You will unavoidably acquire a lot of useless items when playing Path of Exile 2. Frequently, you will come across equipment that is just not appropriate for your current character class. It can be sold, disenchanted with the aid of specific merchants, deconstructed using the Salvage Bench, or moved to a different character using the stash. Although they don’t cover every kind of useless loot, these all assist in making goods you don’t need more useful.
You can equip your existing character with an item, but what if it’s significantly worse than everything you already have? It feels wasteful, but you can sell, disassemble, or disenchant it as usual. The Reforging Bench is a substitute in this situation. With this special crafting option, you can swap out different kinds of the same item for a chance to reroll its stats, and this usually yields greater results than the sum of its parts. The Reforging Bench in Path of Exile 2 can be found and used as follows.
How & When To Unlock The Reforging Bench
If you’ve just started the game, you’ll have to wait a long time before you can begin rerolling your equipment because the Reforging Bench isn’t available until Act 3 of Path of Exile 2. At some point in Act 3, you will go on a quest known as “Legacy of the Vaal,” which will lead you to a new location known as The Drowned City.
After completing the task, head back to the Ziggurat Encampment and look for Oswald, an NPC, in the screen’s northwest corner. He will initiate a quest known as “Treasures of Utzaal,” which will lead to the Reforging Bench.
Beating The Molten Vault & Mektul
To get to the nearby Drowned City and the dungeon called The Molten Vault, follow the quest marker. If the location name didn’t tell you, you’re going to be up against a fire-based army of opponents, so now would be a good time to equip whatever fire-resistant equipment and cold magic you may have. Fight your way through the Vault until you collide with Mektul, The Forgemaster, head-on.
Tip – You’ll want to be about level 40 to take on the Molten Vault.
Mektul is a fierce boss who deals with enormous amounts of fire damage. Fortunately, he is rather slow and has a long cooldown period in between most of his strikes. Hit him as hard as you can to take advantage of the downtime, while keeping one finger on the dodge button. You have four minutes to finish this fight; if you don’t, the room will fill with lava and you will undoubtedly perish. You should have no trouble defeating him if you simply apply cold damage and learn his attack patterns.
Open a portal to return to town and see Oswald after Mektul has died and you have taken possession of the Hammer of Kamasa. The Reforging Bench will be unlocked instantly, allowing you to begin rerolling your loot right away. An Uncut Skill Gem will also be given to you.
How To Use The Reforging Bench
From this point on, each town will have a Reforging Bench. You can even put one in your hiding location if you want to. Approaching it and using it is as simple as using any other crafting station.
You must arrange three things of the same type and rarity (for example, three normal axes) on one side of the Reforging Bench in order to use it. These items will be combined to create an item of the same type but with completely different stats. In the process, the reforged artifacts will be destroyed. Don’t anticipate acquiring, say, a Soul Core by putting in gear; the item you get is completely dependent on those you put in. You can use any of the following with a forging bench:
- Weapons, armor, or accessories of the same type and rarity
- Unique items
- Catalyst
- Essence
- Soul Core
- Precursor Tablets
- Distilled Emotion
- Runes
- Relics
- Waystones of the same tier
Keep in mind that you will only ever receive one of the input items, even though you will always need three. Items of higher tiers are always rewarded by Waystones and Distilled Emotions, but the majority of rerolls are random. Remember that there are other limitations on what you can use on the Reforging Bench as well. For instance, corrupted objects are not allowed.
Tip – Before you can see the full potential of most rerolled artifacts, you will need to identify them using a Scroll of Wisdom or the Hooded One.
Finally, note that the item level of the output will be the same as the lowest-level item you surrender. To make sure you don’t waste two high-level things to obtain only one low-level one, you should ideally include three items of about the same item level.
That should provide you with all the information you require to begin rerolling goods using the Reforging Bench. You will need to play with the Reforging Bench and see what you receive in Path of Exile 2 to figure out the rest.
