Path of Exile: Ancient Reliquary Key – What Can Be Found Inside?

Barely even a couple of months ago, the Path of Exile community were treated to one of the biggest and most important updates in quite some time. While I could go on and on about all the changes/additions that were added in update 2.6, I'm mainly going to focus on just the one: the addition of the Ancient Reliquary Key and what sort of effect it could have on you as a player, along with your character as well.

Do you wish to know how you use the key in question? Well, allow me to explain! You head over to the map selection, input the key into the slot, hit accept, and watch as a bunch of portals pop up around you in the map room. From there, you can pick pretty much any portal that you wish to and you will enter the same exact location: the Ancient Reliquary.

 

Inside this location you will find a chest, bright, glowing, golden chest that practically screams "open me" the second you see it. Surrounding the area is gold and riches aplenty, but in a game where money doesn't actually exist, it's purely for decorative purposes and nothing more; it's only the golden chest that will require your attention.

 

You're going to want to make your way up to it and open it like you would any other chest in the game; just be sure to expect to see 1, 2 or 3 little, orange items exploding out of it for you to pick up and examine as you see fit.

 

Think of it like a fun version of gambling, where you always manage to win!

 

Now then, you might be wondering where it is you can actually find one of these. In response to that, I would have to say that there isn't anywhere in particular that you can find these keys. They pretty much crop up out of nowhere completely randomly and they're relatively rare, but not quite to the degree of gold dust. When it comes to these keys, I like to think that if I randomly find one as I'm in the middle of farming, it's nothing more than an extra bonus to go along with things – much rather than just spamming through maps to get a key, just hope to see one by the time you're done; otherwise you'll be tearing out your hair in the process.

 

Another reason I definitely wouldn't recommend farming through map after map because what you get out of the chest is quite rarely worth the effort, I hate to say. There's this massive fanfare to hype you up about what's inside the chest, but when your first item is something pretty dreadful like "Wool Gloves" or a "Heavy Belt" you quickly come to realise that it's not really worth the time or the effort.

 

Don't get me wrong, there are some great unique items you can find inside the Ancient Reliquary thanks to this key, but that doesn't mean you're likely to receive something of use. When you go through that portal for the first time, it's probably for the best that you don't go on with the expectation to receive the greatest orange drop in the entire game, because the likelihood of that is pretty slim.

 

If you manage to ignore just how difficult these keys can be to acquire, you've got a nice by-product that can positively end your Path of Exile runs for the day to top things off; but in terms of making the effort to farm them, their value just quite simply isn't there.