Step 1 Farming
How do I Farm?
We are looking for the key breakpoints on when the most important affixes/modifiers appear on each piece of gear.
These are the most important tiers to remember:
Tier 1, Level 65 (Ancient Waystone 1)
Tier 7, Level 71 (Refined Waystone 2)
Tier 11, Level 75 (Pristine Waystone 1)
Now let's break it down further.
In Tier 1 you have access to:
Boots - 30% Movement Speed
Helmets - +2 Minion / Critical Hit Chance
Gloves - +2 Melee / Critical Damage Bonus / Attack Speed
In tier 7 you have access to:
Up to 40% resistances on all gear slots. So we want to hunt items that traditionally aim to fill your resistances. For example, Belts, Armour, and Rings. Armours also gain the benefit of extra defence stats at this tier.
In tier 11 you have access to:
Most maximum flat damage modifiers. Examples being flat damage on rings and gloves. Further, this is where +3 starts dropping. Martials also roll very well with T1 Flat Physical, and T2 flat elementals at this tier.
So to recap this step, we are spending more time in tier 1 gearing until we can make the jump to be comfortable in tier 7, and then the same to jump to tier 11. Farming maps in the middle isn't as productive as extra difficulty doesn't mean better rewards in these cases.
NOTES ON THE ABOVE.
There are a few considerations. The higher the ilvl of the item the more mods open up. Let's take boots. So for example at 72 you add another tier of stun threshold, 74 has another tier of int and hybrid stun threshold, and 75 opens reduced ailment duration. All generally seen as bricks. However, the only improvements to modifiers you can roll happens at level 71 (t2 res) and 82 (t1 MS + T1 res). Therefore, you can improve your odds of hitting your MS + triple res boots by keeping the item intentionally lower ilvl hence the tiers above. Hitting the breakpoints described keeps the best odds if you can't go all in and search for ilvl82 items in t16s for the best tiers of all the mods.
Step 2 Crafting
Early league crafting can be broken down into 3 core systems
1) Blue Currencies
Orb of Transmutation. Brings a normal item to magic with 1 modifier.
Orb of Augmentation. Adds another modifier to a magic item with only 1 modifier.
For these two currencies you always want to be spamming them on any relevant bases to your character!
Regal Orb. Adds one modifier to a magic item and upgrades it to a rare. You want to use these on magic items with 2 good modifiers.
Not sure what a good modifier is? Look for item exclusive modifiers first. See step 1 for examples. Things like Movement Speed on boots and + to skills on amulets. Otherwise it's generally pretty simple. Look for high rolls for your desired defensive type, as well as a high resist roll such as Tier 3 or better.
2) Essences
There are so many essences in PoE2, however, you only need to focus your attention on these 6.
Perfect Essence of Sorcery - Adds +to Spells on Wands and Staves
Perfect Essence of Battle - Adds +to Attacks on Martial Weapons
Use these on weapons that already rolled good stats
Greater Essence of Thawing - Cold Resistance
Greater Essence of Insulation - Fire Resistance
Greater Essence of Grounding - Lightning Resistance
Greater Essence of Ruin - Chaos Resistance
Use these on belts and boots that already have good modifiers
3) Putrefactions
This is the most overpowered part of crafting in the league start. When paired with a desecration item it adds 6 unrevealed desecrated modifiers to an item.
This omen is insane because you don't need to use regals, essences, or exalts to get a 6 modded item. Saving you crucial exalts for trading.
The other factor is that you get 3 choices for every modifier. When looking at helmets, there are only 8 prefix modifiers. Once you've selected your first two modifiers, your third reveal for prefix would show you 3 of the remaining 6 modifiers which is how we end up getting amazing coverage with these omens. In the end, we see 18 modifiers and for each line we pick our favourite of the 3.
Note that since the Putrefaction CORRUPTS your item you want to ensure to qual and socket before using it.
Step 3 Beating Inflation
Many items are effectively priced with respect to Mirrors of Kalandra. The community generally trades in divines. This is because most items are not worth an entire Mirror. Whenever you're looking at prices, think of them as being in respect to Mirrors.
In order of size, the following are good investments to keep track with inflation:
1) Omen of Abyssal Echo
2) Omen of Whittling / Omen of Light
3) Hinekora's Lock
4) Mirror of Kalandra
You want to start at step 1 and upgrade through the tiers. Save up Abyssal Echos until you have enough to convert to a Whittle or Ligjt. Save up Whittles until you can convert to a Hinekora's Lock. And finally, save Hinekora's Locks until you can convert to your mirror.
Headhunter on day 2.