How do I know what Atlas Passives to take?

Putting this here because I couldn't think of a more appropriate spot.

I have a couple of questions regarding this atlas passive tree as I skipped a couple of leagues.

1. Which nodes do I take to have an easier time farming currency to afford things?

2. Any particular type of encounter (blight, delirium, harvest, etc) more useful than the others?

3. At the top of the tree you have the giant blue and red clusters plus that elder/shaper stuff at the very top, are these important?

How am I supposed to as a relatively casual player know where I should path without making horrible mistakes that I will have to spend a lot of time refunding later?

The thing is, you can earn currency by doing/specing into what you enjoy doing. There is no "right", there's only "right for you". What do YOU enjoy running? What is your favorite mechanic? Build your tree around it. Forcing yourself down a path you don't enjoy, won't yield you currency in the long run, because there will be no "long run".

The big endgame wheels on top, is very nice when you target farm something, or if you want to get the most out of your influenced maps.

Lastly, I really do not think you can make "horrible" mistakes. Hell, you can hardly even do a regular mistake.

Honestly outside of Delve which is the mechanic I had the most experience prior with, I can't say which mechanics I like or dislike. Just I got sick of running my own builds or inefficient ones so I'm looking to see the endgame for once... which I know needs money to afford the good gears (I am legit blind when it comes to crafting rares, no idea how to make or get what I exactly need lol).

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PhazonXenomorph wrote:

Putting this here because I couldn't think of a more appropriate spot.

I have a couple of questions regarding this atlas passive tree as I skipped a couple of leagues.

1. Which nodes do I take to have an easier time farming currency to afford things?

2. Any particular type of encounter (blight, delirium, harvest, etc) more useful than the others?

3. At the top of the tree you have the giant blue and red clusters plus that elder/shaper stuff at the very top, are these important?

How am I supposed to as a relatively casual player know where I should path without making horrible mistakes that I will have to spend a lot of time refunding later?

There's any number of videos around this, nearly any would be more useful than hoping random people try to explain it in a forum. Here's one:

https://youtu.be/bDKHgMTrGJE

I've been getting the "How do I know?" question from my students a lot this last year. Pissing me off. You know stuff because you learn it. Not because of some magic fairy that imparts knowledge in the dark of night. You spend time. You make hypotheses and you test them. You deduce some stuff logically.

You think.

That's how you know stuff. There is no "how" involved.

I'd guess that the "watch a video" advice is a big part of the problem.

It depends on what mechanic you like. I took the passive route, and got things that will appear on every map so I will get guaranteed drops every map. This includes strongbox nodes, harbinger nodes, essence nodes, and now I'm working on getting the nodes that increase map drops (Skies node and something else)
One thing I've heard a few people complain about, is that once they specced into a certain mechanic (like say Blight), it stopped appearing. I cannot verify the truth of it, but it bears some consideration, as broken and bugged nodes are not that uncommon a thing for GGG.

The "it stopped appearing" is pretty easy to explain. You start looking for something that you've speced into more. So you notice it missing more. Not rocket science. Just basic psych.

I'd say it is much more varied than "take whatever you want". Blight, for example, was busted for a whole week and I assume this hit the blight maps market hard. Meanwhile, some mechanics are worthless without combining them with others. You shouldn't run beyond if you don't use the beyond mod in your map device, for example. Finally, some mechanics are just not profitable for some reason. I tried metamorph and ritual but both offer pitiful rewards so I don't see the point in running them.

I'd rate Delirium highly because of 2 simple reasons
1. There are no Delirium scarabs so taking the chance to pop up nodes makes sense
2. Delirium orbs will always bee a sought after commodity.

I went for the Harbinger passives for the occasional exalt shards. I got like 40 shards (2 ex) in 200 maps, with alch-and-go without scarabs or Kirak mods. Also have all generic IIQ/IIR/increased map modifiers effect passives, so all my 20% quality alch-and-go maps are over 100% IIQ/50% IIR/24% pack size.

Surprisingly, the league mechanic seems to be the best currency generator.

I wouldn't call 2 exalts in 200 maps "the best"