How to Unlock New Kalguuran Skills in Path of Exile 2

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Path of Exile 2’s Runes of Aldur league (which arrived with the Return of the Ancients expansion) introduced a fascinating new layer to character building: Kalguuran Skills. If you haven't played around with them yet, they are 21 cross-class skills that completely throw the traditional rulebook out the window. They don't have gem color restrictions, attribute milestones, or weapon requirements, making them incredibly flexible additions to pretty much any build you can dream up.

If you are wondering how to get your hands on them and—more importantly—how to actually get them to work, here is a straightforward, step-by-step breakdown of how the whole system works.

The Main Method: Hunting Rune Remnants

To target these specific gems yourself, you will need to hunt down Rune Remnants. These are monumental stone structures that you will spot scattered natively across Wraeclast. You can track them down in a couple of different ways:

• During the Campaign: You will actively run into them while playing through the main story acts. If you want to do some early repeat farming, popular layout reset areas like the Manor Ramparts in Act 1 or the Buried Shrines in Act 2 are highly efficient spots to reset and check for spawns.
• In Endgame Maps: Remnants scale right into end-of-game maps, taking the place of older Expedition setups. If you are farming high-tier maps, keep an eye out for rune markers with multiple geometric circles on them, as these guarantee much better rewards.
  
  

Once you find a Remnant, the process of extracting a skill gem follows a three-step loop.

Step 1: Choose Your Modifier Runeshapes

When you interact with an active Remnant, the game will present you with options to place runic symbols—or "runeshapes"—onto it. This is a classic risk-versus-reward mechanic. Inscribing these runes dynamically creates an explicit reward, but it also buffs the local monster waves with dangerous defensive and offensive attributes.

Before you start placing things blindly, open your in-game book (just press "B" while you are in town) to review your Kalguuran rune recipes. If you are looking for a specific skill, you need to match the recipe. For instance, if you want the powerful defensive skill Repulsion, the book will show you that you need to combine Cyclonic, Earth, and Protective modifiers.

Step 2: Defeat the Empowered Monsters

Once you have your runeshapes set, it's time to initiate the encounter. Be ready for a fight—you will have to wipe out waves of elite monsters raised by the Remnant, and depending on what modifiers you picked, they can hit pretty hard.

Step 3: Shatter the Remnant

Upon clearing out the entire pack of monsters, you can go ahead and shatter the Remnant monument. This is where you claim your loot, securing either your custom-crafted Kalguuran Skill Gem or meta crafting runes.

The Lazy Way: Direct Player Trade

If you are having terrible luck with RNG or simply don't feel like engaging with the runeshaping mechanic, you can easily skip the grind. Kalguuran Skill Gems are fully tradeable. You can hoard your standard currency and purchase the exact gem you need directly from other players on the in-game trade market.

Crucial Setup: Generating Runic Ward

Getting the gem into your gear is only half the battle. Unlike standard gems, Kalguuran skills do not cost Mana or Life. Instead, they are exclusively fueled by a secondary resource called Runic Ward. If you try to cast them without this resource active, nothing will happen.

To actually deploy and use your new skills, you have to unlock and build up this defense type by following these steps:

• Do the Side Quest: Complete the Runeseeker side quest, which takes you through the Lost Catacombs all the way up to the Runic Vault.
• Unlock the Anvil: Finishing this quest unlocks the Verisium Anvil.
• Forge Your Gear: Interact with the anvil to engage in Verisium Runeforging. This mechanic allows you to forge Runic Ward defenses directly onto your armor pieces, giving you the resource pool needed to finally unleash your new Kalguuran skills.