Frustration with Ascendancy Trials (Trial of the Sekhemas & Trial of Chaos)

Hello GGG Team,

I’ve stopped playing Path of Exile 2 because of the current design of the Ascendancy Trials, specifically Trial of the Sekhemas and Trial of Chaos, which are required to obtain the 7th and 8th Ascendancy points.

The issue is that these trials rely too much on luck rather than skill. I’ve tried many times with different characters, builds, and strategies since the game’s release, but every attempt ends in frustration. A single mistake or one random hit can end the entire run, forcing me to start over.

This design feels punishing and discouraging. It doesn’t reward preparation, defenses, or smart flask usage — the very core mechanics of Path of Exile. Months of character development can be invalidated by one unavoidable hit.

I believe this mechanic draws inspiration from Sanctum League, which I also disliked for the same reason: the “one-shot” style of gameplay that ignores the core strengths of the ARPG system.

While some players might enjoy this extreme challenge, I’m certain that a large portion of the community does not. This creates a serious issue for long-term player retention — many of us feel burned out and unable to progress, turning what should be a fun experience into frustration.

I hope the development team will reconsider or rework these Trials before the game’s full release. Since Ascendancy Trials are a core part of progression and will appear every season, balancing them is crucial for the enjoyment of all players, not just a few.

My only goal with this feedback is to help make the game more enjoyable for everyone. I deeply respect your work and understand the challenges of balancing such a complex system. Thank you for your time, and I wish you all continued success.

Best regards,

Agreed. 💩iest thing ever. I never liked jump&run stuff, and I'm bad at it. so being forced to do exactly that to be able to get important points for the main game is just lame. Leave that mechanics for those who want to do them, and give normal/casual players like myself these points somewhere during the campaign.

Well written & thought out post, Voss. Not something commonly seen on this forum.

I have to disagree that the Trials are mechanics based around luck rather than skill. For Trial of the Sekhemas, get relics totaling 75% honour resist (max honour as well, if you need an additional buffer). This alone will render the trial trivial.

I am just a sub-par dad gamer playing hcssf, and I have completed the 3rd and 4th ascendancy on 3 characters this league on the first try. It really is not a matter of luck.

The same goes for Trial of Chaos but this may require more experimentation with the mods. Eventually you figure out which mods are trivial and your specific build will usually render a few more options trivial as well.

-Quest

Here are a few small changes I think can make Sekhemas more fair:

1.
As soon as you have completed the trial, all monsters die and you can't be damaged. All too often I've completed a floor only for an enemy pop out from under the ground and damage my character. Like, why? I won, I completed the trial. Feels very petty.

2.
You have no evasion/armour/energy shield afflictions are removed. If you have really bad luck and end up on a room with this affliction you can't get past, it's instant game over. How are those even minor?

3.
Less underground pop up monsters, more visible monsters

this is why I like my gemling xbow. fill up on red gems and I effectively have 2 free debuff slots for ToC. I take no extra crit damage.

Honestly, I wouldn't touch ToC. With the boss hp nerf, it's in a good place now. Sekhemas tho.. is cancer. I'd be ok with it not even existing.

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voss1016#3752 wrote:

The issue is that these trials rely too much on luck rather than skill.

-1

If this were true, people would close their eyes for sekhemas since it’s just too much luck based and not planning in your mind.

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voss1016#3752 wrote:

It doesn’t reward preparation, defenses, or smart flask usage — the very core mechanics of Path of Exile. Months of character development can be invalidated by one unavoidable hit.

-1
Flask usage… lol okay gpt

Yea it rewards all of these actually.


I think I’ll stop the post here to just say it’s better to put your thoughts out and express what you believe to have a discussion and not put it into some program and have it spit out objectively false statements.


Months of character development… it’s barely over one month into the league and you didn’t spend that much time getting to sekhemas

Eghhh… AI


Look if you struggle there are guides. It seems there is a lot of basic game knowledge being glossed over, at obvious fault of using a chat bot to write this out, that are the core issue here

Not the trials

Idk about the luck part, but both trials are unique brands of misery AND they take forever. I usually just have my buddy carry me through the final 2 trials because I simply won't do them. They've been consistently nerfing the trials since launch so I'm hopeful about where they're headed.