How I effectively craft high end items in POE2

This is merely a simple approach that I use to make high end items and/or turn mid items into better items.

Firstly i would like to say that recombination is mostly useless and I never use it as it is much easier to overwrite mods I don’t want than have a 7% chance to merge them into something else

Secondly I find the reforging bench mostly useless as well.

You could potentially make use of them if you pick up damn near everything that drops but this is excessively tedious and I refuse to do it.

So

Things to keep in mind

1. There are two sub-categories for modifiers.

2. There are omens that will force suffixes/prefixes and

3. There are omens that force suffixes/prefixes to be overwritten

4. Desecration can be an easy placeholder for being overwritten by perfect essences

So typically I have two different openings to my crafting process

1. Item is magic

2. Item is rare

Certain items have certain mods that don’t have high roll weight. If you want these mods on the final craft then start the craft with a magic item that already possesses one or both. Examples being

+ level to spells/skills/minions

+spirit.

The exception here being weapons as you can use a perfect essence to give them +levels. The exception to this would be the case where you get a base that gives >3/5 the essence gives

Make effective use of greater essences when making a magic item rare.

So,

Start with magic item as base that has mod(s) I want

Are they suffixes or prefixes?

If there are mods I don’t want keep that in mind once item is rare and make effective use of omens to overwrite unwanted mods with ones I do want.

Weapons are easiest to deterministally craft

Best case scenario beginning item has 2 mods you want and they are both in the same category (suffix/prefix)

Weapon example

You can 100% guarantee

Prefix

1. Random mod it started with maybe you keep maybe you override maybe this is where your desecration ends up

2. Any “Gain” #-#% damage as extra ____________

3. Random mod it started it maybe you overwrite maybe you keep maybe this is where your desecration ends up

Suffix

1. Random mod it started with maybe you keep maybe you override maybe this is where your desecration ends up

2. • level to skills

3. Onslaught

Basically fill your prefixes if you can and then the suffixes can/will always be +level to skills, onslaught, desecration

There is an omen to reroll desecrations so effective use of any desecration attempt gives you 6 minimum possibles and if you reveal early and get bricked you can always over write with a perfect essence and the appropriate omen dextral/sinistral

And then desecrate again at the end for another 6 possibles

Final and not required would be to juice quality to max and give augment slots before activating Vaal omen to force change via next Vaal orb. In my experience this quite often gives another augment slot and if you’re feeling frisky hit it with an architect orb. Last step optional as that may send it to the shadow realm

If the item is rare then obviously it’s only worth crafting onto if all of its traits are already desirable and rolled as high as possible. you can effectively make it better via same methods as previously described.

Example amulet I crafted

Solar amulet magic base

+50 spirit

+3 to level of minion skills

Made it rare via greater essence of mind for mana bonus as I really wanted mana on it

Hit it with desecration +omen for reroll and got minions deal 24% increased damage if you’ve hit recently

That’s four solid mods that I absolutely wanted

Fills empty slots with perfect exalts cuz at this point it doesn’t matter what I get I can work around it

+22 attributes

+34% fire resistance

This is an amulet that I can’t put a price on because it’s exactly what I wanted.

Side notes would be that you shouldn’t really concern yourself with crafting until you’re at ilevel 80

If you’re going to be crafting consistently onto things for resale you want a 200ish div buffer because they won’t all necessarily be winners, some of them get banished to the shadow realm and some of them will be top notch but just won’t sell.

I have had extremely consistent sales on prismatic rings with max base roll that come magic/rare with +15% to all ele resist and any combination of 1 or two other ele resist rolls >30

If you read all this thanks ha

stay sane exiles