Path of Exile: Sanctum League Mechanic Guide

Welcome to the Sanctum league mechanic guide! Sanctum is one of the most distinct forms of endgame content you can find in Path of Exile. Aside from the item that gives you access to it, it is entirely separate from the rest of the game. In this guide we'll go through everything you need to know before starting a Sanctum run: Relics, resources and currency, boons & afflictions, room types and boss fights. Near the end, we'll take a look at the big bad of Sanctum, as well as the few options you have for doing Sanctum in "hard mode".

Sanctum is not considered Extra Content as it doesn't actually have a league mechanic that can spawn in maps.

Our league mechanic guides are structured according to "Depth" - the deeper you go into the article, the more complex the mechanics get. If it all becomes too much, take a break from this guide, play with the league mechanic enough to master the fundamentals then come back and delve deeper!

Difficulty: Average
Complexity: Average

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Depth 1 - Sanctum Preparation

In Act 10, you'll come across Divinia, who will task you with retrieving a fancy book from The Ossuary. This is a quest version of a Forbidden Tome (The Mortinomicon Exitio Immortalis), the item that grants you access to the Sanctum. After you travel to The Forbidden Sanctum through a Waypoint or by speaking to Divinia, she'll give you a short tutorial that perfectly encapsulates the preparation phase of a Sanctum run:

• She'll ask you to put The Mortinomicon into the Relic Altar and give you a Relic as well.
• Once you place the tome into the Altar, you'll be shown a small inventory. This is where you can place Relics, items that you find inside Sanctums whose modifiers enhance your Sanctum run in various ways.
• Once that's all settled, you're good to go!

Before we get into the Sanctum proper, let's talk about Forbidden Tomes:

• A Forbidden Tome is basically a full Sanctum run.
• Forbidden Tomes can drop from any monsters in maps, and can be traded to other players.
• The Sanctum has 4 floors.
  • After completing a floor, you'll be taken back to the entrance, where you'll have to interact with the Relic Altar again to open the next floor.
  • At this point, you'll notice you no longer have a Forbidden Tome in the Altar, but a Sanctum Research item.
  • This item is basically a "save game" of all the floors you've so far cleared in the Sanctum.
  • You can trade Sanctum Research to other players! They will be able to read its details, which include what floor it starts at, as well as several of the run's stats and potential future rewards that you deferred.
  • If you think you can't successfully complete the rest of the Sanctum but there's some juicy potential loot waiting within it, feel free to sell the Sanctum Research item to someone else!

Oh, and before we get deeper into this, remember the following: If you die in a Sanctum, it's over! You've failed the entire run!

After the short tutorial in Act 10, you'll unlock the Relic Locker Hideout Decoration, a stash you can place in your hideout that will house all the Relics you collect.

Depth 2 - Relics

Before we tackle the Sanctum itself, let's briefly talk about Relics. There's three components to this system:

• Relic - an unmodifiable item that you can use to enhance your Sanctum run. Drops exclusively in Sanctums.
• Relic Locker - a special stash that holds all your Relics.
• Relic Altar - the place where you put the Relics you want to use for a Sanctum run.
  • The Relic Altar starts small, only having six squares of space for Relics. As you explore the Sanctum, you'll slowly unlock the rest by defeating minibosses and floor bosses.
  • Once you've put your chosen Relics in the Altar, they are locked in for the entire Sanctum run. They cannot be removed or replaced by other Relics unless you start a fresh run.

In true Path of Exile fashion, Relics come in all sorts of odd shapes, turning the cramped Relic Altar space into a minigame of its own. Here's a sample of each Relic type. Read their modifiers to get an idea of what sort of uses Relics may have for you. We'll discuss the concepts you find unfamiliar in the very next section.

table with a few sample magic-quality relics

There's also quite a few Unique Relics that only drop from the Sanctum's final boss - we'll talk about those in Depth 10!

If you've got a lot of Relics and they're all worthless, you can sell 5 to a vendor and get a new one back.

Depth 3 - Sanctum Layout, Stats

As we previously mentioned, the Sanctum has 4 floors. Each floor is made up of 8 rooms, with the eighth room being a boss battle. This means to fully complete a Sanctum, you have to make it through 32 rooms.

As you'll see in the image below, there's several paths you can take to get to the end of each floor. Each room:

• Leads to one, two or three other rooms.
• Has a specific type of reward
• Has a specific type of layout and objective.

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We'll talk about rooms in a lot more detail later, but it's important to grasp how long a Sanctum run is, because now it's time to talk about the various stats you'll need to contend with.

There are three main stats, or mechanics rather, that directly affect you and whether you'll succeed in a Sanctum.

Resolve

• Resolve is your main stat in Sanctum and represents how close, or hopefully how far, you are from failing a Sanctum run.
• When your Resolve reaches 0, you fail the Sanctum run regardless of whether your character is actually still alive.
• By default, you start with 300 Resolve. You lose Resolve by:
  • Being hit by any monster. Some monsters' abilities may remove more Resolve.
  • Being hit by traps.
  • Being closer to an enemy will make you lose less Resolve when hit, because melee builds need all the help they can get.
• Resolve does not regenerate on its own. You can only regenerate Resolve by:
  • Finding a room that contains a Fountain. There's several types of fountains that each restore a varying amount of Resolve.
  • Gaining additional Maximum Resolve through ways we will discuss shortly will give you extra Resolve of the same amount. Not technically regenerating Resolve, more like getting some extra.
• Maximum Resolve is soft capped at 1000.

Another feature of Resolve is how it interacts with your defences. Sanctum doesn't really care about your damage reduction or avoidance stats. Resolve gonna' get lost anyway. However, it does take into account your primary defence stats through three buffs you get by default:

• Resolve Mitigation - Prevents a portion of Resolve loss based on your Armor stat.
  • You can prevent up to 40% Resolve loss, which caps out at ~3 million Armor.
• Resolve Avoidance - Gives you a chance to avoid Resolve loss from enemy hits entirely based on your Evasion Rating.
  • You can raise this chance up to 40%, which caps out at ~3 million Evasion Rating.
• Resolve Aegis - Up to 65% of Resolve loss from Enemy Hits is removed from the Aegis before Resolve or Inspiration. Aegis is broken when any Resolve is lost from Enemy hits. Aegis is instantly restored after 4 seconds of no Resolve being lost. This is based on your Energy Shield.
  • Resolve Aegis has some similarities with Energy Shield. You can scale this stat up to 65%, for which you'd need ~160,000 Energy Shield.

Inspiration

Inspiration is like an additional layer of Resolve, but... it's not Resolve!

• It functions much the same as Resolve, but is 'on top' of Resolve, meaning when you're hit, you'll lose Inspiration before you lose Resolve.
• Inspiration cannot be recovered like Resolve; you can only find more sources that give you more Inspiration.
• Inspiration is soft capped at 1000.

Aureus

Aureus is not really a stat, but a currency. It's literally 'Sanctum gold'. Similarly to Azurite or Expedition Artifacts, it's non-tradeable and you don't even pick it up; you automatically collect it by walking over it.

• It drops from enemies and chests throughout the Sanctum.
• Bar any unfortunate modifiers, you get to keep it across rooms and floors.
• Aureus is used to trade or buy services you may encounter throughout the Sanctum. We'll delve deeper into this soon.

Depth 4 - Boons & Afflictions

Perhaps the most exciting mechanic of Sanctums is that of Boons and Afflictions, which are semi-permanent modifiers you may come across in Sanctum rooms.

• Boons grant you a good effect that acts like a passive skill.
• Afflictions work the same way, but grant a negative effect.
• Both Boons and Afflictions come in Minor and Major varities, depending on the magnitude of their effect.
• Both Boons and Afflictions can be removed, though this option is not very commonly found.
• You cannot receive a Boon or an Affliction again if you already have it.
  • When you've gotten the hang of Sanctum, you'll find in some lucky runs that you can amass enough Boons to ensure you get some of the more useful ones simply because the pool of potential Boons is smaller!

There's quite a ridiculous amount of Boons and Afflictions, so we've divided them up into four boxes to keep the guide well formatted. Open each of the boxes below to see what awesome powers or horrible curses you may come across:

You'll notice that a lot of rooms are "Afflicted". This means that, when you enter that room, you will gain the Affliction described in the tooltip. Yikes! Hopefully the reward is worth it!

image of afflicted room

Right, but how do you come across these Boons? Or even decent amounts of Aureus, or things to spend Aureus on? It's time we tackled room types.

Depth 5 - Room Types By Objective

There's two ways we need to look at rooms when we're considering which one to pick and go to. What must I do within? and What'll I get for it?

In this section, we're looking at what you must do. Each floor's rooms have different names and different layouts, however they'll always have one of five objectives. In the table below, the first row will indicate the objective, while each subsequent row will show the name of the room depending on what floors it's found on. Note this table does not contain the floor boss rooms, which are always identical.

check if miniboss rooms can only spawn in Room 4 of each floor

The hardest ones, meaning the ones where you're most likely to lose Resolve, are the rooms where you have to Defeat all the Guards (Arena). Try avoid those unless their rewards are absolutely worth it.

Guards are all the Rare and Unique monsters found on a floor. Unique Guards come in ten different flavors, each with their own skills. A couple of Sanctums runs is generally enough to get a good handle on what each of them to, and most importantly, what their skills are and how to dodge them!

If you want a closer look at the layout of each room, PoEWiki has a great page that tells you everything you need to know.

Depth 6 - Room Types By Reward

At the end of each room, you'll find a reward that can be seen before you enter it, on the Sanctum map, as long as you didn't pick one one of the nastier Afflictions. By far the most common rooms you'll encounter are:

• Minor Treasure Reward rooms, that contain two chests full of Aureus.
• Major Treasure Reward rooms, that contain five chests full of Aureus.
• Item Reward Rooms, which offer one of three items as a reward, but you're given an interesting choice:
  • You can get the first item right now, or
  • You can get the second item at the end of the floor, or
  • You can get the third item at the end of the Sanctum, once you've defeated the final boss.
  • Note that in order to make a choice, you'll have to pay an upfront cost of 5 Aureus.

Usually, the more rewarding items are found as options #2 and #3. You'll have to make the choice right then and there, and hopefully your build can get you far enough to get the reward! Note that rarer potential item rewards, such as Mirror of Kalandra, Divine Orb, Exalted Orb and Sacred Orb can only be found in Item Reward Rooms on floors 3 and 4.

That's not all, however! Other reward rooms you can find contain Fountains, which come in four different varieties. Using a Fountain will cost Aureus.

*In addition, if a Radiant Fountain has an Affliction to remove, it will reroll all Afflictions on Afflicted Rooms on the current floor.

Another genuinely useful room you may come across is the "Merchant" room, which contains Sister Divinia. She sells the following in exchange for Aureus (all items can only be bought once per visit):

• An item that recovers 50 Resolve and costs 200 Aureus.
• A random assortment of Boons that generally cost somewhere between 200-500 Aureus.
• The occasional non-Unique Relic.

There's one more reward room type you can find, but it requires a section of its own...

Depth 7 - The Accursed Pact Room

This reward room is where you can sign some bargains that can drastically affect your Sanctum run. It is composed of two rewards:

• The Accursed Pact altar, which grants you three choices.
  • Each of these choices has a positive and negative effect.
  • You can accept any amount of them, or none at all.
• You need to accept at least one of these Accursed Pacts in order to unlock the Item Reward that's behind the Accursed Pact altar.

How drastic can those Accursed Pacts be, really? Well, we've prepared three of them here for you, each one more intense than the last:

Accursed Pacts are most useful once you're a little more acquainted with how Sanctums work, but don't let that stop you from experimenting with them! Some of the best Sanctum runs are forged by making questionable pacts with whatever demon keeps giving out these offers (spoiler, it's Beidat).

Open the box below for the full list of possible Accursed Pacts you may come across:

Depth 8 - Floors 1-3 Bosses

The first 3 floor bosses of Sanctum aren't particularly hard. Like everything in Sanctum, the faster you kill it, the safer your Resolve remains. Xenathar is probably the most troublesome of the lot, as the arena is quite small, but I believe in you, champ! Here's a short primer on them:

Remember, these are encountered only in the final room of their respective floors.

Click on each boss' name to see a video of the boss fight, opened in a separate tab.

These folks are small fish compared to the endboss of Sanctum, however.

Depth 9 - Lycia, Sanctum Big Bad

You'll find Lycia in the final room of the Sanctum. You'll have to fight her twice!

The first fight is a 'classic' Sanctum fight, in that your Resolve still matters and the arena is a maze. Here's how it goes:

• As you enter the room, you'll approach Lycia. Behind her, the rest of the map is covered in a thick red mist.
• After a short dialogue, she'll attack!
• The fog will start creeping up 'behind' you, from the area entrance. Simultaneously, the fog that was behind Lycia will start clearing up.
• You have to keep moving with the fog and stay in the clearing while fighting Lycia, dodging traps and minions' attacks.
• After damaging her enough, Lycia will teleport to the end of the area, and shortly thereafter the fog will dissipate.
• Make your way to her, but bear in mind the traps and minions are still present, and you still need your Resolve.
• Once you've made it to the end, the fight continues. Defeat her before she kills you or drains your Resolve! She can be pretty dangeous, so keep dodging all her abilities!

Once you've defeated her, she calls upon Beidat and retreats into 'The Beyond', a sub-zone where you'll be fighting her final form. Here, your Resolve will no longer matter. If you die at any point before you defeat her, or even after, if that's possible, you won't be able to access the reward room at the end.

Lycia #2 is genuinely dangeous. Her attacks hit like a truck and they hit fast. I highly recommend watching the video below before attempting her yourself.

• Lycia #2 is hanging out in the middle of an empty circular arena.
• She's usually start by casting a tornado beam that will absolutely melt you. It'll follow you around, so keep circling her until she's done.
• She'll also cast a 'delayed slam', but not delayed by much. This ability is sometimes hard to see coming up, as she's a grey boss in a grey arena raising a silver staff before she hits the ground. Keep your eyes open and prepare to dodge at all times.
• She'll also summon spinning staves around the arena. Don't run into those, of course.
• Periodically, she'll enter a phase where she's immune.
  • Here, she will create a maze of waves of lightning bolts that travel from her to the edges of the arena.
  • These lightning bolts really hurt, but thankfully there's gaps in the waves.
  • Get your groove on and dance through the gaps until she's done summoning waves.

Listen, I won't sugarcoat it; this is one of the harder league bosses in the game, especially when so much is riding on your ability to kill her. You only get one shot. There's no portals, and all the final rewards are locked behind defeating her. Good luck, Exile!

Here's a video that showcases the entire Lycia encounter:

In terms of loot, she is guaranteed to drop a random Unique Relic! Let's take a look at what those do in the next section.

After you've defeat Lycia #2, exit The Beyond and you'll notice that the final reward room has opened below Lycia #1's platform. Go in and receive all the rewards you've deferred to the end of the Sanctum!

Depth 10 - Sanctum Hard Mode

Lycia will always drop one of ten Unique Relics, which modify your Sanctum run in a certain way (spoiler alert, they maker it harder). Unique Relics:

• Are placed in the Relic Altar just like normal Relics.
• Can only be used once; they are destroyed once they are applied to a Sanctum run.
• Can often only be used in Sanctums of a certain area level or higher.

Here are all the Relics, as well as their rewards. Hover over each Relic to see how they modify a Sanctum run:

Think you've got what it takes to complete a Sanctum with one of those? Give it a try! If not, sell them! The Original Scripture is particularly valuable...

Other Considerations

Are there even any?