Path of Exile: Affliction is released in one week! Yesterday’s developer's live broadcast also revealed most of the content of the upcoming Affliction League. Here, I summarize all the important things to know about Affliction League. Without further ado, let’s get started!

In Affliction, you will clear Affliction in Viridian Wildwood, earn valuable rewards and learn the ancient ways of Azmeri Wanderers.

POE’s December expansion introduces Affliction Challenge League, three new Wildwood Ascendancy Classes, the return of Ultimatum League, over a hundred new Transfigured Gems, and more!

Affliction Challenge League

In Affliction League, you’ll encounter Sacred Wisps who summon you into the overgrown passageway to Viridian Wildwood. The evil Affliction has cast an ominous darkness over the forest. You need to uncover the mysteries of the forest to stop the source of Affliction.

Viridian Wildwood

As you approach darkness, Sacred Wisps will burn away Affliction that shrouds the forest. Just be sure to proceed with caution, as Wisps only have a limited amount of power, and once they’re depleted, you’ll need to return to Wraeclast. Be aware that it fills the darkness with cursed monsters that will appear out of nowhere to kill you.

As you explore, you may see other types of Wisps trapped in the darkness. You can follow their trail by collecting Wisps and discover many secrets such as new Characters, Shrines, Boss Battles, and new Encounters. There’s plenty of POE Currency and loot to be won for those brave enough to seek the rewards.

Control Your Challenge And Reward

When you return from Wildwood, any Wisps you rescued from Affliction will scatter into the environment and populate randomly chosen monsters, increasing their power and bonuses. Different types of Wisps have different effects. Sometimes more than one type of Wisps will inhabit a monster, making the fight more difficult and more rewarding.

Primal Wisps provide item rarity bonuses to the monsters they inhabit. Wild Wisps will give a bonus to the number of items. Vivid Wisps will cause them to drop currency items. If a monster gets all three types of Wisps, they will drop more items of higher rarity and more POE currency.

Wildwood Ascendancy Classes

While exploring Wildwood, you may spot some of the last Azmeri Wanderers who have survived since the forest was cursed.

You can randomly select Azmeri Wanderer you will complete the mission with to unlock one of three new Ascendancy Classes. You can have these classes in addition to the regular Ascendancy Classes. As you complete Azmeri Wanderer’s missions, you can unlock up to eight points in these professions.

New Ascendancy: Warden Of The Maji

Warden of Eaves teaches you to become Warden of the Maji, a powerful class that uses wilderness knowledge. Warden of the Maji can coat their weapons with Tinctures, giving them special bonuses. For example, Ironwood Tincture always stuns enemies when full health, and Oakbranch Tincture is a great finisher for bosses.

Warden of the Maji has many other wilderness abilities, such as Barkskin, which causes Bark to grow throughout your body, increasing armor. When you take damage, Bark temporarily detaches, increasing your evasion capabilities.

New Ascendancy: Warlock Of The Mists

Breaker of Oaths can teach you to become a Warlock of the Mists, a profession that specializes in the darker arts of Azmeri.

One powerful ability you can choose from is Blood Hunt. It lets you consume a corpse for more damage and provides protection against monsters that share a creature type with the corpse.

You can also get some strange types of corpses from Breakers of Oaths. We can also use these corpses as powerful spectres. Warlock of the Mists also gains access to many other abilities, including three new curse skills.

New Ascendancy: Wildwood Primalist

Primal Huntress can help you become a Wildwood Primalist. Unlike other new Ascendancy Classes, Wildwood Primalist allows you to customize your tree with Charms with randomly generated skills from regular Ascendancy Classes. Charms are magic items with consistent properties that can have up to two random modifiers.

Wildwood Primalists gain access to other powerful abilities, such as a small extra backpack, or the ability to use Warcry to make corpses drop additional items.

New Rewards

There will be a variety of different rewards in Affliction Challenge League. The monsters you fight in Wraeclast may be affected by Wisps you bring back from Viridian Wildwood, increasing the quality and quantity of the items they drop.

As you progress through the league, you’ll earn Wildwood Ascendancy Classes and Charms, Corpses or Tinctures they use. There are many additional secret rewards hidden within Mists that you will discover as you explore. Path of Exile: Affliction also includes over 15 new unique items.

The Return Of Ultimatum

Ultimatum is finally at its core. Trialmaster is back too. You can choose to accept the deadly Vaal trial for generous rewards. If you fail the trial, he will offer to double up with you or do nothing.

So, are you willing to take risks and pursue better returns? Or do you lock in winnings you’ve already won?

The developers have completely rebalanced Ultimatum and added many new Modifiers, Atlas passive skills, Keystones and rewards, including new and redesigned unique items.

Transfigured Gems

In POE 3.23, they have merged Alternate Quality Gems, Labyrinth Helmet Enchantments and Unique Threshold Jewels into a new system called Transfigured Gems. It is an alternative version of an existing skill gem with different functionality and balance.

They have changed Divine Font at the end of Eternal Labyrinth to a gem-making device, which can create deformed gems and increase the quality or experience of gems. Players can also sacrifice gems for one or more Treasure Keys, or exchange Support Gems for Exceptional Support Gems like Empower or Enlighten.

New Core Supporter Packs

Finally, the developer will release annual Core Supporter Packs alongside the release of Path of Exile: Affliction.

There are five packages available. Each pack includes its full value of points, exclusive armor sets and additional cosmetic micro-transactions that visually interact with the game in new ways. Higher packs also include physical merchandise and new opportunities to leave a mark on Path of Exile.

The above is all the content of this developer’s live broadcast about POE 3.23 league. The new season is coming soon, looking forward to seeing you in Affliction!