B, I ended up with

However, after just 20 Chromes on a hybrid piece, I ended up with

Hence, although crafting is very much about luck and RnG, there is an element of common sense to it too!

How to use a Divine Orb

Divine Orbs reroll the stats on all mods in an item (including uniques) and can only reroll it within it’s mod range. (or in the case of uniques, within the unique item’s mod ranges)

Let’s take a look at this item:

Question: Oh man that item only has +9 Energy Shield. I’d like to use a divine orb on it to roll +106! Can I?

Ans: No.

Take a look at this screenshot again.

That item has +9 ES, and that lies within the Glittering prefix which has a value range of 9-12.

Hence, if you divine the above-mentioned shield, you will only get a maximum of +12 ES.

Question: Do divine orbs always roll things higher?

Ans: No.

If you notice this item, it has +142 ES which lies within the Incandescent prefix. If you divine it, sure it might hit +148, however, it might also go down to as low as +107. In addition, it might roll the 170% Increased ES to as low as 121%. Even if you do manage to roll +142 to +148, the 170% might roll down to 130% making the overall ES lower than it used to be.

Once again, although crafting is very much about luck and RnG, You must also know when to take a gamble and when to stop.

How to use Blessed Orbs

Blessed Orbs reroll an item’s implicit mod. (circled in red)They can reroll the values higher or lower.

Not all items have implicit values that can be rerolled. For instance, most shields EXCEPT Spiked Shields have fixed implicit values.
Most weapons such as daggers, swords, rapiers have fixed implicit values as well. The only exceptions to the rule are Wands.

In terms of Chestpieces, Astral Plate and Occultist Vestments can have variable implicit values and can be rerolled with a blessed.

Range of values for items with rerollable implicit mods
Onyx Amulet: 10-20 to all attributes
Jade Amulet: 20-30 to Dexterity
Paua Amulet: +20-30% to mana regen
Amber Amulet: 20-30 to Strength
Lapis Amulet: 20-30 to Intelligence
Coral Amulet: 40-70 life regen/min
Gold Amulet: 12-20% to IIR

Resist Rings: 20%-30%
Coral Ring: +20-30 to maximum life
Paua Ring: +20-25 to maximum mana
Gold Ring: 6-15% IIR

Chain Belt: 9 to 20
Leather Belt: 25 to 40
Heavy Belt: 25 to 35
Studded Belt: 20 to 30
Cloth Belt: 15 to 25
Rustic Sash: 3 to 5

For Spiked Shields and Astral Plate/Occultist Vestment: Armour
For Wands: Weapons (bottom of page)

Crafting Uniques

Wait, you mean.. it’s actually possible?!
Yes it is! However the chance of you crafting one is very low.You can craft a unique by using an Orb of Chance on an item with a unique counterpart.
For instance, if you chance a sapphire ring, there is a slim chance you might get Dream Fragments.
If you chance a Heavy Belt, there is a chance you might get Meginord’s Girdle.

Even if you don’t manage to turn the item into a unique, you might still end up getting a pretty good magic/rare item.

For some high level uniques which exist only in very high level maps, some players prefer to keep repeating the cycle of using Orbs of Scouring and Orbs of Chance on the white item counterpart of the unique.

Eg. Kaom’s Heart

The Fabled Mirror of Kalandra

This is the most expensive orb in the game. It basically duplicates any non-consumable item in the game.It can vendor for 2 Exalteds, 5 Regals and 1 Divine.

Items that cannot be mirrored include:
1. Mirror of Kalandra
2. Uniques
3. any other Orbs
4. Scroll fragments
5. Scrolls

Any items that can be alt-ed can be mirrored
1. Flasks can be mirrored (Verified by VictorDoom)
2. Maps can be mirrored (Verified by me)

If you do use a Mirror of Kalandra on an item, the mirrored item will have the exact same stats as the original copy and it will not be possible to change the mirrored copy in any way, be it colour of sockets, links or stats.

Therefore, before you mirror an item, make sure that the item has the specific colours that you need, or else you’ll end up with a useless 6L chestpiece that you can’t use because the colours do not suit your skillset.

Here’s an example of an original:

and here’s an example of the mirrored copy:

The reason the two are different was because the mirror was used on the original before the original subsequently had its stats divined up and its colours changed.

Lastly, just for laughs, here’s a video of Mirror of Kalandras in action.
Invalesco’s Mirrors of Kalandra Tutorial

Some common misconceptions/questions

Take a look at this screenshot.
Now take a look at this item.

Question: Didn’t the screenshot say that the maximum %ES is 170? Why in the world does that item have 208% Increased ES?

Answer: Some prefixes exist as double mods. For instance, in this shield’s case, it has the Dauntless Mod as well as the Djinn Mod, meaning that it can go as high as 220% Increased ES.

Question: That item only has 5 mods! Does it have an extra slot for an Exalt bearing in mind that Rule Number 1 says that crafted items can have up to 6 mods?

Answer: No this item cannot have an extra slot because it already has 6 mods!

The dagger above has a combination of the Pure Damage scaling prefix as well as the Damage Scaling and Accuracy double mod prefix.

In addition it has one of the accuracy suffixes. Hence there was actually one double mod prefix hidden in that dagger!

Listing out the 6 mods in that dagger to make it clearer
1. Damage Scaling (Prefix)
2. +Phys Damage (Prefix)
3. Attack Speed (Suffix)
4. Lightning Resist (Suffix)
5. Accuracy (Suffix)
6. Damage Scaling and Accuracy (Prefix)

Question: Considering that item has a mixture of the Damage Scaling, Damage Scaling and Accuracy and Accuracy affixes, is it possible to tell what exact mods those are? In other words, is the Damage Scaling mod Cruel or Bloodthirsty?

Ans: In this dagger there are quite a few possible combinations, so it is pretty tough to tell. However in items such as the shield mentioned above, it is much more straightforward.