PoE 2 [0.2.0] Tactician Ascendancy Class-Everything You Need to Know

Ben Author

Created - 03.09.2025 Updated - 03.09.2025

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Are you excited by the prospect of utilizing a Crossbow to a much greater extent in Path of Exile 2? How about commanding an army of minions or establishing totems to wipe the enemies out of existence? If the answer to these questions is yes, then you will love the new Tactician ascendancy class! Read further to learn more!

Now, if you need PoE 2 currency at any point of your journey, you can find them sold for low prices in our PoE 2 Store!

PoE 2 Tactician

The Tactician is a new ascendancy class for the Mercenary and he is coming in Path of Exile 2: Dawn of the Hunt! He specializes in minions, totems, and the Mercenary’s default weapon—the Crossbow. Let’s take a closer look at his ascendancy nodes, shall we?

Suppressing Fire

First up, Suppressing Fire is an ascendancy node that makes the Tactician’s projectile damage build up “Pin” on the enemy. This is basically the same as having Pin Support socketed and functioning at all times, albeit specifically for projectile damage. This node is not that exciting, though the ascendancy node next to it certainly is!

Right Where We Want Them

Once you have successfully pinned the enemy down, you should definitely have this ascendancy node allocated. Why? Right Where We Want Them is an ascendancy node that prevents enemies from performing their attacks and abilities for a brief period. In Path of Exile 2, a short amount of time is more than enough for you to slay any lowly monster in the game!

Right Where We Want Them, as you can tell, makes enemies act similarly to when they are frozen (except, you do not need to deal cold damage for that to happen).

Cannons, Ready!

There is no ascendancy class in PoE 2 that has nodes that improve totem damage output whatsoever until now. “Cannons, Ready!” is an ascendancy node that substantially increases the skill speed of your totems, which means that they fire a lot faster than before!

The only thing that you have to keep in mind when allocating “Cannons, Ready!” is that the totems you have put up will only shoot at enemies when you do. Besides that, you must fire an attack projectile for the totems to activate. Because of this, you might want to buy a Bombard Crossbow so that you can fire grenades at your enemies and have your totems finish them off.

Unleash Hell!

It looks like the Tactician is quite passionate in everything that he does because this next ascendancy node also has an exclamation mark to accentuate that point. “Unleash Hell!” calls forth a bombardment to periodically rain arrows down on the Tactician’s foes.

This is a good ascendancy node to take if you want to have support fire while you hit enemies with your own crossbow.

Watch How I Do It

The Tactician in Path of Exile 2: Dawn of the Hunt can be developed as a minion master, and even if he does not have a plethora of minion nodes available to him, he only needs one.

Watch How I Do It is an ascendancy node that grants added attack damage to nearby allies (typically means minions when playing solo) based on 25% of your main hand weapon’s damage.

We think that the Skeletal Sniper is one of the best minions that the Tactician can use because they fire arrows quickly and deal attack damage. Of course, to maximize “Watch How I Do It,” you need to have an endgame crossbow. Don’t worry, we have that and more in our PoE 2 Store!

A Solid Plan

Even if the Tactician does not go directly into the frontlines, he can still be useful to his allies by providing them with some much-needed buffs. A Solid Plan is an ascendancy node that greatly reduces the Spirit reservation cost of persistent buffs. How much does it reduce exactly, you ask? Well, about 50% less!

If you are not aware, GGG is very particular about the wording of each skill, passive node, and modifier in Path of Exile 2. The word “less” here talks about a multiplicative value. In less complex terms, it simply means that you need far less Spirit to activate a single buff.

That said, allocating “A Solid Plan” might allow you to activate two or even three more buffs to aid you and your party in battle.

Whoever Pays Best

Banner skills, as they stand prior to Path of Exile 2: Dawn of the Hunt, are not popular at all. In fact, you can count on your fingers how many people actually utilize them, which is quite sad, to be honest. However, we might see a huge influx of banner skill users because of the Tactician’s “Whoever Pays Best” ascendancy node!

Whoever Pays Best allows you to place multiple banner skills at once. Now, imagine putting up the War Banner, Defiance Banner, and Dread Banner at the same time. You will be getting increased attack damage and accuracy, armor and movement speed, as well as more stun and ailment threshold, respectively.

Stay Light, Use Cover

In battle, you do not always get the upper hand. Sometimes, you have to fall back or stay low to avoid getting hit in the crossfire. Well, that is the premise of this next ascendancy node for the Tactician aptly called “Stay Light, Use Cover.”

The description of this ascendancy node might confuse Path of Exile 2 beginners but we will explain it to you in much simpler terms. Basically, “Stay Light, Use Cover” significantly boosts your armor, though this comes at the expense of your chance to evade attacks and physical damage reduction.

If there is any consolation to the downsides, it is that enemies have an accuracy penalty against you based on distance. In other words, the farther the enemies are shooting at you, the lesser the chance their projectiles will actually hit.

Polish That Gear

To further improve the Tactician’s ability to survive, there is the ascendancy node called “Polish That Gear.” This may not wow you or anything but what it does is increase the stun and elemental ailment threshold by 100%.

If you are completely new to the game, this just means that you are less likely to get Chill, Freeze, Shock, and Ignite from the enemy. You are also less prone to getting stunned by their attacks.

Final Thoughts

The Tactician is probably GGG’s way of making some least-used skills in the game rise to prominence. Banner skills and totems are not at all used by the vast majority of players, so the company added “Whoever Pays Best” and “Cannons, Ready!” to somehow address that.

He can also activate more buffs due to “A Solid Plan.” Maybe the so-called “aurabots” will now exist in Path of Exile 2: Dawn of the Hunt thanks to this particular Tactician ascendancy node.

While certainly unorthodox given that this is a Mercenary ascendancy class, the Tactician can be developed into someone who can make certain minions hit hard thanks to “Watch How I Do It.”

If we were to sum up the Tactician ascendancy class in PoE 2 in one word, it would be “interesting.” So, what do you think? Do you agree with us? If not, why? Share your thoughts in the comments!

In the meantime, head to our PoE 2 Store to find currencies, rare items, and uniques being sold at very affordable prices! You might need a high-powered crossbow if you want to enjoy playing the Tactician!