Whats the trick to Sanctum?

I get weaker and weaker every step of the way. By the time I'm halfway through the first floor I cant even see stuff on the map.

I've read the guides, they tell about Sanctum, but don't tell how to get through it.

Reddit was no help. Apparently its my fault because I need a one-shot build and have every room map and guard location memorized.

I want to bring home something overpowered to standard, need some help. I still have time before league ends.

what are you trying to get from sanctum? relics and invocations are being deleted once league ends.



Ah I guess you might be after Original Sin...

You're getting weaker because you enter rooms with afflictions. You don't see stuff on map because you got the affliction with "90% reduced Light Radius/Minimap is hidden".

Read what the afflictions do, avoid the ones that are hard to handle for your build, and get boons. Once you get a few relics, Sanctum runs will be easier. There are relics that give you bonus inspiration every time you get a new afflictions, these are very good early.

I thought I could avoid trap rooms and everything would go smoothly. Then suddenly got two-shotted from a guard that was already two screens away from me. He was probably fighting my ballistas and I got hit by stray projectiles. I died with more than 400 combined aspiration and resolve remaining too. They just went after my life pool instead.

Sometimes I question if I didn't replace my Grace with Haste going into sanctums, I might have survived that attack. I'm doubtful whether guard hits make me lose resolve but evasion might still be rolled to prevent those hits from taking my life too.

None of the streamers / content creators have any problems completing sanctums, and they did it with a variety of builds including those with very low DPS. Isn't that how they farmed Eternal Damnation on SSFHC gauntlet races?

There is a number of things.

When you start out, try to memorize the different types of guardians and their movesets as well as how to avoid them as best as you can. Depending on how many there and the combinations you won't be able to avoid everything 100% of the time with low dps but you can dodge a lot. Most of the ranged guys can be dealt with "run a circle around them" but there are exceptions.

Second thing is this:https://www.reddit.com/r/pathofexile/comments/zm6mts/sanctum_room_content_cheat_sheet/

Look at the rooms you can choose to enter, what afflictions do they have? What rewards? But also what type of room is it. When you are still new and struggling try to pick exit and trap exit rooms whereever you can, avoid battle arenas, especially at floor 3 and 4. In terms of afflictions you want to avoid movementspeed buffs to enemies and reductions to you, as well as stuff that increases resolve loss in the beginning. In the beginning you shouldn't aim to fully clear the sanctum, just aim to kill as many bosses as you can because they drop relics.

Which get's us to the main point. Get relics with "maximum resolve on fountain use", (maximum) resolve on boss kill and/or "inspiration on affliction" anything that refills/increases your resolve/inspiration pool. Once you get a couple of those it get's massively easier to the point where you will finish full runs with 500+ resolve left.

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jeerinho wrote:

Sometimes I question if I didn't replace my Grace with Haste going into sanctums, I might have survived that attack. I'm doubtful whether guard hits make me lose resolve but evasion might still be rolled to prevent those hits from taking my life too.

You would not. The guards in there ignore evasion.

The real trick to Sanctum is that there are only so many different rooms. Each only has 1 layout and the guards always start in the exact same positions. They also pretty much only act in 1 way. So if you do enough of them, you will memorize all of that without trying.

The easiest way to complete Sanctum rooms is to play something that proxies damage, like a totem build. Inch up and drop totems at your maximum range. When they start firing, you go hide. For wide open rooms where they spawn guards, just drop your totems then focus on running around in a circle.

I see a lot of people struggle because they are hasty and keep running headfirst into a room with guards. You aren't timed and there's no prize for going fast in there. Just treat it like a tactical mission and go slow. Once you've beaten certain rooms a number of times, you'll naturally know how to do it quicker. It's not a race, if you play each room really slowly when you are new, it is pathetically easy.

To avoid one shots in Sanctum, you kinda' need at least 3k hp and capped resists.
Armor helps as well, but 3k hp should be enough to tank a single physical damage hit from any guard.