Why T18 Maps Are Necessary for the Future of Endgame PoE

As Path of Exile continues to evolve, the power ceiling of endgame characters has steadily increased. Through improved itemization, powerful crafting systems, atlas passives, scarabs, league mechanics, and increasingly optimized builds, experienced players are reaching a point where the current endgame no longer provides a consistent challenge. For those of us who primarily engage with Path of Exile at the highest level, T18 maps are no longer a theoretical luxury, they are a necessity.


The Current Endgame Is Being Outpaced by Player Power

At present, well-geared endgame characters trivialize T16 maps, even when heavily juiced. While league mechanics and atlas strategies can add difficulty, they often do so by increasing monster density or damage spikes rather than providing a fundamentally harder baseline experience. For veteran players, this results in gameplay that is fast but shallow: monsters melt instantly, bosses pose little threat, and meaningful decision-making diminishes.

As player power continues to grow with each expansion, the gap between “challenging” and “efficient” gameplay widens. Without higher-tier content, the endgame risks becoming repetitive and unrewarding for those who invest heavily into their characters.


T18 Maps as a Natural Progression Step

T18 maps would represent a logical extension of the existing map system, rather than a radical departure. We already have precedents:

- Voidstones pushing maps beyond their natural tiers
- Uber bosses offering aspirational, opt-in difficulty
- Scarabs and atlas passives scaling content far beyond its base state

T18 maps could serve as a true late-endgame mapping tier—content explicitly designed for optimized builds, deep atlas investment, and experienced players who want to test the limits of their characters.


Challenge Should Scale With Rewards

One of Path of Exile’s core design pillars is risk versus reward. If players are expected to face significantly harder content, rewards should scale accordingly.
T18 maps could offer:

- Improved base item quantity/rarity
- Higher chances for top-end currency, scarabs, and invitations
- Access to exclusive modifiers, bosses, or crafting materials
- A meaningful alternative to boss rushing for endgame farming

This would ensure that difficult content feels worthwhile without invalidating existing strategies or forcing casual players into content they may not enjoy.


Optional, Not Mandatory

It’s important to emphasize that T18 maps should be optional aspirational content. T16s can and should remain the standard endgame for the majority of players. Just as Uber bosses are not required for progression, T18 maps would exist for those who want more difficulty, more risk, and more reward.

This preserves accessibility while still giving long-term players something meaningful to strive for.


Longevity and Player Retention

A deeper, more challenging late endgame increases league longevity. When players feel there is still room to push their builds further, experiment with optimization, and overcome genuinely difficult mapping content, they are more likely to stay engaged throughout a league.

T18 maps would give endgame-focused players a reason to keep investing—into gear, crafting, atlas strategies, and mastery of game mechanics—rather than hitting a ceiling where progression feels finished far too early.


Conclusion

Path of Exile thrives when it offers depth, challenge, and aspirational goals. As player power continues to rise, the endgame must rise with it. T18 maps would provide a much-needed outlet for high-end characters, restore meaningful challenge to late-game mapping, and reinforce the game’s core risk-versus-reward philosophy.

For endgame players, the question is no longer if we need higher-tier maps, but when we're getting them.

It's time, GGG.

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Community Suggestions From This Thread

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ARealLifeCaribbeanPirate#2605 wrote:

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ArtCrusade#4438 wrote:

A keystone that turns T17 maps into T18 while also giving a hefty downside would work, although that also comes with implications I don't really like.

Suggestion: T18s don't drop, they can only be created by vaal orb use on T17 or special map altar in Incursion temples. Make the Atlas of Worlds room actually do something for once.

We don't need T18. Hell, T17 is already a mistake.

What we need are nerfs. T16 should be the peak endgame, and GGG should draw the line at where power starts to outperform it. You said yourself that player performance is already too high. The solution to the problem isn't to keep adding more content to appeal to bored elites, but it should take away their OP power crutches and have them struggle with everyone else.

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Pizzarugi#6258 wrote:

We don't need T18. Hell, T17 is already a mistake.

What we need are nerfs. T16 should be the peak endgame, and GGG should draw the line at where power starts to outperform it. You said yourself that player performance is already too high. The solution to the problem isn't to keep adding more content to appeal to bored elites, but it should take away their OP power crutches and have them struggle with everyone else.

GGG can't nerf the way they should. Have you forgotten about 3.15? The moment T16 becomes "peak endgame" you're pushing the majority of players down to T15 or T14.

Expanding and adding on top, while being optional - not accounting for fomo - is the way to go.

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Pizzarugi#6258 wrote:

We don't need T18. Hell, T17 is already a mistake.

What we need are nerfs. T16 should be the peak endgame, and GGG should draw the line at where power starts to outperform it. You said yourself that player performance is already too high. The solution to the problem isn't to keep adding more content to appeal to bored elites, but it should take away their OP power crutches and have them struggle with everyone else.

Do we agree on the analysis of the current state of the game? Right now, player power is outgrowing available content in the game. This is in part a good reason why Keepers has been underwhelming for a lot of Exiles as well - lack of challenging content.

So the way I see it there are 2 paths forward:

1) nerf player power
2) add challenging content

I don't see option 1 as viable after what happened in Expedition league. It just won't feel good no matter how they go about it.

On the other hand, T18 may be an option, although I wonder how that would be implemented. T17 has special drop restrictions after all, and if there's one thing we don't need it's more content fragments dropping from bosses.

A keystone that turns T17 maps into T18 while also giving a hefty downside would work, although that also comes with implications I don't really like.

It doesn't have to be T18 maps per say, but something needs to happen to keep the game interesting for the existing playerbase.

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ArtCrusade#4438 wrote:

A keystone that turns T17 maps into T18 while also giving a hefty downside would work, although that also comes with implications I don't really like.

Suggestion: T18s don't drop, they can only be created by vaal orb use on T17 or special map altar in Incursion temples. Make the Atlas of Worlds room actually do something for once.

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ARealLifeCaribbeanPirate#2605 wrote:

"

ArtCrusade#4438 wrote:

A keystone that turns T17 maps into T18 while also giving a hefty downside would work, although that also comes with implications I don't really like.

Suggestion: T18s don't drop, they can only be created by vaal orb use on T17 or special map altar in Incursion temples. Make the Atlas of Worlds room actually do something for once.

This is actually a good idea. Adding it to the main post. :)

While I would enjoy T18s or even higher tiers in the longterm a lot I think T17s are in a really weird spot and simply adjusting and fixing the broken stuff would already go a long way to counter the powercreep without requiring too much devtime.

Some examples for what I'd like to see in 3.28:

- Significantly stronger corrupted implicits on T17s, preferably with strong up- and downsides.

- T17 modifiers receiving <tags> and allowing them to be rolled with fossils. Fun fact for this one: Fossils have multiple, very weird behaviors when used to roll T16.5s. Using an opulent fossil currently results in a blank rare map because it likely errors out and fails to generate.

- More scarabs that add toughness or generic scaling similar to titanic.

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ArtCrusade#4438 wrote:

Do we agree on the analysis of the current state of the game?

Not really, no. Not everyone has the capability of making builds that can trivialize the content you claim people are outpacing. Not only that, there's not many people coming here to voice that opinion. Without naming names, whenever I see threads pop up asking for more difficulty in the form of harsher death penalties or higher map tiers, it's always The Usual Suspects(tm) making them. They don't represent the majority of the playerbase, nor do their claims that Keepers of the Flame is underwhelming. You think it's underwhelming, meanwhile I'm still getting my ass handed to me. In fact, the number of threads complaining about the current death penalty and dying all the time to things they can barely see greatly outnumber the opposite.

If a small group of people are clearing T17 maps as easily as T1 and Uber bosses like act 1 bosses, the solution isn't to give them yet another tier of difficulty to trivialize next, but to tone them down.

Alternatively, GGG makes "flex" difficulty that provide no better or exclusive rewards and only serves to provide challenge for players who have done it all. That way, GGG has full liberty of making it as difficult as possible.

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Pizzarugi#6258 wrote:

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ArtCrusade#4438 wrote:

Do we agree on the analysis of the current state of the game?

Not really, no. Not everyone has the capability of making builds that can trivialize the content you claim people are outpacing. Not only that, there's not many people coming here to voice that opinion. Without naming names, whenever I see threads pop up asking for more difficulty in the form of harsher death penalties or higher map tiers, it's always The Usual Suspects(tm) making them. They don't represent the majority of the playerbase, nor do their claims that Keepers of the Flame is underwhelming. You think it's underwhelming, meanwhile I'm still getting my ass handed to me. In fact, the number of threads complaining about the current death penalty and dying all the time to things they can barely see greatly outnumber the opposite.

If a small group of people are clearing T17 maps as easily as T1 and Uber bosses like act 1 bosses, the solution isn't to give them yet another tier of difficulty to trivialize next, but to tone them down.

Alternatively, GGG makes "flex" difficulty that provide no better or exclusive rewards and only serves to provide challenge for players who have done it all. That way, GGG has full liberty of making it as difficult as possible.

I was asking whether or not we agree on the fact that player power is increasing every league, not whether you agree with the options presentented. I'll pretend I didn't read the rest of that for everyone's sake here

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ArtCrusade#4438 wrote:

I was asking whether or not we agree on the fact that player power is increasing every league, not whether you agree with the options presentented. I'll pretend I didn't read the rest of that for everyone's sake here

Then the answer is no, especially not for those lacking the means of acquiring exceptional amounts of wealth to reach said power.