There are some good ideas in Phrecia

I think there are some good ideas in the Phrecia event and I hope the developers consider bringing some of them to the main game.

Short version (my recommendations without context):

I would love to see the “Unwavering Vision” keystone (which disables scarabs) have two (mutually exclusive) options: the current “Grants 20 Atlas Passive Skill Points” and a second one that enables a 3x3 (or maybe 2x3?) Idol grid.

I would love to see some of the build-enabling aspects of the new ascendancies folded into existing ascendancies – for example, maybe replace some of the more useless Chieftain nodes with some of the really great Ancestral Commander nodes; or maybe just add one of the Phrecia ascendancies as a new option to each class (just adding Architect of Chaos to the game would enable so many fun builds). We could even add some of the Phrecia notables as additional options to existing ascendancies.

Longer version (context):

To be clear, I do not like Idols as a replacement for the Atlas Passive Tree; compared to the tree, idols are messy and painful (less agency; lots of unwanted content; very trade-dependent and basically impossible to optimize on SSF or console). But, as many have said, Idols as a replacement for scarabs could be really great. Scarabs are also messy and painful and very difficult to use effectively in SSF or on console, but being able to exchange access to scarabs for access to a handful of carefully crafted idols (that sit on top of the passive tree) could perfectly balance what is difficult about both. When your whole mapping strategy depends on idols, then they are painful; but if they are just a small source of increased flexibility (e.g., making atlas tree pathing a little easier, or pushing one aspect of your mapping strategy a little further), then you can slowly curate the ones you want (and not limp along with the crazy stuff you don’t want) and still depend on the tree for your base mapping experience.

We already have a way of trading in scarabs, the “Unwavering Vision” keystone, so why not include a second mutually exclusive option (obviously, you wouldn’t be able to have both) of trading them in for limited access to idols? I think a 3x3 grid would give you enough room to do something with whatever imperfect idols you drop and this is the smallest configuration that would fit all existing idol shapes. Of course, that's obviously too much power, given what you can do with 1x1 idols, at least with current rolls (maybe 2x3 with nerfed modifiers, and the 3x1 idol shape removed would be more realistic). Not sure about the right balance there, but that could be tinkered with.

Regarding the new ascendancies, I also don’t think that they are better than the current ones, nor should they replace them. But the new ascendancies do show that there are a lot of very fun playstyles already latent in the base version of the game and these would require very little to unlock. For example, the Architect of Chaos ascendancy allowed me to build around all of those vaal items, modifiers, etc. that I usually just ignore (like the really powerful “during soul gain prevention” stuff). Not to mention, being able to use Vaal skills consistently opens up so many build possibilities (running around with my buddy Innocence was some of the most fun I’ve had in POE).

It might be a bit chaotic to try and add all of these ascendancies into the base game, and I’m not sure all of them even belong in the game. But there are notables there that took existing elements of the game and gave them new life and I would love to see some of those find their way into the base game. So, maybe add one new ascendancy per class; or replace some existing notables that don’t get used much with some of the good stuff in Phrecia (looking at you, Chieftain; you would look great with some ancestral commander on you); or just expand the existing ascendancies and give us too many choices.