If you want to start doing significantly more damage in Path of Exile 2, there are a few simple yet powerful steps you can follow regardless of your build or class. By optimizing key aspects like speed, attack speed, and understanding how to boost your damage exponentially, you can go from struggling to melting bosses with ease. In this guide, we’ll break down everything you need to know to push your damage into the millions and beyond.

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Understanding Why Your Sheet DPS Is Misleading

Your in-game sheet DPS (damage per second) is not an accurate reflection of your true damage output. This is because it doesn’t account for several critical factors:

• Projectile duration and speed: Faster projectiles hit more enemies or the same enemy multiple times.
• Skill level scaling: Higher skill levels boost your base damage, multiplying all your damage bonuses.
• Cast and attack speed: The more often you can cast or attack, the more frequently you apply all your other damage bonuses.

To truly optimize your damage, focus on these factors rather than relying solely on sheet DPS.

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Step 1: Maximize Survivability First

If you’re dead, you’re doing zero damage. Start by capping your resistances at 75% for all elements if possible. This ensures you survive long enough to apply your damage:

• Overcapped resistances: Build some extra resistance to counter debuffs.
• Prioritize life or energy shield: Choose based on your build and gear availability.

Once you’re comfortably surviving, you can start swapping survivability for damage. For instance, replacing a resistance ring with one that offers cast speed can provide a substantial DPS boost without sacrificing too much survivability.

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Step 2: Prioritize Attack and Cast Speed

Attack and cast speed are some of the most impactful stats for boosting damage:

• More hits per second: Every other multiplier in your build benefits more with higher speed.
• Sustainability: Ensure you have enough mana or energy shield to sustain rapid attacks or casts.

Example: Swapping a ring with resistance for one that boosts cast speed can skyrocket your DPS by thousands. Even if the base damage remains the same, casting more often multiplies every other bonus.

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Step 3: Focus on Skill Levels and Damage Multipliers

Skill levels significantly boost your base damage:

• +1 to skill levels: Increases the base damage that all your other multipliers apply to.
• More multipliers: Effects like increased spell damage, physical damage, or Elemental damage scale off your skill’s base damage.

Important: Avoid getting fixated on a single damage type. Balance between raw damage increases (like spell damage) and multipliers (like critical strike damage).

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Step 4: Leverage Critical Strike Chance and Damage

Crits are a massive damage boost due to their multiplier effect:

• Crit chance: Ensures you’re consistently getting critical hits.
• Crit damage: Multiplies your base and all other damage modifiers.

Optimal Jewels: Look for crit chance and crit damage on jewels. Double crit rolls on a jewel are incredibly powerful and significantly outperform other stats.

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Step 5: Optimize Curses and Exposure

Applying curses and exposure is a direct way to shred enemy defenses:

• Curses: Use curses like Conductivity or Elemental Weakness to reduce enemy resistances by a significant margin.
• Exposure: Apply exposure to further reduce resistances by a flat percentage (e.g., -20% to lightning resistance).

Pro Tip: Build around boosting curse effectiveness and exposure efficiency for exponential damage gains.

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Step 6: Exploit Weapon and Gear Affixes

Your weapons and gear are your most significant damage sources:

• Attack speed or cast speed: Prefer these over flat damage increases.
• Skill level boosts: Weapons that provide +1 or +2 to skill levels massively boost your base damage.

Example: A staff with +7 to lightning spell skills may seem powerful, but if it lacks cast speed, a simpler wand with +4 to skills and high cast speed might provide far more DPS.

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Step 7: Utilize Jewels for Huge Damage Increases

Jewels offer some of the best damage increases in the game:

• Critical damage: Focus on double crit damage rolls.
• Attack speed or cast speed: Look for jewels with these bonuses to exponentially boost DPS.

Tip: Even defensive jewels can improve damage if they enable you to survive longer or cast more frequently without interruptions.

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Step 8: Balance Between Offense and Defense

High damage means little if you’re dead:

• Cap resistances: Prioritize elemental resistance first, then chaos resistance for late-game content.
• Armor and evasion: Invest in these based on your build’s strengths.

Sometimes, investing in damage can indirectly improve survivability. Faster kills mean fewer chances for enemies to attack you.

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Step 9: Embrace Speed as a Defensive Strategy

High attack or cast speed doesn’t just boost DPS—it prevents enemies from fighting back:

• Stun-lock potential: Faster attacks can interrupt enemy skills.
• Kill before being killed: Eliminating threats faster reduces your need for excessive defenses.

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Step 10: Understand the Power of Curse Duration and Effectiveness

Curses are a cornerstone of high-damage builds:

• Increased curse effectiveness: Extends the debuff duration and magnitude.
• Boost curse duration: Ensures enemies stay weakened longer.

Focus on scaling curse effectiveness through passive skills and gear to maintain uptime on critical debuffs.

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Conclusion: Becoming a Damage God in Path of Exile 2

Achieving 10x damage isn’t about a single trick but optimizing multiple aspects of your build:

1. Cap resistances first.
2. Maximize attack or cast speed.
3. Leverage skill levels for base damage boosts.
4. Stack crit chance and damage multipliers.
5. Use curses and exposure to shred enemy defenses.
6. Optimize gear for both speed and skill level bonuses.

By systematically optimizing these aspects, you can turn any build into a powerhouse capable of deleting bosses and clearing maps with ease. Good luck, Exile!