Crafting Influenced Items: Shaper, Elder and Conqueror Mods

Some of the best modifiers in Path of Exile only exist on influenced items. There are six influences: the Shaper and the Elder, and the four Conquerors of the Atlas, Crusader, Redeemer, Hunter and Warlord. If you've wanted boots with Tailwind or a chest that makes enemies explode, you've wanted influenced gear.

Separate the donor from the retained item

For an Awakener craft, the first item is consumed and the second retains its base and item level. Buy the first for its exact influence mod and required tier. Buy the second for the finished build: its defence type, implicit, sockets/links and all planned natural tiers. Tailwind's 75 minimum is useful for a disposable donor; boots you keep should generally be 86 when chasing natural 35% movement speed. See base selection.

The Onslaught/Tailwind/Elusive craft demonstrates separate influence preparation followed by merging and manual finishing. The Tailwind guide compares that with CDR and spectre variants. A shared Alt-rolling step does not make the later recipes interchangeable.

What influence does

An influenced item carries a marker (you'll see "Hunter Item" when you Ctrl+C it) that adds an extra pool of modifiers on top of the base's normal mods. Each influence has its own pool per item slot. Two examples we cover in their own guides:

• Hunter boots can roll "You have Tailwind if you have dealt a Critical Strike Recently". See the Tailwind boots guide.
• Crusader body armours can roll the explode-on-kill mod. See the explode chest guide.

Because the influence pool is added to the normal pool, any single influence mod is competing with more mods than usual. That's exactly why precise targeting matters here.

Influence mods have item-level requirements. Choose the donor for the required influence tier and the retained base for all finishing tiers; use the distinction above rather than a blanket high-ilvl rule.

How an item gets influence

• It drops that way. Influenced bases drop from influenced endgame content, and plenty of cheap ones are on trade.
• Conqueror's Exalted Orbs. A Crusader's, Redeemer's, Hunter's or Warlord's Exalted Orb adds that influence to a non-influenced rare and adds one mod from its pool. The mod is random, so it's a gamble on the mod but a guaranteed way to get the influence.
• Awakener's Orb (double influence). Using it destroys one influenced item and puts that item's influence onto a second item of the same type that has a different influence. The second item is then reforged as a rare with both influences. The target keeps its base type, item level, sockets and links. This is how double-influenced items are made.
• Orb of Dominance (elevation). On eligible rare influenced armour with at least two influenced mods, it removes one and upgrades another. The selected mod becomes elevated only from its highest normal tier. With exactly two influenced mods, selection is 50/50; inspect the result after Regal. This upgrades mods and does not add influence. See the imprint guide.

One trade-off to know

Eldritch implicits can't go on influenced armour. Eater of Worlds and Searing Exarch implicits only apply to helmets, gloves, boots and body armours with no influence. For each armour slot you're choosing between influence mods and Eldritch implicits, so plan which one your build needs before spending currency. See the Eldritch implicits guide.

The basic workflow

1. Get an influenced base with the item level required for its donor or retained role.
2. Fish for the influence mod, either with Alteration spam at magic rarity (influence mods can roll on magic items) or with a more targeted method like a Harvest tag reforge or fossils where the mod's tags allow it.
3. Regal or keep the rare, then finish with bench crafts or metacrafting.

Targeting influence mods with Exiled Bench

In the app's Mod DB you filter Item type → Base → Influence, then pick the influence mod and the lowest tier you'd keep. Tiers are ranked per item type, so T1 on boots means boots' T1. The engine rolls until that mod appears at that tier or better. A lower tier, or a mod from a different influence, won't stop it early. The database filters are a starting point: also check the actual item's influence, item level, available slots and compatible modifier groups. A listed target is not a guarantee it can appear on every item of that base.

Alt/Aug-roll the influence mod on a magic donor. For Dominance preparation, One of each can require the key mod and a second influence mod on the opposite affix side: two prefixes or two suffixes cannot fit a magic item. Stop before the imprint.

Regal can also run automatically, in a separate stage after imprinting; see the imprint guide. Ordinary rare targets can use From my stash for Regal, capped Exalts and a different Step-2 bonus. The app does not select Awakener donors or make merge/Dominance decisions. See the multi-currency setup.

Tips

• Set the influence filter. The default list is the normal pool. Switch it to the item's influence so you only see what can actually roll.
• Check the base before you start. If the influence isn't on the item, no amount of rolling will produce its mods.
• Start single-influence. Awakener's Orb crafts are expensive and high-variance. Get comfortable with single-influence items first.

Sources

• PoEDB: Awakener's Orb — donor and target restrictions
• PoEDB: Orb of Dominance
• GGG: Eldritch eligibility